“Oh yes; they’re in full retreat; the town will be empty by daybreak. Oh for light now, to let loose your troop, and the lancers after them.”
“Better let the poor lads rest,” grumbled Danby.
“Is Colonel Vincent there?” said a voice.
“Yes; what is it?” cried my father, striding in the direction of the voice.
“They found the rajah, sir, under quite a heap of slain.”
“Hah!” cried my father, and he hurried away.
It was true enough, as I soon heard. Ny Deen had fallen when trying to make his followers face my father’s charge, and somehow a feeling of bitterness and sorrow came over me, for, in my sight, he was a brave man, and I felt that he was justified in his struggle to cast off his allegiance to our race.
It was as my father had said: the next day the city was emptied of all but the peaceably disposed inhabitants, who made no secret of their delight at the scattering of Ny Deen’s forces. The best homes were taken possession of for our sick and wounded; food was plentiful, and those who had toiled like slaves in the enclosure had found servants enough willing to attend upon them.
For the remnants of the rajah’s forces had gone far away in utter disbandment now their chief was no more, seeking to fight under some other rebel leader, and the tide of war ebbed farther and farther from Nussoor, where the wounded and sick lay in peace and comfort, tended by loving hands.
My father insisted upon Brace being carried to the house we occupied, and my mother and Grace were unremitting in their attention during the next few weeks, in which I rapidly grew stronger, though Brace mended more slowly.