The jewels which loaded their necks, wrists, and ankles, proclaimed them attendants on the court of the Shah,* and were flashing like their own bright eyes in the sunshine, while the coils of their hair of purple blackness, were interwoven with the white flowers of the wild jasmine. Some had vinas, or rude guitars fashioned of half-gourds; and others had tom-toms or little Indian drums, to the sound of which they sung. *Now, as in the time of the "Arabian Nights," Nautch girls are attached to all Eastern Courts. As all Nautch dancing borders a little on the indelicate, Rose had now a fair excuse for leaving the vicinity of the band. Denzil sprang into the little seat behind her, as she still insisted on driving, and they quitted the cantonments by the west-gate, opposite the musjeed, where Bob Waller was listening to the distant strains of the music and killing the hours of his duty as best he could; and thus they escaped Polwhele and a few others who had been waiting to pounce upon her or Mabel, for they were especial favourites with the officers, nathless the ungallant banter to which their names were subjected at times. CHAPTER VIII. THE DRIVE. Mabel was not at the Residency, as the sentinels of the Queen's 44th, at the gate, informed them, she having driven away with the Lady of the Envoy to visit Lady Sale, about half an hour before. Denzil perhaps might have foreseen that the sisters would miss each other, had he known more of the inner nature of Rose Trecarrel, or more of the science of flirtation. "How excessively provoking!" she exclaimed; "shall we return to the band, or--drive without her? Besides we might perhaps meet or overtake them." The idea of a solitary drive was somewhat perilous at that juncture of our affairs, as the district was much disturbed, and patrols of the 5th Cavalry and 1st Local Horse of the Shah, were on all the roads leading to Cabul. All the people were in arms, and since the murder of Sir Alexander Burnes, more than one officer had been waylaid and seriously wounded. But the temptation was too great, and Denzil "supposed that they might take a little drive together;" so turning the phaeton from the Residency gate, Rose drove along the Kohistan road, in a direction from Cabul.