In the Valley where the Pharaohs sleep, below the smiling hills, the
heat and the power of the sun were becoming an actual danger. The best
working hours were those which began at dawn and terminated at eleven
o'clock.
In the early summer, for Egypt knows no spring, as it knows no
twilight, the heat compels even the natives to abandon work during the
hottest hours of the day. The sun is at its most dangerous point in
the sky at three o'clock in the afternoon; at that hour, as the season
advances, little exposed work can be done.
One particularly hot afternoon Margaret was waiting for her brother to
come to tea. She had always contrived to keep their sitting-room fresh
and cool by closing its windows and drawing down wet blinds before the
sun got a chance of entering it. The windows were kept open all night.
She had tried almost every possible device--and had been very
successful--for excluding "the brightness of Aton" from their home.
If the windows were left open after sunrise, an army of flies too great
to combat would invade the room, and ten minutes of sunshine would warm
the room for the whole day. If the sun never penetrated it and the
windows were kept open during the chilly hours of the night, it was
always an agreeable and refreshing place to enter after a long spell in
the blinding sunlight. It was so essential for Freddy's health that he
should have a cool, dark room to rest in, that Margaret gave the
subject her best care and unremitting attention.
The dryness of the air in Upper Egypt can hardly be imagined by those
who have not experienced it.
Margaret had heard the overseer's whistle; she knew that work was
suspended for some hours. A beautiful sense of order and neatness had
been developed out of the mess of debris and broken rocks which had
disfigured the site of the tomb, and some new chambers had been cleared
and examined.
When Freddy appeared, Margaret asked him a few questions about his
work. Had he heard from the experts who were examining the skull and
bones of the mummy? Freddy answered her absently and half-heartedly.
"No, not yet--no report has come. Let's have some tea, first, before
we talk--my throat's bone dry."
Meg was conscious of some constraint, some anxiety in his manner.
Freddy's silence could be very eloquent. She gave him his tea and
administered to his wants. For some days he had had a little touch of
diarrhoea, the result of a slight cold caught during one of the quick
falls of temperature which take place in Upper Egypt. Margaret knew
that in Egypt diarrhoea must never be neglected, for it too often leads
to dysentery. She had made her brother take the proper remedies, a
gentle aperient followed by concentrated tincture of camphor, and she
had been very careful not to allow him to eat any fatty food or fruit
or meat.
Freddy did not take kindly to a diet of arrowroot or rice boiled in
milk, adulterated with water. This afternoon he looked tired and out
of spirits. Meg wondered if the tiresome complaint had been troubling
him again.
As she handed him the bread and butter she said, "Should you eat
butter, Freddy! Tell me the truth--are you not feeling so well to-day?
Has there been any return of the trouble?"
Freddy looked at her in astonishment. His thoughts were so far removed
from his own health. If abstaining from the flesh of animals and the
eating of fruit would ease his anxiety, he felt that for the rest of
his life, he would never ask for any other food than watery arrowroot.
"I'm perfectly all right. That trouble's quite gone--your care has
done the trick. Thanks awfully."
"Then what is it, Freddy?" Meg laid her hand on his arm, her eyes held
his. If he attempted to deny the fact that there was something on his
mind, she knew that he knew that his eyes could not hide it from her.
"I am bothered about something, Meg. There's an ugly report going
about--I've made up my mind to tell you."
"Report about whom? You?" Meg's eyes showed battle. The Lampton
fighting instinct was roused.
"No, I wish it was about me--I'd soon settle it!" Freddy's eyes were
still searched by his sister's.
"It's about Michael," she said. She rose from her seat. "I have
expected it. I knew it was coming."
"What?" Freddy looked at her in amazement. "You expected it?"
"I felt there was some trouble. I don't know what--I can't even
guess--but I felt it was coming." She stood in front of her brother.
"Out with it, old boy! Tell me the worst at once. Is he dying? Has
he been murdered? I can bear anything except suspense."
"It's something uglier than death, Meg."
"Treachery?"
"Yes, treachery." Freddy thought that Meg meant treachery on her
lover's part. She had thought of treachery from enemies. Had some one
forestalled Michael with the treasure?
He paused. What could he tell her next?
"Oh, go on!" Meg cried. "For heaven's sake, don't spare me! A woman
can stand almost anything, Freddy, anything but uncertainty."
