reaching waste of arid sand. There Maldar gave the
order to dismount. The Khouans sprang lightly from their weary horses,
both men and animals going directly to the wells, where they took long
draughts of the cool, refreshing water. The night was now far spent, and
as the abductors of Esperance threw themselves upon the grass
surrounding the wells, the first rosy streaks of dawn appeared in the
eastern heavens. The horses stood cropping the verdure for a brief
period, then they also lay down for rest and recuperation. Soon slumber
reigned supreme, for Maldar, fearing neither pursuit nor attack, had
not taken the precaution to post sentinels. The scarf had been removed
from Esperance's mouth, and the son of Monte-Cristo, still wrapped in
his lethargic sleep, lay on the sod beside Maldar near one of the wells.
It was a wild and picturesque group, such a group as would have filled
the soul of a painter with delight and inspiration.

As the light increased, but while it was yet vague and uncertain, giving
a demoniac and supernatural cast to the group and its tropical
surroundings, Esperance suddenly awoke and raised himself upon his
elbow. For an instant he gazed around him in bewilderment and terror.
Was he dead, and were those swarthy-visaged forms extended motionless on
the grass of the oasis the forms of fiends? This thought shot through
his mind and augmented his consternation. When he fell asleep he was
with his father, with the dauntless Monte-Cristo, and the last faces he
had seen were the faces of French people and friends. Now he was in the
midst of beings of another race, in the midst of strangers. Strangers?
No, for at that moment his eyes rested on Maldar, and he realized that
he was again in the clutches of his remorseless foe, and that the men
around him belonged to the dreaded Khouan tribe.

He was unbound; nothing restrained his movements and not a single guard
was watching over him. His fear vanished with his bewilderment and gave
place to heroic resolution. Why should he not escape and make his way
back to his beloved father and devoted countrymen? He arose cautiously
to his feet, and peered into the distance. His heart throbbed with
anguish, for beyond the narrow confines of the green oasis, as far as
his eye could reach, stretched the trackless sands of the arid and
inhospitable desert. Flight would be madness, nay, perhaps, death, but
would it not also be death to remain? The son of Monte-Cristo, full