and sighed and descended slowly to meet him. The
greeting of the Chief was sharp, his manner wild, and he said little ere
he said, 'I will see thee under the light of the Jewel, so tie it in a
band and set it on thy brow, Bhanavar!'

Her mouth was open to intercede with his desire, but his forehead became
black as night, and he shouted in the thunder of his lion-voice, 'Do
this!'

She took the Jewel from its warm bed in her bosom, and held it, and got
together a band of green weeds, and set it in the middle of the band, and
tied the band on her brow, and lifted her countenance to the Chief. Ruark
stood back from her and gazed on her; and he would have veiled his sight
from her, but his hand fell. Then the might of her loveliness seized
Bhanavar likewise, and the full orbs of her eyes glowed on the Chief as
on a mirror, and she moved her serpent figure scornfully, and smiled,
saying, 'Is it well?'

And he, when he could speak, replied, ''Tis well! I have seen thee! for
now can I die this day, if it be that I am to die. And well it is! for
now know I there is truly no place but the tomb can hold me from thee!'

Bhanavar put the Jewel from her brow into her bosom, and questioned him,
'What is thy dread this day, O my Chief?'

He answered her gravely, 'I have seen Rukrooth my mother while I slept;
and she was weeping, weeping by a stream, yea, a stream of blood; and it
was a stream that flowed in a hundred gushes from her own veins. The sun
of this dawn now, seest thou not? 'tis overcrimson; the vulture hangeth
low down yonder valley.' And he cried to her, 'Haste! mount with me; for
I have told Rukrooth a thing; and I know that woman crafty in the
thwarting of schemes; such a fox is she where aught accordeth not with
her forecastings, and the judgment of her love for me! By Allah! 'twere
well we clash not; for that I will do I do, and that she will do doth
she.'

So the twain mounted their steeds, and Ruark gathered his Arabs and
placed them, some in advance, some on either side of Bhanavar; and they
rode forward to the head of the valley, and across the meadows, through
the blushing crowds of flowers, baths of freshest scents, cool breezes
that awoke in the nostrils of the mares neighings of delight; and these
pranced and curvetted and swung their tails, and gave expression to their
joy in many graceful fashions; but a gloom was on Ruark, and a quick fire
in his falcon-eye, and he rode with heels alert on the flanks