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 All of a sodden his face grew pale.

"The time is come" said he. Aesha and Osman listened motionless—the leech kept holding Jagat Singha's pulse.

"The state's bad" said he after a while, "the pulse irregular." Aesha's face grew pale. Suddenly Jagat Singha's face became white and showed an unnatural expression, his fists clenched fast, his eyes manifested a preternatural twinkling. Aesha understood that the coup de grace of the Destroyer was not distant. The physician who sat ready with his medicine, seeing the symptoms opened the patient's mouth and poured in the drug. The change was electric. By and bye, his face re-assumed its natural expression and composed. The whiteness which spread over his body disappeared, the blood renewed its free circulation, his fists relaxed, and his eyes closed in composure. The physician felt his pulse, all attention.

"No fear any more" exclaimed he joyfully, after a long while, "he will recover."

"Has the fever gone off?" enquired Osman

"It has" answered the follower of Esculapius.

Both Aesha and Osman now looked cheerful. "There is no more danger" said the physician. "I needn't wait any more. Let the patient take this medicine every now and then up to twelve o'clock." He then went away. After a while, Osman too went to his house. Aesha sat as before on the couch beside the Prince, tending him.

A little before midnight, he opened his eyes. The first sight that struck him was Aesha's cheerful countenance. From his side-glance, Aesha gathered that his mind was wandering, he looked like one who tried to recall some thing, but without success.