grindstone!"

But Seti hung by the skin of his teeth to the fringe of Fielding's good-
nature--Fielding's words only were sour and wrathful. So Seti grinned
and said: "For the grindstone, behold it sent Ebn Haroun to the mercy of
God. Let him rest, praise be to God!"

"You were drummed out of the army. You can't fight," said Fielding
again; but he was smiling under his long moustache.

"Is not a bobtailed nag sufficient shame? Let thy friend ride the
bobtailed nag and pay the price of the grindstone and the drum," said
Seti.

"Fall in!" rang the colonel's command, and Fielding, giving Seti a
friendly kick in the ribs, galloped away to the troop.

Seti turned to the little onion-garden. His eye harried it for a moment,
and he grinned. He turned to the doorway where a stew-pot rested, and
his mind dwelt cheerfully on the lamb he had looted for Fielding's
dinner. But last of all his eye rested upon his bobtailed Arab, the
shameless thing in an Arab country, where every horse rears his tail as a
peacock spreads his feathers, as a marching Albanian lifts his foot. The
bobtailed Arab's nose was up, his stump was high. A hundred times he had
been in battle; he was welted and scarred like a shoe-maker's apron. He
snorted his cry towards the dust rising like a surf behind the heels of
the colonel's troop.

Suddenly Seti answered the cry--he answered the cry and sprang forward.