waiting for?"

That was the beginning, too, of Will's feud with the Rajput, neither
so remorseless nor so sudden as the woman's, because he had a different
code to guide him and also had to convince himself that a quarrel
with a man of color was compatible with Yankee dignity. We could
have wished them all three either friends, or else a thousand miles
apart two hundred times before the journey ended.

As we rode forward with even our Zeitoonli mounted now on strong
mules, Maga Jhaere sat her stallion beside Will with an air of
owning him. She was likely a safer friend than enemy, and we did
nothing to interfere. Monty pressed forward. Fred and I fell to
the rear.

"Haide!"* shouted Gregor Jhaere, and all the motley swarm of women
and children caught themselves mounts--some already loaded with the
gipsy baggage, some with saddles, some without, some with grass halters
for bridles. In another minute Fred and I were riding surrounded
by a smelly swarm of them, he with big fingers already on the keys
of his beloved concertina, but I less enamored than he of the company.

-----------------
* Haide!--Turkish, "Come on!"
-----------------

Women and children, loaded, loose and led horses were all mixed together
in unsortable confusion, the two oldest hags in the world trusting
themselves on sorry, lame nags between Fred and me as if proximity
to us would solve the very riddle of the gipsy race. And last of