"Well, look here," Edgar said in English, letting go the rope, "the sooner we come to an understanding the better. I am not going to stand any nonsense from you fellows; and if you don't keep a civil tongue in your heads I will give you such a licking as will teach you to do so in future."
Although they did not understand his words they guessed the import of them, and the biggest of the men, a powerful negro, repeated the word Kaffir and spat upon him. Edgar's right arm flew out from his shoulder, the blow struck the negro on the nose, and in an instant he was upon his back upon the ground. His comrade stood for a moment stupefied, and then with loud yells ran towards the tents, leaving the negro to pick himself up at his leisure. Edgar continued the work of raising and emptying the bucket until the negro returned, followed by the sheik, his wife, and all the inhabitants of the village. By this time the negro who had been knocked down had risen to his feet and was roaring like a bull at the top of his voice, while the blood was streaming from his nose.
"What is this?" the sheik shouted in great anger.
The negro volubly explained that the Kaffir slave had struck down their comrade.
"Why is this?" the sheik demanded of Edgar.
"I am my lord's slave," Edgar said; "but this fellow is a slave also. He called me a Kaffir dog and spat upon me. I knocked him down; and if any other slave does the same I will punish him also."
As the woman whose child had been ill had a short time before reported that the fever had left her, and that having drunk two basins of the arrow-root she was much better, the sheik had been greatly pleased with the idea that he had made a far more valuable capture than he had anticipated; he therefore received Edgar's explanation in his broken Arabic favourably.
"The white slave has done right," he said. "Who are you that you are to insult him? He came to work on my business, and you would have interfered with and hindered him. Hamish has been rightly punished, though truly the white man must have hit hard, for his nose is flattened to his face. Mashallah it must have been a wonderful blow. The white men are Kaffirs, but they have marvellous powers. Now go to work again and let me hear of no more quarrels."
