“And you promised to give him one?”

“Of course.  I am to send it to the Taj Mahal hotel to-morrow morning.”

Mrs. Repton was a little startled.  She did not understand at all why Thresk asked for the letter and, not understanding, was the more alarmed.  The request seemed to imply not merely that he had decided to make the journey but that during the hour or so since they had sat at the dinner-table he had formed some definite and serious plan.

“Did you tell him anything?” she asked rather timidly.

“Not a word,” replied Repton.

“Not even about—­what happened in the hills at Mussoorie?”

“Of course not.”

“No, of course not,” Jane Repton agreed.

She leaned back against the cushions of the victoria.  A clear dark sky of stars wonderfully bright stretched above her head.  After the hot day a cool wind blew pleasantly on the hill, and between the trees of the gardens she could see the lights of the city and of a ship here and there in the Bay at their feet.

“But it’s not very likely that Thresk will find them at Chitipur,” said Repton.  “They will probably be in camp.”

Mrs. Repton sat forward.

“Yes, that’s true.  This is the time they go on their tour of inspection.  He will miss them.”  And at once disappointment laid hold of her.  Mrs. Repton was not in the mood for logic that evening.  She had been afraid a moment since that the train she had laid would bring about a conflagration.  Now that she knew it would not even catch fire she passed at once to a passionate regret.  Thresk had inspired her with a great confidence.  He was the man, she believed, for her Stella.  But he was going up to Chitipur!  Anything might happen!  She leaned back again in the carriage and cried defiantly to the stars.

“I am glad that he’s going.  I am very glad.”  And in spite of her conscience her heart leaped joyously in her bosom.

CHAPTER V

THE QUEST

The next night Henry Thresk left Bombay and on the Wednesday afternoon he was travelling in a little white narrow-gauge train across a flat yellow desert which baked and sparkled in the sun.  Here and there a patch of green and a few huts marked a railway station and at each gaily-robed natives sprung apparently from nowhere and going no-whither thronged the platform and climbed into the carriages.  Thresk looked impatiently through the clouded windows, wondering what he should find in Chitipur if ever he got there.  The capital of that state lies aloof from the trunk roads and is reached by a branch railway sixty miles long, which is the private possession of the Maharajah and takes four hours to traverse.  For in Chitipur the ancient ways are devoutly followed.  Modern ideas of speed and progress may whirl up the big central railroad from Bombay to Ajmere.  But they stop at the junction.  They do not travel along the