"Do you mean to wait for the attack of the Mahdi's men here or to go to meet them?" Edgar asked after a long pause.
"If they come here too numerous to fight we must fly; but if they are not too strong we will give them battle here. Why should we go to meet them?"
"It is for you to decide," Edgar said. "I know nothing of your Arab ways of fighting. But it seemed to me that it might be better, if they are not altogether too strong, to meet them as near the other wells as we can."
"But why so, Muley? They would have water close to them and we should have none. If one was wounded he would have to be carried a long distance. Why do you advise that we should fight them there?"
"You told me, sheik, that the existence of this well was only known to you and your people and a small section of the tribe."
"That is so, Muley. It is a secret that has been well guarded. The wady has served as a retreat many times in our history."
"If they come on and any of them go back again the secret will be a secret no longer," Edgar said. "It is for this reason that I thought that we had better go out and meet them. There is but one man with them who knows the way hither, and against him our balls should be all directed. If we kill him they would be without a guide and would be unable to find the way, for they would never venture into this desert knowing that if they failed to find our well they might all perish for want of water."
"You speak well," the sheik said. "I had not thought of this; but I see that your plan is a good one. As soon as I learn that they have arrived at the wells we will set out to meet them unless their force is altogether too strong for us."
On the seventh day after their arrival at the wady the messenger who had been despatched for aid returned. His news was that the greater part of the men were away; they were expected in a few days, but it might be a week or more before they came back. The sheik was unwilling to send off the few men at the douar, but promised that as soon as his main force returned he would set out with the whole strength of his fighting men to their assistance.
Upon the following morning one of the men left to watch the wells also returned. He had come through without stopping, and reported that late in the evening before he left he and his companions had seen a line of camels with some horsemen coming towards the wells. He had waited until morning in order to discover their force; he put it down as forty men.