He took precautions first, when and where such were possible, then rode and looked fate in the eye.
He appeared to take no more notice of the glowering looks that followed him from stuffy balconies and dense-packed corners than of the mosquitoes to and the heat.

Without hurry he picked his way through the thronged streets, where already men lay in thousands to escape the breathlessness of walled interiors; the gutters seemed like trenches where the dead of a devastated city had been laid; the murmur was like the voice of storm-winds gathering, and the little lights along the housetops were for the vent-holes on the lid of a tormented underworld.
But he rode on at his ease.

Ahead of him lay that which he considered duty.

He could feel the long-kept peace of India disintegrating all around him, and he knew--he was certain--as sometimes a brave man can see what cleverer men all overlook--that the right touch by the right man at the right moment, when the last taut-held thread should break, would very likely swing the balance in favor of peace again, instead of individual self seeking anarchy.
He knew what "Cunnigan-bahadur" would have done.

He swore by Cunnigan-bahadur.