Fulton County tribune. (Wauseon, Ohio) 1883-1925, 1917-12-07
King of the Khyber Rifles
By TALBOT MUNDY
The Most Picturesque Romance of the Decade


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flashed again, but his did not waver
Princess" he said, why speak of
what you don't know?"
He thought she would strike like a
snake, but she smiled at him instead.
And when Yasmini has smiled on a
man he has never been Just the same
man afterward. He knows more, for
one thing. He has had a lesson in
one of the finer arts.
Il will speak of what l do know"
she said. "No, there is no need. Look
LOokI'
She pointed at the bed-at the man
on the bed-fngers locked in those of
a woman who looked so like herself.
He looked, knowing well there was
something to be understood, that
stared him in the face. But for the
life of him he could not determine
question or answer.
"What is in your bosom?" she
asked him.
He put his hand to his shirt.
DRAW it out.' she said, as a teacher
drills a child.
He drew out the gold-hilted knife
with the bronze blade, with which q
man had meant to murder him. He let
it lie on the palm of his hand and
looked from it to her and back again.
The hilt might have been portrait Of
her modelled from the life.
Here is another like it," she said,
| stepping to the bedside She drew back
| the Woman's dress at the bosom and
showed knife exactly like that in
! Kings hand. zone lay on her bosom
and one on his when 1 found them ~
she said. "NOw, think again!"
He did think, of thirty thousand pos
sibilities and of one impossible idea
that stood up prominent among them
all and insisted on seeming the only
! likely one.
81 saw the knife in your bosom last
night" she said, land laughed SO that
l nearly wakened you
"Why didn't you take it with the
bracelet" King asked her, holding il
!
She accepted it and laid it on the
mans bronze armor. Then, however
she resumed it and played with it.
Look again p she said. Think ant
look again!"
He looked, and he knew now. Blu
he still preferred that she should tel
MIN, and his lips shut tight.
'Can you guess why 1 changed N.
mind about yOu-wise man?"
She looked from him to the man OF
the bed and back to him again. Hav
ing solved the riddle, King had leisur
to be interested in her eyes, ant
watched them analytically, like a jew
eler appraising diamonds. They wer
strangely reminiscent, but much NOR
changeable and colorful than any b
had ever seen. They had the baf1lin
trick of changing while he watches
them.
Having sent man to kill you, VIII
did I cease to want to kill you? In
stead of losing you on the way to Khir
jan, why did l run risks to prOtec
you after you reached here? Why di
| save your life in the Cavern 0
Earth's Drink tonight? You do no
know yet? Then 1 will tell you some
thing else you do not know. 1 was i
Delhi when you werel l watched an
listened while you and Rewa Gung
talked in my house! l was in Rev
Gunga's carriage on the train that b
; took and you did not! / have learne
: at first hand that you are not a fCO
But that was not enoughI You had t
he three things-clever and brave an
one other. The one other you are
Brave you have proved yourself t
be! Clever you must be, to trick you
way into Khinjan caves, even wit
Ismail at your elbow That is VIII
I saved your life-because you al
those two things and - and - on
other!"
She snatched a mirror from a littl
, ivory table-a modern mirrOr-ba
glass, bad art, bad workmanship, bt
silver warranted.
Look in it and then at him! !' 81
ordered.
But he did not need to look. tt
: man on the bed was not so much Ill
himself as the woman was like he
= but the resemblance seemed to gro
4 under his eyes. King was the tallt
4 and the younger by several years, b1
4 the noses were the same, and IL
wrinkled foreheads; both men had Il
same firm mouth; both looked iii
\ Romans.