“But the woman!”

“Woman?  She is a tiger-cat, and tiger-cats must sometimes be flogged.  It is my will.  Now I have news for you.  There is another sister, younger and weaker.  Our queen,” and he salaamed ironically, “our queen did not know that her father lived, and there I made my first mistake.”

“But she will now submit to save him!”

“Ah, would indeed that were the case.  But tiger-cats are always tiger-cats, and nothing will bend this maid; she must be broken, broken.  It is my will,” with a flash of fire in his eyes.

The council salaamed.  Umballa’s will must of necessity be theirs, hate him darkly as they might.

The bungalow of Colonel Hare was something on the order of an armed camp.  Native animal keepers, armed with rifles, patrolled the menagerie.  No one was to pass the cordon without explaining frank his business, whence he came, and whither he was bound.

By the knees of one of the sentries a little native child was playing.  From time to time the happy father would stoop and pat her head.

Presently there was a stir about camp.  An elephant shuffled into the clearing.  He was halted, made to kneel, and Ahmed stepped out of the howdah.

The little girl ran up to Ahmed joyfully and begged to be put into the howdah.  Smiling, Ahmed set her in the howdah, and the mahout bade the elephant to rise, but, interested in some orders by Ahmed, left the beast to his own devices.  The child called and the elephant walked off quietly.  So long as he remained within range of vision no one paid any attention to him.  Finally he passed under a tree near the cages and reached up for some leaves.  The child caught hold of a limb and gleefully crawled out upon it some distance beyond the elephant’s reach.  Once there, she became frightened, not daring to crawl back.

She prattled “elephant talk,” but the old fellow could not reach her.  The baboon in the near-by cage set up a chattering.  The child ordered the elephant to rise on his hind legs.  He placed his fore legs on the roof of the baboon’s cage, which caved in, rather disturbing the elephant’s calm.  He sank to the ground.

The baboon leaped through the opening and made off to test this unexpected liberty.  He was friendly and tame, but freedom was just then paramount.

The elephant remained under the trees, as if pondering, while the child began to cry loudly.  One of the natives saw her predicament and hastened away for assistance.

Achmed was greatly alarmed over the loss of the baboon.  It was a camp pet of Colonel Hare’s and ran free in camp whenever the colonel was there.  He had captured it when a mere baby in British East Africa.  The troglodyte, with a strange reasoning yet untranslatable, loved the colonel devotedly and followed him about like a dog and with a scent far keener.  So Ahmed and some of the keepers set off in search of the colonel’s pet.