The Fight in the Desert
As the three squatted upon the roof above the quarters of the
Ouled-Nails they heard the angry cursing of the Arabs in the room
beneath. Abdul translated from time to time to Tarzan.
“They are berating those in the street below now,” said Abdul, “for
permitting us to escape so easily. Those in the street say that we did
not come that way—that we are still within the building, and that those
above, being too cowardly to attack us, are attempting to deceive them
into believing that we have escaped. In a moment they will have
fighting of their own to attend to if they continue their brawling.”
Presently those in the building gave up the search, and returned to the
café. A few remained in the street below, smoking and talking.
Tarzan spoke to the girl, thanking her for the sacrifice she had made
for him, a total stranger.
“I liked you,” she said simply. “You were unlike the others who come to
the café. You did not speak coarsely to me—the manner in which you gave
me money was not an insult.”
“What shall you do after tonight?” he asked. “You cannot return to the
café. Can you even remain with safety in Sidi Aissa?”
“Tomorrow it will be forgotten,” she replied. “But I should be glad if
it might be that I need never return to this or another café. I have
not remained because I wished to; I have been a prisoner.”
“A prisoner!” ejaculated Tarzan incredulously.
“A slave would be the better word,” she answered. “I was stolen in the
night from my father’s _douar_ by a band of marauders. They brought me
here and sold me to the Arab who keeps this café. It has been nearly
two years now since I saw the last of mine own people. They are very
far to the south. They never come to Sidi Aissa.”
“You would like to return to your people?” asked Tarzan. “Then I shall
promise to see you safely so far as Bou Saada at least. There we can
doubtless arrange with the commandant to send you the rest of the way.”
“Oh, m’sieur,” she cried, “how can I ever repay you! You cannot really
mean that you will do so much for a poor Ouled-Nail. But my father can
reward you, and he will, for is he not a great sheik? He is Kadour ben
Saden.”
“Kadour ben Saden!” ejaculated Tarzan. “Why, Kadour ben Saden is in
Sidi Aissa this very night. He dined with me but a few hours since.”
“My father in Sidi Aissa?” cried the amazed girl. “Allah be praised
then, for I am indeed saved.”
“Hssh!” cautioned Abdul. “Listen.”
From below came the sound of voices, quite distinguishable upon the
still night air. Tarzan could not understand the words, but Abdul and
the girl translated.
“They have gone now,” said the latter. “It is you they want, m’sieur.
One of them said that the stranger who had offered money for your
slaying lay in the house of Akmed din Soulef with a broken wrist, but
that he had offered a still greater reward if some would lay in wait
for you upon the road to Bou Saada and kill you.”
“It is he who followed m’sieur about the market today,” exclaimed
Abdul. “I saw him again within the café—him and another; and the two
went out into the inner court after talking with this girl here. It was
they who attacked and fired upon us, as we came out of the café. Why do
they wish to kill you, m’sieur?”
“I do not know,” replied Tarzan, and then, after a pause: “Unless—” But
he did not finish, for the thought that had come to his mind, while it
seemed the only reasonable solution of the mystery, appeared at the
same time quite improbable. Presently the men in the street went away.
The courtyard and the café were deserted. Cautiously Tarzan lowered
himself to the sill of the girl’s window. The room was empty. He
returned to the roof and let Abdul down, then he lowered the girl to
the arms of the waiting Arab.
From the window Abdul dropped the short distance to the street below,
while Tarzan took the girl in his arms and leaped down as he had done
on so many other occasions in his own forest with a burden in his arms.
A little cry of alarm was startled from the girl’s lips, but Tarzan
landed in the street with but an imperceptible jar, and lowered her in
safety to her feet.
She clung to him for a moment.
“How strong m’sieur is, and how active,” she cried. “_El Adrea_, the
black lion, himself is not more so.”
“I should like to meet this _el Adrea_ of yours,” he said. “I have
heard much about him.”
