Page:Harold Lamb--The House of the Falcon.djvu/149

 he raised himself unsteadily, and Edith hastened to place pillows behind his back.

"I never believed in miracles," he murmured. "Will you tell me—where you came from?"

His voice still had the low note of weakness, and he paused often. It was a quiet voice, deliberate, musing—as if its owner was more accustomed to communing with himself than others.

"Hush!" said Edith reprovingly. "You are not well enough to talk."

Donovan smiled, and when he smiled the gaunt face lighted up and tiny wrinkles appeared at the eyes. She liked his eyes.

"You are—well enough to answer. I want to know why—you are in Yakka Arik."

Edith noticed that he pronounced the name in the sonorous fashion of the natives. She smiled back. "To take care of you."

"Me?"

A slight frown creased his brow as he pondered this slowly. Almost to himself, he muttered.

"And I thought you were not here. A splendid spirit. Angels might come to Yakka Arik—more easily than white women."

Worriedly, Edith surveyed him, chin on hand. For comfort's sake she had dressed her hair low on her neck, and she wore a silk scarf—a donation from Aravang—about her much enduring shirtwaist In the absence of mirrors—she had been unable to make known her great need of such an article to her faithful attendant by signs—she did not realize how becoming the effect was. John Donovan looked at her long.

"Because," he resumed, "I thought those horns were Gabriel's, you know, when I wakened that time, and