Talbot Mundy

“ As he finished cleaning his rifle, and laid it across his knees with the sort of affectionate slap a man bestows on a dog or a horse, he looked at least as worthy to be dealt with as any of those diplomatists who play the international game with marked cards. ”

“ I have made the prince's life my personal affair.”
“I have heard words. They are principally wind, smelling of onions,” said the Hillman.
He was well aware that we would not sit there offering him terms, if there had been any easier or less expensive course open to the Government just then, only business acumen prevented him from insulting the Sikh beyond recall, and even that element of self-control was weakening, as the Sikh had foreseen. He prodded if further. “The truth is, you are afraid to refuse Ali Babul,” he asserted, with an air of absolute conviction. ”

“ They like big men where he came from, and I wore a beard at that time, which was another point in my favor. However, King took up the argument—since argument there must be in the North, whatever else happens.
“The tale is this,” he said, leaning for ward to knock the ashes out of his pipe; and with his dark skin and Roman nose he looked in the firelight like one of Julius Cæsar's men, “that you, Kangra Khan, are planning a raid while the prince is in this part of India; and that I am told off to prevent you.” ”

“ King suggested meaningly. “There is cavalry and infantry to right and left of us; and guns at the rear.”
“Aye, but this is women's talk. I know the chances,” Kangra Khan answered.
“Talk like a man then!” growled Narayan Singh.
It seemed to me that that was what the Hillman had done, but the Sikh knew what he was doing.
“Meet me across the border, and I will show thee how a man fights!” the other retorted.
Narayan Singh was about to answer, but Grim interrupted him.
“None will talk if the time for fighting comes. Talk like a man first,” he advised him, and Kangra Khan nodded. ”

“ He did that, but remained standing with his back to ward the river, so I motioned him toward a chair on the other side of the fire, between Grim and me.
“By Allah,” he answered, opening a great gap of a grin in the midst of his black beard, “if my men should lose sight of me I might die with you, and I have business elsewhere! It is not so easy aiming in the dark.”
So I set the chair where his men could see him in the firelight; and the first thing he demanded when he sat down—awkwardly, unused to canvas chairs—was a rag and some oil for his wet rifle. ”

“ That was absolutely true, and also plenty, since whatever we had said our real business was they would not have believed us. “We have a proposal that will interest Kangra Khan. If he will come to us here, with no more than a two-man escort we will guarantee his personal safety.”
They believed the last implicitly. That part of the game has always been played straight by the men who hold the border line, and generally, too, by the wind-weaned rascals whose profitable sport it is to violate line, life, women and most promises when ever possible. ”

“ You carry unexpected overloads at your own expense and [meet?] with no more reward than any decent fellow gets, who likes not to grudge the gift of manliness and muscle.
So Athelstan King, James Schuyler Grim and I—an Englishman and two Americans—with Narayan Singh, who is a Sikh and was a sepoy once, were under canvas by the left bank of Jhelum River, swatting flies, smoking more than was wholesome, and wishing the prince were in care of Scotland Yard. ”

“ Even in broad daylight that is no safe border for a solitary horse man, whose equipment is worth powder and shot; belated prowlers lie up until the next night affords opportunity to sneak back with their plunder to the hills, and in their eyes it is sin and shame to overlook a chance that Allah sends. ”

“ Undesirables get short shrift, with apologies in the proper quarter later on—if called for. Men whose courses up and down the earth will bear investigation find surprizing details forced on them, without much explanation and no insurance. ”