is camp-fire he was pleased.

"Sit you here at my right," he said to Hunsa, for he conceived him to
be captain of the Raja's guard.

Sookdee and the others, without apparent motive, contrived it so that a
Bagree or two sat between each of the merchant's men, engaging them in
pleasant speech, tendering tobacco. And, as if in modesty, some of the
Bagrees sat behind the retainers.

"This is indeed a courtesy," the merchant assured Hunsa; "a poor trader
feels honoured by a visit from so brave a soldier as the captain of the
Raja's guard."

He noticed, too, with inward satisfaction, that the jamadars had left
their weapons behind, which they had done in a way of not arousing
their victim's fears.

"Would not it be deemed a courtesy," the merchant asked, "if one like
myself, who is a poor trader, should go to pay his respects to the Raja
ere he retires, for of course it would be beneath his dignity to come
to his servant?"

"No, indeed," declared Hunsa quickly, thinking of the graves that were
even then being dug; "he is a man of a haughty temper, and when he is
in the society of the beautiful dancing girl who is with him, he cares
not to be disturbed. Even now he is about to escort her in the cart
down the road to where there is a shrine that women of that caste make
offering to."

It had been arranged that Ajeet would escort Bootea, with two Bagrees
as attendants, to the grove of trees half a mile down the road. He had
insisted on this in the way of a negative support to the murder. As
there would be no fighting this did not reflect on his courage as a
leader. And as to complicity, Hunsa knew that as the leader of the
party, Ajeet would be held the chief culprit. It was always the leader
of a gang of decoits who was beheaded when captured, the others perhaps
escaping with years of jail. And Hunsa himself, even Sookdee, would be
safe, for they were in league with the Dewan.

There was an hour of social talk; many times Hunsa fingered the
_roomal_ that was about his waist; the yellow-and-white strangling
cloth with which Bhowanee had commanded her disciples, the thugs, to
kill their victims. In one corner of it was tied a silver rupee for
luck. The natural ferocity of his mind threw him into an eager
anticipation: he took pride in his proficiency as a strangler; his
coarse heavy hands, like those of a Punjabi wrestler, were suited to
the task. Grasping the cloth at the base of a victim's skull, tight to
t