“The young sahib is better?”
“Better?” I replied in a curiously faint voice—“better? Have I been ill?”
“Don’t try to talk. Not ill, sahib—wounded.”
“Oh!” I ejaculated. “Then I was hurt in that charge. Where is Captain Brace?”
“Don’t talk; you are weak. Let me look at your wound.”
As he spoke he laid his hand upon my left arm, but changed his mind, and his hands were busy about my head, which I found now was confined by a bandage.
This being removed, he gave me a little pain by touching one spot just above my temple, which was extremely tender, and then, taking out a pair of scissors, he snipped away a little hair closely; after this he drew a piece of fine white cloth from his pocket, he poured some brown strongly scented fluid from a little flask to moisten it, and laid the little wet patch on my head, with the result that it tingled sharply.
“Hurt?” he said quietly.
“Yes; a little.”
“It will soon go off.”