"We can't very well stay as we are," said Gerrard drily.
"True, O most sapient Hal, and we can hardly expect Chand Singh to attack us unprovoked. He knows too well that his game is to stay quiet in the plain there and wait for us to come down, like Colonel Carter's 'possum. Therefore we must make the plain uncomfortable—not too hot to hold him, for that we can't do, but simply rather warm. I suggest that you take two of your guns to-night round by that nullah on the left, and tickle him up a bit in the morning. It won't be a particularly quiet corner for you, but you can post two other guns in support, and we'll back you up. If Chand Singh retreats again we'll follow him, if he attacks we've got him."
"Quite so. If he don't see how ill-mannered it is to block the road in this way to two gentlemen in a hurry, he must be politely removed. But listen, Bob! It sounds almost as if—— And yet they can't possibly be attacking."
"Charteris, do you know that Chand Singh is advancing?" cried Warner, coming in hastily.
"Advancing? He must be mad."
"Advancing in line, with flags and music. They say Sher Singh is there too, on an elephant."
"Then he is delivered into our hands," said Charteris, and Gerrard and he hurried out of the tent and looked over the plain, where the distant dust-cloud, through the rifts in which came glimpses of colour and flashing steel, and bursts of barbaric music, showed the approach of the Agpuri host. Rukn-ud-din came towards them as they gazed.
"Her Highness sends her salaams, sahib, and she will lead her troops to-day."
"Ah, this is the day of vengeance, then?"
"So it would appear, sahib, since the brother-slayer yonder has consulted a famous soothsayer of the unbelievers, who declares that this day his arms shall be invincible."