how Skinner was always lamenting
our want of weight."

"I don't think," Edgar said with a laugh, "that he has gained much in
weight. He was about our size before, but he looked to me quite a little
chap when I saw him on the march."

"He is tough," Rupert said; "he is like whip-cord all over; he is a
capital fellow, not a bit changed. Easton has turned out first-rate; he
was awfully good to me after you went away, and took no end of pains to
cheer me up, had me down to his place in the holidays, and was a real
friend. He is a big fellow now, and in another two or three years will
make a splendid man. They will be delighted when we both turn up again.
I don't think either of them thought, when they said good-bye to me,
that I should ever get back. They thought the language would floor me, I
think. You have got on wonderfully that way. I thought I had picked it
up pretty quickly, but you jaw away as if you had been years at it."

"I have been more with them, Rupert; besides, I had picked up a little
in the year I was at Cairo. You see I had nearly four months start of
you, and in the life I led among them of course I had a lot more
occasion to talk than you have had, always on camel back and only
talking in the encampment at night. El Bakhat says that in a casual
conversation now no one would notice that I was not a native. So if we
do get into any mess and have to ride for it by ourselves, we shall have
no difficulty in making our way across the country; but I do not see
much chance of that. If we should fall in with the Mahdists your sheik
can give his name and appear to be the head of the party, and as there
is nothing against him I don't see why we should have any trouble."

"I daresay we shall fall in with some Mahdists," Rupert said. "I got up
the maps thoroughly before I started, and specially studied the routes
leading to the coast. I fancy the line we shall travel will take us down
by Kassala. The Mahdists were besieging it, but I don't know whether it
has fallen or not. The safest route would certainly be to go through
Abyssinia, but the Arabs wouldn't like to travel that way if they could
help it. There have been troubles for years between Abyssinia and the
Soudan, and it is by no means certain what sort of treatment we should
meet if we got there. Massowah is certainly the best place to strike
for. Suakim would have been the best place in some respects, because
there are lots of English there and we should