“‘Little girl go ill,’ said the elder Arab. ‘We seek policeman.’ “‘You drop that child,’ answered the ‘cousin,’ doubling his fists. Then I grew faint again, and when I came to myself the two white-robed men had gone. All the way home my governess scolded me for accepting sweets from strangers, saying that if my parents came to know of it, I should be whipped and sent to bed. Of course, I begged her not to tell them, and at last she consented. Do you know, I think you are the first to whom I have ever mentioned the matter, of which I am sure the governess never breathed a word, though after that, whenever we walked in the gardens, her ‘cousin’ always came to look after us. In the end I think she married him.” “You believe the sweet was drugged?” I asked. She nodded. “There was something very strange in it. It was a night or two after I had tasted it that I had what just now I called my awakening, and began to think about Africa.” “Have you ever seen these men again, Miss Holmes?” “No, never.” At this moment I heard Lady Longden say, in a severe voice: “My dear Luna, I am sorry to interrupt your absorbing conversation, but we are all waiting for you.” So they were, for to my horror I saw that everyone was standing up except ourselves. Miss Holmes departed in a hurry, while Scroope whispered in my ear with a snigger: “I say, Allan, if you carry on like that with his young lady, his lordship will be growing jealous of you.” “Don’t be a fool,” I said sharply. But there was something in his remark, for as Lord Ragnall passed on his way to the other end of the table, he said in a low voice and with rather a forced smile: “Well, Quatermain, I hope your dinner has not been as dull as mine, although your appetite seemed so poor.” Then I reflected that I could not remember having eaten a thing since the first entrée. So overcome was I that, rejecting all Scroope’s attempts at conversation, I sat silent, drinking port and filling up with dates, until not long afterwards we went into the drawing-room, where I sat down as far from Miss Holmes as possible, and looked at a book of views of Jerusalem. While I was thus engaged, Lord Ragnall, pitying my lonely condition, or being instigated thereto by Miss Holmes, I know not which, came up and began to chat with me about African big-game shooting. Also he asked me what was my permanent address in that country. I told him Durban, and in my turn asked why he wanted to know. “Because Miss Holmes seems quite crazy about the place, and I expect I shall be dragged out there one day,” he replied, quite gloomily. It was a prophetic remark.