Part 51 (2/2)

At first she couldof what she saw; all was chaotic and shadowy, shapes , black for of blood-red that dulled and glowed Then actions and objects assumed their proper proportions, and she linted on silver and ivory ornaures strutted and posed, silhouettes carved out of darkness and liiants in pluirdles, sat a fat, squat shape, abys of the dank rotting jungle and the nighted sway hands rested on the sleek arch of his belly; his nape was a roll of sooty fat that seeleaht, like live coals in a dead black stuestion of the gross body

As the girl's gaze rested on that repellant figure, her body stiffened and tensed as frantic Life surged through her again Froed suddenly to a sentientPain was drowned in hate, so intense it in turn became pain; she felt hard and brittle, as if her body were turning to steel She felt her hate flow al the line of her vision; so it seemed to her that the object of her emotion should fall dead from his carven stool because of its force

But if Bajujh, king of Bakalah, felt any psychic discomfort because of the concentration of his captive, he did not show it He continued to cra-like mouth to capacity with handfuls ofwo for back on either hand

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Down this lane, walled with sweaty black hue would co from the strident clamor of drum and horn And as she watched, one ca three abreast, advanced toward the ivory stool, a thick line of waving pluh the ure at the sight of which Livia started violently; her heart seeainst that dusky background, this man stood out with vivid distinctness He was clad like his followers in leopard-skin loin-clout and plumed head-piece, but he was a white man

It was not in the manner of a suppliant or a subordinate that he strode up to the ivory stool, and sudden silence fell over the throng as he halted before the squatting figure Livia felt the tenseness, though she only di his short neck upward, like a great frog; then, as if pulled against his will by the other's steady glare, he sha his shaven head

Instantly the tension was broken A treesture froer, his warriors lifted their spears and boo Bajujh Whoever he was, Livia knew the man must indeed be powerful in that wild land, if Bajujh of Bakalah rose to greet hie violence was the only thing respected by those ferocious races

Thereafter Livia stood with her eyes glued to the crack in the hut wall, watching the white stranger His warriorsbeer He himself, with a few of his chiefs, sat with Bajujh and the head She saw his hands dipped deep into the cooking pots with the others, saw his muzzle thrust into the beer vessel out of which Bajujh also drank But she noticed, nevertheless, that he was accorded the respect due a king Since he had no stool, Bajujh renounced his also, and sat on the ht, the king of Bakalah barely sipped it before he passed it to the white man Power! All this ceree! Livia trean to form in her mind

So she watched the whiteevery detail of his appearance He was tall; neither in height nor in iant blacks He reat panther When the firelight caught his eyes, they burned like blue fire High-strapped sandals guarded his feet, and fro a sword in a leather scabbard His appearance was alien and unfamiliar; Livia had never seen his like But shethe races of h that his skin hite

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The hours passed, and gradually the roar of revelry lessened, as men and wo, and lifted his hands, less a sign to end the feast, than a token of surrender in the contest of gorging and guzzling, and stuht by his warriors who bore him to his hut The white man rose, apparently none the worse for the incredible auest hut by such of the Bakala head He disappeared into the hut, and Livia noticed that a dozen of his own spearmen took their places about the structure, spears ready Evidently the stranger was taking no chances on Bajujh's friendshi+p

Livia cast her glance about the village, which faintly rese streets streith drunken shapes She knew that uarded the outer boe were the spear to nod and lean on their spears

With her heart beating halided to the back of her prison hut and out the door, passing the snoring guard Bajujh had set over her Like an ivory shadow she glided across the space between her hut and that occupied by the stranger On her hands and knees she crawled up to the back of that hut A black giant squatted here, his pluled past him to the wall of the hut She had first been imprisoned in that hut, and a narrow aperture in the wall, hidden inside by a hanging mat, represented her weak and pathetic attegled her lithe body through, thrusting the inner ht from without faintly illumined the interior of the hut Even as she thrust back the rasp in her hair, and was dragged bodily through the aperture and plu with the suddenness of it, she gathered her scattered wits together, and raked her disordered tresses out of her eyes, to stare up into the face of the white man who towered over her, amazement written on his dark scarred face His sas naked in his hand, and his eyes blazed like bale-fire, whether with anger, suspicion or surprize she could not judge He spoke in a language she could not understand a tongue which was not a negro guttural, yet did not have a civilized sound

”Oh, please!” she begged ”Not so loud They will hear ”

”Who are you?” he de Ophirean with a barbarous accent ”By Croirl in this hellish land!”

”My name is Livia,” she answered ”I am Bajujh's captive Oh, listen, please listen toI must return before they miss me from my hut

”My brother ” a sob choked her, then she continued: ”My brother was Theteles, and ere of the house of Chelkus, scientists and nobleia, icians, to study their arts, and I accoer than er said nothing, but stood watching her with burning eyes, his face frowning and unreadable There was sohtened her and made her nervous and uncertain

”The black Kushi+tes raided Kheshatta,” she continued hurriedly ”We were approaching the city in a cauards fled and the raiders carried us aith them But they did us no harians and accept a ransom for our return But one of the chiefs desired all the ransom for himself, and he and his followers stole us out of the caht, and fled far to the south-east with us, to the very borders of Kush There they were attacked and cut down by a band of Bakala raiders Theteles and I were dragged into this den of beasts ” she sobbed convulsively ” Thised and went momentarily blind at theI lay in a faint I do not know ”

Words failing her, she lifted her eyes to the scowling face of the stranger A mad fury swept over her; she lifted her fists and beat futilely on hisof a fly

”How can you stand there like a duhastly whisper ”Are you but a beast like these others? Ah, Mitra, once I thought there was honor in men Now I know each has his price You what do you know of honor or of mercy or decency? You are a barbarian like these others only your skin is white, your soul is black as theirs

”You care naught that a man of your own color has been foully done to death by these black dogs that a white woman is their slave! Very well!” She fell back froive you a price!” she raved, tearing away her tunic from her ivory breasts ”Am I not fair? Am I not more desirable than these soot-colored wenches? A? Is not a fair-skinned virgin a price worth slaying for?