"Ah! Prasad, surely thy memory is at fault," she retorted. "I no longer blame thee for it, if truly thou art changed, but there was a time when thou didst prefer to drink of Foreign spirits, and enjoy the charms of _natch_ girls, rather than obey the summons of the Rani." "Never," he cried vehemently. "I vow it is not so. Explain more of this I do beseech thee, so that I may perceive clearly the source of the untruth." "I would not recall the matter, only to satisfy thee," she answered, "but when thou wert a guest of Ahmad Khan, dost not remember his enthralling dancer? Ah! fickle one," she rebuked him lightly. "Has Ganga's face, too, vanished from thy mind"? "In truth," Prasad affirmed. "Her face never was in my mind to vanish from it. With thy dear face ever before my eyes, I beheld no other, not even as a passing fancy." "Say you so"? she spoke quickly. "Yet Ahmad Khan vowed most reluctantly that thou wert so drunk with wine, so intoxicated with thy passion for the girl, that thou couldst not be brought to listen to my voice." Prasad started, as the late suspicion of his friend's treachery began to receive confirmation. "Tell me! Tell me"! he urged. "Did he convey my message to thee, that I was sick, that I yearned for a glance from thine eyes to heal my malady"? "Truly he did not," the Rani answered. "No such message did he ever bring." Prasad sprang to his feet impulsively. "The lying, treacherous Moslem," he ejaculated fiercely. "Farewell for a little space, great Rani. For this he shall answer even at the banquet. I will slay him in his seat." "Nay, stay, good Prasad," she enjoined. "Aye, but thou dost not know all," he returned vehemently. "But I would know all," she answered calmly, "before thou dost commit so rash an act." "Dear Rani! Ah God, that there could be such vileness coiled like a serpent round any creature's heart. What wouldst thy order be, if I were to disclose to thee, that yonder villain, had sworn thy ears were too full of the love words of another Moslem to hear of my petition, that his name so hung upon thy lips as to stifle any message in return, thine eyes so captivated with his form that thou hadst yielded thy virtue to his passion as readily as a lotus bending its fair head before a storm? Such was thy case with Dost Ali; he swore upon his cursed Koran, and so he stirred my nature until I lost my reason. What now, great Rani, is thy pleasure, thy command"? He waited, breathing heavily with emotion, for the order he anticipated would burst forth from the outraged woman's lips to exterminate the Mohammedan. But it did not come. For a moment, and for a moment only, she was tempted thus to act. An angry glance swept to the lighted windows of the banquet hall. But she perceived the fatal consequences of a blood feud stirred up at that feast. It might be ruinous to the brightening prospects of the cause she cherished more than all else.