
Jim Easton, a British mining engineer, finds himself stranded near a remote desert town after a cholera outbreak spreads through his camp. Forced to remain in a crumbling rest house, he watches the sun set over the Nile while the memory of his servant’s death haunts him. The sweltering heat, the dusty mud‑brick streets of Kôm‑es‑Sultân, and the distant railway create an oppressive backdrop for his uneasy vigil.
As he battles fever and loneliness, Jim wrestles with his stubborn independence and the responsibility of keeping the disease from reaching the nearby workers. The narrow alleys, the white‑washed mosque, and the occasional Greek shopkeeper hint at a fragile community clinging to life on the edge of the desert. Listeners will feel his tension between self‑preservation and duty, setting the stage for a tale that blends harsh environment with human resolve.
Language
en
Duration
~8 hours (463K characters)
Publisher of text edition
Project Gutenberg
Credits
Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
Release date
2019-08-26
Rights
Public domain in the USA.

1880–1934
An Egyptologist, journalist, and novelist, he helped bring the ancient world to a wide popular audience in the early twentieth century. His books ranged from lively histories of the pharaohs to fiction and travel writing, reflecting a career shaped by both scholarship and storytelling.
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