Page:Harold Lamb--The House of the Falcon.djvu/119

 for here is the woman herself, alone and quite harmless."

In this fashion he of the leadership, the soiled fez, the immense shawl girdle and the very dirty drill suiting introduced himself—Abbas Abad, just arrived in Kashgar—and gave sharp command to one of his men to seek out Monsey in the new town.

To Edith it was clear that Abbas Adad was turning a deaf ear to her pleas that he take here to the sahibs—if, indeed, he understood.

Her heart had leaped when she heard her name spoken. Eagerly she stared at Abbas, trying to place him. Then her heart sank.

The whole appearance of the man—oily black hair, moist, bloodshot eyes, and flabby mouth—was against him. He met her gaze boldly and grinned, muttering to himself.

"Who is your master?" she asked.

Abbas shrugged his shoulders, not understanding. When Edith drew back, he gripped her arm in an iron clasp and pulled downward. Instinct warned the girl to keep to the saddle. Abbas only grinned the more and dragged her down with the calm assurance of a constrictor coiled about a gazelle. She slid from the saddle. And Abbas passed a tentative hand across her slim shoulders and the breast of her jacket, after the manner of a skilled Kirghiz feeling a sheep.

"If the American father will not pay," he muttered to himself, "you will be worth much—much, but otherwise. A beautiful slave."

Edith shrank back from the smiling Alaman in angry revolt. The followers of Abbas looked on apathetically but with some curiosity at the dilemma of the white woman. Usually in Abbas' seizure of