not speak so," she half whispered. "I deserved any mark of your
displeasure; I only wish I could persuade you that the sharpest sting
lies in the lips we love. Do remember, since you would not let me run
the slightest risk of harm, that if you come to hurt you will have
killed me."

"Rest assured I shall come to no serious ill. I hope this evening to
laugh with you at your alarms; and so long as you do not see me either
in the flesh or in the spirit, you may know that I am safe. I _could
not_ leave you for ever without meeting you again."

This speech, which I should have ventured in no other presence, would
hardly have established my lunacy more decisively in Martial eyes than
in those of Terrestrial common sense. It conveyed, however, a real if
not sufficient consolation to Eveena; the idea it implied being not
wholly unfamiliar to a daughter of the Star. I was surprised that,
almost shrinking from my last embrace, Eveena suddenly dropped her
veil around her; till, turning, I saw that Ergimo was standing at the
top of the ladder leading to the deck, and just in sight.

"I will send word," he said, addressing himself to me, but speaking
for her ears, "of your safety at noon and at night. So far as my
utmost efforts can ensure it you will be safe; an obligation higher,
and enforced by sanctions graver, than even the Campta's command
forbids me to lead a _brother_ into peril, and fail to bring him out
of it."

The significant word was spoken in so low a tone that it could not
possibly reach the ears of our companions of the chase, who had
mustered on shore within a few feet of the vessel. But Eveena
evidently caught both the sound and the meaning, and I was glad that
they should convey to her a confidence which seemed to myself no
better founded than her alarms. To me its only value lay in the
friendly relation it established with one I had begun greatly to like.
I relied on my own strength and nerve for all that human exertion
could do in such peril as we might encounter; and, in a case in which
these might fail me, I doubted whether even the one tie that has
binding force on Mars would avail me much.

Immediately outside the town were waiting, saddled but not bridled,
some score of the extraordinary riding-birds Eveena had described. The
seat of the rider is on the back, between the wings; but the saddle
consists only of a sort of girth immediately in front, to which a pair
of stirrups, resembling that of a lady