To all this Bandar listened in silence, lounging insolently, his elbows on his knees. Then he smiled, his good eye gleaming, his teeth shining under the sparse black moustache he had recently grown.

“Tatahattim! You cringe like a Hutaymi!” Bandar sneered.

Youssef’s head snapped back as if he had been struck. His eyes burned into Bandar as he stood there rigidly, trying to control his anger. Then all at once he broke. With an anguished cry he grabbed a handful of gold coins from the sack he had brought with him as a down payment and flung them into the sand at Bandar’s feet.

They all sprang up, appalled. It was a terrible insult.

Bandar’s face burned. His good eye rolled in its socket. He looked insane. With a savage growl he leaped upon Youssef, pummeling him to the ground. Zaid and Faraj were stunned. For one Bedu to strike another was an inconceivable sin.

Suddenly the Scorpion was between Bandar and the fallen Youssef. His riding crop slashed at Bandar’s face, ripping his cheek open. Bandar staggered back, his hand pressed against the bleeding gash. Howling like a wolf, Bandar tore his khanjar dagger from his sheath and advanced upon the Scorpion. Nick’s khanjar was already in his hand.

“Enough!” Zaid cried, leaping between them. For an endless moment they held their positions, like figures in an ancient tableau.

“No more!” Zaid cried hoarsely. “Or there will be a blood feud that will tear this tribe apart.”

“Kafir dog, this is not over,” Bandar hissed, sheathing his khanjar.

The Scorpion smiled. It was not a pretty smile.

That night it was decided to send Bandar to the Royal Army. It was hoped that the discipline he would learn there would teach him how to behave. It was also necessary to separate him from Zaid’s sons. As for Aisha, nothing could be done. She too would be sent away—to a girl’s school in Riyadh.

“Bandar has turned out like some fancy rifle, all fine inlay and gleaming stock, but which proves not to shoot straight and true,” Sheikh Zaid declared sadly. They sat on the rug in a circle, sipping coffee served by Iffat from the old coffee pot. The electric lamps gave off a smoky yellow light. Insects beat against the window screens like rain.

“How could you have struck your cousin?” Zaid asked Nick at last. For a moment the veiled woman, grown immensely fat, glanced compassionately at the young man, then she waddled discreetly out of the room. Nick glanced after her. She was growing old, he told himself sadly.

“You know the saying: ‘I and my cousins against the world, I and my brothers against my cousins, I against my brothers.’ How could I not? Youssef is my brother,” Nick replied in a quiet voice.