Thus, contentedly and free from care, the three fugitives wandered on towards the south where on the frontier they expected their troubles to begin.  One day when passing a hamlet by the roadside they tarried to look on at a wedding at which a buxom country maid was being married to a family of six brothers.  The village headman performed the simple ceremony, which consisted of offering a bowl of murwa to the gods, then presenting a cupful to the bride and eldest bridegroom, blessing them, and expressing a hope that the union might be a fruitful one.  The rest, after the usual presents had been given to the bride’s relatives, was simply a matter of feasting everyone.  The stranger lamas were invited to join; but Frank refused and dragged away the convivial Tashi, who was anxious to accept the invitation.  Wargrave with difficulty led him aside and was so occupied in arguing with his discontented guide that he did not notice that Muriel had not followed.

A sudden cry from her and his name shrieked out wildly made him turn in alarm.  To his horror he saw the girl struggling in the grasp of a Chinaman, while another on a mule and holding the bridle of a second animal was calling on the villagers in the Penlop’s name to assist his comrade.

CHAPTER XV

A STRANGE RESCUE

Neither Muriel, absorbed in watching the wedding, nor the two men engrossed in their dispute had noticed the Chinese come riding along the road and pulling up when they saw the peasants gathered together.  One of them had been about to question the villagers from his saddle when his eyes fell on the disguised girl standing apart from the crowd.  He stared at her for a few moments.  Then he spoke hurriedly to his companions, and, springing from the mule’s back seized Muriel in a rough grasp.

At her cry Frank ran back, forgetting his disguise.  He recognised in her assailant the pock-marked officer of the Amban.  The man, seeing him coming, drew a revolver; but Wargrave whipped out his pistol quicker and without hesitation shot him through the heart.  The Chinaman collapsed to the ground and in his fall dragged the girl down.  His comrade fired at his slayer and, missing him, wheeled his mule round and galloped off.  Tashi returned the shot while Frank ran to Muriel.  He fired several times and the rider was apparently hit; for he fell forward on the neck of his animal; but he recovered himself and, crouching low, was still in the saddle when a turn in the road hid him from sight.

The startled villagers scattered and fled in terror at the tragedy suddenly enacted in their midst, the six cowardly husbands deserting their new-made wife and leaving her to follow as they ran away, which she did at her utmost speed.

Frank freed Muriel from the stiffened grasp of the dead man and helped her to her feet; then the three hurried from the fatal spot, so lately filled by a cheerful crowd of merrymakers and now tenanted only by the corpse that lay with sightless eyes staring up at the blue sky.  They made for the shelter of jungle-clad hills that rose a couple of miles away.