"How well thou keepest track of all progress, though things were different when thou wast last in the north," Maïeddine said.

"It is my business to know all that goes on in my own country, north, south, east, and west. When wilt thou start?"

"To-night."

"Thou art indeed in earnest! Thou wilt of course pay thine own respects to the Governor? I will send him a gift by thee, since there is no reason he should not know that we have met. The mission on which thou wert ostensibly travelling brought thee to the south."

"I will take thy gift and messages with pleasure." Maïeddine said. "It was expected that I should return for the ball, and present myself in place of my father, who is too old now for such long journeys; but I intended to make my health an excuse for absence. I should have pleaded a touch of the sun, and a fever caught in the marshes while carrying out the mission. Indeed, it is true that I am subject to fever. However, I will go, since thou desirest. The ball, which was delayed, is now fixed for a week from to-morrow. I will show myself for some moments, and the rest of the night I can devote to a talk with the caïds. I know what the result will be. And a fortnight from to-morrow thou wilt see me here again with the letters."

"I believe thou wilt not fail," the marabout answered. "And neither will I fail thee."

XL

On the night of the Governor's ball, it was four weeks to the day since Stephen Knight and Nevill Caird had inquired for Victoria Ray at the Hotel de la Kasbah, and found her gone.

For rather more than a fortnight, they had searched for her quietly without applying to the police; but when at the end of that time, no letter had come, or news of any kind, the police were called into consultation. Several supposed clues had been followed, and had led to nothing; but Nevill persuaded Stephen to hope something from the ball. If any caïds of the south knew that Roumis had a secret reason for questioning them, they would pretend to know nothing, or give misleading answers; but if they were drawn on to describe their own part of the country, and the facilities for travelling through it, news of those who had lately passed that way might be inadvertently given.