He paused,--then resumed in calmer accents,--"You judge rightly, reverend sir,--I am a stranger in Al-Kyris. I entered the city- gates this morning when the sun was high,--and ere noon I found courteous welcome and princely shelter,--I am the guest of the poet Sah-luma."
The old man looked at him half compassionately.
"Ah, Sah-luma is thine host?" he said with a touch of melancholy surprise in his tone--"Then wherefore art thou here? ... here in this dark abode where none may linger and escape with life? ... how earnest thou within the bounds of Lysid's fatal pleasaunce! ... Has the Laureate's friendship thus misguided thee?"
Theos hesitated before replying. He was again moved by that curious instinctive dread of hearing Sah-luma's name associated with any sort of reproach,--and his voice had a somewhat defiant ring as he answered: "Nay, surely I am neither child nor woman that I should weakly yield to guidance or misleading! Some trifling matter of free-will remains to me in spite of mine affliction,--and that I have supped with Sah-luma at the Palace of the High Priestess, has been as much my choice as his example. Who among men would turn aside from high feasting and mirthful company? ... not I, believe me! ... and Sah-luma's desires herein were but the reflex of mine own. We came together through the woodland, and parted but a moment since..."
He stopped abruptly, startled by a sudden clash as of steel and the tramp-tramp of approaching feet. His aged companion caught him by the arm...
"Hush!" he whispered.. "Not a word more.. not a breath! ... or thy life must pay the penalty! Quick,--follow me close! ... step softly! ... there is a hiding-place near at hand where we may couch unseen till these dread visitants pass by."
Moving stealthily and with anxious precaution, he led the way to a niche hollowed deeply out in the thickness of the wall, and turning his lamp aside so that not the faintest glimmer of it could be perceived, he took Theos by the hand, and drew him into what seemed to be a huge cavernous recess, utterly dark and icy cold.
Here, crouching low in the furthest gloom, they both waited silently,--Theos ignorant as to the cause of the sudden alarm, and wondering vaguely what strange new circumstance was about to happen. The measured tramp-tramp of feet came nearer and nearer, and in another moment the flare of smoking torches illumined the vaulted passage, casting many a ruddy flicker and flash on the ivory-gleaming whiteness of the vast skeleton army that stood with such grim and pallid patience as though waiting for a marching signal.