Yet assuredly disappointment awaited, for Mushim Khan, having heard all that had been said, absolutely declined to join in the plot. He had given the _Sirkar_ assurances of his friendship. The new Sahib who had come as representative of the _Sirkar_, had treated him straightforwardly and as a brother, and he refused to behave towards him treacherously and as a liar. Infidel or not, to act thus towards him would not be pleasing to Allah, nor could it be justified out of the teaching of His Prophet. "As a brother?" repeated the crafty _mullah_, now about to throw his trump card. "And was not the Sirdar Allahyar Khan a brother of the Nawab?" "Surely," answered Mushim Khan, looking slightly puzzled, for he saw no coherence in the question. "And his end--peace to his soul?" went on the _mullah_. "And his end, what was it?" "His end was that of a brave man if a mistaken one," replied the chief, in a deep voice, and frowning, for he disliked and resented the raking up of this matter. But Hadji Haroun nodded, looking as though awaiting further particulars. "He died fighting the Feringhi, by whom he was shot--and is now in Paradise," supplemented Kuhandil Khan. "But if he was not so shot?" pursued the _mullah_, a gleam of triumphant malice darting from his cruel eyes. "Then he is alive?" The words broke simultaneously from the chief and his brother. But the _mullah_ dropped his eyes to the ground, and for a moment kept silence. Then he said,-- "Would that he were. Would that his end had been that of a soldier. But it was not. Ya, Mahomed! What an end was his! Wah-wah! what an end!" And the crooked, claw-like fingers clenched and unclenched upon empty air. Murad Afzul, who had been prepared for this psychological moment, now rose, and having salaamed, moved away, for it was not fitting that he should hear the terrible disclosure about to be made to the two brothers. "The Sirdar Allahyar Khan was a havildar in one of the regiments serving under the Feringhi at the time of the great rising?" went on the _mullah_, in a kind of slow monotone. "And by them he was shot, by reason of the part he took against them in the rising," said the chief. "And, after all, it was what he might expect, for many of the Feringhi were then slain." "By them he was not shot, O Chief of the Gularzai whom the Feringhi have named Nawab," returned the _mullah_. "By them he was hanged." "Hanged?" broke from both, in incredulous horror. "Now that cannot be. The Feringhi would never put to so shameful a death a man of his descent." "Yet he was hanged, O chiefs--hanged in such fashion as is not to be named--hanged with a portion of swine flesh tied to his body." Both the listeners had half sprung to their feet, and all unconsciously had struck a crouching, wild-beast attitude--and in truth their faces were in keeping. Their lips had gone back from their teeth and their eyes were glaring.