Terry

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As they neared the foot of the ladder that served as stairway the
Major started violently as two brown forms appeared at their elbows;
at a word from Terry they stepped aside to let the two white men pass,
one calling softly to a guard stationed at the top of the ladder. The
door was thrown open and they mounted the bamboo rungs and entered the
house of Ohto.

Pine torches illuminated the room, which was some twenty feet square,
roughly sided and floored with bamboo slats; there was no ceiling, so
that a quarter of the high-pitched thatching of the house showed
overhead. A dozen middle-aged Hillmen stood along the wall, evidently
the influential men of the village. Across from them an aged Hillman
sat in a rough-hewed, high-backed chair.

Terry advanced and addressed the old man, his whole manner bespeaking
a sincere regard and respect; then he beckoned to the Major.

"This is Ohto," he said. "I will interpret for you if he does not
understand your dialect."

The Major faced the fine, austere old patriarch. The brown face had
been wrinkled bewilderingly by the heavy-handed years, but his eyes
still glowed with something of the pride and spirit of his youth.
Wrapped in a thick blanket of hand woven _kapok_, he confronted them
with that air of dignity and distinction common to those who from
early life have dominated the councils of a community.

The Major silently tendered his gifts. Ohto motioned to one of his
retainers and in a few monosyllables ordered their distribution among
the people, the red cloth to the women, the beads to the children and
the matches to be divided among the young men. As he retained nothing
for himself the Major produced a new pocket knife he carried, and bade
Terry make Ohto understand that it was for himself. The savage bent
his hoary locks over the treasure, examining the mysterious blades
that opened and closed at his will, and accepted it as his own.

The Major attempted to address the chief in his scanty Bogobo,
stumbled, and turned to Terry beseechingly.

"You tell him, Terry. You know what we've got to say better than I
do!"

So Terry spoke, and though the Major did not know it, he continually
referred to him as his chief, put all of the fine phrases in his name.
The warriors along the wall weighed every word.

Terry told Ohto of their great pleasure in having entered the Hills,
and of their appreciation of their reception. He extended the
greetings of the White Chief across the waters at Zamboanga, tried to
impress him with the interest the White Chief took in the Hill People
and of his good will toward them: told of the advantages that would
follow intercourse with the lowlands, of the good that would come to
his people from contact with others. Finally he dwelt upon the folly
of isolation, of the benefits of commerce and schools and other
elements of civilization.

The flare of the pitch torches brought out the sincerity of his face.
The old chief listened, inscrutably, his unwavering gaze fixed upon
the earnest speaker. Before the aged infirmity of Ohto Terry stood in
apt symbol of lithe youth.

It was apparent that Ohto did not grasp much of what Terry strove to
impart, for the primitive imagination was powerless to understand
institutions he could not conceive. He listened gravely but gave no
inkling of what went on behind the mask of his wise old eyes.

Terry finished, awaited expression of his decision. For a long time
the patriarch remained silent, idly opening and closing the blades of
his knife. The Hillmen ranged along the wall, who had listened
attentively to Terry's arguments for opening up their country to the
outlanders, waited their chief's pronouncement with set faces and
gleaming eyes, their brown bodies still as bronze figures.

At last the patriarch raised his head high, so that the snow white
hair fell back across his blanketed shoulders. He spoke so slowly
that Terry was able to follow him with whispered interpretations into
the anxious Major's ear.

"Many rainy seasons have washed my hair white. I live to see strange
things--I never thought to see a white man's face within my
walls--except, perhaps, upon a spear, grinning.

"When I was born--and no other man or woman of my tribe lives who saw
the sun of that far day--they said, the wise men, that much good would
come to my people before I died.

"They read it in the stars, they said. No great ill has come, except
to my own blood. All gone--wife, sons, grandsons. Never again will the
Agong ring for one of Ohto's blood!"

They felt the greater pity because the proud old chieftain demanded no
sympathy, but merely stated the pathetic fact with a simple dignity.

He was silent for a time, lost in an old man's memories. Then he
turned to one of the four retainers who flanked his chair.

"I am lonely," he said. "I would that Ahma would sit by me."

As the swart Hillman crossed the springy floor and rapped gently upon
a closed door, the Major saw that every black eye focussed upon it
with eager expectancy. For a moment the room was palpitant with
suspense. He looked to Terry for explanation, but turned back at the
grinding crunch of the hingeless door which opened to frame a fairer
vision than the Major had ever dreamed, asleep or awake.

