The tale which came from between Govind's chattering teeth made the listener set his. Here was confirmation of old Khôjee's story with a vengeance; explanation also of the closed shops, the empty alleys. And the explanation was so natural. Given an amulet which brought death by the visitation of God at once, or, in lieu of that, death by removal to hospital and subsequent poisoning, what more obvious palliative--since God's act must stand--than to strike at the works of the devil? If, by dawn, neither hospitals nor doctors remained, that would surely mend matters. Meanwhile, in every house to which the cursed charm had gone, there must be purification by prayer and fasting, by spells, and incantations, and burnings of the hateful thing. It did not need much imagination to picture the scene. A narrow court, a dead child or husband awaiting dusk for secret removal, shuddering excited women, hysterical from lack of food, listening to the denunciations of officiating priests and _mullahs_, looking at their dead, at their living--round whose wrists the amulet had been perhaps an hour before--and remembering that though half the evil in the future lay with God, Who was beyond coercion, the other half lay with men who were! Not a reassuring scene in a city whose two hundred and odd thousand inhabitants were curiously unreliable. Still less so, because, if those immediately responsible had been true to their salt, all this information would have been in the strong hands of authorities hours ago. That it had not been so when he left the club, Jack Raymond felt sure. Why! he had seen the city magistrate there reading the _Illustrated London News!_ 'Who is in it? Who is working it? Come, hurry up!' he asked, with a significant dropping of the whip-lash. Govind squirmed horribly, but protested ignorance. It was not that sort of trouble. No one had thought of it twenty-four hours ago, in spite of all the talk, all the misfortunes, in spite even of the conspirings. It had come of itself. That was true, the listener knew. This sort of thing always did; but there were always people to help it on, and every hour that had been lost had increased the aiders and abettors. By now, half the city might be implicated. He took out another thousand-rupee note and held it out. 'Take me to the most likely scoundrel,' he said briefly. 'You understand!' Govind understood perfectly, and from abject terror passed to such infernal, such jubilant betrayal, that Jack Raymond put his hands and his whip behind his back in fear of using them. For he was going to see this thing through. He had still two thousand-rupee notes in his betting-book, and that in a native city meant much; the only caution necessary being not to bribe the wrong person.