"That is no answer!" cried the Moulvie, with fierce eagerness to draw his victim to utter the word which of all others most rouses the bigotry of the Moslem. "Tell me but this,—had He a Father?"
"Yes."
"And who was that Father?—whose Son was your Prophet Isa?"
"He that confesses Me before men, him will I also confess before the angels of heaven!" thought Walter, feeling as if a train of gunpowder were beneath him, and that he was himself called to apply the match.
"Whose Son was He?" repeated the Moulvie.
"The Son of God," replied Walter, with distinct voice, though a quivering lip.
"Down with him! kill him! slay the blasphemer!" cried the Moulvie; "the path to paradise is over the corpses of Kafirs!"
There was a rush up the ladder staircase, daggers flashed in the sunlight. The assailants, on so narrow a way, cumbered each other's movements; Walter felt himself struck, but the attempt of the man behind the foremost ruffian to get in front by pushing past him partly diverted the blow, and instead of receiving a mortal wound, Walter, in the scuffle, was thrown with violence off the ladder into the court-yard below!
It was like falling amongst a herd of yelling wolves, who would soon have finished their terrible work, had not at the moment the loud angry voice of the Afghan chief arrested his followers. With naked weapon in his hand, and wrath flashing from his eyes, Assad Khan strode into the midst of the throng.
"Back, madmen!" he exclaimed. "Would you dare to slay the prisoner whom I please to protect, and rob me of a ransom that will make me the wealthiest chief in the land of the Afghans!"