"I'm on," replied Webb. "Figuratively, of course. When it comes to the back of a donkey it may be a different matter."
"The brutes look quiet enough," resumed Osborne, eyeing the three sorry-looking donkeys, who were continually flicking their ears in a vain attempt to rid themselves of the tormenting attentions of a swarm of flies. "All right," he added, addressing the donkey-boy. "Twenty-five piastres, mind!"
The 'Gippy extended a grimy, sunburned hand. "On de nail," he exclaimed, making use of one of many English idioms that he had picked up in the course of his dealings with tourists in pre-war days, and with British and Australian troops since the outbreak of hostilities.
The officers smiled. The words, coming from the lips of a dark-skinned Egyptian, tickled them. The fellow's eyes looked so pathetic and trustful that Osborne obligingly paid for the hire of the animals.
Evidently the guide was not going to exert himself by walking. Throwing himself upon the back of the third donkey he urged the brutes into a steady trot, yelling the while in a jargon of English and Arabic, and belabouring the animals with a stick.
"Avast there!" said Osborne authoritatively. "Stop it! Not so much of the stick business. They'll go just as well without."
The "boy"—he was a man of between twenty-five and thirty—obeyed, but only for a time. Ere long he began to thrash the animals again.
"For the second time, stop it!" thundered the Lieutenant.
The donkey-driver muttered something under his breath. A momentary scowl flashed across his olivine features. If looks could kill, Osborne would have been stretched lifeless in the desert.
On and on the donkeys went, sometimes trotting, at others plodding stolidly through the sand; for already the cotton-fields had been left behind, and nothing but the desert could now be seen, bounded on the right hand by the intricate swamps of Lake Mareotis. Before they had gone five miles, both the officers discovered, to their great discomfort, that their mounts possessed very aggressive backbones, the pain from the sharp edges of which the meagre native saddle did little to mitigate.