Therefore the only course for them seemed to be to join him, and so escape the vengeance which would otherwise overtake them. And since they had hesitated and therefore incurred suspicion, it was advisable, they thought, to show the greater zeal, and they in many instances adopted the Mahdi's uniform, as the present prisoner had done. But they did not thoroughly believe in him; they were not at any rate fanatical in his cause, and were not likely to impale themselves on bayonets to encourage the others, as his more earnest adherents thought it a privilege to do. At the same time they were Mohammedans, and to kill an unbeliever must be always a meritorious action in their eyes. So it was a pleasure to them to pepper the Christians a bit, when occasion offered, not to mention that any sort of a fight was attractive to such a warlike race. But still there was no venom in their hostility; we were enemies, of course, but enemies who might any day become friends; and Grady's prisoner did not think it necessarily behoved him to sulk, refuse food, commit suicide, or, which was much the same thing, attempt to escape. So he was soon chatting freely with the natives, of whom there were a good many, for the camels conveying the invalids were led and tended by them. It stands to reason that all he said about his own tribe and others, and the number of the Mahdi's followers, and the distribution of his forces, could not be accepted as implicitly correct. For, in the first place, he most likely had no accurate knowledge on many of these and similar points; and in the next place, if he had, he might more than possibly wish to mislead, rather than afford useful information. But after a certain amount of practice an officer with a head on his shoulders learns how to sift the reports gathered from spies, deserters, prisoners, and peasants, and to get a few grains of valuable fact out of bushels of chaff. So the chief interpreter went to work, and translated much useless and some practical talk. The most interesting account he had to give could not be called useful, however, because it referred to past events, and these were already fully reported; but the present party had not heard them. It was concerning the death of Colonel Stewart, the only English companion Gordon had for so long, and of which the man professed to have been a witness in the October of 1884. The following was the Arab's account, transcribed from the note-book of Sergeant Barton, who could take things down in shorthand, when men spoke slowly and deliberately, or with the delay, as in the present instance, of an interpreter:--