But he felt that to cry before a native, excepting only his
mother's ayah, would be an infamy greater than any mutiny.
Moreover, he, as future Colonel of the 195th, had that grim
regiment at his back.

"Are you going to carry us away?" said Wee Willie Winkie, very
blanched and uncomfortable.

"Yes, my little Sahib Bahadur," said the tallest of the men, "and
eat you afterwards."

"That is child's talk," said Wee Willie Winkie. "Men do not eat
men."

A yell of laughter interrupted him, but he went on firmly--"And if
you do carry us away, I tell you that all my regiment will come up
in a day and kill you all without leaving one. Who will take my
message to the Colonel Sahib?"

Speech in any vernacular--and Wee Willie Winkie had a colloquial
acquaintance with three--was easy to the boy who could not yet
manage his "r's" and "th's" aright.

Another man joined the conference, crying, "O foolish men! What
this babe says is true. He is the heart's heart of those white
troops. For the sake of peace let them go both, for if he be
taken, the regiment will break loose and gut the valley. OUR
villages are in the valley, and we shall not escape. That regiment
are devils. They broke Khoda Yar's breastbone with kicks when he
tried to take the rifles; and if we touch this child they will