The fugitive tried to make himself as comfortable as his circumstances would admit, resolving to secure a period of sleep and at the first break in the journey to fortify himself by a good breakfast. This, however, he feared might not be for some time seeing the train, for an express, was going at an unaccountably slow pace. Sheer exhaustion came to his aid, and he fell into a deep sleep, only to awake when the train pulled up at a station. "Now for some breakfast, I'm desperately hungry!" he said, yawning and stretching himself with an air of satisfaction, which soon changed to bewilderment when he observed that the few passengers were all tumbling out of their respective carriages, and that the train had evidently reached its terminus. Rubbing his eyes he peered out, perceiving to his dismay the familiar station of Puranapore. Mistaking this train for the express for Beypore, he had been carried to the place which of all others he would have wished to avoid. "Good heavens!" he muttered, throwing himself back on the carnage bench. "And the very first person I see may be Zynool himself!" Then to his relief he remembered that, after all, he appeared as an old Hindu ayah, on whom the haughty Mussulman would not deign to look. He slipped out of the carriage, saying to himself: "I must feign rheumatics and limp a bit!" In spite of his confidence in his disguise, he could not help glancing furtively round. Nobody, however, seemed to be taking any account of the harmless looking old woman. In fact, there seemed to be some absorbing preoccupation filling the minds of all the bystanders. The new arrivals hung about with an air of trouble on their faces, their bundles deposited by their sides, as they listened open-mouthed to the native porters, who were expatiating volubly on some matter which was evidently of general interest. The Eurasian station-master had a worried air, and, in coming in contact with the supposed ayah, bustled her unceremoniously aside. The question with Rayner, meanwhile, was not to discover the topic of interest, but how he could proceed to Beypore. This involved some inquiries, and he was timid in his first attempts at personating his fictitious character.