Into the quiet and dimly lit place of flowers the music of the violins floated with a note of wistfulness in the melody they played—a suggestion of regret. Through a doorway at the end of the conservatory Shere Ali could see the dancers swing by in the lighted ball-room, the women in their bright frocks and glancing jewels, some of whom had flattered him, a few of whom had been his friends, and all of whom had treated him as one of their own folk and their equal.
"I have heard the tune, which they are playing, before," he said slowly. "I heard it one summer night in Geneva. Linforth and I had come down from the mountains. We were dining with a party on the balcony of a restaurant over the lake. A boat passed hidden by the darkness. We could hear the splash of the oars. There were musicians in the boat playing this melody. We were all very happy that night. And I hear it again now—when I am with you. I think that I shall remember it very often in Chiltistan."
There was so unmistakable a misery in his manner, in his voice, in his dejected looks, that Violet was moved to a deep sympathy. He was only a boy, of course, but he was a boy sunk in distress.
"But there are your plans," she urged. "Have you forgotten them? You were going to do so much. There was so much to do. So many changes, so many reforms which must be made. You used to talk to me so eagerly. No more of your people were to be sold into slavery. You were going to stop all that. You were going to silence the mullahs when they preached sedition and to free Chiltistan from their tyranny."
Violet remembered with a whimsical little smile how Shere All's enthusiasm had wearied her, but she checked the smile and continued:
"Are all those plans mere dreams and fancies?"
"No," replied Shere Ali, lifting his head. "No," he said again with something of violence in the emphasis; and for a moment he sat erect, with his shoulders squared, fronting his destiny. Almost for a moment he recaptured that for which he had been seeking—his identity with his own race. But the moment passed. His attitude relaxed. He turned to Violet with troubled eyes. "No, they are not dreams; they are things which need to be done. But I can't realise them now, with you sitting here, any more than I can realise, with this music in my ears, that it is my home to which I am going back."
"Oh, but you will!" cried Violet. "When you are out there you will.
There's the road, too, the road which you and Mr. Linforth—"
She did not complete the sentence. With a low cry Shere All broke in upon her words. He leaned forward, with his hands covering his face.
"Yes," he whispered, "there's the road—there's the road." A passion of self-reproach shook him. Not for nothing had Linforth been his friend. "I feel a traitor," he cried. "For ten years we have talked of that road, planned it, and made it in thought, poring over the maps. Yes, for even at the beginning, in our first term at Eton, we began. Over the passes to the foot of the Hindu Kush! Only a year ago I was eager, really, honestly eager," and he paused for a moment, wondering at that picture of himself which his words evoked, wondering whether it was indeed he—he who sat in the conservatory—who had cherished those bright dreams of a great life in Chiltistan. "Yes, it is true. I was honestly eager to go back."