savage. No wonder that the little Abati tribe
feared them so intensely, notwithstanding the mighty precipices by which
they were protected from their hate.

About eleven o'clock Orme came on watch, and I turned in, having nothing
to report. Soon I was fast asleep, notwithstanding the anxieties that,
had I been less weary, might well have kept me wakeful. For these were
many. On the coming night we must slip through the Fung, and before
midday on the morrow we should either have entered Mur, or failed to
have entered Mur, which meant--death, or, what was worse, captivity
among barbarians, and subsequent execution, preceded probably by torture
of one sort or another.

Of course, however, we might come thither without accident, travelling
with good guides on a dark night, for, after all, the place was big, and
the road lonely and little used, so that unless we met a watch, which,
we were told, would not be there, our little caravan had a good chance
to pass unobserved. Shadrach seemed to think that we should do so, but
the worst of it was that, like Quick, I did not trust Shadrach. Even
Maqueda, the Lady of the Abati, she whom they called Child of Kings, had
her doubts about him, or so it had seemed to me.

At any rate, she had told me before I left Mur that she chose him for
this mission because he was bold and cunning, one of the very few of her
people also who, in his youth, had crossed the desert and, therefore,
knew the road. "Yet, Physician," she added meaningly, "watch him, for
is he not named 'Cat'? Yes, watch him, for did I not hold his wife and
children hostages, and were I not sure that he desires to win the great
reward in land which I have promised to him, I would not trust you to
this man's keeping."

Well, after many experiences in his company, my opinion coincided with
Maqueda's, and so did that of Quick, no mean judge of men.

"Look at him, Doctor," he said when he came to tell me that I could turn
in, for whether it were his watch or not, the Sergeant never seemed to
be off duty. "Look, at him," and he pointed to Shadrach, who was seated
under the shade of a tree, talking earnestly in whispers with two of his
subordinates with a very curious and unpleasing smile upon his face. "If
God Almighty ever made a scamp, he's squatting yonder. My belief is that
he wanted to be rid of us all at Zeu, so that he might steal our goods,
and I hope he won't play the same trick again to-night. Even the dog
can't ab