The next step was to proceed to Kamard and repeat the process of occupation. Here, however, an unexpected difficulty arose. The easy-going, hard-drinking Tajik chief of Kamard was far too wily to put himself into Haji Khan's power, and with some of the Uzbek chiefs who owed their allegiance to that fine old border bandit Murad Khan of Kunduz (of whom we shall hear again), positively declined to permit Haji Khan to come farther. Meanwhile, however, a force had advanced over the divide between Saighan and Kamard by a pass which Masson calls the Nalpach (or horseshoe-breaking pass), which can hardly be the same as the well-known Dandan Shikan (or tooth-breaking pass), but is probably to the east of it, leading more directly to Bajgah. Before ascending the pass, Masson noted the remains of an ancient town or fort built of immense stones, and here they halted. Here also snow fell. Next day a reconnaissance in force was made over the Nalpach Pass ("long, but not difficult"), and apparently part of the force descended into Kamard and commenced hostile operations against the Kamard chieftain. Haji Khan, however, returned to camp. He had now succeeded in breaking up the Hazara force which was with him into two or three detached bodies, so the opportunity was ripe for one of the blackest acts of treachery that ever disgraced Afghan history--which is saying a good deal. He entrapped and seized the fine old Hazara chief, Yezdambaksh, and, after dragging him about with him under circumstances of great indignity, he finally executed him. The Hazara troops seem to have scattered without striking a concerted blow; their camp was looted, whilst such wretched refugees as were caught were stripped and enslaved.
The savage barbarity of these proceedings, especially of the method of the execution of Yezdambaksh (a rope being looped round the wretched victim's neck, the two ends of which were hauled tight by a mixed company of relatives and enemies), disgusted Masson deeply, and there is a very obvious disposition evinced hereafter to part company with his treacherous host, although he makes some attempt to excuse these proceedings by pointing out that Haji Khan, after meeting with an unexpected rebuff from Kamard (which he dare not resent so long as the redoubtable Murad Beg loomed in the distance as the protector of the frontier chiefs of Badakshan), would have been unable to keep and feed his troops in the winter without scattering the Hazara contingent and possessing himself of the resources of Besud.
