It is curious how, even outside the covers of a book, or off the stage, poetic justice will sometimes overtake delinquents, and that as a sheer matter of cause and effect, and now for instance, as they yelled and writhed, each with a red-hot coal bound up within his left armpit--not the right, lest they should be unable to indite the requisite document authorising payment of their ransom--it did not, of course, occur to Sunt Singh and Kaur Singh that this was indirect result of their supercilious repulse of Chand Lall from their master's audience, because they were unaware of the nature of his errand. But it is none the less certain that had that luckless trader been able to communicate that Murad Afzul and his gang of "budmashes" were out in the district, and dacoity in full blast, Raynier would never have ventured forth thus on a practically defenceless camping expedition, nor suffered others to do so either, in which contingency the events just recorded would, so far, never have taken place. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Raynier, awaking to consciousness, stared at the opposite wall, then at the furniture, then at the window, then closed his eyes again. A confused medley was flitting through his clouded brain. He seemed to see, but as if in a far-off time, the hiding-place among the mountain tops, the rain and mist and wild storms, to feel in a dull and uneasy form of sense the oppression of some peril hanging over him, but sequence of thought refused to come. Events chased each other in wild phantasmagoria through his mind, a sense of being hurled through space, a shock of some sort, a ring of shaggy fierce countenances and the flash of uplifted tulwars. Then, of a sudden, his mind cleared. He remembered the runaway horse and how his last sense had been that of being whirled into space, wrapped in a chill mist. But Hilda? What of her? Where was she? Had she been found too. Was she here, and--where on earth was he? He opened his eyes wide now, and stared around the room. Yes, it was a room, but a strange one. The walls were of a dull brown colour, and unpapered. The window was a tall, narrow embrasure, glazed and partly open. In the doorway was a _chik_ of fine split bamboo, draped by faded curtains, and a lamp of strange, but very artistic, design hung from the ceiling. Where was he? And he made a movement to spring out of bed. A figure glided to his side, a figure clad in white and wearing a turban, and a hand was laid upon his wrist. "Do not move, Sahib. The Sahib must lie quiet. The Sahib has been ill." The words were spoken in Hindustani, and now Raynier answered in the same tongue,-- "I suppose I have been. But where am I, and--who are you?" "I am a Hakim [native physician.]. The Sahib must not talk," was the answer, ignoring the first part of the question. This the patient did not fail to notice.