CHAPTER XV.

"IF NOT TOO LATE!" When I came on deck next morning the coast of Arabia was rising, a thin thread of hazy blue between the leaden grey of the sea and the soft grey of the sky. The morning was cloudy, and the blazing sunlight was veiled in atmospheric gauze. I had hardly put my foot on deck when Natalie Brande ran to meet me. I hung back guiltily. "I thought you would never come. There is dreadful news!" she cried. I muttered some incoherent words, to which she did not attend, but went on hurriedly: "Rockingham has …