“I think not. The Elchi’s deed has been condemned by every Farangi who heard of it. I know of none who would imitate it—least of all the General.”
“He had better not!” cried Kamal-ud-din rudely. “He comes to Khemistan with a few hundred white soldiers, who are even now dying fast of sicknesses great and small, while our armies are numbered by thousands, and they are growing every day. Should he seek to defy or betray us, death such as the Elchi met with will be the least thing he has to fear.”
Astonished and displeased, Colonel Bayard made as if to rise from his chair. “I must ask leave of your Highnesses to retire——” he was beginning, but Shahbaz Khan interposed hastily.
“Nay, this is shameful talk! O my brother, is it to go forth to the world that the Khans of Khemistan permitted such things to be said in their hearing concerning their father and protector, the Bahadar Jang?”
“Nay, nay!” said Gul Ali timorously. “Youth speaks with the tongue of youth, which is headstrong and foolish. The General Sahib will know how to regard the folly.”
The mildness of the rebuke gave Kamal-ud-din fresh courage. “The General Sahib has nothing to fear if he comes to us in peace and openness of mind,” he said sullenly, “But who is he that we must guard our tongues when speaking of his greatness? He may call himself Bahadar Jang” [valiant in fight]—this was one of the polite epithets employed by the Khans in his interview with them which Sir Harry, who was not a conspicuously modest man, save in the presence of the fair sex or the Duke of Wellington, had accepted with some complacency as merely appropriate,—“but in all his years of warfare he has not taken spoil enough to put a single diamond in his sword-hilt!”
“Farangi Generals don’t go to war for the sake of loot,” said Colonel Bayard. “Any spoil the General Sahib might take he would present to his and my august mistress, the Queen of England.” He turned slightly to bow towards the large engraving of the young Queen which hung crookedly on the wall—suggesting that it had been put there hurriedly when the interview was found inevitable—very sleek of hair, very lofty of brow, sweetly simpering as to expression, and obviously overburdened with a headgear recalling the mural crown of antiquity. Richard followed his example, and the Khans salamed perfunctorily. The words seemed to have given them a new idea.
“Then the rulers of Farangistan also do not like their subjects to be too rich,” chuckled Gul Ali.
“To strip a conqueror of his booty is poor policy,” said Kamal-ud-din with a fine air of detachment. “My Sardars will always be allowed to keep what they win.”
“Lest, being robbed of their due by their own master, they should seek it at the hands of his enemies,” said his cousin Karimdâd, going a step further. The prudent Khair Husain pulled them up hastily.