A white girl had stepped out of the other room and paused a moment
against the dark background of the door to sweep the room with big
black eyes.

A single piece of white cloth, fringed with bat fur, was draped about
her waist and fell below her knee, the ends passing up in front and
back of her round body to fasten loosely at the right shoulder. This,
with a little sleeveless garment fashioned, bolero-like, out of the
delicate bat skins, and a pair of sandals contrived in such a way as
to bring the hair of the deer skin against the little feet, was all
she wore.

Bronner scarcely realized the symmetry of the slender form, so lost
was he in the spell of the dark eyes that plumbed his for one long
second, leaving him tingling with a curious conviction that his soul
had been bared. Vivid of white skin, of jet eyes, of a mass of
midnight hair that hung loose to her waist, she radiated the fire and
spirit of vibrant youth.

"God! Such a girl--up here--all these years!" he breathed.

She left the doorway and crossing the room with the light grace of
slender, untrammeled limbs, sank down on a bench drawn up at Ohto's
side. He set his withered hand contentedly upon the mass of her hair,
and in a moment he spoke again.

"If the prophecies of the wise men are to be fulfilled, it must be
soon. The good fortune of which they spoke has not come to my
people--and Ohto cannot tarry long in wait.... Death calls an old man.

"It may be that the prophecy had to do with the coming of these white
men. It may be that it would be better to no longer guard the Hills
with balatak and stake and spear and poisoned dart. It may be that our
people would be stronger--happier."

Again he halted his slow monosyllables, searching the faces of the
Hillmen who waited upon his words: utter devotion and loyalty were
apparent in every brown face. Proudly conscious of their fidelity, he
regarded them kindly, then his thoughts reverted to the girl at his
side, and he gently stroked the lustrous black hair. She sat quiet
under the caress, her head bent down in an attitude that revealed the
white line from shoulder to throat, her eyes sheltered behind long
lashes. At last Ohto raised his head again and when he spoke he gazed
straight at Terry.

"Ever since we ... found ... her, this lovely flower has flourished.
She now blooms in full blossom in my house--a white orchid on a
gnarled old root.

"Before Ohto leaves the Hills he would like to see Ahma safe,--guarded
and cherished by one who loves ... and knows. Though not of Ohto's
blood, she is of Ohto's heart. I will that when she finds a stronger
tree upon which to fasten--the Tribal Agong shall be rung for her."

Astonished out of their racial imperturbability, the Hillmen eyed each
other at this departure from the ancient custom of ringing the Giant
Agong only for those of chieftain blood. The girl's wide eyes raised
to Terry, shifted momentarily to the Major, and lowered.

The old man concluded: "You both speak fair, but I do not know what
is best for my people. I do not know.

"We must await a sign to guide us. The Spirit will speak to us through
limocon or nature, will solve the problem that you have brought to us
... and will decide your fate.

"Until the Spirit speaks, you are safe with us, white men.

"I am weary now."

* * * * *

The venerable savage gathered the blanket more closely about his thin
shoulders and closed his eyes as if exhausted. One of the four who
stood behind him pointed to the door to indicate that their audience
was at an end. As they passed out, the Major turned for a last look at
Ahma, who was leading the old man into his room.

In the middle of the clearing he stopped short.

"Say, you forgot to translate what Ohto said after she came into the
room!"

Terry smiled whimsically up into the chagrined face: "That's right, I
did! But you seemed to lose interest in his words!"

As they made their way through the village Terry explained Ohto's
decision, concluding with: "And so he awaits one of their 'signs,' the
appearance of the limocons, or some freak of weather or natural
phenomenon like an earthquake--they read prophecies in everything."

The Major sat down heavily upon the bench. He was genuinely disturbed
at this new phase, as he had thought their hazards passed.

"Why," he exclaimed, "that puts us square in the Lap o' Luck! Think of
just waiting around for an earthquake or something--or for some darned
bird to sing! With the opening up of this country as the stake--yes
and our own hides. Sus-marie-hosep!"

Terry had taken his usual seat on the threshold, chin in hand, his
face bathed in the light of the moon that now hung high overhead and
flooded the mountain top with a friendly glow. The cool night breezes
came in strong gusts which rustled the foliage about them.