"Can she stand unfaithfulness, Meg, dishonour?" Freddy's eyes dropped.
He could not inflict upon himself the pain which Meg's trusting eyes
would cause him.
A cry rang through the room. "No, not that, not that! Go on, go
on--what more?" As she spoke, she threw up her head. "It's a lie,
Freddy, a hideous lie!"
"I'm afraid there must be some truth in the story, Meg." Freddy's voice
was terrible. It conveyed his reluctant, yet absolute, belief that her
lover was guilty. Before he had finished speaking, another cry rang
through the room. It startled Freddy with its intensity, its rage and
independence.
"I tell you it's a lie! It's not true! And what's more, until I hear
it from his own lips, I will never believe a word of the scandal."
"Poor old chum!" Freddy tried to comfort her with the assurance of his
sympathy.
Meg flashed round upon him. "Don't pity me! Don't dare to pity me!
It's all the basest treachery. I'll have no pity. I don't need it!"
Freddy was silent. It was like Meg not to cry or collapse, as most
girls would have done. She was fighting splendidly for her man, whose
honour was dearer to her than his life. He wished that Michael could
have been there to see her, unworthy though he apparently was of such
unwavering loyalty.
"What is this report?" she asked. Her cheeks were as white as a
blanched almond; her eyes splendidly alight. The excitement of battle
vitalized her. Margaret was beautiful in her wrath.
"I have heard it from several sources that Millicent Mervill joined
Michael in the desert, that she now forms part of his camp, that she
is, in fact, your lover's mistress. I can't have it, chum."
"It's a lie! How can you believe it? A hideous, abominable lie! It's
contemptible of you to listen to it, to give it a moment's
consideration." She shivered. "Oh, these filthy native tongues!"
"I wish I could think so, Meg."
Meg swung round on him and for a moment he thought she was going to
strike him.
"Damn you!" She flashed out the words just as he himself would have
said them. "How dare you say so? He is your friend, he has been
closer to you than a brother! He has no one to defend his name! You
know that he would kill any man who attempted to slander you behind
your back!"
Freddy did not resent her attack. She had done just what he would have
done to any man who had reported any slander against her fair name.
"I know it's awfully hard for you to believe it."
"I don't believe it, Freddy, nor do you!"
"I told you I wished I didn't. The evidence is too clear."
"You haven't told me that you believe it is true. You can't get beyond
the fact that there's ugly gossip going round and that I'm in love with
him. If you thought this was your dying oath, that heaven depended
upon the truth of your statement, can you say that in your soul you
believe that Michael has taken this woman with him, that he is utterly
treacherous and faithless? Does your unconquerable voice condemn him?"
Freddy thought for a moment. "It looks very black, Meg. The evidence
is very convincing."
"Confound the evidence!" she said. "That is not an answer. I asked
you, does your inner self, your super-man, believe absolutely in his
guilt?" Meg was staring at him with hard, questioning eyes; all trace
of her love for him had been driven out.
"Well no, if you put it like that, perhaps not. But I can't have your
name connected with these stories."
"My name?" she cried. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that our women have married straight, clean, honourable men."
"The Lamptons again!" she said. "Am I never to be free from tradition?
Just because I'm a Lampton, I am to behave in a mean, disloyal manner
to the man I swore to trust? Do you suppose I'm going to? If you do,
you're much mistaken. In my own heart I've been Michael's wife for
weeks and weeks, so you needn't imagine I'm going to divorce him."
"But I do, Meg." Freddy rose from the table. "Now, look here," he
said, "try to speak dispassionately. How can I, as your sole male
guardian, countenance an engagement between you and Michael while there
is only too much ground for belief that this story is true? I've not
only heard it from the natives."
"You're wholly without reason. You just said you didn't believe it!"
The words flashed from Meg's lips like the fire from a gun.
"I find it hard to believe. One always wants to hear two sides of a
story. If Michael can swear that it is not true----"
"There is only one side to this story--that it is a lie."
"Then why has this report been spread about? There is always some fire
where there is smoke, even in Egypt."
"I don't know, Freddy." Meg's voice broke; something suddenly choked
her.
"The story goes that they met as if by accident in the open desert.
Millicent had taken a splendid travelling equipment with her. She has
made no secret of her love for Michael in the camp."
Meg was silent. A furious rage was gnawing at her bowels; it was going
to her brain.
