He tossed the paper towards me and pointed to a chair.
“Sit down!” he said sharply. “Have you had any report from poor Barber?”
In response I handed him the beginning of an official report. I say the beginning, because it consisted of four lines only. It was in Barber's handwriting, and it broke off suddenly in the middle of a word before it began to tell me anything. In its way it was a tragedy. Death had called for Barber while he was wondering how to spell “nauseous.” I also gave him Colonel Simpson's letter, which he read carefully.
“What is it?” he asked suddenly, as he laid the papers aside.
“Officially—I don't know.”
“And unofficially?”
“I am afraid it is cholera.”
The brigadier raised his glass of claret a few inches from the table, but his hand was too unsteady, and he set the glass down again untouched. I was helplessly sorry for him. There was something abject and humiliating in his averted gaze. Beneath his white moustache his lips were twitching nervously.
For a few moments there was silence, and I dreaded his next words. I was trembling for his manhood.
“I suppose something must be done for them,” he said at length, hoarsely, and it was hard to believe that the voice was the voice of our leader—a man dreaded in warfare, respected in peace.