“Her answer!” said Ismail with a wicked grin.
“What is her word? Where is the Orakzai Pathan?”
But Ismail laughed and would not answer him. It seemed to King that he scented climax. So did his near-fifty and their thirty friends. He chose to take the arrival of the blind men as a hint from Providence and to “go it blind” on the strength of what he had hoped might happen. Also he chose in that instant to force the mullah's hand, on the principle that hurried buffaloes will blunder.
“To Khinjan!” he shouted to the nearest man. “The mullah will march on Khinjan!”
They murmured and wondered and backed away from him to give him room. Ismail watched him with dropped jaw and wild eye.
“Spread it through the camp that we march on Khinjan! Shout it! Bid them strike the tents!”
Somebody behind took up the shout and it went across the camp in leaps, as men toss a ball. There was a surge toward the tents, but King called to his deserters and they clustered back to him. He had to cement their allegiance now or fail altogether, and he would not be able to do it by ordinary argument or by pleading; he had to fire their imagination. And he did.
“She is on our side!” That was a sheer guess. “She has kept our man and sent another as hostage for him in token of good faith! Listen! Ye saw this man's eyes healed. Let that be a token! Be ye the men with new eyes! Give it out! Claim the title and be true to it and see me guide you down the Khyber in good time like a regiment, many more than a hundred strong!”
They jumped at the idea. The “Hills”--the whole East, for that matter--are ever ready to form a new sect or join a new band or a new blood-feud. Witness the Nikalseyns, who worship a long-since dead Englishman.
“We see!” yelled one of them.