Then a horse whinnied and a hoarse voice swore low at a restive charger.

His own mare neighed, throwing her head high, and some one challenged through the dead-black night.
"How-ut! Hukkums--thar!" A horseman appeared suddenly from nowhere, and examined them at close quarters instead of waiting for their answer.

He peered curiously at Cunningham--glanced at Mahommed Gunga--then wheeled, spinning his horse as the dust eddies twist in the sudden hot-wind gusts.
"Sahib-bahadur hai!" he shouted, racing back.
The night was instantly alive with jingling movement, as line after line of quite invisible light-horse-men--self-disciplined and eager to obey--took up their dressing.

The overhanging cliff of sandstone hid the moon, but here and there there was a gleam of eyeballs in the dark--now man's, now horse's--and a sheen that was the hint of steel held vertical.

No human being could have guessed the length of the gorge nor the number of the men who waited in it, for the restless chargers stamped in inch-deep sand that deadened sound without seeming to lessen its quantity.
"Salaam, bahadur!" It was Alwa, saluting with drawn sabre, reining back a pedigreed mare to get all the spectacular emotion out of the encounter that he could.
"Here are fifteen hundred eight and fifty, sahib--all Rangars--true believers--all true men--all pledged to see thee unsinged through the flames of hell! Do them the honor of a quick inspection, sahib!" "Certainly!" smiled Cunningham.
"I have told them, sahib, that their homes, their women, their possessions, and their honor are all guaranteed them.