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This arrangement being agreed to by Sheikh Faiz Ulla, he sent me word that, in order that he might not appear to betray his master, it would be necessary for me next morning to open the fiercest fire possible on his camp; that he would reply; that on both sides it should be with the intention of doing as little hurt as possible; that I should pretend it was to force him to give me a passport, which he would send me in the evening; and that I should then send him the money I had promised.
The heat from the thick brick walls struck him across the face as if it had been a hot towel; and he reflected that there were at least five nights and four days of this travel before him. Faiz Ullah, used to the chances of service, plunged into the crowd on the stone platform, while Scott, a black cheroot between his teeth, waited till his compartment should be set away.
Having no more ammunition, Faiz Talab hugged his wall closer than a limpet, and noticed with growing satisfaction that ammunition was running out all along the line. On the other hand, as an inquisitive neighbour, with two bullets in his puggery, pointed out, the English were advancing very quickly, apparently with plenty of ammunition, and were just at that moment fixing bayonets.
Thou and I, O brother, will thus secure the servants' places close by; and because of our masters' authority none will dare to disturb us." When Faiz Ullah reported all things ready, Scott settled down at full length, coatless and bootless, on the broad leather-covered bunk. The heat under the iron-arched roof of the station might have been anything over a hundred degrees.
A moment later I learned that Sheikh Faiz Ulla was on the opposite bank with his army and his artillery, that he intended to wait for me in a narrow place called Choquova, at the foot of which my boats must pass, and that he was diligently making entrenchments there. My embarrassment was then extreme.
'But I am no goatherd, said Faiz Ullah. 'When we cross the Bias River again we will talk of izzat, Scott replied. 'Till that day thou and the policemen shall be sweepers to the camp, if I give the order. 'Thus, then, it is done, grunted Faiz Ullah, 'if the Sahib will have it so'; and he showed how a goat should be milked, while Scott stood over him.
But when Faiz Ullah brought him a drink, he found it necessary to support one hand with the other, or the good whisky and soda would have been spilled abroad. There are fevers and fevers. But it was worse much worse the strained, eye-shirking talk at dinner till the servants had withdrawn, and worst of all when Mrs.
"I can't come into camp in this state. I won't," he replied pettishly. "Well, you are rather a sight, but from what I gathered there it seemed to me they'd be glad to see you under any conditions. I'll look over your work here, if you like, for a couple of days, and you can pull yourself together while Faiz Ullah feeds you up."
The Madrassee telegraph-clerk did not approve of a large, gaunt man falling over him in a dead faint, not so much because of the weight as because of the names and blows that Faiz Ullah dealt him when he found the body rolled under a bench.
An hour later Scott was under way; the apothecary threatening him with the penalties of the law for that he, a member of the Subordinate Medical Department, had been coerced and bound against his will and all laws governing the liberty of the subject; the pink-shirted Eurasian begging leave to see his mother, who happened to be dying some three miles away: "Only verree, verree short leave of absence, and will presently return, sar "; the two constables, armed with staves, bringing up the rear; and Faiz Ullah, a Mohammedan's contempt for all Hindoos and foreigners in every line of his face, explaining to the drivers that though Scott Sahib was a man to be feared on all fours, he, Faiz Ullah, was Authority Itself.
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