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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
+will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
+using this eBook.
+
+Title: When the World Shook
+
+Author: H. Rider Haggard
+
+Release Date: June, 1998 [eBook #1368]
+[Most recently updated: December 26, 2020]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: Anthony Matonak and David Widger
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+When the World Shook
+
+Being an Account of the Great Adventure
+of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+by H. Rider Haggard
+
+
+Contents
+
+ CHAPTER I. Arbuthnot Describes Himself
+ CHAPTER II. Bastin and Bickley
+ CHAPTER III. Natalie
+ CHAPTER IV. Death and Departure
+ CHAPTER V. The Cyclone
+ CHAPTER VI. Land
+ CHAPTER VII. The Orofenans
+ CHAPTER VIII. Bastin Attempts the Martyr’s Crown
+ CHAPTER IX. The Island in the Lake
+ CHAPTER X. The Dwellers in the Tomb
+ CHAPTER XI. Resurrection
+ CHAPTER XII. Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!
+ CHAPTER XIII. Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues
+ CHAPTER XIV. The Under-world
+ CHAPTER XV. Oro in His House
+ CHAPTER XVI. Visions of the Past
+ CHAPTER XVII. Yva Explains
+ CHAPTER XVIII. The Accident
+ CHAPTER XIX. The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley
+ CHAPTER XX. Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night
+ CHAPTER XXI. Love’s Eternal Altar
+ CHAPTER XXII. The Command
+ CHAPTER XXIII. In the Temple of Fate
+ CHAPTER XXIV. The Chariot of the Pit
+ CHAPTER XXV. Sacrifice
+ CHAPTER XXVI. Tommy
+ CHAPTER XXVII. Bastin Discovers a Resemblance
+ NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+Ditchingham, 1918.
+
+MY DEAR CURZON,
+
+More than thirty years ago you tried to protect me, then a stranger to
+you, from one of the falsest and most malignant accusations ever made
+against a writer.
+
+So complete was your exposure of the methods of those at work to
+blacken a person whom they knew to be innocent, that, as you will
+remember, they refused to publish your analysis which destroyed their
+charges and, incidentally, revealed their motives.
+
+Although for this reason vindication came otherwise, your kindness is
+one that I have never forgotten, since, whatever the immediate issue of
+any effort, in the end it is the intention that avails.
+
+Therefore in gratitude and memory I ask you to accept this romance, as
+I know that you do not disdain the study of romance in the intervals of
+your Imperial work.
+
+The application of its parable to our state and possibilities—beneath
+or beyond these glimpses of the moon—I leave to your discernment.
+
+Believe me,
+Ever sincerely yours,
+H. RIDER HAGGARD.
+
+To
+The Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G.
+
+
+
+
+WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+Arbuthnot Describes Himself
+
+
+I suppose that I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, should begin this history in
+which Destiny has caused me to play so prominent a part, with some
+short account of myself and of my circumstances.
+
+I was born forty years ago in this very Devonshire village in which I
+write, but not in the same house. Now I live in the Priory, an ancient
+place and a fine one in its way, with its panelled rooms, its beautiful
+gardens where, in this mild climate, in addition to our own, flourish
+so many plants which one would only expect to find in countries that
+lie nearer to the sun, and its green, undulating park studded with
+great timber trees. The view, too, is perfect; behind and around the
+rich Devonshire landscape with its hills and valleys and its scarped
+faces of red sandstone, and at a distance in front, the sea. There are
+little towns quite near too, that live for the most part on visitors,
+but these are so hidden away by the contours of the ground that from
+the Priory one cannot see them. Such is Fulcombe where I live, though
+for obvious reasons I do not give it its real name.
+
+Many years ago my father, the Rev. Humphrey Arbuthnot, whose only child
+I am, after whom also I am named Humphrey, was the vicar of this place
+with which our family is said to have some rather vague hereditary
+connection. If so, it was severed in the Carolian times because my
+ancestors fought on the side of Parliament.
+
+My father was a recluse, and a widower, for my mother, a Scotswoman,
+died at or shortly after my birth. Being very High Church for those
+days he was not popular with the family that owned the Priory before
+me. Indeed its head, a somewhat vulgar person of the name of Enfield
+who had made money in trade, almost persecuted him, as he was in a
+position to do, being the local magnate and the owner of the rectorial
+tithes.
+
+I mention this fact because owing to it as a boy I made up my mind that
+one day I would buy that place and sit in his seat, a wild enough idea
+at the time. Yet it became engrained in me, as do such aspirations of
+our youth, and when the opportunity arose in after years I carried it
+out. Poor old Enfield! He fell on evil fortunes, for in trying to
+bolster up a favourite son who was a gambler, a spendthrift, and an
+ungrateful scamp, in the end he was practically ruined and when the bad
+times came, was forced to sell the Fulcombe estate. I think of him
+kindly now, for after all he was good to me and gave me many a day’s
+shooting and leave to fish for trout in the river.
+
+By the poor people, however, of all the district round, for the parish
+itself is very small, my father was much beloved, although he did
+practise confession, wear vestments and set lighted candles on the
+altar, and was even said to have openly expressed the wish, to which
+however he never attained, that he could see a censer swinging in the
+chancel. Indeed the church which, as monks built it, is very large and
+fine, was always full on Sundays, though many of the worshippers came
+from far away, some of them doubtless out of curiosity because of its
+papistical repute, also because, in a learned fashion, my father’s
+preaching was very good indeed.
+
+For my part I feel that I owe much to these High-Church views. They
+opened certain doors to me and taught me something of the mysteries
+which lie at the back of all religions and therefore have their home in
+the inspired soul of man whence religions are born. Only the pity is
+that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred he never discovers, never
+even guesses at that entombed aspiration, never sinks a shaft down on
+to this secret but most precious vein of ore.
+
+I have said that my father was learned; but this is a mild description,
+for never did I know anyone quite so learned. He was one of those men
+who is so good all round that he became pre-eminent in nothing. A
+classic of the first water, a very respectable mathematician, an expert
+in theology, a student of sundry foreign languages and literature in
+his lighter moments, an inquirer into sociology, a theoretical musician
+though his playing of the organ excruciated most people because it was
+too correct, a really first-class authority upon flint instruments and
+the best grower of garden vegetables in the county, also of apples—such
+were some of his attainments. That was what made his sermons so
+popular, since at times one or the other of these subjects would break
+out into them, his theory being that God spoke to us through all of
+these things.
+
+But if I began to drift into an analysis of my father’s abilities, I
+should never stop. It would take a book to describe them. And yet mark
+this, with them all his name is as dead to the world to-day as though
+he had never been. Light reflected from a hundred facets dissipates
+itself in space and is lost; that concentrated in one tremendous ray
+pierces to the stars.
+
+Now I am going to be frank about myself, for without frankness what is
+the value of such a record as this? Then it becomes simply another
+convention, or rather conventional method of expressing the octoroon
+kind of truths with which the highly civilised races feed themselves,
+as fastidious ladies eat cakes and bread from which all but the
+smallest particle of nourishment has been extracted.
+
+The fact is, therefore, that I inherited most of my father’s abilities,
+except his love for flint instruments which always bored me to
+distraction, because although they are by association really the most
+human of things, somehow to me they never convey any idea of humanity.
+In addition I have a practical side which he lacked; had he possessed
+it surely he must have become an archbishop instead of dying the vicar
+of an unknown parish. Also I have a spiritual sense, mayhap mystical
+would be a better term, which with all this religion was missing from
+my father’s nature.
+
+For I think that notwithstanding his charity and devotion he never
+quite got away from the shell of things, never cracked it and set his
+teeth in the kernel which alone can feed our souls. His keen intellect,
+to take an example, recognised every one of the difficulties of our
+faith and flashed hither and thither in the darkness, seeking
+explanation, seeking light, trying to reconcile, to explain. He was not
+great enough to put all this aside and go straight to the informing
+Soul beneath that strives to express itself everywhere, even through
+those husks which are called the World, the Flesh and the Devil, and as
+yet does not always quite succeed.
+
+It is this boggling over exteriors, this peering into pitfalls, this
+desire to prove that what such senses as we have tell us is impossible,
+is in fact possible, which causes the overthrow of many an earnest,
+seeking heart and renders its work, conducted on false lines, quite
+nugatory. These _will_ trust to themselves and their own intelligence
+and not be content to spring from the cliffs of human experience into
+the everlasting arms of that Infinite which are stretched out to
+receive them and to give them rest and the keys of knowledge. When will
+man learn what was taught to him of old, that faith is the only plank
+wherewith he can float upon this sea and that his miserable works avail
+him nothing; also that it is a plank made of many sorts of wood,
+perhaps to suit our different weights?
+
+So to be honest, in a sense I believe myself to be my father’s
+superior, and I know that he agreed with me. Perhaps this is owing to
+the blood of my Scotch mother which mixed well with his own; perhaps
+because the essential spirit given to me, though cast in his mould, was
+in fact quite different—or of another alloy. Do we, I wonder, really
+understand that there are millions and billions of these alloys, so
+many indeed that Nature, or whatever is behind Nature, never uses the
+same twice over? That is why no two human beings are or ever will be
+quite identical. Their flesh, the body of their humiliation, is
+identical in all, any chemist will prove it to you, but that which
+animates the flesh is distinct and different because it comes from the
+home of that infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate
+evolution of the good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and hell.
+
+Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another advantage
+over my father, which certainly came to me from my mother, who was, as
+I judge from all descriptions and such likenesses as remain of her, an
+extremely handsome woman. I was born much better looking. He was small
+and dark, a little man with deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also
+dark, but tall above the average, and well made. I do not know that I
+need say more about my personal appearance, to me not a very attractive
+subject, but the fact remains that they called me “handsome Humphrey”
+at the University, and I was the captain of my college boat and won
+many prizes at athletic sports when I had time to train for them.
+
+Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because he knew
+that he could do it better than anyone else, and partly to save school
+expenses. The experiment was very successful, as my love of all outdoor
+sports and of any small hazardous adventure that came to my hand, also
+of associating with fisherfolk whom the dangers of the deep make men
+among men, saved me from becoming a milksop. For the rest I learned
+more from my father, whom I always desired to please because I loved
+him, than I should have done at the best and most costly of schools.
+This was shown when at last I went to college with a scholarship, for
+there I did very well indeed, as search would still reveal.
+
+Here I had better set out some of my shortcomings, which in their sum
+have made a failure of me. Yes, a failure in the highest sense, though
+I trust what Stevenson calls “a faithful failure.” These have their
+root in fastidiousness and that lack of perseverance, which really
+means a lack of faith, again using the word in its higher and wider
+sense. For if one had real faith one would always persevere, knowing
+that in every work undertaken with high aim, there is an element of
+nobility, however humble and unrecognised that work may seem to be. God
+after all is the God of Work, it is written large upon the face of the
+Universe. I will not expand upon the thought; it would lead me too far
+afield, but those who have understanding will know what I mean.
+
+As regards what I interpret as fastidiousness, this is not very easy to
+express. Perhaps a definition will help. I am like a man with an
+over-developed sense of smell, who when walking through a foreign city,
+however clean and well kept, can always catch the evil savours that are
+inseparable from such cities. More, his keen perception of them
+interferes with all other perceptions and spoils his walks. The result
+is that in after years, whenever he thinks of that beautiful city, he
+remembers, not its historic buildings or its wide boulevards, or
+whatever it has to boast, but rather its ancient, fish-like smell. At
+least he remembers that first owing to this defect in his temperament.
+
+So it is with everything. A lovely woman is spoiled for such a one
+because she eats too much or has too high a voice; he does not care for
+his shooting because the scenery is flat, or for his fishing because
+the gnats bite as well as the trout. In short he is out of tune with
+the world as it is. Moreover, this is a quality which, where it exists,
+cannot be overcome; it affects day-labourers as well as gentlemen at
+large. It is bred in the bone.
+
+Probably the second failure-breeding fault, lack of perseverance, has
+its roots in the first, at any rate in my case. At least on leaving
+college with some reputation, I was called to the Bar where, owing to
+certain solicitor and other connections, I had a good opening. Also,
+owing to the excellence of my memory and powers of work, I began very
+well, making money even during my first year. Then, as it happened, a
+certain case came my way and, my leader falling ill suddenly after it
+was opened, was left in my hands. The man whose cause I was pleading
+was, I think, one of the biggest scoundrels it is possible to conceive.
+It was a will case and if he won, the effect would be to beggar two
+most estimable middle-aged women who were justly entitled to the
+property, to which end personally I am convinced he had committed
+forgery; the perjury that accompanied it I do not even mention.
+
+Well, he did win, thanks to me, and the estimable middle-aged ladies
+were beggared, and as I heard afterwards, driven to such extremities
+that one of them died of her misery and the other became a
+lodging-house keeper. The details do not matter, but I may explain that
+these ladies were unattractive in appearance and manner and broke down
+beneath my cross-examination which made them appear to be telling
+falsehoods, whereas they were only completely confused. Further, I
+invented an ingenious theory of the facts which, although the judge
+regarded it with suspicion, convinced an unusually stupid jury who gave
+me their verdict.
+
+Everybody congratulated me and at the time I was triumphant, especially
+as my leader had declared that our case was impossible. Afterwards,
+however, my conscience smote me sorely, so much so that arguing from
+the false premise of this business, I came to the conclusion that the
+practice of the Law was not suited to an honest man. I did not take the
+large view that such matters average themselves up and that if I had
+done harm in this instance, I might live to do good in many others, and
+perhaps become a just judge, even a great judge. Here I may mention
+that in after years, when I grew rich, I rescued that surviving old
+lady from her lodging-house, although to this day she does not know the
+name of her anonymous friend. So by degrees, without saying anything,
+for I kept on my chambers, I slipped out of practice, to the great
+disappointment of everybody connected with me, and took to authorship.
+
+A marvel came to pass, my first book was an enormous success. The whole
+world talked of it. A leading journal, delighted to have discovered
+someone, wrote it up; other journals followed suit to be in the
+movement. One of them, I remember, which had already dismissed it with
+three or four sneering lines, came out with a second and two-column
+notice. It sold like wildfire and I suppose had some merits, for it is
+still read, though few know that I wrote it, since fortunately it was
+published under a pseudonym.
+
+Again I was much elated and set to work to write another and, as I
+believe, a much better book. But jealousies had been excited by this
+leaping into fame of a totally unknown person, which were, moreover,
+accentuated through a foolish article that I published in answer to
+some criticisms, wherein I spoke my mind with an insane freedom and
+biting sarcasm. Indeed I was even mad enough to quote names and to give
+the example of the very powerful journal which at first carped at my
+work and then gushed over it when it became the fashion. All of this
+made me many bitter enemies, as I found out when my next book appeared.
+
+It was torn to shreds, it was reviled as subversive of morality and
+religion, good arrows in those days. It was called puerile,
+half-educated stuff—I half-educated! More, an utterly false charge of
+plagiarism was cooked up against me and so well and venomously run that
+vast numbers of people concluded that I was a thief of the lowest
+order. Lastly, my father, from whom the secret could no longer be kept,
+sternly disapproved of both these books which I admit were written from
+a very radical and somewhat anti-church point of view. The result was
+our first quarrel and before it was made up, he died suddenly.
+
+Now again fastidiousness and my lack of perseverance did their work,
+and solemnly I swore that I would never write another book, an oath
+which I have kept till this moment, at least so far as publication is
+concerned, and now break only because I consider it my duty so to do
+and am not animated by any pecuniary object.
+
+Thus came to an end my second attempt at carving out a career. By now I
+had grown savage and cynical, rather revengeful also, I fear. Knowing
+myself to possess considerable abilities in sundry directions, I sat
+down, as it were, to think things over and digest my past experiences.
+Then it was that the truth of a very ancient adage struck upon my mind,
+namely, that money is power. Had I sufficient money I could laugh at
+unjust critics for example; indeed they or their papers would scarcely
+dare to criticise me for fear lest it should be in my power to do them
+a bad turn. Again I could follow my own ideas in life and perhaps work
+good in the world, and live in such surroundings as commended
+themselves to me. It was as clear as daylight, but—how to make the
+money?
+
+I had some capital as the result of my father’s death, about £8,000 in
+all, plus a little more that my two books had brought in. In what way
+could I employ it to the best advantage? I remembered that a cousin of
+my father and therefore my own, was a successful stock-broker, also
+that there had been some affection between them. I went to him, he was
+a good, easy-natured man who was frankly glad to see me, and offered to
+put £5,000 into his business, for I was not minded to risk every thing
+I had, if he would give me a share in the profits. He laughed heartily
+at my audacity.
+
+“Why, my boy,” he said, “being totally inexperienced at this game, you
+might lose us more than that in a month. But I like your courage, I
+like your courage, and the truth is that I do want help. I will think
+it over and write to you.”
+
+He thought it over and in the end offered to try me for a year at a
+fixed salary with a promise of some kind of a partnership if I suited
+him. Meanwhile my £5,000 remained in my pocket.
+
+I accepted, not without reluctance since with the impatience of youth I
+wanted everything at once. I worked hard in that office and soon
+mastered the business, for my knowledge of figures—I had taken a
+first-class mathematical degree at college—came to my aid, as in a way
+did my acquaintance with Law and Literature. Moreover I had a certain
+aptitude for what is called high finance. Further, Fortune, as usual,
+showed me a favourable face.
+
+In one year I got the partnership with a small share in the large
+profits of the business. In two the partner above me retired, and I
+took his place with a third share of the firm. In three my cousin,
+satisfied that it was in able hands, began to cease his attendance at
+the office and betook himself to gardening which was his hobby. In four
+I paid him out altogether, although to do this I had to borrow money on
+our credit, for by agreement the title of the firm was continued. Then
+came that extraordinary time of boom which many will remember to their
+cost. I made a bold stroke and won. On a certain Saturday when the
+books were made up, I found that after discharging all liabilities, I
+should not be worth more than £20,000. On the following Saturday but
+two when the books were made up, I was worth £153,000! _L’appétit vient
+en mangeant_. It seemed nothing to me when so many were worth millions.
+
+For the next year I worked as few have done, and when I struck a
+balance at the end of it, I found that on the most conservative
+estimate I was the owner of a million and a half in hard cash, or its
+equivalent. I was so tired out that I remember this discovery did not
+excite me at all. I felt utterly weary of all wealth-hunting and of the
+City and its ways. Moreover my old fastidiousness and lack of
+perseverance re-asserted themselves. I reflected, rather late in the
+day perhaps, on the ruin that this speculation was bringing to
+thousands, of which some lamentable instances had recently come to my
+notice, and once more considered whether it were a suitable career for
+an upright man. I had wealth; why should I not take it and enjoy life?
+
+Also—and here my business acumen came in, I was sure that these times
+could not last. It is easy to make money on a rising market, but when
+it is falling the matter is very different. In five minutes I made up
+my mind. I sent for my junior partners, for I had taken in two, and
+told them that I intended to retire at once. They were dismayed both at
+my loss, for really I was the firm, and because, as they pointed out,
+if I withdrew all my capital, there would not be sufficient left to
+enable them to carry on.
+
+One of them, a blunt and honest man, said to my face that it would be
+dishonourable of me to do so. I was inclined to answer him sharply,
+then remembered that his words were true.
+
+“Very well,” I said, “I will leave you £600,000 on which you shall pay
+me five per cent interest, but no share of the profits.”
+
+On these terms we dissolved the partnership and in a year they had lost
+the £600,000, for the slump came with a vengeance. It saved them,
+however, and to-day they are earning a reasonable income. But I have
+never asked them for that £600,000.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+Behold me once more a man without an occupation, but now the possessor
+of about £900,000. It was a very considerable fortune, if not a large
+one in England; nothing like the millions of which I had dreamed, but
+still enough. To make the most of it and to be sure that it remained, I
+invested it very well, mostly in large mortgages at four per cent
+which, if the security is good, do not depreciate in capital value.
+Never again did I touch a single speculative stock, who desired to
+think no more about money. It was at this time that I bought the
+Fulcombe property. It cost me about £120,000 of my capital, or with
+alterations, repairs, etc., say £150,000, on which sum it may pay a net
+two and a half per cent, not more.
+
+This £3,700 odd I have always devoted to the upkeep of the place, which
+is therefore in first-rate order. The rest I live on, or save.
+
+These arrangements, with the beautifying and furnishing of the house
+and the restoration of the church in memory of my father, occupied and
+amused me for a year or so, but when they were finished time began to
+hang heavy on my hands. What was the use of possessing about £20,000 a
+year when there was nothing upon which it could be spent? For after all
+my own wants were few and simple and the acquisition of valuable
+pictures and costly furniture is limited by space. Oh! in my small way
+I was like the weary King Ecclesiast. For I too made me great works and
+had possessions of great and small cattle (I tried farming and lost
+money over it!) and gathered me silver and gold and the peculiar
+treasure of kings, which I presume means whatever a man in authority
+chiefly desires, and so forth. But “behold all was vanity and vexation
+of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun.”
+
+So, notwithstanding my wealth and health and the deference which is the
+rich man’s portion, especially when the limit of his riches is not
+known, it came about that I too “hated life,” and this when I was not
+much over thirty. I did not know what to do; for Society as the word is
+generally understood, I had no taste; it bored me; horse-racing and
+cards I loathed, who had already gambled too much on a big scale. The
+killing of creatures under the name of sport palled upon me, indeed I
+began to doubt if it were right, while the office of a junior county
+magistrate in a place where there was no crime, only occupied me an
+hour or two a month.
+
+Lastly my neighbours were few and with all due deference to them,
+extremely dull. At least I could not understand them because in them
+there did not seem to be anything to understand, and I am quite certain
+that they did not understand me. More, when they came to learn that I
+was radical in my views and had written certain “dreadful” and somewhat
+socialistic books in the form of fiction, they both feared and
+mistrusted me as an enemy to their particular section of the race. As I
+had not married and showed no inclination to do so, their womenkind
+also, out of their intimate knowledge, proclaimed that I led an immoral
+life, though a little reflection would have shown them that there was
+no one in the neighbourhood which for a time I seldom left, who could
+possibly have tempted an educated creature to such courses.
+
+Terrible is the lot of a man who, while still young and possessing the
+intellect necessary to achievement, is deprived of all ambition. And I
+had none at all. I did not even wish to purchase a peerage or a
+baronetcy in this fashion or in that, and, as in my father’s case, my
+tastes were so many and so catholic that I could not lose myself in any
+one of them. They never became more than diversions to me. A hobby is
+only really amusing when it becomes an obsession.
+
+At length my lonesome friendlessness oppressed me so much that I took
+steps to mitigate it. In my college life I had two particular friends
+whom I think I must have selected because they were so absolutely
+different from myself.
+
+They were named Bastin and Bickley. Bastin—Basil was his Christian
+name—was an uncouth, shock-headed, flat-footed person of large, rugged
+frame and equally rugged honesty, with a mind almost incredibly simple.
+Nothing surprised him because he lacked the faculty of surprise. He was
+like that kind of fish which lies at the bottom of the sea and takes
+every kind of food into its great maw without distinguishing its
+flavour. Metaphorically speaking, heavenly manna and decayed cabbage
+were just the same to Bastin. He was not fastidious and both were
+mental pabulum—of a sort—together with whatever lay between these
+extremes. Yet he was good, so painfully good that one felt that without
+exertion to himself he had booked a first-class ticket straight to
+Heaven; indeed that his guardian angel had tied it round his neck at
+birth lest he should lose it, already numbered and dated like an
+identification disc.
+
+I am bound to add that Bastin never went wrong because he never felt
+the slightest temptation to do so. This I suppose constitutes real
+virtue, since, in view of certain Bible sayings, the person who is
+tempted and would like to yield to the temptation, is equally a sinner
+with the person who does yield. To be truly good one should be too good
+to be tempted, or too weak to make the effort worth the tempter’s
+while—in short not deserving of his powder and shot.
+
+I need hardly add that Bastin went into the Church; indeed, he could
+not have gone anywhere else; it absorbed him naturally, as doubtless
+Heaven will do in due course. Only I think it likely that until they
+get to know him he will bore the angels so much that they will
+continually move him up higher. Also if they have any susceptibilities
+left, probably he will tread upon their toes—an art in which I never
+knew his equal. However, I always loved Bastin, perhaps because no one
+else did, a fact of which he remained totally unconscious, or perhaps
+because of his brutal way of telling one what he conceived to be the
+truth, which, as he had less imagination than a dormouse, generally it
+was not. For if the truth is a jewel, it is one coloured and veiled by
+many different lights and atmospheres.
+
+It only remains to add that he was learned in his theological fashion
+and that among his further peculiarities were the slow, monotonous
+voice in which he uttered his views in long sentences, and his total
+indifference to adverse argument however sound and convincing.
+
+My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different character.
+Like Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced another way. If
+Bastin’s omnivorous throat could swallow a camel, especially a
+theological camel, Bickley’s would strain at the smallest gnat,
+especially a theological gnat. The very best and most upright of men,
+yet he believed in nothing that he could not taste, see or handle. He
+was convinced, for instance, that man is a brute-descended accident and
+no more, that what we call the soul or the mind is produced by a
+certain action of the grey matter of the brain; that everything
+apparently inexplicable has a perfectly mundane explanation, if only
+one could find it; that miracles certainly never did happen, and never
+will; that all religions are the fruit of human hopes and fears and the
+most convincing proof of human weakness; that notwithstanding our
+infinite variations we are the subjects of Nature’s single law and the
+victims of blind, black and brutal chance.
+
+Such was Bickley with his clever, well-cut face that always reminded me
+of a cameo, and thoughtful brow; his strong, capable hands and his
+rather steely mouth, the mere set of which suggested controversy of an
+uncompromising kind. Naturally as the Church had claimed Bastin, so
+medicine claimed Bickley.
+
+Now as it happened the man who succeeded my father as vicar of Fulcombe
+was given a better living and went away shortly after I had purchased
+the place and with it the advowson. Just at this time also I received a
+letter written in the large, sprawling hand of Bastin from whom I had
+not heard for years. It went straight to the point, saying that he,
+Bastin, had seen in a Church paper that the last incumbent had resigned
+the living of Fulcombe which was in my gift. He would therefore be
+obliged if I would give it to him as the place he was at in Yorkshire
+did not suit his wife’s health.
+
+Here I may state that afterwards I learned that what did not suit Mrs.
+Bastin was the organist, who was pretty. She was by nature a woman with
+a temperament so insanely jealous that actually she managed to be
+suspicious of Bastin, whom she had captured in an unguarded moment when
+he was thinking of something else and who would as soon have thought of
+even looking at any woman as he would of worshipping Baal. As a matter
+of fact it took him months to know one female from another. Except as
+possible providers of subscriptions and props of Mothers’ Meetings,
+women had no interest for him.
+
+To return—with that engaging honesty which I have mentioned—Bastin’s
+letter went on to set out all his own disabilities, which, he added,
+would probably render him unsuitable for the place he desired to fill.
+He was a High Churchman, a fact which would certainly offend many; he
+had no claims to being a preacher although he was extraordinarily well
+acquainted with the writings of the Early Fathers. (What on earth had
+that to do with the question, I wondered.) On the other hand he had
+generally been considered a good visitor and was fond of walking (he
+meant to call on distant parishioners, but did not say so).
+
+Then followed a page and a half on the evils of the existing system of
+the presentation to livings by private persons, ending with the
+suggestion that I had probably committed a sin in buying this
+particular advowson in order to increase my local authority, that is,
+if I had bought it, a point on which he was ignorant. Finally he
+informed me that as he had to christen a sick baby five miles away on a
+certain moor and it was too wet for him to ride his bicycle, he must
+stop. And he stopped.
+
+There was, however, a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows:
+
+“Someone told me that you were dead a few years ago, and of course it
+may be another man of the same name who owns Fulcombe. If so, no doubt
+the Post Office will send back this letter.”
+
+That was his only allusion to my humble self in all those diffuse
+pages. It was a long while since I had received an epistle which made
+me laugh so much, and of course I gave him the living by return of
+post, and even informed him that I would increase its stipend to a sum
+which I considered suitable to the position.
+
+About ten days later I received another letter from Bastin which, as a
+scrawl on the flap of the envelope informed me, he had carried for a
+week in his pocket and forgotten to post. Except by inference it
+returned no thanks for my intended benefits. What it did say, however,
+was that he thought it wrong of me to have settled a matter of such
+spiritual importance in so great a hurry, though he had observed that
+rich men were nearly always selfish where their time was concerned.
+Moreover, he considered that I ought first to have made inquiries as to
+his present character and attainments, etc., etc.
+
+To this epistle I replied by telegraph to the effect that I should as
+soon think of making inquiries about the character of an archangel, or
+that of one of his High Church saints. This telegram, he told me
+afterwards, he considered unseemly and even ribald, especially as it
+had given great offence to the postmaster, who was one of the sidesmen
+in his church.
+
+Thus it came about that I appointed the Rev. Basil Bastin to the living
+of Fulcombe, feeling sure that he would provide me with endless
+amusement and act as a moral tonic and discipline. Also I appreciated
+the man’s blunt candour. In due course he arrived, and I confess that
+after a few Sundays of experience I began to have doubts as to the
+wisdom of my choice, glad as I was to see him personally. His sermons
+at once bored me, and, when they did not send me to sleep, excited in
+me a desire for debate. How could he be so profoundly acquainted with
+mysteries before which the world had stood amazed for ages? Was there
+nothing too hot or too heavy in the spiritual way for him to dismiss in
+a few blundering and casual words, as he might any ordinary incident of
+every-day life, I wondered? Also his idea of High Church observances
+was not mine, or, I imagine, that of anybody else. But I will not
+attempt to set it out.
+
+His peculiarities, however, were easy to excuse and entirely swallowed
+up by the innate goodness of his nature which soon made him beloved of
+everyone in the place, for although he thought that probably most
+things were sins, I never knew him to discover a sin which he
+considered to be beyond the reach of forgiveness. Bastin was indeed a
+most charitable man and in his way wide-minded.
+
+The person whom I could not tolerate, however, was his wife, who, to my
+fancy, more resembled a vessel, a very unattractive vessel, full of
+vinegar than a woman. Her name was Sarah and she was small, plain,
+flat, sandy-haired and odious, quite obsessed, moreover, with her
+jealousies of the Rev. Basil, at whom it pleased her to suppose that
+every woman in the countryside under fifty was throwing herself.
+
+Here I will confess that to the best of my ability I took care that
+they did in outward seeming, that is, whenever she was present,
+instructing them to sit aside with him in darkened corners, to present
+him with flowers, and so forth. Several of them easily fell into the
+humour of the thing, and I have seen him depart from a dinner-party
+followed by that glowering Sarah, with a handful of rosebuds and
+violets, to say nothing of the traditional offerings of slippers,
+embroidered markers and the like. Well, it was my only way of coming
+even with her, which I think she knew, for she hated me poisonously.
+
+So much for Basil Bastin. Now for Bickley. Him I had met on several
+occasions since our college days, and after I was settled at the Priory
+from time to time I asked him to stay with me. At length he came, and I
+found out that he was not at all comfortable in his London practice
+which was of a nature uncongenial to him; further, that he did not get
+on with his partners. Then, after reflection, I made a suggestion to
+him. I pointed out that, owing to its popularity amongst seaside
+visitors, the neighbourhood of Fulcombe was a rising one, and that
+although there were doctors in it, there was no really first-class
+surgeon for miles.
+
+Now Bickley was a first-class surgeon, having held very high hospital
+appointments, and indeed still holding them. Why, I asked, should he
+not come and set up here on his own? I would appoint him doctor to the
+estate and also give him charge of a cottage hospital which I was
+endowing, with liberty to build and arrange it as he liked. Further, as
+I considered that it would be of great advantage to me to have a man of
+real ability within reach, I would guarantee for three years whatever
+income he was earning in London.
+
+He thanked me warmly and in the end acted on the idea, with startling
+results so far as his prospects were concerned. Very soon his really
+remarkable skill became known and he was earning more money than as an
+unmarried man he could possibly want. Indeed, scarcely a big operation
+took place at any town within twenty miles, and even much farther away,
+at which he was not called in to assist.
+
+Needless to say his advent was a great boon to me, for as he lived in a
+house I let him quite near by, whenever he had a spare evening he would
+drop in to dinner, and from our absolutely opposite standpoints we
+discussed all things human and divine. Thus I was enabled to sharpen my
+wits upon the hard steel of his clear intellect which was yet, in a
+sense, so limited.
+
+I must add that I never converted him to my way of thinking and he
+never converted me to his, any more than he converted Bastin, for whom,
+queerly enough, he had a liking. They pounded away at each other,
+Bickley frequently getting the best of it in the argument, and when at
+last Bastin rose to go, he generally made the same remark. It was:
+
+“It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your intellect so
+utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted you of error at
+least half a dozen times, and not to confess it is mere pigheadedness.
+Good night. I am sure that Sarah will be sitting up for me.”
+
+“Silly old idiot!” Bickley would say, shaking his fist after him. “The
+only way to get him to see the truth would be to saw his head open and
+pour it in.”
+
+Then we would both laugh.
+
+Such were my two most intimate friends, although I admit it was rather
+like the equator cultivating close relationships with the north and
+south poles. Certainly Bastin was as far from Bickley as those points
+of the earth are apart, while I, as it were, sat equally distant
+between the two. However, we were all very happy together, since in
+certain characters, there are few things that bind men more closely
+than profound differences of opinion.
+
+Now I must turn to my more personal affairs. After all, it is
+impossible for a man to satisfy his soul, if he has anything of the
+sort about him which in the remotest degree answers to that
+description, with the husks of wealth, luxury and indolence,
+supplemented by occasional theological and other arguments between his
+friends. Becoming profoundly convinced of this truth, I searched round
+for something to do and, like Noah’s dove on the waste of waters, found
+nothing. Then I asked Bickley and Bastin for their opinions as to my
+best future course. Bickley proved a barren draw. He rubbed his nose
+and feebly suggested that I might go in for “research work,” which, of
+course, only represented his own ambitions. I asked him indignantly how
+I could do such a thing without any scientific qualifications whatever.
+He admitted the difficulty, but replied that I might endow others who
+had the qualifications.
+
+“In short, become a milch cow for sucking scientists,” I replied, and
+broke off the conversation.
+
+Bastin’s idea was, first, that I should teach in a Sunday School;
+secondly, that if this career did not satisfy all my aspirations, I
+might be ordained and become a missionary.
+
+On my rejection of this brilliant advice, he remarked that the only
+other thing he could think of was that I should get married and have a
+large family, which might possibly advantage the nation and ultimately
+enrich the Kingdom of Heaven, though of such things no one could be
+quite sure. At any rate, he was certain that at present I was in
+practice neglecting my duty, whatever it might be, and in fact one of
+those cumberers of the earth who, he observed in the newspaper he took
+in and read when he had time, were “very happily named—the idle rich.”
+
+“Which reminds me,” he added, “that the clothing-club finances are in a
+perfectly scandalous condition; in fact, it is £25 in debt, an amount
+that as the squire of the parish I consider it incumbent on you to make
+good, not as a charity but as an obligation.”
+
+“Look here, my friend,” I said, ignoring all the rest, “will you answer
+me a plain question? Have you found marriage such a success that you
+consider it your duty to recommend it to others? And if you have, why
+have _you_ not got the large family of which you speak?”
+
+“Of course not,” he replied with his usual frankness. “Indeed, it is in
+many ways so disagreeable that I am convinced it must be right and for
+the good of all concerned. As regards the family I am sure I do not
+know, but Sarah never liked babies, which perhaps has something to do
+with it.”
+
+Then he sighed, adding, “You see, Arbuthnot, we have to take things as
+we find them in this world and hope for a better.”
+
+“Which is just what I am trying to do, you unilluminating old donkey!”
+I exclaimed, and left him there shaking his head over matters in
+general, but I think principally over Sarah.
+
+By the way, I think that the villagers recognised this good lady’s
+vinegary nature. At least, they used to call her “Sour Sal.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+Natalie
+
+
+Now what Bastin had said about marriage stuck in my mind as his
+blundering remarks had a way of doing, perhaps because of the grain of
+honest truth with which they were often permeated. Probably in my
+position it was more or less my duty to marry. But here came the rub; I
+had never experienced any leanings that way. I was as much a man as
+others, more so than many are, perhaps, and I liked women, but at the
+same time they repelled me.
+
+My old fastidiousness came in; to my taste there was always something
+wrong about them. While they attracted one part of my nature they
+revolted another part, and on the whole I preferred to do without their
+intimate society, rather than work violence to this second and higher
+part of me. Moreover, quite at the beginning of my career I had
+concluded from observation that a man gets on better in life alone,
+rather than with another to drag at his side, or by whom perhaps he
+must be dragged. Still true marriage, such as most men and some women
+have dreamed of in their youth, had always been one of my ideals;
+indeed it was on and around this vision that I wrote that first book of
+mine which was so successful. Since I knew this to be unattainable in
+our imperfect conditions, however, notwithstanding Bastin’s strictures,
+again I dismissed the whole matter from my mind as a vain imagination.
+
+As an alternative I reflected upon a parliamentary career which I was
+not too old to begin, and even toyed with one or two opportunities that
+offered themselves, as these do to men of wealth and advanced views.
+They never came to anything, for in the end I decided that Party
+politics were so hateful and so dishonest, that I could not bring
+myself to put my neck beneath their yoke. I was sure that if I tried to
+do so, I should fail more completely than I had done at the Bar and in
+Literature. Here, too, I am quite certain that I was right.
+
+The upshot of it all was that I sought refuge in that last expedient of
+weary Englishmen, travel, not as a globe-trotter, but leisurely and
+with an inquiring mind, learning much but again finding, like the
+ancient writer whom I have quoted already, that there is no new thing
+under the sun; that with certain variations it is the same thing over
+and over again.
+
+No, I will make an exception, the East did interest me enormously.
+There it was, at Benares, that I came into touch with certain thinkers
+who opened my eyes to a great deal. They released some hidden spring in
+my nature which hitherto had always been striving to break through the
+crust of our conventions and inherited ideas. I know now that what I
+was seeking was nothing less than the Infinite; that I had “immortal
+longings in me.” I listened to all their solemn talk of epochs and
+years measureless to man, and reflected with a thrill that after all
+man might have his part in every one of them. Yes, that bird of passage
+as he seemed to be, flying out of darkness into darkness, still he
+might have spread his wings in the light of other suns millions upon
+millions of years ago, and might still spread them, grown radiant and
+glorious, millions upon millions of years hence in a time unborn.
+
+If only I could know the truth. Was Life (according to Bickley) merely
+a short activity bounded by nothingness before and behind; or
+(according to Bastin) a conventional golden-harped and haloed
+immortality, a word of which he did not in the least understand the
+meaning?
+
+Or was it something quite different from either of these, something
+vast and splendid beyond the reach of vision, something God-sent,
+beginning and ending in the Eternal Absolute and at last partaking of
+His attributes and nature and from aeon to aeon shot through with His
+light? And how was the truth to be learned? I asked my Eastern friends,
+and they talked vaguely of long ascetic preparation, of years upon
+years of learning, from whom I could not quite discover. I was sure it
+could not be from them, because clearly they did not know; they only
+passed on what they had heard elsewhere, when or how they either could
+not or would not explain. So at length I gave it up, having satisfied
+myself that all this was but an effort of Oriental imagination called
+into life by the sweet influences of the Eastern stars.
+
+I gave it up and went away, thinking that I should forget. But I did
+not forget. I was quick with a new hope, or at any rate with a new
+aspiration, and that secret child of holy desire grew and grew within
+my soul, till at length it flashed upon me that this soul of mine was
+itself the hidden Master from which I must learn my lesson. No wonder
+that those Eastern friends could not give his name, seeing that
+whatever they really knew, as distinguished from what they had heard,
+and it was little enough, each of them had learned from the teaching of
+his own soul.
+
+Thus, then, I too became a dreamer with only one longing, the longing
+for wisdom, for that spirit touch which should open my eyes and enable
+me to see.
+
+Yet now it happened strangely enough that when I seemed within myself
+to have little further interest in the things of the world, and least
+of all in women, I, who had taken another guest to dwell with me, those
+things of the world came back to me and in the shape of Woman the
+Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed since is it not written that no
+man can live to himself alone, or lose himself in watching and
+nurturing the growth of his own soul?
+
+It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and stayed
+there a while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name in the book
+of our Minister to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred Upton, not because I
+wished him to ask me to dinner, but for the reason that I had heard of
+him as a man of archæological tastes and thought that he might enable
+me to see things which otherwise I should not see.
+
+As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire neighbours
+who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on the following
+night. I accepted and found myself one of a considerable party, some of
+them distinguished English people who wore Orders, as is customary when
+one dines with the representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and
+this shows that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first
+time in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
+Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in to
+dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even a lady
+as there was not one to spare.
+
+Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself seated
+between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither of whom could
+talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign language, not even French
+in which they addressed me, seeming surprised that I did not understand
+them. I was humiliated at my own ignorance, although in fact I was not
+ignorant, only my education had been classical. Indeed I was a good
+classic and had kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I
+became an idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
+countess might know Latin from which her own language was derived, and
+addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir Alfred, who was not
+far off and overheard me (he also knew Latin), burst into laughter and
+proceeded to explain the joke in a loud voice, first in French and then
+in English, to the assembled company, who all became infected with
+merriment and also stared at me as a curiosity.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to a
+mistake of my driver I had arrived rather late and had not been
+introduced to her. As her father’s only daughter, her mother being
+dead, she was seated at the end of the table behind a fan-like
+arrangement of white Madonna lilies, and she had bent forward and, like
+the others, was looking at me, but in such a fashion that her head from
+that distance seemed as though it were surrounded and crowned with
+lilies. Indeed the greatest art could not have produced a more
+beautiful effect which was, however, really one of naked accident.
+
+An angel looking down upon earth through the lilies of Heaven—that was
+the rather absurd thought which flashed into my mind. I did not quite
+realise her face at first except that it seemed to be both dark and
+fair; as a fact her waving hair which grew rather low upon her
+forehead, was dark, and her large, soft eyes were grey. I did not know,
+and to this moment I do not know if she was really beautiful, but
+certainly the light that shone through those eyes of hers and seemed to
+be reflected upon her delicate features, was beauty itself. It was like
+that glowing through a thin vase of the purest alabaster within which a
+lamp is placed, and I felt this effect to arise from no chance, like
+that of the lily-setting, but, as it were, from the lamp of the spirit
+within.
+
+Our eyes met, and I suppose that she saw the wonder and admiration in
+mine. At any rate her amused smile faded, leaving the face rather
+serious, though still sweetly serious, and a tinge of colour crept over
+it as the first hue of dawn creeps into a pearly sky. Then she withdrew
+herself behind the screen of lilies and for the rest of that dinner
+which I thought was never coming to an end, practically I saw her no
+more. Only I noted as she passed out that although not tall, she was
+rounded and graceful in shape and that her hands were peculiarly
+delicate.
+
+Afterwards in the drawing-room her father, with whom I had talked at
+the table, introduced me to her, saying:
+
+“My daughter is the real archaeologist, Mr. Arbuthnot, and I think if
+you ask her, she may be able to help you.”
+
+Then he bustled away to speak to some of his important guests, from
+whom I think he was seeking political information.
+
+“My father exaggerates,” she said in a soft and very sympathetic voice,
+“but perhaps”—and she motioned me to a seat at her side.
+
+Then we talked of the places and things that I more particularly
+desired to see and, well, the end of it was that I went back to my
+hotel in love with Natalie; and as she afterwards confessed, she went
+to bed in love with me.
+
+It was a curious business, more like meeting a very old friend from
+whom one had been separated by circumstances for a score of years or so
+than anything else. We were, so to speak, intimate from the first; we
+knew all about each other, although here and there was something new,
+something different which we could not remember, lines of thought,
+veins of memory which we did not possess in common. On one point I am
+absolutely clear: it was not solely the everyday and ancient appeal of
+woman to man and man to woman which drew us together, though doubtless
+this had its part in our attachment as under our human conditions it
+must do, seeing that it is Nature’s bait to ensure the continuance of
+the race. It was something more, something quite beyond that elementary
+impulse.
+
+At any rate we loved, and one evening in the shelter of the solemn
+walls of the great Coliseum at Rome, which at that hour were shut to
+all except ourselves, we confessed our love. I really think we must
+have chosen the spot by tacit but mutual consent because we felt it to
+be fitting. It was so old, so impregnated with every human experience,
+from the direst crime of the tyrant who thought himself a god, to the
+sublimest sacrifice of the martyr who already was half a god; with
+every vice and virtue also which lies between these extremes, that it
+seemed to be the most fitting altar whereon to offer our hearts and all
+that caused them to beat, each to the other.
+
+So Natalie and I were betrothed within a month of our first meeting.
+Within three we were married, for what was there to prevent or delay?
+Naturally Sir Alfred was delighted, seeing that he possessed but small
+private resources and I was able to make ample provision for his
+daughter who had hitherto shown herself somewhat difficult in this
+business of matrimony and now was bordering on her twenty-seventh year.
+Everybody was delighted, everything went smoothly as a sledge sliding
+down a slope of frozen snow and the mists of time hid whatever might be
+at the end of that slope. Probably a plain; at the worst the upward
+rise of ordinary life.
+
+That is what we thought, if we thought at all. Certainly we never
+dreamed of a precipice. Why should we, who were young, by comparison,
+quite healthy and very rich? Who thinks of precipices under such
+circumstances, when disaster seems to be eliminated and death is yet a
+long way off?
+
+And yet we ought to have done so, because we should have known that
+smooth surfaces without impediment to the runners often end in
+something of the kind.
+
+I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where of
+course we met with a great reception, including the ringing (out of
+tune) of the new peal of bells that I had given to the church, Bastin
+made haste to point this out.
+
+“Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot,” he
+reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as usual,
+though what at I do not know, had been escorted from the room by
+Natalie, “and really, when I come to think of it, you are an unusually
+fortunate person. You possess a great deal of money, much more than you
+have any right to; which you seem to have done very little to earn and
+do not spend quite as I should like you to do, and this nice property,
+that ought to be owned by a great number of people, as, according to
+the views you express, I should have thought you would acknowledge, and
+everything else that a man can want. It is very strange that you should
+be so favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
+which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even in
+the end and you will get your share of troubles, like others. Perhaps
+Mrs. Arbuthnot will have no children as there is so much for them to
+take. Or perhaps you will lose all your money and have to work for your
+living, which might be good for you. Or,” he added, still thinking
+aloud after his fashion, “perhaps she will die young—she has that kind
+of face, although, of course, I hope she won’t,” he added, waking up.
+
+I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the
+proverbial funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to them. I
+suppose it was because in a flash of intuition I knew that they would
+come true and that he was an appointed Cassandra. Perhaps this uncanny
+knowledge overcame my natural indignation at such super-_gaucherie_ of
+which no one but Bastin could have been capable, and even prevented me
+from replying at all, so that I merely sat still and looked at him.
+
+But Bickley did reply with some vigour.
+
+“Forgive me for saying so, Bastin,” he said, bristling all over as it
+were, “but your remarks, which may or may not be in accordance with the
+principles of your religion, seem to me to be in singularly bad taste.
+They would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians,
+who appear to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at
+any decent heathen feast your neck would have been wrung as that of a
+bird of ill omen.”
+
+“Why?” asked Bastin blankly. “I only said what I thought to be the
+truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste.”
+
+“Then I will say what I think also to be the truth,” replied Bickley,
+growing furious. “It is that you use your Christianity as a cloak for
+bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy for others of which
+you seem to have none. Moreover, since you talk of the death of
+people’s wives, I will tell you something about your own, as a doctor,
+which I can do as I never attended her. It is highly probable, in my
+opinion, that she will die before Mrs. Arbuthnot, who is quite a
+healthy person with a good prospect of life.”
+
+“Perhaps,” said Bastin. “If so, it will be God’s will and I shall not
+complain” (here Bickley snorted), “though I do not see what you can
+know about it. But why should you cast reflections on the early
+Christians who were people of strong principle living in rough times,
+and had to wage war against an established devil-worship? I know you
+are angry because they smashed up the statues of Venus and so forth,
+but had I been in their place I should have done the same.”
+
+“Of course you would, who doubts it? But as for the early Christians
+and their iconoclastic performances—well, curse them, that’s all!” and
+he sprang up and left the room.
+
+I followed him.
+
+Let it not be supposed from the above scene that there was any
+ill-feeling between Bastin and Bickley. On the contrary they were much
+attached to each other, and this kind of quarrel meant no more than the
+strong expression of their individual views to which they were
+accustomed from their college days. For instance Bastin was always
+talking about the early Christians and missionaries, while Bickley
+loathed both, the early Christians because of the destruction which
+they had wrought in Egypt, Italy, Greece and elsewhere, of all that was
+beautiful; and the missionaries because, as he said, they were
+degrading and spoiling the native races and by inducing them to wear
+clothes, rendering them liable to disease. Bastin would answer that
+their souls were more important than their bodies, to which Bickley
+replied that as there was no such thing as a soul except in the stupid
+imagination of priests, he differed entirely on the point. As it was
+quite impossible for either to convince the other, there the
+conversation would end, or drift into something in which they were
+mutually interested, such as natural history and the hygiene of the
+neighbourhood.
+
+Here I may state that Bickley’s keen professional eye was not mistaken
+when he diagnosed Mrs. Bastin’s state of health as dangerous. As a
+matter of fact she was suffering from heart disease that a doctor can
+often recognise by the colour of the lips, etc., which brought about
+her death under the following circumstances:
+
+Her husband attended some ecclesiastical function at a town over twenty
+miles away and was to have returned by a train which would have brought
+him home about five o’clock. As he did not arrive she waited at the
+station for him until the last train came in about seven
+o’clock—without the beloved Basil. Then, on a winter’s night she tore
+up to the Priory and begged me to lend her a dog-cart in which to drive
+to the said town to look for him. I expostulated against the folly of
+such a proceeding, saying that no doubt Basil was safe enough but had
+forgotten to telegraph, or thought that he would save the sixpence
+which the wire cost.
+
+Then it came out, to Natalie’s and my intense amusement, that all this
+was the result of her jealous nature of which I have spoken. She said
+she had never slept a night away from her husband since they were
+married and with so many “designing persons” about she could not say
+what might happen if she did so, especially as he was “such a favourite
+and so handsome.” (Bastin was a fine looking man in his rugged way.)
+
+I suggested that she might have a little confidence in him, to which
+she replied darkly that she had no confidence in anybody.
+
+The end of it was that I lent her the cart with a fast horse and a good
+driver, and off she went. Reaching the town in question some two and a
+half hours later, she searched high and low through wind and sleet, but
+found no Basil. He, it appeared, had gone on to Exeter, to look at the
+cathedral where some building was being done, and missing the last
+train had there slept the night.
+
+About one in the morning, after being nearly locked up as a mad woman,
+she drove back to the Vicarage, again to find no Basil. Even then she
+did not go to bed but raged about the house in her wet clothes, until
+she fell down utterly exhausted. When her husband did return on the
+following morning, full of information about the cathedral, she was
+dangerously ill, and actually passed away while uttering a violent
+tirade against him for his supposed suspicious proceedings.
+
+That was the end of this truly odious British matron.
+
+In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process, canonised her in
+his imagination as a kind of saint. “So loving,” he would say, “such a
+devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can assure you that even in the
+midst of her death-struggle her last thoughts were of me,” words that
+caused Bickley to snort with more than usual vigour, until I kicked him
+to silence beneath the table.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+Death and Departure
+
+
+Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life to
+bitterness and my hopes to ashes.
+
+Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and Natalie.
+Mentally, physically, spiritually we were perfectly mated, and we loved
+each other dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet there was something about
+her which filled me with vague fears, especially after she found that
+she was to become a mother. I would talk to her of the child, but she
+would sigh and shake her head, her eyes filling with tears, and say
+that we must not count on the continuance of such happiness as ours,
+for it was too great.
+
+I tried to laugh away her doubts, though whenever I did so I seemed to
+hear Bastin’s slow voice remarking casually that she might die, as he
+might have commented on the quality of the claret. At last, however, I
+grew terrified and asked her bluntly what she meant.
+
+“I don’t quite know, dearest,” she replied, “especially as I am
+wonderfully well. But—but—”
+
+“But what?” I asked.
+
+“But I think that our companionship is going to be broken for a little
+while.”
+
+“For a little while!” I exclaimed.
+
+“Yes, Humphrey. I think that I shall be taken away from you—you know
+what I mean,” and she nodded towards the churchyard.
+
+“Oh, my God!” I groaned.
+
+“I want to say this,” she added quickly, “that if such a thing should
+happen, as it happens every day, I implore you, dearest Humphrey, not
+to be too much distressed, since I am sure that you will find me again.
+No, I can’t explain how or when or where, because I do not know. I have
+prayed for light, but it has not come to me. All I know is that I am
+not talking of reunion in Mr. Bastin’s kind of conventional heaven,
+which he speaks about as though to reach it one stumbled through
+darkness for a minute into a fine new house next door, where excellent
+servants had made everything ready for your arrival and all the lights
+were turned up. It is something quite different from that and very much
+more real.”
+
+Then she bent down ostensibly to pat the head of a little black cocker
+spaniel called Tommy which had been given to her as a puppy, a highly
+intelligent and affectionate animal that we both adored and that loved
+her as only a dog can love. Really, I knew, it was to hide her tears,
+and fled from the room lest she should see mine.
+
+As I went I heard the dog whimpering in a peculiar way, as though some
+sympathetic knowledge had been communicated to its wonderful animal
+intelligence.
+
+That night I spoke to Bickley about the matter, repeating exactly what
+had passed. As I expected, he smiled in his grave, rather sarcastic
+way, and made light of it.
+
+“My dear Humphrey,” he said, “don’t torment yourself about such
+fancies. They are of everyday occurrence among women in your wife’s
+condition. Sometimes they take one form, sometimes another. When she
+has got her baby you will hear no more of them.”
+
+I tried to be comforted but in vain.
+
+The days and weeks went by like a long nightmare and in due course the
+event happened. Bickley was not attending the case; it was not in his
+line, he said, and he preferred that where a friend’s wife was
+concerned, somebody else should be called in. So it was put in charge
+of a very good local man with a large experience in such domestic
+matters.
+
+How am I to tell of it? Everything went wrong; as for the details, let
+them be. Ultimately Bickley did operate, and if surpassing skill could
+have saved her, it would have been done. But the other man had
+misjudged the conditions; it was too late, nothing could help either
+mother or child, a little girl who died shortly after she was born but
+not before she had been christened, also by the name of Natalie.
+
+I was called in to say farewell to my wife and found her radiant,
+triumphant even in her weakness.
+
+“I know now,” she whispered in a faint voice. “I understood as the
+chloroform passed away, but I cannot tell you. Everything is quite
+well, my darling. Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the
+wonderful place in which you will find me, not knowing that you have
+found me. Good-bye for a little while; only for a little while, my own,
+my own!”
+
+Then she died. And for a time I too seemed to die, but could not. I
+buried her and the child here at Fulcombe; or rather I buried their
+ashes since I could not endure that her beloved body should see
+corruption.
+
+Afterwards, when all was over, I spoke of these last words of Natalie’s
+with both Bickley and Bastin, for somehow I seemed to wish to learn
+their separate views.
+
+The latter I may explain, had been present at the end in his spiritual
+capacity, but I do not think that he in the least understood the nature
+of the drama which was passing before his eyes. His prayers and the
+christening absorbed all his attention, and he never was a man who
+could think of more than one thing at a time.
+
+When I told him exactly what had happened and repeated the words that
+Natalie spoke, he was much interested in his own nebulous way, and said
+that it was delightful to meet with an example of a good Christian,
+such as my wife had been, who actually saw something of Heaven before
+she had gone there. His own faith was, he thanked God, fairly robust,
+but still an undoubted occurrence of the sort acted as a refreshment,
+“like rain on a pasture when it is rather dry, you know,” he added,
+breaking into simile.
+
+I remarked that she had not seemed to speak in the sense he indicated,
+but appeared to allude to something quite near at hand and more or less
+immediate.
+
+“I don’t know that there is anything nearer at hand than the
+Hereafter,” he answered. “I expect she meant that you will probably
+soon die and join her in Paradise, if you are worthy to do so. But of
+course it is not wise to put too much reliance upon words spoken by
+people at the last, because often they don’t quite know what they are
+saying. Indeed sometimes I think this was so in the case of my own
+wife, who really seemed to me to talk a good deal of rubbish. Good-bye,
+I promised to see Widow Jenkins this afternoon about having her
+varicose veins cut out, and I mustn’t stop here wasting time in
+pleasant conversation. She thinks just as much of her varicose veins as
+we do of the loss of our wives.”
+
+I wonder what Bastin’s ideas of _unpleasant_ conversation may be,
+thought I to myself, as I watched him depart already wool-gathering on
+some other subject, probably the heresy of one of those “early fathers”
+who occupied most of his thoughts.
+
+Bickley listened to my tale in sympathetic silence, as a doctor does to
+a patient. When he was obliged to speak, he said that it was
+interesting as an example of a tendency of certain minds towards
+romantic vision which sometimes asserts itself, even in the throes of
+death.
+
+“You know,” he added, “that I put faith in none of these things. I wish
+that I could, but reason and science both show me that they lack
+foundation. The world on the whole is a sad place, where we arrive
+through the passions of others implanted in them by Nature, which,
+although it cares nothing for individual death, is tender towards the
+impulse of races of every sort to preserve their collective life.
+Indeed the impulse _is_ Nature, or at least its chief manifestation.
+Consequently, whether we be gnats or elephants, or anything between and
+beyond, even stars for aught I know, we must make the best of things as
+they are, taking the good and the evil as they come and getting all we
+can out of life until it leaves us, after which we need not trouble.
+You had a good time for a little while and were happy in it; now you
+are having a bad time and are wretched. Perhaps in the future, when
+your mental balance has re-asserted itself, you will have other good
+times in the afternoon of your days, and then follow twilight and the
+dark. That is all there is to hope for, and we may as well look the
+thing in the face. Only I confess, my dear fellow, that your experience
+convinces me that marriage should be avoided at whatever inconvenience.
+Indeed I have long wondered that anyone can take the responsibility of
+bringing a child into the world. But probably nobody does in cold
+blood, except misguided idiots like Bastin,” he added. “He would have
+twenty, had not his luck intervened.”
+
+“Then you believe in nothing, Friend,” I said.
+
+“Nothing, I am sorry to say, except what I see and my five senses
+appreciate.”
+
+“You reject all possibility of miracle, for instance?”
+
+“That depends on what you mean by miracle. Science shows us all kinds
+of wonders which our great grandfathers would have called miracles, but
+these are nothing but laws that we are beginning to understand. Give me
+an instance.”
+
+“Well,” I replied at hazard, “if you were assured by someone that a man
+could live for a thousand years?”
+
+“I should tell him that he was a fool or a liar, that is all. It is
+impossible.”
+
+“Or that the same identity, spirit, animating principle—call it what
+you will—can flit from body to body, say in successive ages? Or that
+the dead can communicate with the living?”
+
+“Convince me of any of these things, Arbuthnot, and mind you I desire
+to be convinced, and I will take back every word I have said and walk
+through Fulcombe in a white sheet proclaiming myself the fool. Now, I
+must get off to the Cottage Hospital to cut out Widow Jenkins’s
+varicose veins. They are tangible and real at any rate; about the
+largest I ever saw, indeed. Give up dreams, old boy, and take to
+something useful. You might go back to your fiction writing; you seem
+to have leanings that way, and you know you need not publish the
+stories, except privately for the edification of your friends.”
+
+With this Parthian shaft Bickley took his departure to make a job of
+Widow Jenkins’s legs.
+
+I took his advice. During the next few months I did write something
+which occupied my thoughts for a while, more or less. It lies in my
+safe to this minute, for somehow I have never been able to make up my
+mind to burn what cost me so much physical and mental toil.
+
+When it was finished my melancholy returned to me with added force.
+Everything in the house took a tongue and cried to me of past days. Its
+walls echoed a voice that I could never hear again; in the very
+looking-glasses I saw the reflection of a lost presence. Although I had
+moved myself for the purposes of sleep to a little room at the further
+end of the building, footsteps seemed to creep about my bed at night
+and I heard the rustle of a remembered dress without the door. The
+place grew hateful to me. I felt that I must get away from it or I
+should go mad.
+
+One afternoon Bastin arrived carrying a book and in a state of high
+indignation. This work, written, as he said, by some ribald traveller,
+grossly traduced the character of missionaries to the South Sea
+Islands, especially of those of the Society to which he subscribed, and
+he threw it on the table in his righteous wrath. Bickley picked it up
+and opened it at a photograph of a very pretty South Sea Island girl
+clad in a few flowers and nothing else, which he held towards Bastin,
+saying:
+
+“Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her distinctly
+attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus blooms with a
+difference to our women—a little lower down.”
+
+“The devil is always attractive,” replied Bastin gloomily. “Child of
+Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph is enough to
+make my poor Sarah turn in her grave.”
+
+“Why?” asked Bickley; “seeing that wide seas roll between you and this
+dusky Venus. Also I thought that according to your Hebrew legend sin
+came in with bark garments.”
+
+“You should search the Scriptures, Bickley,” I broke in, “and cultivate
+accuracy. It was fig-leaves that symbolised its arrival. The garments,
+which I think were of skin, developed later.”
+
+“Perhaps,” went on Bickley, who had turned the page, “she” (he referred
+to the late Mrs. Bastin) “would have preferred her thus,” and he held
+up another illustration of the same woman.
+
+In this the native belle appeared after conversion, clad in broken-down
+stays—I suppose they were stays—out of which she seemed to bulge and
+flow in every direction, a dirty white dress several sizes too small, a
+kind of Salvation Army bonnet without a crown and a prayer-book which
+she held pressed to her middle; the general effect being hideous, and
+in some curious way, improper.
+
+“Certainly,” said Bastin, “though I admit her clothes do not seem to
+fit and she has not buttoned them up as she ought. But it is not of the
+pictures so much as of the letterpress with its false and scandalous
+accusations, that I complain.”
+
+“Why do you complain?” asked Bickley. “Probably it is quite true,
+though that we could never ascertain without visiting the lady’s home.”
+
+“If I could afford it,” exclaimed Bastin with rising anger, “I should
+like to go there and expose this vile traducer of my cloth.”
+
+“So should I,” answered Bickley, “and expose these introducers of
+consumption, measles and other European diseases, to say nothing of
+gin, among an innocent and Arcadian people.”
+
+“How can you call them innocent, Bickley, when they murder and eat
+missionaries?”
+
+“I dare say we should all eat a missionary, Bastin, if we were hungry
+enough,” was the answer, after which something occurred to change the
+conversation.
+
+But I kept the book and read it as a neutral observer, and came to the
+conclusion that these South Sea Islands, a land where it was always
+afternoon, must be a charming place, in which perhaps the stars of the
+Tropics and the scent of the flowers might enable one to forget a
+little, or at least take the edge off memory. Why should I not visit
+them and escape another long and dreary English winter? No, I could not
+do so alone. If Bastin and Bickley were there, their eternal arguments
+might amuse me. Well, why should they not come also? When one has money
+things can always be arranged.
+
+The idea, which had its root in this absurd conversation, took a
+curious hold on me. I thought of it all the evening, being alone, and
+that night it re-arose in my dreams. I dreamed that my lost Natalie
+appeared to me and showed me a picture. It was of a long, low land, a
+curving shore of which the ends were out of the picture, whereon grew
+tall palms, and where great combers broke upon gleaming sand.
+
+Then the picture seemed to become a reality and I saw Natalie herself,
+strangely changeful in her aspect, strangely varying in face and
+figure, strangely bright, standing in the mouth of a pass whereof the
+little bordering cliffs were covered with bushes and low trees, whose
+green was almost hid in lovely flowers. There in my dream she stood,
+smiling mysteriously, and stretched out her arms towards me.
+
+As I awoke I seemed to hear her voice, repeating her dying words: “Go
+where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in which
+you will find me, not knowing that you have found me.”
+
+With some variations this dream visited me twice that night. In the
+morning I woke up quite determined that I would go to the South Sea
+Islands, even if I must do so alone. On that same evening Bastin and
+Bickley dined with me. I said nothing to them about my dream, for
+Bastin never dreamed and Bickley would have set it down to indigestion.
+But when the cloth had been cleared away and we were drinking our glass
+of port—both Bastin and Bickley only took one, the former because he
+considered port a sinful indulgence of the flesh, the latter because he
+feared it would give him gout—I remarked casually that they both looked
+very run down and as though they wanted a rest. They agreed, at least
+each of them said he had noticed it in the other. Indeed Bastin added
+that the damp and the cold in the church, in which he held daily
+services to no congregation except the old woman who cleaned it, had
+given him rheumatism, which prevented him from sleeping.
+
+“Do call things by their proper names,” interrupted Bickley. “I told
+you yesterday that what you are suffering from is neuritis in your
+right arm, which will become chronic if you neglect it much longer. I
+have the same thing myself, so I ought to know, and unless I can stop
+operating for a while I believe my fingers will become useless. Also
+something is affecting my sight, overstrain, I suppose, so that I am
+obliged to wear stronger and stronger glasses. I think I shall have to
+leave Ogden” (his partner) “in charge for a while, and get away into
+the sun. There is none here before June.”
+
+“I would if I could pay a _locum tenens_ and were quite sure it isn’t
+wrong,” said Bastin.
+
+“I am glad you both think like that,” I remarked, “as I have a
+suggestion to make to you. I want to go to the South Seas about which
+we were talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that Bickley has
+been advising for me, and I should be very grateful if you would both
+come as my guests. You, Bickley, make so much money out of cutting
+people about, that you can arrange your own affairs during your
+absence. But as for you, Bastin, I will see to the wherewithal for the
+_locum tenens_, and everything else.”
+
+“You are very kind,” said Bastin, “and certainly I should like to
+expose that misguided author, who probably published his offensive work
+without thinking that what he wrote might affect the subscriptions to
+the missionary societies, also to show Bickley that he is not always
+right, as he seems to think. But I could never dream of accepting
+without the full approval of the Bishop.”
+
+“You might get that of your nurse also, if she happens to be still
+alive,” mocked Bickley. “As for his Lordship, I don’t think he will
+raise any objection when he sees the certificate I will give you about
+the state of your health. He is a great believer in me ever since I
+took that carbuncle out of his neck which he got because he will not
+eat enough. As for me, I mean to come if only to show you how
+continually and persistently you are wrong. But, Arbuthnot, how do you
+mean to go?”
+
+“I don’t know. In a mail steamer, I suppose.”
+
+“If you can run to it, a yacht would be much better.”
+
+“That’s a good idea, for one could get out of the beaten tracks and see
+the places that are never, or seldom, visited. I will make some
+inquiries. And now, to celebrate the occasion, let us all have another
+glass of port and drink a toast.”
+
+They hesitated and were lost, Bastin murmuring something about doing
+without his stout next day as a penance. Then they both asked what was
+the toast, each of them, after thought, suggesting that it should be
+the utter confusion of the other.
+
+I shook my head, whereon as a result of further cogitation, Bastin
+submitted that the Unknown would be suitable. Bickley said that he
+thought this a foolish idea as everything worth knowing was already
+known, and what was the good of drinking to the rest? A toast to the
+Truth would be better.
+
+A notion came to me.
+
+“Let us combine them,” I said, “and drink to the Unknown Truth.”
+
+So we did, though Bastin grumbled that the performance made him feel
+like Pilate.
+
+“We are all Pilates in our way,” I replied with a sigh.
+
+“That is what I think every time I diagnose a case,” exclaimed Bickley.
+
+As for me I laughed and for some unknown reason felt happier than I had
+done for months. Oh! if only the writer of that tourist tale of the
+South Sea Islands could have guessed what fruit his light-thrown seed
+would yield to us and to the world!
+
+I made my inquiries through a London agency which hired out yachts or
+sold them to the idle rich. As I expected, there were plenty to be had,
+at a price, but wealthy as I was, the figure asked of the buyer of any
+suitable craft, staggered me. In the end, however, I chartered one for
+six months certain and at so much per month for as long as I liked
+afterwards. The owners paid insurance and everything else on condition
+that they appointed the captain and first mate, also the engineer, for
+this yacht, which was named _Star of the South_, could steam at about
+ten knots as well as sail.
+
+I know nothing about yachts, and therefore shall not attempt to
+describe her, further than to say that she was of five hundred and
+fifty tons burden, very well constructed, and smart to look at, as well
+she might be, seeing that a deceased millionaire from whose executors I
+hired her had spent a fortune in building and equipping her in the best
+possible style. In all, her crew consisted of thirty-two hands. A
+peculiarity of the vessel was that owing to some fancy of the late
+owner, the passenger accommodation, which was splendid, lay forward of
+the bridge, this with the ship’s store-rooms, refrigerating chamber,
+etc., being almost in the bows. It was owing to these arrangements,
+which were unusual, that the executors found it impossible to sell, and
+were therefore glad to accept such an offer as mine in order to save
+expenses. Perhaps they hoped that she might go to the bottom, being
+heavily insured. If so, the Fates did not disappoint them.
+
+The captain, named Astley, was a jovial person who held every kind of
+certificate. He seemed so extraordinarily able at his business that
+personally I suspected him of having made mistakes in the course of his
+career, not unconnected with the worship of Bacchus. In this I believe
+I was right; otherwise a man of such attainments would have been
+commanding something bigger than a private yacht. The first mate,
+Jacobsen, was a melancholy Dane, a spiritualist who played the
+concertina, and seemed to be able to do without sleep. The crew were a
+mixed lot, good men for the most part and quite unobjectionable, more
+than half of them being Scandinavian. I think that is all I need say
+about the _Star of the South_.
+
+The arrangement was that the _Star of the South_ should proceed through
+the Straits of Gibraltar to Marseilles, where we would join her, and
+thence travel via the Suez Canal, to Australia and on to the South
+Seas, returning home as our fancy or convenience might dictate.
+
+All the first part of the plan we carried out to the letter. Of the
+remainder I say nothing at present.
+
+_Star of the South_ was amply provided with every kind of store. Among
+them were medicines and surgical instruments, selected by Bickley, and
+a case of Bibles and other religious works in sundry languages of the
+South Seas, selected by Bastin, whose bishop, when he understood the
+pious objects of his journey, had rather encouraged than hindered his
+departure on sick leave, and a large number of novels, books of
+reference, etc., laid in by myself. She duly sailed from the Thames and
+reached Marseilles after a safe and easy passage, where all three of us
+boarded her.
+
+I forgot to add that she had another passenger, the little spaniel,
+Tommy. I had intended to leave him behind, but while I was packing up
+he followed me about with such evident understanding of my purpose that
+my heart was touched. When I entered the motor to drive to the station
+he escaped from the hands of the servant, whimpering, and took refuge
+on my knee. After this I felt that Destiny intended him to be our
+companion. Moreover, was he not linked with my dead past, and, had I
+but known it, with my living future also?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+The Cyclone
+
+
+We enjoyed our voyage exceedingly. In Egypt, a land I was glad to
+revisit, we only stopped a week while the _Star of the South_, which we
+rejoined at Suez, coaled and went through the Canal. This, however,
+gave us time to spend a few days in Cairo, visit the Pyramids and
+Sakkara which Bastin and Bickley had never seen before, and inspect the
+great Museum. The journey up the Nile was postponed until our return.
+It was a pleasant break and gave Bickley, a most omnivorous reader who
+was well acquainted with Egyptian history and theology, the opportunity
+of trying to prove to Bastin that Christianity was a mere development
+of the ancient Egyptian faith. The arguments that ensued may be
+imagined. It never seemed to occur to either of them that all faiths
+may be and indeed probably are progressive; in short, different rays of
+light thrown from the various facets of the same crystal, as in turn
+these are shone upon by the sun of Truth.
+
+Our passage down the Red Sea was cool and agreeable. Thence we shaped
+our course for Ceylon. Here again we stopped a little while to run up
+to Kandy and to visit the ruined city of Anarajapura with its great
+Buddhist topes that once again gave rise to religious argument between
+my two friends. Leaving Ceylon we struck across the Indian Ocean for
+Perth in Western Australia.
+
+It was a long voyage, since to save our coal we made most of it under
+canvas. However, we were not dull as Captain Astley was a good
+companion, and even out of the melancholy Dane, Jacobsen, we had
+entertainment. He insisted on holding seances in the cabin, at which
+the usual phenomena occurred. The table twisted about, voices were
+heard and Jacobsen’s accordion wailed out tunes above our heads. These
+happenings drove Bickley to a kind of madness, for here were events
+which he could not explain. He was convinced that someone was playing
+tricks upon him, and devised the most elaborate snares to detect the
+rogue, entirely without result.
+
+First he accused Jacobsen, who was very indignant, and then me, who
+laughed. In the end Jacobsen and I left the “circle” and the cabin,
+which was locked behind us; only Bastin and Bickley remaining there in
+the dark. Presently we heard sounds of altercation, and Bickley emerged
+looking very red in the face, followed by Bastin, who was saying:
+
+“Can I help it if something pulled your nose and snatched off your
+eyeglasses, which anyhow are quite useless to you when there is no
+light? Again, is it possible for me, sitting on the other side of that
+table, to have placed the concertina on your head and made it play the
+National Anthem, a thing that I have not the slightest idea how to do?”
+
+“Please do not try to explain,” snapped Bickley. “I am perfectly aware
+that you deceived me somehow, which no doubt you think a good joke.”
+
+“My dear fellow,” I interrupted, “is it possible to imagine old Basil
+deceiving anyone?”
+
+“Why not,” snorted Bickley, “seeing that he deceives himself from one
+year’s end to the other?”
+
+“I think,” said Bastin, “that this is an unholy business and that we
+are both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do with it,” and
+he departed to his cabin, probably to say some appropriate prayers.
+
+After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an
+instrument called a planchette and with difficulty persuaded Bickley to
+try it, which he did after many precautions. The thing, a heart-shaped
+piece of wood mounted on wheels and with a pencil stuck at its narrow
+end, cantered about the sheet of paper on which it was placed, Bickley,
+whose hands rested upon it, staring at the roof of the cabin. Then it
+began to scribble and after a while stopped still.
+
+“Will the Doctor look?” said Jacobsen. “Perhaps the spirits have told
+him something.”
+
+“Oh! curse all this silly talk about spirits,” exclaimed Bickley, as he
+arranged his eyeglasses and held up the paper to the light, for it was
+after dinner.
+
+He stared, then with an exclamation which I will not repeat, and a
+glance of savage suspicion at the poor Dane and the rest of us, threw
+it down and left the cabin. I picked it up and next moment was
+screaming with laughter. There on the top of the sheet was a rough but
+entirely recognizable portrait of Bickley with the accordion on his
+head, and underneath, written in a delicate, Italian female hand,
+absolutely different from his own, were these words taken from one of
+St. Paul’s Epistles—“Oppositions of science falsely so called.”
+Underneath them again in a scrawling, schoolboy fist, very like
+Bastin’s, was inscribed, “Tell us how this is done, you silly doctor,
+who think yourself so clever.”
+
+“It seems that the devil really can quote Scripture,” was Bastin’s only
+comment, while Jacobsen stared before him and smiled.
+
+Bickley never alluded to the matter, but for days afterwards I saw him
+experimenting with paper and chemicals, evidently trying to discover a
+form of invisible ink which would appear upon the application of the
+hand. As he never said anything about it, I fear that he failed.
+
+This planchette business had a somewhat curious ending. A few nights
+later Jacobsen was working it and asked me to put a question. To oblige
+him I inquired on what day we should reach Fremantle, the port of
+Perth. It wrote an answer which, I may remark, subsequently proved to
+be quite correct.
+
+“That is not a good question,” said Jacobsen, “since as a sailor I
+might guess the reply. Try again, Mr. Arbuthnot.”
+
+“Will anything remarkable happen on our voyage to the South Seas?” I
+inquired casually.
+
+The planchette hesitated a while then wrote rapidly and stopped.
+Jacobsen took up the paper and began to read the answer aloud—“To A, B
+the D, and B the C, the most remarkable things will happen that have
+happened to men living in the world.”
+
+“That must mean me, Bickley the doctor and Bastin the clergyman,” I
+said, laughing.
+
+Jacobsen paid no attention, for he was reading what followed. As he did
+so I saw his face turn white and his eyes begin to start from his head.
+Then suddenly he tore the paper in pieces which he thrust into his
+pocket. Lifting his great fist he uttered some Danish oath and with a
+single blow smashed the planchette to fragments, after which he strode
+away, leaving me astonished and somewhat disturbed. When I met him the
+next morning I asked him what was on the paper.
+
+“Oh!” he said quietly, “something I should not like you too-proper
+English gentlemens to see. Something not nice. You understand. Those
+spirits not always good; they do that kind of thing sometimes. That’s
+why I broke up this planchette.”
+
+Then he began to talk of something else and there the matter ended.
+
+I should have said that, principally with a view to putting themselves
+in a position to confute each other, ever since we had started from
+Marseilles both Bastin and Bickley spent a number of hours each day in
+assiduous study of the language of the South Sea Islands. It became a
+kind of competition between them as to which could learn the most. Now
+Bastin, although simple and even stupid in some ways, was a good
+scholar, and as I knew at college, had quite a faculty for acquiring
+languages in which he had taken high marks at examinations. Bickley,
+too, was an extraordinarily able person with an excellent memory,
+especially when he was on his mettle. The result was that before we
+ever reached a South Sea island they had a good working knowledge of
+the local tongues.
+
+As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife who,
+under some of the “white Australia” regulations, were not allowed to
+remain in the country and offered to work as servants in return for a
+passage to Apia where we proposed to call some time or other. With
+these people Bastin and Bickley talked all day long till really they
+became fairly proficient in their soft and beautiful dialect. They
+wished me to learn also, but I said that with two such excellent
+interpreters and the natives while they remained with us, it seemed
+quite unnecessary. Still, I picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as
+much as they did perhaps.
+
+At length, travelling on and on as a voyager to the planet Mars might
+do, we sighted the low shores of Australia and that same evening were
+towed, for our coal was quite exhausted, to the wharf at Fremantle.
+Here we spent a few days exploring the beautiful town of Perth and its
+neighbourhood where it was very hot just then, and eating peaches and
+grapes till we made ourselves ill, as a visitor often does who is
+unaware that fruit should not be taken in quantity in Australia while
+the sun is high. Then we departed for Melbourne almost before our
+arrival was generally known, since I did not wish to advertise our
+presence or the object of our journey.
+
+We crossed the Great Australian Bight, of evil reputation, in the most
+perfect weather; indeed it might have been a mill pond, and after a
+short stay at Melbourne, went on to Sydney, where we coaled again and
+laid in supplies.
+
+Then our real journey began. The plan we laid out was to sail to Suva
+in Fiji, about 1,700 miles away, and after a stay there, on to Hawaii
+or the Sandwich Islands, stopping perhaps at the Phoenix Islands and
+the Central Polynesian Sporades, such as Christmas and Fanning Isles.
+Then we proposed to turn south again through the Marshall Archipelago
+and the Caroline Islands, and so on to New Guinea and the Coral Sea.
+Particularly did we wish to visit Easter Island on account of its
+marvelous sculptures that are supposed to be the relics of a
+pre-historic race. In truth, however, we had no fixed plan except to go
+wherever circumstance and chance might take us. Chance, I may add, or
+something else, took full advantage of its opportunities.
+
+We came to Suva in safety and spent a while in exploring the beautiful
+Fiji Isles where both Bastin and Bickley made full inquiries about the
+work of the missionaries, each of them drawing exactly opposite
+conclusions from the same set of admitted facts. Thence we steamed to
+Samoa and put our two natives ashore at Apia, where we procured some
+coal. We did not stay long enough in these islands to investigate them,
+however, because persons of experience there assured us from certain
+familiar signs that one of the terrible hurricanes with which they are
+afflicted, was due to arrive shortly and that we should do well to put
+ourselves beyond its reach. So having coaled and watered we departed in
+a hurry.
+
+Up to this time I should state we had met with the most wonderful good
+fortune in the matter of weather, so good indeed that never on one
+occasion since we left Marseilles, had we been obliged to put the
+fiddles on the tables. With the superstition of a sailor Captain
+Astley, when I alluded to the matter, shook his head saying that
+doubtless we should pay for it later on, since “luck never goes all the
+way” and cyclones were reported to be about.
+
+Here I must tell that after we were clear of Apia, it was discovered
+that the Danish mate who was believed to be in his cabin unwell from
+something he had eaten, was missing. The question arose whether we
+should put back to find him, as we supposed that he had made a trip
+inland and met with an accident, or been otherwise delayed. I was in
+favour of doing so though the captain, thinking of the threatened
+hurricane, shook his head and said that Jacobsen was a queer fellow who
+might just as well have gone overboard as anywhere else, if he thought
+he heard “the spirits, of whom he was so fond,” calling him. While the
+matter was still in suspense I happened to go into my own stateroom and
+there, stuck in the looking-glass, saw an envelope in the Dane’s
+handwriting addressed to myself. On opening it I found another sealed
+letter, unaddressed, also a note that ran as follows:
+
+“Honoured Sir,
+    “You will think very badly of me for leaving you, but the enclosed
+    which I implore you not to open until you have seen the last of the
+    _Star of the South_, will explain my reason and I hope clear my
+    reputation. I thank you again and again for all your kindness and
+    pray that the Spirits who rule the world may bless and preserve
+    you, also the Doctor and Mr. Bastin.”
+
+
+This letter, which left the fate of Jacobsen quite unsolved, for it
+might mean either that he had deserted or drowned himself, I put away
+with the enclosure in my pocket. Of course there was no obligation on
+me to refrain from opening the letter, but I shrank from doing so both
+from some kind of sense of honour and, to tell the truth, for fear of
+what it might contain. I felt that this would be disagreeable; also,
+although there was nothing to connect them together, I bethought me of
+the scene when Jacobsen had smashed the planchette.
+
+On my return to the deck I said nothing whatsoever about the discovery
+of the letter, but only remarked that on reflection I had changed my
+mind and agreed with the captain that it would be unwise to attempt to
+return in order to look for Jacobsen. So the boatswain, a capable
+individual who had seen better days, was promoted to take his watches
+and we went on as before. How curiously things come about in the world!
+For nautical reasons that were explained to me, but which I will not
+trouble to set down, if indeed I could remember them, I believe that if
+we had returned to Apia we should have missed the great gale and
+subsequent cyclone, and with these much else. But it was not so fated.
+
+It was on the fourth day, when we were roughly seven hundred miles or
+more north of Samoa, that we met the edge of this gale about sundown.
+The captain put on steam in the hope of pushing through it, but that
+night we dined for the first time with the fiddles on, and by eleven
+o’clock it was as much as one could do to stand in the cabin, while the
+water was washing freely over the deck. Fortunately, however, the wind
+veered more aft of us, so that by putting about her head a little
+(seamen must forgive me if I talk of these matters as a landlubber) we
+ran almost before the wind, though not quite in the direction that we
+wished to go.
+
+When the light came it was blowing very hard indeed, and the sky was
+utterly overcast, so that we got no glimpse of the sun, or of the stars
+on the following night. Unfortunately, there was no moon visible;
+indeed, if there had been I do not suppose that it would have helped us
+because of the thick pall of clouds. For quite seventy-two hours we ran
+on beneath bare poles before that gale. The little vessel behaved
+splendidly, riding the seas like a duck, but I could see that Captain
+Astley was growing alarmed. When I said something complimentary to him
+about the conduct of the _Star of the South_, he replied that she was
+forging ahead all right, but the question was—where to? He had been
+unable to take an observation of any sort since we left Samoa; both his
+patent logs had been carried away, so that now only the compass
+remained, and he had not the slightest idea where we were in that great
+ocean studded with atolls and islands.
+
+I asked him whether we could not steam back to our proper course, but
+he answered that to do so he would have to travel dead in the eye of
+the gale, and he doubted whether the engines would stand it. Also there
+was the question of coal to be considered. However, he had kept the
+fires going and would do what he could if the weather moderated.
+
+That night during dinner which now consisted of tinned foods and whisky
+and water, for the seas had got to the galley fire, suddenly the gale
+dropped, whereat we rejoiced exceedingly. The captain came down into
+the saloon very white and shaken, I thought, and I asked him to have a
+nip of whisky to warm him up, and to celebrate our good fortune in
+having run out of the wind. He took the bottle and, to my alarm, poured
+out a full half tumbler of spirit, which he swallowed undiluted in two
+or three gulps.
+
+“That’s better!” he said with a hoarse laugh. “But man, what is it you
+are saying about having run out of the wind? Look at the glass!”
+
+“We have,” said Bastin, “and it is wonderfully steady. About 29 degrees
+or a little over, which it has been for the last three days.”
+
+Again Astley laughed in a mirthless fashion, as he answered:
+
+“Oh, that thing! That’s the passengers’ glass. I told the steward to
+put it out of gear so that you might not be frightened; it is an old
+trick. Look at this,” and he produced one of the portable variety out
+of his pocket.
+
+We looked, and it stood somewhere between 27 degrees and 28 degrees.
+
+“That’s the lowest glass I ever saw in the Polynesian or any other seas
+during thirty years. It’s right, too, for I have tested it by three
+others,” he said.
+
+“What does it mean?” I asked rather anxiously.
+
+“South Sea cyclone of the worst breed,” he replied. “That cursed Dane
+knew it was coming and that’s why he left the ship. Pray as you never
+prayed before,” and again he stretched out his hand towards the whisky
+bottle. But I stepped between him and it, shaking my head. Thereon he
+laughed for the third time and left the cabin. Though I saw him once or
+twice afterwards, these were really the last words of intelligible
+conversation that I ever had with Captain Astley.
+
+“It seems that we are in some danger,” said Bastin, in an unmoved kind
+of way. “I think that was a good idea of the captain’s, to put up a
+petition, I mean, but as Bickley will scarcely care to join in it I
+will go into the cabin and do so myself.”
+
+Bickley snorted, then said:
+
+“Confound that captain! Why did he play such a trick upon us about the
+barometer? Humphrey, I believe he had been drinking.”
+
+“So do I,” I said, looking at the whisky bottle. “Otherwise, after
+taking those precautions to keep us in the dark, he would not have let
+on like that.”
+
+“Well,” said Bickley, “he can’t get to the liquor, except through this
+saloon, as it is locked up forward with the other stores.”
+
+“That’s nothing,” I replied, “as doubtless he has a supply of his own;
+rum, I expect. We must take our chance.”
+
+Bickley nodded, and suggested that we should go on deck to see what was
+happening. So we went. Not a breath of wind was stirring, and even the
+sea seemed to be settling down a little. At least, so we judged from
+the motion, for we could not see either it or the sky; everything was
+as black as pitch. We heard the sailors, however, engaged in rigging
+guide ropes fore and aft, and battening down the hatches with extra
+tarpaulins by the light of lanterns. Also they were putting ropes round
+the boats and doing something to the spars and topmasts.
+
+Presently Bastin joined us, having, I suppose, finished his devotions.
+
+“Really, it is quite pleasant here,” he said. “One never knows how
+disagreeable so much wind is until it stops.”
+
+I lit my pipe, making no answer, and the match burned quite steadily
+there in the open air.
+
+“What is that?” exclaimed Bickley, staring at something which now I saw
+for the first time. It looked like a line of white approaching through
+the gloom. With it came a hissing sound, and although there was still
+no wind, the rigging began to moan mysteriously like a thing in pain. A
+big drop of water also fell from the sides into my pipe and put it out.
