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Babu's tale was substantially the same which he had told Mr. Warburton and which had caused the latter to rush out of the audience hall and straddle the first horse he saw in the palace courtyard.

One of the tofanghees, the irregular soldiers, who had been left behind as a body-guard for Jane at the little village not far from the capital, had ridden into town with the news that the fat Afghan charpadar who, with his lean companion, had joined the caravan a day or two earlier, had returned to the village atop a swift dromedary. He had talked to Jane Warburton; then, suddenly, had dismounted, had picked her up and lifted her into the saddle, and, in spite of his immense bulk, had vaulted up behind her, using the dromedary's tail as a handle in true desert style, and had been off at a gallop.

Of course, the tofanghees had not been able to shoot, afraid they might hit the girl, but half-a-dozen of them had started in pursuit

Thus the Babu's tale, told with a beatific smile and a conscious stressing and straining of dramatic high spots, and, momentarily, Hector Wade came near to fainting. It seemed to him as if he were sinking into a cushion of air.