ALIVE IN THE JUNGLE (continued 3)

"Rest, sahib," urged the hunter, pointing to the trickling reeds.

Hungry as he was, Oliver laid himself down, intending to watch, not to sleep. But the heat and the drowsy influences of the gentle shower-bath overcame the boy, and he was soon as fast asleep as the child. After his night's adventures in the forest, the sensation was most delightful. Care and fear seemed to vanish, and his dreams transported him to the beauties of fairy-land. The horned heads of the oxen came alarmingly near, but they did not disturb the blissful tranquillity in which he lay, as if he were spell-bound.

Tara's hand upon his shoulder roused him at last. He heard the faint, low musical tinkle of a distant bell from the idol-temple, where the Rana worshipped his monkey-headed divinity; where he took his young sons to be sprinkled with consecrated water, and have their limbs touched with all imaginable substances, until Rattam was thoroughly cross. He was crosser than usual this morning, being bored out with the tedious childish ceremonies which he had had to sit through in stately silence.

It was delightful to receive a message from a native woman, as he came out of the temple, to tell him the hunter had returned, and was waiting with the young sahib at the water-shed.

When the shikaree touched Oliver on the shoulder, the milk-white ass, the gold-fringed umbrella, and the crowd of dusky attendants were advancing with Rattam across the intervening plateau.

"What does my brother in so mean a place," he asked, "when tiffin waits him in our castle-hall?"

Oliver stretched himself and rubbed his eyes, not at once remembering all that had happened. Then recollection came back, and he sprang to his feet, pointing to the sleeping child, and gave Rattam's hand a hearty Yorkshire grip.

The girlish young Oriental smiled, although he felt as if his fingers would all be out of joint: and pointing to a led ass behind him, signed to Oliver to mount.

The Thibetan had hid herself in the shed. But Rattam would not come near poor Carl. "He will bite," he said warningly, and his attendants shared in his belief. Not one of them dared touch Carl.

"Give him to me," shouted Oliver; for it was easy to see the Thibetan was growing fearful by contagion.

Oliver tumbled into the saddle. The hunter gently lifted up the child and laid it across his knees. A running syce led the ass, and another carried an umbrella over it, shading Oliver and his novel burden from the dazzling sun. Rattam rode beside him.

Tara Ghur came up, bending to the very ground before them. He was anxious to be the first to carry the good news to the search-party below the koond. He was thinking of his well-earned reward, and he did not want another messenger to share it. So they bade him go.

Rattam called to his attendants to halt under the leafy arches of a banyan tree, that they might watch Tara leaping down into the koond, springing from bough to bough, as if food and sleep were luxuries, to be enjoyed in leisure hours alone. Then Oliver blamed his sleepy head that he had not spoken again about the wolf.

"O Rattam," he urged, "you have one empty den in the corner of your lovely gardens; will you have it there? Think of the love that could transform a wolf! You should have seen its face as I did, when we first looked down into the pit. It made me feel there is nothing in the world so beautiful as love—nothing so strong. And when we had got the child away, I could not bear to let Tara hurt the wolf. The same God who made us made it. God is love. Does not he care for the whole world around, for everything he has made? How will he look on the cruelty of leaving the noble brute to perish in the pit?—and I've done that."

"Forget it," said Rattam; "remember only you have rescued the child."

Oliver hugged the sleeping bundle of life in his arms. "Oh, don't mistake me!" he said passionately. "But now we have got him away, it is such cruelty to leave the wolf tied as I have tied it. Surely you must see it is. And I have let the hunter go."

Perhaps Rattam did not see just what Oliver desired he should; but the young idolater was struck by his companion's earnestness. With all a Hindu's reluctance to take the life of the animals around him, he had no care for the cruelty of leaving the wolf to perish; yet, like a flash in the darkness, a sense of the difference between him and the English boy was stirring in his heart.

"It is too much like striking a fallen foe," urged Oliver, as they resumed their journey.

"Nay," returned Rattam; "I accept the gift: the wolf is mine. There is my father."

The Rana in his everyday dress of ordinary white cotton could only be distinguished from the headman of his village by the silver ring on his finger and the fineness of the shawl about his waist. He was driving back from the village when he encountered his son.

Meanwhile the old shikaree had raised the signal of success agreed upon. He had sent up a tall column of smoke whilst Oliver slept, by setting fire to a patch of grass. The nearest scout had seen and repeated it. The tiny flags on the long bamboos which his companions carried had waved the good news from the jagged cliffs across the temple ruins, from point to point along the broken ground, until it reached the father's ears.

The boys glanced round, and saw the wearied jogies swarming up the steep ascent above the koond, towards the slip of table-land on the verge of the forest behind the Rana's castle.