+Then one of the sailors cried in a hoarse voice:
+
+“Get down below, governors, unless you want to go out to sea!”
+
+“Why?” inquired Bastin.
+
+“Why? Becos the ‘urricane is coming, that’s all. Coming as though the
+devil had kicked it out of ‘ell.”
+
+Bastin seemed inclined to remonstrate at this sort of language, but we
+pushed him down the companion and followed, propelling the spaniel
+Tommy in front of us. Next moment I heard the sailors battening the
+hatch with hurried blows, and when this was done to their satisfaction,
+heard their feet also as they ran into shelter.
+
+Another instant and we were all lying in a heap on the cabin floor with
+poor Tommy on top of us. The cyclone had struck the ship! Above the
+wash of water and the screaming of the gale we heard other mysterious
+sounds, which doubtless were caused by the yards hitting the seas, for
+the yacht was lying on her side. I thought that all was over, but
+presently there came a rending, crashing noise. The masts, or one of
+them, had gone, and by degrees we righted.
+
+“Near thing!” said Bickley. “Good heavens, what’s that?”
+
+I listened, for the electric light had temporarily gone out, owing, I
+suppose, to the dynamo having stopped for a moment. A most unholy and
+hollow sound was rising from the cabin floor. It might have been caused
+by a bullock with its windpipe cut, trying to get its breath and
+groaning. Then the light came on again and we saw Bastin lying at full
+length on the carpet.
+
+“He’s broken his neck or something,” I said.
+
+Bickley crept to him and having looked, sang out:
+
+“It’s all right! He’s only sea-sick. I thought it would come to that if
+he drank so much tea.”
+
+“Sea-sick,” I said faintly—“sea-sick?”
+
+“That’s all,” said Bickley. “The nerves of the stomach acting on the
+brain or vice-versa—that is, if Bastin has a brain,” he added sotto
+voce.
+
+“Oh!” groaned the prostrate clergyman. “I wish that I were dead!”
+
+“Don’t trouble about that,” answered Bickley. “I expect you soon will
+be. Here, drink some whisky, you donkey.”
+
+Bastin sat up and obeyed, out of the bottle, for it was impossible to
+pour anything into a glass, with results too dreadful to narrate.
+
+“I call that a dirty trick,” he said presently, in a feeble voice,
+glowering at Bickley.
+
+“I expect I shall have to play you a dirtier before long, for you are a
+pretty bad case, old fellow.”
+
+As a matter of fact he had, for once Bastin had begun really we thought
+that he was going to die. Somehow we got him into his cabin, which
+opened off the saloon, and as he could drink nothing more, Bickley
+managed to inject morphia or some other compound into him, which made
+him insensible for a long while.
+
+“He must be in a poor way,” he said, “for the needle went more than a
+quarter of an inch into him, and he never cried out or stirred.
+Couldn’t help it in that rolling.”
+
+But now I could hear the engines working, and I think that the bow of
+the vessel was got head on to the seas, for instead of rolling we
+pitched, or rather the ship stood first upon one end and then upon the
+other. This continued for a while until the first burst of the cyclone
+had gone by. Then suddenly the engines stopped; I suppose that they had
+broken down, but I never learned, and we seemed to veer about, nearly
+sinking in the process, and to run before the hurricane at terrific
+speed.
+
+“I wonder where we are going to?” I said to Bickley. “To the land of
+sleep, Humphrey, I imagine,” he replied in a more gentle voice than I
+had often heard him use, adding: “Good-bye, old boy, we have been real
+friends, haven’t we, notwithstanding my peculiarities? I only wish that
+I could think that there was anything in Bastin’s views. But I can’t, I
+can’t. It’s good night for us poor creatures!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+Land
+
+
+At last the electric light really went out. I had looked at my watch
+just before this happened and wound it up, which, Bickley remarked, was
+superfluous and a waste of energy. It then marked 3.20 in the morning.
+We had wedged Bastin, who was now snoring comfortably, into his berth,
+with pillows, and managed to tie a cord over him—no, it was a large
+bath towel, fixing one end of it to the little rack over his bed and
+the other to its framework. As for ourselves, we lay down on the floor
+between the table legs, which, of course, were screwed, and the settee,
+protecting ourselves as best we were able by help of the cushions,
+etc., between two of which we thrust the terrified Tommy who had been
+sliding up and down the cabin floor. Thus we remained, expecting death
+every moment till the light of day, a very dim light, struggling
+through a port-hole of which the iron cover had somehow been wrenched
+off. Or perhaps it was never shut, I do not remember.
+
+About this time there came a lull in the hellish, howling hurricane;
+the fact being, I suppose, that we had reached the centre of the
+cyclone. I suggested that we should try to go on deck and see what was
+happening. So we started, only to find the entrance to the companion so
+faithfully secured that we could not by any means get out. We knocked
+and shouted, but no one answered. My belief is that at this time
+everyone on the yacht except ourselves had been washed away and
+drowned.
+
+Then we returned to the saloon, which, except for a little water
+trickling about the floor, was marvelously dry, and, being hungry,
+retrieved some bits of food and biscuit from its corners and ate. At
+this moment the cyclone began to blow again worse than ever, but it
+seemed to us, from another direction, and before it sped our poor
+derelict barque. It blew all day till for my part I grew utterly weary
+and even longed for the inevitable end. If my views were not quite
+those of Bastin, certainly they were not those of Bickley. I had
+believed from my youth up that the individuality of man, the ego, so to
+speak, does not die when life goes out of his poor body, and this faith
+did not desert me then. Therefore, I wished to have it over and learn
+what there might be upon the other side.
+
+We could not speak much because of the howling of the wind, but Bickley
+did manage to shout to me something to the effect that his partners
+would, in his opinion, make an end of their great practice within two
+years, which, he added, was a pity. I nodded my head, not caring
+twopence what happened to Bickley’s partners or their business, or to
+my own property, or to anything else. When death is at hand most of us
+do not think much of such things because then we realise how small they
+are. Indeed I was wondering whether within a few minutes or hours I
+should or should not see Natalie again, and if this were the end to
+which she had seemed to beckon me in that dream.
+
+On we sped, and on. About four in the afternoon we heard sounds from
+Bastin’s cabin which faintly reminded me of some tune. I crept to the
+door and listened. Evidently he had awakened and was singing or trying
+to sing, for music was not one of his strong points, “For those in
+peril on the sea.” Devoutly did I wish that it might be heard.
+Presently it ceased, so I suppose he went to sleep again.
+
+The darkness gathered once more. Then of a sudden something fearful
+happened. There were stupendous noises of a kind I had never heard;
+there were convulsions. It seemed to us that the ship was flung right
+up into the air a hundred feet or more.
+
+“Tidal wave, I expect,” shouted Bickley.
+
+Almost as he spoke she came down with the most appalling crash on to
+something hard and nearly jarred the senses out of us. Next the saloon
+was whirling round and round and yet being carried forward, and we felt
+air blowing upon us. Then our senses left us. As I clasped Tommy to my
+side, whimpering and licking my face, my last thought was that all was
+over, and that presently I should learn everything or nothing.
+
+I woke up feeling very bruised and sore and perceived that light was
+flowing into the saloon. The door was still shut, but it had been
+wrenched off its hinges, and that was where the light came in; also
+some of the teak planks of the decking, jagged and splintered, were
+sticking up through the carpet. The table had broken from its
+fastenings and lay upon its side. Everything else was one confusion. I
+looked at Bickley. Apparently he had not awakened. He was stretched out
+still wedged in with his cushions and bleeding from a wound in his
+head. I crept to him in terror and listened. He was not dead, for his
+breathing was regular and natural. The whisky bottle which had been
+corked was upon the floor unbroken and about a third full. I took a
+good pull at the spirit; to me it tasted like nectar from the gods.
+Then I tried to force some down Bickley’s throat but could not, so I
+poured a little upon the cut on his head. The smart of it woke him in a
+hurry.
+
+“Where are we now?” he exclaimed. “You don’t mean to tell me that
+Bastin is right after all and that we live again somewhere else? Oh! I
+could never bear that ignominy.”
+
+“I don’t know about living somewhere else,” I said, “although my
+opinions on that matter differ from yours. But I do know that you and I
+are still on earth in what remains of the saloon of the _Star of the
+South_.”
+
+“Thank God for that! Let’s go and look for old Bastin,” said Bickley.
+“I do pray that he is all right also.”
+
+“It is most illogical of you, Bickley, and indeed wrong,” groaned a
+deep voice from the other side of the cabin door, “to thank a God in
+Whom you do not believe, and to talk of praying for one of the worst
+and most inefficient of His servants when you have no faith in prayer.”
+
+“Got you there, my friend,” I said.
+
+Bickley murmured something about force of habit, and looked smaller
+than I had ever seen him do before.
+
+Somehow we forced that door open; it was not easy because it had
+jammed. Within the cabin, hanging on either side of the bath towel
+which had stood the strain nobly, something like a damp garment over a
+linen line, was Bastin most of whose bunk seemed to have disappeared.
+Yes—Bastin, pale and dishevelled and looking shrunk, with his hair
+touzled and his beard apparently growing all ways, but still Bastin
+alive, if very weak.
+
+Bickley ran at him and made a cursory examination with his fingers.
+
+“Nothing broken,” he said triumphantly. “He’s all right.”
+
+“If _you_ had hung over a towel for many hours in most violent weather
+you would not say that,” groaned Bastin. “My inside is a pulp. But
+perhaps you would be kind enough to untie me.”
+
+“Bosh!” said Bickley as he obeyed. “All you want is something to eat.
+Meanwhile, drink this,” and he handed him the remains of the whisky.
+
+Bastin swallowed it every drop, murmuring something about taking a
+little wine for his stomach’s sake, “one of the Pauline injunctions,
+you know,” after which he was much more cheerful. Then we hunted about
+and found some more of the biscuits and other food with which we filled
+ourselves after a fashion.
+
+“I wonder what has happened,” said Bastin. “I suppose that, thanks to
+the skill of the captain, we have after all reached the haven where we
+would be.”
+
+Here he stopped, rubbed his eyes and looked towards the saloon door
+which, as I have said, had been wrenched off its hinges, but appeared
+to have opened wider than when I observed it last. Also Tommy, who was
+recovering his spirits, uttered a series of low growls.
+
+“It is a most curious thing,” he went on, “and I suppose I must be
+suffering from hallucinations, but I could swear that just now I saw
+looking through that door the same improper young woman clothed in a
+few flowers and nothing else, whose photograph in that abominable and
+libellous book was indirectly the cause of our tempestuous voyage.”
+
+“Indeed!” replied Bickley. “Well, so long as she has not got on the
+broken-down stays and the Salvation Army bonnet without a crown, which
+you may remember she wore after she had fallen into the hands of your
+fraternity, I am sure _I_ do not mind. In fact I should be delighted to
+see anything so pleasant.”
+
+At this moment a distinct sound of female tittering arose from beyond
+the door. Tommy barked and Bickley stepped towards it, but I called to
+him.
+
+“Look out! Where there are women there are sure to be men. Let us be
+ready against accidents.”
+
+So we armed ourselves with pistols, that is Bickley and I did, Bastin
+being fortified solely with a Bible.
+
+Then we advanced, a remarkable and dilapidated trio, and dragged the
+door wide. Instantly there was a scurry and we caught sight of women’s
+forms wearing only flowers, and but few of these, running over white
+sand towards groups of men armed with odd-looking clubs, some of which
+were fashioned to the shapes of swords and spears. To make an
+impression I fired two shots with my revolver into the air, whereupon
+both men and women fled into groves of trees and vanished.
+
+“They don’t seem to be accustomed to white people,” said Bickley. “Is
+it possible that we have found a shore upon which no missionary has set
+a foot?”
+
+“I hope so,” said Bastin, “seeing that unworthy as I am, then the
+opportunities for me would be very great.”
+
+We stood still and looked about us. This was what we saw. All the after
+part of the ship from forward of the bridge had vanished utterly; there
+was not a trace of it; she had as it were been cut in two. More, we
+were some considerable distance from the sea which was still raging
+over a quarter of a mile away where great white combers struck upon a
+reef and spouted into the air. Behind us was a cliff, apparently of
+rock but covered with earth and vegetation, and against this cliff, in
+which the prow of the ship was buried, she, or what remained of her,
+had come to anchor for the last time.
+
+“You see what has happened,” I said. “A great tidal wave has carried us
+up here and retreated.”
+
+“That’s it,” exclaimed Bickley. “Look at the debris,” and he pointed to
+torn-up palms, bushes and seaweed piled into heaps which still ran salt
+water; also to a number of dead fish that lay about among them, adding,
+“Well, we are saved anyhow.”
+
+“And yet there are people like you who say that there is no
+Providence!” ejaculated Bastin.
+
+“I wonder what the views of Captain Astley and the crew are, or rather
+were, upon that matter,” interrupted Bickley.
+
+“I don’t know,” answered Bastin, looking about him vaguely. “It is true
+that I can’t see any of them, but if they are drowned no doubt it is
+because their period of usefulness in this world had ended.”
+
+“Let’s get down and look about us,” I remarked, being anxious to avoid
+further argument.
+
+So we scrambled from the remnant of the ship, like Noah descending out
+of the ark, as Bastin said, on to the beach beneath, where Tommy rushed
+to and fro, gambolling for joy. Here we discovered a path which ran
+diagonally up the side of a cliff which was nowhere more than fifty or
+sixty feet in height, and possibly had once formed the shore of this
+land, or perhaps that of a lake. Up this path we went, following the
+tracks of many human feet, and reaching the crest of the cliff, looked
+about us, basking as we did so in the beautiful morning sun, for the
+sky was now clear of clouds and with that last awful effort, which
+destroyed our ship, the cyclone had passed away.
+
+We were standing on a plain down which ran a little stream of good
+water whereof Tommy drank greedily, we following his example. To the
+right and left of this plain, further than we could see, stretched
+bushland over which towered many palms, rather ragged now because of
+the lashing of the gale. Looking inland we perceived that the ground
+sloped gently downwards, ending at a distance of some miles in a large
+lake. Far out in this lake something like the top of a mountain of a
+brown colour rose above the water, and on the edge of it was what from
+that distance appeared to be a tumbled ruin.
+
+“This is all very interesting,” I said to Bickley. “What do you make of
+it?”
+
+“I don’t quite know. At first sight I should say that we are standing
+on the lip of a crater of some vast extinct volcano. Look how it curves
+to north and south and at the slope running down to the lake.”
+
+I nodded.
+
+“Lucky that the tidal wave did not get over the cliff,” I said. “If it
+had the people here would have all been drowned out. I wonder where
+they have gone?”
+
+As I spoke Bastin pointed to the edge of the bush some hundreds of
+yards away, where we perceived brown figures slipping about among the
+trees. I suggested that we should go back to the mouth of our path, so
+as to have a line of retreat open in case of necessity, and await
+events. So we did and there stood still. By degrees the brown figures
+emerged on to the plain to the number of some hundreds, and we saw that
+they were both male and female. The women were clothed in nothing
+except flowers and a little girdle; the men were all armed with wooden
+weapons and also wore a girdle but no flowers. The children, of whom
+there were many, were quite naked.
+
+Among these people we observed a tall person clothed in what seemed to
+be a magnificent feather cloak, and, walking around and about him, a
+number of grotesque forms adorned with hideous masks and basket-like
+head-dresses that were surmounted by plumes.
+
+“The king or chief and his priests or medicine-men! This is splendid,”
+said Bickley triumphantly.
+
+Bastin also contemplated them with enthusiasm as raw material upon
+which he hoped to get to work.
+
+By degrees and very cautiously they approached us. To our joy, we
+perceived that behind them walked several young women who bore wooden
+trays of food or fruit.
+
+“That looks well,” I said. “They would not make offerings unless they
+were friendly.”
+
+“The food may be poisoned,” remarked Bickley suspiciously.
+
+The crowd advanced, we standing quite still looking as dignified as we
+could, I as the tallest in the middle, with Tommy sitting at my feet.
+When they were about five and twenty yards away, however, that wretched
+little dog caught sight of the masked priests. He growled and then
+rushed at them barking, his long black ears flapping as he went.
+
+The effect was instantaneous. One and all they turned and fled
+precipitately, who evidently had never before seen a dog and looked
+upon it as a deadly creature. Yes, even the tall chief and his masked
+medicine-men fled like hares pursued by Tommy, who bit one of them in
+the leg, evoking a terrific howl. I called him back and took him into
+my arms. Seeing that he was safe for a while the crowd reformed and
+once again advanced.
+
+As they came we noted that they were a wonderfully handsome people,
+tall and straight with regularly shaped features and nothing of the
+negro about them. Some of the young women might even be called
+beautiful, though those who were elderly had become corpulent. The
+feather-clothed chief, however, was much disfigured by a huge growth
+with a narrow stalk to it that hung from his neck and rested on his
+shoulder.
+
+“I’ll have that off him before he is a week older,” said Bickley,
+surveying this deformity with great professional interest.
+
+On they came, the girls with the platters walking ahead. On one of
+these were what looked like joints of baked pork, on another some
+plantains and pear-shaped fruits. They knelt down and offered these to
+us. We contemplated them for a while. Then Bickley shook his head and
+began to rub his stomach with appropriate contortions. Clearly they
+were quick-minded enough for they saw the point. At some words the
+girls brought the platters to the chief and others, who took from them
+portions of the food at hazard and ate them to show that it was not
+poisoned, we watching their throats the while to make sure that it was
+swallowed. Then they returned again and we took some of the food though
+only Bickley ate, because, as I pointed out to him, being a doctor who
+understood the use of antidotes; clearly he should make the experiment.
+However, nothing happened; indeed he said that it was very good.
+
+After this there came a pause. Then suddenly Bastin took up his parable
+in the Polynesian tongue which—to a certain extent—he had acquired with
+so much pains.
+
+“What is this place called?” he asked slowly and distinctly, pausing
+between each word.
+
+His audience shook their heads and he tried again, putting the accents
+on different syllables. Behold! some bright spirit understood him and
+answered:
+
+“Orofena.”
+
+“That means a hill, or an island, or a hill in an island,” whispered
+Bickley to me.
+
+“Who is your God?” asked Bastin again.
+
+The point seemed one upon which they were a little doubtful, but at
+last the chief answered, “Oro. He who fights.”
+
+“In other words, Mars,” said Bickley.
+
+“I will give you a better one,” said Bastin in the same slow fashion.
+
+Thinking that he referred to himself these children of Nature
+contemplated his angular form doubtfully and shook their heads. Then
+for the first time one of the men who was wearing a mask and a wicker
+crate on his head, spoke in a hollow voice, saying:
+
+“If you try Oro will eat you up.”
+
+“Head priest!” said Bickley, nudging me. “Old Bastin had better be
+careful or he will get his teeth into him and call them Oro’s.”
+
+Another pause, after which the man in a feather cloak with the growth
+on his neck that a servant was supporting, said:
+
+“I am Marama, the chief of Orofena. We have never seen men like you
+before, if you are men. What brought you here and with you that fierce
+and terrible animal, or evil spirit which makes a noise and bites?”
+
+Now Bickley pretended to consult me who stood brooding and majestic,
+that is if I can be majestic. I whispered something and he answered:
+
+“The gods of the wind and the sea.”
+
+“What nonsense,” ejaculated Bastin, “there are no such things.”
+
+“Shut up,” I said, “we must use similes here,” to which he replied:
+
+“I don’t like similes that tamper with the truth.”
+
+“Remember Neptune and Aeolus,” I suggested, and he lapsed into
+consideration of the point.
+
+“We knew that you were coming,” said Marama. “Our doctors told us all
+about you a moon ago. But we wish that you would come more gently, as
+you nearly washed away our country.”
+
+After looking at me Bickley replied:
+
+“How thankful should you be that in our kindness we have spared you.”
+
+“What do you come to do?” inquired Marama again. After the usual
+formula of consulting me Bickley answered:
+
+“We come to take that mountain (he meant lump) off your neck and make
+you beautiful; also to cure all the sickness among your people.”
+
+“And I come,” broke in Bastin, “to give you new hearts.”
+
+These announcements evidently caused great excitement. After
+consultation Marama answered:
+
+“We do not want new hearts as the old ones are good, but we wish to be
+rid of lumps and sicknesses. If you can do this we will make you gods
+and worship you and give you many wives.” (Here Bastin held up his
+hands in horror.) “When will you begin to take away the lumps?”
+
+“To-morrow,” said Bickley. “But learn that if you try to harm us we
+will bring another wave which will drown all your country.”
+
+Nobody seemed to doubt our capacities in this direction, but one
+inquiring spirit in a wicker crate did ask how it came about that if we
+controlled the ocean we had arrived in half a canoe instead of a whole
+one.
+
+Bickley replied to the effect that it was because the gods always
+travelled in half-canoes to show their higher nature, which seemed to
+satisfy everyone. Then we announced that we had seen enough of them for
+that day and would retire to think. Meanwhile we should be obliged if
+they would build us a house and keep us supplied with whatever food
+they had.
+
+“Do the gods eat?” asked the sceptic again.
+
+“That fellow is a confounded radical,” I whispered to Bickley. “Tell
+him that they do when they come to Orofena.”
+
+He did so, whereon the chief said:
+
+“Would the gods like a nice young girl cooked?”
+
+At this point Bastin retired down the path, realising that he had to do
+with cannibals. We said that we preferred to look at the girls alive
+and would meet them again to-morrow morning, when we hoped that the
+house would be ready.
+
+So our first interview with the inhabitants of Orofena came to an end,
+on which we congratulated ourselves.
+
+On reaching the remains of the _Star of the South_ we set to work to
+take stock of what was left to us. Fortunately it proved to be a very
+great deal. As I think I mentioned, all the passenger part of the yacht
+lay forward of the bridge, just in front of which the vessel had been
+broken in two, almost as cleanly as though she were severed by a
+gigantic knife. Further our stores were forward and practically
+everything else that belonged to us, even down to Bickley’s instruments
+and medicines and Bastin’s religious works, to say nothing of a great
+quantity of tinned food and groceries. Lastly on the deck above the
+saloon had stood two large lifeboats. Although these were amply secured
+at the commencement of the gale one of them, that on the port side, was
+smashed to smithers; probably some spar had fallen upon it. The
+starboard boat, however, remained intact and so far as we could judge,
+seaworthy, although the bulwarks were broken by the waves.
+
+“There’s something we can get away in if necessary,” I said.
+
+“Where to?” remarked Bastin. “We don’t know where we are or if there is
+any other land within a thousand miles. I think we had better stop here
+as Providence seems to have intended, especially when there is so much
+work to my hand.”
+
+“Be careful,” answered Bickley, “that the work to your hand does not
+end in the cutting of all our throats. It is an awkward thing
+interfering with the religion of savages, and I believe that these
+untutored children of Nature sometimes eat missionaries.”
+
+“Yes, I have heard that,” said Bastin; “they bake them first as they do
+pigs. But I don’t know that they would care to eat me,” and he glanced
+at his bony limbs, “especially when you are much plumper. Anyhow one
+can’t stop for a risk of that sort.”
+
+Deigning no reply, Bickley walked away to fetch some fine fish which
+had been washed up by the tidal wave and were still flapping about in a
+little pool of salt water. Then we took counsel as to how to make the
+best of our circumstances, and as a result set to work to tidy up the
+saloon and cabins, which was not difficult as what remained of the ship
+lay on an even keel. Also we got out some necessary stores, including
+paraffin for the swinging lamps with which the ship was fitted in case
+of accident to the electric light, candles, and the guns we had brought
+with us so that they might be handy in the event of attack. This done,
+by the aid of the tools that were in the storerooms, Bickley, who was
+an excellent carpenter, repaired the saloon door, all that was
+necessary to keep us private, as the bulkhead still remained.
+
+“Now,” he said triumphantly when he had finished and got the lock and
+bolts to work to his satisfaction, “we can stand a siege if needed, for
+as the ship is iron built they can’t even burn us out and that teak
+door would take some forcing. Also we can shore it up.”
+
+“How about something to eat? I want my tea,” said Bastin.
+
+“Then, my reverend friend,” replied Bickley, “take a couple of the fire
+buckets and fetch some water from the stream. Also collect driftwood of
+which there is plenty about, clean those fish and grill them over the
+saloon stove.”
+
+“I’ll try,” said Bastin, “but I never did any cooking before.”
+
+“No,” replied Bickley, “on second thoughts I will see to that myself,
+but you can get the fish ready.”
+
+So, with due precautions, Bastin and I fetched water from the stream
+which we found flowed over the edge of the cliff quite close at hand
+into a beautiful coral basin that might have been designed for a bath
+of the nymphs. Indeed one at a time, while the other watched, we
+undressed and plunged into it, and never was a tub more welcome than
+after our long days of tempest. Then we returned to find that Bickley
+had already set the table and was engaged in frying the fish very
+skilfully on the saloon stove, which proved to be well adapted to the
+purpose. He was cross, however, when he found that we had bathed and
+that it was now too late for him to do likewise.
+
+While he was cleaning himself as well as he could in his cabin basin
+and Bastin was boiling water for tea, suddenly I remembered the letter
+from the Danish mate Jacobsen. Concluding that it might now be opened
+as we had certainly parted with most of the _Star of the South_ for the
+last time, I read it. It was as follows:
+
+“The reason, honoured Sir, that I am leaving the ship is that on the
+night I tore up the paper, the spirit controlling the planchette wrote
+these words: ‘After leaving Samoa the _Star of the South_ will be
+wrecked in a hurricane and everybody on board drowned except A. B. and
+B. Get out of her! Get out of her! Don’t be a fool, Jacob, unless you
+want to come over here at once. Take our advice and get out of her and
+you will live to be old.—SKOLL.”
+
+
+“Sir, I am not a coward but I know that this will happen, for that
+spirit which signs itself Skoll never tells a lie. I did try to give
+the captain a hint to stop at Apia, but he had been drinking and openly
+cursed me and called me a sneaking cheat. So I am going to run away, of
+which I am very much ashamed. But I do not wish to be drowned yet as
+there is a girl whom I want to marry, and my mother I support. You will
+be safe and I hope you will not think too badly of me.—JACOB JACOBSEN.
+    “_P.S_.—It is an awful thing to know the future. Never try to learn
+    that.”
+
+
+I gave this letter to Bastin and Bickley to read and asked them what
+they thought of it.
+
+“Coincidence,” said Bickley. “The man is a weak-minded idiot and heard
+in Samoa that they expected a hurricane.”
+
+“I think,” chimed in Bastin, “that the devil knows how to look after
+his own at any rate for a little while. I dare say it would have been
+much better for him to be drowned.”
+
+“At least he is a deserter and failed in his duty. I never wish to hear
+of him again,” I said.
+
+As a matter of fact I never have. But the incident remains quite
+unexplained either by Bickley or Bastin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+The Orofenans
+
+
+To our shame we had a very pleasant supper that night off the grilled
+fish, which was excellent, and some tinned meat. I say to our shame, in
+a sense, for on our companions the sharks were supping and by rights we
+should have been sunk in woe. I suppose that the sense of our own
+escape intoxicated us. Also, notwithstanding his joviality, none of us
+had cared much for the captain, and his policy had been to keep us
+somewhat apart from the crew, of whom therefore we knew but little. It
+is true that Bastin held services on Sundays, for such as would attend,
+and Bickley had doctored a few of them for minor ailments, but there,
+except for a little casual conversation, our intercourse began and
+ended.
+
+Now the sad fact is that it is hard to be overwhelmed with grief for
+those with whom we are not intimate. We were very sorry and that is all
+that can be said, except that Bastin, being High Church, announced in a
+matter-of-fact way that he meant to put up some petitions for the
+welfare of their souls. To this Bickley retorted that from what he had
+seen of their bodies he was sure they needed them.
+
+Yes, it was a pleasant supper, not made less so by a bottle of
+champagne which Bickley and I shared. Bastin stuck to his tea, not
+because he did not like champagne, but because, as he explained, having
+now come in contact with the heathen it would never do for him to set
+them an example in the use of spirituous liquors.
+
+“However much we may differ, Bastin, I respect you for that sentiment,”
+commented Bickley.
+
+“I don’t know why you should,” answered Bastin; “but if so, you might
+follow my example.”
+
+That night we slept like logs, trusting to our teak door which we
+barricaded, and to Tommy, who was a most excellent watch-dog, to guard
+us against surprise. At any rate we took the risk. As a matter of fact,
+nothing happened, though before dawn Tommy did growl a good deal, for I
+heard him, but as he sank into slumber again on my bed, I did not get
+up. In the morning I found from fresh footprints that two or three men
+had been prowling about the ship, though at a little distance.
+
+We rose early, and taking the necessary precautions, bathed in the
+pool. Then we breakfasted, and having filled every available receptacle
+with water, which took us a long time as these included a large tank
+that supplied the bath, so that we might have at least a week’s supply
+in case of siege, we went on deck and debated what we should do. In the
+end we determined to stop where we were and await events, because, as I
+pointed out, it was necessary that we should discover whether these
+natives were hostile or friendly. In the former event we could hold our
+own on the ship, whereas away from it we must be overwhelmed; in the
+latter there was always time to move inland.
+
+About ten o’clock when we were seated on stools smoking, with our guns
+by our side—for here, owing to the overhanging cliff in which it will
+be remembered the prow of the ship was buried, we could not be reached
+by missiles thrown from above—we saw numbers of the islanders advancing
+upon us along the beach on either side. They were preceded as before by
+women who bore food on platters and in baskets. These people, all
+talking excitedly and laughing after their fashion, stopped at a
+distance, so we took no notice of them. Presently Marama, clad in his
+feather cloak, and again accompanied by priests or medicine-men,
+appeared walking down the path on the cliff face, and, standing below,
+made salutations and entered into a conversation with us of which I
+give the substance—that is, so far as we could understand it.
+
+He reproached us for not having come to him as he expected we would do.
+We replied that we preferred to remain where we were until we were sure
+of our greeting and asked him what was the position. He explained that
+only once before, in the time of his grandfather, had any people
+reached their shores, also during a great storm as we had done. They
+were dark-skinned men like themselves, three of them, but whence they
+came was never known, since they were at once seized and sacrificed to
+the god Oro, which was the right thing to do in such a case.
+
+We asked whether he would consider it right to sacrifice us. He
+replied:
+
+Certainly, unless we were too strong, being gods ourselves, or unless
+an arrangement could be concluded. We asked—what arrangement? He
+replied that we must make them gifts; also that we must do what we had
+promised and cure him—the chief—of the disease which had tormented him
+for years. In that event everything would be at our disposal and we,
+with all our belongings, should become _taboo_, holy, not to be
+touched. None would attempt to harm us, nothing should be stolen under
+penalty of death.
+
+We asked him to come up on the deck with only one companion that his
+sickness might be ascertained, and after much hesitation he consented
+to do so. Bickley made an examination of the growth and announced that
+he believed it could be removed with perfect safety as the attachment
+to the neck was very slight, but of course there was always a risk.
+This was explained to him with difficulty, and much talk followed
+between him and his followers who gathered on the beach beneath the
+ship. They seemed adverse to the experiment, till Marama grew furious
+with them and at last burst into tears saying that he could no longer
+drag this terrible burden about with him, and he touched the growth. He
+would rather die. Then they gave way.
+
+I will tell the rest as shortly as I can.
+
+A hideous wooden idol was brought on board, wrapped in leaves and
+feathers, and upon it the chief and his head people swore safety to us
+whether he lived or died, making us the guests of their land. There
+were, however, two provisos made, or as such we understood them. These
+seemed to be that we should offer no insult or injury to their god, and
+secondly, that we should not set foot on the island in the lake. It was
+not till afterwards that it occurred to me that this must refer to the
+mountain top which appeared in the inland sheet of water. To those
+stipulations we made no answer. Indeed, the Orofenans did all the
+talking. Finally, they ratified their oaths by a man who, I suppose,
+was a head priest, cutting his arm and rubbing the blood from it on the
+lips of the idol; also upon those of the chief. I should add that
+Bastin had retired as soon as he saw that false god appear, of which I
+was glad, since I felt sure that he would make a scene.
+
+The operation took place that afternoon and on the ship, for when once
+Marama had made up his mind to trust us he did so very thoroughly. It
+was performed on deck in the presence of an awed multitude who watched
+from the shore, and when they saw Bickley appear in a clean nightshirt
+and wash his hands, uttered a groan of wonder. Evidently they
+considered it a magical and religious ceremony; indeed ever afterwards
+they called Bickley the Great Priest, or sometimes the Great Healer in
+later days. This was a grievance to Bastin who considered that he had
+been robbed of his proper title, especially when he learned that among
+themselves he was only known as “the Bellower,” because of the loud
+voice in which he addressed them. Nor did Bickley particularly
+appreciate the compliment.
+
+With my help he administered the chloroform, which was done under
+shelter of a sail for fear lest the people should think that we were
+smothering their chief. Then the operation went on to a satisfactory
+conclusion. I omit the details, but an electric battery and a red-hot
+wire came into play.
+
+“There,” said Bickley triumphantly when he had finished tying the
+vessels and made everything neat and tidy with bandages, “I was afraid
+he might bleed to death, but I don’t think there is any fear of that
+now, for I have made a real job of it.” Then advancing with the horrid
+tumour in his hands he showed it in triumph to the crowd beneath, who
+groaned again and threw themselves on to their faces. Doubtless now it
+is the most sacred relic of Orofena.
+
+When Marama came out of the anesthetic, Bickley gave him something
+which sent him to sleep for twelve hours, during all which time his
+people waited beneath. This was our dangerous period, for our
+difficulty was to persuade them that he was not dead, although Bickley
+had assured them that he would sleep for a time while the magic worked.
+Still, I was very glad when he woke up on the following morning, and
+two or three of his leading men could see that he was alive. The rest
+was lengthy but simple, consisting merely in keeping him quiet and on a
+suitable diet until there was no fear of the wound opening. We achieved
+it somehow with the help of an intelligent native woman who, I suppose,
+was one of his wives, and five days later were enabled to present him
+healed, though rather tottery, to his affectionate subjects.
+
+It was a great scene, which may be imagined. They bore him away in a
+litter with the native woman to watch him and another to carry the
+relic preserved in a basket, and us they acclaimed as gods.
+Thenceforward we had nothing to fear in Orofena—except Bastin, though
+this we did not know at the time.
+
+All this while we had been living on our ship and growing very bored
+there, although we employed the empty hours in conversation with
+selected natives, thereby improving our knowledge of the language.
+Bickley had the best of it, since already patients began to arrive
+which occupied him. One of the first was that man whom Tommy had
+bitten. He was carried to us in an almost comatose state, suffering
+apparently from the symptoms of snake poisoning.
+
+Afterward it turned out that he conceived Tommy to be a divine but most
+venomous lizard that could make a very horrible noise, and began to
+suffer as one might do from the bite of such a creature. Nothing that
+Bickley could do was enough to save him and ultimately he died in
+convulsions, a circumstance that enormously enhanced Tommy’s
+reputation. To tell the truth, we took advantage of it to explain that
+Tommy was in fact a supernatural animal, a sort of tame demon which
+only harmed people who had malevolent intentions towards those he
+served or who tried to steal any of their possessions or to intrude
+upon them at inconvenient hours, especially in the dark. So terrible
+was he, indeed, that even the skill of the Great Priest, _i.e._,
+Bickley, could not avail to save any whom once he had bitten in his
+rage. Even to be barked at by him was dangerous and conveyed a curse
+that might last for generations.
+
+All this we set out when Bastin was not there. He had wandered off, as
+he said, to look for shells, but as we knew, to practise religious
+orations in the Polynesian tongue with the waves for audience, as
+Demosthenes is said to have done to perfect himself as a political
+orator. Personally I admit that I relied more on the terrors of Tommy
+to safeguard us from theft and other troubles than I did upon those of
+the native _taboo_ and the priestly oaths.
+
+The end of it all was that we left our ship, having padlocked up the
+door (the padlock, we explained, was a magical instrument that bit
+worse than Tommy), and moved inland in a kind of triumphal procession,
+priests and singers going before (the Orofenans sang extremely well)
+and minstrels following after playing upon instruments like flutes,
+while behind came the bearers carrying such goods as we needed. They
+took us to a beautiful place in a grove of palms on a ridge where grew
+many breadfruit trees, that commanded a view of the ocean upon one side
+and of the lake with the strange brown mountain top on the other. Here
+in the midst of the native gardens we found that a fine house had been
+built for us of a kind of mud brick and thatched with palm leaves,
+surrounded by a fenced courtyard of beaten earth and having wide
+overhanging verandahs; a very comfortable place indeed in that
+delicious climate. In it we took up our abode, visiting the ship
+occasionally to see that all was well there, and awaiting events.
+
+For Bickley these soon began to happen in the shape of an
+ever-increasing stream of patients. The population of the island was
+considerable, anything between five and ten thousand, so far as we
+could judge, and among these of course there were a number of sick.
+Ophthalmia, for instance, was a prevalent disease, as were the growths
+such as Marama had suffered from, to say nothing of surgical cases and
+those resulting from accident or from nervous ailments. With all of
+these Bickley was called upon to deal, which he did with remarkable
+success by help of his books on Tropical Diseases and his ample
+supplies of medical necessaries.
+
+At first he enjoyed it very much, but when we had been established in
+the house for about three weeks he remarked, after putting in a solid
+ten hours of work, that for all the holiday he was getting he might as
+well be back at his old practice, with the difference that there he was
+earning several thousands a year. Just then a poor woman arrived with a
+baby in convulsions to whose necessities he was obliged to sacrifice
+his supper, after which came a man who had fallen from a palm tree and
+broken his leg.
+
+Nor did I escape, since having somehow or other established a
+reputation for wisdom, as soon as I had mastered sufficient of the
+language, every kind of knotty case was laid before me for decision. In
+short, I became a sort of Chief Justice—not an easy office as it
+involved the acquirement of the native law which was intricate and
+peculiar, especially in matrimonial cases.
+
+At these oppressive activities Bastin looked on with a gloomy eye.
+
+“You fellows seem very busy,” he said one evening; “but I can find
+nothing to do. They don’t seem to want me, and merely to set a good
+example by drinking water or tea while you swallow whisky and their
+palm wine, or whatever it is, is very negative kind of work, especially
+as I am getting tired of planting things in the garden and playing
+policeman round the wreck which nobody goes near. Even Tommy is better
+off, for at least he can bark and hunt rats.”
+
+“You see,” said Bickley, “we are following our trades. Arbuthnot is a
+lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I may add a general—a
+very general—practitioner and work at medicine in an enormous and
+much-neglected practice. Therefore, you, being a clergyman, should go
+and do likewise. There are some ten thousand people here, but I do not
+observe that as yet you have converted a single one.”
+
+Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his usual
+object of what is known as “getting a rise” out of Bastin. Little did
+he guess what he was doing.
+
+Bastin thought a while ponderously, then said:
+
+“It is very strange from what peculiar sources Providence sometimes
+sends inspirations. If wisdom flows from babes and sucklings, why
+should it not do so from the well of agnostics and mockers?”
+
+“There is no reason which I can see,” scoffed Bickley, “except that as
+a rule wells do not flow.”
+
+“Your jest is ill-timed and I may add foolish,” continued Bastin. “What
+I was about to add was that you have given me an idea, as it was no
+doubt intended that you should do. I will, metaphorically speaking,
+gird up my loins and try to bear the light into all this heathen
+blackness.”
+
+“Then it is one of the first you ever had, old fellow. But what’s the
+need of girding up your loins in this hot climate?” inquired Bickley
+with innocence. “Pyjamas and that white and green umbrella of yours
+would do just as well.”
+
+Bastin vouchsafed no reply and sat for the rest of that evening plunged
+in deep thought.
+
+On the following morning he approached Marama and asked his leave to
+teach the people about the gods. The chief readily granted this,
+thinking, I believe, that he alluded to ourselves, and orders were
+issued accordingly. They were to the effect that Bastin was to be
+allowed to go everywhere unmolested and to talk to whom he would about
+what he would, to which all must listen with respect.
+
+Thus he began his missionary career in Orofena, working at it, good and
+earnest man that he was, in a way that excited even the admiration of
+Bickley. He started a school for children, which was held under a fine,
+spreading tree. These listened well, and being of exceedingly quick
+intellect soon began to pick up the elements of knowledge. But when he
+tried to persuade them to clothe their little naked bodies his failure
+was complete, although after much supplication some of the bigger girls
+did arrive with a chaplet of flowers—round their necks!
+
+Also he preached to the adults, and here again was very successful in a
+way, especially after he became more familiar with the language. They
+listened; to a certain extent they understood; they argued and put to
+poor Bastin the most awful questions such as the whole Bench of Bishops
+could not have answered. Still he did answer them somehow, and they
+politely accepted his interpretation of their theological riddles. I
+observed that he got on best when he was telling them stories out of
+the Old Testament, such as the account of the creation of the world and
+of human beings, also of the Deluge, etc. Indeed one of their elders
+said—Yes, this was quite true. They had heard it all before from their
+fathers, and that once the Deluge had taken place round Orofena,
+swallowing up great countries, but sparing them because they were so
+good.
+
+Bastin, surprised, asked them who had caused the deluge. They replied,
+Oro which was the name of their god, Oro who dwelt yonder on the
+mountain in the lake, and whose representation they worshipped in
+idols. He said that God dwelt in Heaven, to which they replied with
+calm certainty:
+
+“No, no, he dwells on the mountain in the lake,” which was why they
+never dared to approach that mountain.
+
+Indeed it was only by giving the name Oro to the Divinity and admitting
+that He might dwell in the mountain as well as everywhere else, that
+Bastin was able to make progress. Having conceded this, not without
+scruples, however, he did make considerable progress, so much, in fact,
+that I perceived that the priests of Oro were beginning to grow very
+jealous of him and of his increasing authority with the people. Bastin
+was naturally triumphant, and even exclaimed exultingly that within a
+year he would have half of the population baptised.
+
+“Within a year, my dear fellow,” said Bickley, “you will have your
+throat cut as a sacrifice, and probably ours also. It is a pity, too,
+as within that time I should have stamped out ophthalmia and some other
+diseases in the island.”
+
+Here, leaving Bastin and his good work aside for a while, I will say a
+little about the country. From information which I gathered on some
+journeys that I made and by inquiries from the chief Marama, who had
+become devoted to us, I found that Orofena was quite a large place. In
+shape the island was circular, a broad band of territory surrounding
+the great lake of which I have spoken, that in its turn surrounded a
+smaller island from which rose the mountain top. No other land was
+known to be near the shores of Orofena, which had never been visited by
+anyone except the strangers a hundred years ago or so, who were
+sacrificed and eaten. Most of the island was covered with forest which
+the inhabitants lacked the energy, and indeed had no tools, to fell.
+They were an extremely lazy people and would only cultivate enough
+bananas and other food to satisfy their immediate needs. In truth they
+lived mostly upon breadfruit and other products of the wild trees.
+
+Thus it came about that in years of scarcity through drought or
+climatic causes, which prevented the forest trees from bearing, they
+suffered very much from hunger. In such years hundreds of them would
+perish and the remainder resorted to the dreadful expedient of
+cannibalism. Sometimes, too, the shoals of fish avoided their shores,
+reducing them to great misery. Their only domestic animal was the pig
+which roamed about half wild and in no great numbers, for they had
+never taken the trouble to breed it in captivity. Their resources,
+therefore, were limited, which accounted for the comparative smallness
+of the population, further reduced as it was by a wicked habit of
+infanticide practised in order to lighten the burden of bringing up
+children.
+
+They had no traditions as to how they reached this land, their belief
+being that they had always been there but that their forefathers were
+much greater than they. They were poetical, and sang songs in a
+language which themselves they could not understand; they said that it
+was the tongue their forefathers had spoken. Also they had several
+strange customs of which they did not know the origin. My own opinion,
+which Bickley shared, was that they were in fact a shrunken and
+deteriorated remnant of some high race now coming to its end through
+age and inter-breeding. About them indeed, notwithstanding their
+primitive savagery which in its qualities much resembled that of other
+Polynesians, there was a very curious air of antiquity. One felt that
+they had known the older world and its mysteries, though now both were
+forgotten. Also their language, which in time we came to speak
+perfectly, was copious, musical, and expressive in its idioms.
+
+One circumstance I must mention. In walking about the country I
+observed all over it enormous holes, some of them measuring as much as
+a hundred yards across, with a depth of fifty feet or more, and this
+not on alluvial lands although there traces of them existed also, but
+in solid rock. What this rock was I do not know as none of us were
+geologists, but it seemed to me to partake of the nature of granite.
+Certainly it was not coral like that on and about the coast, but of a
+primeval formation.
+
+When I asked Marama what caused these holes, he only shrugged his
+shoulders and said he did not know, but their fathers had declared that
+they were made by stones falling from heaven. This, of course,
+suggested meteorites to my mind. I submitted the idea to Bickley, who,
+in one of his rare intervals of leisure, came with me to make an
+examination.
+
+“If they were meteorites,” he said, “of which a shower struck the earth
+in some past geological age, all life must have been destroyed by them
+and their remains ought to exist at the bottom of the holes. To me they
+look more like the effect of high explosives, but that, of course, is
+impossible, though I don’t know what else could have caused such
+craters.”
+
+Then he went back to his work, for nothing that had to do with
+antiquity interested Bickley very much. The present and its problems
+were enough for him, he would say, who neither had lived in the past
+nor expected to have any share in the future.
+
+As I remained curious I made an opportunity to scramble to the bottom
+of one of these craters, taking with me some of the natives with their
+wooden tools. Here I found a good deal of soil either washed down from
+the surface or resulting from the decomposition of the rock, though
+oddly enough in it nothing grew. I directed them to dig. After a while
+to my astonishment there appeared a corner of a great worked stone
+quite unlike that of the crater, indeed it seemed to me to be a marble.
+Further examination showed that this block was most beautifully carved
+in bas-relief, apparently with a design of leaves and flowers. In the
+disturbed soil also I picked up a life-sized marble hand of a woman
+exquisitely finished and apparently broken from a statue that might
+have been the work of one of the great Greek sculptors. Moreover, on
+the third finger of this hand was a representation of a ring whereof,
+unfortunately, the bezel had been destroyed.
+
+I put the hand in my pocket, but as darkness was coming on, I could not
+pursue the research and disinter the block. When I wished to return the
+next day, I was informed politely by Marama that it would not be safe
+for me to do so as the priests of Oro declared that if I sought to
+meddle with the “buried things the god would grow angry and bring
+disaster on me.”
+
+When I persisted he said that at least I must go alone since no native
+would accompany me, and added earnestly that he prayed me not to go. So
+to my great regret and disappointment I was obliged to give up the
+idea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+Bastin Attempts the Martyr’s Crown
+
+
+That carved stone and the marble hand took a great hold of my
+imagination. What did they mean? How could they have come to the bottom
+of that hole, unless indeed they were part of some building and its
+ornaments which had been destroyed in the neighbourhood? The stone of
+which we had only uncovered a corner seemed far too big to have been
+carried there from any ship; it must have weighed several tons.
+Besides, ships do not carry such things about the world, and none had
+visited this island during the last two centuries at any rate, or local
+tradition would have recorded so wonderful a fact. Were there, then,
+once edifices covered with elegant carving standing on this place, and
+were they adorned with lovely statues that would not have disgraced the
+best period of Greek art? The thing was incredible except on the
+supposition that these were relics of an utterly lost civilisation.
+
+Bickley was as much puzzled as myself. All he could say was that the
+world was infinitely old and many things might have happened in it
+whereof we had no record. Even Bastin was excited for a little while,
+but as his imagination was represented by zero, all he could say was:
+
+“I suppose someone left them there, and anyhow it doesn’t matter much,
+does it?”
+
+But I, who have certain leanings towards the ancient and mysterious,
+could not be put off in this fashion. I remembered that unapproachable
+mountain in the midst of the lake and that on it appeared to be
+something which looked like ruins as seen from the top of the cliff
+through glasses. At any rate this was a point that I might clear up.
+
+Saying nothing to anybody, one morning I slipped away and walked to the
+edge of the lake, a distance of five or six miles over rough country.
+Having arrived there I perceived that the cone-shaped mountain in the
+centre, which was about a mile from the lake shore, was much larger
+than I had thought, quite three hundred feet high indeed, and with a
+very large circumference. Further, its sides evidently once had been
+terraced, and it was on one of these broad terraces, half-way up and
+facing towards the rising sun, that the ruin-like remains were heaped.
+I examined them through my glasses. Undoubtedly it was a cyclopean ruin
+built of great blocks of coloured stone which seemed to have been
+shattered by earthquake or explosion. There were the pillars of a
+mighty gateway and the remains of walls.
+
+I trembled with excitement as I stared and stared. Could I not get to
+the place and see for myself? I observed that from the flat bush-clad
+land at the foot of the mountain, ran out what seemed to be the residue
+of a stone pier which ended in a large table-topped rock between two
+and three hundred feet across. But even this was too far to reach by
+swimming, besides for aught I knew there might be alligators in that
+lake. I walked up and down its borders, till presently I came to a path
+which led into a patch of some variety of cotton palm.
+
+Following this path I discovered a boat-house thatched over with palm
+leaves. Inside it were two good canoes with their paddles, floating and
+tied to the stumps of trees by fibre ropes. Instantly I made up my mind
+that I would paddle to the island and investigate. Just as I was about
+to step into one of the canoes the light was cut off. Looking up I saw
+that a man was crouching in the door-place of the boat-house in order
+to enter, and paused guiltily.
+
+“Friend-from-the-Sea” (that was the name that these islanders had given
+to me), said the voice of Marama, “say—what are you doing here?”
+
+“I am about to take a row on the lake, Chief,” I answered carelessly.
+
+“Indeed, Friend. Have we then treated you so badly that you are tired
+of life?”
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked.
+
+“Come out into the sunlight, Friend, and I will explain to you.”
+
+I hesitated till I saw Marama lifting the heavy wooden spear he carried
+and remembered that I was unarmed. Then I came out.
+
+“What does all this mean, Chief?” I asked angrily when we were clear of
+the patch of cotton palm.
+
+“I mean, Friend, that you have been very near to making a longer
+journey than you thought. Have patience now and listen to me. I saw you
+leaving the village this morning and followed, suspecting your purpose.
+Yes, I followed alone, saying nothing to the priests of Oro who
+fortunately were away watching the Bellower for their own reasons. I
+saw you searching out the secrets of the mountain with those magic
+tubes that make things big that are small, and things that are far off
+come near, and I followed you to the canoes.”
+
+“All that is plain enough, Marama. But why?”
+
+“Have I not told you, Friend-from-the-Sea, that yonder hill which is
+called Orofena, whence this island takes its name, is sacred?”
+
+“You said so, but what of it?”
+
+“This: to set foot thereon is to die and, I suppose, great as you are,
+you, too, can die like others. At least, although I love you, had you
+not come away from that canoe I was about to discover whether this is
+so.”
+
+“Then for what are the canoes used?” I asked with irritation.
+
+“You see that flat rock, Friend, with the hole beyond, which is the
+mouth of a cave that appeared only in the great storm that brought you
+to our land? They are used to convey offerings which are laid upon the
+rock. Beyond it no man may go, and since the beginning no man has ever
+gone.”
+
+“Offerings to whom?”
+
+“To the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead who live there.”
+
+“Oromatuas? Oro! It is always something to do with Oro. Who and what is
+Oro?”
+
+“Oro is a god, Friend, though it is true that the priests say that
+above him there is a greater god called Degai, the Creator, the Fate
+who made all things and directs all things.”
+
+“Very well, but why do you suppose that Oro, the servant of Degai,
+lives in that mountain? I thought that he lived in a grove yonder where
+your priests, as I am told, have an image of him.”
+
+“I do not know, Friend-from-the-Sea, but so it has been held from the
+beginning. The image in the grove is only visited by his spirit from
+time to time. Now, I pray you, come back and before the priests
+discover that you have been here, and forget that there are any canoes
+upon this lake.”
+
+So, thinking it wisest, I turned the matter with a laugh and walked
+away with him to the village. On our road I tried to extract some more
+information but without success. He did not know who built the ruin
+upon the mountain, or who destroyed it. He did not know how the
+terraces came there. All he knew was that during the convulsion of
+Nature which resulted in the tidal wave that had thrown our ship upon
+the island, the mountain had been seen to quiver like a tree in the
+wind as though within it great forces were at work. Then it was
+observed to have risen a good many more feet above the surface of the
+lake, as might be noted by the water mark upon the shore, and then also
+the mouth of the cave had appeared. The priests said that all this was
+because the Oromatuas who dwelt there were stirring, which portended
+great things. Indeed great things had happened—for had we not arrived
+in their land?
+
+I thanked him for what he had told me, and, as there was nothing more
+to be learned, dropped the subject which was never mentioned between us
+again, at least not for a long while. But in my heart I determined that
+I would reach that mountain even though to do so I must risk my life.
+Something seemed to call me to the place; it was as though I were being
+drawn by a magnet.
+
+As it happened, before so very long I did go to the mountain, not of my
+own will but because I was obliged. It came about thus. One night I
+asked Bastin how he was getting on with his missionary work. He
+replied: Very well indeed, but there was one great obstacle in his
+path, the idol in the Grove. Were it not for this accursed image he
+believed that the whole island would become Christian. I asked him to
+be more plain. He explained that all his work was thwarted by this
+idol, since his converts declared that they did not dare to be baptised
+while it sat there in the Grove. If they did, the spirit that was in it
+would bewitch them and perhaps steal out at night and murder them.
+
+“The spirit being our friends the sorcerers,” I suggested.
+
+“That’s it, Arbuthnot. Do you know, I believe those devilish men
+sometimes offer human sacrifices to this satanic fetish, when there is
+a drought or anything of that sort.”
+
+“I can quite believe it,” I answered, “but as they will scarcely remove
+their god and with it their own livelihood and authority, I am afraid
+that as we don’t want to be sacrificed, there is nothing to be done.”
+
+At this moment I was called away. As I went I heard Bastin muttering
+something about martyrs, but paid no attention. Little did I guess what
+was going on in his pious but obstinate mind. In effect it was
+this—that if no one else would remove that idol he was quite ready to
+do it himself.
+
+However, he was very cunning over that business, almost Jesuitical
+indeed. Not one word did he breathe of his dark plans to me, and still
+less to Bickley. He just went on with his teaching, lamenting from time
+to time the stumbling-block of the idol and expressing wonder as to how
+it might be circumvented by a change in the hearts of the islanders, or
+otherwise. Sad as it is to record, in fact, dear old Bastin went as
+near to telling a fib in connection with this matter as I suppose he
+had ever done in his life. It happened thus. One day Bickley’s sharp
+eye caught sight of Bastin walking about with what looked like a bottle
+of whisky in his pocket.
+
+“Hallo, old fellow,” he said, “has the self-denying ordinance broken
+down? I didn’t know that you took pegs on the sly,” and he pointed to
+the bottle.
+
+“If you are insinuating, Bickley, that I absorb spirits
+surreptitiously, you are more mistaken than usual, which is saying a
+good deal. This bottle contains, not Scotch whisky but paraffin,
+although I admit that its label may have misled you, unintentionally,
+so far as I am concerned.”
+
+“What are you going to do with the paraffin?” asked Bickley.
+
+Bastin coloured through his tan and replied awkwardly:
+
+“Paraffin is very good to keep away mosquitoes if one can stand the
+smell of it upon one’s skin. Not that I have brought it here with that
+sole object. The truth is that I am anxious to experiment with a lamp
+of my own design made—um—of native wood,” and he departed in a hurry.
+
+“When next old Bastin wants to tell a lie,” commented Bickley, “he
+should make up his mind as to what it is to be, and stick to it. I
+wonder what he is after with that paraffin? Not going to dose any of my
+patients with it, I hope. He was arguing the other day that it is a
+great remedy taken internally, being quite unaware that the lamp
+variety is not used for that purpose.”
+
+“Perhaps he means to swallow some himself, just to show that he is
+right,” I suggested.
+
+“The stomach-pump is at hand,” said Bickley, and the matter dropped.
+
+Next morning I got up before it was light. Having some elementary
+knowledge of the main facts of astronomy, which remained with me from
+boyhood when I had attended lectures on the subject, which I had tried
+to refresh by help of an encyclopedia I had brought from the ship, I
+wished to attempt to obtain an idea of our position by help of the
+stars. In this endeavour, I may say, I failed absolutely, as I did not
+know how to take a stellar or any other observation.
+
+On my way out of our native house I observed, by the lantern I carried,
+that the compartment of it occupied by Bastin was empty, and wondered
+whither he had gone at that hour. On arriving at my observation-post, a
+rocky eminence on open ground, where, with Tommy at my side, I took my
+seat with a telescope, I was astonished to see or rather to hear a
+great number of the natives walking past the base of the mound towards
+the bush. Then I remembered that some one, Marama, I think, had
+informed me that there was to be a great sacrifice to Oro at dawn on
+that day. After this I thought no more of the matter but occupied
+myself in a futile study of the heavenly bodies. At length the dawn
+broke and put a period to my labours.
+
+Glancing round me before I descended from the little hill, I saw a
+flame of light appear suddenly about half a mile or more away among
+those trees which I knew concealed the image of Oro. On this personally
+I had never had the curiosity to look, as I knew that it was only a
+hideous idol stuck over with feathers and other bedizenments. The flame
+shot suddenly straight into the still air and was followed a few
+seconds later by the sound of a dull explosion, after which it went
+out. Also it was followed by something else—a scream of rage from an
+infuriated mob.
+
+At the foot of the hill I stopped to wonder what these sounds might
+mean. Then of a sudden appeared Bickley, who had been attending some
+urgent case, and asked me who was exploding gunpowder. I told him that
+I had no idea.
+
+“Then I have,” he answered. “It is that ass Bastin up to some game. Now
+I guess why he wanted that paraffin. Listen to the row. What are they
+after?”
+
+“Sacrificing Bastin, perhaps,” I replied, half in jest. “Have you your
+revolver?”
+
+He nodded. We always wore our pistols if we went out during the dark
+hours.
+
+“Then perhaps we had better go to see.”
+
+We started, and had not covered a hundred yards before a girl, whom I
+recognised as one of Bastin’s converts, came flying towards us and
+screaming out, “Help! Help! They kill the Bellower with fire! They cook
+him like a pig!”
+
+“Just what I expected,” said Bickley.
+
+Then we ran hard, as evidently there was no time to lose. While we went
+I extracted from the terrified girl, whom we forced to show us the way,
+that as the sacrifice was about to be offered Bastin had appeared, and,
+“making fire,” applied it to the god Oro, who instantly burst into
+flame. Then he ran back, calling out that the devil was dead. As he did
+so there was a loud explosion and Oro flew into pieces. His burning
+head went a long way into the air and, falling on to one of the
+priests, killed him. Thereon the other priests and the people seized
+the Bellower and made him fast. Now they were engaged in heating an
+oven in which to put him to cook. When it was ready they would eat him
+in honour of Oro.
+
+“And serve him right too!” gasped Bickley, who, being stout, was not a
+good runner. “Why can’t he leave other people’s gods alone instead of
+blowing them up with gunpowder?”
+
+“Don’t know,” I answered. “Hope we shall get there in time!”
+
+“To be cooked and eaten with Bastin!” wheezed Bickley, after which his
+breath gave out.
+
+As it chanced we did, for these stone ovens take a long time to heat.
+There by the edge of his fiery grave with his hands and legs bound in
+palm-fibre shackles, stood Bastin, quite unmoved, smiling indeed, in a
+sort of seraphic way which irritated us both extremely. Round him
+danced the infuriated priests of Oro, and round them, shrieking and
+howling with rage, was most of the population of Orofena. We rushed up
+so suddenly that none tried to stop us, and took our stand on either
+side of him, producing our pistols as we did so.
+
+“Thank you for coming,” said Bastin in the silence which followed;
+“though I don’t think it is the least use. I cannot recall that any of
+the early martyrs were ever roasted and eaten, though, of course,
+throwing them into boiling oil or water was fairly common. I take it
+that the rite is sacrificial and even in a low sense, sacramental, not
+merely one of common cannibalism.”
+
+I stared at him, and Bickley gasped out:
+
+“If you are to be eaten, what does it matter why you are eaten?”
+
+“Oh!” replied Bastin; “there is all the difference in the world, though
+it is one that I cannot expect you to appreciate. And now please be
+quiet as I wish to say my prayers. I imagine that those stones will be
+hot enough to do their office within twenty minutes or so, which is not
+very long.”
+
+At that moment Marama appeared, evidently in a state of great
+perturbation. With him were some of the priests or sorcerers who were
+dancing about as I imagine the priests of Baal must have done, and
+filled with fury. They rolled their eyes, they stuck out their tongues,
+they uttered weird cries and shook their wooden knives at the placid
+Bastin.
+
+“What is the matter?” I asked sternly of the chief.
+
+“This, Friend-from-the-Sea. The Bellower there, when the sacrifice was
+about to be offered to Oro at the dawn, rushed forward, and having
+thrust something between the legs of the image of the god, poured
+yellow water over it, and with fire caused it to burst into fierce
+flame. Then he ran away and mocked the god who presently, with a loud
+report, flew into pieces and killed that man. Therefore the Bellower
+must be sacrificed.”
+
+“What to?” I asked. “The image has gone and the piece of it that
+ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened if the god
+had been angry with him, but on one of its own priests, whom it killed.
+Therefore, having been sacrificed by the god itself, he it is that
+should be eaten, not the Bellower, who merely did what his Spirit bade
+him.”
+
+This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon Marama, but
+to the priests it did not at all appeal.
+
+“Eat them all!” these cried. “They are the enemies of Oro and have
+worked sacrilege!”
+
+Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people seemed
+to agree with them. Things began to look very ugly. The priests rushed
+forward, threatening us with their wooden weapons, and one of them even
+aimed a blow at Bickley, which only missed him by an inch or two.
+
+“Look here, my friend,” called the doctor whose temper was rising, “you
+name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you not? Well, be careful,
+lest I should show you that I can kill as well as heal!”
+
+Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great bedizened
+fellow who literally was foaming at the mouth with rage, rushed forward
+again, his club raised, apparently with the object of dashing out
+Bickley’s brains.
+
+Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot through
+the heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face—stone dead. There
+was consternation, for these people had never seen us shoot anything
+before, and were quite unacquainted with the properties of firearms,
+which they supposed to be merely instruments for making a noise. They
+stared, they gasped in fear and astonishment, and then they fled,
+pursued by Tommy, barking, leaving us alone with the two dead men.
+
+“It was time to teach them a lesson,” said Bickley as he replaced the
+empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled him into the burning
+pit.
+
+“Yes,” I answered; “but presently, when they have got over their
+fright, they will come back to teach us one.”
+
+Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had taken.
+
+“What do you suggest?” asked Bickley.
+
+“Flight,” I answered.
+
+“Where to—the ship? We might hold that.”
+
+“No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our road
+there. To the island in the lake where they dare not follow us, for it
+is holy ground.”
+
+“How are we going to live on the island?” asked Bickley.
+
+“I don’t know,” I replied; “but I am quite certain that if we stay here
+we shall die.”
+
+“Very well,” he said; “let us try it.”
+
+While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin’s bonds. “Thank you,” he
+said. “It is a great relief to stretch one’s arms after they have been
+compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do not know that I am
+really grateful. The martyr’s crown was hanging above me, so to speak,
+and now it has vanished into the pit, like that man whom Bickley
+murdered.”
+
+“Look here,” exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, “if you say much more,
+Bastin, I’ll chuck you into the pit too, to look for your martyr’s
+crown, for I think you have done enough mischief for one morning.”
+
+“If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that unfortunate
+man’s destruction on to me—”
+
+“Oh! shut it and trot,” broke in Bickley. “Those infernal savages are
+coming with your blessed converts leading the van.”
+
+So we “trotted” at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin stooped down
+and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as Atalanta in Academy
+pictures is represented as doing to the apples, and bore it away in
+triumph.
+
+“I know it is scorched,” he ejaculated at intervals, “but they might
+trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original false god. Now
+they _can’t_, for there’s nothing left.”
+
+As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our pursuit
+was very half-hearted indeed. To begin with, now that their first rage
+was over, the Orofenans who were fond of us had no particular wish to
+do us to death, while the ardour of their sorcerers, who wished this
+very much, had been greatly cooled by the mysterious annihilation of
+their idol and the violent deaths of two of their companions, which
+they thought might be reduplicated in their own persons. So it came
+about that the chase, if noisy, was neither close nor eager.
+
+We reached the edge of the lake where was the boat-house of which I
+have spoken already, travelling at little more than a walk. Here we
+made Bastin unfasten the better of the two canoes that by good luck was
+almost filled with offerings, which doubtless, according to custom,
+must be made upon the day of this feast to Oro, while we watched
+against surprise at the boat-house door. When he was ready we slipped
+in and took our seats, Tommy jumping in after us, and pushed the canoe,
+now very heavily laden, out into the lake.
+
+Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be beyond
+wooden spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what would
+happen. All the crowd of islanders had rushed to the lake edge where
+they stood staring at us stupidly. Bastin, thinking the occasion
+opportune, lifted the hideous head of the idol which he had carefully
+washed, and began to preach on the downfall of “the god of the Grove.”
+
+This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in the
+minds of his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was
+concerned—I do not know. At any rate, one of the priests shouted
+something, whereon everybody began to talk at once. Then, stooping
+down, they threw water from the lake over themselves and rubbed its
+sand and mud into their hair, all the while making genuflexions toward
+the mountain in the middle, after which they turned and departed.
+
+“Don’t you think we had better go back?” asked Bastin. “Evidently my
+words have touched them and their minds are melting beneath the light
+of Truth.”
+
+“Oh! by all means,” replied Bickley with sarcasm; “for then their
+spears will touch _us_, and our bodies will soon be melting above the
+fires of that pit.”
+
+“Perhaps you are right,” said Bastin; “at least, I admit that you have
+made matters very difficult by your unjustifiable homicide of that
+priest who I do not think meant to injure you seriously, and really was
+not at all a bad fellow, though opinionated in some ways. Also, I do
+not suppose that anybody is expected, as it were, to run his head into
+the martyr’s crown. When it settles there of itself it is another
+matter.”
+
+“Like a butterfly!” exclaimed the enraged Bickley.
+
+“Yes, if you like to put it that way, though the simile seems a very
+poor one; like a sunbeam would be better.”
+
+Here Bickley gave way with his paddle so vigorously that the canoe was
+as nearly as possible upset into the lake.
+
+In due course we reached the flat Rock of Offerings, which proved to be
+quite as wide as a double croquet lawn and much longer.
+
+“What are those?” I asked, pointing to certain knobs on the edge of the
+rock at a spot where a curved projecting point made a little harbour.
+
+Bickley examined them, and answered:
+
+“I should say that they are the remains of stone mooring-posts worn
+down by many thousands of years of weather. Yes, look, there is the cut
+of the cables upon the base of that one, and very big cables they must
+have been.”
+
+We stared at one another—that is, Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+still engaged in contemplating the blackened head of the god which he
+had overthrown.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+The Island in the Lake
+
+
+We made the canoe fast and landed on the great rock, to perceive that
+it was really a peninsula. That is to say, it was joined to the main
+land of the lake island by a broad roadway quite fifty yards across,
+which appeared to end in the mouth of the cave. On this causeway we
+noted a very remarkable thing, namely, two grooves separated by an
+exact distance of nine feet which ran into the mouth of the cave and
+vanished there.
+
+“Explain!” said Bickley.
+
+“Paths,” I said, “worn by countless feet walking on them for thousands
+of years.”
+
+“You should cultivate the art of observation, Arbuthnot. What do you
+say, Bastin?”
+
+He stared at the grooves through his spectacles, and replied:
+
+“I don’t say anything, except that I can’t see anybody to make paths
+here. Indeed, the place seems quite unpopulated, and all the Orofenans
+told me that they never landed on it because if they did they would
+die. It is a part of their superstitious nonsense. If you have any idea
+in your head you had better tell us quickly before we breakfast. I am
+very hungry.”
+
+“You always are,” remarked Bickley; “even when most people’s appetites
+might have been affected. Well, I think that this great plateau was
+once a landing-place for flying machines, and that there is the
+air-shed or garage.”
+
+Bastin stared at him.
+
+“Don’t you think we had better breakfast?” he said. “There are two
+roast pigs in that canoe, and lots of other food, enough to last us a
+week, I should say. Of course, I understand that the blood you have
+shed has thrown you off your balance. I believe it has that effect,
+except on the most hardened. Flying machines were only invented a few
+years ago by the brothers Wright in America.”
+
+“Bastin,” said Bickley, “I begin to regret that I did not leave you to
+take part in another breakfast yonder—I mean as the principal dish.”
+
+“It was Providence, not you, who prevented it, Bickley, doubtless
+because I am unworthy of such a glorious end.”
+
+“Then it is lucky that Providence is a good shot with a pistol. Stop
+talking nonsense and listen. If those were paths worn by feet they
+would run to the edge of the rock. They do not. They begin there in
+that gentle depression and slope upwards somewhat steeply. The air
+machines, which were evidently large, lit in the depression, possibly
+as a bird does, and then ran on wheels or sledge skids along the
+grooves to the air-shed in the mountain. Come to the cave and you will
+see.”
+
+“Not till we have breakfast,” said Bastin. “I will get out a pig. As a
+matter of fact, I had no supper last night, as I was taking a class of
+native boys and making some arrangements of my own.”
+
+As for me, I only whistled. It all seemed very feasible. And yet how
+could such things be?
+
+We unloaded the canoe and ate. Bastin’s appetite was splendid. Indeed,
+I had to ask him to remember that when this supply was done I did not
+know where we should find any more.
+
+“Take no thought for the morrow,” he replied. “I have no doubt it will
+come from somewhere,” and he helped himself to another chop.
+
+Never had I admired him so much. Not a couple of hours before he was
+about to be cruelly murdered and eaten. But this did not seem to affect
+him in the least. Bastin was the only man I have ever known with a
+really perfect faith. It is a quality worth having and one that makes
+for happiness. What a great thing not to care whether you are
+breakfasted on, or breakfast!
+
+“I see that there is lots of driftwood about here,” he remarked, “but
+unfortunately we have no tea, so in this climate it is of little use,
+unless indeed we can catch some fish and cook them.”
+
+“Stop talking about eating and help us to haul up the canoe,” said
+Bickley.
+
+Between the three of us we dragged and carried the canoe a long way
+from the lake, fearing lest the natives should come and bear it off
+with our provisions. Then, having given Tommy his breakfast off the
+scraps, we walked to the cave. I glanced at my companions. Bickley’s
+face was alight with scientific eagerness. Here are not dreams or
+speculations, but facts to be learned, it seemed to say, and I will
+learn them. The past is going to show me some of its secrets, to tell
+me how men of long ago lived and died and how far they had advanced to
+that point on the road of civilisation at which I stand in my little
+hour of existence.
+
+That of Bastin was mildly interested, no more. Obviously, with half his
+mind he was thinking of something else, probably of his converts on the
+main island and of the school class fixed for this hour which
+circumstances prevented him from attending. Indeed, like Lot’s wife he
+was casting glances behind him towards the wicked place from which he
+had been forced to flee.
+
+Neither the past nor the future had much real interest for Bastin; any
+more than they had for Bickley, though for different reasons. The
+former was done with; the latter he was quite content to leave in other
+hands. If he had any clear idea thereof, probably that undiscovered
+land appeared to him as a big, pleasant place where are no unbelievers
+or erroneous doctrines, and all sinners will be sternly repressed, in
+which, clad in a white surplice with all proper ecclesiastical
+trappings, he would argue eternally with the Early Fathers and in due
+course utterly annihilate Bickley, that is in a moral sense. Personally
+and as a man he was extremely attached to Bickley as a necessary and
+wrong-headed nuisance to which he had become accustomed.
+
+And I! What did I feel? I do not know; I cannot describe. An
+extraordinary attraction, a semi-spiritual exaltation, I think. That
+cave mouth might have been a magnet drawing my soul. With my body I
+should have been afraid, as I daresay I was, for our circumstances were
+sufficiently desperate. Here we were, castaways upon an island,
+probably uncharted, one of thousands in the recesses of a vast ocean,
+from which we had little chance of escape. More, having offended the
+religious instincts of the primeval inhabitants of that island, we had
+been forced to flee to a rocky mountain in the centre of a lake, where,
+after the food we had brought with us by accident was consumed, we
+should no doubt be forced to choose between death by starvation, or, if
+we attempted to retreat, at the hands of justly infuriated savages. Yet
+these facts did not oppress me, for I was being drawn, drawn to I knew
+not what, and if it were to doom—well, no matter.
+
+Therefore, none of us cared: Bastin because his faith was equal to any
+emergency and there was always that white-robed heaven waiting for him
+beyond which his imagination did not go (I often wondered whether he
+pictured Mrs. Bastin as also waiting; if so, he never said anything
+about her); Bickley because as a child of the Present and a servant of
+knowledge he feared no future, believing it to be for him non-existent,
+and was careless as to when his strenuous hour of life should end; and
+I because I felt that yonder lay my true future; yes, and my true past,
+even though to discover them I must pass through that portal which we
+know as Death.
+
+We reached the mouth of the cave. It was a vast place; perhaps the arch
+of it was a hundred feet high, and I could see that once all this arch
+had been adorned with sculptures. Protected as these were by the
+overhanging rock, for the sculptured mouth of the cave was cut deep
+into the mountain face, they were still so worn that it was impossible
+to discern their details. Time had eaten them away like an acid. But
+what length of time? I could not guess, but it must have been
+stupendous to have worked thus upon that hard and sheltered rock.
+
+This came home to me with added force when, from subsequent
+examination, we learned that the entire mouth of this cave had been
+sealed up for unnumbered ages. It will be remembered that Marama told
+me the mountain in the lake had risen much during the frightful cyclone
+in which we were wrecked and with it the cave mouth which previously
+had been invisible. From the markings on the mountain side it was
+obvious that something of the sort had happened very recently, at any
+rate on this eastern face. That is, either the flat rock had sunk or
+the volcano had been thrown upwards.
+
+Once in the far past the cave had been as it was when we found it. Then
+it had gone down in such a way that the table-rock entirely sealed the
+entrance. Now this entrance was once more open, and although of course
+there was a break in them, the grooves of which I have spoken ran on
+into the cave at only a slightly different level from that at which
+they lay upon the flat rock. And yet, although they had been thus
+sheltered by a great stone curtain in front of them, still these
+sculptures were worn away by the tooth of Time. Of course, however,
+this may have happened to them _before_ they were buried in some
+ancient cataclysm, to be thus resurrected at the hour of our arrival
+upon the island.
+
+Without pausing to make any closer examination of these crumbled
+carvings, we entered the yawning mouth of that great place, following
+and indeed walking in the deep grooves that I have mentioned. Presently
+it seemed to open out as a courtyard might at the end of a passage;
+yes, to open on to some vast place whereof in that gloom we could not
+see the roof or the limits. All we knew was that it must be
+enormous—the echoes of our voices and footsteps told us as much, for
+these seemed to come back to us from high, high above and from far, far
+away. Bickley and I said nothing; we were too overcome. But Bastin
+remarked:
+
+“Did you ever go to Olympia? I did once to see a kind of play where the
+people said nothing, only ran about dressed up. They told me it was
+religious, the sort of thing a clergyman should study. I didn’t think
+it religious at all. It was all about a nun who had a baby.”
+
+“Well, what of it?” snapped Bickley.
+
+“Nothing particular, except that nuns don’t have babies, or if they do
+the fact should not be advertised. But I wasn’t thinking of that. I was
+thinking that this place is like an underground Olympia.”
+
+“Oh, be quiet!” I said, for though Bastin’s description was not bad,
+his monotonous, drawling voice jarred on me in that solemnity.
+
+“Be careful where you walk,” whispered Bickley, for even he seemed
+awed, “there may be pits in this floor.”
+
+“I wish we had a light,” I said, halting.
+
+“If candles are of any use,” broke in Bastin, “as it happens I have a
+packet in my pocket. I took them with me this morning for a certain
+purpose.”
+
+“Not unconnected with the paraffin and the burning of the idol, I
+suppose?” said Bickley. “Hand them over.”
+
+“Yes; if I had been allowed a little more time I intended—”
+
+“Never mind what you intended; we know what you did and that’s enough,”
+said Bickley as he snatched the packet from Bastin’s hand and proceeded
+to undo it, adding, “By heaven! I have no matches, nor have you,
+Arbuthnot!”
+
+“I have a dozen boxes of wax vestas in my other pocket,” said Bastin.
+“You see, they burn so well when you want to get up a fire on a damp
+idol. As you may have noticed, the dew is very heavy here.”
+
+In due course these too were produced. I took possession of them as
+they were too valuable to be left in the charge of Bastin, and,
+extracting a box from the packet, lit two of the candles which were of
+the short thick variety, like those used in carriage-lamps.
+
+Presently they burned up, making two faint stars of light which,
+however, were not strong enough to show us either the roof or the sides
+of that vast place. By their aid we pursued our path, still following
+the grooves till suddenly these came to an end. Now all around us was a
+flat floor of rock which, as we perceived clearly when we pushed aside
+the dust that had gathered thickly on it in the course of ages,
+doubtless from the gradual disintegration of the stony walls, had once
+been polished till it resembled black marble. Indeed, certain cracks in
+the floor appeared to have been filled in with some dark-coloured
+cement. I stood looking at them while Bickley wandered off to the right
+and a little forward, and presently called to me. I walked to him,
+Bastin sticking close to me as I had the other candle, as did the
+little dog, Tommy, who did not like these new surroundings and would
+not leave my heels.
+
+“Look,” said Bickley, holding up his candle, “and tell me—what’s that?”
+
+Before me, faintly shown, was some curious structure of gleaming rods
+made of yellowish metal, which rods appeared to be connected by wires.
+The structure might have been forty feet high and perhaps a hundred
+long. Its bottom part was buried in dust.
+
+“What is that?” asked Bickley again.
+
+I made no answer, for I was thinking. Bastin, however, replied:
+
+“It’s difficult to be sure in this light, but I should think that it
+may be the remains of a cage in which some people who lived here kept
+monkeys, or perhaps it was an aviary. Look at those little ladders for
+the monkeys to climb by, or possibly for the birds to sit on.”
+
+“Are you sure it wasn’t tame angels?” asked Bickley.
+
+“What a ridiculous remark! How can you keep an angel in a cage? I—”
+
+“Aeroplane!” I almost whispered to Bickley.
+
+“You’ve got it!” he answered. “The framework of an aeroplane and a
+jolly large one, too. Only why hasn’t it oxidised?”
+
+“Some indestructible metal,” I suggested. “Gold, for instance, does not
+oxidise.”
+
+He nodded and said:
+
+“We shall have to dig it out. The dust is feet thick about it; we can
+do nothing without spades. Come on.”
+
+We went round to the end of the structure, whatever it might be, and
+presently came to another. Again we went on and came to another, all of
+them being berthed exactly in line.
+
+“What did I tell you?” said Bickley in a voice of triumph. “A whole
+garage full, a regular fleet of aeroplanes!”
+
+“That must be nonsense,” said Bastin, “for I am quite sure that these
+Orofenans cannot make such things. Indeed they have no metal, and even
+cut the throats of pigs with wooden knives.”
+
+Now I began to walk forward, bearing to the left so as to regain our
+former line. We could do nothing with these metal skeletons, and I felt
+that there must be more to find beyond. Presently I saw something
+looming ahead of me and quickened my pace, only to recoil. For there,
+not thirty feet away and perhaps three hundred yards from the mouth of
+the cave, suddenly appeared what looked like a gigantic man. Tommy saw
+it also and barked as dogs do when they are frightened, and the sound
+of his yaps echoed endlessly from every quarter, which scared him to
+silence. Recovering myself I went forward, for now I guessed the truth.
+It was not a man but a statue.
+
+The thing stood upon a huge base which lessened by successive steps,
+eight of them, I think, to its summit. The foot of this base may have
+been a square of fifty feet or rather more; the real support or
+pedestal of the statue, however, was only a square of about six feet.
+The figure itself was little above life-size, or at any rate above our
+life-size, say seven feet in height. It was very peculiar in sundry
+ways.
+
+To begin with, nothing of the body was visible, for it was swathed like
+a corpse. From these wrappings projected one arm, the right, in the
+hand of which was the likeness of a lighted torch. The head was not
+veiled. It was that of a man, long-nosed, thin-lipped, stern-visaged;
+the countenance pervaded by an awful and unutterable calm, as deep as
+that of Buddha only less benign. On the brow was a wreathed head-dress,
+not unlike an Eastern turban, from which sprang two little wings
+resembling in some degree those on the famous Greek head of Hypnos,
+lord of Sleep. Between the folds of the wrappings on the back sprang
+two other wings, enormous wings bent like those of a bird about to take
+flight. Indeed the whole attitude of the figure suggested that it was
+springing from earth to air. It was executed in black basalt or some
+stone of the sort, and very highly finished. For instance, on the bare
+feet and the arm which held the torch could be felt every muscle and
+even some of the veins. In the same way the details of the skull were
+perfectly perceptible to the touch, although at first sight not visible
+on the marble surface. This was ascertained by climbing on the pedestal
+and feeling the face with our hands.
+
+Here I may say that its modelling as well as that of the feet and the
+arm filled Bickley, who, of course, was a highly trained anatomist,
+with absolute amazement. He said that he would never have thought it
+possible that such accuracy could have been reached by an artist
+working in so hard a material.
+
+When the others had arrived we studied this relic as closely as our two
+candles would allow, and in turn expressed our opinions of its
+significance. Bastin thought that if those things down there were
+really the remains of aeroplanes, which he did not believe, the statue
+had something to do with flying, as was shown by the fact that it had
+wings on its head and shoulders. Also, he added, after examining the
+face, the head was uncommonly like that of the idol that he had blown
+up. It had the same long nose and severe shut mouth. If he was right,
+this was probably another effigy of Oro which we should do well to
+destroy at once before the islanders came to worship it.
+
+Bickley ground his teeth as he listened to him.
+
+“Destroy that!” he gasped. “Destroy! Oh! you, you—early Christian.”
+
+Here I may state that Bastin was quite right, as we proved subsequently
+when we compared the head of the fetish, which, as it will be
+remembered, he had brought away with him, with that of the statue.
+Allowing for an enormous debasement of art, they were essentially
+identical in the facial characteristics. This would suggest the descent
+of a tradition through countless generations. Or of course it may have
+been accidental. I am sure I do not know, but I think it possible that
+for unknown centuries other old statues may have existed in Orofena
+from which the idol was copied. Or some daring and impious spirit may
+have found his way to the cave in past ages and fashioned the local god
+upon this ancient model.
+
+Bickley was struck at once, as I had been, with the resemblance of the
+figure to that of the Egyptian Osiris. Of course there were
+differences. For instance, instead of the crook and the scourge, this
+divinity held a torch. Again, in place of the crown of Egypt it wore a
+winged head-dress, though it is true this was not very far removed from
+the winged disc of that country. The wings that sprang from its
+shoulders, however, suggested Babylonia rather than Egypt, or the
+Assyrian bulls that are similarly adorned. All of these symbolical
+ideas might have been taken from that figure. But what was it? What was
+it?
+
+In a flash the answer came to me. A representation of the spirit of
+Death! Neither more nor less. There was the shroud; there the cold,
+inscrutable countenance suggesting mysteries that it hid. But the torch
+and the wings? Well, the torch was that which lighted souls to the
+other world, and on the wings they flew thither. Whoever fashioned that
+statue hoped for another life, or so I was convinced.
+
+I explained my ideas. Bastin thought them fanciful and preferred his
+notion of a flying man, since by constitution he was unable to discover
+anything spiritual in any religion except his own. Bickley agreed that
+it was probably an allegorical representation of death but sniffed at
+my interpretation of the wings and the torch, since by constitution he
+could not believe that the folly of a belief in immortality could have
+developed so early in the world, that is, among a highly civilised
+people such as must have produced this statue.
+
+What we could none of us understand was why this ominous image with its
+dead, cold face should have been placed in an aerodrome, nor in fact
+did we ever discover. Possibly it was there long before the cave was
+put to this use. At first the place may have been a temple and have so
+remained until circumstances forced the worshippers to change their
+habits, or even their Faith.
+
+We examined this wondrous work and the pedestal on which it stood as
+closely as we were able by the dim light of our candles. I was anxious
+to go further and see what lay beyond it; indeed we did walk a few
+paces, twenty perhaps, onward into the recesses of the cave.
+
+Then Bickley discovered something that looked like the mouth of a well
+down which he nearly tumbled, and Bastin began to complain that he was
+hot and very thirsty; also to point out that he wished for no more
+caves and idols at present.
+
+“Look here, Arbuthnot,” said Bickley, “these candles are burning low
+and we don’t want to use up more if we can prevent it, for we may need
+what we have got very badly later on. Now, according to my pocket
+compass the mouth of this cave points due east; probably at the
+beginning it was orientated to the rising sun for purposes of
+astronomical observation or of worship at certain periods of the year.
+From the position of the sun when we landed on the rock this morning I
+imagine that just now it rises almost exactly opposite to the mouth of
+the cave. If this is so, to-morrow at dawn, for a time at least, the
+light should penetrate as far as the statue, and perhaps further. What
+I suggest is that we should wait till then to explore.”
+
+I agreed with him, especially as I was feeling tired, being exhausted
+by wonder, and wanted time to think. So we turned back. As we did so I
+missed Tommy and inquired anxiously where he was, being afraid lest he
+might have tumbled down the well-like hole.
+
+“He’s all right,” said Bastin. “I saw him sniffing at the base of that
+statue. I expect there is a rat in there, or perhaps a snake.”
+
+Sure enough when we reached it there was Tommy with his black nose
+pressed against the lowest of the tiers that formed the base of the
+statue, and sniffing loudly. Also he was scratching in the dust as a
+dog does when he has winded a rabbit in a hole. So engrossed was he in
+this occupation that it was with difficulty that I coaxed him to leave
+the place.
+
+I did not think much of the incident at that time, but afterwards it
+came back to me, and I determined to investigate those stones at the
+first opportunity.
+
+Passing the wrecks of the machines, we emerged on to the causeway
+without accident. After we had rested and washed we set to work to draw
+our canoe with its precious burden of food right into the mouth of the
+cave, where we hid it as well as we could.
+
+This done we went for a walk round the base of the peak. This proved to
+be a great deal larger than we had imagined, over two miles in
+circumference indeed. All about it was a belt of fertile land, as I
+suppose deposited there by the waters of the great lake and resulting
+from the decay of vegetation. Much of this belt was covered with
+ancient forest ending in mud flats that appeared to have been thrown up
+recently, perhaps at the time of the tidal wave which bore us to
+Orofena. On the higher part of the belt were many of the extraordinary
+crater-like holes that I have mentioned as being prevalent on the main
+island; indeed the place had all the appearance of having been
+subjected to a terrific and continuous bombardment.
+
+When we had completed its circuit we set to work to climb the peak in
+order to explore the terraces of which I have spoken and the ruins
+which I had seen through my field-glasses. It was quite true; they were
+terraces cut with infinite labour out of the solid rock, and on them
+had once stood a city, now pounded into dust and fragments. We
+struggled over the broken blocks of stone to what we had taken for a
+temple, which stood near the lip of the crater, for without doubt this
+mound was an extinct volcano, or rather its crest. All we could make
+out when we arrived was that here had once stood some great building,
+for its courts could still be traced; also there lay about fragments of
+steps and pillars.
