ething in the Rajput's voice that was strange, that hinted
at a darker meaning.

"Ayah!" she called again, afraid, though she knew not why, to enter.

"She guards the jewels, heavenborn! Wait, while I bring the lamp!"

He crossed the room, brought it and stepped with it past Ruth, straight
into the room.

"See!" he said, holding the lamp up above his head. "There in her bosom
are the jewels! It was there, too, that she had the knife to slay thee
with! My sword is clean, yet, heavenborn! I slew her with my fingers,
thus!"

He kicked the prostrate ayah, and, as the black face with the wide-open
bloodshot eyes and the protruding tongue rolled sidewise and the body
moved, a little heap of jewels fell upon the floor. Mahommed Khan
stooped down to gather them, bending, a little painfully, on one old
knee--but stopped half-way and turned. There was a thud behind him in
the doorway. Ruth Bellairs had fainted, and lay as the ayah had lain
when Risaldar had not yet locked her in the room.

He raised the lamp and studied her in silence for a minute, looking from
her to the bound priest and back to her again.

"Now praised be Allah!" he remarked aloud, with a world of genuine
relief in his voice. "Should she stay fainted for a little while, that
priest--"

He stalked into the middle of the outer room. He set the lamp down on a
table and looked the priest over as a butcher might survey a sheep he is
about to kill.

"Now--robber of orphans--bleeder of widows' blood--dog of an
idol-briber! This stands between thee and Kharvani!" He drew his sword
and flicked the edges of it. "And this!" He took up the tongs again.
"There is none now to plead or to forbid! Think! Show me the way out of
this devil's nest, or--" He raised the tongs again.

At that minute came a quiet knock. He set the tongs down again and
crossed the room and opened the door.

VII.

Mahommed Khan closed the door again behind his half-brother and turned
the key, but the half-brother shot the bolt home as well before he
spoke, then listened intently for a minute with his ear to the keyhole.

"Where is the priest's son?" growled the Risaldar, in the Rajput tongue.

"I have him. I have the priestling in a sack. I have him trussed and
bound and gagged, so that he can neither speak nor wriggle!"

"Where?"

"Hidden safely."

"I said to bring him here!"

"I could not. Listen! That ayah--where is she?"

"Dead! What has the ayah to do with it?"

"T