Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/57

 but Kûlop told him curtly to bide where he was.

"This time," he said, "I go forward alone. One may not scout in this forest with three pairs of feet crashing through the underwood at one's heels like a troop of wild kine. Stay here till I return."

Without another word, he lounged off, with his long musket over his shoulder, and was soon lost to view. He went, as the Sâkai themselves go, flitting through the trees as noiselessly as a bat.

"Did I not say truly that he is possessed by the Demons of the Forest?" said one of the Jĕlai youths. "Ya Allah! Fancy going into this wilderness alone for choice, and with the darkness about to fall!"

Thereafter followed for Kria a miserable night, for while the Jělai lads slept beside him, he lay awake, a prey to a thousand torturing thoughts and memories, and oppressed by a load of vague forebodings.

VIII

Kria awoke in broad daylight to find old Kûlop Rîau, his dew-drenched clothes soiled with the earth of the jungle, bending over him with a light of wild excitement and exultation blazing in his eyes.

"Come, brother," he said. "I have found the wench. Come!"

Without another word, he turned away into the forest, Kria following him as best he might, binding about his waist as he ran the belt from which hung his heavy woodknife.