The Two Ordeals

Umballa stepped back, his hand on his jeweled sword. He was quite
unprepared for any such flagrant mutiny--mutiny from his angle of
vision, though in law the troopers had only responded to the desire of
their queen. He turned questioningly to the council and the priests.
He himself could move no further. His confreres appreciated the danger
in which their power stood. They announced that it was decreed to give
the queen a respite of seven days in which to yield. It would at least
hold the bold troopers on the leash till they could be brought to see
the affair in its true light by the way of largess in rupees. Umballa
consented because he was at the bottom of the sack. A priest read from
a scroll the law, explaining that no woman might rule unmarried.
Because the young queen was not conversant with the laws of the state
she would be given seven days. Thus the durbar ended.

With a diplomacy which would have graced a better man Umballa directed
the troopers to escort Kathlyn to her chamber in the zenana. He had in
mind seven days. Many things could be accomplished in that space of
time.

"For the present," he said, smiling at Kathlyn, "the God of your
fathers has proven strongest. But to-morrow! . . . Ah, to-morrow!
There will be seven days. Think, then, deeply and wisely. Your
khidmutgar Rao is a prisoner. It will be weeks ere your presence is
known here. You are helpless as a bird in the net. Struggle if you
will; you will only bruise your wings. The British Raj? The British
Raj does not want a great border war, and I can bring down ten thousand
wild hillmen outlaws between whom and the British Raj there is a blood
feud; ten thousand from a land where there is never peace, only truce.
In seven days. Salaam, heaven born!"