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And on the following day when the visitors were entertained by athletic sports of the detachment on the parade ground and an interesting archery competition between excited teams of the Deb Zimpun's followers and of local Bhuttias, they allowed the Amban no opportunity of approaching her.
He wouldn't let me accompany him, but told me to go for my ride in the opposite direction. I didn't stay away long. I had just returned to the bungalow and dismounted and was giving my pony a piece of sugar, when several Bhuttias rushed at me from behind the house and seized me. Poor Lalla, my syce, tried to keep them off with his bare hands, but one brute struck him on the head with his sword.
Having learned what had happened he ordered them to guide the newcomers' pursuit. When the attack began the Bhuttias, having no fire-arms, took refuge in trees. So when the herd swept down upon the assailants all the hillmen escaped. But they were witnesses of the terrible vengeance of the powerful devil-man and devil-elephant.
Couldn't we get some machine guns?" "I'm afraid we couldn't hold the Fort of Ranga Duar against a whole invading army, Parker. You know it isn't really defensible against a serious attack." "Oh, I say! Do you mean, sir, that we'd give it up to a lot of Chinks and bare-legged Bhuttias without firing a shot?" The Major smiled at his junior's indignation.
His hair was cropped close, he was wearing Bhuttia clothes, but it was Narain Dass, the University graduate who was working as a coolie for a few annas a day." "And he had eight hundred and fifty rupees on him," added the young engineer. "Yes; and if all the Bhuttias had as much as the one shot that meant over two thousand." "Where did they get it?" "Who is behind all this?"
But here, too, he was unsuccessful. Certain that the Brahmin had not slipped through the meshes of the net formed by his secret service of subsidised Bhuttias, Dermot returned to the jungle to make search for him along the way. But all to no avail, much to his chagrin; for he had reason to hope that he would find on the emissary proof enough of the treason of the rulers of Lalpuri to hang them.
He disappeared a short time ago. Deserted, I suppose, though I don't see why he should. He was getting on well here." Dermot smiled grimly and touched the cord and spectacles. "The man who wore these, who led the Bhuttias in the raid, was Narain Dass." These was a moment's amazed silence in the room. Then a hubbub arose, and there was a chorus of exclamations and questions.
A mile or two further on the track crossed the dry bed of a small stream. In the sand Dermot noticed to his surprise the heel-mark of a boot among the footprints of the raiders, it being most unusual for Bhuttias to be shod. As his rider knelt down to examine the tracks, Badshah stretched out his trunk and smelt them as though he understood the object of their mission.
Do Bhuttias, unless they have just looted a garden successfully and we know these fellows had not carry sums like this?" And Dermot threw on the supper-table a cloth in which coins were wrapped. "Open that, Payne, and count the money, please."
I called the other servants, but no one came. The Bhuttias tied my hands and tried to lift me on to my pony's back, but Kitty got frightened and bolted. Then they didn't seem to know what to do, and one went to a man who had remained at a distance from us and spoke to him. He apparently told them to fetch a chair from the bungalow and put me into it.
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