the shoulders of each of
us. "Go, and forget. It is not yet time to teach the world our sciences.
India is not yet ripe for freedom. I urged them to move too soon. Go, ye
two, and tell none what ye have seen, for men will only call you fools
and liars. Above all, never seek to learn the secrets, for that means
death--and there are such vastly easier deaths! Good-bye."

He turned and was gone in a moment, stepping sidewise into the shadows.
We could not find him again, although we hunted until the temple priests
came and made it obvious that they would prefer our room to our company.
They did not exactly threaten us, but refused to answer questions, and
pointed at the open door, as if they thought that was what we were
looking for.

So we sought the sunlight, which was as refreshing after the temple
gloom as a cold bath after heat, and turned first of all in the
direction of Mulji Singh's apothecary, hoping to find that Yasmini had
lied, or had been mistaken about that bag.

But Mulji Singh, although fabulously glad to see us, had no bag nor
anything to say about its disappearance. He would not admit that we had
left it there.

"You have been where men go mad, _sahibs_," was all the comment he would
make.

"Don't you understand that we'll protect you against these people?" King
insisted.

For answer to that Mulji Singh hunted about among the shelves for a
minute, and presently set down a little white paper package on a corner
of the table.

"Do you recognize that, _sahib_?" he asked.

"Deadly aconite," said King, reading the label.

"Can you protect me against it?"

"You're safe if you let it alone," King answered unguardedly.

"That is a very wise answer, _sahib_," said Mulji Singh, and set the
aconite back on the highest shelf in the darkest corner out of reach.

So, as we could get nothing more out of Mulji Singh except a tonic that
he said would preserve us both from fever, we sought the telegraph
office, making as straight for it as the winding streets allowed. The
door was shut. With my ear to a hole in the shutters I could hear loud
snores within. King picked up a stone and started to thunder on the door
with it.

The ensuing din brought heads to every upper window, and rows of other
heads, like trophies of a ghastly hunt, began to decorate the edges of
the roofs. Several people shouted to us, but King went on hammering, and
at last a sleepy telegraph babu, half-in and half-out of his black
alpa