Pirates of Venus

questionable act. I had spoken to her only when necessary, for I had determined to atone for my previous conduct by maintaining a purely official attitude toward her that would reassure her and give her no cause for apprehension as to my intentions.

This was a difficult role for me to play while I yearned to take her into my arms and tell her again of the great love that was consuming me; but I had succeeded so far in controlling myself and saw no reason to believe that I should not be able to continue to do so, at least as long as Duare continued to give me no encouragement. The very idea that she might give me encouragement caused me to smile in spite of myself.

Presently, much to my surprise, she said, 'You are very quiet. What is the matter?'

It was the first time that Duare had ever opened a conversation with me or given me any reason to believe that I existed for her as a personality; I might have been a clod of earth or a piece of furniture, for all the interest she had seemed to take in me since those two occasions upon which I had surprised her as she watched me from the concealing foliage of her garden.

'There is nothing the matter with me,' I assured her. 'I am only concerned with your welfare and the necessity for getting you back to the Sofal as quickly as possible.'

'You do not talk any more,' she complained. 'Formerly, when I saw you, you used to talk a great deal.'

'Probably altogether too much,' I admitted, 'but you see, now I am trying not to annoy you.'

Her eyes fell to the ground. 'It would not annoy me,' she said almost inaudibly, but now that I was invited to do the very thing that I had been longing to do, I became dumb; I could think of nothing to say. 'You see,' she continued in her normal voice, 'conditions are very different now from any that I have ever before encountered. The rules and restrictions under which I have lived among my own people cannot, I now realize, be expected to apply to situations so unusual or to people and places so foreign to those whose lives they were intended to govern.

'I have been thinking a great deal about many things—and you. I commenced to think these strange thoughts after I saw you the first time in the garden at Kooaad. I have thought that perhaps it might be nice to talk to other men than those I am permitted to see in the house of my father, the jong. I became tired of talking to these same men and to my women, but custom had made a slave and a coward of me. I did not dare do the things I most wished to do. I always wanted to talk to you, and now for the brief time before we shall be again aboard the Sofal , where I must again be governed by the laws of Vepaja, I am going to be free; I am going to do what I wish; I am going to talk to you.'

This naive declaration revealed a new Duare, one in the presence of whom it was going to be most difficult to maintain an austere Platonicism; yet I continued to steel myself to the carrying out of my resolve.

'Why do you not talk to me?' she demanded when I made no immediate comment on her confession.

'I do not know what to talk about,' I admitted, 'unless I talk about the one thing that is uppermost in my mind.'

She was silent for a moment, her brows knit in thought, and then she asked with seeming innocence, 'What is that?'

'Love,' I said, looking into her eyes.

Her lids dropped and her lips trembled. 'No!' she exclaimed. 'We must not talk of that; it is wrong; it is wicked.'

'Is love wicked on Amtor?' I asked.

'No, no; I do not mean that,' she hastened to deny; 'but it is wrong to speak to me of love until after I am twenty.'

'May I then, Duare?' I asked.

She shook her head, a little sadly I thought. 'No, not even then,' she answered. 'You may never speak to me of love, without sinning, nor may I listen without sinning, for I am the daughter of a jong.'

'Perhaps it would be safer were we not to talk at all,' I said glumly.

'Oh, yes, let us talk,' she begged. 'Tell me about the strange world you are supposed to come from.'

To amuse her, I did as she requested; and walking beside her I devoured her with my eyes until at last we came to the ocean. Far out I saw the Sofal , and now came the necessity for devising a scheme by which we might signal her.

On either side of the canyon, through which the river emptied into the ocean, were lofty cliffs. That on the west side, and nearer us, was the higher, and to this I made my way, accompanied by Duare and the angan. The ascent was steep, and most of the way I found it, or made it, necessary to assist Duare, so that often I had my arm about her as I half carried her upward.

At first I feared that she might object to this close contact; but she did not, and in some places where it was quite level and she needed no help, though I still kept my arm about her, she did not draw away nor seem to resent the familiarity. At the summit of the cliff I hastily gathered dead wood and leaves with the assistance of the angan, and presently we had a signal fire sending a smoke column into the air. The wind had abated, and the smoke rose far above the cliff before it was dissipated. I was positive that it would be seen aboard the Sofal , but whether it would be correctly interpreted, I could not know.

A high sea was still running that would have precluded the landing of a small boat, but we had the angan, and if the Sofal were to draw in more closely to shore, he could easily transport us to her deck one at a time. However, I hesitated to risk Duare in the attempt while the ship was at its present considerable distance from shore, as what wind there was would have been directly in the face of the angan.

From the summit of this cliff we could overlook the cliff on the east side of the canyon, and presently the angan called my attention to something in that direction. 'Men are coming,' he said.

I saw them immediately, but they were still too far away for me to be able to identify them, though even at a distance I was sure that they were not of the same race as the savages which had attacked Duare and the klangan.

Now indeed it became imperative that we attract the attention of the Sofal immediately, and to that end I built two more fires at intervals from the first, so that it might be obvious to anyone aboard the ship that this was in fact a signal rather than an accidental fire or a camp fire.

Whether or not the Sofal had seen our signal, it was evident that the party of men approaching must have; and I could not but believe that, attracted by it, they were coming to investigate. Constantly they were drawing nearer, and as the minutes passed we saw that they were armed men of the same race as the Vepajans.

They were still some distance away when we saw the Sofal change her course and point her bow toward shore. Our signal had been seen, and our comrades were coming to investigate; but would they be in time? For us it was a thrilling race The wind had sprung up again and the sea was rising once more. I asked the angan if he could breast the gale, for I had determined to send Duare off at once if I received a favorable reply.

'I could alone,' he said, 'but I doubt that I could if I were carrying another.'

We watched the Sofal plunging and wallowing in the rising sea as it forged steadily closer, and we watched the men drawing near with equal certainty. There was no doubt in my mind as to which would reach us first; my only hope now was that the Sofal could lessen the distance in the meantime sufficiently so that it would be safe for the angan to attempt to carry Duare to her.

Now the men had reached the summit of the cliff on the opposite side of the canyon, and here they halted and observed us while carrying on a discussion of some nature.

'Vilor is with them!' exclaimed Duare suddenly.

'And Moosko,' I added. 'I see them both now.'

'What shall we do?' cried Duare. 'Oh, they must not get me again!''

'They shall not,' I promised her.

Down the canyon side they came. We watched them swim the river and cross to the foot of the cliff where we were standing. We watched the Sofal creeping slowly shoreward. I went to the edge of the cliff and looked down upon the ascending men. They were half way up. Then I returned to Duare and the angan.

'We can wait no longer,' I said, and then to the angan, 'Take the janjong and fly to the ship. She is closer now; you can make it; you must make it!'

He started to obey, but Duare drew away from him. 'I will not go,' she said quietly. 'I will not leave you here alone!'