Foremost of all came Mr. Desborough up the precipitous path, until the footing for the well-trained mule he rode became too precarious. Then he sprang to the ground, flung the bridle to his syce, and hurried along on foot. The two friends following copied his example.

Rattam and Oliver turned back to meet them; then they perceived the old shikaree running before them as their guide. His tattered garments were so exactly the colour of the waving grass and scattered bushes through which he was leading them, that he looked more like some huge grasshopper than a living man.

They saw him pointing to the castle wall and gesticulating frantically in all the pride of his hardly-earned success, counting on the moment when he should lay the rescued little one in its father's arms. Then far down behind the lingerers of the scattered party they heard the echo of the dandy-wallahs' song. Despite the stubborn temper of the thing he was riding, Oliver did manage to press forward, and lifting up the sleepy child, he held it conspicuously before him. Of course he waked up Carl, and the howling wail again began.

Was ever any sound so grateful to Mr. Desborough's straining ears?

"There, there; listen!" he exclaimed, as he cleared the ground between them and came up panting.

"Here is the child, Mr. Desborough!" cried Oliver. "Now tell us, is he yours?"

"Turned nurse, my boy?" laughed the major.

Oliver answered with a shrug and a grimace, growing ridiculous, as he felt their task was accomplished.

Mr. Desborough sat down with the child on a lichen-covered stone. Where were the clear blue eyes? Gummed up.—Where was the soft fair hair? A shock of dirt.

The child snapped savagely at the hand that was fondling him, and renewed his wail.

"Take care," said Rattam. "I warned you it would be dangerous," backing his ass as he spoke.

"Quiet!" The single word fell from the major's lips in the stern tones of military command. The howl ceased, and the child lay passive in Mr. Desborough's arms. They soon found out how well it had learned the all-important lesson of obedience in the wild wolf's nest.

"A good scrub would be an improvement, I am thinking," remarked the deputy, with more drollery in the corner of his eye than Oliver had imagined him to possess.

The whole party were gathering now. They drew together under the banyan tree. In its grateful shadow there was room for all; for its arching branches had struck root as they touched the ground, forming a succession of leafy cloisters, until a grove had grown from a single tree. The overwhelming thankfulness in Mr. Desborough's heart lay far too deep for words as he looked the child well over, and felt it was his own—his Carl.

There were laughter and rejoicing all around him; but his brow was grave with the depth of his gratitude when the dandy-wallahs came up. As Kathleen peeped from her swinging carriage, she saw but one face, and that was her father's.

What did it mean?

He looked up and smiled at her. His eye was off the child just for one moment. Carl sprang into the air with a bound, leaping off like a frog to the tufted grass. Everybody ran—even Rattam. But Kathleen and her bearers faced him. They set the dandy on the ground, and ran round and round, scaring the queer little creature back, but not daring to touch him. Kathleen, peeping through the curtains of her dandy, saw it all. The great love that was throbbing in her childish heart shut out every thought of fear. The strange wild thing gave another leap. She tumbled out of the dandy, and as it touched the grass, with hands outspread, she caught it in her arms. The thing seemed nothing better than a human frog, with half-blind eyes and champing teeth. Save where the leaves clung to it, as if they had been glued, the little figure was completely naked and covered with slimy dirt. What did it matter? she loved him the more.

"You will have hard work to get the child home in safety yet," said Major Iffley; "you will have to secure it somehow. Borrow a cummer-band and swathe it round and round like a mummy."

"No bad thought," added the deputy; "something must be done."

Mr. Desborough was kneeling by his children. Before the major had finished speaking, an elderly bearer in Rattam's train, who looked as if he had huddled himself into a clean sheet to attend his young chieftain at the temple service, threw off this additional covering at a sign from his master and laid it at the sahib's feet.

"Put it round us both, papa," said Kathleen, "and then Carl won't mind it." Mr. Desborough thought the sunbeam she had been trying to entrap had made its home in the happy eyes uplifted so pleadingly to his. "He will be good with me, papa; he always was," she added.

The deputy was searching in his niece's dandy. Yes; Bona had understood all his hasty directions. At the back of the cushions there was the store of cakes, sufficiently English-looking to delight a child. "Here, Oliver," he said; "feed it."

"It." The word jarred on Kathleen's ears. "It is not it," she persisted indignantly; "it is my pretty Carl."

Mr. Desborough took the cake from Oliver's hand and fed Carl himself.

The cake was devoured; and whilst he filled the hungry mouth, the major passed the long length of calico quickly round Carl's neck, enveloping arms and feet, until the wild little harlequin was reduced to a great white ball, at least in appearance. How fast the cakes were vanishing!

