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"It was just as I guessed when you first told me of these fits of his merely the jungle calling him." "Yes, sir. But the weirdest tale of all was that you were seen leading an army of elephants, just like a Hindu god, to invade Bhutan." "Where did you hear that?" asked Dermot in surprise.
Half a mile away down the hill Colonel Dermot and Wargrave watched them through their field-glasses. "Who is that fellow in khaki uniform, sir?" asked the subaltern. The Political Officer lowered his binoculars and laughed. "A gentlemen I've been very anxious to meet. He's the Chinese Amban we call him an Envoy of the Republic of China to Bhutan.
Over this vast forest with its treasures of tree and plant, animal and insect life, tropical, temperate, and alpine, the eagle might have soared; and then, passing over the Himalayan watershed, have looked down upon the treeless, open, undulating, almost uninhabited plain of Tibet, and in the distance seen the great Brahmaputra River, which, circling round Bhutan, cuts clean through the Himalaya and, turning westward, also joins the Ganges.
Napal and Bhutan were overrun, and the whole northern boundary of India pressed against by this fearful tide of life. To the west, Bokhara, and, even to the south and west, Afghanistan, were swallowed up. Persia, Turkestan, and all Central Asia felt the pressure of the flood. It was at this time that Burchaldter revised his figures. He had been mistaken.
That members of this timorous race should venture to enter such a lawless and savage country as Bhutan and that, having entered it, they lived to come back proved that there must be a strong understanding between many Bhutanese officials and a certain disloyal element in India.
The reason of the existence of this outpost and its garrison was the guarding of the duars, or passes, through the Himalayas against raiders from Bhutan, that little-known independent State lying between Tibet and the Bengal border. Its frontier was only two miles from, and a few thousand feet above, Ranga Duar.
None suspected the three of being other than they seemed. The Buddhism of Bhutan and Tibet to-day has but one article of faith "Acquire merit by feeding and paying the lamas and they will win salvation for you."
For when he overtook them they were on a path that led away from the mountains, so they were not making for Bhutan. And the identity of the leader perplexed him. There could be no political motive for the outrage. The affair was a puzzle. But he put the matter aside for the time being and began to consider their position. The sun was declining, for the afternoon was well advanced.
Often, as Dermot sat high perched on the mountain side, searching the narrow valleys and deep ravines of Bhutan with powerful glasses, his thoughts flew to Noreen safe beyond the giant hills at his back. It cheered him to know that he was watching over her safety as well as guarding the peace of hundreds of millions in the same land.
Dermot had not been gone a fortnight before one or two raids were attempted on British villages by lawless mountaineers from across the Bhutan frontier. Wargrave soon proved that the mantle of Colonel Dermot had not fallen on unworthy shoulders.
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