"Alas! Princess," he cried, "I well deserve your scorn; yet knowest thou not how that against my will I have been forced into this service. Well I know that to ask pardon would be useless--the king will never pardon, should this reach his ears; still less will Coryon. Yet I care not if thou wilt but grant me _thy_ forgiveness. If these strangers are thy friends, grant me to serve thee by serving them; and should this service be even to death, it will content me that thou shouldst say of me that Ergalon had done his duty, and redeemed himself in thine eyes." "Be it so, Ergalon," Ulama answered, her voice and manner charged with a sweet graciousness that quite captivated the three bystanders. Then, turning to Monella, she continued, "My father, I owe you much for what you have done to-day. I shall try in the future to repay you to some measure. Meantime you will need friends--accept from Ergalon this proffered service. I feel sure, after what has happened, you may trust him--even to the death. I know not who you are, whether immortals, or beings of like nature to myself, thus timely sent by the Great Spirit to my aid. But this I know, that I may trust you; that you have come to be my friends, and my friends from henceforth you shall be." It would be difficult to convey an idea of the wonderful mixture of simple gentleness and queenly dignity with which these words were spoken. Further, it would be hard to say which of her hearers was most impressed. She had the art of winning hearts without intending or desiring it; and few could long resist the fascination of her presence. Small wonder then if Leonard Elwood had already fallen incontinently, helplessly, irretrievably in love. "And now," she finished, "I invite you to my home, where my father will bid you welcome." "And these?" Monella asked, pointing to the dead bodies. "Ergalon will know what to do," she answered; and moved away in the direction she had indicated. But by this time a small crowd was on its way to meet them. Those forming it were, as it appeared, chiefly her maidens and attendants and a file of soldiers--her guards. They looked curiously at the strangers, but, at a sign from her, fell in respectfully behind the little party. "Doubtless you marvel," she observed to Elwood and Monella, between whom she walked, "how it comes about that with all these people to attend and guard me, I was alone this morning. But for that chance the dead Zelus had never found his opportunity of saying that he did to me. He must have been watching for it; perchance had heard that I sometimes like to steal away alone for a little ramble. One gets so tired of always having people around one," she added, with an almost childish wilfulness. "But this will cure me. For the future I shall be more careful."