Somewhat grudgingly Ajeet consented, for Bootea, strangely enough, was quite eager over it.  As Nana Sahib had fancied the girl had taken an unexplainable liking for Captain Barlow.  Of course that, the call, is rarely explainable on reasonable grounds—­it is a matter of a higher dispensation; just two pairs of eyes settle the whole business; one look and the thing is done.

The Sahib would see her in a new light—­in an appealing light.  In her thoughts there was nothing of a serious intent; just that to look upon him, perhaps to see in his eyes a friendly pleasure, would be intoxication.

So Ajeet took her to the palace to dance, but, of course, he had to cool his heels without the durbar chamber—­smoke the hooka and chat with other natives while the one of desire was within.

The girl had an exquisite sense of the beauty of simplicity—­both in dress and manner, and in her art; it was as if a lotus flower had been animated—­given life.  Her dancing was a floaty rhythm, an undulating drifting to the soft call of the sitar; and her voice, when she sang the ghazal, the love-song, was soft, holding the compelling power of subdued passion—­it thrilled Barlow with an emotion that, when she had finished, caused him to take himself to task.  It was as if he had said, “By Jove! fancy I’ve had a bit too much of that champagne—­better look out.”

Nana Sahib and the Captain were sitting side by side, and the Gulab, when she had finished the song, had swept her sinuous lithe form back in a graceful curtsy in front of the two, and, as if by accident, a red rose had floated to the feet of Captain Barlow.  Surely her soft, dark, languorous eyes had said:  “For thee.”

With a cynical smile Nana Sahib picked up the rose and presented it to Barlow saying:  “My dear Captain, you receive the golden apple—­beauty will out.”

Barlow’s fingers trembled with suppressed emotion as he took the flower and carefully slipped it into a buttonhole.

Elizabeth, who sat next him, saw this by-play, and her voice was cold as she commented:  “Homage is a delightful thing, but it spoils children.”

Nana Sahib leaned across Barlow:  “My dear Miss Hodson, these dancers always play to the gods—­it is their trade.  But there is safety in caste—­in varna, which is the old Brahmin name for caste, meaning colour.  When the Aryans came down into Hind they were olive-skinned and the aborigines here were quite black, so, to draw the line, they created caste and called it varna, meaning that they of the light skin were of a higher order than the aborigines—­which they were.  A white skin is like a shirt-of-mail, it protects morally, socially, in India.”

“Ultimately, no doubt, Prince.  And, of course, a dance-girl is one of the fourth caste, practically an outcast—­an ‘untouchable,’” Elizabeth commented.

Barlow knew this as a devilish arraignment of himself, for he had felt a strong attraction.  He said nothing; but he was aware of a feeling of repulsion toward Elizabeth; her harshness, on so slight a provocation, suggested vindictiveness—­a narrow exaction.