“And you come to the _douar_ of my father you shall see him,” said the
girl. “He lives in a spur of the mountains north of us, and comes down
from his lair at night to rob my father’s _douar_. With a single blow
of his mighty paw he crushes the skull of a bull, and woe betide the
belated wayfarer who meets _el Adrea_ abroad at night.”
Without further mishap they reached the hotel. The sleepy landlord
objected strenuously to instituting a search for Kadour ben Saden until
the following morning, but a piece of gold put a different aspect on
the matter, so that a few moments later a servant had started to make
the rounds of the lesser native hostelries where it might be expected
that a desert sheik would find congenial associations. Tarzan had felt
it necessary to find the girl’s father that night, for fear he might
start on his homeward journey too early in the morning to be
intercepted.
They had waited perhaps half an hour when the messenger returned with
Kadour ben Saden. The old sheik entered the room with a questioning
expression upon his proud face.
“Monsieur has done me the honor to—” he commenced, and then his eyes
fell upon the girl. With outstretched arms he crossed the room to meet
her. “My daughter!” he cried. “Allah is merciful!” and tears dimmed the
martial eyes of the old warrior.
When the story of her abduction and her final rescue had been told to
Kadour ben Saden he extended his hand to Tarzan.
“All that is Kadour ben Saden’s is thine, my friend, even to his life,”
he said very simply, but Tarzan knew that those were no idle words.
It was decided that although three of them would have to ride after
practically no sleep, it would be best to make an early start in the
morning, and attempt to ride all the way to Bou Saada in one day. It
would have been comparatively easy for the men, but for the girl it was
sure to be a fatiguing journey.
She, however, was the most anxious to undertake it, for it seemed to
her that she could not quickly enough reach the family and friends from
whom she had been separated for two years.
It seemed to Tarzan that he had not closed his eyes before he was
awakened, and in another hour the party was on its way south toward Bou
Saada. For a few miles the road was good, and they made rapid progress,
but suddenly it became only a waste of sand, into which the horses sank
fetlock deep at nearly every step. In addition to Tarzan, Abdul, the
sheik, and his daughter were four of the wild plainsmen of the sheik’s
tribe who had accompanied him upon the trip to Sidi Aissa. Thus, seven
guns strong, they entertained little fear of attack by day, and if all
went well they should reach Bou Saada before nightfall.
A brisk wind enveloped them in the blowing sand of the desert, until
Tarzan’s lips were parched and cracked. What little he could see of the
surrounding country was far from alluring—a vast expanse of rough
country, rolling in little, barren hillocks, and tufted here and there
with clumps of dreary shrub. Far to the south rose the dim lines of the
Saharan Atlas range. How different, thought Tarzan, from the gorgeous
Africa of his boyhood!
Abdul, always on the alert, looked backward quite as often as he did
ahead. At the top of each hillock that they mounted he would draw in
his horse and, turning, scan the country to the rear with utmost care.
At last his scrutiny was rewarded.
“Look!” he cried. “There are six horsemen behind us.”
“Your friends of last evening, no doubt, monsieur,” remarked Kadour ben
Saden dryly to Tarzan.
“No doubt,” replied the ape-man. “I am sorry that my society should
endanger the safety of your journey. At the next village I shall remain
and question these gentlemen, while you ride on. There is no necessity
for my being at Bou Saada tonight, and less still why you should not
ride in peace.”
“If you stop we shall stop,” said Kadour ben Saden. “Until you are safe
with your friends, or the enemy has left your trail, we shall remain
with you. There is nothing more to say.”
Tarzan nodded his head. He was a man of few words, and possibly it was
for this reason as much as any that Kadour ben Saden had taken to him,
for if there be one thing that an Arab despises it is a talkative man.
All the balance of the day Abdul caught glimpses of the horsemen in
their rear. They remained always at about the same distance. During the
occasional halts for rest, and at the longer halt at noon, they
approached no closer.
