Captain Foley sat in Doctor Boelke's big chair in the doctor's bungalow,
seeing a lovely vision in the smoke which curled upward from his
cheroot; he saw himself the possessor of two race horses he would buy
when he went back to Europe--perhaps it would have to be in
Germany--with the money Boelke had gone to the palace for. The crafty
captain had demanded "money down"--the two thousand pounds he was to
have for delivering the stolen paper, and that, too, before he showed
the paper. To guard against force, he had allowed Marie to keep the
document, but Marie should have been in the bungalow; however, she could
not be far--she would be in shortly.
From where he sat at Boelke's flat desk, Foley looked upon a wall of the
room that was panelled in richly carved teakwood, and from a brass rod
hung heavy silk curtains. On the panel that immediately fronted his eyes
was Ganesha, a pot-bellied, elephant-headed god; a droll figure that
caught the captain's fancy, especially when it reeled groggily to one
side to uncover an opening through which a dark, brilliant eye peered at
him. The captain's face held placid under this mystic scrutiny, but his
right hand gently pulled a drawer of the desk open, disclosing a Mauser
pistol.
When the whole panel commenced to slide silently, he lifted the pistol
so that its muzzle rested on the desk. Through the opening created in
the wall a handsome native stepped into the room, salaamed, and,
turning, closed the aperture; then he said: "I am Nawab Darna Singh, the
brother of Rajah Ananda's princess. May I close the door, sahib?"
Foley lifted the Mauser into view, drawling: "If you wish; I have a key
here to open it, if necessary."
Darna Singh closed a door that led from the front hall to the room, and,
coming back to stand just across the desk from Foley, said: "The major
sahib and the captain sahib are prisoners of Doctor Boelke; they are
below in a cell--they will be killed."
In answer to a question, Darna Singh related how the two men had been
captured and how he, not observed, had slipped away, and, knowing all
the passages, had made his way to the stone steps that led from the
tunnels to Doctor Boelke's bungalow.
Foley in his cold, unimpassioned voice asked: "What do you want me to
do?"
"Save them."
The captain's eyes narrowed. "They are not friends of mine; they
searched me to-day, and if I play this silly game I chuck in the sea two
thousand quid. It's a damn tall order."
Darna Singh's voice throbbed with passionate feeling: "I am a rajput,
sahib, and we look upon the sahibs as white rajputs. We may hate our
conquerors, but we do not despise them as cowards. I never knew a sahib
to leave a sahib to die; I never knew a rajput to leave a brother rajput
to die."
Foley puffed at his cigar, and behind his set face went on the conflict
the rajput's appeal to his manhood had stirred.
Darna Singh spoke again: "The sahib will not live to be branded a
coward, for his eyes show he has courage. And we must hurry or it will
be too late, for these two sahibs have risked their lives to save the
British raj against Prince Ananda's, who is a traitor to the sahib's
king; he is a traitor to his wife, the princess, for to-morrow he will
force into the palace the white mem-sahib who is here with Doctor
Boelke."
"By gad!" At last the cold gambler blood had warmed. His daughter Marie,
eh? That was different! And to funk it--let two Englishmen die! One an
Irishman, even! No doubt it was true, he reasoned, for that was why
Darna Singh was in revolt against the prince.
"What chance have we got?" Foley asked.
"There will be a guard at the cage."
"A German?"
"Yes, sahib."
"They have seen me with Doctor Boelke; perhaps we can turn the trick.
But," and his hard grey eyes rested on Darna Singh's face, "if, when we
go down there is no chance, I won't play the giddy goat; I'll come
back." He handed Boelke's Mauser to the rajput, saying: "I have a pistol
in my belt."
Darna Singh slid the panel, and they passed from the room to a landing
and down a dozen stone steps to a dim-lighted passage. Here the rajput
whispered: "I can take the sahib by a dark way to where he can see the
cage in which the two sahibs will be."
