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Show athS p n ft? S P nnn m3 m m uil 3 LI ill tUUJ Is S JBY TALBOT MUNDY . . . .u,o,,-wWSSc firel a half breed without losing caste, we've been fair to middling friends, you and I. But if you use my name again promiscuous like that, I'll knock your block off." "Fathead," said Moses. "He knows me. He doesn't know you. He came out because he was curious." cu-rious." "And he told you to go to the devil. That's all you learned." "Fathead! You mean that's all you learned. I learned that he's ready. He's red-hot ready." "Ready for what?" "To get Norwood. He's trigger-ready. trigger-ready. If he weren't, he'd be playing play-ing for time, and we'd be arguing this minute about the price o' what "Let us talk about you," said Run-dhia. Run-dhia. "Very well, what about me?" "Now you have made me speechless!" speech-less!" "Have I? Then perhaps you will listen to me." "Beloved, I will glady listen to you, in an ecstasy of patience and devotion, during years which shall flow so fast that we'll be old before we know it!" "Did you get that from a book?" "I never read books. When I talk to you, my tongue can only stutter miserable hints of how I feel You make me delirious. Be good enough to notice that these arms resist impulse!" im-pulse!" He extender! hi arm. tn. tPlEB XV Continued . -14- TT .. jet your point. What do f Vtofind out?" asked Stod- Li" aid Moses- "Gulbaz titflike a Jockey. He's the 1,e 0' pace in all India. He f. M the minute. If he 'tusyy, then he'll play for rSif-jcfc halted in front of a TTLose red front door was CAj jarred, and scrawled In infamous remarks anent 1 ! if its inmates. There was Vj", yard wide, pitch dark at er end. Into that alley yel- . itreamed through a door I partly ajar. There was a k.iltcato drumbeat, a twang L music, the sickly wall of fad i stench in which sensual sensu-al iue fought with the reek of 1 Moses spoke to the truck fad the truck driver sounded ''jLthree times, then three Jes once. i3ssolute and dirty looking 3 Js the big white turban, to sm gave a captured knife "laar, appeared suddenly, .j from nowhere. i know how many western women have become the wives of Indian princes?" "I don't want to know. I don't care." "You are right, Lynn. Quite right. Why should you care? It is love, not what others have done, that crumbles crum-bles superstitions. Lynn, I love you. I wouldn't lie to you" "Have you done your best for Captain Cap-tain Norwood? Have you really done it? What have you done?" "Never mind. I have done it" "You swear?" "Yes." "Then I will listen. You were saying?" Rundhia had to recover the train of his thought. He turned away from her a moment, paced the wall, and came back: "Lynn, my love for you may sound selfish. I always have been selfish, until I met you. I have no practice with words that a genuine lover should use. But I am genuine. For the first time in my life, I am unselfish. un-selfish. May I tell you will you listen if I tell you what my heart tells me?" "Yes, I will listen, Rundhia." "Will you really listen?" "Yes, Rundhia. I would rather listen to almost anything than my own thought, at the moment." "You are feeling deserted?" "Despised!" Lynn answered. "If Captain Norwood had answered my letter" "You are lonely! So am I lonely! Lynn, diwaza kola hai! The door Is open! Enter. It is that short step across the threshold that makes you we u teu him if he'll pay." "You mean he'd have bribed us?" "I do not. Gulbaz makes promises. prom-ises. And he sometimes keeps his promises, unless." "Unless what?" "Unless someone else can keep 'em for him with a long knife. He can hire that done for five rupees a head. So why pay us a thousand? Can your intellect answer that conundrum? con-undrum? Figure it out on a board when you get home." ward the moon, then dropped them to his sides. "Oh, Lynn, I love you." "Good Job I don't love you," she answered. "There'd be" "A new golden age in Kadur!" Rundhia interrupted. "Lynn: philosophy, philos-ophy, religion, economics and the other muck they made me listen to at school and college left me. until you came, dry of faith in anything but evil and even evil dying! You are my first glimpse of goodness." "Don't you love the Maharanee? Isn't she good?" "Oh, yes. She Is good past history. his-tory. Lynn, you are the present and the future! One straight look into your blue eyes, and I knew what hope