After the Banjara had gone, Finnerty said: "That's the gentle Hindu for
you--mixes his mythology and data; he's found out something, I believe,
and worked his fancy for the melodrama of the black leopard stalking
abroad at night."
"I'm here to follow up any possible clue that may lead to the discovery
of anything," Swinton observed.
"Besides," the major added, "I meant to take you for a sit up over that
pool some night; many an interesting hour I've spent sitting in a machan
over a pool watching jungle dwellers. There's a salt lick in Jadoo Nala,
and even bison, shy as they are, have been known to come down out of the
big sal forest to that pool. Nobody shoots over it, so that entices the
animals; but Prince Ananda has a roomy machan there with an electric
light in it. I suppose one of his German chaps put it in, for he has an
electric lighting plant under the palace, also an ice-making machine.
We'd better get a couple of guns fixed up in the way of defence, for it
will be dark in an hour or so."
He went to his room and returned with a gun in each hand, saying:
"Fine-sighted rifles will be little use; here's a double-barrelled
12-bore Paradox, with some ball cartridges. We won't be able to see
anything beyond twenty yards, and she'll shoot true for that distance;
I'll take this 10-bore. Now we'll go over into the jungle and get some
night sights."
Wonderingly Swinton accompanied Finnerty, and just beyond the compound
they came to a halt beneath a drooping palm, from a graceful branch of
which a long, pear-shaped nest swung gently back and forth in the
evening breeze. "This is the nest of the baya, the weaver bird; it's a
beautiful bit of architecture," Finnerty said as he tapped with gentle
fingers on the tailored nest.
A fluttering rustle within, followed by the swooping flight of a bird,
explained his motive. "I didn't want the little cuss to beat her eggs to
pieces in fright when I put my hand in," he added softly as he thrust
two fingers up the tunnellike entrance to the nest, drawing them forth
with a little lump of soft clay between their tips in which was imbedded
a glowworm. "That will make a most excellent night sight," the major
explained; "there should be two or three more in there."
"What is the idea of this most extraordinarily clever thing?" Swinton
asked.
"It may be food in cold storage, but the natives say it's a matter of
lighting up the house. At any rate, I've always found these glowworms
alive and ready to flash their little electric bulbs."
As he gathered two more nature incandescents Finnerty indicated the
beauty of the nest. The insects were placed in the hall, or tunnel
entrance, and above this, to one side, like a nursery, was the breeding
nest, the whole structure being hung by a network of long grass and
slender roots from the branch of the palm.
As they went back to the bungalow, Finnerty, as if switched from the
machinations of Prince Ananda by the touch of nature's sweet handicraft
in the nest, fell into a mood so poetically gentle that Swinton could
hardly subdue a sense of incongruity in its association with the
huge-framed speaker. There was no doubt whatever about the pleasing
thrill of sincerity in his Irish voice as he said, "One of my enjoyments
is the study of bird nidification. They run true to breeding--which is
more than we do. On that"--he pointed to a giant teakwood monarch that
had fallen perhaps a century before and was draped with a beautiful
shroud of lichen and emerald-green moss that peeped from between bracken
and fern--"is the nest of a little yellow-bellied 'fly-catcher warbler'
that is built of brilliant green moss lined with snowy cotton-silk from
the Simul tree. See that fellow?" and Finnerty pointed to a little
scarlet-and-black bird, its wings splashed with grey and gold, sitting
on a limb. "That's a Minivet; she covers her nest with lichens so that
on a lichen-covered limb it looks like a knot."
"Tremendously wise are Nature's children," Swinton contributed.
"Generally," Finnerty answered thoughtfully: "sometimes, though, her
children do such foolish things. For instance, the Frog-mouth is just as
cunning about hiding her nest, covering it with scraps of bark and moss
to make it look like the limb of a tree, lining it inside with down from
her own breast; but there's a screw loose somewhere, for she lays two
eggs and the nest is never big enough to contain more than one bird, so
the other one is crowded out to die."
