"You have done better than we did, my boy. We have only brought back sore bones. There, I am not in much of a humour for talking to-night; I want a good rest."
"You must be tired, father."
"Yes, too tired to think of anything but sleep. Not quite, though; there are those birds. Sree, can you come first thing in the morning and skin them?"
"Yes, Sahib. I was going to ask if I might come."
No more was said till the elephant had stopped of its own accord at the gateway of the bungalow garden for as soon as it had got over its irritation at being separated from its companion it had gone steadily enough.
After this the mahout was so liberally rewarded that he wanted to get down from the elephant's neck to prostrate himself, and of course was not allowed, but sent back, Harry stopping to watch his great, grey, shambling mount till it disappeared, with Sree still hanging by the back of the howdah.
Breakfast was late the next morning, both the merchant and his son sleeping very soundly; and when at last Harry dragged himself from his light bamboo bedstead and had refreshed himself, not with a good swim in the river,—a luxury too dangerous to attempt,—but by squatting in a large, open tub and pouring jars of cold water over his head, he went out into the verandah, to find Sree just finishing the skin of the last of the birds by painting the fleshy side all over with preserving paste before turning it back and filling it with cotton wool.
"How quick you have been, Sree!" said Harry. "I meant to have come and helped you."
"The young Sahib must have been tired."
"I'm tired now," said the boy, with a yawn. "But I say, they are all good birds, aren't they?"