nger of being trodden underfoot among the
hundreds of huge animals straying about. But Badshah knew it, too, and so
he remained standing over his man, while the latter sat down on the ground,
rested his aching back against a tree, and made a meal from the contents of
his haversack. Badshah contented himself with the grass and leaves that he
could reach without stirring from the spot, and then cautiously lowered
himself to the ground and stretched his huge limbs out.

Dermot lay down beside him, as he had so often done before in the nights
spent in the jungle. But, exhausted as he was, he could not sleep at first.
The strangeness of the adventure kept him awake. To find his presence
accepted by this vast gathering of wild elephants, animals which are
usually extremely shy of human beings, was in itself extraordinary. Much as
he knew of the jungle he had never dreamt of this. In Central Indian
villages he had been told legends of lost children being adopted by wolves.
But for elephants to admit a man into their herd was beyond belief. That it
was due to Badshah's affection for him was little less remarkable than the
fact itself. For it opened up the question of the animal's extraordinary
power over his kind. And that was an unfathomable mystery.

Dermot found the riddle too difficult to solve. He ceased to puzzle over
it. The noises in the forest gradually died down, and the intense silence
that followed was broken only by the harsh call of the barking-deer or the
wailing cry of the giant owl. Fatigue overcame him, and he slept.

It seemed to him that he had scarcely lost consciousness when he was
awakened by a touch on his face. It was still dark; but, when he sprang up
hastily, he could vaguely make out Badshah standing beside him. The
elephant touched him with his trunk and then sank down on his knees. The
invitation to mount was unmistakable; and Dermot slung his rifle on his
back and climbed on to the elephant's neck. Badshah rose up and moved off,
and apparently the other elephants followed him, for the noises that had
filled the forest and showed them to be awake and feeding, ceased abruptly.
Dermot could just faintly distinguish the soft footfall of the animal
immediately behind him.

When Badshah reached the lowest hills and left the heavy forest behind the
sky became visible, filled with the clear and vivid tropic starlight. An
animal track led up between giant clumps of bamboos, by long-leaved
plantain trees