up the telegram, tore the penciled strip of figures from the top and burned it with a match, he was at pains to look pleased.
“Good news?” asked Saunders, blowing smoke through his nose.
“Excellent. Where's my man? Here--you--Ismail!”
The giant came and towered above him.
“You swore she went North!”
“Ha, sahib! To Peshawur she went!”
“Did she start from this station?”
“From where else, sahib?”
But this was too much for Saunders, who stepped forward and thrust in an oar. King on the other hand stepped back a pace so as to watch both faces.
“Then, when did she go?”
“I saw her go!” said Ismail, affronted.
“When? When, confound you! When?”
“Yesterday.”
“I expect he means to-morrow,” said King. With the advantage of looker-on and a very deep experience of Northerners, he had noted that Ismail was lying and that Saunders was growing doubtful, although both men concealed the truth with what was very close to being art.
“I have a telegram here,” he said, “that says she is in Delhi!”
He patted his coat, where the inner pocket bulged.
“Nay, then the tar lies, for I saw her go with these two eyes of mine!”
“It is not wise to lie to me, my friend,” King assured him, so pleasantly that none could doubt he was telling truth.
“If I lie may I eat dirt!” Ismail answered him.
Inches lent the Afridi dignity, but dignity has often been used as a stalking horse for untruth. King nodded, and it was not possible to judge by
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