Msaliti then began her beating.

"No, Master!" she screamed at the ring, twisting and writhing. But Msaliti administered to her an efficient, though brief, discipline. As beatings go it was not particularly severe. On the other hand, it was genuine. Evelyn had been truly beaten. She had felt the whip.

"Have mercy, Master, on your slave!" she wept.

Msaliti then, after some ten or twelve strokes, lowered the whip. He spoke to the askaris. They unlocked the left slave bracelet of the girl, freeing her from the ring. She fell to her stomach, weeping.

"To my feet," said he.

She crawled to his feet and kissed them. "Yes, Master," she said.

Msaliti again spoke to the askaris and they pulled the girl's wrists behind her back and, refastening her left wrist in the left slave bracelet, the right still locked on her right wrist, secured them there.

Msaliti looked down at her, on her stomach at his feet.

"What a miserable, worthless thing you are," he said.

I recalled that these had been the words the dark-haired girl had used to the blond-haired barbarian, still kneeling blindfolded, but now terribly frightened, to one side. She knew little of what was going on. She did understand, of course, that some sister in bondage, near to her, had just been disciplined.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Behold," said Msaliti, smiling, to Shaba and myself. Then, to the dark-haired girl, he said, sharply, "Nadu!"

She struggled to her knees and, as she could, her wrists braceleted behind her, assumed before him the lovely, elegant position of the pleasure slave.

"Despicable slave," smiled Msaliti to the girl.

"Yes, Master," she said, sobbing.

These words, too, I recalled, had been used by the dark-haired girl earlier to the blond-haired barbarian.

The dark-haired girl now knelt, collared, before Msaliti, herself, too, now only a girl, and slave, at the mercy of men.

Msaliti spoke again to the askaris. He gave one of them the key to the girl's collar.

"Several days ago," said he to the kneeling girl before him, "your sale to Pembe was arranged. Tonight you will be delivered to him."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"It seems he has taken a fancy to you," said Msaliti. "He thinks that you may have in you the makings of a paga girl. I do not know if it is true or not. I would, however, if I were you, attempt to do my best to justify Pembe's confidence in you. Pembe is not a patient man. He has taken the hands and feet from more than one girl."

She turned white. "Yes, Master," she said.

The askaris lifted her to her feet, one holding each arm. "Master," she asked.

"Yes," he said.

"May I have permission to speak?" she asked.

"Yes," he said.

"Do I have even a name?" she asked.

"No," he said, "unless Pembe should choose to give you one."

"Master," she said. "Yes," he said.

"What did you get for me?" she asked.

"You have a slave girl's vanity," he said. "Do you not?"

She put down her head. "Yes, Master," she said.

"That is an excellent sign," he said. "Perhaps you will even survive.

She looked at him, piteously.

"Four copper tarsks," he said.

"So little?" she said.

"In my opinion it is more than you are worth," said Msaliti. Then he waved his hand to the askaris, and they turned the slave about and thrust her, ahead of them, from our presence, out into the anteroom. There, in the anteroom, one of them retrieved the tiny scrap of yellow pleasure silk the girl had brought with her, wadded in her hand, when she had come earlier to the building. He tied this, snugly, on her collar. She looked back at us, frightened. Then she was thrust stumbling though the outside door, and into the street.

I stood up, near the table. "I shall see you, then, tomorrow evening," I said.

"Bring with you," said Shaba, "the false ring and the notes."

"And you," I said, "do not neglect to bring the genuine ring with you."

"I shall have it with me," he averred. I did not doubt it.

Msaliti, to one side, had begun his transformation into the beggar, Kunguni. He had already slipped the padded hump beneath his tunic and adjusted the straps by which it was held in place. He was now, at a mirror, with paste and ocher, attending to the matter of the simulated scar.

"What of this slave?" I asked Msaliti, indicating the blond-haired barbarian.

Msaliti shrugged. "She Is now worthless to us," he said.

"What did you pay Uchafu for her?" I asked.

"Five silver tarsks," he said.

"I will give you six," I said.

"She is hot," admitted Msaliti.

"Have you subjected her to rape test? I asked.

"No," said he. "Only to the touch of the owner's hands."

"That is usually a reliable test," I said.

"I will take six tarsks for her," said he, "if you are serious in the matter."

I gave Msaliti six silver tarsks for the girl. She was then mine. In the situation, as I assessed it, either she should have been given to me, upon my expression of interest, or I should have paid something for her in increments of silver tarsks, something over the price Msaliti had paid. Things turned out much as I had expected. I did not think Msaliti, truly, whom I took to be a shrewd, clever fellow, and one concerned with matters of wealth and power, would wish to give a girl away. Too, since he had paid for her in silver tarsks he would wish to sell her in the same denomination and, presumably, at some profit. My offer of six seemed perfect. It permitted him to satisfy his sense of venality and yet not appear excessively mercenary. Had I tried to obtain her for less than six tarsks or he tried to obtain more for her I think the situation could have become unpleasant.

Msaliti, his scar now affixed, and his disguise intact, bent down and removed the shackles from the blond barbarian's ankles. He then removed the collar from her and, with it, the rope which had tethered her to the wall. He then jerked her to her feet and unbound her hands. He then thrust her stumbling, blindfolded and naked, but otherwise unbound, to me. She stood against me, clutching me, frightened.

"I now own you," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

She lifted her hands to remove the blindfold.

"Do not remove the blindfold," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said, her lip trembling.

"You may have the blindfold," smiled Msaliti. "Keep her in it until she is well away from here."

"Very well," I said. He did not wish her, of course, to be able to find her way again to this place.

"You are not to touch the blindfold without permission," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said, standing quietly beside me. So simply, she a slave had been placed in the shackles of my will.

"Until tomorrow night," said Msaliti, lifting his hand.

"Until tomorrow night," I said.

He then left.

"We are now alone." I said to Shaba. The presence of the girl, of course, did not count. She was a slave.

"Yes," said Shaba, rising from behind the table.

I measured the distance to him.

"Who are you truly?" he asked.

"I think," I said, "you have the ring upon you, and would not leave it elsewhere."

"You are a shrewd man," said Shaba. He lifted his left hand, on the first finger of which was a fang ring. He folded his left hand into a fist and, with his thumb, pressed a tiny switch on the ring. The fang, of hollow steel, springing up, was then exposed.

"It contains kanda?" I asked.

"Yes," said he.

"It will do you little good," I said, "if you cannot strike me with it."

"A scratch will be sufficient," he said.

"One must, upon occasion, take risks," I said.

"I think I may easily multiply the risks," said he. He reached into his robes with his right hand. In a moment he had seemed to swirl and then, the light-diversion field activated, had vanished from my view.