It is in vain that Teuns tries to sleep that night. He is much too tense, and his body position is hopelessly too uncomfortable. They have tied his hands and feet so tightly that he can scarcely move. He has to stay in this one position. Therefore, he cannot even turn around on the hard sand to change his position. For that reason, he is glad when the dawn breaks.
When he sees the first light, he lies and waits on the arrival of the Berbers. He is waiting for the moment they will put him in front of an impossible choice, helping them with this dangerous weapon or losing his limbs, one after the other. While waiting for the day’s arrival, he contemplates the Arab’s seeming inability to master the simple mechanism. When a firing object looks a little different from another, they cannot figu