+
+Apparently the latter had once been carved, but the passage of
+innumerable ages had obliterated the work and we could not turn these
+great blocks over to discover if any remained beneath. It was as though
+the god Thor had broken up the edifice with his hammer, or Jove had
+shattered it with his thunderbolts; nothing else would account for that
+utter wreck, except, as Bickley remarked significantly, the scientific
+use of high explosives.
+
+Following the line of what seemed to have been a road, we came to the
+edge of the volcano and found, as we expected, the usual depression out
+of which fire and lava had once been cast, as from Hecla or Vesuvius.
+It was now a lake more than a quarter of a mile across. Indeed it had
+been thus in the ancient days when the buildings stood upon the
+terraces, for we saw the remains of steps leading down to the water.
+Perhaps it had served as the sacred lake of the temple.
+
+We gazed with wonderment and then, wearied out, scrambled back through
+the ruins, which, by the way, were of a different stone from the lava
+of the mountain, to the mouth of the great cave.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+The Dwellers in the Tomb
+
+
+By now it was drawing towards sunset, so we made such preparations as
+we could for the night. One of these was to collect dry driftwood, of
+which an abundance lay upon the shore, to serve us for firing, though
+unfortunately we had nothing that we could cook for our meal.
+
+While we were thus engaged we saw a canoe approaching the table-rock
+and perceived that in it were the chief Marama and a priest. After
+hovering about for a while they paddled the canoe near enough to allow
+of conversation which, taking no notice of their presence, we left it
+to them to begin.
+
+“O, Friend-from-the-Sea,” called Marama, addressing myself, “we come to
+pray you and the Great Healer to return to us to be our guests as
+before. The people are covered with darkness because of the loss of
+your wisdom, and the sick cry aloud for the Healer; indeed two of those
+whom he has cut with knives are dying.”
+
+“And what of the Bellower?” I asked, indicating Bastin.
+
+“We should like to see him back also, Friend-from-the-Sea, that we may
+sacrifice and eat him, who destroyed our god with fire and caused the
+Healer to kill his priest.”
+
+“That is most unjust,” exclaimed Bastin. “I deeply regret the blood
+that was shed on the occasion, unnecessarily as I think.”
+
+“Then go and atone for it with your own,” said Bickley, “and everybody
+will be pleased.”
+
+Waving to them to be silent, I said:
+
+“Are you mad, Marama, that you should ask us to return to sojourn among
+people who tried to kill us, merely because the Bellower caused fire to
+burn an image of wood and its head to fly from its shoulders, just to
+show you that it had no power to hold itself together, although you
+call it a god? Not so, we wash our hands of you; we leave you to go
+your own way while we go ours, till perchance in a day to come, after
+many misfortunes have overtaken you, you creep about our feet and with
+prayers and offerings beg us to return.”
+
+I paused to observe the effect of my words. It was excellent, for both
+Marama and the priest wrung their hands and groaned. Then I went on:
+
+“Meanwhile we have something to tell you. We have entered the cave
+where you said no man might set a foot, and have seen him who sits
+within, the true god.” (Here Bastin tried to interrupt, but was
+suppressed by Bickley.)
+
+They looked at each other in a frightened way and groaned more loudly
+than before.
+
+“He sends you a message, which, as he told us of your approach, we came
+to the shore to deliver to you.”
+
+“How can you say that?” began Bastin, but was again violently
+suppressed by Bickley.
+
+“It is that he, the real Oro, rejoices that the false Oro, whose face
+is copied from his face, has been destroyed. It is that he commands you
+day by day to bring food in plenty and lay it upon the Rock of
+Offerings, not forgetting a supply of fresh fish from the sea, and with
+it all those things that are stored in the house wherein we, the
+strangers from the sea, deigned to dwell awhile until we left you
+because in your wickedness you wished to murder us.”
+
+“And if we refuse—what then?” asked the priest, speaking for the first
+time.
+
+“Then Oro will send death and destruction upon you. Then your food
+shall fail and you shall perish of sickness and want, and the
+Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead, shall haunt you in your
+sleep, and Oro shall eat up your souls.”
+
+At these horrible threats both of them uttered a kind of wail, after
+which, Marama asked:
+
+“And if we consent, what then, Friend-from-the-Sea?”
+
+“Then, perchance,” I answered, “in some day to come we may return to
+you, that I may give you of my wisdom and the Great Healer may cure
+your sick and the Bellower may lead you through his gate, and in his
+kindness make you to see with his eyes.”
+
+This last clause of my ultimatum did not seem to appeal to the priest,
+who argued a while with Marama, though what he said we could not hear.
+In the end he appeared to give way. At any rate Marama called out that
+all should be done as we wished, and that meanwhile they prayed us to
+intercede with Oro in the cave, and to keep back the ghosts from
+haunting them, and to protect them from misfortune. I replied that we
+would do our best, but could guarantee nothing since their offence was
+very great.
+
+Then, to show that the conversation was at an end, we walked away with
+dignity, pushing Bastin in front of us, lest he should spoil the effect
+by some of his ill-timed and often over-true remarks.
+
+“That’s capital,” said Bickley, when we were out of hearing. “The enemy
+has capitulated. We can stop here as long as we like, provisioned from
+the mainland, and if for any reason we wish to leave, be sure of our
+line of retreat.”
+
+“I don’t know what you call capital,” exclaimed Bastin. “It seems to me
+that all the lies which Arbuthnot has just told are sufficient to bring
+a judgment upon us. Indeed, I think that I will go back with Marama and
+explain the truth.”
+
+“I never before knew anybody who was so anxious to be cooked and
+eaten,” remarked Bickley. “Moreover, you are too late, for the canoe is
+a hundred yards away by now, and you shan’t have ours. Remember the
+Pauline maxims, old fellow, which you are so fond of quoting, and be
+all things to all men, and another that is more modern, that when you
+are at Rome, you must do as the Romans do; also a third, that necessity
+has no law, and for the matter of that, a fourth, that all is fair in
+love and war.”
+
+“I am sure, Bickley, that Paul never meant his words to bear the
+debased sense which you attribute to them—” began Bastin, but at this
+point I hustled him off to light a fire—a process at which I pointed
+out he had shown himself an expert.
+
+We slept that night under the overhanging rock just to one side of the
+cave, not in the mouth, because of the draught which drew in and out of
+the great place. In that soft and balmy clime this was no hardship,
+although we lacked blankets. And yet, tired though I was, I could not
+rest as I should have done. Bastin snored away contentedly, quite
+unaffected by his escape which to him was merely an incident in the
+day’s work; and so, too, slumbered Bickley, except that he did not
+snore. But the amazement and the mystery of all that we had discovered
+and of all that might be left for us to discover, held me back from
+sleep.
+
+What did it mean? What could it mean? My nerves were taut as harp
+strings and seemed to vibrate to the touch of invisible fingers,
+although I could not interpret the music that they made. Once or twice
+also I thought I heard actual music with my physical ears, and that of
+a strange quality. Soft and low and dreamful, it appeared to well from
+the recesses of the vast cave, a wailing song in an unknown tongue from
+the lips of women, or of a woman, multiplied mysteriously by echoes.
+This, however, must have been pure fancy, since there was no singer
+there.
+
+Presently I dozed off, to be awakened by the sudden sound of a great
+fish leaping in the lake. I sat up and stared, fearing lest it might be
+the splash of a paddle, for I could not put from my mind the
+possibility of attack. All I saw, however, was the low line of the
+distant shore, and above it the bright and setting stars that heralded
+the coming of the sun. Then I woke the others, and we washed and ate,
+since once the sun rose time would be precious.
+
+At length it appeared, splendid in a cloudless sky, and, as I had
+hoped, directly opposite to the mouth of the cave. Taking our candles
+and some stout pieces of driftwood which, with our knives, we had
+shaped on the previous evening to serve us as levers and rough shovels,
+we entered the cave. Bickley and I were filled with excitement and hope
+of what we knew not, but Bastin showed little enthusiasm for our quest.
+His heart was with his half-converted savages beyond the lake, and of
+them, quite rightly I have no doubt, he thought more than he did of all
+the archaeological treasures in the whole earth. Still, he came,
+bearing the blackened head of Oro with him which, with unconscious
+humour, he had used as a pillow through the night because, as he said,
+“it was after all softer than stone.” Also, I believe that in his heart
+he hoped that he might find an opportunity of destroying the bigger and
+earlier edition of Oro in the cave, before it was discovered by the
+natives who might wish to make it an object of worship. Tommy came
+also, with greater alacrity than I expected, since dogs do not as a
+rule like dark places. When we reached the statue I learned the reason;
+he remembered the smell he had detected at its base on the previous
+day, which Bastin supposed to proceed from a rat, and was anxious to
+continue his investigations.
+
+We went straight to the statue, although Bickley passed the half-buried
+machines with evident regret. As we had hoped, the strong light of the
+rising sun fell upon it in a vivid ray, revealing all its wondrous
+workmanship and the majesty—for no other word describes it—of the
+somewhat terrifying countenance that appeared above the wrappings of
+the shroud. Indeed, I was convinced that originally this monument had
+been placed here in order that on certain days of the year the sun
+might fall upon it thus, when probably worshippers assembled to adore
+their hallowed symbol. After all, this was common in ancient days:
+witness the instance of the awful Three who sit in the deepest recesses
+of the temple of Abu Simbel, on the Nile.
+
+We gazed and gazed our fill, at least Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+occupied in making a careful comparison between the head of his wooden
+Oro and that of the statue.
+
+“There is no doubt that they are very much alike,” he said. “Why,
+whatever is that dog doing? I think it is going mad,” and he pointed to
+Tommy who was digging furiously at the base of the lowest step, as at
+home I have seen him do at roots that sheltered a rabbit.
+
+Tommy’s energy was so remarkable that at length it seriously attracted
+our attention. Evidently he meant that it should do so, for
+occasionally he sprang back to me barking, then returned and sniffed
+and scratched. Bickley knelt down and smelt at the stone.
+
+“It is an odd thing, Humphrey,” he said, “but there is a strange odour
+here, a very pleasant odour like that of sandal-wood or attar of
+roses.”
+
+“I never heard of a rat that smelt like sandal-wood or attar of roses,”
+said Bastin. “Look out that it isn’t a snake.”
+
+I knelt down beside Bickley, and in clearing away the deep dust from
+what seemed to be the bottom of the step, which was perhaps four feet
+in height, by accident thrust my amateur spade somewhat strongly
+against its base where it rested upon the rocky floor.
+
+Next moment a wonder came to pass. The whole massive rock began to turn
+outwards as though upon a pivot! I saw it coming and grabbed Bickley by
+the collar, dragging him back so that we just rolled clear before the
+great block, which must have weighed several tons, fell down and
+crushed us. Tommy saw it too, and fled, though a little late, for the
+edge of the block caught the tip of his tail and caused him to emit a
+most piercing howl. But we did not think of Tommy and his woes; we did
+not think of our own escape or of anything else because of the marvel
+that appeared to us. Seated there upon the ground, after our backward
+tumble, we could see into the space which lay behind the fallen step,
+for there the light of the sun penetrated.
+
+The first idea it gave me was that of the jewelled shrine of some
+mediaeval saint which, by good fortune, had escaped the plunderers;
+there are still such existing in the world. It shone and glittered,
+apparently with gold and diamonds, although, as a matter of fact, there
+were no diamonds, nor was it gold which gleamed, but some ancient
+metal, or rather amalgam, which is now lost to the world, the same that
+was used in the tubes of the air-machines. I think that it contained
+gold, but I do not know. At any rate, it was equally lasting and even
+more beautiful, though lighter in colour.
+
+For the rest this adorned recess which resembled that of a large
+funeral vault, occupying the whole space beneath the base of the statue
+that was supported on its arch, was empty save for two flashing objects
+that lay side by side but with nearly the whole width of the vault
+between them.
+
+I pointed at them to Bickley with my finger, for really I could not
+speak.
+
+“Coffins, by Jove!” he whispered. “Glass or crystal coffins and people
+in them. Come on!”
+
+A few seconds later we were crawling into that vault while Bastin,
+still nursing the head of Oro as though it were a baby, stood confused
+outside muttering something about desecrating hallowed graves.
+
+Just as we reached the interior, owing to the heightening of the sun,
+the light passed away, leaving us in a kind of twilight. Bickley
+produced carriage candles from his pocket and fumbled for matches.
+While he was doing so I noticed two things—firstly, that the place
+really did smell like a scent-shop, and, secondly, that the coffins
+seemed to glow with a kind of phosphorescent light of their own, not
+very strong, but sufficient to reveal their outlines in the gloom. Then
+the candles burnt up and we saw.
+
+Within the coffin that stood on our left hand as we entered, for this
+crystal was as transparent as plate glass, lay a most wonderful old
+man, clad in a gleaming, embroidered robe. His long hair, which was
+parted in the middle, as we could see beneath the edge of the
+pearl-sewn and broidered cap he wore, also his beard were snowy white.
+The man was tall, at least six feet four inches in height, and rather
+spare. His hands were long and thin, very delicately made, as were his
+sandalled feet.
+
+But it was his face that fixed our gaze, for it was marvelous, like the
+face of a god, and, as we noticed at once, with some resemblance to
+that of the statue above. Thus the brow was broad and massive, the nose
+straight and long, the mouth stern and clear-cut, while the cheekbones
+were rather high, and the eyebrows arched. Such are the characteristics
+of many handsome old men of good blood, and as the mummies of Seti and
+others show us, such they have been for thousands of years. Only this
+man differed from all others because of the fearful dignity stamped
+upon his features. Looking at him I began to think at once of the
+prophet Elijah as he must have appeared rising to heaven, enhanced by
+the more earthly glory of Solomon, for although the appearance of these
+patriarchs is unknown, of them one conceives ideas. Only it seemed
+probable that Elijah may have looked more benign. Here there was no
+benignity, only terrible force and infinite wisdom.
+
+Contemplating him I shivered a little and felt thankful that he was
+dead. For to tell the truth I was afraid of that awesome countenance
+which, I should add, was of the whiteness of paper, although the cheeks
+still showed tinges of colour, so perfect was the preservation of the
+corpse.
+
+I was still gazing at it when Bickley said in a voice of amazement:
+
+“I say, look here, in the other coffin.”
+
+I turned, looked, and nearly collapsed on the floor of the vault, since
+beauty can sometimes strike us like a blow. Oh! there before me lay all
+loveliness, such loveliness that there burst from my lips an
+involuntary cry:
+
+“Alas! that she should be dead!”
+
+A young woman, I supposed, at least she looked young, perhaps five or
+six and twenty years of age, or so I judged. There she lay, her tall
+and delicate shape half hidden in masses of rich-hued hair in colour of
+a ruddy blackness. I know not how else to describe it, since never have
+I seen any of the same tint. Moreover, it shone with a life of its own
+as though it had been dusted with gold. From between the masses of this
+hair appeared a face which I can only call divine. There was every
+beauty that woman can boast, from the curving eyelashes of
+extraordinary length to the sweet and human mouth. To these charms also
+were added a wondrous smile and an air of kind dignity, very different
+from the fierce pride stamped upon the countenance of the old man who
+was her companion in death.
+
+She was clothed in some close-fitting robe of white broidered with
+gold; pearls were about her neck, lying far down upon the perfect
+bosom, a girdle of gold and shining gems encircled her slender waist,
+and on her little feet were sandals fastened with red stones like
+rubies. In truth, she was a splendid creature, and yet, I know not how,
+her beauty suggested more of the spirit than of the flesh. Indeed, in a
+way, it was unearthly. My senses were smitten, it pulled at my
+heart-strings, and yet its unutterable strangeness seemed to awake
+memories within me, though of what I could not tell. A wild fancy came
+to me that I must have known this heavenly creature in some past life.
+
+By now Bastin had joined us, and, attracted by my exclamation and by
+the attitude of Bickley, who was staring down at the coffin with a
+fixed look upon his face, not unlike that of a pointer when he scents
+game, he began to contemplate the wonder within it in his slow way.
+
+“Well, I never!” he said. “Do you think the Glittering Lady in there is
+human?”
+
+“The Glittering Lady is dead, but I suppose that she was human in her
+life,” I answered in an awed whisper.
+
+“Of course she is dead, otherwise she would not be in that glass
+coffin. I think I should like to read the Burial Service over her,
+which I daresay was never done when she was put in there.”
+
+“How do you know she is dead?” asked Bickley in a sharp voice and
+speaking for the first time. “I have seen hundreds of corpses, and
+mummies too, but never any that looked like these.”
+
+I stared at him. It was strange to hear Bickley, the scoffer at
+miracles, suggesting that this greatest of all miracles might be
+possible.
+
+“They must have been here a long time,” I said, “for although human,
+they are not, I think, of any people known to the world to-day; their
+dress, everything, shows it, though perhaps thousands of years ago—”
+and I stopped.
+
+“Quite so,” answered Bickley; “I agree. That is why I suggest that they
+may have belonged to a race who knew what we do not, namely, how to
+suspend animation for great periods of time.”
+
+I said no more, nor did Bastin, who was now engaged in studying the old
+man, and for once, wonderstruck and overcome. Bickley, however, took
+one of the candles and began to make a close examination of the
+coffins. So did Tommy, who sniffed along the join of that of the
+Glittering Lady until his nose reached a certain spot, where it
+remained, while his black tail began to wag in a delighted fashion.
+Bickley pushed him away and investigated.
+
+“As I thought,” he said—“air-holes. See!”
+
+I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in a line
+with the face of its occupant, were a number of little holes that
+either by accident or design outlined the shape of a human mouth.
+
+“They are not airtight,” murmured Bickley; “and if air can enter, how
+can dead flesh remain like that for ages?”
+
+Then he continued his search upon the other side.
+
+“The lid of this coffin works on hinges,” he said. “Here they are,
+fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within could have
+pulled it down before the senses departed.”
+
+“No,” I answered; “for look, here is a crystal bolt at the end and it
+is shot from without.”
+
+This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to examine
+the other coffin.
+
+“I’ve got it!” he exclaimed presently. “The old god in here” (somehow
+we all thought of this old man as not quite normal) “shut down the
+Glittering Lady’s coffin and bolted it. His own is not bolted, although
+the bolt exists in the same place. He just got in and pulled down the
+lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking—for how can such things be? Let us
+get out and think.”
+
+So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had begun to
+oppress us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the cave, where for
+a while we remained silent.
+
+“I am very thirsty,” said Bastin presently. “Those smells seem to have
+dried me up. I am going to get some tea—I mean water, as unfortunately
+there is no tea,” and he set off towards the mouth of the cave.
+
+We followed him, I don’t quite know why, except that we wished to
+breathe freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and its
+contents would be as safe as they had been for—well, how long?
+
+It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and down
+enjoying it sub-consciously, for really our—that is Bickley’s and my
+own—intelligences were concentrated on that sepulchre and its contents.
+Where Bastin’s may have been I do not know, perhaps in a visionary
+teapot, since I was sure that it would take him a day or two to
+appreciate the significance of our discoveries. At any rate, he
+wandered off, making no remarks about them, to drink water, I suppose.
+
+Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the table-rock and we
+went to see the reason of his noise. It proved to be very satisfactory,
+for while we were in the cave the Orofenans had brought absolutely
+everything belonging to us, together with a large supply of food from
+the main island. Not a single article was missing; even our books, a
+can with the bottom out, and the broken pieces of a little pocket
+mirror had been religiously transported, and with these a few articles
+that had been stolen from us, notably my pocket-knife. Evidently a
+great taboo had been laid upon all our possessions. They were now
+carefully arranged in one of the grooves of the rock that Bickley
+supposed had been made by the wheels of aeroplanes, which was why we
+had not seen them at once.
+
+Each of us rushed for what we desired most—Bastin for one of the
+canisters of tea, I for my diaries, and Bickley for his chest of
+instruments and medicines. These were removed to the mouth of the cave,
+and after them the other things and the food; also a bell tent and some
+camp furniture that we had brought from the ship. Then Bastin made some
+tea of which he drank four large pannikins, having first said grace
+over it with unwonted fervour. Nor did we disdain our share of the
+beverage, although Bickley preferred cocoa and I coffee. Cocoa and
+coffee we had no time to make then, and in view of that sepulchre in
+the cave, what had we to do with cocoa and coffee?
+
+So Bickley and I said to each other, and yet presently he changed his
+mind and in a special metal machine carefully made some extremely
+strong black coffee which he poured into a thermos flask, previously
+warmed with hot water, adding thereto about a claret glass of brandy.
+Also he extracted certain drugs from his medicine-chest, and with them,
+as I noted, a hypodermic syringe, which he first boiled in a kettle and
+then shut up in a little tube with a glass stopper.
+
+These preparations finished, he called to Tommy to give him the scraps
+of our meal. But there was no Tommy. The dog was missing, and though we
+hunted everywhere we could not find him. Finally we concluded that he
+had wandered off down the beach on business of his own and would return
+in due course. We could not bother about Tommy just then.
+
+After making some further preparations and fidgeting about a little,
+Bickley announced that as we had now some proper paraffin lamps of the
+powerful sort which are known as “hurricane,” he proposed by their aid
+to carry out further examinations in the cave.
+
+“I think I shall stop where I am,” said Bastin, helping himself from
+the kettle to a fifth pannikin of tea. “Those corpses are very
+interesting, but I don’t see any use in staring at them again at
+present. One can always do that at any time. I have missed Marama once
+already by being away in that cave, and I have a lot to say to him
+about my people; I don’t want to be absent in case he should return.”
+
+“To wash up the things, I suppose,” said Bickley with a sniff; “or
+perhaps to eat the tea-leaves.”
+
+“Well, as a matter of fact, I have noticed that these natives have a
+peculiar taste for tea-leaves. I think they believe them to be a
+medicine, but I don’t suppose they would come so far for them, though
+perhaps they might in the hope of getting the head of Oro. Anyhow, I am
+going to stop here.”
+
+“Pray do,” said Bickley. “Are you ready, Humphrey?”
+
+I nodded, and he handed to me a felt-covered flask of the
+non-conducting kind, filled with boiling water, a tin of preserved
+milk, and a little bottle of meat extract of a most concentrated sort.
+Then, having lit two of the hurricane lamps and seen that they were
+full of oil, we started back up the cave.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+Resurrection
+
+
+We reached the sepulchre without stopping to look at the parked
+machines or even the marvelous statue that stood above it, for what did
+we care about machines or statues now? As we approached we were
+astonished to hear low and cavernous growlings.
+
+“There is some wild beast in there,” said Bickley, halting. “No, by
+George! it’s Tommy. What can the dog be after?”
+
+We peeped in, and there sure enough was Tommy lying on the top of the
+Glittering Lady’s coffin and growling his very best with the hair
+standing up upon his back. When he saw who it was, however, he jumped
+off and frisked round, licking my hand.
+
+“That’s very strange,” I exclaimed.
+
+“Not stranger than everything else,” said Bickley.
+
+“What are you going to do?” I asked.
+
+“Open these coffins,” he answered, “beginning with that of the old god,
+since I would rather experiment on him. I expect he will crumble into
+dust. But if by chance he doesn’t I’ll jam a little strychnine, mixed
+with some other drugs, of which you don’t know the names, into one of
+his veins and see if anything happens. If it doesn’t, it won’t hurt
+him, and if it does—well, who knows? Now give me a hand.”
+
+We went to the left-hand coffin and by inserting the hook on the back
+of my knife, of which the real use is to pick stones out of horses’
+hoofs, into one of the little air-holes I have described, managed to
+raise the heavy crystal lid sufficiently to enable us to force a piece
+of wood between it and the top. The rest was easy, for the hinges being
+of crystal had not corroded. In two minutes it was open.
+
+From the chest came an overpowering spicy odour, and with it a
+veritable breath of warm air before which we recoiled a little. Bickley
+took a pocket thermometer which he had at hand and glanced at it. It
+marked a temperature of 82 degrees in the sepulchre. Having noted this,
+he thrust it into the coffin between the crystal wall and its occupant.
+Then we went out and waited a little while to give the odours time to
+dissipate, for they made the head reel.
+
+After five minutes or so we returned and examined the thermometer. It
+had risen to 98 degrees, the natural temperature of the human body.
+
+“What do you make of that if the man is dead?” he whispered.
+
+I shook my head, and as we had agreed, set to helping him to lift the
+body from the coffin. It was a good weight, quite eleven stone I should
+say; moreover, _it was not stiff_, for the hip joints bent. We got it
+out and laid it on a blanket we had spread on the floor of the
+sepulchre. Whilst I was thus engaged I saw something that nearly caused
+me to loose my hold from astonishment. Beneath the head, the centre of
+the back and the feet were crystal boxes about eight inches square, or
+rather crystal blocks, for in them I could see no opening, and these
+boxes emitted a faint phosphorescent light. I touched one of them and
+found that it was quite warm.
+
+“Great heavens!” I exclaimed, “here’s magic.”
+
+“There’s no such thing,” answered Bickley in his usual formula. Then an
+explanation seemed to strike him and he added, “Not magic but radium or
+something of the sort. That’s how the temperature was kept up. In
+sufficient quantity it is practically indestructible, you see. My word!
+this old gentleman knew a thing or two.”
+
+Again we waited a little while to see if the body begun to crumble on
+exposure to the air, I taking the opportunity to make a rough sketch of
+it in my pocket-book in anticipation of that event. But it did not; it
+remained quite sound.
+
+“Here goes,” said Bickley. “If he should be alive, he will catch cold
+in his lungs after lying for ages in that baby incubator, as I suppose
+he has done. So it is now or never.”
+
+Then bidding me hold the man’s right arm, he took the sterilized
+syringe which he had prepared, and thrusting the needle into a vein he
+selected just above the wrist, injected the contents.
+
+“It would have been better over the heart,” he whispered, “but I
+thought I would try the arm first. I don’t like risking chills by
+uncovering him.”
+
+I made no answer and again we waited and watched.
+
+“Great heavens, he’s stirring!” I gasped presently.
+
+Stirring he was, for his fingers began to move.
+
+Bickley bent down and placed his ear to the heart—I forgot to say that
+he had tested this before with a stethoscope, but had been unable to
+detect any movement.
+
+“I believe it is beginning to beat,” he said in an awed voice.
+
+Then he applied the stethoscope, and added, “It is, it is!”
+
+Next he took a filament of cotton wool and laid it on the man’s lips.
+Presently it moved; he was breathing, though very faintly. Bickley took
+more cotton wool and having poured something from his medicine-chest on
+to it, placed it over the mouth beneath the man’s nostrils—I believe it
+was sal volatile.
+
+Nothing further happened for a little while, and to relieve the strain
+on my mind I stared absently into the empty coffin. Here I saw what had
+escaped our notice, two small plates of white metal and cut upon them
+what I took to be star maps. Beyond these and the glowing boxes which I
+have mentioned, there was nothing else in the coffin. I had no time to
+examine them, for at that moment the old man opened his mouth and began
+to breathe, evidently with some discomfort and effort, as his empty
+lungs filled themselves with air. Then his eyelids lifted, revealing a
+wonderful pair of dark glowing eyes beneath. Next he tried to sit up
+but would have fallen, had not Bickley supported him with his arm.
+
+I do not think he saw Bickley, indeed he shut his eyes again as though
+the light hurt them, and went into a kind of faint. Then it was that
+Tommy, who all this while had been watching the proceedings with grave
+interest, came forward, wagging his tail, and licked the man’s face. At
+the touch of the dog’s red tongue, he opened his eyes for the second
+time. Now he saw—not us but Tommy, for after contemplating him for a
+few seconds, something like a smile appeared upon his fierce but noble
+face. More, he lifted his hand and laid it on the dog’s head, as though
+to pat it kindly. Half a minute or so later his awakening senses
+appreciated our presence. The incipient smile vanished and was replaced
+by a somewhat terrible frown.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley had poured out some of the hot coffee laced with
+brandy into the cup that was screwed on the top of the thermos flask.
+Advancing to the man whom I supported, he put it to his lips. He tasted
+and made a wry face, but presently he began to sip, and ultimately
+swallowed it all. The effect of the stimulant was wonderful, for in a
+few minutes he came to life completely and was even able to sit up
+without support.
+
+For quite a long while he gazed at us gravely, taking us in and
+everything connected with us. For instance, Bickley’s medicine-case
+which lay open showing the little vulcanite tubes, a few instruments
+and other outfit, engaged his particular attention, and I saw at once
+that he understood what it was. Thus his arm still smarted where the
+needle had been driven in and on the blanket lay the syringe. He looked
+at his arm, then looked at the syringe, and nodded. The paraffin
+hurricane lamps also seemed to interest and win his approval. We two
+men, as I thought, attracted him least of all; he just summed us up and
+our garments, more especially the garments, with a few shrewd glances,
+and then seemed to turn his thoughts to Tommy, who had seated himself
+quite contentedly at his side, evidently accepting him as a new
+addition to our party.
+
+I confess that this behaviour on Tommy’s part reassured me not a
+little. I am a great believer in the instincts of animals, especially
+of dogs, and I felt certain that if this man had not been in all
+essentials human like ourselves, Tommy would not have tolerated him. In
+the same way the sleeper’s clear liking for Tommy, at whom he looked
+much oftener and with greater kindness than he did at us, suggested
+that there was goodness in him somewhere, since although a dog in its
+wonderful tolerance may love a bad person in whom it smells out hidden
+virtue, no really bad person ever loved a dog, or, I may add, a child
+or a flower.
+
+As a matter of fact, the “old god,” as we had christened him while he
+was in his coffin, during all our association with him, cared
+infinitely more for Tommy than he did for any of us, a circumstance
+that ultimately was not without its influence upon our fortunes. But
+for this there was a reason as we learned afterwards, also he was not
+really so amiable as I hoped.
+
+When we had looked at each other for a long while the sleeper began to
+arrange his beard, of which the length seemed to surprise him,
+especially as Tommy was seated on one end of it. Finding this out and
+apparently not wishing to disturb Tommy, he gave up the occupation, and
+after one or two attempts, for his tongue and lips still seemed to be
+stiff, addressed us in some sonorous and musical language, unlike any
+that we had ever heard. We shook our heads. Then by an afterthought I
+said “Good day” to him in the language of the Orofenans. He puzzled
+over the word as though it were more or less familiar to him, and when
+I repeated it, gave it back to me with a difference indeed, but in a
+way which convinced us that he quite understood what I meant. The
+conversation went no further at the moment because just then some
+memory seemed to strike him.
+
+He was sitting with his back against the coffin of the Glittering Lady,
+whom therefore he had not seen. Now he began to turn round, and being
+too weak to do so, motioned me to help him. I obeyed, while Bickley,
+guessing his purpose, held up one of the hurricane lamps that he might
+see better. With a kind of fierce eagerness he surveyed her who lay
+within the coffin, and after he had done so, uttered a sigh as of
+intense relief.
+
+Next he pointed to the metal cup out of which he had drunk. Bickley
+filled it again from the thermos flask, which I observed excited his
+keen interest, for, having touched the flask with his hand and found
+that it was cool, he appeared to marvel that the fluid coming from it
+should be hot and steaming. Presently he smiled as though he had got
+the clue to the mystery, and swallowed his second drink of coffee and
+spirit. This done, he motioned to us to lift the lid of the lady’s
+coffin, pointing out a certain catch in the bolts which at first we
+could not master, for it will be remembered that on this coffin these
+were shot.
+
+In the end, by pursuing the same methods that we had used in the
+instance of his own, we raised the coffin lid and once more were driven
+to retreat from the sepulchre for a while by the overpowering odour
+like to that of a whole greenhouse full of tuberoses, that flowed out
+of it, inducing a kind of stupefaction from which even Tommy fled.
+
+When we returned it was to find the man kneeling by the side of the
+coffin, for as yet he could not stand, with his glowing eyes fixed upon
+the face of her who slept therein and waving his long arms above her.
+
+“Hypnotic business! Wonder if it will work,” whispered Bickley. Then he
+lifted the syringe and looked inquiringly at the man, who shook his
+head, and went on with his mesmeric passes.
+
+I crept round him and took my stand by the sleeper’s head, that I might
+watch her face, which was well worth watching, while Bickley, with his
+medicine at hand, remained near her feet, I think engaged in
+disinfecting the syringe in some spirit or acid. I believe he was about
+to make an attempt to use it when suddenly, as though beneath the
+influence of the hypnotic passes, a change appeared on the Glittering
+Lady’s face. Hitherto, beautiful as it was, it had been a dead face
+though one of a person who had suddenly been cut off while in full
+health and vigour a few hours, or at the most a day or so before. Now
+it began to live again; it was as though the spirit were returning from
+afar, and not without toil and tribulation.
+
+Expression after expression flitted across the features; indeed these
+seemed to change so much from moment to moment that they might have
+belonged to several different individuals, though each was beautiful.
+The fact of these remarkable changes with the suggestion of multiform
+personalities which they conveyed impressed both Bickley and myself
+very much indeed. Then the breast heaved tumultuously; it even appeared
+to struggle. Next the eyes opened. They were full of wonder, even of
+fear, but oh! what marvelous eyes. I do not know how to describe them,
+I cannot even state their exact colour, except that it was dark,
+something like the blue of sapphires of the deepest tint, and yet not
+black; large, too, and soft as a deer’s. They shut again as though the
+light hurt them, then once more opened and wandered about, apparently
+without seeing.
+
+At length they found my face, for I was still bending over her, and,
+resting there, appeared to take it in by degrees. More, it seemed to
+touch and stir some human spring in the still-sleeping heart. At least
+the fear passed from her features and was replaced by a faint smile,
+such as a patient sometimes gives to one known and well loved, as the
+effects of chloroform pass away. For a while she looked at me with an
+earnest, searching gaze, then suddenly, for the first time moving her
+arms, lifted them and threw them round my neck.
+
+The old man stared, bending his imperial brows into a little frown, but
+did nothing. Bickley stared also through his glasses and sniffed as
+though in disapproval, while I remained quite still, fighting with a
+wild impulse to kiss her on the lips as one would an awakening and
+beloved child. I doubt if I could have done so, however, for really I
+was immovable; my heart seemed to stop and all my muscles to be
+paralysed.
+
+I do not know for how long this endured, but I do know how it ended.
+Presently in the intense silence I heard Bastin’s heavy voice and
+looking round, saw his big head projecting into the sepulchre.
+
+“Well, I never!” he said, “you seem to have woke them up with a
+vengeance. If you begin like _that_ with the lady, there will be
+complications before you have done, Arbuthnot.”
+
+Talk of being brought back to earth with a rush! I could have killed
+Bastin, and Bickley, turning on him like a tiger, told him to be off,
+find wood and light a large fire in front of the statue. I think he was
+about to argue when the Ancient gave him a glance of his fierce eyes,
+which alarmed him, and he departed, bewildered, to return presently
+with the wood.
+
+But the sound of his voice had broken the spell. The Lady let her arms
+fall with a start, and shut her eyes again, seeming to faint. Bickley
+sprang forward with his sal volatile and applied it to her nostrils,
+the Ancient not interfering, for he seemed to recognise that he had to
+deal with a man of skill and one who meant well by them.
+
+In the end we brought her round again and, to omit details, Bickley
+gave her, not coffee and brandy, but a mixture he compounded of hot
+water, preserved milk and meat essence. The effect of it on her was
+wonderful, since a few minutes after swallowing it she sat up in the
+coffin. Then we lifted her from that narrow bed in which she had slept
+for—ah! how long? and perceived that beneath her also were crystal
+boxes of the radiant, heat-giving substance. We sat her on the floor of
+the sepulchre, wrapping her also in a blanket.
+
+Now it was that Tommy, after frisking round her as though in welcome of
+an old friend, calmly established himself beside her and laid his black
+head upon her knee. She noted it and smiled for the first time, a
+marvelously sweet and gentle smile. More, she placed her slender hand
+upon the dog and stroked him feebly.
+
+Bickley tried to make her drink some more of his mixture, but she
+refused, motioning him to give it to Tommy. This, however, he would not
+do because there was but one cup. Presently both of the sleepers began
+to shiver, which caused Bickley anxiety. Abusing Bastin beneath his
+breath for being so long with the fire, he drew the blankets closer
+about them.
+
+Then an idea came to him and he examined the glowing boxes in the
+coffin. They were loose, being merely set in prepared cavities in the
+crystal. Wrapping our handkerchiefs about his hand, he took them out
+and placed them around the wakened patients, a proceeding of which the
+Ancient nodded approval. Just then, too, Bastin returned with his first
+load of firewood, and soon we had a merry blaze going just outside the
+sepulchre. I saw that they observed the lighting of this fire by means
+of a match with much interest.
+
+Now they grew warm again, as indeed we did also—too warm. Then in my
+turn I had an idea. I knew that by now the sun would be beating hotly
+against the rock of the mount, and suggested to Bickley, that, if
+possible, the best thing we could do would be to get them into its
+life-giving rays. He agreed, if we could make them understand and they
+were able to walk. So I tried. First I directed the Ancient’s attention
+to the mouth of the cave which at this distance showed as a white
+circle of light. He looked at it and then at me with grave inquiry. I
+made motions to suggest that he should proceed there, repeating the
+word “Sun” in the Orofenan tongue. He understood at once, though
+whether he read my mind rather than what I said I am not sure.
+Apparently the Glittering Lady understood also and seemed to be most
+anxious to go. Only she looked rather pitifully at her feet and shook
+her head. This decided me.
+
+I do not know if I have mentioned anywhere that I am a tall man and
+very muscular. She was tall, also, but as I judged not so very heavy
+after her long fast. At any rate I felt quite certain that I could
+carry her for that distance. Stooping down, I lifted her up, signing to
+her to put her arms round my neck, which she did. Then calling to
+Bickley and Bastin to bring along the Ancient between them, with some
+difficulty I struggled out of the sepulchre, and started down the cave.
+She was more heavy than I thought, and yet I could have wished the
+journey longer. To begin with she seemed quite trustful and happy in my
+arms, where she lay with her head against my shoulder, smiling a little
+as a child might do, especially when I had to stop and throw her long
+hair round my neck like a muffler, to prevent it from trailing in the
+dust.
+
+A bundle of lavender, or a truss of new-mown hay, could not have been
+more sweet to carry and there was something electric about the touch of
+her, which went through and through me. Very soon it was over, and we
+were out of the cave into the full glory of the tropical sun. At first,
+that her eyes might become accustomed to its light and her awakened
+body to its heat, I set her down where shadow fell from the overhanging
+rock, in a canvas deck chair that had been brought by Marama with the
+other things, throwing the rug about her to protect her from such wind
+as there was. She nestled gratefully into the soft seat and shut her
+eyes, for the motion had tired her. I noted, however, that she drew in
+the sweet air with long breaths.
+
+Then I turned to observe the arrival of the Ancient, who was being
+borne between Bickley and Bastin in what children know as a
+dandy-chair, which is formed by two people crossing their hands in a
+peculiar fashion. It says much for the tremendous dignity of his
+presence that even thus, with one arm round the neck of Bickley and the
+other round that of Bastin, and his long white beard falling almost to
+the ground, he still looked most imposing.
+
+Unfortunately, however, just as they were emerging from the cave,
+Bastin, always the most awkward of creatures, managed to leave hold
+with one hand, so that his passenger nearly came to the ground. Never
+shall I forget the look that he gave him. Indeed, I think that from
+this moment he hated Bastin. Bickley he respected as a man of
+intelligence and learning, although in comparison with his own, the
+latter was infantile and crude; me he tolerated and even liked; but
+Bastin he detested. The only one of our party for whom he felt anything
+approaching real affection was the spaniel Tommy.
+
+We set him down, fortunately uninjured, on some rugs, and also in the
+shadow. Then, after a little while, we moved both of them into the sun.
+It was quite curious to see them expand there. As Bickley said, what
+happened to them might well be compared to the development of a
+butterfly which has just broken from the living grave of its chrysalis
+and crept into the full, hot radiance of the light. Its crinkled wings
+unfold, their brilliant tints develop; in an hour or two it is perfect,
+glorious, prepared for life and flight, a new creature.
+
+So it was with this pair, from moment to moment they gathered strength
+and vigour. Near-by to them, as it happened, stood a large basket of
+the luscious native fruits brought that morning by the Orofenans, and
+at these the Lady looked with longing. With Bickley’s permission, I
+offered them to her and to the Ancient, first peeling them with my
+fingers. They ate of them greedily, a full meal, and would have gone on
+had not the stern Bickley, fearing untoward consequences, removed the
+basket. Again the results were wonderful, for half an hour afterwards
+they seemed to be quite strong. With my assistance the Glittering Lady,
+as I still call her, for at that time I did not know her name, rose
+from the chair, and, leaning on me, tottered a few steps forward. Then
+she stood looking at the sky and all the lovely panorama of nature
+beneath, and stretching out her arms as though in worship. Oh! how
+beautiful she seemed with the sunlight shining on her heavenly face!
+
+Now for the first time I heard her voice. It was soft and deep, yet in
+it was a curious bell-like tone that seemed to vibrate like the sound
+of chimes heard from far away. Never have I listened to such another
+voice. She pointed to the sun whereof the light turned her radiant hair
+and garments to a kind of golden glory, and called it by some name that
+I could not understand. I shook my head, whereon she gave it a
+different name taken, I suppose, from another language. Again I shook
+my head and she tried a third time. To my delight this word was
+practically the same that the Orofenans used for “sun.”
+
+“Yes,” I said, speaking very slowly, “so it is called by the people of
+this land.”
+
+She understood, for she answered in much the same language:
+
+“What, then, do you call it?”
+
+“Sun in the English tongue,” I replied.
+
+“Sun. English,” she repeated after me, then added, “How are you named,
+Wanderer?”
+
+“Humphrey,” I answered.
+
+“Hum-fe-ry!” she said as though she were learning the word, “and
+those?”
+
+“Bastin and Bickley,” I replied.
+
+Over these patronymics she shook her head; as yet they were too much
+for her.
+
+“How are you named, Sleeper?” I asked.
+
+“Yva,” she answered.
+
+“A beautiful name for one who is beautiful,” I declared with
+enthusiasm, of course always in the rich Orofenan dialect which by now
+I could talk well enough.
+
+She repeated the words once or twice, then of a sudden caught their
+meaning, for she smiled and even coloured, saying hastily with a wave
+of her hand towards the Ancient who stood at a distance between Bastin
+and Bickley, “My father, Oro; great man; great king; great god!”
+
+At this information I started, for it was startling to learn that here
+was the original Oro, who was still worshipped by the Orofenans,
+although of his actual existence they had known nothing for uncounted
+time. Also I was glad to learn that he was her father and not her old
+husband, for to me that would have been horrible, a desecration too
+deep for words.
+
+“How long did you sleep, Yva?” I asked, pointing towards the sepulchre
+in the cave.
+
+After a little thought she understood and shook her head hopelessly,
+then by an afterthought, she said,
+
+“Stars tell Oro to-night.”
+
+So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had guessed as
+much from those plates in the coffin which seemed to have stars
+engraved on them.
+
+At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient himself
+approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged in an
+animated argument with Bastin.
+
+“For Heaven’s sake!” said Bickley, “keep your theology to yourself at
+present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a temper he may
+die.”
+
+“If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him that he
+is a liar,” replied Bastin obstinately.
+
+“Which you did, Bastin, only fortunately he did not understand you. But
+for your own sake I advise you not to take liberties. He is not one, I
+think, with whom it is wise to trifle. I think he seems thirsty. Go and
+get some water from the rain pool, not from the lake.”
+
+Bastin departed and presently returned with an aluminum jug full of
+pure water and a glass. Bickley poured some of it into a glass and
+handed it to Yva who bent her head in thanks. Then she did a curious
+thing. Having first lifted the glass with both hands to the sky and
+held it so for a few seconds, she turned and with an obeisance poured a
+little of it on the ground before her father’s feet.
+
+A libation, thought I to myself, and evidently Bastin agreed with me,
+for I heard him mutter,
+
+“I believe she is making a heathen offering.”
+
+Doubtless we were right, for Oro accepted the homage by a little motion
+of the head. After this, at a sign from him she drank the water. Then
+the glass was refilled and handed to Oro who also held it towards the
+sky. He, however, made no libation but drank at once, two tumblers of
+it in rapid succession.
+
+By now the direct sunlight was passing from the mouth of the cave, and
+though it was hot enough, both of them shivered a little. They spoke
+together in some language of which we could not understand a word, as
+though they were debating what their course of action should be. The
+dispute was long and earnest. Had we known what was passing, which I
+learned afterwards, it would have made us sufficiently anxious, for the
+point at issue was nothing less than whether we should or should not be
+forthwith destroyed—an end, it appears, that Oro was quite capable of
+bringing about if he so pleased. Yva, however, had very clear views of
+her own on the matter and, as I gather, even dared to threaten that she
+would protect us by the use of certain powers at her command, though
+what these were I do not know.
+
+While the event hung doubtful Tommy, who was growing bored with these
+long proceedings, picked up a bough still covered with flowers which,
+after their pretty fashion, the Orofenans had placed on the top of one
+of the baskets of food. This small bough he brought and laid at the
+feet of Oro, no doubt in the hope that he would throw it for him to
+fetch, a game in which the dog delighted. For some reason Oro saw an
+omen in this simple canine performance, or he may have thought that the
+dog was making an offering to him, for he put his thin hand to his brow
+and thought a while, then motioned to Bastin to pick up the bough and
+give it to him.
+
+Next he spoke to his daughter as though assenting to something, for I
+saw her sigh in relief. No wonder, for he was conveying his decision to
+spare our lives and admit us to their fellowship.
+
+After this again they talked, but in quite a different tone and manner.
+Then the Glittering Lady said to me in her slow and archaic Orofenan:
+
+“We go to rest. You must not follow. We come back perhaps tonight,
+perhaps next night. We are quite safe. You are quite safe under the
+beard of Oro. Spirit of Oro watch you. You understand?”
+
+I said I understood, whereon she answered:
+
+“Good-bye, O Humfe-ry.”
+
+“Good-bye, O Yva,” I replied, bowing.
+
+Thereon they turned and refusing all assistance from us, vanished into
+the darkness of the cave leaning upon each other and walking slowly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!
+
+
+“You seem to have made the best of your time, old fellow,” said Bickley
+in rather a sour voice.
+
+“I never knew people begin to call each other by their Christian names
+so soon,” added Bastin, looking at me with a suspicious eye.
+
+“I know no other,” I said.
+
+“Perhaps not, but at any rate _you_ have another, though you don’t seem
+to have told it to her. Anyway, I am glad they are gone, for I was
+getting tired of being ordered by everybody to carry about wood and
+water for them. Also I am terribly hungry as I can’t eat before it is
+light. They have taken most of the best fruit to which I was looking
+forward, but thank goodness they do not seem to care for pork.”
+
+“So am I,” said Bickley, who really looked exhausted. “Get the food,
+there’s a good fellow. We’ll talk afterwards.”
+
+When we had eaten, somewhat silently, I asked Bickley what he made of
+the business; also whither he thought the sleepers had gone.
+
+“I think I can answer the last question,” interrupted Bastin. “I expect
+it is to a place well known to students of the Bible which even Bickley
+mentions sometimes when he is angry. At any rate, they seem to be very
+fond of heat, for they wouldn’t part from it even in their coffins, and
+you will admit that they are not quite natural, although that
+Glittering Lady is so attractive as regards her exterior.”
+
+Bickley waved these remarks aside and addressed himself to me.
+
+“I don’t know what to think of it,” he said; “but as the experience is
+not natural and everything in the Universe, so far as we know it, has a
+natural explanation, I am inclined to the belief that we are suffering
+from hallucinations, which in their way are also quite natural. It does
+not seem possible that two people can really have been asleep for an
+unknown length of time enclosed in vessels of glass or crystal, kept
+warm by radium or some such substance, and then emerge from them
+comparatively strong and well. It is contrary to natural law.”
+
+“How about microbes?” I asked. “They are said to last practically for
+ever, and they are living things. So in their case your natural law
+breaks down.”
+
+“That is true,” he answered. “Some microbes in a sealed tube and under
+certain conditions do appear to possess indefinite powers of life. Also
+radium has an indefinite life, but that is a mineral. Only these people
+are not microbes nor are they minerals. Also, experience tells us that
+they could not have lived for more than a few months at the outside in
+such circumstances as we seemed to find them.”
+
+“Then what do you suggest?”
+
+“I suggest that we did not really find them at all; that we have all
+been dreaming. You know that there are certain gases which produce
+illusions, laughing gas is one of them, and that these gases are
+sometimes met with in caves. Now there were very peculiar odours in
+that place under the statue, which may have worked upon our
+imaginations in some such way. Otherwise we are up against a miracle,
+and, as you know, I do not believe in miracles.”
+
+“_I_ do,” said Bastin calmly. “You’ll find all about it in the Bible if
+you will only take the trouble to read. Why do you talk such rubbish
+about gases?”
+
+“Because only gas, or something of the sort, could have made us imagine
+them.”
+
+“Nonsense, Bickley! Those people were here right enough. Didn’t they
+eat our fruit and drink the water I brought them without ever saying
+thank you? Only, they are not human. They are evil spirits, and for my
+part I don’t want to see any more of them, though I have no doubt
+Arbuthnot does, as that Glittering Lady threw her arms round his neck
+when she woke up, and already he is calling her by her Christian name,
+if the word Christian can be used in connection with her. The old
+fellow had the impudence to tell us that he was a god, and it is
+remarkable that he should have called himself Oro, seeing that the
+devil they worship on the island is also called Oro and the place
+itself is named Orofena.”
+
+“As to where they have gone,” continued Bickley, taking no notice of
+Bastin, “I really don’t know. My expectation is, however, that when we
+go to look tomorrow morning—and I suggest that we should not do so
+before then in order that we may give our minds time to clear—we shall
+find that sepulchre place quite empty, even perhaps without the crystal
+coffins we have imagined to stand there.”
+
+“Perhaps we shall find that there isn’t a cave at all and that we are
+not sitting on a flat rock outside of it,” suggested Bastin with heavy
+sarcasm, adding, “You are clever in your way, Bickley, but you can talk
+more rubbish than any man I ever knew.”
+
+“They told us they would come back tonight or tomorrow,” I said. “If
+they do, what will you say then, Bickley?”
+
+“I will wait till they come to answer that question. Now let us go for
+a walk and try to change our thoughts. We are all over-strained and
+scarcely know what we are saying.”
+
+“One more question,” I said as we rose to start. “Did Tommy suffer from
+hallucinations as well as ourselves?”
+
+“Why not?” answered Bickley. “He is an animal just as we are, or
+perhaps we thought we saw Tommy do the things he did.”
+
+“When you found that basket of fruit, Bastin, which the natives brought
+over in the canoe, was there a bough covered with red flowers lying on
+the top of it?”
+
+“Yes, Arbuthnot, one bough only; I threw it down on the rock as it got
+in the way when I was carrying the basket.”
+
+“Which flowering bough we all thought we saw the Sleeper Oro carry away
+after Tommy had brought it to him.”
+
+“Yes; he made me pick it up and give it to him,” said Bastin.
+
+“Well, if we did not see this it should still be lying on the rock, as
+there has been no wind and there are no animals here to carry it away.
+You will admit that, Bickley?”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“Then if it has gone you will admit also that the presumption is that
+we saw what we thought we did see?”
+
+“I do not know how that conclusion can be avoided, at any rate so far
+as the incident of the bough is concerned,” replied Bickley with
+caution.
+
+Then, without more words, we started to look. At the spot where the
+bough should have been, there was no bough, but on the rock lay several
+of the red flowers, bitten off, I suppose, by Tommy while he was
+carrying it. Nor was this all. I think I have mentioned that the
+Glittering Lady wore sandals which were fastened with red studs that
+looked like rubies or carbuncles. On the rock lay one of these studs. I
+picked it up and we examined it. It had been sewn to the sandal-strap
+with golden thread or silk. Some of this substance hung from the hole
+drilled in the stone which served for an eye. It was as rotten as
+tinder, apparently with extreme age. Moreover, the hard gem itself was
+pitted as though the passage of time had taken effect upon it, though
+this may have been caused by other agencies, such as the action of the
+radium rays. I smiled at Bickley who looked disconcerted and even sad.
+In a way it is painful to see the effect upon an able and earnest man
+of the upsetting of his lifelong theories.
+
+We went for our walk, keeping to the flat lands at the foot of the
+volcano cone, for we seemed to have had enough of wonders and to desire
+to reassure ourselves, as it were, by the study of natural and familiar
+things. As it chanced, too, we were rewarded by sundry useful
+discoveries. Thus we found a place where the bread-tree and other
+fruits, most of them now ripe, grew in abundance, as did the yam. Also,
+we came to an inlet that we noticed was crowded with large and
+beautiful fish from the lake, which seemed to find it a favourite spot.
+Perhaps this was because a little stream of excellent water ran in
+here, overflowing from the great pool or mere which filled the crater
+above.
+
+At these finds we rejoiced greatly, for now we knew that we need not
+fear starvation even should our supply of food from the main island be
+cut off. Indeed, by help of some palm-leaf stalks which we wove
+together roughly, Bastin, who was rather clever at this kind of thing,
+managed to trap four fish weighing two or three pounds apiece, wading
+into the water to do so. It was curious to observe with what ease he
+adapted himself to the manners and customs of primeval man, so much so,
+indeed, that Bickley remarked that if he could believe in
+re-incarnation, he would be absolutely certain that Bastin was a
+troglodyte in his last sojourn on the earth.
+
+However this might be, Bastin’s primeval instincts and abilities were
+of the utmost service to us. Before we had been many days on that
+island he had built us a kind of native hut or house roofed with palm
+leaves in which, until provided with a better, as happened afterwards,
+we ate and he and Bickley slept, leaving the tent to me. Moreover, he
+wove a net of palm fibre with which he caught abundance of fish, and
+made fishing-lines of the same material (fortunately we had some hooks)
+which he baited with freshwater mussels and the insides of fish. By
+means of these he secured some veritable monsters of the carp species
+that proved most excellent eating. His greatest triumph, however, was a
+decoy which he constructed of boughs, wherein he trapped a number of
+waterfowl. So that soon we kept a very good table of a sort, especially
+after he had learned how to cook our food upon the native plan by means
+of hot stones. This suited us admirably, as it enabled Bickley and
+myself to devote all our time to archaeological and other studies which
+did not greatly interest Bastin.
+
+By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards evening, so
+we cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly exhausted, made
+ourselves as comfortable as we could and went to sleep. Even our
+marvelous experiences could not keep Bickley and myself from sleeping,
+and on Bastin such things had no effect. He accepted them and that was
+all, much more readily than we did, indeed. Triple-armed as he was in
+the mail of a child-like faith, he snapped his fingers at evil spirits
+which he supposed the Sleepers to be, and at everything else that other
+men might dread.
+
+Now, as I have mentioned, after our talk with Marama, although we did
+not think it wise to adventure ourselves among them again at present,
+we had lost all fear of the Orofenans. In this attitude, so far as
+Marama himself and the majority of his people were concerned, we were
+quite justified, for they were our warm friends. But in the case of the
+sorcerers, the priests and all their rascally and superstitious
+brotherhood, we were by no means justified. They had not forgiven
+Bastin his sacrilege or for his undermining of their authority by the
+preaching of new doctrines which, if adopted, would destroy them as a
+hierarchy. Nor had they forgiven Bickley for shooting one of their
+number, or any of us for our escape from the vengeance of their god.
+
+So it came about that they made a plot to seize us all and hale us off
+to be sacrificed to a substituted image of Oro, which by now they had
+set up. They knew exactly where we slept upon the rock; indeed, our
+fire showed it to them and so far they were not afraid to venture,
+since here they had been accustomed for generations to lay their
+offerings to the god of the Mountain. Secretly on the previous night,
+without the knowledge of Marama, they had carried two more canoes to
+the borders of the lake. Now on this night, just as the moon was
+setting about three in the morning, they made their attack, twenty-one
+men in all, for the three canoes were large, relying on the following
+darkness to get us away and convey us to the place of sacrifice to be
+offered up at dawn and before Marama could interfere.
+
+The first we knew of the matter, for most foolishly we had neglected to
+keep a watch, was the unpleasant sensation of brawny savages kneeling
+on us and trussing us up with palm-fibre ropes. Also they thrust
+handfuls of dry grass into our mouths to prevent us from calling out,
+although as air came through the interstices of the grass, we did not
+suffocate. The thing was so well done that we never struck a blow in
+self-defence, and although we had our pistols at hand, much less could
+we fire a shot. Of course, we struggled as well as we were able, but it
+was quite useless; in three minutes we were as helpless as calves in a
+net and like calves were being conveyed to the butcher. Bastin managed
+to get the gag out of his mouth for a few seconds, and I heard him say
+in his slow, heavy voice:
+
+“This, Bickley, is what comes of trafficking with evil spirits in
+museum cases—” There his speech stopped, for the grass wad was jammed
+down his throat again, but distinctly I heard the inarticulate Bickley
+snort as he conceived the repartee he was unable to utter. As for
+myself, I reflected that the business served us right for not keeping a
+watch, and abandoned the issue to fate.
+
+Still, to confess the truth, I was infinitely more sorry to die than I
+should have been forty-eight hours earlier. This is a dull and in most
+ways a dreadful world, one, if we could only summon the courage, that
+some of us would be glad to leave in search of new adventures. But here
+a great and unprecedented adventure had begun to befall me, and before
+its mystery was solved, before even I could formulate a theory
+concerning it, my body must be destroyed, and my intelligence that was
+caged therein, sent far afield; or, if Bickley were right, eclipsed. It
+seemed so sad just when the impossible, like an unguessed wandering
+moon, had risen over the grey flats of the ascertained and made them
+shine with hope and wonder.
+
+They carried us off to the canoes, not too gently; indeed, I heard the
+bony frame of Bastin bump into the bottom of one of them and reflected,
+not without venom, that it served him right as he was the fount and
+origin of our woes. Two stinking magicians, wearing on their heads
+undress editions of their court cages, since these were too cumbersome
+for active work of the sort, and painted all over with various
+pigments, were just about to swing me after him into the same, or
+another canoe, when something happened. I did not know what it was, but
+as a result, my captors left hold of me so that I fell to the rock,
+lying upon my back.
+
+Then, within my line of vision, which, it must be remembered, was
+limited because I could not lift my head, appeared the upper part of
+the tall person of the Ancient who said that he was named Oro. I could
+only see him down to his middle, but I noted vaguely that he seemed to
+be much changed. For instance, he wore a different coloured dress, or
+rather robe; this time it was dark blue, which caused me to wonder
+where on earth it came from. Also, his tremendous beard had been
+trimmed and dressed, and on his head there was a simple black cap,
+strangely quilted, which looked as though it were made of velvet.
+Moreover, his face had plumped out. He still looked ancient, it is
+true, and unutterably wise, but now he resembled an antique youth, so
+great were his energy and vigour. Also, his dark and glowing eyes shone
+with a fearful intensity. In short, he seemed impressive and terrible
+almost beyond imagining.
+
+He looked about him slowly, then asked in a deep, cold voice, speaking
+in the Orofenan tongue:
+
+“What do you, slaves?”
+
+No one seemed able to answer, they were too horror-stricken at this
+sudden vision of their fabled god, whose fierce features of wood had
+become flesh; they only turned to fly. He waved his thin hand and they
+came to a standstill, like animals which have reached the end of their
+tether and are checked by the chains that bind them. There they stood
+in all sorts of postures, immovable and looking extremely ridiculous in
+their paint and feathers, with dread unutterable stamped upon their
+evil faces.
+
+The Sleeper spoke again:
+
+“You would murder as did your forefathers, O children of snakes and
+hogs fashioned in the shape of men. You would sacrifice those who dwell
+in my shadow to satisfy your hate because they are wiser than you. Come
+hither thou,” and he beckoned with a bony finger to the chief magician.
+
+The man advanced towards him in short jumps, as a mechanical toy might
+do, and stood before him, his miniature crate and feathers all awry and
+the sweat of terror melting the paint in streaks upon his face.
+
+“Look into the eyes of Oro, O worshipper of Oro,” said the Sleeper, and
+he obeyed, his own eyes starting out of his head.
+
+“Receive the curse of Oro,” said the Ancient again. Then followed a
+terrible spectacle. The man went raving mad. He bounded into the air to
+a height inconceivable. He threw himself upon the ground and rolled
+upon the rock. He rose again and staggered round and round, tearing
+pieces out of his arms with his teeth. He yelled hideously like one
+possessed. He grovelled, beating his forehead against the rock. Then he
+sat up, slowly choked and—died.
+
+His companions seemed to catch the infection of death as terrified
+savages often do. They too performed dreadful antics, all except three
+of them who stood paralysed. They rushed about battering each other
+with their fists and wooden weapons, looking like devils from hell in
+their hideous painted attire. They grappled and fought furiously. They
+separated and plunged into the lake, where with a last grimace they
+sank like stones.
+
+It seemed to last a long while, but I think that as a matter of fact
+within five minutes it was over; they were all dead. Only the three
+paralysed ones remained standing and rolling their eyes.
+
+The Sleeper beckoned to them with his thin finger, and they walked
+forward in step like soldiers.
+
+“Lift that man from the boat,” he said, pointing to Bastin, “cut his
+bonds and those of the others.”
+
+They obeyed with a wonderful alacrity. In a minute we stood at liberty
+and were pulling the grass gags from our mouths. The Ancient pointed to
+the head magician who lay dead upon the rock, his hideous, contorted
+countenance staring open-eyed at heaven.
+
+“Take that sorcerer and show him to the other sorcerers yonder,” he
+said, “and tell them where your fellows are if they would find them.
+Know by these signs that the Oro, god of the Mountain, who has slept a
+while, is awake, and ill will it go with them who question his power or
+dare to try to harm those who dwell in his house. Bring food day by day
+and await commands. Begone!”
+
+The dreadful-looking body was bundled into one of the canoes, that out
+of which Bastin had emerged. A rower sprang into each of them and
+presently was paddling as he had never done before. As the setting moon
+vanished, they vanished with it, and once more there was a great
+silence.
+
+“I am going to find my boots,” said Bastin. “This rock is hard and I
+hurt my feet kicking at those poor fellows who appear to have come to a
+bad end, how, I do not exactly understand. Personally, I think that
+more allowances should have been made for them, as I hope will be the
+case elsewhere, since after all they only acted according to their
+lights.”
+
+“Curse their lights!” ejaculated Bickley, feeling his throat which was
+bruised. “I’m glad they are out.”
+
+Bastin limped away in search of his boots, but Bickley and I stood
+where we were contemplating the awakened Sleeper. All recollection of
+the recent tumultuous scene seemed to have passed from his mind, for he
+was engaged in a study of the heavens. They were wonderfully brilliant
+now that the moon was down, brilliant as they only can be in the
+tropics when the sky is clear.
+
+Something caused me to look round, and there, coming towards us, was
+she who said her name was Yva. Evidently all her weakness had departed
+also, for now she needed no support, but walked with a peculiar gliding
+motion that reminded me of a swan floating forward on the water. Well
+had we named her the Glittering Lady, for in the starlight literally
+she seemed to glitter. I suppose the effect came from her golden
+raiment, which, however, I noticed, as in her father’s case, was not
+the same that she had worn in the coffin; also from her hair that
+seemed to give out a light of its own. At least, she shimmered as she
+came, her tall shape swaying at every step like a willow in the wind.
+She drew near, and I saw that her face, too, had filled out and now was
+that of one in perfect health and vigour, while her eyes shone softly
+and seemed wondrous large.
+
+In her hands she carried those two plates of metal which I had seen
+lying in the coffin of the Sleeper Oro. These she gave to him, then
+fell back out of his hearing—if it were ever possible to do this, a
+point on which I am not sure—and began to talk to me. I noted at once
+that in the few hours during which she was absent, her knowledge of the
+Orofenan tongue seemed to have improved greatly as though she had drunk
+deeply from some hidden fount of memory. Now she spoke it with
+readiness, as Oro had done when he addressed the sorcerers, although
+many of the words she used were not known to me, and the general form
+of her language appeared archaic, as for instance that of Spenser as
+compared with modern English. When she saw I did not comprehend her,
+however, she would stop and cast her sentences in a different shape,
+till at length I caught her meaning. Now I give the substance of what
+she said.
+
+“You are safe,” she began, glancing first at the palm ropes that lay
+upon the rock and then at my wrists, one of which was cut.
+
+“Yes, Lady Yva, thanks to your father.”
+
+“You should say thanks to me. My father was thinking of other things,
+but I was thinking of you strangers, and from where I was I saw those
+wicked ones coming to kill you.”
+
+“Oh! from the top of the mountain, I suppose.”
+
+She shook her head and smiled but vouchsafed no further explanation,
+unless her following words can be so called. These were:
+
+“I can see otherwise than with my eyes, if I choose.” A statement that
+caused Bickley, who was listening, to mutter:
+
+“Impossible! What the deuce can she mean? Telepathy, perhaps.”
+
+“I saw,” she continued, “and told the Lord, my father. He came forth.
+Did he kill them? I did not look to learn.”
+
+“Yes. They lie in the lake, all except three whom he sent away as
+messengers.”
+
+“I thought so. Death is terrible, O Humphrey, but it is a sword which
+those who rule must use to smite the wicked and the savage.”
+
+Not wishing to pursue this subject, I asked her what her father was
+doing with the metal plates.
+
+“He reads the stars,” she answered, “to learn how long we have been
+asleep. Before we went to sleep he made two pictures of them, as they
+were then and as they should be at the time he had set for our
+awakening.”
+
+“We set that time,” interrupted Bickley.
+
+“Not so, O Bickley,” she answered, smiling again. “In the divine Oro’s
+head was the time set. You were the hand that executed his decree.”
+
+When Bickley heard this I really thought he would have burst. However,
+he controlled himself nobly, being anxious to hear the end of this
+mysterious fib.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+“How long was the time that the lord Oro set apart for sleep?” I asked.
+
+She paused as though puzzled to find words to express her meaning, then
+held up her hands and said:
+
+“Ten,” nodding at her fingers. By second thoughts she took Bickley’s
+hands, not mine, and counted his ten fingers.
+
+“Ten years,” said Bickley. “Well, of course, it is impossible, but
+perhaps—” and he paused.
+
+“Ten tens,” she went on with a deepening smile, “one hundred.”
+
+“O!” said Bickley.
+
+“Ten hundreds, one thousand.”
+
+“I say!” said Bickley.
+
+“Ten times ten thousand, one hundred thousand.”
+
+Bickley became silent.
+
+“Twice one hundred thousand and half a hundred thousand, two hundred
+and fifty thousand years. _That_ was the space of time which the lord
+Oro, my father, set for our sleep. Whether it has been fulfilled he
+will know presently when he has read the book of the stars and made
+comparison of it with what he wrote before we laid us down to rest,”
+and she pointed to the metal plates which the Ancient was studying.
+
+Bickley walked away, making sounds as though he were going to be ill
+and looking so absurd in his indignation that I nearly laughed. The
+Lady Yva actually did laugh, and very musical was that laugh.
+
+“He does not believe,” she said. “He is so clever he knows everything.
+But two hundred and fifty thousand years ago we should have thought him
+quite stupid. Then we could read the stars and calculate their
+movements for ever.”
+
+“So can we,” I answered, rather nettled.
+
+“I am glad, O Humphrey, since you will be able to show my father if in
+one of them he is wrong.”
+
+Secretly I hoped that this task would not be laid on me. Indeed, I
+thought it well to change the subject for the edification of Bickley
+who had recovered and was drawn back by his eager curiosity. Just then,
+too, Bastin joined us, happy in his regained boots.
+
+“You tell us, Lady Yva,” I said, “that you slept, or should have slept
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years.” Here Bastin opened his eyes.
+“If that was so, where was your mind all this time?”
+
+“If by my mind you mean spirit, O Humphrey, I have to answer that at
+present I do not know for certain. I think, however, that it dwelt
+elsewhere, perhaps in other bodies on the earth, or some different
+earth. At least, I know that my heart is very full of memories which as
+yet I cannot unroll and read.”
+
+“Great heavens, this is madness!” said Bickley.
+
+“In the great heavens,” she answered slowly, “there are many things
+which you, poor man, would think to be madness, but yet are truth and
+perfect wisdom. These things, or some of them, soon I shall hope to
+show you.”
+
+“Do if you can,” said Bickley.
+
+“Why not?” interrupted Bastin. “I think the lady’s remarks quite
+reasonable. It seems to me highly improbable if really she has slept
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years, which, of course, I can’t
+decide, that an immortal spirit would be allowed to remain idle for so
+long. That would be wallowing in a bed of idleness and shirking its
+duty which is to do its work. Also, as she tells you, Bickley, you are
+not half so clever as you think you are in your silly scepticism, and I
+have no doubt that there are many things in other worlds which would
+expose your ignorance, if only you could see them.”
+
+At this moment Oro turned and called his daughter. She went at once,
+saying:
+
+“Come, strangers, and you shall learn.”
+
+So we followed her.
+
+“Daughter,” he said, speaking in Orofenan, I think that we might
+understand, “ask these strangers to bring one of those lamps of theirs
+that by the light of it I may study these writings.”
+
+“Perhaps this may serve,” said Bickley, suddenly producing an electric
+torch from his pocket and flashing it into his face. It was his form of
+repartee for all he had suffered at the hands of this incomprehensible
+pair. Let me say at once that it was singularly successful. Perhaps the
+wisdom of the ages in which Oro flourished had overlooked so small a
+matter as electric torches, or perhaps he did not expect to meet with
+them in these degenerate days. At any rate for the first and last time
+in my intercourse with him I saw the god, or lord—the native word bears
+either meaning—Oro genuinely astonished. He started and stepped back,
+and for a moment or two seemed a little frightened. Then muttering
+something as to the cleverness of this light-producing instrument, he
+motioned to his daughter to take it from Bickley and hold it in a
+certain position. She obeyed, and in its illumination he began to study
+the engraved plates, holding one of them in either hand.
+
+After a while he gave me one of the plates to hold, and with his
+disengaged hand pointed successively to the constellation of Orion, to
+the stars Castor, Pollux, Aldebaran, Rigel, the Pleiades, Sirius and
+others which with my very limited knowledge I could not recognise
+offhand. Then on the plate which I held, he showed us those same stars
+and constellations, checking them one by one.
+
+Then he remarked very quietly that all was in order, and handing the
+plate he held to Yva, said:
+
+“The calculations made so long ago are correct, nor have the stars
+varied in their proper motions during what is after all but an hour of
+time. If you, Stranger, who, I understand, are named Humphrey, should
+be, as I gather, a heaven-master, naturally you will ask me how I could
+fix an exact date by the stars without an error of, let us say, from
+five to ten thousand years. I answer you that by the proper motion of
+the stars alone it would have been difficult. Therefore I remember that
+in order to be exact, I calculated the future conjunctions of those two
+planets,” and he pointed to Saturn and Jupiter. “Finding that one of
+these occurred near yonder star,” and he indicated the bright orb,
+Spica, “at a certain time, I determined that then I would awake.
+Behold! There are the stars as I engraved them from my foreknowledge,
+upon this chart, and there those two great planets hang in conjunction.
+Daughter Yva, my wisdom has not failed me. This world of ours has
+travelled round the sun neither less nor more than two hundred and
+fifty thousand times since we laid ourselves down to sleep. It is
+written here, and yonder,” and he pointed, first to the engraved plates
+and then to the vast expanse of the starlit heavens.
+
+Awe fell on me; I think that even Bickley and Bastin were awed, at any
+rate for the moment. It was a terrible thing to look on a being, to all
+appearance more or less human, who alleged that he had been asleep for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years, and proceeded to prove it by
+certain ancient star charts. Of course at the time I could not check
+those charts, lacking the necessary knowledge, but I have done so since
+and found that they are quite accurate. However this made no
+difference, since the circumstances and something in his manner
+convinced me that he spoke the absolute truth.
+
+He and his daughter had been asleep for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years. Oh! Heavens, _for two hundred and fifty thousand years!_
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues
+
+
+The reader of what I have written, should there ever be such a person,
+may find the record marvelous, and therefore rashly conclude that
+because it is beyond experience, it could not be. It is not a wise
+deduction, as I think Bickley would admit today, because without doubt
+many things are which surpass our extremely limited experience.
+However, those who draw the veil from the Unknown and reveal the New,
+must expect incredulity, and accept it without grumbling. Was that not
+the fate, for instance, of those who in the Middle Ages, a few hundred
+years ago, discovered, or rather rediscovered the mighty movements of
+those constellations which served Oro for an almanac?
+
+But the point I want to make is that if the sceptic plays a Bickleyan
+part as regards what has been written, it seems probable that his
+attitude will be accentuated as regards that which it still remains for
+me to write. If so, I cannot help it, and must decline entirely to
+water down or doctor facts and thus pander to his prejudice and
+ignorance. For my part I cannot attempt to explain these occurrences; I
+only know that they happened and that I set down what I saw, heard and
+felt, neither more nor less.
+
+Immediately after Oro had triumphantly vindicated his stellar
+calculations he turned and departed into the cave, followed by his
+daughter, waving to us to remain where we were. As she passed us,
+however, the Glittering Lady whispered—this time to Bastin—that he
+would see them again in a few hours, adding:
+
+“We have much to learn and I hope that then you who, I understand, are
+a priest, will begin to teach us of your religion and other matters.”
+
+Bastin was so astonished that he could make no reply, but when they had
+gone he said:
+
+“Which of you told her that I was a priest?”
+
+We shook our heads for neither of us could remember having done so.
+
+“Well, I did not,” continued Bastin, “since at present I have found no
+opportunity of saying a word in season. So I suppose she must have
+gathered it from my attire, though as a matter of fact I haven’t been
+wearing a collar, and those men who wanted to cook me, pulled off my
+white tie and I didn’t think it worth while dirtying a clean one.”
+
+“If,” said Bickley, “you imagine that you look like the minister of any
+religion ancient or modern in a grubby flannel shirt, a battered
+sun-helmet, a torn green and white umbrella and a pair of ragged duck
+trousers, you are mistaken, Bastin, that is all.”
+
+“I admit that the costume is not appropriate, Bickley, but how
+otherwise could she have learned the truth?”
+
+“These people seem to have ways of learning a good many things. But in
+your case, Bastin, the cause is clear enough. You have been walking
+about with the head of that idol and always keep it close to you. No
+doubt they believe that you are a priest of the worship of the god of
+the Grove—Baal, you know, or something of that sort.”
+
+When he heard this Bastin’s face became a perfect picture. Never before
+did I see it so full of horror struggling with indignation.
+
+“I must undeceive them without a moment’s delay,” he said, and was
+starting for the cave when we caught his arms and held him.
+
+“Better wait till they come back, old fellow,” I said, laughing. “If
+you disobey that Lord Oro you may meet with another experience in the
+sacrifice line.”
+
+“Perhaps you are right, Arbuthnot. I will occupy the interval in
+preparing a suitable address.”
+
+“Much better occupy it in preparing breakfast,” said Bickley. “I have
+always noticed that you are at your best extempore.”
+
+In the end he did prepare breakfast though in a _distrait_ fashion;
+indeed I found him beginning to make tea in the frying-pan. Bastin felt
+that his opportunity had arrived, and was making ready to rise to the
+occasion.
+
+Also we felt, all three of us, that we were extremely shabby-looking
+objects, and though none of us said so, each did his best to improve
+his personal appearance. First of all Bickley cut Bastin’s and my hair,
+after which I did him the same service. Then Bickley who was normally
+clean shaven, set to work to remove a beard of about a week’s growth,
+and I who wore one of the pointed variety, trimmed up mine as best I
+could with the help of a hand-glass. Bastin, too, performed on his
+which was of the square and rather ragged type, wisely rejecting
+Bickley’s advice to shave it off altogether, offered, I felt convinced,
+because he felt that the result on Bastin would be too hideous for
+words. After this we cut our nails, cleaned our teeth and bathed; I
+even caught Bickley applying hair tonic from his dressing case in
+secret, behind a projecting rock, and borrowed some myself. He gave it
+me on condition that I did not mention its existence to Bastin who, he
+remarked, would certainly use the lot and make himself smell horrible.
+
+Next we found clean ducks among our store of spare clothes, for the
+Orofenans had brought these with our other possessions, and put them
+on, even adding silk cumberbunds and neckties. My tie I fastened with a
+pin that I had obtained in Egypt. It was a tiny gold statuette of very
+fine and early workmanship, of the god Osiris, wearing the crown of the
+Upper Land with the uraeus crest, and holding in his hands, which
+projected from the mummy wrappings, the emblems of the crook, the
+scourge and the _crux ansata_, or Sign of Life.
+
+Bastin, for his part, arrayed himself in full clerical costume, black
+coat and trousers, white tie and stick-up clergyman’s collar which, as
+he remarked, made him feel extremely hot in that climate, and were
+unsuitable to domestic duties, such as washing-up. I offered to hold
+his coat while he did this office and told him he looked very nice
+indeed.
+
+“Beautiful!” remarked Bickley, “but why don’t you put on your surplice
+and biretta?” (Being very High-Church Bastin did wear a biretta on
+festival Sundays at home.) “There would be no mistake about you then.”
+
+“I do not think it would be suitable,” replied Bastin whose sense of
+humour was undeveloped. “There is no service to be performed at present
+and no church, though perhaps that cave—” and he stopped.
+
+When we had finished these vain adornments and Bastin had put away the
+things and tidied up, we sat down, rather at a loose end. We should
+have liked to walk but refrained from doing so for fear lest we might
+dirty our clean clothes. So we just sat and thought. At least Bickley
+thought, and so did I for a while until I gave it up. What was the use
+of thinking, seeing that we were face to face with circumstances which
+baffled reason and beggared all recorded human experience? What Bastin
+did I am sure I do not know, but I think from the expression of his
+countenance that he was engaged in composing sermons for the benefit of
+Oro and the Glittering Lady.
+
+One diversion we did have. About eleven o’clock a canoe came from the
+main island laden with provisions and paddled by Marama and two of his
+people. We seized our weapons, remembering our experiences of the
+night, but Marama waved a bough in token of peace. So, carrying our
+revolvers, we went to the rock edge to meet him. He crept ashore and,
+chief though he was, prostrated himself upon his face before us, which
+told me that he had heard of the fate of the sorcerers. His apologies
+were abject. He explained that he had no part in the outrage of the
+attack, and besought us to intercede on behalf of him and his people
+with the awakened god of the Mountain whom he looked for with a
+terrified air.
+
+We consoled him as well as we could, and told him that he had best be
+gone before the god of the Mountain appeared, and perhaps treated him
+as he had done the sorcerers. In his name, however, we commanded Marama
+to bring materials and build us a proper house upon the rock, also to
+be sure to keep up a regular and ample supply of provisions. If he did
+these things, and anything else we might from time to time command, we
+said that perhaps his life and those of his people would be spared.
+This, however, after the evil behaviour of some of them of course we
+could not guarantee.
+
+Marama departed so thoroughly frightened that he even forgot to make
+any inquiries as to who this god of the Mountain might be, or where he
+came from, or whither he was going. Of course, the place had been
+sacred among his people from the beginning, whenever that may have
+been, but that its sacredness should materialise into an active god who
+brought sorcerers of the highest reputation to a most unpleasant end,
+just because they wished to translate their preaching into practice,
+was another matter. It was not to be explained even by the fact of
+which he himself had informed me, that during the dreadful storm of
+some months before, the cave mouth which previously was not visible on
+the volcano, had suddenly been lifted up above the level of the Rock of
+Offerings, although, of course, all religious and instructed persons
+would have expected something peculiar to happen after this event.
+
+Such I knew were his thoughts, but, as I have said, he was too
+frightened and too hurried to express them in questions that I should
+have found it extremely difficult to answer. As it was he departed
+quite uncertain as to whether one of us was not the real “god of the
+Mountain,” who had power to bring hideous death upon his molesters.
+After all, what had he to go on to the contrary, except the word of
+three priests who were so terrified that they could give no coherent
+account of what had happened? Of these events, it was true, there was
+evidence in the twisted carcass of their lamented high sorcerer, and,
+for the matter of that, of certain corpses which he had seen, that lay
+in shallow water at the bottom of the lake. Beyond all was vague, and
+in his heart I am sure that Marama believed that Bastin was the real
+“god of the Mountain.” Naturally, he would desire to work vengeance on
+those who tried to sacrifice and eat him. Moreover, had he not
+destroyed the image of the god of the Grove and borne away its head
+whence he had sucked magic and power?
+
+Thus argued Marama, disbelieving the tale of the frightened sorcerers,
+for he admitted as much to me in after days.
+
+Marama departed in a great hurry, fearing lest the “god of the
+Mountain,” or Bastin, whose new and splendid garb he regarded with much
+suspicion, might develop some evil energy against him. Then we went
+back to our camp, leaving the industrious Bastin, animated by a
+suggestion from Bickley that the fruit and food might spoil if left in
+the sun, to carry it into the shade of the cave. Owing to the terrors
+of the Orofenans the supply was so large that to do this he must make
+no fewer than seven journeys, which he did with great good will since
+Bastin loved physical exercise. The result on his clerical garments,
+however, was disastrous. His white tie went awry, squashed fruit and
+roast pig gravy ran down his waistcoat and trousers, and his high
+collar melted into limp crinkles in the moisture engendered by the
+tropical heat. Only his long coat escaped, since that Bickley kindly
+carried for him.
+
+It was just as he arrived with the seventh load in this extremely
+dishevelled condition that Oro and his daughter emerged from the cave.
+Indeed Bastin, who, being shortsighted, always wore spectacles that,
+owing to his heated state were covered with mist, not seeing that
+dignitary, dumped down the last basket on to his toes, exclaiming:
+
+“There, you lazy beggar, I told you I would bring it all, and I have.”
+
+In fact he thought he was addressing Bickley and playing off on him a
+troglodytic practical joke.
+
+Oro, however, who at his age did not appreciate jokes, resented it and
+was about to do something unpleasant when with extraordinary tact his
+daughter remarked:
+
+“Bastin the priest makes you offerings. Thank him, O Lord my father.”
+
+So Oro thanked him, not too cordially for evidently he still had
+feeling in his toes, and once more Bastin escaped. Becoming aware of
+his error, he began to apologise profusely in English, while the lady
+Yva studied him carefully.
+
+“Is that the costume of the priests of your religion, O Bastin?” she
+asked, surveying his dishevelled form. “If so, you were better without
+it.”
+
+Then Bastin retired to straighten his tie, and grabbing his coat from
+Bickley, who handed it to him with a malicious smile, forced his
+perspiring arms into it in a peculiarly awkward and elephantine
+fashion.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley and I produced two camp chairs which we had made
+ready, and on these the wondrous pair seated themselves side by side.
+
+“We have come to learn,” said Oro. “Teach!”
+
+“Not so, Father,” interrupted Yva, who, I noted, was clothed in yet a
+third costume, though whence these came I could not imagine. “First I
+would ask a question. Whence are you, Strangers, and how came you
+here?”
+
+“We are from the country called England and a great storm shipwrecked
+us here; that, I think, which raised the mouth of the cave above the
+level of this rock,” I answered.
+
+“The time appointed having come when it should be raised,” said Oro as
+though to himself.
+
+“Where is England?” asked Yva.
+
+Now among the books we had with us was a pocket atlas, quite a good one
+of its sort. By way of answer I opened it at the map of the world and
+showed her England. Also I showed, to within a thousand miles or so,
+that spot on the earth’s surface where we spoke together.
+
+The sight of this atlas excited the pair greatly. They had not the
+slightest difficulty in understanding everything about it and the shape
+of the world with its division into hemispheres seemed to be quite
+familiar to them. What appeared chiefly to interest them, and
+especially Oro, were the relative areas and positions of land and sea.
+
+“Of this, Strangers,” he said, pointing to the map, “I shall have much
+to say to you when I have studied the pictures of your book and
+compared them with others of my own.”
+
+“So he has got maps,” said Bickley in English, “as well as star charts.
+I wonder where he keeps them.”
+
+“With his clothes, I expect,” suggested Bastin.
+
+Meanwhile Oro had hidden the atlas in his ample robe and motioned to
+his daughter to proceed.
+
+“Why do you come here from England so far away?” the Lady Yva asked, a
+question to which each of us had an answer.
+
+“To see new countries,” I said.
+
+“Because the cyclone brought us,” said Bickley.
+
+“To convert the heathen to my own Christian religion,” said Bastin,
+which was not strictly true.
+
+It was on this last reply that she fixed.
+
+“What does your religion teach?” she asked.
+
+“It teaches that those who accept it and obey its commands will live
+again after death for ever in a better world where is neither sorrow
+nor sin,” he answered.
+
+When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a new
+thought and look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
+
+“Who are the heathen?” Yva asked again after a pause, for she also
+seemed to be impressed.
+
+“All who do not agree with Bastin’s spiritual views,” answered Bickley.
+
+“Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness of heart,
+do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose that your father
+and you are heathen,” replied Bastin stoutly.
+
+This seemed to astonish them, but presently Yva caught his meaning and
+smiled, while Oro said:
+
+“Of this great matter of faith we will talk later. It is an old
+question in the world.”
+
+“Why,” went on Yva, “if you wished to travel so far did you come in a
+ship that so easily is wrecked? Why did you not journey through the
+air, or better still, pass through space, leaving your bodies asleep,
+as, being instructed, doubtless you can do?”
+
+“As regards your first question,” I answered, “there are no aircraft
+known that can make so long a journey.”
+
+“And as regards the second,” broke in Bickley, “we did not do so
+because it is impossible for men to transfer themselves to other places
+through space either with or without their bodies.”
+
+At this information the Glittering Lady lifted her arched eyebrows and
+smiled a little, while Oro said:
+
+“I perceive that the new world has advanced but a little way on the
+road of knowledge.”
+
+Fearing that Bastin was about to commence an argument, I began to ask
+questions in my turn.
+
+“Lord Oro and Lady Yva,” I said, “we have told you something of
+ourselves and will tell you more when you desire it. But pardon us if
+first we pray you to tell us what we burn to know. Who are you? Of what
+race and country? And how came it that we found you sleeping yonder?”
+
+“If it be your pleasure, answer, my Father,” said Yva.
+
+Oro thought a moment, then replied in a calm voice:
+
+“I am a king who once ruled most of the world as it was in my day,
+though it is true that much of it rebelled against me, my councillors
+and servants. Therefore I destroyed the world as it was then, save only
+certain portions whence life might spread to the new countries that I
+raised up. Having done this I put myself and my daughter to sleep for a
+space of two hundred and fifty thousand years, that there might be time
+for fresh civilisations to arise. Now I begin to think that I did not
+allot a sufficiency of ages, since I perceive from what you tell me,
+that the learning of the new races is as yet but small.”
+
+Bickley and I looked at each other and were silent. Mentally we had
+collapsed. Who could begin to discuss statements built upon such a
+foundation of gigantic and paralysing falsehoods?
+
+Well, Bastin could for one. With no more surprise in his voice than if
+he were talking about last night’s dinner, he said:
+
+“There must be a mistake somewhere, or perhaps I misunderstand you. It
+is obvious that you, being a man, could not have destroyed the world.
+That could only be done by the Power which made it and you.”
+
+I trembled for the results of Bastin’s methods of setting out the
+truth. To my astonishment, however, Oro replied:
+
+“You speak wisely, Priest, but the Power you name may use instruments
+to accomplish its decrees. I am such an instrument.”
