About a year after Colonel Keeling’s marriage, there came a time when troubles crowded thick and fast upon the Alibad colony. An earthquake did terrible damage to the great irrigation-works, which were fast approaching completion; and when this was followed by unusually heavy winter rains, the result was a disastrous inundation. It was a new thing for Khemistan, and especially its northern portion, to be afflicted with too much rain instead of too little; but the change seemed to have the effect of making the climate even more unhealthy than usual. The European officers who rode from village to village distributing medicines and food, and encouraging the people to rebuild their houses and cultivate their spoilt fields afresh, fell ill one after the other; and there was almost as much sickness among the troopers of the Khemistan Horse, most of whom came from another part of India, and found the salt desert a land of exile. The alarm caused by the Nalapuri invasion had at last drawn the attention of the Government to Colonel Keeling’s reiterated requests for a larger force; and he had been allowed to raise a second regiment, which he was moulding vigorously into shape when the troubles began. It was these new men and their unacclimatised officers who went down so quickly, and must needs be invalided to the coast; and the Commandant found himself left with little more than his original force and European staff when the news came that Gobind Chand was threatening the frontier anew. From Gobind Chand’s point of view the move was a timely one, if not the only one possible to him, for the Sheikh-ul-Jabal, at the head of the young Amir’s troops, was shouldering him mercilessly out of Nalapur, quite content to leave to Colonel Keeling the task of dealing with him finally. By dint of avoiding a pitched battle, and presenting a resolute front to his pursuers, the ex-Vizier had contrived to keep his force almost intact, and a golden opportunity seemed to be presenting itself for dealing a blow at one of his chief enemies while he was already in difficulties.