e 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.)

CHAPTER III.

THE WOMAN.

(And Augustus Grabble; General Murger; Sergeant-Major Lawrence-Smith;
Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Gosling-Green; Mr. Horace Faggit; as well as a
reformed JOHN ROBIN ROSS-ELLISON.)

Sec. 1. MR. GROBBLE.

There was something very maidenly about the appearance of Augustus
Clarence Percy Marmaduke Grobble. One could not imagine him doing
anything unfashionable, perspiry, rough or rude; nor could o