It was the
voice of his pony, of his 'Dhooplal,' his 'red sunlight,' and, he
would never ride Dhooplal again. The south breeze brought no other
sound, the palace stretched on either side of him dark and still, a
sweet heavy fragrance from a frangipanni-tree in the garden floated
up, and that was all. Sunni looked across the river, and saw that
a group of palms on the other side was beginning to stand
distinctly against the sky. Then he remembered that he must make
haste.
The first thing he did was to unwind his long turban from his neck,
and cut it in two. Two-thirds he twisted round his waist, the
other he made fast to one of the little red stone pillars of the
balcony. It hung straight and black down into the shadows of the
pipal-tree. Then, very gradually and cautiously, Sunni slipped
over the balcony's edge and let himself down, down, till he reached
a branch thick enough to cling to. The turban was none too long,
the branches at the top were so slender. Just as he grasped a
thick one, clutching it with both arms and legs, and swaying
desperately in the dark, he felt a rush of wings across his face,
and a great white owl flew out hooting in her panic. The boy
almost missed his catch with fear, and the Maharajah, wakeful in
his apartments, lost another good hour's sleep through hearing the
owl's cry.
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