"Bid him wait; he is, indeed, most needful. I will not be long away, mother, or I will send for him."
Entering the garden by the private door, Abbas Khan performed his ablutions at the little fountain, whose cool, sparkling water refreshed him. The garden was refreshing also; and, as he knelt down, a soft feeling of grateful adoration stole over him. Many of his friends were assembled there, and their salutations, with the warm grasp of the hand which accompanied them, were more grateful to him than he had ever remembered before.
"I will attend ye speedily, friends," he said to them, "but I have some private affairs to see to first here, and ye must excuse me;" and, calling to an attendant, he bade him bring in Runga Naik, and seating himself on the rim of the fountain, awaited his coming alone. Presently he saw the Beydur chief enter, peering about as though he were in a thick forest, but, directly he saw his young master, he bounded forward with a cry of joy, and threw himself at his feet.
"I was not in time, Meeah," he said, as soon as his emotion had subsided, "to see thee slay that villain. Would I had been! But I could not travel faster with the prisoners; and it was only at the last stage that I heard thou hadst reached this the day before, when the Lady Queen was hunting. What had delayed thee?"
"Only the wound again, friend," said the Khan, laughing. "One day—it was our second march—my horse, it was one of Osman Beg's, stumbled and fell with me, the stitches of my wound burst open, and the Padré Sahib insisted I should not travel till I was well. Notwithstanding his skill, I could not move for more than a month; but I had good lodging at Talikota."
"So near to my town; and why did you not send for me, Meeah?"
"I did send; but thou wert gone, they said, to Belgaum, and thou hadst not returned when I resumed my journey."
"Then you have heard nothing, my lord, of the old Dervish and his child? Are they with thee?"
"No!" replied Abbas Khan, starting at the question. "Not with me. I have never even heard of them. By your soul, tell me what you know."
"I had been absent from home, tracing our men who had deserted us at Kórla, and had three hundred of my best men with me. You were then in Juldroog, and I heard afterwards you and the Moodgul Padré had departed. There was one of our Beydur festivals to come on after that, and I returned home for it, when I was suddenly sent for by the Dervish, and I delivered Zóra from the palace of Osman Beg, where she was confined under the charge of two procuresses from Moodgul. Yes, Burma Naik and Bheema and I did it; and to this day I regret that I did not slay thy profligate cousin as he slept."