AMANULLAH

walls of the Palace itself, there would soon rage the mob
that began the end of this strange chapter of Eastern
history.

Up and up we went, looking over the precipices and
skirting the outer ridges of the road as we went. The
road was well engineered, but still the surface was
appalling, and the back-seat passengers had their songs
choked in their throats if they ever contemplated another
burst of high spirits. There were more fords and
bridges, and more than once the driver had to force his
way over obstructions, where the road-menders were
clearing away landslips and huge boulders that had
fallen down the cliff-side.

It grew cooler every minute, until, at the top of the
plateau we had been mounting, a keen wind blew across
the road, delightful and invigorating. We stopped the
car for water, at one of the springs at the side of the road,
indicated by a notice board that Amanullah had been at
pains to erect for motorists.

Towards noon we stopped again, this time at the
command of a huge, signalling figure in the centre of the
road. We saw him from some way off, on the down slope
of a long gradient. He seemed strangely clad from a
distance. And as we got nearer, I saw that he was a
European, very tanned and swarthy, with the unmis-
takable features of an Italian.

He was dressed in mechanic's clothes, with the addition
of Afghan top-boots. His hands were oily and his face
was begrimed and sweating. When he had halted us, he
climbed on to the running-board and bade us drive down
the hill. Then we saw his trouble. A huge military
transport van, with the mark of an Italian firm on its
bonnet, but the Afghan Army marks on its flank, was at
the side of the road, its bonnet open and the legs of
another mechanic, similarly clad, appearing from the

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