"Huzoor, have you ever gone anywhere without me since you came to my hut that night when I was stricken with smallpox--" "Only once, you rascal, and then you came after me to my great good fortune. Very well, then; that is settled. Stop raising dust and listen. We ride to-night. Let us discuss the manner of our traveling, for 'tis a long road and full of mischief." Chumru laid aside the garment and tickled his wiry hair underneath his turban. "By the Kaaba," he growled, "such roads lead to Jehannum more easily than to Delhi. Do you go to the Princess Roshinara, sahib?" Malcolm's overwrought feelings found vent in a hearty laugh. "What fiend tempted thee to think of her, owl?" he cried. "Nay, sahib, no fiend other than a woman. What else would bring your honor to Delhi? Is there not occupation here in plenty?" "I tell thee, image, that the General-sahib hath ordered it. And I am making for the British camp on the Ridge, not for the city." Chumru dismissed the point. He was a fatalist and he probably reserved his opinion. Malcolm had beguiled the long night after they left Rai Bareilly with the story of his strange meetings with the King's daughter. To the Eastern mind there was Kismet in such happenings. "I would you had not lost Bahadur Shah's pass, huzoor," he said. "That would be worth a bagful of gold mohurs on the north road now. But, as matters stand, we must fall back on walnut juice. You have blue eyes and fair hair, alack, yet must we--" "What! Wouldst thou make me a brother of thine?" demanded Malcolm, understanding that the walnut juice was intended to darken his skin. "There is no other way, huzoor. This is no ride of a night. We shall be seven days, let us go at the best, and meeting budmashes at every mile. If you did not talk Urdu like one of us, sahib, I should bid you die here in peace rather than fall in the first village. Still, we may have luck, and you can bandage your hair and forehead and swear that those cursed Feringhis nearly cut your scalp off. But you must be rubbed all over, sahib, until you are the color of brown leather, for we can have no patches of white skin showing where, perchance, your garments are rent." Malcolm saw the wisdom of the suggestion and fell in with it. While Chumru went to compound walnut juice in the nearest bazaar, he, in pursuance of the plan they had concocted together, got a native writer to compile a letter which purported to emanate from Nana Sahib, and was addressed to Bahadur Shah. It was a very convincing document. Malcolm contributed a garbled history of recent events, and one of the Brahmin's seals, which came into Havelock's possession when Cawnpore was occupied, lent verisimilitude to the script.