He was the High Priest Seydama, guardian of the Holy Tooth--the one living being who dared by right to touch it or to lay hands upon the shrine that contained it.

Fearful, when the false rumour of that intended loot was circulated, that infidel eyes should look upon it, infidel hands profane the sacred relic, he determined to remove it from Dambool to the rock-hewn temple of Galwihara and to enshrine it there.

For the purpose of giving no clue to his movements, he chose to abandon his priestly vestments, to disguise himself as a common tribesman, and, the better to defeat the designs of any who might penetrate that disguise and endeavour to take the sacred relic from him and hold it for ransom, he hid the Holy Tooth in the barrel of a gun.

That gun was in his hands, your ladyship, when Ferralt rushed out and brained him." "In his hands?
Oh, Mr.Cleek, then--then--" Her voice all but failed her as a sudden realization came.

"That relic, that fetish! If it was in that gun at that time, then it is now--" "Embedded in the fleshy part of the boy's thigh," said Cleek, finishing the sentence for her.