Horror of what might happen had held me aloof lest she crumble at my touch to that awful powder which I had trodden on.
"I did not know what to do; my Arabs had begun to whisper among themselves, suspicious of my absences, impatient to break camp, perhaps, and roam on once more.

Perhaps they believed I had discovered treasure somewhere; I am not sure.

At any rate, dread of their following me, determination to take my dead away with me, drove me into action; and that day when I reached her silent chamber I lighted my candle, and, leaning above her for one last look, I touched her shoulder with my finger tip.
"It was a strange sensation.

Prepared for a dreadful dissolution, utterly unprepared for cool, yielding flesh, I almost dropped where I stood.

For her body was neither cold nor warm, neither dust-dry nor moist; neither the skin of the living nor the dead.