"Never mind that!" replied Dick Sand. "We are going to halt. Mrs.
Weldon will consent to pass a last night under the trees, and
to-morrow, when it is broad daylight, we will proceed on our journey!
Two or three miles still, that will be an hour's walk!"
"Be it so," replied Harris.
At that moment Dingo commenced to bark furiously.
"Here, Dingo, here!" cried Dick Sand. "You know well that no one is there, and that we are in the desert!"
This last halt was then decided upon.
Mrs. Weldon let her companions work without saying a word. Her little
Jack was sleeping in her arms, made drowsy by the fever.
They sought the best place to pass the night. This was under a large bunch of trees, where Dick Sand thought of disposing all for their rest. But old Tom, who was helping him in these preparations, stopped suddenly, crying out:
"Mr. Dick! look! look!"
"What is it, old Tom?" asked Dick Sand, in the calm tone of a man who attends to everything.
"There—there!" cried Tom; "on those trees—blood stains!—and—on the ground—mutilated limbs!"