e to one side with the man, who spoke quickly
and low in English.

"I have spoken the truth," said he. "I am Cushnan Di"--he drew himself
up--"and once I had a city of my own and five thousand men, but a plague
and then a war came, and the Dakoon entered upon my city. I left my
people and hid, and changed myself that no one should know me, and I
came to Mandakan. It was noised abroad that I was dead. Little by little
I grew in favour with the Dakoon, and little by little I gathered strong
men about me-two hundred in all at last. It was my purpose, when the day
seemed ripe, to seize upon the Palace as the Dakoon had seized upon my
little city. I knew from my father, whose father built a new portion
of the Palace, of a secret way by the Aqueduct of the Failing Fountain,
even into the Palace itself. An army could ride through and appear in
the Palace yard like the mist-shapes from the lost legions. When I had a
thousand men I would perform this thing, I thought.

"But day by day the Dakoon drew me to him, and the thing seemed hard to
do, even now before I had the men. Then his sickness came, and I could
not strike an ailing man. When I saw how he was beset by traitors, in
my heart I swore that he should not suffer by my hands. I heard of your
riding to the Neck of Baroob--the men of Boonda Broke brought word. So
I told the Dakoon, and I told him also that Boonda Broke was ready to
steal into his Palace even before he died. He started up, and new life
seemed given him. Calling his servants, he clothed himself, and he came
forth and ordered out his troops. He bade me take my men to keep the
road against Pango Dooni. Then he ranged his men before the Palace, and
scattered them at points in the city to resist Boonda Broke.

"So I rode forth, but I came first to my daughter's bedside. She lies
in a little house not a stone's throw from the Palace, and near to the
Aqueduct of the Falling Fountain. Once she was beautiful and tall and
straight as a bamboo stem, but now she is in body no more than a piece
of silken thread. Yet her face is like the evening sky after a rain.
She is much alone, and only in the early mornings may I see her. She is
cared for by an old woman of our people, and there she bides, and thinks
strange thoughts, and speaks words of wisdom.

"When I told her what the Dakoon bade me do, and what I had sworn to
perform when the Dakoon was dead, she said:

"'But no. Go forth as the Dakoon hath bidden. Stand in