means and the higher vision. I had never seen it, until I saw you." "Sounds good," Lynn answered. "What was in the cocktails?" "Don't Joke! Lynn, I'm in love. I mean every word I'm saying to you." CHAPTER XVI The Maharanee was scrupulously fair. Rather than disguise her motive, mo-tive, she revealed it She stripped objections to it naked. She didn't pretend that Rundhia was a prince of virtue or a man of his word, except when it suited him, or when compelled to keep a promise. The i that bloke up to? Where .' :ime from?" Stoddart de- i U , i .d looked under the truck , ( t," said Moses. "He ain't i ie, so he don't ride first me and you." shispered to the man, who ::wn the alley and entered ""J i your harem? Aren't we asked Stoddart .$ Tou'd break the ladies' We'll wait here and give i me. This is Gulbaz' tem-id tem-id headquarters. I've sent tsssage. He'll come or he T .' be don't we'll know the "iid you tell that bloke to : that Sergeant Stoddart's ; information that he'll sell sand wants a personal in- ;g lace to face, no go- ( got your nerve," said : "It'll be all over the fiiaar that I'm telling se-Sway se-Sway don't you use your own ? w : booked him. Here he aid Moses. "Keep your 1 w and sit tight. Say noth-Jeave noth-Jeave it to me." the door, down the alley jybt to the truck, without iside, without a moment's jjcame a man of medium jzi middle weight who Li( a young god, though he Imaged. He was dressed "ing turban, white singlet hesitate. Leap!" "You mean into your arms?" "Yes." "No." "Come, Lynn!" "No." "Lynn, you make me hate myself. my-self. Am I so unappealing to your" Suddenly he changed his voice. He sounded angry: "Are you in love with Norwood?" "I hardly know him. How could I be? I only know that I never felt dirty before in all my life. I don't like it, Rundhia. And I can't forgive for-give you for having crowed over Captain Norwood's disgrace. You and I brought it on him." "Lynn, is that all that's the matter? mat-ter? If I give you my word of honor that I have solved the Norwood problem, will you listen to me?" "Have you solved it?" "If I prove to you, before midnight mid-night that there is no longer any problem about Norwood, will you come into my arms?" "Speak plainly, Rundhia." "I will. Lynn, face It! Norwood has no use for you. Has he answered your letter? He has not! The mes- "I mean what I say, too," Lynn answered. "I don't love you What was that noise? In the distance. It sounded like shooting." "I didn't hear it" said Rundhia. They had reached the steps that led to the kiosk on the garden wall. It was dark in the wall's shadow. He was Justified In offering his arm to guide her up the steps, but he put it around her. She could feel his vibrance. She escaped him ran up the steps ahead of him, then waited on the wall in full moonlight facing him, unafraid. "There! Did you hear that? Wasn't that a rifle-shot, Rundhia?" "Might have been," he answered. "Not so easy to tell." "Isn't Captain Norwood's camp in that direction?" Lynn asked. "Somewhere over there, yes. Possibly Pos-sibly a Jackal! or a stray dog scared his sentries. Never mind Norwood. Lynn, you say you don't love me. I don't believe you." "Why not? I told you the plain truth Do you think sentries would fire at a dog?" ; "His would! He's crazy. Lynn, I don't believe you because you for- gave what I did in the treasure room. And because when you hurt me, you were sorry. Also because you are not afraid to be alone with me now. Lynn, you don't know yourself. You're" "Do you know yourself?" she retorted. re-torted. "Don't you think it strange that they should be shooting at night?" "No. Most soldiers live in a continual con-tinual state of false alarm. Lynn, listen to me. Don't I excite you?" "You did. But I saw you, and I heard you laugh at Captain Norwood's Nor-wood's ruin." "You dislike me?" "Oh, no." "You admit I can stir your emotions?" emo-tions?" "Oh, yes. I admit that. Why tell lies about it? You're magnetic. I almost fell in love with you." "Lynn, you are thinking about East and West. That hoary old superstition! su-perstition! It lingers, they tell me, in America more tenaciously than anywhere else, though even school-books school-books nowadays admit that we and you are of the same race. Do you senger reponea mai ne lore up your letter without reading it I don't know why you care a damn what happens to him. He doesn't care what happens to you. Your