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to Taphro, ‘You may go.’
    Taphro snatched his palm to his forehead and was gone like a candle-flame in the wind. Zelda followed him with more dignity.
    ‘Now, Kelderek ,’ said the twisted mouth, slowly, ‘you are an honest man, you say, and we are alone, so there is nothing to hinder you from telling your story.’
    Sweat broke out on Kelderek ‘s face. He tried to speak, but no words came.
    ‘Why did you tell the shendron a few words and then refuse to tell more?’ said the High Baron. ‘What foolishness was that ? A rogue should know how to cover his tracks. If there was something you wished to conceal, why did you not invent some tale that would satisfy the shendron?’
    ‘Because — because the truth - ‘ The hunter hesitated. ‘Because I was afraid and I am still afraid.’ He stopped, but then burst out suddenly, ‘Who can lie to God? - ‘
    Bel-ka-Trazet watched him as a lizard watches a fly.
    ‘ Zelda P he called suddenly. The baron returned.
    ‘Take this man out, put his arm in a sling and let him eat Bring him back in half an hour - and then, by this knife, Kelderek -‘ and he drove the point of his dagger into the golden snake painted on the lid of the chest beside him - ‘you shall tell me what you know.’
    The unpredictable nature of dealings with Bel-ka-Trazet were the subject of many a tale. With Zelda’s hand under his shoulder, Kelderek stumbled out into the Sindrad and sat huddled on a bench while the boys brought him food and a leather sling.
    When next he faced Bel-ka-Trazet night had fallen. The Sindrad outside was quiet, for all but two of the barons had gone to their own quarters. Zelda sat in the firelight, looki ng over some arrows which the fle tcher had brought Fassel-Hasta was hunched on another bench at the table, slowly writing, with an inked brush on bark, by the light of a smoky earthenware lamp. A lamp was burning also on the lid of Bel-ka-Trazet’s chest. In the shadows beyond, two fire-flies went winking about the room. A curtain of wooden beads had been let fall over the doorway and from time to time these clicked quietly in the night breeze.
    The distortion of Bel-ka-Trazet’s face seemed like a trick of the lamplight, the features monstrous as a devil-mask in a play, the nose appearing to extend to the neck in a single, unbroken line, the shadows under the jaw p ulsing slightl y and rhythmically, like the throat of a toad. And indeed it was a play they were now to act^ thought Kelderek, for it accorded with nothing in life as he had known it A plain man, seeking only his living and neither wealth nor power, had been mysteriously singled out and made an instrument to cross the will of Bel-ka-Trazet
    ‘Well, Kelderek ,’ said the High Baron, pronouncing his name with a slight emphasis that somehow conveyed contempt, ‘while you have been filling your belly, I have learned as much as there is to be known about a man like you - all, that is, but what you are going to tell me now, Kelderek Zenzuata. Do you know they call you that? *
    ‘Yes, my lord.’
    ‘Kelderek Play-with-the-Children. A solitary young man, with no taste for taverns, it seems, and an unnatural indifference towards girls: but known nevertheless for a skilful hunter, who often brings in game and rarities for the factors trading with Gelt and Bekla.’
    ‘If you have heard so much, my lord -‘
    ‘So that he is allowed to come and go alone, much as he pleases, with no questions asked. Sometimes he is gone for several days at a time, is he not?’
    ‘It is necessary, my lord, if the game -
    ‘Why do you play with the children? A young man unmarried - what sort of nonsense is that?’ Kelderek considered.
    ‘Children often need friends,’ he said. ‘Some of the children I play with are unhappy. Some have been left with no parents - their parents have deserted them -‘
    He broke off in confusion, meeti ng the gaze of Bel-ka-Trazet’s distorted eye over the ridge. After some minutes he muttered