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'Would you have cared for a transfer? said Bullows keenly. Then, laying his hand on Tallantire's shoulder: 'We're all in the same boat; don't desert us. And yet, why the devil should you stay, if you can get another charge? 'It was Orde's, said Tallantire simply. 'Well, it's De's now.
And a moment later Tallantire heard Debendra Nath De, who brotherliwise had followed his kinsman's fortune and hoped for the shadow of his protection as a pleader, whisper in Bengali, 'Better are dried fish at Dacca than drawn swords at Delhi. Brother of mine, these men are devils, as our mother said. And you will always have to ride upon a horse!
'Well, we're all sick here, and I don't think I can horse thirty men; but we're bub bub bub blessed willing. Stop, does this impress you as a trap or a lie? He tossed a scrap of paper to Tallantire, on which was written painfully in crabbed Gurmukhi, 'We cannot hold young horses.
For two hours the bellying sail tacked and blundered up and down the river, Tallantire still clasping Orde in his arms, and Khoda Dad Khan chafing his feet. He spoke now and again of the district and his wife, but, as the end neared, more frequently of the latter. They hoped he did not know that she was even then risking her life in a crazy native boat to regain him.
They will cross in the morning, for they have better boats. Can he live so long? Tallantire shook his head. Yardley-Orde was very near to death. What need to vex his soul with hopes of a meeting that could not be? The river gulped at the banks, brought down a cliff of sand, and snarled the more hungrily.
Soured, old, worn with heat and cold, he waited till he should be entitled to sufficient pension to keep him from starving. 'Tallantire, said he, disregarding Grish Chunder De, 'come outside. I want to speak to you. They withdrew. 'It's this, continued Curbar.
Tallantire drove his spurs into a rampant skewbald stallion with china- blue eyes, and settled himself for the forty-mile ride to Fort Ziar. Knowing his district blindfold, he wasted no time hunting for short cuts, but headed across the richer grazing-ground to the ford where Orde had died and been buried.
After their horse will come the little devil-guns that they can drag up to the tops of the hills, and, for aught I know, to the clouds when we crown the hills. If the tribe-council thinks good, I will go to Tallantire Sahib who loves me and see if I can stave off at least the blockade. Do I speak for the tribe? 'Ay, speak for the tribe in God's name. How those accursed fires wink!
What child's talk is this of Sahibdom after Orde Sahib too! Of a truth the Blind Mullah was right. 'What of him? asked Tallantire uneasily. He mistrusted that old man with his dead eyes and his deadly tongue. 'Nay, now, because of the oath that I sware to Orde Sahib when we watched him die by the river yonder, I will tell.
Tallantire was conscious of no distinct thought till the nose of the dawdling ferry-boat grounded on the farther side, and his horse shied snorting at the white headstone of Orde's grave. Then he uncovered, and shouted that the dead might hear, 'They're out, old man!