“It’s a strange position,” Quest remarked moodily.

Lenora leaned forward to where a little group of Mongars were talking together.

“I wish that beautiful girl would come and let us see her again,” she murmured.

“She,” the Professor explained, “is the Chief’s daughter, Feerda, whose life Craig saved.”

“And from the way she looks at him,” Laura observed, “I should say she hadn’t forgotten it, either.”

The Professor held up a warning finger.  The girl herself had glided to their side out of the shadows.  She faced the Professor.  The rest of the party she seemed to ignore.  She spoke very slowly and in halting English.

“My father wishes to know that you are satisfied?” she said.  “You have no further wants?”

“None,” the Professor assured her.  “We are very grateful for this hospitality, Feerda.”

“Won’t you talk to us for a little time?” Lenora begged, leaning forward.

The girl made no responsive movement.  She seemed, if anything, to shrink a little away.  Her head was thrown back, her dark eyes were filled with dislike.  She turned suddenly to the Professor and spoke to him in her own language.  She pointed to the signs upon the tent, drew her finger along one of the sentences, flashed a fierce glance at them all and disappeared.

“Seems to me we are not exactly popular with the young lady,” Quest remarked.  “What was she saying, Professor?”

“She suspects us,” the Professor said slowly, “of wishing to bring evil to Craig.  She pointed to a sentence upon the tent.  Roughly it means ‘Gratitude is the debt of hospitality.’  I am very much afraid that the young lady must have been listening to our conversation a while ago.”

Lenora shivered.

“To think of any girl,” she murmured, “caring for a fiend like Craig!”

Before they knew it she was there again, her eyes on fire, her tone shaking.

“You call him evil, he who saved your lives, who saved you from the swords of my soldiers!” she cried.  “I wish that you had all died before you came here.  I hope that you yet may die!”

She passed away into the night.  The Professor looked anxiously after her.

“It is a humiliating reflection,” he said, “but we are most certainly in Craig’s power.  Until we have been able to evolve some scheme for liberating ourselves and taking him with us, if possible, I think that we had better avoid any reference to him as much as possible.  That young woman is quite capable of stirring up the whole tribe against us.  The whole onus of hospitality would pass if they suspected we meant evil to Craig, and they have an ugly way of dealing with their enemies....  Ah!  Listen!”

The Professor suddenly leaned forward.  There was a queer change in his face.  From somewhere on the other side of that soft bank of violet darkness came what seemed to be the clear, low cry of some animal.