“Thou hast brought home the nephew of their leader! What glory for thee! Is he to be ransomed?” [2] Aybek, a slave of Mahommad-Ghori, founded the present Kingdom of Delhi. “No, by my life! I like the fellow, and I have made him my cup-bearer. He pleases me with his manner. He is like thee:—rebellious. Why, look you, on the first night of his captivity he slept in one of my rooms here—would not go into the house of slaves, and so put me to the blush for asking a prince to demean himself, that I have granted him a bed in one of the antechambers near my sleeping-room. Also, yesterday, at the noon meal, he ceased to fill my cup after the second jar was empty. I asked him why he failed in his duty, and he answered that he did not fail, but was, rather, careful of my welfare:—that the gods had made kings to be examples to their people; and that a drunken king bred drunkenness in his subjects!” Ahalya’s eyes shone. “And thou—what didst thou, my lord?” “I gave the fellow ten lashes for his impertinence. But I like him, and I shall keep him in my service.” “Keep a prince for thy slave, lord?” “Whoorroo, Ahalya! Thou hast his tongue to-night. Come; I am weary of talking. Dance for me—the poppy dance, if thou wilt, now we are alone.” Ahalya rose submissively, and poised herself, while the Rajah lay back in deep comfort on his pillows. She was a beautiful dancer when she chose to dance; and she could hum her own music, beating the rhythm with her feet as she swayed slowly from one posture to another. But she did not dance the poppy dance to-night. She only made a series of tableaux that would have delighted the soul of an artist, and which fully satisfied the eyes of the Rajah. Ahalya circled round him like some broad-winged bird, moving more and more lightly, becoming more and more cloudlike to his stilling senses. And presently when, out of her gauzy mist, the Ranee looked at him, she perceived that his eyes were closed and that his breath was coming deeply and regularly.