Up to this time not the sign of a woman or a child had been seen. But when order was finally restored and the defenseless warriors were herded together as compactly as possible, the huts surrounding the main buildings were opened, as by magic, and the women poured forth wailing and shrieking.
It was bedlam let loose. They pictured all the terrors of captivity. They knew what it meant. They passed around the cordon beating their breasts, and shrieking like demoniacs. John, motioning to Muro and Uraso, stepped aside, and ordered the chiefs to follow.
"This is the building they came out of," said George quietly to John.
"Then it will be a good place to hold the conference. Uraso, instruct your men not to allow anyone to leave his place within the circle, and then attend the conference with us."
The guards followed John as he entered the building. The boys were eager to see the interior. Once within they saw a dozen women and twice that number of children huddled together in one of the rooms. The entrance from the main door in front led directly into a hall, and at the rear end of the hall was a large room the entire width of the building.
Several smaller rooms were on each side of the hall. It was, to all appearance, arranged like an American or European dwelling, the entire interior being finished in wood, but in a terribly dilapidated condition.
The surprise was still greater when they found in the interior of the great room a number of articles of furniture, such as chairs, tables, settees, and articles which, in their younger days, might have been rugs. Parts of bedsteads were littered around, broken articles of furniture were scattered here and there, and everywhere the place was lavish with dirt.
The boys had seen many native places where filth had accumulated, but the atmosphere seemed to fairly reek. It appeared so to the boys, who had lived so much in the open, and who had such vivid imaginations that the wrecked condition of the interior suggested a worse atmosphere than there really was.
It was not close or confined, that was certain; for the places which once, evidently, had windows, did not contain even the suggestion of glass. It was one mass of broken, misplaced, jumbled up belongings, that would require the rebus manager of a magazine to assemble in order.