Payne answered in a careless tone:

"Let's sit down. There are a couple of chairs. We'll bag them."

He pointed to two at the far end of the verandah and led the way to them.

When they were seated he said:

"Haven't you any idea of what she means, Miss Daleham?"

The girl stared at him anxiously.

"Then she does mean something, and you know it. Mr. Payne, you have always been good to me. Won't you help me? Everyone seems to have grown suddenly very unfriendly."

The grey-haired man looked pityingly at her.

"Will you be honest with me, child?" he asked. "Are you engaged to Chunerbutty?"

"Engaged? What—to marry him? Good gracious, no!" exclaimed the astonished girl, half rising from her chair.

"Will you tell me frankly—have you any intention of marrying him?" he persisted.

Noreen stared at him, her cheeks flaming.

"Marry Mr. Chunerbutty? Of course not. How could you think so! Why, he's not even a white man."

"Thank God!" Payne exclaimed fervently. "I'm delighted to hear it. I couldn't believe it—yet one never knows."

"But what on earth put such a preposterous idea into your head, Mr. Payne?" asked Noreen. "And what has this got to do with Mrs. Rice?"

"Because Mrs. Rice said that you were engaged to Chunerbutty."

For a moment Noreen could find no words. Then she leaned forward, her eyes flashing.

"Oh, how could she—how could she think so?"

"Perhaps she didn't. But she wanted us to. She said that you had told her you were engaged to him, but wanted it kept secret for the present. So naturally she told everyone."

"Told everyone that I was going to marry a native? Oh, how cruel of her! How could she be so wicked!" exclaimed the girl, much distressed. Then she added: "Did you believe it?"

Payne shook his head.

"Candidly, child, I didn't know what to think. I hoped it wasn't true. But of late that damned Bengali seemed so intimate with you. He apparently wanted everyone to see on what very friendly terms you and he were."

"Did Major Dermot believe it too?"

"I don't know," said Payne doubtfully. "Dermot's not the fellow to talk about women. He's never mentioned you."

"But how do you know that Mrs. Rice said such a thing? Did she tell you?"

"No; she knows that I am your friend, and I daresay she was afraid to tell me such a lie. But she told others."

He turned in his chair and called to a young fellow standing near the bar of the club.

"I say, Travers, do you mind coming here a moment? Pull up a chair and sit down."

Travers was a straight, clean-minded boy, one of those of their community whom Noreen liked best, and she had felt hurt at his marked avoidance of her all the afternoon.

"Look here, youngster," said Payne in a low voice, "did Mrs. Rice tell you that Miss Daleham was engaged to Chunerbutty?"

Travers looked at him in surprise.

"Yes. I told you so the other day. She said that Miss Daleham had confided to her that they were engaged, but wanted it kept secret for a time until he could get another job."

"Then, my boy, you'll be pleased to hear it's a damned lie," said Payne impressively. "Miss Daleham would never marry a black man."

The boy's face lit up.

"I am glad!" he cried impulsively. "I'm very, very sorry, Miss Daleham, for helping to spread the lie. But I only told Payne. I knew he was a friend of yours, and I hoped he'd be able to contradict the yarn. For I felt very sick about it."

"Thank you, Mr. Travers," the girl said gratefully. "But I'm glad that you did tell him. Otherwise I might not have heard it, at least not from a friend."

Just then the four men on the tennis-court finished their game and came in to the bar. Fred Daleham and another took their places and began a single. Mrs. Rice, with Dermot and several other men, came up the steps of the verandah, and, sitting down, ordered tea for the party.

Noreen looked at her with angry eyes, and, rising, walked along the verandah to where she was sitting surrounded by the group of men.

Her enemy looked up as she approached.

"Are you coming to have tea, dear?" she said sweetly. "I haven't ordered any for you, but I daresay they'll find you a cup."

Dermot rose to offer the girl his chair; but, ignoring him, she confronted the other woman.

"Mrs. Rice, will you please tell me if it is true that you said I was engaged to Mr. Chunerbutty?" she demanded in a firm tone.

It was as if a bomb had exploded in the club. Noreen's voice carried clearly through the building, so that everyone inside it heard her words distinctly. The only two members of their little community who missed them were her brother and his opponent on the tennis-court.

Mrs. Rice gasped and stared at the indignant girl, while the men about her sat up suddenly in their chairs.

"I said so? What an idea!" ejaculated the planter's wife. Then in an insinuating voice she added: "You know I never betray secrets."

"There is no secret. Please answer me. Did you say to any one that I had told you I was engaged to him?" persisted the girl.

The older woman tried to crush her by a haughty assumption of superiority.

"You absurd child, you must be careful what accusations you bring. You shouldn't say such things."

"Kindly answer my question," demanded the angry girl.

Mrs. Rice lay back in her chair with affected carelessness.

"Well, aren't you engaged to him? Won't even he—?" she broke off and sniggered impertinently.

"I am not. Most certainly not," said Noreen hotly. "I insist on your answering me. Did you say that I had told you we were and asked you to keep it a secret?"

"No, I did not. Who did I tell?" snapped the other woman.

"Me for one," broke in a voice; and Dermot took a step forward. "You told me very clearly and precisely, Mrs. Rice, that Miss Daleham had confided to you under the pledge of secrecy—which, by the way, you were breaking—that she was engaged to this man."

There was an uncomfortable pause. Noreen glanced gratefully at her champion. The other men shifted uneasily, and Mrs. Rice's husband, who was standing at the bar, hastily hid his face in a whiskey and soda.

Noreen turned again to her traducer.

"Will you kindly contradict your false statement?" she asked.

The other woman looked down sullenly and made no reply.

"Then I shall," continued the girl. She faced the group of men before her, Payne and Travers by her side.

"I ask you to believe, gentlemen, that there never was nor could be any question of an engagement between Mr. Chunerbutty and me," she said firmly. "And I give you my word of honour that I never said such a thing to Mrs. Rice."

She waited for a moment, then turned and walked away down the verandah, followed by Payne and Travers, leaving a pained silence behind her. Mrs. Rice tried to regain her self-confidence.

"The idea of that chit talking to me like that!" she exclaimed. "It was only meant for a joke, if I did say it. Who'd have ever thought she'd have taken it that way?"

"Any decent man—or woman, Mrs. Rice," said Dermot severely. Then, after looking at Rice to see if he wished to take up the cudgels on his wife's behalf, and failing to catch that gentleman's carefully-averted eye, the soldier turned and walked deliberately to where Noreen was sitting, now suffering from the reaction from her anger and frightened at the memory of her boldness.

The other men got up one by one and went to the bar, from which the hen pecked Rice was peremptorily called by his angry wife and ordered to drive her home.

After the Dalehams had returned to their bungalow the girl told her brother of what had happened at the club. He was exceedingly angry and agreed that it would be wiser for her to keep Chunerbutty at a distance in future. And later on he had no objection to her inviting Dermot to pay them a flying visit when he was again in their neighbourhood. For the incident at the club had brought about a resumption of the old friendly relations between Noreen and Dermot, who occasionally invited her to accompany him on Badshah for a short excursion into the forest, much to her delight. She confided to him the offer of the necklace and learned in return his belief that the Rajah was the instigator of the attempt to carry her off. When her brother heard of this and of Chunerbutty's action in the matter of the jewels he was so enraged that he quarrelled for the first time with his Hindu friend.