"Michael made a fine show of surprise," Freddy continued. "But it did
not deceive the natives. She doesn't seem to be very popular with
them."
Meg was thinking and thinking. Was this the explanation why over and
over again she had had presentiments that Michael was in trouble, that
he needed her? She had so often tried to reach him. Suddenly a light
broke on her darkness, her whirlwind of anger abated.
"Freddy," she said, more gently. "If Millicent was in the camp, their
meeting in the desert _was_ unexpected by Michael. She trapped him,
she planned it all. Don't you remember, that night when you found me
on the balcony? I told you I had heard Michael calling to me. I can
hear his voice now." She paused. "He woke me as surely as Mohammed
Ali wakes me every morning. He wouldn't have wanted my help if he had
been happy with Millicent, if he had arranged the meeting." Meg
laughed, but there were tears in her voice. "That's the explanation,
as clear as daylight. It's been sent to me, this light, to lighten my
darkness."
"What is as clear as daylight, Meg? You put far too much faith in
dreams and visions. I want to get you out of this. I wish you were
more like your old practical self. What has this wonderful light made
clear?"
"That Millicent tricked and trapped Michael, that she followed him."
"Do you mean that you think that she met Michael against his wish?"
Freddy's soul wondered at the faith of women.
"I do. I don't think she ever mentioned her plans to him. I can see
it all as clear as a pikestaff." A sudden sob broke Meg's voice. Her
thankfulness at the unexpected revelation of the mystery caused it.
"Of course, that's it. Millicent tempted Michael, after she had once
met him. He thought he was proof against her woman's wiles, but while
we're on earth we're only human, Freddy, and he was afraid of his own
weakness. He called to me. We arranged to help each other--we were
always to try our best to reach each other when we felt troubled. Love
is not such a simple thing as it seems. I used to think that when once
one was engaged to the man one loved, one would just be at anchor in a
divine calm."
"You believe in dreams and all that sort of thing too much. Michael's
led you off--he's to blame."
"There are some things one must believe in, Freddy. Our development is
in other hands."
"What are they? Mere old wives' tales and charlatans' prophecies."
"Oh, Freddy!"
"Well, Michael's religion's got so mixed, he doesn't know what he is or
what he believes in and doesn't believe in. He has a fine scorn for
the old order of things. The beliefs of our forefathers have kept the
Lampton men pretty straight and made splendid wives and mothers of
their women, and I think that's good enough for this everyday,
practical world!"
"Has it been their belief that has done it, Freddy, or their family
traditions? I think we Lamptons are as true ancestor-worshippers as
any Shintoists in Japan. I was never taught anything about my higher
self as a child, or made to see that religion was a vital part of our
existence. It was the shades of our ancestors, nothing more or
less--what would Uncle John have thought, or what would Aunt Anna
think? It was never what would your own soul think--was it now? It
was pure Shinto. Our god-shelf bore the family-portraits."
"A jolly good worship, too. You can't do anything very far wrong if
you never disgrace the honour of your ancestors. I think it's as good
a principle, and far more practical and restraining than Michael's
mixture of Akhnaton's Aton worship and I don't know what else. I get
lost when he expounds his idea of God."
"It annoys you that his God is too big for any church. The Lamptons
have always been ardent upholders of the Established Church of England."
"Let him enlarge his church, build his God a bigger one."
"That's just what he has done, that's just what he says the Protestant
church has failed to do. Their church has never expanded. People's
minds have grown, while the Church of England--and, in fact, all
churches--have stood still."
"Michael can't do things in moderation--he's just an enthusiast about
his religion, as he has been about all his phases."
"The best of all things! What were your Luthers, your Cromwells, and
St. Francis?" Meg paused. Her voice fell. "And Our Lord? Weren't
they enthusiasts? Did they take things moderately? Does moderation
ever achieve anything? Napoleon said no country was ever conquered by
half methods."
"Mike's enthusiasm is only theoretical. If he has done this thing, his
new religion allows him too much latitude. He'd much better have stuck
to our plain ancestor-worship."
"But he hasn't done it! You know he hasn't. Don't go over it again.
That detestable woman met him and trapped him."
"And tempted him? The old, old story--the world's first romance--'the
woman tempted me and I fell.'"
Meg's tears had dried very quickly. She was strong again. "I don't
see how you can speak like that. You told me that Michael was straight
as a die--you know you did."
"But I said he was weak--I told you that, too, didn't I?"
