onel should go
because he was the oldest, and the Colonel was a very angry man.

"One would think I was an octogenarian," he cried. "These remarks are
quite uncalled for."

"Well, then," said Belmont, "let us all refuse to go."

"But this is not very wise," cried the Frenchman. "See, my friends! Here
are the ladies being carried off alone. Surely it would be far better
that one of us should be with them to advise them."

They looked at one another in perplexity. What Fardet said was obviously
true, but how could one of them desert his comrades? The Emir himself
suggested the solution.

"The chief says," said Mansoor, "that if you cannot settle who is to go,
you had better leave it to Allah and draw lots."

"I don't think we can do better," said the Colonel, and his three
companions nodded their assent.

It was the Moolah who approached them with four splinters of palm-bark
protruding from between his fingers.

"He says that he who draws the longest has the camel," says Mansoor.

"We must agree to abide absolutely by this," said Cochrane, and again
his companions nodded.

The Dervishes had formed a semicircle in front of them, with a fringe
of the oscillating heads of the camels. Before them was a cooking fire,
which threw its red light over the group. The Emir was standing with his
back to it, and his fierce face towards the prisoners. Behind the four
men was a line of guards, and behind them again the three women, who
looked down from their camels upon this tragedy. With a malicious smile,
the fat, one-eyed Moolah advanced with his fist closed, and the four
little brown spicules protruding from between his fingers.

It was to Belmont that he held them first. The Irishman gave an
involuntary groan, and his wife gasped behind him, for the splinter came
away in his hand. Then it was the Frenchman's turn, and his was half an
inch longer than Belmont's. Then came Colonel Cochrane, whose piece was
longer than the two others put together. Stephen's was no bigger than
Belmont's. The Colonel was the winner of this terrible lottery.

[Illustration: The Colonel was the winner of this terrible lottery p222]

"You're welcome to my place, Belmont," said he. "I've neither wife nor
child, and hardly a friend in the world. Go with your wife, and I'll
stay."

"No, indeed! An agreement is an agreement. It's all fair play, and the
prize to the luckiest."

"The Emir says that you are to mount at once," said Mansoor, and a