I did as I was bidden, and reached the plateau in about an hour. After we had marched a little further in the darkness, Hamed stood still.
"Stop here," he said. "Make a ring of stones as camel-herds do in winter to protect themselves from the cold, and lie down between them. You know how to do it. You are just as much an Arab as one of us. In the evening, I will come again to fetch you. I go back to the camels. The people of these parts know me, and I have nothing to fear. If they ask me any questions I shall say I have come from Dar Shaigia to look up some people who are settled here. Luckily, I have some relations here also." He went back. I stood upon the rolling plain alone—abandoned.
I piled the stones on top of one another to a height of about half a metre, leaving just room enough between for myself, my water-skin, and my gun. Morning began to grow gray, and I crept into my hiding-place. The ground beneath was sandy. I dug it up with a flat, pointed stone, and heaped up sufficient between the piles of slabs to prevent my being seen from without. I flung myself on my back in weariness, and stretched out my limbs. Again reflection came and thoughts thronged past. I looked back again to the past, and pictured to myself the Khalifa's anger at my flight. My imagination sped once more towards my dear ones. I longed to be united to them again, and, unanticipated, almost insuperable obstacles seemed to be springing up round me. What change has come over me? Where is my motto of "Never despair?" However desperate the circumstances in which I may have found myself, I have never lost courage, never abandoned confidence in my ultimate good fortune. To-day a sense of fear is pressing on me. Perhaps it is that I am already lying in what will be my grave. But that is, after all, the end of every man. Be his days long or short, he can go no other way. And yet to die in a strange land forsaken! God, up there in heaven, have mercy on me, have mercy on a miserable man who, if he has sinned, has surely bitterly atoned for his transgressions. God have mercy on me! Let me see my friends and dear ones, my fatherland again!
Then I grew calm once more. After all, I thought, in spite of a few little delays, affairs are not so bad. To-night, I shall cross the river. To-morrow, I reach the desert. In two or three days, I shall be beyond the reach of danger, and fly towards those I crave to see. I smiled once more, and grew full of confidence and hope. The sun was burning hot. I had brought my farda, and held it up over me to keep my face in the shade, waiting in patience for what would follow.
A little after midday, I heard a low whistle, and raised myself to look out over the stones. It was Hamed, who approached me smiling.
"Good news," he cried. "We have found your people."
A sense of joy possessed me as I caught his words, and my lucky star was once more in the ascendant. When he came up to me, he sat down outside the stones.
"You may make yourself more comfortable," he said. "I have kept a good lookout all round. You have nothing to fear. Zeki found your people before daybreak, and just now one of them came over to us to find out where we were. They are ready. In the evening, they will come to fetch you. But you will have to take great care, for your flight is known in this part of the country. Come with me now, or, better still, wait till darkness comes on. I am going now. Can you find the way alone, or shall I come back for you?"
"It is not necessary for you to go over the ground again. I know the place, and will join you in the evening."
The sun had disappeared from the horizon when, with gun and water-skin slung upon my back, I left the spot which had cost me such bitter hours of reflection. When I reached my companions, I found myself in the presence of two men who were strangers to me.