They were starting back toward the city leaving the two priests. Most strangely, as no one Skag had ever met, Carlin could see the native and the English side of things. He felt that Cadman would say this of her, too. He wanted sanction on such things, because he felt that already his judgment was not cold—on matters that concerned her. Everything about her was more than one expected. She seemed to have an open consciousness, which saw two or all sides of a question before speech.
A great weakness had come upon Skag. It was in his limbs and in his voice and in his mind. It had not been so when the priests were near, nor when there was work to do. Now they were alone; the jungle was vast with a new vastness. The girl was taller and more powerful—her sayings veritable, equitable. There were golden flashes among the rich shadows of her mind, like the cathedral dimness of the jungle on their right hand as they walked, slanting shafts of sunlight raining through.
They walked slowly. Skag reflected that since his first sight of the sambhur, he had watched and done nothing. All his life had been like that. Yet this girl watched and worked, too. She loved the English and the natives, too. She had skilled hands, a trained body, a cultured mind—certainly a wonderful mind, as full of wonder as this jungle, with a sacred river flowing through.
Moreover, she could ask questions like Cadman—the spirit of things. He told her of his mother, of his running away from school when he first saw the animals at Lincoln Park Zoo, how they enveloped him, so that he thought nothing but of them, lived only for animals later as a circus trainer, and had come to India to see the life of the wild creatures outside of cages. . . . His tongue fumbled in the telling.
"But I do not see yet, why the priests of Hanuman let you go with them—"
"Nor I," said Skag.
"But they know you are not an animal-killer—"
They walked rather slowly. . . . Night was upon them when they reached the edge of the jungle and heard voices. The back of Skag's hand nearest Carlin was swiftly touched and she whispered breathlessly:
"My people. They are coming for me—good-bye—-"
The last few words had been just for him; the tone might have come up from the centre of himself.