murderers, panderers, that they might be freed from service by some
corrupt pasha or bimbashi; but no one in the knowledge of the world had
ever been expelled from the army of the Khedive.

There was a satanic humour in the situation pleasant to the soul of
Mahommed Seti, if soul his subconsciousness might be called. In the
presence of his regiment, drawn up in the Beit-el-Mal, before his
trembling bimbashi, whose lips were now pale with terror at the loss of
his mascot, Mahommed Seti was drummed out of line, out of his regiment,
out of the Beit-el-Mal. It was opera boufe, and though Seti could not
know what opera boufe was, he did know that it was a ridiculous fantasia,
and he grinned his insolent grin all the way, even to the corner of the
camel-market, where the drummer and the sergeant and his squad turned
back from ministering a disgrace they would gladly have shared.

Left at the corner of the camel-market, Mahommed Seti planned his future.
At first it was to steal a camel and take the desert for Berber. Then he
thought of the English hakim, Fielding Bey, who had saved his life. Now,
a man who has saved your life once may do it again; one favour is always
the promise of another. So Seti, with a sudden inspiration, went
straight to the house of Fielding Bey and sat down before it on his mat.

With the setting of the sun came a clatter of tins and a savoury odour
throughout Khartoum to its farthest precincts, for it was Ramadan, and no
man ate till sunset. Seti smiled an avid smile, and waited. At last he
got up, turned his face towards Mecca, and said his prayers. Then he
lifted the latch of Fielding's hut, entered, eyed the medicine bottles
and the surgical case with childish apprehension, and made his way to the
kitchen. There he foraged. He built a fire; his courage grew; he ran to
the bazaar, and came back with an armful of meats and vegetables.