concerned with us. A sleen will usually follow the first scent it picks up when hunting, and then follow it tenaciously. There are stories of such beasts on the trail of something actually running between, or among, other animals, and even men, and paying them no attention.
'Too, sleen seldom attack groups,' said the leader. 'They prefer isolated animals.'
I took some courage from these remarks.
'Let us move the women,' said the leader. 'We have been too long in this place.' I was pleased to hear this resolution. I would have been zealously cooperative even if I had been a free woman, hodlng forth my limbs to be bound, putting forth my neck for the coffle collar, and not a mere slave.
'Free their ankles,' said the leader of the men.
'Look,' said one of the small fellow' s two cohorts, pointing across the meadow. One of the leader' s two men had scarcely bent to unknot the bonds on Tupita' s crossed ankles when he stopped, given pause by this utterance. He stood up, shading his eyes.
Two beasts were approaching, doubtless the companions of the one with us. One thrust a man before it. The other was dragging behind itself, through the grass, a belt, with an attached scabbard and sword.
'No,' cried Tupita, in misery.
The fellow, pushed forward by the beast, looked at her, dully, angrily. I pulled back a little, the railing hard against the back of my neck. I saw him regard me, with frustration, with hatred.
'What are you doing here?' asked the small fellow of the prisoner.
He was silent.
There was a growl from the beast behind him.
'He came to seek me,' said Tupita, boldly.
'No,' said the man, looking at her.
'What then? What then?' asked the small fellow.
'I followed that thing,' he said, rubbing his arm, where the beast had gripped him.
'He is from the camp of Pietro Vacchi,' said the leader of the men. 'I saw him there, two days ago.'
'Yes!' said the small fellow. 'I, too, I am sure, saw him there!' 'He is one of Vacchi' s men,' said one of the small fellow' s cohorts. 'There must be others about, too, then!' said the other, alarmed.:They are seeking the two women.'
'I am not of the company of Pietro Vacchi,' said the man.
'How came you here?' asked the small fellow.
'I followed that,' he said, indicating the beast, 'as I told you.' The beast growled, menacingly. I take it, it did not care to accept the fact that a man might be able to follow it.
'You are a hunter?' asked one of the leader' s men.
'In a way,' he said.
'You are a brave fellow,' said one of the leader' s men, 'to pursue such a beast.'
'It was not the beast which I was interested,' he said.
'How many are with you?' asked one of the small fellow' s cohorts. 'I am alone,' he said proudly.
'What are you doing here?' asked the small fellow. 'What is it you seek?' 'I seek the blood of a slave,' he said, regarding me.
I put down my head.
Tupita sobbed.
Surely he had given himself up for lost. It was hard to understand otherwise the pride, the grandeur, with which he spoke. He had risked all, and lost all. He stood there with folded arms. For my blood he had dared even to follow so terrible a beast. This was no small measure of his hatred of me and his determination. He looked about himself with scorn. He disdained to conceal his intent or objective. He had not understood, however, it seemed, in his single-minded pursuit of his bloody goal, that there might be others of that kind about. They had taken him. I did not doubt but that they, too, in their way, were hunters.
'Kill it,' said the largest of the beasts, their leader.
Tupita screamed in protest, but the nearest beast to the captive struck him from the side with the back of its closed paw. There was a sickening sound, and the captive' s head snapped to the side. The other beast reached down and lifted up the figure, and threw it on the store of meat beside the blanket. 'No, no,' wept Tupita, 'no, no, no!'
'There may be others about,' said the leader of the men. 'Let us reconnoiter the area.'
'Do you understand?' asked the small man of the largest beast.
The beast looked at him, and its long, dark tongue came out of the side of its mouth, and it licked at the bloody fur at the side of its jaw. Then it looked around, its ears lifted.
'He wants to look,' said the small fellow, making a large, circular motion with his hand, encompassing the meadow. 'He wants to look. There may be others.' The beast then again fixed its gaze on the small fellow, and he stepped back, in trepidation.
'Yes,' it said. 'We will look.'
'Spread out,' said the small fellow to his cohorts, and the others. 'We will return here.'
I looked at Mirus, of Brundisium. The side of his head was bloody.
'It is your fault!' cried Tupita, turning her head, in her neck ropes, toward me.
'Forgive me, Tupita!' I wept.
'You are safe now!' she wept. 'Rejoice! If I could get my hands on you I would kill you myself!'
'Please, Tupita!' I begged. 'I, too, am in sorrow! He was kind to me!' 'This is what you wanted!' she cried.
'No,' I said. 'Never, never!'
'It is you who have killed him!' she wept. 'It was you who drove him to madness! It was you who change him, who made him some crazed beast, who made him thirst for blood! It is you who are responsible! It was you who did this to him!' 'No!' I wept. 'No!'
Then she began to weep uncontrollably, her head back.
'Forgive me, Tupita,' I said. 'Forgive me!'
'You killed him!' she sobbed.
'No! No! I said. Then, I, too, in my sorrow, wept. We could not, as men had put us, wipe our tears. They coursed down our cheeks. Their salty flow fell even upon, and ran down, our bodies. I looked upon the bloody, still figure, cast upon the bodies and the quarter of a tarsk. 'Tupita!' I said.
She did not respond, so lost in her grief she was.
'Tupita,' I whispered. 'I do not think he is dead.'
'What?' cried Tupita.
'Look,' I said. 'He is still bleeding.'
'Oh, Master!' she cried, suddenly, frightened.
'He is very strong,' I said. 'I do not think he is dead.'
'No!' she said. 'He is alive! My master is alive! He lives!' she looked at me, wildly, in her neck ropes. She laughed, sobbing. Her tears now were tears of joy. Then suddenly she looked at me. She was very frightened. 'Oh, Tuka,' she said. 'You are in terrible danger.'
I tightened in the binding fiber, shuddering. 'He may not recover consciousness before we are taken away,' I said. 'Perhaps the beasts may not notice he is alive. Perhaps he can make good his escape.'
Suddenly Tela, to my left, made a frightened noise. 'There,' she said, suddenly. 'There, beside the well!'
'What is it?' asked Mina.
I could not see anything. I tried to lift my head but, bound as I was, kneeling, tied by the neck at the rail, I could do very little. I sobbed with frustration. 'What is it?' said Mina, insistently.
'You cannot see it now,' said Tela. 'I think it is behind the well.' 'What was it?' asked Mina.
'There!' cried Tela, frightened. 'A sleen!'
Terror coursed through us.
'It is probably not on our scent,' said Tupita. 'Do not move!'
We could see it now, by the well, its head lifted above the grass.
It was looking at us.
