"'Ah!' the prince groaned aloud; the veins of his forehead knotted; a sharp, strained look appeared in his eyes, and he shivered with a mortal chill. "A stinging, sharp surge attracted his attention to his right wrist. "It was swollen beyond its usual size, and a bluish discoloration surrounded the livid line where the dagger point had penetrated. "He placed his hands together and noted their disproportion, considered the wounded arm, and then--he remembered. "'The dagger!' he gasped, and a new horror charged his bloodshot eyes as he recalled the devilish craft employed by the natives to envenom their weapons. "'Poisoned! and by Lal Lu!' "At this thought the malignant light of a fearful determination illumed his features and revealed their frightful distortion. "'I shall not--go--alone!' he sighed, and repossessing himself of the fatal dagger, which he had cast upon the table on entering the room, he rose from the chair, looked with fearful purpose upon the curtains which disguised the entrance to the secret passageway from which he had emerged but a short time before, took one step forward, and then fell inertly on to the couch from which he had risen in the excitement of his malignant impulse. "'Ha!' The faint sound of an alien air smote his ears. "'The bagpipes!' he muttered; 'the Scots, the hellish Highlanders.' "Nearer and nearer the lively air was borne to him. "His raging pulse thrummed through his palpitating veins a rhythmic, mocking accompaniment to the swelling music. "His frame stiffened and stretched as though subjected to the distortion of the ancient rack. "The agony was unendurable. With a final conscious effort he reached for the poisoned weapon to bring his sufferings to a summary conclusion, but his failing will could no longer vitalize his palsied arm, and with a gasp that seemed to rend his tortured body, to the weird orchestration of that refrain which was destined in the near future to herald such joy at Lucknow, 'The Campbells Are Coming, Hi-ay, Hi-ay!' the spirit of Prince Otondo returned to Him who gave it, to be put into what repair was possible for such a proposition. "As the last writhing rigor ceased to convulse his frame, the prince lurched forward, and his body collapsed into an attitude not unlike that of one engaged in some dejecting reflection. "By a singular nervous caprice he had raised his hands to his face, which he had clutched in his agony, and his elbows rested upon the table in grewsome support of his head. "This ghastly calm, however, of which he was the center, was to be interrupted. "A trumpet blast sounded without the gate; a clamor of voices filled the air. "The bagpipes, in anticipation of some show of resistance, had ceased their stirring strains; within, the silence of an ambuscade prevailed. "Suddenly, through the unguarded entrance rushed a body of red-coated soldiers; but their advance was unopposed; the courtyard was abandoned.