how he shivered a little when he thought of her;
it was as though her influence were over him already. Next moment he
forgot her for a while, for they had come to the river brink and the
litter was being carried on to a barge or ferry, about which were
gathered many armed men. Evidently the Gold House was well defended both
by Nature and otherwise. The ferry was pulled or rowed across the river,
he could not see which, and they passed through a gateway into the town
and up a broad street where hundreds of people watched his advent. They
did not seem to speak, or if they spoke their voices were lost in the
sound of the thunder of the great cataract which dominated the place
with its sullen, continuous roar. It took Alan days to become accustomed
to that roar, but by the inhabitants of Asiki-land apparently it was not
noticed; their ears and voices were attuned to overcome its volume which
their fathers had known from the beginning.

Presently they were through the town and a wooden gate in an inner wall
which surrounded the park where the cedars grew. At this spot Alan noted
that everybody left them except the bearers and a few men whom he took
to be priests. On they stole like ghosts beneath the mighty trees, from
whose limbs hung long festoons of moss. It was very dark there, only in
places where a bough was broken the moonlight lay in white gules upon
the ground. Another wall and another gate, and suddenly the litter was
set down. Its curtains opened, torches flashed, women appeared clad in
white robes, veiled and mysterious, who bowed before him, then half led
and half lifted him from his litter. He could feel their eyes on him
through their veils, but he could not see their faces. He could see
nothing except their naked, copper-coloured arms and long thin hands
stretched out to assist him.

Alan descended from the litter as slowly as he could, for somehow he
shrank from the quaint, carved portal which he saw before him. He did
not wish to pass it; its aspect filled him with reluctance. The women
drew him on, their hands pulled at his arms, their shoulders pressed him
from behind. Still he hung back, looking about him, till to his delight
he saw the other litter arrive and out of it emerge Jeekie, still
wearing his sun-helmet with its fringe of tattered mosquito curtain.

"Here we are, Major," he said in his cheerful voice, "turned up all
right like a bad ha'penny, but in odd situation."

"Very odd," echoed Alan.