10
There was an air of formality, even of solemnity, in the gathering that faced Cunningham several hours later. A full two hundred Strangers were gathered in a little glade with slanting sides that formed a sort of amphitheater. Scouts were hidden in the woods beyond.
And Maria was there, with a white and stricken face which dashed Cunningham’s joyous mood. Vladimir’s servant was there too, ashen with dread and with a crude bandage about his arm where a throwing-knife had gone through his muscles as he tried to shoot Cunningham a second time. And Stephan, Maria’s father, with his features worn and very weary.
Cunningham’s shoulder had been dressed with crushed plantain-leaves. It was a tiny wound at best, hardly worth more than adhesive plaster. The bullet had barely nicked the skin, but Maria had wept over it as she bound it up.
Cunningham had felt that this was no time for common sense. He knew.
“I love you,” he whispered as she bent down above him.
Brimming eyes met his for an instant.
“And I love you,” she said with a queer soft fierceness. “I tell you, because I will never see you again. I love you!”
Cunningham felt a nameless dread. Stephan looked at him with dreary, resolute eyes. Maria’s lips were pinched and bloodless. The Strangers regarded him with somber faces which were not unfriendly, but perturbingly sympathetic.
The gathering seemed to be something like a court. The women were gathered around the outer edges. The men stood about a rock on which Stephan had seated himself. Maria stood beside him. Cunningham found himself thrust gently forward.
“My friend,” said Stephan wearily, “you find us gathered in council. Men say that you kissed my daughter, Maria.”
Cunningham flushed, then stood straight.
“I did,” he said evenly. “I ask your permission to marry her. Is it a crime for me to speak to her first and have her answer?”
Stephan shook his head wearily.
“No. No crime. And if you were one of us I would be glad. I think you are a man. I would join your hands myself. But you are not of our people.”
“And who are you,” demanded Cunningham, “that I am not fit to marry into?”
Stephan’s voice was gentle and quaintly sympathetic.
“We have killed one man who knew the answer to that question,” he said in the teasing soft unfamiliar accent that all the Strange People had. “We do not wish to kill you. And you are not unfit to marry my daughter. My daughter, or any of us, is not fit to marry you.”
Cunningham shook his head.
“Let me be the judge of that.”
Again Stephan made a gesture of negation.
“I think you are our friend,” he said heavily. “We need a friend of those who are not like us. We may die because we have not such a friend. But you must come here no more. What says the council?”
A murmur went up about the amphitheater—a murmur of agreement. Cunningham whirled with clenched fists, expecting to see hostile faces. Instead, he saw friendly sorry ones.
“He must not come again,” ran the murmur all about the crowd, in the faint and fascinating dialect that could not ever be identified. Men gazed at Cunningham with a perturbing sympathy while they banished him.
“But why?” demanded Cunningham fiercely. “I am your friend. I came hundreds of miles because the picture of Maria drew me. I refused offers of bribes. That man”—he pointed at Vladimir’s servant—“tried to kill me only today, only because I am your friend. And what have I asked of you? If Maria tells me to go, I will go. But otherwise——”
Stephan put his hand on Cunningham’s shoulder.
“You must not come again,” he said quietly, “because Maria loves you also. Our people know such things quickly. She has said that she loves you. And we dare not let our women marry any man but one of ourselves. It is not that we hate you. We kept that man from killing you today, and we would have killed him if you said so. We will kill him for you now, if you tell us. But we dare not let one of our women marry you. So you must go.”
“Will Maria tell me to go?” demanded Cunningham fiercely.
“Yes,” said Maria, dry-lipped. “Go! Oh-h-h-h. Go, if you love me!”
She flung herself down upon the grass and sobbed. Some of the women murmured to each other and one or two moved forward and patted her shoulders comfortingly.
“She tells you to go,” said Stephan wearily, “because we would have to kill you otherwise.”
“But why? Why?” demanded Cunningham desperately.
Stephan rose from his seat and spread out his hands.
“Because no woman can ever keep a secret from the man she loves,” he said wearily. “Some day she would tell you who we are. And then you would hate her and hate us. You would turn from her in horror, and you would denounce us. And we would die, swiftly. I am not happy, my son. Maria is my daughter and I would see her happy. But some day she would tell you who we are——”
Cunningham found himself being crowded gently away from Maria. He thrust himself fiercely against the pressure.
“But who are you?” he cried savagely. “Dammit, I don’t care who you are! You’re making her cry! Let me pass! Let me get——”
Stephan made a gesture. With the quickness of lightning Cunningham was seized by a hundred hands. He fought like a fiend against the innumerable grips that clasped his hands, his arms, his feet. But they were too many. He stopped his struggling, panting, and stared raging at Stephan.
“We give you a gift,” said Stephan quietly. “Gold, my son. Much gold. Because if Vladimir tells our secrets we will all be killed, and he threatens to tell.”
“I don’t want your money,” panted Cunningham savagely. “I want this silly mystery ended! I want Maria! I want——”
“Go in peace,” said Stephan drearily.
Cunningham was laid upon the ground and tied fast. He struggled with every ounce of his strength, but in vain. The Strange People were too many and too resolute. But they seemed to take pains not to injure him. Indeed, when they put him in a litter and started off with him, there seemed to be a consistent effort by the bearers not to make him even uncomfortable.
Cunningham raged and tore at his bonds. Then he subsided into a savage silence. His lips were set into a grim firmness. Maria sobbing upon the grass... this abominable sympathy for him....
The litter stopped. They took him out and cut his bonds. They offered him the bags of hammered gold-pieces again.
“I don’t want them,” he said with grim politeness. “I warn you, I’m coming back.”
The leader of his escort was the young man who had first come out of the woods the first time Cunningham had seen the Strangers. He nodded gravely.
“I know,” he said quietly. “I loved a girl not of our people, last year.”
The litter-bearers had vanished into the woods. Cunningham matched at a straw of hope. Perhaps here was a friend, or even a source of help.
“You understand,” he said in a hurried, eager undertone. “Perhaps we can——”
“I gave her up,” said the young Stranger quietly. “My people would have killed her if I had married her. You see, I might have told her.”
He shrugged and pointed off through the woods.
“Coulters is there,” he said gravely. “You would not take gold. I am sorry. But we think you are a man.”
“I’m coming back,” said Cunningham grimly.
The Stranger nodded and touched the hilt of his knife regretfully. He swung away and vanished in the underbrush.
Cunningham started toward Coulters. He knew they would be watching him. But perhaps a quarter of a mile on the way he stopped. He heard nothing and saw nothing. He slipped aside into the woods. And he had gone no more than a dozen paces before there was a little golden glitter in a ray of the dying sun. A knife had flashed past his face not two feet away. He turned back, raging.
Later he tried again. And again a warning knife swept across the path before him.