He overtook the men who were carrying in the nail-killed sentry, and he saw that their faces were drawn and white. So were those of the other men, who were clustered in the guardroom door.
“What next, Sergeant? Hadn't we better be quick? Why not burn the place? That'd do instead o' buryin' the dead ones, and it'd give us a light to get away by. Might serve as a beacon, too. Might fetch assistance!”
It was evident that panic had set in.
“Fall in!” commanded Brown, and his straight back took on a curve that meant straightness to the nth power.
“'Tshun! Ri'—dress! Eyes—front!”
He glared at them for just about one minute before he spoke, and during that minute each man there realized that what was coming would be quite irrevocable.
“I'm sergeant here. My orders are to hold this post until relieved. Therefore—and I hope there's no man here holds any other notion; I hope it for his own sake!—until we are relieved, we're going to hold it! Moreover, this command is going to be a real command, from now on. It's going to buck up. I'm going to put some ginger in it. There are three dead men here to be avenged, and I'm going to avenge 'em, or make you do it! And if any man imagines he's going to help himself by feeling afraid, let me assure him that the only thing he needs to fear is me! I've a right to command men—I know how—I intend to do it. And if I've got to make men first out of whey-faced cowards, why, I'm game to do it, and this is just where I begin! Now! Anybody got a word to say?”
There was grim silence.
“Good! I'll assume, then, until I'm contradicted, that you're all brave men. Into the guardroom with you!”
“Sahib! Sahib!” said a voice beside him.