"In it and out of it, sir, thanks be! He's too good a sort to lose. He's inside there. This is his horse I'm patching up, 'cos he wouldn't lie quiet till I done it." And the Colonel dived into the tent with a grateful heart, and found Jim fast asleep on a hastily made couch. His wounds had been bound up, and there were even mottled white streaks on his face where a hasty sponge had made an attempt to clean it. But he was sleeping soundly, and it was the very best medicine he could have. The Colonel went quietly out again to wait. He gave the horse-mender a very fine cigar, and lit it for him along with his own. "Bully!" said the man. "Best thing I've tasted since I left Chelsea." "Your losses must be very heavy." "Under two hundred at roll-call, sir, and we went in over six." "Awful!" "Set of ---- fools we were, sir; but we showed 'em what was in us, an' now mebbe they won't talk about us any more as they have bin doen." "They'll talk about you to the end of time," said the Colonel heartily. "That's all right, sir. That's a different kind of talk." "We knowed it was all a mistake," he went on, with his head on one side, as he laid on artistic patches of ointment; "but we'd bin aching for a slap at the beggars, just to put a stopper on the mouth-wagglers nearer home. And we _did_ slap 'em too, by----!"--and he lost himself for a moment in admiring contemplation of their prowess. "But they're vermin, them Roosians! Shot down their own men when we got all mixed up with 'em coming home, so they say." "Yes, they did that. We saw it all from the heights." "Well, that's not what I call right, sir." "It was barbarous and damnable. No civilised nation would do such a thing." "That's it, sir--barbarous and damnable and no civilised nation would do such a thing." And he said it over and over to himself, and gained considerable éclat by the use of it in discussion with his fellows later on. "Jackson!" said a drowsy voice inside the tent. "How's Bob? And what the deuce are you preaching about?" And the brown horse gave a whuffle at sound of the voice. "That's it. Thinks more of his hoss than he does of himself," said Jackson, with a wink at the Colonel. "Bob's patching up fine, sir. He's a good bit ripped up, but no balls gone in, s'far as I can see. He'll be ready for you, sir, by time you're ready for him, I should say. Gentleman called to see you, sir." "My dear lad," said the Colonel, sitting down by his side on a stained-red saddle. "I am grateful for the sight of you. We doubted if one of you would come back alive." "I don't know that we expected to, sir. But we hadn't time to think about it." "Whose mistake was it? Lucan's?" "I don't think so, sir," he said thoughtfully, as he strove to recall it all. "I remember the look that came on his face when Nolan brought him the order. . . . I think both he and Cardigan knew there was something wrong. But Nolan was hot to have us go----"