"One at a time!" she laughed. "There is one Ali Higg who could
command you with a word--another who could order your carcass
thrown to the vultures. Words first, since your boastings are all
words! I say that, for all your brave words, this Ali Higg who
rides ahead of us can make you slay me for a word of praise
from him."

"You mean, beloved, you could make me slay him for a word of
praise from you!" the Sikh lied glibly.

"But I might not want him slain."

"Have him made into a cripple, then--a ruin of a man, for daring
to displease you!"

"But he pleases me!"

"Aha! I am jealous! By the beard of the Prophet, Ayisha, beware
of my jealousy! I am a man of few words but sudden deeds! Is
there a man who stands in my way? May Allah show compassion on
him, for he is like to need it!"

He was so fervid in his avowals that he almost convinced
me--almost made me believe that his private agreement with
me had been a camouflage for his real intentions.

There is precious little of which my friend Narayan Singh isn't
capable in the way of romantic soldiering; he ought to have been
born two or three hundred years ago as, in fact, according to his
reincarnating creed, he was. Perhaps he remembers past lives so
vividly that he lives them over again. I wish I could remember a
past life or two.

Ayisha was about to answer him when Grim's shrill bosun's whistle
that he keeps for emergencies whined from in front, and the
sleepy-looking line awoke with a start. Every single rifle down
the length of the caravan, including mine, was unslung in a
second and the click of the sliding bolts was as businesslike as
if we had been a squad on the parade-ground. Narayan Singh, rifle
in hand, sprang on to Ayisha's little Bishareen, and she jumped
into the _shibriyah,_ like a pair doing stunts at the circus.

So far good. But the rest was amateurish. We milled badly. Grim
away in front had halted to let the line close, and we swarmed
around him like a herd of steers that smell wolves, and nobody
seemed to know which way to look, or what to do next.

I was right in the midst of the mess, with a camel on either side
trying to get its teeth into me, and what with Grim's shouting to
get the tangle straightened, and our all trying to obey at once,
it was some minutes before I got the hang of things. In fact, I
think I understood last.

We were already surrounded perfectly on three sides by camel-men
who kept out of reasonable rifle-rang