"Thanks. We may round up some of the survivors."
"I say, Major, would you tell us a thing that's puzzled me, and I daresay more than me?" ventured a young assistant manager, voicing the thoughts of others present. "How the deuce did those wild elephants happen to turn up just in the nick of time for you?"
"They were probably close by and the firing disturbed them," was the careless answer.
"H'm; very curious, wasn't it, Major?" said Granger. "You know the habits of the jungli hathi better than most other people. Wouldn't they be far more likely to run away from the firing than right into it?"
"As a rule. But when wild elephants stampede in a panic they'll go through anything."
The assistant manager was persistent.
"But how did your elephant chance to join up with them?" he asked. "Judging by the look of him he took a very prominent part in clearing your enemies off."
"Oh, Badshah is a fighter. I daresay if there was a scrap anywhere near him he'd like to be in it," replied Dermot lightly, and tried to change the conversation.
But the others insisted on keeping to the subject. They had all been curious as to the truth of the stories about Dermot's supposed miraculous power over wild elephants, but no one had ever ventured to question him on the subject before.
"I suppose you know, Major, that the natives have some wonderful tales about Badshah?" said a planter.