Bill Sanders was already there: he and John Whitley were in the courtyard around which all the rooms opened. Bill was squatted on his heels, cowboy fashion, with a knife in his hand, idly whittling a stick.
As he saw them and stood up they saw that he was tall and very thin; so thin, in fact, that he looked more like an underfed man than a tough, sinewy, sturdy mountaineer. However his skin was brown with healthy exposure and his grip, when they shook hands, made Nicky wince a little.
Quipu Bill Sanders had the eyes of a fox and the courage of a lion; and he was cunning, too; but his cunning was not the stealthy, wicked sort.
“You know who I am,” he greeted. “Let’s see if I know which of you is which.”
Cliff, who had discovered a little skein of colored yarn at the roadside near the inn entrance and who had paused to glance at it and slip it aimlessly in his pocket as some decorative native object about which he would ask later, came forward at once.
“You’re Cliff,” said Bill. “The others stood back for you. And this is Tom—because he sort of fits his name, for he looks quiet and has a manly grip. Of course there’s only Nicky left so this must be Nicky.”
They smiled at his deduction and felt as though they had known him for a long time, he was so easy to meet. He already called Mr. Whitley by his first name, insisted they call him Bill, and alluded to them as “comrade” or “comrade Cliff.”
“How is it you are called ‘Quipu’ Bill?” Nicky asked at once.
Bill squatted and began work on his stick again.
“The Incas didn’t have any alphabet or writing to keep their records and history,” Bill answered, “Nor any stone carvings such as you see in Egypt. When they wanted to send a message or make a record, or even figure up accounts, they used wool yarn of different colors and wove it together with different knots. The colors meant something and so did the placing of the knots and the number and the way they were made.