AMANULLAH

The excuse saved his life, but it did not satisfy the
deputation, or the soldiers who heard the tale from them.
They offered Ali Ahmed Jhan an ultimatum* He could
stay and be killed, or fly. With a little more whiskey, he
might have defied them, but that night he fled over the
Border to Peshawar, where men had broader views
about the proper use for the best Scotch.

One night, a month after I saw him, he finished the
current bottle, and left once more for Afghanistan. But
he had hiccupped his last. He found himself in the centre
of a struggle that was no longer a drunkard's dream,
discovered himself no longer to be the Strong Man of
Kabul, and died a violent death before he had made
many days' journey towards Kabul. A jovial rascaL I
had enjoyed our little talk in the Peshawar hotel.

Nadir Khan, sober and soldierly, made no move for
many months. He paced his room in Peshawar until
well into the hot weather, waiting for the snow to clear
from the passes. He was an impressive man, and an
old campaigner. He it was who had crossed the Frontier
on that innocent journey to see a relative in 1919. The
result had been the Second Afghan War. He combined
then, and does still, the cunning of the Afghan with the
learning of the West. But in these days, working behind
the scenes in Peshawar bazaar, he was more Asiatic than
otherwise.

The winter was a hard one. The passes were frozen
well into the second month of the year, and all movement
in the land over the Border was suspended until less
danger was threatened by the elements.

In spite of the handicap, however, the aeroplanes
were still going daily to Kabul bringing back their
quota of refugees. The landing-ground at Peshawar
was daily a busy scene. Then came the news that the
last claimants to a place in a British machine had been

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