So I slipped out through the screen door and spent a minute looking for
Narayan Singh. I'm an old hunter, but it wasn't until Narayan Singh
deliberately moved a hand to call attention to himself that I discovered
him within ten feet of me.

The risk of being seen from the street in case some spy were lurking out
there was obvious. So I walked all the way round the house, and came
and stood below him on his left hand where the house cast impenetrable
shadow; but though I took my time and moved stealthily he heard me and
passed me a letter through the veranda rails, accepting the pistol in
exchange without comment.

I could see him distinctly from that angle. His uniform on one side was
torn almost into rags, and his turban was all awry, as if he had lost it
in a scuffle and hadn't spared time to rewind it properly--a sure sign
of desperate haste; for a male tiger in the spring-time is no more
careful of his whiskers than a Sikh is of the thirty yards of cloth he
winds around his head.

As he didn't speak or make any more movement than was necessary to pass
me the letter and take the pistol, I returned the way I had come,
entered by the back door, tossed the letter to Grim, and crept back
again to bear a hand in case of need. Grim said nothing, but Jeremy
followed me, and two minutes later the Australian and I were crouching
in darkness below the veranda. This time I don't think Narayan Singh was
aware of friends at hand.

His eyes were fixed on the slightly lighter gap in a dark wall that was
the garden gate but looked more like a dim hole leading into a cave.