"O Bona!" muttered Oliver, too proud to take the share he was longing for, "she might have sent us more."

No one but Rattam heard the low-voiced grumble.

"Sahib," he said, "my father awaits you," waving his hand in the direction of the castle wall.

But home was the word. "Yes, home," repeated Mr. Desborough—"home to his mother."

"Try a tub first," suggested the major.

Rattam was speaking to his shikaree.

"You have done my bidding, and you have done it well," he said like a prince. "Now bring me home the wolf you have caught. Bring it home alive to the vacant den in the castle gardens."

Tara Ghur salaamed before his chieftain till the dust rose up in a cloud between them. Oliver grasped the hand of his dusky friend once more. How was it he was always feeling Rattam more of a man than himself, or far too much of a girl?

Now that poor little Carl was made safe, so that he could not hurt any one, Rattam alighted, and drew nearer to the group on the grass.

"Talk to Carly again, Kathleen," Mr. Desborough was saying; "I believe he knows you. But you must not kiss him until I tell you it is safe," he added quickly, as she threw her arms around her long-lost brother.

Kathleen paused, and looked up in her father's face, bewildered for a moment.

"Then I will not do it, papa. I'll never forget again to mind what you say."

The hand which had snatched her back patted her fondly on the cheek, and the bitter pain which Kathleen had felt so long vanished altogether as her father answered,—

"Yes: I can trust you now, and I am going to trust you to take Carl home, my darling."

He put them both into the dandy, and drew the curtains closely round, so that nothing could be seen by the children. Bona's great bag of cakes was on Kathleen's lap, and her father showed her how to give Carl a bite without letting her fingers go near enough to his teeth to be in danger of an angry snap.

Mr. Desborough had left himself a peep-hole, so that his eye was never off his children for a moment as he walked by the side of the dandy. Had ever father such a journey before?

"Now, Kathy," he said cheerily, "you can do what no one else can do: you can make Carly listen. See how his eyes follow yours! Try and waken up his old love; you were with him to the last. Think of all that he was fond of in his nursery days; no one knows but you."

"Sahib! sahib!" entreated the coolies round, "no trust it with the little beebee—no trust it; grow angry, tear and bite."

Even the major and the deputy looked on doubtfully. They had known Kathleen only as a little wilful, heedless thing; but now they saw the better, higher nature in the child, expanding through the sorrow and the joy she had felt so deeply,—just as young plants grow and blossom when sunshine follows rain.

"I should think myself a happy man, Desborough, if I had such another fairy to call me father," observed the major, as they listened to Kathleen's cooing voice as she chattered on.

"O Carly, don't you know your own, own sissy? Now eat this, you dear, and Kath will give you plenty more, all so nice. There, there!"

"That sahib would blow the conch shell for a daughter," remarked Rattam thoughtfully. "I remember how our people blew it loudly for joy when Aglar was born; but when my little sister Deodee came, they all began to sigh and lament. I really think it would be well for us if that were changed."

"Then change it all you can," retorted Oliver. "Some day you and I will be men. But you need not wait for that; you are a brother now."

Rattam went home with a shadow on his brow, and a hunger in his heart for better things. We know of the promise that such hunger shall be satisfied at last; but Rattam knew only the favourite Hindu saying, "As it has always been, so it always will be," which fell like a wet blanket on his new-born wish to try. Yet that one day had not been lived in vain.

CHAPTER XV.

A LITTLE SAVAGE.

As the search-party were descending the hills, the Thibetan peeped out from the water-shed. The sheen of her resplendent jewels caught Oliver's eye, so he sent his uncle's syce to persuade her to go with them to the Beebee Desborough, who knew her. She was mourning over her lost cows, which she feared some of the wandering robber tribes would drive away if they found them straying. They all wore necklets of red cloth, she said, which she had sewn with cowries in patterns.

Oliver was counting up his money, to see if he could buy her a cow, when one of the jogies declared he had seen them rush out from the jungle when they were beating the second koond. He was certain she would find them roaming amidst the bushes below the ruins. So on she went, for the vultures and kites were sweeping round and round in great disorder—a sure presage of the approach of the storm Tara Ghur had predicted. A gust of cold wind swept down from the highest peaks, driving before it a dark and whirling cloud, which covered the travellers with a thick pall of dust.

They groped their way, afraid to linger in the dangerous neighbourhood of the koonds, and still more afraid of losing each other.

Major Iffley rode about, looking up the stragglers; and making the men close round the dandy, they marched on. A brooding silence filled the air, only broken at intervals by the vulture's scream or the beat of retreating wings. Mr. Desborough parted the curtains of the dandy and felt about, to assure himself both children were safe. Carl waked with the darkness, and began to howl—the same wild howl which had frightened the old shikaree in the morning. He was not there now to point out its danger. But the Thibetan put her hand to her ear again and again as she listened. Was there an answer from the distant koond?

