’You will find out who we are in good time,’ was the answer, given with a grim laugh. ’Will you surrender quietly, or shall we’—— The speaker did not finish the sentence, but waited for an answer, as though he considered it unnecessary to say more. There were other sounds, however, which had caught Malto’s quick ear—sounds as of a number of men moving about amongst the surrounding rocks, and from these he drew the inference that the threat that had been made was not likely to prove an idle one. ’If we yield, what are you going to do with us?’ he asked again. ’That is for us to say. We cannot make any bargain with you,’ was the answer given roughly and impatiently. ’Will you guarantee us good treatment? Remember, I have told you we are peaceable folk. Have you no fear that King Agrando will call you to account?’ At this there was a harsh laugh. ’We have no fear of Agrando or his ruffians,’ the voice declared jeeringly. ’You will gain nothing by appealing to him here.’ ’Then you ought to welcome us as friends instead of treating us as enemies, for we have no more bitter foe than that same Agrando.’ ’Why,’ cried another voice, ’the fellow is mocking us! Is he not himself one of Agrando’s myrmidons? He is dressed in the tyrant’s uniform—ay, and so is another I can see beside him!’ ’A man may wear another’s uniform and yet be no friend of’—— Malto began, when Malandris interrupted him. It struck him that the second speaker was not unknown to him. ’I ought to know that voice!’ he exclaimed. ’I should recognise it among a thousand. Surely it is Landris, who was once a friend of mine!’ ’It is Malandris,’ they heard the second man then say; and there ensued a colloquy in a low tone between the unseen speakers. Presently the second man’s voice was heard again. ’If you are Malandris, what are you doing here? If you have come out at the tyrant’s bidding to join in hunting us down’—— ’We are fugitives, Landris. We have run away from him, as you yourself did once, and for the same reason—because we could put up with his treatment no longer. He condemned me to the cage of the krudias—his great monstrous bats—but by good chance these brave gentlemen, who are my companions, rescued me, and we all had to flee for our lives in consequence.’ Again there was a conference in low tones, and what seemed to be an argument ensued. At last the one called Landris said aloud, ’I tell you I will have it so! I know this Malandris to be an honest man, and once he saved my life; and I insist that he and those with him shall go before the chief and speak for themselves.’ ’Oh, very well, if you insist!’ the other replied. ’But, recollect, if there is trouble about it, it is your doing, not mine.’