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different patterns on the objects they erode. Everyone thought the Sphinx was three or four thousand years old, eroded by the desert winds.”
    “But it wasn’t.”
    “It was eroded by water, Mr. Rufford. The pattern is quite clear.”
    “Water, in the middle of the desert?” He thought briefly. “And we would not be talking floods, as of the Nile. You mean it rained on the Sphinx? Impossible.”
    Beth smiled slowly. He had caught the thing at once. He was brighter than most men, at any rate. “Ah, you are thinking of Egypt as we know it now. But think in terms of geological time, Mr. Rufford. The earth changes; mountains come and go; seas rise and fall. Once, the desert must have been wet. A very long time ago. It rained on the Sphinx for many centuries.”
    “How long ago?” He cocked his head.
    “Ten thousand years, at least. I don’t think the head is even original. You must have noted how small it is, and much better preserved than the lower parts. It was re-carved.”
    His brow wrinkled. “Ten thousand. But then who could have . . . ?” He trailed off.
    “Could have made it?” Beth finished his question. “Ah, the mysteries of the Dark Continent, Mr. Rufford. It contains more than you and I have ever contemplated in our world.”
    His head sagged between his shoulders almost imperceptibly. “You are right about that.” She had hurt him. She did not know how. He squared his shoulders. That was the courage again. “I should like to meet your father. He sounds an interesting sort.”
    Beth swallowed. Her loss washed over her so suddenly it must have been lying in wait. Rufford should have guessed from her mourning clothes that his remark was tactless. After she could breathe, she said, “Too late for that, sir. He is dead a month and more.”
    There was an awkward silence. “I’m sorry.” The low rumble sounded sincere. What an odd creature he was, sneering and sincere in turns.
    “So am I.” She had said too much, flaunting knowledge like a bluestocking, determined to impress, and so taken unawares by lurking grief. “And what of you? Why are you in Tripoli?”
    He hesitated. It was not such a hard question, unless of course he was a prison escapee. “I was staying at the British delegation at El Golea.”
    He said it as though that explained why he was in the middle of the Sahara and so far from England. “My father and I were organizing an expedition in Bi’er Tegheri to look for Petra’s sister city, Kivala, sleeping somewhere under the sands of the desert.”
    He looked up sharply at her. “Did you find it?” Fear, even horror, flashed in his eyes.
    “No. My father died before we could fairly start.”
    He caught his expression and carefully shut down. “Then you are lucky.”
    “What do you mean?” He couldn’t mean she was lucky her father had died.
    “You said yourself there are more things in the desert than we can comprehend. That particular section of desert is dangerous.” He said it lightly, but he was hiding something.
    “Oh.” She wanted to ask him more, but just then Captain Tindly stepped on deck.
    “Look sharp, boy, for a signal from the sloop!” he bellowed. “Prepare to back tops’ls.”
    Shouts and activity exploded. Beth turned to find her fellow passenger had disappeared.
    The Beltrane was almost quiet now. Ian felt freer. Only a few hands were above decks, since she was “hove to,” as they said, for the night with sails furled, waiting for the rest of the convoy to arrive. Those sailors awake smoked or huddled over their mugs of grog. Ships were close quarters. Hardly a word was exchanged but what four people did not witness it. He could not afford shipboard curiosity.
    He’d taken careful sips of the dread substance he now craved for four nights running before he boarded, hoping to forestall his need. It had been almost more than he could manage to take only a pint from each of his victims, for the hunger was bestial in its demands. The need rose