“They are waiting for darkness,” said Kadour ben Saden.
And darkness came before they reached Bou Saada. The last glimpse that
Abdul had of the grim, white-robed figures that trailed them, just
before dusk made it impossible to distinguish them, had made it
apparent that they were rapidly closing up the distance that intervened
between them and their intended quarry. He whispered this fact to
Tarzan, for he did not wish to alarm the girl. The ape-man drew back
beside him.
“You will ride ahead with the others, Abdul,” said Tarzan. “This is my
quarrel. I shall wait at the next convenient spot, and interview these
fellows.”
“Then Abdul shall wait at thy side,” replied the young Arab, nor would
any threats or commands move him from his decision.
“Very well, then,” replied Tarzan. “Here is as good a place as we could
wish. Here are rocks at the top of this hillock. We shall remain hidden
here and give an account of ourselves to these gentlemen when they
appear.”
They drew in their horses and dismounted. The others riding ahead were
already out of sight in the darkness. Beyond them shone the lights of
Bou Saada. Tarzan removed his rifle from its boot and loosened his
revolver in its holster. He ordered Abdul to withdraw behind the rocks
with the horses, so that they should be shielded from the enemies’
bullets should they fire. The young Arab pretended to do as he was bid,
but when he had fastened the two animals securely to a low shrub he
crept back to lie on his belly a few paces behind Tarzan.
The ape-man stood erect in the middle of the road, waiting. Nor did he
have long to wait. The sound of galloping horses came suddenly out of
the darkness below him, and a moment later he discerned the moving
blotches of lighter color against the solid background of the night.
“Halt,” he cried, “or we fire!”
The white figures came to a sudden stop, and for a moment there was
silence. Then came the sound of a whispered council, and like ghosts
the phantom riders dispersed in all directions. Again the desert lay
still about him, yet it was an ominous stillness that foreboded evil.
Abdul raised himself to one knee. Tarzan cocked his jungle-trained
ears, and presently there came to him the sound of horses walking
quietly through the sand to the east of him, to the west, to the north,
and to the south. They had been surrounded. Then a shot came from the
direction in which he was looking, a bullet whirred through the air
above his head, and he fired at the flash of the enemy’s gun.
Instantly the soundless waste was torn with the quick staccato of guns
upon every hand. Abdul and Tarzan fired only at the flashes—they could
not yet see their foemen. Presently it became evident that the
attackers were circling their position, drawing closer and closer in as
they began to realize the paltry numbers of the party which opposed
them.
But one came too close, for Tarzan was accustomed to using his eyes in
the darkness of the jungle night, than which there is no more utter
darkness this side the grave, and with a cry of pain a saddle was
emptied.
“The odds are evening, Abdul,” said Tarzan, with a low laugh.
But they were still far too one-sided, and when the five remaining
horsemen whirled at a signal and charged full upon them it looked as if
there would be a sudden ending of the battle. Both Tarzan and Abdul
sprang to the shelter of the rocks, that they might keep the enemy in
front of them. There was a mad clatter of galloping hoofs, a volley of
shots from both sides, and the Arabs withdrew to repeat the maneuver;
but there were now only four against the two.
For a few moments there came no sound from out of the surrounding
blackness. Tarzan could not tell whether the Arabs, satisfied with
their losses, had given up the fight, or were waiting farther along the
road to waylay them as they proceeded on toward Bou Saada. But he was
not left long in doubt, for now all from one direction came the sound
of a new charge. But scarcely had the first gun spoken ere a dozen
shots rang out behind the Arabs. There came the wild shouts of a new
party to the controversy, and the pounding of the feet of many horses
from down the road to Bou Saada.
The Arabs did not wait to learn the identity of the oncomers. With a
parting volley as they dashed by the position which Tarzan and Abdul
were holding, they plunged off along the road toward Sidi Aissa. A
moment later Kadour ben Saden and his men dashed up.
