The stowaway's rash act
was still big with possibilities of the most sinister import.
"This is probably just a temporary respite," said Bohannan, as he sat
with the Master in the latter's cabin. The windows had been slid
wide open, and the two men, leaning back in easy wicker chairs, were
enjoying the desert panorama each in his own way--Bohannan with a
cigar, the Master with a few leaves of the "flower of paradise."
Now once more clean and a little rested, they had again assumed
something of their former aspect. "Captain Alden," and as many others
as could be spared from duty, were asleep. The Legion was already
pulling itself together, though in depleted numbers. Discipline had
tautened again. Once more the sunshine of possible success had begun
to slant in through a rift in the lowering clouds of disaster.
"It's still, perhaps, only a temporary respite," the major was saying.
"Of course, as long as we stay in the Sahara, we're safe enough
from molestation. It's trying to get out--that, and shortage of
petrol--that constitute our problem now."
"Yes?" asked the chief, noncommittally. He peered out the window at
the vast, indigo horizons of the desert, curving off to northward into
a semicircle of burnished blue.
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