"You'll find all that written in the book of fate, as Mahomed would say. More, I can not tell you."
"Will not?"
"Well, that phrase expresses it."
They both heard the sound. Fortune, her face white and drawn, stood immediately behind them.
[CHAPTER XVI]
MAHOMED RIDES ALONE
It was as if the stillness of the desert itself had encompassed the two men. In their ears the slither of the brittle palm-leaves against one another and the crackle of the fire were no longer sounds. They stared at Fortune with that speechless wonder of men who had come unexpectedly upon a wraith. What with the faint glow of the fire upon one side of her and the pallor of moonshine upon the other, she did indeed resemble man's conception of the spiritual.
Ryanne was first to pull himself together.