im, and I know that the natives have
beauty in their natures--one gets to almost love them as children. So,
my dear Captain, when you tell me that the Gulab rendered you and me
and the British Raj this tremendous service, and add, quite
unnecessarily, that she's a good girl, I believe it all; we need never
bring it up again. Elizabeth has just made a mistake. And, Barlow,
men are always forgiving the mistakes of women where their feelings are
concerned--they must--that is one of the proofs of their strength. But
these"--and he patted the papers lovingly--"well, they're rather like a
reprieve brought at the eleventh hour to a man who is to be executed.
We're put in a difficult position, though. To pass over in silence the
killing of two soldiers would end only in the House of Commons;
somebody would rise in his place and want to know why it had been
hushed up. But to take action, to create a stir, would give rise to a
suspicion of the existence of this."

Hodson rose from his chair and paced the floor, one hand clasped to his
forehead, his small grey eyes carrying a dream-look as though he were
seeking an occult enlightenment; then he sat down wearily, and spoke as
if interpreting something that had been whispered him.

"Yes, Barlow, this decoit has been seized by the Nana Sahib lot. His
life was forfeit, and they've offered him his life back to come here
and turn Approver--to become a spy, not _for_ us but as a spy _on_ us
for them. Ajeet would know that information of his coming to me would
be carried to them by spies--the spies are always with me--and his life
wouldn't be worth two annas. I gave him that pardon because we have no
power to seize him here, but it will make them think that we have
fallen into the trap. They might even believe--wily and suspicious as
they are--that what he gleans here is the truth.

"There's a curious efficacy, Barlow, in what I might call an
affectation of simplicity. You know those stupid heavy-headed
crocodiles in that big pool of the Nerbudda below the marble gorge, and
how they'll take nearly an hour wallowing and sidling up to a mud-bank
before they crawl out to bask in the sun; but just show the tip of your
helmet above the rock and they're gone. That's perhaps what I mean.
As we might say back in dear old London, this wily Rajput thinks he has
pulled my leg."

"I think, Colonel, that you are dead onto his wicket."

"Well, then, the thing to do is to emulate the mu