* * * * *

Dermot was kept informed of whatever happened in Lalpuri by the repentant Rama through the medium of Barclay. For the Deputy Superintendent had been appointed to a special and important post in the Secret Police and told off to watch the conspiracy in Bengal. This he owed to a strong recommendation from Dermot to the Head of the Department in Simla. Rama proved invaluable. Through him they learned of the despatch of an important Brahmin messenger and intermediary from the Palace to Bhutan, by way of Malpura, where he was to visit some of his caste-fellows on Parry's garden. The information reached Dermot too late to enable him to seize the man on the tea-estate. So he hurried to the border to intercept the messenger before he crossed it. But here, too, he was unsuccessful. Certain that the Brahmin had not slipped through the meshes of the net formed by his secret service of subsidised Bhuttias, Dermot returned to the jungle to make search for him along the way. But all to no avail, much to his chagrin; for he had reason to hope that he would find on the emissary proof enough of the treason of the rulers of Lalpuri to hang them. He went back to Malpura to prosecute enquiries.

To console himself for his disappointment Dermot determined to have a day's shooting in the jungle, a treat he rarely had leisure for now. He invited the Dalehams to accompany him. Noreen accepted eagerly, but her brother was obliged to decline, much to his regret. For Parry was now always in a state bordering on lunacy, and his brutal treatment of the coolies, when his assistant was not there to restrain him, several times nearly drove them into open revolt. So Dermot and his companion set off alone.

As they went along they chanced to pass near a little village buried in the heart of the jungle. A man working on the small patch of cleared soil in which he and his fellows grew their scanty crops saw them, recognised Badshah and his male rider, and ran away shouting to the hamlet. Then out of it swarmed men, women, and children, the last naked, while only miserable rags clothed the skinny frames of their elders. All prostrated themselves in the dust in Badshah's path. The elephant stopped. Then a wizened old man with scanty white beard raised his hands imploringly to Dermot.

"Lord! Holy One! Have mercy on us!"

The rest chorused: "Have mercy!"

"Spare thy slaves, O Lord!" went on the old man. "Spare us ere all perish. We worship at thy shrine. We grudge not thy elephants our miserable crops. Are they not thy servants? But let not the Striped Death slay all of us."

Dermot questioned him and then explained to Noreen that a man-eating tiger had taken up its residence near the village and was rapidly killing off its inhabitants.

"Oh, do help them," she said. "Can't you shoot it?"

He reflected for a few moments.

"Yes, I think I know how to get it. Will you wait for me in the village?"

"What? Mayn't I go with you to see you kill it? Please let me. I promise I'll not scream or be stupid."

He looked at her admiringly.

"Bravo!" he said. "I'm sure you'll be all right. Very well. I promise you you shall see a sight that not many other women have seen."

He borrowed a puggri—a strip of cotton cloth several yards long—from a villager, and bade them show him where the tiger lay up during the heat of the day. When they had done so from a safe distance, he turned Badshah, and, to Noreen's surprise, sped off swiftly in the opposite direction.

Suddenly the girl touched his arm quietly.

"Look! I see a wild elephant. There's another! And another!" she whispered.

"Yes; I've come in search of them," he replied in his ordinary tone. "It's Badshah's herd."

"Is it really? How wonderful! How did you know where to find them?" she cried, thrilled by the sight of the great beasts all round them and exclaiming with delight at the solemn little woolly babies, many newly born. For this was the calving season.

Dermot uttered a peculiar cry that sent the cow-elephants huddling together, their young hiding under their bodies, while from every quarter the great tuskers broke out through the undergrowth and came to him in a mass. Then, as Badshah turned and set off at a rapid pace, the bull-elephants followed.

When he arrived near the spot in which the man-eater was said to have his lair, Dermot stopped them all. Despite her protests he tied Noreen firmly with the puggri to the rope crossing Badshah's pad. Then he drove his animal into the herd of tuskers, which had crowded together, and divided them into two bodies. The tiger was reported to lie up in a narrow nullah filled and fringed with low bushes. From the near bank to where Badshah stood the forest was free from undergrowth, which came to within a score of yards of the far bank.

Badshah smelled the ground, and the other elephants followed his example and, when they scented the tiger's trail, began to be restless and excited. A sharp cry from Dermot and the two bodies of tuskers separated and moved away, branching off half right and left, and disappeared in the undergrowth.

Dermot cocked his double-barrelled rifle. There was a long pause. A strange feeling of awe crept over Noreen at the realisation of her companion's strange power over these great animals. No wonder the superstitious natives believed him to be a god.

Presently there was a loud crashing in the undergrowth beyond the nullah, and Noreen saw the saplings in it agitated, as if by the passage of the elephants. The tiger gave no sign of life. The girl's heart beat fast, and her breath came quickly. But her companion never moved.

Suddenly Noreen gasped, for through the screen of thin bushes that fringed the edge of the nullah a hideous painted mask was thrust out. It was a tiger's face, the ears flattened to the skull, the eyes flaming, the lips drawn back to bare the teeth in a ghastly snarl. The brute saw Badshah and drew quietly back. A pause. Then it sprang into full view and poised for a single instant on the far bank. But at that very moment the line of tuskers burst out of the tangled undergrowth and the tiger jumped down into the nullah again.

Then like a flash it leaped into sight over the near bank, bounding in a furious charge straight at Badshah. Noreen held her breath as it crouched to spring. Dermot's rifle was at his shoulder, and he pressed the trigger. There was a click—the cartridge had missed fire. And the tiger sprang full at the man.

But as it did so Badshah swung swiftly round—well for Noreen that she was securely fastened—for he had been standing a little sideways. And with an upward sweep of his head he caught the leaping tiger in mid-air on the point of his tusk, hurling it back a dozen yards.

As the baffled brute struck the ground with a heavy thud it lay still for a second and then sprang up, but at that moment Dermot's second barrel rang out, and, shot through the brain, the tiger collapsed, its head resting on its paws. A tremor shook the powerful frame, the tail twitched feebly, then all was still.

The long line of elephants halted on the far bank of the nullah, swung into file, and moved swiftly out of sight. Their work was done.

Dermot reloaded and urged Badshah forward, covering the tiger with his rifle. There was no need. It was dead.

Noreen leant forward and looked down at the striped body.

"What a splendid beast!" she exclaimed.

Dermot turned to her.

"You kept your word well, Miss Daleham," he said. "I congratulate you on your pluck. The highest compliment I can pay you is to say that I forgot you were there. Not many men would have sat as quiet as you did when the cartridge missed fire and the brute sprang."

The girl's eyes sparkled and she blushed. His praise was very dear to her.

In a lighter tone he continued:

"As a reward and a souvenir you shall have the skin. I'll get the villagers to take it off. Now stay on Badshah, please, while I slip down and have a look at the tiger's little nest."

With rifle at the ready, lest the dead animal should have had a mate, he climbed down into the nullah. He had not gone ten yards before his foot struck against something hard. In the pressed-down weeds was the half-gnawed skull of a man. The skin and flesh of the face were fairly intact. He took the head up in his hands. On the forehead were painted three white horizontal strokes. The tiger's last prey had been a Brahmin. A thought flashed across Dermot's mind. He searched about. A few bones, parts of the hands and feet, some rags of clothing—and a long flat narrow leather case. He tore this open and hastily took out the papers it contained; and as he skimmed through them his eyes glistened with delight.

He sprang up out of the nullah and ran towards Badshah. When the elephant's trunk had swung him up on to the massive head he said:

"We must go back at once. I 'll tell the villagers as we pass to flay the tiger. I must borrow your brother's pony and ride as fast as I can to Salchini to get Payne's motor to take me to the railway."

"The railway?" exclaimed the girl. "Why, what is the matter? Where are you going?"

"To Simla. I've found the lost messenger. Aye, and perhaps information that may save India and proofs that will hang our friends in the Palace of Lalpuri. Mul, Badshah!"



