“I see. Not trousers like these things, I hope!”
“No; not trousers like those. Skirts. I hope you don’t wear trousers—like that.”
She gave a sniff of disgust.
“No, Harilek! Skirts. Nice short ones.”
Having loaded the tent, Forsyth came over, made a hurried breakfast, looked at his watch, and said:
“We’d better finish packing up. It’s twenty-five past five, and I told John we’d get away by six.”
“What’s left to pack?” I asked.
“Only the mess things, but that’ll take a quarter of an hour, at least. Hi, Firoz!”
“Look here, we’d better take a hand at washing up these things. We don’t want to pack ’em up all dirty,” said I. “I’ll just dip ’em in the stream.”
Forsyth had turned Aryenis off the valise and was roping it up. Seeing me with my hands full of plates going to the stream, thirty yards away, she gathered up the remaining cups and saucers and followed. I was on my knees by the stream when she arrived, evidently anxious to help. She said something about that being woman’s work, from which I imagine she thought I might be doing something more useful. However, we finished the job together, and, coming back with the lot washed up, packed them into the yakhdans. Then we roped on the last loads, and cast a final glance over everything.