For a moment the two great beasts were silent, gently caressing each other with their trunks. Then Mahmoud spoke:
"Had I reflected, O Joy of my Heart, I could have saved thee all thy apprehensions. But it was not until they had released thee that I remembered. Look thou, Duchess, at the under side of my trunk and tell me what thou seest there."
Mahmoud raised his trunk in the air, and his mate inspected it carefully, feeling its under side from lip to tip. Presently she said, with surprise and some reproach in her tones:
"Why hast thou concealed thy wounds from me, thy faithful mate, my Lord? Almost from lip to tip thou art scarred as though by lion's claws. Surely this is since we came from the Jungle? Then, when I was young and my eyes keen, thou couldst not have concealed from me these dreadful wounds."
"Calm thyself, O Light of my Life," said Mahmoud, soothingly. "Canst thou remember the time long before we came to this pleasant place, when, for many weary months, we were separated, my beloved?"
"Aye, well, my Lord. It was the time when, day after day, I marched at the head of a long train of gaudily painted wagons in which were Menial People of every sort, stopping now and then at towns and villages for the pleasure of the Master People, who came by thousands to see us. And where wert thou, my Lord, during that dreary time of our separation?"
"In the summer," said Mahmoud, "I roamed the country at the head of a train of Menial People, as didst thou. But in the winter I was housed with many others where iron boxes contained fire wherewith to warm us. It is to this same fire that I owe these wounds."