158 THE EMPTY QUARTER

and he had already deflected Ms course at right angles. I
almost wanted to camp where we were and leave the ruins
till the morrow, but 1 yielded to their pressure and we
marched in the direction indicated by the disgruntled chief
guide. For a while lie rode silently by my side, having first
ascertained the cause of my displeasure. I was not certain
of the position, he tried furtively, and I did not want to lead
you Mther and thither over these sands. So you left us
without a guide at all, I replied, to wander at our own sweet
will! I told Zayid the direction to follow, he urged, and there
were no Mils or valleys in the way for me to name to you. It
was all Sa'afij and Tara'iz. Yet you should not have gone
without a word to me, I insisted, thinking nowr more of what
lay before us than of his conduct.

Look you, Shaikh 'Abdullah, he went on hoping I had
relented, I have found the castles. They are over yonder.
We shall see them soon. And I give you good news—I have
never seen so much of them exposed before. Often the sand
buries them entirely, and I knew not till I saw them that we
should see them at all. And look! he went on, I have brought
a stone of one of the buildings to show you. From under his
mantle, with an air of mystery, he produced a squarish block
of vitreous blue-black slag as of a furnace 1