"Do you hear anything?" asked Oliver, as the first returning gleam of light showed them the gate of Mr. Desborough's compound. They had reached his home, and might have passed it unawares, so great was the darkness of the coming storm. The trees in his garden bent their proud heads, and swayed from side to side like jungle grass as the rain came down at last in a mighty torrent. There was just light enough to distinguish the white columns of the veranda through the open gate. There was a general rush to shelter, for in those brief moments the carriage drive had become a rushing river. The gleam of the lighted lamps in Mr. Desborough's hall cast a glow of welcome on the sodden curtains of the dandy. Mr. Desborough made his men carry it right through the folding doors, and set it down on the middle of the floor, whilst he carefully closed them behind it. Major Iffley had divined his intention, and was already shutting every other door which opened into the hall. Oliver and his uncle were both shut out, and groped their way to the dining-room window, where Bona was standing watching the storm.

"You here!" they both exclaimed in surprise, as she opened it to let them in.

"Why, yes," she hesitated. "I grew so impatient I came across to see if you had got home. Have you found anything?"

"Yes, yes!" they reiterated, as Mrs. Desborough herself appeared behind her.

"Where is Kathleen?" she asked, looking beyond the deputy—whom she failed to recognize in the gloom of the storm—to the dripping coolies. The men were crowding in the veranda, rubbing their wet feet and wringing the water from their calico garments.

In the hubble-bubble of the many tongues she failed to understand anything.

"Kathleen is all right," said Bona quickly. "I told you she was with her father."

"Calm your anxiety, my dear Mrs. Desborough," began the deputy, with a seriousness which he intended should prepare the way; but it only startled her.

"What does all this mean?" she asked, looking from one to the other.

"It means—well, it means—" and the deputy coughed to gain time.—"Just see, Oliver," he added aside.

"Bother it!" muttered the boy; "I can't open this door."

Bona hastened to his help; but they pushed against it in vain.

Mrs. Desborough, always apprehensive since Carl was lost, was growing desperate. "Where is Kathleen?" she reiterated.

"Call her," suggested the coughing deputy to his nephew.

"Kathleen!" shouted Oliver. "Do come to your mother."

"Are the doors all shut?" demanded Mr. Desborough in return.

"Yes, yes!" echoed a chorus of voices as Mr. Desborough walked in, carrying what seemed to his wife to be nothing but a big bundle of calico.

Kathleen flew to her side. Mrs. Desborough caught hold of her by both hands.

"Do not look at me, mamma; look at what we've found," said Kathleen excitedly.

"A child," continued Mr. Desborough, speaking as quietly as he could. "Come and look, my dear."

A flash of lightning lit up the darkened room for one brief moment, and left it blacker than before.

"Bring lights," said Mr. Desborough.

"Yes; and order in the roast-joint, for this poor lad has scarcely tasted food all day," put in Major Iffley, laying his hand on Oliver's shoulder. "Besides," he added in a low aside, "nothing will be so attractive to that young animal as the savoury smell of the roast. I speak advisedly."

"Let us have our dinner, my dear," said Mr. Desborough, turning to Mrs. Desborough as she bent over the bundle in his arms.

The lights quickly appeared, followed by the ayah with sponge, soap, and towel.

He took the sponge from her hand, and gently washed the queer little face that was hiding itself from the light under his arm. He turned Carl slowly round towards Mrs. Desborough. But no amount of dirt, no scars, no scratches, could hide the truth from his mother. She clasped him to her, exclaiming, "It is ours—our own—our Carl!"

"Can it be possible?" cried Bona.

"With God all things are possible," said the deputy reverently. How Kathleen listened! The servants were hurrying in with the steaming dishes of roast-meat, game and fowl. The cloth had been laid an hour ago, awaiting the return of the gentlemen. There was little to do, but they made that little long in their eagerness to catch sight of the lost and found. At last they were all dismissed, and the doors made fast.

"Now, Iffley," said Mr. Desborough; and they began to unwind the length of calico with which poor Carly had been fettered. Between them they got him at last into a clean pinafore of Horace's which the ayah had brought.

Then his mother took him on her lap; but how to hold him was the difficulty. He wriggled and twisted himself into all sorts of contortions. He had struck with shoes and socks, and would have none of them, and began his fearful howl once more.

"Quiet!" said Mr. Desborough, in a quick, decisive tone; and the noise was hushed in a moment. But the light was obviously painful to Carl. He put up his hands, flickering his fingers before his eyes.

"He will howl again," said the major, "if we all stand looking at him."

