g, with this old man, to find us guides who can point out the
tracks of the one which has, for some time, been preying on their
animals."

"Yes, and our children," the old man put in; "for three of them were
carried off, from the street here, within the last month."

The soldiers looked doubtful, but one of them said:

"This is for our officer to inquire about. The men are strangers to
the village, and he will want to question them."

"We are quite ready to be questioned," Surajah said. "Our host, here,
will bear me out in what I say, and there are others in the village
who will tell you that we have been arranging, with them, to kill
tigers in this neighbourhood; though as yet we have not settled what
they will pay us for each beast we destroy."

Accompanied by the peasant, they went with the soldiers to the guard
house, with which each of the frontier villages was provided. It
consisted of a group of huts, surrounded by a thick wall of sunburnt
bricks. They were taken into the largest hut, where the officer of the
party was seated on a rough divan.

"Who have you here?" he asked irritably, for he had been awakened from
a doze by their entry.

"They are two young fellows, who are strangers here. They say they are
shikarees, who have come into the village to gain a reward for killing
a tiger that has been troublesome."

"They were here three days ago, Sahib," the villager said, "and asked
us many questions about the tigers, and were, when the soldiers came
to the door, questioning me as to the tiger's place of retreat, and
whether a pitfall, or a kid as a decoy, would be most suitable."

"Where do you come from?" the officer asked Surajah.

"We live in a little village, some distance down the ghauts. We heard
that tigers were more abundant, in the jungle country up here, than
they are below; and thought that we would, for a time, follow our
calling here. We can get good prices for the skins, down below; and
with that, and what we get from the villages for freeing them from the
tigers, we hope, in a few months, to take back a good store of money."

"Your story is a doubtful one," the officer said, harshly. "You may be
what you say, and you may be spies."

"If we had been spies," Surajah said, "we should not be here, but at
Bangalore or Seringapatam. These villages are not the places where
news is to be gained."

This was so self evident that the officer had nothing to say against
it.

"At any rate," he