n worried to death about you. When
the servants came to the factory to say that Kitty had galloped home with
broken reins and without you, I thought you had been killed."

"Oh, Fred, I've had such an adventure," she cried gaily. "You'll say it
served me right. Wait until I get down. But how am I to do so, Major
Dermot?"

"The elephant will kneel down. Hold on tightly," he replied. "_Buth_,
Badshah." He unslung his rifle as he dismounted.

When her brother had lifted her off the pad, the girl kissed him and said:

"I'm so glad to get back to you, dear. I thought I never would. I know
you'll crow over me and and say, 'I told you so.' But I must introduce you
to Major Dermot. This is my brother, Major. Fred, if it had not been for
Major Dermot, you wouldn't have a sister now. Just listen."

The men shook hands as she began her story. Her brother interrupted her to
suggest their going on to the verandah to get out of the sun. When they
were all seated he listened with the deepest interest.

At the end of her narrative he could not help saying:

"I warned you, young woman. What on earth would have happened to you if
Major Dermot had not been there?" He turned to their visitor and continued:
"I must thank you awfully, sir. There's no doubt that Noreen would have
been killed without your help."

"Oh, perhaps not. But certainly you were right in advising her not to enter
the forest alone."

"There, you see, Noreen?"

The girl pouted a little.

"Is it really so dangerous, Major Dermot?" she asked.

"Well, one ought never to go into it without a good rifle," he replied.
"You might pass weeks, months, in it without any harm befalling you; but on
the other hand you might be exposed to the greatest danger on your very
first day in it. You've just had a sample."

"You were attacked yourself by a rogue, weren't you?" asked the girl. "You
said that your elephant saved you? Was this the one? Do tell us about it."

Dermot briefly narrated his adventure with the rogue. Brother and sister
punctuated the tale with exclamations of surprise and admiration, and at
the conclusion of it, turned to look at Badshah, who had taken refuge from
the sun's rays under a tree and was standing in the shade, shifting his
weight from leg to leg, flapping his ears and driving away the flies by
flicking his sides with a small branch which he held in his trunk. Dermot
had taken off his pad.

"You dear thing!" cried the girl to him. "You are a