+
+“Quite so,” said Bastin, “just like anybody else. You have more
+knowledge of the truth than I thought. But pray, how did you destroy
+the world?”
+
+“Using my wisdom to direct the forces that are at work in the heart of
+this great globe, I drowned it with a deluge, causing one part to sink
+and another to rise, also changes of climate which completed the work.”
+
+“That’s quite right,” exclaimed Bastin delightedly. “We know all about
+the Deluge, only _you_ are not mentioned in connection with the matter.
+A man, Noah, had to do with it when he was six hundred years old.”
+
+“Six hundred?” said Oro. “That is not very old. I myself had seen more
+than a thousand years when I lay down to sleep.”
+
+“A thousand!” remarked Bastin, mildly interested. “That is unusual,
+though some of these mighty men of renown we know lived over nine
+hundred.”
+
+Here Bickley snorted and exclaimed:
+
+“Nine hundred moons, he means.”
+
+“I did not know Noah,” went on Oro. “Perhaps he lived after my time and
+caused some other local deluge. Is there anything else you wish to ask
+me before I leave you that I may study this map writing?”
+
+“Yes,” said Bastin. “Why were you allowed to drown your world?”
+
+“Because it was evil, Priest, and disobeyed me and the Power I serve.”
+
+“Oh! thank you,” said Bastin, “that fits in exactly. It was just the
+same in Noah’s time.”
+
+“I pray that it is not just the same now,” said Oro, rising. “To-morrow
+we will return, or if I do not who have much that I must do, the lady
+my daughter will return and speak with you further.”
+
+He departed into the cave, Yva following at a little distance.
+
+I accompanied her as far as the mouth of the cave, as did Tommy, who
+all this time had been sitting contentedly upon the hem of her gorgeous
+robe, quite careless of its immemorial age, if it was immemorial and
+not woven yesterday, a point on which I had no information.
+
+“Lady Yva,” I said, “did I rightly understand the Lord Oro to say that
+he was a thousand years old?”
+
+“Yes, O Humphrey, and really he is more, or so I think.”
+
+“Then are you a thousand years old also?” I asked, aghast.
+
+“No, no,” she replied, shaking her head, “I am young, quite young, for
+I do not count my time of sleep.”
+
+“Certainly you look it,” I said. “But what, Lady Yva, do you mean by
+young?”
+
+She answered my question by another.
+
+“What age are your women when they are as I am?”
+
+“None of our women were ever quite like you, Lady Yva. Yet, say from
+twenty-five to thirty years of age.”
+
+“Ah! I have been counting and now I remember. When my father sent me to
+sleep I was twenty-seven years old. No, I will not deceive you, I was
+twenty-seven years and three moons.” Then, saying something to the
+effect that she would return, she departed, laughing a little in a
+mischievous way, and, although I did not observe this till afterwards,
+Tommy departed with her.
+
+When I repeated what she had said to Bastin and Bickley, who were
+standing at a distance straining their ears and somewhat aggrieved, the
+former remarked:
+
+“If she is twenty-seven her father must have married late in life,
+though of course it may have been a long while before he had children.”
+
+Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while, went off
+like a bomb.
+
+“Do you tell us, Bastin,” he asked, “that you believe one word of all
+this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan being a
+thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the rest?”
+
+“If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it at
+present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept warm by a
+pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of the
+constellations at the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do most
+things.”
+
+“Even cause the Deluge,” jeered Bickley.
+
+“I don’t know about _the_ Deluge, but perhaps he may have been
+permitted to cause a deluge. Why not? You can’t look at things from far
+enough off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you, you conclude
+that therefore it is impossible. The same Power which gives you skill
+to succeed in an operation, that hitherto was held impracticable, as I
+know you have done once or twice, may have given that old fellow power
+to cause a deluge. You should measure the universe and its
+possibilities by worlds and not by acres, Bickley.”
+
+“And believe, I suppose, that a man can live a thousand years, whereas
+we know well that he cannot live more than about a hundred.”
+
+“You don’t _know_ anything of the sort, Bickley. All you know is that
+over the brief period of history with which we are acquainted, say ten
+thousand years at most, men have only lived to about a hundred. But the
+very rocks which you are so fond of talking about, tell us that even
+this planet is millions upon millions of years of age. Who knows then
+but that at some time in its history, men did not live for a thousand
+years, and that lost civilisations did not exist of which this Oro and
+his daughter may be two survivors?”
+
+“There is no proof of anything of the sort,” said Bickley.
+
+“I don’t know about proof, as you understand it, though I have read in
+Plato of a continent called Atlantis that was submerged, according to
+the story of old Egyptian priests. But personally I have every proof,
+for it is all written down in the Bible at which you turn up your nose,
+and I am very glad that I have been lucky enough to come across this
+unexpected confirmation of the story. Not that it matters much, since I
+should have learned all about it when it pleases Providence to remove
+me to a better world, which in our circumstances may happen any day.
+Now I must change my clothes before I see to the cooking and other
+things.”
+
+“I am bound to admit,” said Bickley, looking after him, “that old
+Bastin is not so stupid as he seems. From his point of view the
+arguments he advances are quite logical. Moreover I think he is right
+when he says that we look at things through the wrong end of the
+telescope. After all the universe is very big and who knows what may
+happen there? Who knows even what may have happened on this little
+earth during the æons of its existence, whenever its balance chanced to
+shift, as the Ice Ages show us it has often done? Still I believe that
+old Oro to be a Prince of Liars.”
+
+“That remains to be proved,” I answered cautiously. “All I know is that
+he is a wonderfully learned person of most remarkable appearance, and
+that his daughter is the loveliest creature I ever saw.”
+
+“There I agree,” said Bickley decidedly, “and as brilliant as she is
+lovely. If she belongs to a past civilisation, it is a pity that it
+ever became extinct. Now let’s go and have a nap. Bastin will call us
+when supper is ready.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+The Under-world
+
+
+That night we slept well and without fear, being quite certain that
+after their previous experience the Orofenans would make no further
+attempts upon us. Indeed our only anxiety was for Tommy, whom we could
+not find when the time came to give him his supper. Bastin, however,
+seemed to remember having seen him following the Glittering Lady into
+the cave. This, of course, was possible, as certainly he had taken an
+enormous fancy to her and sat himself down as close to her as he could
+on every occasion. He even seemed to like the ancient Oro, and was not
+afraid to jump up and plant his dirty paws upon that terrific person’s
+gorgeous robe. Moreover Oro liked him, for several times I observed him
+pat the dog upon the head; as I think I have said, the only human touch
+that I had perceived about him. So we gave up searching and calling in
+the hope that he was safe with our supernatural friends.
+
+The next morning quite early the Lady Yva appeared alone; no, not
+alone, for with her came our lost Tommy looking extremely spry and well
+at ease. The faithless little wretch just greeted us in a casual
+fashion and then went and sat by Yva. In fact when the awkward Bastin
+managed to stumble over the end of her dress Tommy growled at him and
+showed his teeth. Moreover the dog was changed. He was blessed with a
+shiny black coat, but now this coat sparkled in the sunlight, like the
+Lady Yva’s hair.
+
+“The Glittering Lady is all very well, but I’m not sure that I care for
+a glittering dog. It doesn’t look quite natural,” said Bastin,
+contemplating him.
+
+“Why does Tommy shine, Lady?” I asked.
+
+“Because I washed him in certain waters that we have, so that now he
+looks beautiful and smells sweet,” she answered, laughing.
+
+It was true, the dog did smell sweet, which I may add had not always
+been the case with him, especially when there were dead fish about.
+Also he appeared to have been fed, for he turned up his nose at the
+bits we had saved for his breakfast.
+
+“He has drunk of the Life-water,” explained Yva, “and will want no food
+for two days.”
+
+Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked incredulous.
+
+“You do not believe, O Bickley,” she said, studying him gravely.
+“Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I tell you many
+lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He is not sure; he
+thinks to himself, I will wait and find out whether or no these funny
+people cheat me.”
+
+Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were contrary
+to experience, also that Tommy in a general way was rather a greedy
+little dog.
+
+“You, too, like to eat, Bickley” (this was true, he had an excellent
+appetite), “but when you have drunk the Life-water you will care much
+less.”
+
+“I am glad to hear it,” interrupted Bastin, “for Bickley wants a lot of
+cooking done, and I find it tedious.”
+
+“You eat also, Lady,” said Bickley.
+
+“Yes, I eat sometimes because I like it, but I can go weeks and not
+eat, when I have the Life-water. Just now, after so long a sleep, I am
+hungry. Please give me some of that fruit. No, not the flesh, flesh I
+hate.”
+
+We handed it to her. She took two plantains, peeled and ate them with
+extraordinary grace. Indeed she reminded me, I do not know why, of some
+lovely butterfly drawing its food from a flower.
+
+While she ate she observed us closely; nothing seemed to escape the
+quick glances of those beautiful eyes. Presently she said:
+
+“What, O Humphrey, is that with which you fasten your neckdress?” and
+she pointed to the little gold statue of Osiris that I used as a pin.
+
+I told her that it was a statuette of a god named Osiris and very, very
+ancient, probably quite five thousand years old, a statement at which
+she smiled a little; also that it came from Egypt.
+
+“Ah!” she answered, “is it so? I asked because we have figures that are
+very like to that one, and they also hold in their hands a staff
+surmounted by a loop. They are figures of Sleep’s brother—Death.”
+
+“So is this,” I said. “Among the Egyptians Osiris was the god of
+Death.”
+
+She nodded and replied that doubtless the symbol had come down to them.
+
+“One day you shall take me to see this land which you call so very old.
+Or I will take you, which would be quicker,” she added.
+
+We all bowed and said we should be delighted. Even Bastin appeared
+anxious to revisit Egypt in such company, though when he was there it
+seemed to bore him. But what she meant about taking us I could not
+guess. Nor had we time to ask her, for she went on, watching our faces
+as she spoke.
+
+“The Lord Oro sends you a message, Strangers. He asks whether it is
+your wish to see where we dwell. He adds that you are not to come if
+you do not desire, or if you fear danger.”
+
+We all answered that there was nothing we should like better, but
+Bastin added that he had already seen the tomb.
+
+“Do you think, Bastin, that we live in a tomb because we slept there
+for a while, awaiting the advent of you wanderers at the appointed
+hour?”
+
+“I don’t see where else it could be, unless it is further down that
+cave,” said Bastin. “The top of the mountain would not be convenient as
+a residence.”
+
+“It has not been convenient for many an age, for reasons that I will
+show you. Think now, before you come. You have naught to fear from us,
+and I believe that no harm will happen to you. But you will see many
+strange things that will anger Bickley because he cannot understand
+them, and perhaps will weary Bastin because his heart turns from what
+is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey will rejoice in them because the
+doors of his soul are open and he longs—what do you long for,
+Humphrey?”
+
+“That which I have lost and fear I shall never find again,” I answered
+boldly.
+
+“I know that you have lost many things—last night, for instance, you
+lost Tommy, and when he slept with me he told me much about you
+and—others.”
+
+“This is ridiculous,” broke in Bastin. “Can a dog talk?”
+
+“Everything can talk, if you understand its language, Bastin. But keep
+a good heart, Humphrey, for the bold seeker finds in the end. Oh!
+foolish man, do you not understand that all is yours if you have but
+the soul to conceive and the will to grasp? All, all, below, between,
+above! Even I know that, I who have so much to learn.”
+
+So she spoke and became suddenly magnificent. Her face which had been
+but that of a super-lovely woman, took on grandeur. Her bosom swelled;
+her presence radiated some subtle power, much as her hair radiated
+light.
+
+In a moment it was gone and she was smiling and jesting.
+
+“Will you come, Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go, down to
+the Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun? Perhaps you will do
+better to stay here in the sun, for the Under-world has terrors for
+weak hearts that were born but yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble
+in the dark.”
+
+“I shall take my electric torch,” said Bastin with decision, “and I
+advise you fellows to do the same. I always hated cellars, and the
+catacombs at Rome are worse, though full of sacred interest.”
+
+Then we started, Tommy frisking on ahead in a most provoking way as
+though he were bored by a visit to a strange house and going home, and
+Yva gliding forward with a smile upon her face that was half mystic and
+half mischievous. We passed the remains of the machines, and Bickley
+asked her what they were.
+
+“Carriages in which once we travelled through the skies, until we found
+a better way, and that the uninstructed used till the end,” she
+answered carelessly, leaving me wondering what on earth she meant.
+
+We came to the statue and the sepulchre beneath without trouble, for
+the glint of her hair, and I may add of Tommy’s back, were quite
+sufficient to guide us through the gloom. The crystal coffins were
+still there, for Bastin flashed his torch and we saw them, but the
+boxes of radium had gone.
+
+“Let that light die,” she said to Bastin. “Humphrey, give me your right
+hand and give your left to Bickley. Let Bastin cling to him and fear
+nothing.”
+
+We passed to the end of the tomb and stood against what appeared to be
+a rock wall, all close together, as she directed.
+
+“Fear nothing,” she said again, but next second I was never more full
+of fear in my life, for we were whirling downwards at a speed that
+would have made an American elevator attendant turn pale.
+
+“Don’t choke me,” I heard Bickley say to Bastin, and the latter’s
+murmured reply of:
+
+“I never could bear these moving staircases and tubelifts. They always
+make me feel sick.”
+
+I admit that for my part I also felt rather sick and clung tightly to
+the hand of the Glittering Lady. She, however, placed her other hand
+upon my shoulder, saying in a low voice:
+
+“Did I not tell you to have no fear?”
+
+Then I felt comforted, for somehow I knew that it was not her desire to
+harm and much less to destroy me. Also Tommy was seated quite at his
+ease with his head resting against my leg, and his absence of alarm was
+reassuring. The only stoic of the party was Bickley. I have no doubt
+that he was quite as frightened as we were, but rather than show it he
+would have died.
+
+“I presume this machinery is pneumatic,” he began when suddenly and
+without shock, we arrived at the end of our journey. How far we had
+fallen I am sure I do not know, but I should judge from the awful speed
+at which we travelled, that it must have been several thousand feet,
+probably four or five.
+
+“Everything seems steady now,” remarked Bastin, “so I suppose this
+luggage lift has stopped. The odd thing is that I can’t see anything of
+it. There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be standing on a level
+floor.”
+
+“The odd thing is,” said Bickley, “that we can see at all. Where the
+devil does the light come from thousands of feet underground?”
+
+“I don’t know,” answered Bastin, “unless there is natural gas here, as
+I am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in Canada.”
+
+“Natural gas be blowed,” said Bickley. “It is more like moonlight
+magnified ten times.”
+
+So it was. The whole place was filled with a soft radiance, equal to
+that of the sun at noon, but gentler and without heat.
+
+“Where does it come from?” I whispered to Yva.
+
+“Oh!” she replied, as I thought evasively. “It is the light of the
+Under-world which we know how to use. The earth is full of light, which
+is not wonderful, is it, seeing that its heart is fire? Now look about
+you.”
+
+I looked and leant on her harder than ever, since amazement made me
+weak. We were in some vast place whereof the roof seemed almost as far
+off as the sky at night. At least all that I could make out was a dim
+and distant arch which might have been one of cloud. For the rest, in
+every direction stretched vastness, illuminated far as the eye could
+reach by the soft light of which I have spoken, that is, probably for
+several miles. But this vastness was not empty. On the contrary it was
+occupied by a great city. There were streets much wider than
+Piccadilly, all bordered by houses, though these, I observed, were
+roofless, very fine houses, some of them, built of white stone or
+marble. There were roadways and pavements worn by the passage of feet.
+There, farther on, were market-places or public squares, and there,
+lastly, was a huge central enclosure one or two hundred acres in
+extent, which was filled with majestic buildings that looked like
+palaces, or town-halls; and, in the midst of them all, a vast temple
+with courts and a central dome. For here, notwithstanding the lack of
+necessity, its builders seemed to have adhered to the Over-world
+tradition, and had roofed their fane.
+
+And now came the terror. All of this enormous city was _dead_. Had it
+stood upon the moon it could not have been more dead. None paced its
+streets; none looked from its window-places. None trafficked in its
+markets, none worshipped in its temple. Swept, garnished, lighted,
+practically untouched by the hand of Time, here where no rains fell and
+no winds blew, it was yet a howling wilderness. For what wilderness is
+there to equal that which once has been the busy haunt of men? Let
+those who have stood among the buried cities of Central Asia, or of
+Anarajapura in Ceylon, or even amid the ruins of Salamis on the coast
+of Cyprus, answer the question. But here was something infinitely more
+awful. A huge human haunt in the bowels of the earth utterly devoid of
+human beings, and yet as perfect as on the day when these ceased to be.
+
+“I do not care for underground localities,” remarked Bastin, his gruff
+voice echoing strangely in that terrible silence, “but it does seem a
+pity that all these fine buildings should be wasted. I suppose their
+inhabitants left them in search of fresh air.”
+
+“Why did they leave them?” I asked of Yva.
+
+“Because death took them,” she answered solemnly. “Even those who live
+a thousand years die at last, and if they have no children, with them
+dies the race.”
+
+“Then were you the last of your people?” I asked.
+
+“Inquire of my father,” she replied, and led the way through the
+massive arch of a great building.
+
+It led into a walled courtyard in the centre of which was a plain
+cupola of marble with a gate of some pale metal that looked like
+platinum mixed with gold. This gate stood open. Within it was the
+statue of a woman beautifully executed in white marble and set in a
+niche of some black stone. The figure was draped as though to conceal
+the shape, and the face was stern and majestic rather than beautiful.
+The eyes of the statue were cunningly made of some enamel which gave
+them a strange and lifelike appearance. They stared upwards as though
+looking away from the earth and its concerns. The arms were
+outstretched. In the right hand was a cup of black marble, in the left
+a similar cup of white marble. From each of these cups trickled a thin
+stream of sparkling water, which two streams met and mingled at a
+distance of about three feet beneath the cups. Then they fell into a
+metal basin which, although it must have been quite a foot thick, was
+cut right through by their constant impact, and apparently vanished
+down some pipe beneath. Out of this metal basin Tommy, who gambolled
+into the place ahead of us, began to drink in a greedy and
+demonstrative fashion.
+
+“The Life-water?” I said, looking at our guide.
+
+She nodded and asked in her turn:
+
+“What is the statue and what does it signify, Humphrey?”
+
+I hesitated, but Bastin answered:
+
+“Just a rather ugly woman who hid up her figure because it was bad.
+Probably she was a relation of the artist who wished to have her
+likeness done and sat for nothing.”
+
+“The goddess of Health,” suggested Bickley. “Her proportions are
+perfect; a robust, a thoroughly normal woman.”
+
+“Now, Humphrey,” said Yva.
+
+I stared at the work and had not an idea. Then it flashed on me with
+such suddenness and certainty that I am convinced the answer to the
+riddle was passed to me from her and did not originate in my own mind.
+
+“It seems quite easy,” I said in a superior tone. “The figure
+symbolises Life and is draped because we only see the face of Life, the
+rest is hidden. The arms are bare because Life is real and active. One
+cup is black and one is white because Life brings both good and evil
+gifts; that is why the streams mingle, to be lost beneath in the
+darkness of death. The features are stern and even terrifying rather
+than lovely, because such is the aspect of Life. The eyes look upward
+and far away from present things, because the real life is not here.”
+
+“Of course one may say anything,” said Bastin, “but I don’t understand
+all that.”
+
+“Imagination goes a long way,” broke in Bickley, who was vexed that he
+had not thought of this interpretation himself. But Yva said:
+
+“I begin to think that you are quite clever, Humphrey. I wonder whence
+the truth came to you, for such is the meaning of the figure and the
+cups. Had I told it to you myself, it could not have been better said,”
+and she glanced at me out of the corners of her eyes. “Now, Strangers,
+will you drink? Once that gate was guarded, and only at a great price
+or as a great reward were certain of the Highest Blood given the
+freedom of this fountain which might touch no common lips. Indeed it
+was one of the causes of our last war, for all the world which was,
+desired this water which now is lapped by a stranger’s hound.”
+
+“I suppose there is nothing medicinal in it?” said Bastin. “Once when I
+was very thirsty, I made a mistake and drank three tumblers of
+something of the sort in the dark, thinking that it was Apollinaris,
+and I don’t want to do it again.”
+
+“Just the sort of thing you would do,” said Bickley. “But, Lady Yva,
+what are the properties of this water?”
+
+“It is very health-giving,” she answered, “and if drunk continually,
+not less than once each thirty days, it wards off sickness, lessens
+hunger and postpones death for many, many years. That is why those of
+the High Blood endured so long and became the rulers of the world, and
+that, as I have said, is the greatest of the reasons why the peoples
+who dwelt in the ancient outer countries and never wished to die, made
+war upon them, to win this secret fountain. Have no fear, O Bastin, for
+see, I will pledge you in this water.”
+
+Then she lifted a strange-looking, shallow, metal cup whereof the
+handles were formed of twisted serpents, that lay in the basin, filled
+it from the trickling stream, bowed to us and drank. But as she drank I
+noted with a thrill of joy that her eyes were fixed on mine as though
+it were me she pledged and me alone. Again she filled the cup with the
+sparkling water, for it did sparkle, like that French liqueur in which
+are mingled little flakes of gold, and handed it to me.
+
+I bowed to her and drank. I suppose the fluid was water, but to me it
+tasted more like strong champagne, dashed with Château Yquem. It was
+delicious. More, its effects were distinctly peculiar. Something quick
+and subtle ran through my veins; something that for a few moments
+seemed to burn away the obscureness which blurs our thought. I began to
+understand several problems that had puzzled me, and then lost their
+explanations in the midst of light, inner light, I mean. Moreover, of a
+sudden it seemed to me as though a window had been opened in the heart
+of that Glittering Lady who stood beside me. At least I knew that it
+was full of wonderful knowledge, wonderful memories and wonderful
+hopes, and that in the latter two of these I had some part; what part I
+could not tell. Also I knew that my heart was open to her and that she
+saw in it something which caused her to marvel and to sigh.
+
+In a few seconds, thirty perhaps, all this was gone. Nothing remained
+except that I felt extremely strong and well, happier, too, than I had
+been for years. Mutely I asked her for more of the water, but she shook
+her head and, taking the cup from me, filled it again and gave it to
+Bickley, who drank. He flushed, seemed to lose the self-control which
+was his very strong characteristic, and said in a rather thick voice:
+
+“Curious! but I do not think at this moment there is any operation that
+has ever been attempted which I could not tackle single-handed and with
+success.”
+
+Then he was silent, and Bastin’s turn came. He drank rather noisily,
+after his fashion, and began:
+
+“My dear young lady, I think the time has come when I should expound to
+you—” Here he broke off and commenced singing very badly, for his voice
+was somewhat raucous:
+
+From Greenland’s icy mountains,
+From India’s coral strand,
+Where Afric’s sunny fountains
+Roll down their golden sand.
+
+
+Ceasing from melody, he added:
+
+“I determined that I would drink nothing intoxicating while I was on
+this island that I might be a shining light in a dark place, and now I
+fear that quite unwittingly I have broken what I look upon as a
+promise.”
+
+Then he, too, grew silent.
+
+“Come,” said Yva, “my father, the Lord Oro, awaits you.”
+
+We crossed the court of the Water of Life and mounted steps that led to
+a wide and impressive portico, Tommy frisking ahead of us in a most
+excited way for a dog of his experience. Evidently the water had
+produced its effect upon him as well as upon his masters. This portico
+was in a solemn style of architecture which I cannot describe, because
+it differed from any other that I know. It was not Egyptian and not
+Greek, although its solidity reminded me of the former, and the beauty
+and grace of some of the columns, of the latter. The profuseness and
+rather grotesque character of the carvings suggested the ruins of
+Mexico and Yucatan, and the enormous size of the blocks of stone, those
+of Peru and Baalbec. In short, all the known forms of ancient
+architecture might have found their inspiration here, and the general
+effect was tremendous.
+
+“The palace of the King,” said Yva, “whereof we approach the great
+hall.”
+
+We entered through mighty metal doors, one of which stood ajar, into a
+vestibule which from certain indications I gathered had once been a
+guard, or perhaps an assembly-room. It was about forty feet deep by a
+hundred wide. Thence she led us through a smaller door into the hall
+itself. It was a vast place without columns, for there was no roof to
+support. The walls of marble or limestone were sculptured like those of
+Egyptian temples, apparently with battle scenes, though of this I am
+not sure for I did not go near to them. Except for a broad avenue along
+the middle, up which we walked, the area was filled with marble benches
+that would, I presume, have accommodated several thousand people. But
+they were empty—empty, and oh! the loneliness of it all.
+
+Far away at the head of the hall was a dais enclosed, and, as it were,
+roofed in by a towering structure that mingled grace and majesty to a
+wonderful degree. It was modelled on the pattern of a huge shell. The
+base of the shell was the platform; behind were the ribs, and above,
+the overhanging lip of the shell. On this platform was a throne of
+silvery metal. It was supported on the arched coils of snakes, whereof
+the tails formed the back and the heads the arms of the throne.
+
+On this throne, arrayed in gorgeous robes, sat the Lord Oro, his white
+beard flowing over them, and a jewelled cap upon his head. In front of
+him was a low table on which lay graven sheets of metal, and among them
+a large ball of crystal.
+
+There he sat, solemn and silent in the midst of this awful solitude,
+looking in very truth like a god, as we conceive such a being to
+appear. Small as he was in that huge expanse of buildings, he seemed
+yet to dominate it, in a sense to fill the emptiness which was
+accentuated by his presence. I know that the sight of him filled me
+with true fear which it had never done in the light of day, not even
+when he arose from his crystal coffin. Now for the first time I felt as
+though I were really in the presence of a Being Supernatural. Doubtless
+the surroundings heightened this impression. What were these mighty
+edifices in the bowels of the world? Whence came this wondrous,
+all-pervading and translucent light, whereof we could see no origin?
+Whither had vanished those who had reared and inhabited them? How did
+it happen that of them all, this man, if he were a man; and this lovely
+woman at my side, who, if I might trust my senses and instincts, was
+certainly a woman, alone survived of their departed multitudes?
+
+The thing was crushing. I looked at Bickley for encouragement, but got
+none, for he only shook his head. Even Bastin, now that the first
+effects of the Life-water had departed, seemed overwhelmed, and
+muttered something about the halls of Hades.
+
+Only the little dog Tommy remained quite cheerful. He trotted down the
+hall, jumped on to the dais and sat himself comfortably at the feet of
+its occupant.
+
+“I greet you,” Oro said in his slow, resonant voice. “Daughter, lead
+these strangers to me; I would speak with them.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+Oro in His House
+
+
+We climbed on to the dais by some marble steps, and sat ourselves down
+in four curious chairs of metal that were more or less copied from that
+which served Oro as a throne; at least the arms ended in graven heads
+of snakes. These chairs were so comfortable that I concluded the seats
+were fixed on springs, also we noticed that they were beautifully
+polished.
+
+“I wonder how they keep everything so clean,” said Bastin as we mounted
+the dais. “In this big place it must take a lot of housemaids, though I
+don’t see any. But perhaps there is no dust here.”
+
+I shrugged my shoulders while we seated ourselves, the Lady Yva and I
+on Oro’s right, Bickley and Bastin on his left, as he indicated by
+pointing with his finger.
+
+“What say you of this city?” Oro asked after a while of me.
+
+“We do not know what to say,” I replied. “It amazes us. In our world
+there is nothing like to it.”
+
+“Perchance there will be in the future when the nations grow more
+skilled in the arts of war,” said Oro darkly.
+
+“Be pleased, Lord Oro,” I went on, “if it is your will, to tell us why
+the people who built this place chose to live in the bowels of the
+earth instead of upon its surface.”
+
+“They did not choose; it was forced upon them,” was the answer. “This
+is a city of refuge that they occupied in time of war, not because they
+hated the sun. In time of peace and before the Barbarians dared to
+attack them, they dwelt in the city Pani which signifies Above. You may
+have noted some of its remaining ruins on the mount and throughout the
+island. The rest of them are now beneath the sea. But when trouble came
+and the foe rained fire on them from the air, they retreated to this
+town, Nyo, which signifies Beneath.”
+
+“And then?”
+
+“And then they died. The Water of Life may prolong life, but it cannot
+make women bear children. That they will only do beneath the blue of
+heaven, not deep in the belly of the world where Nature never designed
+that they should dwell. How would the voices of children sound in such
+halls as these? Tell me, you, Bickley, who are a physician.”
+
+“I cannot. I cannot imagine children in such a place, and if born here
+they would die,” said Bickley.
+
+Oro nodded.
+
+“They did die, and if they went above to Pani they were murdered. So
+soon the habit of birth was lost and the Sons of Wisdom perished one by
+one. Yes, they who ruled the world and by tens of thousands of years of
+toil had gathered into their bosoms all the secrets of the world,
+perished, till only a few, and among them I and this daughter of mine,
+were left.”
+
+“And then?”
+
+“Then, Humphrey, having power so to do, I did what long I had
+threatened, and unchained the forces that work at the world’s heart,
+and destroyed them who were my enemies and evil, so that they perished
+by millions, and with them all their works. Afterwards we slept,
+leaving the others, our subjects who had not the secret of this Sleep,
+to die, as doubtless they did in the course of Nature or by the hand of
+the foe. The rest you know.”
+
+“Can such a thing happen again?” asked Bickley in a voice that did not
+hide his disbelief.
+
+“Why do you question me, Bickley, you who believe nothing of what I
+tell you, and therefore make wrath? Still I will say this, that what I
+caused to happen I can cause once more—only once, I think—as perchance
+you shall learn before all is done. Now, since you do not believe, I
+will tell you no more of our mysteries, no, not whence this light comes
+nor what are the properties of the Water of Life, both of which you
+long to know, nor how to preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave
+of dreamless sleep, like a live jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor
+aught else. As to these matters, Daughter, I bid you also to be silent,
+since Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this around him, he who saw us
+rise from the coffins, still mocks at us in his heart. Therefore let
+him, this little man of a little day, when his few years are done go to
+the tomb in ignorance, and his companions with him, they who might have
+been as wise as I am.”
+
+Thus Oro spoke in a voice of icy rage, his deep eyes glowing like
+coals. Hearing him I cursed Bickley in my heart for I was sure that
+once spoken, his decree was like to that of the Medes and Persians and
+could not be altered. Bickley, however, was not in the least dismayed.
+Indeed he argued the point. He told Oro straight out that he would not
+believe in the impossible until it had been shown to him to be
+possible, and that the law of Nature never had been and never could be
+violated. It was no answer, he said, to show him wonders without
+explaining their cause, since all that he seemed to see might be but
+mental illusions produced he knew not how.
+
+Oro listened patiently, then answered:
+
+“Good. So be it, they are illusions. I am an illusion; those savages
+who died upon the rock will tell you so. This fair woman before you is
+an illusion; Humphrey, I am sure, knows it as you will also before you
+have done with her. These halls are illusions. Live on in your
+illusions, O little man of science, who because you see the face of
+things, think that you know the body and the heart, and can read the
+soul at work within. You are a worthy child of tens of thousands of
+your breed who were before you and are now forgotten.”
+
+Bickley looked up to answer, then changed his mind and was silent,
+thinking further argument dangerous, and Oro went on:
+
+“Now I differ from you, Bickley, in this way. I who have more wisdom in
+my finger-point than you with all the physicians of your world added to
+you, have in your brains and bodies, yet desire to learn from those who
+can give me knowledge. I understand from your words to my daughter that
+you, Bastin, teach a faith that is new to me, and that this faith tells
+of life eternal for the children of earth. Is it so?”
+
+“It is,” said Bastin eagerly. “I will set out—”
+
+Oro cut him short with a wave of the hand.
+
+“Not now in the presence of Bickley who doubtless disbelieves your
+faith, as he does all else, holding it with justice or without, to be
+but another illusion. Yet you shall teach me and on it I will form my
+own judgment.”
+
+“I shall be delighted,” said Bastin. Then a doubt struck him, and he
+added: “But why do you wish to learn? Not that you may make a mock of
+my religion, is it?”
+
+“I mock at no man’s belief, because I think that what men believe is
+true—for them. I will tell you why I wish to hear of yours, since I
+never hide the truth. I who am so wise and old, yet must die; though
+that time may be far away, still I must die, for such is the lot of man
+born of woman. And I do not desire to die. Therefore I shall rejoice to
+learn of any faith that promises to the children of earth a life
+eternal beyond the earth. Tomorrow you shall begin to teach me. Now
+leave me, Strangers, for I have much to do,” and he waved his hand
+towards the table.
+
+We rose and bowed, wondering what he could have to do down in this
+luminous hole, he who had been for so many thousands of years out of
+touch with the world. It occurred to me, however, that during this long
+period he might have got in touch with other worlds, indeed he looked
+like it.
+
+“Wait,” he said, “I have something to tell you. I have been studying
+this book of writings, or world pictures,” and he pointed to my atlas
+which, as I now observed for the first time, was also lying upon the
+table. “It interests me much. Your country is small, very small. When I
+caused it to be raised up I think that it was larger, but since then
+that seas have flowed in.”
+
+Here Bickley groaned aloud.
+
+“This one is much greater,” went on Oro, casting a glance at Bickley
+that must have penetrated him like a searchlight. Then he opened the
+map of Europe and with his finger indicated Germany and
+Austria-Hungary. “I know nothing of the peoples of these lands,” he
+added, “but as you belong to one of them and are my guests, I trust
+that yours may succeed in the war.”
+
+“What war?” we asked with one voice.
+
+“Since Bickley is so clever, surely he should know better than an
+illusion such as I. All I can tell you is that I have learned that
+there is war between this country and that,” and he pointed to Great
+Britain and to Germany upon the map; “also between others.”
+
+“It is quite possible,” I said, remembering many things. “But how do
+you know?”
+
+“If I told you, Humphrey, Bickley would not believe, so I will not
+tell. Perhaps I saw it in that crystal, as did the necromancers of the
+early world. Or perhaps the crystal serves some different purpose and I
+saw it otherwise—with my soul. At least what I say is true.”
+
+“Then who will win?” asked Bastin.
+
+“I cannot read the future, Preacher. If I could, should I ask you to
+expound to me your religion which probably is of no more worth than a
+score of others I have studied, just because it tells of the future? If
+I could read the future I should be a god instead of only an
+earth-lord.”
+
+“Your daughter called you a god and you said that you knew we were
+coming to wake you up, which is reading the future,” answered Bastin.
+
+“Every father is a god to his daughter, or should be; also in my day
+millions named me a god because I saw further and struck harder than
+they could. As for the rest, it came to me in a vision. Oh! Bickley, if
+you were wiser than you think you are, you would know that all things
+to come are born elsewhere and travel hither like the light from stars.
+Sometimes they come faster before their day into a single mind, and
+that is what men call prophecy. But this is a gift which cannot be
+commanded, even by me. Also I did not know that you would come. I knew
+only that we should awaken and by the help of men, for if none had been
+present at that destined hour we must have died for lack of warmth and
+sustenance.”
+
+“I deny your hypothesis _in toto_,” exclaimed Bickley, but nobody paid
+any attention to him.
+
+“My father,” said Yva, rising and bowing before him with her swan-like
+grace, “I have noted your commands. But do you permit that I show the
+temple to these strangers, also something of our past?”
+
+“Yes, yes,” he said. “It will save much talk in a savage tongue that is
+difficult to me. But bring them here no more without my command, save
+Bastin only. When the sun is four hours high in the upper world, let
+him come tomorrow to teach me, and afterwards if so I desire. Or if he
+wills, he can sleep here.”
+
+“I think I would rather not,” said Bastin hurriedly. “I make no
+pretense to being particular, but this place does not appeal to me as a
+bedroom. There are degrees in the pleasures of solitude and, in short,
+I will not disturb your privacy at night.”
+
+Oro waved his hand and we departed down that awful and most dreary
+hall.
+
+“I hope you will spend a pleasant time here, Bastin,” I said, looking
+back from the doorway at its cold, illuminated vastness.
+
+“I don’t expect to,” he answered, “but duty is duty, and if I can drag
+that old sinner back from the pit that awaits him, it will be worth
+doing. Only I have my doubts about him. To me he seems to bear a strong
+family resemblance to Beelzebub, and he’s a bad companion week in and
+week out.”
+
+We went through the portico, Yva leading us, and passed the fountain of
+Life-water, of which she cautioned us to drink no more at present, and
+to prevent him from doing so, dragged Tommy past it by his collar.
+Bickley, however, lingered under the pretence of making a further
+examination of the statue. As I had seen him emptying into his pocket
+the contents of a corked bottle of quinine tabloids which he always
+carried with him, I guessed very well that his object was to procure a
+sample of this water for future analysis. Of course I said nothing, and
+Yva and Bastin took no note of what he was doing.
+
+When we were clear of the palace, of which we had only seen one hall,
+we walked across an open space made unutterably dreary by the absence
+of any vegetation or other sign of life, towards a huge building of
+glorious proportions that was constructed of black stone or marble. It
+is impossible for me to give any idea of the frightful solemnity of
+this domed edifice, for as I think I have said, it alone had a roof,
+standing there in the midst of that brilliant, unvarying and most
+unnatural illumination which came from nowhere and yet was everywhere.
+Thus, when one lifted a foot, there it was between the sole of the boot
+and the floor, or to express it better, the boot threw no shadow. I
+think this absence of shadows was perhaps the most terrifying
+circumstance connected with that universal and pervading light. Through
+it we walked on to the temple. We passed three courts, pillared all of
+them, and came to the building which was larger than St. Paul’s in
+London. We entered through huge doors which still stood open, and
+presently found ourselves beneath the towering dome. There were no
+windows, why should there be in a place that was full of light? There
+was no ornamentation, there was nothing except black walls. And yet the
+general effect was magnificent in its majestic grace.
+
+“In this place,” said Yva, and her sweet voice went whispering round
+the walls and the arching dome, “were buried the Kings of the Sons of
+Wisdom. They lie beneath, each in his sepulchre. Its entrance is
+yonder,” and she pointed to what seemed to be a chapel on the right.
+“Would you wish to see them?”
+
+“Somehow I don’t care to,” said Bastin. “The place is dreary enough as
+it is without the company of a lot of dead kings.”
+
+“I should like to dissect one of them, but I suppose that would not be
+allowed,” said Bickley.
+
+“No,” she answered. “I think that the Lord Oro would not wish you to
+cut up his forefathers.”
+
+“When you and he went to sleep, why did you not choose the family
+vault?” asked Bastin.
+
+“Would you have found us there?” she queried by way of answer. Then,
+understanding that the invitation was refused by general consent,
+though personally I should have liked to accept it, and have never
+ceased regretting that I did not, she moved towards a colossal object
+which stood beneath the centre of the dome.
+
+On a stepped base, not very different from that in the cave but much
+larger, sat a figure, draped in a cloak on which was graved a number of
+stars, doubtless to symbolise the heavens. The fastening of the cloak
+was shaped like the crescent moon, and the foot-stool on which rested
+the figure’s feet was fashioned to suggest the orb of the sun. This was
+of gold or some such metal, the only spot of brightness in all that
+temple. It was impossible to say whether the figure were male or
+female, for the cloak falling in long, straight folds hid its outlines.
+Nor did the head tell us, for the hair also was hidden beneath the
+mantle and the face might have been that of either man or woman. It was
+terrible in its solemnity and calm, and its expression was as remote
+and mystic as that of Buddha, only more stern. Also without doubt it
+was blind; it was impossible to mistake the sightlessness of those
+staring orbs. Across the knees lay a naked sword and beneath the cloak
+the arms were hidden. In its complete simplicity the thing was
+marvelous.
+
+On either side upon the pedestal knelt a figure of the size of life.
+One was an old and withered man with death stamped upon his face; the
+other was a beautiful, naked woman, her hands clasped in the attitude
+of prayer and with vague terror written on her vivid features.
+
+Such was this glorious group of which the meaning could not be
+mistaken. It was Fate throned upon the sun, wearing the constellations
+as his garment, armed with the sword of Destiny and worshipped by Life
+and Death. This interpretation I set out to the others.
+
+Yva knelt before the statue for a little while, bowing her head in
+prayer, and really I felt inclined to follow her example, though in the
+end I compromised, as did Bickley, by taking off my hat, which, like
+the others, I still wore from force of habit, though in this place none
+were needed. Only Bastin remained covered.
+
+“Behold the god of my people,” said Yva. “Have you no reverence for it,
+O Bastin?”
+
+“Not much,” he answered, “except as a work of art. You see I worship
+Fate’s Master. I might add that _your_ god doesn’t seem to have done
+much for you, Lady Yva, as out of all your greatness there’s nothing
+left but two people and a lot of old walls and caves.”
+
+At first she was inclined to be angry, for I saw her start. Then her
+mood changed, and she said with a sigh:
+
+“Fate’s Master! Where does He dwell?”
+
+“Here amongst other places,” said Bastin. “I’ll soon explain that to
+you.”
+
+“I thank you,” she replied gravely. “But why have you not explained it
+to Bickley?” Then waving her hand to show that she wished for no
+answer, she went on:
+
+“Friends, would you wish to learn something of the history of my
+people?”
+
+“Very much,” said the irrepressible Bastin, “but I would rather the
+lecture took place in the open air.”
+
+“That is not possible,” she answered. “It must be here and now, or not
+at all. Come, stand by me. Be silent and do not move. I am about to set
+loose forces that are dangerous if disturbed.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+Visions of the Past
+
+
+She led us to the back of the statue and pointed to each of us where we
+should remain. Then she took her place at right angles to us, as a
+showman might do, and for a while stood immovable. Watching her face,
+once more I saw it, and indeed all her body, informed with that strange
+air of power, and noted that her eyes flashed and that her hair grew
+even more brilliant than was common, as though some abnormal strength
+were flowing through it and her. Presently she spoke, saying:
+
+“I shall show you first our people in the day of their glory. Look in
+front of you.”
+
+We looked and by degrees the vast space of the apse before us became
+alive with forms. At first these were vague and shadowy, not to be
+separated or distinguished. Then they became so real that until he was
+reproved by a kick, Tommy growled at them and threatened to break out
+into one of his peals of barking.
+
+A wonderful scene appeared. There was a palace of white marble and in
+front of it a great courtyard upon which the sun beat vividly. At the
+foot of the steps of the palace, beneath a silken awning, sat a king
+enthroned, a crown upon his head and wearing glorious robes. In his
+hand was a jewelled sceptre. He was a noble-looking man of middle age
+and about him were gathered the glittering officers of his court. Fair
+women fanned him and to right and left, but a little behind, sat other
+fair and jewelled women who, I suppose, were his wives or daughters.
+
+“One of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom new-crowned, receives the
+homage of the world,” said Yva.
+
+As she spoke there appeared, walking in front of the throne one by one,
+other kings, for all were crowned and bore sceptres. At the foot of the
+throne each of them kneeled and kissed the foot of him who sat thereon,
+as he did so laying down his sceptre which at a sign he lifted again
+and passed away. Of these kings there must have been quite fifty, men
+of all colours and of various types, white men, black men, yellow men,
+red men.
+
+Then came their ministers bearing gifts, apparently of gold and jewels,
+which were piled on trays in front of the throne. I remember noting an
+incident. An old fellow with a lame leg stumbled and upset his tray, so
+that the contents rolled hither and thither. His attempts to recover
+them were ludicrous and caused the monarch on the throne to relax from
+his dignity and smile. I mention this to show that what we witnessed
+was no set scene but apparently a living piece of the past. Had it been
+so the absurdity of the bedizened old man tumbling down in the midst of
+the gorgeous pageant would certainly have been omitted.
+
+No, it must be life, real life, something that had happened, and the
+same may be said of what followed. For instance, there was what we call
+a review. Infantry marched, some of them armed with swords and spears,
+though these I took to be an ornamental bodyguard, and others with
+tubes like savage blowpipes of which I could not guess the use. There
+were no cannon, but carriages came by loaded with bags that had spouts
+to them. Probably these were charged with poisonous gases. There were
+some cavalry also, mounted on a different stamp of horse from ours,
+thicker set and nearer the ground, but with arched necks and fiery eyes
+and, I should say, very strong. These again, I take it, were
+ornamental. Then came other men upon a long machine, slung in pairs in
+armoured sacks, out of which only their heads and arms projected. This
+machine, which resembled an elongated bicycle, went by at a tremendous
+rate, though whence its motive power came did not appear. It carried
+twenty pairs of men, each of whom held in his hand some small but
+doubtless deadly weapon, that in appearance resembled an orange. Other
+similar machines which followed carried from forty to a hundred pairs
+of men.
+
+The marvel of the piece, however, were the aircraft. These came by in
+great numbers. Sometimes they flew in flocks like wild geese, sometimes
+singly, sometimes in line and sometimes in ordered squadrons, with
+outpost and officer ships and an exact distance kept between craft and
+craft. None of them seemed to be very large or to carry more than four
+or five men, but they were extraordinarily swift and as agile as
+swallows. Moreover they flew as birds do by beating their wings, but
+again we could not guess whence came their motive power.
+
+The review vanished, and next appeared a scene of festivity in a huge,
+illuminated hall. The Great King sat upon a dais and behind him was
+that statue of Fate, or one very similar to it, beneath which we stood.
+Below him in the hall were the feasters seated at long tables, clad in
+the various costumes of their countries. He rose and, turning, knelt
+before the statue of Fate. Indeed he prostrated himself thrice in
+prayer. Then taking his seat again, he lifted a cup of wine and pledged
+that vast company. They drank back to him and prostrated themselves
+before him as he had done before the image of Fate. Only I noted that
+certain men clad in sacerdotal garments not at all unlike those which
+are worn in the Greek Church to-day, remained standing.
+
+Now all this exhibition of terrestrial pomp faded. The next scene was
+simple, that of the death-bed of this same king—we knew him by his
+wizened features. There he lay, terribly old and dying. Physicians,
+women, courtiers, all were there watching the end. The tableau vanished
+and in place of it appeared that of the youthful successor amidst
+cheering crowds, with joy breaking through the clouds of simulated
+grief upon his face. It vanished also.
+
+“Thus did great king succeed great king for ages upon ages,” said Yva.
+“There were eighty of them and the average of their reigns was 700
+years. They ruled the earth as it was in those days. They gathered up
+learning, they wielded power, their wealth was boundless. They nurtured
+the arts, they discovered secrets. They had intercourse with the stars;
+they were as gods. But like the gods they grew jealous. They and their
+councillors became a race apart who alone had the secret of long life.
+The rest of the world and the commonplace people about them suffered
+and died. They of the Household of Wisdom lived on in pomp for
+generations till the earth was mad with envy of them.
+
+“Fewer and fewer grew the divine race of the Sons of Wisdom since
+children are not given to the aged and to those of an ancient, outworn
+blood. Then the World said:
+
+“‘They are great but they are not many; let us make an end of them by
+numbers and take their place and power and drink of their Life-water,
+that they will not give to us. If myriads of us perish by their arts,
+what does it matter, since we are countless?’ So the World made war
+upon the Sons of Wisdom. See!”
+
+Again a picture formed. The sky was full of aircraft which rained down
+fire like flashes of lightning upon cities beneath. From these cities
+leapt up other fires that destroyed the swift-travelling things above,
+so that they fell in numbers like gnats burned by a lamp. Still more
+and more of them came till the cities crumbled away and the flashes
+that darted from them ceased to rush upwards. The Sons of Wisdom were
+driven from the face of the earth.
+
+Again the scene changed. Now it showed this subterranean hall in which
+we stood. There was pomp here, yet it was but a shadow of that which
+had been in the earlier days upon the face of the earth. Courtiers
+moved about the palace and there were people in the radiant streets and
+the houses, for most of them were occupied, but rarely did the vision
+show children coming through their gates.
+
+Of a sudden this scene shifted. Now we saw that same hall in which we
+had visited Oro not an hour before. There he sat, yes, Oro himself,
+upon the dais beneath the overhanging marble shell. Round him were some
+ancient councillors. In the body of the hall on either side of the dais
+were men in military array, guards without doubt though their only
+weapon was a black rod not unlike a ruler, if indeed it were a weapon
+and not a badge of office.
+
+Yva, whose face had suddenly grown strange and fixed, began to detail
+to us what was passing in this scene, in a curious monotone such as a
+person might use who was repeating something learned by heart. This was
+the substance of what she said:
+
+“The case of the Sons of Wisdom is desperate. But few of them are left.
+Like other men they need food which is hard to come by, since the foe
+holds the upper earth and that which their doctors can make here in the
+Shades does not satisfy them, even though they drink the Life-water.
+They die and die. There comes an embassy from the High King of the
+confederated Nations to talk of terms of peace. See, it enters.”
+
+As she spoke, up the hall advanced the embassy. At the head of it
+walked a young man, tall, dark, handsome and commanding, whose aspect
+seemed in some way to be familiar to me. He was richly clothed in a
+purple cloak and wore upon his head a golden circlet that suggested
+royal rank. Those who followed him were mostly old men who had the
+astute faces of diplomatists, but a few seemed to be generals. Yva
+continued in her monotonous voice:
+
+“Comes the son of the King of the confederated Nations, the Prince who
+will be king. He bows before the Lord Oro. He says ‘Great and Ancient
+Monarch of the divine blood, Heaven-born One, your strait, and that of
+those who remain to you, is sore. Yet on behalf of the Nations I am
+sent to offer terms of peace, but this I may only do in the presence of
+your child who is your heiress and the Queen-to-be of the Sons of
+Wisdom.’”
+
+Here, in the picture, Oro waved his hand and from behind the marble
+shell appeared Yva herself, gloriously apparelled, wearing royal
+ornaments and with her train held by waiting ladies. She bowed to the
+Prince and his company and they bowed back to her. More, we saw a
+glance of recognition pass between her and the Prince.
+
+Now the real Yva by our side pointed to the shadow Yva of the vision or
+the picture, whichever it might be called, a strange thing to see her
+do, and went on:
+
+“The daughter of the Lord Oro comes. The Prince of the Nations salutes
+her. He says that the great war has endured for hundreds of years
+between the Children of Wisdom fighting for absolute rule and the
+common people of the earth fighting for liberty. In that war many
+millions of the Sons of the Nations had perished, brought to their
+death by fearful arts, by wizardries and by plagues sown among them by
+the Sons of Wisdom. Yet they were winning, for the glorious cities of
+the Sons of Wisdom were destroyed and those who remained of them were
+driven to dwell in the caves of the earth where with all their strength
+and magic they could not increase, but faded like flowers in the dark.
+
+“The Lord Oro asks what are the terms of peace proposed by the Nations.
+The Prince answers that they are these: That the Sons of Wisdom shall
+teach all their wisdom to the wise men among the Nations. That they
+shall give them to drink of the Life-water, so that their length of
+days also may be increased. That they shall cease to destroy them by
+sickness and their mastery of the forces which are hid in the womb of
+the world. If they will do these things, then the Nations on their part
+will cease from war, will rebuild the cities they have destroyed by
+means of their flying ships that rain down death, and will agree that
+the Lord Oro and his seed shall rule them for ever as the King of
+kings.
+
+“The Lord Oro asks if that be all. The Prince answers that it is not
+all. He says that when he dwelt a hostage at the court of the Sons of
+Wisdom he and the divine Lady, the daughter of the Lord Oro, and his
+only living child, learned to love each other. He demands, and the
+Nations demand, that she shall be given to him to wife, that in a day
+to come he may rule with her and their children after them.
+
+“See!” went on Yva in her chanting, dreamy voice, “the Lord Oro asks
+his daughter if this be true. She says,” here the real Yva at my side
+turned and looked me straight in the eyes, “that it is true; that she
+loves the Prince of the Nations and that if she lives a million years
+she will wed no other man, since she who is her father’s slave in all
+else is still the mistress of herself, as has ever been the right of
+her royal mothers.
+
+“See again! The Lord Oro, the divine King, the Ancient, grows wroth. He
+says that it is enough and more than enough that the Barbarians should
+ask to eat of the bread of hidden learning and to drink of the
+Life-water of the Sons of Wisdom, gifts that were given to them of old
+by Heaven whence they sprang in the beginning. But that one of them,
+however highly placed, should dare to ask to mix his blood with that of
+the divine Lady, the Heiress, the Queen of the Earth to be, and claim
+to share her imperial throne that had been held by her pure race from
+age to age, was an insult that could only be purged by death. Sooner
+would he give his daughter in marriage to an ape than to a child of the
+Barbarians who had worked on them so many woes and striven to break the
+golden fetters of their rule.
+
+“Look again!” continued Yva. “The Lord Oro, the divine, grows angrier
+still” (which in truth he did, for never did I see such dreadful rage
+as that which the picture revealed in him). “He warns, he threatens. He
+says that hitherto out of gentle love and pity he has held his hand;
+that he has strength at his command which will slay them, not by
+millions in slow war, but by tens of millions at one blow; that will
+blot them and their peoples from the face of earth and that will cause
+the deep seas to roll where now their pleasant lands are fruitful in
+the sun. They shrink before his fury; behold, their knees tremble
+because they know that he has this power. He mocks them, does the Lord
+Oro. He asks for their submission here and now, and that in the name of
+the Nations they should take the great oath which may not be broken,
+swearing to cease from war upon the Sons of Wisdom and to obey them in
+all things to the ends of the earth. Some of the ambassadors would
+yield. They look about them like wild things that are trapped. But
+madness takes the Prince. He cries that the oath of an ape is of no
+account, but that he will tear up the Children of Wisdom as an ape
+tears leaves, and afterwards take the divine Lady to be his wife.
+
+“Look on the Lord Oro!” continued the living Yva, “his wrath leaves
+him. He grows cold and smiles. His daughter throws herself upon her
+knees and pleads with him. He thrusts her away. She would spring to the
+side of the Prince; he commands his councillors to hold her. She cries
+to the Prince that she loves him and him only, and that in a day to
+come him she will wed and no other. He thanks her, saying that as it is
+with her, so it is with him, and that because of his love he fears
+nothing. She swoons. The Lord Oro motions with his hand to the guard.
+They lift their death-rods. Fire leaps from them. The Prince and his
+companions, all save those who were afraid and would have sworn the
+oath, twist and writhe. They turn black; they die. The Lord Oro
+commands those who are left to enter their flying ships and bear to the
+Nations of the Earth tidings of what befalls those who dare to defy and
+insult him; to warn them also to eat and drink and be merry while they
+may, since for their wickedness they are about to perish.”
+
+The scene faded and there followed another which really I cannot
+describe. It represented some vast underground place and what appeared
+to be a huge mountain of iron clothed in light, literally a thing like
+an alp, rocking and spinning down a declivity, which farther on
+separated into two branches because of a huge razor-edge precipice that
+rose between. There in the middle of this vast space with the dazzling
+mountain whirling towards him, stood Oro encased in some transparent
+armour, as though to keep off heat, and with him his daughter who under
+his direction was handling something in the rock behind her. Then there
+was a blinding flash and everything vanished. All of this picture
+passed so swiftly that we could not grasp its details; only a general
+impression remained.
+
+“The Lord Oro, using the strength that is in the world whereof he alone
+has the secret, changes the world’s balance causing that which was land
+to become sea and that which was sea to become land,” said Yva in her
+chanting, unnatural voice.
+
+Another scene of stupendous and changing awfulness. Countries were
+sinking, cities crashing down, volcanoes were spouting fire; the end of
+the earth seemed to be at hand. We could see human beings running to
+and fro in thousands like ants. Then in huge waves hundreds and
+hundreds of feet high, the ocean flowed in and all was troubled, yeasty
+sea.
+
+“Oro carries out his threat to destroy the Nations who had rebelled
+against him,” said Yva. “Much of the world sinks beneath the waves, but
+in place of it other lands arise above the waves, to be inhabited by
+the seed of those who remain living in those portions of the Earth that
+the deluge spared.”
+
+This horrible vision passed and was succeeded by one more, that of Oro
+standing in the sepulchre of the cave by the side of the crystal coffin
+which contained what appeared to be the body of his daughter. He gazed
+at her, then drank some potion and laid himself down in the companion
+coffin, that in which we had found him.
+
+All vanished away and Yva, appearing to wake from some kind of trance,
+smiled, and in her natural voice asked if we had seen enough.
+
+“Quite,” I answered in a tone that caused her to say:
+
+“I wonder what you have seen, Humphrey. Myself I do not know, since it
+is through me that you see at all and when you see I am in you who
+see.”
+
+“Indeed,” I replied. “Well, I will tell you about it later.”
+
+“Thank you so much,” exclaimed Bastin, recovering suddenly from his
+amazement. “I have heard a great deal of these moving-picture shows
+which are becoming so popular, but have always avoided attending them
+because their influence on the young is supposed to be doubtful, and a
+priest must set a good example to his congregation. Now I see that they
+can have a distinct educational value, even if it is presented in the
+form of romance.”
+
+“How is it done?” asked Bickley, almost fiercely.
+
+“I do not altogether know,” she answered. “This I do know, however,
+that everything which has happened on this world can be seen from
+moment to moment at some point in the depths of space, for thither the
+sun’s light takes it. There, too, it can be caught and thence in an
+instant returned to earth again, to be reflected in the mirror of the
+present by those who know how that mirror should be held. Ask me no
+more; one so wise as you, O Bickley, can solve such problems for
+himself.”
+
+“If you don’t mind, Lady Yva,” said Bastin, “I think I should like to
+get out of this place, interesting as it is. I have food to cook up
+above and lots of things to attend to, especially as I understand I am
+to come back here tomorrow. Would you mind showing me the way to that
+lift or moving staircase?”
+
+“Come,” she said, smiling.
+
+So we went past the image of Fate, out of the temple, down the vast and
+lonely streets so unnaturally illuminated, to the place where we had
+first found ourselves on arrival in the depths. There we stood.
+
+A moment later and we were whirling up as we had whirled down. I
+suppose that Yva came with us though I never saw her do so, and the odd
+thing was that when we arrived in the sepulchre, she seemed already to
+be standing there waiting to direct us.
+
+“Really,” remarked Bastin, “this is exactly like Maskelyne and Cook.
+Did you ever see their performance, Bickley? If so, it must have given
+you lots to explain for quite a long while.”
+
+“Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in Orofena,”
+replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from his pocket an end
+of candle to which he set light.
+
+“What is jugglery?” asked Bastin, and they departed arguing, leaving me
+alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
+
+“What have I seen?” I asked her.
+
+“I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but perhaps
+something of the truth.”
+
+“I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you swear
+yourself to a man for ever.”
+
+“Yes, and this I did. What of it?”
+
+“Only that it might be hard for another man.”
+
+“Yes, for another man it might be hard. You were once married, were you
+not, Humphrey, to a wife who died?”
+
+“Yes, I was married.”
+
+“And did you not swear to that wife that you would never look in love
+upon another woman?”
+
+“I did,” I answered in a shamed voice. “But how do you know? I never
+told you so.”
+
+“Oh! I know you and therefore guessed.”
+
+“Well, what of it, Yva?”
+
+“Nothing, except that you must find your wife before you love again,
+and before I love again I must find him whom I wish to be my husband.”
+
+“How can that happen,” I asked, “when both are dead?”
+
+“How did all that you have seen to-day in Nyo happen?” she replied,
+laughing softly. “Perhaps you are very blind, Humphrey, or perhaps we
+both are blind. If so, mayhap light will come to us. Meanwhile do not
+be sad. Tomorrow I will meet you and you shall teach me—your English
+tongue, Humphrey, and other things.”
+
+“Then let it be in the sunlight, Yva. I do not love those darksome
+halls of Nyo that glow like something dead.”
+
+“It is fitting, for are they not dead?” she answered, with a little
+laugh. “So be it. Bastin shall teach my father down below, since sun
+and shade are the same to him who only thinks of his religion, and you
+shall teach me up above.”
+
+“I am not so certain about Bastin and of what he thinks,” I said
+doubtfully. “Also will the Lord Oro permit you to come?”
+
+“Yes, for in such matters I rule myself. Also,” she added meaningly,
+“he remembers my oath that I will wed no man—save one who is dead. Now
+farewell a while and bid Bastin be here when the sun is three hours
+high, not before or after.”
+
+Then I left her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+Yva Explains
+
+
+When I reached the rock I was pleased to find Marama and about twenty
+of his people engaged in erecting the house that we had ordered them to
+build for our accommodation. Indeed, it was nearly finished, since
+house-building in Orofena is a simple business. The framework of poles
+let into palm trunks, since they could not be driven into the rock, had
+been put together on the further shore and towed over bodily by canoes.
+The overhanging rock formed one side of the house; the ends were of
+palm leaves tied to the poles, and the roof was of the same material.
+The other side was left open for the present, which in that equable and
+balmy clime was no disadvantage. The whole edifice was about thirty
+feet long by fifteen deep and divided into two portions, one for
+sleeping and one for living, by a palm leaf partition. Really, it was
+quite a comfortable abode, cool and rainproof, especially after Bastin
+had built his hut in which to cook.
+
+Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and implored
+us to visit them on the main island. I answered that perhaps we would
+later on, as we wished to procure certain things from the wreck. Also,
+he requested Bastin to continue his ministrations as the latter greatly
+desired to do. But to this proposal I would not allow him to give any
+direct answer at the moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure
+of Oro’s approval.
+
+Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind them the
+usual ample store of provisions.
+
+We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had said
+about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little appetite
+for solid food, though this returned upon the following day. The same
+thing happened upon every occasion after drinking of that water which
+certainly was a most invigorating fluid. Never for years had any of us
+felt so well as it caused us to do.
+
+So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of these,
+indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them as something
+out of the common, of course, but as facts which admitted of no
+discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament told much the same
+story of people called the Sons of God who lived very long lives and
+ran after the daughters of men whom they should have left alone, and
+thus became the progenitors of a remarkable race. Of this race, he
+presumed that Oro and his daughter were survivors, especially as they
+spoke of their family as “Heaven born.” How they came to survive was
+more than he could understand and really scarcely worth bothering over,
+since there they were.
+
+It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although naturally
+Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly exaggerated, when he
+declared that he had caused this catastrophe, unless indeed he was
+talking about a totally different deluge, though even then _he_ could
+not have brought it about. It was curious, however, that the people
+drowned were said to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion
+about those whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of
+that, he could not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his
+own showing he was a most revengeful person and one who declined to
+agree to a quite suitable alliance, apparently desired by both parties,
+merely because it offended his family pride. No, on reflection he might
+be unjust to Oro in this particular, since _he_ never told that story;
+it was only shown in some pictures which very likely were just made up
+to astonish us. Meanwhile, it was his business to preach to this old
+sinner down in that hole, and he confessed honestly that he did not
+like the job. Still, it must be done, so with our leave he would go
+apart and seek inspiration, which at present seemed to be quite
+lacking.
+
+Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
+
+“Don’t you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause another
+just to show that you are wrong,” called Bickley after him.
+
+“I can’t help that,” answered Bastin. “Certainly I shall not hide the
+truth to save Oro’s feelings, if he has got any. If he revenges himself
+upon us in any way, we must just put up with it like other martyrs.”
+
+“I haven’t the slightest ambition to be a martyr,” said Bickley.
+
+“No,” shouted Bastin from a little distance, “I am quite aware of that,
+as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you become one, I am
+sorry to say that I do not see how you can expect any benefit. You
+would only be like a man who puts a sovereign into the offertory bag in
+mistake for a shilling. The extra nineteen shillings will do him no
+good at all, since in his heart he regrets the error and wishes that he
+could have them back.”
+
+Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not laugh.
+
+“Arbuthnot,” he said, “I have come to the conclusion that I have gone
+quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of homicidal mania, which I
+feel developing in me where Bastin is concerned, or of other abnormal
+violence, that you will take whatever steps you consider necessary,
+even to putting me out of the way if that is imperative.”
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked. “You seem sane enough.”
+
+“Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great number
+of things which I know it to be quite impossible that I should have
+seen or experienced. The only explanation is that I am suffering from
+delusions.”
+
+“Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?”
+
+“Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case.”
+
+“I don’t agree with you, Bickley—about Bastin, I mean. I am by no means
+certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He has a faith
+and he sticks to it, as millions have done before him, and that is
+better than making spiritual experiments, as I am sorry to say I do, or
+rejecting things because one cannot understand them, as you do, which
+is only a form of intellectual vanity.”
+
+“I won’t argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat that I
+am mad, and Bastin is mad.”
+
+“How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I mad, too?”
+
+“You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn’t enough to drive a man mad when
+he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly impossible
+moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible young woman in
+an utterly impossible underground city, then I don’t know what is.”
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked, starting.
+
+“Mean? Well, if you didn’t notice it, there’s hope for you.”
+
+“Notice what?”
+
+“All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do you admit
+that?”
+
+“Of course; there could be no mistake on that point.”
+
+“Very well. Then according to my version there came a man, still young,
+dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions of peace and
+wanted to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is that right?”
+
+“Absolutely.”
+
+“Well, and didn’t you recognise the man?”
+
+“No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose appearance
+reminded me of someone.”
+
+“I suppose it must be true,” mused Bickley, “that we do not know
+ourselves.”
+
+“So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be our
+special study. ‘Know thyself,’ you remember.”
+
+“I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean to tell
+me that you did not recognise your own double in that man? Shave off
+your beard and put on his clothes and no one could distinguish you
+apart.”
+
+I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
+
+“Now you mention it,” I said slowly, “I suppose there was a
+resemblance. I didn’t look at him very much; I was studying the
+simulacrum of Yva. Also, you know it is some time since—I mean, there
+are no pier-glasses in Orofena.”
+
+“The man was _you_,” went on Bickley with conviction. “If I were
+superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am not,
+I know that I must be mad.”
+
+“Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble each
+other.”
+
+“There are degrees in resemblance,” said Bickley with one of his
+contemptuous snorts. “It won’t do, Humphrey, my boy,” he added. “I can
+only think of one possible explanation—outside of the obvious one of
+madness.”
+
+“What is that?”
+
+“The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that cinematograph
+show in some way or other, did she not? She said that in order to do
+this she loosed some hidden forces. I suggest that she did nothing of
+the sort.”
+
+“Then whence did the pictures come and why?”
+
+“From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-bull,
+fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally fill the
+role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had happened to
+impress her. Hence the resemblance.”
+
+“You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural cunning
+and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don’t know, first, why she should
+be so anxious to add another impression to the many we have received in
+this place; and, secondly, if she was, how she managed to mesmerise
+three average but totally different men into seeing the same things.
+_My_ explanation is that you were deceived as to the likeness, which,
+mind you, I did not recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin.”
+
+“Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask Yva
+herself. She ought to know. Now I’m off to try to analyse that
+confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary spring
+variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and possibly not
+uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I can only apply some
+very elementary tests.”
+
+So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was left
+alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting continually to
+wander off into the cave, whence I must recall him. I suppose that my
+experiences of the day, reviewed beneath the sweet influences of the
+wonderful tropical night, affected me. At any rate, that mystical side
+of my nature, to which I think I alluded at the beginning of this
+record, sprang into active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal
+vanished, the abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of
+us creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British. I
+lost my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in strange
+places; of course, always supposing that we have a spirit, which
+Bickley would deny.
+
+I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
+unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see and
+accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps only a
+refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and again, and that
+our animating principle, whatever it might be, does inhabit various
+bodies, which, naturally enough, it would shape to its own taste and
+likeness? Would that taste and likeness vary so very much over, let us
+say, a million years or so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a
+minute, in the æons of Eternity?
+
+On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect that it
+may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered man of the far
+past were in fact identical? If the woman were the same, preserved
+across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why should not her lover be
+the same? What did I say—her lover? Was I her lover? No, I was the
+lover of one who had died—my lost wife. Well, if I had died and lived
+again, why should not—why should not that Sleeper—have lived again
+during her long sleep? Through all those years the spirit must have had
+some home, and, if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points,
+similarities, which rushed in upon me—oh! it was ridiculous. Bickley
+was right. We were all mad!
+
+There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war with
+Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such knowledge would
+presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond those given to man. I
+could not believe that he possessed these; as Bickley said, it would be
+past experience. Yet it was most strange that he who was uninformed as
+to our national history and dangers, should have hit upon a country
+with which we might well have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here
+again I was bewildered and overcome. My brain rocked. I would seek
+sleep, and in it escape, or at any rate rest from all these mysteries.
+
+On the following morning we despatched Bastin to keep his rendezvous in
+the sepulchre at the proper time. Had we not done so I felt sure that
+he would have forgotten it, for on this occasion he was for once an
+unwilling missioner. He tried to persuade one of us to come with
+him—even Bickley would have been welcome; but we both declared that we
+could not dream of interfering in such a professional matter; also that
+our presence was forbidden, and would certainly distract the attention
+of his pupil.
+
+“What you mean,” said the gloomy Bastin, “is that you intend to enjoy
+yourselves up here in the female companionship of the Glittering Lady
+whilst I sit thousands of feet underground attempting to lighten the
+darkness of a violent old sinner whom I suspect of being in league with
+Satan.”
+
+“With whom you should be proud to break a lance,” said Bickley.
+
+“So I am, in the daylight. For instance, when he uses _your_ mouth to
+advance his arguments, Bickley, but this is another matter. However, if
+I do not appear again you will know that I died in a good cause, and, I
+hope, try to recover my remains and give them decent burial. Also, you
+might inform the Bishop of how I came to my end, that is, if you ever
+get an opportunity, which is more than doubtful.”
+
+“Hurry up, Bastin, hurry up!” said the unfeeling Bickley, “or you will
+be late for your appointment and put your would-be neophyte into a bad
+temper.”
+
+Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed in the
+language of the South Sea Islands.
+
+A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous robes which,
+being a man, it is quite impossible for me to describe. She saw us
+looking at these, and, after greeting us both, also Tommy, who was
+enraptured at her coming, asked us how the ladies of our country
+attired themselves.
+
+We tried to explain, with no striking success.
+
+“You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the Old
+World,” she said, shaking her head and laughing. “I thought that you
+had with you pictures of ladies you have known which would show me.”
+
+Now, in fact, I had in a pocket-book a photograph of my wife in
+evening-dress, also a miniature of her head and bust painted on ivory,
+a beautiful piece of work done by a master hand, which I always wore.
+These, after a moment’s hesitation, I produced and showed to her,
+Bickley having gone away for a little while to see about something
+connected with his attempted analysis of the Life-water. She examined
+them with great eagerness, and as she did so I noted that her face grew
+tender and troubled.
+
+“This was your wife,” she said as one who states what she knows to be a
+fact. I nodded, and she went on:
+
+“She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I am, I
+think.”
+
+“No,” I answered, “she lacked height; given that she would have been a
+lovely woman.”
+
+“I am glad you think that women should be tall,” she said, glancing at
+her shadow. “The eyes were such as mine, were they not—in colour, I
+mean?”
+
+“Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger.”
+
+“That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be angry if I
+tried it? I weary of this old fashion.”
+
+“Why should I be angry?” I asked.
+
+At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the details
+of the dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than had been the
+custom among the women of her people, but was very pretty.
+
+“That is because we are still barbarians,” said Bickley; “at least, our
+women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods of attraction,
+like the savages yonder.”
+
+She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the photograph
+and the miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
+
+“I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear this
+picture on your heart, as well as in it.”
+
+“Then you must be a very remarkable woman,” said Bickley. “Never before
+did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man was faithful to
+somebody else.”
+
+“Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so angry
+to us women?” asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without waiting for an
+answer, she inquired of him whether he had been successful in his
+analysis of the Life-water.
+
+“How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did Bastin tell
+you?” exclaimed Bickley.
+
+“Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the descent to
+Nyo; that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I do, and that he
+thought that my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil or evil spirit from
+some Under-world which he called hell.”
+
+“Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth,” said Bickley, “for which
+I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady Yva, and tell us
+who and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what are you.”
+
+“Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord Oro and I
+are two who have lived on from the old time when the world was
+different, and yet, I think, the same. He is a man and not a god, and I
+am a woman. His powers are great because of his knowledge, which he has
+gathered from his forefathers and in a life of a thousand years before
+he went to sleep. He can do things you cannot do. Thus, he can pass
+through space and take others with him, and return again. He can learn
+what is happening in far-off parts of the world, as he did when he told
+you of the war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible
+powers; for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he
+knows the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can change its
+turning so that earthquakes happen and sea becomes land, and land sea,
+and the places that were hot grow cold, and those that were cold grow
+hot.”
+
+“All of which things have happened many times in the history of the
+globe,” said Bickley, “without the help of the Lord Oro.”
+
+“Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless will have
+knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge, and knowledge is
+strength.”
+
+“Yes,” I interposed, “but such powers as you attribute to your father
+are not given to man.”
+
+“You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks that he
+has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is not so.
+Hundreds of thousands of years ago men knew more than it seems they do
+today, ten times more, as they lived ten times longer, or so you tell
+me.”
+
+“Men?” I said.
+
+“Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations supposed
+them to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and terrors of man.
+He desires power which is ambition, and when the world refused his
+rule, he destroyed that part of it which rebelled, which is revenge.
+Moreover, above all things he dreads death, which is fear. That is why
+he suspended life in himself and me for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years, as his knowledge gave him strength to do, because death was near
+and he thought that sleep was better than death.”
+
+“Why should he dread to die,” asked Bickley, “seeing that sleep and
+death are the same?”
+
+“Because his knowledge tells him that Sleep and Death are _not_ the
+same, as you, in your foolishness, believe, for there Bastin is wiser
+than you. Because for all his wisdom he remains ignorant of what
+happens to man when the Light of Life is blown out by the breath of
+Fate. That is why he fears to die and why he talks with Bastin the
+Preacher, who says he has the secret of the future.”
+
+“And do you fear to die?” I asked.
+
+“No, Humphrey,” she answered gently. “Because I think that there is no
+death, and, having done no wrong, I dread no evil. I had dreams while I
+was asleep, O Humphrey, and it seemed to me that—”
+
+Here she ceased and glanced at where she knew the miniature was hanging
+upon my breast.
+
+“Now,” she continued, after a little pause, “tell me of your world, of
+its history, of its languages, of what happens there, for I long to
+know.”
+
+So then and there, assisted by Bickley, I began the education of the
+Lady Yva. I do not suppose that there was ever a more apt pupil in the
+whole earth. To begin with, she was better acquainted with every
+subject on which I touched than I was myself; all she lacked was
+information as to its modern aspect. Her knowledge ended two hundred
+and fifty thousand years ago, at which date, however, it would seem
+that civilisation had already touched a higher water-mark than it has
+ever since attained. Thus, this vanished people understood astronomy,
+natural magnetism, the force of gravity, steam, also electricity to
+some subtle use of which, I gathered, the lighting of their underground
+city was to be attributed. They had mastered architecture and the arts,
+as their buildings and statues showed; they could fly through the air
+better than we have learned to do within the last few years.
+
+More, they, or some of them, had learned the use of the Fourth
+Dimension, that is their most instructed individuals, could move
+_through_ opposing things, as well as over them, up into them and
+across them. This power these possessed in a two-fold form. I mean,
+that they could either disintegrate their bodies at one spot and cause
+them to integrate again at another, or they could project what the old
+Egyptians called the Ka or Double, and modern Theosophists name the
+Astral Shape, to any distance. Moreover, this Double, or Astral Shape,
+while itself invisible, still, so to speak, had the use of its senses.
+It could see, it could hear, and it could remember, and, on returning
+to the body, it could avail itself of the experience thus acquired.
+
+Thus, at least, said Yva, while Bickley contemplated her with a cold
+and unbelieving eye. She even went further and alleged that in certain
+instances, individuals of her extinct race had been able to pass
+through the ether and to visit other worlds in the depths of space.
+
+“Have you ever done that?” asked Bickley.
+
+“Once or twice I dreamed that I did,” she replied quietly.
+
+“We can all dream,” he answered.
+
+As it was my lot to make acquaintance with this strange and uncanny
+power at a later date, I will say no more of it now.
+
+Telepathy, she declared, was also a developed gift among the Sons of
+Wisdom; indeed, they seem to have used it as we use wireless messages.
+Only, in their case, the sending and receiving stations were skilled
+and susceptible human beings who went on duty for so many hours at a
+time. Thus intelligence was transmitted with accuracy and despatch.
+Those who had this faculty were, she said, also very apt at reading the
+minds of others and therefore not easy to deceive.
+
+“Is that how you know that I had been trying to analyse your
+Life-water?” asked Bickley.
+
+“Yes,” she answered, with her unvarying smile. “At the moment I spoke
+thereof you were wondering whether my father would be angry if he knew
+that you had taken the water in a little flask.” She studied him for a
+moment, then added: “Now you are wondering, first, whether I did not
+see you take the water from the fountain and guess the purpose, and,
+secondly, whether perhaps Bastin did not tell me what you were doing
+with it when we met in the sepulchre.”
+
+“Look here,” said the exasperated Bickley, “I admit that telepathy and
+thought-reading are possible to a certain limited extent. But supposing
+that you possess those powers, as I think in English, and you do not
+know English, how can you interpret what is passing in my mind?”
+
+“Perhaps you have been teaching me English all this while without
+knowing it, Bickley. In any case, it matters little, seeing that what I
+read is the thought, not the language with which it is clothed. The
+thought comes from your mind to mine—that is, if I wish it, which is
+not often—and I interpret it in my own or other tongues.”
+
+“I am glad to hear it is not often, Lady Yva, since thoughts are
+generally considered private.”
+
+“Yes, and therefore I will read yours no more. Why should I, when they
+are so full of disbelief of all I tell you, and sometimes of other
+things about myself which I do not seek to know?”
+
+“No wonder that, according to the story in the pictures, those Nations,
+whom you named Barbarians, made an end of your people, Lady Yva.”
+
+“You are mistaken, Bickley; the Lord Oro made an end of the Nations,
+though against my prayer,” she added with a sigh.
+
+Then Bickley departed in a rage, and did not appear again for an hour.
+
+“He is angry,” she said, looking after him; “nor do I wonder. It is
+hard for the very clever like Bickley, who think that they have
+mastered all things, to find that after all they are quite ignorant. I
+am sorry for him, and I like him very much.”
+
+“Then you would be sorry for me also, Lady Yva?”
+
+“Why?” she asked with a dazzling smile, “when your heart is athirst for
+knowledge, gaping for it like a fledgling’s mouth for food, and, as it
+chances, though I am not very wise, I can satisfy something of your
+soul-hunger.”
+
+“Not very wise!” I repeated.
+
+“No, Humphrey. I think that Bastin, who in many ways is so stupid, has
+more true wisdom than I have, because he can believe and accept without
+question. After all, the wisdom of my people is all of the universe and
+its wonders. What you think magic is not magic; it is only gathered
+knowledge and the finding out of secrets. Bickley will tell you the
+same, although as yet he does not believe that the mind of man can
+stretch so far.”
+
+“You mean that your wisdom has in it nothing of the spirit?”
+
+“Yes, Humphrey, that is what I mean. I do not even know if there is
+such a thing as spirit. Our god was Fate; Bastin’s god is a spirit, and
+I think yours also.”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Therefore, I wish you and Bastin to teach me of your god, as does Oro,
+my father. I want—oh! so much, Humphrey, to learn whether we live after
+death.”
+
+“You!” I exclaimed. “You who, according to the story, have slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years! You, who have, unless I mistake,
+hinted that during that sleep you may have lived in other shapes! Do
+you doubt whether we can live after death?”
+
+“Yes. Sleep induced by secret arts is not death, and during that sleep
+the _I_ within might wander and inhabit other shapes, because it is
+forbidden to be idle. Moreover, what seems to be death may not be
+death, only another form of sleep from which the _I_ awakes again upon
+the world. But at last comes the real death, when the _I_ is
+extinguished to the world. That much I know, because my people learned
+it.”
+
+“You mean, you know that men and women may live again and again upon
+the world?”
+
+“Yes, Humphrey, I do. For in the world there is only a certain store of
+life which in many forms travels on and on, till the lot of each _I_ is
+fulfilled. Then comes the real death, and after that—what, oh!—what?”
+
+“You must ask Bastin,” I said humbly. “I cannot dare to teach of such
+matters.”
+
+“No, but you can and do believe, and that helps me, Humphrey, who am in
+tune with you. Yes, it helps me much more than do Bastin and his new
+religion, because such is woman’s way. Now, I think Bickley will soon
+return, so let us talk of other matters. Tell me of the history of your
+people, Humphrey, that my father says are now at war.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+The Accident
+
+
+Bickley did return, having recovered his temper, since after all it was
+impossible for anyone to remain angry with the Lady Yva for long, and
+we spent a very happy time together. We instructed and she was the
+humble pupil.
+
+How swift and nimble was her intelligence! In that one morning she
+learned all our alphabet and how to write our letters. It appeared that
+among her people, at any rate in their later periods, the only form of
+writing that was used was a highly concentrated shorthand which saved
+labour. They had no journals, since news which arrived telepathically
+or by some form of wireless was proclaimed to those who cared to
+listen, and on it all formed their own judgments. In the same way poems
+and even romances were repeated, as in Homer’s day or in the time of
+the Norse _sagas_, by word of mouth. None of their secret knowledge was
+written down. Like the ritual of Freemasonry it was considered too
+sacred.
+
+Moreover, when men lived for hundreds of years this was not so
+necessary, especially as their great fear was lest it should fall into
+the hands of the outside nations, whom they called Barbarians. For, be
+it remembered, these Sons of Wisdom were always a very small people who
+ruled by the weight of their intelligence and the strength of their
+accumulated lore. Indeed, they could scarcely be called a people;
+rather were they a few families, all of them more or less connected
+with the original ruling Dynasty which considered itself half divine.
+These families were waited upon by a multitude of servants or slaves
+drawn from the subject nations, for the most part skilled in one art or
+another, or perhaps, remarkable for their personal beauty. Still they
+remained outside the pale.
+
+The Sons of Wisdom did not intermarry with them or teach them their
+learning, or even allow them to drink of their Life-water. They ruled
+them as men rule dogs, treating them with kindness, but no more, and as
+many dogs run their course and die in the lifetime of one master, so
+did many of these slaves in that of one of the Sons of Wisdom.
+Therefore, the slaves came to regard their lords not as men, but gods.
+They lived but three score years and ten like the rest of us, and went
+their way, they, whose great-great-grandfathers had served the same
+master and whose great-great-great-grandchildren would still serve him.
+What should we think of a lord who we knew was already adult in the
+time of William the Conqueror, and who remained still vigorous and
+all-powerful in that of George V? One, moreover, who commanded almost
+infinite knowledge to which we were denied the key? We might tremble
+before him and look upon him as half-divine, but should we not long to
+kill him and possess his knowledge and thereby prolong our own
+existence to his wondrous measure?
+
+Such, said Yva, was the case with their slaves and the peoples from
+whence these sprang. They grew mad with jealous hate, till at length
+came the end we knew.
+
+Thus we talked on for hours till the time came for us to eat. As before
+Yva partook of fruit and we of such meats as we had at hand. These, we
+noticed, disgusted her, because, as she explained, the Children of
+Wisdom, unless driven thereto by necessity, touched no flesh, but lived
+on the fruits of the earth and wine alone. Only the slaves and the
+Barbarians ate flesh. In these views Bickley for once agreed with her,
+that is, except as regards the wine, for in theory, if not in
+practice—he was a vegetarian.
+
+“I will bring you more of the Life-water,” she said, “and then you will
+grow to hate these dead things, as I do. And now farewell. My father
+calls me. I hear him though you do not. To-morrow I cannot come, but
+the day after I will come and bring you the Life-water. Nay, accompany
+me not, but as I see he wishes it, let Tommy go with me. I will care
+for him, and he is a friend in all that lonely place.”
+
+So she went, and with her Tommy, rejoicing.
+
+“Ungrateful little devil!” said Bickley. “Here we’ve fed and petted him
+from puppyhood, or at least you have, and yet he skips off with the
+first stranger. I never saw him behave like that to any woman, except
+your poor wife.”
+
+“I know,” I answered. “I cannot understand it. Hullo! here comes
+Bastin.”
+
+Bastin it was, dishevelled and looking much the worse for wear, also
+minus his Bible in the native tongue.
+
+“Well, how have you been getting on?” said Bickley.
+
+“I should like some tea, also anything there is to eat.”
+
+We supplied him with these necessaries, and after a while he said
+slowly and solemnly:
+
+“I cannot help thinking of a childish story which Bickley told or
+invented one night at your house at home. I remember he had an argument
+with my wife, which he said put him in mind of it, I am sure I don’t
+know why. It was about a monkey and a parrot that were left together
+under a sofa for a long while, where they were so quiet that everybody
+forgot them. Then the parrot came out with only one feather left in its
+tail and none at all on its body, saying, ‘I’ve had no end of a time!’
+after which it dropped down and died. Do you know, I feel just like
+that parrot, only I don’t mean to die, and I think I gave the monkey
+quite as good as he gave me!”
+
+“What happened?” I asked, intensely interested.
+
+“Oh! the Glittering Lady took me into that palace hall where Oro was
+sitting like a spider in a web, and left me there. I got to work at
+once. He was much interested in the Old Testament stories and said
+there were points of truth about them, although they had evidently come
+down to the modern writer—he called him a _modern_ writer—in a
+legendary form. I thought his remarks impertinent and with difficulty
+refrained from saying so. Leaving the story of the Deluge and all that,
+I spoke of other matters, telling him of eternal life and Heaven and
+Hell, of which the poor benighted man had never heard. I pointed out
+especially that unless he repented, his life, by all accounts, had been
+so wicked, that he was certainly destined to the latter place.”
+
+“What did he say to that?” I asked.
+
+“Do you know, I think it frightened him, if one could imagine Oro being
+frightened. At any rate he remarked that the truth or falsity of what I
+said was an urgent matter for him, as he could not expect to live more
+than a few hundred years longer, though perhaps he might prolong the
+period by another spell of sleep. Then he asked me why I thought him so
+wicked. I replied because he himself said that he had drowned millions
+of people, which showed an evil heart and intention even if it were not
+a fact. He thought a long while and asked what could be done in the
+circumstances. I replied that repentance and reparation were the only
+courses open to him.”
+
+“Reparation!” I exclaimed.
+
+“Yes, reparation was what I said, though I think I made a mistake
+there, as you will see. As nearly as I can remember, he answered that
+he was beginning to repent, as from all he had learned from us, he
+gathered that the races which had arisen as a consequence of his
+action, were worse than those which he had destroyed. As regards
+reparation, what he had done once he could do again. He would think the
+matter over seriously, and see if it were possible and advisable to
+raise those parts of the world which had been sunk, and sink those
+which had been raised. If so, he thought that would make very handsome
+amends to the departed nations and set him quite right with any
+superior Power, if such a thing existed. What are you laughing at,
+Bickley? I don’t think it a laughing matter, since such remarks do not
+seem to me to indicate any real change in Oro’s heart, which is what I
+was trying to effect.”
+
+Bickley, who was convulsed with merriment, wiped his eyes and said:
+
+“You dear old donkey, don’t you see what you have done, or rather would
+have done if there were a word of truth in all this ridiculous story
+about a deluge? You would be in the way of making your precious pupil,
+who certainly is the most masterly old liar in the world, repeat his
+offence and send Europe to the bottom of the sea.”
+
+“That did occur to me, but it doesn’t much matter as I am quite certain
+that such a thing would never be allowed. Of course there was a real
+deluge once, but Oro had no more to do with it than I had. Don’t you
+agree, Arbuthnot?”