They were at the bungalow now, and saying that he and Swinton must have
a day some time among the birds Finnerty adjusted the night sights. With
a slim rubber band he fastened a match across the double barrels at the
front sight and beneath this placed a glowworm.
As Finnerty and Swinton went by a jungle path up the hill, the oncoming
night was draping the forest with heavy gloom.
"We'll get within sight of the palace by this path," the major advised,
"and then we'll skirt around the Lake of the Golden Coin to see if there
are indications of things unusual."
When they came out on the plateau they were on the road that wound about
the palace outside of the garden wall, and as they passed the teakwood
gate it looked forbiddingly sombre outlined against the palace light.
Swinton shuddered, and through his mind flashed a curious thought of how
so much treacherous savagery could exist in the mind of a man capable of
soft-cultured speech, and who was of a pleasing grace of physical
beauty.
They circled the Lake of the Golden Coin till they faced the marble
bridge; here they stood in the shadow of a mango thicket. The moon, now
climbing to shoot its rays through the feathery tops of the sal trees,
picked out the palace in blue-grey tones, the absence of lights, the
pillared architecture, giving it the suggestion of a vast mausoleum.
Finnerty placed his hand on Swinton's arm, the clasp suggesting he was
to listen. Straining his ear, he heard the measured military tramp of
men; then their forms loomed grotesquely in the struggling moonlight as
they crossed the marble bridge coming from the palace; even in that
uncertain light the military erectness of the figures, the heavy,
measured tramp told Swinton they were Prussians. Finnerty and the
captain hurried away, and as they passed around the lake end to the road
a figure, or perhaps two, indefinite, floated across a patch of
moonlight like a drift of smoke.
The major spread his nostrils. "Attar of rose! Did you get it, Swinton?"
"Think I did."
"There's only one woman on this hill whose clothes are so saturated with
attar."
"Ananda's princess? What would she be doing out here at night?"
As they moved along, Finnerty chuckled: "What are we doing up here? What
were the Prussians doing in the prince's palace? What is Marie doing
here in Darpore? I tell you, captain, I wouldn't give much for that
girl's chances if the princess thinks she's a rival. The princess comes
from a Rajput family that never stopped at means to an end."
"It would suggest that there is really something on to-night. Doesn't
Boelke's bungalow lie up in that direction?"
"Yes; and I think it was two women who passed; probably it was Marie's
ayah whom the Banjara referred to when he said there were always teeth
that could be opened with a silver coin. Prince Ananda has not been seen
much with the girl, but the princess may have discovered that he meets
her at the pool. It would be a safe trysting place so far as chance
discovery is concerned, for natives never travel that path at night;
they believe that a phantom leopard lives in the cave from which the
salt stream issues. This is the way," he added, turning to the left
along a path that dipped down in gentle gradient to the beginning of
Jadoo Nala, which in turn led on to a valley that reached the great
plain.
Along this valley lay a trail, stretching from the forest-covered hills
to the plains, that had been worn by the feet of great jungle
creatures--bison, tiger, even elephants, in their migratory trips,
Finnerty told Swinton, and sometimes they wandered up Jadoo Nala for a
lick at the salt, knowing that they were never disturbed.
There was some bitterness in the major's low-pitched voice as he said:
"Jadoo Pool would be an ideal spot for pothunters who come out here to
kill big game and sit up in a machan over a drinking place to blaze away
at bison or tiger, generally only wounding the animal in the bad night
light; if it's a tiger he goes off into the jungle, and, crazed by the
pain of a festering sore, will kill on sight, and finally, his strength
and speed reduced by the weakening wound, will turn to killing the
easiest kind of game--man; becomes a man-eater. I once shot a rogue
elephant that had killed a dozen people, and found that the cause of his
madness was a maggot-filled hole in his skull that had been made by a
ball from an 8-bore in the hands of a juvenile civil servant, fired at
night."
