“I’ve seen brigadiers before now reduced to a proper sense of their own unimportance!” remarked another man.  And he was connected with the Treasury.  He knew.

But a week later, when the papers were sent to the Brigadier for signature, he amazed everybody by consenting without the least objection.  Nobody but he knew who his visitor had been the night before.

“How did you know about it, Mahommed Gunga?” he demanded, as the veteran sat and faced him over the tent candle, his one lean leg swaying up and down, as usual, above the other.

“Have club servants not got ears, sahib?”

“And you—?”

“I, too, have ears—­good ones!”

The Brigadier drummed his fingers on the table, hesitating.  No officer, however high up in the service, likes to lose even a subaltern from his command when that subaltern is worth his salt.

“Let him go, sahib!  You have seen how we Rangars honor him—­you may guess what difference he might make in a crisis.  Sign, sahib—­let him go!”

“But—­where do you come in?  What have you had to do with this?”

“First, sahib, I tested him thoroughly.  I found him good.  Second, I told tales about him, making him out better than even he is.  Third, I made sure that all those in authority at Peshawur should hate him.  That would have been impossible if he had been a fool, or a weak man, or an incompetent; but any good man can be hated easily.  Fourth, sahib, I sent, by the hand of a man of mine, a message to Everton-sahib at Abu reporting to him that it was not in Howrah as it should be, and warning him that a sahib should be sent there.  I knew that he would listen to a hint from me, and I knew that he had no one in his office whom he could send.  Then, sahib, I brought matters to a head by bringing every man of merit whom I could raise to salute him and make an outrageous exhibition of him.  That is what I have done!”

“One would think you were scheming for a throne, Mahommed Gunga!”

“Nay, sahib, I am scheming for the peace of India!  But there will be war first.”

“I know there will be war,” said the Brigadier.  “I only wish I could make the other sahibs realize it.”

“Will you sign the paper, sahib?”

“Yes, I will sign the paper.  But—­”

“But what, sahib?”

“I’m not quite certain that I’m doing right.”

“Brigadier-sahib, when the hour comes—­and that is soon—­it will be time to answer that!  There lie the papers.”

CHAPTER XIII

Even in darkness lime and sand
Will blend to make up mortar. 
Two by two would equal four
Under a bucket of water.

Now it may seem unimaginable that two Europeans could be cooped in Howrah, not under physical restraint, and yet not able to communicate with any one who could render them assistance.  It was the case, though, and not by any means an isolated case.  The policy of the British Government, once established in India, was and always has been not to occupy an inch of extra territory until compelled by circumstances.