CHAPTER XIX

TEMPEST

The storm had burst on India. In the Khyber Pass there was fiercer fighting than even that blood-stained defile had ever seen. The flames kindled by fanaticism and lust of plunder blazed up along the North-west Frontier and burned fiercest around Peshawar, where the Pathan tribes gathered thickest. No news came from the interior of Bhutan.

So far, however, the interior of the land was comparatively tranquil. Sporadic outbreaks in the Bombay Presidency and the Punjaub had been crushed promptly. The great plan of a wide-spread concerted rising throughout the peninsula had come to naught, thanks to the papers that Dermot had found in the man-eater's den. He had carried them straight to Simla himself, for closer examination had confirmed his first impression and shown him that they were far too important to be confided to any one else.

The information in them proved to be of the utmost value, for they disclosed the complete plans of the conspirators and told the very dates arranged for the advance of the Afghan army and the attacks of the Pathans, which were to take place simultaneously with the general rising in India. This latter the military authorities were enabled to deal with so effectively that it came to nothing.

Incidentally the papers conclusively proved the treason of the Rajah and the Dewan of Lalpuri, and that the Palace was one of the most important centres of the conspiracy. To Dermot's amazement no action was taken against the two arch-plotters, owing to the incredible timidity of the chief civil authorities in India and their susceptibility to political influences in England. For Lalpuri and its rulers had been taken under the very particular protection of the Socialist Party; and the Government of India feared to touch the traitors. The excuse given for this leniency was that any attempt to punish them might be the signal for the long delayed rising in Lalpuri and Eastern Bengal generally.

A few days after Dermot's return from Simla orders came to him from the Adjutant General to hand over the command of the detachment to Parker, as he himself had been appointed extra departmental Political Officer of the Bhutan Border, with headquarters at Ranga Duar. This released him from the responsibilities of his military duties and left him free to devote himself to watching the frontier. He was able to keep in communication with Parker by means of signal stations established on high peaks near the Fort, visible from many points in the mountains and the forest; for he carried a signalling outfit always with him.

Thanks to this precaution the garrison of the outpost was not taken by surprise when one morning the hills around Ranga Duar were seen to be covered with masses of armed men, and long lines of troops wound down the mountain paths. For from the peaks above the pass through which he had once gone to the Death Place of the elephants, Dermot had looked down upon an invading force of Chinese regulars supported by levies of Bhutanese from the interior and a wild mob of masterless Bhuttias from both sides of the border. He had flashed a warning to Parker in ample time, returned to the peelkhana and bidden Ramnath hide with Badshah in a concealed spot in the foothills where he could easily find them, sent the other mahouts and elephants out of reach of the invaders, and climbed up to the Fort to watch with his late subaltern the arrival of the enemy.

"Well, Major, it's come our way at last," said Parker as they greeted each other. "Thanks to your warning we're ready for them. But we are not the only people who've been expecting them. The wires are cut, the road blocked, and we are isolated."

"Yes, I know. Many messengers have got through from the enemy; for my cordon of faithful Bhuttias has disappeared. The members of it have joined the invaders in the hope of loot." Parker looked up at the hills, black with descending forms.

"There's a mighty lot of the beggars," he said simply. "Do you remember our discussing this very happening once and your saying that we weren't equal to stopping a whole army? What's your advice now?"

"See it out. We're bound to go under in the end, but we'll be able, I hope, to keep them off for a few days. And every hour we hold them up will be worth a lot to those below. We shan't be relieved, for there aren't any men to spare in India. But we'll have done our part."

"I say, Major, wasn't it lucky we got those machine guns in time? I've plenty of ammunition, so we ought to be able to put up a good fight. What'll they do first?"

"Try to rush the defences at once. They have a lot of irregulars whom the Chinese General won't be able to keep in hand. He won't mind their being wiped out either. I see you've made a good job of clearing the foreground. You haven't left them much cover. So you blew up our poor old Mess and the bungalows?"

"Yes. The rubble came in handy for filling in that nullah. Hullo!" Parker's glasses went to his eyes. "You're right, by Jingo! They're gathering for an assault. Gad! what a beautiful mark for shrapnel. I wish we'd a gun or two."

A storm of shells from the mountain batteries, the only artillery that the enemy had been able to bring with them through the Himalayas, fell on the Fort and its defences. Then masses of men rushed down the hills to the attack. Not a shot was fired at them. Encouraged by the garrison's silence and carried away by the prospect of an easy victory, they lost all formation and crowded together in dense swarms.

The two British officers watched them from the central redoubt. Parker held his binoculars to his eyes with his right hand, while his left forefinger rested on a polished button in a little machine on the table beside him. The assailants, favoured by the fall of the ground, soon reached the limits of the cantonments, bare now of buildings and trees. There were trained Chinese troops, some tall, light-complexioned Northerners of Manchu blood, others stocky, yellow men from Canton and the Southern Provinces. Mobs of Bhutanese with heads, chests, legs, and feet bare, fierce but undisciplined fighters, armed with varied weapons, led the van. Uttering weird yells and brandishing their dahs, spears, muskets, and rifles, they rushed towards the fort, from which no shot was fired. Accustomed to the lofty jongs, or castles, of their own land they deemed the breastworks and trenches unworthy of notice. And the stone barracks and walls in the Fort were rapidly melting away under the rain of shells.

Flushed with victory the swarming masses came on. But suddenly the world upheaved behind the leaders. Rocks, earth, and rubble went up in clouds into the air, and with them scores of the Chinese regular troops, under whose very feet mines of the new explosive had been fired by Parker. And the howling mobs in front were held up by barbed wire, while from the despised trenches and breastworks a storm of lead swept the crowded masses of the attackers away. At that close range every bullet from the machine guns and rifles of the defenders drove through two or three assailants, every bomb and grenade slew a group. Only in one spot by sheer weight of numbers did they break through.

But like a thunderbolt fell the counter-attack. Stalwart Punjaubi Mohammedans, led by Dermot, swept down upon them, and with bomb and bayonet drove them out. The survivors turned and staggered up the hills again, withering away under the steady fire of the sepoys, who adjusted their sights with the utmost coolness as the range increased.

Again and again the assaults were repeated and repulsed, until the undisciplined and demoralised Bhutanese refused to advance, and the Chinese regulars attacked alone. But fresh mines exploded under them; the deadly fire of the defenders' machine guns blasted them; and the Pekin general looked anxious as his best troops melted away. He would not go far into India if every small body of its soldiers took equally heavy toll of his force. So he ordered a cessation of the assaults.

But there was no respite for the little garrison. Day and night the pitiless bombardment by the mountain batteries and long-range fire of rifles and machine guns never ceased. And death was busy among the defenders.

On the third night of the siege Dermot and the subaltern knelt side by side in what was now the last line of the defence.

"I ought not to ask you to go, Major," whispered Parker. "It's not possible to get through, I'm afraid. I can't forget the awful sight of the fiendish tortures they inflicted on poor Hikmat Khan and Shaikh Ismail today in full view of us all. They tried to slip through last night with their naked bodies covered with oil. It's a terrible death for you if they catch you. It would be much easier to die fighting. Yet someone ought to go."

"Yes, they must be told at Headquarters," replied his companion in an equally low tone. "We can't hold them two days longer."

"Not that, if they try to rush us again. Our ammunition is giving out," said Parker. "I'd go myself if I weren't commanding here. But I'd have no chance of getting through. You are our only hope. Oh, I don't mean of relief. There's no possibility of that."

"No; if I do manage to get into touch with Headquarters, it would be too late, even if they could spare any troops."

"Yes, it's all over now, bar the shouting. Well, we've had some jolly times together, sir, you and I, in this little place, haven't we? Do you remember when the Dalehams were up here? What a nice girl she was. I hope she's safe."

