drove away with a six-man escort to clear the way and scatter sparks!

They careered round through the narrow gate of the hotel courtyard as
though a Viceroy at least were in the trap behind them; and Mahommed
Gunga--six medaled, strapping feet of him--dismounted and held out
an arm for him to take when he alighted. The hotel people understood
at once that Somebody from Somewhere had arrived.

Young Cunningham had never yet been somebody. The men who give their
lives for India are nothing much at home, and their sons are even less.
Scarcely even at school, when they had made him captain of the team,
had he felt the feel of homage and the subtle flattery that undermines
a bad man's character; at schools in England they confer honors but
take simultaneous precautions. He was green to the dangerous influence
of feudal loyalty, but he quitted himself well, with reserve and
dignity.

"He is good! He will do!" swore Mahommed Gunga fiercely, for the other
emotions are meant for women only.

"He is better than the best!"

"We will make a man of this one!"

"Did you mark how he handed me his purse to defray expenses?" asked a
black-bearded soldier of the five.

"He is a man who knows by instinct!" said Mahommed Gunga. "See to it
that thy accounting is correct, and overpay no man!"