"Here, Emilio--drive your pick here!" commanded the major, his red face now dark crimson with heat and excitement as well as with the intense force wherewith he was wielding his implement. Cement flew in showers at every stroke, out over the sweating Legionaries and the prostrate Moslems near the stone. The white men slid and stumbled on limp bodies, trampled them unheedingly, and of the outstretched pilgrims made as it were a kind of vantage-post for the attack on the inmost citadel of Islam. "Work quick, Major!" came the Master's voice, seemingly at Bohannan's elbow. "There's a fearful drove of the rascals coming. You'd better get that stone out and away in double-quick time!" The major replied nothing, but his pick-axe flailed into the cement with desperate energy. Emilio and others seconded him, while Rennes and Wallace dug, kneeling, with their crowbars. The blows echoed with staccato rapidity through the sacred Haram, which now had begun to fill with the confused roar of the on-coming mobs from the Ma'abidah suburb and the Plain of Mina, from Jebel Hindi and the Sulaymainyah quarter. "You have about five minutes more," the Master spoke again. "If necessary, we will open on them with machine-guns, from the ship, but I'd like to avoid bloodshed if possible. Do the best you can!" Bohannan had no breath for answering. Every ounce of energy of all seven men was being flung into that mad labor. Sweat streamed into their eyes, half blinding them; they dashed it off, and struck again and again. The cement crumbled and gave; the heavy gold band commenced to bend; Rennes got his crowbar into an advantageous leverage and gave a mighty heave. The stone seemed to cry aloud, with a dry, harsh screaming sound of outraged agony, as it yielded. It was only the sundering of the mortar, of course; but a chill ran up the major's spine, and goose-flesh prickled all over him. Furiously the Legionaries worked the stone back and forth; a shower of mortar fell on the workers' feet and on the upturned, staring faces of the paralyzed Moslems trampled by the horrible contamination of heretical boots--perhaps even pigskin boots!--and then, all at once, the Hajar el Aswad slid from the place where it had lain uncounted centuries. Cursing with frantic excitement, the Legionaries tugged it from the wall, together with its golden band. Above them the _kiswah_ bellied outward, swaying in the breeze. No Moslem has ever admitted that the Ka'aba veil is ever moved by any other thing than the wings of angels. Those of the Faithful who now beheld that movement, felt the avenging messengers of Allah were near, indeed; and a thousand unspoken prayers flamed aloft: "Angels of death, Azraël and his host, smite these outcasts of Feringistan!"