e correspondingly relaxed.

The king had a private chamber, the window of which overlooked the
garden of brides. There, with his sherbets and water pipe he resumed
his old habit of inditing verse in pure Persian, for he was a scholar.
He never entered the zenana or harem; but occasionally he sent for some
of the women to play and dance before him. And the woman who loved
Umballa was among these. One day she asked to take a journey into the
bazaars to visit her sister. Ordinarily such a request would have been
denied. But the king no longer cared what the women did, and the chief
eunuch slept afternoons and nights, being only partly alive in the
mornings.

An hour later a palanquin was lowered directly beneath the king's
window. To his eye it looked exactly like the one which had departed.
He went on writing, absorbed. Had he looked closely, had he been the
least suspicious . . . !

This palanquin was the gift of Durga Ram, so-called Umballa. It had
been built especially for this long waited for occasion. It was
nothing more nor less than a cunning cage in which a tiger was huddled,
in a vile temper. The palanquin bearers, friends of the dancing girl,
had overpowered the royal bearers and donned their costumes. At this
moment one of the bearers (Umballa himself, trusting no one!) crawled
stealthily under the palanquin and touched the spring which liberated
the tiger and opened the blind. The furious beast sprang to the
window. The king was too astonished to move, to appreciate his danger.
From yon harmless palanquin this striped fury!

The tiger in his leap struck the lacquered desk, broke it and scattered
the papers about the floor.

Ramabai and his officers were just entering the corridor which led to
the chamber when the tragedy occurred. They heard the noise, the
king's cries. When they reached the door silence greeted them.

The room was wrecked. There was evidence of a short but terrific
struggle. The king lay dead upon the floor, the side of his head
crushed in. His turban and garments were in tatters. But he had died
like a king; for in the corner by the window lay the striped one, a
jeweled dagger in his throat.

Ramabai was first to discover the deserted palanquin, and proceeded to
investigate. It did not take him more than a minute to understand what
had happened. It was not an accident; it was cold-blooded murder, and
back of it stood the infernal ingenuity of one man.

Thus fat