“A steamer’s whistle?” in astonishment.
“Precisely, sir—the whistle of the Nebula, no less, with the Light Company of Her Majesty’s —th on board, sent off post-haste by Sir Henry, as soon as he saw things were getting risky here.”
“A welcome reinforcement, indeed!” said Colonel Bayard heartily. “We must see that the news gets to the Khans at once. They will find it easy enough to restrain the Arabits now. But how did you hear of this, captain?”
“Why, sir, finding the river so low, Captain Warner was afraid of running aground in the dark, so he sent his mate and two men in the dinghy to find us and see where the channels were, and I sent my mate back to pilot ’em in.”
“Well done. We must get ’em ashore at once—make a regular tamasha of it, so that the spies in the bazar may take exaggerated reports to the Fort. This is an enormous relief to my mind.”
“And incidentally to mine,” remarked Richard to Brian, as Colonel Bayard handed Eveleen up the gangway to the deck, whither Captain Franks preceded them to receive her properly. “Has it struck you that we three become civilians from the moment Montgomery and his fellows arrive?”
“D’ye tell me that? Ah, I see it! The Colonel is a mere Political, you and I nothing but Staff—ornamental but powerless. Senior officer in command of European troops takes charge. What a do!”
“Better restrain your joy a bit. We don’t want the notion to occur to Bayard, or he’ll order the Nebula to stand off till daylight, by which time——”
“We’ll be smashed entirely,” supplied Brian. “I believe you, my boy! Whereas if the Khans hear large reinforcements have arrived in the night, they’ll wait till morning to attack, so as to get a good look at ’em first.”
With much shrieking of whistles and a lavish display of lights, the Nebula was welcomed to her anchorage, and that the effect was not wasted was clear from the array of villagers, roused from their beds by the noise, who lined the bank above the Agency and watched the landing with awed and not altogether pleasurable interest. Brian pointed them out to Richard with a grin.