Evidently the guide was not going to exert himself by walking. Throwing himself upon the back of the third donkey he urged the brutes into a steady trot, yelling the while in a jargon of English and Arabic, and belabouring the animals with a stick.
"Avast there!" said Osborne authoritatively. "Stop it! Not so much of the stick business. They'll go just as well without."
The "boy"--he was a man of between twenty-five and thirty--obeyed, but only for a time. Ere long he began to thrash the animals again.
"For the second time, stop it!" thundered the Lieutenant.
The donkey-driver muttered something under his breath. A momentary scowl flashed across his olivine features. If looks could kill, Osborne would have been stretched lifeless in the desert.
On and on the donkeys went, sometimes trotting, at others plodding stolidly through the sand; for already the cotton-fields had been left behind, and nothing but the desert could now be seen, bounded on the right hand by the intricate swamps of Lake Mareotis. Before they had gone five miles, both the officers discovered, to their great discomfort, that their mounts possessed very aggressive backbones, the pain from the sharp edges of which the meagre native saddle did little to mitigate.
"Not far," was the 'Gippy's non-committal reply.
"Hanged if I don't think the rascal is taking us past the place," declared Osborne, indicating a solidly constructed building on the left, at a distance of about three-quarters of a mile.
"No, sah, no," he expostulated earnestly. "Him no good. Nothing dere; empty. Tomb of Ctesos, sah, him be right dere."
"Dash the tomb of Ctesos!" declared Osborne. "It's not good enough. Look here, Ali Babi; we've chucked the idea. We'll have a look at this place instead. We may find shelter from the sun, and get back in the cool of the evening."
The suggestion did not at all meet with the native's approval. Obviously he had strong reasons against falling in with the proposal.
"Evidently our dusky dragoman considers this to be a breach of contract," observed Webb.
"Can't imagine why," rejoined Osborne. "If what he says is correct with reference to the direction of this precious tomb, we're saving his animals a considerable distance. He who pays the piper calls the tune, you know; so let's be firm."