Calmed by Terry's attitude of quiet confidence and strength, the Major
faced their problem coolly, sought a way out. For a while his mind
raced with plans, but each died in the minute of inception. He could
not influence winds, or induce wild birds to sing in given quarters of
the compass, or devise earthquakes. He fell to thinking of Ahma.

Later, observing Terry closely, he asked: "And what are you dreaming
about now?"

Terry stirred as though awakened: "Oh, home--mostly."

The Major wanted to talk, but the patient distress in the voice
deterred him from what seemed intrusion.

Later he suggested sleep. Terry lighted a torch and stuck it into the
doorway, so that while lighting both rooms its fumes carried into the
open. The Major discarded shoes and leggings, and wrapping himself in
his blanket lay down with his pack as pillow. Terry waited till the
Major had disposed himself as comfortably as possible, then
extinguished the torch and went into his own room, closing the door
behind him.

The Major stared through the dark at the closed door, wondering, as
usual, what was going on behind it. Then as a gust of cold wind blew
in through the window he snugged down into his blanket.

Another and stronger gust, and he heard the door into Terry's room
creak as it swung to the breeze. Looking up, he learned at last.

In the rectangular patch of moonlight which entered Terry's room
through a raised window he saw him by the side of the rough slatted
cot, kneeling in that most ancient of attitudes, in which the children
of all the ages have bowed to supplicate and render homage to the
Keeper of the Great Secret.

The Major's eyes moistened. As the last clear phrase reached him he
again stood flattened against the wind swept crag--"on the top of the
world," and he now understood the "dozen words spoken on another
mountain." They came from Terry's lips low, simple, majestic:

"--is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory.... Forever...."

CHAPTER XV

THE SIGN

The sun striking on his face through the open window waked the Major
to the cool clear morning. Sitting up, he saw Terry sunning himself on
the threshold, wrapped in a scant blanket such as Ohto had worn, his
hair wet from his bath in the creek which emptied the big spring at
the foot of the crag. Even in the stupor in which he woke from his
heavy sleep the Major noted the ruddy glow of the skin which covered
Terry's bare arm and leg, was surprised at the development of the
muscles which played into being at each slight movement. His face was
as evenly pallid as ever.

The Major stopped yawning. "Terry, I always thought of you as
being--sort of skinny, but you're as hard as nails."

He wrapped closer in the cotton cloth. "I've always taken good care of
myself, Major. From the time when I was a boy I have thought a good
deal about--all sorts of things--and I realized early that one thing
was certain--that this is the only body I'm ever going to have."

Learning from Terry where he could wash up, the Major made his way to
the creek and after disrobing waded into the deepest spot and soaped
himself liberally. For a moment he enjoyed the bath, but as the
spring was the source of water supply for the village and as the young
women were allotted the task of carrying it, his exhilaration was
short lived. The water came but to his knees, so most of the half hour
he spent in the pool he lay submerged to his chin, his agonized
bachelor face exposed to the maidens who observed him from the spring
three rods away. He would have taken no comfort from the thought--if
it had come to him--that to them comparative nakedness was the normal
state.

Mountain springs are usually clear and chill, and this was no
exception. He was numb with cold when, hearing a snort of
irrepressible joy behind him, he twisted his head about to discover
Terry enjoying his discomfiture. After Terry drove the girls away the
Major jumped out of the creek and hurried into his clothes, blue
lipped, shivering.

"T-Terry, you'd better q-q-quit laughing! M-Millions have been
m-m-murdered on less p-p-provocation!"

After breakfast Terry, intent upon discovery of some way out of their
predicament, left for a long walk. Alone in the little house, the
Major brooded half the morning over the plight in which the old
chief's dictum had placed them, then dismissed the profitless
forebodings and went out to the village to study the natives.

The clearing was empty of men. A score of the older women were
fetching wood to the fires, another group were washing camotes and
threshing rice with hand flails. Upward of a hundred naked children,
pot-bellied, straightbacked, stared at the big white stranger as he
passed, then ceased their pathetically futile efforts at play and
trooped along behind him, their eyes as old as Ohto's. He looked in at
the young women weaving kapok thread into cloth for blankets and the
garments the women wore, but recognizing in the third house he entered
three of the girls who had watched him in the creek, he fled in
confusion.