+
+“I think so,” I answered cautiously, “but really in this place I am
+beginning to lose count of what is or is not possible. Also, of course,
+there may have been many deluges; indeed the history of the world shows
+that this was so; it is written in its geological strata. What was the
+end of it?”
+
+“The end was that he took the South Sea Bible and, after I had
+explained a little about our letters, seemed to be able to read it at
+once. I suppose he was acquainted with the art of printing in his
+youth. At any rate he said that he would study it, I don’t know how,
+unless he can read, and that in two days’ time he would let me know
+what he thought about the matter of my religion. Then he told me to go.
+I said that I did not know the way and was afraid of losing myself.
+Thereupon he waved his hand, and I really can’t say what happened.”
+
+“Did you levitate up here,” asked Bickley, “like the late lamented Mr.
+Home at the spiritualistic seances?”
+
+“No, I did not exactly levitate, but something or someone seemed to get
+a hold of me, and I was just rushed along in a most tumultuous fashion.
+The next thing I knew was that I was standing at the door of that
+sepulchre, though I have no recollection of going up in the lift, or
+whatever it is. I believe those beastly caves are full of ghosts, or
+devils, and the worst of it is that they have kept my solar-tope, which
+I put on this morning forgetting that it would be useless there.”
+
+“The Lady Yva’s Fourth Dimension in action,” I suggested, “only it
+wouldn’t work on solar-topes.”
+
+“I don’t know what you are talking about,” said Bastin, “but if my hat
+had to be left, why not my boots and other garments? Please stop your
+nonsense and pass the tea. Thank goodness I haven’t got to go down
+there tomorrow, as he seems to have had enough of me for the present,
+so I vote we all pay a visit to the ship. It will be a very pleasant
+change. I couldn’t stand two days running with that old fiend, and his
+ghosts or devils in the cave.”
+
+Next morning accordingly, fearing no harm from the Orofenans, we took
+the canoe and rowed to the main island. Marama had evidently seen us
+coming, for he and a number of his people met us with every
+demonstration of delight, and escorted us to the ship. Here we found
+things just as we had left them, for there had been no attempt at theft
+or other mischief.
+
+While we were in the cabin a fit of moral weakness seemed to overcome
+Bickley, the first and I may add the last from which I ever saw him
+suffer.
+
+“Do you know,” he said, addressing us, “I think that we should do well
+to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal of the
+marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here, it is still
+obvious that we find ourselves in very peculiar and unhealthy
+surroundings. I mean mentally unhealthy, indeed I think that if we stay
+here much longer we shall probably go off our heads. Now that boat on
+the deck remains sound and seaworthy. Why should not we provision her
+and take our chance? We know more or less which way to steer.”
+
+Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.
+
+“Wouldn’t it be rather a risky job in an open boat?” he asked.
+“However, that doesn’t matter much because I don’t take any account of
+risks, knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow and that the
+hairs of my head are all numbered.”
+
+“They might be numbered under water as well as above it,” muttered
+Bickley, “and I feel sure that on your own showing, you would be as
+valuable dead as alive.”
+
+“What I seem to feel,” went on Bastin, “is that I have work to my hand
+here. Also, the _locum tenens_ at Fulcombe no doubt runs the parish as
+well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man for the place than
+I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but I do not despair of him
+yet, and besides him there is the Glittering Lady, a most open-minded
+person, whom I have not yet had any real opportunity of approaching in
+a spiritual sense. Then there are all these natives who cannot learn
+without a teacher. So on the whole I think I would rather stay where I
+am until Providence points out some other path.”
+
+“I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons,” I said.
+“I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of men to come in
+touch with such things as we have found upon this island. They may be
+illusions, but at least they are very interesting illusions. One might
+live ten lifetimes and find nothing else of the sort. Therefore I
+should like to see the end of the dream.”
+
+Bickley reflected a little, then said:
+
+“On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am terribly
+afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear and see, and
+that way madness lies. It is better to die than to go mad.”
+
+“You’ll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean decease,
+of course,” interrupted Bastin. “And who knows, perhaps all this is an
+opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes, which, I must say,
+are singularly blind. You think you know everything there is to learn,
+but the fact is that like the rest of us, you know nothing at all, and
+good man though you are, obstinately refuse to admit the truth and to
+seek support elsewhere. For my part I believe that you are afraid of
+falling in love with that Glittering Lady and of being convinced by her
+that you are wrong in your most unsatisfactory conclusions.”
+
+“I am out-voted anyway,” said Bickley, “and for the rest, Bastin, look
+after yourself and leave me alone. I will add that on the whole I think
+you are both right, and that it is wisest for us to stop where we are,
+for after all we can only die once.”
+
+“I am not so sure, Bickley. There is a thing called the second death,
+which is what is troubling that old scoundrel, Oro. Now I will go and
+look for those books.”
+
+So the idea of flight was abandoned, although I admit that even to
+myself it had attractions. For I felt that I was being wrapped in a net
+of mysteries from which I saw no escape. Yes, and of more than
+mysteries; I who had sworn that I would never look upon another woman,
+was learning to love this sweet and wondrous Yva, and of that what
+could be the end?
+
+We collected all we had come to seek, and started homewards escorted by
+Marama and his people, including a number of young women who danced
+before us in a light array of flowers.
+
+Passing our old house, we came to the grove where the idol Oro had
+stood and Bastin was so nearly sacrificed. There was another idol there
+now which he wished to examine, but in the end did not as the natives
+so obviously objected. Indeed Marama told me that notwithstanding the
+mysterious death of the sorcerers on the Rock of Offerings, there was
+still a strong party in the island who would be glad to do us a
+mischief if any further affront were offered to their hereditary god.
+
+He questioned us also tentatively about the apparition, for such he
+conceived it to be, which had appeared upon the rock and killed the
+sorcerers, and I answered him as I thought wisest, telling him that a
+terrible Power was afoot in the land, which he would do well to obey.
+
+“Yes,” he said; “the God of the Mountain of whom the tradition has come
+down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he sees, he hears
+and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O Friend-from-the-Sea.”
+
+As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick bush.
+Suddenly from out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore a mask upon
+his face, but from his shape could not have been more than thirteen or
+fourteen years of age. In his hand was a wooden club. He ran forward,
+stopped, and with a yell of hate hurled it, I think at Bastin, but it
+hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and remembered no more.
+
+Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do not
+know. It seemed to me that through them continually I saw the stately
+figure of old Oro contemplating me gravely, as though he were making up
+his mind about something in which I must play a part. Then there was
+another figure, that of the gracious but imperial Yva, who from time to
+time, as I thought, leant over me and whispered in my ear words of rest
+and comfort. Nor was this all, since her shape had a way of changing
+suddenly into that of my lost wife who would speak with her voice. Or
+perhaps my wife would speak with Yva’s voice. To my disordered sense it
+was as though they were one personality, having two shapes, either of
+which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me most
+blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the dead, and in
+the dead the living. More, I took journeys, or rather some unknown part
+of me seemed to do so. One of these I remember, for its majestic
+character stamped itself upon my mind in such a fashion that all the
+waters of delirium could not wash it out nor all its winds blow away
+that memory.
+
+I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster than
+light can flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near, they grew
+into enormous, flaming Glories round which circled world upon world.
+They became small, dwindled to points of light and disappeared.
+
+We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous white city
+wherein were buildings with domes of crystal and alabaster, in the
+latter of which were set windows made of great jewels; sapphires or
+rubies they seemed to me. We went on up a lovely valley. To the left
+were hills, down which tumbled waterfalls; to the right was a river
+broad and deep that seemed to overflow its banks as does the Nile.
+Behind were high mountains on the slopes of which grew forests of
+glorious trees, some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up their
+crests stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
+guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was lit with
+a light such as that of the moon, only intensified and of many colours.
+Indeed looking up, I saw that above us floated three moons, each of
+them bigger than our own at the full, and gathered that here it was
+night.
+
+We came to a house set amid scented gardens and having in front of it
+terraces of flowers. It seemed not unlike my own house at home, but I
+took little note of it, because of a woman who sat upon the verandah,
+if I may call it so. She was clad in garments of white silk fastened
+about her middle with a jewelled girdle. On her neck also was a collar
+of jewels. I forget the colour; indeed this seemed to change
+continually as the light from the different moons struck when she
+moved, but I think its prevailing tinge was blue. In her arms this
+woman nursed a beauteous, sleeping child, singing happily as she rocked
+it to and fro. Yva went towards the woman who looked up at her step and
+uttered a little cry. Then for the first time I saw the woman’s face.
+It was that of my dead wife!
+
+As I followed in my dream, a little cloud of mist seemed to cover both
+my wife and Yva, and when I reached the place Yva was gone. Only my
+wife remained, she and the child. There she stood, solemn and sweet.
+While I drew near she laid down the child upon the cushioned seat from
+which she had risen. She stretched out her arms and flung them about
+me. She embraced me and I embraced her in a rapture of reunion. Then
+turning she lifted up the child, it was a girl, for me to kiss.
+
+“See your daughter,” she said, “and behold all that I am making ready
+for you where we shall dwell in a day to come.”
+
+I grew confused.
+
+“Yva,” I said. “Where is Yva who brought me here? Did she go into the
+house?”
+
+“Yes,” she answered happily. “Yva went into the house. Look again!”
+
+I looked and it was Yva’s face that was pressed against my own, and
+Yva’s eyes that gazed into mine. Only she was garbed as my wife had
+been, and on her bosom hung the changeful necklace.
+
+“You may not stay,” she whispered, and lo! it was my wife that spoke,
+not Yva.
+
+“Tell me what it means?” I implored.
+
+“I cannot,” she answered. “There are mysteries that you may not know as
+yet. Love Yva if you will and I shall not be jealous, for in loving Yva
+you love me. You cannot understand? Then know this, that the spirit has
+many shapes, and yet is the same spirit—sometimes. Now I who am far,
+yet near, bid you farewell a while.”
+
+Then all passed in a flash and the dream ended.
+
+Such was the only one of those visions which I can recall.
+
+I seemed to wake up as from a long and tumultuous sleep. The first
+thing I saw was the palm roof of our house upon the rock. I knew it was
+our house, for just above me was a palm leaf of which I had myself tied
+the stalk to the framework with a bit of coloured ribbon that I had
+chanced to find in my pocket. It came originally from the programme
+card of a dance that I had attended at Honolulu and I had kept it
+because I thought it might be useful. Finally I used it to secure that
+loose leaf. I stared at the ribbon which brought back a flood of
+memories, and as I was thus engaged I heard voices talking, and
+listened—Bickley’s voice, and the Lady Yva’s.
+
+“Yes,” Bickley was saying, “he will do well now, but he went near, very
+near.”
+
+“I knew he would not die,” she answered, “because my father said so.”
+
+“There are two sorts of deaths,” replied Bickley, “that of the body and
+that of the mind. I was afraid that even if he lived, his reason would
+go, but from certain indications I do not think that will happen now.
+He will get quite well again—though—” and he stopped.
+
+“I am very glad to hear you say so,” chimed in Bastin. “For weeks I
+thought that I should have to read the Burial Service over poor
+Arbuthnot. Indeed I was much puzzled as to the best place to bury him.
+Finally I found a very suitable spot round the corner there, where it
+isn’t rock, in which one can’t dig and the soil is not liable to be
+flooded. In fact I went so far as to clear away the bush and to mark
+out the grave with its foot to the east. In this climate one can’t
+delay, you know.”
+
+Weak as I was, I smiled. This practical proceeding was so exactly like
+Bastin.
+
+“Well, you wasted your labour,” exclaimed Bickley.
+
+“Yes, I am glad to say I did. But I don’t think it was your operations
+and the rest that cured him, Bickley, although you take all the credit.
+I believe it was the Life-water that the Lady Yva made him drink and
+the stuff that Oro sent which we gave him when you weren’t looking.”
+
+“Then I hope that in the future you will not interfere with my cases,”
+said the indignant Bickley, and either the voices passed away or I went
+to sleep.
+
+When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my side
+watching me.
+
+“Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out walking,” she
+said slowly in English.
+
+“Who taught you my language?” I asked, astonished.
+
+“Bastin and Bickley, while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man
+just same now as he was hundred thousand years ago,” she added
+enigmatically. “All think one woman beautiful when no other woman
+there.”
+
+“Indeed,” I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part of
+Bastin and Bickley she alluded. Could that self-centred pair—oh! it was
+impossible.
+
+“How long have I been ill?” I asked to escape the subject which I felt
+to be uncomfortable.
+
+She lifted her beautiful eyes in search of words and began to count
+upon her fingers.
+
+“Two moon, one half moon, yes, ten week, counting Sabbath,” she
+answered triumphantly.
+
+“Ten weeks!” I exclaimed.
+
+“Yes, Humphrey, ten whole weeks and three days you first bad, then mad.
+Oh!” she went on, breaking into the Orofenan tongue which she spoke so
+perfectly, although it was not her own. That language of hers I never
+learned, but I know she thought in it and only translated into
+Orofenan, because of the great difficulty which she had in rendering
+her high and refined ideas into its simpler metaphor, and the strange
+words which often she introduced. “Oh! you have been very ill, friend
+of my heart. At times I thought that you were going to die, and wept
+and wept. Bickley thinks that he saved you and he is very clever. But
+he could not have saved you; that wanted more knowledge than any of
+your people have; only I pray you, do not tell him so because it would
+hurt his pride.”
+
+“What was the matter with me then, Yva?”
+
+“All was the matter. First, the weapon which that youth threw—he was
+the son of the sorcerer whom my father destroyed—crushed in the bone of
+your head. He is dead for his crime and may he be accursed for ever,”
+she added in the only outbreak of rage and vindictiveness in which I
+ever saw her indulge.
+
+“One must make excuses for him; his father had been killed,” I said.
+
+“Yes, that is what Bastin tells me, and it is true. Still, for that
+young man I can make no excuse; it was cowardly and wicked. Well,
+Bickley performed what he calls operation, and the Lord Oro, he came up
+from his house and helped him, because Bastin is no good in such
+things. Then he can only turn away his head and pray. I, too, helped,
+holding hot water and linen and jar of the stuff that made you feel
+like nothing, although the sight made me feel more sick than anything
+since I saw one I loved killed, oh, long, long ago.”
+
+“Was the operation successful?” I asked, for I did not dare to begin to
+thank her.
+
+“Yes, that clever man, Bickley, lifted the bone which had been crushed
+in. Only then something broke in your head and you began to bleed
+here,” and she touched what I believe is called the temporal artery.
+“The vein had been crushed by the blow, and gave way. Bickley worked
+and worked, and just in time he tied it up before you died. Oh! then I
+felt as though I loved Bickley, though afterwards Bastin said that I
+ought to have loved _him_, since it was not Bickley who stopped the
+bleeding, but his prayer.”
+
+“Perhaps it was both,” I suggested.
+
+“Perhaps, Humphrey, at least you were saved. Then came another trouble.
+You took fever. Bickley said that it was because a certain gnat had
+bitten you when you went down to the ship, and my father, the Lord Oro,
+told me that this was right. At the least you grew very weak and lost
+your mind, and it seemed as though you must die. Then, Humphrey, I went
+to the Lord Oro and kneeled before him and prayed for your life, for I
+knew that he could cure you if he would, though Bickley’s skill was at
+an end.
+
+“‘Daughter,’ he said to me, ‘not once but again and again you have set
+up your will against mine in the past. Why then should I trouble myself
+to grant this desire of yours in the present, and save a man who is
+nothing to me?’
+
+“I rose to my feet and answered, ‘I do not know, my Father, yet I am
+certain that for your own sake it will be well to do so. I am sure that
+of everything even you must give an account at last, great though you
+be, and who knows, perhaps one life which you have saved may turn the
+balance in your favour.’
+
+“‘Surely the priest Bastin has been talking to you,’ he said.
+
+“‘He has,’ I answered, ‘and not he alone. Many voices have been talking
+to me.’”
+
+“What did you mean by that?” I asked.
+
+“It matters nothing what I meant, Humphrey. Be still and listen to my
+story. My father thought a while and answered:
+
+“‘I am jealous of this stranger. What is he but a short-lived
+half-barbarian such as we knew in the old days? And yet already you
+think more of him than you do of me, your father, the divine Oro who
+has lived a thousand years. At first I helped that physician to save
+him, but now I think I wish him dead.’
+
+“‘If you let this man die, my Father,’ I answered, ‘then we part.
+Remember that I also have of the wisdom of our people, and can use it
+if I will.’
+
+“‘Then save him yourself,’ he said.
+
+“‘Perhaps I shall, my Father,’ I answered, ‘but if so it will not be
+here. I say that if so we part and you shall be left to rule in your
+majesty alone.’
+
+“Now this frightened the Lord Oro, for he has the weakness that he
+hates to be alone.
+
+“‘If I do what you will, do you swear never to leave me, Yva?’ he
+asked. ‘Know that if you will not swear, the man dies.’
+
+“‘I swear,’ I answered—for your sake, Humphrey—though I did not love
+the oath.
+
+“Then he gave me a certain medicine to mix with the Life-water, and
+when you were almost gone that medicine cured you, though Bickley does
+not know it, as nothing else could have done. Now I have told you the
+truth, for your own ear only, Humphrey.”
+
+“Yva,” I asked, “why did you do all this for me?”
+
+“Humphrey, I do not know,” she answered, “but I think because I must.
+Now sleep a while.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+So far as my body was concerned I grew well with great rapidity, though
+it was long before I got back my strength. Thus I could not walk far or
+endure any sustained exertion. With my mind it was otherwise. I can not
+explain what had happened to it; indeed I do not know, but in a sense
+it seemed to have become detached and to have assumed a kind of
+personality of its own. At times it felt as though it were no longer an
+inhabitant of the body, but rather its more or less independent
+partner. I was perfectly clear-headed and of insanity I experienced no
+symptoms. Yet my mind, I use that term from lack of a better, was not
+entirely under my control. For one thing, at night it appeared to
+wander far away, though whither it went and what it saw there I could
+never remember.
+
+I record this because possibly it explains certain mysterious events,
+if they were events and not dreams, which shortly I must set out. I
+spoke to Bickley about the matter. He put it by lightly, saying that it
+was only a result of my long and most severe illness and that I should
+steady down in time, especially if we could escape from that island and
+its unnatural atmosphere. Yet as he spoke he glanced at me shrewdly
+with his quick eyes, and when he turned to go away I heard him mutter
+something to himself about “unholy influences” and “that confounded old
+Oro.”
+
+The words were spoken to himself and quite beneath his breath, and of
+course not meant to reach me. But one of the curious concomitants of my
+state was that all my senses, and especially my hearing, had become
+most abnormally acute. A whisper far away was now to me like a loud
+remark made in a room.
+
+Bickley’s reflection, for I can scarcely call it more, set me thinking.
+Yva had said that Oro sent me medicine which was administered to me
+without Bickley’s knowledge, and as she believed, saved my life, or
+certainly my reason. What was in it? I wondered. Then there was that
+Life-water which Yva brought and insisted upon my drinking every day.
+Undoubtedly it was a marvelous tonic and did me good. But it had other
+effects also. Thus, as she said would be the case, after a course of it
+I conceived the greatest dislike, which I may add has never entirely
+left me, of any form of meat, also of alcohol. All I seemed to want was
+this water with fruit, or such native vegetables as there were. Bickley
+disapproved and made me eat fish occasionally, but even this revolted
+me, and since I gained steadily in weight, as we found out by a simple
+contrivance, and remained healthy in every other way, soon he allowed
+me to choose my own diet.
+
+About this time Oro began to pay me frequent visits. He always came at
+night, and what is more I knew when he was coming, although he never
+gave me warning. Here I should explain that during my illness Bastin,
+who was so ingenious in such matters, had built another hut in which he
+and Bickley slept, of course when they were not watching me, leaving
+our old bed-chamber to myself.
+
+Well, I would wake up and be aware that Oro was coming. Then he
+appeared in a silent and mysterious way, as though he had materialised
+in the room, for I never saw him pass the doorway. In the moonlight, or
+the starlight, which flowed through the entrance and the side of the
+hut that was only enclosed with latticework, I perceived him seat
+himself upon a certain stool, looking like a most majestic ghost with
+his flowing robes, long white beard, hooked nose and hawk eyes. In the
+day-time he much resembled the late General Booth whom I had often
+seen, except for certain added qualities of height and classic beauty
+of countenance. At night, however, he resembled no one but himself,
+indeed there was something mighty and godlike in his appearance,
+something that made one feel that he was not as are other men.
+
+For a while he would sit and look at me. Then he began to speak in a
+low, vibrant voice. What did he speak of? Well, many matters. It was as
+though he were unburdening that hoary soul of his because it could no
+longer endure the grandeur of its own loneliness. Amongst sundry secret
+things, he told me of the past history of this world of ours, and of
+the mighty civilisations which for uncounted ages he and his
+forefathers had ruled by the strength of their will and knowledge, of
+the dwindling of their race and of the final destruction of its
+enemies, although I noticed that now he no longer said that this was
+his work alone. One night I asked him if he did not miss all such pomp
+and power.
+
+Then suddenly he broke out, and for the first time I really learned
+what ambition can be when it utterly possesses the soul of man.
+
+“Are you mad,” he asked, “that you suppose that I, Oro, the King of
+kings, can be content to dwell solitary in a great cave with none but
+the shadows of the dead to serve me? Nay, I must rule again and be even
+greater than before, or else I too will die. Better to face the future,
+even if it means oblivion, than to remain thus a relic of a glorious
+past, still living and yet dead, like that statue of the great god Fate
+which you saw in the temple of my worship.”
+
+“Bastin does not think that the future means oblivion,” I remarked.
+
+“I know it. I have studied his faith and find it too humble for my
+taste, also too new. Shall I, Oro, creep a suppliant before any Power,
+and confess what Bastin is pleased to call my sins? Nay, I who am great
+will be the equal of all greatness, or nothing.”
+
+He paused a while, then went on:
+
+“Bastin speaks of ‘eternity.’ Where and what then is this eternity
+which if it has no end can have had no beginning? I know the secret of
+the suns and their attendant worlds, and they are no more eternal than
+the insect which glitters for an hour. Out of shapeless, rushing gases
+they gathered to live their day, and into gases at last they dissolve
+again with all they bore.”
+
+“Yes,” I answered, “but they reform into new worlds.”
+
+“That have no part with the old. This world, too, will melt, departing
+to whence it came, as your sacred writings say, and what then of those
+who dwelt and dwell thereon? No, Man of today, give me Time in which I
+rule and keep your dreams of an Eternity that is not, and in which you
+must still crawl and serve, even if it were. Yet, if I might, I confess
+it, I would live on for ever, but as Master not as Slave.”
+
+On another night he began to tempt me, very subtly. “I see a spark of
+greatness in you, Humphrey,” he said, “and it comes into my heart that
+you, too, might learn to rule. With Yva, the last of my blood, it is
+otherwise. She is the child of my age and of a race outworn; too
+gentle, too much all womanly. The soul that triumphs must shine like
+steel in the sun, and cut if need be; not merely be beauteous and shed
+perfume like a lily in the shade. Yet she is very wise and fair,” here
+he looked at me, “perchance of her might come children such as were
+their forefathers, who again would wield the sceptre of the dominion of
+the earth.”
+
+I made no answer, wondering what he meant exactly and thinking it
+wisest to be silent.
+
+“You are of the short-lived races,” he went on, “yet very much a man,
+not without intelligence, and by the arts I have I can so strengthen
+your frame that it will endure the shocks of time for three such lives
+as yours, or perchance for more, and then—”
+
+Again he paused and went on:
+
+“The Daughter of kings likes you also, perhaps because you resemble—”
+here he fixed me with his piercing eyes, “a certain kinglet of base
+blood whom once she also liked, but whom it was my duty to destroy.
+Well, I must think. I must study this world of yours also and therein
+you may help me. Perhaps afterwards I will tell you how. Now sleep.”
+
+In another moment he was gone, but notwithstanding his powerful
+command, for a while I could not sleep. I understood that he was
+offering Yva to me, but upon what terms? That was the question. With
+her was to go great dominion over the kingdoms of the earth. I could
+not help remembering that always this has been and still is Satan’s
+favourite bait. To me it did not particularly appeal. I had been
+ambitious in my time—who is not that is worth his salt? I could have
+wished to excel in something, literature or art, or whatever it might
+be, and thus to ensure the memory of my name in the world.
+
+Of course this is a most futile desire, seeing that soon or late every
+name must fade out of the world like an unfixed photograph which is
+exposed to the sun. Even if it could endure, as the old demigod, or
+demidevil, Oro, had pointed out, very shortly, by comparison with
+Time’s unmeasured vastness, the whole solar system will also fade. So
+of what use is this feeble love of fame and this vain attempt to be
+remembered that animates us so strongly? Moreover, the idea of enjoying
+mere temporal as opposed to intellectual power, appealed to me not at
+all. I am a student of history and I know what has been the lot of
+kings and the evil that, often enough, they work in their little day.
+
+Also if I needed any further example, there was that of Oro himself. He
+had outlived the greatness of his House, as a royal family is called,
+and after some gigantic murder, if his own story was to be believed,
+indulged in a prolonged sleep. Now he awoke to find himself quite alone
+in the world, save for a daughter with whom he did not agree or
+sympathise. In short, he was but a kind of animated mummy inspired by
+one idea which I felt quite sure would be disappointed, namely, to
+renew his former greatness. To me he seemed as miserable a figure as
+one could imagine, brooding and plotting in his illuminated cave, at
+the end of an extended but misspent life.
+
+Also I wondered what he, or rather his _ego_, had been doing during all
+those two hundred and fifty thousand years of sleep. Possibly if Yva’s
+theory, as I understood it, were correct, he had reincarnated as
+Attila, or Tamerlane, or Napoleon, or even as Chaka the terrible Zulu
+king. At any rate there he was still in the world, filled with the
+dread of death, but consumed now as ever by his insatiable and most
+useless finite ambitions.
+
+Yva, also! Her case was his, but yet how different. In all this long
+night of Time she had but ripened into one of the sweetest and most
+gentle women that ever the world bore. She, too, was great in her way,
+it appeared in her every word and gesture, but where was the ferocity
+of her father? Where his desire to reach to splendour by treading on a
+blood-stained road paved with broken human hearts? It did not exist.
+Her nature was different although her body came of a long line of these
+power-loving kings. Why this profound difference of the spirit? Like
+everything else it was a mystery. The two were as far apart as the
+Poles. Everyone must have hated Oro, from the beginning, however much
+he feared him, but everyone who came in touch with her must have loved
+Yva.
+
+Here I may break into my personal narrative to say that this, by their
+own confession, proved to be true of two such various persons as Bastin
+and Bickley.
+
+“The truth, which I am sure it would be wrong to hide from you,
+Arbuthnot,” said the former to me one day, “is that during your long
+illness I fell in love, I suppose that is the right word, with the
+Glittering Lady. After thinking the matter over also, I conceived that
+it would be proper to tell her so if only to clear the air and prevent
+future misunderstandings. As I remarked to her on that occasion, I had
+hesitated long, as I was not certain how she would fill the place of
+the wife of the incumbent of an English parish.”
+
+“Mothers’ Meetings, and the rest,” I suggested.
+
+“Exactly so, Arbuthnot. Also there were the views of the Bishop to be
+considered, who might have objected to the introduction into the
+diocese of a striking person who so recently had been a heathen, and to
+one in such strong contrast to my late beloved wife.”
+
+“I suppose you didn’t consider the late Mrs. Bastin’s views on the
+subject of re-marriage. I remember that they were strong,” I remarked
+rather maliciously.
+
+“No, I did not think it necessary, since the Scriptural instructions on
+the matter are very clear, and in another world no doubt all
+jealousies, even Sarah’s, will be obliterated. Upon that point my
+conscience was quite easy. So when I found that, unlike her parent, the
+Lady Yva was much inclined to accept the principles of the faith in
+which it is my privilege to instruct her, I thought it proper to say to
+her that if ultimately she made up her mind to do so—of course _this_
+was a _sine qua non_—I should be much honoured, and as a man, not as a
+priest, it would make me most happy if she would take me as a husband.
+Of course I explained to her that I considered, under the
+circumstances, I could quite lawfully perform the marriage ceremony
+myself with you and Bickley as witnesses, even should Oro refuse to
+give her away. Also I told her that although after her varied
+experiences in the past, life at Fulcombe, if we could ever get there,
+might be a little monotonous, still it would not be entirely devoid of
+interest.”
+
+“You mean Christmas decorations and that sort of thing?”
+
+“Yes, and choir treats and entertaining Deputations and attending other
+Church activities.”
+
+“Well, and what did she say, Bastin?”
+
+“Oh! she was most kind and flattering. Indeed that hour will always
+remain the pleasantest of my life. I don’t know how it happened, but
+when it was over I felt quite delighted that she had refused me. Indeed
+on second thoughts, I am not certain but that I shall be much happier
+in the capacities of a brother and teacher which she asked me to fill,
+than I should have been as her husband. To tell you the truth,
+Arbuthnot, there are moments when I am not sure whether I entirely
+understand the Lady Yva. It was rather like proposing to one’s guardian
+angel.”
+
+“Yes,” I said, “that’s about it, old fellow. ‘Guardian Angel’ is not a
+bad name for her.”
+
+Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
+
+“Look here, Arbuthnot,” he said. “I want to own up to something. I
+think I ought to, because of certain things I have observed, in order
+to prevent possible future misunderstandings.”
+
+“What’s that?” I asked innocently.
+
+“Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed bachelor on
+principle. Women introduce too many complications into life, and
+although it involves some sacrifice, on the whole, I have thought it
+best to do without them and leave the carrying on of the world to
+others.”
+
+“Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley.”
+
+“Only this. While you were ill the sweetness of that Lady Yva and her
+wonderful qualities as a nurse overcame me. I went to pieces all of a
+sudden. I saw in her a realisation of every ideal I had ever
+entertained of perfect womanhood. So to speak, my resolves of a
+lifetime melted like wax in the sun. Notwithstanding her queer history
+and the marvels with which she is mixed up, I wished to marry her. No
+doubt her physical loveliness was at the bottom of it, but, however
+that may be, there it was.”
+
+“She is beautiful,” I commented; “though I daresay older than she
+looks.”
+
+“That is a point on which I made no inquiries, and I should advise you,
+when your turn comes, as no doubt it will, to follow my example. You
+know, Arbuthnot,” he mused, “however lovely a woman may be, it would
+put one off if suddenly she announced that she was—let us say—a hundred
+and fifty years old.”
+
+“Yes,” I admitted, “for nobody wants to marry the contemporary of his
+great-grandmother. However, she gave her age as twenty-seven years and
+three moons.”
+
+“And doubtless for once did not tell the truth. But, as she does not
+look more than twenty-five, I think that we may all agree to let it
+stand at that, namely, twenty-seven, plus an indefinite period of
+sleep. At any rate, she is a sweet and most gracious woman, apparently
+in the bloom of youth, and, to cut it short, I fell in love with her.”
+
+“Like Bastin,” I said.
+
+“Bastin!” exclaimed Bickley indignantly. “You don’t mean to say that
+clerical oaf presumed—well, well, after all, I suppose that he is a
+man, so one mustn’t be hard on him. But who could have thought that he
+would run so cunning, even when he knew my sentiments towards the lady?
+I hope she told him her mind.”
+
+“The point is, what did she tell _you_, Bickley?”
+
+“Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure to be
+refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one’s ease.” (Here,
+remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to hide a
+smile.) “She said—what did she say exactly? Such a lot that it is
+difficult to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking of marriage. Also,
+that she had not yet recovered from some recent love affair which left
+her heart sore, since the time of her sleep did not count. Also, that
+her father would never consent, and that the mere idea of such a thing
+would excite his animosity against all of us.”
+
+“Is that all?” I asked.
+
+“Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and extremely
+honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her. She hoped,
+however, that I should never repeat it or even allude to the matter
+again, as her dearest wish was to be able to look upon me as her most
+intimate friend to whom she could always come for sympathy and
+counsel.”
+
+“What happened then?”
+
+“Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she wished,
+and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore and upset, but
+I am getting over it, having always practised self-control.”
+
+“I am sorry for you, old fellow.”
+
+“Are you?” he asked suspiciously. “Then perhaps you have tried your
+luck, too?”
+
+“No, Bickley.”
+
+His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
+
+“Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing how lately
+you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin. Perhaps you will
+get over it—recent marriage, I mean—as he has.” He hesitated a while,
+then went on: “Of course you will, old fellow; I know it, and, what is
+more, I seem to know that when your turn comes you will get a different
+answer. If so, it will keep her in the family as it were—and good luck
+to you. Only—”
+
+“Only what?” I asked anxiously.
+
+“To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don’t think that there will be real good
+luck for any one of us over this woman—not in the ordinary sense, I
+mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman. Is she quite a
+woman, and could she really marry a man as others do?”
+
+“It is curious that you should talk like that,” I said uneasily. “I
+thought that you had made up your mind that the whole business was
+either illusion or trickery—I mean, the odd side of it.”
+
+“If it is illusion, Arbuthnot, then a man cannot marry an illusion. And
+if it is trickery, then he will certainly be tricked. But, supposing
+that I am wrong, what then?”
+
+“You mean, supposing things are as they seem to be?”
+
+“Yes. In that event, Arbuthnot, I am sure that something will occur to
+prevent your being united to a woman who lived thousands of years ago.
+I am sorry to say it, but Fate will intervene. Remember, it is the god
+of her people that I suppose she worships, and, I may add, to which the
+whole world bows.”
+
+At his words a kind of chill fell upon me. I think he saw or divined
+it, for after a few remarks upon some indifferent matter, he turned and
+went away.
+
+Shortly after this Yva came to sit with me. She studied me for a while
+and I studied her. I had reason to do so, for I observed that of late
+her dress had become much more modern, and on the present occasion this
+struck me forcibly. I do not know exactly in what the change, or
+changes, consisted, because I am not skilled in such matters and can
+only judge of a woman’s garments by their general effect. At any rate,
+the gorgeous sweeping robes were gone, and though her attire still
+looked foreign and somewhat oriental, with a touch of barbaric
+splendour about it—it was simpler than it had been and showed more of
+her figure, which was delicate, yet gracious.
+
+“You have changed your robes, Lady,” I said.
+
+“Yes, Humphrey. Bastin gave me pictures of those your women wear.” (On
+further investigation I found that this referred to an old copy of the
+_Queen_ newspaper, which, somehow or other, had been brought with the
+books from the ship.) “I have tried to copy them a little,” she added
+doubtfully.
+
+“How do you do it? Where do you get the material?” I asked.
+
+“Oh!” she answered with an airy wave of her hand, “I make it—it is
+there.”
+
+“I don’t understand,” I said, but she only smiled radiantly, offering
+no further explanation. Then, before I could pursue the subject, she
+asked me suddenly:
+
+“What has Bickley been saying to you about me?”
+
+I fenced, answering: “I don’t know. Bastin and Bickley talk of little
+else. You seem to have been a great deal with them while I was ill.”
+
+“Yes, a great deal. They are the nearest to you who were so sick. Is it
+not so?”
+
+“I don’t know,” I answered again. “In my illness it seemed to me that
+_you_ were the nearest.”
+
+“About Bastin’s words I can guess,” she went on. “But I ask again—what
+has Bickley been saying to you about me? Of the first part, let it be;
+tell me the rest.”
+
+I intended to evade her question, but she fixed those violet,
+compelling eyes upon me and I was obliged to answer.
+
+“I believe you know as well as I do,” I said; “but if you will have it,
+it was that you are not as other human women are, and that he who would
+treat you as such, must suffer; that was the gist of it.”
+
+“Some might be content to suffer for such as I,” she answered with
+quiet sweetness. “Even Bastin and Bickley may be content to suffer in
+their own little ways.”
+
+“You know that is not what I meant,” I interrupted angrily, for I felt
+that she was throwing reflections on me.
+
+“No; you meant that you agreed with Bickley that I am not quite a
+woman, as you know women.”
+
+I was silent, for her words were true.
+
+Then she blazed out into one of her flashes of splendour, like
+something that takes fire on an instant; like the faint and distant
+star which flames into sudden glory before the watcher’s telescope.
+
+“It is true that I am not as your women are—your poor, pale women, the
+shadows of an hour with night behind them and before. Because I am
+humble and patient, do you therefore suppose that I am not great? Man
+from the little country across the sea, I lived when the world was
+young, and gathered up the ancient wisdom of a greater race than yours,
+and when the world is old I think that I still shall live, though not
+in this shape or here, with all that wisdom’s essence burning in my
+breast, and with all beauty in my eyes. Bickley does not believe
+although he worships. You only half believe and do not worship, because
+memory holds you back, and I myself do not understand. I only know
+though knowing so much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble
+road called Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an
+immortal city.”
+
+“Nor do I understand how all this can be, Yva,” I said feebly, for she
+dazzled and overwhelmed me with her blaze of power.
+
+“No, you do not understand. How can you, when even I cannot? Thus for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years I slept, and they went by as a
+lightning flash. One moment my father gave me the draught and I laid me
+down, the next I awoke with you bending over me, or so it seemed. Yet
+where was I through all those centuries when for me time had ceased?
+Tell me, Humphrey, did you dream at all while you were ill? I ask
+because down in that lonely cavern where I sleep a strange dream came
+to me one night. It was of a journey which, as I thought, you and I
+seemed to make together, past suns and universes to a very distant
+earth. It meant nothing, Humphrey. If you and I chanced to have dreamed
+the same thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is
+most common, or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I am not
+altogether as your women are, and I can bring no happiness to any man,
+or at the least, to one who cannot wait. Therefore, perhaps you would
+do well to think less of me, as I have counselled Bastin and Bickley.”
+
+Then again she gazed at me with her wonderful, great eyes, and, shaking
+her glittering head a little, smiled and went.
+
+But oh! that smile drew my heart after her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night
+
+
+As time went on, Oro began to visit me more and more frequently, till
+at last scarcely a night went by that he did not appear mysteriously in
+my sleeping-place. The odd thing was that neither Bickley nor Bastin
+seemed to be aware of these nocturnal calls. Indeed, when I mentioned
+them on one or two occasions, they stared at me and said it was strange
+that he should have come and gone as they saw nothing of him.
+
+On my speaking again of the matter, Bickley at once turned the
+conversation, from which I gathered that he believed me to be suffering
+from delusions consequent on my illness, or perhaps to have taken to
+dreaming. This was not wonderful since, as I learned afterwards,
+Bickley, after he was sure that I was asleep, made a practice of tying
+a thread across my doorway and of ascertaining at the dawn that it
+remained unbroken. But Oro was not to be caught in that way. I suppose,
+as it was impossible for him to pass through the latticework of the
+open side of the house, that he undid the thread and fastened it again
+when he left; at least, that was Bastin’s explanation, or, rather, one
+of them. Another was that he crawled beneath it, but this I could not
+believe. I am quite certain that during all his prolonged existence Oro
+never crawled.
+
+At any rate, he came, or seemed to come, and pumped me—I can use no
+other word—most energetically as to existing conditions in the world,
+especially those of the civilised countries, their methods of
+government, their social state, the physical characteristics of the
+various races, their religions, the exact degrees of civilisation that
+they had developed, their attainments in art, science and literature,
+their martial capacities, their laws, and I know not what besides.
+
+I told him all I could, but did not in the least seem to satisfy his
+perennial thirst for information.
+
+“I should prefer to judge for myself,” he said at last.
+
+“Why are you so anxious to learn about all these nations, Oro?” I
+asked, exhausted.
+
+“Because the knowledge I gather may affect my plans for the future,” he
+replied darkly.
+
+“I am told, Oro, that your people acquired the power of transporting
+themselves from place to place.”
+
+“It is true that the lords of the Sons of Wisdom had such power, and
+that I have it still, O Humphrey.”
+
+“Then why do you not go to look with your own eyes?” I suggested.
+
+“Because I should need a guide; one who could explain much in a short
+time,” he said, contemplating me with his burning glance until I began
+to feel uncomfortable.
+
+To change the subject I asked him whether he had any further
+information about the war, which he had told me was raging in Europe.
+
+He answered: “Not much; only that it was going on with varying success,
+and would continue to do so until the nations involved therein were
+exhausted,” or so he believed. The war did not seem greatly to interest
+Oro. It was, he remarked, but a small affair compared to those which he
+had known in the old days. Then he departed, and I went to sleep.
+
+Next night he appeared again, and, after talking a little on different
+subjects, remarked quietly that he had been thinking over what I had
+said as to his visiting the modern world, and intended to act upon the
+suggestion.
+
+“When?” I asked.
+
+“Now,” he said. “I am going to visit this England of yours and the town
+you call London, and _you_ will accompany me.”
+
+“It is not possible!” I exclaimed. “We have no ship.”
+
+“We can travel without a ship,” said Oro.
+
+I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a much
+better companion than I should in my present weak state.
+
+“An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues, would be
+useless,” he replied sharply. “You shall come and you only.”
+
+I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly—which, indeed, I did do, in
+another sense.
+
+But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand to and
+fro above my head.
+
+My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
+
+They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog, which I
+knew could belong to one place only—London, in December, and at my side
+was Oro.
+
+“Is this the climate of your wonderful city?” he asked, or seemed to
+ask, in an aggrieved tone.
+
+I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and began to
+look about me.
+
+Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of buildings,
+looking dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I recognised the Houses
+of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, for both could be seen from where
+we stood in front of the Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their
+identity to Oro.
+
+“Good,” he said. “Let us enter your Place of Talk.”
+
+“But I am not a member, and we have no passes for the Strangers’
+Gallery,” I expostulated.
+
+“We shall not need any,” he replied contemptuously. “Lead on.”
+
+Thus adjured, I crossed the road, Oro following me. Looking round, to
+my horror I saw him right in the path of a motor-bus which seemed to go
+over him.
+
+“There’s an end to Oro,” thought I to myself. “Well, at any rate, I
+have got home.”
+
+Next instant he was at my side quite undisturbed by the incident of the
+bus. We came to a policeman at the door and I hesitated, expecting to
+be challenged. But the policeman seemed absolutely indifferent to our
+presence, even when Oro marched past him in his flowing robes. So I
+followed with a like success. Then I understood that we must be
+invisible.
+
+We passed to the lobby, where members were hurrying to and fro, and
+constituents and pressmen were gathered, and so on into the House. Oro
+walked up its floor and took his stand by the table, in front of the
+Speaker. I followed him, none saying us No.
+
+As it chanced there was what is called a scene in progress—I think it
+was over Irish matters; the details are of no account. Members shouted,
+Ministers prevaricated and grew angry, the Speaker intervened. On the
+whole, it was rather a degrading spectacle. I stood, or seemed to
+stand, and watched it all. Oro, in his sweeping robes, which looked so
+incongruous in that place, stepped, or seemed to step, up to the
+principal personages of the Government and Opposition, whom I indicated
+to him, and inspected them one by one, as a naturalist might examine
+strange insects. Then, returning to me, he said:
+
+“Come away; I have seen and heard enough. Who would have thought that
+this nation of yours was struggling for its life in war?”
+
+We passed out of the House and somehow came to Trafalgar Square. A
+meeting was in progress there, convened, apparently, to advocate the
+rights of Labour, also those of women, also to protest against things
+in general, especially the threat of Conscription in the service of the
+country.
+
+Here the noise was tremendous, and, the fog having lifted somewhat, we
+could see everything. Speakers bawled from the base of Nelson’s column.
+Their supporters cheered, their adversaries rushed at them, and in one
+or two instances succeeded in pulling them down. A woman climbed up and
+began to scream out something which could only be heard by a few
+reporters gathered round her. I thought her an unpleasant-looking
+person, and evidently her remarks were not palatable to the majority of
+her auditors. There was a rush, and she was dragged from the base of
+one of Landseer’s lions on which she stood. Her skirt was half rent off
+her and her bodice split down the back. Finally, she was conveyed away,
+kicking, biting, and scratching, by a number of police. It was a
+disgusting sight, and tumult ensued.
+
+“Let us go,” said Oro. “Your officers of order are good; the rest is
+not good.”
+
+Later we found ourselves opposite to the doors of a famous restaurant
+where a magnificent and gigantic commissionaire helped ladies from
+motor-cars, receiving in return money from the men who attended on
+them. We entered; it was the hour of dinner. The place sparkled with
+gems, and the naked backs of the women gleamed in the electric light.
+Course followed upon course; champagne flowed, a fine band played,
+everything was costly; everything was, in a sense, repellent.
+
+“These are the wealthy citizens of a nation engaged in fighting for its
+life,” remarked Oro to me, stroking his long beard. “It is interesting,
+very interesting. Let us go.”
+
+We went out and on, passing a public-house crowded with women who had
+left their babies in charge of children in the icy street. It was a day
+of Intercession for the success of England in the war. This was
+placarded everywhere. We entered, or, rather, Oro did, I following him,
+one of the churches in the Strand where an evening service was in
+progress. The preacher in the pulpit, a very able man, was holding
+forth upon the necessity for national repentance and self-denial; also
+of prayer. In the body of the church exactly thirty-two people, most of
+them elderly women, were listening to him with an air of placid
+acceptance.
+
+“The priest talks well, but his hearers are not many,” said Oro. “Let
+us go.”
+
+We came to the flaunting doors of a great music-hall and passed through
+them, though to others this would have been impossible, for the place
+was filled from floor to roof. In its promenades men were drinking and
+smoking, while gaudy women, painted and low-robed, leered at them. On
+the stage girls danced, throwing their legs above their heads. Then
+they vanished amidst applause, and a woman in a yellow robe, who
+pretended to be tipsy, sang a horrible and vulgar song full of topical
+allusions, which was received with screams of delight by the enormous
+audience.
+
+“Here the hearers are very many, but those to whom they listen do not
+talk well. Let us go,” said Oro, and we went.
+
+At a recruiting station we paused a moment to consider posters supposed
+to be attractive, the very sight of which sent a thrill of shame
+through me. I remember that the inscription under one of them was:
+“What will your best girl say?”
+
+“Is that how you gather your soldiers? Later it will be otherwise,”
+said Oro, and passed on.
+
+We reached Blackfriars and entered a hall at the doors of which stood
+women in poke-bonnets, very sweet-faced, earnest-looking women. Their
+countenances seemed to strike Oro, and he motioned me to follow him
+into the hall. It was quite full of a miserable-looking congregation of
+perhaps a thousand people. A man in the blue and red uniform of the
+Salvation Army was preaching of duty to God and country, of
+self-denial, hope and forgiveness. He seemed a humble person, but his
+words were earnest, and love flowed from him. Some of his miserable
+congregation wept, others stared at him open-mouthed, a few, who were
+very weary, slept. He called them up to receive pardon, and a number,
+led by the sweet-faced women, came and knelt before him. He and others
+whispered to them, then seemed to bless them, and they rose with their
+faces changed.
+
+“Let us go,” said Oro. “I do not understand these rites, but at last in
+your great and wonderful city I have seen something that is pure and
+noble.”
+
+We went out. In the streets there was great excitement. People ran to
+and fro pointing upwards. Searchlights, like huge fingers of flame,
+stole across the sky; guns boomed. At last, in the glare of a
+searchlight, we saw a long and sinister object floating high above us
+and gleaming as though it were made of silver. Flashes came from it
+followed by terrible booming reports that grew nearer and nearer. A
+house collapsed with a crash just behind us.
+
+“Ah!” said Oro, with a smile. “I know this—it is war, war as it was
+when the world was different and yet the same.”
+
+As he spoke, a motor-bus rumbled past. Another flash and explosion. A
+man, walking with his arms round the waist of a girl just ahead of us;
+seemed to be tossed up and to melt. The girl fell in a heap on the
+pavement; somehow her head and her feet had come quite close together
+and yet she appeared to be sitting down. The motor-bus burst into
+fragments and its passengers hurtled through the air, mere hideous
+lumps that had been men and women. The head of one of them came dancing
+down the pavement towards us, a cigar still stuck in the corner of its
+mouth.
+
+“Yes, this is war,” said Oro. “It makes me young again to see it. But
+does this city of yours understand?”
+
+We watched a while. A crowd gathered. Policemen ran up, ambulances
+came. The place was cleared, and all that was left they carried away. A
+few minutes later another man passed by with his arm round the waist of
+another girl. Another motor-bus rumbled up, and, avoiding the hole in
+the roadway, travelled on, its conductor keeping a keen look-out for
+fares.
+
+The street was cleared by the police; the airship continued its course,
+spawning bombs in the distance, and vanished. The incident was closed.
+
+“Let us go home,” said Oro. “I have seen enough of your great and
+wonderful city. I would rest in the quiet of Nyo and think.”
+
+The next thing that I remember was the voice of Bastin, saying:
+
+“If you don’t mind, Arbuthnot, I wish that you would get up. The
+Glittering Lady (he still called her that) is coming here to have a
+talk with me which I should prefer to be private. Excuse me for
+disturbing you, but you have overslept yourself; indeed, I think it
+must be nine o’clock, so far as I can judge by the sun, for my watch is
+very erratic now, ever since Bickley tried to clean it.”
+
+“I am sorry, my dear fellow,” I said sleepily, “but do you know I
+thought I was in London—in fact, I could swear that I have been there.”
+
+“Then,” interrupted Bickley, who had followed Bastin into the hut,
+giving me that doubtful glance with which I was now familiar, “I wish
+to goodness that you had brought back an evening paper with you.”
+
+A night or two later I was again suddenly awakened to feel that Oro was
+approaching. He appeared like a ghost in the bright moonlight, greeted
+me, and said:
+
+“Tonight, Humphrey, we must make another journey. I would visit the
+seat of the war.”
+
+“I do not wish to go,” I said feebly.
+
+“What you wish does not matter,” he replied. “_I_ wish that you should
+go, and therefore you must.”
+
+“Listen, Oro,” I exclaimed. “I do not like this business; it seems
+dangerous to me.”
+
+“There is no danger if you are obedient, Humphrey.”
+
+“I think there is. I do not understand what happens. Do you make use of
+what the Lady Yva called the Fourth Dimension, so that our bodies pass
+over the seas and through mountains, like the vibrations of our
+Wireless, of which I was speaking to you?”
+
+“No, Humphrey. That method is good and easy, but I do not use it
+because if I did we should be visible in the places which we visit,
+since there all the atoms that make a man would collect together again
+and be a man.”
+
+“What, then, do you do?” I asked, exasperated.
+
+“Man, Humphrey, is not one; he is many. Thus, amongst other things he
+has a Double, which can see and hear, as he can in the flesh, if it is
+separated from the flesh.”
+
+“The old Egyptians believed that,” I said.
+
+“Did they? Doubtless they inherited the knowledge from us, the Sons of
+Wisdom. The cup of our learning was so full that, keep it secret as we
+would, from time to time some of it overflowed among the vulgar, and
+doubtless thus the light of our knowledge still burns feebly in the
+world.”
+
+I reflected to myself that whatever might be their other
+characteristics, the Sons of Wisdom had lost that of modesty, but I
+only asked how he used his Double, supposing that it existed.
+
+“Very easily,” he answered. “In sleep it can be drawn from the body and
+sent upon its mission by one that is its master.”
+
+“Then while you were asleep for all those thousands of years your
+Double must have made many journeys.”
+
+“Perhaps,” he replied quietly, “and my spirit also, which is another
+part of me that may have dwelt in the bodies of other men. But
+unhappily, if so I forget, and that is why I have so much to learn and
+must even make use of such poor instruments as you, Humphrey.”
+
+“Then if I sleep and you distil my Double out of me, I suppose that you
+sleep too. In that case who distils your Double out of _you_, Lord
+Oro?”
+
+He grew angry and answered:
+
+“Ask no more questions, blind and ignorant as you are. It is your part
+not to examine, but to obey. Sleep now,” and again he waved his hand
+over me.
+
+In an instant, as it seemed, we were standing in a grey old town that I
+judged from its appearance must be either in northern France or
+Belgium. It was much shattered by bombardment; the church, for
+instance, was a ruin; also many of the houses had been burnt. Now,
+however, no firing was going on for the town had been taken. The
+streets were full of armed men wearing the German uniform and helmet.
+We passed down them and were able to see into the houses. In some of
+these were German soldiers engaged in looting and in other things so
+horrible that even the unmoved Oro turned away his head.
+
+We came to the market-place. It was crowded with German troops, also
+with a great number of the inhabitants of the town, most of them
+elderly men and women with children, who had fallen into their power.
+The Germans, under the command of officers, were dragging the men from
+the arms of their wives and children to one side, and with rifle-butts
+beating back the screaming women. Among the men I noticed two or three
+priests who were doing their best to soothe their companions and even
+giving them absolution in hurried whispers.
+
+At length the separation was effected, whereon at a hoarse word of
+command, a company of soldiers began to fire at the men and continued
+doing so until all had fallen. Then petty officers went among the
+slaughtered and with pistols blew out the brains of any who still
+moved.
+
+“These butchers, you say, are Germans?” asked Oro of me.
+
+“Yes,” I answered, sick with horror, for though I was in the mind and
+not in the body, I could feel as the mind does. Had I been in the body
+also, I should have fainted.
+
+“Then we need not waste time in visiting their country. It is enough;
+let us go on.”
+
+We passed out into the open land and came to a village. It was in the
+occupation of German cavalry. Two of them held a little girl of nine or
+ten, one by her body, the other by her right hand. An officer stood
+between them with a drawn sword fronting the terrified child. He was a
+horrible, coarse-faced man who looked to me as though he had been
+drinking.
+
+“I’ll teach the young devil to show us the wrong road and let those
+French swine escape,” he shouted, and struck with the sword. The girl’s
+right hand fell to the ground.
+
+“War as practised by the Germans!” remarked Oro. Then he stepped, or
+seemed to step up to the man and whispered, or seemed to whisper, in
+his ear.
+
+I do not know what tongue or what spirit speech he used, or what he
+said, but the bloated-faced brute turned pale. Yes, he drew sick with
+fear.
+
+“I think there are spirits in this place,” he said with a German oath.
+“I could have sworn that something told me that I was going to die.
+Mount!”
+
+The Uhlans mounted and began to ride away.
+
+“Watch,” said Oro.
+
+As he spoke out of a dark cloud appeared an aeroplane. Its pilot saw
+the band of Germans beneath and dropped a bomb. The aim was good, for
+the missile exploded in the midst of them, causing a great cloud of
+dust from which arose the screams of men and horses.
+
+“Come and see,” said Oro.
+
+We were there. Out of the cloud of dust appeared one man galloping
+furiously. He was a young fellow who, as I noted, had turned his head
+away and hidden his eyes with his hand when the horror was done yonder.
+All the others were dead except the officer who had worked the deed. He
+was still living, but both his hands and one of his feet had been blown
+away. Presently he died, screaming to God for mercy.
+
+We passed on and came to a barn with wide doors that swung a little in
+the wind, causing the rusted hinges to scream like a creature in pain.
+On each of these doors hung a dead man crucified. The hat of one of
+them lay upon the ground, and I knew from the shape of it that he was a
+Colonial soldier.
+
+“Did you not tell me,” said Oro after surveying them, “that these
+Germans are of your Christian faith?”
+
+“Yes; and the Name of God is always on their ruler’s lips.”
+
+“Ah!” he said, “I am glad that I worship Fate. Bastin the priest need
+trouble me no more.”
+
+“There is something behind Fate,” I said, quoting Bastin himself.
+
+“Perhaps. So indeed I have always held, but after much study I cannot
+understand the manner of its working. Fate is enough for me.”
+
+We went on and came to a flat country that was lined with ditches, all
+of them full of men, Germans on one side, English and French upon the
+other. A terrible bombardment shook the earth, the shells raining upon
+the ditches. Presently that from the English guns ceased and out of the
+trenches in front of them thousands of men were vomited, who ran
+forward through a hail of fire in which scores and hundreds fell,
+across an open piece of ground that was pitted with shell craters. They
+came to barbed wire defenses, or what remained of them, cut the wire
+with nippers and pulled up the posts. Then through the gaps they surged
+in, shouting and hurling hand grenades. They reached the German
+trenches, they leapt into them and from those holes arose a hellish
+din. Pistols were fired and everywhere bayonets flashed.
+
+Behind them rushed a horde of little, dark-skinned men, Indians who
+carried great knives in their hands. Those leapt over the first trench
+and running on with wild yells, dived into the second, those who were
+left of them, and there began hacking with their knives at the
+defenders and the soldiers who worked the spitting maxim guns. In
+twenty minutes it was over; those lines of trenches were taken, and
+once more from either side the guns began to boom.
+
+“War again,” said Oro, “clean, honest war, such as the god I call Fate
+decrees for man. I have seen enough. Now I would visit those whom you
+call Turks. I understand they have another worship and perhaps they are
+nobler than these Christians.”
+
+We came to a hilly country which I recognised as Armenia, for once I
+travelled there, and stopped on a seashore. Here were the Turks in
+thousands. They were engaged in driving before them mobs of men, women
+and children in countless numbers. On and on they drove them till they
+reached the shore. There they massacred them with bayonets, with
+bullets, or by drowning. I remember a dreadful scene of a poor woman
+standing up to her waist in the water. Three children were clinging to
+her—but I cannot go on, really I cannot go on. In the end a Turk waded
+out and bayoneted her while she strove to protect the last living child
+with her poor body whence it sprang.
+
+“These, I understand,” said Oro, pointing to the Turkish soldiers,
+“worship a prophet who they say is the voice of God.”
+
+“Yes,” I answered, “and therefore they massacre these who are
+Christians because they worship God without a prophet.”
+
+“And what do the Christians massacre each other for?”
+
+“Power and the wealth and territories that are power. That is, the King
+of the Germans wishes to rule the world, but the other Nations do not
+desire his dominion. Therefore they fight for Liberty and Justice.”
+
+“As it was, so it is and shall be,” remarked Oro, “only with this
+difference. In the old world some were wise, but here—” and he stopped,
+his eyes fixed upon the Armenian woman struggling in her death agony
+while the murderer drowned her child, then added: “Let us go.”
+
+Our road ran across the sea. On it we saw a ship so large that it
+attracted Oro’s attention, and for once he expressed astonishment.
+
+“In my day,” he said, “we had no vessels of this greatness in the
+world. I wish to look upon it.”
+
+We landed on the deck of the ship, or rather the floating palace, and
+examined her. She carried many passengers, some English, some American,
+and I pointed out to Oro the differences between the two peoples. These
+were not, he remarked, very wide except that the American women wore
+more jewels, also that some of the American men, to whom we listened as
+they conversed, spoke of the greatness of their country, whereas the
+Englishmen, if they said anything concerning it, belittled their
+country.
+
+Presently, on the surface of the sea at a little distance appeared
+something strange, a small and ominous object like a can on the top of
+a pole. A voice cried out “_Submarine!_” and everyone near rushed to
+look.
+
+“If those Germans try any of their monkey tricks on us, I guess the
+United States will give them hell,” said another voice near by.
+
+Then from the direction of the pole with the tin can on the top of it,
+came something which caused a disturbance in the smooth water and
+bubbles to rise in its wake.
+
+“A torpedo!” cried some.
+
+“Shut your mouth,” said the voice. “Who dare torpedo a vessel full of
+the citizens of the United States?”
+
+Next came a booming crash and a flood of upthrown water, in the wash of
+which that speaker was carried away into the deep. Then horror! horror!
+horror! indescribable, as the mighty vessel went wallowing to her doom.
+Boats launched; boats overset; boats dragged under by her rush through
+the water which could not be stayed. Maddened men and women running to
+and fro, their eyes starting from their heads, clasping children,
+fastening lifebelts over their costly gowns, or appearing from their
+cabins, their hands filled with jewels that they sought to save. Orders
+cried from high places by stern-faced officers doing their duty to the
+last. And a little way off that thin pole with a tin can on the top of
+it watching its work.
+
+Then the plunge of the enormous ship into the deep, its huge screws
+still whirling in the air and the boom of the bursting boilers. Lastly
+everything gone save a few boats floating on the quiet sea and around
+them dots that were the heads of struggling human beings.
+
+“Let us go home,” said Oro. “I grow tired of this war of your Christian
+peoples. It is no better than that of the barbarian nations of the
+early world. Indeed it is worse, since then we worshipped Fate and but
+a few of us had wisdom. Now you all claim wisdom and declare that you
+worship a God of Mercy.”
+
+With these words still ringing in my ears I woke up upon the Island of
+Orofena, filled with terror at the horrible possibilities of nightmare.
+
+What else could it be? There was the brown and ancient cone of the
+extinct volcano. There were the tall palms of the main island and the
+lake glittering in the sunlight between. There was Bastin conducting a
+kind of Sunday school of Orofenans upon the point of the Rock of
+Offerings, as now he had obtained the leave of Oro to do. There was the
+mouth of the cave, and issuing from it Bickley, who by help of one of
+the hurricane lamps had been making an examination of the buried
+remains of what he supposed to be flying machines. Without doubt it was
+nightmare, and I would say nothing to them about it for fear of
+mockery.
+
+Yet two nights later Oro came again and after the usual preliminaries,
+said:
+
+“Humphrey, this night we will visit that mighty American nation, of
+which you have told me so much, and the other Neutral Countries.”
+
+[At this point there is a gap in Mr. Arbuthnot’s M.S., so Oro’s
+reflections on the Neutral Nations, if any, remain unrecorded. It
+continues:]
+
+On our homeward way we passed over Australia, making a detour to do so.
+Of the cities Oro took no account. He said that they were too large and
+too many, but the country interested him so much that I gathered he
+must have given great attention to agriculture at some time in the
+past. He pointed out to me that the climate was fine, and the land so
+fertile that with a proper system of irrigation and water-storage it
+could support tens of millions and feed not only itself but a great
+part of the outlying world.
+
+“But where are the people?” he asked. “Outside of those huge hives,”
+and he indicated the great cities, “I see few of them, though doubtless
+some of the men are fighting in this war. Well, in the days to come
+this must be remedied.”
+
+Over New Zealand, which he found beautiful, he shook his head for the
+same reason.
+
+On another night we visited the East. China with its teeming millions
+interested him extremely, partly because he declared these to be the
+descendants of one of the barbarian nations of his own day. He made a
+remark to the effect that this race had always possessed points and
+capacities, and that he thought that with proper government and
+instruction their Chinese offspring would be of use in a regenerated
+world.
+
+For the Japanese and all that they had done in two short generations,
+he went so far as to express real admiration, a very rare thing with
+Oro, who was by nature critical. I could see that mentally he put a
+white mark against their name.
+
+India, too, really moved him. He admired the ancient buildings at Delhi
+and Agra, especially the Taj Mahal. This, he declared, was reminiscent
+of some of the palaces that stood at Pani, the capital city of the Sons
+of Wisdom, before it was destroyed by the Barbarians.
+
+The English administration of the country also attracted a word of
+praise from him, I think because of its rather autocratic character.
+Indeed he went so far as to declare that, with certain modifications,
+it should be continued in the future, and even to intimate that he
+would bear the matter in mind. Democratic forms of government had no
+charms for Oro.
+
+Amongst other places, we stopped at Benares and watched the funeral
+rites in progress upon the banks of the holy Ganges. The bearers of the
+dead brought the body of a woman wrapped in a red shroud that glittered
+with tinsel ornaments. Coming forward at a run and chanting as they
+ran, they placed it upon the stones for a little while, then lifted it
+up again and carried it down the steps to the edge of the river. Here
+they took water and poured it over the corpse, thus performing the rite
+of the baptism of death. This done, they placed its feet in the water
+and left it looking very small and lonely. Presently appeared a tall,
+white-draped woman who took her stand by the body and wailed. It was
+the dead one’s mother. Again the bearers approached and laid the corpse
+upon the flaming pyre.
+
+“These rites are ancient,” said Oro. “When I ruled as King of the World
+they were practised in this very place. It is pleasant to me to find
+something that has survived the changefulness of Time. Let it continue
+till the end.”
+
+Here I will cease. These experiences that I have recorded are but
+samples, for also we visited Russia and other countries. Perhaps, too,
+they were not experiences at all, but only dreams consequent on my
+state of health. I cannot say for certain, though much of what I seemed
+to see fitted in very well indeed with what I learned in after days,
+and certainly at the time they appeared as real as though Oro and I had
+stood together upon those various shores.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+Love’s Eternal Altar
+
+
+Now of all these happenings I said very little to Bastin and Bickley.
+The former would not have understood them, and the latter attributed
+what I did tell him to mental delusions following on my illness. To Yva
+I did speak about them, however, imploring her to explain their origin
+and to tell me whether or not they were but visions of the night.
+
+She listened to me, as I thought not without anxiety, from which I
+gathered that she too feared for my mind. It was not so, however, for
+she said:
+
+“I am glad, O Humphrey, that your journeyings are done, since such
+things are not without danger. He who travels far out of the body may
+chance to return there no more.”
+
+“But were they journeyings, or dreams?” I asked.
+
+She evaded a direct answer.
+
+“I cannot say. My father has great powers. I do not know them all. It
+is possible that they were neither journeyings nor dreams. Mayhap he
+used you as the sorcerers in the old days used the magic glass, and
+after he had put his spell upon you, read in your mind that which
+passes elsewhere.”
+
+I understood her to refer to what we call clairvoyance, when the person
+entranced reveals secret or distant things to the entrancer. This is a
+more or less established phenomenon and much less marvelous than the
+actual transportation of the spiritual self through space. Only I never
+knew of an instance in which the seer, on awaking, remembered the
+things that he had seen, as in my case. There, however, the matter
+rested, or rests, for I could extract nothing more from Yva, who
+appeared to me to have her orders on the point.
+
+Nor did Oro ever talk of what I had seemed to see in his company,
+although he continued from time to time to visit me at night. But now
+our conversation was of other matters. As Bastin had discovered, by
+some extraordinary gift he had soon learned how to read the English
+language, although he never spoke a single word in that tongue. Among
+our reference books that we brought from the yacht, was a thin paper
+edition of the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, which he borrowed when he
+discovered that it contained compressed information about the various
+countries of the world, also concerning almost every other matter. My
+belief is that within a month or so that marvelous old man not only
+read this stupendous work from end to end, but that he remembered
+everything of interest which it contained. At least, he would appear
+and show the fullest acquaintance with certain subjects or places,
+seeking further light from me concerning them, which very often I was
+quite unable to give him.
+
+An accident, as it chanced, whereof I need not set out the details,
+caused me to discover that his remarkable knowledge was limited. Thus,
+at one period, he knew little about any modern topic which began with a
+letter later in the alphabet than, let us say, C. A few days afterwards
+he was acquainted with those up to F, or G; and so on till he reached
+Z, when he appeared to me to know everything, and returned the book.
+Now, indeed, he was a monument of learning, very ancient and very new,
+and with some Encyclopedia-garnered facts or deductions of what had
+happened between.
+
+Moreover, he took to astronomical research, for more than once we saw
+him standing on the rock at night studying the heavens. On one of these
+occasions, when he had the two metal plates, of which I have spoken, in
+his hands, I ventured to approach and ask what he did. He replied that
+he was checking his calculations that he found to be quite correct, an
+exact period of two hundred and fifty thousand years having gone by
+since he laid himself down to sleep. Then, by aid of the plates, he
+pointed out to me certain alterations that had happened during that
+period in the positions of some of the stars.
+
+For instance, he showed me one which, by help of my glasses, I
+recognised as Sirius, and remarked that two hundred and fifty thousand
+years ago it was further away and much smaller. Now it was precisely in
+the place and of the size which he had predicted, and he pointed to it
+on his prophetic map. Again he indicated a star that the night-glass
+told me was Capella, which, I suppose, is one of the most brilliant
+stars in the sky, and showed me that on the map he had made two hundred
+and fifty thousand years ago, it did not exist, as then it was too far
+north to appear thereon. Still, he observed, the passage of this vast
+period of time had produced but little effect upon the face of the
+heavens. To the human eye the majority of the stars had not moved so
+very far.
+
+“And yet they travel fast, O Humphrey,” he said. “Consider then how
+great is their journey between the time they gather and that day when,
+worn-out, once more they melt to vaporous gas. You think me long-lived
+who compared to them exist but a tiny fraction of a second, nearly all
+of which I have been doomed to pass in sleep. And, Humphrey, I desire
+to live—I, who have great plans and would shake the world. But my day
+draws in; a few brief centuries and I shall be gone, and—whither,
+whither?”
+
+“If you lived as long as those stars, the end would be the same, Oro.”
+
+“Yes, but the life of the stars is very long, millions of millions of
+years; also, after death, they reform, as other stars. But shall I
+reform as another Oro? With all my wisdom, I do not know. It is known
+to Fate only—Fate-the master of worlds and men and the gods they
+worship—Fate, whom it may please to spill my gathered knowledge, to be
+lost in the sands of Time.”
+
+“It seems that you are great,” I said, “and have lived long and learned
+much. Yet the end of it is that your lot is neither worse nor better
+than that of us creatures of an hour.”
+
+“It is so, Humphrey. Presently you will die, and within a few centuries
+I shall die also and be as you are. You believe that you will live
+again eternally. It may be so because you _do_ believe, since Fate
+allows Faith to shape the future, if only for a little while. But in me
+Wisdom has destroyed Faith and therefore I must die. Even if I sleep
+again for tens of thousands of years, what will it help me, seeing that
+sleep is unconsciousness and that I shall only wake again to die, since
+sleep does not restore to us our youth?”
+
+He ceased, and walked up and down the rock with a troubled mien. Then
+he stood in front of me and said in a triumphant voice:
+
+“At least, while I live I will rule, and then let come what may come. I
+know that you do not believe, and the first victory of this new day of
+mine shall be to make you believe. I have great powers and you shall
+see them at work, and afterwards, if things go right, rule with me for
+a little while, perhaps, as the first of my subjects. Hearken now; in
+one small matter my calculations, made so long ago, have gone wrong.
+They showed me that at this time a day of earthquakes, such as those
+that again and again have rocked and split the world, would recur. But
+now it seems that there is an error, a tiny error of eleven hundred
+years, which must go by before those earthquakes come.”
+
+“Are you sure,” I suggested humbly, “that there is not also an error in
+those star-maps you hold?”
+
+“I am sure, Humphrey. Some day, who knows? You may return to your world
+of modern men who, I gather, have knowledge of the great science of
+astronomy. Take now these maps with which I have done, and submit them
+to the most learned of those men, and let them tell you whether I was
+right or wrong in what I wrote upon this metal two hundred and fifty
+thousand years ago. Whatever else is false, at least the stars in their
+motions can never die.”
+
+Then he handed me the maps and was gone. I have them today, and if ever
+this book is published, they will appear with it, that those who are
+qualified may judge of them and of the truth or otherwise of Oro’s
+words.
+
+From that night forward for quite a long time I saw Oro no more. Nor
+indeed did any of us, since for some reason of his own he forbade us to
+visit the underground city of Nyo. Oddly enough, however, he commanded
+Yva to bring down the spaniel, Tommy, to be with him from time to time.
+When I asked her why, she said it was because he was lonely and desired
+the dog’s companionship. It seemed to us very strange that this
+super-man, who had the wisdom of ten Solomons gathered in one within
+his breast, should yet desire the company of a little dog. What then
+was the worth of learning and long life, or, indeed, of anything? Well,
+Solomon himself asked the question ages since, and could give no answer
+save that all is vanity.
+
+I noted about this time that Yva began to grow very sad and troubled;
+indeed, looking at her suddenly on two or three occasions, I saw that
+her beautiful eyes were aswim with tears. Also, I noted that always as
+she grew sadder she became, in a sense, more human. In the beginning
+she was, as it were, far away. One could never forget that she was the
+child of some alien race whose eyes had looked upon the world when, by
+comparison, humanity was young; at times, indeed, she might have been
+the denizen of another planet, strayed to earth. Although she never
+flaunted it, one felt that her simplest word hid secret wisdom; that to
+her books were open in which we could not read. Moreover, as I have
+said, occasionally power flamed out of her, power that was beyond our
+ken and understanding.
+
+Yet with all this there was nothing elfish about her, nothing uncanny.
+She was always kind, and, as we could feel, innately good and
+gentle-hearted, just a woman made half-divine by gifts and experience
+that others lack. She did not even make use of her wondrous beauty to
+madden men, as she might well have done had she been so minded. It is
+true that both Bastin and Bickley fell in love with her, but that was
+only because all with whom she had to do must love her, and then, when
+she told them that it might not be, it was in such a fashion that no
+soreness was left behind. They went on loving her, that was all, but as
+men love their sisters or their daughters; as we conceive that they may
+love in that land where there is no marrying or giving in marriage.
+
+But now, in her sadness, she drew ever nearer to us, and especially to
+myself, more in tune with our age and thought. In truth, save for her
+royal and glittering loveliness in which there was some quality which
+proclaimed her of another blood, and for that reserve of hidden power
+which at times would look out of her eyes or break through her words,
+she might in most ways have been some singularly gifted and beautiful
+modern woman.
+
+The time has come when I must speak of my relations with Yva and of
+their climax. As may have been guessed, from the first I began to love
+her. While the weeks went on that love grew and grew, until it utterly
+possessed me, although for a certain reason connected with one dead, at
+first I fought against it. Yet it did not develop quite in the fashion
+that might have been expected. There was no blazing up of passion’s
+fire; rather was there an ever-increasing glow of the holiest
+affection, till at last it became a lamp by which I must guide my feet
+through life and death. This love of mine seemed not of earth but from
+the stars. As yet I had said nothing to her of it because in some way I
+felt that she did not wish me to do so, felt also that she was well
+aware of all that passed within my heart, and desired, as it were, to
+give it time to ripen there. Then one day there came a change, and
+though no glance or touch of Yva’s told me so, I knew that the bars
+were taken down and that I might speak.
+
+It was a night of full moon. All that afternoon she had been talking to
+Bastin apart, I suppose about religion, for I saw that he had some
+books in his hand from which he was expounding something to her in his
+slow, earnest way. Then she came and sat with us while we took our
+evening meal. I remember that mine consisted of some of the Life-water
+which she had brought with her and fruit, for, as I think I have said,
+I had acquired her dislike to meat, also that she ate some plantains,
+throwing the skins for Tommy to fetch and laughing at his play. When it
+was over, Bastin and Bickley went away together, whether by chance or
+design I do not know, and she said to me suddenly:
+
+“Humphrey, you have often asked me about the city Pani, of which a
+little portion of the ruins remains upon this island, the rest being
+buried beneath the waters. If you wish I will show you where our royal
+palace was before the barbarians destroyed it with their airships. The
+moon is very bright, and by it we can see.”
+
+I nodded, for, knowing what she meant, somehow I could not answer her,
+and we began the ascent of the hill. She explained to me the plan of
+the palace when we reached the ruins, showing me where her own
+apartments had been, and the rest. It was very strange to hear her
+quietly telling of buildings which had stood and of things that had
+happened over two hundred and fifty thousand years before, much as any
+modern lady might do of a house that had been destroyed a month ago by
+an earthquake or a Zeppelin bomb, while she described the details of a
+disaster which now frightened her no more. I think it was then that for
+the first time I really began to believe that in fact Yva had lived all
+those æons since and been as she still appeared.
+
+We passed from the palace to the ruins of the temple, through what, as
+she said, had been a pleasure-garden, pointing out where a certain
+avenue of rare palms had grown, down which once it was her habit to
+walk in the cool of the day. Or, rather, there were two terraced
+temples, one dedicated to Fate like that in the underground city of
+Nyo, and the other to Love. Of the temple to Fate she told me her
+father had been the High Priest, and of the temple to Love she was the
+High Priestess.
+
+Then it was that I understood why she had brought me here.
+
+She led the way to a marble block covered with worn-out carvings and
+almost buried in the debris. This, she said, was the altar of
+offerings. I asked her what offerings, and she replied with a smile:
+
+“Only wine, to signify the spirit of life, and flowers to symbolise its
+fragrance,” and she laid her finger on a cup-like depression, still
+apparent in the marble, into which the wine was poured.
+
+Indeed, I gathered that there was nothing coarse or bacchanalian about
+this worship of a prototype of Aphrodite; on the contrary, that it was
+more or less spiritual and ethereal. We sat down on the altar stone. I
+wondered a little that she should have done so, but she read my
+thought, and answered:
+
+“Sometimes we change our faiths, Humphrey, or perhaps they grow. Also,
+have I not told you that sacrifices were offered on this altar?” and
+she sighed and smiled.
+
+I do not know which was the sweeter, the smile or the sigh.
+
+We looked at the water glimmering in the crater beneath us on the edge
+of which we sat. We looked at heaven above in which the great moon
+sailed royally. Then we looked into each other’s eyes.
+
+“I love you,” I said.
+
+“I know it,” she answered gently. “You have loved me from the first,
+have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you began to love
+me, but until you dreamed a certain dream you would not admit it.”
+
+“Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?”
+
+“I cannot say, Humphrey. But I tell you this. As you will learn in
+time, one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the flesh.”
+
+I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words brought
+to my mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and I answered:
+
+“Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere, for
+certainly I should find her. Doubtless she meant beyond the shores of
+death—or perhaps she also dreamed.”
+
+She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
+
+“Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey. As you
+dream and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed. Of dreams, then, let us say
+no more, since I think that they have served their purpose, and all
+three of us understand.”
+
+Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon her
+perfumed breast. She lifted it and kissed me on the lips, saying:
+
+“With this kiss again I give myself to you. But oh! Humphrey, do not
+ask too much of the god of my people, Fate,” and she looked me in the
+eyes and sighed.
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked, trembling.
+
+“Many, many things. Among them, that happiness is not for mortals, and
+remember that though my life began long ago, I am mortal as you are,
+and that in eternity time makes no difference.”
+
+“And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?”
+
+“Who said it? Not I. Humphrey, I tell you this. Nor earth, nor heaven,
+nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst its way towards
+reunion and completeness. Only there must be love, manifested in many
+shapes and at many times, but ever striving to its end, which is not of
+the flesh. Aye, love that has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated,
+love that seems false, love betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering
+through the worlds, love asleep and living in its sleep, love awake and
+yet sleeping; all love that has in it the germ of life. It matters not
+what form love takes. If it be true I tell you that it will win its
+way, and in the many that it has seemed to worship, still find the one,
+though perchance not here.”
+
+At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
+
+“Not here? Then where?” I said.
+
+“Ask your dead wife, Humphrey. Ask the dumb stars. Ask the God you
+worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word—Somewhere! Man, be not
+afraid. Do you think that such as you and I can be lost in the aching
+abysms of space? I know but little, yet I tell you that we are its
+rulers. I tell you that we, too, are gods, if only we can aspire and
+believe. For the doubting and timid there is naught. For those who see
+with the eyes of the soul and stretch out their hands to grasp there is
+all. Even Bastin will tell you this.”
+
+“But,” I said, “life is short. Those worlds are far away, and you are
+near.”
+
+She became wonderful, mysterious.
+
+“Near I am far,” she said; “and far I am near, if only this love of
+yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp. And, Humphrey, it needs
+strength, for here I am afraid that it will bear little of such fruit
+as men desire to pluck.”
+
+Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for I did not know
+what to say or ask.
+
+“Listen,” she went on. “Already my father has offered me to you in
+marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not understand?
+Believe me, it is one that you should never pay, since the rule of the
+world can be too dearly bought by the slaughter of half the world. And
+if you would pay it, I cannot.”
+
+“But this is madness!” I exclaimed. “Your father has no powers over our
+earth.”
+
+“I would that I could think so, Humphrey. I tell you that he has powers
+and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done before. You, too,
+he would use, and me.”
+
+“And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves. Let us take each other
+while we may. Bastin is a priest.”
+
+“Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment Oro
+watches us in his thought and laughs. Only in death, Humphrey, shall we
+pass beyond his reach and become lords of ourselves.”
+
+“It is monstrous!” I cried. “There is the boat, let us fly away.”
+
+“What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god of my
+people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we must wait
+our doom.”
+
+“Doom,” I said—“doom? What then is about to happen?”
+
+“A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey. Or, rather, it will not
+happen.”
+
+“Why not, if it must?”
+
+“Beloved,” she whispered, “Bastin has expounded to me a new faith
+whereof the master-word is Sacrifice. The terrible thing will not
+happen _because of sacrifice!_ Ask me no more.”
+
+She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the ancient altar
+of sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her face and making her
+mysterious. Then she threw it back, showing her lovely eyes and
+glittering hair, and laughed.
+
+“We have still an earthly hour,” she said; “therefore let us forget the
+far, dead past and the eternities to come and be joyful in that hour.
+Now throw your arms about me and I will tell you strange stories of
+lost days, and you shall look into my eyes and learn wisdom, and you
+shall kiss my lips and taste of bliss—you, who were and are and shall
+be—you, the beloved of Yva from the beginning to the end of Time.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+The Command
+
+
+I think that both Bastin and Bickley, by instinct as it were, knew what
+had passed between Yva and myself and that she had promised herself to
+me. They showed this by the way in which they avoided any mention of
+her name. Also they began to talk of their own plans for the future as
+matters in which I had no part. Thus I heard them discussing the
+possibility of escape from the island whereof suddenly they seemed to
+have grown weary, and whether by any means two men (two, not three)
+could manage to sail and steer the lifeboat that remained upon the
+wreck. In short, as in all such cases, the woman had come between; also
+the pressure of a common loss caused them to forget their differences
+and to draw closer together. I who had succeeded where they both had
+failed, was, they seemed to think, out of their lives, so much that our
+ancient intimacy had ended.
+
+This attitude hurt me, perhaps because in many respects the situation
+was awkward. They had, it is true, taken their failures extremely well,
+still the fact remained that both of them had fallen in love with the
+wonderful creature, woman and yet more than woman, who had bound
+herself to me. How then could we go on living together, I in
+prospective possession of the object that all had desired, and they
+without the pale?
+
+Moreover, they were jealous in another and quite a different fashion
+because they both loved me in their own ways and were convinced that I
+who had hitherto loved them, henceforward should have no affection left
+to spare, since surely this Glittering Lady, this marvel of wisdom and
+physical perfections would take it all. Of course they were in error,
+since even if I could have been so base and selfish, this was no
+conduct that Yva would have wished or even suffered. Still that was
+their thought.
+
+Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then spoke
+straight out to them.
+
+“My friends,” I said, “as I see that you have guessed, Yva and I are
+affianced to each other and love each other perfectly.”
+
+“Yes, Arbuthnot,” said Bastin, “we saw that in your face, and in hers
+as she bade us good night before she went into the cave, and we
+congratulate you and wish you every happiness.”
+
+“We wish you every happiness, old fellow,” chimed in Bickley. He paused
+a while, then added, “But to be honest, I am not sure that I
+congratulate you.”
+
+“Why not, Bickley?”
+
+“Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not because
+you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be expected that you
+would do, but on account of something totally different. I told you a
+while ago and repetition is useless and painful. I need only add
+therefore that since then my conviction has strengthened and I am sure,
+sorry as I am to say it, that in this matter you must prepare for
+disappointment and calamity. That woman, if woman she really is, will
+never be the wife of mortal man. Now be angry with me if you like, or
+laugh as you have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and
+yourself, I also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak
+what I believe to be the truth.”
+
+“Like Cassandra,” I suggested.
+
+“Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person.” At first I was
+inclined to resent Bickley’s words—who would not have been in the
+circumstances? Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my mind the
+conviction that he spoke the truth. In this world Yva was not for me or
+any man. Moreover she knew it, the knowledge peeped out of every word
+she spoke in our passionate love scene by the lake. She was aware, and
+subconsciously I was aware, that we were plighting our troth, not for
+time but for eternity. With time we had little left to do; not for long
+would she wear the ring I gave her on that holy night.
+
+Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt that the
+situation was strained and awkward and broke in with a curious air of
+forced satisfaction:
+
+“It’s uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to have a
+clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you in a
+respectable fashion. Of course I can’t say that the Glittering Lady is
+as yet absolutely converted to our faith, but I am certain that she has
+absorbed enough of its principles to justify me in uniting her in
+Christian wedlock.”
+
+“Yes,” I answered, “she has absorbed its principles; she told me as
+much herself. Sacrifice, for instance,” and as I spoke the word my eyes
+filled with tears.
+
+“Sacrifice!” broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he needed a vent
+to his mental disturbance. “Rubbish. Why should every religion demand
+sacrifice as savages do? By it alone they stand condemned.”
+
+“Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of all life
+that is worth the living,” I answered sadly enough. “Anyhow I believe
+you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will not be troubled to marry
+us.”
+
+“You don’t mean,” broke in Bastin with a horrified air, “that you
+propose to dispense—”
+
+“No, Bastin, I don’t mean that. What I mean is that it comes upon me
+that something will prevent this marriage. Sacrifice, perhaps, though
+in what shape I do not know. And now good night. I am tired.”
+
+That night in the chill dead hour before the dawn Oro came again. I
+woke up to see him seated by my bed, majestic, and, as it seemed to me,
+lambent, though this may have been my imagination.
+
+“You take strange liberties with my daughter, Barbarian, or she takes
+strange liberties with you, it does not matter which,” he said,
+regarding me with his calm and terrible eyes.
+
+“Why do you presume to call me Barbarian?” I asked, avoiding the main
+issue.
+
+“For this reason, Humphrey. All men are the same. They have the same
+organs, the same instincts, the same desires, which in essence are but
+two, food and rebirth that Nature commands; though it is true that
+millions of years before I was born, as I have learned from the records
+of the Sons of Wisdom, it was said that they were half ape. Yet being
+the same there is between them a whole sea of difference, since some
+have knowledge and others none, or little. Those who have none or
+little, among whom you must be numbered, are Barbarians. Those who have
+much, among whom my daughter and I are the sole survivors, are the
+Instructed.”
+
+“There are nearly two thousand millions of living people in this
+world,” I said, “and you name all of them Barbarians?”
+
+“All, Humphrey, excepting, of course, myself and my daughter who are
+not known to be alive. You think that you have learned much, whereas in
+truth you are most ignorant. The commonest of the outer nations, when I
+destroyed them, knew more than your wisest know today.”
+
+“You are mistaken, Oro; since then we have learned something of the
+soul.”
+
+“Ah!” he exclaimed, “that interests me and perhaps it is true. Also, if
+true it is very important, as I have told you before—or was it Bastin?
+If a man has a soul, he lives, whereas even we Sons of Wisdom die, and
+in Death what is the use of Wisdom? Because you can believe, you have
+souls and are therefore, perhaps, heirs to life, foolish and ignorant
+as you are today. Therefore I admit you and Bastin to be my equals,
+though Bickley, who like myself believes nothing, is but a common
+chemist and doctor of disease.”
+
+“Then you bow to Faith, Oro?”
+
+“Yes, and I think that my god Fate also bows to Faith. Perhaps, indeed,
+Faith shapes Fate, not Fate, Faith. But whence comes that faith which
+even I with all my learning cannot command? Why is it denied to me and
+given to you and Bastin?”
+
+“Because as Bastin would tell you, it is a gift, though one that is
+never granted to the proud and self-sufficient. Become humble as a
+child, Oro, and perchance you too may acquire faith.”
+
+“And how shall I become humble?”
+
+“By putting away all dreams of power and its exercise, if such you
+have, and in repentance walking quietly to the Gates of Death,” I
+replied.
+
+“For you, Humphrey, who have little or none of these things, that may
+be easy. But for me who have much, if not all, it is otherwise. You ask
+me to abandon the certain for the uncertain, the known for the unknown,
+and from a half-god communing with the stars, to become an earthworm
+crawling in mud and lifting blind eyes towards the darkness of
+everlasting night.”
+
+“A god who must die is no god, half or whole, Oro; the earthworm that
+lives on is greater than he.”