"I hope to Heaven she is," muttered Dermot. "Well, Parker, I must say good-bye. We've been good friends, you and I; and I'm sorry it's the end."

In the darkness their hands met in a firm grip.

"One word, sir," whispered the subaltern. "If you do pull through, you've got my mother's address. You'll let her know? She thinks a lot of me, poor old lady."

Dermot answered him only by a pressure of the hand. The next moment he was gone. Parker, straining eyes and ears, saw nothing, heard nothing.

Half an hour later a picquet of slant-eyed men lying on the steep slopes of the hill below the Fort saw above them a man's figure dark against the paling stars. They challenged and sprang towards it with levelled bayonets. The next instant they were hurled apart, dashed to the ground, trampled to death. One as he expired had a shadowy vision of some awful bulk towering black against the coming dawn.

The sun was low in the heavens when Dermot awoke in a bracken-carpeted glade of the forest thirty miles away from Ranga Duar. Over him Badshah stood watchfully. The man yawned, rubbed his eyes and sat up. He looked at his watch.

"Good Heavens! I've slept for hours!" he cried.

Overcome by fatigue, for he had not even lain down once since the siege began, and finding that he was in danger of falling off the elephant, he had dismounted for a few minutes' rest. But exhausted Nature had conquered him, and he had fallen into a deep sleep. Haggard, hollow-eyed, and worn out, despite the rest, he staggered to his feet and was swung up to Badshah's neck by the crooked trunk and started again.

He was hastening towards Salchini, where he hoped to secure Payne's car, if the owner had not fled, and try to get into touch with Army Headquarters. But what to do if his friend had gone he hardly knew. The heavy firing at Ranga Duar, echoed by the mountains, must have been heard in the district; and all the planters had probably taken the warning and gone away. He was racked with anxiety as to Noreen's fate and could only hope that at the first alarm her brother had hurried her off. But there was no military station nearer than Calcutta or Darjeeling, and by this time it was probable that the whole of Eastern Bengal was in revolt. God help the Englishwoman that fell into its people's hands! The temptation to turn aside to Malpura was great. But Dermot overcame it. His duty came first.

Darkness had fallen on the jungle now. Except to lessen his speed it made little difference to the elephant; but for the man it was harder to find his way. On the twisting jungle tracks his luminous compass was of little use. He was forced to trust mainly to the animal.

But soon a suspicion arose in his mind that Badshah had swerved away from the direction in which Salchini lay and was heading for Malpura. It became certainty when they reached a deep nullah in the forest which Dermot knew was on the route to that garden. He tried to turn the elephant. Badshah paid no heed to him and held on his way with an invincible determination that made the man suspect there was a grave reason for his obstinacy. He knew too well the animal's strange and mysterious intelligence. He gave up contending uselessly and was borne along through the dark forest unresisting. Over the tree-tops floated the long, wailing cry of a Giant Owl circling against the stars. Close to their path the warning bark of a khakur deer was answered by the harsh braying roar of a tiger. Far away the metallic trumpeting of a wild elephant rang out into the night.

Presently Dermot saw a red glow through the trees ahead. Badshah never checked his pace but swept on until the glow became a ruddy glare staining the tree-trunks. Suddenly the stars shone overhead. They were clear of the jungle; and as they emerged on the open clearing of the tea-garden a column of fire blazed up ahead of them.

A chill fear smote Dermot. He would have urged Badshah on, but the elephant did not need it. Rapidly they sped along the soft road towards the leaping flames, which the soldier soon realised rose from the burning factory and withering sheds. And black against the light danced hundreds of figures, while yells and wild cries rent the air. And, well to one side, a fresh burst of flame and sparks leapt up into the night. It was one of the bungalows afire. Round it more figures moved fantastically. A groan came from the man's lips. Was it Daleham's bungalow that burned?

All at once Badshah stopped of his own accord and sank down on his knees. Mechanically his rider slipped to the ground and stood staring at the strange scene. He hardly noticed that the elephant rose, touched him caressingly with its trunk, swung round and sped away towards the forest. Half-dazed and heedless of danger Dermot hurried forward. Again the flames shot up, and by their light he saw to his relief that the Dalehams' bungalow was still standing. Parry's house was burning furiously. Pistol in hand he ran forward, scarcely cognizant of the crowds of shifting figures around the blazing buildings, deaf to their triumphant yells. Groups of natives crossed his path, shouting and leaping into the air excitedly, but they paid no attention to him. But, as he ran, he hit up against one man who turned and, seeing his white face, yelled and sprang away.

As Dermot neared the Dalehams' bungalow he saw that it was surrounded by a cordon of coolies armed with rifles and strung out many yards apart. He raced swiftly for a gap between two of them; but a man rose from the ground and snatched at him. The soldier struck savagely at him with the hand in which the pistol was firmly clenched, putting all his weight into the blow. The native crumpled and fell in a heap.

Dashing on Dermot shouted Daleham's name. From behind a barricade of boxes on the verandah a stern voice which he recognised as belonging to one of the Punjaubi servants whom he had provided, called out:

"Kohn hai? Kohn atha? (Who is there? Who comes?)"

"Sher Afzul! It is I. Dermot Sahib," he replied, as he sprang up the verandah steps.

The muzzle of a rifle was pointed at him over the barricade, and a bearded face peered at him.

"It is the Major Sahib!" said the Mohammedan. "In the name of Allah, Sahib, have you brought your sepoys?"

"No; I am alone. Where are the Sahib and the missie baba?"

"In the bungalow. Enter, Sahib."

Dermot climbed over the barricade and pushed open the door of the dining-room, which was in darkness. But the heavy curtain dividing it from the drawing-room was dragged aside and Daleham appeared in the doorway, outlined against the faint light of a turned-down lamp. Behind him Noreen was rising from a chair.

"Who's there?" cried the boy, raising a revolver.

"It's all right, Daleham. It's I, Dermot. I'm alone, I'm sorry to say."

A stifled cry burst from the girl.

"Oh, you are safe, thank God!" she cried, her hand at her heart.

"What has happened here?" asked Dermot, entering the room.

Fred let fall the curtain as he answered:

"Hell's broke loose on the garden, sir. The coolies have mutinied. Parry's dead, murdered; and we're alive only by the kind mercies of that brute Chunerbutty, damn him! You were right about him, Major; and I was a fool.... Is it true you've been attacked up in Ranga Duar?" he continued.

"Are you wounded, Major Dermot?" broke in the girl anxiously.

"No, Miss Daleham. I'm quite safe and sound."

Then he told them briefly what had happened. When he had finished he asked them when the trouble began at Malpura.

"Three days ago," replied Fred. "The wind was blowing from the north, and we heard firing up in the mountains. I thought you were having an extra go of musketry there. But the coolies suddenly stopped work and gathered outside their village, where those infernal Brahmins harangued them. I went to order them back to their jobs——".

"Where was Parry?"

"Lying dead drunk in his bungalow. Well, some of the coolies attacked me with lathis, others tried to protect me. The Brahmins told me that the end of the British Raj (dominion) had come and that you were being attacked in Ranga Duar by a big army from China and would be wiped out. Then I was hustled back to the bungalow where those Mohammedan servants that you got for us—lucky you did!—turned out with rifles, which they said afterwards you'd given them, and wanted to fire on the mob. But I stopped them."

"Where was Chunerbutty?"

"Oh, he hadn't thrown off the mask yet. He came to me and said he was a prisoner and would not be allowed to leave the estate. But he advised me to ride over to Granger or some of the other fellows and get their help. But I wouldn't leave Noreen; and Sher Afzul told me that it was as bad on the other gardens. But only today the real trouble began."

