remain buried? And aren't the Pyramids just like Titanic, golden
beehives? And can't you simply _see_ the swarming builders, like bees
themselves, working for twenty years?

Thus we jabbered; and others, many others, appeared to dispute the
scene with us, to break the magic of the moonlight, and to puncture the
vast silence of the desert with their cooings and gurglings and
chatterings in German, English, Arabic, and every other language known
since the Tower of Babel. Arab guides lit up the Sphinx with flaring
magnesium, an impertinence that should have made hideous with hate the
insulted features, but instead turned them for a thrilling instant of
suspense into marble. Indeed, none of our petty vulgarities could jar
or even fret the majestic calm of the desert and the stone Mystery
among its billows. The Sphinx gazed above and past us all. She was like
some royal captive surrounded by a rabble mob, yet as undisturbed in
soul as though her puny, hooting tormentors had no existence. It was
not so much that she scorned us, as that she did not know we were
there.

When we sorted ourselves out, to escape Sir Marcus, Cleopatra deigned
to make use of me, having first observed (with burning interest) that
Monny and Rachel were with Bailey, and that "Antoun" was pointing
things out to Brigit O'Brien, as it is Man's metier (in pictures and
advertisements) to point things out to Woman.

"It's been a wonderful evening," Mrs. East said. "It has made up for
everything I suffered last night. We brought dinner out into the
desert, in that smallest tea-basket, you know, and ate it together, he
and I--Antony and I. There! I may as well confess that's what I call
him to myself, for I've guessed your secret--and his. But don't be