“Then you would give all the others to death, daughter?”
“Nay, I would save the Deliverer alive, for a while at least.”
“And wherefore? You are too subtle for me.”
“For this reason, father; he loves her who is named Aca, and trusts to marry her, to marry her fully according to the custom of his people: therefore I would that he should see her given to another.”
“To another! To whom then?”
“To Olfan the king, who also loves her.”
Now Nam held up his hands in perplexity, saying:
“Oh! my daughter, be plain, I pray of you, for I cannot understand your counsels. Were it not better to give to these people the red stones which they desire, and send them secretly from the land, saying that they had vanished into the earth again, for so it seems to me we should be rid of much shame and trouble?”
“Listen, my father, and I will tell you. Were she whom I love to leave this land, I should see her face no more, and this madness has come upon me that I cannot live without the sight of her. Also, how can these people escape the dangers of the road? But four of them are left alive, and even were they without our borders, they must journey for three months before they come to any place where white men live, passing through swamps and deserts and tribes of wild men. This they could hardly do with arms such as those whereby the Deliverer slew the priests, and now their arms are gone, you alone know where, my father.”
“The instruments of which you speak lie in the deep waters of the temple pool, daughter, for there I caused them to be cast.”