A roar of approval went up from those of the other prisoners and
the Sagoths who had witnessed the brief drama; not, as I later
learned, because I had championed the girl, but for the neat and,
to them, astounding method by which I had bested Hooja.

And the girl? At first she looked at me with wide, wondering
eyes, and then she dropped her head, her face half averted, and a
delicate flush suffused her cheek. For a moment she stood thus in
silence, and then her head went high, and she turned her back upon
me as she had upon Hooja. Some of the prisoners laughed, and I
saw the face of Ghak the Hairy One go very black as he looked at
me searchingly. And what I could see of Dian's cheek went suddenly
from red to white.

Immediately after we resumed the march, and though I realized that
in some way I had offended Dian the Beautiful I could not prevail
upon her to talk with me that I might learn wherein I had erred--in
fact I might quite as well have been addressing a sphinx for all
the attention I got. At last my own foolish pride stepped in and
prevented my making any further attempts, and thus a companionship
that without my realizing it had come to mean a great deal to me was
cut off. Thereafter I confined my conversation to Perry. Hooja
did not renew his advances toward the girl, nor did he again venture
near me.

Again the weary and apparently interminable marching became a
perfect nightmare of horrors to me. The more firmly fixed became
the realization that the girl's friendship had meant so much to me,
the more I came to miss it; and the more impregnable the barrier
of silly pride. But I was very young and would not ask Ghak for