"What happened?"

"Some news apparently reached the coolies that drove them mad with delight. They murdered the Parsi storekeeper, looted his place, and got drunk on his daru. Then they started killing the few Mohammedans we had on the estate. Some of the women and children got to us and we took them in. But the rest, even the little babies, were murdered by the brutes.

"I went over to Parry, but he was still too drunk to understand me. I was trying to rouse him when I heard shouts and ran out on the verandah. All the coolies, men, women, and children, were streaming towards the bungalows, mad with excitement, screaming and yelling. The men and even most of the boys carried weapons. The Brahmins were leading them. They made for Chunerbutty's house first. I was going to run to his assistance, when he came out and they cheered him like anything. He was in native dress and had marks painted on his forehead like the other Brahmins."

"Yes; go on. What happened then?"

"The engineer seemed as excited and mad as the rest. He ran down his steps, put himself at the head of the mob, shouted out something, and pointed to Parry's bungalow. They all rushed over to it, yelling like mad. Poor old Parr heard them and, dazed and drunk, staggered out on the verandah in his pyjamas and bare feet. Chunerbutty and the Brahmins came up the steps, driving back the crowd, which tried to follow them, howling like demons."

Fred passed his hand across his eyes. Dermot bent forward and stared eagerly at him, while Noreen looked only at the soldier.

"I called out to the engineer and asked him what it all meant," went on the boy, "but he took no notice of me. Parry tottered towards him, abusing him. Chunerbutty let him come to within a yard or two, then pulled out a pistol and fired three shots straight at the old man's heart. Poor old Parr fell dead."

Daleham paused for a moment.

"Poor old chap! He had his faults; but he had his good points, too. Well, I rushed towards him, but the Bengalis fell on me, knocked me down, and overpowered me. The mob outside yelled for my blood; but Chunerbutty shut them up. I was allowed to get on my feet again; and Chunerbutty held a pistol to my head, and cursed me and ordered me to go back to my bungalow and wait. He said that somebody would come here tomorrow to settle what was to be my fate and to take Noreen."

The girl sprang up.

"You never told me that," she cried.

"No; it wasn't any use distressing you," replied her brother. "But I had to tell the Major."

She turned impetuously to Dermot and stretched out her arms to him.

"You won't let them take me, will you? Oh, say you won't!" she said with a little sob.

He took both her hands in his.

"No, little girl, I won't. Not while I live."

"You'll kill me first? Promise me."

"On my honour."

She gave a sigh of relief and, strangely content, sank back into her chair. But she still held one of his hands clasped tightly in both of hers.

"Well, that's pretty well all there is to tell, Major," her brother went on. "I came back here, and the servants and I tried to put the house into a state of defence. No one's come near us so far."

"So Chunerbutty was at the head of affairs here. I thought so, I suppose the someone is that scoundrelly Rajah. He'll make his conditions known and, if you don't surrender, they'll attack us. Now, let's see what we've got as garrison. We two and the servants—seven. How are you off for weapons? I left my rifle behind."

"The servants have got their rifles and plenty of ammunition. I have a double-barrelled .400 cordite rifle and a shot-gun. If it comes to a scrap I'll take that and leave you the rifle. You're a much better shot; and I can't miss at close quarters with a scatter-gun."

"Do you think there's any hope for us?" asked the girl quietly.

"Frankly, I don't. I'd not put it so bluntly, only I've seen you in a tight corner before, Miss Daleham, and you weren't afraid."

"I am not now," she replied calmly.

"I believe we'd hold off these coolies, aye, and the Rajah's soldiers too, if they came. But we may have the Chinese troops on us at any minute; and that's a different matter."

"But why should you stay with us, Major Dermot?" said the girl anxiously. "As you got in through these men, surely you could escape the same way."

"I'll be candid with you, Miss Daleham, and tell you that if I could I would. For it's my duty to go on and report. But I'm stranded without my elephant, and even if I had him it wouldn't be much good unless I had Payne's car. And what has happened here must have happened on the other gardens. Without the motor I'd be too late with my news. So I'll stay here and take my chance."

Then he laughed and added:

"But cheer up; we're not dead yet. If only I'd Badshah I'd take you both up on him and we'd break through the whole Chinese Army."

The girl shook her head.

"We couldn't go. We couldn't leave those poor women and children and the servants."

"I forgot them. No; you're right. Well, I haven't lost all hope. I have great faith in old Badshah. I shouldn't be surprised if he got us out of this scrape, as he did before."

"Oh, I forgot him. I believe he'll help us still," cried the girl. "Where did you leave him?"

"He left me. He's quite able to take care of himself," replied Dermot grimly. "Now, Daleham, please take me round the house and show me the defences; and we'll arrange about the roster of sentry-duty with the servants. Please excuse me, Miss Daleham."

Through the weary night the two men, when not taking their turn on guard, sat and talked with Noreen in the drawing-room. For the girl refused to go to bed and, only to content them, lay back on a settee.

When she and Dermot were left alone she sighed and said:

"Ah, my beautiful forest! I must say good-bye to it. How I have enjoyed the happy days in it."

"Some of them were too exciting to be pleasant," he replied smiling.

"But the others made up for them. I like to think of you in the forest best," she said dreamily. "We were real friends there."

"And elsewhere, I hope."

"No. In Darjeeling you didn't like me."

"I did. Tonight I can be frank and tell you that I was glad to go to it because you were there."

She looked at him wonderingly.

"But you wouldn't take any notice of me there," she said.

"No. I was told that you were engaged, or practically engaged, to Charlesworth, and disliked any one else taking up your time."

She sat up indignantly.

"To Captain Charlesworth? How absurd! I suppose I've Ida to thank for that. I wouldn't have married him for anything."

"Is that so? What a game of cross-purposes life is! But that's why I didn't try to speak to you much."

"Did you want to? I thought you disliked me. And it hurt me so much. Do you know, I used to cry about it sometimes. I wanted you to be my friend."

He walked over to her settee.

"Noreen, dear, I wanted to be your friend and you to be mine," he said, looking down at her. "I liked you so much. At least, I thought I liked you."

"And—and don't you?" she asked, looking up at him.

He knelt beside her.

"No, little friend, I don't like you. Because I—" He paused.

"What?" she whispered faintly.

"I love you, dear. Do you think it absurd?"

She was silent for a moment. Then she looked slowly up at him; and in her eyes he read her answer.

"Sweetheart! Little sweetheart!" he whispered, and held out his arms to her.

With a little cry she crept into them; and he pressed her to his heart. At that moment enemies, danger, death, were forgotten. For Noreen her whole world lay within the circle of his arms.

"Do you really, really love me?" she asked wonderingly.

He held her very close to his heart and looked fondly, tenderly down into the lovely upturned face.

"Love you, my dearest? I love you with all my heart, my soul, my being," he whispered. "How could I help loving you?"

And bending down he kissed her fondly.

"It's all so wonderful," she murmured. "I didn't think that you cared for me, that you could ever care. You seemed so far away, too occupied with important things to spare a thought for me. So serious a person, and sometimes so stern, that I was afraid of you."

He laughed amusedly.

"The wonder is that you ever came to care for me. You do care, don't you, beloved?"

She looked up at him earnestly.

"Dear, do I seem forward, bold? But our time together is too short for pretence. Yes, I do care. I love you? I seem to have always loved you. Or at least to have waited always to love you. I don't think I knew what love was until now. Until now. Now I do know."

She paused and stared across the room, seeing the vision of her childhood, her girlhood. From outside came intermittent shouts and an occasional random shot. But she did not hear them.

