"You are certainly taxing my generosity," said he, "but, though I do not pretend to be a Hatim Tai, your friends shall be shown the road to safety."
Collecting his men, and leading them out, Faris rode towards the spot which I had pointed out to him while I watched anxiously to see what would happen I had not to wait long, however; for, before the Aeniza had gone a few yards, I saw, to my intense relief, that even the Shammar were aware that discretion is the better part of valour, and were in full flight across the desert. Faris pursued only to such a distance as to lead his foes to believe that he was in earnest, and then, recalling his men, brought them back to the shadow of the Birs Nimroud.
What astonished the sheik more than anything was the recovery of his own two horses, which we had lost at the ruins of Katib; and, as Edwards had foretold long before, he ascribed it to my dealings with magic.
"One thing is certain," said Faris, after he had heard all our adventures, "and that is that we cannot remain here. Hillah is too near, and the Turkis are in a restless state just now. Our tents are but four days' journey away; our riding camels we can reach to-night; the Jews who have made away with your heart's desire we shall yet reckon with; so you and the good Hakim shall come once again to the Jelas tents, and we will start as soon as possible."
"But what shall we do with the sick stranger?" I asked.
"Leave him to the vultures," was the curt reply.
"Great sheik," I said reprovingly, "that was not spoken out of the heart of Faris-ibn-Feyzul. What if the Englishman who found your wounded Sedjur had uttered such words?"
"Then what do you wish to do with him?" asked Faris. "You say that he is too ill to ride, and we must move quickly."
Edwards and I consulted, and, much against my will, I felt bound to act as he advised. We could not abandon Kellner; to take him away into the desert would probably kill him; moreover, since Edwards had no medicines with him, he could do little or nothing for the ailing German, even if the journey did not prove fatal. On the other hand, Hillah lay only a few miles away, and the Turkish hospital there was well-equipped. So we decided that Kellner must be conveyed to Hillah, and as, of course, the Aeniza would not go near the place, we two would have to accompany him. Now came the difficulty; to walk was out of the question, Kellner had no horse, and the horses which we had been riding belonged to Faris, who, however, was in possession of the two horses which we had brought with us from Baghdad. In the end, we agreed to lay the matter before the sheik, and trust to his generosity to help us. At first he was greatly disappointed at the thought that we proposed to leave him, as he had intended to give us a grand reception at his headquarters, and he had hoped that we would have travelled with his people when they moved to their winter grazing grounds in the Hamad. He argued with us about the folly of abandoning our search for the Girdle, after all that we had passed through, and when there was every hope of our obtaining it, but finding that our minds were made up, and that no words of his would make us change them, he accepted the inevitable, and acted in a far more noble manner than we could have expected.
"You shall have your wish," said he, "and some day you will again visit the Jelas tents, where you will always be truly welcome. I shall send away to their camp all my men save six, who, with Sedjur and myself, will ride with you this night to the very walls of the town. There we shall leave you ere day dawns, when we can gallop away out of danger, and overtake our camels on the way to the tents."