Marching Sands
was not easily tired; but he had been long without food and he stumbled as he ran after the hardy Kirghiz who was afire with the spirit of the chase.
"Allah has given us meat for our pot this night," he whispered to Gray, "if we are clever and the animals do not get wind of us."
Gray understood how important their quest was. Their shadows were 1engthening swiftly on the sand, and the sun, like a red brazier, was settling over the horizon in front of them. If they did not bag a gazelle, they would have no food that night, and—both men were weakened by hunger.
Mirai Khan stalked his prey with the skill of long experience, pushing ahead patiently until the wind blew from the gazelles to them. But darkness falls fast at the edge of the Gobi. The sky had changed from blue to purple when Mirai Khan threw himself in the sand and began to crawl to the summit of a rise, pushing his crotched stick in front of him.
Following, Gray made out the gazelles feeding some hundred and fifty yards in front of them. The light brown and white bodies were barely discernible against the brown plain, but Mirai Khan arranged his stick, and laid the musket on it carefully.
Gray, stretched out beside him, hazarded a guess as to the distance. The hunter touched him warningly.
"Let me have the shot, Excellency," he whis-
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