"No fighting for you, my boys," he said. "The Arabs won't meet you this time, I expect, and you have had your walk for nothing. I expect that they see that the sun will lick us single-handed, and they need not take the trouble." "What makes you say that?" "Well, at El Teb, you know, they kept their women and boys with them, and these carried hatchets to kill our wounded with after the fight." "That's their notion of surgery," said Tom, in a very audible aside. "It goes more directly to its result than ours." "Wait till you come under my hands, you young monkey! You will sing a different song then." "I have no doubt you will hurt me more than Mrs Arab would, doctor; but then you would cure me, you know, and she wouldn't." "Never mind that cheeky boy, MacBean," said Fitzgerald. "Why won't they fight now?" "Because they have sent all their women and boys away, and that, the friendly natives say, is a sure sign." "Curious; it is just the other way on with other savage people, who send their families off when they _do_ mean to fight." "But the Arabs are only half savages; and besides they are quite unlike other people. Why, their lucky day is Friday, and their unlucky day Wednesday." "Yes," said Tom Strachan, "and Robinson Crusoe called his savage Friday, and these fellows calls their Prophet Tuesday." "Tuesday! What _do_ you mean?" asked Major Elmfoot. "Mardi is the French for Tuesday, is it not, sir?" "Strachan, you are really too bad, to make such execrable puns in the middle of the desert." "That is it, sir? I thought even my poor flowers of speech might be welcome in such a barren waste!" Soon after this the colonel was called up to the brigadier, and when he returned he communicated what he had been told to his officers. The low hills being found clear of the enemy, it was intended to occupy them at once, and then if possible to advance upon the camp and the wells, and carry that position before nightfall. But this depended on what daylight they had, for rather than risk being overtaken by darkness in an unfavourable position, it was determined to form a zereba and wait for the advance till next day. "It is just four o'clock," said Strachan, looking at his watch as he returned to his company; "and surely there must be a fair chance of carrying the wells before sunset, for I see a lot of the enemy on the hills beyond. Therefore I shall risk a drink," and he put his water- bottle to his lips accordingly. "Hurrah! So will I," said Green.