"If we had but one friend in the village! The cowards! And they are
fools as well, to desert a chief like my father for one like Minghal
Khan. Were there one brave man having any wits among them, he would blow
up that powder, and our trouble would be gone."

Ahsan could only sigh and wish that the chief had not gone
horse-raiding.

"He is too old for such deeds. 'Tis time he rested and made ready to
obey the last call. Hai! and some day, if he continues thus, he will
fall into a snare--some calamity will light on him. It may be with him
even as it was with Mir Ismail of Bangash."

"Why, how was it with him?"

"He had gone on just such an errand, and he was old, like our master
Rahmut. He had cut a hole in the stable of the Malik he had gone to rob,
and was in the very act of loosening the horse's halter when he was
disturbed by a noise. Loh! he made haste to escape by the hole he
himself had made, but being old and stiff, he had but got his head and
shoulders out when his legs were caught from behind. Hai! hai! and then
was he in desperate fear lest he should be dragged back and known by his
captors, for he was a famous stealer of horses, and it would have
snapped his heart-strings if they saw him and gloated over his capture.
The honour of his family and people would be smirched. Wherefore he
cried aloud to his son, who waited outside, bidding him cut off his head
rather than let that shame fall upon him. His head being gone, they
would not recognize his trunk."

"And did his son obey him?" asked Ahmed.

"He did, and so was the honour of his house saved," replied the old man.

Ahmed was silent for a minute or two; then he said--

"Ahsan, think you I could cut a hole in that shed where the powder-bags
are laid?"

"Hai! How wouldest thou get there?" said the gate-keeper. "Verily not by
the door; were it opened, Minghal's dogs would burst in."

"True, but could you not let me down over the wall by a rope?"

"And what then? The gates are shut: there is no entrance."

"But I know of a place on the other side of the village where there are
notches in the wall, by which I might mount; and, the wall scaled, I
could steal my way to the shed and maybe cut a hole and lay a train, and
so fire the powder that lies there for our destruction."

"You could never get over the wall unspied," said the old man; "and if
they catch you, you are dead."

"But the place where I can scale the wall will be in darkness when the