from the
table, and presently muttered some Arab salutation, departed, and was
lost in the wind.

The murderer was now frankly asleep with his head upon the table, and
the Spahi began to blink. I, too, felt very tired, but I had something
still to say. Speaking softly, I said to the Spahi:

"That sound we heard to-night----"

"Monsieur?"

"Have you ever heard it before?"

"Never, monsieur. But my brother heard it just before he had a stroke of
the sun. He fell dead before his captain beside the wall of Sada. He was
a tirailleur."

"And you think this sound means that death is near?

"I know it, monsieur. All desert people know it. I was born at
Touggourt, and how should I not know?"

"But then one of us----"

I looked from him to the sleeping murderer.

"There will be death in Sidi-Massarli tonight, monsieur. It is the will
of Allah. Blessed be Allah."

I got up, locked the heavy door of the Bordj, and put the key in the
inner pocket of my coat. As I did so, I fancied I saw the heavy black
lids of the murderer's closed eyes flutter for a moment. But I cannot
be sure. My head was aching with fatigue. The Spahi, too, looked stupid
with sleep. He jerked the cord, the murderer awoke with a start, glanced
heavily round, stood up. Pulling him as one would an obstinate dog, the
Spahi made him lie down on the bare floor in the corner of the Bordj,
ere he himself curled up in the thick quilt which had been rolled
up behind his high saddle. I made no protest, but when the Spahi was
asleep, his lean brown hand laid upon his sword, his musket under his
shaven head, I pushed one of my blankets over to the murderer, who lay
looking like a heap of rags against the white wall. He smiled at me
gently, as he had smiled when the desert drum was beating, and drew the
blanket over his mighty limbs and face.

I did not mean to sleep that night. Tired though I was my brain was so
excited that I felt I should not. I blew out the candle without even the
thought that it would be necessary to struggle against sleep. And in the
darkness I heard for an instant the roar of the wind outside, the heavy
breathing of my two strange companions within. For an instant--then it
seemed as if a shutter was drawn suddenly over the light in my brain.
Blackness filled the room where the thoughts develop, crowd, stir in
endless activities. Slumber fell upon me like a great stone that strikes
a man down to dumbness, to unconsciousness.

Far in th