"Better see to Miss Harding," he said, and passed her and went down to the hall. She turned to see what he was going to do, in an agony of alertness to preserve the decency of the locked study door. But he went across to speak to the policeman, and she hurried after the Kafirs, to get the girl in bed and free herself to deal with the demand for the presence of the doctor.
The Kafir stood with his back to the wall, near the big front door, closer to which was the trooper, always with the revolver in his hand and a manner of watching eagerly for an occasion to use it. Ford went to them, knitting his brows at the spectacle. The prisoner saw him as a slim young man of a not unusual type in a dressing-gown, with short tumbled hair; the policeman, with a more specialized experience, took in the quality of his manner with a rapid glance and stiffened to uprightness. He knew the directness and aloofness that go to the making of that ripe fruit of our civilization, an officer of the army.
"Have n't you searched him for weapons?" demanded Ford.
"No," said the policeman, and added "sir," as an afterthought.
Ford stepped over to the Kafir and passed his hands down his sides and across his breast, feeling for any concealed dangers about his person.
"Nothing," he said. "You can handcuff him if you want to, but there 's no need to keep him with his hands up. It's torture—you hear?"
"Yes, sir," responded the policeman again. "Put them down," he bade his prisoner.
Kamis, with a sigh, lowered his hands, wincing at the stiffness of his cramped arms.
"Thank you," he said to Ford, in a low voice. "I 've had them up—it must be half an hour."
"Well, you 're all right now," responded Ford, with a nod.