“Khodah hai!”[A] she murmured; “it would have attacked my baby!”
Two men, mounted on Turkoman horses, were now spurring towards them. Mirza Ali Beg advanced a few paces to meet them.
One, an elderly man of grave appearance and richly attired, reined in his horse at a little distance and cried to his companion:—
“By the tomb of Mahomet, Sher Khan, ’tis he of my dream!”
The other, a handsome and soldierly youth, came nearer and questioned Ali Beg, mostly concerning the disabled and dying snake, found and beaten into pulp by the foremost men of the caravan.
The Mirza told his tale with dignified eloquence; he ended with a pathetic request for help for his exhausted wife and family.
This was forthcoming quickly, and, while he himself was refreshed with good milk, and dates, and cakes of pounded wheat, Malik Masúd, the elder of the two horsemen and leader of the train, told how he dreamt the previous night that during a wayside halt under a big tree he was attacked by a poisonous snake, which was vanquishing him until a stranger came to his aid.
The snake lying in the path of the kafila was the exact counterpart of that seen in his disturbing vision, but his amazement was complete when he recognized in Ali Beg the stranger who had saved him.
So, in due course, Mihr-ul-nisa, with her baby girl, was mounted on a camel, and her husband and two sons on another, and Deri, the cow, before joining the train, was regaled with a copious draught of water and an ample measure of grain.