and no one ever knew who had done it. This windfall
whetted Chikki's appetite, and he soon found this occupation even
more lucrative than that of cattle lifting.

As his fame increased, secret commissions came to him from many
quarters--from men who had life enemies, but who feared to risk their
own lives in ridding themselves of them. With success, however, came
danger. Chikki was a marked man, and had to take unusually strict
precautions for the preservation of his own life; his repeating rifle
was never out of his hand, and no one ever saw him off his guard. He
built himself a strong tower, and at night-time retired into this by
means of a rope ladder to the upper window (it had no lower windows),
then, drawing up the ladder after him, he secured the window. Then
came the opportunity of his life. There were two factions in the
tribe, the Gur and the Samil, and these had been on bad terms for a
long time, but hostilities had so far been confined to a few murders
and thefts. Then one day a prominent malik of the Gur faction was
shot while on a visit to a Samil village. This could not be atoned
for without war, and within twenty-four hours the tocsin of war was
beating in every Gur village all over the hills. The Samil replied by
burning a Gur village, and soon the whole mountain-side was in arms on
one side or the other; desultory warfare was carried on for some time,
and much blood had been shed on both sides, but the Samil party lacked
a leader. Then they bethought them of Chikki, and sent a deputation,
asking him to take their lead. He consented on condition of their
recognizing him as paramount chief of the Zaimukhts in the event of
success attending his arms. They agreed, and he, collecting together
some other soldiers of fortune who had thrown in their lot with him,
took the field against the Gur faction. The latter were defeated
in several engagements, and finally both sides tired of the fray,
and they were all the more ready to come to terms as the harvest was
ripe and would spoil if not rapidly gathered in.

Both sides agreed to call a jirgah, which met, drew up conditions
of peace acceptable to both sides, and smoked the pipe of peace. The
agreement was ratified by a big feast, in which twenty fat dumbas were
slain and cooked, with immeasurable quantities of ghi, and a dance,
in which the men of the two sides, which had so recently been moving
heaven and earth to shoot each other, danced together as though t