Finnerty's monologue was cut short by the screeching bell of a deer. "A
chital at the pool; something, perhaps a leopard hunting his supper, has
startled him," he advised.
They moved forward softly, their feet scarce making a rustle on the
smooth path, and as they came to the roots of a graceful pipal that
stretched its lean arms out over the pool, from the opposite bank the
startled cry of the deer again rent the brooding stillness as he bounded
away, his little hoofs ringing on the stony hill.
A light bamboo ladder, strapped to the pipal, led to a machan that was
hidden by a constructed wall of twigs and grass, through which were
little openings that afforded a view of the pool.
As they reached the machan, Finnerty said: "As we are here to hear and
see only, I suppose that even if Pundit Bagh comes we let him go free,
eh?"
"Yes; I really don't want to kill anything while I'm in Darpore; that
is, unless it's necessary to take a pot shot at a Hun, and I have a
feeling that we're going to see something worth while--that Banjara is
no fool."
Then the two men settled back on the springy, woven floor of the machan
to a wait in the mysterious night of a tropical jungle. Stilled, the
noise of their own movements hushed, the silence of the mighty forest
was oppressive; it suggested vastness, a huge void, as though they sat
in a gigantic cave, themselves the only living thing within. A dried
leaf rustling to earth sounded like the falling of a large body; the
drip of dew-drops on the leaf carpet was heard because of the dead
stillness; a belated nightjar, one of those mysterious sailors of the
night air, swept acres the pool with his sad cry, "Chyeece--chyeece!"
Then the stillness.
Swinton, his ear tuned to the outer distances of the void, caught a soft
faint rub-a-dub, rub-a-dub! that drifted lazily up from a village in the
plain, where some native thrummed idly on a tom-tom or his wife pounded
grain in a clay mortar. Then something rustled the leaves just where the
little streamlet flowed sluggishly from the cave to the pool, and
something that was a hare or a mouse-deer slipped across the open space
upon which the moon swept its soft light. To the left a startled
"bhar-ha-ha!" from the bank above the pool was followed by a tattoo of
tiny stamping hoofs as a muntjac, frightened by the mouse-deer, gave
this first evidence of his own approach; then he bounded away, leaving
stillness to take his place.
The boom of a gun sounded drowsily from down in the plains, some native,
sitting up in a machan to guard his jowari or sugar cane, had fired his
old muzzle-loader to frighten away greedy jungle pigs or bison.
Swinton found the drowsiness of the brooding jungle creeping into his
frame; with difficulty he kept from sleep. He knew enough of jungle
watching to know that he dare not smoke; the telltale odour of burning
tobacco would leave them indeed in their solitude. And there was the
thought that something was to happen, some mysterious thing to
eventuate; the Banjara had not sent them there to see deer drinking at
the pool or even to feast their eyes on bigger game.
What was it? What was it? His head drooped toward his chest; dreamily he
heard the soft rustle of something close; half consciously he raised his
heavy lids to gaze into two big round orbs that blazed with ruby light.
On the point of calling out, he saw a pair of white wings spread; there
was an almost silent swoop, and that night hunter, the great horned owl,
swept away. He felt the pressure of Finnerty's elbow; it was a silent
laugh.
For five minutes the unruffled pool mirrored the moon in placid silence;
it lay beneath them like some jewel, a moonstone on a deep green cloth.
Where the stream trickled in and out of ruts and holes left in the muddy
shore by drinking animals the water gleamed like scattered pearls.
