"I can assure you that I am perfectly harmless." "It is Bullen's voice," one of them exclaimed, and all crowded round him, and wrung his hands and patted him on the back.
"This is the second time, Bullen, that you have come back to us from the dead; and this time, like Hamlet's father, you have come back with very questionable disguise.

Now, sit down and take a cup of tea, which is all we have to offer you." "I will," Lisle said, "and I shall be glad of some cold meat; for I have been living, for the past three days, on uncooked grain." The meat was brought, and Lisle ate it ravenously, declining to answer any questions until he had finished.
"Now," he said, "I will tell you a plain, unvarnished tale;" and he gave them, in full detail, the adventure he had gone through.
"Upon my word, Lisle, you are as full of resources as an egg is full of meat.

Your pluck, in going down to the lower story of that house while the women were chatting outside, was wonderful.

It was, of course, sheer luck that you found that dead Pathan, and so got suitable clothes; but how you dyed your face that colour, I cannot understand." Lisle explained how he had found a plant which was, as he knew, used for that purpose; and how he had extracted the colouring matter from it.
"You had wonderful luck in making your way through the Pathans, without being questioned; but, as we know, fortune favours the brave.

Well, I shall have another yarn to tell General Lockhart, in the morning; but how we are to rig you out, I don't know." Several of the officers, however, had managed to carry one or two spare garments in their kits.