The Arabs began to smoke, some of them using a mere perforated piece of bone for a pipe. They could afford to wait patiently for their dinner, for they knew that a sheep was being killed and skinned in preparation for a grand feast. Presently Shelah exclaimed, "There's a dead sheep; look, they are cutting it up with their knives!"
By the light of a large fire kindled outside the tent, the captives could see all that the Arabs could exhibit of culinary art. They watched the Bedouins as they flung fragments of the recently slaughtered sheep into a large cauldron. The boiling seemed a tedious affair, especially to poor hungry Shelah. At last the hissing cauldron was removed from the fireplace, which was formed of nothing but stones. The steaming contents of the flesh-pot were emptied into one large dirty, wooden bowl, and there was a general rush towards it.
"No plates, no knives and forks,—what can we do!" cried Miss Petty.
"We must use nature's implements," said Harold, cheerfully, "and we must use them quickly too, or we shall find nothing but bones."
Hartley bore Shelah in his arms to the place, and managed to make room for the child, while a vigorous attack was carried on by the Bedouins upon the food. So many brown hands—of course very dirty—were plunged into the seething bowl, that Harold had no small difficulty in getting out two lumps of most untempting mutton for his two charges, and then something for his own hungry self. Half-famished Miss Petty and Shelah found it quite possible to feed without knives and forks. The child was closely picking a fragment of bone, when it was snatched away by a hungry dog.
Water, anything but pellucid, was handed round in a small pail, from which everyone drank. Miss Petty declared that she must have a cup to herself, but even the coarsest pottery was not to be found in the Bedouin camp.
In ten minutes the banquet was over.
"Now I can sleep," said Miss Petty; "can't I have a tent to myself?"
With a good deal of difficulty, Harold making the Bedouins understand the wants of their captives more by signs than by words, a small dirty tent was secured.
"Let us have a little prayer together before we go to rest," said the young missionary. "I have unfortunately no portion of the Scriptures with me to read, but I can repeat some verses by heart."