CHAPTER XXVII.
SHUT IN.
The situation in which the visitors to the dominions of King Haffgo were placed, was such as to sharpen their wits to the keenest edge.
After the departure of Fred Ashman, Ziffak talked more plainly with the Professor and New Englander.

The head chieftain told his white friends what they had suspected; Haffgo was enraged at Ashman's presumption with his daughter.

He was in that mood indeed, in which, but for his promise, he would have hurled his javelin at the youth before he left the audience chamber.
Ziffak, however, was hopeful that the anger of his royal brother would cool sufficiently to allow the visitors to remain there two days; but he doubted whether, after all, they would want to stay that long under the strained condition of things.
When the chieftain took his departure, it was without any hint that he wished to have an eye to the young gentleman, but Grimcke and Long suspected it, and their conversation became of the gravest character, for they fully realized their peril.
They regretted the mad infatuation of their young friend with Ariel the princess, and yet they did not blame him, for, as the New Englander remarked, could they have believed there was any hope for them, they would have fallen as irrestrainably in love as he.
But they did not, and, therefore, were in a frame of mind to consider the situation more coolly than the hot-headed lover.
Both agreed that the stroll taken by Ashman was likely to bring about trouble, but they were powerless to do anything.

Ziffak was the only individual who could manage matters in such an emergency.
It will be remembered that night had fully come at the time of the chieftain's departure.

The interior of the room would have been wrapped in gloom, had not the mother of Ziffak made her appearance and started a fire on the hearth at the further end of the apartment.
The white men watched her closely to see how the Murhapas were accustomed to secure ignition.