“What a fool law!” I ejaculated, but I realized at last how heinous my transgression must have appeared in the eyes of Duare.
Kamlot shrugged. “It may be a fool law,” he said, “but it is still the law; and in the case of Duare its enforcement means much to Vepaja, for she is the hope of Vepaja.”
I had heard that title conferred upon her before, but it was meaningless to me. “Just what do you mean by saying that she is the hope of Vepaja?” I asked.
“She is Mintep’s only child. He has never had a son, though a hundred women have sought to bear him one. The life of the dynasty ends if Duare bears no son; and if she is to bear a son, then it is essential that the father of that son be one fitted to be the father of a jong.”
“Have they selected the father of her children yet?” I asked.
“Of course not,” replied Kamlot. “The matter will not even be broached until after Duare has passed her twentieth birthday.”
“And she is not even nineteen yet,” I remarked with a sigh.
“No,” agreed Kamlot, eyeing me closely, “but you act as though that fact were of importance to you.”
“It is,” I admitted.
“What do you mean?” he demanded.
“I intend to marry Duare!”
Kamlot leaped to his feet and whipped out his sword. It was the first time that I had ever seen him show marked excitement. I thought he was going to kill me on the spot.
“Defend yourself!” he cried. “I cannot kill you until you draw.”
“Just why do you wish to kill me at all?” I demanded. “Have you gone crazy?”
The point of Kamlot’s sword dropped slowly toward the floor. “I do not wish to kill you,” he said rather sadly, all the nervous excitement gone from his manner. “You are my friend, you have saved my life—no, I would rather die myself than kill you, but the thing you have just said demands it.”
I shrugged my shoulders; the thing was inexplicable to me. “What did I say that demands death?” I demanded.
“That you intend to marry Duare.”
“In my world,” I told him, “men are killed for saying that they do not intend marrying some girl.” I had been sitting at the desk in my cabin at the time that Kamlot had threatened me, and I had not arisen; now I stood up and faced him. “You had better kill me, Kamlot,” I said, “for I spoke the truth.”
He hesitated for a moment, standing there looking at me; then he returned his sword to its scabbard. “I cannot,” he said huskily. “May my ancestors forgive me! I cannot kill my friend.
“Perhaps,” he added, seeking some extenuating circumstance, “you should not be held accountable to customs of which you had no knowledge. I often forget that you are of another world than ours. But tell me, now that I have made myself a party to your crime by excusing it, what leads you to believe that you will marry Duare? I can incriminate myself no more by listening to you further.”
“I intend to marry her, because I know that I love her and believe that she already half loves me.”
At this Kamlot appeared shocked and horrified again. “That is impossible,” he cried. “She never saw you before; she cannot dream what is in your heart or your mad brain.”
“On the contrary, she has seen me before; and she knows quite well what is in my ‘mad brain,’ ” I assured him. “I told her in Kooaad; I told her again today.”
“And she listened?”
“She was shocked,” I admitted, “but she listened; then she upbraided me and ordered me from her presence.”
Kamlot breathed a sigh of relief. “At least she has not gone mad. I cannot understand on what you base your belief that she may return your love.”
“Her eyes betrayed her; and, what may be more convincing, she did not expose my perfidy and thus send me to my death.”
He pondered that and shook his head. “It is all madness,” he said; “I can make nothing of it. You say that you talked with her in Kooaad, but that would have been impossible. But if you had ever even seen her before, why did you show so little interest in her fate when you knew that she was a prisoner aboard the Sovong? Why did you say that you thought that she was my sweetheart?”
“I did not know until a few minutes ago,” I explained, “that the girl I saw and talked with in the garden at Kooaad was Duare, the daughter of the jong.”
A few days later I was again talking with Kamlot in my cabin when we were interrupted by a whistle at the door; and when I bade him do so, one of the Vepajan prisoners that we had rescued from the Sovong entered. He was not from Kooaad but from another city of Vepaja, and therefore none of the other Vepajans aboard knew anything concerning him. His name was Vilor, and he appeared to be a decent sort of fellow, though rather inclined to taciturnity. He had manifested considerable interest in the klangans and was with them often, but had explained this idiosyncrasy on the grounds that he was a scholar and wished to study the birdmen, specimens of which he had never before seen.
“I have come,” he explained in response to my inquiry, “to ask you to appoint me an officer. I should like to join your company and share in the work and responsibilities of the expedition.”
“We are well officered now,” I explained, “and have all the men we need. Furthermore,” I added frankly, “I do not know you well enough to be sure of your qualifications. By the time we reach Vepaja, we shall be better acquainted; and if I need you then, I will tell you.”
“Well, I should like to do something,” he insisted.
