'Camels! Camels!' cried Martin. 'And these, no doubt, are the tabernacles of Scripture.' His one eye was shining, and in spite of the flies and the oppressive heat - far worse for those fresh from the sea- his face expressed pure happiness, a striking contrast to the fasting apathetic camel-drivers, who lay in the shade, looking little more than half alive. The horses, on the other hand, were full of spirit: three charming Arabs, two of them bays and quite small, the third a mare of nearly sixteen hands, and all three standing on their toes as it were in pleasurable expectation. The mare was a remarkable golden colour and she was one of the most beautiful creatures Jack had ever seen, with a small high-bred head and huge lustrous eyes. His heart went out to her at once and she for her part was very willing to make his acquaintance, bringing her fine-cut little ears to bear and taking a most intelligent interest when he asked her how she did.
'Mr Hairabedian,' he said, stroking her neck, 'pray tell the Effendi that I admire his taste extremely - most grateful - prodigious handsome mare - and then go on and tell him of the arrangements we have made for the landing of the men. They will wait here until I come back: I hope to return shortly after sunset and by that time therefore the tents should be struck, lanterns provided, beasts watered and all hands fed, so that we may get under way without the loss of a minute.'
Hairabedian conveyed all this: Abbas looked pleased, or at least less anxious, and said that the Captain's directions should be carried out to the letter.
'Capital,' said Jack. 'Dr Maturin, be so good as to throw out the signal to the ship, by waving your handkerchief.' He was just about to mount when the odabashi plunged forward and seized the stirrup to help him up; and as he did so he said something that sounded extraordinarily like 'Beg parm, me Lord.'
'Thankee, odabashi,' said Jack. 'You are an honest fellow, no doubt, though uncommon stupid. What now?' - this to Stephen, who had laid a hand upon his bridle.
'I take it there would be no objection to our going a little way towards the delta, perhaps on a camel, just to set our feet in Africa, and even to see a little of the African flora?'
'None in the world,' said Jack. 'Gather posies by the score, so long as you take care not to be devoured by lions or crocodiles, and, which is even more important, so long as you are back here in time. Should you like Hairabedian to arrange it with the Effendi?'
'Not at all, not at all. We can manage very well in Greek. Good day, now, and God bless you.'
Jack turned his horse's head, following the boy, and they rode cautiously down the slope, bearing left-handed round the castle; as they reached the level ground on the farther side a group of black tents came into sight, with camels and tethered horses, a Bedouin encampment, and the mare, raising her head high, uttered a fine ringing whinny. A gross figure in a dirty nightshirt and a long grey beard came out of one of his tents and waved: she whinnied again, looking steadfastly in his direction.
'The boy says that is Mahommed ibn Rashid, the great enormous fat man of the Beni Khoda, the heaviest man in the northern wilderness. The horse is his. It was thought most suitable for you,' said Hairabedian.
'Well,' said Jack, 'there is nothing like candour. Come, my dear,' he went on, addressing the mare, who showed a distinct inclination to join the tents, 'it is only an hour or so to Katia: just carry me there, and then you shall go back to your master.'
He had no sort of doubt that she understood him perfectly well: she twitched her little ears once or twice, then brought them to bear right forward, gave a curious little skip, changing foot, and set out at a swinging pace. They left the ruins of Pelusium and its mound on their right; and now there was nothing but flat hard sand, more reddish than dun and sprinkled with small flat stones, before them and on either hand; and now the mare really got into her stride, a very long, smooth, powerful trot, so light and even that she might have been carrying a child, and a meagre child at that, rather than a massive post-captain in something near full-dress uniform with a world of gold lace on it. But this was nothing to her gallop. The boy had pushed his horse ahead; she could not bear it, and Jack felt her grow tense. He gave her her head and she instantly changed pace, with an immensely powerful drive from behind. In a few moments she was far beyond the little bay, going fast and free out over the dead-flat plain, faster than Jack had ever known, yet still with this same effortless even perfection, high-sprung and aerial - a kind of flying, for indeed they only touched the ground at long intervals. Now the welcome wind streamed in his face, pierced his thick coat, and filled his heart with joy; never had he so delighted in being on a horse's back; never had he felt such a good rider; and never in fact had he ridden so well.
But it could not last: very gently he reined in, saying 'Come, my dear, this ain't sober, responsible conduct. We have a long way to go.' She whinnied again, and to his astonishment he found that she was scarcely breathing faster than before.
When the others came up (Hairabedian labouring heavily) he asked her name. 'Yamina,' said the boy.
'If we bring this caper off,' thought Jack, 'and if money can tempt the great enormous fat man of the wilderness, I shall take her home and keep her as a pet. She would teach all the children to ride, one after another; and she would even reconcile Sophie with horses.'
They rode on at a sober, responsible pace, and his thoughts moved forward to his meeting with Murad. He knew, from his experience in the Ionian, that there was often a wide difference between the interests of the Sublime Porte and those of local Turkish commanders, a wide difference between what the one ordered and the other performed. He turned over various lines of approach in his mind, but dismissed them all. 'If he is a straightforward candid Turk we shall agree directly: if he is a devious brute, I shall have to find out the nature of his deviousness. And if I cannot deal with it, I shall make the passage on my own, even though that would be a damned bad beginning.'
Now that this somewhat remote and hypothetical scheme had more nearly become a possibility, he longed for its success with his whole being. The treasure that the gallery was said to be bringing up to Mubara entered into the line of count of course: but it was not the whole reason for his eagerness, nor anything like it. For some time now he had been dissatisfied with himself and although as a result of his being sent into the Ionian the French had been turned out of Marga he knew very well how much had depended on luck and on the excellent conduct of his Turkish and Albanian allies. He had also sunk the Torgud. But that was more in the nature of a massacre than an evenly-fought battle, and mere slaughter could not cure that deep dissatisfaction. It seemed to him that his reputation in the service (and with himself as one who watched Jack Aubrey's doings from a certain distance and with an almost perfect knowledge of his motives) was based on two or three fortunate actions, sea-fights that he could look back upon with real pleasure, small though they were; but they belonged to the past; they had all happened long ago; and now there were several men who stood far higher in the esteem of those whose opinion he valued. Young Hoste, for example, had done wonders in the Adriatic, and Hoste was junior to him on the post- captain's list. It was as though he were running a race: a race in which he had done fairly well for a while, after a slow start, but one in which he could not hold his lead and was being overtaken, perhaps from lack of bottom, perhaps from lack of judgment, perhaps from lack of that particularly nameless quality that brought some men success when it just eluded others, though they might take equal pains. He could not put his finger on the fault with any certainty, and there were days when he could say with real conviction that the whole thing was mere fatality, the other side of the good luck that had attended him in his twenties and early thirties, the restoration of
