I was silent for a moment, thinking.
“I have travelled for three days due north,” I said, apparently reflecting. “If you send your men due south three days’ journey, they will come upon a small oasis. This must be passed, and still south again, a three hours’ ride, there is a larger oasis on the further side of a high ridge. It is there that Hadj Absalam is taking his ease.”
“Good!” exclaimed the officer, calling over a Chasseur who was sauntering past with his hands in his pockets and ordering him to send immediately a sous-officier, whom he named.
“It’s a fine night,” he said. “We will start when the moon rises, and, mon Dieu! it will not be our fault if we do not exterminate the band, and bring the black-faced old scoundrel back with us. The caravans will never be safe until his head is in the lunette.”
“But he may have moved by this time,” I suggested.
“Then we will follow and overtake him,” he replied, brushing some dust from his braided sleeve. “He shall not escape us this time. When I was quartered in Biskra, I knew old Hafiz well. Though prejudiced against France, he was always good to our men, poor old fellow.”
“Yes,” I said. “Though a strict Moslem, he was most amiable and generous.”
At that moment a lieutenant of Chasseurs strode up and saluted.
“Victor,” the commandant exclaimed, addressing him, “we leave at once, with the whole of your enfants d’enfer, in search of Absalam, who is three days’ journey south. This time we will pursue him till we run him to earth. The Spahis will remain;” and, turning to me, he added: “M’sieur Holcombe, you are welcome to stay here also, if it pleases you.”
Thanking him, I assured him how deeply I appreciated his hospitality, and then, having been handed over to the care of a sous-officier, I was shown to the tent which the commandant ordered should be placed at my disposal, while the Spahis—or homards, as they are termed in the argot of the 19th Army Corps, because of their red burnouses—were busy assisting their comrades to prepare for departure.