CHAPTER XV

A BANDIT AS AMIR—RULE BY PERSECUTION—TWO AFGHANS
IN AN HOTEL—THE LAST BRITON LEAVES KABUL

riTlHE train rolled on through the night, across

II the bare and inhospitable desert into the dawn.
-*** The grinding of the brakes woke me, and I
tumbled out on to a small wayside platform. The
guards were at their positions, bayonets fixed. The
servants of the British officers in charge of the train
wandered about the little station. Further along, a
stout, unhappy individual stood talking to an English
civilian. It was Inayatullah.

Nobody knew who I was. The English Chief of Police
came up and asked me. I told him, and watched the
expressions of amazement, then anger, chase across his
face.

" You can throw me out here if you like," I said.
44 But it is such an out-of-the-way sort of place... ."

" How about some breakfast ? " he invited. We went
down the train to the refreshment car.

Next to me at table was a young, slim, Afghan prince.
He spoke perfect English. We talked of the cold morn-
ing, the coming hot weather, the food. We talked of
anything but this strange journey.

44 Were you at Oxford ? " he asked. 4C Do you know
the Cherwell ? When I was there, they stopped the
playing of gramophones on the Cherwell at night. I
thought it was very wise, for it is such a beautiful
stream,..."

Inayatullah die} not come to breakfast. He was, I

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