Sumbal laughed.  “Bah!  But, see you, I stay my hand while I count ten—­no more.”

“One! two! three! four!”

The artillery men, amused at the race, leaned over.  “He runs well!—­He will win!—­He will lose!—­He climbs like a hill cat!”——­

“Five! six! seven! eight! nine!”

And now, unintelligible from sheer breathlessness, Roy’s voice is heard.  The grave, silent Rajput leaps out to meet him.

“Ten!”

Sumbal’s hand swings the portfire to the breech.

Roy sees it, throws up his arms wildly, and with a cry—­

“The bastion!  The bastion!  The Heir-to-Empire!” falls headlong into the Rajput’s arms.

“What did he say?” asked the master fireworker, pausing half surprised, half angry.

But the Rajput was too busy tearing aside Roy’s flimsy, bloodstained waistcoat to answer.

“Something about the bastion and the Heir-to-Empire, master!” said the sergeant doubtfully.  “Mayhap ’twould be as well to wait till we can see more clearly.  Kumran,” he added in a lower voice, “would stick at naught——­”

Sumbal hesitated, then put down the portfire and walked over to the fallen lad, beside whom the stranger was kneeling.

“He is not dead!  He is not dead!” said the grave, silent Rajput, looking up, his face working, the tears streaming down his bronzed cheek.  “My master is not dead!”

“Who?” asked Sumbal, uncomprehending.

“I knew it must be he!” went on the man exultantly, even in his grief. 
“None could do that sort of thing save a Sun hero!  My Master! my King! 
See, here the race mark on his breast!  The sign of uttermost truth!  My
Master!  My King!”

But Roy did not hear himself called thus.  He did not even know for days afterwards if he had succeeded or if he had failed; for a wound just above the heart, close to the sign-mark of his race, very nearly carried him off into the Shadowy Land where all things are remembered, yet all are forgotten.

But he had succeeded.  He had saved the Heir-to-Empire’s life that dawn, and a day or two afterwards Kumran, daily more hated for his cruelty, had escaped, and the soldiers, rejoiced to get rid of him, flung open the gates of the Bala Hissar, thus ending Prince Akbar’s adventures.

But when Roy came to himself Mirak was sitting beside him and Down was purring on Bija’s lap; Bija, who had just returned from India with Queen Humeeda in time to console the Heir-to-Empire for all he must have suffered during the few days he was left alone with cruel Uncle Kumran.  How much he had suffered no one knew, and the little fellow refused to say anything about it.  It was a way he had when the luck went against him.  So, just as he had remarked when he had fallen down the ravine, when the white cat and the black dog first came to him, that he had “tumbu-down,” so now he simply said that it wasn’t “very comfy,” but that Tumbu had come to see him more than once.  And this was possible, for you may be sure that once he allowed the Afghan sentry to rise, Tumbu, being a wise dog, never went near him again.  Therefore he had to find his old master.