He shrugged significantly. Even by the starlight I could see the pallor that blanched the Armenian's face. He took the threat in sober earnest.
"You shall have no cause to blame! All shall be as you wish. I will remit the charges for the last distribution. Take your horse, Monseigneur, both horses—the mule! Take all!"
Nikka gave him a single look, and he subsided.
"Heidi, Jakka!" called Wasso Mikali.
"Mount, Jack," added Nikka. "The other horse is for you. We must hasten. My uncle does not like to be seen entering or leaving the town."
We rode out in single-file, first Wasso Mikali, then Nikka, then myself, last the young Tzigane, leading the pack-mule. The Gypsies set a pace that made the horses trot to keep up with them, a long, slack-kneed shamble, ungainly in appearance, but tremendously effective. By sunrise we had left the town behind the first mountain-ridge, and were heading north towards the waste of mountains that fringed the Bulgarian frontier. Hour after hour we plodded along. More than once I suggested a rest, for I knew our escorts had been afoot all night. But they would not hear of it. Neither would they consent to sharing the horses with us turn-about, and in this Nikka upheld them.
"Our feet are soft," he pointed out. "We could never maintain such a speed, and it is best to put as long a distance as possible between us and Seres, lest our trailers should pick up the scent."
During the early part of the day we passed frequent villages, melancholy collections of hovels that had been scorched by the awful visitation of wars the Balkans had known for a decade. But in the afternoon we departed from the main road, and struck off across the hills. Occasionally we saw farmhouses or sheepfolds, but when night came we made camp in a lonely ravine with the stars for roof. There was not a light on the horizon, not even the barking of dogs to indicate a human habitation.
The next day it was practically the same. The trail we followed was a mere trace that sometimes disappeared. Toward evening we entered a vast forest, and finally halted on the banks of a stream where a campfire blazed. Against the flames showed gaunt, turbanned figures.
"Are these our friends?" I asked.