he was dressed like a Corahano, and yet he did not
look like one; he looked more like a
callardo,
and yet he was not a
callardo either, though
he was almost black; and as I looked upon him, I thought
he looked something like the Errate; and he said to
me, ‘Zincali, chachipe!’ and then he whispered
to me in queer language, which I could scarcely understand,
’Your
ro is waiting; come with me, my
little sister, and I will take you unto him.’
‘Where is he?’ said I, and he pointed to
the west, to the land of the Corahai, and said, ’He
is yonder away; come with me, little sister, the
ro
is waiting.’ For a moment I was afraid,
but I bethought me of my husband, and I wished to
be amongst the Corahai; so I took the little
parne
I had, and locking up the
cachimani, went with
the strange man. The sentinel challenged us at
the gate, but I gave him
repani, and he let
us pass; in a moment we were in the land of the Corahai.
About a league from the town, beneath a hill, we found
four people, men and women, all very black like the
strange man, and we joined ourselves with them, and
they all saluted me, ‘little sister.’
That was all I understood of their discourse, which
was very crabbed; and they took away my dress and
gave me other clothes, and I looked like a Corahani;
and away we marched for many days amidst deserts and
small villages, and more than once it seemed to me
that I was amongst the Errate, for their ways were
the same. The men would
hokkawar with mules
and asses, and the women told
baji, and after
many days we came before a large town, and the black
man said, ’Go in there, little sister, and there
you will find your
ro;’ and I went to
the gate, and an armed Corahano stood within the gate,
and I looked in his face, and lo! it was my
ro.
“Oh, what a strange town it was that I found
myself in, full of people who had once been Candore,
but had renegaded and become Corahai! There were
Sese and Lalore, and men of other nations, and amongst
them were some of the Errate from my own country;
all were now soldiers of the Crallis of the Corahai,
and followed him to his wars; and in that town I remained
with my ro a long time, occasionally going out
to him to the wars; and I often asked him about the
black men who had brought me thither, and he told
me that he had had dealings with them, and that he
believed them to be of the Errate. Well, brother,
to be short, my ro was killed in the wars,
before a town to which the king of the Corahai laid
siege, and I became a piuli, and I returned
to the village of the renegades, as it was called,
and supported myself as well as I could; and one day,
as I was sitting weeping, the black man, whom I had
never seen since the day he brought me to my ro,
again stood before me, and he said, ’Come with
me, little sister, come with me; the ro is at
hand;’ and I went with him, and beyond the gate
in the desert was the same party of black men and
women which I had seen before. ’Where is
my ro?’ said I. ‘Here he is,
little sister,’ said the black man, ’here
he is; from this day I am the ro and you are
the romi. Come, let us go, for there is
business to be done.’