Tony was the first to recover breath.
'Whew!' he cried, still spluttering, 'but that was sudden! It took me clean off my feet for a moment. I got your hand, Tom, only just in time to save myself!' He shook himself, the sand was down his back and in his hair, his shoes were full of it. 'There'll be another any minute now— another whirlwind—we'd better be starting.' He began packing up busily, shouting as he did so to the donkey-boys. 'By Jove!' he cried the next second, 'look what's happened to our dune!'
Tom, who was on his knees, helping Lettice shake her skirts free, rose to look. The high, curving bank of sand where they had sheltered had indeed changed its shape; the entire ridge had been flattened by the wind; the crest had been lifted and carried away, scattered in all directions. The wave-outline of two minutes before no longer existed, it had broken, fallen over, melted back into the surrounding sea of desert whence it rose.…
'It's disappeared!' exclaimed Tom and Lettice in the same breath.
The boys arrived with the animals and sand-cart; the baskets were quickly arranged, Tony mounted, Tom helped Lettice in. She leaned heavily on his arm and shoulder. It was in this moment's pause before the actual start that Lettice turned her head suddenly as though listening. The air, motionless again, extraordinarily heated, hung in a dull and yet transparent curtain between them and the sinking sun. The entire heavens seemed to form a sounding-board, the least vibration resonant beneath its stretch.
'Listen!' she exclaimed. She had uttered no word till now. She looked down at Tom, then looked away again.
They turned their heads in the direction where she pointed, and Tom caught a faint, distant sound as of little strokes that fell thudding on the heavy air. Tony declared he heard nothing. The sound repeated itself rapidly, but at rhythmic intervals; it was unpleasant somewhere, a hint of alarm and menace in the throbbing note—ominous as though it warned. In the pulse of the blood it seemed, like the beating of the heart, Tom thought. It came to him almost through the pressure of her hand upon his shoulder, although his ear told him it came from the horizon where the Theban Hills loomed through the coming dusk, just visible, but shadowy. The muttering died away, then ceased, but not before he suddenly recalled an early morning hour beside a mountain lake, when months ago the thud of invisible paddle-wheels had stolen upon him through the quiet air.…
'A drum,' he heard Lettice murmur. 'It's a native drum in Thebes. My little dream! How the sound travels too! And how it multiplies!' She peered at Tom through half-closed eyelids. 'It must be at least a dozen miles away…!' She smiled faintly, then dropped her eyes quickly.
'Or a dozen centuries,' he replied, not knowing quite why he said it. 'And more like a thousand drums than only one!' He smiled too. For another part of him, beyond capture somehow, knew what he meant, knew also why he smiled—knew also that she knew.
'It frightens me! It's horrible. It sounds like death!' And though she whispered the words, more to herself than to the others, Tom heard each syllable.