A Pathan torch-bearer approached the palki, and, as luck would have it, Roger came to Mowbray at that moment to tell him that his count tallied with their reckoning.
Something said by the Pathan caused his employer to withdraw the second set of curtains. Hence, the light of the torch illumined the interior of the litter and revealed most clearly the identity of its tenant.
Walter would scarce have believed his eyes had not Roger muttered:—
“’Fore God, ’tis Dom Geronimo!”
“He and no other,” whispered Walter. “I knew there were Jesuits in Agra, but they are well spoken of, and I never dreamed that this wretch was numbered among them.”
“He knows us, too,” growled Sainton. “Why should we not requite him for the ill he would have done us. ‘Return good for evil,’ saith the maxim, and ’twill be a good deed to let some of the bad blood out of him.”
“No, no. It would ruin our cause with Akbar. Though he is our enemy, he is less able to work us harm in this heathen land than in our own country. Let him pass. I vow he takes us for malign spirits, come back to earth to vex him.”
Certainly the aspect of Dom Geronimo’s face as the palki moved on and his carriers resumed their song was that of a man who gazed at a threatening vision. Incredulity blended with fear at first, to be succeeded by a glance of utmost malevolence as his shocked senses resumed their sway. That he recognized the two friends was not to be doubted. Sainton’s gigantic stature alone marked him out from other men, and, at that season of the year, their garb did not differ materially from the clothes they wore when the Jesuit left them to their fate on board the Spanish vessel in the Thames.
He closed the curtains of his palki with an angry gesture, as though the sight of them was displeasing to him. Yet Dom Geronimo would have been a lucky man in that hour had he blotted them from his memory as well.