Yussuf was now at a disadvantage.
Max leaped from the saddle and stood by the Egyptian’s side.
“We are equal,” he said.
But it was scarcely the truth, for Yussuf had only one arm to fight with.
The Egyptian slipped in a pool of blood, and as he did so a sword still grasped by a dead man pierced his side.
The brave man could stand no more.
“I surrender!” he gasped, but it was not a surrender to Max, but to the Great Creator, for as the man uttered the words the breath left his body.
Out of four thousand seven hundred men—hale, hearty veterans—who had marched under the crescent of Egypt that morning, only two hundred and one survived at night.
The Mahdists did not lose more than four hundred men all told.
They did not stop to care for the wounded or bury the dead.