“Nothing of the sort!” said Brown. “If we're to march on Jailpore, off we go at once! You can sleep on the road, my son! It's time we paid a visit to that village, I'm thinking. Those treacherous brutes need a lesson. I'd have been down there before, only I wanted to be in full view of the road in case anybody came looking for me from Bholat. We'll need a wagon for the fakir. You can sleep in it too.” “Sleep with a fakir? I? Allah! I am a Rajput, sahib! A sergeant of the Rajput Horse, retired!” “I wouldn't want to sleep with him myself!” admitted Brown. “Come and look at him. You can smell him from here, but the sight of him's the real thing!” The Rajput swaggered up beside Brown, after loosening his horse's girths and lifting the saddle for a moment. “He's not the only one that needs a drink!” said Brown. “We're all dry as brick-dust here, except the fakir!” “He must wait a while before he drinks. Show me the fakir. Why, Brown sahib, know you what you have there?” “The father of all the smells, and all the dirt and all the evil eyes and evil tongues in Asia!” Brown hazarded. “More than that, sahib! That is the nameless fakir--him whom they know as HE! Has there been no attempt made to rescue him?” “They rescued him once, and murdered three of my men to get him. When they tried again, I put a halter round his neck and he and I arranged a sort of temporary compromise.” “And the terms of it?” “Oh, he's supposed to have performed a miracle. He made us unslip the halter, and fall down flat, and he's supposed to be keeping us by him, by a sort of spell, so's to give us something extra-special in the line of ghastly deaths at his own convenience. That way, I was able to wait for news from Bholat--see?” “You could have captured no more important prisoner than that, sahib, let me tell you! They believe him to be almost a god; so nearly one that the gods themselves obey his orders now and then! It was he, and no other, that told the men of Jailpore that he would make them impervious to bullets. If we have him, sahib, we have the key to Jailpore!” “We, have certainly got him,” said Brown. “You can see him, and you can smell him. I'll order one of the men to prick him with a bayonet, if you want to hear him, too! I wouldn't feel him, if I were you!” “He must come, too, to Jailpore!” “Of course he comes!” “Then, sahib, let us move away from here to where there is water. There let us rest until sundown, and then march, in the cool of the evening. It will be better so. And of a truth I must sleep, or else drop dead from weariness.” “Does that message put you in command?” asked Brown, a trifle truculently. “No, sahib! But it orders you to listen to my advice whenever possible.” “That means that you are under my orders?” “That letter does not say so, sahib!” “Very well, are you, or are you not?” “We are supposed to act in concert, sahib.”