+
+“Mayhap. Yet while I endure I will be as a god, so that when night
+comes, if come it must, I shall have played my part and left my mark
+upon this little world of ours. Have done!” he added with a burst of
+impatience. “What will you of my daughter?”
+
+“What man has always willed of woman—herself, body and soul.”
+
+“Her soul perchance is yours, if she has one, but her body is mine to
+give or withhold. Yet it can be bought at a price,” he added slowly.
+
+“So she told me, Oro.”
+
+“I can guess what she told you. Did I not watch you yonder by the lake
+when you gave her a ring graved with the signs of Life and
+Everlastingness? The question is, will you pay the price?”
+
+“Not so; the question is—what is the price?”
+
+“This; to enter my service and henceforth do my will—without debate or
+cavil.”
+
+“For what reward, Oro?”
+
+“Yva and the dominion of the earth while you shall live, neither more
+nor less.”
+
+“And what is your will?”
+
+“That you shall learn in due course. On the second night from this I
+command the three of you to wait upon me at sundown in the buried halls
+of Nyo. Till then you see no more of Yva, for I do not trust her. She,
+too, has powers, though as yet she does not use them, and perchance she
+would forget her oaths, and following some new star of love, for a
+little while vanish with you out of my reach. Be in the sepulchre at
+the hour of sundown on the second day from this, all three of you, if
+you would continue to live upon the earth. Afterwards you shall learn
+my will and make your choice between Yva with majesty and her loss with
+death.”
+
+Then suddenly he was gone.
+
+Next morning I told the others what had passed, and we talked the
+matter over. The trouble was, of course, that Bickley did not believe
+me. He had no faith in my alleged interviews with Oro, which he set
+down to delusions of a semi-mesmeric character. This was not strange,
+since it appeared that on the previous night he had watched the door of
+my sleeping-place until dawn broke, which it did long after Oro had
+departed, and he had not seen him either come or go, although the moon
+was shining brightly.
+
+When he told me this I could only answer that all the same he had been
+there as, if he could speak, Tommy would have been able to certify. As
+it chanced the dog was sleeping with me and at the first sound of the
+approach of someone, woke up and growled. Then recognising Oro, he went
+to him, wagged his tail and curled himself up at his feet.
+
+Bastin believed my story readily enough, saying that Oro was a peculiar
+person who no doubt had ways of coming and going which we did not
+understand. His point was, however, that he did not in the least wish
+to visit Nyo any more. The wonders of its underground palaces and
+temples had no charms for him. Also he did not think he could do any
+good by going, since after “sucking him as dry as an orange” with
+reference to religious matters “that old vampire-bat Oro had just
+thrown him away like the rind,” and, he might add, “seemed no better
+for the juice he had absorbed.”
+
+“I doubt,” continued Bastin, “whether St. Paul himself could have
+converted Oro, even if he performed miracles before him. What is the
+use of showing miracles to a man who could always work a bigger one
+himself?”
+
+In short, Bastin’s one idea, and Bickley’s also for the matter of that,
+was to get away to the main island and thence escape by means of the
+boat, or in some other fashion.
+
+I pointed out that Oro had said we must obey at the peril of our lives;
+indeed that he had put it even more strongly, using words to the effect
+that if we did not he would kill us.
+
+“I’d take the risk,” said Bickley, “since I believe that you dreamt it
+all, Arbuthnot. However, putting that aside, there is a natural reason
+why you should wish to go, and for my own part, so do I in a way. I
+want to see what that old fellow has up his extremely long sleeve, if
+there is anything there at all.”
+
+“Well, if you ask me, Bickley,” I answered, “I believe it is the
+destruction of half the earth, or some little matter of that sort.”
+
+At this suggestion Bickley only snorted, but Bastin said cheerfully:
+
+“I dare say. He is bad enough even for that. But as I am quite
+convinced that it will never be allowed, his intentions do not trouble
+me.”
+
+I remarked that he seemed to have carried them out once before.
+
+“Oh! you mean the Deluge. Well, no doubt there was a deluge, but I am
+sure that Oro had no more to do with it than you or I, as I think I
+have said already. Anyhow it is impossible to leave you to descend into
+that hole alone. I suggest, therefore, that we should go into the
+sepulchre at the time which you believe Oro appointed, and see what
+happens. If you are not mistaken, the Glittering Lady will come there
+to fetch us, since it is quite certain that we cannot work the lift or
+whatever it is, alone. If you are mistaken we can just go back to bed
+as usual.”
+
+“Yes, that’s the best plan,” said Bickley, shortly, after which the
+conversation came to an end.
+
+All that day and the next I watched and waited in vain for the coming
+of Yva, but no Yva appeared. I even went as far as the sepulchre, but
+it was as empty as were the two crystal coffins, and after waiting a
+while I returned. Although I did not say so to Bickley, to me it was
+evident that Oro, as he had said, was determined to cut off all
+communication between us.
+
+The second day drew to its close. Our simple preparations were
+complete. They consisted mainly in making ready our hurricane lamps and
+packing up a little food, enough to keep us for three or four days if
+necessary, together with some matches and a good supply of oil, since,
+as Bastin put it, he was determined not to be caught like the foolish
+virgins in the parable.
+
+“You see,” he added, “one never knows when it might please that old
+wretch to turn off the incandescent gas or electric light, or whatever
+it is he uses to illumine his family catacombs, and then it would be
+awkward if we had no oil.”
+
+“For the matter of that he might steal our lamps,” suggested Bickley,
+“in which case we should be where Moses was when the light went out.”
+
+“I have considered that possibility,” answered Bastin, “and therefore,
+although it is a dangerous weapon to carry loaded, I am determined to
+take my revolver. If necessary I shall consider myself quite justified
+in shooting him to save our lives and those of thousands of others.”
+
+At this we both laughed; somehow the idea of Bastin trying to shoot Oro
+struck us as intensely ludicrous. Yet that very thing was to happen.
+
+It was a peculiarly beautiful sunset over the southern seas. To the
+west the great flaming orb sank into the ocean, to the east appeared
+the silver circle of the full moon. To my excited fancy they were like
+scales hanging from the hand of a materialised spirit of calm. Over the
+volcano and the lake, over the island with its palm trees, over the
+seas beyond, this calm brooded. Save for a few travelling birds the sky
+was empty; no cloud disturbed its peace; the world seemed steeped in
+innocence and quiet.
+
+All these things struck me, as I think they did the others, because by
+the action of some simultaneous thought it came to our minds that very
+probably we were looking on them for the last time. It is all very well
+to talk of the Unknown and the Infinite whereof we are assured we are
+the heirs, but that does not make it any easier for us to part with the
+Known and the Finite. The contemplation of the wonders of Eternity does
+not conceal the advantages of actual and existent Time. In short there
+is no one of us, from a sainted archbishop down to a sinful suicide,
+who does not regret the necessity of farewell to the pleasant light and
+the kindly race of men wherewith we are acquainted.
+
+For after all, who can be quite certain of the Beyond? It may be
+splendid, but it will probably be strange, and from strangeness, after
+a certain age, we shrink. We know that all things will be different
+there; that our human relationships will be utterly changed, that
+perhaps sex which shapes so many of them, will vanish to be replaced by
+something unknown, that ambitions will lose their hold of us, and that,
+at the best, the mere loss of hopes and fears will leave us empty. So
+at least we think, who seek not variation but continuance, since the
+spirit must differ from the body and that thought alarms our
+intelligence.
+
+At least some of us think so; others, like Bickley, write down the
+future as a black and endless night, which after all has its
+consolations since, as has been wisely suggested, perhaps oblivion is
+better than any memories. Others again, like Bastin, would say of it
+with the Frenchman, _plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose_. Yet
+others, like Oro, consider it as a realm of possibilities, probably
+unpleasant and perhaps non-existent; just this and nothing more. Only
+one thing is certain, that no creature which has life desires to leap
+into the fire and from the dross of doubts, to resolve the gold—or the
+lead—of certainty.
+
+“It is time to be going,” said Bastin. “In these skies the sun seems to
+tumble down, not to set decently as it does in England, and if we wait
+any longer we shall be late for our appointment in the sepulchre. I am
+sorry because although I don’t often notice scenery, everything looks
+rather beautiful this evening. That star, for instance, I think it is
+called Venus.”
+
+“And therefore one that Arbuthnot should admire,” broke in Bickley,
+attempting to lighten matters with a joke. “But come on and let us be
+rid of this fool’s errand. Certainly the world is a lovely place after
+all, and for my part I hope that we haven’t seen the last of it,” he
+added with a sigh.
+
+“So do I,” said Bastin, “though of course, Faith teaches us that there
+are much better ones beyond. It is no use bothering about what they are
+like, but I hope that the road to them doesn’t run through the hole
+that the old reprobate, Oro, calls Nyo.”
+
+A few minutes later we started, each of us carrying his share of the
+impedimenta. I think that Tommy was the only really cheerful member of
+the party, for he skipped about and barked, running backwards and
+forwards into the mouth of the cave, as though to hurry our movements.
+
+“Really,” said Bastin, “it is quite unholy to see an animal going on in
+that way when it knows that it is about to descend into the bowels of
+the earth. I suppose it must like them.”
+
+“Oh! no,” commented Bickley, “it only likes what is in them—like
+Arbuthnot. Since that little beast came in contact with the Lady Yva,
+it has never been happy out of her company.”
+
+“I think that is so,” said Bastin. “At any rate I have noticed that it
+has been moping for the last two days, as it always does when she is
+not present. It even seems to like Oro who gives me the creeps, perhaps
+because he is her father. Dogs must be very charitable animals.”
+
+By now we were in the cave marching past the wrecks of the half-buried
+flying-machines, which Bickley, as he remarked regretfully, had never
+found time thoroughly to examine. Indeed, to do so would have needed
+more digging than we could do without proper instruments, since the
+machines were big and deeply entombed in dust.
+
+We came to the sepulchre and entered.
+
+“Well,” said Bickley, seating himself on the edge of one of the coffins
+and holding up his lamp to look about him, “this place seems fairly
+empty. No one is keeping the assignation, Arbuthnot, although the sun
+is well down.”
+
+As he spoke the words Yva stood before us. Whence she came we did not
+see, for all our backs were turned at the moment of her arrival. But
+there she was, calm, beautiful, radiating light.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+In the Temple of Fate
+
+
+Yva glanced at me, and in her eyes I read tenderness and solicitude,
+also something of inquiry. It seemed to me as though she were wondering
+what I should do under circumstances that might, or would, arise, and
+in some secret fashion of which I was but half conscious, drawing an
+answer from my soul. Then she turned, and, smiling in her dazzling way,
+said:
+
+“So, Bickley, as usual, you did not believe? Because _you_ did not see
+him, therefore the Lord Oro, my father, never spoke with Humphrey. As
+though the Lord Oro could not pass you without your knowledge, or,
+perchance, send thoughts clothed in his own shape to work his errand.”
+
+“How do you know that I did not believe Arbuthnot’s story?” Bickley
+asked in a rather cross voice and avoiding the direct issue. “Do you
+also send thoughts to work _your_ errands clothed in your own shape,
+Lady Yva?”
+
+“Alas! not so, though perhaps I could if I might. It is very simple,
+Bickley. Standing here, I heard you say that although the sun was well
+down there was no one to meet you as Humphrey had expected, and from
+those words and your voice I guessed the rest.”
+
+“Your knowledge of the English language is improving fast, Lady Yva.
+Also, when I spoke, you were not here.”
+
+“At least I was very near, Bickley, and these walls are thinner than
+you think,” she answered, contemplating what seemed to be solid rock
+with eyes that were full of innocence. “Oh! friend,” she went on
+suddenly, “I wonder what there is which will cause you to believe that
+you do not know all; that there exist many things beyond the reach of
+your learning and imagination? Well, in a day or two, perhaps, even you
+will admit as much, and confess it to me—elsewhere,” and she sighed.
+
+“I am ready to confess now that much happens which I do not understand
+at present, because I have not the key to the trick,” he replied.
+
+Yva shook her head at him and smiled again. Then she motioned to all of
+us to stand close to her, and, stooping, lifted Tommy in her arms. Next
+moment that marvel happened which I have described already, and we were
+whirling downwards through space, to find ourselves in a very little
+time standing safe in the caves of Nyo, breathless with the swiftness
+of our descent. How and on what we descended neither I nor the others
+ever learned. It was and must remain one of the unexplained mysteries
+of our great experience.
+
+“Whither now, Yva?” I asked, staring about me at the radiant vastness.
+
+“The Lord Oro would speak with you, Humphrey. Follow. And I pray you
+all do not make him wrath, for his mood is not gentle.”
+
+So once more we proceeded down the empty streets of that underground
+abode which, except that it was better illuminated, reminded me of the
+Greek conception of Hades. We came to the sacred fountain over which
+stood the guardian statue of Life, pouring from the cups she held the
+waters of Good and Ill that mingled into one health-giving wine.
+
+“Drink, all of you,” she said; “for I think before the sun sets again
+upon the earth we shall need strength, every one of us.”
+
+So we drank, and she drank herself, and once more felt the blood go
+dancing through our veins as though the draught had been some nectar of
+the gods. Then, having extinguished the lanterns which we still
+carried, for here they were needless, and we wished to save our oil, we
+followed her through the great doors into the vast hall of audience and
+advanced up it between the endless, empty seats. At its head, on the
+dais beneath the arching shell, sat Oro on his throne. As before, he
+wore the jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes, while the table
+in front of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which he wrote
+with a pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his own fierce
+eyes. Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to ascend the dais.
+
+“You are here. It is well,” he said, which was all his greeting. Only
+when Tommy ran up to him he bent down and patted the dog’s head with
+his long, thin hand, and, as he did so, his face softened. It was
+evident to me that Tommy was more welcome to him than were the rest of
+us.
+
+There was a long silence while, one by one, he searched us with his
+piercing glance. It rested on me, the last of the three of us, and from
+me travelled to Yva.
+
+“I wonder why I have sent for you?” he said at length, with a mirthless
+laugh. “I think it must be that I may convince Bickley, the sceptic,
+that there are powers which he does not understand, but that I have the
+strength to move. Also, perhaps, that your lives may be spared for my
+own purposes in that which is about to happen. Hearken! My labours are
+finished; my calculations are complete,” and he pointed to the sheets
+of metal before him that were covered with cabalistic signs. “Tomorrow
+I am about to do what once before I did and to plunge half the world in
+the deeps of ocean and lift again from the depths that which has been
+buried for a quarter of a million years.”
+
+“Which half?” asked Bickley.
+
+“That is my secret, Physician, and the answer to it lies written here
+in signs you cannot read. Certain countries will vanish, others will be
+spared. I say that it is my secret.”
+
+“Then, Oro, if you could do what you threaten, you would drown hundreds
+of millions of people.”
+
+“If I could do! If I could do!” he exclaimed, glaring at Bickley.
+“Well, tomorrow you shall see what I can do. Oh! why do I grow angry
+with this fool? For the rest, yes, they must drown. What does it
+matter? Their end will be swift; some few minutes of terror, that is
+all, and in one short century every one of them would have been dead.”
+
+An expression of horror gathered on Bastin’s face.
+
+“Do you really mean to murder hundreds of millions of people?” he
+asked, in a thick, slow voice.
+
+“I have said that I intend to send them to that heaven or that hell of
+which you are so fond of talking, Preacher, somewhat more quickly than
+otherwise they would have found their way thither. They have
+disappointed me, they have failed; therefore, let them go and make room
+for others who will succeed.”
+
+“Then you are a greater assassin than any that the world has bred, or
+than all of them put together. There is nobody as bad, even in the Book
+of Revelation!” shouted Bastin, in a kind of fury. “Moreover, I am not
+like Bickley. I know enough of you and your hellish powers to believe
+that what you plan, that you can do.”
+
+“I believe it also,” sneered Oro. “But how comes it that the Great One
+whom you worship does not prevent the deed, if He exists, and it be
+evil?”
+
+“He _will_ prevent it!” raved Bastin. “Even now He commands me to
+prevent it, and I obey!” Then, drawing the revolver from his pocket, he
+pointed it at Oro’s breast, adding: “Swear not to commit this crime, or
+I will kill you!”
+
+“So the man of peace would become a man of blood,” mused Oro, “and kill
+that _I_ may not kill for the good of the world? Why, what is the
+matter with that toy of yours, Preacher?” and he pointed to the pistol.
+
+Well might he ask, for as he spoke the revolver flew out of Bastin’s
+hand. High into the air it flew, and as it went discharged itself, all
+the six chambers of it, in rapid succession, while Bastin stood staring
+at his arm and hand which he seemed unable to withdraw.
+
+“Do you still threaten me with that outstretched hand, Preacher?”
+mocked Oro.
+
+“I can’t move it,” said Bastin; “it seems turned to stone.”
+
+“Be thankful that you also are not turned to stone. But, because your
+courage pleases me, I will spare you, yes, and will advance you in my
+New Kingdom. What shall you be? Controller of Religions, I think, since
+all the qualities that a high priest should have are yours—faith,
+fanaticism and folly.”
+
+“It is very strange,” said Bastin, “but all of a sudden my arm and hand
+are quite well again. I suppose it must have been ‘pins and needles’ or
+something of that sort which made me throw away the pistol and pull the
+trigger when I didn’t mean to do so.”
+
+Then he went to fetch that article which had fallen beyond the dais,
+and quite forgot his intention of executing Oro in the interest of
+testing its mechanism, which proved to be destroyed. To his proposed
+appointment he made no illusion. If he comprehended what was meant,
+which I doubt, he took it as a joke.
+
+“Hearken all of you,” said Oro, lifting his head suddenly, for while
+Bastin recovered the revolver he had been brooding. “The great thing
+which I shall do tomorrow must be witnessed by you because thereby only
+can you come to understand my powers. Also yonder where I bring it
+about in the bowels of the earth, you will be safer than elsewhere,
+since when and perhaps before it happens, the whole world will heave
+and shake and tremble, and I know not what may chance, even in these
+caves. For this reason also, do not forget to bring the little hound
+with you, since him least of all of you would I see come to harm,
+perhaps because once, hundreds of generations ago as you reckon time, I
+had a dog very like to him. Your mother loved him much, Yva, and when
+she died, this dog died also. He lies embalmed with her on her coffin
+yonder in the temple, and yesterday I went to look at both of them. The
+beasts are wonderfully alike, which shows the everlastingness of
+blood.”
+
+He paused a while, lost in thought, then continued: “After the deed is
+done I’ll speak with you and you shall choose, Strangers, whether you
+will die your own masters, or live on to serve me. Now there is one
+problem that is left to me to solve—whether I can save a certain
+land—do not ask which it is, Humphrey, though I see the question in
+your eyes—or must let it go with the rest. I only answer you that I
+will do my best because you love it. So farewell for a while, and,
+Preacher, be advised by me and do not aim too high again.”
+
+“It doesn’t matter where I aim,” answered Bastin sturdily, “or whether
+I hit or miss, since there is something much bigger than me waiting to
+deal with you. The countries that you think you are going to destroy
+will sleep quite as well tomorrow as they do tonight, Oro.”
+
+“Much better, I think, Preacher, since by then they will have left
+sorrow and pain and wickedness and war far behind them.”
+
+“Where are we to go?” I asked.
+
+“The Lady Yva will show you,” he answered, waving his hand, and once
+more bent over his endless calculations.
+
+Yva beckoned to us and we turned and followed her down the hall. She
+led us to a street near the gateway of the temple and thence into one
+of the houses. There was a portico to it leading to a court out of
+which opened rooms somewhat in the Pompeian fashion. We did not enter
+the rooms, for at the end of the court were a metal table and three
+couches also of metal, on which were spread rich-looking rugs. Whence
+these came I do not know and never asked, but I remember that they were
+very beautiful and soft as velvet.
+
+“Here you may sleep,” she said, “if sleep you can, and eat of the food
+that you have brought with you. Tomorrow early I will call you when it
+is time for us to start upon our journey into the bowels of the earth.”
+
+“I don’t want to go any deeper than we are,” said Bastin doubtfully.
+
+“I think that none of us want to go, Bastin,” she answered with a sigh.
+“Yet go we must. I pray of you, anger the Lord Oro no more on this or
+any other matter. In your folly you tried to kill him, and as it
+chanced he bore it well because he loves courage. But another time he
+may strike back, and then, Bastin—”
+
+“I am not afraid of him,” he answered, “but I do not like tunnels.
+Still, perhaps it would be better to accompany you than to be left in
+this place alone. Now I will unpack the food.”
+
+Yva turned to go.
+
+“I must leave you,” she said, “since my father needs my help. The
+matter has to do with the Force that he would let loose tomorrow, and
+its measurements; also with the preparation of the robes that we must
+wear lest it should harm us in its leap.”
+
+Something in her eyes told me that she wished me to follow her, and I
+did so. Outside the portico where we stood in the desolate, lighted
+street, she halted.
+
+“If you are not afraid,” she said, “meet me at midnight by the statue
+of Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you, Humphrey,
+where, if anywhere, we may be alone.”
+
+“I will come, Yva.”
+
+“You know the road, and the gates are open, Humphrey.”
+
+Then she gave me her hand to kiss and glided away. I returned to the
+others and we ate, somewhat sparingly, for we wished to save our food
+in case of need, and having drunk of the Life-water, were not hungry.
+Also we talked a little, but by common consent avoided the subject of
+the morrow and what it might bring forth.
+
+We knew that terrible things were afoot, but lacking any knowledge of
+what these might be, thought it useless to discuss them. Indeed we were
+too depressed, so much so that even Bastin and Bickley ceased from
+arguing. The latter was so overcome by the exhibition of Oro’s powers
+when he caused the pistol to leap into the air and discharge itself,
+that he could not even pluck up courage to laugh at the failure of
+Bastin’s efforts to do justice on the old Super-man, or rather to
+prevent him from attempting a colossal crime.
+
+At length we lay down on the couches to rest, Bastin remarking that he
+wished he could turn off the light, also that he did not in the least
+regret having tried to kill Oro. Sleep seemed to come to the others
+quickly, but I could only doze, to wake up from time to time. Of this I
+was not sorry, since whenever I dropped off dreams seemed to pursue me.
+For the most part they were of my dead wife. She appeared to be trying
+to console me for some loss, but the strange thing was that sometimes
+she spoke with her own voice and sometimes with Yva’s, and sometimes
+looked at me with her own eyes and sometimes with those of Yva. I
+remember nothing else about these dreams, which were very confused.
+
+After one of them, the most vivid of all, I awoke and looked at my
+watch. It was half-past eleven, almost time for me to be starting. The
+other two seemed to be fast asleep. Presently I rose and crept down the
+court without waking them. Outside the portico, which by the way was a
+curious example of the survival of custom in architecture, since none
+was needed in that weatherless place, I turned to the right and
+followed the wide street to the temple enclosure. Through the pillared
+courts I went, my footsteps, although I walked as softly as I could,
+echoing loudly in that intense silence, through the great doors into
+the utter solitude of the vast and perfect fane.
+
+Words can not tell the loneliness of that place. It flowed over me like
+a sea and seemed to swallow up my being, so that even the wildest and
+most dangerous beast would have been welcome as a companion. I was as
+terrified as a child that wakes to find itself deserted in the dark.
+Also an uncanny sense of terrors to come oppressed me, till I could
+have cried aloud if only to hear the sound of a mortal voice. Yonder
+was the grim statue of Fate, the Oracle of the Kings of the Sons of
+Wisdom, which was believed to bow its stony head in answer to their
+prayers. I ran to it, eager for its terrible shelter, for on either
+side of it were figures of human beings. Even their cold marble was
+company of a sort, though alas! over all frowned Fate.
+
+Let anyone imagine himself standing alone beneath the dome of St.
+Paul’s; in the centre of that cathedral brilliant with mysterious
+light, and stretched all about it a London that had been dead and
+absolutely unpeopled for tens of thousands of years. If he can do this
+he will gather some idea of my physical state. Let him add to his
+mind-picture a knowledge that on the following day something was to
+happen not unlike the end of the world, as prognosticated by the Book
+of Revelation and by most astronomers, and he will have some idea of my
+mental perturbations. Add to the mixture a most mystic yet very real
+love affair and an assignation before that symbol of the cold fate
+which seems to sway the universes down to the tiniest detail of
+individual lives, and he may begin to understand what I, Humphrey
+Arbuthnot, experienced during my vigil in this sanctuary of a vanished
+race.
+
+It seemed long before Yva came, but at last she did come. I caught
+sight of her far away beyond the temple gate, flitting through the
+unholy brightness of the pillared courts like a white moth at night and
+seeming quite as small. She approached; now she was as a ghost, and
+then drawing near, changed into a living, breathing, lovely woman. I
+opened my arms, and with something like a sob she sank into them and we
+kissed as mortals do.
+
+“I could not come more quickly,” she said. “The Lord Oro needed me, and
+those calculations were long and difficult. Also twice he must visit
+the place whither we shall go tomorrow, and that took time.”
+
+“Then it is close at hand?” I said.
+
+“Humphrey, be not foolish. Do you not remember, who have travelled with
+him, that Oro can throw his soul afar and bring it back again laden
+with knowledge, as the feet of a bee are laden with golden dust? Well,
+he went and went again, and I must wait. And then the robes and
+shields; they must be prepared by his arts and mine. Oh! ask not what
+they are, there is no time to tell, and it matters nothing. Some folk
+are wise and some are foolish, but all which matters is that within
+them flows the blood of life and that life breeds love, and that love,
+as I believe, although Oro does not, breeds immortality. And if so,
+what is Time but as a grain of sand upon the shore?”
+
+“This, Yva; it is ours, who can count on nothing else.”
+
+“Oh! Humphrey, if I thought that, no more wretched creature would
+breathe tonight upon this great world.”
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked, growing fearful, more at her manner and
+her look than at her words.
+
+“Nothing, nothing, except that Time is so very short. A kiss, a touch,
+a little light and a little darkness, and it is gone. Ask my father Oro
+who has lived a thousand years and slept for tens of thousands, as I
+have, and he will say the same. It is against Time that he fights; he
+who, believing in nothing beyond, will inherit nothing, as Bastin says;
+he to whom Time has brought nothing save a passing, blood-stained
+greatness, and triumph ending in darkness and disaster, and hope that
+will surely suffer hope’s eclipse, and power that must lay down its
+coronet in dust.”
+
+“And what has it brought to you, Yva, beyond a fair body and a soul of
+strength?”
+
+“It has brought a spirit, Humphrey. Between them the body and the soul
+have bred a spirit, and in the fires of tribulation from that spirit
+has been distilled the essence of eternal love. That is Time’s gift to
+me, and therefore, although still he rules me here, I mock at Fate,”
+and she waved her hand with a gesture of defiance at the stern-faced,
+sexless effigy which sat above us, the sword across its knees.
+
+“Look! Look!” she went on in a swelling voice of music, pointing to the
+statues of the dotard and the beauteous woman. “They implore Fate, they
+worship Fate. _I_ do not implore, _I_ do not worship or ask a sign as
+even Oro does and as did his forefathers. _I_ rise above and triumph.
+As Fate, the god of my people, sets his foot upon the sun, so I set my
+foot upon Fate, and thence, like a swimmer from a rock, leap into the
+waters of Immortality.”
+
+I looked at her whose presence, as happened from time to time, had
+grown majestic beyond that of woman; I studied her deep eyes which were
+full of lights, not of this world, and I grew afraid.
+
+“What do you mean?” I asked. “Yva, you talk like one who has finished
+with life.”
+
+“It passes,” she answered quickly. “Life passes like breath fading from
+a mirror. So should all talk who breathe beneath the sun.”
+
+“Yes, Yva, but if you went and left me still breathing on that mocking
+glass—”
+
+“If so, what of it? Will not your breath fade also and join mine where
+all vapours go? Or if it were yours that faded and mine that remained
+for some few hours, is it not the same? I think, Humphrey, that already
+you have seen a beloved breath melt from the glass of life,” she added,
+looking at me earnestly.
+
+I bowed my head and answered:
+
+“Yes, and therefore I am ashamed.”
+
+“Oh! why should you be ashamed, Humphrey, who are not sure but that two
+breaths may yet be one breath? How do you know that there is a
+difference between them?”
+
+“You drive me mad, Yva. I cannot understand.”
+
+“Nor can I altogether, Humphrey. Why should I, seeing that I am no more
+than woman, as you are no more than man? I would always have you
+remember, Humphrey, that I am no spirit or sorceress, but just a
+woman—like her you lost.”
+
+I looked at her doubtfully and answered:
+
+“Women do not sleep for two hundred thousand years. Women do not take
+dream journeys to the stars. Women do not make the dead past live again
+before the watcher’s eyes. Their hair does not glimmer in the dusk nor
+do their bodies gleam, nor have they such strength of soul or eyes so
+wonderful, or loveliness so great.”
+
+These words appeared to distress her who, as it seemed to me, was above
+all things anxious to prove herself woman and no more.
+
+“All these qualities are nothing, Humphrey,” she cried. “As for the
+beauty, such as it is, it comes to me with my blood, and with it the
+glitter of my hair which is the heritage of those who for generations
+have drunk of the Life-water. My mother was lovelier than I, as was her
+mother, or so I have heard, since only the fairest were the wives of
+the Kings of the Children of Wisdom. For the rest, such arts as I have
+spring not from magic, but from knowledge which your people will
+acquire in days to come, that is, if Oro spares them. Surely you above
+all should know that I am only woman,” she added very slowly and
+searching my face with her eyes.
+
+“Why, Yva? During the little while that we have been together I have
+seen much which makes me doubt. Even Bickley the sceptic doubts also.”
+
+“I will tell you, though I am not sure that you will believe me.” She
+glanced about her as though she were frightened lest someone should
+overhear her words or read her thoughts. Then she stretched out her
+hands and drawing my head towards her, put her lips to my ear and
+whispered:
+
+“Because once you saw me _die_, as women often die—giving life for
+life.”
+
+“I saw _you_ die?” I gasped.
+
+She nodded, then continued to whisper in my ear, not in her own voice,
+but another’s:
+
+“_Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in
+which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me. Good-bye
+for a little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!_”
+
+I knew the voice as I knew the words, and knowing, I think that I
+should have fallen to the ground, had she not supported me with her
+strong arms.
+
+“Who told you?” I stammered. “Was it Bickley or Bastin? They knew,
+though neither of them heard those holy words.”
+
+“Not Bickley nor Bastin,” she answered, shaking her head, “no, nor you
+yourself, awake or sleeping, though once, by the lake yonder, you said
+to me that when a certain one lay dying, she bade you seek her
+elsewhere, for certainly you would find her. Humphrey, I cannot say who
+told me those words because I do not know. _I think they are a memory,
+Humphrey!_”
+
+“That would mean that you, Yva, are the same as one who was—not called
+Yva.”
+
+“The same as one who was called _Natalie_, Humphrey,” she replied in
+solemn accents. “One whom you loved and whom you lost.”
+
+“Then you think that we live again upon this earth?”
+
+“Again and yet again, until the time comes for us to leave the earth
+for ever. Of this, indeed, I am sure, for that knowledge was part of
+the secret wisdom of my people.”
+
+“But you were not dead. You only slept.”
+
+“The sleep was a death-sleep which went by like a flash, yes, in an
+instant, or so it seemed. Only the shell of the body remained preserved
+by mortal arts, and when the returning spirit and the light of life
+were poured into it again, it awoke. But during this long death-sleep,
+that spirit may have spoken through other lips and that light may have
+shone through other eyes, though of these I remember nothing.”
+
+“Then that dream of our visit to a certain star may be no dream?”
+
+“I think no dream, and you, too, have thought as much.”
+
+“In a way, yes, Yva. But I could not believe and turned from what I
+held to be a phantasy.”
+
+“It was natural, Humphrey, that you should not believe. Hearken! In
+this temple a while ago I showed you a picture of myself and of a man
+who loved me and whom I loved, and of his death at Oro’s hands. Did you
+note anything about that man?”
+
+“Bickley did,” I answered. “Was he right?”
+
+“I think that he was right, since otherwise I should not have loved
+you, Humphrey.”
+
+“I remember nothing of that man, Yva.”
+
+“It is probable that you would not, since you and he are very far
+apart, while between you and him flow wide seas of death, wherein are
+set islands of life; perhaps many of them. But I remember much who seem
+to have left him but a very little while ago.”
+
+“When you awoke in your coffin and threw your arms about me, what did
+you think, Yva?”
+
+“I thought _you_ were that man, Humphrey.”
+
+There was silence between us and in that silence the truth came home to
+me. Then there before the effigy of Fate and in the desolate, glowing
+temple we plighted anew our troth made holy by a past that thus so
+wonderfully lived again.
+
+Of this consecrated hour I say no more. Let each picture it as he will.
+A glory as of heaven fell upon us and in it we dwelt a space.
+
+“Beloved,” she whispered at length in a voice that was choked as though
+with tears, “if it chances that we should be separated again for a
+little while, you will not grieve over much?”
+
+“Knowing all I should try not to grieve, Yva, seeing that in truth we
+never can be parted. But do you mean that I shall die?”
+
+“Being mortal either of us might seem to die, Humphrey,” and she bent
+her head as though to hide her face. “You know we go into dangers this
+day.”
+
+“Does Oro really purpose to destroy much of the world and has he in
+truth the power, Yva?”
+
+“He does so purpose and most certainly he has the power, unless—unless
+some other Power should stay his hand.”
+
+“What other power, Yva?”
+
+“Oh! perhaps that which you worship, that which is called Love. The
+love of man may avert the massacre of men. I hope so with all my heart.
+Hist! Oro comes. I feel, I know that he comes, though not in search of
+us who are very far from his thought tonight. Follow me. Swiftly.”
+
+She sped across the temple to where a chapel opened out of it, which
+was full of the statues of dead kings, for here was the entrance to
+their burial vault. We reached it and hid behind the base of one of
+these statues. By standing to our full height, without being seen we
+still could see between the feet of the statue that stood upon a
+pedestal.
+
+Then Oro came.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+The Chariot of the Pit
+
+
+Oro came and of necessity alone. Yet there was that in his air as he
+advanced into the temple, which suggested a monarch surrounded by the
+pomp and panoply of a great court. He marched, his head held high, as
+though heralds and pursuivants went in front of him, as though nobles
+surrounded him and guards or regiments followed after him. Let it be
+admitted that he was a great figure in his gorgeous robes, with his
+long white beard, his hawk-like features, his tall shape and his
+glittering eyes, which even at that distance I could see. Indeed once
+or twice I thought that he glanced out of the corners of them towards
+the chapel where we were hid. But this I think was fancy. For as Yva
+said, his thoughts were set elsewhere.
+
+He reached the statue of Fate and stood for a while contemplating it
+and the suppliant figures on either side, as though he were waiting for
+his invisible court to arrange itself. Then he doffed his jewelled cap
+to the effigy, and knelt before it. Yes, Oro the Ancient, the
+Super-man, the God, as the early peoples of the earth fancied such a
+being, namely, one full of wrath, revenge, jealousy, caprice and power,
+knelt in supplication to this image of stone which he believed to be
+the home of a spirit, thereby showing himself to be after all not so
+far removed from the savages whose idol Bastin had destroyed. More, in
+a clear and resonant voice which reached us even across that great
+space, he put up his prayer. It ran something as follows, for although
+I did not understand the language in which he spoke Yva translated it
+to me in a whisper:
+
+“God of the Sons of Wisdom, God of the whole earth, only God to whom
+must bow every other Power and Dominion, to thee I, Oro the Great King,
+make prayer and offer sacrifice. Twenty times ten thousand years and
+more have gone by since I, Oro, visited this, thy temple and knelt
+before this, thy living effigy, yet thou, ruler of the world, dost
+remember the prayer I made and the sacrifice I offered. The prayer was
+for triumph over my enemies and the sacrifice a promise of the lives of
+half of those who in that day dwelt upon the earth. Thou heardest the
+prayer, thou didst bow thy head and accept the sacrifice. Yea, the
+prayer was granted and the sacrifice was made, and in it were counted
+the number of my foes.
+
+“Then I slept. Through countless generations I slept on and at my side
+was the one child of my body that was left to me. What chanced to my
+spirit and to hers during that sleep, thou knowest alone, but doubtless
+they went forth to work thy ends.
+
+“At the appointed time which thou didst decree, I awoke again and found
+in my house strangers from another land. In the company of one of those
+whose spirit I drew forth, I visited the peoples of the new earth, and
+found them even baser and more evil than those whom I had known.
+Therefore, since they cannot be bettered. I purpose to destroy them
+also, and on their wreck to rebuild a glorious empire, such as was that
+of the Sons of Wisdom at its prime.
+
+“A sign! O Fate, ruler of the world, give me a sign that my desire
+shall be fulfilled.”
+
+He paused, stretching out his arms and staring upwards. While he waited
+I felt the solid rock on which I stood quiver and sway beneath my feet
+so that Yva and I clung to each other lest we should fall. This chanced
+also. The shock of the earth tremor, for such without doubt it was,
+threw down the figures of the ancient man and the lovely woman which
+knelt as though making prayers to Fate, and shook the marble sword from
+off its knees. As it fell Oro caught it by the hilt, and, rising, waved
+it in triumph.
+
+“I thank thee, God of my people from the beginning,” he cried. “Thou
+hast given to me, thy last servant, thine own sword and I will use it
+well. For these worshippers of thine who have fallen, thou shalt have
+others, yes, all those who dwell in the new world that is to be. My
+daughter and the man whom she has chosen to be the father of the kings
+of the earth, and with him his companions, shall be the first of the
+hundreds of millions that are to follow, for they shall kiss thy feet
+or perish. Thou shalt set thy foot upon the necks of all other gods;
+thou shalt rule and thou alone, and, as of old, Oro be thy minister.”
+
+Still holding the sword, he flung himself down as though in an ecstasy,
+and was silent.
+
+“I read the omen otherwise,” whispered Yva. “The worshippers of Fate
+are overthrown. His sword of power is fallen, but not into the hands
+that clasped it, and he totters on his throne. A greater God asserts
+dominion of the world and this Fate is but his instrument.”
+
+Oro rose again.
+
+“One prayer more,” he cried. “Give me life, long life, that I may
+execute thy decrees. By word or gesture show me a sign that I shall be
+satisfied with life, a year for every year that I have lived, or
+twain!”
+
+He waited, staring about him, but no token came; the idol did not speak
+or bow its head, as Yva had told me it was wont to do in sign of
+accepted prayer, how, she knew not. Only I thought I heard the echo of
+Oro’s cries run in a whisper of mockery round the soaring dome.
+
+Once more Oro flung himself upon his knees and began to pray in a
+veritable agony.
+
+“God of my forefathers, God of my lost people, I will hide naught from
+thee,” he said. “I who fear nothing else, fear death. The priest-fool
+yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering words of judgment and
+damnation which, though I do not believe them, yet stick in my heart
+like arrows. I will stamp out his faith, and with this ancient sword of
+thine drive back the new gods into the darkness whence they came. Yet
+what if some water of Truth flows through the channel of his leaden
+lips, and what if because I have ruled and will rule as thou didst
+decree, therefore, in some dim place of souls, I must bear these
+burdens of terror and of doom which I have bound upon the backs of
+others! Nay, it cannot be, for what power is there in all the universe
+that dares to make a slave of Oro and to afflict him with stripes?
+
+“Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my path in
+the ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless and forgotten
+as are those who went before me, while my crown of Power shines on
+younger brows. Alas! I grow old, since æons of sleep have not renewed
+my strength. My time is short and yet I would not die as mortals must.
+Oh! God of my people, whom I have served so well, save me from the
+death I dread. For I would not die. Give me a sign; give me the
+ancient, sacred sign!”
+
+So he spoke, lifting his proud and splendid head and watching the
+statue with wide, expectant eyes.
+
+“Thou dost not answer,” he cried again. “Wouldst thou desert me, Fate?
+Then beware lest I set up some new god against thee and hurl thee from
+thine immemorial throne. While I live I still have powers, I who am the
+last of thy worshippers, since it seems that my daughter turns her back
+on thee. I will get me to the sepulchre of the kings and take counsel
+with the dust of that wizard who first taught me wisdom. Even from the
+depths of death he must come to my call clad in a mockery of life, and
+comfort me. A little while yet I will wait, and if thou answer not,
+then Fate, soon I’ll tear the sceptre from thy hand, and thou shalt
+join the company of dead gods.” And throwing aside the sword, again Oro
+laid down his head upon the ground and stretched out his arms in the
+last abasement of supplication.
+
+“Come,” whispered Yva, “while there is yet time. Presently he will seek
+this place to descend to the sepulchre, and if he learns that we have
+read his heart and know him for a coward deserted of his outworn god,
+surely he will blot us out. Come, and be swift and silent.”
+
+We crept out of the chapel, Yva leading, and along the circle of the
+great dome till we reached the gates. Here I glanced back and perceived
+that Oro, looking unutterably small in that vastness, looking like a
+dead man, still lay outstretched before the stern-faced, unanswering
+Effigy which, with all his wisdom, he believed to be living and divine.
+Perhaps once it was, but if so its star had set for ever, like those of
+Amon, Jupiter and Baal, and he was its last worshipper.
+
+Now we were safe, but still we sped on till we reached the portico of
+our sleeping place. Then Yva turned and spoke.
+
+“It is horrible,” she said, “and my soul sickens. Oh, I thank the
+Strength which made it that I have no desire to rule the earth, and,
+being innocent of death, do not fear to die and cross his threshold.”
+
+“Yes, it is horrible,” I answered. “Yet all men fear death.”
+
+“Not when they have found love, Humphrey, for that I think is his true
+name, and, with it written on his brow, he stands upon the neck of Fate
+who is still my father’s god.”
+
+“Then he is not yours, Yva?”
+
+“Nay. Once it was so, but now I reject him; he is no longer mine. As
+Oro threatens, and perchance dare do in his rage, I have broken his
+chain, though in another fashion. Ask me no more; perhaps one day you
+will learn the path I trod to freedom.”
+
+Then before I could speak, she went off:
+
+“Rest now, for within a few hours I must come to lead you and your
+companions to a terrible place. Yet whatever you may see or hear, be
+not afraid, Humphrey, for I think that Oro’s god has no power over you,
+strong though he was, and that Oro’s plans will fail, while I, who too
+have knowledge, shall find strength to save the world.”
+
+Then of a sudden, once again she grew splendid, almost divine; no more
+a woman but as it were an angel. Some fire of pure purpose seemed to
+burn up in her and to shine out of her eyes. Yet she said little. Only
+this indeed:
+
+“To everyone, I think, there comes the moment of opportunity when
+choice must be made between what is great and what is small, between
+self and its desires and the good of other wanderers in the way. This
+day that moment may draw near to you or me, and if so, surely we shall
+greet it well. Such is Bastin’s lesson, which I have striven to learn.”
+
+Then she flung her arms about me and kissed me on the brow as a mother
+might, and was gone.
+
+Strangely enough, perhaps because of my mental exhaustion, for what I
+had passed through seemed to overwhelm me so that I could no longer so
+much as think with clearness, even after all that I have described I
+slept like a child and awoke refreshed and well.
+
+I looked at my watch to find that it was now eight o’clock in the
+morning in this horrible place where there was neither morn, nor noon,
+nor night, but only an eternal brightness that came I knew not whence,
+and never learned.
+
+I found that I was alone, since Bickley and Bastin had gone to fill our
+bottles with the Life-water. Presently they returned and we ate a
+little; with that water to drink one did not need much food. It was a
+somewhat silent meal, for our circumstances were a check on talk;
+moreover, I thought that the others looked at me rather oddly. Perhaps
+they guessed something of my midnight visit to the temple, but if so
+they thought it wisest to say nothing. Nor did I enlighten them.
+
+Shortly after we had finished Yva appeared. She was wonderfully quiet
+and gentle in her manner, calm also, and greeted all of us with much
+sweetness. Of our experiences during the night she said no word to me,
+even when we were alone. One difference I noticed about her, however;
+that she was clothed in garments such as I had never seen her wear
+before. They were close fitting, save for a flowing cape, and made of
+some grey material, not unlike a coarse homespun or even asbestos
+cloth. Still they became her very well, and when I remarked upon them,
+all she answered was that part of our road would be rough. Even her
+feet were shod with high buskins of this grey stuff.
+
+Presently she touched Bastin on the shoulder and said that she would
+speak with him apart. They went together into one of the chambers of
+that dwelling and there remained for perhaps the half of an hour. It
+was towards the end of this time that in the intense silence I heard a
+crash from the direction of the temple, as though something heavy had
+fallen to the rocky floor. Bickley also heard this sound. When the two
+reappeared I noticed that though still quite calm, Yva looked radiant,
+and, if I may say so, even more human and womanly than I had ever seen
+her, while Bastin also seemed very happy.
+
+“One has strange experiences in life, yes, very strange,” he remarked,
+apparently addressing the air, which left me wondering to what
+particular experience he might refer. Well, I thought that I could
+guess.
+
+“Friends,” said Yva, “it is time for us to be going and I am your
+guide. You will meet the Lord Oro at the end of your journey. I pray
+you to bring those lamps of yours with you, since all the road is not
+lightened like this place.”
+
+“I should like to ask,” said Bickley, “whither we go and for what
+object, points on which up to the present we have had no definite
+information.”
+
+“We go, friend Bickley, deep into the bowels of the world, far deeper,
+I think, than any mortal men have gone hitherto, that is, of your
+race.”
+
+“Then we shall perish of heat,” said Bickley, “for with every thousand
+feet the temperature rises many degrees.”
+
+“Not so. You will pass through a zone of heat, but so swiftly that if
+you hold your breath you will not suffer overmuch. Then you will come
+to a place where a great draught blows which will keep you cool, and
+thence travel on to the end.”
+
+“Yes, but to what end, Lady Yva?”
+
+“That you will see for yourselves, and with it other wondrous things.”
+
+Here some new idea seemed to strike her, and after a little hesitation
+she added:
+
+“Yet why should you go? Oro has commanded it, it is true, but I think
+that at the last he will forget. It must be decided swiftly. There is
+yet time. I can place you in safety in the sepulchre of Sleep where you
+found us. Thence cross to the main island and sail away quickly in your
+boat out into the great sea, where I believe you will find succour.
+Know that after disobeying him, you must meet Oro no more lest it
+should be the worse for you. If that be your will, let us start. What
+say you?”
+
+She looked at me.
+
+“I say, Yva, that I am willing to go if you come with us. Not
+otherwise.”
+
+“I say,” said Bickley, “that I want to see all this supernatural
+rubbish thoroughly exploded, and that therefore I should prefer to go
+on with the business.”
+
+“And I say,” said Bastin, “that my most earnest desire is to be clear
+of the whole thing, which wearies and perplexes me more than I can
+tell. Only I am not going to run away, unless you think it desirable to
+do so too, Lady Yva. I want you to understand that I am not in the
+least afraid of the Lord Oro, and do not for one moment believe that he
+will be allowed to bring about disaster to the world, as I understand
+is his wicked object. Therefore on the whole I am indifferent and quite
+prepared to accept any decision at which the rest of you may arrive.”
+
+“Be it understood,” said Yva with a little smile when Bastin had
+finished his sermonette, “that I must join my father in the bowels of
+the earth for a reason which will be made plain afterwards. Therefore,
+if you go we part, as I think to meet no more. Still my advice is that
+you should go.”[1]
+
+ [1] It is fortunate that we did not accept Yva’s offer. Had we done so
+ we should have found ourselves shut in, and perished, as shall be
+ told.—H. A.
+
+
+To this our only answer was to attend to the lighting of our lamps and
+the disposal of our small impedimenta, such as our tins of oil and
+water bottles. Yva noted this and laughed outright.
+
+“Courage did not die with the Sons of Wisdom,” she said.
+
+Then we set out, Yva walking ahead of us and Tommy frisking at her
+side.
+
+Our road led us through the temple. As we passed the great gates I
+started, for there, in the centre of that glorious building, I
+perceived a change. The statue of Fate was no more! It lay broken upon
+the pavement among those fragments of its two worshippers which I had
+seen shaken down some hours before.
+
+“What does this mean?” I whispered to Yva. “I have felt no other
+earthquake.”
+
+“I do not know,” she answered, “or if I know I may not say. Yet learn
+that no god can live on without a single worshipper, and, in a fashion,
+that idol was alive, though this you will not believe.”
+
+“How very remarkable,” said Bastin, contemplating the ruin. “If I were
+superstitious, which I am not, I should say that this occurrence was an
+omen indicating the final fall of a false god. At any rate it is dead
+now, and I wonder what caused it?”
+
+“I felt an earth tremor last night,” said Bickley, “though it is odd
+that it should only have affected this particular statue. A thousand
+pities, for it was a wonderful work of art.”
+
+Then I remembered and reminded Bickley of the crash which we had heard
+while Yva and Bastin were absent on some secret business in the
+chamber.
+
+Walking the length of the great church, if so it could be called, we
+came to an apse at the head of it where, had it been Christian, the
+altar would have stood. In this apse was a little open door through
+which we passed. Beyond it lay a space of rough rock that looked as
+though it had been partially prepared for the erection of buildings and
+then abandoned. All this space was lighted, however, like the rest of
+the City of Nyo, and in the same mysterious way. Led by Yva, we
+threaded our path between the rough stones, following a steep downward
+slope. Thus we walked for perhaps half a mile, till at length we came
+to the mouth of a huge pit that must, I imagine, have lain quite a
+thousand feet below the level of the temple.
+
+I looked over the edge of this pit and shrank back terrified. It seemed
+to be bottomless. Moreover, a great wind rushed up it with a roaring
+sound like to that of an angry sea. Or rather there were two winds,
+perhaps draughts would be a better term, if I may apply it to an air
+movement of so fierce and terrible a nature. One of these rushed up the
+pit, and one rushed down. Or it may have been that the up rush
+alternated with the down rush. Really it is impossible to say.
+
+“What is this place?” I asked, clinging to the others and shrinking
+back in alarm from its sheer edge and bottomless depth, for that this
+was enormous we could see by the shaft of light which flowed downwards
+farther than the eye could follow.
+
+“It is a vent up and down which air passes from and to the central
+hollows of the earth,” Yva answered. “Doubtless in the beginning
+through it travelled that mighty force which blew out these caves in
+the heated rocks, as the craftsman blows out glass.”
+
+“I understand,” said Bastin. “Just like one blows out a bubble on a
+pipe, only on a larger scale. Well, it is very interesting, but I have
+seen enough of it. Also I am afraid of being blown away.”
+
+“I fear that you must see more,” answered Yva with a smile, “since we
+are about to descend this pit.”
+
+“Do you mean that we are to go down that hole, and if so, how? I don’t
+see any lift, or moving staircase, or anything of that sort.”
+
+“Easily and safely enough, Bastin. See.”
+
+As she spoke a great flat rock of the size of a small room appeared,
+borne upwards, as I suppose, by the terrific draught which roared past
+us on its upward course. When it reached the lip of the shaft, it hung
+a little while, then moved across and began to descend with such
+incredible swiftness that in a few seconds it had vanished from view.
+
+“Oh!” said Bastin, with his eyes almost starting out of his head,
+“that’s the lift, is it? Well, I tell you at once I don’t like the look
+of the thing. It gives me the creeps. Suppose it tilted.”
+
+“It does not tilt,” answered Yva, still smiling. “I tell you, Bastin,
+that there is naught to fear. Only yesterday, I rode this rock and
+returned unharmed.”
+
+“That is all very well, Lady Yva, but you may know how to balance it;
+also when to get on and off.”
+
+“If you are afraid, Bastin, remain here until your companions return.
+They, I think, will make the journey.”
+
+Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the truth, if
+less frank we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
+
+“No, I’ll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as any
+other, and if anything were to happen to them and I were left alone, it
+would be worse still.”
+
+“Then be prepared,” said Yva, “for presently this air-chariot of ours
+will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge, step on to it and
+throw yourselves upon your faces and all will be well. At the foot of
+the shaft the motion lessens till it almost stops, and it is easy to
+spring, or even crawl to the firm earth.”
+
+Then she stooped down and lifted Tommy who was sniffing suspiciously at
+the edge of the pit, his long ears blown straight above his head,
+holding him beneath her left arm and under her cloak, that he might not
+see and be frightened.
+
+We waited a while in silence, perhaps for five or six minutes, among
+the most disagreeable, I think, that I ever passed. Then far down in
+the brightness below appeared a black speck that seemed to grow in size
+as it rushed upwards.
+
+“It comes,” said Yva. “Prepare and do as I do. Do not spring, or run,
+lest you should go too far. Step gently on to the rock and to its
+centre, and there lie down. Trust in me, all of you.”
+
+“There’s nothing else to do,” groaned Bastin.
+
+The great stone appeared and, as before, hung at the edge of the pit.
+Yva stepped on to it quietly, as she did so, catching hold of my wrist
+with her disengaged hand. I followed her feeling very sick, and
+promptly sat down. Then came Bickley with the air of the virtuous hero
+of a romance walking a pirate’s plank, and also sat down. Only Bastin
+hesitated until the stone began to move away. Then with an ejaculation
+of “Here goes!” he jumped over the intervening crack of space and
+landed in the middle of us like a sack of coal. Had I not been seated
+really I think he would have knocked me off the rock. As it was, with
+one hand he gripped me by the beard and with the other grasped Yva’s
+robe, of neither of which would he leave go for quite a long time,
+although we forced him on to his face. The lantern which he held flew
+from his grasp and descended the shaft on its own account.
+
+“You silly fool!” exclaimed Bickley whose perturbation showed itself in
+anger. “There goes one of our lamps.”
+
+“Hang the lamp!” muttered the prostrate Bastin. “We shan’t want it in
+Heaven, or the other place either.”
+
+Now the stone which had quivered a little beneath the impact of Bastin,
+steadied itself again and with a slow and majestic movement sailed to
+the other side of the gulf. There it felt the force of gravity, or
+perhaps the weight of the returning air pressed on it, which I do not
+know. At any rate it began to fall, slowly at first, then more swiftly,
+and afterwards at an incredible pace, so that in a few seconds the
+mouth of the pit above us grew small and presently vanished quite away.
+I looked up at Yva who was standing composedly in the midst of our
+prostrate shapes. She bent down and called in my ear:
+
+“All is well. The heat begins, but it will not endure for long.”
+
+I nodded and glanced over the edge of the stone at Bastin’s lantern
+which was sailing alongside of us, till presently we passed it. Bastin
+had lit it before we started, I think in a moment of aberration, and it
+burned for quite a long while, showing like a star when the shaft grew
+darker as it did by degrees, a circumstance that testifies to the
+excellence of the make, which is one advertised not to go out in any
+wind. Not that we felt wind, or even draught, perhaps because we were
+travelling with it.
+
+Then we entered the heat zone. About this there was no doubt, for the
+perspiration burst out all over me and the burning air scorched my
+lungs. Also Tommy thrust his head from beneath the cloak with his
+tongue hanging out and his mouth wide open.
+
+“Hold your breaths!” cried Yva, and we obeyed until we nearly burst. At
+least I did, but what happened to the others I do not know.
+
+Fortunately it was soon over and the air began to grow cool again. By
+now we had travelled an enormous distance, it seemed to be miles on
+miles, and I noticed that our terrific speed was slackening, also that
+the shaft grew more narrow, till at length there were only a few feet
+between the edge of the stone and its walls. The result of this, or so
+I supposed, was that the compressed air acted as a buffer, lessening
+our momentum, till at length the huge stone moved but very slowly.
+
+“Be ready to follow me,” cried Yva again, and we rose to our feet, that
+is, Bickley and I did, but poor Bastin was semi-comatose. The stone
+stopped and Yva sprang from it to a rock platform level with which it
+lay. We followed, dragging Bastin between us. As we did so something
+hit me gently on the head. It was Bastin’s lamp, which I seized.
+
+“We are safe. Sit down and rest,” said Yva, leading us a few paces
+away.
+
+We obeyed and presently by the dim light saw the stone begin to stir
+again, this time upwards. In another twenty seconds it was away on its
+never-ending journey.
+
+“Does it always go on like that?” said Bastin, sitting up and staring
+after it.
+
+“Tens of thousands of years ago it was journeying thus, and tens of
+thousands of years hence it will still be journeying, or so I think,”
+she replied. “Why not, since the strength of the draught never changes
+and there is nothing to wear it except the air?”
+
+Somehow the vision of this huge stone, first loosed and set in motion
+by heaven knows what agency, travelling from aeon to aeon up and down
+that shaft in obedience to some law I did not understand, impressed my
+imagination like a nightmare. Indeed I often dream of it to this day.
+
+I looked about me. We were in some cavernous place that could be but
+dimly seen, for here the light that flowed down the shaft from the
+upper caves where it was mysteriously created, scarcely shone, and
+often indeed was entirely cut off, when the ever-journeying stone was
+in the narrowest parts of the passage. I could see, however, that this
+cavern stretched away both to right and left of us, while I felt that
+from the left, as we sat facing the shaft, there drew down a strong
+blast of fresh air which suggested that somewhere, however far away, it
+must open on to the upper world. For the rest its bottom and walls
+seemed to be smooth as though they had been planed in the past ages by
+the action of cosmic forces. Bickley noticed this the first and pointed
+it out to me. We had little time to observe, however, for presently Yva
+said:
+
+“If you are rested, friends, I pray you light those lamps of yours,
+since we must walk a while in darkness.”
+
+We did and started, still travelling downhill. Yva walked ahead with me
+and Tommy who seemed somewhat depressed and clung close to our heels.
+The other two followed, arguing strenuously about I know not what. It
+was their way of working off irritation and alarms.
+
+I asked Yva what was about to happen, for a great fear oppressed me.
+
+“I am not sure, Beloved,” she answered in a sweet and gentle voice,
+“who do not know all Oro’s secrets, but as I think, great things. We
+are now deep in the bowels of the world, and presently, perhaps, you
+will see some of its mighty forces whereof your ignorant races have no
+knowledge, doing their everlasting work.”
+
+“Then how is it that we can breathe here?” I asked. “Because this road
+that we are following connects with the upper air or used to do so,
+since once I followed it. It is a long road and the climb is steep, but
+at last it leads to the light of the blessed sun, nor are there any
+pitfalls in the path. Would that we might tread it together, Humphrey,”
+she added with passion, “and be rid of mysteries and the gloom, or that
+light which is worse than gloom.”
+
+“Why not?” I asked eagerly. “Why should we not turn and flee?”
+
+“Who can flee from my father, the Lord Oro?” she replied. “He would
+snare us before we had gone a mile. Moreover, if we fled, by tomorrow
+half the world must perish.”
+
+“And how can we save it by not flying, Yva?”
+
+“I do not know, Humphrey, yet I think it will be saved, perchance by
+sacrifice. That is the keystone of your faith, is it not? Therefore if
+it is asked of you to save the world, you will not shrink from it, will
+you, Humphrey?”
+
+“I hope not,” I replied, without enthusiasm, I admit. Indeed it struck
+me that a business of this sort was better fitted to Bastin than to
+myself, or at any rate to his profession. I think she guessed my
+thoughts, for by the light of the lamp I saw her smile in her dazzling
+way. Then after a swift glance behind her, she turned and suddenly
+kissed me, as she did so calling down everlasting blessings on my head
+and on my spirit. There was something very wonderful about this
+benediction of Yva’s and it thrilled me through and through, so that to
+it I could make no answer.
+
+Next moment it was too late to retreat, for our narrowing passage
+turned and we found ourselves in a wondrous place. I call it wondrous
+because of it we could see neither the beginning nor the end, nor the
+roof, nor aught else save the rock on which we walked, and the side or
+wall that our hands touched. Nor was this because of darkness, since
+although it was not illuminated like the upper caverns, light of a sort
+was present. It was a very strange light, consisting of brilliant and
+intermittent flashes, or globes of blue and lambent flame which seemed
+to leap from nowhere into nowhere, or sometimes to hang poised in mid
+air.
+
+“How odd they are,” said the voice of Bastin behind me. “They remind me
+of those blue sparks which jump up from the wires of the tramways in
+London on a dark night. You know, don’t you, Bickley? I mean when the
+conductor pulls round that long stick with an iron wheel on the top of
+it.”
+
+“Nobody but you could have thought of such a comparison, Bastin,”
+answered Bickley. “Still, multiplied a thousandfold they are not
+unlike.”
+
+Nor indeed were they, except that each blue flash was as big as the
+full moon and in one place or another they were so continuous that one
+could have read a letter by their light. Also the effect of them was
+ghastly and most unnatural, terrifying, too, since even their
+brilliance could not reveal the extent of that gigantic hollow in the
+bowels of the world wherein they leapt to and fro like lightnings, or
+hung like huge, uncanny lanterns.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+Sacrifice
+
+
+“The air in this place must be charged with some form of electricity,
+but the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm us,” said Bickley in
+a matter-of-fact fashion as though he were determined not to be
+astonished.
+
+“To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights, though how
+these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know,” I answered.
+
+As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above. It
+resembled a shooting star or a meteor more than anything else that I
+had ever seen, and made me wonder whether we were not perhaps standing
+beneath some inky, unseen sky.
+
+Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light, which
+made him terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in front of us
+clad in a long cloak.
+
+“Dear me!” said Bastin, “he looks just like the devil, doesn’t he, and
+now I come to think of it, this isn’t at all a bad imitation of hell.”
+
+“How do you know it is an imitation?” asked Bickley.
+
+“Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it were, the
+Lady Yva and I should not be here.”
+
+Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the argument
+went no further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent the knee in
+greeting to him.
+
+“So you have come, all of you,” he said. “I thought that perhaps there
+were one or two who would not find courage to ride the flying stone. I
+am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he who had shown himself a
+coward should have had no share in the rule of that new world which is
+to be. Therefore I chose yonder road that it might test you.”
+
+“Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to return by,
+I shall be much obliged to you, Oro,” said Bastin.
+
+“How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible, Preacher?
+How do you know indeed that this is not your last journey from which
+there is no return?”
+
+“Of course I can’t be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the question
+is one which you might more appropriately put to yourself. According to
+your own showing you are now extremely old and therefore your end is
+likely to come at any moment. Of course, however, if it did you would
+have one more journey to make, but it wouldn’t be polite for me to say
+in what direction.”
+
+Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden rage.
+Remembering the scene in the temple where he had grovelled before his
+god, uttering agonised, unanswered prayers for added days, I understood
+the reason of his wrath. It was so great that I feared lest he should
+kill Bastin (who only a few hours before, be it remembered, had tried
+to kill _him_) then and there, as doubtless he could have done if he
+wished. Fortunately, if he felt it; the impulse passed.
+
+“Miserable fool!” he said. “I warn you to keep a watch upon your words.
+Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy. Today you stab me with
+your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I silence it for ever.”
+
+“I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that _you_ can’t
+hurt me at all any more than I could hurt you last night because, you
+see, it wasn’t permitted. When the time comes for me to die, I shall
+go, but _you_ will have nothing to do with that. To tell the truth, I
+am very sorry for you, as with all your greatness, your soul is of the
+earth, earthy, also sensual and devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I
+am afraid, very malignant, and you will have a great deal to answer for
+shortly. Yours _won’t_ be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you
+glory in your sins and don’t know what repentance means.”
+
+I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the most
+unbounded admiration for Bastin’s fearless courage which enabled him
+thus to beard this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed were we all, for
+I read it in Yva’s face and heard Bickley mutter:
+
+“Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!”
+
+Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his heart, for
+he stared at the man and made no answer. In the language of the ring,
+he was quite “knocked out” and, almost humbly, changed the subject.
+
+“We have yet a little while,” he said, “before that happens which I
+have decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of the marvels
+of this bubble blown in the bowels of the world,” and he motioned to us
+to pick up the lanterns.
+
+Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it was, for a
+distance of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here suddenly we came
+to a great groove in the rocky floor, as broad as a very wide roadway,
+and mayhap four feet in depth. The bottom of this groove was polished
+and glittered; indeed it gave us the impression of being iron, or other
+ore which had been welded together beneath the grinding of some
+immeasurable weight. Just at the spot where we struck the groove, it
+divided into two, for this reason.
+
+In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been, rose,
+the fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more sharply, and this
+at a spot where the groove had a somewhat steep downward dip which
+appeared to extend onwards I know not how far.
+
+Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a mile, I
+should think, we observed that it became ever more pronounced, till at
+length it ended in a razor-edge cliff which stretched up higher than we
+could see, even by the light of the electrical discharges. Standing
+against the edge of this cliff, we perceived that at a distance from it
+there were now _two_ grooves of about equal width. One of these ran
+away into the darkness on our right as we faced the sharp edge, and at
+an ever-widening angle, while the other, at a similar angle, ran into
+the darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
+
+No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves now lay
+within hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter of a mile, for
+be it remembered we had followed the rising rock between them. To put
+it quite clearly, it was exactly as though one line of rails had
+separated into two lines of rails, as often enough they do, and an
+observer standing on high ground between could see them both vanishing
+into tunnels to the right and left, but far apart.
+
+The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where first we
+saw it at the point of separation, was not polished like the left-hand
+groove, although at some time or other it seemed to have been subjected
+to the pressure of the same terrific weight which cut its fellow out of
+the bed of rock or iron, as the sharp wheels of a heavily laden wagon
+sink ruts into a roadway.
+
+“What does it all mean, Lord Oro?” I asked when he had led us back to
+the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves, that is, a mile
+or so away from the razor-edged cliff.
+
+“This, Humphrey,” he answered. “That which travels along yonder road,
+when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the left-hand path
+which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could a giant at that
+moment of its touching this exact spot on which I lay my hand, thrust
+it with sufficient strength, it would leave the left-hand road and take
+the right-hand road.”
+
+“And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?”
+
+“Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough upon its
+way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and great things would
+happen in the world above, as once they happened in bygone days. Now do
+you understand, Humphrey?”
+
+“Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now,” I answered. “But fortunately
+there is no such giant.”
+
+Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up with a
+fiendish exultation, as he cried:
+
+“Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned the
+balance of the world from the right-hand road which now is dull with
+disuse, to the left-hand road which glitters so brightly to your eyes,
+and the face of the earth was changed. Now again I will turn it from
+the left-hand road to the right-hand road in which for millions of
+years it was wont to run, and once more the face of the earth shall
+change, and those who are left living upon the earth, or who in the
+course of ages shall come to live upon the new earth, must bow down to
+Oro and take him and his seed to be their gods and kings.”
+
+When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also I
+remembered a certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us in the
+Temple of Nyo. But supported by his disbelief, Bickley asked:
+
+“And how often does the balance of which you speak come this way, Lord
+Oro?”
+
+“Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley,” he
+replied.
+
+“Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble us,”
+remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
+
+“Do you think so, you learned Bickley?” asked Oro. “If so, I do not.
+Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone awry, that
+Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us. Hearken now!
+What is that sound we hear?”
+
+As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs of a
+dreadful music. I cannot describe it in words because that is
+impossible, but it was something like to the buzz of a thousand
+humming-tops such as are loved by children because of their weird song.
+
+“Back to the wall!” cried Oro triumphantly. “The time is short!”
+
+So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us with
+long, determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side and, as I
+thought, now and again glanced at my face with a look that was half
+anxious and half pitiful. Also twice she stooped and patted Tommy.
+
+We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had started
+to examine the grooved roads. At least I think this was so, since now
+for the first time I observed a kind of little window in its rocky
+face. It stood about five feet from its floor level, and was perhaps
+ten inches square, not more. In short, except for its shape it
+resembled a ship’s porthole rather than a window. Its substance
+appeared to be talc, or some such material, and inches thick, yet
+through it, after Oro had cast aside some sort of covering, came a
+glare like that of a search-light. In fact it was a search-light so far
+as concerned one of its purposes.
+
+By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four objects
+which looked like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown metal or
+material. Very deftly, very quietly, Yva lifted these cloaks and
+wrapped one of them about each of us, and while she was thus employed I
+noticed that they were of a substance very similar to that of the gown
+she wore, which I have described, but harder. Next she gave one of the
+metal-like shields to each of us, bidding us hold them in front of our
+bodies and heads, and only to look through certain slits in them in
+which were eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the
+searchlight window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row with
+our backs against the rock wall, at certain spots which she indicated
+with great precision, and whatever we saw or heard on no account to
+move.
+
+So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin. Then Yva
+took the fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one than ours, and
+placed herself between me and the search-light or porthole. On the
+other side of this was Oro who had no shield.
+
+These arrangements took some minutes and during that time occupied all
+our attention. When they were completed, however, our curiosity and
+fear began to reassert themselves. I looked about me and perceived that
+Oro had his right hand upon what seemed to be a rough stone rod, in
+shape not unlike that with which railway points are moved. He shouted
+to us to stand still and keep the shields over our faces. Then very
+gently he pressed upon the lever. The porthole sank the fraction of an
+inch, and instantly there leapt from it a most terrific blaze of
+lightning, which shot across the blackness in front and, as lightning
+does, revealed far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that
+against which we leant.
+
+“All works well,” exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting his hand
+from the rod, “and the strength which I have stored will be more than
+enough.”
+
+Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
+
+“I say,” said Bickley, “as you know, I have been sceptical, but I don’t
+like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?”
+
+“Sink half the world beneath the seas,” said Oro, “and raise up that
+which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as you do not
+believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you ask such
+questions?”
+
+“_I_ believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
+yesterday,” said Bastin. “For your soul’s sake I beg you to desist from
+an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but which will certainly
+involve your eternal damnation, since the failure will be no fault of
+yours.”
+
+Then I spoke also, saying:
+
+“I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not know
+exactly how much or how little you can do, but I understand that your
+object is to slay men by millions in order to raise up another world of
+which you will be the absolute king, as you were of some past empire
+that has been destroyed, either through your agency or otherwise. No
+good can come of such ambitions. Like Bastin, for your soul’s sake I
+pray you to let them be.”
+
+“What Humphrey says I repeat,” said Yva. “My Father, although you know
+it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you sow you will
+harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not dream. Moreover, your
+plans will fail. Now I who am, like yourself, of the Children of
+Wisdom, have spoken, for the first and last time, and my words are
+true. I pray you give them weight, my Father.”
+
+Oro heard, and grew furious.
+
+“What!” he said. “Are you against me, every one, and my own daughter
+also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a new world; I
+would destroy your vile civilisations which I have studied with my
+eyes, that I may build better! To you, Humphrey, I would give my only
+child in marriage that from you may spring a divine race of kings! And
+yet you are against me and set up your puny scruples as a barrier
+across my path of wisdom. Well, I tread them down, I go on my appointed
+way. But beware how you try to hold me back. If any one of you should
+attempt to come between me and my ends, know that I will destroy you
+all. Obey or die.”
+
+“Well, he has had his chance and he won’t take it,” said Bastin in the
+silence that followed. “The man must go to the devil his own way and
+there is nothing more to be said.”
+
+I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant humming grew
+to a roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound which presently
+drowned all attempts at ordinary speech.
+
+Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away there
+appeared something terrible. I can only describe its appearance as that
+of an attenuated mountain on fire. When it drew nearer I perceived that
+it was more like a ballet-dancer whirling round and round upon her
+toes, or rather all the ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and
+then multiplied a million times in size. No, it was like a mushroom
+with two stalks, one above and one below, or a huge top with a point on
+which it spun, a swelling belly and another point above. But what a
+top! It must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an inch, and
+its circumference who could measure?
+
+On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate inconceivable, so
+that it looked like a gigantic wheel of fire. Yet it was not fire that
+clothed it but rather some phosphorescence, since from it came no heat.
+Yes, a phosphorescence arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red,
+with streaks of other colours running up between, and a kind of waving
+fringe of purple.
+
+The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of avalanches
+or of icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to the sea. Its
+terrific aspect was appalling, and its weight caused the solid rock to
+quiver like a leaf. Watching it, we felt as ants might feel at the
+advent of the crack of doom, for its mere height and girth and size
+overwhelmed us. We could not even speak. The last words I heard were
+from the mouth of Oro who screamed out:
+
+“Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men, and
+behold me change its path—turning it as the steersman turns a ship!”
+
+Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them approached
+the porthole or search-light to which she did something that I could
+not distinguish. The effect was to make the beam of light much stronger
+and sharper, also to shift it on to the point or foot of the spinning
+mountain and, by an aiming of the lens from time to time, to keep it
+there.
+
+This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not travel fast
+notwithstanding the frightful speed of its revolutions. I should doubt
+indeed if it advanced more quickly than a man could walk; at any rate
+so it seemed to us. But we had no means of judging its real rate of
+progress whereof we knew as little as we did of the course it followed
+in the bowels of the earth. Perhaps that was spiral, from the world’s
+deep heart upwards, and this was the highest point it reached. Or
+perhaps it remained stationary, but still spinning, for scores or
+hundreds of years in some central powerhouse of its own, whence, in
+obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these terrific
+journeys.
+
+No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the
+information to himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate there it
+was, travelling towards us on its giant butt, the peg of the top as it
+were, which, hidden in a cloud of friction-born sparks that enveloped
+it like the cup of a curving flower of fire, whirled round and round at
+an infinite speed. It was on this flaming flower that the search-light
+played steadily, doubtless that Oro might mark and measure its
+monstrous progress.
+
+“He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand path,” I
+shouted into Bickley’s ear.
+
+“Can’t be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens of
+millions of tons one inch,” Bickley roared back, trying to look
+confident.
+
+Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a sudden
+she cast down her shield and, throwing herself upon her knees,
+stretched out her hands in supplication to her father. I understood, as
+did we all, that she was imploring him to abandon his hellish purpose.
+He glared at her and shook his head. Then, as she still went on
+praying, he struck her across the face with his hand and pushed her to
+her feet again. My blood boiled as I saw it and I think I should have
+sprung at him, had not Bickley caught hold of me, shouting, “Don’t, or
+he will kill her and us too.”
+
+Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the blue
+discharges which now flashed almost continuously, and the
+phosphorescent glare of the advancing mountain, I saw that though her
+beautiful face worked beneath the pain of the blow, her eyes remained
+serene and purposeful. Even then I wondered—what was the purpose
+shining through them. Also I wondered if I was about to be called upon
+to make that sacrifice of which she had spoken, and if so, how. Of one
+thing I was determined—that if the call came it should not find me
+deaf. Yet all the while I was horribly afraid.
+
+At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens—again,
+being alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The beam of light
+shifted and wandered till, far away, it fell exactly upon that spot
+where the rock began to rise into the ridge which separated the two
+grooves or roads and ended in the razor-edged cliff. Moreover I
+observed that Oro, who left it the last of us, had either placed
+something white to mark this first infinitesimal bulging of the floor
+of the groove, or had smeared it with chalk or shining pigment. I
+observed also what I had not been able to see before, that a thin white
+line ran across the floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of
+this painted rise of rock, and that the glare of the search-light now
+lay exactly over that line.
+
+The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature’s workshop, for
+such without doubt it was, was drawing near, emitting as it came a
+tumult of sounds which, with the echoes that they caused, almost
+over-whelmed our senses. Poor little Tommy, already cowed, although he
+was a bold-natured beast, broke down entirely, and I could see from his
+open mouth that he was howling with terror. He stared about him, then
+ran to Yva and pawed at her, evidently asking to be taken into her
+arms. She thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me to
+lift him up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting
+sadly that if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I even
+thought of passing him on to Bickley, but had no time. Indeed I could
+not attract his attention, for Bickley was staring with all his eyes at
+the nightmare-like spectacle which was in progress about us. Indeed no
+nightmare, no wild imagination of which the mind of man is capable,
+could rival the aspect of its stupendous facts.
+
+Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by those
+globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and now shot
+upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or end, like a
+stream of meteors that had gone mad. Then the travelling mountain, two
+thousand feet in height, or more, with its enormous saucer-like rim
+painted round with bands of lurid red and blue, and about its grinding
+foot the tulip bloom of emitted flame. Then the fierce-faced Oro at his
+post, his hand upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to drown half of
+this great world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a saint
+in hell and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a saint
+might bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And lastly we
+three men flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
+
+Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which it was
+given to our human eyes to witness.
+
+And all the while, bending, bowing towards us—away from us—making
+obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to the path
+behind as though in farewell; instinct with a horrible life, with a
+hideous and gigantic grace, that titanic Terror whirled onwards to the
+mark of fate.
+
+At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive and did
+not know its awful mission. Visions flashed across my mind. I thought
+of the peoples of the world sleeping in their beds, or going about
+their business, or engaged even in the work of war. I thought of the
+ships upon the seas steaming steadily towards their far-off ports. Then
+I thought of what presently might happen to them, of the tremors
+followed by convulsions, of the sudden crashing down of cities, such as
+we had seen in the picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the inflow
+of the waters of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and
+desolation as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following
+death. So I thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect
+of the Universe to stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin of
+His handiwork.
+
+Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod, his
+hair and long beard seemed to bristle with furious and delighted
+excitement. The purple-fringed rim of the Monster had long overshadowed
+the whited patch of rock; its grinding foot was scarce ten yards away.
+Oro made more signs to Yva who, beneath the shelter of her shield,
+again bent down and did something that I could not see. Then, as though
+her part were played, she rose, drew the grey hood of her cloak all
+about her face so that her eyes alone remained visible, took one step
+towards me and in the broken English we had taught her, called into my
+ear.
+
+“Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not me!”
+
+She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and next
+instant with a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending himself
+double, thrust upon the rod, as I could see from his open mouth,
+shouting while he thrust.
+
+At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately in front
+of the lens or window, so that the metallic shield with which she
+covered herself pressed against its substance.
+
+Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
+
+Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out a rush
+of living flame. It struck on Yva’s shield and expanded to right and
+left. The insulated shield and garments that she wore seemed to resist
+it. For a fraction of time she stood there like a glowing angel,
+wrapped in fire.
+
+Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little distance
+dissolved like a ghost and vanished from our sight.
+
+Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
+
+And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had received the
+full blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet whilst destroying, it
+turned away from her, seeking the free paths of the air. So it came
+about that its obstructed strength struck the foot of the travelling
+gyroscope, diffused and did not suffice to thrust it that one necessary
+inch on which depended the fate of half the world, or missing it
+altogether, passed away on either side. Even so the huge, gleaming
+mountain rocked and trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it bowed itself
+towards us as though in majestic homage to greatness passed away. For a
+second, too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
+and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of fire
+went out, while I was thrown to the ground.
+
+When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more sailing
+majestically upon its way and _down the accustomed left-hand path!_
+
+Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook—but Yva had saved
+the world!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+Tommy
+
+
+I lay still a while, on my back as I had fallen, and beneath the
+shield-like defence which Yva had given to me. Notwithstanding the
+fire-resisting, metalised stuff of which it was made, I noted that it
+was twisted and almost burnt through. Doubtless the stored-up
+electricity or earth magnetism, or whatever it may have been that had
+leapt out of that hole, being diffused by the resistance with which it
+was met, had grazed me with its outer edge, and had it not been for the
+shield and cloak, I also should have been burned up. I wished, oh! how
+I wished that it had been so. Then, by now all must have finished and I
+should have known the truth as to what awaits us beyond the change:
+sleep, or dreams, or perchance the fullest life. Also I should not have
+learned alone.
+
+Lying there thus, idly, as though in a half-sleep, I felt Tommy licking
+my face, and throwing my arm about the poor little frightened beast, I
+watched the great world-balance as it retreated on its eternal journey.
+At one time its vast projecting rim had overshadowed us and almost
+seemed to touch the cliff of rock against which we leant. I remember
+that the effect of that shining arch a thousand feet or so above our
+heads was wonderful. It reminded me of a canopy of blackest thunder
+clouds supported upon a framework of wheeling rainbows, while beneath
+it all the children of the devil shouted together in joy. I noted this
+effect only a few seconds before Yva spoke to me and leapt into the
+path of the flash.
+
+Now, however, it was far away, a mere flaming wheel that became
+gradually smaller, and its Satanic voices were growing faint. As I have
+said, I watched its disappearance idly, reflecting that I should never
+look upon its like again; also that it was something well worth going
+forth to see. Then I became aware that the humming, howling din had
+decreased sufficiently to enable me to hear human voices without
+effort. Bastin was addressing Bickley—like myself they were both upon
+the ground.
+
+“Her translation, as you may have noticed, Bickley, if you were not too
+frightened, was really very remarkable. No doubt it will have reminded
+you, as it did me, of that of Elijah. She had exactly the appearance of
+a person going up to Heaven in a vehicle of fire. The destination was
+certainly the same, and even the cloak she wore added a familiar touch
+and increased the similarity.”
+
+“At any rate it did not fall upon you,” answered Bickley with something
+like a sob, in a voice of mingled awe and exasperation. “For goodness’
+sake! Bastin, stop your Biblical parallels and let us adore, yes, let
+us adore the divinest creature that the earth has borne!”
+
+Never have I loved Bickley more than when I heard him utter those
+words.
+
+“‘Divinest’ is a large term, Bickley, and one to which I hesitate to
+subscribe, remembering as I do certain of the prophets and the Early
+Fathers with all their faults, not of course to mention the Apostles.
+But—” here he paused, for suddenly all three of us became aware of Oro.
+
+He also has been thrown to the ground by the strength of the prisoned
+forces which he gathered and loosed upon their unholy errand, but, as I
+rejoiced to observe, had suffered from them much more than ourselves.
+Doubtless this was owing to the fact that he had sprung forward in a
+last wild effort to save his daughter, or to prevent her from
+interfering with his experiment, I know not which. As a result his
+right cheek was much scorched, his right arm was withered and helpless,
+and his magnificent beard was half burnt off him. Further, very
+evidently he was suffering from severe shock, for he rocked upon his
+feet and shook like an aspen leaf. All this, however, did not interfere
+with the liveliness of his grief and rage.
+
+There he stood, a towering shape, like a lightning-smitten statue, and
+cursed us, especially Bastin.
+
+“My daughter has gone!” he cried, “burned up by the fiery power that is
+my servant. Nothing remains of her but dust, and, Priest, this is your
+doing. You poisoned her heart with your childish doctrines of mercy and
+sacrifice, and the rest, so that she threw herself into the path of the
+flash to save some miserable races that she had never even known.”
+
+He paused exhausted, whereon Bastin answered him with spirit:
+
+“Yes, Oro, she being a holy woman, has gone where you will never follow
+her. Also it is your own fault since you should have listened to her
+entreaties instead of boxing her ears like the brute you are.”
+
+“My daughter is gone,” went on Oro, recovering his strength, “and my
+great designs are ruined. Yet only for a while,” he added, “for the
+world-balance will return again, if not till long after your life-spans
+are done.”
+
+“If you don’t doctor yourself, Lord Oro,” said Bickley, also rising, “I
+may tell you as one who understands such things, that most likely it
+will be after your life-span is done also. Although their effect may be
+delayed, severe shocks from burns and over-excitement are apt to prove
+fatal to the aged.”
+
+Oro snarled at him; no other word describes it.
+
+“And there are other things, Physician,” he said, “which are apt to
+prove fatal to the young. At least now you will no longer deny my
+power.”
+
+“I am not so sure,” answered Bickley, “since it seems that there is a
+greater Power, namely that of a woman’s love and sacrifice.”
+
+“And a greater still,” interrupted Bastin, “Which put those ideas into
+her head.”
+
+“As for you, Humphrey,” went on Oro, “I rejoice to think that you at
+least have lost two things that man desires above all other things—the
+woman you sought and the future kingship of the world.”
+
+I stood up and faced him.
+
+“The first I have gained, although how, you do not understand, Oro,” I
+answered. “And of the second, seeing that it would have come through
+you, on your conditions, I am indeed glad to be rid. I wish no power
+that springs from murder, and no gifts from one who answered his
+daughter’s prayer with blows.”
+
+For a moment he seemed remorseful.
+
+“She vexed me with her foolishness,” he said. Then his rage blazed up
+again:
+
+“And it was you who taught it to her,” he went on. “You are guilty, all
+three of you, and therefore I am left with none to serve me in my age;
+therefore also my mighty schemes are overthrown.”
+
+“Also, Oro, if you speak truth, therefore half the world is saved,” I
+added quietly, “and one has left it of whom it was unworthy.”
+
+“You think that these civilisations of yours, as you are pleased to
+call them, are saved, do you?” he sneered. “Yet, even if Bickley were
+right and I should die and become powerless, I tell you that they are
+already damned. I have studied them in your books and seen them with my
+eyes, and I say that they are rotten before ever they are ripe, and
+that their end shall be the end of the Sons of Wisdom, to die for lack
+of increase. That is why I would have saved the East, because in it
+alone there is increase, and thence alone can rise the great last race
+of man which I would have given to your children for an heritage.
+Moreover, think not that you Westerners have done with wars. I tell you
+that they are but begun and that the sword shall eat you up, and what
+the sword spares class shall snatch from class in the struggle for
+supremacy and ease.”
+
+Thus he spoke with extraordinary and concentrated bitterness that I
+confess would have frightened me, had I been capable of fear, which at
+the moment I was not. Who is afraid when he has lost all?
+
+Nor was Bastin alarmed, if for other reasons.
+
+“I think it right to tell you, Oro,” he said, “that the only future you
+need trouble about is your own. God Almighty will look after the
+western civilisations in whatever way He may think best, as you may
+remember He did just now. Only I am sure you won’t be here to see how
+it is done.”
+
+Again fury blazed in Oro’s eyes.
+
+“At least I will look after you, you half-bred dogs, who yap out
+ill-omened prophecies of death into my face. Since the three of you
+loved my daughter whom you brought to her doom, and were by her
+beloved, if differently, I think it best that you should follow on her
+road. How? That is the question? Shall I leave you to starve in these
+great caves?—Nay, look not towards the road of escape which doubtless
+she pointed out to you, for, as Humphrey knows, I can travel swiftly
+and I will make sure that you find it blocked. Or shall I—” and he
+glanced upwards at the great globes of wandering fire, as though he
+purposed to summon them to be our death, as doubtless he could have
+done.
+
+“I do not care what you do,” I answered wearily. “Only I would beg you
+to strike quickly. Yet for my friends I am sorry, since it was I who
+led them on this quest, and for you, too, Tommy,” I added, looking at
+the poor little hound. “You were foolish, Tommy,” I went on, “when you
+scented out that old tyrant in his coffin, at least for our own sake.”
+
+Indeed the dog was terribly scared. He whined continually and from time
+to time ran a little way and then returned to us, suggesting that we
+should go from this horror-haunted spot. Lastly, as though he
+understood that it was Oro who kept us there, he went to him and
+jumping up, licked his hand in a beseeching fashion.
+
+The super-man looked at the dog and as he looked the rage went out of
+his face and was replaced by something resembling pity.
+
+“I do not wish the beast to die,” he muttered to himself in low
+reflective tones, as though he thought aloud, “for of them all it alone
+liked and did not fear me. I might take it with me but still it would
+perish of grief in the loneliness of the caves. Moreover, she loved it
+whom I shall see no more; yes, Yva—” as he spoke the name his voice
+broke a little. “Yet if I suffer them to escape they will tell my story
+to the world and make me a laughingstock. Well, if they do, what does
+it matter? None of those Western fools would believe it; thinking that
+they knew all; like Bickley they would mock and say that they were mad,
+or liars.”
+
+Again Tommy licked his hand, but more confidently, as though instinct
+told him something of what was passing in Oro’s mind. I watched with an
+idle wonder, marvelling whether it were possible that this merciless
+being would after all spare us for the sake of the dog.
