in the place where he has chosen to secrete himself.
“I will take the Middle Way if I can find it, and I hope neither of us may get lost. I wish you all success.
“Cottswold Ommony.”
“Sarcasm?” said Mrs. Cornock-Campbell. “I wonder if that ever pays.”
“We’ll see!”
Ommony sealed up the envelope, on which he had written simply “Tsiang Samdup,” and stood over Dawa Tsering.
“Take this letter to the Lama. Come back here with proof you have delivered it, and you shall have your knife.”
“Send him in my dog-cart,” McGregor advised. “My sais[[7]] is one of those rare birds who do as they’re told. He doesn’t talk or ask questions.”
So Dawa Tsering was seen on to the back seat of the dog-cart, with a horse-blanket under him to keep grease off the cushion, and the conference was resumed. McGregor questioned Ommony narrowly concerning the events of the afternoon, and particularly as to the exact location of the courtyard where the attack had taken place.
“It doesn’t look to me as if they meant to kill you,” he said at last. “It seems to me they were hell-bent on merely driving you away. Um-tiddley-um-tum-tum—we’ve made a mess of this—we should have had that building watched. Katherine, I will bet these ten rupees that our friend from Spiti draws blank.”