'Koran again!' thought Colville. 'You mean by faith in it?'
'Yes; by writing therefrom some holy sentences on paper, and drinking the water wherein that paper has been washed clean.'
'You have heard, I suppose, that the Ameer has gone over to the Russians?' said Colville to change the subject.
'Yes, sahib,' replied the hadji, in whose eyes a strange light now appeared, 'but he is dying of mortal disease, and will never reach Tashkend.'
'Then Yakoub Khan will succeed.'
'Yes; the man who has already aspired to sit on a musnud (throne) is little likely to content himself with a carpet, especially if supported by the bayonets of the Ghora logue. By the Prophet, no!' added the hadji, referring to what was well known—that Yakoub Khan had conspired against his father, who, in consequence, had kept him for years imprisoned in a dungeon without light.
The hadji seemed a genuine Afghan, and considerably past middle-age. He was tall, spare, and muscular, with aquiline—almost Jewish—features; high cheek bones, and strong, black, glittering eyes, with an intensity and keenness in their expression that reminded Colville of those of a mountain eagle. He was fairer complexioned than most of his people, among whom even red hair is sometimes met with; but his face had been cleft from temple to chin by a tulwar stroke in some past battle or brawl; and now the livid mark of that terrible slash could be seen distinctly as altering, and in some measure distorting, features that were naturally very regular.
After partaking of a little food of the plainest kind, he performed the ablutions enjoined by his faith, spread a white cloth over his kneeling-carpet, and, turning his face in the direction of Mecca, said his salat al Moghreb, or evening prayer, while Colville took himself off to the mess-room; and when he returned the hadji was lying on the verandah outside, fast asleep, and cosily muffled up in his dark-coloured choga, or camel-hair cloak.
In the morning he had left the Bala Hissar, and gone, none knew where, save that he had been seen going towards Cabul by the way of the Ali Musjid Pass.
It never occurred to Leslie Colville, in performing the acts of kindness he had done to this stranger, whether there might be peril or evil evolved from them in the future; or whether the man was—as he ultimately proved to be—a keen and observant spy, come to watch and note the strength, preparations, and object of Sir Samuel Browne's column; and, poor though the hadji looked, Colville's servant—a more than usually sharp example of Private Thomas Atkins—had found him in the early morning reckoning over a quantity of gold in his wallet, and one of these which he dropped was found to be of the last Russian mintage.