He came down and ate supper with us at a trestle table in the dimly lighted dining-room, and I encouraged his new-born optimism by ordering two bottles of whisky to take upstairs.  Jeremy, who can’t be happy unless playing his part for all it’s worth, became devoutly religious and made a tremendous fuss because ham was put on the table.  He accused the proprietor of using pig’s fat to smear all the cooking utensils, demanded to see the kitchen, and finally refused to eat anything but leban, which is a sort of curds.  If Yussuf Dakmar had entertained suspicions of Jeremy’s real nationality they were all resolved by the time that meal was finished.

But the five’ men who had followed us from the station sat in the dark at a table in the far corner of the room and watched every move we made.  When the coffee was brought I sat smoking and surly over it, as if my head ached from the day’s drink; Grim and Jeremy, aching for sleep but refusing like good artists to neglect a detail of their part, went to another table and played backgammon, betting quarrelsomely; and at last one of the five men walked over and touched Yussuf Dakmar’s shoulder.  At once he followed all five of them out of the room, whereat Grim and Jeremy promptly went to bed.  It was so obviously my turn to stay awake that Grim didn’t even trouble to remind me of it.

So I took the whisky upstairs, noticed that Narayan Singh was missing from the couch where he had gone to sleep, although the fox-terrier was snoring so loud in his blankets that I had to look twice in the dim light.  I mentioned that fact to Grim who merely smiled as he got between the sheets.  Then I went down to the street to get exercise and fresh air.  I didn’t go far, but strode up and down in front of the hotel a quarter of a mile or so in each direction, keeping in the middle of the street.

I had made the fourth or fifth turn when Narayan Singh came out and accosted me under the lamplight.

“Pardon,” he called aloud in English, “does the sahib know where I can find a druggist’s open at this hour?  I have a toothache and need medicine.”

“Come and I’ll show you a place,” said I with the patronizing air of a tourist showing off his knowledge, and we strode along together down the street, he holding one hand to his jaw.

“Thus and so it happened, sahib,” he began as soon as we had gone a safe distance.  “I lay sleeping, having kept my belly empty that I might wake easily.  There came Yussuf Dakmar and five men brushing by me, and they all went into a room four doors beyond the sahib’s.  The room next beyond that one is occupied by an officer sahib, who fought at El-Arish alongside my battalion.  Between him and me is a certain understanding based on past happenings in which we both had a hand.  He is not as some other sahibs, but a man who opens both ears and his heart, and when I knocked on his door he opened it and recognized me.