“The Nabob? Then he’s going to Sinzaun’s house—for me!” I murmured, and would have fallen, had not Mr Fraser supported me.
“Courage, madam! We’ll reach the Agency before he can discover your evasion. Which way, Mirza Shaw?”
“This way,” said the Tartar, and led us down a lane and into an open doorway, where we stood and trembled, for although our party might have hoped to pass the Cotwal, with the help of a suitable present, as two respectable Moormen guarding some relative to her abode, we knew that the Nabob and his loose companions were accustomed to maltreat any unoffending person they met, and only to release such an one, after loading him with shocking insults and the most degrading injuries, with the loss of all the property he might have about him. But the riotous rabble passed the end of our lane without discovering us, though they turned their lights into most corners in the hope of catching sight of some crouching wretch, and when they were gone we left our concealment and hastened on, Mr Fraser cheering me with the assurance that we had not now far to go. The words had scarce left his mouth, when the music, which had been dying away, became on a sudden louder again in our ears.
“Some one from the house has met ’em and given the alarm,” says Mr Fraser.
“Pray leave me, sir, and save yourselves,” said I. “You have done your utmost.”
“Pray, madam, what do you take me for?” he asked.
“Here’s the door,” said the Tartar, who had been groping with his hands along a wall, and Mr Fraser whistled softly. The door opened, and I was hurried inside, and into a sort of closed shed filled with packages.
“Pray, madam, be so good as to rest here for a moment, while we acquaint Mr Watts of your arrival,” says Mr Fraser, and I was left alone in the dark.
(Miss Freyne’s next letter appears unfortunately to have been lost.)