"Eighth Hussars, all present!"
"Eleventh Hussars, all present!"
"Thirteenth Hussars, all present!"
"Seventeenth Lancers, all present!"
The first sergeant's arm flashed in a vibrating salute. "Sir," he said, "the brigade is formed."
Potts concentrated on the sergeant; but, aside from blue eyes, a black mustache, and luminous chevrons, the man's appearance remained vague. His uniform had no definite color, except for moments when it blushed a brilliant red, and his headgear expanded and contracted so rapidly that Potts could not be certain whether he wore a shako or a tam.
"Take your post," Potts said. "Men!" he shouted. "We're going to charge at those guns!"
"Oh, Oi say!" wailed a small private with scarcely any features but a mouth. "Them Russians'll murder us!"
"Yours not to reason why," Potts said. "Draw sabers! Charge!"
The ground quaked under the beat of twenty-four hundred hoofs. As the first puffs of smoke billowed from the entrenchments half a league away, Potts remembered that he had forgotten to give orders to the lancers. Should he tell them to couch lances, or lower lances, or aim lances, or—