“Of Gungadhura?  I?  I never was!  But now whoever fears him would run from a broken snake.  I have word that the fool has murdered Mukhum Dass the money-lender.  You may trust the English to draw his teeth nicely for him after that!  Gungadhura is like a tiger in a net he can not break!”

“He might send men to break into the house,” Tess argued.

“There will be sharper eyes than any of his watching!”

But Tess was alarmed at the prospect.  She did not mind in the least what the English might have to say about it afterward; but to have her little house the center of nocturnal feuds, with her husband using his six-shooters, and heaven only knew what bloodshed resulting, was more of a prospect than she looked forward to.

“Sister,” said Yasmini, taking her by both hands.  “I must use your house.  There is no other place.”

No one could refuse her when her deep blue eyes grew soft and pleading, let alone Tess, who had lived with her and loved her for a week.

“Very well,” she answered; and Yasmini’s eyes softened and brightened even more.

“I shall not forget!”

Getting ready was no child’s play.  It was to be a leisurely procession in the olden style, with tents, servants, and all the host of paraphernalia and hangers-on that that entails; not across the desert this time, but around the edge of it, the way the polo ponies went, and out of Gungadhura’s reach.  For, however truly Yasmini might declare that she was not afraid of Gungadhura (and she vowed she never boasted), she was running no unnecessary risks; it takes a long time for the last rats to desert a sinking ship, (the obstinate go down with it), and just as long for the last assassins to change politics.  She was eager to run all the risks when that was the surest strategy, but cautious otherwise.

The secret of her safety lay in the inviolable privacy surrounding woman’s life in all that part of India—­privacy that the English have respected partly because of their own inherent sense of personal retirement, partly because it was the easiest way and saved trouble; but mainly because India’s women have no ostensible political power, and there is politics enough without bringing new millions more potential agitators into light.  So word of her life among the women did not travel swiftly to official ears, as that of a male intriguer would certainly have done.  Utirupa was busy all day long with polo, and the Powers that Be were sure of it, and pleased.  What Gungadhura knew, or guessed, was another matter; but Gungadhura had his own hands full just then.

So they formed part of a procession that straggled along the miles, of elephants, camels and groups of ponies, carts loaded with tents, chattering servants, parties of Rajput gentlemen, beggars, hangers-on, retainers armed with ancient swords, mountebanks, several carriage-loads of women, who could sing and dance and were as particular about their veiling as if Lalun were not their ancestress, the inevitable faquirs, camel-loads of entertainers, water-carriers, sheep, asses, and bullock-drawn, squeaking two-wheeled carts aburst with all that men and animals could eat.  Three days and nights of circus life, as Tess described it afterward to Dick.