Suddenly there was a crash of breaking bamboos, followed by the heavy
breathing of large animals and the shuffling of many feet. Then a herd
of bison--two bulls, a few cows, and two calves--less cautious in their
enormous strength, swept over the hill brow of the farther bank; there
they checked and examined the pool. A big cow, followed by two others
and the calves, clambered down to the water, and the scraping of their
rough tongues against the crusted salt lick could be heard. One bull,
his high wither with its massive hump and enormous head denoting his sex
even in the transient, vibrating shimmers of moonlight the swaying
branches wove into the heavy gloom, stood on guard, his big ears
flapping from side to side to catch every sound of danger. The other
bull, as if depending on the sentry, slid down the bank, took a hasty
drink, and returned; then the cows, with their calves, went up from the
water, and the herd melted like shadows into the gloomed sal forest.
Swinton was wide awake now; the majestic bison, the faithful bull on
guard lest a tiger creep up on the calves, was a sight worth an hour or
two of vigil.
Finnerty's head leaned toward Swinton as he whispered: "Gad! I wish I
dared smoke." Then, with a smothered chuckle: "If I had turned on the
electric it would have been a sight. I wonder if the current is on; we
might need it if there's a shindy."
Like an echo of the major's whisper a sound floated up from the heavy
pall of darkness that lay beneath the pipal; it might have been the
sniff of a honey badger, the inquisitive, faint woof of a bear, or a
muttered word. His hand resting on Swinton's arm in a tense grip,
Finnerty strained his ears to define the curious sense he had that some
one was stealthily moving beneath them. Once he put a hand on the top
rung of the bamboo ladder; it vibrated as though some one leaned against
it or had commenced to ascend. He slipped the butt of his 10-bore
forward, ready for a handy, silent push of defence. But still, he
thought, if it were Prince Ananda to meet somebody he would wait below.
With a pang, Finnerty realised who the somebody that the prince must
meet so secretly would be.
A little slipping sound as of a foot higher up on the path came to the
listeners' ears; there was the tinkle-clink of a pebble rolling to the
stones below; the rustling push of a body passing from beneath the pipal
and along the mud bank of the pool. Then Finnerty saw, for a second, an
outlined figure where the moon fell upon the pearllike cups of water;
and the straight, athletic Rajput swing betrayed that it was Darna
Singh. Then he was swallowed up in the shadow that lay heavy toward the
cave.
A cicada started his shrill piping in a neighbouring tree, awakening
several of his kind, and the hissing hum, raspingly monotonous, filled
their ears. Suddenly it was drowned by droning English words that came
floating up from below, smothered to indistinctness.
"It is the prince," Finnerty thought.
Then there were odd catches of a woman's voice. Distinctly the major
heard: "No, I cannot." The man's tones had a wavering drawl, as though
he pleaded. More than once the word "love," with a little fierce
intonation, came to the listener. The woman had uttered words that,
patched together out of their fragmentary hearing, told that she, or
some one, would go away the next day.
A low, purring note carried to the machan from the cave mouth.
Turning his head cautiously, lest the machan creak, Finnerty, holding
his eyes on the trickling stream where it splashed into light, dread in
his heart, saw a shadow creep toward the pool, its progress marked by
the blotting out of the pearllike spots of moonlit water; then the
shadow was lost, and next he heard the pushing pad of velvet paws upon
the leaf-covered ground just beyond the pipal. Finnerty knew. Only a
tiger or a leopard stalked like that. Now the approaching animal had
stopped. There was no moving shadow, no faint rustle of leaves; the
thing was eyeing the pool--looking for something to kill by its brink.
Below, the voices still droned, their owners unconscious of the yellow
cat eyes that perhaps even then watched them in desire.
To Finnerty came with full horror a memory of the Banjara's words: "See
the black leopard drink at the pool to-night."
Silently shifting his 10-bore till its muzzle ranged the side along
which the thing crept, he uncovered the glowworm, and a little speck of
luminous light showed that it was still alive.
Swinton, who sat facing the other way, feeling that there was something
stirring, drew his gun across his knee.
A minute, two minutes--they seemed years to Finnerty--then he heard,
deeper in the jungle, a bush swish as if it had been pushed, and in
relief he muttered: "The brute must have seen my movement and has gone
away."