He ate dinner alone, as Terry had not returned. In the afternoon he
continued his study of tribal customs. He had known the Luzon head
hunters intimately, so had a basis of comparison. He went among the
older women freely and sat with them about the fires, practicing his
Bogobo, questioning, enlarging his vocabulary, winning their
friendliness.

As the afternoon waned he left the clearing, feeling in need of
exercise. He strode rapidly about the circumference of the plateau and
as he threaded the fringe of woods that separated the main clearing
from Ohto's reservation, he halted suddenly as he saw Ahma tripping
toward him on her way to Ohto's house.

His first wild impulse was to dodge among the trees and avoid her, but
as she had seen him he stood still until she should pass. But she
swerved toward him and approaching with light, swift tread of free
limbs she stopped a few feet before him, smiling.

Embarrassed by the creamy curves of shoulder and limbs, he sought
diversion in the treetops. She spoke, and at the sound of the clear
little voice he looked at her, and in looking forgot the eccentricity
of her frank costume. Her dark eyes held him: he knew that he was
gazing at the only wholly ingenuous being he had ever seen. He
swallowed convulsively.

"Hello," he said.

Bronner was subtle to a fault!

Puzzled at the word, she wrinkled her nose in delicious groping for
understanding, then laughed up at him. And with the laugh something
popped within his sturdy chest.

He hastily substituted the Hillmen's word of greeting, which he had
learned during the morning, and joined loudly in her merriment. Elated
with this success, he marshalled his resources of dialect to further
impress her but with a last bewildering glance from her dark eyes she
flitted homeward.

He watched the white figure out of sight in the woods, vaguely aware
that some new emotion had come to him. He stood among the trees some
minutes after she had disappeared, then turned toward the village.

"Sus-marie-hosep!" he exploded.

* * * * *

At supper time the clearing was again crowded with the entire
population of the village, the men having returned from their pursuits
of hunting, gardening and patrolling the great slope. Terry and
Bronner talked little, each taking his usual seat at window and door
to idly watch the crowd outside.

Most of the Hillmen ignored their presence, but one, a squat, powerful
fellow, swaggered by the door where Terry sat. Twice he passed, and
each time he leered derisively at the white man.

"Who's your friend, Terry?" queried the Major.

"Oh, that's Pud-Pud. He's the town bully--and never has liked me. He
led the crowd that opposed my--staying. He has bothered Ahma a good
deal, too: wants to marry her. She laughs at him, of course. What have
you been doing all day, Major?"

The Major told him of everything but the meeting with Ahma, spoke
enthusiastically of the tribe.

"They're straight Malay, Terry," he wound up. "A pure strain,
something you seldom see in the lowlands where the Spanish and Chinese
have addled the blood. They ought to develop rapidly under proper
guidance--they are a single-minded, sincere, fearless people."

Terry nodded agreement: "Nor are they the terrible people that the
Bogobos think them. Their fear of them must have been based on dread
of that sinister belt of forest. A good road will end all that."

They waited till Pud-Pud made a third mocking trip past their hut, gay
in a G-string contrived of a length of the cloth the Major had brought
up: it flamed against the naked brownness of back and legs.

"He's a lady-killer all right!" Terry said. "Ahma told me that he had
coaxed the calico away from one of the girls."

The Major stirred. "You saw Ahma to-day?"

But he had hesitated so long over the question that Terry, sunk in
deep thought, did not hear him, and somehow he did not feel like
repeating. He turned in on the hard bed with new things on his mind.
Measles is not the only affection that "takes harder" near maturity.

Several days passed without incident. Each morning the clearing
emptied after breakfast as all but the cooks left for the day's work.
Usually Terry wandered out alone, returning at evening to sit in the
doorway, lost in study.

Daily the Major loitered about the village till late afternoon, then
took up his stand in the woods near Ohto's domicile, waiting: and Ahma
never failed him. Bashfully distressed at first in the close proximity
to the wealth of charm revealed by her scant costume, he soon became
unconscious of it, her garb was so entirely congruous to her free,
unschooled nature. He practiced his sketchy dialect upon her,
delighted in each successful transmission of thought, more delighted
in the naive bewilderment that many of his linguistic efforts wrought
in her frank features.

The fifth day she failed to appear. He waited long, restless, till
certain that she would not come and then set off through the woods,
his big heart yearning for an unattainable something he could not
define or classify.

