The Lion of Petra

he Kites, the

ot in the least pleased with their mounts, for a baggage camel is as different from a beast trained to carry a rider as an up-to-date limousine is from a Chinese one-wheel barrow. Perched on top of

in color than the rest, ridden by a wiry, mean rascal with a very black face. He seemed anxious not to

eling camels to their feet. One of Ali Baba's sons caught the beast assigned to me, brought him round to the gate, and began nakhi

and instead of continuing to nakh in the cam

your mount kneel in order to get on his back, pretty much as horsemen of other lands despise the tender foot who can't rope and saddle his own pony. There's no excuse for that, of course; it

ainst me. There was also an enormous feeling of relief, beca

line through the streets of a city as old as Abraham! Utter silence, except for three camel bells with different notes. Instant, utte

resilience, whatever the camels might say by way of objection. And they said a very great deal gutturally, as camels always do, yi

isha's was the second bell, three beasts ahead of me; she being the guest of honor as it were, or, rather, the prize passenger, it was important to know her whereabouts at any given moment. And last of all c

h the city streets. He was next in front of me, and I saw him exchange signals with a fat man in a house door, who may have b

at was plenty fast enough for the baggage beasts, the man in front of me urged his beast forward, thru

in particular happened for several miles until we began to descend between huge hills of limestone and, j

mult of indignation from the wool-merchant's crowd-blunt refusal by them to consent to any change at all-threats-abuse-arguments-the roaring of camels who object on principle to everythin

y crowd. If that man knows his own mind and has a plan worth spending effort on he can trumpet cohesion out of tumult and win against men with twenty times his brains. I don't doub

camels behind Rafiki's men and see them safely into the city, that black-faced fellow on the Bishareen edged away, and in a moment was off at full ga

of Ali Baba's men

Shall we slay?" a

tted any crime yet. Catc

e? We can kill him. But overt

, and by the time they were off the deserter had a lo

legs in the air all together, it is three more camels doing the same thing. They looked like a giant's washing blown off the line flapping before a high wind,

east lose heart before morning and lie down in the middle of the road. A camel in pain from a badly cinched girth will endure it

nd we swayed along under the stars in majestic silence. There have been better night

urate. There is a school of fools who set themselves up to scoff at its facts, but every new discovery only confirms the old record; and here were we saunterin

h a raw hand as myself. Or perhaps it was pride of race and country that impelled him. Even the meanest Arab thrills with emotion when he contemplates his anc

theory-much like the stuff they put between the covers of school history books-so Ali Baba's lecture, although gorgeous fiction in its way, har

he sky-line with a dramatic sweep of his arm, "the

e, he expected me to believe

the tomb was of every national saint and hero, every one of whom had apparently died within a radius of twenty m

whatever cannot be otherwise explained is set down to the Ancestor, the Arabs ranking Abraham next after Mohammed, bec

els' gurgling, until about midnight we overhauled the three men who had been sent in chase of the fellow on the Bishareen. They ha

e a policeman holds up a hand and men halt? Hah! Wallah! It was he who drew sword, and behold my camel's nose where he slashed at it! One finger'

be laughed at by that father of dunghills! His beast was

etting the camels kneel and rest for half a

messenger," said Gri

h of the Beni Yussuf,

fering to forgo the

for us and carr

of those cloaked and muffled rascals had a notion of his ow

t is simple. We come on his village before dawn when those sons of Egyptian mothers* are asleep. W

Egyptian is an Arab's notion

a light to it, and run," suggested Mujrim. "There isn

women to keep as hostages against

shall carry o

hommed trades with El-Kerak, and only last month

n fight twice fifty of suc

he police paid them a vi

ommed in the court for arrears of interest. They are cow

, and then ride by thei

e out from under the curtains of the shibrayah and sat against h

can cross the desert in three days, and by the evening of the fourth day there will be no village left, nor a man to call Abbas Mahommed by his name. If I haven't killed him already Abbas Mah

good will. But Grim had the peace of the border in mind; and the gang were not at all disp

Who never sleeps* slay me before I see my sons afraid to fi

of the Dead Sea. We must turn that corner. If we pass between him and the sea he has us between land and water. If we journey too far south to avoid him we lose at least a day and tire our camels out. A forced

