“Oh, they’d be all right, sir.”
“Would they?”
“I say, Doctor, don’t talk like that. You don’t think that we have anything to fear?”
“I don’t know.—Well, fear? No, I suppose I mustn’t mention such a thing as fear; but we are hundreds of miles away from Singapore and help.”
“Oh no, sir. There’s the river. It wouldn’t take long for the gunboat to bring up reinforcements and supplies; and then, even if Mr Sultan Suleiman turned against us—which isn’t likely—”
“I don’t know,” growled the Doctor.
“Well, sir, I think I do,” said Archie, rather importantly. “Why, if he did, there’s our friend the Rajah Hamet. He would be on our side.”
“Ah, that I don’t know,” said the Doctor again; and he tapped the table with his nails. “This is all in confidence, boy. I don’t think Sir Charles has much faith in that young gentleman. But still, that’s the way that our Government worked things in India.”
“I don’t quite understand you.”
“Read up your history, then, my boy. Our position in India has been made by the jealousies of the different princes and our political folks working them one against another. But there, you didn’t come here to chatter politics. What is it? You have got something more to say to me, haven’t you?”