Moussa Isa, five minutes later....

Moussa Isa never boasted (if he realized the fact) that the collapse of
the revolt and mutiny in Gungapur, before the arrival of troops, was due
as much to the death of its chief ringleader and director, the blind
faquir, as to the disastrous repulse of the great assault upon the
Military Prison.

Sec. 2.

It had gone. Nothing remained but to clear up the mess and begin afresh
with more wisdom and sounder policy. It was over, and, among other
things now possible, Colonel John Robin Ross-Ellison might ask the woman
he loved whether she could some day become his wife. He had saved her
life, watched over her, served her with mind and body, lived for her.
And she had smiled upon him, looked at him as a woman looks at the man
she more than likes, had given him the encouragement of her smiles, her
trust, affectionate greeting on return from danger, prayers that he
would be "careful" when he went forth to danger.

He believed that she loved him, and would, after a decent interval, even
perhaps a year hence, marry him.

And then he would abandon the old life and ways, become wholly English
and settle down to make her life a happy walk through an enchanted
valley. He would take her to England and there, far from all sights,
sounds and smells of the East, far from everything wild, turbulent,
violent, crush out all the Pathan instincts so terribly aroused and
developed during the late glorious time of War. He would take himself
cruelly in hand. He would neither hunt nor shoot. He would eat no meat,
drink no alcohol, nor seek excitement. He would school himself until he
was a quiet, domesticated English country-gentleman--respectable and
respected, fit husband for a delicately-bred English gentlewoman. And if
ever his hand itched for the knife-hilt, his finger for the trigger,
his cheek for the rifle-butt, his nostrils for the smell of the
cooking-fires, his soul for the wild mountain passes, the mad gallop,
the stealthy stalk--he would live on cold water until the Old Adam were
drowned.

He _would_ be worthy of her--and she should never dream what blood was
on his hands, what sights he had looked on, what deeds he had done, what
part he had played in wild undertakings in wild places. English would he
be to the back-bone, to the finger tips, to the marrow; a quiet, clean,
straight-dealing Englishman of normal tastes, habits, and life.

Strange if, with all his love of fighting,