The man

et there be

mgrim. There will be a deception and a ruse

ere let the camels graze. But I, and a few of us, will take the lady Ayisha's camel with the shibriyah, and draw nea

in the litter. So they will believe that Rafiki's messenger has told

you go? They are ruffi

all find a

o few men, when Rafiki's messenger wi

further proof that

rked Ali Baba, and his sons grunted agreement. "But you have a devil o

a good one unless it entailed murder. The farther we headed eastward, the nearer we came to the pale beyond which her lord and master's w

et the camels moaning, while their riders yelled alternately to Allah and apostrophized their beasts in the monosyllabic camel language. Camel

because they don't love the folk who drive them headlong into gorges full

gh explosives bursting all about them, but go into a panic at the sight of a piece of paper in broad daylight. A

a small boat in a big sea, and whenever a rock leaned out over the narrow trail, or a scraggy old thorn branch swung, it was by a combination of luc

s like the breath from an oven door behind us. There the animals went best foot forward, as if they smelled the dawn and hoped to meet it sooner by

sand-dunes, Grim ordered camp pitched, and in very few minutes there was

ew like scabs on a yellow skin. There was no fear of their wandering too far, for if the camel ever was wild, as many maintain that he n

the daytime; so there is a limit to what you can do with a camel, in spite of his endurance, and once in

on good corn, which a horse must have, they thrive and grow fat on desert gleanings; and whereas sweet water will ma

ry to making breakfast off dry thorns that you wouldn't dare handle with gloves on? If so,

forty-year-old giant-two of the younger men, Narayan Singh and me; and with the lady Ayisha's bea

uts, surrounded by a mud wall with high, arched gates. Only one minaret like a candle topped with an extinguisher pretended to anything like architecture, and even from where we were you could see

oached at prayer-time, it was hardly a minute after we rose in view over a low dune before a good number of men were on the wall

and he seemed to have a modern rifle as against the spears and long-barreled muskets of the others. There were about two-sc

ped head-gear called a halt. He seemed disturbed by Grim's nonchalance,

d. "Did Allah make no

est your real reason for visiting an Arab vi

you in the

and

nd us slowly-I suppose with the idea of annoying us; for that is an old trick, to irritate your intended victim until some ill-considered wor

nderfully offset by a pointed black beard such as he wore. But there was something about the way he sat his camel that suggested laziness, and his lips were n

gingerly, as if he expected a trick mecha

re is the woman

at supposititious poker hand. Grim had doped him out too,

I bring my wife

! Thy

se e

g's wife accord

the offal thrown to them! By the beard o

hould I know

he kites, the

w I think of it they did say he was beardless. Nay

abroad while you herd c

forbi

likely less

u are Al

o e

the

serv

els abroad with

ry who fled hither from El-Kalil last night to persuade the dogs of this place to bark in some hunt of his.

He is my

ot fire one shot and summon e

They tell me you tra

y m

been joined by fifty or a hundred others in the night. Or there might be others on the way to meet him now. It was a big risk, for Ali Higg's vengeance was always the same; he simply turned a horde of men loos

or wants?" he asked.

camel-and a

this place. There has been a bad sea

me and take them," Grim answered. "I

! What

s me to ca

otion with his hea

, all this day until sundown,

els go to gr

oday yours graze

r grazing to

westward all this day does so in despit

ll

witness!" a

ed because there was no suggestion of weakness there. It was the

my town and break bread wit

m answered. "Send me out that black-faced liar and the

and do we not merit

alked into that trap by betraying the spirit of compromise. On the other

y have obeyed and regretted it? But by the beard of Allah's Prophet," he thundered suddenly, "I

ck-still at a respectful distance; for the name of Ali Higg meant evidently more to them than the honor of their own sheikh-which at best

deigned to acknowledge with the slightest possi

done if he had called

s they were all

etty sure of my man. That guy doesn't own many chips. As a last resort I'd

when they handed him over was the color of raw liver, and if ever a man was too scared to try to escape it was he. Ali Baba's two sons got one on either side of him without making

made a gesture to Narayan Singh, who promptly took charge of the prisoner himself and sent Ali Baba's sons back for the presents. They had the good grace to find fault with every

on the ridge of a dune, and coming to li

ell," sa

g! What now?" the