Part 3 (1/2)
”Poggul's no password!” said the sentry ”Neither to et on your feet, and march! Look alive, now! Call h with yer, and see!”
The Rajput chose to consider a retort beneath his dignity He rose, and took one quick look at the horse, which was still breathing
”Your bayonet just there,” he said, ”and press So he will die quickly”
The sentry placed his bayonet-point exactly where directed, and leaned his weight above it The horse gave a little shudder, and lay still
”Poggul!” said the Rajput once again And this time the sentry looked and saw cold steel within three inches of his eye!
”Your rifle!” said the Rajput ”Hand it here!”
And, to save his eyesight, the sentry corinned at him pleasantly
”Now, hands to your sides! Attention! March!” the Rajput ordered, and with his own bayonet at his back the sentry had to march, whether he wanted to or not, by the route that the other chose, toward the guardroom The Rajput seeh the ht He called out, ”Friend!” again as he passed hiined that the real situation was reversed
So, out of a pall of blackness, to the accoht up to the shoulder, a British sentry-feeling and looking precisely like a fool-uardrooe of hiot there, Stanley?”
”Stanley is nized
He stepped up closer, to ut Khan!”
”Aye, Brown sahib! Juggut Khan-with tidings, and a dead gray horse on which to bear them! If this fool could only use his bayonet as he can shoot, I think I would be dead too His brains, though, are all behind his right eye Tie him up, where no little child can come and make him prisoner!”
”Arrest that man!” commanded Brown, and two uard, and stood him between theut Khan, and Brown received it with an ill grace
”How did you get past the other sentry?” he asked
”Oh, easily! You English are only brave; you have no brains Sometimes one part of the rule is broken, but the other never You are not always brave!”
”I suppose you're angry because he killed your horse?”
”I as than that! The ht, since I did not halt for hiry because the standard of rebellion is raised, and because of what it ut Khan?”
”Your honor is pleased to be humorous? No, I am not drunk Nor have I eaten opium I have eaten of the bread of bitterness this day, and drunk of the cup of gall I have seen British officers-good, brave fools, some of whom I knew and loved-killed by the , and a city given over to be looted I have seen white wo mob, and I have seen certain of them shot by their own husbands!”
”Quietly!” ordered Brown ”Don't let the men hear!”
”One of them I slew myself, because her husband, ounded, sent me to her and bade me kill her She died bravely And certain others I have hidden where the mutineers are not likely to discover them at present I ride now for succor-or, I rode, rather, until your expert marksman interfered with me! I now need another horse”
”You mean that the native troops have mutinied?” ”I mean rather more than that, sahib Mohammedans and Hindus are as one, and the crowd is with them This is probably the end of the powder-train, for, from what I heard shouted by the mutineers, almost the whole of India is in revolt already!”
”Why?”