As Hunsa turned from the ordeal and passed the Gulab Begum to where the
Bagrees stood in line, Nana Sahib said, "Do you know, General, what
that baboon-faced jamadar made oath to?"

"The last one, my Prince?"

"Yes, he of the splendid ugliness. He testified, 'If I fail to thrust
a knife between the shoulder-blades of Ajeet Singh may Bhowanee cast me
as a sacrifice.'"

"He is jamadar to the other, Prince--but why?"

"He looked upon the Rose Lady as he passed, and as the blooded finger
lay upon his forehead he looked upon Ajeet, and in his pig eyes was
unholiness."

The cold grey eyes of the Frenchman rested for a second upon the
burning black eyes of the speaker, and again he shivered. He knew that
the careless words meant that Hunsa was an instrument, if needs be.
But the Prince's teeth were gleaming in a smile. And he was saying:
"If the play is over, Sirdar, turn your mount over to the _syce_ and
pop up here beside Captain Barlow--I'll tool you home. The Captain
might like a peg."

The bay Arabs swirled the brake along the smooth roadway that lay like
a wide band of coral between giant green walls of gold-mohr and
tamarind; and sometimes a pipal, its white bole and branches gleaming
like the bones of a skeleton through leaves of the deepest emerald, and
its roots daubed with the red paint of devotion to the tree god. Here
and there a neem, its delicate branches dusted with tiny white star