Page:Weird Tales v02 n01 (1923-07-08).djvu/8

Rh They had seen the frightful companion of this girl.

And yet when Waring, breathing wrath against his friend, reached the lower level, he did not hale Tellifer violently thence, as he had intended. Instead, those still above saw him come to an abrupt halt. After a moment, they saw him remove his hat. They watched him advance the rest of the way at a gait which somehow suggested embarrassment—even chastened meekness.

"Mr Waring is shaking hands with her now," commented John B. with mild interest.

"This is madness!" Otway’s voice in turn was raised in a protesting shout. "Waring! Oh, Waring! Don’t forget that hundred-legger! Well, by George! You two stay here. I’ll run down and make that pair of lunatics realize—"

The explorer’s voice, unnaturally harsh with anxiety, died away down the inner stair.

"If they think," said Sigsbee indignantly, "that I’m going to be left out of every single interesting thing that comes along—"

The balance of his protest, also, was lost down the inner stair.

John B. offered no reasons, for his own descent. Being the last to go, he had no one to offer them to. But even a man of the widest experience may yield to the human instinct and "follow the crowd."

When the steward reached the center of attraction at the lower level, his sense of fitness kept him from thrusting in and claiming a handclasp of welcome, like that which had just been bestowed on his young employer. But he, too, respectfully removed his hat. He also neglected to urge the retreat which would really have been most wise.

The trouble was, as Sigsbee afterward complained, she was such a surprising sort of girl to meet in the heart of an ancient pyramid, dancing with an incredible length of centipede! Some bronzed Amazon with wild black eyes and snaky locks would have seemed not only suitable to the place, but far easier either to retreat from or hale away as a hostage.

This girl’s eyes were large, a trifle mournful. Their color was a dusky shade of blue, the hue of a summer sky to eastward just at the prophetic moment before dawn. The men who had come down into her domain made no haste away. Moreover, the need for doing so seemed suddenly remote; almost trivial, in fact. The face framed in that red-gold glory of hair, crowned with stars, was impossible to associate with evil.

By the time Otway had reached the scene, however, and received his first startled knowledge that references to a "Blessed Damozel" were less out-of-place than they had seemed from above, Waring had recovered enough to laugh a little.

"Otway," he greeted, "priestess of the ancient sun-worship—centipede worship—some sort of weird religion—wants to make your acquaintance! You’re the local linguist. Know any scraps of pre-Adamite dialect likely to fit the occasion?"

The explorer, too, had accepted the welcoming hand and looked into the dawn-blue eyes. He drew a long breath —shook his head over Waring’s question.

"I'll try her in Tupi and some of the dialects. But this is no Indian girl. Can’t you see, Waring? She’s pure Caucasian. Of either Anglo-Saxon or French blood, by those eyes and that hair. Perhaps a trace of Irish. The nose and—"

"For Heaven’s sake! Stop discussing her in that outrageous way," urged young Sigsbee, who had fallen victim without a struggle. "I believe she understands every word you're saying."

There was a brief, embarrassed pause. Certainly the grave, sweet smile and the light in the dusky eyes had for an instant seemed very intelligent.

But when Waring spoke to her again, asking if she spoke English, the girl made no reply nor sign that she understood him. Otway made a similar attempt, phrasing his question in Portuguese, Tupi—universal trade language of Brazil—and several Indian dialects, All to no avail. French, Italian and German, resorted to in desperation, all produced a negative result. The resources of the five seemed exhausted, when Tellifer added his quota in the shape of a few sounding phrases of ancient Greek.

At that the sweet, grave smile grew more pathetic. As if deprecating her inability to understand, the girl drew back a little. She made a graceful gesture with her slim, white arms—and fled lightly away around the central pillars.

"Greek!" snorted Waring. "Think the Rio Silencioso is the Hellespont, Tellifer? You’ve frightened her away!"

The esthete defended himself indignantly. "It was an invocation to Psyche! Your frightful German verbs were the—"

"Gentlemen, we are playing the fool with a vengeance! She’s gone to call that monstrous hundred-legger up again!"

"Beg pardon, Mr. Otway, but you’re wrong." John B. had unassumingly moved after the lady. He called back his correction from a viewpoint commanding the western side: "She’s only closing the hole where it went down--and now she’s coming back."

With needless heat, Sigsbee flung out an opinion:

"You fellows make me tired! As if a girl like that would be capable of bringing harm to anyone, particularly to people she had just shaken hands with and—and—"

"Smiled upon," Waring finished for him heartlessly. "Otway’s right, Sig. Playing the fool. And we aren’t all boys. Queer place. Too almighty queer! Woman may be planning anything. We must compel her to—There she goes! Bring the whole tribe out on us, I'll bet!"

"Beg pardon, Mr. Waring." John B. was still keeping the subject of discussion well in view. She had disappeared, this time into one of several clear lanes in the banked-off shrubbery that led from the central space toward the walls. "I don’t think the young lady means to call anyone, sir. She’s coming back again."

As he spoke, the girl reappeared. In her slim hands she bore a traylike receptacle made of woven reeds and piled high with ripe mangoes, bananas and fine white guava-fruits.

Here was a situation in which the most unassuming of yacht-stewards could take part without thrusting himself unduly forward. When John B.’s young employer beat him to it by a yard and himself gallantly took the heavy tray from their hostess, John B. looked almost actively resentful.

Sigsbee returned, triumphant. The tray was in his hands and the girl of dawn-blue eyes drifted light as a cloud beside him.

"If anyone dares suggest that she’s trying to poison us with this fruit," he said forcefully, "that person will have me to deal with!"

"Cut it, Sig, Matter of common sense. Know nothing about the girl."

Waring broke off abruptly. A selection of several of the finer fruits was being extended to him in two delicate hands. For some reason, as the girl’s glance met his across the offering, the big correspondent’s freckled face colored deeply. He muttered something that sounded remarkably like, "Beg pardon!" and hastily accepted the offering.

Her eyes, observed Tellifer, absently, were deeper than the depth of waters stilled at even'."

"Cut it, Tellifer! Please. Girl’s a mere child. Can’t hurt a child by re-