Jump in, Bobby. Get on, Coachwan!'
On the Umballa platform waited a detachment of officers
discussing the latest news from the stricken cantonment, and it was
here that Bobby learned the real condition of the Tail Twisters.
'They went into camp,' said an elderly Major recalled from the
whist-tables at Mussoorie to a sickly Native Regiment, 'they went
into camp with two hundred and ten sick in carts. Two hundred
and ten fever cases only, and the balance looking like so many
ghosts with sore eyes. A Madras Regiment could have walked
through 'em.'
'But they were as fit as be-damned when I left them!' said Bobby.
'Then you'd better make them as fit as bedamned when you rejoin,'
said the Major brutally.
Bobby pressed his forehead against the rain-splashed window-pane
as the train lumbered across the sodden Doab, and prayed for the
health of the Tyneside Tail Twisters. Naini Tal had sent down her
contingent with all speed; the lathering ponies of the Dalhousie
Road staggered into Pathankot, taxed to the full stretch of their
strength; while from cloudy Darjiling the Calcutta Mail whirled up
the last straggler of the little army that was to fight a fight in which
was neither medal nor honour for the winning, against an enemy
none other than 'the sickness that destroyeth in the noonday.'
And as each man reported himself, he said: 'This is a bad business,'
and went about his own forthwith, for every Regiment and Battery
in the cantonment was under canvas, the sickness bearing them
company.
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