Instantly he was on his knees beside her; stanching the cut on her forehead, binding it with his handkerchief; consumed with rage and concern;--rage at himself and the dastardly intruder,--no monkey, that was certain.

His quick ear caught the stealthy rustling again, lower down; and, yes--unmistakably--a human sound, like a stifled exclamation of dismay.

"Aruna--I _must_ get at that devil," he whispered. "Does your head feel better? Dare I leave you a moment?"

"Yes--oh yes," she whispered back. "Nothing will harm me. Only take care--please take care."

Hastily he made a pillow of his overcoat and covered her with the cloak; then, stooping down, he kissed her fervently--and was gone.

CHAPTER XV.

"Then was I rapt away by the impulse, one Immeasurable ... wave of a need To abolish that detested life."

--BROWNING.

Lithe and noiseless as a cat, Roy crept through the archway into outer darkness. It was hateful leaving Aruna; but rage at her hurt and the primitive instinct of pursuit were not to be denied. And she _might_ have been killed. And she had done it for him:--coals of fire, indeed!

Also, the others would be getting anxious. Let him only catch that mysterious skulker, and he could shout across to the Palace roof. They would hear.

Close under the wall he waited, all the scout in him alert. The cautious rustlings drew stealthily nearer; ceased, for a few tantalising seconds; then, out of the ma.s.sed shadows, there crept a moving shadow.

Roy's spring was calculated to a nicety; but the thing swerved sharply and fled up the rough hillside. There followed a ghostly chase, unreal as a nightmare, lit up by the moon's deceptive brilliance; the earth, an unstable welter of light and darkness, shifting under his feet.

The fleeing shade was agile; and plainly familiar with the ground.

Baulked, and lured steadily farther from Aruna, all the Rajput flamed in Roy. During those mad moments he was capable of murdering the unknown with his hands....

Suddenly, blessedly, the thing stumbled and dropped to its knees. With the spring of a panther, he was on it, his angers at its throat, pinning it to earth. The choking cry moved him not at all:--and suddenly the moonlight showed him the face of Chandranath, mingled hate and terror in the starting eyes....

Amazed beyond measure, he unconsciously relaxed his grip. "_You_--is it?--you devil!"

There was no answer. Chandranath had had the wit to wriggle almost clear of him;--almost, not quite. Roy's pounce was worthy of his Rajput ancestors; and next moment they were locked in a silent, purposeful embrace....

But Roy's brain was cooler now. Sanity had returned. He could still have choked the life out of the man, without compunction. But he did not choose to embroil himself, or his people, on account of anything so contemptible as the creature that was writhing and scratching in his grasp. He simply wanted to secure him and hand him over to the Jaipur authorities, who had several scores up against him.

But Chandranath, though not skilled, had the ready cunning of the lesser breeds. With a swift unexpected move, he tripped Roy up so that he nearly fell backward; and, in a supreme effort to keep his balance, unconsciously loosened his hold. This time, Chandranath slipped free of him; and, in the act, pushed him so violently that he staggered and came down among sharp broken stones with one foot twisted under him. When he would have sprung up, a stab of pain in his ankle told him he was done for....

The sheer ignominy of it enraged him; and he was still further enraged by the proceedings of the victor, who sprang nimbly out of reach on to a fragment of b.u.t.tressed wall, whence he let fly a string of abusive epithets nicely calculated to touch up Roy's pride and temper and goad him to helpless fury.

But if his ankle was crippled, his brain was not. While Chandranath indulged his pent-up spite, Roy was feeling stealthily, purposefully, in the semi-darkness, for the sharpest chunk of stone he could lay hands on; a chunk warranted to hurt badly, if nothing more. The strip of shadow against the sky made an admirable target; and Roy's move, when it came, was swift, his aim unerring.

Somewhere about the head or shoulders it took effect: a yell of rage and pain a.s.sured him of that, as his target vanished on the far side of the wall.

Had he jumped or fallen? And what did the damage amount to? Roy would have given a good deal to know; but he had neither time nor power to investigate. Nothing for it but to crawl back, and shout to Aruna, when he got within hail.

It was an undignified performance. His twisted ankle stabbed like a knife, and never failed to claim acquaintance with every obstacle in its path. Presently, to his immense relief, the darkness ahead was raked by a restless light, zigzagging like a giant glow-worm.

"Lance--ahoy!" he shouted.

"Righto!" Lance sang out; and the glow-worm waggled a welcome.

Another shout from the Palace roof, answered in concert; and the mad, bad dream was over. He was back in the world of realities; on his feet again--one foot, to be exact--supported by Desmond's arm; pouring out his tale.