"If being human is weak, then I suppose he is. I never met a man who
was a saint. And if believing that we are all more good than bad is
weak, then I admit his lack of strength. It is his humility that makes
it impossible for him to think evil of anyone. I have often proved it.
Almost any man is a better man than himself in his own eyes."
"Bosh!" Freddy said. "I do wish he was more ordinary, less of a crank
about these things! How can he think he isn't as good a man as that
fair-tongued, lying Mohammed Ali, for instance, or any of these lying
sensualists? It's the ugliest of all prides, the one that apes
humility, Meg. Lots of religious enthusiasts have it."
"No, not with Michael. He thinks he is less good than they are because
he is perfectly conscious of God, as he expresses it. He enjoys all
the privileges of a close connection with God; he doesn't only pray to
Him, as we do. He lives with him; Mike is never alone. And yet, with
all that sense of God, he is full of faults and failings. These men
and women, who to us appear so bad, are simply further back in their
evolution. They can't be bad, if it is not their fault. They have not
had the same privileges, they are only gradually evolving. Spiritually
they are like the dwellers in the slums as compared with the inmates of
the beautifully-appointed hygienic house in the country. Michael is in
the light; these poor souls are in darkness. It is all a part of the
Great Law."
Freddy had finished his tea. It had afforded him little pleasure. He
must come to some definite understanding with Meg. His thoughts had
been all centred on the plan of sending her home, getting her away from
the atmosphere which had so strong a hold over her imagination.
Perhaps if she was back in England, she might be able to put Michael
and his ideas out of her thoughts. He had no wish to be disloyal to
his friend, or to give him no chance to defend himself; but he had to
admit that he was very thankful that it was Michael himself who had
insisted that there was to be no recognized engagement between them.
Had he at the time had any motive for insisting on the fact? That was
an idea; it had not occurred to him before.
He turned to Meg and said abruptly. "What about going home, Meg? It's
getting too hot for this sort of thing--the Valley is stifling."
"What do you mean?"
"It's too hot--the year's advancing."
Meg tried to speak calmly.
"Don't treat me like a naughty child, Freddy. If it gets hotter than
the Inferno I won't leave the place until I hear from Michael." She
was not going to be a Lampton in one respect and not in another. A
horse with the staggers was not in it with a mulish Lampton.
"If you hear from him, or find undeniable proofs that the story is
true, will you go then?"
"Yes, when Michael tells me with his own lips, or I see it in his own
handwriting, or I myself am convinced that Millicent was with him, I
will meekly obey you. You can rely upon the Lampton pride. It won't
fail me."
"Right you are, old girl! That's all I'll ask." Freddy bent down and
pressed her head to his breast. "I hope to God that will never be, old
lady, you know that."
Freddy's little touch of tenderness was the last straw. It was too
much for Meg. She turned round and hid her face against his shoulder.
A very fountain of weeping welled up.
"You dear, blessed old thing! I've been a brute, a perfect brute, but
I love him awfully! Oh, Freddy, you don't know how much I can love,
and you hurt me dreadfully!" She had sobbed out the words. The fiery
Lampton was now a sorrowing, heartsick girl, hungering for her lover's
caresses. Freddy's gentleness had called up a thousand wants.
Freddy knew that affection was what she needed, but he was a bad hand
at any show of brotherly emotion. The Lampton men were fine lovers; no
woman had ever found them wanting in the art. But it was part of their
tradition to suppress all outward signs of family affection. Instinct
told him that some caresses and a petting were what his sister longed
for. For weeks she had been robbed of a lover's devotion, a very fine
lover, who had filled her days with romance and her heart with song.
"You weren't a bit a brute, Meg. You were just as usual, a bit more
like a man than a girl. I'd have done and said just as you did if
anyone had said things about the woman I loved--or, I hope I should."
Meg only hugged her brother. Words were beyond her. She knew by the
way he was speaking that he was quite glad to help her, now that he had
got over the disagreeable business of telling her and warning her, that
his efforts would be turned now towards the finding of Michael's
whereabouts and dotting to the bottom of the gossip. She looked up
with cheerful eyes.
"Do you remember that day, Freddy, when Millicent Mervill lunched here?"
"Rather!"
"And you said she came for some object which she took care not to
reveal?"
"Yes, I remember."
"Well, I never told you, because I thought you had good reason for
thinking that I was too hard on her, that I was jealous of her, to the
exclusion of all reason. . . ."