"Give him a bone," suggested Oliver, who was going in for a good feed, a little quicker and faster than etiquette allowed; but a day's starvation is no joke, and everybody told him to help himself, and he was just doing it.

Carl slid down from his mother's lap and sat under the table sucking his bone contentedly. Presently he gave a rough, hoarse cry that sounded very much like "More." It was his first attempt to speak. The wing of chicken on Kathleen's plate was in his other hand in a moment.

"We are getting on," said the major, looking down at the two small heads beneath the table, whilst the deputy was explaining to Mrs. Desborough where and how they had found her child. It was a never-to-be-forgotten hour: the storm was raging without, thankfulness and wonder reigned within.

Oliver grew eloquent as he described the amazing sagacity of Rattam's old hunter. It was happiness now to look back and see how slender was the thread on which the poor child's fate had depended, and how singularly it had been preserved in the midst of unheard-of perils. Mrs. Desborough's eyes were welling over as she thought of her long-lost darling, in the midst of the wild beasts in a trackless koond, yet fed and cherished! How?

By the mercy of our heavenly Father, as she truly said, in the fervour of her mother's love. But she did not see the way in which the wonderful escape had been brought about. She knew nothing of the double nature in the wolf; and they told her it was safe in Rattam's cage. That there was any danger yet for her child, from the very love of the wolves, never crossed her mind; how could it?

She had enough to think about. Her child was at her feet, but it had forgotten its home. She saw it, estranged and wild.

"Call him by his name," said Mr. Desborough. "Call him Carl every time you give him anything to eat, and he will remember his name; if not, he will soon learn it afresh. We must 'gentle' him, as the grooms say, my dear. Never fear; we shall bring him round."

Carl had taken the wing of the chicken Kathleen had brought him, and laid his other bone on the floor. Kathleen still sat on the carpet by his side, with a patience she had never shown to any one before. He had even rubbed his head against her shoulder, when the moongus, which had been asleep in one corner of the room, aroused, and seeing an inviting bone, stole up to it for a taste. Carl flew at it in savage fury, tearing and raging. The scuffle which ensued before the two were parted filled Mrs. Desborough with many fears for Horace, who was happily in bed and asleep before his brother was brought home. But to the surprise of every one present, when Mr. Desborough made his voice heard above the din of the combatants, Carl was silent in a moment, and dropped back on the floor in instantaneous obedience. After a little while he came creeping to his father's feet. Oh, it was piteous to see him so, and yet it was hopeful.

Kathleen, who was trembling all over, put her moongus out of the room, and ran back with her lap full of playthings. She had brought Carl's own old drum that he used to be so fond of, and his horse and cart, and a new steam-engine he had never seen. "Perhaps," she thought, "he may remember these. They were his favourites; and Racy always loves my engine." She set it running on the floor before Carl's feet. The major lifted up his corner of the tablecloth, that he might watch the proceedings. Carl gave one of his frog-like leaps, pounced on the swiftly-moving toy, and snapped it in two with a cry of delight.

"Never mind, dear," said Mrs. Desborough, turning to Kathleen.

"Mind, mamma!" repeated Kathleen desperately; "can I ever mind anything he does, when I know that all this happened because I meddled with the blind? You told me never to touch it, and all my crying would not undo the mischief. Carl is better than I am, mamma, for he has minded every word papa has spoken."

"This comforts me, Kathleen, more than anything else," answered her mother fondly. "Always to obey is the one great lesson for every child to learn, and it cannot be learned too early. It is the foundation-stone of all that is good in after life—a young child's safeguard and its shield. If you both are careful to obey, we shall soon bring Carly round, and all be happy again."

Kathleen hung her head in her self-reproachful shame. She did not see the joy in her mother's eyes; for there is no joy so dear to a mother's heart as the joy of seeing her children try to overcome their faults, and turn to all that is right and good.

No one else understood the whispered conversation; they were all intent on Carl. Oliver took up the drum and beat a jolly tune.

Suddenly Carl sprang up and listened. Yes, there was a tiny creeping sound. It was only the lizard from behind the picture-frame that hung over the sideboard coming out for its crumbs, which Kathleen gathered for it every day after dinner. It was a pretty rose-pink creature, with a sharply-pointed tail and bead-like eyes. It had grown so tame it ran between the plates, helping itself as it liked.

"Tic-tickee!" cried Carl, calling it by the Hindu name his ayah had taught him, and grabbing at it with both his hands.

Strange that he should remember the lizard, when everything else was forgotten! Had he played with the lizards in the forest? Oh, horror! he was going to eat it. Bona nearly screamed. In her heart she was almost as afraid of him as the Hindu servants, and was thankful when the deputy talked of going, for the storm was over.

