of the ladies and officers from the neighbouring military station of Mhow were always invited to be present on the fourth day.  The old plotter proposed that, similarly, some of the English community of the Duars, the Civil Servants and planters, should receive invitations to Lalpuri.  It would seem only natural to include the Officer Commanding Ranga Duar.  And to tempt Dermot into the trap Chunerbutty suggested Noreen as a bait, undertaking to persuade her brother to bring her.

The Rajah was delighted at the thought of her presence in the Palace.  The Dewan smiled and quoted two Hindu proverbs: 

“Where the honey is spread there will the flies gather,” said he.  “Any lure is good that brings the bird to the net.”

The consequence of the plotting was that Noreen Daleham, fretting in Darjeeling at having to wait for her brother to come there for the Puja holidays, received a letter from him saying that he had changed his mind and had accepted an invitation from the Rajah of Lalpuri for her and himself to be present at the celebrations of the great Hindu festival at the Palace.  She was to pack up and leave at once by rail to Jalpaiguri, where he would meet her with a motor-car lent him for the purpose by the Lalpuri Durbar, or State Council.  If Mrs. Smith cared to accompany her an invitation for her would be at once forthcoming.  Fred added that he was making up a party from their district which included Payne, Granger, and the Rices.  From Lalpuri Noreen would return with him to Malpura.

The girl was delighted at the thought of leaving Darjeeling sooner than she had expected.  To her surprise Ida announced her intention of accompanying her to Lalpuri.  But the fact that her Calcutta friend was returning to the city on the Hoogly and that by going with Noreen she could travel with him as far as Jalpaiguri explained it.

Chunerbutty, deputed by the Rajah to act as host to his European guests, met Daleham’s party when they arrived at the gates of Lalpuri and conducted them to the Palace.  They passed through the teeming city with its thronged bazaar, its narrow, winding streets hemmed in by the overhanging houses with their painted walls and closely-latticed windows through which thousands of female eyes peered inquisitively at the white women, the brightly dressed crowds flattening themselves against the walls to get out of the way of the two cavalry soldiers of the Rajah’s Bodyguard who galloped recklessly ahead of the car.  Soon they reached the Nila Mahal, or Blue Palace, as His Highness’s residence was called, with its iron-studded gates, carved doors, and countless wooden balconies.  A swarm of retainers in magnificent, if soiled, gold-laced liveries filled the courtyards, and bare-footed sepoys in red coats, generally burst at the seams and lacking buttons, and old shakoes with white cotton flaps hanging down behind, guarded the entrance.