ll, where, if you were 'stalked,' you could open the sluice gates
and let the Thames and the mill stream rush in and meet, and make a hell
of whirling waters that would drown a fish. She would go there if it
were she. And yet--it is an Apache: I swear it is an Apache!"

He turned and looked back at Arjeeb Noosrut, then raised his hand and
brushed it down the back of his head, which was always the sign "Wait!"
to Dollops, and then spoke as calmly as he could.

"Brother, I will go in and break bread and eat salt with thee," he said.
"But I may do no more, for to-night I am in haste."

"Come, then," the man answered; and taking him by the hand, led him in
and up to a room at the back of the second storey, where, hot as the
night was, the windows were closed and a woman, squatted before a
lighted brasier, was dripping the contents of an oil cruse over the
roasting carcase of a young kid.

"It is to shut out the sounds of the vile infidel orgies from the house
adjoining," explained Arjeeb Noosrut, as Cleek walked to the tightly
closed window and leant his forehead against it. "Yet, if the heat
oppresses thee----"

"It does," interposed Cleek, and leant far out into the darkness as
though sucking in the air when the sash was raised and the thing which
had been only a dim babel of wordless sounds a moment before became now
the riotous laughter and the ribald comments of men upon the verses of a
comic song which one of their number was joyously singing.

"French!" said Cleek under his breath, as he caught the notes of the
singer and the words of his audience, "French--I knew it!"

Then he drew in his head, and having broken of the bread and eaten of
the salt which, at a word from Arjeeb Noosrut, the woman brought on a
wicker tray and laid before them, he moved hastily to the door.

"Brother and son of the faithful, peace be with thee, I must go," he
said. "But I come again; and it is written that thou shalt be honoured
above all men when I return to thee, and that the true believers--the
true sons of Holy Buddha--shall have cause to set thy name at the head
of the records of those who are most blest of him!"

Then he salaamed and passed out. Closing the door behind him, he ran
like a hare down the narrow stairs. At the door Dollops rose up like the
imp in a pantomime and jumped toward him.

"Law, guv'ner, I'm nigh starved a-waitin' for yer!" he said in a
whisper. "Wot's the lay now? A double quick change? I've got the