"As a child, as a schoolgirl, even afterwards, I used to day-dream. I used to wonder if any one would ever love me, ever teach me what love is. I dreamt of a Fairy Prince who would come to me one day, of a strong, brave, tender man who would care for me, who would want me to care for him. I often laughed at myself for it afterwards. For in London men all seemed so very unlike my dream-hero."

She turned her face to him and looked tenderly at him.

"But when I met you," she continued, "I think I knew that you were He. But I never dared hope that you would learn to care for me."

"Dearest heart," he replied, "I think I must have fallen in love with you the first moment I saw you. I can see you now as you stood surrounded by the elephants, a delightful but most unexpected vision in the jungle."

"Did you—oh, did you really like me that very first day?" she asked eagerly. At the moment the answer seemed to her the most important thing in the world.

As a lover will do Dermot deceived himself and imagined that his love had been born at the first sight of her. He told her so; and the girl forgot the imminent, deadly peril about them in the glow of happiness that warms the heart of a loving woman who hears that she has been beloved from the beginning.

"But I looked so absurd," she said dreamily; "so untidy, when you first saw me. Why, my hair was all down."

He laughed again; but the laughter died from his lips as the remembrance of their situation returned to him. Death was ordinarily little to him; though now life could be so sweet since she loved him. It seemed a terrible thing that this young girl must die so soon—and probably by his own hand to save her from a worse fate.

She guessed his thoughts.

"Is this really the end, dear?" she asked, unwilling but unafraid to meet death. "Is there no hope for us?"

"I fear not, beloved."

"I—I don't want to die so soon. Before you came tonight I wouldn't have minded very much; for I was not happy. But now it's a little hard, just as this wonderful thing has happened to me."

She sighed. He held out his arms again, and she crept into them and nestled into his embrace.

"Well, if it must be so, I'll try to be worthy of my soldier and not disgrace you, dear," she said fondly, bravely. "Let's try to forget it for a while and not let it spoil our last hours together. Let's 'make-believe,' as the children say. Let's pretend that this is all a hideous nightmare, that our lives and our love are before us."

So through the long, dread night with the hideous menace never out of their minds they talked bravely of what they would like to do, to be—if only they were not to die so soon. Several times Noreen left him and went to comfort, to console the poor Mohammedan women and children to whom she had given shelter. Her brother refused to allow Dermot to relieve him on watch, saying that he could not sleep or rest, and begging him instead to remain with the girl to cheer her, to hearten her in the awful hours of waiting for the end.

So Dermot was with her when a sudden uproar outside caused him to dash out on to the verandah. From behind the barricade on the front verandah Daleham was watching.

"What is it? Are they attacking?" cried the soldier.

"No. It's not an attack. They're cheering somebody, I think, and firing into the air."

Dermot stared out. Men ran forward to the smouldering ruins of the factory and threw on them tins of kerosene oil, looted from the murdered Parsi's shop, until the flames blazed up again and lit up the scene. The hundreds of coolies were cheering and crowding round a body of men in red coats.

"I believe it's the Rajah's infantry," said Dermot. "Are they going to attack? Sher Afzul, wake up the others and tell them to be on their guard. Give me that rifle, Daleham."

So Noreen did not see her lover again until the sun rose on a scene of desolation and ruin. Smoke and sparks still came from the blackened heaps of the destroyed buildings. The cordon of sentries had apparently been withdrawn; but when Daleham climbed up on the barricade to get a better view a shot was fired from somewhere and a bullet tore up the ground before the bungalow.

A couple of hours dragged slowly by; and then a servant doing sentry on the front verandah reported a cloud of dust on the road from the forest leading to the village. Dermot went out on the front verandah which looked towards the coolie lines and put up the glasses.

"Some men on horses. Yes, and a motor-car coming slowly behind them," he said to Daleham and his sister, who had followed him out. "It's the Rajah and his escort, I suppose. Things will begin to move now."

When the newcomers reached the village a storm of shouting arose. Volley after volley of shots were fired, conch-shells blown, tom-toms beaten.

"Yes, there's no doubt of it. It must be that fat brute," said Daleham.

Half an hour went by. The sun was high in the heavens. The landscape was bare of life. Not a man was visible. But presently from the village came a little figure, a naked little coolie boy. He moved slowly towards the bungalow, stopping every few minutes to look back to the huts, then advancing again with evident reluctance.

Dermot watched him through the glass. The whole garrison was on the verandah.

"He's a messenger. I see a letter in his hand," said the soldier. "Poor little devil, he's in an awful funk. None of the cowards dared do it themselves, so they beat this child and made him come."

At last the frightened infant reached the bungalow, and Sher Afzul met him and took the letter from him. Fred tore it open. It was written by Chunerbutty and couched in the most offensive terms. If within half an hour Miss Daleham came willingly to the Rajah, her brother's life would be spared and he would be given a safe conduct to Calcutta. But everyone else in the bungalow would be put to death, including the white man reported to have entered it during the night. If the girl did not surrender, her brother would be killed with the rest and she herself taken by force.

Dermot acquainted the Mohammedan servants with the contents, to show them that there was no hope for them, so that they would fight to the death. The little boy was told that there was no answer, and Daleham gave him a few copper coins; but the scared child dropped them as though they were red hot and scampered back to the village as fast as his little legs would carry him.



CHAPTER XX

THE GOD OF THE ELEPHANTS

At the end of the half hour a tempest of noise arose from the village; tom-toms were beaten, conch-shells blown and vigorous cheering was heard. Then from the huts long lines of coolies carrying weapons of every sort, rifles, old muskets, spears, and swords streamed out and encircled the bungalow at a distance. A little later the Rajah's twenty horsemen rode out of the village on their raw-boned stallions, followed by a hundred infantry soldiers who, Dermot observed, were now armed with rifles in place of their former muskets.

The dismounted troops formed up before the bungalow but half a mile away, in two lines in open order. But the cavalry kept together in a body; and the officer, turning in his saddle to speak to his men, pointed to the house with his sword.

"I believe they're going to charge us," said Dermot.

He had divided up the garrison to the four sides of the bungalow; but now, leaving one man with the shot gun to keep a watch on the back, he collected the rest on the front verandah. Noreen was inside, feeding the hungry children and consoling the mothers.

"Now, Daleham, don't fire until they are close, and then aim at the horses," said the Major, repeating the instruction to the servants in Urdu.

The Punjaubis grinned and patted their rifles.

The cavalry advanced. The sowars ambled forward, brandishing their curved sabres and uttering fierce yells. Dermot, knowing Sher Afzul and another man to be good shots, ordered them to open fire when the horsemen were about four hundred yards away. He himself took a steady aim at the commander and pressed the trigger. The officer, shot through the body, threw up his arms and fell forward on his horse's head. The startled animal shied and bolted across the furrows; and the corpse, dropping from the saddle, was dragged along the ground, one foot being caught in a stirrup. The cavalry checked for an instant; and Dermot fired again. A sowar fell. The rest cantered forward, yelling and waving their tulwars. Sher Afzul and the other servants opened fire. A second horseman dropped from his saddle, a stallion stumbled and fell, throwing its rider heavily. The firing grew faster. Two or three more horses were wounded and galloped wildly off. The rest of the cavalry came on, but, losing their nerve, checked their pace instead of charging home.

Dermot, loading and firing rapidly, bringing a sowar down with each shot, suddenly found Noreen crouching beside him behind the barricade. She was holding a revolver.

"For Heaven's sake, get into the house, darling!" he cried.

"No; I have Fred's pistol and know how to use it," she answered, calmly. "I have often practised with it."

