Oh,—­nights of tireless talking by the hearth of hidden fires—­
On roofs, behind the trade-bales—­among oxen in the byres—­
Out in rain between the godowns, where the splashing puddles warn
Of tiptoeing informers; when I faced the freezing dawn
With set price on my head, but still the set resolve untamed,
Not melted by the mockery, by no suspicion shamed,
To hide by day in holes, abiding dark and wind and rain
That loosed me straining to the task ye ridiculed again!

Oh, weeks of empty waiting, while the enemy designed
In detail how to loot the stuff ye would not leave behind! 
Worse weeks of empty agony when, helpless and alone,
I watched in hiding for the crops from that seed I had sown;

For dust-clouds that should prove at last Armenia awake—­
A nation up and coming!  I had labored for your sake,
I had hungered, I had suffered.  Ye had well rewarded then
If ye had come, and hanged me just to prove that ye were men!

But all the pride was promises, the criticism jeers;
Ye had no heart for sacrifice, and I no time for tears. 
I offered—­nay, I gave!  I squandered body and breath and soul,
I bared the need, I showed the way, I preached a goodly goal,
I urged you choose a leader, since your faith in me was dim,
I swore to serve the chief ye chose, and teach my lore to him,
So he should reap where I had sown.  And yet ye bade me wait—­
And waited till, awake at last, ye bid me lead too late!

And so, in place of ripe reward,
Your cactus crown!  And I, who urged
“Get ready for the untoward”
Must drink the dregs of wrath I dirged! 
Ye bid me set time’s finger back! 
And stage anew the opened fight! 
I’ll lead.  But slime of Dead Sea wrack
Were sweeter on my lips this night!

The first thought that occurred to each of us four was that Kagig had probably lied, or that he had merely voiced his private opinion, based on expectation.  The glare in the distance seemed too big and solid to be caused by burning houses, even supposing a whole village were in flames.  Yet there was not any other explanation we could offer.  A distant cloud of black smoke with bulging red under-belly rolled away through the darkness like a tremendous mountain range.

We stood in silence trying to judge how far away the thing might be, Kagig standing alone with his foot on the parapet, his goat-skin coat hanging like a hussar’s dolman, and Monty pacing up and down along the roof behind us all.  The gipsies seemed able to converse by nods and nudges, with now and then one word whispered.  After a little while Maga whispered in Will’s ear, and he went below with her.  All the gipsies promptly followed.  Otherwise in the darkness we might not have noticed where Will went.

“That proves she is no gipsy!” vowed Rustum Khan, standing between Fred and me.  “They, would have trusted one of their own kind.”