The women’s apartments were built round a small inner courtyard, gloomy in the extreme from its want of outlook, but possessing a tank of rather stagnant water which was called a fountain, and some shrubs in pots. In the verandahs round this court the whole life of the place was carried on, the servants--all of them women of a discreet age--performing all their duties in the open, to the accompaniment of much chattering. Among them moved, or rather flashed, Maadat Ali, questioning, meddling, calling down endless explosions of wrath on his devoted head, but undoubtedly brightening the days of the old ladies whom he alternately coaxed and defied. When he saw the visitors he left the servants at once, and after ordering a carpet to be spread for the Memsahibs, seated himself cross-legged on the ground, with his back against the coping of the tank, and began to ask questions. His subject was Major Keeling, whose brief visit more than a year before seemed to have left a vivid impression. Was it true that Kīlin Sahib was invulnerable to bullets, that he could make water flow uphill or rise from the ground at his word, that he could read all the thoughts of a man by merely looking him in the face? These inquiries and many others had been answered, when a peculiar look on the boy’s face made Lady Haigh turn round. Behind her, leaning against the wall of the house, stood Wazira Begum, twisting a spray of mimosa in her fingers, and trying to look as if she had not been listening to what had passed. Lady Haigh rose and saluted her politely, prompting Penelope to do the same, and after a moment’s hesitation the girl returned the salutation courteously, if a little sulkily. It was evident that the meeting of the night before was to be ignored, and Maadat Ali made room for his sister joyfully at his side.
“I knew she would come when she heard us talking about Kīlin Sahib,” he said. “She hates him very much.”
“When he came here,” pursued the boy, “she tried very hard to make him afraid; but he would not be afraid, and therefore she hated him even more than before. She has part of a tassel that she cut from his sword----”
“From his sword? Oh, from the sword-knot,” said Lady Haigh.