"If you want us, Desborough," said Major Iffley, "we are not so very far away. But you will tame your young savage all the better when you are alone."

They were careful even in the moment of departure not to leave a door ajar, for fear little Carl should try to rush out.

"Come and look at him to-morrow," replied Mr. Desborough, "when a warm bath and his mother's scissors have had their turn."

"Leave the shoes and socks for a day or two—that is my advice," laughed the deputy as he rode away, splashing through the flood that still surrounded the compound.

The horse which had been found for Oliver was tired with its day's hard work, and would not keep pace with his uncle's and Bona's. As he lagged behind he heard a cow lowing in the moonlight. He thought of the Thibetan when he saw the horned head drinking at the stream which drained the road. He rode up to it, looking for the scarlet necklet she had described.

There it was, embroidered all over with tiny shells in a most fanciful pattern. Laughing heartily to think of so much ingenuity being wasted on a cow, he drove it before him into the gates of Runnangore, glad to have recovered one of the scattered herd for their luckless owner. He was sure that Mr. Desborough would look after her; but he meant to take her a new blanket all the same.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE CONCLUSION.

The sunrise found Old Gray Legs roaming through the koond in search of his missing mate, whilst the half-grown wolflings sat howling by the korinda bush until the sun was high. The time for sleep had come. They laid themselves down, but not to rest. The most adventurous of them all had his ear on the ground listening. It heard Old Gray Legs give tongue as he found himself at last on the track of his mate. Out they all rushed, scattering themselves over bush and boulder to join him. They were scenting the ground as they ran, and one of them alighted on the path which Carl had taken with his furry protector. Once on the scent of his lost playfellow, the keen young wolf pursued him through all its windings to the pit, which it had just light enough to avoid, then up to the heights, and back to the very gate of Mr. Desborough's compound, where it lay crouching among the ferns.

The native servants were at their usual work. Bene Madho was returning from the bazaar, with one or two of the coolies carrying home his purchases. The dandy-bearers, who went into the patches of jungle to cut grass for the horses every day, were coming back with their bundles on their heads. The Thibetan was with them. She had gone out hoping to see something of her straying cattle. Oliver, too, had risen early. He wanted to tell her to come over to Runnangore and claim her cow. In spite of her rags and her losses she was a rich woman. She had only to sell a few of her beads to buy a new herd. Bona would gladly become their purchaser, so he made this a reason for presenting himself at the gate of Noak-holly by five o'clock in the morning. He did not expect to see either Mr. or Mrs. Desborough at such an hour, but he thought he might inquire of the servants how the night had gone.

In truth, it had gone queerly enough behind the nursery purdah, where both father and mother had been working at their precious little savage with sponge, soap, and towel. The cutting of his hair was terrible, and, worse than all, the cutting of his nails, which had grown into veritable claws. The poor wee child, so long a stranger to bath or hair-brush, hated both. If his father had not been there to hold him, it would not have been possible to wash him clean from Tara's bird-lime. Painful as the tedious process must have been, he was singularly obedient. He seemed to like nothing so well as coiling himself round on his mother's lap. But to get him to sleep was an impossibility. Oh how his father longed for the lulling influences of the water-shed on the hills! Carl was continually racing after the toads and spiders, making all sorts of strange noises, feeling his way about the darkened room, and howling at each unfamiliar sound. But morning dawned, and he began to yawn and blink in the growing light. Suddenly he gave one of his frog-like leaps, parting the chintz curtains of the purdah with his head, and peeping into the veranda. Mr. Desborough was nodding; but mamma was close beside her boy, wondering what he would do next. The servants were all astir, and the gate was locked, so she let him take his first look round by daylight.

Another bound and he was over the veranda railing into the garden, where he coiled himself round in the middle of a bed of mignonnette, and settled for sleep at last.

"Better not disturb him," thought Mrs. Desborough. "After so many months in the woods he could not sleep indoors."

So she opened a large white sunshade over his head, and sat down under an acacia tree to watch his slumbers.

Mr. Desborough was sleeping too, having had no rest for two whole nights. She could not bear to wake him, so she called up Kathleen. It was early; but the early morning in India is delightful. The ayah brought her, and returned to Horace, who had not yet seen his brother.

Swarms of young frogs had appeared in the veranda after last night's storm. The bhisti was gathering them up, sweeping them into a pail to carry away and put them somewhere outside the compound. Kathleen amused herself with watching the round, red insects which covered the grass, looking as if, instead of a hailstorm, there had been a shower of red velvet buttons, the rain had brought them out in such numbers. The gardener was hoeing within call.

"Yes," thought Mrs. Desborough; "all safe at home. All danger over now." Yet she could not take her eyes off the little sleeper in the mignonnette.

