her priests and had
taught him the tenets of the Christian faith--doubtless a high and noble
one since your honour is of it."

[38] Priest.

"He had been taught the Christian doctrines, then?"

"Without doubt, Sahib. Throughout his childhood; in the absence of his
father. And doubtless this aided his foreign blood in making him act
thus foolishly."

"Doubtless," I agreed, with a smile.

"Yea, at the last moment he had put his vengeance from him and behaved
like a weak fool, throwing away the acid, cleaning the bottle and
filling it with pure water. He had intended to give Ibrahim a fright
(and also the opprobrious title of _the Weeper_), to teach him a lesson
and to let him go--provided he swore on the Q'ran never to return to
Mekran Kot when he left for England.... Such a man was my poor brother.
But the hand of Allah intervened and Ibrahim the Weeper lived and died
stone blind.... A strange man that poor brother of mine, strong save
when his foreign blood and foreign religion arose like poison within him
and made him weak.... There was the case of the English Sergeant
Larnce-Ishmeet whom he spared and sent into the English lines in the
little Border War."

"Lance-Sergeant Smith? What regiment?" I asked.

"I know not, Sahib, save that it was a British Infantry Regiment. (He
was not Lance-Sergeant Ishmeet but Sergeant Larnce-Ishmeet.) We ... I
mean ... they ... slew many of a Company that was doing rear-guard and
their officers being slain and many men also, a Sergeant took them off
with great skill. Section by section, from point to point he retired
them, and our ... their ... triumphant joy at the capture and slaughter
of the Company was changed to gnashing of teeth--for we lost many and
the Company retired safely on the main body. But we got the Sergeant,
badly wounded, and my brother would not have him slain. Rather he showed
him much honour and had him borne to Mekran Kot, and when he was healed
he took him to within sight of the outermost Khyber fort and set him
free.... Yet was he not an enemy, Sahib, taken in war? Strange
weaknesses had my poor brother...."

"I knew a Sergeant-Major Lawrence-Smith," I remarked, as light dawned on
me after pondering "Larnce-Ishmeet." "He shot himself at Duri some time
ago."

"He was a brave man," said Mir Daoud Khan. "Peace be upon him."

"And what became of your brother?" I asked, although I knew only too
well--alas!

"He left Mekran Kot when I did, Sahib, for o