Not particularly sorry at the other’s absence, he walked on to the end of the little town where the detachment was situated. The place smelled musty and stale as he entered. Papers, old letters, and torn novels lay littered about the local sergeant’s desk. The bed was not made up and various items of kit were strewn around. Everything seemed covered with a thick accumulation of dust.
“Nasty, lazy, slovenly devil,” he growled. “Lord, what a pig-pen! Inspector Purvis’ll happen along down here, unexpected, one of these days. Then there’ll be something doing.”
He passed on through the back door to the stable, where a joyous whinny from “Johnny” greeted him. He led the horse out along with the Sergeant’s and watered them, their greedy thirst drawing a savage curse from him. “Takes d—d good care never to go dry himself,” he muttered.
After grooming Johnny down he went into the kitchen and rummaged around until he found two or three pieces of lump sugar, at the sight of which the horse began to nicker softly and raised its nigh forefoot, bending the limb back for a piece to be inserted into the fetlock-joint, where it was promptly licked out.
He was a superb, powerfully-built black, with white hind fetlocks, standing fully sixteen hands, well ribbed up, with the short back, strong, flat-boned legs, and good, sloping shoulders of the ideal saddle-horse. Benton had had him for over three years and was passionately attached to the animal.
He petted Johnny awhile then, fixing both horses up for the night, he went down to the only restaurant the little town boasted—a Chinese establishment—and got some supper. This despatched, he retraced his steps and mooned around the dirty detachment, where he tried to read; but his thoughts, ever and anon, kept reverting to the little cherubic face of the child on the train, with her hollow-cheeked mother, and he found himself vaguely wondering how far away they were by now.
He looked at his watch. It was about twenty minutes to ten and, feeling inclined for a drink, he strolled down town again and, entering the bar of the Golden West Hotel, ordered a glass of beer.
There were about half a dozen men in the bar who, after gazing awhile at his uniformed figure and seeing he was not the convivial Churchill, eyed him with sullen distrust. His gaze flickered over them casually, but knowing nobody there but the bartender, he kept aloof.
Suddenly, amid the babel of talk, a drunken, nasal voice made itself heard:
“Oh, you Harry! Say, wha’s dat dere wit de yaller laigs?”