"When he awakens," she said to Kathleen, "we will let him see Horace at play in the veranda. I fear they have forgotten each other; but they are twins, and the old love will revive. It will be safer to have the veranda railing between them at first. Racy is so trying, and if Carl grew cross he might fly at his brother as he did at your moongus. We will put the old red reins on Carl, so that he cannot leap away unawares. Being with Racy will bring Carl round sooner than anything else, if it is but safe to let them be together."

Whilst Mrs. Desborough was speaking the men came in with their bundles of grass. As the gate opened, in rushed the wolf with a cry. Up flew Carl with a bound of delight to meet it. They tumbled on the grass together in a tumult of ecstasy. Mrs. Desborough's first thought was to lift up Kathleen into the acacia under which they were sitting, while she shrieked for help. At the sound of her voice and of the running feet hurrying towards her from every direction, the wolf stopped in its gambols, seized Carl in its mouth, and was dragging him away. They were nearly at the gate.

"Come back, Carl! Carl, come back!" cried Kathleen from the acacia boughs.

Mr. Desborough ran out with his gun. He was levelling it to take deadly aim, when he perceived the close embrace with which Carl was clinging to the wolf, and lowered it in despair.

"Shut the gate!" he shouted.

Oliver and the Thibetan rushed into the garden.

Mrs. Desborough saw Carl turn his head at the sound of his sister's voice, and she repeated the call in her desperation. His name rang loud and clear above the clamour the servants were raising in their usual fashion. Carl came as a well-trained dog obeys his master, and, O horror! the young wolf with him. She showered the cakes she had brought with her across the grass towards him. Oliver snatched a pitchfork from one of the grass-cutters and ran; but the Thibetan, who was the nearest, seized the wolf by the hind legs and held it fast. Oliver put the arching tines of the pitchfork over its neck like a collar, and drove the points into the ground until its head was fixed but not hurt, and he leaned on the handle with all his strength to keep it there. Oh for Tara Ghur! but the old shikaree was far away, rejoicing in his well-deserved and ample reward. Was there nobody to help?

"Hold hard!" shouted Mr. Desborough, as he rushed up white and resolute to pull the child away. But Carl clung passionately to his furry playfellow. The wolf had ceased to struggle, but it held his pinafore in a grip of iron.

Mr. Desborough tore the thin muslin in two, and forced the child backwards. Mrs. Desborough was close beside him. She pushed the sweetest cake she had into Carl's mouth to try to divert his attention. He threw it to the wolf as he struggled to free himself from his father's arm.

"Booraba no hurt child," said the Thibetan, who had watched the wolf and the child all night in the shikaree's pit. "Young booraba like its bahee [brother]. Hurt it, and child hate you all its life. Cage it, child stop, feed booraba; no run away from each other."

There was so much sense in what she urged so earnestly, Mr. Desborough was afraid to disregard it. He looked around him, not knowing what to do for the best. Then he shouted to the grass-cutters to fetch the iron hurdles which divided the paddock behind the garden. They ran across, pulled them up, and flung them over the hedge of roses.

Meanwhile Bene Madho had fetched old Gobur to the sahib's assistance. Mrs. Desborough had taken off Kathleen's sash and knotted it round Carl's waist, so that she could hold him whilst Mr. Desborough fixed the hurdles firmly in the grass.

Gobur came up with another pitchfork and put it over the wolf's hind legs, fixing them to the ground, as Oliver had fixed its head, to release the courageous Thibetan. It was a trying moment for Oliver when Mr. Desborough put down the fourth hurdle and shut him in with the wolf and Gobur. It was a tremendous effort to hold the wolf down, and he was getting exhausted.

Mr. Desborough saw this, and leaving his men to make a threefold fence round the wolf, he leaned over the hurdle and took the handle of the pitchfork from him. The boldest of the syces followed his example, and released Gobur. It was a moment of intense relief to Mrs. Desborough when she saw them both safely outside. The Thibetan was helping her to control Carl, who was struggling to get free. Five or six men were driving in the hurdles as fast as they could, and in the noise of their hammering Mrs. Desborough could no longer make herself heard.

By Mr. Desborough's orders every hurdle on the place was brought, until a perfect pyramid of iron was piled over the prostrate wolf. After the three-fold fence a row of hurdles were set endways between the lines, slanting inwards, and over these another tier was laid to form a roof, and another and another, crossing each other in every direction. Before the last corners were shut in the pitchforks were slowly withdrawn, and young Fawnie was left unhurt to examine the iron house which had been built over him.

One hurdle at the top was so placed that it could be withdrawn a little way, like a window-shutter. Gobur climbed up and let down a pail of water.