He could not stop to argue with her, for the troopers still came on. But they bunched together, knee to knee, in a frontal attack, instead of assaulting from all four sides at once. They made a splendid target and suffered heavily. But some brought their horses' heads almost against the verandah railing. All the garrison rose from behind the barricade and fired point-blank at them. The girl, steadying her hand on a box, shot one sowar through the body. The few survivors turned and galloped madly away, leaving most of their number on the ground. To cover their retreat a ragged volley broke from the infantry; and a storm of bullets flew over and around the bungalow, ricocheted from the ground or struck the walls. But one young Mohammedan servant, who had incautiously exposed himself, dropped back shot through the lungs.

Then from every side fire was opened, the coolies blazing wildly; but as none of them had ever had a rifle in his hands before, the firing was for the most part innocuous. Yet it served to encourage them, and they drew nearer. The garrison, with only one or two defenders to each side of the house, could not keep them at a distance. The infantry began to crawl forward. The circle of foes closed in on the bungalow and its doomed inhabitants. Shrieks and cries rose from the women and children inside.

But although every bullet from the garrison found its billet, the issue was only a matter of time. Ill-directed as was the assailants' fire, the showers of bullets were too thick not to have some effect. Another servant was killed, a third wounded. Daleham was struck on the shoulder by a ricochet but only scratched. A rifle bullet, piercing the barricade, passed through Noreen's hair, as she crouched beside her lover, whom she resolutely refused to leave. The ring of enemies constricted.

Suddenly a bugle sounded from the village; and after a little the firing from the attackers ceased. Dermot, who with Noreen and Sher Afzul, was defending the front verandah, looked cautiously over the barricade. A white flag appeared in the village. The Major shouted to the others in the house to hold their fire but be on their guard.

After a pause the flag advanced, borne by a coolie. It was followed by a group of men; and Dermot through the glasses recognised the Rajah and Chunerbutty accompanied by several Brahmins. They advanced timidly towards the bungalow and stopped a hundred yards away. After some urging Chunerbutty stepped to the front and called for Daleham to appear.

Fred came through the house from the back verandah, where his place was taken by Sher Afzul. He looked over the barricade. Chunerbutty came nearer and shouted:

"Daleham, the Rajah gives you one more chance to surrender. You see your case is hopeless. You can have a quarter of an hour to think things over. If at the end of that time you and your sister don't come out, we'll rush the bungalow and finish you all."

Standing under the white flag he drew out his watch.

"Thank you," said Daleham; "and our reply is that if in a quarter of an hour you're still there, you'll get a bullet through you, white flag or no white flag."

He turned to Dermot whose arm was around Noreen as she crouched beside him.

"Well, Major, it's fifteen more minutes of life, that's all."

"Yes, it's nearly the end now. I've only two cartridges left."

"We're all in the same box. Getting near time we said good-bye. It was jolly good of you to stick by us, when you might have got away last night."

Dermot gripped the outstretched hand.

"If I go under first, you'll not let Noreen fall alive into the hands of those brutes, will you, sir?"

The girl raised her revolver.

"I'll keep the last cartridge for myself, dear," she said.

She looked lovingly at Dermot whose arm was still about her. Her brother betrayed no surprise.

"I'm not afraid to die, dear one," she whispered to her lover. "I couldn't live without you now. And I'm happy at this moment, happier than I've ever been, I think. But I wish you had saved yourself."

He mastered his emotion with difficulty.

"Darling, life without you wouldn't be possible for me either."

He could not take his eyes from her; and the minutes were flying all too swiftly. At last he looked at his watch and held out his hand to the boy.

"Good-bye, Daleham, you've got your wish. You're dying like a soldier for England," he said. "We've done our share for her. Now, we've three minutes more. If the Rajah and Chunerbutty come into view again I'll have them with my last two shots."

He turned to the girl and took her in his arms for a last embrace.

"Good-bye, sweetheart. Dear love of my heart. Pray that we may be together in the next world."

He paused and listened.

"Are they coming?"

But he did not put her from him. One second now was worth an eternity.

Then suddenly a distant murmur swelled through the strange silence. Daleham looked out over the barricade.

"They're—No. What is it? What are they doing?"

All round the circle of besiegers there was an eerie hush. No voice was heard. All—the Rajah, the flag-bearer, Brahmins, soldiers, coolies—had turned their faces away from the bungalow and were staring into the distance. And as the few survivors of the garrison looked up over the barricade an incredible sight met their eyes.

From the far-off forest, bursting out at every point of the long-stretching wall of dark undergrowth that hemmed in the wide estate, wild elephants appeared. Over the furrowed acres they streamed in endless lines, trampling down the ordered stretch of green bushes. In scores, in hundreds, they came, silently, slowly; the great heads nodding to the rhythm of their gait, the trunks swinging, the ragged ears flapping, as they advanced. Converging as they came, they drew together in a solid mass that blotted out the ground, a mass sombre-hued, dark, relieved only by flashes of gleaming white. For on either side of every massive skull jutted out the sharp-pointed, curving ivory. Of all save one.

For the mammoth that led them, the splendid beast that captained the oncoming array of Titans under the ponderous strokes of whose feet the ground trembled, had one tusk, one only. And as though the white flag were a magnet to him, he moved unerringly towards it, the immense, earth-shaking phalanx following him.

The awestruck crowds of armed men, so lately flushed with fanatical lust of slaughter, stood as though turned to stone, their faces set towards the terrifying onset. Their pain unheeded, their groans silenced, the wounded staggered to their feet to look. Even the dying strove to raise themselves on their arms from the reddened soil to gaze, and, gazing, fell back dead. Slowly, mechanically, silently, the living gave way, the weapons dropping from their nerveless grip. Step by step they drew back as if compelled by some strange mesmeric power.

And on the verandah the few survivors of the little band stood together, silent, amazed, scarce believing their eyes as they stared at the incredible vision. All but Dermot. His gaze was fixed on the leader of that terrible army; and he smiled, tenderly yet proudly. His arm drew the girl beside him still closer to him, as he murmured:

"He comes to save us for each other, beloved!"

Nothing was heard, save the dull thunder of the giant feet. Then from the village the high-pitched shriek of a woman pierced the air and shattered the eerie silence of the terror-stricken crowds. Murmurs, groans, swelled into shouts, wild yells, the appalling uproar of panic; and strong and weak, hale men and those from whose wounds the life-blood dripped, turned and fled. Fled past their dead brothers, past the little group of leaders whose power to sway them had vanished before this awful menace.

Petrified, rooted to the ground as though their quaking limbs were incapable of movement, the Rajah and his satellites stood motionless before the oncoming elephants. But when the leader almost towered above him, Chunerbutty was galvanised to life again. In mad panic he raised a pistol in his trembling hand and fired at the great beast. The next instant the huge tusk caught him. He was struck to the earth, gored, and lifted high in air. An appalling shriek burst from his bloodless lips. He was hurled to the ground with terrific force and trodden under foot. The Rajah screamed shrilly and turned to flee. Too late! The earth shook as the great phalanx moved on faster and passed without checking over the white-clad group, blotting them out of all semblance to humanity.

The dying yell of the renegade Hindu, arresting in its note of agony, caused the fleeing crowds to pause and turn to look. And as they witnessed the annihilation of their leaders they saw a yet more wondrous sight. For the dark array of monsters halted as the leader reached the house; and with the sea of twisted trunks upraised to salute him and a terrifying peal of trumpeting, they welcomed the white man who walked out from the shot-torn building towards the leader of the vast herd. Then in a solemn hush he was raised high in air and held aloft for all to see, beasts and men. And in the silence a single voice in the awestruck crowds cried shrilly:

"Hathi ka Deo ki jai! (Victory to the God of the Elephants!)"

