Half an hour after the Kaid came forward to meet him with a little
black sheep in his arms, struggling, frightened at finding itself
captured, bleating painfully. The wool was separated, and Owen was
invited to feel this living flesh, which in a few hours he would be
eating; it would have been impolite to the Kaid to refuse to feel
the sheep's ribs, so Owen complied, though he knew that doing so
would prevent him from enjoying his dinner, and he was very hungry
at the time. The sheep's eyes haunted him all through the meal, and
his pleasure was still further discounted by the news that though
the eagles were at Ain Mahdy, the owner having left them--
"Having left them," Owen repeated. "Good God! I was told he was
here."
"He left here three days ago."
Owen cursed his friend in Laghouat. If he had only told him in the
beginning of the week! The dragoman answered:
"_Sidna, vous vous en souvenez_"
"Speak to me in Arabic, damn you! There is nothing to do here but to
learn Arabic."
"Quite true, _Sidna_, we shall not be able to start to-morrow; the
rains are beginning again."
"Was there ever such luck as mine, to come to the desert, where it
never rains, and to find nothing but rain?"--rain which Owen had
never seen equalled except once in Connemara, where he had gone to
fish, and it annoyed him to hear that these torrential rains only
happened once every three or four years in the Sahara.
Pages:
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125