"I have ears in every village, Rajah."
"Why did you follow me?"
"I have a wish to serve you."
"You are English——"
"English!" Barclay laughed. "Yes, I have English blood in my veins. I am the son of the old Tristram Sahib who seduced my mother and brought about her death, who hunted down my brothers and our father's servants and shot them from the cannon's mouth, who gave honourable life to Tristram Sahib, the wealthy and happy and honoured, who gave life to me, an outcaste——"
"Yet a night ago you sat and ate with these, thy people——"
"That also is true. I fought for their friendship, Rajah, I grovelled for it. I schemed for it. I would have sold you and all these, my brothers, if they would have made me one of them. But they would not. They have chosen, not I. Last night, Rasaldû, the swineherd's son, would not sit at table with me. That was the end."
"You have an English wife."
Barclay laughed again.
"Who sold herself to me for a high price, who would rather die ten deaths than be a wife to me, who loves Tristram Sahib——" He broke off and jerked his head towards the intently watching Sadhu. "Vahana here knows something of what I say. Let him testify for me."