"No, but take the knife which served to release you."
"'Half a loaf is better than no bread.' Look out! Here they come!"
The Arabs, shouting and brandishing their swords, returned to the charge.
Two fresh shots from the revolvers resounded on the midnight air, but the balls took no effect, and the Arabs were unscathed.
"The game is not equal!" exclaimed M. de Morin. "Our task is ended.
Let us run for it."
The danger must have been extreme indeed for M. de Morin to speak of flight. And it was so.
These three young men, armed with one knife and two revolvers, could not, as one half of their ammunition was already expended, struggle for any length of time with the slightest chance of success against six men, furnished with swords and daggers. But the successive reports of the pistols, in a suburb of Khartoum and within a few yards of the inhabited portion of it, had attracted the attention of an Egyptian picket patrolling the town. As a rule, the soldiers who in Upper Egypt act as police only put in an appearance when they think there is no danger. If they do not hesitate to take strong measures against quarrelsome slaves and drunken negroes, they prudently avoid all interference in the disputes of the Mussulmen, slave dealers and scamps of all sorts, who, knife in hand, swarm about Khartoum. But a large portion of the Egyptian army is composed of prisoners taken in former days from the territories now annexed to Egypt, and those in whom the Government places the most reliance come from the Dinka tribe, fine, brave, soldier-like looking men. The slave merchants have for some time past abandoned all idea of dealing with this tribe, their indomitable character, their independent spirit, and, above all, their strength rendering them very dangerous customers. In the ranks of the army, on the contrary, although they are occasionally insubordinate, they render valuable service. The commanding officers themselves frequently belong to this tribe, and it was only last year that the Soudan contingent was under the command of Adam Pasha, a Dinka ex-prisoner.
The small picket, which, attracted by the noise, came to the assistance of the three Europeans, was fortunately almost entirely composed of these picked men. As soon as they saw the Arabs, they advanced against them at the double, attacked them at close quarters, and dealt their blows right and left without apparently taking any thought of their own danger.
The struggle was soon over. Two Arabs took to flight, whilst the remaining four, hastily concealing their arms, began to bellow and shout, and maintained that they were the victims of an unprovoked attack on the part of the Europeans. The latter contented themselves with a shrug of the shoulders without trying to enter into any explanations, which, moreover, would have been utterly futile, seeing that the Dinkas could not have understood them. The matter ended, as it would have done in our own country, by the whole party being taken to the Egyptian station-house, situated in a square of Khartoum close to the Divan. The soldiers, however, treated the Europeans with the greatest courtesy, making them walk in front, without using any force, whereas on the slightest provocation they used both their fists and their feet on their other prisoners, whom they had recognised as slave dealers. The Dinkas hate these brutes, whom they, and on good grounds, reproach with having depopulated their country, and with still making razzias there for the purpose of seizing their women, celebrated for their culinary and household talents, and, for these reasons, eagerly sought after in every well-appointed harem.
When the station-house was reached, the Europeans succeeded in explaining matters to the officer on duty, and were at once set at liberty, whereas the traders were detained in durance vile to answer later on for their misdeeds.