“But sure ’twas the wisest thing he could do!” Eveleen had been bubbling over for some moments with the desire to speak. “Wouldn’t you say the unfortunate old creature was silly? He can do no good for himself or anybody else.”
Colonel Bayard was painfully taken aback. “I didn’t expect this from you, Mrs Ambrose. Is the unhappy Gul Ali to be branded as a fool because unfortunate? His misfortunes all spring from the misdeeds of others.”
“Ah, but do they? Is he able to retain the fidelity of a single supporter, will you tell me? Has he taken one bit of the advice you have given him, or kept any single promise he has made? I grant you he’s unfortunate, but I’d say with all my heart he was incapable as well!”
“A Daniel come to judgment!” said Richard drily.
“And if he ain’t incapable,” pursued Eveleen, rushing on before Colonel Bayard could speak, “he’s treacherous, believe me. As Ambrose says, you don’t know the things he has been doing—stopping the dâks and attacking our boats on the river, besides the army he’s been getting together. And when poor Sir Harry sends word that the army is to be disbanded, all the old horror will do is to say there’s no army to disband.”
“Precisely. How can he disband an army if he hasn’t got one? I grant you that in their childish way the Khans have sought to lead Sir Henry to think they were raising troops, but this was purely make-believe, designed to deter him from attempting decisive measures against them.”
“Then they were finely mistaken in Sir Harry! But believe me, they have been assembling their Arabit hordes for months. We have heard too much of them to doubt that. Ah, don’t let your kind heart set you against the General and all of us who see that unfortunate old deceiver as he really is, and not as you do—an angel with wings a weeshy bit muddy!”
“I have brought this upon myself, I suppose——” with a pique he could not disguise. “But don’t be afraid, ma’am. I value my friends too highly to part company with ’em over a difference of opinion, and I trust they’ll extend the like compliment to me. This last effort to preserve the authority of the Khans and prevent bloodshed I’ll carry through with my whole heart. If it fail, my work here is done. I am merely, as Sir Henry has more than once reminded me, a commissioner under a peace treaty, and if there’s no treaty, I am at liberty to go home.”
“Now why would such a nice man be so unreasonable as all that?” asked Eveleen mournfully as he left them.
“Why, my dear, ain’t all nice people the same, in your estimation?” Richard’s tone tried to be jaunty—not very successfully.