ge. But you know you are looking a bit cheap, old man."

"I'm pretty fit," said Lewis, and he raised his brown face to a glass.
"Why I'm tanned like a nigger and my eye's perfectly clear."

"Then you're in love," said the mysterious Andover. "Trust me for
knowing. When a man keeps as quiet as you for so long, he's either in
love or seedy. Up here people don't fall in love, so I thought it must
be the other thing."

"Rot," said Lewis. "I'm going out of doors. I must be off pretty soon,
if I'm to get to Nazri by sundown. I wish you'd come out and show me
the sort of lie of the land. There are three landmarks, but I can't
remember their order."

An hour later the two men returned, and Lewis sat down to an early
dinner. He ate quickly, and made up sandwiches which he stuffed into
his pocket. Then he rose and gripped his host's hand.

"Good-bye, Andy. This has been a pleasant meeting. Wish it could have
been longer."

"Good-bye, old chap. Glad to have seen you. My love to George, if you
get to Nazri. Give you three to one in half-crowns you won't get there
to-night."

"Done," said Lewis. "You shall pay when I see you next." And in the
most approved style of the hero of melodrama he lit a short pipe and
went off into Immensity.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE WAY TO NAZRI

Our traveller did not reach Nazri that night for many reasons, of which
the chief shall be told. The way to Nazri is long and the way to Nazri
is exceedingly rough. Leaving the table-land you plunge down a
trackless gully into the dry bed of a stream. Thence it is an hour's
uneasy walking among stagnant pools and granite boulders to the foot of
another nullah which runs up to the heart of the hills. From this you
pick your way along the precipitous side of a mountain, and if your head
is good and your feet sure, may come eventually to a place like the roof
of the house, beyond which lies a thicket of thorn-bushes and the Nazri
gully. At first sight the thing seems impossible, but by a bold man it
can be crossed either in the untanned Kashmir shoes or with the naked
feet.

Lewis had not gone a mile and had barely reached the dry watercourse,
when the weather broke utterly in a storm of mist and fine rain. At
other times this chill weather would have been a comfort, but here in
these lonely altitudes, with a difficult path before him, its result was
to confound confusion. So long as he stuck to the stream he had some
guidance; it was hard, even when the