“You want to go today,” I continued. “I agree: If the maharaja was angry enough to shoot his pet monkeys yesterday, then today, after having all of us escape him at one time, he’ll be insane with rage. I’m glad Sunny is out of things, but the others are too vulnerable. We can’t wait until Nesbit is fit, but I refuse to stay with him. Leave Bindra here.”

“Unfortunately, I have given my word that the boy will not be left behind again,” O’Hara told me.

“As you wish, although I don’t believe I’d take a son of mine into that hornets’ nest. When do we go?”

“It is better that you stay here,” O’Hara said. Holmes took an involuntary step back.

“And why is that?” I began, then stopped. “No, don’t bother, I don’t need to ask. What do women need to do in order to be taken as equals? Become Prime Minister? For heaven’s sake, just pretend I’m ‘Martin’ if it makes you any happier, but let’s have no more words about leaving Miss Russell out of anything. Besides, you need me. I’m the only one who’s been to the toy room.”

“You can draw us a map.”

“Inaccurate. And you’d need to use a torch or matches, either of which would be seen from the room’s high window. I can walk it in the dark.”

O’Hara’s dark eyes travelled to consult Holmes, who nodded and said, “She has a certain skill at the Jewel Game.”

O’Hara studied me, as if such a talent would show on the surface, then said abruptly, “You went into the stables yesterday night.”

“Yes,” I replied, wondering if he was accusing me of something. “I wanted to see that the horses had been looked after.”

O’Hara had something else in mind. “We will cover your eyes, and you will walk through the stables by way of demonstration.”

It seemed to me a rather silly exercise, but we were, after all, embarked on a game here, and perhaps my accepting the challenge would move things ahead more rapidly.

And so it proved. From the moment O’Hara snugged the linen dish-cloth around my head to the time we slipped across the Khanpur border was a matter of half a day.

We left with a rucksack Bindra had found somewhere, provisioned with food, water, and candles; two knives and an ancient revolver Holmes had got from the khansama; the rope and morphia, which Holmes had hidden about his person ever since the night in the gaol; and several small but vital pieces of inside information possessed by Nesbit. Only when we had extracted the facts did we reveal to the man that we were leaving him behind. He was not pleased; we had to chain his wrist to the iron bed to keep him from joining us.