In wonder, in dread, in superstitious reverence, hundreds of voices took up the refrain: "Hathi ka Deo! Hathi ka Deo ki jai!"

And leaving his thousand companions behind, the sacred elephant that all recognised now advanced towards the shrinking crowds, bearing the dread white god upon its neck. Had he not come invisibly among them again? Had they not witnessed the fate of those that opposed him? Had he not summoned from all Hindustan his man-devouring monsters to punish, to annihilate his enemies. Forgetful of their hate, their bloodthirst, their lust of battle, conscious only of their guilt, the terror-stricken crowds surged forward and flung themselves down in supplication on the earth. They wept, they wailed, they bared their heads and poured dust upon them, in all the extravagant demonstration of Oriental sorrow. Out from the village streamed the women and children to add their shrill cries to the lamentations.

With uplifted hand, Dermot silenced them. An awful hush succeeded the tumult. He swept his eyes slowly over them all, and every head went down to the dust again. Then he spoke, solemnly, clearly; and his voice reached everyone in the prostrate mob.

"My wrath is upon you and upon your children. Flee where you will, it shall overtake you. You have sinned and must atone. On those most guilty punishment has already fallen. Where are they that misled you? Go look for them under the feet of my elephants. Yet from you, ye poor deluded fools, for the moment I withhold my hand. But touch a single hair of those in your midst whom I protect, and you perish."

Not a sound was heard.

Then he said:

"Men of Lalpuri, who have come among these fools in thirst for blood. You have heard of me. You have seen my power. You see me. Go back to your city. Tell them there that I, who fed my elephants on the flesh of your comrades in the forest, shall come to them riding on my steed sacred to Gunesh. If they spare the evil counselors among them, then them I will not spare. Of their city no stone shall remain. Go back to them and bear this message to all within and without the walls, 'The British Raj shall endure. It is my will.' Tell them to engrave it on their hearts, on their children's hearts."

He paused. Then he spoke again:

"Rise, all ye people. Ye have my leave to go."

Noiselessly they obeyed. He watched them move away in terrified silence. Not a whisper was heard.

Then he smiled as he said to himself:

"That should keep them quiet."

He turned Badshah towards the bungalow.

Forty miles away, when darkness fell on the mountains that night, the army of the invaders slept soundly in their bivouacs around the doomed post of Ranga Duar. On the morrow the last feeble resistance of its garrison must cease, and happy those of the defenders who died. Luckless they that lived. For the worst tortures that even China knew would be theirs.

But when the morrow came there was no longer an investing army. Panic-stricken, the scattered remnants of the once formidable host staggered blindly up the inhospitable mountains only to perish in the snows of the passes. For in the dark hours annihilation had come upon the rest. Countless monsters, worse, far worse, than the legendary dragons of their native land, had come from the skies, sprung from the earth. And under their huge feet the army had perished.

When the sun rose Dermot knelt beside the mattress on which Parker lay among the heaps of rubble that had once been the Fort. An Indian officer, the only one left, and a few haggard sepoys stood by. The rest of the few survivors of the gallant band had thrown themselves down to sleep haphazard among the ruins that covered the bodies of their comrades.

"Is it all true, Major? Are they really gone?" whispered the subaltern feebly.

"Yes, Parker, it's quite true. They've gone. You've helped to save India. You held them off—God knows how you did it. Your wound's a nasty one; but you'll get over it."

He rose and held out his hands to the others. "Shabash! (Well done!) Subhedar Sahib, Mohammed Khan, Gulab Khan, Shaikh Bakar, well done."

And the men of the alien race pressed round him and clasped his hands gratefully.

The defeat of the invaders in this little-known corner of the Indian Empire was but the forerunner of the disasters that befell the other enemies of the British dominion, though many months passed before peace settled on the land again. But Lalpuri had not so long to wait for Dermot to redeem his promise to visit it. When he did he rode on Badshah at the head of a British force. The gates were flung open wide; and he passed through submissive crowds to see the blackened ruins of the Palace that, stormed, looted, and burnt by its rebel soldiery, hid the ashes of the Dewan.

A year had gone by. In the villages perched on the steep sides of the mountains the Bhuttia women rejoiced to know that the peace of the Borderland would never be broken again while the dread hand of a god lay on it. And in their bamboo huts they tried to hush their little children with the mention of his name. But the sturdy, naked babies had no fear of him. For they all knew him; and he was kind and far less terrible than the gods and demons that the old lama showed them in the painted Wheel of Life sent him from Tibet. Moreover, the white god's wife was kinder even than he. But that was because she was not a goddess. Only a girl.

On the high hills, up above the villages, a couple stood. No god and goddess: just a man and a woman. And the woman looked down past the huts, down to the great Terai Forest lying like a vast billowy sea of foliage far below them. Then, as her husband's arm stole round her, she turned her eyes from it and gazed into his and whispered:

"I love it more than even you do. For it gave you to me."

A crashing in the clump of hill bamboos at their feet attracted their attention; and with a smile he pointed down to the great elephant with the single tusk who was dragging down the feathery plumes with his curving trunk.

But Noreen looked up at Dermot again and said:

"I love you more than even Badshah does."

And their lips met.



THE END



A Selection from the Catalogue of

G.P. PUTNAM'S SONS

Complete Catalogues sent on application



Rosa Mundi

By

Ethel M. Dell

Author of

"The Top of the World," "The Lamp in the Desert," "The Way of an Eagle," etc.

Some of the finest stories ever written by Miss Ethel M. Dell are gathered together in this volume. They are arresting, thrilling, tense with throbbing life, and of absorbing interest; they tell of romantic and passionate episodes in many lands—in the hill districts of India, in the burning heart of Africa, and in the colonial bush country. The author's vivid and vigorous style, skillfully developed plots, her intensely sympathetic treatment of emotional scenes, and the strongly delineated character sketches, are typical of Ethel M. Dell's best work, and this volume will be found to contain some of the most remarkable of her shorter romances.

G.P. Putnam's Sons

New York London



Prairie Flowers

By

James B. Hendryx

Author of "The Texan"

When Tex Benton said he'd do a thing, he did it, as readers of "The Texan" will affirm. So when, after a year of drought, he announced his purpose of going to town to get thoroughly "lickered up," unsuspecting Timber City was elected as the stage for a most thorough and sensational orgy.

But neither Tex nor Timber City could foresee the turbulent chain of events which were to result from his high, if indecorous, resolve, here set down—the wild tale of an untamed West.

A well-known writer, who has served his apprenticeship in the cow country, said the other day, "I like Hendryx's stories—they're real. His boys are the boys I used to work with and know. His West is the West I learned to love."

G.P. Putnam's Sons

New York London



The Ivory Fan

By

Adrian Heard

When Lily Kellaway makes the observation, "It is better to be a slave to a man, which is natural, than to a woman, which is intolerable," she recites the text upon which the author of The Ivory Fan has built up a novel that is at once humorous in its cynicism and cynical in its humor. At the same time he gives us a pastel of certain phases of life comprehensive in its coloring and bitterly uncompromising of line.

This is an unconventional book, full of incident and plenty of clever dialogue.

G.P. Putnam's Sons

New York London



Too Old for Dolls

By

Anthony M. Ludovici

The story of a "flapper" too old for dolls, scarcely old enough for anything else, but capable of enraging her older sister and even her mother by the ease with which she secures the admiration of their male friends.

"From a Mohawk, from a sexless savage with tangled hair and blotchy features, she had, by a stroke of the wand, become metamorphosed into a remarkably attractive young woman." And with the change came a disconcerting knowledge of power.

A very real, very tense, and very modern novel.



G.P. Putnam's Sons

New York London

THE END