For a full minute of dread suspense the silence held, save for the
rasping cicada and a droning voice beneath; then, from beyond where
those below stood, some noise came out of the gloom--it might have been
a small branch falling or the scamper of a startled jungle rat. Holding
his eyes on the spot, Finnerty saw two round balls of light
gleam--yellow green, as if tiny mirrors reflected the moonlight. They
disappeared, then glowed again; they rose and fell. With a chill at his
heart he knew that the beast, with devilish cunning, had circled, and
now approached from the side farthest from the machan. Swinging his gun,
with a prayer that the current was on, he turned the electric button; a
splash of white light cut the jungle gloom, and where his eyes searched
was outlined in strong relief, crouched for a spring, a black leopard.
Turned up to the sudden glare, ghastly in the white light, was the face
of Lord Victor; at his side, clutching his arm, with her eyes riveted on
the leopard, stood Marie.
Values flashed through Finnerty's mind with lightning speed. He had
expected the jungle dweller to flee when the electric glare lit up the
scene, but the leopard was unafraid; he even crept a pace closer to
those below. His forepaws gripped nervously at the ground in a churning
movement; his tail stiffened; but before he could rise in a flying
tackle a stream of red light belched from Swinton's gun; there was a
coughing roar telling of a hit, and the leopard, turned by the shot,
bounded into the jungle, his crashing progress growing fainter as he
fled. Then darkness closed out the scene of almost tragedy, for Finnerty
had turned the switch.
On the point of calling in assurance, Swinton was checked by the sudden
death of the light; he understood the major's motive.
The two sat still, while Finnerty, his grasp on Swinton's shoulder,
whispered into his ear: "The leopard is wounded; he won't turn now that
he has started to run; let them get away without knowing who saw them,
for they're in no danger."
There came the sound of feet going with stumbling speed up the path as
Marie, dreading discovery more than the terrors of the jungle path,
clutching Gilfain's hand, fled.
After a little, Finnerty said: "Fancy we may go back now. I wonder how
much of this business the Banjara knew; how much of it is a twist of
fate upsetting somebody's plans." And as they climbed the hill path from
Jadoo Nala he continued: "Tomorrow morning we'll follow the pugs of that
black devil; there'll be blood enough for the shikari to track him down,
I think; he'll have stiffened up from his wound by then and we'll get
him."
With irrelevance the captain blurted, in a voice filled with disgust:
"That young ass!"
Finnerty laughed softly. "The dear old earl sent him to India to be out
of the way of skirts. It can't be done!"
"But how did he get a meeting with that foolish virgin; he's only been
here three days! And how did the Banjara know, and how did--oh, one's
life here is a damn big query mark!"
"I should say that there's been a note written, either by the girl to
his giddy lordship or vice versa; Darna Singh has made the mistake of
supposing Prince Ananda was the man she was to meet; that's why the
black leopard was turned loose."
"Do you think it really was the prince's beast?"
"Yes; that's why he didn't run when the light flashed. He's accustomed
to it in the zoo grounds. But it was a fiendish caper, and Gilfain is
fortunate."
"I think it proves the girl is a spy; she probably, at the prince's
suggestion, led the young fool on. I'm glad he doesn't know anything
about----" Swinton broke off suddenly, as the heavy gloom of the forest
interior was brushed aside like a curtain, disclosing to their eyes a
fairy scene--the prince's palace.
The moon, which had leaped high above the barrier of the forest, poured
a flood of yellow light across the open plateau, gilding with gold leaf
the mosquelike dome roof of a turret and shimmering a white marble
minaret till it sparkled like a fretwork thing of silver. The Lake of
the Golden Coin was a maze of ribboned colours where the mahseer rose to
its surface in play or in pursuit of night flies. A dreamy quiet lay
over all the mass of gleaming white and purple shadow as they swung to
the road that circled the gardens. Coming to the big teakwood gate,
Finnerty clutched the captain's arm, bringing him to a halt as a sigh
from its rusty hinges told it had just been closed by some one.
