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Updated: June 2, 2025
"I will see to all that, risaldar. I can assure you that, so far from finding it a trouble to act as a native, I shall really enjoy it; and shall make very light of any hardships that I may have to undergo. When it comes to fighting I am, as you know, a very good shot; and should certainly be able to do my part, with credit."
The Risaldar stood grimly where he was until the last hoof-beat and bump of gun-wheel had died away into the distance; then he turned and climbed the winding stairway to the room where the lamp still shone through gauzy curtains. On a dozen roof-tops, where men lay still and muttered, brown eyes followed the movements of the section and teeth that were betel-stained grinned hideously.
The Risaldar bowed low again. "I would speak with that ayah, heavenborn!" he muttered, almost into his beard. She could hardly catch the words. "I can't get her to speak to me at all tonight, Mahommed Khan. She's terrified almost out of her life at something. But perhaps you can do better. Try. Do you want to question her alone?" "By the heavenborn's favor, yes."
There was something lying on the floor, in the middle of the room, that was bulky and shapeless and unfamiliar. "Ayah!" said Ruth. "Ayah!" But there was no answer. "Where is she, Risaldar?" "She is there, heavenborn!" "Is she asleep?" "Aye! She sleeps deeply!" There was, something in the Rajput's voice that was strange, that hinted at a darker meaning.
"Now, sahib!" The Risaldar broke silence after fifteen minutes. Neither he nor Cunningham were of the type that chatters when the time has come to loosen sabres and sit tight. "In the matter of what lies ahead as I said, neither I nor any man knows what this plan of thine may be, but I and the others have accepted thy bare word.
He was very much attached to your father, and felt his loss as much as anyone. Indeed, I think that every one of the native officers will do all he can for you." "That would make it very easy for me," Lisle said. "Till you suggested it, the idea of going as a soldier never occurred to me but, with their assistance, it will not be difficult." "Shall I go and fetch the risaldar here, sahib?"
The risaldar promised to release me as soon as I should confess: but instead of that he set fire to the straw out of pure villainy, for what could I do to him? I have been a good friend to the English. Sir, pursue that man: he must be a Frenchman. I will give you a quarter, nay, a third of my goods, if you recover them." "That is impossible, Khwaja.
Mahommed Khan closed the door again behind his half-brother and turned the key, but the half-brother shot the bolt home as well before he spoke, then listened intently for a minute with his ear to the keyhole. "Where is the priest's son?" growled the Risaldar, in the Rajput tongue. "I have him. I have the priestling in a sack.
It took them by surprise, and the Risaldar and his half-brother turned and looked. Their breath left them. Framed in the yellow lamplight, her thin, hot-weather garments draped about her like a morning mist, Ruth stood and stared straight back at them through frightened eyes.
A black beard and a turban and the figure of a man and then white teeth and a saber-hilt and eyes that gleamed moved forward from the darkness. "It is I, Mahommed Khan!" boomed the voice again, and the Risaldar stepped out into the lamplight and closed the door behind him. Then, with a courtly, long-discarded sweep of his right arm, he saluted. "At the heavenborn's service!" "Mahommed Khan!
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