+
+So, strange to say, it came about, for suddenly Oro looked up and said:
+
+“Get you gone, and quickly, before my mood changes. The hound has saved
+you. For its sake I give you your lives, who otherwise should certainly
+have died. She who has gone pointed out to you, I doubt not, a road
+that runs to the upper air. I think that it is still open. Indeed,” he
+added, closing his eyes for a moment, “I see that it is still open, if
+long and difficult. Follow it, and should you win through, take your
+boat and sail away as swiftly as you can. Whether you die or live I
+care nothing, but my hands will be clean of your blood, although yours
+are stained with Yva’s. Begone! and my curse go with you.”
+
+Without waiting for further words we went to fetch our lanterns,
+water-bottles and bag of food which we had laid down at a little
+distance. As we approached them I looked up and saw Oro standing some
+way off. The light from one of the blue globes of fire which passed
+close above his head, shone upon him and made him ghastly. Moreover, it
+seemed to me as though approaching death had written its name upon his
+malevolent countenance.
+
+I turned my head away, for about his aspect in those sinister
+surroundings there was something horrible, something menacing and
+repellent to man and of him I wished to see no more. Nor indeed did I,
+for when I glanced in that direction again Oro was gone. I suppose that
+he had retreated into the shadows where no light played.
+
+We gathered up our gear, and while the others were relighting the
+lanterns, I walked a few paces forward to the spot where Yva had been
+dissolved in the devouring fire. Something caught my eye upon the rocky
+floor. I picked it up. It was the ring, or rather the remains of the
+ring that I had given her on that night when we declared our love
+amidst the ruins by the crater lake. She had never worn it on her hand
+but for her own reasons, as she told me, suspended it upon her breast
+beneath her robe. It was an ancient ring that I had bought in Egypt,
+fashioned of gold in which was set a very hard basalt or other black
+stone. On this was engraved the _ank_ or looped cross, which was the
+Egyptian symbol of Life, and round it a snake, the symbol of Eternity.
+The gold was for the most part melted, but the stone, being so hard and
+protected by the shield and asbestos cloak, for such I suppose it was,
+had resisted the fury of the flash. Only now it was white instead of
+black, like a burnt onyx that had known the funeral pyre. Indeed,
+perhaps it was an onyx. I kissed it and hid it away, for it seemed to
+me to convey a greeting and with it a promise.
+
+Then we started, a very sad and dejected trio. Leaving with a shudder
+that vast place where the blue lights played eternally, we came to the
+shaft up and down which the travelling stone pursued its endless path,
+and saw it arrive and depart again.
+
+“I wonder he did not send us that way,” said Bickley, pointing to it.
+
+“I am sure I am very glad it never occurred to him,” answered Bastin,
+“for I am certain that we could not have made the journey again without
+our guide, Yva.”
+
+I looked at him and he ceased. Somehow I could not bear, as yet, to
+hear her beloved name spoken by other lips.
+
+Then we entered the passage that she pointed out to us, and began a
+most terrible journey which, so far as we could judge, for we lost any
+exact count of time, took us about sixty hours. The road, it is true,
+was smooth and unblocked, but the ascent was fearfully steep and
+slippery; so much so that often we were obliged to pull each other up
+it and lie down to rest.
+
+Had it not been for those large, felt-covered bottles of Life-water, I
+am sure we should never have won through. But this marvelous elixir,
+drunk a little at a time, always re-invigorated us and gave us strength
+to push on. Also we had some food, and fortunately our spare oil held
+out, for the darkness in that tunnel was complete. Tommy became so
+exhausted that at length we must carry him by turns. He would have died
+had it not been for the water; indeed I thought that he was going to
+die.
+
+After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to begin to
+recover, and generally there was something in his manner which
+suggested to us that he knew himself to be not far from the surface of
+the earth towards which we had crawled upwards for thousands upon
+thousands of feet, fortunately without meeting with any zone of heat
+which was not bearable.
+
+We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little further,
+suddenly Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished. Then we heard him barking
+but where we could not see, since the tunnel appeared to take a turn
+and continue, but this time on a downward course, while the sound of
+the barks came from our right. We searched with the lanterns which were
+now beginning to die and found a little hole almost filled with fallen
+pieces of rock. We scooped these away with our hands, making an
+aperture large enough to creep through. A few more yards and we saw
+light, the blessed light of the moon, and in it stood Tommy barking
+hoarsely. Next we heard the sound of the sea. We struggled on
+desperately and presently pushed our way through bushes and vegetation
+on to a steep declivity. Down this we rolled and scrambled, to find
+ourselves at last lying upon a sandy beach, whilst above us the full
+moon shone in the heavens.
+
+Here, with a prayer of thankfulness, we flung ourselves down and slept.
+
+If it had not been for Tommy and we had gone further along the tunnel,
+which I have little doubt stretched on beneath the sea, where, I
+wonder, should we have slept that night?
+
+When we woke the sun was shining high in the heavens. Evidently there
+had been rain towards the dawn, though as we were lying beneath the
+shelter of some broad-leaved tree, from it we had suffered little
+inconvenience. Oh! how beautiful, after our sojourn in those unholy
+caves, were the sun and the sea and the sweet air and the raindrops
+hanging on the leaves.
+
+We did not wake of ourselves; indeed if we had been left alone I am
+sure that we should have slept the clock round, for we were terribly
+exhausted. What woke us was the chatter of a crowd of Orofenans who
+were gathered at a distance from the tree and engaged in staring at us
+in a frightened way, also the barks of Tommy who objected to their
+intrusion. Among the people I recognised our old friend the chief
+Marama by his feather cloak, and sitting up, beckoned to him to
+approach. After a good deal of hesitation he came, walking delicately
+like Agag, and stopping from time to time to study us, as though he
+were not sure that we were real.
+
+“What frightens you, Marama?” I asked him.
+
+“You frighten us, O Friend-from-the-Sea. Whence did you and the Healer
+and the Bellower come and why do your faces look like those of ghosts
+and why is the little black beast so large-eyed and so thin? Over the
+lake we know you did not come, for we have watched day and night;
+moreover there is no canoe upon the shore. Also it would not have been
+possible.”
+
+“Why not?” I asked idly.
+
+“Come and see,” he answered.
+
+Rising stiffly we emerged from beneath the tree and perceived that we
+were at the foot of the cliff against which the remains of the yacht
+had been borne by the great tempest. Indeed there it was within a
+couple of hundred yards of us.
+
+Following Marama we climbed the sloping path which ran up the cliff and
+ascended a knoll whence we could see the lake and the cone of the
+volcano in its centre. At least we used to be able to see this cone,
+but now, at any rate with the naked eye, we could make out nothing,
+except a small brown spot in the midst of the waters of the lake.
+
+“The mountain which rose up many feet in that storm which brought you
+to Orofena, Friend-from-the-Sea, has now sunk till only the very top of
+it is to be seen,” said Marama solemnly. “Even the Rock of Offerings
+has vanished beneath the water, and with it the house that we built for
+you.”
+
+“Yes,” I said, affecting no surprise. “But when did that happen?”
+
+“Five nights ago the world shook, Friend-from-the-Sea, and when the sun
+rose we saw that the mouth of the cave which appeared on the day of
+your coming, had vanished, and that the holy mountain itself had sunk
+deep, so that now only the crest of it is left above the water.”
+
+“Such things happen,” I replied carelessly.
+
+“Yes, Friend-from-the-Sea. Like many other marvels they happen where
+you and your companions are. Therefore we beg you who can arise out of
+the earth like spirits, to leave us at once before our island and all
+of us who dwell thereon are drowned beneath the ocean. Leave us before
+we kill you, if indeed you be men, or die at your hands if, as we
+think, you be evil spirits who can throw up mountains and drag them
+down, and create gods that slay, and move about in the bowels of the
+world.”
+
+“That is our intention, for our business here is done,” I answered
+calmly. “Come now and help us to depart. But first bring us food. Bring
+it in plenty, for we must victual our boat.”
+
+Marama bowed and issued the necessary orders. Indeed food sufficient
+for our immediate needs was already there as an offering, and of it we
+ate with thankfulness.
+
+Then we boarded the ship and examined the lifeboat. Thanks to our
+precautions it was still in very fair order and only needed some little
+caulking which we did with grass fibre and pitch from the stores. After
+this with the help of the Orofenans who worked hard in their desperate
+desire to be rid of us, we drew the boat into the sea, and provisioned
+her with stores from the ship, and with an ample supply of water.
+Everything being ready at last, we waited for the evening wind which
+always blew off shore, to start. As it was not due for half an hour or
+more, I walked back to the tree under which we had slept and tried to
+find the hole whence we had emerged from the tunnel on to the face of
+the cliff.
+
+My hurried search proved useless. The declivity of the cliff was
+covered with tropical growth, and the heavy rain had washed away every
+trace of our descent, and very likely filled the hole itself with
+earth. At any rate, of it I could discover nothing. Then as the breeze
+began to blow I returned to the boat and here bade adieu to Marama, who
+gave me his feather cloak as a farewell gift.
+
+“Good-bye, Friend-from-the-Sea,” he said to me. “We are glad to have
+seen you and thank you for many things. But we do not wish to see you
+any more.”
+
+“Good-bye, Marama,” I answered. “What you say, we echo. At least you
+have now no great lump upon your neck and we have rid you of your
+wizards. But beware of the god Oro who dwells in the mountain, for if
+you anger him he will sink your island beneath the sea.”
+
+“And remember all that I have taught you,” shouted Bastin.
+
+Marama shivered, though whether at the mention of the god Oro, of whose
+powers the Orofenans had so painful a recollection, or at the result of
+Bastin’s teachings, I do not know. And that was the last we shall ever
+see of each other in this world.
+
+The island faded behind us and, sore at heart because of all that we
+had found and lost again, for three days we sailed northward with a
+fair and steady wind. On the fourth evening by an extraordinary stroke
+of fortune, we fell in with an American tramp steamer, trading from the
+South Sea Islands to San Francisco. To the captain, who treated us very
+kindly, we said simply that we were a party of Englishmen whose yacht
+had been wrecked on a small island several hundreds of miles away, of
+which we knew neither the name, if it had one, nor the position.
+
+This story was accepted without question, for such things often happen
+in those latitudes, and in due course we were landed at San Francisco,
+where we made certain depositions before the British Consul as to the
+loss of the yacht _Star of the South_. Then we crossed America, having
+obtained funds by cable, and sailed for England in a steamer flying the
+flag of the United States.
+
+Of the great war which made this desirable I do not speak since it has
+nothing, or rather little, to do with this history. In the end we
+arrived safely at Liverpool, and thence travelled to our homes in
+Devonshire.
+
+Thus ended the history of our dealings with Oro, the super-man who
+began his life more than two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and
+with his daughter, Yva, whom Bastin still often calls the Glittering
+Lady.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+Bastin Discovers a Resemblance
+
+
+There is little more to tell.
+
+Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman,
+volunteered for service at the front and departed in the uniform of the
+R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin
+how much better it was in such a national emergency as existed, to
+belong to a profession in which a man could do something to help the
+bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the common cause, than
+to one like his in which it was only possible to pelt them with vain
+words.
+
+“You think that, do you, Bickley?” answered Bastin. “Well, I hold that
+it is better to heal souls than bodies, because, as even you will have
+learned out there in Orofena, they last so much longer.”
+
+“I am not certain that I learned anything of the sort,” said Bickley,
+“or even that Oro was more than an ordinary old man. He said that he
+had lived a thousand years, but what was there to prove this except his
+word, which is worth nothing?”
+
+“There was the Lady Yva’s word also, which is worth a great deal,
+Bickley.”
+
+“Yes, but she may have meant a thousand moons. Further, as according to
+her own showing she was still quite young, how could she know her
+father’s age?”
+
+“Quite so, Bickley. But all she actually said was that she was of the
+same age as one of our women of twenty-seven, which may have meant two
+hundred and seventy for all I know. However, putting that aside you
+will admit that they had both slept for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years.”
+
+“I admit that they slept, Bastin, because I helped to awaken them, but
+for how long there is nothing to show, except those star maps which are
+probably quite inaccurate.”
+
+“They are not inaccurate,” I broke in, “for I have had them checked by
+leading astronomers who say that they show a marvelous knowledge of the
+heavens as these were two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and are
+today.”
+
+Here I should state that those two metal maps and the ring which I gave
+to Yva and found again after the catastrophe, were absolutely the only
+things connected with her or with Oro that we brought away with us. The
+former I would never part with, feeling their value as evidence.
+Therefore, when we descended to the city Nyo and the depths beneath, I
+took them with me wrapped in cloth in my pocket. Thus they were
+preserved. Everything else went when the Rock of Offerings and the cave
+mouth sank beneath the waters of the lake.
+
+This may have happened either in the earth tremor, which no doubt was
+caused by the advance of the terrific world-balance, or when the
+electric power, though diffused and turned by Yva’s insulated body,
+struck the great gyroscope’s travelling foot with sufficient strength,
+not to shift it indeed on to the right-hand path as Oro had designed,
+but still to cause it to stagger and even perhaps to halt for the
+fraction of a second. Even this pause may have been enough to cause
+convulsions of the earth above; indeed, I gathered from Marama and
+other Orofenans that such convulsions had occurred on and around the
+island at what must have corresponded with that moment of the loosing
+of the force.
+
+This loss of our belongings in the house of the Rock of Offerings was
+the more grievous because among them were some Kodak photographs which
+I had taken, including portraits of Oro and one of Yva that was really
+excellent, to say nothing of pictures of the mouth of the cave and of
+the ruins and crater lake above. How bitterly I regret that I did not
+keep these photographs in my pocket with the map-plates.
+
+“Even if the star-maps are correct, still it proves nothing,” said
+Bickley, “since possibly Oro’s astronomical skill might have enabled
+him to draw that of the sky at any period, though I allow this is
+impossible.”
+
+“I doubt his taking so much trouble merely to deceive three wanderers
+who lacked the knowledge even to check them,” I said. “But all this
+misses the point, Bickley. However long they had slept, that man and
+woman did arise from seeming death. They did dwell in those marvelous
+caves with their evidences of departed civilisations, and they did show
+us that fearful, world-wandering gyroscope. These things we saw.”
+
+“I admit that we saw them, Arbuthnot, and I admit that they are one and
+all beyond human comprehension. To that extent I am converted, and, I
+may add, humbled,” said Bickley.
+
+“So you ought to be,” exclaimed Bastin, “seeing that you always swore
+that there was nothing in the world that is not capable of a perfectly
+natural explanation.”
+
+“Of which all these things may be capable, Bastin, if only we held the
+key.”
+
+“Very well, Bickley, but how do you explain what the Lady Yva did? I
+may tell you now what she commanded me to conceal at the time, namely,
+that she became a Christian; so much so that by her own will, I
+baptised and confirmed her on the very morning of her sacrifice.
+Doubtless it was this that changed her heart so much that she became
+willing, of course without my knowledge, to leave everything she cared
+for,” here he looked hard at me, “and lay down her life to save the
+world, half of which she believed was about to be drowned by Oro. Now,
+considering her history and upbringing, I call this a spiritual marvel,
+much greater than any you now admit, and one you can’t explain,
+Bickley.”
+
+“No, I cannot explain, or, at any rate, I will not try,” he answered,
+also staring hard at me. “Whatever she believed, or did not believe,
+and whatever would or would not have happened, she was a great and
+wonderful woman whose memory I worship.”
+
+“Quite so, Bickley, and now perhaps you see my point, that what you
+describe as mere vain words may also be helpful to mankind; more so,
+indeed, than your surgical instruments and pills.”
+
+“You couldn’t convert Oro, anyway,” exclaimed Bickley, with irritation.
+
+“No, Bickley; but then I have always understood that the devil is
+beyond conversion because he is beyond repentance. You see, I think
+that if that old scoundrel was not the devil himself, at any rate he
+was a bit of him, and, if I am right, I am not ashamed to have failed
+in his case.”
+
+“Even Oro was not utterly bad, Bastin,” I said, reflecting on certain
+traits of mercy that he had shown, or that I dreamed him to have shown
+in the course of our mysterious midnight journeys to various parts of
+the earth. Also I remembered that he had loved Tommy and for his sake
+had spared our lives. Lastly, I do not altogether wonder that he came
+to certain hasty conclusions as to the value of our modern
+civilisations.
+
+“I am very glad to hear it, Humphrey, since while there is a spark left
+the whole fire may burn up again, and I believe that to the Divine
+mercy there are no limits, though Oro will have a long road to travel
+before he finds it. And now I have something to say. It has troubled me
+very much that I was obliged to leave those Orofenans wandering in a
+kind of religious twilight.”
+
+“You couldn’t help that,” said Bickley, “seeing that if you had
+stopped, by now you would have been wandering in religious light.”
+
+“Still, I am not sure that I ought not to have stopped. I seem to have
+deserted a field that was open to me. However, it can’t be helped,
+since it is certain that we could never find that island again, even if
+Oro has not sunk it beneath the sea, as he is quite capable of doing,
+to cover his tracks, so to speak. So I mean to do my best in another
+field by way of atonement.”
+
+“You are not going to become a missionary?” I said.
+
+“No, but with the consent of the Bishop, who, I think, believes that my
+_locum_ got on better in the parish than I do, as no doubt was the
+case, I, too, have volunteered for the Front, and been accepted as a
+chaplain of the 201st Division.”
+
+“Why, that’s mine!” said Bickley.
+
+“Is it? I am very glad, since now we shall be able to pursue our
+pleasant arguments and to do our best to open each other’s minds.”
+
+“You fellows are more fortunate than I am,” I remarked. “I also
+volunteered, but they wouldn’t take me, even as a Tommy, although I
+misstated my age. They told me, or at least a specialist whom I saw did
+afterwards, that the blow I got on the head from that sorcerer’s boy—”
+
+“I know, I know!” broke in Bickley almost roughly. “Of course, things
+might go wrong at any time. But with care you may live to old age.”
+
+“I am sorry to hear it,” I said with a sigh, “at least I think I am.
+Meanwhile, fortunately there is much that I can do at home; indeed a
+course of action has been suggested to me by an old friend who is now
+in authority.”
+
+Once more Bickley and Bastin in their war-stained uniforms were dining
+at my table and on the very night of their return from the Front, which
+was unexpected. Indeed Tommy nearly died of joy on hearing their voices
+in the hall. They, who played a worthy part in the great struggle, had
+much to tell me, and naturally their more recent experiences had
+overlaid to some extent those which we shared in the mysterious island
+of Orofena. Indeed we did not speak of these until, just as they were
+going away, Bastin paused beneath a very beautiful portrait of my late
+wife, the work of an artist famous for his power of bringing out the
+inner character, or what some might call the soul, of the sitter. He
+stared at it for a while in his short-sighted way, then said: “Do you
+know, Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more than
+at this moment, that although they were different in height and so on,
+there was a really curious physical resemblance between your late wife
+and the Lady Yva.”
+
+“Yes,” I answered. “I think so too.”
+
+Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he did so I
+saw him start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
+
+Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life. It is, I
+admit, an odd story and one which suggests problems that I cannot
+solve. Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance which is the
+privilege and hall-mark of faith; Bickley disposes, or used to dispose,
+of them by a blank denial which carries no conviction, and least of all
+to himself.
+
+What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves learned?
+A round, short but still with time and to spare wherein to be dull and
+lonesome; a fateful treadmill to which we were condemned we know not
+how, but apparently through the casual passions of those who went
+before us and are now forgotten, causing us, as the Bible says, to be
+born in sin; up which we walk wearily we know not why, seeming never to
+make progress; off which we fall outworn we know not when or whither.
+
+Such upon the surface it appears to be, nor in fact does our
+ascertained knowledge, as Bickley would sum it up, take us much
+further. No prophet has yet arisen who attempted to define either the
+origin or the reasons of life. Even the very Greatest of them Himself
+is quite silent on this matter. We are tempted to wonder why. Is it
+because life as expressed in the higher of human beings, is, or will be
+too vast, too multiform and too glorious for any definition which we
+could understand? Is it because in the end it will involve for some, if
+not for all, majesty on unfathomed majesty, and glory upon unimaginable
+glory such as at present far outpass the limits of our thought?
+
+The experiences which I have recorded in these pages awake in my heart
+a hope that this may be so. Bastin is wont, like many others, to talk
+in a light fashion of Eternity without in the least comprehending what
+he means by that gigantic term. It is not too much to say that
+Eternity, something without beginning and without end, and involving,
+it would appear, an everlasting changelessness, is a state beyond human
+comprehension. As a matter of fact we mortals do not think in
+constellations, so to speak, or in æons, but by the measures of our own
+small earth and of our few days thereon. We cannot really conceive of
+an existence stretching over even one thousand years, such as that
+which Oro claimed and the Bible accords to a certain early race of men,
+omitting of course his two thousand five hundred centuries of sleep.
+And yet what is this but one grain in the hourglass of time, one day in
+the lost record of our earth, of its sisters the planets and its father
+the sun, to say nothing of the universes beyond?
+
+It is because I have come in touch with a prolonged though perfectly
+finite existence of the sort, that I try to pass on the reflections
+which the fact of it awoke in me. There are other reflections connected
+with Yva and the marvel of her love and its various manifestations
+which arise also. But these I keep to myself. They concern the wonder
+of woman’s heart, which is a microcosm of the hopes and fears and
+desires and despairs of this humanity of ours whereof from age to age
+she is the mother.
+
+HUMPHREY ARBUTHNOT.
+
+
+
+
+NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+Within about six months of the date on which he wrote the last words of
+this history of our joint adventures, my dear friend, Humphrey
+Arbuthnot, died suddenly, as I had foreseen that probably he would do,
+from the results of the injury he received in the island of Orofena.
+
+He left me the sole executor to his will, under which he divided his
+property into three parts. One third he bequeathed to me, one third
+(which is strictly tied up) to Bastin, and one third to be devoted,
+under my direction, to the advancement of Science.
+
+His end appears to have been instantaneous, resulting from an effusion
+of blood upon the brain. When I was summoned I found him lying dead by
+the writing desk in his library at Fulcombe Priory. He had been writing
+at the desk, for on it was a piece of paper on which appear these
+words: “_I have seen her. I_—” There the writing ends, not stating whom
+he thought he had seen in the moments of mental disturbance or delusion
+which preceded his decease.
+
+Save for certain verbal corrections, I publish this manuscript without
+comment as the will directs, only adding that it sets out our mutual
+experiences very faithfully, though Arbuthnot’s deductions from them
+are not always my own.
+
+I would say also that I am contemplating another visit to the South Sea
+Islands, where I wish to make some further investigations. I dare say,
+however, that these will be barren of results, as the fountain of
+Life-water is buried for ever, nor, as I think, will any human being
+stand again in the Hades-like halls of Nyo. It is probable also that it
+would prove impossible to rediscover the island of Orofena, if indeed
+that volcanic land still remains above the waters of the deep.
+
+Now that he is a very wealthy man, Bastin talks of accompanying me for
+purposes quite different from my own, but on the whole I hope he will
+abandon this idea. I may add that when he learned of his unexpected
+inheritance he talked much of the “deceitfulness of riches,” but that
+he has not as yet taken any steps to escape their golden snare. Indeed
+he now converses of his added “opportunities of usefulness,” I gather
+in connection with missionary enterprise.
+
+J. R. BICKLEY.
+
+
+_P.S_.—I forgot to state that the spaniel Tommy died within three days
+of his owner. The poor little beast was present in the room at the time
+of Arbuthnot’s passing away, and when found seemed to be suffering from
+shock. From that moment Tommy refused food and finally was discovered
+quite dead and lying by the body on Marama’s feather cloak, which
+Arbuthnot often used as a dressing-gown. As Bastin raised some
+religious objections, I arranged without his knowledge that the dog’s
+ashes should rest not far from those of the master and mistress whom it
+loved so well.
+
+J.R.B.
+
+
+
+
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+<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold;'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard</div>
+<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
+at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you
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+country where you are located before using this eBook.
+</div>
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: When the World Shook</div>
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: H. Rider Haggard</div>
+<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Release Date: June, 1998 [eBook #1368]<br />
+[Most recently updated: December 26, 2020]</div>
+<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div>
+<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div>
+<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Anthony Matonak and David Widger</div>
+<div style='margin-top:2em;margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***</div>
+
+<div class="fig" style="width:55%;">
+<img src="images/cover.jpg" style="width:100%;" alt="[Illustration]" />
+</div>
+
+<h1>When the World Shook</h1>
+
+<h3>Being an Account of the Great Adventure<br />
+of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot</h3>
+
+<h2 class="no-break">by H. Rider Haggard</h2>
+
+<hr />
+
+<h2>Contents</h2>
+
+<table summary="" style="">
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap01">CHAPTER I. Arbuthnot Describes Himself</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap02">CHAPTER II. Bastin and Bickley</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap03">CHAPTER III. Natalie</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap04">CHAPTER IV. Death and Departure</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap05">CHAPTER V. The Cyclone</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap06">CHAPTER VI. Land</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap07">CHAPTER VII. The Orofenans</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap08">CHAPTER VIII. Bastin Attempts the Martyr&rsquo;s Crown</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap09">CHAPTER IX. The Island in the Lake</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap10">CHAPTER X. The Dwellers in the Tomb</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap11">CHAPTER XI. Resurrection</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap12">CHAPTER XII. Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap13">CHAPTER XIII. Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap14">CHAPTER XIV. The Under-world</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap15">CHAPTER XV. Oro in His House</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap16">CHAPTER XVI. Visions of the Past</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap17">CHAPTER XVII. Yva Explains</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap18">CHAPTER XVIII. The Accident</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap19">CHAPTER XIX. The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap20">CHAPTER XX. Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap21">CHAPTER XXI. Love&rsquo;s Eternal Altar</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap22">CHAPTER XXII. The Command</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap23">CHAPTER XXIII. In the Temple of Fate</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap24">CHAPTER XXIV. The Chariot of the Pit</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap25">CHAPTER XXV. Sacrifice</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap26">CHAPTER XXVI. Tommy</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap27">CHAPTER XXVII. Bastin Discovers a Resemblance</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td> <a href="#chap28">NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+
+</table>
+
+<hr />
+
+<h2>DEDICATION</h2>
+
+<p class="right">
+Ditchingham, 1918.
+</p>
+
+<p class="letter">
+M<small>Y DEAR</small> C<small>URZON</small>,
+</p>
+
+<p>
+More than thirty years ago you tried to protect me, then a stranger to you,
+from one of the falsest and most malignant accusations ever made against a
+writer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So complete was your exposure of the methods of those at work to blacken a
+person whom they knew to be innocent, that, as you will remember, they refused
+to publish your analysis which destroyed their charges and, incidentally,
+revealed their motives.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Although for this reason vindication came otherwise, your kindness is one that
+I have never forgotten, since, whatever the immediate issue of any effort, in
+the end it is the intention that avails.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Therefore in gratitude and memory I ask you to accept this romance, as I know
+that you do not disdain the study of romance in the intervals of your Imperial
+work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The application of its parable to our state and possibilities&mdash;beneath or
+beyond these glimpses of the moon&mdash;I leave to your discernment.
+</p>
+
+<p class="right">
+Believe me,<br />
+Ever sincerely yours,<br />
+H. RIDER HAGGARD.
+</p>
+
+<p class="letter">
+To<br />
+The Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G.
+</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2>WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK</h2>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.<br />
+Arbuthnot Describes Himself</h2>
+
+<p>
+I suppose that I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, should begin this history in which
+Destiny has caused me to play so prominent a part, with some short account of
+myself and of my circumstances.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I was born forty years ago in this very Devonshire village in which I write,
+but not in the same house. Now I live in the Priory, an ancient place and a
+fine one in its way, with its panelled rooms, its beautiful gardens where, in
+this mild climate, in addition to our own, flourish so many plants which one
+would only expect to find in countries that lie nearer to the sun, and its
+green, undulating park studded with great timber trees. The view, too, is
+perfect; behind and around the rich Devonshire landscape with its hills and
+valleys and its scarped faces of red sandstone, and at a distance in front, the
+sea. There are little towns quite near too, that live for the most part on
+visitors, but these are so hidden away by the contours of the ground that from
+the Priory one cannot see them. Such is Fulcombe where I live, though for
+obvious reasons I do not give it its real name.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Many years ago my father, the Rev. Humphrey Arbuthnot, whose only child I am,
+after whom also I am named Humphrey, was the vicar of this place with which our
+family is said to have some rather vague hereditary connection. If so, it was
+severed in the Carolian times because my ancestors fought on the side of
+Parliament.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+My father was a recluse, and a widower, for my mother, a Scotswoman, died at or
+shortly after my birth. Being very High Church for those days he was not
+popular with the family that owned the Priory before me. Indeed its head, a
+somewhat vulgar person of the name of Enfield who had made money in trade,
+almost persecuted him, as he was in a position to do, being the local magnate
+and the owner of the rectorial tithes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I mention this fact because owing to it as a boy I made up my mind that one day
+I would buy that place and sit in his seat, a wild enough idea at the time. Yet
+it became engrained in me, as do such aspirations of our youth, and when the
+opportunity arose in after years I carried it out. Poor old Enfield! He fell on
+evil fortunes, for in trying to bolster up a favourite son who was a gambler, a
+spendthrift, and an ungrateful scamp, in the end he was practically ruined and
+when the bad times came, was forced to sell the Fulcombe estate. I think of him
+kindly now, for after all he was good to me and gave me many a day&rsquo;s
+shooting and leave to fish for trout in the river.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By the poor people, however, of all the district round, for the parish itself
+is very small, my father was much beloved, although he did practise confession,
+wear vestments and set lighted candles on the altar, and was even said to have
+openly expressed the wish, to which however he never attained, that he could
+see a censer swinging in the chancel. Indeed the church which, as monks built
+it, is very large and fine, was always full on Sundays, though many of the
+worshippers came from far away, some of them doubtless out of curiosity because
+of its papistical repute, also because, in a learned fashion, my father&rsquo;s
+preaching was very good indeed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For my part I feel that I owe much to these High-Church views. They opened
+certain doors to me and taught me something of the mysteries which lie at the
+back of all religions and therefore have their home in the inspired soul of man
+whence religions are born. Only the pity is that in ninety-nine cases out of a
+hundred he never discovers, never even guesses at that entombed aspiration,
+never sinks a shaft down on to this secret but most precious vein of ore.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I have said that my father was learned; but this is a mild description, for
+never did I know anyone quite so learned. He was one of those men who is so
+good all round that he became pre-eminent in nothing. A classic of the first
+water, a very respectable mathematician, an expert in theology, a student of
+sundry foreign languages and literature in his lighter moments, an inquirer
+into sociology, a theoretical musician though his playing of the organ
+excruciated most people because it was too correct, a really first-class
+authority upon flint instruments and the best grower of garden vegetables in
+the county, also of apples&mdash;such were some of his attainments. That was
+what made his sermons so popular, since at times one or the other of these
+subjects would break out into them, his theory being that God spoke to us
+through all of these things.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But if I began to drift into an analysis of my father&rsquo;s abilities, I
+should never stop. It would take a book to describe them. And yet mark this,
+with them all his name is as dead to the world to-day as though he had never
+been. Light reflected from a hundred facets dissipates itself in space and is
+lost; that concentrated in one tremendous ray pierces to the stars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now I am going to be frank about myself, for without frankness what is the
+value of such a record as this? Then it becomes simply another convention, or
+rather conventional method of expressing the octoroon kind of truths with which
+the highly civilised races feed themselves, as fastidious ladies eat cakes and
+bread from which all but the smallest particle of nourishment has been
+extracted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The fact is, therefore, that I inherited most of my father&rsquo;s abilities,
+except his love for flint instruments which always bored me to distraction,
+because although they are by association really the most human of things,
+somehow to me they never convey any idea of humanity. In addition I have a
+practical side which he lacked; had he possessed it surely he must have become
+an archbishop instead of dying the vicar of an unknown parish. Also I have a
+spiritual sense, mayhap mystical would be a better term, which with all this
+religion was missing from my father&rsquo;s nature.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For I think that notwithstanding his charity and devotion he never quite got
+away from the shell of things, never cracked it and set his teeth in the kernel
+which alone can feed our souls. His keen intellect, to take an example,
+recognised every one of the difficulties of our faith and flashed hither and
+thither in the darkness, seeking explanation, seeking light, trying to
+reconcile, to explain. He was not great enough to put all this aside and go
+straight to the informing Soul beneath that strives to express itself
+everywhere, even through those husks which are called the World, the Flesh and
+the Devil, and as yet does not always quite succeed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It is this boggling over exteriors, this peering into pitfalls, this desire to
+prove that what such senses as we have tell us is impossible, is in fact
+possible, which causes the overthrow of many an earnest, seeking heart and
+renders its work, conducted on false lines, quite nugatory. These <i>will</i>
+trust to themselves and their own intelligence and not be content to spring
+from the cliffs of human experience into the everlasting arms of that Infinite
+which are stretched out to receive them and to give them rest and the keys of
+knowledge. When will man learn what was taught to him of old, that faith is the
+only plank wherewith he can float upon this sea and that his miserable works
+avail him nothing; also that it is a plank made of many sorts of wood, perhaps
+to suit our different weights?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So to be honest, in a sense I believe myself to be my father&rsquo;s superior,
+and I know that he agreed with me. Perhaps this is owing to the blood of my
+Scotch mother which mixed well with his own; perhaps because the essential
+spirit given to me, though cast in his mould, was in fact quite
+different&mdash;or of another alloy. Do we, I wonder, really understand that
+there are millions and billions of these alloys, so many indeed that Nature, or
+whatever is behind Nature, never uses the same twice over? That is why no two
+human beings are or ever will be quite identical. Their flesh, the body of
+their humiliation, is identical in all, any chemist will prove it to you, but
+that which animates the flesh is distinct and different because it comes from
+the home of that infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate evolution
+of the good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and hell.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another advantage over my
+father, which certainly came to me from my mother, who was, as I judge from all
+descriptions and such likenesses as remain of her, an extremely handsome woman.
+I was born much better looking. He was small and dark, a little man with
+deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also dark, but tall above the average,
+and well made. I do not know that I need say more about my personal appearance,
+to me not a very attractive subject, but the fact remains that they called me
+&ldquo;handsome Humphrey&rdquo; at the University, and I was the captain of my
+college boat and won many prizes at athletic sports when I had time to train
+for them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because he knew that he
+could do it better than anyone else, and partly to save school expenses. The
+experiment was very successful, as my love of all outdoor sports and of any
+small hazardous adventure that came to my hand, also of associating with
+fisherfolk whom the dangers of the deep make men among men, saved me from
+becoming a milksop. For the rest I learned more from my father, whom I always
+desired to please because I loved him, than I should have done at the best and
+most costly of schools. This was shown when at last I went to college with a
+scholarship, for there I did very well indeed, as search would still reveal.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I had better set out some of my shortcomings, which in their sum have made
+a failure of me. Yes, a failure in the highest sense, though I trust what
+Stevenson calls &ldquo;a faithful failure.&rdquo; These have their root in
+fastidiousness and that lack of perseverance, which really means a lack of
+faith, again using the word in its higher and wider sense. For if one had real
+faith one would always persevere, knowing that in every work undertaken with
+high aim, there is an element of nobility, however humble and unrecognised that
+work may seem to be. God after all is the God of Work, it is written large upon
+the face of the Universe. I will not expand upon the thought; it would lead me
+too far afield, but those who have understanding will know what I mean.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As regards what I interpret as fastidiousness, this is not very easy to
+express. Perhaps a definition will help. I am like a man with an over-developed
+sense of smell, who when walking through a foreign city, however clean and well
+kept, can always catch the evil savours that are inseparable from such cities.
+More, his keen perception of them interferes with all other perceptions and
+spoils his walks. The result is that in after years, whenever he thinks of that
+beautiful city, he remembers, not its historic buildings or its wide
+boulevards, or whatever it has to boast, but rather its ancient, fish-like
+smell. At least he remembers that first owing to this defect in his
+temperament.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So it is with everything. A lovely woman is spoiled for such a one because she
+eats too much or has too high a voice; he does not care for his shooting
+because the scenery is flat, or for his fishing because the gnats bite as well
+as the trout. In short he is out of tune with the world as it is. Moreover,
+this is a quality which, where it exists, cannot be overcome; it affects
+day-labourers as well as gentlemen at large. It is bred in the bone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Probably the second failure-breeding fault, lack of perseverance, has its roots
+in the first, at any rate in my case. At least on leaving college with some
+reputation, I was called to the Bar where, owing to certain solicitor and other
+connections, I had a good opening. Also, owing to the excellence of my memory
+and powers of work, I began very well, making money even during my first year.
+Then, as it happened, a certain case came my way and, my leader falling ill
+suddenly after it was opened, was left in my hands. The man whose cause I was
+pleading was, I think, one of the biggest scoundrels it is possible to
+conceive. It was a will case and if he won, the effect would be to beggar two
+most estimable middle-aged women who were justly entitled to the property, to
+which end personally I am convinced he had committed forgery; the perjury that
+accompanied it I do not even mention.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Well, he did win, thanks to me, and the estimable middle-aged ladies were
+beggared, and as I heard afterwards, driven to such extremities that one of
+them died of her misery and the other became a lodging-house keeper. The
+details do not matter, but I may explain that these ladies were unattractive in
+appearance and manner and broke down beneath my cross-examination which made
+them appear to be telling falsehoods, whereas they were only completely
+confused. Further, I invented an ingenious theory of the facts which, although
+the judge regarded it with suspicion, convinced an unusually stupid jury who
+gave me their verdict.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Everybody congratulated me and at the time I was triumphant, especially as my
+leader had declared that our case was impossible. Afterwards, however, my
+conscience smote me sorely, so much so that arguing from the false premise of
+this business, I came to the conclusion that the practice of the Law was not
+suited to an honest man. I did not take the large view that such matters
+average themselves up and that if I had done harm in this instance, I might
+live to do good in many others, and perhaps become a just judge, even a great
+judge. Here I may mention that in after years, when I grew rich, I rescued that
+surviving old lady from her lodging-house, although to this day she does not
+know the name of her anonymous friend. So by degrees, without saying anything,
+for I kept on my chambers, I slipped out of practice, to the great
+disappointment of everybody connected with me, and took to authorship.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A marvel came to pass, my first book was an enormous success. The whole world
+talked of it. A leading journal, delighted to have discovered someone, wrote it
+up; other journals followed suit to be in the movement. One of them, I
+remember, which had already dismissed it with three or four sneering lines,
+came out with a second and two-column notice. It sold like wildfire and I
+suppose had some merits, for it is still read, though few know that I wrote it,
+since fortunately it was published under a pseudonym.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again I was much elated and set to work to write another and, as I believe, a
+much better book. But jealousies had been excited by this leaping into fame of
+a totally unknown person, which were, moreover, accentuated through a foolish
+article that I published in answer to some criticisms, wherein I spoke my mind
+with an insane freedom and biting sarcasm. Indeed I was even mad enough to
+quote names and to give the example of the very powerful journal which at first
+carped at my work and then gushed over it when it became the fashion. All of
+this made me many bitter enemies, as I found out when my next book appeared.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was torn to shreds, it was reviled as subversive of morality and religion,
+good arrows in those days. It was called puerile, half-educated stuff&mdash;I
+half-educated! More, an utterly false charge of plagiarism was cooked up
+against me and so well and venomously run that vast numbers of people concluded
+that I was a thief of the lowest order. Lastly, my father, from whom the secret
+could no longer be kept, sternly disapproved of both these books which I admit
+were written from a very radical and somewhat anti-church point of view. The
+result was our first quarrel and before it was made up, he died suddenly.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Now again fastidiousness and my lack of perseverance did their work, and
+solemnly I swore that I would never write another book, an oath which I have
+kept till this moment, at least so far as publication is concerned, and now
+break only because I consider it my duty so to do and am not animated by any
+pecuniary object.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus came to an end my second attempt at carving out a career. By now I had
+grown savage and cynical, rather revengeful also, I fear. Knowing myself to
+possess considerable abilities in sundry directions, I sat down, as it were, to
+think things over and digest my past experiences. Then it was that the truth of
+a very ancient adage struck upon my mind, namely, that money is power. Had I
+sufficient money I could laugh at unjust critics for example; indeed they or
+their papers would scarcely dare to criticise me for fear lest it should be in
+my power to do them a bad turn. Again I could follow my own ideas in life and
+perhaps work good in the world, and live in such surroundings as commended
+themselves to me. It was as clear as daylight, but&mdash;how to make the money?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I had some capital as the result of my father&rsquo;s death, about £8,000 in
+all, plus a little more that my two books had brought in. In what way could I
+employ it to the best advantage? I remembered that a cousin of my father and
+therefore my own, was a successful stock-broker, also that there had been some
+affection between them. I went to him, he was a good, easy-natured man who was
+frankly glad to see me, and offered to put £5,000 into his business, for I was
+not minded to risk every thing I had, if he would give me a share in the
+profits. He laughed heartily at my audacity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why, my boy,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;being totally inexperienced at this
+game, you might lose us more than that in a month. But I like your courage, I
+like your courage, and the truth is that I do want help. I will think it over
+and write to you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He thought it over and in the end offered to try me for a year at a fixed
+salary with a promise of some kind of a partnership if I suited him. Meanwhile
+my £5,000 remained in my pocket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I accepted, not without reluctance since with the impatience of youth I wanted
+everything at once. I worked hard in that office and soon mastered the
+business, for my knowledge of figures&mdash;I had taken a first-class
+mathematical degree at college&mdash;came to my aid, as in a way did my
+acquaintance with Law and Literature. Moreover I had a certain aptitude for
+what is called high finance. Further, Fortune, as usual, showed me a favourable
+face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In one year I got the partnership with a small share in the large profits of
+the business. In two the partner above me retired, and I took his place with a
+third share of the firm. In three my cousin, satisfied that it was in able
+hands, began to cease his attendance at the office and betook himself to
+gardening which was his hobby. In four I paid him out altogether, although to
+do this I had to borrow money on our credit, for by agreement the title of the
+firm was continued. Then came that extraordinary time of boom which many will
+remember to their cost. I made a bold stroke and won. On a certain Saturday
+when the books were made up, I found that after discharging all liabilities, I
+should not be worth more than £20,000. On the following Saturday but two when
+the books were made up, I was worth £153,000! <i>L&rsquo;appétit vient en
+mangeant</i>. It seemed nothing to me when so many were worth millions.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the next year I worked as few have done, and when I struck a balance at the
+end of it, I found that on the most conservative estimate I was the owner of a
+million and a half in hard cash, or its equivalent. I was so tired out that I
+remember this discovery did not excite me at all. I felt utterly weary of all
+wealth-hunting and of the City and its ways. Moreover my old fastidiousness and
+lack of perseverance re-asserted themselves. I reflected, rather late in the
+day perhaps, on the ruin that this speculation was bringing to thousands, of
+which some lamentable instances had recently come to my notice, and once more
+considered whether it were a suitable career for an upright man. I had wealth;
+why should I not take it and enjoy life?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Also&mdash;and here my business acumen came in, I was sure that these times
+could not last. It is easy to make money on a rising market, but when it is
+falling the matter is very different. In five minutes I made up my mind. I sent
+for my junior partners, for I had taken in two, and told them that I intended
+to retire at once. They were dismayed both at my loss, for really I was the
+firm, and because, as they pointed out, if I withdrew all my capital, there
+would not be sufficient left to enable them to carry on.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One of them, a blunt and honest man, said to my face that it would be
+dishonourable of me to do so. I was inclined to answer him sharply, then
+remembered that his words were true.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;I will leave you £600,000 on which you
+shall pay me five per cent interest, but no share of the profits.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On these terms we dissolved the partnership and in a year they had lost the
+£600,000, for the slump came with a vengeance. It saved them, however, and
+to-day they are earning a reasonable income. But I have never asked them for
+that £600,000.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.<br />
+Bastin and Bickley</h2>
+
+<p>
+Behold me once more a man without an occupation, but now the possessor of about
+£900,000. It was a very considerable fortune, if not a large one in England;
+nothing like the millions of which I had dreamed, but still enough. To make the
+most of it and to be sure that it remained, I invested it very well, mostly in
+large mortgages at four per cent which, if the security is good, do not
+depreciate in capital value. Never again did I touch a single speculative
+stock, who desired to think no more about money. It was at this time that I
+bought the Fulcombe property. It cost me about £120,000 of my capital, or with
+alterations, repairs, etc., say £150,000, on which sum it may pay a net two and
+a half per cent, not more.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This £3,700 odd I have always devoted to the upkeep of the place, which is
+therefore in first-rate order. The rest I live on, or save.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+These arrangements, with the beautifying and furnishing of the house and the
+restoration of the church in memory of my father, occupied and amused me for a
+year or so, but when they were finished time began to hang heavy on my hands.
+What was the use of possessing about £20,000 a year when there was nothing upon
+which it could be spent? For after all my own wants were few and simple and the
+acquisition of valuable pictures and costly furniture is limited by space. Oh!
+in my small way I was like the weary King Ecclesiast. For I too made me great
+works and had possessions of great and small cattle (I tried farming and lost
+money over it!) and gathered me silver and gold and the peculiar treasure of
+kings, which I presume means whatever a man in authority chiefly desires, and
+so forth. But &ldquo;behold all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there
+was no profit under the sun.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So, notwithstanding my wealth and health and the deference which is the rich
+man&rsquo;s portion, especially when the limit of his riches is not known, it
+came about that I too &ldquo;hated life,&rdquo; and this when I was not much
+over thirty. I did not know what to do; for Society as the word is generally
+understood, I had no taste; it bored me; horse-racing and cards I loathed, who
+had already gambled too much on a big scale. The killing of creatures under the
+name of sport palled upon me, indeed I began to doubt if it were right, while
+the office of a junior county magistrate in a place where there was no crime,
+only occupied me an hour or two a month.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Lastly my neighbours were few and with all due deference to them, extremely
+dull. At least I could not understand them because in them there did not seem
+to be anything to understand, and I am quite certain that they did not
+understand me. More, when they came to learn that I was radical in my views and
+had written certain &ldquo;dreadful&rdquo; and somewhat socialistic books in
+the form of fiction, they both feared and mistrusted me as an enemy to their
+particular section of the race. As I had not married and showed no inclination
+to do so, their womenkind also, out of their intimate knowledge, proclaimed
+that I led an immoral life, though a little reflection would have shown them
+that there was no one in the neighbourhood which for a time I seldom left, who
+could possibly have tempted an educated creature to such courses.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Terrible is the lot of a man who, while still young and possessing the
+intellect necessary to achievement, is deprived of all ambition. And I had none
+at all. I did not even wish to purchase a peerage or a baronetcy in this
+fashion or in that, and, as in my father&rsquo;s case, my tastes were so many
+and so catholic that I could not lose myself in any one of them. They never
+became more than diversions to me. A hobby is only really amusing when it
+becomes an obsession.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length my lonesome friendlessness oppressed me so much that I took steps to
+mitigate it. In my college life I had two particular friends whom I think I
+must have selected because they were so absolutely different from myself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They were named Bastin and Bickley. Bastin&mdash;Basil was his Christian
+name&mdash;was an uncouth, shock-headed, flat-footed person of large, rugged
+frame and equally rugged honesty, with a mind almost incredibly simple. Nothing
+surprised him because he lacked the faculty of surprise. He was like that kind
+of fish which lies at the bottom of the sea and takes every kind of food into
+its great maw without distinguishing its flavour. Metaphorically speaking,
+heavenly manna and decayed cabbage were just the same to Bastin. He was not
+fastidious and both were mental pabulum&mdash;of a sort&mdash;together with
+whatever lay between these extremes. Yet he was good, so painfully good that
+one felt that without exertion to himself he had booked a first-class ticket
+straight to Heaven; indeed that his guardian angel had tied it round his neck
+at birth lest he should lose it, already numbered and dated like an
+identification disc.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I am bound to add that Bastin never went wrong because he never felt the
+slightest temptation to do so. This I suppose constitutes real virtue, since,
+in view of certain Bible sayings, the person who is tempted and would like to
+yield to the temptation, is equally a sinner with the person who does yield. To
+be truly good one should be too good to be tempted, or too weak to make the
+effort worth the tempter&rsquo;s while&mdash;in short not deserving of his
+powder and shot.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I need hardly add that Bastin went into the Church; indeed, he could not have
+gone anywhere else; it absorbed him naturally, as doubtless Heaven will do in
+due course. Only I think it likely that until they get to know him he will bore
+the angels so much that they will continually move him up higher. Also if they
+have any susceptibilities left, probably he will tread upon their toes&mdash;an
+art in which I never knew his equal. However, I always loved Bastin, perhaps
+because no one else did, a fact of which he remained totally unconscious, or
+perhaps because of his brutal way of telling one what he conceived to be the
+truth, which, as he had less imagination than a dormouse, generally it was not.
+For if the truth is a jewel, it is one coloured and veiled by many different
+lights and atmospheres.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It only remains to add that he was learned in his theological fashion and that
+among his further peculiarities were the slow, monotonous voice in which he
+uttered his views in long sentences, and his total indifference to adverse
+argument however sound and convincing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different character. Like
+Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced another way. If Bastin&rsquo;s
+omnivorous throat could swallow a camel, especially a theological camel,
+Bickley&rsquo;s would strain at the smallest gnat, especially a theological
+gnat. The very best and most upright of men, yet he believed in nothing that he
+could not taste, see or handle. He was convinced, for instance, that man is a
+brute-descended accident and no more, that what we call the soul or the mind is
+produced by a certain action of the grey matter of the brain; that everything
+apparently inexplicable has a perfectly mundane explanation, if only one could
+find it; that miracles certainly never did happen, and never will; that all
+religions are the fruit of human hopes and fears and the most convincing proof
+of human weakness; that notwithstanding our infinite variations we are the
+subjects of Nature&rsquo;s single law and the victims of blind, black and
+brutal chance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such was Bickley with his clever, well-cut face that always reminded me of a
+cameo, and thoughtful brow; his strong, capable hands and his rather steely
+mouth, the mere set of which suggested controversy of an uncompromising kind.
+Naturally as the Church had claimed Bastin, so medicine claimed Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now as it happened the man who succeeded my father as vicar of Fulcombe was
+given a better living and went away shortly after I had purchased the place and
+with it the advowson. Just at this time also I received a letter written in the
+large, sprawling hand of Bastin from whom I had not heard for years. It went
+straight to the point, saying that he, Bastin, had seen in a Church paper that
+the last incumbent had resigned the living of Fulcombe which was in my gift. He
+would therefore be obliged if I would give it to him as the place he was at in
+Yorkshire did not suit his wife&rsquo;s health.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I may state that afterwards I learned that what did not suit Mrs. Bastin
+was the organist, who was pretty. She was by nature a woman with a temperament
+so insanely jealous that actually she managed to be suspicious of Bastin, whom
+she had captured in an unguarded moment when he was thinking of something else
+and who would as soon have thought of even looking at any woman as he would of
+worshipping Baal. As a matter of fact it took him months to know one female
+from another. Except as possible providers of subscriptions and props of
+Mothers&rsquo; Meetings, women had no interest for him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To return&mdash;with that engaging honesty which I have
+mentioned&mdash;Bastin&rsquo;s letter went on to set out all his own
+disabilities, which, he added, would probably render him unsuitable for the
+place he desired to fill. He was a High Churchman, a fact which would certainly
+offend many; he had no claims to being a preacher although he was
+extraordinarily well acquainted with the writings of the Early Fathers. (What
+on earth had that to do with the question, I wondered.) On the other hand he
+had generally been considered a good visitor and was fond of walking (he meant
+to call on distant parishioners, but did not say so).
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then followed a page and a half on the evils of the existing system of the
+presentation to livings by private persons, ending with the suggestion that I
+had probably committed a sin in buying this particular advowson in order to
+increase my local authority, that is, if I had bought it, a point on which he
+was ignorant. Finally he informed me that as he had to christen a sick baby
+five miles away on a certain moor and it was too wet for him to ride his
+bicycle, he must stop. And he stopped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was, however, a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Someone told me that you were dead a few years ago, and of course it may
+be another man of the same name who owns Fulcombe. If so, no doubt the Post
+Office will send back this letter.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That was his only allusion to my humble self in all those diffuse pages. It was
+a long while since I had received an epistle which made me laugh so much, and
+of course I gave him the living by return of post, and even informed him that I
+would increase its stipend to a sum which I considered suitable to the
+position.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About ten days later I received another letter from Bastin which, as a scrawl
+on the flap of the envelope informed me, he had carried for a week in his
+pocket and forgotten to post. Except by inference it returned no thanks for my
+intended benefits. What it did say, however, was that he thought it wrong of me
+to have settled a matter of such spiritual importance in so great a hurry,
+though he had observed that rich men were nearly always selfish where their
+time was concerned. Moreover, he considered that I ought first to have made
+inquiries as to his present character and attainments, etc., etc.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To this epistle I replied by telegraph to the effect that I should as soon
+think of making inquiries about the character of an archangel, or that of one
+of his High Church saints. This telegram, he told me afterwards, he considered
+unseemly and even ribald, especially as it had given great offence to the
+postmaster, who was one of the sidesmen in his church.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus it came about that I appointed the Rev. Basil Bastin to the living of
+Fulcombe, feeling sure that he would provide me with endless amusement and act
+as a moral tonic and discipline. Also I appreciated the man&rsquo;s blunt
+candour. In due course he arrived, and I confess that after a few Sundays of
+experience I began to have doubts as to the wisdom of my choice, glad as I was
+to see him personally. His sermons at once bored me, and, when they did not
+send me to sleep, excited in me a desire for debate. How could he be so
+profoundly acquainted with mysteries before which the world had stood amazed
+for ages? Was there nothing too hot or too heavy in the spiritual way for him
+to dismiss in a few blundering and casual words, as he might any ordinary
+incident of every-day life, I wondered? Also his idea of High Church
+observances was not mine, or, I imagine, that of anybody else. But I will not
+attempt to set it out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His peculiarities, however, were easy to excuse and entirely swallowed up by
+the innate goodness of his nature which soon made him beloved of everyone in
+the place, for although he thought that probably most things were sins, I never
+knew him to discover a sin which he considered to be beyond the reach of
+forgiveness. Bastin was indeed a most charitable man and in his way
+wide-minded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The person whom I could not tolerate, however, was his wife, who, to my fancy,
+more resembled a vessel, a very unattractive vessel, full of vinegar than a
+woman. Her name was Sarah and she was small, plain, flat, sandy-haired and
+odious, quite obsessed, moreover, with her jealousies of the Rev. Basil, at
+whom it pleased her to suppose that every woman in the countryside under fifty
+was throwing herself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I will confess that to the best of my ability I took care that they did in
+outward seeming, that is, whenever she was present, instructing them to sit
+aside with him in darkened corners, to present him with flowers, and so forth.
+Several of them easily fell into the humour of the thing, and I have seen him
+depart from a dinner-party followed by that glowering Sarah, with a handful of
+rosebuds and violets, to say nothing of the traditional offerings of slippers,
+embroidered markers and the like. Well, it was my only way of coming even with
+her, which I think she knew, for she hated me poisonously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So much for Basil Bastin. Now for Bickley. Him I had met on several occasions
+since our college days, and after I was settled at the Priory from time to time
+I asked him to stay with me. At length he came, and I found out that he was not
+at all comfortable in his London practice which was of a nature uncongenial to
+him; further, that he did not get on with his partners. Then, after reflection,
+I made a suggestion to him. I pointed out that, owing to its popularity amongst
+seaside visitors, the neighbourhood of Fulcombe was a rising one, and that
+although there were doctors in it, there was no really first-class surgeon for
+miles.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now Bickley was a first-class surgeon, having held very high hospital
+appointments, and indeed still holding them. Why, I asked, should he not come
+and set up here on his own? I would appoint him doctor to the estate and also
+give him charge of a cottage hospital which I was endowing, with liberty to
+build and arrange it as he liked. Further, as I considered that it would be of
+great advantage to me to have a man of real ability within reach, I would
+guarantee for three years whatever income he was earning in London.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He thanked me warmly and in the end acted on the idea, with startling results
+so far as his prospects were concerned. Very soon his really remarkable skill
+became known and he was earning more money than as an unmarried man he could
+possibly want. Indeed, scarcely a big operation took place at any town within
+twenty miles, and even much farther away, at which he was not called in to
+assist.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Needless to say his advent was a great boon to me, for as he lived in a house I
+let him quite near by, whenever he had a spare evening he would drop in to
+dinner, and from our absolutely opposite standpoints we discussed all things
+human and divine. Thus I was enabled to sharpen my wits upon the hard steel of
+his clear intellect which was yet, in a sense, so limited.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I must add that I never converted him to my way of thinking and he never
+converted me to his, any more than he converted Bastin, for whom, queerly
+enough, he had a liking. They pounded away at each other, Bickley frequently
+getting the best of it in the argument, and when at last Bastin rose to go, he
+generally made the same remark. It was:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your intellect so
+utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted you of error at least half
+a dozen times, and not to confess it is mere pigheadedness. Good night. I am
+sure that Sarah will be sitting up for me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Silly old idiot!&rdquo; Bickley would say, shaking his fist after him.
+&ldquo;The only way to get him to see the truth would be to saw his head open
+and pour it in.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we would both laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such were my two most intimate friends, although I admit it was rather like the
+equator cultivating close relationships with the north and south poles.
+Certainly Bastin was as far from Bickley as those points of the earth are
+apart, while I, as it were, sat equally distant between the two. However, we
+were all very happy together, since in certain characters, there are few things
+that bind men more closely than profound differences of opinion.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Now I must turn to my more personal affairs. After all, it is impossible for a
+man to satisfy his soul, if he has anything of the sort about him which in the
+remotest degree answers to that description, with the husks of wealth, luxury
+and indolence, supplemented by occasional theological and other arguments
+between his friends. Becoming profoundly convinced of this truth, I searched
+round for something to do and, like Noah&rsquo;s dove on the waste of waters,
+found nothing. Then I asked Bickley and Bastin for their opinions as to my best
+future course. Bickley proved a barren draw. He rubbed his nose and feebly
+suggested that I might go in for &ldquo;research work,&rdquo; which, of course,
+only represented his own ambitions. I asked him indignantly how I could do such
+a thing without any scientific qualifications whatever. He admitted the
+difficulty, but replied that I might endow others who had the qualifications.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In short, become a milch cow for sucking scientists,&rdquo; I replied,
+and broke off the conversation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin&rsquo;s idea was, first, that I should teach in a Sunday School;
+secondly, that if this career did not satisfy all my aspirations, I might be
+ordained and become a missionary.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On my rejection of this brilliant advice, he remarked that the only other thing
+he could think of was that I should get married and have a large family, which
+might possibly advantage the nation and ultimately enrich the Kingdom of
+Heaven, though of such things no one could be quite sure. At any rate, he was
+certain that at present I was in practice neglecting my duty, whatever it might
+be, and in fact one of those cumberers of the earth who, he observed in the
+newspaper he took in and read when he had time, were &ldquo;very happily
+named&mdash;the idle rich.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which reminds me,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;that the clothing-club
+finances are in a perfectly scandalous condition; in fact, it is £25 in debt,
+an amount that as the squire of the parish I consider it incumbent on you to
+make good, not as a charity but as an obligation.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here, my friend,&rdquo; I said, ignoring all the rest, &ldquo;will
+you answer me a plain question? Have you found marriage such a success that you
+consider it your duty to recommend it to others? And if you have, why have
+<i>you</i> not got the large family of which you speak?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course not,&rdquo; he replied with his usual frankness.
+&ldquo;Indeed, it is in many ways so disagreeable that I am convinced it must
+be right and for the good of all concerned. As regards the family I am sure I
+do not know, but Sarah never liked babies, which perhaps has something to do
+with it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he sighed, adding, &ldquo;You see, Arbuthnot, we have to take things as we
+find them in this world and hope for a better.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which is just what I am trying to do, you unilluminating old
+donkey!&rdquo; I exclaimed, and left him there shaking his head over matters in
+general, but I think principally over Sarah.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By the way, I think that the villagers recognised this good lady&rsquo;s
+vinegary nature. At least, they used to call her &ldquo;Sour Sal.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.<br />
+Natalie</h2>
+
+<p>
+Now what Bastin had said about marriage stuck in my mind as his blundering
+remarks had a way of doing, perhaps because of the grain of honest truth with
+which they were often permeated. Probably in my position it was more or less my
+duty to marry. But here came the rub; I had never experienced any leanings that
+way. I was as much a man as others, more so than many are, perhaps, and I liked
+women, but at the same time they repelled me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+My old fastidiousness came in; to my taste there was always something wrong
+about them. While they attracted one part of my nature they revolted another
+part, and on the whole I preferred to do without their intimate society, rather
+than work violence to this second and higher part of me. Moreover, quite at the
+beginning of my career I had concluded from observation that a man gets on
+better in life alone, rather than with another to drag at his side, or by whom
+perhaps he must be dragged. Still true marriage, such as most men and some
+women have dreamed of in their youth, had always been one of my ideals; indeed
+it was on and around this vision that I wrote that first book of mine which was
+so successful. Since I knew this to be unattainable in our imperfect
+conditions, however, notwithstanding Bastin&rsquo;s strictures, again I
+dismissed the whole matter from my mind as a vain imagination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As an alternative I reflected upon a parliamentary career which I was not too
+old to begin, and even toyed with one or two opportunities that offered
+themselves, as these do to men of wealth and advanced views. They never came to
+anything, for in the end I decided that Party politics were so hateful and so
+dishonest, that I could not bring myself to put my neck beneath their yoke. I
+was sure that if I tried to do so, I should fail more completely than I had
+done at the Bar and in Literature. Here, too, I am quite certain that I was
+right.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The upshot of it all was that I sought refuge in that last expedient of weary
+Englishmen, travel, not as a globe-trotter, but leisurely and with an inquiring
+mind, learning much but again finding, like the ancient writer whom I have
+quoted already, that there is no new thing under the sun; that with certain
+variations it is the same thing over and over again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No, I will make an exception, the East did interest me enormously. There it
+was, at Benares, that I came into touch with certain thinkers who opened my
+eyes to a great deal. They released some hidden spring in my nature which
+hitherto had always been striving to break through the crust of our conventions
+and inherited ideas. I know now that what I was seeking was nothing less than
+the Infinite; that I had &ldquo;immortal longings in me.&rdquo; I listened to
+all their solemn talk of epochs and years measureless to man, and reflected
+with a thrill that after all man might have his part in every one of them. Yes,
+that bird of passage as he seemed to be, flying out of darkness into darkness,
+still he might have spread his wings in the light of other suns millions upon
+millions of years ago, and might still spread them, grown radiant and glorious,
+millions upon millions of years hence in a time unborn.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+If only I could know the truth. Was Life (according to Bickley) merely a short
+activity bounded by nothingness before and behind; or (according to Bastin) a
+conventional golden-harped and haloed immortality, a word of which he did not
+in the least understand the meaning?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Or was it something quite different from either of these, something vast and
+splendid beyond the reach of vision, something God-sent, beginning and ending
+in the Eternal Absolute and at last partaking of His attributes and nature and
+from aeon to aeon shot through with His light? And how was the truth to be
+learned? I asked my Eastern friends, and they talked vaguely of long ascetic
+preparation, of years upon years of learning, from whom I could not quite
+discover. I was sure it could not be from them, because clearly they did not
+know; they only passed on what they had heard elsewhere, when or how they
+either could not or would not explain. So at length I gave it up, having
+satisfied myself that all this was but an effort of Oriental imagination called
+into life by the sweet influences of the Eastern stars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I gave it up and went away, thinking that I should forget. But I did not
+forget. I was quick with a new hope, or at any rate with a new aspiration, and
+that secret child of holy desire grew and grew within my soul, till at length
+it flashed upon me that this soul of mine was itself the hidden Master from
+which I must learn my lesson. No wonder that those Eastern friends could not
+give his name, seeing that whatever they really knew, as distinguished from
+what they had heard, and it was little enough, each of them had learned from
+the teaching of his own soul.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus, then, I too became a dreamer with only one longing, the longing for
+wisdom, for that spirit touch which should open my eyes and enable me to see.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yet now it happened strangely enough that when I seemed within myself to have
+little further interest in the things of the world, and least of all in women,
+I, who had taken another guest to dwell with me, those things of the world came
+back to me and in the shape of Woman the Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed
+since is it not written that no man can live to himself alone, or lose himself
+in watching and nurturing the growth of his own soul?
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and stayed there a
+while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name in the book of our Minister
+to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred Upton, not because I wished him to ask me to
+dinner, but for the reason that I had heard of him as a man of archæological
+tastes and thought that he might enable me to see things which otherwise I
+should not see.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire neighbours who
+were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on the following night. I
+accepted and found myself one of a considerable party, some of them
+distinguished English people who wore Orders, as is customary when one dines
+with the representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and this shows that in
+the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first time in my life I was sorry
+that I had none and was only plain Mr. Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained
+to me politely, must go in to dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and
+without even a lady as there was not one to spare.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself seated between an
+Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither of whom could talk English,
+while, alas, I knew no foreign language, not even French in which they
+addressed me, seeming surprised that I did not understand them. I was
+humiliated at my own ignorance, although in fact I was not ignorant, only my
+education had been classical. Indeed I was a good classic and had kept up my
+knowledge more or less, especially since I became an idle man. In my confusion
+it occurred to me that the Italian countess might know Latin from which her own
+language was derived, and addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir
+Alfred, who was not far off and overheard me (he also knew Latin), burst into
+laughter and proceeded to explain the joke in a loud voice, first in French and
+then in English, to the assembled company, who all became infected with
+merriment and also stared at me as a curiosity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to a mistake of my
+driver I had arrived rather late and had not been introduced to her. As her
+father&rsquo;s only daughter, her mother being dead, she was seated at the end
+of the table behind a fan-like arrangement of white Madonna lilies, and she had
+bent forward and, like the others, was looking at me, but in such a fashion
+that her head from that distance seemed as though it were surrounded and
+crowned with lilies. Indeed the greatest art could not have produced a more
+beautiful effect which was, however, really one of naked accident.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+An angel looking down upon earth through the lilies of Heaven&mdash;that was
+the rather absurd thought which flashed into my mind. I did not quite realise
+her face at first except that it seemed to be both dark and fair; as a fact her
+waving hair which grew rather low upon her forehead, was dark, and her large,
+soft eyes were grey. I did not know, and to this moment I do not know if she
+was really beautiful, but certainly the light that shone through those eyes of
+hers and seemed to be reflected upon her delicate features, was beauty itself.
+It was like that glowing through a thin vase of the purest alabaster within
+which a lamp is placed, and I felt this effect to arise from no chance, like
+that of the lily-setting, but, as it were, from the lamp of the spirit within.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Our eyes met, and I suppose that she saw the wonder and admiration in mine. At
+any rate her amused smile faded, leaving the face rather serious, though still
+sweetly serious, and a tinge of colour crept over it as the first hue of dawn
+creeps into a pearly sky. Then she withdrew herself behind the screen of lilies
+and for the rest of that dinner which I thought was never coming to an end,
+practically I saw her no more. Only I noted as she passed out that although not
+tall, she was rounded and graceful in shape and that her hands were peculiarly
+delicate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Afterwards in the drawing-room her father, with whom I had talked at the table,
+introduced me to her, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My daughter is the real archaeologist, Mr. Arbuthnot, and I think if you
+ask her, she may be able to help you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he bustled away to speak to some of his important guests, from whom I
+think he was seeking political information.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My father exaggerates,&rdquo; she said in a soft and very sympathetic
+voice, &ldquo;but perhaps&rdquo;&mdash;and she motioned me to a seat at her
+side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we talked of the places and things that I more particularly desired to see
+and, well, the end of it was that I went back to my hotel in love with Natalie;
+and as she afterwards confessed, she went to bed in love with me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was a curious business, more like meeting a very old friend from whom one
+had been separated by circumstances for a score of years or so than anything
+else. We were, so to speak, intimate from the first; we knew all about each
+other, although here and there was something new, something different which we
+could not remember, lines of thought, veins of memory which we did not possess
+in common. On one point I am absolutely clear: it was not solely the everyday
+and ancient appeal of woman to man and man to woman which drew us together,
+though doubtless this had its part in our attachment as under our human
+conditions it must do, seeing that it is Nature&rsquo;s bait to ensure the
+continuance of the race. It was something more, something quite beyond that
+elementary impulse.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At any rate we loved, and one evening in the shelter of the solemn walls of the
+great Coliseum at Rome, which at that hour were shut to all except ourselves,
+we confessed our love. I really think we must have chosen the spot by tacit but
+mutual consent because we felt it to be fitting. It was so old, so impregnated
+with every human experience, from the direst crime of the tyrant who thought
+himself a god, to the sublimest sacrifice of the martyr who already was half a
+god; with every vice and virtue also which lies between these extremes, that it
+seemed to be the most fitting altar whereon to offer our hearts and all that
+caused them to beat, each to the other.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So Natalie and I were betrothed within a month of our first meeting. Within
+three we were married, for what was there to prevent or delay? Naturally Sir
+Alfred was delighted, seeing that he possessed but small private resources and
+I was able to make ample provision for his daughter who had hitherto shown
+herself somewhat difficult in this business of matrimony and now was bordering
+on her twenty-seventh year. Everybody was delighted, everything went smoothly
+as a sledge sliding down a slope of frozen snow and the mists of time hid
+whatever might be at the end of that slope. Probably a plain; at the worst the
+upward rise of ordinary life.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That is what we thought, if we thought at all. Certainly we never dreamed of a
+precipice. Why should we, who were young, by comparison, quite healthy and very
+rich? Who thinks of precipices under such circumstances, when disaster seems to
+be eliminated and death is yet a long way off?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And yet we ought to have done so, because we should have known that smooth
+surfaces without impediment to the runners often end in something of the kind.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where of course we
+met with a great reception, including the ringing (out of tune) of the new peal
+of bells that I had given to the church, Bastin made haste to point this out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot,&rdquo; he
+reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as usual, though what
+at I do not know, had been escorted from the room by Natalie, &ldquo;and
+really, when I come to think of it, you are an unusually fortunate person. You
+possess a great deal of money, much more than you have any right to; which you
+seem to have done very little to earn and do not spend quite as I should like
+you to do, and this nice property, that ought to be owned by a great number of
+people, as, according to the views you express, I should have thought you would
+acknowledge, and everything else that a man can want. It is very strange that
+you should be so favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
+which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even in the end
+and you will get your share of troubles, like others. Perhaps Mrs. Arbuthnot
+will have no children as there is so much for them to take. Or perhaps you will
+lose all your money and have to work for your living, which might be good for
+you. Or,&rdquo; he added, still thinking aloud after his fashion,
+&ldquo;perhaps she will die young&mdash;she has that kind of face, although, of
+course, I hope she won&rsquo;t,&rdquo; he added, waking up.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the proverbial
+funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to them. I suppose it was
+because in a flash of intuition I knew that they would come true and that he
+was an appointed Cassandra. Perhaps this uncanny knowledge overcame my natural
+indignation at such super-<i>gaucherie</i> of which no one but Bastin could
+have been capable, and even prevented me from replying at all, so that I merely
+sat still and looked at him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Bickley did reply with some vigour.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Forgive me for saying so, Bastin,&rdquo; he said, bristling all over as
+it were, &ldquo;but your remarks, which may or may not be in accordance with
+the principles of your religion, seem to me to be in singularly bad taste. They
+would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians, who appear
+to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at any decent heathen
+feast your neck would have been wrung as that of a bird of ill omen.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Bastin blankly. &ldquo;I only said what I thought to
+be the truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then I will say what I think also to be the truth,&rdquo; replied
+Bickley, growing furious. &ldquo;It is that you use your Christianity as a
+cloak for bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy for others of
+which you seem to have none. Moreover, since you talk of the death of
+people&rsquo;s wives, I will tell you something about your own, as a doctor,
+which I can do as I never attended her. It is highly probable, in my opinion,
+that she will die before Mrs. Arbuthnot, who is quite a healthy person with a
+good prospect of life.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;If so, it will be God&rsquo;s will
+and I shall not complain&rdquo; (here Bickley snorted), &ldquo;though I do not
+see what you can know about it. But why should you cast reflections on the
+early Christians who were people of strong principle living in rough times, and
+had to wage war against an established devil-worship? I know you are angry
+because they smashed up the statues of Venus and so forth, but had I been in
+their place I should have done the same.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course you would, who doubts it? But as for the early Christians and
+their iconoclastic performances&mdash;well, curse them, that&rsquo;s
+all!&rdquo; and he sprang up and left the room.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I followed him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Let it not be supposed from the above scene that there was any ill-feeling
+between Bastin and Bickley. On the contrary they were much attached to each
+other, and this kind of quarrel meant no more than the strong expression of
+their individual views to which they were accustomed from their college days.
+For instance Bastin was always talking about the early Christians and
+missionaries, while Bickley loathed both, the early Christians because of the
+destruction which they had wrought in Egypt, Italy, Greece and elsewhere, of
+all that was beautiful; and the missionaries because, as he said, they were
+degrading and spoiling the native races and by inducing them to wear clothes,
+rendering them liable to disease. Bastin would answer that their souls were
+more important than their bodies, to which Bickley replied that as there was no
+such thing as a soul except in the stupid imagination of priests, he differed
+entirely on the point. As it was quite impossible for either to convince the
+other, there the conversation would end, or drift into something in which they
+were mutually interested, such as natural history and the hygiene of the
+neighbourhood.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I may state that Bickley&rsquo;s keen professional eye was not mistaken
+when he diagnosed Mrs. Bastin&rsquo;s state of health as dangerous. As a matter
+of fact she was suffering from heart disease that a doctor can often recognise
+by the colour of the lips, etc., which brought about her death under the
+following circumstances:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her husband attended some ecclesiastical function at a town over twenty miles
+away and was to have returned by a train which would have brought him home
+about five o&rsquo;clock. As he did not arrive she waited at the station for
+him until the last train came in about seven o&rsquo;clock&mdash;without the
+beloved Basil. Then, on a winter&rsquo;s night she tore up to the Priory and
+begged me to lend her a dog-cart in which to drive to the said town to look for
+him. I expostulated against the folly of such a proceeding, saying that no
+doubt Basil was safe enough but had forgotten to telegraph, or thought that he
+would save the sixpence which the wire cost.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then it came out, to Natalie&rsquo;s and my intense amusement, that all this
+was the result of her jealous nature of which I have spoken. She said she had
+never slept a night away from her husband since they were married and with so
+many &ldquo;designing persons&rdquo; about she could not say what might happen
+if she did so, especially as he was &ldquo;such a favourite and so
+handsome.&rdquo; (Bastin was a fine looking man in his rugged way.)
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I suggested that she might have a little confidence in him, to which she
+replied darkly that she had no confidence in anybody.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The end of it was that I lent her the cart with a fast horse and a good driver,
+and off she went. Reaching the town in question some two and a half hours
+later, she searched high and low through wind and sleet, but found no Basil.
+He, it appeared, had gone on to Exeter, to look at the cathedral where some
+building was being done, and missing the last train had there slept the night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About one in the morning, after being nearly locked up as a mad woman, she
+drove back to the Vicarage, again to find no Basil. Even then she did not go to
+bed but raged about the house in her wet clothes, until she fell down utterly
+exhausted. When her husband did return on the following morning, full of
+information about the cathedral, she was dangerously ill, and actually passed
+away while uttering a violent tirade against him for his supposed suspicious
+proceedings.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That was the end of this truly odious British matron.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process, canonised her in his
+imagination as a kind of saint. &ldquo;So loving,&rdquo; he would say,
+&ldquo;such a devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can assure you that even
+in the midst of her death-struggle her last thoughts were of me,&rdquo; words
+that caused Bickley to snort with more than usual vigour, until I kicked him to
+silence beneath the table.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.<br />
+Death and Departure</h2>
+
+<p>
+Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life to bitterness
+and my hopes to ashes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and Natalie. Mentally,
+physically, spiritually we were perfectly mated, and we loved each other
+dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet there was something about her which filled me
+with vague fears, especially after she found that she was to become a mother. I
+would talk to her of the child, but she would sigh and shake her head, her eyes
+filling with tears, and say that we must not count on the continuance of such
+happiness as ours, for it was too great.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I tried to laugh away her doubts, though whenever I did so I seemed to hear
+Bastin&rsquo;s slow voice remarking casually that she might die, as he might
+have commented on the quality of the claret. At last, however, I grew terrified
+and asked her bluntly what she meant.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t quite know, dearest,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;especially
+as I am wonderfully well. But&mdash;but&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But what?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But I think that our companionship is going to be broken for a little
+while.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For a little while!&rdquo; I exclaimed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Humphrey. I think that I shall be taken away from you&mdash;you
+know what I mean,&rdquo; and she nodded towards the churchyard.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh, my God!&rdquo; I groaned.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I want to say this,&rdquo; she added quickly, &ldquo;that if such a
+thing should happen, as it happens every day, I implore you, dearest Humphrey,
+not to be too much distressed, since I am sure that you will find me again. No,
+I can&rsquo;t explain how or when or where, because I do not know. I have
+prayed for light, but it has not come to me. All I know is that I am not
+talking of reunion in Mr. Bastin&rsquo;s kind of conventional heaven, which he
+speaks about as though to reach it one stumbled through darkness for a minute
+into a fine new house next door, where excellent servants had made everything
+ready for your arrival and all the lights were turned up. It is something quite
+different from that and very much more real.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she bent down ostensibly to pat the head of a little black cocker spaniel
+called Tommy which had been given to her as a puppy, a highly intelligent and
+affectionate animal that we both adored and that loved her as only a dog can
+love. Really, I knew, it was to hide her tears, and fled from the room lest she
+should see mine.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I went I heard the dog whimpering in a peculiar way, as though some
+sympathetic knowledge had been communicated to its wonderful animal
+intelligence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That night I spoke to Bickley about the matter, repeating exactly what had
+passed. As I expected, he smiled in his grave, rather sarcastic way, and made
+light of it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My dear Humphrey,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t torment yourself
+about such fancies. They are of everyday occurrence among women in your
+wife&rsquo;s condition. Sometimes they take one form, sometimes another. When
+she has got her baby you will hear no more of them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I tried to be comforted but in vain.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The days and weeks went by like a long nightmare and in due course the event
+happened. Bickley was not attending the case; it was not in his line, he said,
+and he preferred that where a friend&rsquo;s wife was concerned, somebody else
+should be called in. So it was put in charge of a very good local man with a
+large experience in such domestic matters.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+How am I to tell of it? Everything went wrong; as for the details, let them be.
+Ultimately Bickley did operate, and if surpassing skill could have saved her,
+it would have been done. But the other man had misjudged the conditions; it was
+too late, nothing could help either mother or child, a little girl who died
+shortly after she was born but not before she had been christened, also by the
+name of Natalie.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I was called in to say farewell to my wife and found her radiant, triumphant
+even in her weakness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know now,&rdquo; she whispered in a faint voice. &ldquo;I understood
+as the chloroform passed away, but I cannot tell you. Everything is quite well,
+my darling. Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place
+in which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me. Good-bye for a
+little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she died. And for a time I too seemed to die, but could not. I buried her
+and the child here at Fulcombe; or rather I buried their ashes since I could
+not endure that her beloved body should see corruption.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Afterwards, when all was over, I spoke of these last words of Natalie&rsquo;s
+with both Bickley and Bastin, for somehow I seemed to wish to learn their
+separate views.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The latter I may explain, had been present at the end in his spiritual
+capacity, but I do not think that he in the least understood the nature of the
+drama which was passing before his eyes. His prayers and the christening
+absorbed all his attention, and he never was a man who could think of more than
+one thing at a time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I told him exactly what had happened and repeated the words that Natalie
+spoke, he was much interested in his own nebulous way, and said that it was
+delightful to meet with an example of a good Christian, such as my wife had
+been, who actually saw something of Heaven before she had gone there. His own
+faith was, he thanked God, fairly robust, but still an undoubted occurrence of
+the sort acted as a refreshment, &ldquo;like rain on a pasture when it is
+rather dry, you know,&rdquo; he added, breaking into simile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I remarked that she had not seemed to speak in the sense he indicated, but
+appeared to allude to something quite near at hand and more or less immediate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know that there is anything nearer at hand than the
+Hereafter,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I expect she meant that you will probably
+soon die and join her in Paradise, if you are worthy to do so. But of course it
+is not wise to put too much reliance upon words spoken by people at the last,
+because often they don&rsquo;t quite know what they are saying. Indeed
+sometimes I think this was so in the case of my own wife, who really seemed to
+me to talk a good deal of rubbish. Good-bye, I promised to see Widow Jenkins
+this afternoon about having her varicose veins cut out, and I mustn&rsquo;t
+stop here wasting time in pleasant conversation. She thinks just as much of her
+varicose veins as we do of the loss of our wives.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I wonder what Bastin&rsquo;s ideas of <i>unpleasant</i> conversation may be,
+thought I to myself, as I watched him depart already wool-gathering on some
+other subject, probably the heresy of one of those &ldquo;early fathers&rdquo;
+who occupied most of his thoughts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley listened to my tale in sympathetic silence, as a doctor does to a
+patient. When he was obliged to speak, he said that it was interesting as an
+example of a tendency of certain minds towards romantic vision which sometimes
+asserts itself, even in the throes of death.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You know,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;that I put faith in none of these
+things. I wish that I could, but reason and science both show me that they lack
+foundation. The world on the whole is a sad place, where we arrive through the
+passions of others implanted in them by Nature, which, although it cares
+nothing for individual death, is tender towards the impulse of races of every
+sort to preserve their collective life. Indeed the impulse <i>is</i> Nature, or
+at least its chief manifestation. Consequently, whether we be gnats or
+elephants, or anything between and beyond, even stars for aught I know, we must
+make the best of things as they are, taking the good and the evil as they come
+and getting all we can out of life until it leaves us, after which we need not
+trouble. You had a good time for a little while and were happy in it; now you
+are having a bad time and are wretched. Perhaps in the future, when your mental
+balance has re-asserted itself, you will have other good times in the afternoon
+of your days, and then follow twilight and the dark. That is all there is to
+hope for, and we may as well look the thing in the face. Only I confess, my
+dear fellow, that your experience convinces me that marriage should be avoided
+at whatever inconvenience. Indeed I have long wondered that anyone can take the
+responsibility of bringing a child into the world. But probably nobody does in
+cold blood, except misguided idiots like Bastin,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;He
+would have twenty, had not his luck intervened.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you believe in nothing, Friend,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing, I am sorry to say, except what I see and my five senses
+appreciate.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You reject all possibility of miracle, for instance?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That depends on what you mean by miracle. Science shows us all kinds of
+wonders which our great grandfathers would have called miracles, but these are
+nothing but laws that we are beginning to understand. Give me an
+instance.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; I replied at hazard, &ldquo;if you were assured by someone
+that a man could live for a thousand years?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should tell him that he was a fool or a liar, that is all. It is
+impossible.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Or that the same identity, spirit, animating principle&mdash;call it
+what you will&mdash;can flit from body to body, say in successive ages? Or that
+the dead can communicate with the living?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Convince me of any of these things, Arbuthnot, and mind you I desire to
+be convinced, and I will take back every word I have said and walk through
+Fulcombe in a white sheet proclaiming myself the fool. Now, I must get off to
+the Cottage Hospital to cut out Widow Jenkins&rsquo;s varicose veins. They are
+tangible and real at any rate; about the largest I ever saw, indeed. Give up
+dreams, old boy, and take to something useful. You might go back to your
+fiction writing; you seem to have leanings that way, and you know you need not
+publish the stories, except privately for the edification of your
+friends.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With this Parthian shaft Bickley took his departure to make a job of Widow
+Jenkins&rsquo;s legs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I took his advice. During the next few months I did write something which
+occupied my thoughts for a while, more or less. It lies in my safe to this
+minute, for somehow I have never been able to make up my mind to burn what cost
+me so much physical and mental toil.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When it was finished my melancholy returned to me with added force. Everything
+in the house took a tongue and cried to me of past days. Its walls echoed a
+voice that I could never hear again; in the very looking-glasses I saw the
+reflection of a lost presence. Although I had moved myself for the purposes of
+sleep to a little room at the further end of the building, footsteps seemed to
+creep about my bed at night and I heard the rustle of a remembered dress
+without the door. The place grew hateful to me. I felt that I must get away
+from it or I should go mad.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+One afternoon Bastin arrived carrying a book and in a state of high
+indignation. This work, written, as he said, by some ribald traveller, grossly
+traduced the character of missionaries to the South Sea Islands, especially of
+those of the Society to which he subscribed, and he threw it on the table in
+his righteous wrath. Bickley picked it up and opened it at a photograph of a
+very pretty South Sea Island girl clad in a few flowers and nothing else, which
+he held towards Bastin, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her distinctly
+attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus blooms with a difference
+to our women&mdash;a little lower down.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The devil is always attractive,&rdquo; replied Bastin gloomily.
+&ldquo;Child of Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph is
+enough to make my poor Sarah turn in her grave.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Bickley; &ldquo;seeing that wide seas roll between you
+and this dusky Venus. Also I thought that according to your Hebrew legend sin
+came in with bark garments.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You should search the Scriptures, Bickley,&rdquo; I broke in, &ldquo;and
+cultivate accuracy. It was fig-leaves that symbolised its arrival. The
+garments, which I think were of skin, developed later.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; went on Bickley, who had turned the page,
+&ldquo;she&rdquo; (he referred to the late Mrs. Bastin) &ldquo;would have
+preferred her thus,&rdquo; and he held up another illustration of the same
+woman.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In this the native belle appeared after conversion, clad in broken-down
+stays&mdash;I suppose they were stays&mdash;out of which she seemed to bulge
+and flow in every direction, a dirty white dress several sizes too small, a
+kind of Salvation Army bonnet without a crown and a prayer-book which she held
+pressed to her middle; the general effect being hideous, and in some curious
+way, improper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;though I admit her clothes do not
+seem to fit and she has not buttoned them up as she ought. But it is not of the
+pictures so much as of the letterpress with its false and scandalous
+accusations, that I complain.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why do you complain?&rdquo; asked Bickley. &ldquo;Probably it is quite
+true, though that we could never ascertain without visiting the lady&rsquo;s
+home.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If I could afford it,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin with rising anger,
+&ldquo;I should like to go there and expose this vile traducer of my
+cloth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So should I,&rdquo; answered Bickley, &ldquo;and expose these
+introducers of consumption, measles and other European diseases, to say nothing
+of gin, among an innocent and Arcadian people.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How can you call them innocent, Bickley, when they murder and eat
+missionaries?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I dare say we should all eat a missionary, Bastin, if we were hungry
+enough,&rdquo; was the answer, after which something occurred to change the
+conversation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But I kept the book and read it as a neutral observer, and came to the
+conclusion that these South Sea Islands, a land where it was always afternoon,
+must be a charming place, in which perhaps the stars of the Tropics and the
+scent of the flowers might enable one to forget a little, or at least take the
+edge off memory. Why should I not visit them and escape another long and dreary
+English winter? No, I could not do so alone. If Bastin and Bickley were there,
+their eternal arguments might amuse me. Well, why should they not come also?
