ughan to follow him, Sax ran to the gate. The Afghan had now
run three times round the little paddock, and as he came round the
fourth time, nearly exhausted, the boy called out to him. Just as the
running man drew level with the gate Sax swung it open. The man fell
through it and lay gasping on the sand, but the camel shot past it
before it saw that it had lost its prey. The boys slammed the gate
shut again. Abul turned and glared at them. It was about to break
down the fence, which it could easily have done, when other camel-men
arrived on the scene, and drove it back with sticks and savage dogs.

When they arrived back at the hotel for dinner, they found that Peter
was looking for them. "Where've you been all the morning?" he asked.

The boys told him about their wanderings around the town, and about the
bull camel which had nearly killed the Afghan.

"That must be Sultan Khan," said Peter. "I heard last night that he
had come back into the country. The police kicked him out ten years
ago for being cruel to his camels. It's a pity the bull didn't get
him."

Sax looked crestfallen. It was not nice to hear that the man whom he
had just saved from a most terrible death would have been better left
to die. But Peter reassured him at once.

"Of course I don't mean that really," he said. "You did fine. It's
what any decent white man would have tried to do. But I suppose you're
dead scared of camels now."

The man went on to explain that he had arranged to travel north with a
string of camels which was leaving the township the same afternoon.
They would go as far as Dingo Creek and wait there for the train which
was being sent down from Oodnadatta. "That's the best arrangement I
can make," said Peter. "If you'd care to come along, now's your
chance. You won't have much to do with camels, anyway. But don't mind
saying if you'd rather not."

Both boys protested that they weren't a bit scared of camels and that
they were anxious to go right away; so, after dinner, they got their
belongings together and followed Peter to the outskirts of the town.
Here they found a line of fifty camels kneeling in the sand ready to
start.

Most of them were heavily loaded with stores for Oodnadatta which had
come up on the same train as the boys had travelled by. More than a
score of men had helped to unload the trucks that morning, and to
arrange the bags and cases and bales ready for being roped to the
camel-saddl