"The critter spit at me!" he ejaculated. Again, and as though he didn't quite believe, "The critter spit at me, and got me square in the eyes!"
Ali went patiently to the aid of the agitated soldier. If he had known how, he would have explained that improperly handled camels will not only spit, but are uncannily accurate. Wilder beasts than these would bite.
Two hours later, an anxious Lieutenant Beale entered the corral. "How's it going?" he queried.
Ali indicated the few saddled camels that were tied to the rail and the many unsaddled ones that were presently dodging about the corral and rather deftly eluding amateur packers. It would be necessary to catch every one. Since nobody except Ali had yet succeeded in bringing a camel and a camel saddle together, it followed that Ali would have to saddle every one after he caught it.
Lieutenant Beale nodded and left.
Back pillowed against a boulder, Ali sprawled in the warm sun and watched the camels browse. Far more than a pleasant sight, he thought, it was a vision that could not fail to lift the heart of anyone not too dull to be inspired. For to see the camels as they were—and where they were—meant that a great victory was won.
It was no small victory.
The camels had arrived at the expedition's base camp on the twenty-first of June. Departure was scheduled for the next morning. But with camels already driven wild by inexperienced help and rapidly getting wilder, they hadn't even succeeded in saddling all of them on that day or for several days thereafter.
Not until June the twenty-fifth were they finally under way, and Ali could not recall a sorrier caravan. The soldiers had acquired just enough skill so they could put a pack on a camel and have some assurance that it wouldn't fall off. In accordance with Lieutenant Beale's wish for a thorough test, the minimum load for any baggage animal was seven hundred pounds. That was far more than should have been carried by animals whose exercise in recent months had consisted of shuffling about the khan.