"You are pretty good at hating, Meg."
"Well, Mohammed Ali has since told me where he found her eye of Horus.
Guess where it was."
Freddy laughed. "I'm sure I couldn't."
"She read my diary all the time she was here alone. He says she asked
if she might rest and tidy up in my room. He found the eye of Horus
just beside the table where she had been reading it. He thinks that it
must have caught in the key of the drawer in the table. Probably she
thought we were coming and moved quickly away--the ring was easily
wrenched open."
"The little cad!" Freddy said slowly. "The venomous little toad!"
"In my diary, Freddy, I referred to Michael's strange journey, his
journey to King Solomon's Mines, as we always called it."
Freddy freed himself from his sister's arms and lit a cigarette.
"What a mean little brute! Mohammed Ali was probably in her pay; he
told her he had found the eye at the spot where she dismounted."
"He said he told that lie because Madam made a face at him. He
confesses to that."
Freddy thought for a moment while he smoked, then he said slowly and
deliberately: "If she got that information from your diary, she could
easily get more. _Baksheesh_ will make the dead give up their secrets.
That is why Bismarck said to his generals, never tell your own shirt
what you want kept a secret. Diaries are dangerous things, Meg."
"I wrote it in French," Meg said. "I thought only the servants would
stoop to reading it and they can't read French."
"Next time, try invisible ink. In Egypt, once a thing is written or
told, it is public property."
"I scarcely write anything now," she said. "I feel as if some spy will
see it, and the dry bones of a diary never interest me."
As Freddy was leaving the sitting-room--he was going to bed for a
couple of hours before he began work again--Margaret said to him:
"Just tell me before you go, where you first heard the report about
Michael, and from whom you heard it."
"One or two days ago," he said. "I heard a smouldering gossip about it
going on amongst the workmen. They'd got wind of it somehow. No one
ever knows how these things begin. Then I met young King from
Professor L----'s camp, and he told me the whole story. He knew
Millicent very well. He said she's not what you could call an immoral
woman so much as a woman without morals. He confesses he never met
anyone in the least like her before, and he rather prides himself on
his knowledge of the world--he would have us believe that he has seen a
devil of a lot. He wondered at a man of Michael's refined temperament
taking her into the desert in the way he has done."
"He never took her," Meg said. "Isn't it hateful, Freddy, hearing
people make these assertions about our Mike?"
"That's what I meant," Freddy said, "when I told you that I hated your
name being mixed up with his."
"Oh, that's not what troubles me. No one knows me out here, or my
affairs. I meant that it's such a wicked libel on Michael, who's not
here to defend himself."
"But if she's there with him, what can you expect the world to say, to
believe?"
"If she followed him and joined him, it wouldn't be very easy to shake
her off, would it?"
Freddy smiled. "You're right there--the fair Millicent wouldn't go
because she wasn't wanted!"
"I often ask myself why and how we tolerated her."
"Did we?" Freddy laughed.
"Well, yes, we did. Even I found myself liking her that day after
lunch. I began to wonder if I had always been too hard on her, if I
had had my judgment perverted by my jealousy."
"Surely you're not really jealous of Millicent?" Freddy paused. "That
is, if you are confident that Michael is not with her at the present
moment?"
"I am confident, Freddy. All the same, I have lots to be jealous of.
Her beauty amazes me every time I look at her and, after all, beauty is
a rare and wonderful thing. Lots of women are good to look at and
attractive, but Millicent is beautiful. You have often said how rare
real beauty is and how carelessly we use the expression. Millicent
deserves it."
"You needn't be jealous of mere beauty, Meg. Even when she's on her
best behaviour, she never could impress a stranger as being anything
but what she is, a soulless little minx."
"Yet you thoroughly enjoyed her company, Freddy."
"I know I did. She's amusing, her personality is stimulating. But I
shouldn't like to have too much of it."
"Yet you'd have kissed her if you'd been alone with her--you said you'd
try!"
Freddy did not deny the accusation.
"Men are queer things," Meg said; "but you must get off to bed, you
look awfully tired."
She hated to have to send him away, for it was only on very rare
occasions, and quite unexpectedly, that Freddy expressed his opinions.
