“Now, where away?” demanded Dick, giving the horse his head.  “To my house?  You’ll be safe there for the present.”

“No.  They might trace us there.”

Yasmini was up beside him, wedged tightly between him and Hasamurti, so like his own wife, except for a vague Eastern scent she used, that he could not for the life of him speak to her as a stranger.

“Listen!” she said excitedly.  “I had horses here, there, everywhere in case of need.  But Gungadhura sent men and took them all.  Now I have only one horse—­in your stable—­I must get that tonight.  First, then, drive my women to a place that I will show you.”

Away in the distance they could hear the trumpeting of Akbar, and the shouts of men who had been turned out to attempt the hopeless task of capturing the brute.  At each scream the horse trembled in the shafts and had to be managed skillfully, but the load was too heavy now for him to run away with it.

“If that elephant will continue to be our friend and will only run the other way for a distraction, so that we are not seen, one of these days I will give him a golden howdah!” vowed Yasmini.

And Akbar did that very thing.  Whoever was awake that night in Sialpore, and was daring enough to venture in the dark streets, followed the line of destruction and excitement, gloating over the broken property of enemies or awakening friends to make them miserable with condolences.  The dog-cart threaded through the streets unseen, for even the scarce night-watchmen left their posts to take part in the hunt.

Yasmini guided them to the outskirts of the town in a line as nearly straight as the congenital deviousness of Sialpore’s ancient architects allowed.  There was not a street but turned a dozen times to the mile.  At one point she bade Dick stop, and begged Tess to let Tom Tripe take her home, promising to see her again within the hour.  But Tess had recovered her nerve and was determined to see the adventure through, in spite of the discomforts of a seat behind Tom’s military saddle.

They brought up at last in front of a low dark house at the very edge of the city.  It stood by itself in a compound, with fields behind it, and looked prosperous enough to belong to one of the maharajah’s suite.

“The house of Mukhum Dass!” Yasmini announced.

“The money-lender?”

“Yes.”

Dick made a wry face, for the man’s extortions were notorious.  But Yasmini never paused to cast up virtue when she needed assistants in a hurry; rather she was adept at appraising character and bending it to suit her ends.  Ismail, hot and out of breath from running at the cart-tail, was sent to pound the money-lender’s door, until that frightened individual came down himself to inquire (with the door well held by a short chain) what the matter was.

“I lend no money in the night!” was his form of greeting.  He always used it when gamblers came to him in the heat of the loser’s passion at unearthly hours—­and sometimes ended by making a loan at very high interest on sound security.  Otherwise he would have stayed in bed, whatever the thunderous importunity.