Martyn, he decreed, then and there, was to live on trains till further orders; was to go back with empty trucks, filling them with starving people as he found them, and dropping them at a famine-camp on the edge of the Eight Districts.  He would pick up supplies and return, and his constables would guard the loaded grain-cars, also picking up people, and would drop them at a camp a hundred miles south.  Scott—­Hawkins was very glad to see Scott again—­would, that same hour, take charge of a convoy of bullock-carts, and would go south, feeding as he went, to yet another famine-camp, far from the rail, where he would leave his starving—­there would be no lack of starving on the route—­and wait for orders by telegraph.  Generally, Scott was in all small things to do what he thought best.

William bit her under lip.  There was no one in the wide world like her one brother, but Martyn’s orders gave him no discretion.  She came out, masked with dust from head to foot, a horse-shoe wrinkle on her forehead, put here by much thinking during the past week, but as self-possessed as ever.  Mrs. Jim—­who should have been Lady Jim, but that no one remembered to call her aright—­took possession of her with a little gasp.

‘Oh, I’m so glad you’re here,’ she almost sobbed.  ’You oughtn’t to, of course, but there—­there isn’t another woman in the place, and we must help each other, you know; and we’ve all the wretched people and the little babies they are selling.’

‘I’ve seen some,’ said William.

’Isn’t it ghastly?  I’ve bought twenty; they’re in our camp; but won’t you have something to eat first?  We’ve more than ten people can do here; and I’ve got a horse for you.  Oh, I’m so glad you’ve come!  You’re a Punjabi too, you know.’

‘Steady, Lizzie,’ said Hawkins, over his shoulder.  ’We’ll look after you, Miss Martyn.  Sorry I can’t ask you to breakfast, Martyn.  You’ll have to eat as you go.  Leave two of your men to help Scott.  These poor devils can’t stand up to load carts.  Saunders’ (this to the engine-driver, half asleep in the cab), ’back down and get those empties away.’  You’ve ‘line clear’ to Anundrapillay; they’ll give you orders north of that.  Scott, load up your carts from that B.P.P. truck, and be off as soon as you can.  The Eurasian in the pink shirt is your interpreter and guide.  You’ll find an apothecary of sorts tied to the yoke of the second wagon.  He’s been trying to bolt; you’ll have to look after him.  Lizzie, drive Miss Martyn to camp, and tell them to send the red horse down here for me.’

Scott, with Faiz Ullah and two policemen, was already busy on the carts, backing them up to the truck and unbolting the sideboards quietly, while the others pitched in the bags of millet and wheat.  Hawkins watched him for as long as it took to fill one cart.

‘That’s a good man,’ he said.  ’If all goes well I shall work him—­hard.’  This was Jim Hawkins’s notion of the highest compliment one human being could pay another.