pped back his head
and took another drink from between his smoky fingers; then his
glassless eye glittered out through the white burning of the noon, as
he added:

"But Mitha Baba would not chase a strange elephant, unless she
positively knew the creature was running off with her own Gul
Moti. . . . She's discriminating, is Mitha Baba. But I say, Gunpat
Rao came from the Vindhas, you know."

It dawned upon Skag that this wasn't monologue, but conversation; also
that it had some vague bearing upon his own affairs. The pause was
very slight, when the Deputy resumed:

"Yes, Gunpat Rao is from the Vindha Hills, within the life-time of one
man. . . . Mitha Baba is as fast, but she won't do it; so there's an
end. Gunpat Rao. . . . Gunpat Rao. The mahouts say young male
elephants will follow a strange male for the chance of a fight. It's
consistent enough. Yes, we'll call in Chakkra. . . . Are you ready to
travel, sir?"

This was to Skag.

No array of terms could express how ready to travel was Sanford Hantee.
The Bengali mahout, Chakkra, appeared; a sturdy little man with blue
turban, red kummerband, and a scarf and tunic of white.

The Deputy flicked away his cigarette and now spoke fast--talk having
to do with Nels, with the Hakima, with Gunpat Rao, who was his
particular mahout's master, and of the strange elephant who had carried
the two Sahibas away.

Chakkra reported at this point that he had seen this elephant in the
market place, an old male--with a woman's howdah, covering too few of
his wrinkles--and a mahout who would ruin the disposition of anything
but a man-killer. Chakkra appeared to have an actual hatred toward
this man, for he enquired of the Deputy:

"Have I your permission to deal with the mahout of this thief elephant?"

"Out of your own blood-lust--no. Out of necessity--yes."

A queer moment. It was as if one supposed only to crawl, had suddenly
revealed wings. Not until this instant did Skag realise that a Chief
Commissioner had the flower of England to pick his deputies from, and
had made no mistake in this man. . . . A moment later, Nels had been
given preliminary instruction, and Skag was lifted, with a playful
flourish of the trunk, by Gunpat Rao himself, into the light hunting
howdah. Chakkra was also in place, when the Deputy waved his hand with
the remark:

"Oh, I say, I'd be glad of the chase, myself, but an official, you
know, . . . and Lord, what a dog!"

The la