It was a chance of escape from the danger which had come home to her sharply in the past twenty-four hours. The danger of yielding to her own weakness about Dan made clear by his actions; the new danger, suggested by his words, of her losing her hold on Lewis. Could the latter really be attracted by Rose? The events of the evening gave colour to the possibility. If so, there was no time to be lost. She must be free; free to do as she chose. No one would know. Nobody would dream of bribing one so powerless as she. And if the jewels had been put there knowingly, it was only her risk. No one else was responsible--Lewis had said so----
So she argued, coming round always to the same thought, till the first glint of dawn brought sleep, as it so often does to weary eyes. Perhaps in the thought that the sun will rise, the world go on, no matter what we do, or think, or say.
She slept so soundly that all the bustle of the hawking party failed to disturb her; and when that was over the long stretch of terraced roof lay empty of all sound or sign of life, save for the green parrots shrieking and swooping about the carven work. A pair of them had built in a loophole, whence the young ones kept up a simmering, bubbling noise, like a boiling tea-kettle; a comfortable homely sound out of keeping with the bare beauty of stone, and sunlight, and hard blue sky.
Down in the courtyard below, two badge wearers in scarlet and gold lounged on the stairs, barring the roof from intrusion, chatting to the passers-by, and discussing the news which had just been brought in by the camel which was crouching beside a pile of fodder in the centre of the yard, while its owner stretched his limbs, cramped with riding all night across the desert, in front of the cook-room. Halfway up the stairs on the landing leading to the state-rooms, Mrs. Boynton's ayah squatted, combining business with pleasure, by being within reach of a call and her forbidden hookah, at one and the same time. A bundle of letters lay beside her, intended as a peace-offering against the possible smell of smoke.
The sun climbed up silently, shifting the shadows on the silent roof. That was the only movement, until suddenly a figure in a white domino peered through the _grille_ which barred the flight of steps leading to the Diwân's tower. Then came the grate of a rusty key in a lock, and the figure flitted, silently as the shadows, to the summer-house, and paused in the mirror-room. Perhaps the transformation which Western taste and Mrs. Boynton's clever fingers had wrought in its adornment, was pleasing, perhaps the reverse. The _burka_, however, is of all disguises the most complete, since it blots out form, colour, expression, even movement. The figure showed indeed like a white extinguisher in the centre of the room, until, with a swaying of ample folds it glided over to the corner stand where the Ayôdhya pot stood out from Gwen's artistic drapery. Then something slid out, still shrouded in white folds, from the extinguisher, raised the vase, shook it slightly, replaced it, and slid back again in a horrible invertebrate protoplasmic sort of movement, calculated to send a shiver through a spectator. But there was none. The thing had the whole roof to itself save for that fair-haired sleeper in the corner room who lay with one hand clasping a little packet hidden under her pillow. Her face was turned to the doorway in full view of those latticed eye-holes belonging to the _burka_, which after a time came to look in on her from the half-raised curtain, and let in with a shaft of sunshine, a vista of blue skies and marble balustrades with two red and green parrots pecking at each other. It may have been the light, more probably the disturbing effect the dim consciousness of other eyes fixed on our own has upon most people, which roused Gwen Boynton. But she opened hers suddenly and started up in bed, her heart throbbing violently, though the curtain had fallen and not a sound was to be heard.