[45] Bullock carts.

On the banks of this river stood an ancient walled city of tall houses separated by narrow streets, a city of smells and filth, wherein there were no Sahibs, few Hindus and many Mussulmans.  In a mud-floored miserable mussafarkhana,[46] without its gates, Moussa Isa slept, naked, hungry and very sad—­for he somehow seemed to have missed the sea.  Surely if one kept on due westward always to the setting sun, one reached the sea in time?  The time was growing long, however, and he was among a strange people, few of whom understood the Hindustani he had learnt at Duri.  Luckily they were largely Mussulmans.  Should he abandon the setting sun and take to the river, following it until it reached the sea?  He could take ship then for Africa by creeping aboard in the darkness, and hiding himself until the ship had started....  There might be no city at the mouth of the river when he got there.  It might never reach the sea.  It might just vanish into some desert like the Webi-Shebeyli in Somaliland.  No, he would keep on toward the West, crossing the great bridge in the morning.  He did so, and turned aside to admire the railway-station of the Cantonment on the other side of the river, to get a drink, and to see a train come in, if happily such might occur.

  [46] Poor travellers’ rest-house.

Ere he had finished rinsing his mouth and bathing his feet at the public water-standard on the platform, the whistle of a distant train charmed his ears and he sat him down, delighted, to enjoy the sights and sounds, the stir and bustle, of its arrival and departure.  And so it came about that certain passengers by this North West Frontier train were not a little intrigued to notice a small and very black boy suddenly arise from beside the drinking-fountain and, with a strange hoarse scream, fling himself at the feet of a young Englishman (who in Norfolk jacket and white flannel trousers strolled up and down outside the first-class carriage in which he was travelling to Kot Ghazi from Karachi), and with every sign of the wildest excitement and joy embrace and kiss his boots....

Moussa Isa was convinced that he had gone mad and that his eyes and brain were playing him tricks.

Mr. John Robin Ross-Ellison (also Mir Ilderim Dost Mahommed Mir Hafiz Ullah Khan when in other dress and other places) was likewise more than a little surprised—­and certainly a little moved, at the sight of Moussa Isa and his wild demonstrations of uncontrollable joy.

“Well, I’m damned!” said he in the role of Mr. John Robin Ross-Ellison.  “Rum little devil.  Fancy your turning up here.”  And in the role of Mir Ilderim Dost Mahommed Mir Hafiz Ullah Khan added in debased Arabic:  “Take this money, little dog, and buy thee a tikkut to Kot Ghazi.  Get into this train, and at Kot Ghazi follow me to a house.”

To the house Moussa Isa followed him and to the end of his life likewise, visiting en route Mekran Kot, among other places, and encountering one, Ilderim the Weeper, among other people (as was told to Major Michael Malet-Marsac by Ross-Ellison’s half-brother, the Subedar-Major.)