at Peshawar and Kot Ghazi.  ’I can track the path of yesterday’s bird through the air and of yesterday’s fish through the water,’ answered the black boy; ’and I would find this Ibrahim by smell though he had blinded me,’ and he led on.  Down the Sudder Bazaar he went unfaltering, though hundreds of feet of camels, horses, bullocks and of men were treading its dust.  As we passed the shop of the European hakim, yes, the kimmish, my brother leapt down and entering the shop asked questions.  Returning and mounting he said to me:  ’’Tis as I thought.  Hither he came last night, and, saying he was science-knowing failed B.Sc., demanded certain acids, that, being mixed, will eat up even gold—­which no other acid can digest, nor even assail....’”

  [30] Tracker.

“Aqua Regia, or vitriol, I believe,” I murmured, still marvelling ... Ross-Ellison!

“Doubtless, if your honour is pleased to say so.  ’He must have poured these acids into the bottle while we were abroad last night,’ continued my brother.  ’Oh, the dog!  The treacherous dreadful dog!...  ’Twas in a good hour that I saved Moussa Isa,’ and indeed I too blessed that Somali, so mysteriously moved by Allah to dash the bottle from my brother’s hand.

“’Think you that Ibrahim Mahmud bribed Moussa and that he repented as he saw you about to anoint your eyes with the acid?’ I asked of my brother.

“‘Nay—­Moussa was with me until I returned,’ replied he, ’and returning, I put the bottle beneath my pillow.  Besides, Ibrahim had fled ere we returned to the bungalow.  Moreover, Moussa would lose his tongue ere he would tell me a lie, his eyes ere he would see me suffer, his hand ere he would take a bribe against me.  No—­Allah moved his heart—­rewarding me for saving his life at the risk of mine own, when he lay beneath a lion,—­or else it is that the black dog hath the instincts of a dog and knows when evil threatens what it loves.’  And indeed it is a wonderful thing and true; and Moussa Isa never knew how he knew, but said his arm moved of itself and that he wondered at himself as he struck the bottle from his master’s hand.  And, in time, we left the city and followed the road and found that Ibrahim was fleeing to Mekran Kot, doubtless to be far away when the thing happened, and also to get counsel and money from his father and my mother, should suspicion fall on him and flight be necessary.  And anon even untrained eyes could see where he had left the Caravan Road and taken the shorter route whereby camels bearing no heavy load could come by steeper passes and dangerous tracks in shorter time to Mekran Kot, provided the rider bore water sufficient—­for there was no oasis nor well.  ’Enough, Moussa Isa, thou mayest return, I can track the camel of Ibrahim now that he hath left the road,’ quoth my brother, breaking a long silence; but Moussa Isa, panting as he ran before, replied:  ’I come, Mir Saheb.  I shall not fall until mine eyes have beheld thy vengeance—­in which perchance, I may take a part.  He called me “Hubshi".’