“They’ve left the door open for us, sir,” Tooke said at his side. He had crept up for a look of his own.

Westphalen snapped around to glare at him. “Back with the others!”

“Aren’t we going in?”

“When I give the order and not before!”

Westphalen watched the soldier sulkily return to his proper place. Only a few hours away from the garrison and already discipline was showing signs of breaking down. Not unexpected with the likes of these. They had all heard the stories about the Temple-in-the-Hills. You couldn’t be in Bharangpur barracks for more than a week without hearing them. Westphalen was sure there was not a man among them who had not used the hope of pocketing something of value from within the temple to spur him along as they had followed the trail into the hills; now they had reached their goal and wanted to know if the stories were true. The looter within them was rising to the surface like something rotten from the bottom of a pond. He could almost smell the foul odor of their greed.

And what about me? Westphalen thought grimly. Do I reek as they do?

He looked back toward the canyon. Behind the wall, rising above it, was the dim shape of the temple itself. Details were lost in the long shadows; all he could make out was a vaguely domelike shape with a spire on top.

As he watched, the door in the wall swung closed with a crash that echoed off the rocky mountain walls, making the horses shy and causing his own heart to skip a beat.

Suddenly it was dark. Why couldn’t India have England’s lingering twilight? Night fell like a curtain here.

What to do now? He hadn’t planned on taking so long to reach the temple, hadn’t planned on darkness and a walled-off canyon. Yet why hesitate? He knew there were no rebels in the temple compound—that had been a fiction he had concocted. Most likely only a few Hindu priests. Why not scale the walls and have done with it?

No… he didn’t want to do that. He could find no rational reason to hesitate, yet something in his gut told him to wait for the sun.

“We’ll wait until morning.”

The men glanced at each other, muttering. Westphalen searched for a way to keep them in hand. He could neither shoot nor handle a lance half as well as they, and he had been in command of the garrison less than two months, nowhere near enough time to win their confidence as an officer. His only recourse was to show himself to be their superior in judgment. And that should be no problem. After all, they were only commoners.

He decided to single out the most vocal of the grumblers.

“Do you detect some flaw in my decision, Mr. Tooke? If so, please speak freely. This is no time for formality.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” the enlisted man said with a salute and exaggerated courtesy, “but we thought we’d be taking them right away. The morning’s a long way off and we’re anxious to be into the fighting. Aren’t I right, men?”