us
noises. The muttering of the cockatoo, the tinkle of the fountain as
the water fell into the basin, the scrape and slither of sandals beyond
the lattice partitions, the rattle of a gun butt somewhere in the outer
corridors--these sounds she heard. Once she thought she heard the
sputter of rifle shots afar, but she was not sure.

Kit, beautiful Kit! Oh, they would not, could not let her die! And
she had come into this land with her mind aglow with fairy stories!

One of the leopards in the treasury corridors roared, and Winnie
crouched into her cushions. What were they going to do to her? For
she understood perfectly that she was only a prisoner and that the
crown meant nothing at all so far as authority was concerned. She was
indeed the veriest puppet. What with Ahmed's disclosures and Kathlyn's
advice she knew that she was nothing more than a helpless pawn in this
oriental game of chess. At any moment she might be removed from the
board.

She became tense again. She heard the slip-slip of sandals In the
corridor, a key turn in the lock. The door opened, and in the dim
light she saw Umballa.

He stood by the door, silently contemplating her. "What a certain
dungeon holds!" still eddied through the current of his thoughts.
Money, money! He needed it; it was the only barrier between him and
the end, which at last he began to see. Money, baskets and bags of it,
and he dared not go near. May the fires of hell burn eternally in the
bones of these greedy soldiers, his only hope!

His body ached; liquid fire seemed to have taken the place of blood in
his veins. His back and shoulders were a mass of bruises. Beaten with
a gun butt, driven, harried, cursed--he, Durga Ram! A gun butt in the
hands of a low caste! He had not only been beaten; he had been
dishonored and defiled. His eyes flashed and his fingers closed
convulsively, but he was sober. To take yonder white throat in his
hands! It was true; he dared not harm a hair of her head!

"Your sister Kathlyn perished under the wheels of the car of
Juggernaut."

Winnie did not stir. The aspect of the man fascinated her as the
nearness of a cobra would have done. Vipers not only crawl in this
terrible land; they walk. One stung with fangs and the other with
words.

"She is dead, and to-morrow your father dies."

The disheveled appearance of the man did not in her eyes confirm this.
Indeed, the longer she gazed at him the more strongly convin