How they
were to accomplish their end they did not know. Force was out of
the question, though they would not have hesitated to use it had
they possessed it. In former years they had marched rough shod over
enormous areas, taking toll by brute force even when kindliness or
diplomacy would have accomplished more; but now they were in bad
straits--so bad that they had shown their true colors scarce twice
in a year and then only when they came upon an isolated village,
weak in numbers and poor in courage.
Kovudoo was not as these, and though his village was in a way
remote from the more populous district to the north his power was
such that he maintained an acknowledged suzerainty over the thin
thread of villages which connected him with the savage lords to
the north. To have antagonized him would have spelled ruin for the
Swedes. It would have meant that they might never reach civilization
by the northern route. To the west, the village of The Sheik lay
directly in their path, barring them effectually. To the east the
trail was unknown to them, and to the south there was no trail.
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