The Frenchman was not even near him. The
Master saw him in the wady, dimly visible through the ghostly white
sand-shrouds spinning in the blue-whipped fire-glare. There on hands
and knees the lieutenant was huddled. With eager hands he was tearing
the hood of a _za'abut_--a rough, woolen slave cloak, patched and
ragged--from the face of a prostrate figure more than half snowed
under a sand-drift.
"_Nom de Dieu!_" the Master heard him cry. "_Mais, nom de_--"
"What have you found, Lieutenant?" shouted the Master, letting the
simoom drive him toward the wady. In their excitement none of the men
would yet take cover, lie down and hide their faces under their coats
as every dictate of prudence would have bidden. "Who is it, now?
What--"
"Ah, my Captain! Ah! the pity of it! Behold!"
The Frenchman's voice, wind-gusted, trembled with grief and passionate
anger; yet through that rage and sorrow rang a note of joy.
"Tell me, Leclair! Who, now?" demanded the Master, as he came close
and peered down by the fire-gleam roaring on the beach, sending
sheaves of sparks in comet-tails of vanishing radiance down-wind with
rushing sand.
"It is impossible, my Captain," the lieutenant answered in French.
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