Hajar el Aswad into it. They scrambled after,
falling into the shelter of the basket.

Into the arcade, at the north-east corner and half-way along the
western side, two furious swarms of white-robed _Hujjaj_ were already
debouching, yelling like fiends, firing as they came. The uproar
swelled rapidly, in a swift-rising tide. The Haram grew all a
confusion of wild-waving arms, streaming robes, running men who
stumbled over the paralyzed forms of their coreligionists. Knives,
spears, scimitars, rifles glinted in the sun.

The whine and patter of bullets filled the air, punctured the
_kiswah_, slogged against the Ka'aba. Lebon and Rennes, turning loose
the machine-guns, mowed into the white of the pack; but still they
came crowding on and on, frenzied, impervious to fear.

Up rose the nacelle, as the major wildly shouted into the phone. It
soared some forty feet in air, up past the black silken curtain, then
unaccountably stopped, level with the Ka'aba roof.

"Up! Up!" yelled Bohannan, frantically. The spud of bullets against
the steel basket tingled the bodies of the men crouching against the
metal-work.

All at once Dr. Lombardo stood up, pick-axe in hand, fully exposed to
rifle-fire.

"Down, you blazing idiot!" commanded the major, dragging at him with
hands that shook. The doctor thrust him away, and turned toward the
Ka'aba, the roof of which was not three feet distant.

"The golden spout--see?" he cried, pointing. "_Dio mio_, what a
treasure!" On to the edge of the nacelle he clambered.

"Don't be a damn fool, Doctor!" the major shouted; but already
Lombardo had leaped. Pick in hand, he jumped, landing on the flat roof
of the temple.

Ferocious howls and execrations swelled into a screaming chorus
of hate, of rage. Unmindful, the Italian was already frantically
attacking the Myzab. Blow after blow he rained upon it with the sharp,
cutting edge of the pick, that at every stroke sank deep into the
massive gold, shearing it in deep gashes.

A perfect hail of rifle-fire riddled the air all about him, but still
he labored with sweat streaming down his face all blackened with dirt
and cement. From _Nissr_, far above, cries and shouts rang down at
him, mingled with the sharp spitting of the machine-guns from the
lower gallery. The guns in the nacelle, too, were chattering; the
Haram filled itself with a wild turmoil; the scene beggared any
attempt at description, there under the blistering ardor of the
Arabia