All the while the men were at work, Carl and the wolfling were crying to each other.

The wolfling was not yet six months old, and had not learned to be so wary as its mother. Yet it was strangely quieted when it found itself a prisoner. Not so Carl: he stamped, and sobbed, and kicked in an agony of distress, because he was shut out.

"Give him his liberty," said Mr. Desborough. "Let him run up to it if he likes."

Carl flew to the hurdles and tried to push between their rails, whilst Fawnie, as Oliver called the wolfling, worked at them from the inside. But the iron walls of his prison were too firmly built to be shaken. A frog leaped out of the grass. Fawnie snapped it up, and brought it to give to Carl through his prison bars.

Then Mrs. Desborough realized how her darling had been fed and kept alive in the trackless jungle.

Oliver was telling her of the old gray wolf now in Rattam's cage, and the Thibetan repeated her story.

The mother's feelings can be better imagined than described when she saw thus clearly that the love of the wild wolves had saved her child. Could she doubt it?

"Ought we to think it impossible?" urged Oliver. "In spite of all its savagery, the dog's nature is in the wolf. It is the strong family feeling amongst them which makes the pack. You see, I have heard a great deal about them from Tara Ghur; and I shall never forget that old wolf's face as she turned to Carl in the pit."

Gobur and the gardener were cutting off some long branches from the nearest trees, to thatch poor Fawnie's pyramid and shelter him from the sun.

Oliver ran to help them, until Fawnie's den looked like a gigantic heap of boughs. Then Oliver fetched the gardener's syringe and drenched it.

When Fawnie found it growing dark and cool as the nest beneath the korinda bush, he laid himself down and fell into the sound mid-day sleep of the wild beast.

But nothing short of force could drag Carl away, and that was not to be thought of. Mr. Desborough saw it would only embitter the child, and rouse and exasperate the wolfling. He was hoping that if Carl were left to himself he too would fall asleep. But no; all sleep was gone. Carl kept on raging round and round the pyramid, tugging with all his might at the boughs which hid his furry friend.

Mr. Desborough lifted Kathleen down from the acacia. Her presence had helped him so much in getting Carl safely through his journey home. But her brave little heart was failing her; she had been terribly frightened at the sight of Fawnie, and she clung to her mother, trembling.

"Fetch Racy," said Mr. Desborough in despair. "The sight of his twin-brother may draw the child away. We must try something."

Mrs. Desborough went herself, not daring to trust any one else with the rebellious Racy in such circumstances.

She soon reappeared, driving him before her on his pretty bicycle-horse; while the ayah crept beside her, her black face puckered with anxiety and fear as she looked at the group on the lawn, and above all at the portentous pyramid.

Horace, who could not understand what had happened, flourished his whip and shouted to his heart's content. He was highly delighted at having got mamma to be his syce. She slowly drove him round the lawn. Of course, he wanted to gallop off at once to his father and Kathleen; but Mrs. Desborough turned him back, so that Carl might see him. The twins perceived each other at last, and drew together, staring.

"Look, Racy, who is that sitting on the grass? Can it be Carl—Racy's own lost Carl—come home at last?"

Carl's eyes followed every movement of the pretty brown horse with a strange bewilderment.

Kathleen, with her father's arm round her, felt her courage revive. She glanced up at him inquiringly. He nodded. Away she ran to meet the young equestrian, calling Carl to follow. Again he obeyed.

"O Racy!" she exclaimed, "we've found poor Carl. Let us put him on your horse, and you and I will drive him home, for fear we should lose him. You push, and I will hold him on. Quick, dear, quick!"

"God bless her," said Mr. Desborough; "she has done it again."

Racy tumbled out of his saddle. Mrs. Desborough and the ayah lifted Carl into his place. He made no resistance, but laid his face down and began to bite the horse's ears. Kathleen seized the bridle. Racy pushed manfully behind. Mrs. Desborough held one arm and the ayah the other. Up ran the bhisti, who stretched over Horace's head and lifted the horse and its rider right up the veranda steps. As usual, the hall door stood wide; in rode Carl, and Mrs. Desborough locked it behind him.

"What is up now?" exclaimed Major Iffley, as he stopped at the familiar gate. "You have found out something wrong about the place?"

"Yes, an imperative necessity to leave it. I want to make over the indigo factory to you for at least a twelvemonth, whilst I take holiday with my wife and children. We should never have rescued Carl if he had not learned to obey, and now distance is our best defence," said Mr. Desborough gravely.

"Done!" answered the major gaily.

"If you go," put in Oliver earnestly, "give Fawnie over to me. He is young enough to tame and train, and I should be proud to own him. With a stout chain and collar he will prove a noble dog."

THE END.