d he was
about to run off to find out what was the matter. But a repetition of
the sound made him jerk himself angrily away.

"One of those beauties!" he muttered. "Talk about a bad-tempered horse,
why he's an angel compared to a camel! Of all the disagreeable,
whining, sour, vicious things that ever breathed, they seem about the
worst. Gritty, that's what they are. Get the sand into their tempers
when they're young, I suppose.--Oh, he's quiet now. Well, it is a
beautiful night after all, and the cool air seems to do one good. I
expect I shall get to like it when I've learnt to ride that brute of a
camel, so long as there's no stabbing and spearing and that sort of
thing."

Sam shook his head very solemnly as these last thoughts came into his
head in company with recollections of scraps he had read in the daily
papers about encounters with the dervishes, and the horrible massacres
they had perpetrated.

"Seems to me," he said, "that these people ought to be stopped. If I
was Government I wouldn't let people go about carrying swords and
spears. With things like them fashionable it stands to reason that
they're sure to want to stick them into somebody.--Ugh! It's very
horrid. There ought never to be any other fighting than what is done
with a fist."

Sam had by this time sauntered up to the opening into the gentlemen's
tent, and there he paused to look round at the figures by that of the
Sheikh, before stepping inside in search of what he required.

The low murmur of conversation came softly to his ears as he looked and
then turned back to enter.

"Shouldn't a bit wonder if they've got a nice hot cup of coffee there,
and that's just the thing that would suit my complaint exactly. I
should be all right if I was at home, but I sha'n't get it here, and--"

By this time he was half across the roomy, booth-like tent, where he
stopped short as if turned to stone in his surprise. For dimly seen by
the light from the hanging lamp, he could see a figure stooping down--
through the opening into the inner tent where the water and brass basins
stood ready for washing.

It was within this place that the leather cases containing the
travellers' clothes and various necessaries had been placed, and over
one of these open portmanteaus the dimly seen figure was bending, and
from the slight noises he made it was evident that he was ransacking the
case in search of something.

"Oh," thought Sam excitedly, "that's why