The Keepers of the People

1131The sight of him broke the spell of frenzy in most; and falling on their knees, they cried, “The son of Indra! The son of Indra!”

1132But there were fierce cries of revolt from many; swords flashed as they drew together, moving forward with a very threatening air; the priestess shrieked a denunciation, calling them on; and one of the assistants rushed at him with drawn sword, yelling, “Son of a dead God — die!”

1133Prince Ralph’s cloak hid the man from him; but Althea screamed; thrust forward her revolver anyhow towards the assassin; it cracked, and the man dropped, his head under the belly of Prince Ralph’s horse.

1134“Forward!” shouted Prince Ralph; and his horsemen thronged out of the wood, and held the crowd surrounded, while Althea rode to his side.

1135The murmurs and menaces ceased; the crowd awoke; their swords clattered on the ground.

1136“Seize that woman and those men,” said Prince Ralph, waving his hand towards the priestess and her assistants; and a score of mutes sprang from their horses, and bound them. Then he pointed out one by one a score of men in the crowd whom his quick eye had marked as readiest to resist; and they were seized and bound in their turn. He set aside three of the assistants, a young man with a weak face and slack mouth, a burly ruffian with the face of a brute, and a man who looked almost a negro. The other three and the men picked from the crowd were lashed to trees, and in five minutes ten of the mutes were flogging ten of them. The crowd looked on in silence; and the only sounds were the swish of the whips, and the yells of the flogged. Althea scarcely winced at them; the girl who had so nearly been sacrificed stood sobbing piteously at her side, recovering slowly from her fright, and stroking her hand. But when the flogging was over, and the man who looked a negro was made to kneel before a brawny mute — the executioner — who shore off his head with a stroke of his sword, cries and groans burst from the crowd: they were cured of their blood madness. The second man met with the like fate, screaming. When it came to the young man’s turn, an old man and an old woman broke from the crowd, and flinging themselves down before Prince Ralph, cried, “Spare him, O son of Indra! Spare him! He is our only son!”