“Surely, sahiba!”

“Do you agree?”

“I already have agreed.  They are my terms.  I named them!”

“I would like to hear you promise, on your honor.”

“I swear by all my gods and by my honor.  I swear by my love, that is dearer to me than a throne, and by the name and the honor of a Rajput!”

“Be ready, then.  I am going now to hide the rope in the shadow of the wall.  It will take perhaps fifteen minutes.  Be ready.”

He made a quick movement to embrace her, but she slipped out and escaped him; and he thought better of his sudden plan to follow her, remembering that her word was likely to be good, whatever his might be.  He elected to wait inside until she returned for him.  He little knew that he missed the downward swing of Alwa’s sabre, that was waiting, poised and balanced for him, in the darkness by the door.

“Bismillah!  I would have had a right to kill him had he followed her and broken faith so early in the business!” Alwa swore, excusing his impatience to Mahommed Gunga.  “Have no fear, sahib!” he counselled Cunningham a moment later, laying a heavy hand on the boy’s arm.  “Let her keep her promises.  That Hindoo pig will not keep his!  We will be after her, and surely—­surely we will find good cause for some throat-slitting as well as the cancelling of marriage promises!”

“Do you understand, Alwa-sahib, that—­if Jaimihr keeps his promise to her, she must keep hers to him?  Do you realize that?”

“Allah!  Listen to him!  Yes, sahib.  Truly, bahadur, I appreciate!  I also know that I have given certain promises which I, too, must fulfil!  She is not the only bargainer!  I am worrying more about those guarantees that Howrah was to give—­I am anxious to see how, with fifteen hundred, we are to get the better of a Rajah and his brother and their total of ten thousand!  I want to see those promises performed!  Ay!  The Miss-sahib has done well.  She has done her share.  Let her continue.  And do thou thy share, bahadur!  I am at thy back with my men, but give us action!”

Cunningham held up a lantern, and looked straight at Duncan McClean.  The missionary had held his daughter’s hand while she recounted what had happened in the cell.  Whatever he may have thought, he had uttered no word of remonstrance.

“Of course, we go to Howrah ahead of you,” he answered to Cunningham’s unspoken question.

Cunningham held out his right hand, and the missionary shook it.

“Hold the lamp, please,” said Cunningham, and Mahommed Gunga seized it.  Then Cunningham took paper and a pencil and read aloud the answer that he wrote to Byng-bahadur.  He wrote it in Greek characters for fear lest it might fall into the enemy’s hands and be too well understood.

“I can be with you in one week, sir, and perhaps sooner.  Unless we are all killed in the meantime we should number more than fifteen hundred when we come.  Expect either all or none of us.  The situation here is critical, but our course seems clear, and we ought to pull through.  Mahommed Gunga sends salaams.  Your obedient servant,
                                        “Ralph Cunningham.”