three of Mahommed Gunga's put together.

"Are they good enough?" demanded Alwa.

"My master will be satisfied," grinned Ali Partab.

"Open the gate, then!" Alwa was peering through the blackness for
a sight of firearms, but could see none. He guessed--and he was
right--that the guard had taken full advantage of their master's
absence, and had been gambling in a corner while their rifles rested
under cover somewhere else. For a second he hesitated, dallying with the
notion of disarming the guard before he left, then decided that a fight
was scarcely worth the risking now, and with ten good men behind him he
wheeled and scooted through the wide-flung gates into outer gloom.

He galloped none too fast, for his party was barely out of range before
a ragged volley ripped from the palace-wall; one of his men, hampered
and delayed by a led horse that was trying to break away from him, was
actually hit, and begged Alwa to ride back and burn the palace after
all. He was grumbling still about the honor of a Rangar, when Alwa
called a halt in the shelter of a deserted side street in order to
question Ali Partab further.

Ali Partab protested that he did not know what to say or think about the
missionaries. He explained his orders and vowed that his honor held him
there in Howrah until Miss McClean should consent to come away. He did
not mention the father; he was a mere side issue--it was Alwa who asked
after him.

"A tick on the belly of an ox rides with the ox," said Ali Partab.

"Lead on, then, to the mission house," commanded Alwa, and the ten-man
troop proceeded to obey. They had reached the main street again, and
were wheeling into it, when Joanna sprang from gutter darkness and
intercepted them. She was all but ridden down before Ali Partab
recognized her.

"The mohurs, sahib!" she demanded. "Three golden mohurs!"

"Ay, three!" said Ali Partab, giving her a hand and yanking her off the
ground. She sprang across his horse's rump behind him, and he seemed to
have less compunction about personal defilement than the others had.

"Is she thy wife or thy mother-in-law?" laughed Alwa.

"Nay, sahib, but my creditor! The mother of confusion tells me that the
Miss-sahib and her father are in Howrah's palace!"

They halted, all together in a cluster in the middle of the street--shut
in by darkness--watched for all they knew, by a hundred enemies.

"Of their own will or as prisoners?"

"As prisoners, sahib."

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