He belonged to the silent order of mankind; to strangers he never
revealed himself; he rarely said anything in their presence which
suggested that he had opinions at all, or that he was really an
exceedingly thoughtful person. Meg knew that he had ideas and
thoughts--very sound, clear ideas, too. She knew that Freddy thought
while other men talked. All the same, his opinions and thoughts, apart
from his profession, were apt to be strangled and suffocated by
tradition. Tradition was a mighty force in the Lampton family. It
almost, as Meg said, amounted to ancestor-worship. Freddy's choice of
a profession had been his one act of emancipation. He had, according
to family tradition, been destined for either the navy or the army, and
it had taken no little strength of character to cut the first link in
the chain.
When Freddy had gone to lie down and the little hut was left to its
midday silence--the tropical breathless silence of Upper Egypt, when
the sun is so hot that even a lizard would not venture from its
shelter--Meg sat down on a chair close to the table, and laid her head
on her arms.
She was tired, tired, tired. She must forget things for a little time,
before she even tried to review the situation, or think out what was
best to be done. If only she could will herself into absolute
unconsciousness for a little time, how sweet it would be! If she let
herself sleep--even though sleep seemed very far from her--she might
dream of Millicent, and that would be worse than wakefulness and
remembrance. To trust herself to the lordship of dreams was to seek
refuge in the unknown, and that was dangerous. It was total
unconsciousness which she desired, the restful unconsciousness of a
blank mind. She remained perfectly still for a little time, asking for
rest, asking for the power not to think. She concentrated her thoughts
on this one desire; she opened her being for the reception of peace.
Suddenly the voice which heals spoke. It suggested a respite for her
troubles. "No mind can remain a blank," it said. "Try instead to
think of your vision, fill your whole being with its beauty, repeat to
yourself all that happened during that wonderful revelation."
Unconsciously and swiftly Meg's painful thoughts drifted away. The
picture of Millicent amusing and tempting her lover, which had danced
before her eyes, was no longer there--or, at all events, it was not
dominating her mind, and Freddy's words no longer rang in her ears.
Her misery, made by her own thoughts, left her, as a headache leaves a
sufferer when a sedative has been administered. The gentle voice, the
divine attendant, achieved its work. Meg had asked for rest and for
forgetfulness. Her prayer was being answered. It repeated to her the
tender words of Akhnaton; it told her in Michael's own dear way the
true explanation of her vision. With tightly-closed eyes and her head
bowed, she saw again the whole scene. It was unnaturally vivid--the
luminous figure, with the pitying, sorrowful eyes. As she gazed at it,
to her spirit came the same quiet comfort as had come to her on that
night when the vision had visited her. So clearly could she see the
rays of Aton behind the high crown of Upper and Lower Egypt, that she
lifted up her head. Perhaps He was there, in the sitting-room,
standing just in front of her? Had the luminous body penetrated the
darkness of her tightly-closed eyes?
Meg blinked her eyes to rid them of their confusion; her fingers had
been tightly pressed against them. She looked fixedly into the space
in front of her. Nothing was there; the room was just as it had been
when she closed her eyes. The disordered table, the cigarette-ash in
the two saucers, the crumbs from a Huntley and Palmer's cake on the
table-cloth--these homely things struck her as incongruous. She had
expected a vision of Akhnaton; she had hoped for it.
She put her head down on her arms again; her thoughts had been very
sweet; with closed eyes they might come back again. How absurd it was
to think of such material things as the silver paper round the imported
cake, and to remember that Freddy had said he was sick of tinned
apricot jam!
These domestic thoughts had taken but a second. She was going back to
her vision and to the happiness it had given her.
And so it came to pass that just as Michael had found solace for heart
and mind in the dancing of the daffodils which he had visualized in the
eastern desert, so Meg's bruised heart lost its sense of fear in her
visualizing of the world's first reformer.
* * * * * *
When Freddy returned to the sitting-room, refreshed and invigorated, he
woke his sister by his noisy entrance. He was extremely angry with
himself, and showed his sorrow very tenderly.
Meg looked at him with half-awakened senses. Where was she? What was
she doing? What hour of the day was it?
"Never mind, Freddy, I've slept long enough." She smiled, and looked
as though the thoughts from which she drew her happiness were far away.
Freddy put his two hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes.
"Were your dreams very nice, old girl? You look as if you'd been
playing on the Elysian plain, or had been re-born!"
Meg pulled-her brother's face down to the level of her own and
whispered, "Heavenly, Freddy, heavenly!"