"What now?" demanded the Master.
"Bells! Camel-bells!"
"Nom d'un, nom!" And the lieutenant drew his gun.
The five fugitives stiffened for another battle. They looked well to their weapons. The Master's weariness and pain were forgotten as he crawled on hands and knees up the side of the little wady. The sound of distant camel-bells, a thin, far quiver of sound, had now reached his ears and those of the other men, less sensitive than the woman's.
Over the edge of the wady he peered, across a wa'ar, or stony ground covered with mummified scrub. Beyond, a blanched salt-plain gleamed hoar-white in the on-coming dusk; and farther off, the dunes began again.
Strangely enough, the Master laughed. He turned and beckoned, silently. The others joined him.
"From the west!" he whispered. "This is no pursuit! It is a caravan going to Jannati Shahr!"
Bohannan chuckled, and patted his revolver.
"Faith, but Allah is being good to us!" he muttered. "Now, when it comes to a fight—"
"Ten dromedaries—no, nine—" Leclair judged.