“The plan now is to keep us here a week,” said he.  “After that to send us to Gallipoli by steamer.”

Sahib, there was uproar!  Men could scarcely eat for the joy of getting in sight of British lines again—­or rather for joy of the promise of it.  They almost forgot to suspect Ranjoor Singh in that minute, but praised him to his face and even made much of Tugendheim.

But I, who followed Ranjoor Singh between the tables in case he should have any orders to give, noticed particularly that he did not say we were going to Gallipoli.  He said, “The plan now is to send us to Gallipoli.”  The trade of a leader of squadrons, thought I, is to confound the laid plans of the enemy and to invent unexpected ones of his own.

“The day we land in Gallipoli behind the Turkish trenches,” said I to myself, “is unlikely to be yet if Ranjoor Singh lives.”

And I was right, sahib.  But If I had been given a thousand years in which to do it, I never could have guessed how Ranjoor Singh would lead us out of the trap.  Can the sahib guess?

CHAPTER IV

Fear comes and goes, but a man’s love lives with him. 
—­Eastern proverb.

Stamboul was disillusionment—­a city of rain and plagues and stinks!  The food in barracks was maggoty.  We breathed foul air and yearned for the streets; yet, once in the streets, we yearned to be back in barracks.  Aye, sahib, we saw more in one day of the streets than we thought good for us, none yet understanding the breadth of Ranjoor Singh’s wakefulness.  He seemed to us like a man asleep in good opinion of himself—­that being doubtless the opinion he wished the German officers to have of him.

Part of the German plan became evident at once, for, noticing our great enthusiasm at the prospect of being sent to Gallipoli, Tugendheim, in the hope of winning praise, told a German officer we ought to be paraded through the streets as evidence that Indian troops really were fighting with the Central Powers.  The German officer agreed instantly, Tugendheim making faces thus and brushing his mustache more fiercely upward.

So the very first morning after our arrival we were paraded early and sent out with a negro band, to tramp back and forth through the streets until nearly too weary to desire life.  Ranjoor Singh marched at our head looking perfectly contented, for which the men all hated him, and beside him went a Turk who knew English and who told him the names of streets and places.

It did not escape my observation that Ranjoor Singh was interested more than a little in the waterfront.  But we all tramped like dumb men, splashed to the waist with street dirt, aware we were being used to make a mental impression on the Turks, but afraid to refuse obedience lest we be not sent to Gallipoli after all.  One thought obsessed every single man but me:  To get to Gallipoli, and escape to the British trenches during some dark night, or perish in the effort.