Being anxious, now, to get away as far as possible from the scene of the struggle, instead of going on to Magree as they had intended, they turned off by the first country road on the left-hand side, and made for Savandroog, which they could see towering up above the plain.

When within three miles of it, they halted in a large wood.

Here, as soon as the horses had been unsaddled, and the fire lighted, their talk naturally turned to the fight they had gone through.
"I cannot make out how you came to suspect them, Dick." "I can hardly account for it myself, but, as I told you, I did not like the look of that man, and I had an uneasy sort of feeling, which I could not explain even to myself, that there was danger in the air." "But what made you think of these Stranglers?
I had heard some talk about them, but never anything for certain." "The Rajah told me, when he was warning me against joining parties of travellers, that although very little was known about the organisation, it was certain that there was a sect who strangled and robbed travellers in great numbers.

He said that he was aware that complaints had been made, to princes all over India, of numbers of persons being missing; and that it was certain that these murders were not the work of ordinary dacoits, but of some secret association; and that even powerful princes were afraid to take any steps against it, as one or two, who had made efforts to investigate the affair, had been found strangled in their beds.

Therefore, no one cared to take any steps to search into the matter.