He grasped Miska again, but she struggled to elude him. "Oh, let me go!" she pleaded. "It is madness you speak!"
"It is madness, yes—for you! Always I have watched, always I have waited; and I also have seen you bloom like a rose in the desert. To-night I am here—watching … and he knows it! Tomorrow I am gone! Do you stay, for—him?
"Oh," she whispered fearfully, "it cannot be."
"You say true when you say I have been your only friend, Miska.
To-morrow he plan that you have no friend."
He released her, and slowly, from the sleeve of his coat, slipped into view the curved blade of a native knife.
"Ali Khan Bhai Salam!" he muttered—by which formula he proclaimed himself a Thug!
Rolling his eyes in the direction of the eastern wall, he concealed the knife.
"Chunda Lal!" Miska spoke wildly. "I am frightened! Please let me go, and tomorrow——"
"To-morrow!" Chunda Lal raised his eyes, which were alight with the awful light of fanaticism. "For me there may be no tomorrow! Jey Bhowani! Yah Allah!"
"Oh, he may hear you!" whispered Miska pitifully. "Please go now.
I shall know that you are near me, if——"