e friends. No man, no woman, shall come between
us. We will work together and we will always be friends.'"

By not so much as the flicker of an eyelid did Shere Ali betray that he
heard the words. Linforth sought to revive that night so vividly that he
needs must turn, needs must respond to the call, and needs must renew
the pledge.

"We sat for a long while that night, smoking our pipes on the step of the
door. It was a dark night. We watched a planet throw its light upwards
from behind the amphitheatre of hills on the left, and then rise clear to
view in a gap. There was a smell of hay, like an English meadow, from the
hut behind us. You pledged your friendship that night. It's not so very
long ago--two years, that's all."

He came to a stop with a queer feeling of shame. He remembered the night
himself, and always had remembered it. But he was not given to sentiment,
and here he had been talking sentiment and to no purpose.

Shere Ali spoke again to his courtier, and the courtier stepped forward
more bland than ever.

"His Highness would like to know if his Excellency is still talking, and
if so, why?" he said to the Pathan, who translated it.

Linforth gave up the attempt to renew his friendship with Shere Ali. He
must go back to Peshawur and tell Ralston that he had failed. Ralston
would merely shrug his shoulders and express neither disappointment nor
surprise. But it was a moment of bitterness to Linforth. He looked at
Shere Ali's indifferent face, he listened for a second or two to the tune
he still hummed, and he turned away. But he had not taken more than a
couple of steps towards the entrance of the balcony when his guide
touched him cautiously upon the elbow.

Linforth stopped and looked back. The three men were once more gazing at
the steps which led down from the road to the well. And once more a
water-carrier descended with his great earthen jar upon his head. He
descended very cautiously, but as he came to the turn of the steps his
foot slipped suddenly.

Linforth uttered a cry, but the man had not fallen. He had tottered for a
moment, then he had recovered himself. But the earthen jar which he
carried on his head had fallen and been smashed to atoms.

Again the three made a simultaneous movement, but this time it was a
movement of joy. Again an exclamation burst from Shere Ali's lips, but
now it was a cry of triumph.

He stood erect, and at once he turned to go. As he turned he met
Linforth'