It was nearly four months before Craven left the camp of Mukair Ibn Zarrarah. His injuries had healed quickly and he had rapidly regained his former strength. He was anxious to return to England without delay, but he had yielded to Saïd's pressing entreaties to wait until they could ride to Algiers together. There had been much for the young Sheik to do. He was already virtual leader of the tribe. Mukair Ibn Zarrarah, elderly when his sons had been born, had aged with startling suddenness since the death of Omar. He had all at once become an old man, unable to rally from the shock of his bereavement, bewailing the fate of his elder and favourite son, and trembling for the future of his beloved tribe left to the tender mercies of a man he now recognised to be more Frenchman than Arab. He exaggerated every Francophile tendency he saw in Saïd and cursed the French as heartily as ever Omar had done, forgetting that he himself was largely responsible for the inclinations he objected to. And his terrors were mainly imaginary.
A few innovations Saïd certainly instituted but he was too astute to make any material changes in the management of his people. They were loyal and attached to the ruling house and he was clever enough to leave well alone; broad-minded enough to know that he could not run a large and scattered tribe on the same plan as a regiment of Spahis; philosophical enough to realise that he had turned down a page in his life's history and must be content to follow, more or less, in the footsteps of his forebears. The fighting men were with him solidly, even those who had been inclined to object to his European tactics had, in view of his brilliant generalship, been obliged to concede him the honour that was his due. For his victory had not been altogether the walkover he had airily described to Craven. The older men--the headmen in particular--more prejudiced still, who, like Mukair Ibn Zarrarah, had centred all their hopes on Omar, were beginning to comprehend that their fears of Saïd's rule were unfounded and that his long sojourn among the hated dominant race had neither impaired his courage nor fostered practices abhorrent to them. Craven watched with interest the gradual establishment of mutual goodwill between the young Sheik and his petty Chiefs. Since his recovery he had attended several of the councils called in consequence of the old Sheik's retirement from active leadership of the tribe, and he had been struck by Saïd's restrained and conciliatory attitude toward his headmen. He had met them half-way, sinking his own inclinations and disarming their suspicions of him. At the same time he had let it be clearly understood that he meant to be absolute as his father had been. In spite of the civilisation that had bitten so deeply he was still too much an Arab, too much the son of Mukair Ibn Zarrarah, to be anything but an autocrat at heart. And his assumption of power had been favourably looked upon by the minor Chiefs. They were used to being ruled by an iron hand and would have despised a weak leader. They had feared the effects of foreign influence, dreaded a régime that might have lessened the prestige of the tribe. Their doubts set at rest they had rallied with enthusiasm round their new Chief.