"May thy bones rot, thou ill-omened prophet!" he screamed, and would have
added more but that Sakr-el-Bahr silenced him.
"What is written is written!" said he in a voice of thunder and reproof.
"Indeed, indeed," Asad agreed, grasping at the fatalist's consolation.
"If we are ripe for the gardeners hand, the gardener will pluck us."
Less fatalistic and more practical was the counsel of Biskaine.
"It were well to act upon the assumption that we are indeed discovered,
and make for the open sea while yet there may be time."
"But that were to make certain what is still doubtful," broke in Marzak,
fearful ever. "It were to run to meet the danger."
"Not so!" cried Asad in a loud, confident voice. "The praise to Allah
who sent us this calm night. There is scarce a breath of wind. We can
row ten leagues while they are sailing one."
A murmur of quick approval sped through the ranks of officers and men.
"Let us but win safely from this cove and they will never overtake us,"
announced Biskaine.
"But their guns may," Sakr-el-Bahr quietly reminded them to damp their
confidence. His own alert mind had already foreseen this one chance of
escaping from the trap, but he had hoped that it would not be quite so
obvious to the others.
"That risk we must take," replied Asad. "We must trust to the night. To
linger here is to await certain destruction." He swung briskly about to
issue his orders.
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