The hotel in which he had a room on the top

floor had been formerly a Khedivial Palace. It had the air of a palace

still. He felt himself in a country-house, with lofty ceilings, cool

and airy corridors, spacious halls. Soft-footed Arabs attended to his

wants; white walls let in light and air without a sign of heat; there

was a feeling of a large, spread tent pitched on the very sand; and the

wind that stirred the oleanders in the shady gardens also crept in to

rustle the palm leaves of his favourite corner seat. Through the large

windows where once the Khedive held high court, the sunshine blazed

upon vistaed leagues of Desert.

And from his bedroom windows he watched the sun dip into gold and

crimson behind the swelling Libyan sands. This side of the pyramids he

saw the Nile meander among palm groves and tilled fields. Across his

balcony railings the Egyptian stars trooped down beside his very bed,

shaping old constellations for his dreams; while, to the south, he

looked out upon the vast untamable Body of the sands that carpeted the

world for thousands of miles towards Upper Egypt, Nubia, and the dread

Sahara itself. He wondered again why people thought it necessary to go

so far afield to know the Desert. Here, within half an hour of Cairo,

it lay breathing solemnly at his very doors.

For little Helouan, caught thus between the shoulders of the Libyan

and Arabian Deserts, is utterly sand-haunted. The Desert lies all round

it like a sea. Henriot felt he never could escape from it, as he moved

about the island whose coasts are washed with sand. Down each broad and

shining street the two end houses framed a vista of its dim

immensity—glimpses of shimmering blue, or flame-touched purple. There

were stretches of deep sea-green as well, far off upon its bosom. The

streets were open channels of approach, and the eye ran down them as

along the tube of a telescope laid to catch incredible distance out of

space. Through them the Desert reached in with long, thin feelers

towards the village. Its Being flooded into Helouan, and over it. Past

walls and houses, churches and hotels, the sea of Desert pressed in

silently with its myriad soft feet of sand. It poured in everywhere,

through crack and slit and crannie. These were reminders of possession

and ownership. And every passing wind that lifted eddies of dust at the

street corners were messages from the quiet, powerful Thing that

permitted Helouan to lie and dream so peacefully in the sunshine. Mere

artificial oasis, its existence was temporary, held on lease, just for

ninety-nine centuries or so.

This sea idea became insistent. For, in certain lights, and

especially in the brief, bewildering dusk, the Desert rose—swaying

towards the small white houses. The waves of it ran for fifty miles

without a break. It was too deep for foam or surface agitation, yet it

knew the swell of tides. And underneath flowed resolute currents,

linking distance to the centre. These many deserts were really one. A

storm, just retreated, had tossed Helouan upon the shore and left it

there to dry; but any morning he would wake to find it had been carried

off again into the depths. Some fragment, at least, would disappear.

The grim Mokattam Hills were rollers that ever threatened to topple

down and submerge the sandy bar that men called Helouan.

Being soundless, and devoid of perfume, the Desert’s message reached

him through two sense only—sight and touch; chiefly, of course, the

former. Its invasion was concentrated through the eyes. And vision,

thus uncorrected, went what pace it pleased.