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"When thou shalt have passed the Gateway, my lord, Naraini will be waiting for thee." "Very well." Amber threw a leg over the crupper, handed the stallion's reins to the sowar, who had dismounted and drawn near, and dropped upon his feet. Naraini nodded to the sowar, who led the animal away. When he was out of earshot the woman leaned from the saddle, her glorious eyes to Amber's.
"How long wouldst thou abide the outcome, my king, after thou hadst informed the Council of this deception to which thou hast been too willing and ready a party?... He who misled you died a dog's death. But thou art thou in love with death?" "Unless thy other name be Death, Naraini ..." "Or if the Council should spare thee as is unlikely?
Is there no love in thy bosom to leap in response to the love of thee that is my life?" She released him and whirled a pace or two away, draperies swirling, jewels scintillating cold fire in hopeless emulation of the radiance of her tear-gemmed eyes. "Naraini?" stammered Amber, recalling what he had heard of the woman. "Naraini!" "Aye, my lord, Naraini, thy wedded wife!"
I claim to be Naraini, Queen, wife to Har Dyal Rutton, rightful ruler of Khandawar coward, traitor, renegade who stands there!" "For the love of Heaven, Rowan, shut her up!" cried Labertouche. "It's all a pack of lies; the woman's raving. Rutton's dead, in the first place; in the second, he's her father. She can't be his wife very well, whether he's alive or dead.
Woman-like she shifted to suit his humour. "He is a man: I answer for that, though ... he is no fool. Still, when the hour strikes, what he must, that will he endure for the sake of that which Naraini hath promised him." "Or for another," Salig Singh growled into his beard. "I did not hear." "I said naught. I am distraught." "Be of good heart," she comforted him still further.
"Thank God!" said Amber from the bottom of his soul; and, "Ah, you would!" cried Labertouche tensely, as Naraini seized the opportunity, when his attention was momentarily diverted, to break for freedom. Amber saw the flash of a steel blade in the woman's hand as she struck at the secret-agent, and the latter, stepping back, deflected the blow with a guarding forearm.
They were to crown you, instead of Salig's son, the next day in the name of Har Dyal Rutton; and then you were to die suddenly by virtue of hemp poison or some other contagious disease, and Salig was to step into your shoes as Emperor of Hindustan, with Naraini as his Empress.... She should have stayed home and been a suffragette." "Better for her," said Amber.
"My king!" she breathed intensely. But the thought of Sophia Farrell and what she might be suffering at that very moment was uppermost obtruded itself like a wall between himself and the woman. He had no further inclination for make-believe, and he saw Naraini with eyes that nothing illuded.
Naraini had, indeed, no need to cry aloud or clutch his hand in order to apprise him that the Eye was vigilant.
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