Not until then did I move, but now I arose and went to the door. It was equipped with a heavy bar on the inside, and this I slid silently into its keeper.

Crossing the room, I entered the chamber where the girl lay and threw back the covers that concealed her. She had not moved. As she looked up at me, I placed a finger across my lips.

“You heard?” I asked in a low whisper.

She nodded.

“Tomorrow I will select you as my slave. Perhaps later I shall find a way to liberate you.”

“You are kind,” she said.

I reached down and took her by the hand. “Come,” I said, “into the other room. You can sleep there safely tonight, and in the morning we will plan how we may carry out the rest of our scheme.”

“I think that will not be difficult,” she said. “Early in the morning everyone but Fal Sivas goes to a large dining room on this level. Many of them will pass along this corridor. I can slip out, unseen, and join them. At breakfast you will have an opportunity of seeing all the slaves. Then you may select me if you still wish to do so.”

There were sleeping silks and furs in the room that I had assigned to her, and I knew that she would be comfortable; so I left her, and returning to my own room completed my preparations for the night that had been so strangely interrupted.

Early the next morning Zanda awoke me. “It will soon be time for them to go to breakfast,” she said. “You must go before I do, leaving the door open. Then when there is no one in the corridor, I will slip out.”

As I left my quarters, I saw two or three people moving along the corridor in the direction that Zanda had told me the dining room lay; and so I followed them, finally entering a large room in which there was a table that would seat about twenty. It was already over half filled. Most of the slaves were women—young women, and many of them were beautiful.

With the exception of two men, one sitting at either end of the table, all the occupants of the room were without weapons.

The man sitting at the head of the table was the same who had admitted Rapas and me the evening before. I learned later that his name was Hamas, and that he was the major-domo of the establishment.

The other armed man was Phystal. He was in charge of the slaves in the establishment. He also, as I was to learn later, attended to the procuring of many of them, usually by bribery or abduction.

As I entered the room, Hamas discovered me and motioned me to come to him. “You will sit here, next to me, Vandor,” he said.

I could not but note the difference in his manner from the night before, when he had seemed more or less an obsequious slave. I gathered that he played two rôles for purposes known best to himself or his master. In his present rôle, he was obviously a person of importance.

“You slept well?” he asked.

“Quite,” I replied; “the house seems very quiet and peaceful at night.”

He grunted. “If you should hear any unusual sounds at night,” he said, “you will not investigate, unless the master or I call you.” And then, as though he felt that that needed some explanation, he added, “Fal Sivas sometimes works upon his experiments late at night. You must not disturb him no matter what you may hear.”

Some more slaves were entering the room now, and just behind them came Zanda. I glanced at Hamas and saw his eyes narrow as they alighted upon her.

“Here she is now, Phystal,” he said.

The man at the far end of the table turned in his seat and looked at the girl approaching from behind him. He was scowling angrily.

“Where were you last night, Zanda?” he demanded, as the girl approached the table.

“I was frightened, and I hid,” she replied.

“Where did you hide?” demanded Phystal.

“Ask Hamas,” she replied.

Phystal glanced at Hamas. “How should I know where you were?” demanded the latter.

Zanda elevated her arched brows. “Oh, I am sorry,” she exclaimed; “I did not know that you cared who knew.”

Hamas scowled angrily. “What do you mean by that?” he demanded; “what are you driving at?”

“Oh,” she said, “I wouldn’t have said anything about it at all but I thought, of course, that Fal Sivas knew.”

Phystal was eyeing Hamas suspiciously.