“Afghan, there is always a reward for the head of Amir Khan; but a gift is of little value to a man who has lost his life in the trying.  Without are guards ready to run a sword through even a shadow, and here I could kill three.”

He raised his black eyes and scanned the form of Ayub Alli.  There was a quizzical smile on his lips as he said: 

“Go back and sit thee upon the divan.”

When Barlow had taken his place, the Chief laughed aloud, saying, “Well done, Captain Sahib; thou art perfect as a Patan; even to the manner of sitting down one would have thought that, except for a saddle, thou hadst always sat upon thy heels.”

Barlow smiled good humouredly, saying, “It is even so; I am Captain Barlow.  And this,”—­he tapped the loose baggy trousers of the Afghan hillman, and the sheepskin coat with the wool inside—­“was not in the way of deceit but for protection on the road.”

“It is well thought of,” the Pindari declared, “for a Sahib travelling alone through Rajasthan would be robbed by a Mahratta or killed by a Rajput.  But as to the deceiving of Amir Khan, dost thou suppose that he gives to a Patan the paper of admittance, or of passing, such as he gave to thee.  Even at the audience I was pleased with thy manner of disguise.”

Barlow was startled.  “Did you know then that I was a Sahib—­how did you know?”

“Because thou wert placed in my hand in the way of protection.”

Then Barlow surmised that of all outside his own caste there could be but one, and he knew that she was in the camp, for he had seen her.  “It was a woman.”

“A rare woman; even I, Chief of the Pindaris—­and we are not bred to softness—­say that she is a pearl.”

“They call her the Gulab,” Barlow ventured.

“She is well named the Gulab; the perfume of her is in my nostrils though it mixes ill with the camel smell.  Without offence to Allah I can retain her for it is in the Koran that a man may have four wives and I have but two.”

“But the Gulab is of a different faith,” Barlow objected and a chill hung over his heart.

The Pindari laughed.  “The Sahibs have agents for the changing of faith, those who wear the black coat of honour; and a mullah will soon make a good Musselmani of the beautiful little infidel.  Of course, Sahib, there is the other way of having a man’s desire which is the way of all Pindaris; they consider women as fair loot when the sword is the passport through a land.  But as to the Gulab, the flower is most too fair for a crushing.  In such a matter as I have spoken of the fragrance is gone, and a man, when he crushes the weak, has conflict with himself.”

“It’s a topping old barbarian, this leader of cut-throats,” Barlow admitted to himself; but in his mind was a horror of the fate meant for the girl.  And somehow it was a sacrifice for him, he knew, an enlargement of the love that had shown in the soft brown eyes.  As he listened schemes of stealing the Gulab away, of saving her were hurtling through his brain.