Minnie, nostrils flaring but answering loyally to the leg, kept her ground until at last the boar, exhausted, gave way, toppling like a sniped stag.

Hervey jumped down. ‘Carbine, Sar’nt Acton!’

He’d no intention of just letting it bleed to death; and a Derringer wouldn’t do.

Acton unshipped the carbine – it was ready primed – and handed it him.

‘A good size, Colonel. And a fighter.’ (He’d leave his observations about the native officers till later.)

‘Indeed.’

A shot, a grunt, and then it was over. Hervey handed back the carbine and touched his cap to the trophy.

The rissaldar, come from the other side of the jhow, jumped down beside him.

‘The colonel is a great shikaree,’ he said in English, and with a smile that was almost warm.

Hervey simply nodded, and coolly. He’d no desire to be complimented by a junior, especially one who’d nearly unseated him. But the admonitions could wait – and the fathoming of what on earth he’d been about.

‘The village chief will come with his men to take the boar,’ said the rissaldar, pointing to the smoke rising in the distance. ‘Please come away now, Colonel, for there is someone who wishes to meet with you.’

Fairbrother heard, and gave Hervey a quizzical look, as if uneasy.

‘Who, Rissaldar?’

‘I am bound not to say, Colonel-sahib. Please come.’

Hervey managed to suppress his irritation, just. ‘We’d better accept, I think,’ he said to Fairbrother, mindful that he didn’t know just how much English the rissaldar understood.

‘Very well.’

The rissaldar looked relieved. ‘Mehrbanee, Colonel-sahib.’

It was the second time he’d added ‘sahib’ to ‘colonel’ – a definite sign of subordination, of submission even. Hervey couldn’t fathom his game.

Tired though they were, the rissaldar put his horse into a canter and turned north towards the forest a quarter of a mile away. Only now did Hervey appreciate they’d come so close, for he was sure the boar had run in the straightest of lines – though perhaps it was the forest which bent south?

Then he saw: spectators, mounted, two dozen and more, by the forest edge.

A little further and he realized who it must be.

The rissaldar slowed to a trot as one of the party – an officer in the uniform of the bodyguard – advanced to meet them.

Fifty yards short, they halted.

‘Colonel Hervey, I am Rissaldar-major Natu,’ said the officer, in the clearest English. ‘I am sirdar of the household. The Ranee wishes you to be presented.’

Hervey angered. He’d been sported with. For what purpose? He kept it close, however. It wouldn’t do to show.

He nodded, and followed keeping Minnie collected, weary though she was.

He looked the Ranee straight in the eye as they neared. She sat composed, astride, splendid in blue silks, and flanked by sowars and an assortment of courtiers – men, all; not another of her sex in sight.

Had she played him as a cat’s paw, if at a distance?