ghed. He well knew the softening effect upon romantic womanhood of a
long sea voyage where the willing winds sway the softer emotions of the
breast, and the trembling woman is defenseless against the perfidious
darts of Cupid.

"My time will come," he murmured as the train rushed along through the
incense breathing plantations. A richer nature than foggy England was
spread out before him in treacherous Hindostan with its warring tribes,
its dying creeds, its dead languages, its history sweeping far back into
the mists of the unknown. For every problem of the human mind, every
throe of the restless heart of man is worn old and threadbare in
Hindostan, with its very dust compounded of the wind-blown ashes of
dead millions upon millions. Gross vulgar Gold reigns now as King on the
broad savannas where spice plantations and indigo farms vary the cotton,
rice, and sugar fields. Wasted treasures of dead dynasties gleam out
in the ornamentation of the temples abandoned to the prowling beast
of prey. And riches and ruin meet the eye in a strange medley. Dead
greatness and the prosaic present.

Modern bungalows, where the faltering conqueror watches the tax-ridden
ryots dot the landscape, and an overweighted official system brings its
haughty military, its self-sufficient civilians, its proud womanhood,
to drain the exhausted heart of India. And the ryot groans under many
taskmasters.

Lingering with a restless heart, in Allahabad, Alan Hawke roused himself
as at a bugle call, when he received a telegram announcing the safe
arrival of the Empress of India at Calcutta.

"La danse va commencer," he muttered, as he read the brief words of his
employer: "Go on to Delhi, await me there. Telegrams to you there at
private address. Leave letters." The signature "Lausanne" was a new
spur to his well-considered prudence. And, so, the next day, Major Hawke
sedately descended at Delhi.

There was nothing to distinguish Hawke from any other well-to-do
European, as he stood gazing around the station, in his cool linens, his
pith helmet and floating puggaree. The prudent air of judicious mystery
lately adopted sat easily upon him as his eye roved over the familiar
scenes of old with a silent gleam of recognition, he followed a
confidential attendant who salaamed, murmuring "My master awaits the
sahib whom he delights to love and honor."

"There is one card I must play at once," murmured Hawke, as the carriage
sped along. "Mademoiselle J