He turned for an instant to look at the men who followed hard upon his track, magnificent in his desperate need, his face alight with the glow of battle. He raised his spear in answer to the Patriarch, who raised his in salutation, and raised it again in greeting to the men, his friends.
“A day which is not thine do not reckon it as of thy life.”—Arabic Proverb.
With the fatalism of the Arab, Zarah stood watching the race between the greyhound and the man who loved her.
She had glanced at the black dromedary carrying Blind Yussuf and “His Eyes” to freedom; she had looked at the magnificent sight of the men she had ruled so tyrannically as they deployed so that they should encircle her when they reached her; she did not turn to look in the direction taken by the girl she hated and the man she had loved passionately and for so brief a time.
Yet did hate outweigh the danger of the hour.
“By Allah,” she cried, lifting her spear, “if I live I will lead my men upon them and trample them and those who help them under foot. Yea, by the honour of the Arab I swear, if I throw the spear so that it pierces the heart of yon cursed dog, that not one of them shall be left alive within the hour.”
She dropped her white cloak from her shoulders and stepped clear, weighing the slender spear as she measured the lessening distance between the stallion and the greyhound. Her heart quickened not one beat, nor did the slightest shadow of fear show in the tawny eyes. She did not despair as the bitch seemed to gain upon the stallion; she did not hope as the thunder of the stallion’s hoofs sounded clearer and clearer every moment.
She was alone in her hour of desperate need, and only upon the strength and skill of her right hand and the judgment of her eye could she depend for life if the Nubian failed to reach her in time.