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Metak led her toward a building which, as she entered, she recognized as the
same to which she and Lieutenant Smith-Oldwick had been led when they were
brought into the city. There was no man sitting behind the carved desk now, but
about the room were a dozen or more warriors in the tunics of the house to which
they were attached, in this case white with a small lion in the form of a crest or
badge upon the breast and back of each.
As Metak entered and the men recognized him they arose, and in answer to a
query he put, they pointed to an arched doorway at the rear of the room. Toward
this Metak led the girl, and then, as though filled with a sudden suspicion, his
eyes narrowed cunningly and turning toward the soldiery he issued an order
which resulted in their all preceding him through the small doorway and up a
flight of stairs a short distance beyond.
The stairway and the corridor above were lighted by small flares which revealed
several doors in the walls of the upper passageway. To one of these the men led
the prince. Bertha Kircher saw them knock upon the door and heard a voice reply
faintly through the thick door to the summons. The effect upon those about her
was electrical. Instantly excitement reigned, and in response to orders from the
king's son the soldiers commenced to beat heavily upon the door, to throw their
bodies against it and to attempt to hew away the panels with their sabers. The
girl wondered at the cause of the evident excitement of her captors.
She saw the door giving to each renewed assault, but what she did not see just
before it crashed inward was the figures of the two men who alone, in all the
world, might have saved her, pass between the heavy hangings in an adjoining
alcove and disappear into a dark corridor.
As the door gave and the warriors rushed into the apartment followed by the
prince, the latter became immediately filled with baffled rage, for the rooms were
deserted except for the dead body of the owner of the palace, and the still form of
the black slave, Otobu, where they lay stretched upon the floor of the alcove.
The prince rushed to the windows and looked out, but as the suite overlooked the
barred den of lions from which, the prince thought, there could be no escape, his
puzzlement was only increased. Though he searched about the room for some
clue to the whereabouts of its former occupants he did not discover the niche
behind the hangings. With the fickleness of insanity he quickly tired of the
search, and, turning to the soldiers who had accompanied him from the floor
below, dismissed them.
After setting up the broken door as best they could, the men left the apartment
and when they were again alone Metak turned toward the girl. As he approached
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