Desmond laughed.
"Likely as not! I'm off for Mackay all the same. Get into my chair and stay there till further orders. Don't bother your head about that letter. It shan't miss the mail. I'll write it myself to-night."
An invisible reminder from the doorway that the Heaven-born's bath had long been waiting, elicited a peremptory order for the Demon; and Amar Singh departed, mystified but obedient. The Sahib he worshipped, with the implicit worship of his race, was a very perplexing person at times.
James Mackay's verdict—given well out of the patient's hearing—was immediate and to the point.
"Typhoid, of course—104°. Fool of a boy not to have sent for me sooner. Ought to have been in bed two days ago. Get him there sharp, and do what you can with wet sheets and compresses. I'll wire for a nurse, but we shan't get one. Never do. Not a ounce of ice in the place, and won't be for three days. That's always the way. He'll keep you on the go all night by the looks of him. May as well let the Major do most of it. You'd be none the worse for a few hours in bed yourself."
A certain lift of Desmond's head signified tacit denial, and the astute Scotsman knew better than to insist. Meeting Wyndham at the gate, he counselled a policy of non-resistance.
"The fellow's overdone without knowing it," he said. "Take my advice, man, and let him gang his ain gait. Fever or no, he's hard as nails, and he'll be glad enough to knock under in twenty-four hours' time."
Throughout that night of anxious battling with the fire of fever the two Englishmen seemed translated into mechanical contrivances for the administering of milk, brandy, and chicken-broth; for the incessant changing of soaked sheets, that were none too cool at best; and for allaying, as far as might be, a thirst that no water on earth can quench.