He would think twice before taking
steps to form acquaintance. "Better not," thought whispered. "Better
leave them alone, this queer couple. They're after things that won't do
you any good." This idea of mischief, almost of danger, in their
purposes was oddly insistent; for what could possibly convey it? But,
while he hesitated, Fate, who sent the warning, pushed him at the same
time into the circle of their lives: at first tentatively--he might
still have escaped; but soon urgently--curiosity led him inexorably
towards the end. IV


It was so simple a manoeuvre by which Fate began the innocent game. The
woman left a couple of books behind her on the table one night, and
Henriot, after a moment's hesitation, took them out after her. He knew
the titles--_The House of the Master_, and _The House of the Hidden
Places_, both singular interpretations of the Pyramids that once had
held his own mind spellbound. Their ideas had been since disproved, if
he remembered rightly, yet the titles were a clue--a clue to that
imaginative part of his mind that was so busy constructing theories and
had found its stride. Loose sheets of paper, covered with notes in a
minute handwriting, lay between the pages; but these, of course, he did
not read, noticing only that they were written round designs of various
kinds--intricate designs. He discovered Vance in a corner of the smoking-lounge. The woman had
disappeared. Vance thanked him politely. "My aunt is so forgetful sometimes," he
said, and took them with a covert eagerness that did not escape the
other's observation. He folded up the sheets and put them carefully in
his pocket. On one there was an ink-sketched map, crammed with detail,
that might well have referred to some portion of the Desert. The points
of the compass stood out boldly at the bottom. There were involved
geometrical designs again. Henriot saw them. They exchanged, then, the
commonplaces of conversation, but these led to nothing further. Vance
was nervous and betrayed impatience. He presently excused himself and
left the lounge. Ten minutes later he passed through the outer hall, the
woman beside him, and the pair of them, wrapped up in cloak and ulster,
went out into the night. At the door, Vance turned and threw a quick,
investigating glance in his direction. There seemed a hint of
questioning in that glance; it might almost have been a tentative
invitation. But, also, he wanted to see if their exit had been
particularly noticed--and by whom. This, briefly told, was the first manoeuvre by which Fate introduced
them. There was nothing in it. The details were so insignificant, so
slight the conversation, so meagre the pieces thus added to Henriot's
imaginative structure. Yet they somehow built it up and made it solid;
the outline in his mind began to stand foursquare. That writing, those
designs, the manner of the man, their going out together, the final
curious look--each and all betrayed points of a hidden thing. Subconsciously he was excavating their buried purposes. The sand was
shifting. The concentration of his mind incessantly upon them removed it
grain by grain and speck by speck. Tips of the smothered thing emerged. Presently a subsidence would follow with a rush and light would blaze
upon its skeleton. He felt it stirring underneath his feet--this flowing
movement of light, dry, heaped-up sand. It was always--sand. Then other incidents of a similar kind came about, clearing the way to a
natural acquaintanceship. Henriot watched the process with amusement,
yet with another feeling too that was only a little less than anxiety. A
keen observer, no detail escaped him; he saw the forces of their lives
draw closer. It made him think of the devices of young people who desire
to know one another, yet cannot get a proper introduction. Fate
condescended to such little tricks. They wanted a third person, he began
to feel. A third was necessary to some plan they had on hand, and--they
waited to see if he could fill the place. This woman, with whom he had
yet exchanged no single word, seemed so familiar to him, well known for
years. They weighed and watched him, wondering if he would do. None of the devices were too obviously used, but at length Henriot
picked up so many forgotten articles, and heard so many significant
phrases, casually let fall, that he began to feel like the villain in a
machine-made play, where the hero for ever drops clues his enemy is
intended to discover. Introduction followed inevitably. "My aunt can tell you; she knows
Arabic perfectly." He had been discussing the meaning of some local name
or other with a neighbour after dinner, and Vance had joined them. The
neighbour moved away; these two were left standing alone, and he
accepted a cigarette from the other's case. There was a rustle of skirts
behind them. "Here she comes," said Vance; "you will let me introduce
you." He did not ask for Henriot's name; he had already taken the
trouble to find it out--another little betrayal, and another clue. It was in a secluded corner of the great hall, and Henriot turned to see
the woman's stately figure coming towards them across the thick carpet
that deadened her footsteps. She came sailing up, her black eyes fixed
upon his face. Very erect, head upright, shoulders almost squared, she
moved wonderfully well; there was dignity and power in her walk. She was
dressed in black, and her face was like the night. He found it
impossible to say what lent her this air of impressiveness and solemnity
that was almost majestic. But there _was_ this touch of darkness and of
power in the way she came that made him think of some sphinx-like figure
of stone, some idol motionless in all its parts but moving as a whole,
and gliding across--sand. Beneath those level lids her eyes stared hard
at him. And a faint sensation of distress stirred in him deep, deep
down. Where had he seen those eyes before? He bowed, as she joined them, and Vance led the way to the armchairs in
a corner of the lounge. The meeting, as the talk that followed, he felt,
were all part of a preconceived plan. It had happened before. The woman,
that is, was familiar to him--to some part of his being that had dropped
stitches of old, old memory. Lady Statham! At first the name had disappointed him. So many folk wear
titles, as syllables in certain tongues wear accents--without them being
mute, unnoticed, unpronounced. Nonentities, born to names, so often
claim attention for their insignificance in this way. But this woman,
had she been Jemima Jones, would have made the name distinguished and
select. She was a big and sombre personality. Why was it, he wondered
afterwards, that for a moment something in him shrank, and that his
mind, metaphorically speaking, flung up an arm in self-protection? The
instinct flashed and passed. But it seemed to him born of an automatic
feeling that he must protect--not himself, but the woman from the man. There was confusion in it all; links were missing.