She was not exactly within the confines of truth in her statement, but having learned in her youth to diagnose the hurt of dumb animals, she felt she was fully qualified to treat her beloved child's unrest without any verbal aid from outsiders.
Yet something, a warning from the future, maybe, had prompted her to speak this night as she stood beside the bed, looking down upon the beauty of the child to whom she seemed, more than anyone else, to stand in the position of sponsor.
"Will you promise me one thing, dearie?"
She stroked the red head lovingly as it leant against the motherly bosom upon which had so often rested errant lambs and stricken pullets.
"Yes, Janie darling. I would promise you anything!"
"I know things are going crosswise a bit with you, dearie, as they always do in an unknown country; but I don't worry about that, because at the crossways there is always a signpost. But now that we are in this heathen land, I want your promise that you will always tell me where you are going to when you go out—always. If it's out for a ride in the desert or over amongst them mummy-tombs, or out to a tennis-party or dance. Will you, dearie? Always?"
The insistence in the demand made the girl look up into the homely face and she did not smile as she made a little cross above her heart in the manner of children.
"I promise, Janie—cross heart. And I'm starting out early-early to-morrow morning on an excursion to the Tombs of the Kings. We are taking lunch with us—paper-bags and remnants of sandwiches amongst Egypt's dead—tea at the Rest House and———"
She stopped for a minute, then continued slowly:
"———and if I don't come back with the rest, Janie dear, don't worry. It's full moon, and I may stay to see the Temple by moonlight."