"I saw him," Finnerty whispered as they passed on. "It was Ananda, I
swear."
Over the walls floated the perfume of rose and jasmine and tuberose; so
sensuous, so drugged the heavy night air that it suggested unreality,
mysticism, dreams, and beyond, rounding a curve, to their nostrils came
the pungent, acrid smell of a hookah from the servants' quarters. Even
deeper of the Orient, of the subtle duplicity of things, was this.
Swinton spat on the roadway, and Finnerty, knowing it as a token of
disgust, muttered: "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves."
As they dipped down a hill toward the path that led to Finnerty's
bungalow they came upon Lord Victor's horse leisurely dawdling along,
stopping at times for a juicy snack from some succulent bush, and
altogether loafing, a broken rein dangling from the bit to occasionally
bring him up with a jerk as he stepped on it. At their approach he
scuttled off into the jungle.
"Gilfain's nag!" Finnerty commented. "Wishing to keep this meeting
secret, he's left the syce at home and tied the pony to a tree up there
somewhere; the shot probably frightened it."
"What's the horse doing on this road?" Swinton asked.
"It's a shorter cut down to the maharajah's stables in Darpore town than
by the tonga road. Lord Victor will have to walk; we couldn't catch that
harebrained weed even if we wanted to."
"Come on, major," Swinton cried, pushing forward; "I've got an idea. You
give me a horse and I'll gallop back to my bungalow, getting there ahead
of the young ass."
"I see," Finnerty grunted as they strode swiftly along. "You'll tell his
lordship that you've been in bed for hours, and let him guess who was
his audience at Jadoo Pool. The Banjara didn't deliver that note or his
lordship wouldn't have been there."
As they hurried along, Swinton panted: "Devil of a hole for a
flirtation; he must be an enthusiast!"
They swung into the bungalow, and Finnerty sent the watchman to have a
syce bring "Phyu," adding that if there was delay a most proper beating
would eventuate. As the watchman hurried away on his mission the major
said: "Phyu is a Shan pony; he's only thirteen hands, but you can gallop
him down that hill without fear of bucking his shins, and you couldn't
do that with an Arab."
While they waited, Finnerty explained: "The girl made that appointment
for some reason. She would know that nobody would see them together
there, as natives don't travel that path at night, and she would know
that tiger and leopard do not ordinarily come to the pool."
"How did the Banjara know?"
"India, my dear boy--and servants; but he only half knew at that; he
thought it would be the prince. I think even if Lord Victor did kill his
dog, having been paid for it, had he known a sahib was the proposed
victim he would have told us."
A grey, sturdy Shan pony, led by a running syce, dashed around the
bungalow, and as Swinton mounted, Finnerty said: "I'll send for Mahadua
right away and make ready for a peep-o'-day follow-up of that wounded
leopard; we can't let him roam to kill natives. Meet me at the top of
the tonga road at daybreak. In the meantime--well, you know how to
handle his lordship."
Then the captain pounded down the mountain road at an unreasonable rate,
though his speed was really unnecessary, for, clad in pajamas, he had
half finished a long cheroot in an armchair on the verandah when he saw
the form of Gilfain coming wearily up the gravelled road.
When Swinton knocked the ash from his cheroot, disclosing the lighted
end, the pedestrian acquired an instantaneous limp; his rather lethargic
mentality was quickened by an inspiration, and he hobbled up the steps
and along the verandah at a pathetic pace.
"Been long home, anxious guardian?" he gasped, sinking into a chair.
"About an hour," Swinton answered blithely.
"I got moony lonesome," Lord Victor explained as the smoker evinced no
curiosity.
"And went for a walk, eh? Where did you go--down to the bazaar?"
Even to Gilfain's unperceptive mind the opening for a sweeping lie
seemed a trifle too wide. Indeed, the fact that he had on riding boots
was rather against this proposition. He didn't answer at once, a twinge
in his newly injured ankle giving him an opportunity for a pause.
