I took one dazed step and another. Then she flew across the space
between us, her thin arms tangling around my neck, and I caught her up,
still disbelieving.
"_Juli!_"
"Oh, Race, I thought I'd die when Mack told me you were leaving tonight.
It's been the only thing that's kept me alive, knowing--knowing I'd see
you." She sobbed and laughed, her face buried in my shoulder.
I let her cry for a minute, then held my sister at arm's length. For a
moment I had forgotten the six years that lay between us. Now I saw
them, all of them, printed plain on her face. Juli had been a pretty
girl. Six years had fined her face into beauty, but there was tension in
the set of her shoulders, and her gray eyes had looked on horrors.
She looked tiny and thin and unbearably frail under the scanty folds of
her fur robe, a Dry-town woman's robe. Her wrists were manacled, the
jeweled tight bracelets fastened together by the links of a long fine
chain of silvered gilt that clashed a little, thinly, as her hands fell
to her sides.
"What's wrong, Juli? Where's Rakhal?"
She shivered and now I could see that she was in a state of shock.
"Gone. He's gone, that's all I know. And--oh, Race, Race, he took Rindy
with him!"
From the tone of her voice I had thought she was sobbing. Now I realized
that her eyes were dry; she was long past tears. Gently I unclasped her
clenched fingers and put her back in the chair. She sat like a doll, her
hands falling to her sides with a thin clash of chains. When I picked
them up and laid them in her lap she let them lie there motionless. I
stood over her and demanded, "Who's Rindy?" She didn't move.
"My daughter, Race. Our little girl."
Magnusson broke in, his voice harsh. "Well, Cargill, should I have let
you leave?"
"Don't be a damn fool!"
"I was afraid you'd tell the poor kid she had to live with her own
mistakes," growled Magnusson. "You're capable of it."
For the first time Juli showed a sign of animation. "I was afraid to
come to you, Mack. You never wanted me to marry Rakhal, either."
"Water under the bridge," Magnusson grunted. "And I've got lads of my
own, Miss Cargill--Mrs.--" he stopped in distress, vaguely remembering
that in the Dry-towns an improper form of address can be a deadly
insult.
But she guessed his predicament.
"You used to call me Juli, Mack. It will do now."
"You've changed," he said quietly. "Juli, then. Tell Race what you told
me. All of it."