There was a little window through which to sell tickets, and down in one corner of it the frosting had been rubbed from off the glass.
"There is an eye," said I in an undertone, "that I could send a bullet through without difficulty!" But Ranjoor Singh called me a person without judgment and turned his back.
"When do we start ?" asked Tugendheim.
"When the men have finished eating," he answered, and at that I stared again, for I knew the men's mood and did not believe it possible to get them away without a long rest, nor even in that case without argument.
"What if they refuse ?" said I, and Ranjoor Singh faced about to look at me.
"Do you refuse ?" he asked.

"Go and warn them to finish eating and be ready to march in twenty minutes!" So I went, and delivered the message, and it was as I had expected, only worse.
"So those are his words?
What are words!" said they.

"Ask him whither he would lead us!" shouted Gooja Singh.

He had been talking in whispers with a dozen men at the rear of the middle hut.
"If I take him such dogs' answers," said I, "he will dismiss me and there will be no more a go-between." "Go, take him this message," shouted Gooja Singh.

"But for his sinking of our ship we should now be among friends in Gallipoli! Could we not have seized another ship and plundered coal?
Tell him, therefore, if he wishes to lead us he must use good judgment.