As I have said, it
is a message from the Gulab Begum."
"I looked for you when I returned from above," the guard answered, "but
you had gone. The Afghan has gone but a little since--stay you here."
He called within, "Yacoub!"
It was the orderly who had conducted Barlow to Amir Khan who answered,
and to him the guard said: "Go to the Chief's apartment and say that
one waits here with word from the favourite."
Hunsa sat down nonchalantly upon a marble step, and drew the guard into
a talk of raids, explaining that he had ridden once upon a time with
Chitu, on his foray into the territory of the Nizam.
CHAPTER XXII
Hunsa had come back to the palace in haste so that the murder of Amir
Khan might be discovered soon after Captain Barlow had left, and that
the crime might be fastened upon the Sahib. As he waited, chatting to
the guard, there was suddenly a frenzied deep-throated call of alarm
from the upper level of rooms that was answered by other voices here
and there crying out; there was the hurrying scuffling of feet on the
marble stairs, and Yacoub appeared, his eyes wide in fright, crying:
"The Chief has been stabbed! he's dead! he's murdered! Guard the
door--let no one out--let no one in!"
"Beat the _nakara_," the guard commanded; "raise the alarm!"
He seized his long-barrelled matchlock, blew on the fuse, and pointing
up toward the moonlit sky, fired.
Pages:
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233