athing or drawing water from the tank. As women are not
valued highly by the poorer Hindus this did not make the _mugger_ very
unpopular. But early in that very year it had committed the awful crime
of dragging under water and devouring a Brahmini bull, an animal devoted
to the Gods and held sacrosanct.

By this time the crocodile had breathed its last. Raymond measured it
roughly and found it to be over twelve feet in length. The peasants
turned the great body on its back. Wargrave saw that the skin
underneath was too thick to be made into leather, so he bade them cut
the belly open. The stomach contained many shells of freshwater crabs
and crayfish, as well as a surprising amount of large pebbles, either
taken for digestive purposes or swallowed when the fish were being
scooped up off the bottom. But further search resulted in the finding of
several heavy brass or copper anklets and armlets, such as are worn by
Indian women. Some had evidently been a long time in the reptile's
interior.

When the camels had come and the party was preparing to mount and start
back home, a crowd of villagers, led by their old priest, bore down upon
them. Learning that Frank was the slayer of the sacrilegious crocodile
the holy man hung a garland of marigolds round his neck and through the
interpreter offered him the thanks of gods and men for his good deed.
And to a chorus of blessings and compliments he rode away with his
companions.

So ended the incident--apparently. But consequences undreamed of by any
of the actors in it flowed from it. For imperceptibly it brought a
change into the relations between Mrs. Norton and Wargrave and
eventually altered them completely. At first it merely seemed to
strengthen their friendship and increase the feeling of intimacy. To
Violet--they were Violet and Frank to each other now--the saving of her
life constituted a bond that could never be severed. He had preserved
her from a horrible death and she owed Wargrave more than gratitude.

Hitherto she had often toyed with the idea of him as a lover, and the
thought had been a pleasant one. But it had hardly occurred to her to be
in love with him in return. In all her life up to now she had never
known what it was to really love. She had married without affection. Her
girlhood had been passed without the mildest flirtation; for she had
been brought up in a quiet country village where there never seemed to
be any bachelors of her own class between th