Lance already knew part of it. He had found Aruna and was hurrying on to find Roy. "Your cousin's got the pluck of a Rajput," he concluded. "But she seems a bit damaged. The left arm's broken, I'm afraid."

Roy cursed freely. "Wish to G.o.d I could make sure if I've sent that skunk to blazes."

"Just as well you can't, perhaps. If your shot took effect, he won't be off in a hurry. The police can nip out when we get back."

"Look here--keep it dark till I've seen Dyan. If Chandranath's nabbed, he'll want to be in it. Only fair!"

Lance chuckled. "What an unholy pair you are!--By the way, I fancy Martin's pulled it off with Miss Flossie. I tumbled across them in the hanging garden. You left that door open. Gave me the tip you might be out on the loose."

Desmond's surmise proved correct. Aruna's left arm was broken above the elbow: a simple fracture, but it hurt a good deal. Thea, in charge of 'the wounded,' eased them both as best she could, during the long drive home. But Aruna, still in her exalted mood, counted mere pain a little thing, when Roy, under cover of the cloak, found her cold right hand and cherished it in his warm one nearly all the way.

No one paid much heed to Martin and Flossie, who felt privately annoyed with 'the native cousin' for putting her nose out of joint. Defrauded of her due importance, she told her complacent lover they must 'save up the news till to-morrow.' Meantime, they rode, very much at leisure, behind the barouche;--and no one troubled about them at all.

Lance and Vincent, having cantered on ahead, called in for Miss Hammond and left word at Sir Lakshman's house that Aruna had met with a slight accident; and would he and her brother come out to the Residency after dinner?

Before the meal was over, they arrived. Miss Hammond was upstairs attending to Aruna; and Sir Lakshman joined them without ceremony, leaving Dyan alone with Roy, who was nursing his ankle in an arm-chair near the drawing-room fire.

In ten minutes of intimate talk he heard the essential facts, with reservations; and Roy had never felt more closely akin to him than on that evening. Rajput chivalry is no mere tradition. It is vital and active as ever it was. Insult or injury to a woman is sternly avenged; and the offender is lucky if he escapes the extreme penalty. Roy frankly hoped he had inflicted it himself. But for Dyan surmise was not enough.

He would not eat nor sleep till he had left his own mark on the man who had come near killing his sister--most sacred being to him, who had neither wife nor mother.

"The delicate attention was meant for me, you know," Roy reminded him; simply from a British impulse to give the devil his due.

"Tcha!" Dyan's thumb and finger snapped like a toy pistol. "No law-courts talk for me. You were so close together. He took the risk. By Indra, he won't take any more such risks if I get at him! You said we would not see him here. But no doubt he has been hanging round Amber, making what mischief he can. He must have heard your party was coming, and got sneaking round for a chance to score off you. Young Ramanund, priest of Kali's shrine, is one of those he has made his tool, the way he made me. If he is in Amber, I shall find him. You can take your oath on that." He stood up, straight and virile, instinct with purpose as a drawn sword. "I am going now, Roy. But not _one word_ to any soul.

Grandfather and Aruna only need to know I am trying to find who toppled those stones. I shall not succeed. That is all:--except for you and me.

Bijli, Son of Lightning, will take me full gallop to Amber. First thing in the morning, I will come--and make my report."

"But look here--Lance knows----"

"Well, your Lance can suppose he got away. We could trust him, I don't doubt. But what is known to more than two, will in time be known to a hundred. For myself, I don't trouble. Among Rajputs the penalty would be slight. But this thing must be kept between you and me--because of Aruna."

Roy held out his hand. Dyan's fingers closed on it like taut strips of steel. Unmistakably the real Dyan Singh had shed the husks of scholarship and politics and come into his own again.

"I wouldn't care to have those at my throat!" remarked Roy, pensively considering the streaks on his own hand.

"Some Germans didn't care for it--in France," said Dyan coolly. "But now----" He scowled at his offending left arm. "I hope--very soon ...

never mind. No more talking ... poison gas!" And with a flash of white teeth--he was gone.

Roy, left staring into the fire, followed him in imagination, speeding through the silent city out into the region of skulls and eye-sockets--a flying shadow in the moonlight with murder in its heart....

Within an hour, that flying shadow was outside the gateway of Amber, startling the doorkeepers from sleep; murder, not only in its heart, but tucked securely in its belt. No 'law-courts talk' for one of his breed; no nice adjustment of penalty to offence; no concern as to possible consequences. The Rajput, with his blood up, is daring to the point of recklessness; deaf to puerile promptings of prudence or mercy; a sword, seeking its victim; insatiate till the thrust has gone home.