When Jivan came to live with his grandfather, who was Prime Minister of Jaipur, there were many things he did not understand. Why, for instance, was he never allowed to ride out unattended on Raj-raj, his great black horse that he loved dearly? What was the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Dhuleep, his cousin, a few months before? What was the secret of the golden bird with ruby eyes that his grandfather cherished? And why did Grandfather insist he go off in the fall to the Chiefs School when he had only so recently come to live with him? Jivan was troubled, but he realized that older and wiser people than he were also facing serious problems. India was about to achieve independence from the British Empire, and there were many decisions to be reached.
Lured away by a mysterious note, Jivan left the safety of his grandfather's house and traveled to Delhi in search of his missing cousin. There, living as an errand boy in the bazaars of the old city, Jivan slowly began to piece together bits of information. Finally, though he endangered his own life in so doing, he was able to untangle the threads of mystery that had bound him for so long.
As readers of The Thirteenth Stone--to which this is an independent sequel--and other of miss Bothwell's books know, she gives a vivid picture of the colorful country of which she writes, and her characters, for all their differences in dress and customs, seem very real to young Americans.