Yes, he said, he knew. Wherefore not, when he had guarded fruit in that garden since he was a boy? There was not much to guard now, owing to past evils. Hushmut the essence-maker--Hushmut was dead. No one made essences any more. How did he die? Very simply. He had seen it with his own eyes when he was guarding fruit. The Huzoors had doubtless heard of the evil times, even though, as the coachman had told him, they had just come from wilayet. Well, it began quite suddenly one evening in May. It was the peaches he was guarding then. There had been a "fool's dinner" in the garden, and afterwards a young sahib and a miss in a pink dress had come running in to take refuge from the troopers. He had seen them, but what could he do? But Hushmut had shown them the secret passage, no doubt. Anyhow he had come out alone and closed the door, and sate beside it singing when the troopers rode up.
And doubtless they would have believed him, seeing that he was friends with all the bad walkers in the city through the selling of his essences; but for a bit of the Miss-sahiba's dress which had caught in the door hasp. So they knew what he had done, and being enraged, had killed him there, by the door. It was quite simple.
Quite. So simple that those two said nothing. Only their hands sought each other as they turned back to the summer-house.
"I should like to see the place again," said the wearer of the pink dress in a hard, even voice. "I wonder if the door is open?"
It was; for no one made essences now. So they entered.
The still stood in the corner as before. The pile of that strange fuel lay between it and the trays of rose-leaves. But there was no difference between them now. Both were yellow, scentless; and though the pink paper which Hushmut had pasted over the rose-shaped air-holes was all broken and torn by birds and winds and weather, the bees did not drift in.
For there was no scent to lead them on. None.
The winds of two long years had swept it away absolutely. What else was to be expected?
Yet a vague disappointment showed in the woman's face as it had in the girl's.
But this time the man's voice trembled as he answered her look with the words--