The Fortieth Door

The Fortieth Door, by Mary
Hastings Bradley

The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Fortieth Door, by Mary Hastings
Bradley
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: The Fortieth Door
Author: Mary Hastings Bradley
Release Date: September 19, 2004 [eBook #13498]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
FORTIETH DOOR***
E-text prepared by Janet Kegg and the Project Gutenberg Online
Distributed Proofreading Team

THE FORTIETH DOOR

by
MARY HASTINGS BRADLEY
AUTHOR OF The Wine of Astonishment, etc.
1920

TO ARTHUR MILLS CORWIN

CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
A RASH PROMISE II. MASKS AND MASKERS III. IN THE
PASHA'S PALACE IV. EXPLANATIONS V. AT THE GARDEN
GATE VI. A SECRET OF THE SANDS VII. TO McLEAN'S
ASTONISHMENT VIII. TEWFICK RECEIVES IX. A WEDDING
PRESENT X. THE RECEPTION XI. THE FORTY DOORS XII. THE
UNINVITED GUEST XIII. THE BEY RETURNS XIV. WITHIN
THE WALLS XV. UNDERGROUND XVI. OUT OF THE
DARKNESS XVII. AZIZA XVIII. AZIZA IS OFFENDED XIX. AN
INTERRUPTION XX. BEYOND THE DOOR XXI. MISS JEFFRIES
MAKES A CALL XXII. FROM THE BAZAARS XXIII. IN THE
DESERT XXIV. THE TOMB OF A KING XXV. IN CAIRO XXVI.
THE PAINTED CASE
CHAPTER I
A RASH PROMISE
He didn't want to go. He loathed the very thought of it. Every flinching
nerve in him protested.
A masked ball--a masked ball at a Cairo hotel! Grimacing through

peep-holes, self-conscious advances, flirtations ending in giggles!
Tourists as nuns, tourists as Turks, tourists as God-knows-what, all
preening and peacocking!
Unhappily he gazed upon the girl who was proposing this horror as a
bright delight. She was a very engaging girl--that was the mischief of it.
She stood smiling there in the bright, Egyptian sunshine, gay
confidence in her gray eyes. He hated to shatter that confidence.
And he had done little enough for her during her stay in Cairo. One tea
at the Gezireh Palace Hotel, one trip to the Sultan al Hassan Mosque,
one excursion through the bazaars--not exactly an orgy of
entertainment for a girl from home!
He had evaded climbing the Pyramids and fled from the ostrich farm.
He had withheld from inviting her to the camp on the edge of the
Libyan desert where he was excavating, although her party had shown
unmistakable signs of a willingness to be diverted from the beaten path
of its travel.
And he was not calling on her now. He had come to Cairo for supplies
and she had encountered him by chance upon a corner of the crowded
Mograby, and there promptly she had invited him to to-night's ball.
"But it's not my line, you know, Jinny," he was protesting. "I'm so
fearfully out of dancing--"
"More reason to come, Jack. You need a change from digging up ruins
all the time--it must be frightfully lonely out there on the desert. I can't
think how you stand it."
Jack Ryder smiled. There was no mortal use in explaining to Jinny
Jeffries that his life on the desert was the only life in the world, that his
ruins held more thrills than all the fevers of her tourist crowds, and that
he would rather gaze upon the mummied effigy of any lady of the
dynasty of Amenhotep than upon the freshest and fairest of the damsels
of the present day.

It would only tax Jinny's credulity and hurt her feelings. And he liked
Jinny--though not as he liked Queen Hatasu or the little nameless
creature he had dug out of a king's ante-room.
Jinny was an interfering modern. She was the incarnation of impossible
demands.
But of course there was no real reason why he should not stop over and
go to the dance.
* * * * *
Ten minutes later, when she had extracted his promise and abandoned
him to the costumers, he was scourging his weakness.
He had known better! Very well, then, let him take his medicine. Let
him go as--here he disgustedly eyed the garment that the Greek was
presenting--as Little Lord Fauntleroy! He deserved it.
Shudderingly he looked away from the pretty velvet suit; he scorned
the monk's robes that were too redolent of former wearers; he rejected
the hot livery of a Russian mujik; he flouted the banality of the Pierrot
pantaloons.
Thankfully he remembered McLean. Kilts, that was the thing. Tartans,
the real Scotch plaids. Some use, now, McLean's precious sporrans....
He'd look him up at once.
Out of the crowded Mograby he made his way on foot to the Esbekeyih
quarters where the streets were wider and emptier of Cairene traffickers
and shrill itinerates and