‘Hold!’ cried a voice, ‘do not kill him—he is an officer; raise him up and disarm him.’
‘Thou art a prisoner,’ said the officer to Kasim; ‘do not resist—art thou wounded?’
‘My leg is broken,’ said Kasim; ‘kill me, I am not fit to live, I have no desire for life.’
‘Poor fellow!’ said the officer, ‘he is in great pain. Lift him up, some of ye, and take him to my tent; he is evidently an officer, by his dress, and the rich caparisons of his horse.’
‘Yonder lies my leader!’ said Kasim, pointing to the Khan; ‘raise me, and let me look upon him once more. We were friends in life until yesterday—in death we should not have been divided.’
They were touched by his words, and obeyed him. The Khan lay on his face, quite dead. They turned the body: Kasim looked upon the familiar features—they were already sharp and livid; there was a small hole in the forehead, from which a few drops of black blood had oozed; his death had been instant as thought. Kasim heeded not the pain he suffered, he felt as though his heart were bursting; and throwing himself beside the body, wept passionately.
After a while he tried to rise, and they assisted him. ‘That was a gallant soldier!’ he said to the officer; ‘let him be buried as one, by men of my faith.’
‘I will answer for it,’ said a native officer, stepping forward; ‘thou shalt hear this evening that the rites of our faith have been performed over him. If he was an enemy, yet he was a brother in the faith of Islam.’
‘Enough! I thank thee, friend,’ replied Kasim. ‘Now lead on—I care not whether I live or die, since those I lived for are gone from the earth.’
But the officer’s curiosity had been excited by his words and his appearance, which was eminently prepossessing. He was removed gently to his tent, and a bedding laid on the ground. A surgeon, a friend of the officer, was sent for; Kasim’s leg was examined; the thigh was badly fractured above the knee, but the operation was skilfully performed, and in a manner which surprised Kasim. It was bound up, and he was soon in comparative ease. How little he had expected such kindness! And when he contrasted it with what would have been an Englishman’s fate within the Fort, his heart was softened from the bigotry it had previously entertained.