“And what did you do?”
“I pretended not to have recognised her, and our eyes did not meet, so I don’t think she could have seen that I knew her. I finished the inspection, and then, when I was reporting to Major Atkinson, I asked him to arrest her at once, as I was sure she was there as a spy.”
“And had she got away in the meantime?”
“Oh dear, no! When I had made Major Atkinson understand which woman I meant, he laughed at me, and said that she was certainly a spy—a spy of our own; and she had a pass signed by the General to allow her to leave the camp when she liked.”
“Somebody is being made a nice fool of.”
“That’s what I thought. If she has come to the General, and offered to betray the fortress to him—that door, you know—and it’s all a trap! He doesn’t know her as we do. I thought of going to him at once, but then it struck me that he might laugh at me as Major Atkinson did, so I came back to tell you as fast as I could.”
“You thought he might be like Burgrave, and dislike ladies’ interfering in politics? Well, I suppose I must go myself, and fish for snubs. What I do admire in all these big chaps is their deep-rooted distrust of the man on the spot. I wonder they don’t order us all out of the district before they’ll deign to set foot in it.”
Before very long Dick was received by General Cranstoun in the seclusion of his tent. To his observant eye, the General’s face wore a slightly expectant, not to say conscious expression, and he went straight to the business in hand.
“I should be glad, sir, if you would authorise the arrest of an East Indian woman who calls herself Joanna Warren or Jehanara. She is a secret agent of Bahram Khan’s, and my wife found her secreted in the Refugees’ Camp this morning.”
“There is no such person in the camp,” was the terse reply.