aunt doesn't care. She is leaving you flat." Lynn interrupted: "You say Captain Cap-tain Norwood tore up my letter? Why didn't you tell me that before?" "To save your feelings. However, you know now. That's how he feels. That's Norwood. Lynn, you are merely hesitating on that damned old superstitious crumbling platform plat-form of 'East is East and West is West,' that Kipling lied about You and I are above all that nonsense. Lynn, beloved, come into my arms now! You are lonely. So am I lonely. lone-ly. See, I am waiting for you. Come here, Lynn. Come of your own will. Be mine. Face things from the inside in-side looking outward. You shall be my wife, and I swear by my love for you, that Norwood" "Oh, that's only a promise," Lynn interrupted. "I won't believe you about Captain Norwood, until you prove it." (TO BE CONTINUED) The Maharanee believed every word she said. Maharanee believed every word she said. But she used arguments that sounded curious, even to Lynn, who was under the spell of the eastern environment. Lynn later found Rundhia standing stand-ing in moonlight in a golden turban tur-ban and European dinner clothes. As a palace door closed behind Lynn, she, too, stepped into the moonlight with her face half veiled under the sequined sari. It was she who looked oriental, dressed according accord-ing to the Maharanee's wishes. Rundhia Run-dhia looked like a western athlete, in more or less fancy dress. And he called Lynn a goddess in western west-ern terms that any polo-playing American gallant might have used: "You look like Miss India! You almost give me religion! Pull away that curtain! Show your golden hair, and let's give all the other goddesses a sight to make them green with envy!" Lynn uncovered her head and walked beside him in silence. "I feel like a god tonight," said Rundhia. "Have you been drinking?" Lynn asked. "You golden-haired iconoclast! Your arrow aimed into the heart of my ballooning self-esteem! You delicious de-licious archer! I have had five cocktails. cock-tails. Do I seem drunk?" "What sized cocktails?" "Measured to my mood, exactly." "Then you seem astonishingly sober. so-ber. What have you done about Captain Norwood?" Mrdotb and a striped silk tpean jacket. He came to "jibe truck, gave one glance Jtptand stared straight at A smile changed, outward-: outward-: little, but something hap-i hap-i 3 corners of his lips. It fled to a fighting smile, malicious, n dog," he remarked in 3 -j 'jou giving away secrets," ered. "I'm here to sell f ssb on the nose. .Me and V ant know something. It's 1 splitting fifty-fifty. How -sten. You may tell your i s the nose," said Moses. " ; wn or nothing doing." l smile changed again. It 1 suggestion of vanity be- V Jtoiost reach of ordinary -He glanced at Stoddart, "gat Moses. 2"'J satisfied?" he asked. Jp recognized me? You can rtthat you have seen me i You saw the door I came 7 well, you may watch me j;!!m that, you may go to frying here until my mes-foies mes-foies out into the street t'A Moses. Hsid him to you," Gulbaz f "He is lucky. Luckier Wait and see." ode back down the alley the door. A moment Messenger came out look- if he felt murder be-' be-' Be ran and crawled in 'Ifuck. Moses spoke to ine truck started, for-ssuse for-ssuse the street was too 'am around in. asked Stoddart "camp," said Moses, rou drew blank that time. J foolish as you look twice before you call me J;gain. You've spent a i f annas for nothing, and f 'cent the wiser." -jfing learned that you're 4; any other blasted Brit-;f Brit-;f met, said Moses, "I've I1 came for. Gulbaz isn't 1" he thinks. In some "ear as stupid as you, j'liis pride." I,1'1 easy to say but it's J ald Stoddart. "If you jre a liar. You haven't fining. To the extent j man can condescend to 1 "Lynn, let's forget Norwood. I want to talk to you." "I can't forget him. You and I have wronged him." "Has he answered your letter?" Rundhia retorted. "No. But have you forgotten your promise?" "Didn't the Maharanee tell you? Don't trouble yourself about Norwood. Nor-wood. Forget him. Talk to me." T wish to talk about Captain Norwood." Nor-wood." "He has talked about you, I don't mind telling you. According to one of the palace servants, he told your aunt this afternoon that he's disgusted dis-gusted with you." "I can believe he is disgusted," Lynn answered. "But I can't imagine imag-ine him saying so to Aunty, or to anyone else." |