“What does he say?” I bellowed in Fred’s car.  But Fred was forcing his way closer to Gloria, to tell her.

“He says the Kurds are coming!  He says two regiments of Kurdish cavalry have been turned loose by the Turks with orders to ‘rescue’ Armenians.  They are on their way, riding by night for a wonder.  They cut both his hands off, but he got away by shamming dead.

He says they are cutting off the feet of people and bidding them walk to Tarsus.  They are taking the women and girls for sale.  Old women and very little children they are making what they call sport with.  Have you heard of Kurds?  Their ideas of sport are worse than the Red-man’s ever were.”

Every tongue in the room broke loose.  In another second every man was still.  They looked toward Ephraim.  He who could order a hanging so glibly should shoulder the new responsibility.

But Ephraim was not ready with a plan, and could not speak English.  Wild-eyed, he seized the lapel of my coat in trembling fingers, and with a throat grown suddenly parched, crackled a question at me in Armenian.  I could have understood Volopuk easier.

“What does he say, Fred?”

“He wants to know how soon Kagig can be here.”

“Kagig!” Ephraim echoed, clutching at my collar.  “Yes, yes, yes!  Kagig!  Come—­how soon?”

“We shall be all right,” said another man in English over on the far side of the room.  His hoarse voice sounded like a bellow in the silence.  “Kagig will come presently.  Kagig will butcher the Kurds.  Kagig will certainly save us.”

“Kagig!” Ephraim insisted.  “Come——­how soon?”

But I knew Kagig would not come, that night or at any time, and Ephraim shook me in frenzied impatience for an answer.

Chapter Eleven “That man’s dose is death, and he dies unshriven!”

“Male and female created he them”

The ancient orders pass.  The fetters fall. 
All-potent inspiration stirs dead peoples to new birth. 
And over bloodied fields a new, clear call
Rings kindlier on deadened ears of earth. 
Man—­male—­usurping—­unwise overlord,
Indoctrinated, flattered, by himself betrayed
And all-betraying since with idiot word
He bade his woman bear and be afraid,
Awakes to see delusion of the past
Unmourned along with all injustice die,
Himself by woman wisdom blessed at last
And her unchallenged right the reason why.

Now for a moment I became the unwilling vortex of that mob of anxious men and women—­I who by, my own confession knew Kagig, I who had sent Kagig a message, I who five minutes ago was on the verge of being hanged in the greasy noose that still swung above the ladder through the hole in the roof—­I who therefore ought to be thoroughly plastic-minded and obedient to demands.

The place had become as evil smelling as the Black Hole of Calcutta.  Everybody was sweating, and they shoved and milled murderously in the effort to get near me and learn, each with his own ears from my lips, just when Kagig might be expected.  Ephraim, their presumptive leader, got shuffled to the outside of the pack—­the only silent man between the four walls, watchful for new opportunity.