What a tempest had seemingly
gone roaring and crashing by me and left its dull thunders pulsing in my
ears!
I was in the rear, as I was saying. Our pack-mules and Arabs were far
ahead, and Dan, Jack, Moult, Davis, Denny, Church, and Birch (these names
will do as well as any to represent the boys) were following close after
them. As my horse nodded to rest, I heard a sort of panting behind me,
and turned and saw that a tawny youth from the village had overtaken me
--a true remnant and representative of his ancestress the Witch--a
galvanised scurvy, wrought into the human shape and garnished with
ophthalmia and leprous scars--an airy creature with an invisible
shirt-front that reached below the pit of his stomach, and no other
clothing to speak of except a tobacco-pouch, an ammunition-pocket, and a
venerable gun, which was long enough to club any game with that came
within shooting distance, but far from efficient as an article of dress.
I thought to myself, "Now this disease with a human heart in it is going
to shoot me." I smiled in derision at the idea of a Bedouin daring to
touch off his great-grandfather's rusty gun and getting his head blown
off for his pains. But then it occurred to me, in simple school-boy
language, "Suppose he should take deliberate aim and 'haul off' and fetch
me with the butt-end of it?" There was wisdom in that view of it, and I
stopped to parley.
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