"Hurry!" Foley answered, for he was thinking ruefully of his money.
The underground place was a cross-hatch of many tunnels, and Darna Singh
led the way through a circuitous maze till they came to a bright-lighted
cross passage, and, peeping around a corner, Foley saw, fifty feet away,
a solitary German leaning against the wall, a rifle resting at his side.
Raising his voice in the utterance of Hindustani words, Foley rounded
the corner at a steady pace, followed by Darna Singh. The sentry grasped
his rifle, and, standing erect, challenged. In German Foley answered:
"We come from the Herr Doctor."
The sentry, having seen Foley with Doctor Boelke, was unsuspicious, and,
grounding his rifle tight against his hip, he clicked his heels together
at attention.
"The two prisoners are wanted above for examination," Foley said. "You
are to bind their arms behind their backs and accompany us."
"The one sahib is a giant," the other answered, when this order,
percolating slowly through his heavy brain, had found no objection.
"Give me the gun; I will cover him while you bind his arms."
The sentry unlocked the door, took a rope in his hand, and, saying to
Foley, "Keep close, _mein Herr_," entered the cell.
Finnerty and Swinton watched this performance, in the major's mind
bitter anger at the thought that an Irishman could be such a damnable
traitor.
"Will the _Herr Kapitän_ give orders in English to these _schweinehunds_
that if they do not obey they will be killed?"
Foley complied. What he said was: "Major, put your hands behind your
back; then when this chap comes close throttle him so quick he can't
squeak."
A hot wave of blood surged in a revulsion of feeling through Finnerty's
heart, and he crossed his hands behind his back, half turning as if to
invite the bondage. When the German stepped close a hand shot up, and,
closing on his windpipe, pinned him flat against the wall, lifted to his
toes, his tongue hanging out from between parted lips.
"Bind and gag him, Swinton," Foley suggested.
In a minute the sentry was trussed, a handkerchief wedged in his mouth,
and he was deposited in a corner. Outside, Foley turned off the cell
light, locked the door, and, handing the guard's gun to Swinton, led the
way back to the dark passage.
On the landing above the stone steps, Darna Singh silently moved the
carved Ganesha and peered through the hole. Then whispering, "The room
is empty," unlocked and slid open the panel, locking it behind them as
they entered Boelke's room.
The bungalow was silent. There was no sound of servants moving about; no
doubt they were over at the palace, waiting for the thing that was in
the air.
Out of the fullness of his heart, Foley spoke in low tones: "Gentlemen,
the doctor will be here shortly with money for me, and your presence
might irritate him."
"I'll never forget what you've done for us, Foley," Finnerty said.
"Neither will I if you do me out of two thousand quid by blathering
here," Foley drawled.
Swinton put his hand on Foley's arm. "Forgive me for what I said on the
trail, and I give you my word that what you've done for us will be
brought to the sircar's notice; but we've got to capture Boelke. We've
got to nip this revolt; you know there's one on."
"Look here, Herbert," Foley drawled, "I don't mind risking my life to
help out a couple of sahibs--a fellow's got to do that--but I'm damned
if I'm going to chuck away a kit bag full of rupee notes."
"I've got nothing to do with the money; that's a matter you must settle
with Boelke," Swinton said in dry diplomacy; "but if you and the major
will hide behind that heavy curtain and capture this enemy to the
British raj, I can promise you an unmolested return to England. There's
another thing"--his words were hesitatingly apologetic--"we are now your
heavy debtors and can't make demands on you for that paper, but if it
gets into Prince Ananda's hands it will make his revolt possible. He
will show it to the chiefs who meet him to-night."
"And with that I have nothing to do. I'll deliver the paper to Boelke
and take my money; what you do to the Herr Doctor after that is no
concern of mine."
With a smile, Swinton held out his hand, saying: "Darna Singh and I are
going to blow up the magazine, but I'll just say, thank you, for fear I
get pipped."