would mean instant death at the hands of the rajah's men.

"He'll come to-night," I thought, and I waited patiently. But the night
had nearly passed as I sat watching by the opening cut in my tent,
before my heart began to beat, and I felt that he was near, for there
was a low rustling sound, a short distance off, beneath the great tree.

"Poor old Dost!" I said to myself; "he is a brave, true fellow;" and
then it was on my lips to say in a whisper, "Quick! this way," when I
turned cold, for there was a low muttering, and I awoke to the fact that
Salaman was talking to some one away there in the darkness.

Acting on the impulse of the moment, I said aloud, "What's that? Who's
there?"

"It is I, my lord," came in Salaman's voice.

"Is there anything wrong?" I said hastily, vexed with myself now for
speaking.

"No, my lord;" he would call me my lord; "but I dared not leave the new
opening to the tent unwatched. There might be serpents or a leopard or
tiger prowling near."

"Poor Dost!" I said to myself, and I might have added, "poor me!" for
mine seemed to be a very pitiable case, and after a minute or two's
thought, I called to Salaman, who came at once to the freshly cut
opening.

"It is cooler to-night," I said sharply, as I turned now upon my couch,
to which I had crept silently. "Fasten up the place."

"Yes, my lord," he said eagerly, and summoning his people, he soon had
the hole closed up.

"It does not matter," I said to myself, "a sharp knife would soon make
another way out or in."

I felt that it was of no use to expect Dost that night, or rather early
morning, and so I went to sleep, awaking fairly refreshed and ready to
turn my thoughts to the invention of a plan to get into conversation
with Dost.

But try as I would, no ideas came, and the day had nearly gone by, when,
as I sat beneath my canopy tree where the divan had been formed,
expecting at any moment to hear the trampling of horses heralding the
coming of the rajah, to my astonishment I saw Dost coming across the
opening, straight for where I sat.

He was stalking toward me slowly, and using a stout bamboo, about six
feet long, to support his steps, while in his left hand he carried a
bowl formed of a gourd, and this he tapped against his stick at every
stride, while he went on half shouting, half singing, a kind of chant,
and turning his head, and swaying it from side to side.

"How well he acts his part," I thought, but I shi