"
"Thou camest by the desert?"
"By the desert, Saadat, as Ebn Ezra effendi comes."
"By the desert! But thou saidst he came by the river."
"Saadat, yonder, forty miles from where we are, the river makes a great
curve. There the effendi landed in the night with four hundred men to
march hither. But he commanded that the boats should come on slowly and
receive the attack in the river, while he came in from the desert."
David's eye flashed. "A great device. They will be here by midnight,
then, perhaps?"
"At midnight, Saadat, by the blessing of God."
"How wert thou wounded?"
"I came upon two of the enemy. They were mounted. I fought them. Upon the
horse of one I came here."
"The other?"
"God is merciful, Saadat. He is in the bosom of God."
"How many men come by the river?"
"But fifty, Saadat," was the answer, "but they have sworn by the stone in
the Kaabah not to surrender."
"And those who come with the effendi, with Ebn Ezra Bey, are they as
those who will not surrender?"
"Half of them are so. They were with thee, as was I, Saadat, when the
great sickness fell upon us, and were healed by thee, and afterwards
fought with thee.
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