Regardless of where he went the Major crossed the tableland and
started down the incline of the slope. A mile, and he came across some
young hunters beating deer into a fenced runway that converged to a
narrow opening where two warriors stood ready, armed with great
spears. He turned to the left, crossing a little burnt clearing which
still bore the stubble of the season's harvest. Another half-mile and
he suddenly came upon a grass lean-to behind which two old Hillmen
grimly stirred a simmering pot from which arose an overpowering
stench: he fled the spot, knowing the sinister character of the
venomous brew.

The sun was low when he returned to the hut, still unhappy over
Ahma's failure to appear. In a few minutes Terry entered the shack. He
had come from the direction of Ohto's house, and his face was cleared
of the perplexity of the last few days.

During supper Terry studied the moody face of his friend, but forebore
comment. At the hour of sunset--the hour when the superstitious
Hillmen looked for their "signs"--the savages thronged the clearing in
mute expectancy. It was apparent that Ohto's injunction had been
communicated throughout the Hills, as each night the crowd who waited
the sign was augmented by contingents from other villages. The
hundreds stood, silent, as the sun sank slowly into a horizon of white
clouds which flushed pink, brightened into shades of rose and crimson.
For a brief moment the upturned faces of the brown host were ruddied;
they stood motionless, mute, while dusk settled. Then night fell
almost at a stroke.

Again there had been no revelation. As the heaped fires illuminated
the clearing, five mature Hillmen stalked past the white men's hut and
into the forest. Terry identified them to the Major as the sub-chiefs
who ruled the five adjacent villages.

The Major sat in the window a while, watching the Hillmen, who
squatted around the fires smoking their ridiculously tiny pipes and
conversing in low gutturals. He fidgeted, then left Terry
unceremoniously and skirting the village through the woods unseen by
the crowd, he waited an hour near Ohto's house in the hope of seeing
Ahma. Disappointed, he returned and threw himself on the cot.

Terry sat in his accustomed place in the doorway, watching the fleecy
clouds that a high wind drove across the sky, vast sliding shutters
which opened and closed over the cool glow of the moon. The cold
breeze chilled the Major, and he drew his blanket tight about him.
Terry's voice roused him from his dejected reverie.

"Major, I notice that you didn't carry your gun to-day. Don't go
without it again."

The Major half rose: "Why--you don't think--I haven't seen any
indication of--"

"I guess you've forgotten that we are in the Hill Country. If they
find a 'sign' that is unfavorable to us--there won't be any delay. And
we don't want to sell out cheaply."

The grave judicial tones startled the Major. In his absorption in the
white girl he had lost sight of their precarious situation.

Terry went on: "The tide of sentiment is turning against us. They seem
more antagonistic, more sullen. So please be careful."

Terry lapsed silent and sat in the door, chin in hand. Soon the
increasing wind drove the Major under his blanket again, and overcome
by a curious feeling of comfort and security in the mere presence of
the slight figure huddled at the door, he soon fell asleep.

Terry, unmindful of the chill breeze, remained in the doorway, deep in
thought. Suddenly he brought his hand to his knee in quick decision,
and after tip-toeing over to the Major to be sure that he slept, he
silently departed the hut and skirting the edge of the moonlit
clearing, disappeared into the lane that led to the house where Ahma
lived.

* * * * *

Toward morning the Major woke with a start, bewildered by an unearthly
sound that smote his ears. The wind had risen to a gale, tearing the
fleece from the sky, so that the moon peered down upon a sea of
treetops turbulent with the buffets of rushing air.

He sat up straight to relieve the thunderous humming in his head, then
comprehending that the amazing sound was a reality, he strove to solve
the source of the bewildering tones. A deep, low murmuring filled the
air, swelling in volume with each heavier gust which drove over the
mountain: the sound deepened and strengthened, mounting to a sustained
musical rumble that almost stupefied him.

"Ooooommmmmm-ah-oooommmmmmmm-ah-oooooo-ommmmmmm." The muffled volume
diminished, increased again with fresh burst of fleeting wind, and as
the wind subsided suddenly, the vibrant note fluttered, died away.

The Major had lived too long and too much to believe in the
supernatural but in the dark he found relief in the sound of his own
voice.

"Sus-marie-hosep!" he breathed. "Some ghost! No wonder they believe in
signs up here!"

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