Once more she stood still by the edge of the river.
She heard the sailors still singing on the Loulia, the faint barking of dogs, perhaps from the village of Luxor. She looked up at the stars mechanically, and remembered how Nigel had gazed at them when she had wanted him to be wholly intent upon her. Then she looked again, for a long time, at the blue light which shone from the Loulia's mast-head.
Behind her the bushes rustled. She turned sharply round. Ibrahim came towards her from the tangled darkness.
"What are you doing here?" she asked him. She spoke almost roughly. The noise had startled her.
"My lady, you better come in," said Ibrahim. "Very lonely heeyah. No peoples comin' heeyah!"
She moved towards the bank. He put his hand gently under her elbow to assist her. When they were at the top she said: "Where's Hamza, Ibrahim?"
Ibrahim's boyish face looked grim.
"I dunno, my lady. I know nothin' at all about Hamza."
For the first time it occurred to Mrs. Armine that Ibrahim and Hamza were no longer good friends. She opened her lips to make some enquiry about their relation. But she shut them again without saying anything, and in silence they walked to the house.
On the following morning, when Mrs. Armine looked out of her window, the Loulia still lay opposite. She took glasses to see if there was any movement of the crew suggestive of impending departure. But all seemed quiet. The men were squatting on the lower deck in happy idleness.
Then Baroudi must presently be coming.
She decided to be patient a little longer, not to make that excuse to go to Cairo. With the morning she felt, she did not know why, more able to endure present conditions.
But as day followed day and Baroudi made no sign, and the Loulia lay always by the western shore with the shutters closed over the cabin windows, the intense irritation of her nerves returned, and grew with each succeeding hour.
Isaacson had not gone to stay at an hotel, but had, as a matter of course, taken up his abode at the villa, and he continued to live there. She was obliged to see him perpetually, obliged to behave to him with politeness, if not with suavity. His watch over Nigel was tireless. The rule he had made at the beginning of his stay was not relaxed. Nigel was not allowed to take anything from any hand but the Doctor's.
The relation between Doctor and patient was still a curious and even an awkward one. Although Nigel's trust in the Doctor was absolute, he had never returned to his former pleasant intimacy with his friend. At first Isaacson had secretly anticipated a gradual growth of personal confidence, had thought that as weakness declined, as a little strength began to bud out almost timidly in the poor, tormented body, Nigel would revert, perhaps unconsciously, to a happier or more friendly mood. But though the Doctor was offered the gratitude of the patient, the friend was never offered the cordiality of the friend.