But, though we tried, we could not send a telegram from there either, although King took the station babu to one side and proved to him beyond argument that he knew the secret service signs.

The babu was extremely sorry, but the wire was down.

The trains were being run for the present on the old block system, one train waiting in a station until the next arrived, and so on.
So, although King sent a long telegram in code from a junction before we reached Lahore, nothing had been done about it by the time we had changed into Christian clothes at our hotel and called on the head of the Intelligence Department.

And by then it was a day and a half since we had seen the Gray Mahatma.
The best part of another day was wasted in consulting and convincing men on whose knees the peace of India rested.

They were naturally nervous about invading the sacred privacy of Hindu temples, and still more so of investigating Yasmini's doings in that nest of hers.