six o'clock
At early dawn next morning , before the village was awake , we crept with stealthy steps out of the monastery , whose inmates were friendly . Our new guide accompanied us . We avoided the village , on whose outskirts the lamasery lay , and made straight for the valley . By six o'clock , we were well out of sight of the clustered houses and the pyramidal spires . But I did not breathe freely till late in the afternoon , when we found ourselves once more under British protection in the first hamlet of the Maharajah 's territory . As for that scoundrel , Ram Das , we heard nothing more of him . He disappeared into space from the moment he deserted us at the door of the trap into which he had led us .