“Or the way you have come,” came the answer from more than one voice. But the man on the camel said nothing, perhaps because he did not understand—or as a freeborn mountaineer, did not choose to understand—the language of servants—of slaves. But he did not look friendly. Things were at a decided deadlock.
There was just barely room to pass, but only then by floundering up the most rugged part of the dry watercourse. But Varne Coates, Commissioner of Baghnagar, and temporarily quartered on leave at the frontier station of Mazaran for the purposes chiefly of markhôr stalking, was temperamentally a peppery man, and traditionally entirely opposed to the idea of giving way to natives whoever they might be. And it looked uncommonly as though he would have to do so now.
“Here, Gholam Ali,” he called back over his shoulder to the syce. “You talk to these people. They don’t seem to understand me.”
The man came forward, and Helston was not slow to notice that his tones, as he talked, were respectful, not to say deferential. The face of the camel rider the while was that of a mask. He uttered a few laconic words in a deep toned voice, and in Pushtu.
“Hazûr, it is a sirdar of the Gularzai,” translated the syce, “His name Allah-din Khan. He does not know the Hazûr, and this is his country. Hazûr, he says, does not belong to the Sirkar here (the Government, or administration), but is a stranger. Further down the tangi is a wide space where all can pass one another. ‘Let those who come up then make way for those who come down.’ Those are the words of the sirdar.”
Here was an impasse. Helston Varne noticed on his kinsman’s face a sort of apoplectic tendency to grow purple. He realised that the situation was critical—very. He noticed likewise that the expression on the faces of the opposite party was one of scowling determination, but he further noticed that there was nothing insolent or provocative in it. This seemed to save the situation. His keen brain saw a way out. It was rather a funny one, but it might answer.
“See now, Gholam Ali,” he said, in Hindustani, of which he had a thorough knowledge. “When we sportsmen have a difference we throw up a coin, and decide according to choice whether the King’s head is uppermost or not. The Gularzai are sportsmen like ourselves. So we can toss up for who shall give way.”
He produced a rupee, and watched the face of the chief while this was put to him. The latter gave a slight nod, and said a word or two to his followers. They crowded forward.
“What does the sirdar say?” went on Helston. “The King’s head or the other side?”
“The King’s head,” was the answer.