The faint laugh, the little shrug of the shoulders came, unfailing as ever.
"Were the world less amusing, sister," he said, "Birbal might have more chance!" He passed lightly to the parapet, and sate on it dangling his legs "Padré Rudolfo, the Jesuit, hath it," he continued, "that I am the fool who saith 'There is no God'; but Birbal propounds no such proposition. He hath an open mind. His very errand here this night, my sister, shows--shall we say credulity? I come, sister, for thy rebeck player. I need him."
"Wherefore?" asked Âtma quickly.
Birbal's mouth quivered cynically. "Shall I say the King desires him, sister? Nay! I will not lie. I want him, because of a talisman stone he wears around his neck. He called it smagdarite. I wish to see it again."
"A stone?" echoed Âtma surprised, "what stone? He wears no talisman, for sure."
Birbal's feet came down the roof in sudden excitement. "He wears none! Better and better! Tell me where he lives, sister. I would see for myself. Come! quick, the night goes on, and it is time the King's Châran was abed."
He looked at her in frank mockery and she flushed slowly.
"If it be not for harm," she began, "he is but a poor player."
"Harm!" he echoed impatiently. "If what I think prove true, it is not likely Birbal would harm one possessed of--smagdarite! Out with it, sister. I have tramped from well to water, and water to well, these two hours seeking the Sinde envoy, but it comes ever from each clue that he has gone--disappeared beyond the city. So I bethought me of smagdarite and thee. Come! where lives he?"
"I will take my lord thither," she said evasively. "Nay! 'tis no trouble; he lives--he lives here in this very house."