Just a fraction of a second, a dim-whirling object plummeted into space. It vanished.
As best he understood, Rrisa had solved his problem and had paid his score.
The Master wakened early, with the late May sun already Slanting in from far, dun and orange desert-levels, gilding the metal walls of his cabin. For a few moments he lay there, half dreamily listening to the deep bass hum of the propellers, the slight give and play of the air-liner as she shuddered under the powerful drive of her Norcross-Brail engines.
His thoughts first dwelt a little on yesterday's battle and on the wondrous treasure now in his hands. Then they touched the approaching campaign beyond the Iron Mountains in regions never yet seen by any white man's eye, and for a while enveloped some of the potentialities of that campaign.
But "Captain Alden" recurring to his mind, drove away such stern imaginings. The Master's lips smiled, a little; his black eyes softened, and for a moment his face assumed something that might almost have made it akin to those of men who feel the natural passions of the heart. Never before, in all his stern, hard life, had the Master's expression been quite as now.
"Who can she be, I wonder?" he mused. "A woman like that, possessed of that extraordinary beauty; a woman with education, languages, medical skill; a woman with courage, loyalty, and devotion beyond compare, and with all the ardor for service and adventure that any man could have—who can she be? And—damn it, now! Who am I, to be thinking of such nonsense, after all?"
His eyes fell on the table. Something lay there, agleam with the sunlight flicking blood-red spots from a polished metal surface. What could this thing be? Surely, it had not lain there, the night before.
The Master wrinkled heavy brows, focussing his sight on this metal object. Puzzled, not yet able to make it out clearly, he raised himself on his elbow and looked with close attention at the mysterious object.
Suddenly he leaped from the berth, strode to the table and caught up—Rrisa's dagger.
"Allah! What's this?" he exclaimed. "Rrisa—he's been here—and with a knife?—"