"You didn't see my syce about, did you?" he asked as a feeler.
"No; why--weren't you walking?"
"No; I went for a bit of a ride--down by the river--and just where the
road forks over by that nala where we took the elephant after the tiger
something sprang out of the jungle, let an awful roar out of him, and
that fool country bred of mine bolted--he's a superb ass of a
horse--jinked at a shadow, and went over a cut bank into a little stream
kind of a place; I came a cropper, with my foot caught in a stirrup, and
was dragged a bit. In fact, I went by-by for a few minutes. How the
devil my foot came out of the stirrup I don't know. When I came to that
three-toed creature they call a horse had vanished, and it's taken me
rather well over an hour to limp back."
Then the cripple, holding his ankle in both hands across his knee,
leaned back in his chair with eyes closed as if in agony, inwardly
muttering: "Gad! I wonder if that bally romance hangs together."
"Was it a tiger or a leopard?" Swinton asked in an even voice.
"I--I rather fancy it was a leopard. I didn't see overmuch of the silly
brute, my mount being in such an ecstasy of fright."
"What about the syce; perhaps the leopard nailed him?" the captain asked
solicitously.
"Hardly think it; I didn't see the bloomer after I left the bungalow.
Oh!" It was the ankle.
This cry of pain galvanised Swinton into compassion; it also gave him an
idea of how to mete out retribution to the awful liar beside him.
"We've got to fix up that ankle right away," he declared, rising.
"Oh, don't bother, old chap; I'll just bathe it."
"Worst thing you could do," Swinton declared professionally. "I've got a
powerful white liniment; it stings like the juice of Hades. Probably
peel the bark off, but it will prevent swelling."
With a sigh Lord Victor surrendered, and Swinton, bringing out his
bottle, rubbed the romancer's ankle until he groaned--not from an
imaginative pain. Then the limb was bound up in a bandage that all but
checked the circulation.
"Feel better now; that give you relief?" And Swinton's voice was as
solicitously tender as a mother's.
"Oh, yes--thanks!" And inwardly the exasperated patient swore.
Of course a whiskey and soda was part of the treatment, doctor and
patient both taking the medicine. As they sipped, the patient asked
cautiously: "What did you and the major do in the evening?"
"Oh, we took a stroll up on the hill."
"Eh, what! Oh, heavens--my ankle!" The guilty conscience had all but
betrayed its possessor. "Go up to see the prince?" he asked, his voice
holding an assumed casualness.
"We didn't go quite that far." Gilfain breathed easier. "Finnerty is a
great chap on birds' nests, and we saw some rather curious ones."
Lord Victor, in sudden inspiration, put his hand on Swinton's arm and
gave it a knowing pinch. "You didn't happen to meet fräulein, old boy,
did you?" And he laughed.
"Not bad, by Jove!" Swinton confided to himself; then aloud: "I'm not
interested; also I'm going to bed. I believe I'll take a gun early in
the morning and see if I can pick up the tracks of that leopard."
"What leopard?"
"The one that--that--charged your pony."
"Oh, yes, of course. But Lord bless me, man, he may be miles away by the
morning."
"Come on, Gilfain; I'll give you an arm in to bed. You hadn't better get
up in the morning. In fact, you'd better lie up all day to-morrow; in
this hot climate a wrench like that may produce black inflammation."
"Black inflammation sounds good, anyway," Swinton thought as the young
man, leaning heavily on his arm, hobbled to his bedroom.
Swinton fell asleep pondering over the proverbial thought that no man
can serve two masters, he being that no man in his now divided duty. In
the earl's interests he should remove that nobleman's son from the
vicinity of Fräulein Marie at once. A most dangerous woman she was, no
doubt. In the interest of his real master, the government, he should
stay on the spot and nip Ananda's intrigue.