ut the fact remained
that England had first claim on Lilamani's children; and Rama's were
tossed on the troubled waters of transition.

As for India herself--sacred Mother-land--her distraught soul seemed
more and more at the mercy of the voluble, the half-baked, the
disruptive, at home and abroad.

Himself, steeped in the threefold culture of his country--Vedantic,
Islamic, and European--he came very near the prevailing ideal of
composite Indian nationality. Yet was he not deceived. In seventy years
of life, he had seen intellectual India pass through many phases, from
ardent admiration of the West and all its works, to no less ardent
denunciation. And in these days he saw too clearly how those same
intellectuals--with catchwords, meaningless to nine-tenths of her
people--were breaking down, stone by stone, their mighty safeguard of
British administration. Useless to protest. Having ears, they heard not.
Having eyes, they saw not. The spirit of destruction seemed abroad in
all the earth. After Germany--Russia. Would it be India next? He knew
her peoples well enough to fear. He also knew them well enough to hope.
But of late, increasingly, fear had prevailed. His shrewd eye discerned,
in every direction, fresh portents of disaster--a weakened executive,
divided counsels, and violence that is the offspring of both. His own
Maharaja, he thanked God, was of the old school, loyal and conservative:
his face set like a flint against the sedition-monger in print or
person. And as concessions multiplied and extremists waxed bolder, so
the need for vigilance waxed in proportion....

But to-day his mind had room for one thought only--the advent of Roy;
legacy of her, his vanished Jewel of Delight.

A message from the Residency had told of the boy's arrival, of his hope
to announce himself in person that evening; and now, on a low divan, the
old man sat awaiting him with a more profound emotion at his heart than
the mere impatience of youth. But the impassive face under the
flesh-pink turban betrayed no sign of disturbance within. The
strongly-marked nose and eyebones might have been carved in old ivory.
The snowy beard, parted in the middle, was swept up over his ears; and
the eyes were veiled. An open book lay on his knee. But he was not
reading. He was listening for the sound of hoofs, the sound of a
voice....

The two had not met for five years: and in those years the boy had
proved the warrior blood in his veins; had pa