She ran toward him, curtsied to
him, and called him _bahadur_. She made two maids bring a chair
for him, and made them set it near the middle of the window whence he
could see the smoke, pushing the men away on either side until he had
a clear view.
But he knew enough of the native mind, at all events, to look at the
smoke and not remark on it. It was so obvious that he was meant to
talk about the smoke, or to ask about it, that even a German
Orientalist understanding the East through German eyes had tact
enough to look in silence, and so to speak, "force trumps."
And that again, of course, was exactly what Yasmini wanted.
Moreover, she surprised him by not leading trumps.
"They are here," she said, with a side-wise glance at the more than
thirty men who crowded near the window.
The German--and he made no pretense any longer of being anything but
German--sat sidewise with both hands on his knees to get a better
view of them. He scanned each face carefully, and each man
entertained a feeling that he had been analyzed and ticketed and
stood aside.
"I have seen all these before," he said. "They are men of the North,
and good enough fighters, I have no doubt. But they are not what I
asked for. How many of these are trained soldiers? Which of these
could swing the allegiance of a single native regiment.
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