The old sheik was much relieved to find that neither Tarzan nor Abdul
had received a scratch. Not even had their horses been wounded. They
sought out the two men who had fallen before Tarzan’s shots, and,
finding that both were dead, left them where they lay.
“Why did you not tell me that you contemplated ambushing those
fellows?” asked the sheik in a hurt tone. “We might have had them all
if the seven of us had stopped to meet them.”
“Then it would have been useless to stop at all,” replied Tarzan, “for
had we simply ridden on toward Bou Saada they would have been upon us
presently, and all could have been engaged. It was to prevent the
transfer of my own quarrel to another’s shoulders that Abdul and I
stopped off to question them. Then there is your daughter—I could not
be the cause of exposing her needlessly to the marksmanship of six
men.”
Kadour ben Saden shrugged his shoulders. He did not relish having been
cheated out of a fight.
The little battle so close to Bou Saada had drawn out a company of
soldiers. Tarzan and his party met them just outside the town. The
officer in charge halted them to learn the significance of the shots.
“A handful of marauders,” replied Kadour ben Saden. “They attacked two
of our number who had dropped behind, but when we returned to them the
fellows soon dispersed. They left two dead. None of my party was
injured.”
This seemed to satisfy the officer, and after taking the names of the
party he marched his men on toward the scene of the skirmish to bring
back the dead men for purposes of identification, if possible.
Two days later, Kadour ben Saden, with his daughter and followers, rode
south through the pass below Bou Saada, bound for their home in the far
wilderness. The sheik had urged Tarzan to accompany him, and the girl
had added her entreaties to those of her father; but, though he could
not explain it to them, Tarzan’s duties loomed particularly large after
the happenings of the past few days, so that he could not think of
leaving his post for an instant. But he promised to come later if it
lay within his power to do so, and they had to content themselves with
that assurance.
During these two days Tarzan had spent practically all his time with
Kadour ben Saden and his daughter. He was keenly interested in this
race of stern and dignified warriors, and embraced the opportunity
which their friendship offered to learn what he could of their lives
and customs. He even commenced to acquire the rudiments of their
language under the pleasant tutorage of the brown-eyed girl. It was
with real regret that he saw them depart, and he sat his horse at the
opening to the pass, as far as which he had accompanied them, gazing
after the little party as long as he could catch a glimpse of them.
Here were people after his own heart! Their wild, rough lives, filled
with danger and hardship, appealed to this half-savage man as nothing
had appealed to him in the midst of the effeminate civilization of the
great cities he had visited. Here was a life that excelled even that of
the jungle, for here he might have the society of men—real men whom he
could honor and respect, and yet be near to the wild nature that he
loved. In his head revolved an idea that when he had completed his
mission he would resign and return to live for the remainder of his
life with the tribe of Kadour ben Saden.
Then he turned his horse’s head and rode slowly back to Bou Saada.
The front of the Hotel du Petit Sahara, where Tarzan stopped in Bou
Saada, is taken up with the bar, two dining-rooms, and the kitchens.
Both of the dining-rooms open directly off the bar, and one of them is
reserved for the use of the officers of the garrison. As you stand in
the barroom you may look into either of the dining-rooms if you wish.
It was to the bar that Tarzan repaired after speeding Kadour ben Saden
and his party on their way. It was yet early in the morning, for Kadour
ben Saden had elected to ride far that day, so that it happened that
when Tarzan returned there were guests still at breakfast.
As his casual glance wandered into the officers’ dining-room, Tarzan
saw something which brought a look of interest to his eyes. Lieutenant
Gernois was sitting there, and as Tarzan looked a white-robed Arab
approached and, bending, whispered a few words into the lieutenant’s
ear. Then he passed on out of the building through another door.
In itself the thing was nothing, but as the man had stooped to speak to
the officer, Tarzan had caught sight of something which the accidental
parting of the man’s burnoose had revealed—he carried his left arm in a
sling.