The courage which had died before he did, though none should know of it. Yet it had died. And who was to blame? Nâgdeo sat gazing stupidly at his grandson's long length, at his fairer beauty; then suddenly he stood up. That was it, of course! And if that were so, then it were best to settle it before dawn, when folk might come prying. He bent curiously over the dead lad, then laid his hand on the dead heart. "Go! Keeper of the Pass, to the Slumberers without fear. I, Nâgdeo, will punish the intruder." Half-an-hour after, he stood silently in his hut beside his still sleeping wife. The old woman, blind, deaf, near her end as it was, scarcely stirred as he drove his spear through her heart. "I doubt thee not, Naolé," he said inwardly, "unless a devil wronged thee; but thy son's son must be avenged. He must take no stranger's blood to the Slumberers." But Herdâsi, the lad's mother, was awake, and screamed. "Hold thy peace, fool!" said the old man, fiercely, "if thou wouldst not proclaim thyself harlot. Thy son is dead--face downwards. It came not from me, nor from my son; so that of us which goes to join the Slumberers must be avenged on the vile spirit that took form within thee. Come out from under the bed, woman! if thou wouldst prove he got it not with thy knowledge. Oh! untrustworthy feminine!" And after a pause the untrustworthy feminine did come out with a curious dignity. "He got it not from me but from my love. Yet what matter if he be dead!" said Herdâsi, and so died with her face to the foe to save her son's name. Since, if it was a devil's doing, none could blame the lad. They found the old man sitting beside the two dead women when they came to tell him that the Keeper of the Pass had given his life for its safety. "Yea, I know," replied Nâgdeo, quietly. "I went and found him before dawn when he returned not. So I came home and slew these useless ones. Since he was dead, and I am nigh death, and there was none to keep the untrustworthy feminine from wandering." He adhered to this story steadfastly in the district magistrate's court, and when he was condemned to death made but one request--that he might be allowed to face it with the insignia of his office about him. So on the eve of his execution they gave the old man back his necklace of tiger claws, and told him he would be allowed to jingle his bells on his way to the scaffold. But when they came to rouse him in the morning he was lying dead, face upward; his arms, his chest, his throat all rent and ripped by those same tiger claws. But there was not even a scratch upon the back of the last Keeper of the Pass. THE PERFUME OF THE ROSE "I think we ought to be going back to the others," said the girl.