r asked.

The wind whipped his words into space. He repeated, louder.

Terry stirred slightly, answered vaguely, his gaze still fixed upon
the tremendous shadowed expanse below them: "I was thinking of a ...
dozen words ... spoken upon another mountain, words that seem very
real ... and make one feel very small ... in such a place as this."

The Major puzzled, gave it up. He was on the point of asking
explanation when Terry spoke.

"We had best get down from here, Major. It is getting darker."

It took them but a few minutes to work their way down, but the crag
reared black against ten thousand stars when they reached the base. In
the regions near the equator the sun courses in hot hurry.

Returned to the hut, the Major sat on the window ledge and Terry at
the threshold. The night was chill with the clear crispness of
altitude. The Major sniffed the pine-laden breeze gratefully.

"We have found a new Baguio," he said.

Terry assented, absentmindedly.

The Major nursed his empty pipe, studying the savages who grouped
around the fires to warm their almost naked bodies. Occasionally one
or two would detach themselves from the groups and approach near where
the two white men sat illumined by the flames, staring at these
strangers in frank curiosity, silent, inscrutable, unafraid. Noticing
the glint of fire upon a nearby row of long-shafted spears which
reared their vicious barbs eight feet above the ground into which they
had been thrust, the Major spoke to Terry.

"Your pistol?"

Terry motioned toward his room; "In there. They never bothered me
about it--probably don't know what a pistol is."

The Major, thinking of the sensation the opening of the Hill Country
would create, of the Governor's joy when he should hear the news, of
the added prestige for his Service, turned to Terry to express
something of his thoughts. But he desisted when he saw by Terry's
flame-illumined countenance that he had forgotten his presence, for
there was something about the lean wistful face that made his
detachment inviolable.

Soon the moon rose above the level of the plateau and flooded the
village with a filtered glow. Terry rose.

"Ohto ordered me to bring you at moonrise." He waited until the Major
had secured the gifts he had packed up, then led the way through the
lane into the smaller clearing.

CHAPTER XIV

AHMA

In the center of the moonlit clearing there stood a larger house than
any in the village. The