But this sort of thing could not last long, since they were close to the caravan route from Kandahar to Kabul; and sure enough, no sooner had the snow on the uplands melted than travellers began to pass through.
Thus news that the little party had escaped death soon filtered from mouth to mouth, till it reached the Captain of the Escort, and ere long Foster-father found himself and those in his care once more semi-prisoners on their way to cruel brother Kumran; all the more cruel, doubtless, because King Humayon had already begun the siege of Kandahar, believing his little son to be still within its walls.
Now Kumran was a far cleverer fellow than his brother Askurry; but there was in him a love of deceit for deceit's sake, which spoiled all his cleverness, for it made him uncertain what he would do in the end.

This indeed is always the case with deceitful people.

They know that what they say and do is _not_ straightforward and true, and so they are like sailors without a compass.

They have no fixed pole by which to steer.
And, in addition, Kumran liked to be considered clever; so he was always outwardly very courteous, very polite, very charming; but what he was within none could say for long.
Thus Foster-father's heart sank within him, when in the distance, down the rocky ravine through which the Kabul River dashes, and along which the caravan road took its high-perched way, he saw the battlemented wall of the city, cresting the low hills on which the town was built.

It was a fully fortified town through which the river ran, and at its extreme end, commanding the wider plain below, stood the citadel called the Bala Hissar or High Fort.