h 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 buttressed 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 ha