Go, and think no more to pry into treasure tales
of this mountain land. It is not for such as you. Go, before it is too
late. I cannot hold back the death from you."

I laughed. I thought of the Koreans who had deserted, of their talk
about the fires at night, of demons and haunted mountains ahead.

"We came a long way on the track of Barto's tale of treasure from which
he brought the golden girl. It will take more than words to frighten us
away."

"Do not laugh! I try to save you from something even worse than death
that can come to you. I want to return to you the favor that you did me.
If you do not listen to me, how can I help you?" Her voice took on a
plaintive, charming note; she smiled a half-smile of complete witchery.

A high, keening cry came suddenly from the slopes above us, and she
raised on her toes as if to spring away.

"They come, my friends! I must leave you. I can only tell you to stay
close by your fire at night. I cannot say what fate will strike you. I
cannot help you. Go back, friend who would live, go back!"

She turned and sprang lightly up the slope toward the sound of the cry,
half human, half beast-like, that she had called "her friends." It had
sounded to me like the cry of a wolf, or a cat-man, anything but human.
But people can make odd sounds, and imitate beasts. Still it had been an
eerie sound that gave me a foreboding, added to her warning words. What
kind of people were these, who wore leather and jewels and used bows
that might have come off an Assyrian wall painting?

Came a tumult above, the high clear blast of some horn, a dozen eerie
cries hardly human--a rush and a pounding in the earth as though a party
had ridden off on heavy, full-size horses. No Manchurian pony ever made
such a sound on soft ground!

Polter and Noldi came back about an hour later. I had dragged the big
Barto into a tent and made him comfortable. He was snoring peacefully.
Polter squatted down beside me, folding his long form like a jackknife.

"That thing _was_ a ship, Keele," he said. There was a husky excitement,
repressed but still obvious about him. I grunted.

"It landed among some big timber on the south end of the mountain. We
got pretty close, enough to see the sides of the thing. Men busy around
it, we couldn't get too close, afraid they'd see us."

I started, a pulse of unreasoning fear, of terrific interest, ran
through me. I asked in a voice I couldn't keep calm, "What kind of men,