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steeper ascent toward the pass.
    He waited until they were long out of view and then carefully followed them up the trail. They would not be turning back, and there was little to fear.
    Hours later, with the first light of dawn, he came to a fork in a deep ravine. There, hidden in a cleft in the rocks, he made camp, eating some of the dried meats and dates he carried in his cloak. Before lying down to rest on the cold stone, he turned in the direction of Mecca and recited reverently the first words he had heard as a Moslem child:
La ilaha illa-’llah: Muham-madum rasulu-’llah
. “No God but Allah: Mohammed is the messenger of Allah.”
    He pulled his woolen blanket around him and lay down on the coldness. He tried to find sleep as he would have done at home, but he could not put his mind to rest. What was he doing here? He knew nothing of the mountains. But Khaldun had insisted Rashid join the raid. “A good tracker must know the mountains,” he had told him. It was all part of his training. And now he had been abandoned in enemy territory without a horse or rifle. Rashid could not understand it.
    His were an ancient people, with tribal bloodlines going back over five thousand years of nomadic life.They were known for their loyalty and legendary tracking skills. There was no other way to survive in the land of the Rub‘ al Khali. It was on the edges of that great desert that his people migrated with their beloved camels and goats and sheep.
    When he was very young, his father had sent him out with a scouting party and he had found his love for tracking in the search for water and pasture. Soon he could look at a hoofprint and know what kind of horse or camel or goat it was and when it had passed. His reputation spread throughout the desert country, and it was the tribal chieftain Ibn al Khaldun who had claimed him for one of his own trackers. With the extra money, Rashid had been able to buy a camel for himself.
    That was why he was here, all because Ibn al Khaldun had wanted the black colt so desperately that he was willing to make raids, if not war, on Abu Já Kub ben Ishak. Now the black colt was dead, dead like the old man who had defended him.
    Why, oh why, in the name of Allah, had the old man screamed?
    To die for the sake of a horse, any horse, was insane. The scout’s dark, sensitive face became twisted in a deep scowl, for horses had played no part in his life. There had been none in his family tribe, for horses were not essential to their existence.
    Horses were owned by chieftains of great wealth, those who could provide them with sufficient feed and grass throughout the year, all from a land that provided little. Horses were ridden for pleasure and racing—and raids, of course, but his tribe took no part in suchactivities. Rashid had learned to ride while scouting the desert on horses Khaldun provided for his men. But he had never even dreamed of owning his own horse.
    He was not impressed by the beauty and grace of horses. It was the homely, awkward camel that had provided him and his family with transportation, food and companionship. It was from the humble sheep and goats that they got their wool and milk.
    Horses were only for those who could afford to watch and glow in their swiftness and beauty. And yet he wished he had one now. He was tired, very tired, and his bare feet burned as they never had from walking in the desert sand.
    The dry, cold air of the high mountains gradually leached out his fear of Abu Já Kub ben Ishak. The wind softened, coddled him and pulled his eyelids down, smothering him into sleep.

T HE C AT
5
    When Rashid awoke, the sun was already beginning to sink beneath the western peaks. Twigs clung to the wisp of a beard that trimmed his oval-shaped face. His hair was thick with wind-blown sand. He emerged from the cleft in the rocks, where he had slept on a rocky shelf wedged behind an enormous boulder. Stretching to get some of the stiffness out of his body, he dusted off his