At the beginning of the ride they had passed several vedettes sitting
motionless on their impatient horses. The men had swung their rifles
high in the air in salute as she passed, and once or twice Gaston had
shouted a question as he galloped after her. But for the last hour they
had seen no one. The desert was undulating here, rising and falling in
short, sharp declivities that made a wide outlook impossible.
Gaston spurred to Diana's side. "Will Madame please to turn?" he said
respectfully. "It is late, and it is not safe riding amongst these
slopes. One cannot see what is coming and I am afraid."
"Afraid, Gaston?" she rallied laughingly.
"For you, Madame," he answered gravely.
She reined in The Dancer as she spoke; but it was too late. Even as she
turned her horse's head innumerable Arabs seemed to spring up on all
sides of them. Before she realised what was happening her escort
flashed past and wheeled in behind her, shooting steadily at the horde
of men who poured in upon them, and, with a groan, Gaston seized her
bridle and urged the horses back in the direction from which they had
come. The noise was deafening, the raucous shouting of the Arabs and
the continuous sharp crack of the rifles. Bullets began to whizz past
her.
Gaston tucked his reins under his knee, and with one hand grasping The
Dancer's bridle and his revolver in the other, rode looking back over
his shoulder. Diana, too, glanced behind her, and mechanically her
fingers closed over the shining little weapon that the Sheik had given
her the previous week. She saw with a sudden sickening the six men who
had formed her escort beaten back by the superior numbers that enclosed
them on every side. Already two were down and the rest were on foot,
and, as she watched, they were swallowed up in the mass of men that
poured over them, and, at the same time, a party of about twenty
horsemen detached themselves from the main body and galloped towards
her and Gaston.
She seized his arm. "Can't we do something? Can't we help them? We
can't leave them like that," she gasped, wrenching the revolver from
the holster at her waist.
"No, no, Madame, it is impossible. It is a hundred to six. You must
think of yourself. Go on, Madame. For God's sake, ride on. We may have
a chance." He loosed her bridle and dropped behind her, interposing
himself between her and the pursuing Arabs. A fierce yelling and a hail
of bullets that went wide made Diana turn her head as she crouched low
in the saddle. She realised the meaning of Gaston's tactics and checked
her horse deliberately.