The visit to the Mahdi and his talk with him had evidently not brought health to Idris, for during that very night he fell seriously ill, and in the morning became unconscious. Chamis, Gebhr, and the Bedouins were sent for to appear before the calif, who detained them several hours and praised them for their courage. But they returned in a very bad temper and were exceedingly angry, for they had expected heaven knows what kind of reward, and now Abdullah had awarded them only an Egyptian pound[[13]] and a horse. The Bedouins began to quarrel with Gebhr, and they nearly came to blows, but finally decided that they would ride along to Fashoda with the camel-post, so as to demand payment from Smain. Chamis, in the hope that Smain’s protection would be more advantageous to him than staying in Omdurman, accompanied them.

And then there began a week of hunger and privation for the children, for Gebhr never even thought of supplying them with food. Happily Stasch still had two Maria Theresa thalers,[[14]] that he had received from the Greek, and so he went to the town to buy dates and rice. The Sudanese had nothing to say against this, for they knew that he could not escape from Omdurman, and that he would on no account leave the little “Biut.” But the walk was not without incident, for the sight of the boy in European clothing buying provisions in the market-place attracted a crowd of half-savage Dervishes, who greeted him with laughter and howls. Luckily many of them had seen him the day before when he was with the Mahdi, and so they restrained the others, who wanted to attack him. The children, however, threw stones and sand at him, but he paid no attention to them.

Prices in the market were exceedingly high, so he could not get dates, and Gebhr took most of the rice away to give to his sick brother. The boy resisted this with all his strength, which resulted in a scuffle, from which naturally the weaker one emerged bumped and bruised. Chamis’ cruelty now first became evident. He only showed an attachment to Saba, and fed him with raw meat, but he viewed with the greatest indifference the needs of the children, whom he had known for some time, and who had always been kind to him; and when Stasch turned to him, begging him to give Nell something to eat, he answered laughingly:

“Go and beg.”

Finally things came to such a pass the next day that Stasch really had to beg to save Nell from suffering from hunger. His efforts were not altogether futile. Many times a former soldier, an officer of the Khedive of Egypt, gave him a few piasters or a handful of dried figs, and told him he would help him the following day. Once he met a missionary and a Sister of Charity, who wept on hearing the tale of the children’s fate, and although they themselves were exhausted from hunger, they shared what they had with him. They also promised to visit them in the barracks, and the following day actually came, in the hope that they might succeed in being permitted to take the children along with them until the departure of the post. But Gebhr and Chamis drove them away with scourges.

On the following day Stasch met them again, and they gave him a little rice and two small quinine powders, of which the missionary told him to be especially careful, in case they should get the fever in Fashoda.

“You are now going,” he said, “to ride along the banks of the White Nile, which has overflowed, or straight through the so-called Suddis. As the river can not flow freely on account of the obstacles in its path, the plants and leaves which the current carries along pile up in the shallow places, where they form large, infectious puddles. There the fever does not spare even the negroes. Take special care not to sleep on the bare ground at night without a fire.”

“Would we had died!” Stasch answered, half sighing.

Now the missionary, raising his wan face toward heaven, prayed a while, and making the sign of the cross on the boy, said:

“Put your faith in God! You have not denied Him, and His mercy and protection will be over you.”