whose accomplishments included even a sketchy knowledge of his master's
tongue. It appeared that the law of Bala Bala forbade the door of the
Father of Swords to open before sunrise. But the tall-hatted one offered
the visitor the provisional hospitality of a black tent, of a refreshing
drink of goats' buttermilk, and of a comfortable felt whereon to stretch
cramped legs.

When Matthews returned to consciousness he first became aware of a
blinding oblong of light in the dark wall of the tent. He then made out
a circle of pontifical black hats, staring at him, his fair hair, and
his indecently close-fitting clothes, in the silence of unutterable
curiosity. It made him think, for a bewildered instant, that he was back
on the barge he had met in the river. As for the black hats, what
astonished them not least was the stranger's immediate demand for water,
and his evident dissatisfaction with the quantity of it they brought
him. There happily proved to be no lack of this commodity, as Matthews'
ears had told him. He was not long in pursuing the sound into the open,
where he found himself at the edge of a village of black tents, pitched
in a grassy hollow between two heights. The nearer and lower was a
detached cone of rock, crowned by a rude castle. The other peak, not
quite so precipitous, afforded foothold for scattered scrub oaks and for
a host of slowly moving sheep and goats. Between them the plateau looked
down on two sides into two converging valleys. And the clear air was
full of the noise of a brook that cascaded between the scrub oaks of the
higher mountain, raced past the tents, and plunged out of sight in the
narrower gorge.

"Ripping!" pronounced Matthews genially to his black-hatted gallery.

He was less genial about the persistence of the gallery, rapidly
increased by recruits from the black tents, in dogging him through every
detail of his toilet. But he was rescued at last by Abbas and an old Lur
who, putting his two hands to the edge of his black cap, saluted him in
the name of the Father of Swords. The Lur then led the way to a trail
that zigzagged up the lower part of the rocky cone. He explained the
quantity of loose boulders obstructing the path by saying that they had
been left there to roll down on whomever should visit the Father of
Swords without an invitation. That such an enterprise would not be too
simple became more evident when the path turned into a cave. Here
another Lur was waiting with