Jackson Gregory

“ Or are you eager to have the vengeance of Yahoya strike?"
"Fool!" snarled Inaa. "Must I, though an old man, be afraid of you, a soft-bodied girl? For the thing I have to tell you, Yahoya, is that you are a girl and no goddess; just a girl as Nayangap there and Tocha, but with the white body of the Bahana."
Northrup felt that he could have patted the old villain on the back for that. For, if anything were to be done for her, the sooner Yahoya got her ideas of her own divinity out of her head, the better. ”

“ Nayangap and Tocha stood one at each side of their mistress, their black eyes wide and startled, their lips parted, a look of fear upon each face. Inaa's back was toward Northrup. The old man's form was tense, his voice vibrant with the emotion riding him.
"It is death to break silence during the Festival of Silence," Yahoya was saying now quite calmly, a little curl of contempt touching her mouth. "You will go down to the Skeleton House, Inaa, before the day is born and dies again!" ”

“ Or would you like to obey the command of Inaa and wed Tiyo—and so remain to the people what Inaa made you, a goddess? You must decide swiftly, for the dawn is coming and does not wait, Yahoya, because a white maid bids it to!"
Nayangap and Tocha gasped, turning their bewildered eyes from their mistress to the old priest, back to where Yahoya sat motionless.
Slowly now Yahoya stirred, her gaze going to Nayangap, then to Tocha.
"You have heard Inaa speak," she said very quietly. "You have seen one high in the thoughts of the gods stricken with madness. ”

“ Surely with old age madness has come upon you! You are great among your people, Inaa, but do you forget that you are only an old man, soon to die? The Skeleton Old Man has one hand upon your beard now! Be careful what you say, how you speak to Yahoya!"
Again Inaa's grunt, making Northrup vaguely uneasy. The old man was unmoved by Yahoya's words, and his attitude was plainly untinged by respect. ”

“ Why, a world is open to you now that is as wonderful as the world of the gods which you have let yourself dream of. It will be like paradise for a girl at your age to come into the Twentieth Century outside! And—" again under the emotion upon him he broke into quick English—"if you'll just buck up I'll send you out of this mess if we have to shoot our way out!"
Yahoya, looking at him a moment curiously, turned and without a word went into the anteroom at the left, dropping a curtain after her. Northrup swung about, seeking Inaa. The old man had slipped away. ”

“ A girl I put where she is; a girl I can pull down and give to the village to play with when I wish. Would you like, oh, dainty Yahoya, to have the hard hands of many drunken men pull you this way and that? ”

“ He noted swiftly that the stairways and ledges seemed alive with figures of men, women and children, and that in long streams they were moving downward into the cañon below. Down there were many other figures, clustering in groups where their fires burned. ”