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The inhabitants of this valley, the name of which is celebrated in the Hedjaz for the abundance of its dates, are of the Beni Salem tribe, the most numerous branch of Harb, and, like most other tribes of the Hedjaz, partly Bedouins and partly settled inhabitants; the latter remaining in their houses and gardens the whole year round, though they dress and live in the same manner as their brethren under tents.
All these Bedouins were decidedly hostile to the Wahaby system: even now, though free from their yoke, they load them with as many reproaches, Before the Wababy invasion, the Beni Harb had never known a master, nor had the produce of their fields ever been taxed.
"Ah, nom de Dieu!" cried Leclair, in sudden rage at seeing his chance all gone to pot, of coming to grips with the hated Beni Harb. From the penetralia of the air-liner, confused shouts burst forth. The upper galleries grew vocal with execrations. Not one was of fear; all voiced disappointment, the passion of baffled fury. Angrily a boiler-shop clatter of machine-guns vomited useless frenzy.
Once more he screamed: "O Allah, deny not their skin and bones to the eternal flame! O owls, oxen, beggars, cut-off ones! Oh, give them the burning oil, Allah! The cold faces! Oh, wither their hands! Make them kusah! Oh, these swine with black livers, gray eyes, beards of red. Vilest that ever hammered tent-pegs, goats of El Akhfash! O Beni Harb!
A caravan departs for Medina once in forty or fifty days, principally with India goods and drugs, and is always augmented by a crowd of pilgrims who wish to visit Mohammed's tomb. These caravans consist of from sixty to one hundred camels, and are conducted by the Harb Bedouins.
And the Frenchman half eased himself up on hands and knees, peering forward into the night. "After what these Beni Harb or their close kin have done to me and to poor Lebon listen! What was that?" "What do you mean?" "That far, roaring noise?" "It is nothing! A little wind, maybe; but it is nothing, nothing! Come, I am ready for the work!" The Master stood up. Rrisa followed suit.
Serious though the situation was, the Frenchman could not repress a thought of the untamed beauty of that scene a land long familiar to him, in the days when he had flown down these coasts on punitive expeditions against the rebellious Beni Harb clans of the Ahl Bayt, or People of the Black Tents.
His eyes were far ahead, where the war-party was beginning to debouch on the white sands along the shore full three hundred fighting-men, or more, well armed, as the tiny sparkles of sunlight flicking from weapons proved. As Nissr drew in to land, the Beni Harb grew visible to the naked eye, like a swarm of ants on the desert rim. "The woman's heart," repeated the Master.
By the dim, fitful gleam of the fire, probably the strangest and most costly necklace in the world became indistinctly visible. At sight of it, everything else was forgotten the wrecked air-liner, the waiting Legion, the unconscious Arabs now being buried in the resistless charge of the sand-armies. Even poor Lebon, tortured slave of the Beni Harb, a lay neglected.
"They will show fight, surely enough, mon capitaine," put in Leclair, as he and the major made their way to the oddly tiptilted door leading back into the main corridor. "I know these folk. No blank cartridges will scatter that breed. Even the Turks are afraid of them. They have a proverb: 'Feed the Beni Harb, and they will fire at Allah! That says it all. "Mohammed laid a special curse on them.
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