But married or single you could help him; so why waste your days here ?" "Is it wasting my days to stay with my father?
He is lonely, most lonely since our Davy went away; and troubled, too, for the dangers of that life yonder.

His voice used to shake when he prayed, in those days when Davy was away in the desert, down at Darfur and elsewhere among the rebel tribes.

He frightened me then, he was so stern and still.

Ah, but that day when we knew he was safe, I was eighteen, and no more!" she added, smiling.

"But, think you, I could marry while my life is so tied to him and to our Egyptian ?" No one looking at her limpid, shining blue eyes but would have set her down for twenty-three or twenty-four, for not a line showed on her smooth face; she was exquisite of limb and feature, and had the lissomeness of a girl of fifteen.