as to have a great importance in the life of Ahmed, son of
Rahmut Khan. He rode close beside Sherdil all the way, and when they
halted at roadside serais for rest and refreshment, those two ate
together and squatted or lay side by side. The things of which Sherdil
had spoken at his father's feast had fired Ahmed's imagination. Though
the impressions of his early childhood had become dim, and the people
among whom he had then lived were mere shadows, he remembered that he
was of English birth, and Sherdil's words had stirred within him a
desire to know more about his own people. In the first days of his life
at Shagpur he had sometimes thought of running away, but he soon found
this to be impossible, and of late the desire had quite left him. The
old chief, he knew, had saved his life on that terrible day when his
real father was killed. That was a tie between them which could not
easily be broken. And he had now become so thoroughly imbued with Pathan
ideas and customs that he never thought of any other destiny than that
of Rahmut Khan's successor. But his contact with a man who was actually
in the service of the sahibs had roused within him a curiosity to see
the people to whom he rightly belonged, and he plied Sherdil with
questions about them.

Further, Sherdil's references to great fights in which the corps of
Guides had been engaged appealed strongly to his spirit of adventure,
and he pressed the man to tell him more.

"What was that fight at Multan of which you spoke?" he asked, as they
took their siesta in the hot hours of the next day.

"Ah! the fight of Fatteh Khan," replied Sherdil. "'Tis a brave tale, and
I will tell it thee. 'Twas seven years and more ago. We were in the
trenches before Multan. Lumsden Sahib was absent; there were only three
sahib officers with us. One day a kasid galloped into our camp with news
that a party of the enemy's horse, some twenty strong, had driven off a
herd of camels from their grazing near the camp of General Whish. Fatteh
Khan was our risaldar, and he called to us to mount and follow him to
punish those marauders. We galloped off, no more than seventy, the kasid
going before to show the way. And lo! when we had ridden three miles,
and came to the place he had spoken of, we discovered, not twenty, but
the whole host of the enemy's cavalry, full twelve hundred men. They had
been sent, as we learnt, to cut off a convoy of treasure which was said
to be on the way to our genera