For a long time we sat there upon the little bench constructed for
the sentry that we had not as yet thought it necessary to post in
more than one of the four towers. We learned to know one another
better in those two brief hours than we had in all the months that
had intervened since we had been thrown together. She told me that
she had loved me from the first, and that she never had loved von
Schoenvorts, their engagement having been arranged by her aunt for
social reasons.

That was the happiest evening of my life; nor ever do I expect
to experience its like; but at last, as is the way of happiness,
it terminated. We descended to the compound, and I walked with Lys
to the door of her quarters. There again she kissed me and bade
me good night, and then she went in and closed the door.

I went to my own room, and there I sat by the light of one of the
crude candles we had made from the tallow of the beasts we had
killed, and lived over the events of the evening. At last I
turned in and fell asleep, dreaming happy dreams and planning for
the future, for even in savage Caspak I was bound to make my girl
safe and happy. It was daylight when I awoke. Wilson, who was
acting as cook, was up and astir at his duties in the cook-house.
The others slept; but I arose and followed by Nobs went down to
the stream for a plunge. As was our custom, I went armed with
both rifle and revolver; but I stripped and had my swim without
further disturbance than the approach of a large hyena, a number
of which occupied caves in the sand-stone cliffs north of the camp.
These brutes are enormous and exceedingly ferocious. I imagine
they correspond with the cave-hyena of prehistoric times.
This fellow charged Nobs, whose Capronian experiences had taught