Page:In Desert and Wilderness (Sienkiewicz, tr. Drezmal).djvu/86

 78 that if it was not for me, your blood would have flowed under Gebhr's courbash—yours and that little 'bint's' also."

"I therefore shall intercede for you only; but Gebhr shall swing on the rope."

At this Idris gazed at him for a while as if with astonishment and said:

"Our lives are not yet in your hands and you already talk to us as our lord—"

After a while he added:

"You are a strange 'uled' (boy), and such a one I have not yet seen. Thus far I have been kind to you, but take heed and do not threaten."

"God punishes treachery," answered Stas.

It was apparent, however, that the assurance with which the boy spoke in connection with the evil omen in the form of a snake which succeeded in escaping, disquieted Idris in a high degree. Having already mounted the camel he repeated several times: "Yes, I was kind to you," as if in any event he wished to impress this upon Stas' memory, and afterwards he began to finger the beads of a rosary made of the shells of "dum" nuts, and pray.

About two o'clock, though it was in the winter season, the heat became unusual. In the sky there was not a cloudlet, but the horizon's border was disfigured.

Above the caravan hovered a few vultures whose widely outstretched wings cast moving, black shadows on the tawny sands. In the heated air could be smelt an odor like the gas exhaled from burning charcoal. The camels, not ceasing to run, began to grunt strangely. One of the Bedouins approached Idris.

"Some evil is brewing?"

"What, do you think?" asked the Sudânese.

"Wicked spirits awoke the wind slumbering on the