od man," Homer told him. "What's up?"

"Evidently, Colonel Ibrahim has decided to come out of retirement.
He's sent small motorized elements to Effok, In Fedjeg, Otoul and even
to Tahifet."

"And--?"

"And has taken them all, of course. Our men fall back, fighting a
stubborn rear-guard action, taking as few casualties as possible."

"I don't get it," Homer bit out. "He's using up his fuel and
ammunition and losing more men than we are. Certainly he can't figure,
with the thousand odd troops he has, to be able to take and hold
enough of the oases and water holes in this vicinity to push us out
completely."

Bey said, "What worries me is the possibility that he knows something
we don't. That he's figuring on being relieved or has a new source of
fuel, ammunition and men on tap."

"The roads are cut. Our men hold every source of water from here to
Libya and the Reunited Nations has put thumbs down on aircraft which
eliminates an air lift."

"Yeah," Bey said, unhappily.

* * * * *

That evening, following the day's last meal, Cliff came into the
headquarters tent grinning, broadly. "Hey, guess what we've
liberated."

"A bottle of Scotch?" Kenny said hopefully.

"A king-size portable radio transmitter. Ralph Sandell knew about it.
The Sahara Afforestation Project people were going to use it to
propagandize the tribesmen into coming in and taking jobs in the new
oases."

Dave Moroka, who'd been censoring press releases, shook his head.
"That's why we need an El Hassan in this country," he complained.
"They put a couple of million dollars into a radio transmitter, never
asking themselves how many of the bedouin own radios."

Jack Peters said, "Wait a moment, you chaps. Didn't Bey capture a
couple of Arab Legion radio technicians today?"

"They defected to us," Homer Crawford said, looking up from an
improvised desk where he was poring over some supply papers with
Isobel. "What did you have in mind, Jack?"

"There are radios in Tamanrasset. In fact, there's probably a radio in
every one of those military vehicles of Ibrahim's. Why can't we
blanket these Arab Union chaps with El Hassan propaganda? Quite a few
of them are from Libya, Tunisia and Egypt. In short, they're Africans
and susceptible to El Hassan's dream."

"Good man. Take over the details, Jack," Homer said. He went back to
his work with Isobel.

Jimmy Peters entered with some papers in hand. He said, seriously,