When I awoke it was already midday.  We had halted near some trees and food was being served out.  I got under the cart to keep the sun off me, and lay there musing until a trooper had brought my meal.  The meal was good, and my thoughts were good—­excellent!  For had we not been a little troop of lean ghosts, looking for graves to lie in?  The talk along the way had been of who should bury us, or who should bury the last man, supposing we all died one by one!  Had we not been famished until the very wind was a wall too heavy to prevail against?  And were we not now what the drill-book calls a composite force, with full bellies, carts, horses and equipment?  Who thought about graves any longer?  I lay and laughed, sahib, until a trooper brought me dinner—­laughed for contempt of the Germans we had left behind, and for the Turks whose plunder we had stolen,—­ laughed like a fool, like a man without brain or experience or judgment.

Not until I had eaten my fill did I bethink me of Ranjoor Singh.  Then I rose lazily, and was astonished at the stiffness in my ankles.  Nevertheless I contrived to stride with military manner, in order that any Turk or Syrian beholding me might know me for a man to be reckoned with, the added pain and effort being well worth while.

Nor did I have far to look for Ranjoor Singh.  The instant I raised my eyes I saw him sitting on a great rock beneath the shadow of a tree, with his horse tied below him eating corn from a cloth spread on the ground.  In order to reach him with least inconvenience, I made a circuit and approached from the rear, because in that direction the rock sloped away gradually and I was in no mood to climb, nor in condition to climb with dignity.

So it happened that I came on him unaware.  Nevertheless, I was surprised that his ears should not detect my footfall.  The horse, six feet below us, was aware of me first and snorted, yet Ranjoor Singh did not turn his head.

“Sahib!” said I; but he did not move.

“Sahib!” I said, going a step nearer and speaking louder.  But he neither moved nor answered.  Now I knew there was no laughing matter, and my hand trembled as I held it out to touch his shoulder.  His arms were folded above his knees and his chin rested on them.  I shook him slightly, and his chin fell down between his knees; but he did not answer.  Now I knew beyond doubt he was not asleep, for however weary he would ever awake at a touch or the lightest whisper.  I began to fear he was dead, and a feeling of sickness swept over me as that grim fear took hold.

“Sahib!” I said again, taking his shoulders with both hands.  And he toppled over toward me, thus, like a dead man.  Yet he breathed.  I made certain he was breathing.

I shook him twice or thrice, with no result.  Then I took him in my arms, thus, one arm under the knees and one under his armpits, and lifted him.  He is a heavy man, all bone and sinew, and my stiff ankles caused me agony; but I contrived to lay him gently full length in the shadow of the tree-trunk, and then I covered him with his overcoat, to keep away flies.  I had scarcely finished that when Gooja Singh came, and I cursed under my breath; but openly I appeared pleased to see him.