"Yes," he admitted, smiling; "that was one of them. But I found that your riding could be of use to us." "Of use to _you_?" she exclaimed. "Yes, in creating a false impression." "An impression of what?" "Of security: that we did not think you were in any danger." "Though you thought I was?" "I was sure of it," he said. She was sitting upright now; her hands set upon the chair-arms; her face changing stormily between anger and astonishment. "You were sure I was in danger, yet you did nothing to prevent it!" she cried. "Do you mean that?" "What should I have done?" he enquired. "Warned me!" she said "But didn't I?" "Oh, that!" she exclaimed impatiently. "And would you have been warned?" "I don't know. I can't say. That's got nothing to do with it. Or you could have given me an escort." He shook his head. "That would have made you no safer, and would have spoilt you as an advertisement." "As an advertisement!" she protested hotly. "Do soldiers let a woman run the risk of being murdered to make things safe far them? I think it's contemptible!" "Yes," he said quietly; "so I see: but you don't think enough." He sat looking at her in a way she detested; as no other man seemed able to look at her; as though she were a piece in a game he played. "Did any one else know it wasn't safe for me?" she demanded. He shook his head. "Wouldn't you have been warned in that case?" he suggested. "Yes," she returned warmly, "I'm quite certain I should." "I think so too," he said. "Nothing in Sar would have been weighed beside it." "Except by you," she retorted. "Except by me," he said. "You see I'm here to weigh things. I'm here to look after you all. You think I should have told you of your danger, and shut you up in the safety of Sar. But there is no safety in Sar. That's the mistake. Your riding was a risk, but it helped our chance to make Sar safer; safer for every one, safer for _you_." "And suppose I had been killed?" "Well," he said, "you can fancy what I should have paid for it. But the safety would have been there, though it was only there for others. And it was to make that that I am here." She met his musing observation of her with hard clear eyes. "Haven't you wasted an unusual lot of time talking to me this morning, Captain Terrington?" she said. He took the deep breath of a man whose heart is sick for sleep, and threw back his shoulders. "Yes," he smiled, rising; "I was quite exceptionally tired." V Terrington gave a practical shape to his forebodings as soon as the Commissioner and his escort started for the Durbar. The entire force was under arms; the Residency guard was trebled; sappers were stationed in every room to break open the loopholes; others waited with discs of guncotton to blow away the trees which masked the polo ground; and the final connexions were made with the mine which was to overthrow the courtyard wall.