“We see!” they chorused, and the idea took charge. From that minute they were a new band, with a war-cry of their own.
“To Khinjan!” they howled, scattering through the camp, and the mullah came out to glare at them and tug his beard and wonder what possessed them.
“To Khinjan!” they roared at him. “Lead us to Khinjan!”
“To Khinjan, then!” he thundered, throwing up both arms in a sort of double apostolic blessing, and then motioning as if he threw them the reins and leave to gallop. They roared back at him like the sea under the whip of a gaining wind. And Ismail disappeared among them, leaving King alone. Then the mullah's eyes fell on King and he beckoned him.
King went up with an effort, for he ached yet from his struggle of the night before. Up there by the ashes of the fire the mullah showed him a letter he had crumpled in his fist. There were only a few lines, written in Arabic, which all mullahs are supposed to be able to read, and they were signed with a strange scrawl that might have meant anything. But the paper smelt strongly of her perfume.
“Come, then. Bring all your men, and I will let you and them enter Khinjan Caves. We will strike a bargain in the Cavern of Earth's Drink.”
That was all, but the fire in the mullah's eyes showed that he thought it was enough. He did not doubt that once he should have his extra four thousand in the caves Khinjan would be his; and he said so.
“Khinjan is mine!” he growled. “India is mine!”
And King did not answer him. He did not believe Yasmini would be fool enough to trust herself in any bargain with Muhammad Anim. Yet he could see no alternative as yet. He could only be still and be glad he had set the camp moving and so had forced the mullah's hand.
“The old fatalist would have suspected her answer otherwise!” he told himself, for he knew that he himself suspected it.