The durbar proceeded.  Formally, and according to strict precedence, each man spoke.  With great amiability Colonel Starr presented the demands of the English Government; with greater amiability the Maharajah and his officers repelled them.  But Colonel Starr was firm, and he had the unanswerable argument of three hundred well-armed men and two nine-pounders, which Maun Rao would have to meet with Petroff Gortschakin’s cartridges.  After duly and sadly reflecting upon this, the Maharajah concluded that he would give up ee-Wobbis’s murderers—­one of them at any rate—­ and let himself be arranged, at all events for the present.  Afterwards he would say to Maun Rao that it was only for the present.  He summoned all his politeness to his aid, and said in the end that such was his admiration for the English Lord Sahib in Calcutta, such his friendship and respect, that he would welcome any one who came to Lalpore in his name.

‘Accompanied by a small force,’ added Colonel Starr in the vernacular, and the Maharajah also added, while Maun Rao behind him ground his teeth, ‘Accompanied by a small force.’

‘One word more,’ said the Maharajah, ’and the durbar is ended.  The opium pledge will appear, and we will drink it with you.  From the palm of your hand I will drink, and from the palm of my hand you shall drink; but the lips of the boy who comes with you shall not taste it.  The Rajputs do not drink opium with their betrayers.’

Sunni heard, and his face grew crimson.

‘Maharajah!’ he shouted, ‘I did not tell; I did not tell.’

The Maharajah shrugged his shoulders contemptuously.

‘He is not of our blood; why should he have kept silence?’ said the old man.

‘But he did keep silence,’ said the Colonel, looking straight into the Chitan’s sunken eyes.  ’I asked him about your men and your ammunition.  I commanded him, I threatened him.  I give you my word of honour as a soldier that he would say nothing.’

The English in India are always believed.  A cry went up from the other Chitans.  Moti clapped his hands together, Maun Rao caught the boy up and kissed him.

‘Then,’ said the Maharajah slowly, ’I love you still, Sunni, and you shall drink the opium with the rest.  Your son,’ he added to Colonel Starr, ‘will bring praise to his father.’

The Colonel smiled.  ‘I have no children,’ said he.  ’I wish he were indeed my son.’

‘If he is not your son,’ asked the Maharajah cunningly, ’why did you bring him to the durbar?’

‘Because he wished to come—­’

‘To say that I did not tell,’ said Sunni.

‘Call the woman,’ ordered His Highness.

She was in the crowd in the courtyard, waiting to see her old master pass again.  She came in bent and shaking, with her head-covering over her face.  She threw herself at Colonel Starr’s feet, and kissed them.

‘Captan Sahib!’ she quavered, ’Captan Sahib!  Mirbani do!’[1]