Golden Blood by Jack Williamson Read Free Book Online

were lacking. The ubiquitous desert insects, ants, spiders, scorpions, were rare. The rakham, the black-winged vultures that had followed ominously from the mountains, had long since deserted.
    It was late afternoon, and the long caravan was winding across one of the ever more frequent red-sand strips, into the selected camping-place for the night, when Price saw the white dromedary.
    A magnificent, pure-white animal, resembling the Unamiya camels which the El Murra breed in the borders of the Rub’ Al Khali, it stood upon a bare red dune two miles off the track. Its rider, a slim, white-clad figure, appeared to be watching the caravan.
    Price fumbled quickly for his binoculars, but he had hardly focussed them when the unknown rider vanished silently beyond the red dune.
    At the moment Price, as the expedition’s leader, was busy with the old sheikh, settling one of the difficulties that had risen as a result of the Arabs’ thievish dispositions and the frayed nerves of the whites. Mawson, a little Cockney machine-gunner, had attacked the Arab Hamed with his fists, accusing him of stealing a gold watch and other trinkets from his pockets, while he slept. Hamed, unable to deny possession of the articles in question, swore that he had found them on the ground, after camp was broken that morning, producing perjured witnesses to substantiate his story.
    A routine affair, but one that required diplomatic settling to maintain the harmonious discipline of the expedition. The tents were already up, on a sand-rimmed plane of shale, before the case was finally adjusted, Mawson’s valuables being returned, and Hamed dismissed with a warning.
    Only then did Jacob Garth inform Price that he had sent three Arabs in pursuit of the lone rider they had seen.
    “Don’t want our arrival broadcast,” the big man said. “Promised the men they could divide the spoil.”
    The three Bedouins had already returned with the white dromedary, which was a priceless animal, and its rider. The captive was a woman.
    “She’s something of a beauty,” Garth added. “Don’t blame de Castro for wanting her.”
    “What have they done with her?” asked Price.
    “The three divided their loot into three shares, and distributed them by lot. Kanja won the girl. He felt rather cheated, because Nur got the camel, which is much more valuable. Alie’s share was her outfit: saddle and her clothing and a long golden knife—a sort of straight jambiyah.
    “Kanja wasn’t especially pleased with his share of the spoil. But de Castro saw the woman, while they were dividing up. It seems she struck his fancy; he gave Kanja his binoculars for her. Must have been hit hard—you know how he prized those glasses.”
    “Where is she now?”
    “Joao has her tied in his tent.”
    “Look here!” cried Price. “We can’t tolerate anything like that!”
    It was Price’s nature to sympathize with the under-dog, with any one mistreated or imposed upon or oppressed merely because some one else was stronger. Jacob Garth’s account of the bound girl roused a dull anger in him. And because Price Durand was essentially a man of action, that resentment was to find physical expression.
    “We’re a long way,” Garth observed placidly, “from the white man’s law.” The pale eyes, the broad, suave, white face, held no feeling.
    “But we’re still white men!” Price insisted, hotly. Then, realizing that the other was unimpressed, he sought for arguments. “And even with honor and decency aside, it’s an unwise way to treat the first citizen of this country that we meet.”
    “She can’t be a very important citizen,” Garth opposed, “or she wouldn’t be out here alone, half dead for a drink.”
    “Anyhow, if we treated her fairly, she might be able to give us valuable information.”
    “She’s going to,” the huge man said calmly. “Just now she’s in a huff, and doesn’t want to talk. But Joao de Castro is an artist at coaxing reluctant