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Hichens, Robert Smythe, 1864-1950

"The Garden of Allah"

And
she found Androvsky still standing by him with fascinated eyes.
She had mounted with the voice of prayer into the sunshine, surely a
little way towards God.
Androvsky had remained in the dark shadow with a curse.
It was foolish, perhaps--a woman's vagrant fancy--but she wished he had
mounted with her.


BOOK III. THE GARDEN

CHAPTER X
It was noon in the desert.
The voice of the Mueddin died away on the minaret, and the golden
silence that comes out of the heart of the sun sank down once more
softly over everything. Nature seemed unnaturally still in the heat.
The slight winds were not at play, and the palms of Beni-Mora stood
motionless as palm trees in a dream. The day was like a dream, intense
and passionate, yet touched with something unearthly, something almost
spiritual. In the cloudless blue of the sky there seemed a magical
depth, regions of colour infinitely prolonged. In the vision of the
distances, where desert blent with sky, earth surely curving up to meet
the downward curving heaven, the dimness was like a voice whispering
strange petitions. The ranges of mountains slept in the burning sand,
and the light slept in their clefts like the languid in cool places.


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