The raiding-party leaped in.
"Lower away!" commanded the chief
Smoothly the winch released the fine steel cable, with a purring
sound. Down shot the nacelle, steadily, swiftly, with the major,
Leclair, and the others now engaged in the most perilous, dare-devil
undertaking imaginable.
Down, swiftly down, to raid the _Bayt Ullah_, the sacred Ka'aba, holy
of holies to more than two hundred million Moslem fanatics, each of
whom would with joy have died to keep the hand of the unbelieving
dog from so much as touching that hoar structure or the earth of the
inviolate Haram.
Down, swiftly down with picks and crowbars. Down, into the midst of
all that paralyzed but still conscious hate, to the very place of the
supremely sacred Black Stone, itself.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE BATTLE OF THE HARAM
The raiding-party, beside its two leaders, consisted of Lombardo,
Rennes, Emilio, Wallace, and three others, including Lebon. The
lieutenant's orderly, now having recovered strength, had pleaded so
hard for an opportunity to avenge himself on the hated Moslems that
Leclair had taken him.
As for Lombardo, he had downright insisted on going. His life, he
knew, was already forfeited to the expedition--by reason of his having
let the stowaway escape--and, this being so, he had begged and been
granted the favor of risking it in this perilous undertaking.
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