+When one has money things can always be arranged.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The idea, which had its root in this absurd conversation, took a curious hold
+on me. I thought of it all the evening, being alone, and that night it re-arose
+in my dreams. I dreamed that my lost Natalie appeared to me and showed me a
+picture. It was of a long, low land, a curving shore of which the ends were out
+of the picture, whereon grew tall palms, and where great combers broke upon
+gleaming sand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the picture seemed to become a reality and I saw Natalie herself,
+strangely changeful in her aspect, strangely varying in face and figure,
+strangely bright, standing in the mouth of a pass whereof the little bordering
+cliffs were covered with bushes and low trees, whose green was almost hid in
+lovely flowers. There in my dream she stood, smiling mysteriously, and
+stretched out her arms towards me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I awoke I seemed to hear her voice, repeating her dying words: &ldquo;Go
+where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in which you
+will find me, not knowing that you have found me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With some variations this dream visited me twice that night. In the morning I
+woke up quite determined that I would go to the South Sea Islands, even if I
+must do so alone. On that same evening Bastin and Bickley dined with me. I said
+nothing to them about my dream, for Bastin never dreamed and Bickley would have
+set it down to indigestion. But when the cloth had been cleared away and we
+were drinking our glass of port&mdash;both Bastin and Bickley only took one,
+the former because he considered port a sinful indulgence of the flesh, the
+latter because he feared it would give him gout&mdash;I remarked casually that
+they both looked very run down and as though they wanted a rest. They agreed,
+at least each of them said he had noticed it in the other. Indeed Bastin added
+that the damp and the cold in the church, in which he held daily services to no
+congregation except the old woman who cleaned it, had given him rheumatism,
+which prevented him from sleeping.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do call things by their proper names,&rdquo; interrupted Bickley.
+&ldquo;I told you yesterday that what you are suffering from is neuritis in
+your right arm, which will become chronic if you neglect it much longer. I have
+the same thing myself, so I ought to know, and unless I can stop operating for
+a while I believe my fingers will become useless. Also something is affecting
+my sight, overstrain, I suppose, so that I am obliged to wear stronger and
+stronger glasses. I think I shall have to leave Ogden&rdquo; (his partner)
+&ldquo;in charge for a while, and get away into the sun. There is none here
+before June.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I would if I could pay a <i>locum tenens</i> and were quite sure it
+isn&rsquo;t wrong,&rdquo; said Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad you both think like that,&rdquo; I remarked, &ldquo;as I have
+a suggestion to make to you. I want to go to the South Seas about which we were
+talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that Bickley has been advising
+for me, and I should be very grateful if you would both come as my guests. You,
+Bickley, make so much money out of cutting people about, that you can arrange
+your own affairs during your absence. But as for you, Bastin, I will see to the
+wherewithal for the <i>locum tenens</i>, and everything else.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are very kind,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;and certainly I should
+like to expose that misguided author, who probably published his offensive work
+without thinking that what he wrote might affect the subscriptions to the
+missionary societies, also to show Bickley that he is not always right, as he
+seems to think. But I could never dream of accepting without the full approval
+of the Bishop.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You might get that of your nurse also, if she happens to be still
+alive,&rdquo; mocked Bickley. &ldquo;As for his Lordship, I don&rsquo;t think
+he will raise any objection when he sees the certificate I will give you about
+the state of your health. He is a great believer in me ever since I took that
+carbuncle out of his neck which he got because he will not eat enough. As for
+me, I mean to come if only to show you how continually and persistently you are
+wrong. But, Arbuthnot, how do you mean to go?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know. In a mail steamer, I suppose.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you can run to it, a yacht would be much better.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good idea, for one could get out of the beaten tracks and
+see the places that are never, or seldom, visited. I will make some inquiries.
+And now, to celebrate the occasion, let us all have another glass of port and
+drink a toast.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They hesitated and were lost, Bastin murmuring something about doing without
+his stout next day as a penance. Then they both asked what was the toast, each
+of them, after thought, suggesting that it should be the utter confusion of the
+other.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I shook my head, whereon as a result of further cogitation, Bastin submitted
+that the Unknown would be suitable. Bickley said that he thought this a foolish
+idea as everything worth knowing was already known, and what was the good of
+drinking to the rest? A toast to the Truth would be better.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A notion came to me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let us combine them,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;and drink to the Unknown
+Truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we did, though Bastin grumbled that the performance made him feel like
+Pilate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We are all Pilates in our way,&rdquo; I replied with a sigh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is what I think every time I diagnose a case,&rdquo; exclaimed
+Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As for me I laughed and for some unknown reason felt happier than I had done
+for months. Oh! if only the writer of that tourist tale of the South Sea
+Islands could have guessed what fruit his light-thrown seed would yield to us
+and to the world!
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+I made my inquiries through a London agency which hired out yachts or sold them
+to the idle rich. As I expected, there were plenty to be had, at a price, but
+wealthy as I was, the figure asked of the buyer of any suitable craft,
+staggered me. In the end, however, I chartered one for six months certain and
+at so much per month for as long as I liked afterwards. The owners paid
+insurance and everything else on condition that they appointed the captain and
+first mate, also the engineer, for this yacht, which was named <i>Star of the
+South</i>, could steam at about ten knots as well as sail.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I know nothing about yachts, and therefore shall not attempt to describe her,
+further than to say that she was of five hundred and fifty tons burden, very
+well constructed, and smart to look at, as well she might be, seeing that a
+deceased millionaire from whose executors I hired her had spent a fortune in
+building and equipping her in the best possible style. In all, her crew
+consisted of thirty-two hands. A peculiarity of the vessel was that owing to
+some fancy of the late owner, the passenger accommodation, which was splendid,
+lay forward of the bridge, this with the ship&rsquo;s store-rooms,
+refrigerating chamber, etc., being almost in the bows. It was owing to these
+arrangements, which were unusual, that the executors found it impossible to
+sell, and were therefore glad to accept such an offer as mine in order to save
+expenses. Perhaps they hoped that she might go to the bottom, being heavily
+insured. If so, the Fates did not disappoint them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The captain, named Astley, was a jovial person who held every kind of
+certificate. He seemed so extraordinarily able at his business that personally
+I suspected him of having made mistakes in the course of his career, not
+unconnected with the worship of Bacchus. In this I believe I was right;
+otherwise a man of such attainments would have been commanding something bigger
+than a private yacht. The first mate, Jacobsen, was a melancholy Dane, a
+spiritualist who played the concertina, and seemed to be able to do without
+sleep. The crew were a mixed lot, good men for the most part and quite
+unobjectionable, more than half of them being Scandinavian. I think that is all
+I need say about the <i>Star of the South</i>.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The arrangement was that the <i>Star of the South</i> should proceed through
+the Straits of Gibraltar to Marseilles, where we would join her, and thence
+travel via the Suez Canal, to Australia and on to the South Seas, returning
+home as our fancy or convenience might dictate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All the first part of the plan we carried out to the letter. Of the remainder I
+say nothing at present.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+<i>Star of the South</i> was amply provided with every kind of store. Among
+them were medicines and surgical instruments, selected by Bickley, and a case
+of Bibles and other religious works in sundry languages of the South Seas,
+selected by Bastin, whose bishop, when he understood the pious objects of his
+journey, had rather encouraged than hindered his departure on sick leave, and a
+large number of novels, books of reference, etc., laid in by myself. She duly
+sailed from the Thames and reached Marseilles after a safe and easy passage,
+where all three of us boarded her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I forgot to add that she had another passenger, the little spaniel, Tommy. I
+had intended to leave him behind, but while I was packing up he followed me
+about with such evident understanding of my purpose that my heart was touched.
+When I entered the motor to drive to the station he escaped from the hands of
+the servant, whimpering, and took refuge on my knee. After this I felt that
+Destiny intended him to be our companion. Moreover, was he not linked with my
+dead past, and, had I but known it, with my living future also?
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.<br />
+The Cyclone</h2>
+
+<p>
+We enjoyed our voyage exceedingly. In Egypt, a land I was glad to revisit, we
+only stopped a week while the <i>Star of the South</i>, which we rejoined at
+Suez, coaled and went through the Canal. This, however, gave us time to spend a
+few days in Cairo, visit the Pyramids and Sakkara which Bastin and Bickley had
+never seen before, and inspect the great Museum. The journey up the Nile was
+postponed until our return. It was a pleasant break and gave Bickley, a most
+omnivorous reader who was well acquainted with Egyptian history and theology,
+the opportunity of trying to prove to Bastin that Christianity was a mere
+development of the ancient Egyptian faith. The arguments that ensued may be
+imagined. It never seemed to occur to either of them that all faiths may be and
+indeed probably are progressive; in short, different rays of light thrown from
+the various facets of the same crystal, as in turn these are shone upon by the
+sun of Truth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Our passage down the Red Sea was cool and agreeable. Thence we shaped our
+course for Ceylon. Here again we stopped a little while to run up to Kandy and
+to visit the ruined city of Anarajapura with its great Buddhist topes that once
+again gave rise to religious argument between my two friends. Leaving Ceylon we
+struck across the Indian Ocean for Perth in Western Australia.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was a long voyage, since to save our coal we made most of it under canvas.
+However, we were not dull as Captain Astley was a good companion, and even out
+of the melancholy Dane, Jacobsen, we had entertainment. He insisted on holding
+seances in the cabin, at which the usual phenomena occurred. The table twisted
+about, voices were heard and Jacobsen&rsquo;s accordion wailed out tunes above
+our heads. These happenings drove Bickley to a kind of madness, for here were
+events which he could not explain. He was convinced that someone was playing
+tricks upon him, and devised the most elaborate snares to detect the rogue,
+entirely without result.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+First he accused Jacobsen, who was very indignant, and then me, who laughed. In
+the end Jacobsen and I left the &ldquo;circle&rdquo; and the cabin, which was
+locked behind us; only Bastin and Bickley remaining there in the dark.
+Presently we heard sounds of altercation, and Bickley emerged looking very red
+in the face, followed by Bastin, who was saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Can I help it if something pulled your nose and snatched off your
+eyeglasses, which anyhow are quite useless to you when there is no light?
+Again, is it possible for me, sitting on the other side of that table, to have
+placed the concertina on your head and made it play the National Anthem, a
+thing that I have not the slightest idea how to do?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Please do not try to explain,&rdquo; snapped Bickley. &ldquo;I am
+perfectly aware that you deceived me somehow, which no doubt you think a good
+joke.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My dear fellow,&rdquo; I interrupted, &ldquo;is it possible to imagine
+old Basil deceiving anyone?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not,&rdquo; snorted Bickley, &ldquo;seeing that he deceives himself
+from one year&rsquo;s end to the other?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;that this is an unholy business and
+that we are both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do with
+it,&rdquo; and he departed to his cabin, probably to say some appropriate
+prayers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an instrument called
+a planchette and with difficulty persuaded Bickley to try it, which he did
+after many precautions. The thing, a heart-shaped piece of wood mounted on
+wheels and with a pencil stuck at its narrow end, cantered about the sheet of
+paper on which it was placed, Bickley, whose hands rested upon it, staring at
+the roof of the cabin. Then it began to scribble and after a while stopped
+still.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Will the Doctor look?&rdquo; said Jacobsen. &ldquo;Perhaps the spirits
+have told him something.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! curse all this silly talk about spirits,&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley,
+as he arranged his eyeglasses and held up the paper to the light, for it was
+after dinner.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He stared, then with an exclamation which I will not repeat, and a glance of
+savage suspicion at the poor Dane and the rest of us, threw it down and left
+the cabin. I picked it up and next moment was screaming with laughter. There on
+the top of the sheet was a rough but entirely recognizable portrait of Bickley
+with the accordion on his head, and underneath, written in a delicate, Italian
+female hand, absolutely different from his own, were these words taken from one
+of St. Paul&rsquo;s Epistles&mdash;&ldquo;Oppositions of science falsely so
+called.&rdquo; Underneath them again in a scrawling, schoolboy fist, very like
+Bastin&rsquo;s, was inscribed, &ldquo;Tell us how this is done, you silly
+doctor, who think yourself so clever.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It seems that the devil really can quote Scripture,&rdquo; was
+Bastin&rsquo;s only comment, while Jacobsen stared before him and smiled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley never alluded to the matter, but for days afterwards I saw him
+experimenting with paper and chemicals, evidently trying to discover a form of
+invisible ink which would appear upon the application of the hand. As he never
+said anything about it, I fear that he failed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This planchette business had a somewhat curious ending. A few nights later
+Jacobsen was working it and asked me to put a question. To oblige him I
+inquired on what day we should reach Fremantle, the port of Perth. It wrote an
+answer which, I may remark, subsequently proved to be quite correct.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is not a good question,&rdquo; said Jacobsen, &ldquo;since as a
+sailor I might guess the reply. Try again, Mr. Arbuthnot.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Will anything remarkable happen on our voyage to the South Seas?&rdquo;
+I inquired casually.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The planchette hesitated a while then wrote rapidly and stopped. Jacobsen took
+up the paper and began to read the answer aloud&mdash;&ldquo;To A, B the D, and
+B the C, the most remarkable things will happen that have happened to men
+living in the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That must mean me, Bickley the doctor and Bastin the clergyman,&rdquo; I
+said, laughing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Jacobsen paid no attention, for he was reading what followed. As he did so I
+saw his face turn white and his eyes begin to start from his head. Then
+suddenly he tore the paper in pieces which he thrust into his pocket. Lifting
+his great fist he uttered some Danish oath and with a single blow smashed the
+planchette to fragments, after which he strode away, leaving me astonished and
+somewhat disturbed. When I met him the next morning I asked him what was on the
+paper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; he said quietly, &ldquo;something I should not like you
+too-proper English gentlemens to see. Something not nice. You understand. Those
+spirits not always good; they do that kind of thing sometimes. That&rsquo;s why
+I broke up this planchette.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he began to talk of something else and there the matter ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I should have said that, principally with a view to putting themselves in a
+position to confute each other, ever since we had started from Marseilles both
+Bastin and Bickley spent a number of hours each day in assiduous study of the
+language of the South Sea Islands. It became a kind of competition between them
+as to which could learn the most. Now Bastin, although simple and even stupid
+in some ways, was a good scholar, and as I knew at college, had quite a faculty
+for acquiring languages in which he had taken high marks at examinations.
+Bickley, too, was an extraordinarily able person with an excellent memory,
+especially when he was on his mettle. The result was that before we ever
+reached a South Sea island they had a good working knowledge of the local
+tongues.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife who, under some
+of the &ldquo;white Australia&rdquo; regulations, were not allowed to remain in
+the country and offered to work as servants in return for a passage to Apia
+where we proposed to call some time or other. With these people Bastin and
+Bickley talked all day long till really they became fairly proficient in their
+soft and beautiful dialect. They wished me to learn also, but I said that with
+two such excellent interpreters and the natives while they remained with us, it
+seemed quite unnecessary. Still, I picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as
+much as they did perhaps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length, travelling on and on as a voyager to the planet Mars might do, we
+sighted the low shores of Australia and that same evening were towed, for our
+coal was quite exhausted, to the wharf at Fremantle. Here we spent a few days
+exploring the beautiful town of Perth and its neighbourhood where it was very
+hot just then, and eating peaches and grapes till we made ourselves ill, as a
+visitor often does who is unaware that fruit should not be taken in quantity in
+Australia while the sun is high. Then we departed for Melbourne almost before
+our arrival was generally known, since I did not wish to advertise our presence
+or the object of our journey.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We crossed the Great Australian Bight, of evil reputation, in the most perfect
+weather; indeed it might have been a mill pond, and after a short stay at
+Melbourne, went on to Sydney, where we coaled again and laid in supplies.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then our real journey began. The plan we laid out was to sail to Suva in Fiji,
+about 1,700 miles away, and after a stay there, on to Hawaii or the Sandwich
+Islands, stopping perhaps at the Phoenix Islands and the Central Polynesian
+Sporades, such as Christmas and Fanning Isles. Then we proposed to turn south
+again through the Marshall Archipelago and the Caroline Islands, and so on to
+New Guinea and the Coral Sea. Particularly did we wish to visit Easter Island
+on account of its marvelous sculptures that are supposed to be the relics of a
+pre-historic race. In truth, however, we had no fixed plan except to go
+wherever circumstance and chance might take us. Chance, I may add, or something
+else, took full advantage of its opportunities.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to Suva in safety and spent a while in exploring the beautiful Fiji
+Isles where both Bastin and Bickley made full inquiries about the work of the
+missionaries, each of them drawing exactly opposite conclusions from the same
+set of admitted facts. Thence we steamed to Samoa and put our two natives
+ashore at Apia, where we procured some coal. We did not stay long enough in
+these islands to investigate them, however, because persons of experience there
+assured us from certain familiar signs that one of the terrible hurricanes with
+which they are afflicted, was due to arrive shortly and that we should do well
+to put ourselves beyond its reach. So having coaled and watered we departed in
+a hurry.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Up to this time I should state we had met with the most wonderful good fortune
+in the matter of weather, so good indeed that never on one occasion since we
+left Marseilles, had we been obliged to put the fiddles on the tables. With the
+superstition of a sailor Captain Astley, when I alluded to the matter, shook
+his head saying that doubtless we should pay for it later on, since &ldquo;luck
+never goes all the way&rdquo; and cyclones were reported to be about.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I must tell that after we were clear of Apia, it was discovered that the
+Danish mate who was believed to be in his cabin unwell from something he had
+eaten, was missing. The question arose whether we should put back to find him,
+as we supposed that he had made a trip inland and met with an accident, or been
+otherwise delayed. I was in favour of doing so though the captain, thinking of
+the threatened hurricane, shook his head and said that Jacobsen was a queer
+fellow who might just as well have gone overboard as anywhere else, if he
+thought he heard &ldquo;the spirits, of whom he was so fond,&rdquo; calling
+him. While the matter was still in suspense I happened to go into my own
+stateroom and there, stuck in the looking-glass, saw an envelope in the
+Dane&rsquo;s handwriting addressed to myself. On opening it I found another
+sealed letter, unaddressed, also a note that ran as follows:
+</p>
+
+<p class="letter">
+&ldquo;Honoured Sir,<br />
+    &ldquo;You will think very badly of me for leaving you, but the enclosed
+which I implore you not to open until you have seen the last of the <i>Star of
+the South</i>, will explain my reason and I hope clear my reputation. I thank
+you again and again for all your kindness and pray that the Spirits who rule
+the world may bless and preserve you, also the Doctor and Mr. Bastin.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This letter, which left the fate of Jacobsen quite unsolved, for it might mean
+either that he had deserted or drowned himself, I put away with the enclosure
+in my pocket. Of course there was no obligation on me to refrain from opening
+the letter, but I shrank from doing so both from some kind of sense of honour
+and, to tell the truth, for fear of what it might contain. I felt that this
+would be disagreeable; also, although there was nothing to connect them
+together, I bethought me of the scene when Jacobsen had smashed the planchette.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On my return to the deck I said nothing whatsoever about the discovery of the
+letter, but only remarked that on reflection I had changed my mind and agreed
+with the captain that it would be unwise to attempt to return in order to look
+for Jacobsen. So the boatswain, a capable individual who had seen better days,
+was promoted to take his watches and we went on as before. How curiously things
+come about in the world! For nautical reasons that were explained to me, but
+which I will not trouble to set down, if indeed I could remember them, I
+believe that if we had returned to Apia we should have missed the great gale
+and subsequent cyclone, and with these much else. But it was not so fated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was on the fourth day, when we were roughly seven hundred miles or more
+north of Samoa, that we met the edge of this gale about sundown. The captain
+put on steam in the hope of pushing through it, but that night we dined for the
+first time with the fiddles on, and by eleven o&rsquo;clock it was as much as
+one could do to stand in the cabin, while the water was washing freely over the
+deck. Fortunately, however, the wind veered more aft of us, so that by putting
+about her head a little (seamen must forgive me if I talk of these matters as a
+landlubber) we ran almost before the wind, though not quite in the direction
+that we wished to go.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When the light came it was blowing very hard indeed, and the sky was utterly
+overcast, so that we got no glimpse of the sun, or of the stars on the
+following night. Unfortunately, there was no moon visible; indeed, if there had
+been I do not suppose that it would have helped us because of the thick pall of
+clouds. For quite seventy-two hours we ran on beneath bare poles before that
+gale. The little vessel behaved splendidly, riding the seas like a duck, but I
+could see that Captain Astley was growing alarmed. When I said something
+complimentary to him about the conduct of the <i>Star of the South</i>, he
+replied that she was forging ahead all right, but the question was&mdash;where
+to? He had been unable to take an observation of any sort since we left Samoa;
+both his patent logs had been carried away, so that now only the compass
+remained, and he had not the slightest idea where we were in that great ocean
+studded with atolls and islands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I asked him whether we could not steam back to our proper course, but he
+answered that to do so he would have to travel dead in the eye of the gale, and
+he doubted whether the engines would stand it. Also there was the question of
+coal to be considered. However, he had kept the fires going and would do what
+he could if the weather moderated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That night during dinner which now consisted of tinned foods and whisky and
+water, for the seas had got to the galley fire, suddenly the gale dropped,
+whereat we rejoiced exceedingly. The captain came down into the saloon very
+white and shaken, I thought, and I asked him to have a nip of whisky to warm
+him up, and to celebrate our good fortune in having run out of the wind. He
+took the bottle and, to my alarm, poured out a full half tumbler of spirit,
+which he swallowed undiluted in two or three gulps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s better!&rdquo; he said with a hoarse laugh. &ldquo;But man,
+what is it you are saying about having run out of the wind? Look at the
+glass!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We have,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;and it is wonderfully steady. About
+29 degrees or a little over, which it has been for the last three days.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again Astley laughed in a mirthless fashion, as he answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh, that thing! That&rsquo;s the passengers&rsquo; glass. I told the
+steward to put it out of gear so that you might not be frightened; it is an old
+trick. Look at this,&rdquo; and he produced one of the portable variety out of
+his pocket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We looked, and it stood somewhere between 27 degrees and 28 degrees.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s the lowest glass I ever saw in the Polynesian or any other
+seas during thirty years. It&rsquo;s right, too, for I have tested it by three
+others,&rdquo; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What does it mean?&rdquo; I asked rather anxiously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;South Sea cyclone of the worst breed,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;That
+cursed Dane knew it was coming and that&rsquo;s why he left the ship. Pray as
+you never prayed before,&rdquo; and again he stretched out his hand towards the
+whisky bottle. But I stepped between him and it, shaking my head. Thereon he
+laughed for the third time and left the cabin. Though I saw him once or twice
+afterwards, these were really the last words of intelligible conversation that
+I ever had with Captain Astley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It seems that we are in some danger,&rdquo; said Bastin, in an unmoved
+kind of way. &ldquo;I think that was a good idea of the captain&rsquo;s, to put
+up a petition, I mean, but as Bickley will scarcely care to join in it I will
+go into the cabin and do so myself.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley snorted, then said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Confound that captain! Why did he play such a trick upon us about the
+barometer? Humphrey, I believe he had been drinking.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So do I,&rdquo; I said, looking at the whisky bottle. &ldquo;Otherwise,
+after taking those precautions to keep us in the dark, he would not have let on
+like that.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;he can&rsquo;t get to the liquor,
+except through this saloon, as it is locked up forward with the other
+stores.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s nothing,&rdquo; I replied, &ldquo;as doubtless he has a
+supply of his own; rum, I expect. We must take our chance.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley nodded, and suggested that we should go on deck to see what was
+happening. So we went. Not a breath of wind was stirring, and even the sea
+seemed to be settling down a little. At least, so we judged from the motion,
+for we could not see either it or the sky; everything was as black as pitch. We
+heard the sailors, however, engaged in rigging guide ropes fore and aft, and
+battening down the hatches with extra tarpaulins by the light of lanterns. Also
+they were putting ropes round the boats and doing something to the spars and
+topmasts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently Bastin joined us, having, I suppose, finished his devotions.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Really, it is quite pleasant here,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;One never
+knows how disagreeable so much wind is until it stops.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I lit my pipe, making no answer, and the match burned quite steadily there in
+the open air.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is that?&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley, staring at something which now I
+saw for the first time. It looked like a line of white approaching through the
+gloom. With it came a hissing sound, and although there was still no wind, the
+rigging began to moan mysteriously like a thing in pain. A big drop of water
+also fell from the sides into my pipe and put it out. Then one of the sailors
+cried in a hoarse voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Get down below, governors, unless you want to go out to sea!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why?&rdquo; inquired Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why? Becos the &lsquo;urricane is coming, that&rsquo;s all. Coming as
+though the devil had kicked it out of &lsquo;ell.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin seemed inclined to remonstrate at this sort of language, but we pushed
+him down the companion and followed, propelling the spaniel Tommy in front of
+us. Next moment I heard the sailors battening the hatch with hurried blows, and
+when this was done to their satisfaction, heard their feet also as they ran
+into shelter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Another instant and we were all lying in a heap on the cabin floor with poor
+Tommy on top of us. The cyclone had struck the ship! Above the wash of water
+and the screaming of the gale we heard other mysterious sounds, which doubtless
+were caused by the yards hitting the seas, for the yacht was lying on her side.
+I thought that all was over, but presently there came a rending, crashing
+noise. The masts, or one of them, had gone, and by degrees we righted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Near thing!&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;Good heavens, what&rsquo;s
+that?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I listened, for the electric light had temporarily gone out, owing, I suppose,
+to the dynamo having stopped for a moment. A most unholy and hollow sound was
+rising from the cabin floor. It might have been caused by a bullock with its
+windpipe cut, trying to get its breath and groaning. Then the light came on
+again and we saw Bastin lying at full length on the carpet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He&rsquo;s broken his neck or something,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley crept to him and having looked, sang out:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It&rsquo;s all right! He&rsquo;s only sea-sick. I thought it would come
+to that if he drank so much tea.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sea-sick,&rdquo; I said faintly&mdash;&ldquo;sea-sick?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s all,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;The nerves of the stomach
+acting on the brain or vice-versa&mdash;that is, if Bastin has a brain,&rdquo;
+he added sotto voce.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; groaned the prostrate clergyman. &ldquo;I wish that I were
+dead!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t trouble about that,&rdquo; answered Bickley. &ldquo;I expect
+you soon will be. Here, drink some whisky, you donkey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin sat up and obeyed, out of the bottle, for it was impossible to pour
+anything into a glass, with results too dreadful to narrate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I call that a dirty trick,&rdquo; he said presently, in a feeble voice,
+glowering at Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I expect I shall have to play you a dirtier before long, for you are a
+pretty bad case, old fellow.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As a matter of fact he had, for once Bastin had begun really we thought that he
+was going to die. Somehow we got him into his cabin, which opened off the
+saloon, and as he could drink nothing more, Bickley managed to inject morphia
+or some other compound into him, which made him insensible for a long while.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He must be in a poor way,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;for the needle went
+more than a quarter of an inch into him, and he never cried out or stirred.
+Couldn&rsquo;t help it in that rolling.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But now I could hear the engines working, and I think that the bow of the
+vessel was got head on to the seas, for instead of rolling we pitched, or
+rather the ship stood first upon one end and then upon the other. This
+continued for a while until the first burst of the cyclone had gone by. Then
+suddenly the engines stopped; I suppose that they had broken down, but I never
+learned, and we seemed to veer about, nearly sinking in the process, and to run
+before the hurricane at terrific speed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder where we are going to?&rdquo; I said to Bickley. &ldquo;To the
+land of sleep, Humphrey, I imagine,&rdquo; he replied in a more gentle voice
+than I had often heard him use, adding: &ldquo;Good-bye, old boy, we have been
+real friends, haven&rsquo;t we, notwithstanding my peculiarities? I only wish
+that I could think that there was anything in Bastin&rsquo;s views. But I
+can&rsquo;t, I can&rsquo;t. It&rsquo;s good night for us poor creatures!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.<br />
+Land</h2>
+
+<p>
+At last the electric light really went out. I had looked at my watch just
+before this happened and wound it up, which, Bickley remarked, was superfluous
+and a waste of energy. It then marked 3.20 in the morning. We had wedged
+Bastin, who was now snoring comfortably, into his berth, with pillows, and
+managed to tie a cord over him&mdash;no, it was a large bath towel, fixing one
+end of it to the little rack over his bed and the other to its framework. As
+for ourselves, we lay down on the floor between the table legs, which, of
+course, were screwed, and the settee, protecting ourselves as best we were able
+by help of the cushions, etc., between two of which we thrust the terrified
+Tommy who had been sliding up and down the cabin floor. Thus we remained,
+expecting death every moment till the light of day, a very dim light,
+struggling through a port-hole of which the iron cover had somehow been
+wrenched off. Or perhaps it was never shut, I do not remember.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About this time there came a lull in the hellish, howling hurricane; the fact
+being, I suppose, that we had reached the centre of the cyclone. I suggested
+that we should try to go on deck and see what was happening. So we started,
+only to find the entrance to the companion so faithfully secured that we could
+not by any means get out. We knocked and shouted, but no one answered. My
+belief is that at this time everyone on the yacht except ourselves had been
+washed away and drowned.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we returned to the saloon, which, except for a little water trickling
+about the floor, was marvelously dry, and, being hungry, retrieved some bits of
+food and biscuit from its corners and ate. At this moment the cyclone began to
+blow again worse than ever, but it seemed to us, from another direction, and
+before it sped our poor derelict barque. It blew all day till for my part I
+grew utterly weary and even longed for the inevitable end. If my views were not
+quite those of Bastin, certainly they were not those of Bickley. I had believed
+from my youth up that the individuality of man, the ego, so to speak, does not
+die when life goes out of his poor body, and this faith did not desert me then.
+Therefore, I wished to have it over and learn what there might be upon the
+other side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We could not speak much because of the howling of the wind, but Bickley did
+manage to shout to me something to the effect that his partners would, in his
+opinion, make an end of their great practice within two years, which, he added,
+was a pity. I nodded my head, not caring twopence what happened to
+Bickley&rsquo;s partners or their business, or to my own property, or to
+anything else. When death is at hand most of us do not think much of such
+things because then we realise how small they are. Indeed I was wondering
+whether within a few minutes or hours I should or should not see Natalie again,
+and if this were the end to which she had seemed to beckon me in that dream.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On we sped, and on. About four in the afternoon we heard sounds from
+Bastin&rsquo;s cabin which faintly reminded me of some tune. I crept to the
+door and listened. Evidently he had awakened and was singing or trying to sing,
+for music was not one of his strong points, &ldquo;For those in peril on the
+sea.&rdquo; Devoutly did I wish that it might be heard. Presently it ceased, so
+I suppose he went to sleep again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The darkness gathered once more. Then of a sudden something fearful happened.
+There were stupendous noises of a kind I had never heard; there were
+convulsions. It seemed to us that the ship was flung right up into the air a
+hundred feet or more.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Tidal wave, I expect,&rdquo; shouted Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Almost as he spoke she came down with the most appalling crash on to something
+hard and nearly jarred the senses out of us. Next the saloon was whirling round
+and round and yet being carried forward, and we felt air blowing upon us. Then
+our senses left us. As I clasped Tommy to my side, whimpering and licking my
+face, my last thought was that all was over, and that presently I should learn
+everything or nothing.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+I woke up feeling very bruised and sore and perceived that light was flowing
+into the saloon. The door was still shut, but it had been wrenched off its
+hinges, and that was where the light came in; also some of the teak planks of
+the decking, jagged and splintered, were sticking up through the carpet. The
+table had broken from its fastenings and lay upon its side. Everything else was
+one confusion. I looked at Bickley. Apparently he had not awakened. He was
+stretched out still wedged in with his cushions and bleeding from a wound in
+his head. I crept to him in terror and listened. He was not dead, for his
+breathing was regular and natural. The whisky bottle which had been corked was
+upon the floor unbroken and about a third full. I took a good pull at the
+spirit; to me it tasted like nectar from the gods. Then I tried to force some
+down Bickley&rsquo;s throat but could not, so I poured a little upon the cut on
+his head. The smart of it woke him in a hurry.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where are we now?&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t mean to
+tell me that Bastin is right after all and that we live again somewhere else?
+Oh! I could never bear that ignominy.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know about living somewhere else,&rdquo; I said,
+&ldquo;although my opinions on that matter differ from yours. But I do know
+that you and I are still on earth in what remains of the saloon of the <i>Star
+of the South</i>.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Thank God for that! Let&rsquo;s go and look for old Bastin,&rdquo; said
+Bickley. &ldquo;I do pray that he is all right also.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is most illogical of you, Bickley, and indeed wrong,&rdquo; groaned a
+deep voice from the other side of the cabin door, &ldquo;to thank a God in Whom
+you do not believe, and to talk of praying for one of the worst and most
+inefficient of His servants when you have no faith in prayer.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Got you there, my friend,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley murmured something about force of habit, and looked smaller than I had
+ever seen him do before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Somehow we forced that door open; it was not easy because it had jammed. Within
+the cabin, hanging on either side of the bath towel which had stood the strain
+nobly, something like a damp garment over a linen line, was Bastin most of
+whose bunk seemed to have disappeared. Yes&mdash;Bastin, pale and dishevelled
+and looking shrunk, with his hair touzled and his beard apparently growing all
+ways, but still Bastin alive, if very weak.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley ran at him and made a cursory examination with his fingers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing broken,&rdquo; he said triumphantly. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s all
+right.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If <i>you</i> had hung over a towel for many hours in most violent
+weather you would not say that,&rdquo; groaned Bastin. &ldquo;My inside is a
+pulp. But perhaps you would be kind enough to untie me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bosh!&rdquo; said Bickley as he obeyed. &ldquo;All you want is something
+to eat. Meanwhile, drink this,&rdquo; and he handed him the remains of the
+whisky.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin swallowed it every drop, murmuring something about taking a little wine
+for his stomach&rsquo;s sake, &ldquo;one of the Pauline injunctions, you
+know,&rdquo; after which he was much more cheerful. Then we hunted about and
+found some more of the biscuits and other food with which we filled ourselves
+after a fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder what has happened,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;I suppose that,
+thanks to the skill of the captain, we have after all reached the haven where
+we would be.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here he stopped, rubbed his eyes and looked towards the saloon door which, as I
+have said, had been wrenched off its hinges, but appeared to have opened wider
+than when I observed it last. Also Tommy, who was recovering his spirits,
+uttered a series of low growls.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is a most curious thing,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;and I suppose I
+must be suffering from hallucinations, but I could swear that just now I saw
+looking through that door the same improper young woman clothed in a few
+flowers and nothing else, whose photograph in that abominable and libellous
+book was indirectly the cause of our tempestuous voyage.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Indeed!&rdquo; replied Bickley. &ldquo;Well, so long as she has not got
+on the broken-down stays and the Salvation Army bonnet without a crown, which
+you may remember she wore after she had fallen into the hands of your
+fraternity, I am sure <i>I</i> do not mind. In fact I should be delighted to
+see anything so pleasant.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this moment a distinct sound of female tittering arose from beyond the door.
+Tommy barked and Bickley stepped towards it, but I called to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look out! Where there are women there are sure to be men. Let us be
+ready against accidents.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we armed ourselves with pistols, that is Bickley and I did, Bastin being
+fortified solely with a Bible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we advanced, a remarkable and dilapidated trio, and dragged the door wide.
+Instantly there was a scurry and we caught sight of women&rsquo;s forms wearing
+only flowers, and but few of these, running over white sand towards groups of
+men armed with odd-looking clubs, some of which were fashioned to the shapes of
+swords and spears. To make an impression I fired two shots with my revolver
+into the air, whereupon both men and women fled into groves of trees and
+vanished.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They don&rsquo;t seem to be accustomed to white people,&rdquo; said
+Bickley. &ldquo;Is it possible that we have found a shore upon which no
+missionary has set a foot?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I hope so,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;seeing that unworthy as I am, then
+the opportunities for me would be very great.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We stood still and looked about us. This was what we saw. All the after part of
+the ship from forward of the bridge had vanished utterly; there was not a trace
+of it; she had as it were been cut in two. More, we were some considerable
+distance from the sea which was still raging over a quarter of a mile away
+where great white combers struck upon a reef and spouted into the air. Behind
+us was a cliff, apparently of rock but covered with earth and vegetation, and
+against this cliff, in which the prow of the ship was buried, she, or what
+remained of her, had come to anchor for the last time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You see what has happened,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;A great tidal wave has
+carried us up here and retreated.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s it,&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley. &ldquo;Look at the
+debris,&rdquo; and he pointed to torn-up palms, bushes and seaweed piled into
+heaps which still ran salt water; also to a number of dead fish that lay about
+among them, adding, &ldquo;Well, we are saved anyhow.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And yet there are people like you who say that there is no
+Providence!&rdquo; ejaculated Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder what the views of Captain Astley and the crew are, or rather
+were, upon that matter,&rdquo; interrupted Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; answered Bastin, looking about him vaguely.
+&ldquo;It is true that I can&rsquo;t see any of them, but if they are drowned
+no doubt it is because their period of usefulness in this world had
+ended.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let&rsquo;s get down and look about us,&rdquo; I remarked, being anxious
+to avoid further argument.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we scrambled from the remnant of the ship, like Noah descending out of the
+ark, as Bastin said, on to the beach beneath, where Tommy rushed to and fro,
+gambolling for joy. Here we discovered a path which ran diagonally up the side
+of a cliff which was nowhere more than fifty or sixty feet in height, and
+possibly had once formed the shore of this land, or perhaps that of a lake. Up
+this path we went, following the tracks of many human feet, and reaching the
+crest of the cliff, looked about us, basking as we did so in the beautiful
+morning sun, for the sky was now clear of clouds and with that last awful
+effort, which destroyed our ship, the cyclone had passed away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We were standing on a plain down which ran a little stream of good water
+whereof Tommy drank greedily, we following his example. To the right and left
+of this plain, further than we could see, stretched bushland over which towered
+many palms, rather ragged now because of the lashing of the gale. Looking
+inland we perceived that the ground sloped gently downwards, ending at a
+distance of some miles in a large lake. Far out in this lake something like the
+top of a mountain of a brown colour rose above the water, and on the edge of it
+was what from that distance appeared to be a tumbled ruin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This is all very interesting,&rdquo; I said to Bickley. &ldquo;What do
+you make of it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t quite know. At first sight I should say that we are
+standing on the lip of a crater of some vast extinct volcano. Look how it
+curves to north and south and at the slope running down to the lake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I nodded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Lucky that the tidal wave did not get over the cliff,&rdquo; I said.
+&ldquo;If it had the people here would have all been drowned out. I wonder
+where they have gone?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I spoke Bastin pointed to the edge of the bush some hundreds of yards away,
+where we perceived brown figures slipping about among the trees. I suggested
+that we should go back to the mouth of our path, so as to have a line of
+retreat open in case of necessity, and await events. So we did and there stood
+still. By degrees the brown figures emerged on to the plain to the number of
+some hundreds, and we saw that they were both male and female. The women were
+clothed in nothing except flowers and a little girdle; the men were all armed
+with wooden weapons and also wore a girdle but no flowers. The children, of
+whom there were many, were quite naked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Among these people we observed a tall person clothed in what seemed to be a
+magnificent feather cloak, and, walking around and about him, a number of
+grotesque forms adorned with hideous masks and basket-like head-dresses that
+were surmounted by plumes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The king or chief and his priests or medicine-men! This is
+splendid,&rdquo; said Bickley triumphantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin also contemplated them with enthusiasm as raw material upon which he
+hoped to get to work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By degrees and very cautiously they approached us. To our joy, we perceived
+that behind them walked several young women who bore wooden trays of food or
+fruit.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That looks well,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;They would not make offerings
+unless they were friendly.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The food may be poisoned,&rdquo; remarked Bickley suspiciously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The crowd advanced, we standing quite still looking as dignified as we could, I
+as the tallest in the middle, with Tommy sitting at my feet. When they were
+about five and twenty yards away, however, that wretched little dog caught
+sight of the masked priests. He growled and then rushed at them barking, his
+long black ears flapping as he went.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The effect was instantaneous. One and all they turned and fled precipitately,
+who evidently had never before seen a dog and looked upon it as a deadly
+creature. Yes, even the tall chief and his masked medicine-men fled like hares
+pursued by Tommy, who bit one of them in the leg, evoking a terrific howl. I
+called him back and took him into my arms. Seeing that he was safe for a while
+the crowd reformed and once again advanced.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As they came we noted that they were a wonderfully handsome people, tall and
+straight with regularly shaped features and nothing of the negro about them.
+Some of the young women might even be called beautiful, though those who were
+elderly had become corpulent. The feather-clothed chief, however, was much
+disfigured by a huge growth with a narrow stalk to it that hung from his neck
+and rested on his shoulder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll have that off him before he is a week older,&rdquo; said
+Bickley, surveying this deformity with great professional interest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On they came, the girls with the platters walking ahead. On one of these were
+what looked like joints of baked pork, on another some plantains and
+pear-shaped fruits. They knelt down and offered these to us. We contemplated
+them for a while. Then Bickley shook his head and began to rub his stomach with
+appropriate contortions. Clearly they were quick-minded enough for they saw the
+point. At some words the girls brought the platters to the chief and others,
+who took from them portions of the food at hazard and ate them to show that it
+was not poisoned, we watching their throats the while to make sure that it was
+swallowed. Then they returned again and we took some of the food though only
+Bickley ate, because, as I pointed out to him, being a doctor who understood
+the use of antidotes; clearly he should make the experiment. However, nothing
+happened; indeed he said that it was very good.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After this there came a pause. Then suddenly Bastin took up his parable in the
+Polynesian tongue which&mdash;to a certain extent&mdash;he had acquired with so
+much pains.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is this place called?&rdquo; he asked slowly and distinctly,
+pausing between each word.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His audience shook their heads and he tried again, putting the accents on
+different syllables. Behold! some bright spirit understood him and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Orofena.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That means a hill, or an island, or a hill in an island,&rdquo;
+whispered Bickley to me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who is your God?&rdquo; asked Bastin again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The point seemed one upon which they were a little doubtful, but at last the
+chief answered, &ldquo;Oro. He who fights.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In other words, Mars,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I will give you a better one,&rdquo; said Bastin in the same slow
+fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thinking that he referred to himself these children of Nature contemplated his
+angular form doubtfully and shook their heads. Then for the first time one of
+the men who was wearing a mask and a wicker crate on his head, spoke in a
+hollow voice, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you try Oro will eat you up.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Head priest!&rdquo; said Bickley, nudging me. &ldquo;Old Bastin had
+better be careful or he will get his teeth into him and call them
+Oro&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Another pause, after which the man in a feather cloak with the growth on his
+neck that a servant was supporting, said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am Marama, the chief of Orofena. We have never seen men like you
+before, if you are men. What brought you here and with you that fierce and
+terrible animal, or evil spirit which makes a noise and bites?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now Bickley pretended to consult me who stood brooding and majestic, that is if
+I can be majestic. I whispered something and he answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The gods of the wind and the sea.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What nonsense,&rdquo; ejaculated Bastin, &ldquo;there are no such
+things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Shut up,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;we must use similes here,&rdquo; to which
+he replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t like similes that tamper with the truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Remember Neptune and Aeolus,&rdquo; I suggested, and he lapsed into
+consideration of the point.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We knew that you were coming,&rdquo; said Marama. &ldquo;Our doctors
+told us all about you a moon ago. But we wish that you would come more gently,
+as you nearly washed away our country.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After looking at me Bickley replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How thankful should you be that in our kindness we have spared
+you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you come to do?&rdquo; inquired Marama again. After the usual
+formula of consulting me Bickley answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We come to take that mountain (he meant lump) off your neck and make you
+beautiful; also to cure all the sickness among your people.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And I come,&rdquo; broke in Bastin, &ldquo;to give you new
+hearts.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+These announcements evidently caused great excitement. After consultation
+Marama answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We do not want new hearts as the old ones are good, but we wish to be
+rid of lumps and sicknesses. If you can do this we will make you gods and
+worship you and give you many wives.&rdquo; (Here Bastin held up his hands in
+horror.) &ldquo;When will you begin to take away the lumps?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To-morrow,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;But learn that if you try to harm
+us we will bring another wave which will drown all your country.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nobody seemed to doubt our capacities in this direction, but one inquiring
+spirit in a wicker crate did ask how it came about that if we controlled the
+ocean we had arrived in half a canoe instead of a whole one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley replied to the effect that it was because the gods always travelled in
+half-canoes to show their higher nature, which seemed to satisfy everyone. Then
+we announced that we had seen enough of them for that day and would retire to
+think. Meanwhile we should be obliged if they would build us a house and keep
+us supplied with whatever food they had.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do the gods eat?&rdquo; asked the sceptic again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That fellow is a confounded radical,&rdquo; I whispered to Bickley.
+&ldquo;Tell him that they do when they come to Orofena.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He did so, whereon the chief said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Would the gods like a nice young girl cooked?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this point Bastin retired down the path, realising that he had to do with
+cannibals. We said that we preferred to look at the girls alive and would meet
+them again to-morrow morning, when we hoped that the house would be ready.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So our first interview with the inhabitants of Orofena came to an end, on which
+we congratulated ourselves.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+On reaching the remains of the <i>Star of the South</i> we set to work to take
+stock of what was left to us. Fortunately it proved to be a very great deal. As
+I think I mentioned, all the passenger part of the yacht lay forward of the
+bridge, just in front of which the vessel had been broken in two, almost as
+cleanly as though she were severed by a gigantic knife. Further our stores were
+forward and practically everything else that belonged to us, even down to
+Bickley&rsquo;s instruments and medicines and Bastin&rsquo;s religious works,
+to say nothing of a great quantity of tinned food and groceries. Lastly on the
+deck above the saloon had stood two large lifeboats. Although these were amply
+secured at the commencement of the gale one of them, that on the port side, was
+smashed to smithers; probably some spar had fallen upon it. The starboard boat,
+however, remained intact and so far as we could judge, seaworthy, although the
+bulwarks were broken by the waves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There&rsquo;s something we can get away in if necessary,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where to?&rdquo; remarked Bastin. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t know where we
+are or if there is any other land within a thousand miles. I think we had
+better stop here as Providence seems to have intended, especially when there is
+so much work to my hand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be careful,&rdquo; answered Bickley, &ldquo;that the work to your hand
+does not end in the cutting of all our throats. It is an awkward thing
+interfering with the religion of savages, and I believe that these untutored
+children of Nature sometimes eat missionaries.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, I have heard that,&rdquo; said Bastin; &ldquo;they bake them first
+as they do pigs. But I don&rsquo;t know that they would care to eat me,&rdquo;
+and he glanced at his bony limbs, &ldquo;especially when you are much plumper.
+Anyhow one can&rsquo;t stop for a risk of that sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Deigning no reply, Bickley walked away to fetch some fine fish which had been
+washed up by the tidal wave and were still flapping about in a little pool of
+salt water. Then we took counsel as to how to make the best of our
+circumstances, and as a result set to work to tidy up the saloon and cabins,
+which was not difficult as what remained of the ship lay on an even keel. Also
+we got out some necessary stores, including paraffin for the swinging lamps
+with which the ship was fitted in case of accident to the electric light,
+candles, and the guns we had brought with us so that they might be handy in the
+event of attack. This done, by the aid of the tools that were in the
+storerooms, Bickley, who was an excellent carpenter, repaired the saloon door,
+all that was necessary to keep us private, as the bulkhead still remained.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now,&rdquo; he said triumphantly when he had finished and got the lock
+and bolts to work to his satisfaction, &ldquo;we can stand a siege if needed,
+for as the ship is iron built they can&rsquo;t even burn us out and that teak
+door would take some forcing. Also we can shore it up.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How about something to eat? I want my tea,&rdquo; said Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then, my reverend friend,&rdquo; replied Bickley, &ldquo;take a couple
+of the fire buckets and fetch some water from the stream. Also collect
+driftwood of which there is plenty about, clean those fish and grill them over
+the saloon stove.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll try,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;but I never did any cooking
+before.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; replied Bickley, &ldquo;on second thoughts I will see to that
+myself, but you can get the fish ready.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So, with due precautions, Bastin and I fetched water from the stream which we
+found flowed over the edge of the cliff quite close at hand into a beautiful
+coral basin that might have been designed for a bath of the nymphs. Indeed one
+at a time, while the other watched, we undressed and plunged into it, and never
+was a tub more welcome than after our long days of tempest. Then we returned to
+find that Bickley had already set the table and was engaged in frying the fish
+very skilfully on the saloon stove, which proved to be well adapted to the
+purpose. He was cross, however, when he found that we had bathed and that it
+was now too late for him to do likewise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While he was cleaning himself as well as he could in his cabin basin and Bastin
+was boiling water for tea, suddenly I remembered the letter from the Danish
+mate Jacobsen. Concluding that it might now be opened as we had certainly
+parted with most of the <i>Star of the South</i> for the last time, I read it.
+It was as follows:
+</p>
+
+<p class="letter">
+&ldquo;The reason, honoured Sir, that I am leaving the ship is that on the
+night I tore up the paper, the spirit controlling the planchette wrote these
+words: &lsquo;After leaving Samoa the <i>Star of the South</i> will be wrecked
+in a hurricane and everybody on board drowned except A. B. and B. Get out of
+her! Get out of her! Don&rsquo;t be a fool, Jacob, unless you want to come over
+here at once. Take our advice and get out of her and you will live to be
+old.&mdash;S<small>KOLL</small>.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="letter">
+&ldquo;Sir, I am not a coward but I know that this will happen, for that spirit
+which signs itself Skoll never tells a lie. I did try to give the captain a
+hint to stop at Apia, but he had been drinking and openly cursed me and called
+me a sneaking cheat. So I am going to run away, of which I am very much
+ashamed. But I do not wish to be drowned yet as there is a girl whom I want to
+marry, and my mother I support. You will be safe and I hope you will not think
+too badly of me.&mdash;J<small>ACOB</small> J<small>ACOBSEN</small>.<br />
+    &ldquo;<i>P.S</i>.&mdash;It is an awful thing to know the future. Never try
+to learn that.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I gave this letter to Bastin and Bickley to read and asked them what they
+thought of it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Coincidence,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;The man is a weak-minded idiot
+and heard in Samoa that they expected a hurricane.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think,&rdquo; chimed in Bastin, &ldquo;that the devil knows how to
+look after his own at any rate for a little while. I dare say it would have
+been much better for him to be drowned.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At least he is a deserter and failed in his duty. I never wish to hear
+of him again,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As a matter of fact I never have. But the incident remains quite unexplained
+either by Bickley or Bastin.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.<br />
+The Orofenans</h2>
+
+<p>
+To our shame we had a very pleasant supper that night off the grilled fish,
+which was excellent, and some tinned meat. I say to our shame, in a sense, for
+on our companions the sharks were supping and by rights we should have been
+sunk in woe. I suppose that the sense of our own escape intoxicated us. Also,
+notwithstanding his joviality, none of us had cared much for the captain, and
+his policy had been to keep us somewhat apart from the crew, of whom therefore
+we knew but little. It is true that Bastin held services on Sundays, for such
+as would attend, and Bickley had doctored a few of them for minor ailments, but
+there, except for a little casual conversation, our intercourse began and
+ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now the sad fact is that it is hard to be overwhelmed with grief for those with
+whom we are not intimate. We were very sorry and that is all that can be said,
+except that Bastin, being High Church, announced in a matter-of-fact way that
+he meant to put up some petitions for the welfare of their souls. To this
+Bickley retorted that from what he had seen of their bodies he was sure they
+needed them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yes, it was a pleasant supper, not made less so by a bottle of champagne which
+Bickley and I shared. Bastin stuck to his tea, not because he did not like
+champagne, but because, as he explained, having now come in contact with the
+heathen it would never do for him to set them an example in the use of
+spirituous liquors.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;However much we may differ, Bastin, I respect you for that
+sentiment,&rdquo; commented Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know why you should,&rdquo; answered Bastin; &ldquo;but if
+so, you might follow my example.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That night we slept like logs, trusting to our teak door which we barricaded,
+and to Tommy, who was a most excellent watch-dog, to guard us against surprise.
+At any rate we took the risk. As a matter of fact, nothing happened, though
+before dawn Tommy did growl a good deal, for I heard him, but as he sank into
+slumber again on my bed, I did not get up. In the morning I found from fresh
+footprints that two or three men had been prowling about the ship, though at a
+little distance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We rose early, and taking the necessary precautions, bathed in the pool. Then
+we breakfasted, and having filled every available receptacle with water, which
+took us a long time as these included a large tank that supplied the bath, so
+that we might have at least a week&rsquo;s supply in case of siege, we went on
+deck and debated what we should do. In the end we determined to stop where we
+were and await events, because, as I pointed out, it was necessary that we
+should discover whether these natives were hostile or friendly. In the former
+event we could hold our own on the ship, whereas away from it we must be
+overwhelmed; in the latter there was always time to move inland.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About ten o&rsquo;clock when we were seated on stools smoking, with our guns by
+our side&mdash;for here, owing to the overhanging cliff in which it will be
+remembered the prow of the ship was buried, we could not be reached by missiles
+thrown from above&mdash;we saw numbers of the islanders advancing upon us along
+the beach on either side. They were preceded as before by women who bore food
+on platters and in baskets. These people, all talking excitedly and laughing
+after their fashion, stopped at a distance, so we took no notice of them.
+Presently Marama, clad in his feather cloak, and again accompanied by priests
+or medicine-men, appeared walking down the path on the cliff face, and,
+standing below, made salutations and entered into a conversation with us of
+which I give the substance&mdash;that is, so far as we could understand it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He reproached us for not having come to him as he expected we would do. We
+replied that we preferred to remain where we were until we were sure of our
+greeting and asked him what was the position. He explained that only once
+before, in the time of his grandfather, had any people reached their shores,
+also during a great storm as we had done. They were dark-skinned men like
+themselves, three of them, but whence they came was never known, since they
+were at once seized and sacrificed to the god Oro, which was the right thing to
+do in such a case.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We asked whether he would consider it right to sacrifice us. He replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Certainly, unless we were too strong, being gods ourselves, or unless an
+arrangement could be concluded. We asked&mdash;what arrangement? He replied
+that we must make them gifts; also that we must do what we had promised and
+cure him&mdash;the chief&mdash;of the disease which had tormented him for
+years. In that event everything would be at our disposal and we, with all our
+belongings, should become <i>taboo</i>, holy, not to be touched. None would
+attempt to harm us, nothing should be stolen under penalty of death.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We asked him to come up on the deck with only one companion that his sickness
+might be ascertained, and after much hesitation he consented to do so. Bickley
+made an examination of the growth and announced that he believed it could be
+removed with perfect safety as the attachment to the neck was very slight, but
+of course there was always a risk. This was explained to him with difficulty,
+and much talk followed between him and his followers who gathered on the beach
+beneath the ship. They seemed adverse to the experiment, till Marama grew
+furious with them and at last burst into tears saying that he could no longer
+drag this terrible burden about with him, and he touched the growth. He would
+rather die. Then they gave way.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I will tell the rest as shortly as I can.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A hideous wooden idol was brought on board, wrapped in leaves and feathers, and
+upon it the chief and his head people swore safety to us whether he lived or
+died, making us the guests of their land. There were, however, two provisos
+made, or as such we understood them. These seemed to be that we should offer no
+insult or injury to their god, and secondly, that we should not set foot on the
+island in the lake. It was not till afterwards that it occurred to me that this
+must refer to the mountain top which appeared in the inland sheet of water. To
+those stipulations we made no answer. Indeed, the Orofenans did all the
+talking. Finally, they ratified their oaths by a man who, I suppose, was a head
+priest, cutting his arm and rubbing the blood from it on the lips of the idol;
+also upon those of the chief. I should add that Bastin had retired as soon as
+he saw that false god appear, of which I was glad, since I felt sure that he
+would make a scene.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The operation took place that afternoon and on the ship, for when once Marama
+had made up his mind to trust us he did so very thoroughly. It was performed on
+deck in the presence of an awed multitude who watched from the shore, and when
+they saw Bickley appear in a clean nightshirt and wash his hands, uttered a
+groan of wonder. Evidently they considered it a magical and religious ceremony;
+indeed ever afterwards they called Bickley the Great Priest, or sometimes the
+Great Healer in later days. This was a grievance to Bastin who considered that
+he had been robbed of his proper title, especially when he learned that among
+themselves he was only known as &ldquo;the Bellower,&rdquo; because of the loud
+voice in which he addressed them. Nor did Bickley particularly appreciate the
+compliment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With my help he administered the chloroform, which was done under shelter of a
+sail for fear lest the people should think that we were smothering their chief.
+Then the operation went on to a satisfactory conclusion. I omit the details,
+but an electric battery and a red-hot wire came into play.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There,&rdquo; said Bickley triumphantly when he had finished tying the
+vessels and made everything neat and tidy with bandages, &ldquo;I was afraid he
+might bleed to death, but I don&rsquo;t think there is any fear of that now,
+for I have made a real job of it.&rdquo; Then advancing with the horrid tumour
+in his hands he showed it in triumph to the crowd beneath, who groaned again
+and threw themselves on to their faces. Doubtless now it is the most sacred
+relic of Orofena.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Marama came out of the anesthetic, Bickley gave him something which sent
+him to sleep for twelve hours, during all which time his people waited beneath.
+This was our dangerous period, for our difficulty was to persuade them that he
+was not dead, although Bickley had assured them that he would sleep for a time
+while the magic worked. Still, I was very glad when he woke up on the following
+morning, and two or three of his leading men could see that he was alive. The
+rest was lengthy but simple, consisting merely in keeping him quiet and on a
+suitable diet until there was no fear of the wound opening. We achieved it
+somehow with the help of an intelligent native woman who, I suppose, was one of
+his wives, and five days later were enabled to present him healed, though
+rather tottery, to his affectionate subjects.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was a great scene, which may be imagined. They bore him away in a litter
+with the native woman to watch him and another to carry the relic preserved in
+a basket, and us they acclaimed as gods. Thenceforward we had nothing to fear
+in Orofena&mdash;except Bastin, though this we did not know at the time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All this while we had been living on our ship and growing very bored there,
+although we employed the empty hours in conversation with selected natives,
+thereby improving our knowledge of the language. Bickley had the best of it,
+since already patients began to arrive which occupied him. One of the first was
+that man whom Tommy had bitten. He was carried to us in an almost comatose
+state, suffering apparently from the symptoms of snake poisoning.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Afterward it turned out that he conceived Tommy to be a divine but most
+venomous lizard that could make a very horrible noise, and began to suffer as
+one might do from the bite of such a creature. Nothing that Bickley could do
+was enough to save him and ultimately he died in convulsions, a circumstance
+that enormously enhanced Tommy&rsquo;s reputation. To tell the truth, we took
+advantage of it to explain that Tommy was in fact a supernatural animal, a sort
+of tame demon which only harmed people who had malevolent intentions towards
+those he served or who tried to steal any of their possessions or to intrude
+upon them at inconvenient hours, especially in the dark. So terrible was he,
+indeed, that even the skill of the Great Priest, <i>i.e.</i>, Bickley, could
+not avail to save any whom once he had bitten in his rage. Even to be barked at
+by him was dangerous and conveyed a curse that might last for generations.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All this we set out when Bastin was not there. He had wandered off, as he said,
+to look for shells, but as we knew, to practise religious orations in the
+Polynesian tongue with the waves for audience, as Demosthenes is said to have
+done to perfect himself as a political orator. Personally I admit that I relied
+more on the terrors of Tommy to safeguard us from theft and other troubles than
+I did upon those of the native <i>taboo</i> and the priestly oaths.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The end of it all was that we left our ship, having padlocked up the door (the
+padlock, we explained, was a magical instrument that bit worse than Tommy), and
+moved inland in a kind of triumphal procession, priests and singers going
+before (the Orofenans sang extremely well) and minstrels following after
+playing upon instruments like flutes, while behind came the bearers carrying
+such goods as we needed. They took us to a beautiful place in a grove of palms
+on a ridge where grew many breadfruit trees, that commanded a view of the ocean
+upon one side and of the lake with the strange brown mountain top on the other.
+Here in the midst of the native gardens we found that a fine house had been
+built for us of a kind of mud brick and thatched with palm leaves, surrounded
+by a fenced courtyard of beaten earth and having wide overhanging verandahs; a
+very comfortable place indeed in that delicious climate. In it we took up our
+abode, visiting the ship occasionally to see that all was well there, and
+awaiting events.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For Bickley these soon began to happen in the shape of an ever-increasing
+stream of patients. The population of the island was considerable, anything
+between five and ten thousand, so far as we could judge, and among these of
+course there were a number of sick. Ophthalmia, for instance, was a prevalent
+disease, as were the growths such as Marama had suffered from, to say nothing
+of surgical cases and those resulting from accident or from nervous ailments.
+With all of these Bickley was called upon to deal, which he did with remarkable
+success by help of his books on Tropical Diseases and his ample supplies of
+medical necessaries.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At first he enjoyed it very much, but when we had been established in the house
+for about three weeks he remarked, after putting in a solid ten hours of work,
+that for all the holiday he was getting he might as well be back at his old
+practice, with the difference that there he was earning several thousands a
+year. Just then a poor woman arrived with a baby in convulsions to whose
+necessities he was obliged to sacrifice his supper, after which came a man who
+had fallen from a palm tree and broken his leg.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nor did I escape, since having somehow or other established a reputation for
+wisdom, as soon as I had mastered sufficient of the language, every kind of
+knotty case was laid before me for decision. In short, I became a sort of Chief
+Justice&mdash;not an easy office as it involved the acquirement of the native
+law which was intricate and peculiar, especially in matrimonial cases.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At these oppressive activities Bastin looked on with a gloomy eye.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You fellows seem very busy,&rdquo; he said one evening; &ldquo;but I can
+find nothing to do. They don&rsquo;t seem to want me, and merely to set a good
+example by drinking water or tea while you swallow whisky and their palm wine,
+or whatever it is, is very negative kind of work, especially as I am getting
+tired of planting things in the garden and playing policeman round the wreck
+which nobody goes near. Even Tommy is better off, for at least he can bark and
+hunt rats.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You see,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;we are following our trades.
+Arbuthnot is a lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I may add a
+general&mdash;a very general&mdash;practitioner and work at medicine in an
+enormous and much-neglected practice. Therefore, you, being a clergyman, should
+go and do likewise. There are some ten thousand people here, but I do not
+observe that as yet you have converted a single one.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his usual object of
+what is known as &ldquo;getting a rise&rdquo; out of Bastin. Little did he
+guess what he was doing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin thought a while ponderously, then said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is very strange from what peculiar sources Providence sometimes sends
+inspirations. If wisdom flows from babes and sucklings, why should it not do so
+from the well of agnostics and mockers?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is no reason which I can see,&rdquo; scoffed Bickley,
+&ldquo;except that as a rule wells do not flow.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Your jest is ill-timed and I may add foolish,&rdquo; continued Bastin.
+&ldquo;What I was about to add was that you have given me an idea, as it was no
+doubt intended that you should do. I will, metaphorically speaking, gird up my
+loins and try to bear the light into all this heathen blackness.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then it is one of the first you ever had, old fellow. But what&rsquo;s
+the need of girding up your loins in this hot climate?&rdquo; inquired Bickley
+with innocence. &ldquo;Pyjamas and that white and green umbrella of yours would
+do just as well.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin vouchsafed no reply and sat for the rest of that evening plunged in deep
+thought.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On the following morning he approached Marama and asked his leave to teach the
+people about the gods. The chief readily granted this, thinking, I believe,
+that he alluded to ourselves, and orders were issued accordingly. They were to
+the effect that Bastin was to be allowed to go everywhere unmolested and to
+talk to whom he would about what he would, to which all must listen with
+respect.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus he began his missionary career in Orofena, working at it, good and earnest
+man that he was, in a way that excited even the admiration of Bickley. He
+started a school for children, which was held under a fine, spreading tree.
+These listened well, and being of exceedingly quick intellect soon began to
+pick up the elements of knowledge. But when he tried to persuade them to clothe
+their little naked bodies his failure was complete, although after much
+supplication some of the bigger girls did arrive with a chaplet of
+flowers&mdash;round their necks!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Also he preached to the adults, and here again was very successful in a way,
+especially after he became more familiar with the language. They listened; to a
+certain extent they understood; they argued and put to poor Bastin the most
+awful questions such as the whole Bench of Bishops could not have answered.
+Still he did answer them somehow, and they politely accepted his interpretation
+of their theological riddles. I observed that he got on best when he was
+telling them stories out of the Old Testament, such as the account of the
+creation of the world and of human beings, also of the Deluge, etc. Indeed one
+of their elders said&mdash;Yes, this was quite true. They had heard it all
+before from their fathers, and that once the Deluge had taken place round
+Orofena, swallowing up great countries, but sparing them because they were so
+good.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin, surprised, asked them who had caused the deluge. They replied, Oro
+which was the name of their god, Oro who dwelt yonder on the mountain in the
+lake, and whose representation they worshipped in idols. He said that God dwelt
+in Heaven, to which they replied with calm certainty:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, no, he dwells on the mountain in the lake,&rdquo; which was why they
+never dared to approach that mountain.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Indeed it was only by giving the name Oro to the Divinity and admitting that He
+might dwell in the mountain as well as everywhere else, that Bastin was able to
+make progress. Having conceded this, not without scruples, however, he did make
+considerable progress, so much, in fact, that I perceived that the priests of
+Oro were beginning to grow very jealous of him and of his increasing authority
+with the people. Bastin was naturally triumphant, and even exclaimed exultingly
+that within a year he would have half of the population baptised.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Within a year, my dear fellow,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;you will have
+your throat cut as a sacrifice, and probably ours also. It is a pity, too, as
+within that time I should have stamped out ophthalmia and some other diseases
+in the island.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here, leaving Bastin and his good work aside for a while, I will say a little
+about the country. From information which I gathered on some journeys that I
+made and by inquiries from the chief Marama, who had become devoted to us, I
+found that Orofena was quite a large place. In shape the island was circular, a
+broad band of territory surrounding the great lake of which I have spoken, that
+in its turn surrounded a smaller island from which rose the mountain top. No
+other land was known to be near the shores of Orofena, which had never been
+visited by anyone except the strangers a hundred years ago or so, who were
+sacrificed and eaten. Most of the island was covered with forest which the
+inhabitants lacked the energy, and indeed had no tools, to fell. They were an
+extremely lazy people and would only cultivate enough bananas and other food to
+satisfy their immediate needs. In truth they lived mostly upon breadfruit and
+other products of the wild trees.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus it came about that in years of scarcity through drought or climatic
+causes, which prevented the forest trees from bearing, they suffered very much
+from hunger. In such years hundreds of them would perish and the remainder
+resorted to the dreadful expedient of cannibalism. Sometimes, too, the shoals
+of fish avoided their shores, reducing them to great misery. Their only
+domestic animal was the pig which roamed about half wild and in no great
+numbers, for they had never taken the trouble to breed it in captivity. Their
+resources, therefore, were limited, which accounted for the comparative
+smallness of the population, further reduced as it was by a wicked habit of
+infanticide practised in order to lighten the burden of bringing up children.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They had no traditions as to how they reached this land, their belief being
+that they had always been there but that their forefathers were much greater
+than they. They were poetical, and sang songs in a language which themselves
+they could not understand; they said that it was the tongue their forefathers
+had spoken. Also they had several strange customs of which they did not know
+the origin. My own opinion, which Bickley shared, was that they were in fact a
+shrunken and deteriorated remnant of some high race now coming to its end
+through age and inter-breeding. About them indeed, notwithstanding their
+primitive savagery which in its qualities much resembled that of other
+Polynesians, there was a very curious air of antiquity. One felt that they had
+known the older world and its mysteries, though now both were forgotten. Also
+their language, which in time we came to speak perfectly, was copious, musical,
+and expressive in its idioms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One circumstance I must mention. In walking about the country I observed all
+over it enormous holes, some of them measuring as much as a hundred yards
+across, with a depth of fifty feet or more, and this not on alluvial lands
+although there traces of them existed also, but in solid rock. What this rock
+was I do not know as none of us were geologists, but it seemed to me to partake
+of the nature of granite. Certainly it was not coral like that on and about the
+coast, but of a primeval formation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I asked Marama what caused these holes, he only shrugged his shoulders and
+said he did not know, but their fathers had declared that they were made by
+stones falling from heaven. This, of course, suggested meteorites to my mind. I
+submitted the idea to Bickley, who, in one of his rare intervals of leisure,
+came with me to make an examination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If they were meteorites,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;of which a shower struck
+the earth in some past geological age, all life must have been destroyed by
+them and their remains ought to exist at the bottom of the holes. To me they
+look more like the effect of high explosives, but that, of course, is
+impossible, though I don&rsquo;t know what else could have caused such
+craters.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he went back to his work, for nothing that had to do with antiquity
+interested Bickley very much. The present and its problems were enough for him,
+he would say, who neither had lived in the past nor expected to have any share
+in the future.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I remained curious I made an opportunity to scramble to the bottom of one of
+these craters, taking with me some of the natives with their wooden tools. Here
+I found a good deal of soil either washed down from the surface or resulting
+from the decomposition of the rock, though oddly enough in it nothing grew. I
+directed them to dig. After a while to my astonishment there appeared a corner
+of a great worked stone quite unlike that of the crater, indeed it seemed to me
+to be a marble. Further examination showed that this block was most beautifully
+carved in bas-relief, apparently with a design of leaves and flowers. In the
+disturbed soil also I picked up a life-sized marble hand of a woman exquisitely
+finished and apparently broken from a statue that might have been the work of
+one of the great Greek sculptors. Moreover, on the third finger of this hand
+was a representation of a ring whereof, unfortunately, the bezel had been
+destroyed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I put the hand in my pocket, but as darkness was coming on, I could not pursue
+the research and disinter the block. When I wished to return the next day, I
+was informed politely by Marama that it would not be safe for me to do so as
+the priests of Oro declared that if I sought to meddle with the &ldquo;buried
+things the god would grow angry and bring disaster on me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I persisted he said that at least I must go alone since no native would
+accompany me, and added earnestly that he prayed me not to go. So to my great
+regret and disappointment I was obliged to give up the idea.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.<br />
+Bastin Attempts the Martyr&rsquo;s Crown</h2>
+
+<p>
+That carved stone and the marble hand took a great hold of my imagination. What
+did they mean? How could they have come to the bottom of that hole, unless
+indeed they were part of some building and its ornaments which had been
+destroyed in the neighbourhood? The stone of which we had only uncovered a
+corner seemed far too big to have been carried there from any ship; it must
+have weighed several tons. Besides, ships do not carry such things about the
+world, and none had visited this island during the last two centuries at any
+rate, or local tradition would have recorded so wonderful a fact. Were there,
+then, once edifices covered with elegant carving standing on this place, and
+were they adorned with lovely statues that would not have disgraced the best
+period of Greek art? The thing was incredible except on the supposition that
+these were relics of an utterly lost civilisation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley was as much puzzled as myself. All he could say was that the world was
+infinitely old and many things might have happened in it whereof we had no
+record. Even Bastin was excited for a little while, but as his imagination was
+represented by zero, all he could say was:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I suppose someone left them there, and anyhow it doesn&rsquo;t matter
+much, does it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But I, who have certain leanings towards the ancient and mysterious, could not
+be put off in this fashion. I remembered that unapproachable mountain in the
+midst of the lake and that on it appeared to be something which looked like
+ruins as seen from the top of the cliff through glasses. At any rate this was a
+point that I might clear up.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Saying nothing to anybody, one morning I slipped away and walked to the edge of
+the lake, a distance of five or six miles over rough country. Having arrived
+there I perceived that the cone-shaped mountain in the centre, which was about
+a mile from the lake shore, was much larger than I had thought, quite three
+hundred feet high indeed, and with a very large circumference. Further, its
+sides evidently once had been terraced, and it was on one of these broad
+terraces, half-way up and facing towards the rising sun, that the ruin-like
+remains were heaped. I examined them through my glasses. Undoubtedly it was a
+cyclopean ruin built of great blocks of coloured stone which seemed to have
+been shattered by earthquake or explosion. There were the pillars of a mighty
+gateway and the remains of walls.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I trembled with excitement as I stared and stared. Could I not get to the place
+and see for myself? I observed that from the flat bush-clad land at the foot of
+the mountain, ran out what seemed to be the residue of a stone pier which ended
+in a large table-topped rock between two and three hundred feet across. But
+even this was too far to reach by swimming, besides for aught I knew there
+might be alligators in that lake. I walked up and down its borders, till
+presently I came to a path which led into a patch of some variety of cotton
+palm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Following this path I discovered a boat-house thatched over with palm leaves.
+Inside it were two good canoes with their paddles, floating and tied to the
+stumps of trees by fibre ropes. Instantly I made up my mind that I would paddle
+to the island and investigate. Just as I was about to step into one of the
+canoes the light was cut off. Looking up I saw that a man was crouching in the
+door-place of the boat-house in order to enter, and paused guiltily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Friend-from-the-Sea&rdquo; (that was the name that these islanders had
+given to me), said the voice of Marama, &ldquo;say&mdash;what are you doing
+here?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am about to take a row on the lake, Chief,&rdquo; I answered
+carelessly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Indeed, Friend. Have we then treated you so badly that you are tired of
+life?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come out into the sunlight, Friend, and I will explain to you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I hesitated till I saw Marama lifting the heavy wooden spear he carried and
+remembered that I was unarmed. Then I came out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What does all this mean, Chief?&rdquo; I asked angrily when we were
+clear of the patch of cotton palm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I mean, Friend, that you have been very near to making a longer journey
+than you thought. Have patience now and listen to me. I saw you leaving the
+village this morning and followed, suspecting your purpose. Yes, I followed
+alone, saying nothing to the priests of Oro who fortunately were away watching
+the Bellower for their own reasons. I saw you searching out the secrets of the
+mountain with those magic tubes that make things big that are small, and things
+that are far off come near, and I followed you to the canoes.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All that is plain enough, Marama. But why?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Have I not told you, Friend-from-the-Sea, that yonder hill which is
+called Orofena, whence this island takes its name, is sacred?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You said so, but what of it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This: to set foot thereon is to die and, I suppose, great as you are,
+you, too, can die like others. At least, although I love you, had you not come
+away from that canoe I was about to discover whether this is so.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then for what are the canoes used?&rdquo; I asked with irritation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You see that flat rock, Friend, with the hole beyond, which is the mouth
+of a cave that appeared only in the great storm that brought you to our land?
+They are used to convey offerings which are laid upon the rock. Beyond it no
+man may go, and since the beginning no man has ever gone.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Offerings to whom?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead who live there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oromatuas? Oro! It is always something to do with Oro. Who and what is
+Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oro is a god, Friend, though it is true that the priests say that above
+him there is a greater god called Degai, the Creator, the Fate who made all
+things and directs all things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very well, but why do you suppose that Oro, the servant of Degai, lives
+in that mountain? I thought that he lived in a grove yonder where your priests,
+as I am told, have an image of him.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not know, Friend-from-the-Sea, but so it has been held from the
+beginning. The image in the grove is only visited by his spirit from time to
+time. Now, I pray you, come back and before the priests discover that you have
+been here, and forget that there are any canoes upon this lake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So, thinking it wisest, I turned the matter with a laugh and walked away with
+him to the village. On our road I tried to extract some more information but
+without success. He did not know who built the ruin upon the mountain, or who
+destroyed it. He did not know how the terraces came there. All he knew was that
+during the convulsion of Nature which resulted in the tidal wave that had
+thrown our ship upon the island, the mountain had been seen to quiver like a
+tree in the wind as though within it great forces were at work. Then it was
+observed to have risen a good many more feet above the surface of the lake, as
+might be noted by the water mark upon the shore, and then also the mouth of the
+cave had appeared. The priests said that all this was because the Oromatuas who
+dwelt there were stirring, which portended great things. Indeed great things
+had happened&mdash;for had we not arrived in their land?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I thanked him for what he had told me, and, as there was nothing more to be
+learned, dropped the subject which was never mentioned between us again, at
+least not for a long while. But in my heart I determined that I would reach
+that mountain even though to do so I must risk my life. Something seemed to
+call me to the place; it was as though I were being drawn by a magnet.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+As it happened, before so very long I did go to the mountain, not of my own
+will but because I was obliged. It came about thus. One night I asked Bastin
+how he was getting on with his missionary work. He replied: Very well indeed,
+but there was one great obstacle in his path, the idol in the Grove. Were it
+not for this accursed image he believed that the whole island would become
+Christian. I asked him to be more plain. He explained that all his work was
+thwarted by this idol, since his converts declared that they did not dare to be
+baptised while it sat there in the Grove. If they did, the spirit that was in
+it would bewitch them and perhaps steal out at night and murder them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The spirit being our friends the sorcerers,&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s it, Arbuthnot. Do you know, I believe those devilish men
+sometimes offer human sacrifices to this satanic fetish, when there is a
+drought or anything of that sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I can quite believe it,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;but as they will
+scarcely remove their god and with it their own livelihood and authority, I am
+afraid that as we don&rsquo;t want to be sacrificed, there is nothing to be
+done.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this moment I was called away. As I went I heard Bastin muttering something
+about martyrs, but paid no attention. Little did I guess what was going on in
+his pious but obstinate mind. In effect it was this&mdash;that if no one else
+would remove that idol he was quite ready to do it himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+However, he was very cunning over that business, almost Jesuitical indeed. Not
+one word did he breathe of his dark plans to me, and still less to Bickley. He
+just went on with his teaching, lamenting from time to time the stumbling-block
+of the idol and expressing wonder as to how it might be circumvented by a
+change in the hearts of the islanders, or otherwise. Sad as it is to record, in
+fact, dear old Bastin went as near to telling a fib in connection with this
+matter as I suppose he had ever done in his life. It happened thus. One day
+Bickley&rsquo;s sharp eye caught sight of Bastin walking about with what looked
+like a bottle of whisky in his pocket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hallo, old fellow,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;has the self-denying ordinance
+broken down? I didn&rsquo;t know that you took pegs on the sly,&rdquo; and he
+pointed to the bottle.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are insinuating, Bickley, that I absorb spirits surreptitiously,
+you are more mistaken than usual, which is saying a good deal. This bottle
+contains, not Scotch whisky but paraffin, although I admit that its label may
+have misled you, unintentionally, so far as I am concerned.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What are you going to do with the paraffin?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin coloured through his tan and replied awkwardly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Paraffin is very good to keep away mosquitoes if one can stand the smell
+of it upon one&rsquo;s skin. Not that I have brought it here with that sole
+object. The truth is that I am anxious to experiment with a lamp of my own
+design made&mdash;um&mdash;of native wood,&rdquo; and he departed in a hurry.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;When next old Bastin wants to tell a lie,&rdquo; commented Bickley,
+&ldquo;he should make up his mind as to what it is to be, and stick to it. I
+wonder what he is after with that paraffin? Not going to dose any of my
+patients with it, I hope. He was arguing the other day that it is a great
+remedy taken internally, being quite unaware that the lamp variety is not used
+for that purpose.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps he means to swallow some himself, just to show that he is
+right,&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The stomach-pump is at hand,&rdquo; said Bickley, and the matter
+dropped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next morning I got up before it was light. Having some elementary knowledge of
+the main facts of astronomy, which remained with me from boyhood when I had
+attended lectures on the subject, which I had tried to refresh by help of an
+encyclopedia I had brought from the ship, I wished to attempt to obtain an idea
+of our position by help of the stars. In this endeavour, I may say, I failed
+absolutely, as I did not know how to take a stellar or any other observation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On my way out of our native house I observed, by the lantern I carried, that
+the compartment of it occupied by Bastin was empty, and wondered whither he had
+gone at that hour. On arriving at my observation-post, a rocky eminence on open
+ground, where, with Tommy at my side, I took my seat with a telescope, I was
+astonished to see or rather to hear a great number of the natives walking past
+the base of the mound towards the bush. Then I remembered that some one,
+Marama, I think, had informed me that there was to be a great sacrifice to Oro
+at dawn on that day. After this I thought no more of the matter but occupied
+myself in a futile study of the heavenly bodies. At length the dawn broke and
+put a period to my labours.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Glancing round me before I descended from the little hill, I saw a flame of
+light appear suddenly about half a mile or more away among those trees which I
+knew concealed the image of Oro. On this personally I had never had the
+curiosity to look, as I knew that it was only a hideous idol stuck over with
+feathers and other bedizenments. The flame shot suddenly straight into the
+still air and was followed a few seconds later by the sound of a dull
+explosion, after which it went out. Also it was followed by something
+else&mdash;a scream of rage from an infuriated mob.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the foot of the hill I stopped to wonder what these sounds might mean. Then
+of a sudden appeared Bickley, who had been attending some urgent case, and
+asked me who was exploding gunpowder. I told him that I had no idea.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then I have,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;It is that ass Bastin up to some
+game. Now I guess why he wanted that paraffin. Listen to the row. What are they
+after?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sacrificing Bastin, perhaps,&rdquo; I replied, half in jest. &ldquo;Have
+you your revolver?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He nodded. We always wore our pistols if we went out during the dark hours.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then perhaps we had better go to see.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We started, and had not covered a hundred yards before a girl, whom I
+recognised as one of Bastin&rsquo;s converts, came flying towards us and
+screaming out, &ldquo;Help! Help! They kill the Bellower with fire! They cook
+him like a pig!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Just what I expected,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we ran hard, as evidently there was no time to lose. While we went I
+extracted from the terrified girl, whom we forced to show us the way, that as
+the sacrifice was about to be offered Bastin had appeared, and, &ldquo;making
+fire,&rdquo; applied it to the god Oro, who instantly burst into flame. Then he
+ran back, calling out that the devil was dead. As he did so there was a loud
+explosion and Oro flew into pieces. His burning head went a long way into the
+air and, falling on to one of the priests, killed him. Thereon the other
+priests and the people seized the Bellower and made him fast. Now they were
+engaged in heating an oven in which to put him to cook. When it was ready they
+would eat him in honour of Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And serve him right too!&rdquo; gasped Bickley, who, being stout, was
+not a good runner. &ldquo;Why can&rsquo;t he leave other people&rsquo;s gods
+alone instead of blowing them up with gunpowder?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;Hope we shall get there in
+time!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To be cooked and eaten with Bastin!&rdquo; wheezed Bickley, after which
+his breath gave out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it chanced we did, for these stone ovens take a long time to heat. There by
+the edge of his fiery grave with his hands and legs bound in palm-fibre
+shackles, stood Bastin, quite unmoved, smiling indeed, in a sort of seraphic
+way which irritated us both extremely. Round him danced the infuriated priests
+of Oro, and round them, shrieking and howling with rage, was most of the
+population of Orofena. We rushed up so suddenly that none tried to stop us, and
+took our stand on either side of him, producing our pistols as we did so.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Thank you for coming,&rdquo; said Bastin in the silence which followed;
+&ldquo;though I don&rsquo;t think it is the least use. I cannot recall that any
+of the early martyrs were ever roasted and eaten, though, of course, throwing
+them into boiling oil or water was fairly common. I take it that the rite is
+sacrificial and even in a low sense, sacramental, not merely one of common
+cannibalism.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I stared at him, and Bickley gasped out:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are to be eaten, what does it matter why you are eaten?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; replied Bastin; &ldquo;there is all the difference in the
+world, though it is one that I cannot expect you to appreciate. And now please
+be quiet as I wish to say my prayers. I imagine that those stones will be hot
+enough to do their office within twenty minutes or so, which is not very
+long.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At that moment Marama appeared, evidently in a state of great perturbation.
+With him were some of the priests or sorcerers who were dancing about as I
+imagine the priests of Baal must have done, and filled with fury. They rolled
+their eyes, they stuck out their tongues, they uttered weird cries and shook
+their wooden knives at the placid Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is the matter?&rdquo; I asked sternly of the chief.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This, Friend-from-the-Sea. The Bellower there, when the sacrifice was
+about to be offered to Oro at the dawn, rushed forward, and having thrust
+something between the legs of the image of the god, poured yellow water over
+it, and with fire caused it to burst into fierce flame. Then he ran away and
+mocked the god who presently, with a loud report, flew into pieces and killed
+that man. Therefore the Bellower must be sacrificed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What to?&rdquo; I asked. &ldquo;The image has gone and the piece of it
+that ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened if the god had
+been angry with him, but on one of its own priests, whom it killed. Therefore,
+having been sacrificed by the god itself, he it is that should be eaten, not
+the Bellower, who merely did what his Spirit bade him.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon Marama, but to the
+priests it did not at all appeal.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Eat them all!&rdquo; these cried. &ldquo;They are the enemies of Oro and
+have worked sacrilege!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people seemed to agree
+with them. Things began to look very ugly. The priests rushed forward,
+threatening us with their wooden weapons, and one of them even aimed a blow at
+Bickley, which only missed him by an inch or two.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here, my friend,&rdquo; called the doctor whose temper was rising,
+&ldquo;you name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you not? Well, be
+careful, lest I should show you that I can kill as well as heal!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great bedizened fellow
+who literally was foaming at the mouth with rage, rushed forward again, his
+club raised, apparently with the object of dashing out Bickley&rsquo;s brains.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot through the
+heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face&mdash;stone dead. There was
+consternation, for these people had never seen us shoot anything before, and
+were quite unacquainted with the properties of firearms, which they supposed to
+be merely instruments for making a noise. They stared, they gasped in fear and
+astonishment, and then they fled, pursued by Tommy, barking, leaving us alone
+with the two dead men.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It was time to teach them a lesson,&rdquo; said Bickley as he replaced
+the empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled him into the burning
+pit.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered; &ldquo;but presently, when they have got over
+their fright, they will come back to teach us one.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had taken.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you suggest?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Flight,&rdquo; I answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where to&mdash;the ship? We might hold that.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our road there.
+To the island in the lake where they dare not follow us, for it is holy
+ground.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How are we going to live on the island?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; I replied; &ldquo;but I am quite certain that
+if we stay here we shall die.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;let us try it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin&rsquo;s bonds. &ldquo;Thank
+you,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It is a great relief to stretch one&rsquo;s arms
+after they have been compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do not know
+that I am really grateful. The martyr&rsquo;s crown was hanging above me, so to
+speak, and now it has vanished into the pit, like that man whom Bickley
+murdered.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, &ldquo;if you say
+much more, Bastin, I&rsquo;ll chuck you into the pit too, to look for your
+martyr&rsquo;s crown, for I think you have done enough mischief for one
+morning.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that unfortunate
+man&rsquo;s destruction on to me&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! shut it and trot,&rdquo; broke in Bickley. &ldquo;Those infernal
+savages are coming with your blessed converts leading the van.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we &ldquo;trotted&rdquo; at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin stooped
+down and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as Atalanta in Academy
+pictures is represented as doing to the apples, and bore it away in triumph.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know it is scorched,&rdquo; he ejaculated at intervals, &ldquo;but
+they might trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original false god.
+Now they <i>can&rsquo;t</i>, for there&rsquo;s nothing left.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our pursuit was very
+half-hearted indeed. To begin with, now that their first rage was over, the
+Orofenans who were fond of us had no particular wish to do us to death, while
+the ardour of their sorcerers, who wished this very much, had been greatly
+cooled by the mysterious annihilation of their idol and the violent deaths of
+two of their companions, which they thought might be reduplicated in their own
+persons. So it came about that the chase, if noisy, was neither close nor
+eager.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We reached the edge of the lake where was the boat-house of which I have spoken
+already, travelling at little more than a walk. Here we made Bastin unfasten
+the better of the two canoes that by good luck was almost filled with
+offerings, which doubtless, according to custom, must be made upon the day of
+this feast to Oro, while we watched against surprise at the boat-house door.
+When he was ready we slipped in and took our seats, Tommy jumping in after us,
+and pushed the canoe, now very heavily laden, out into the lake.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be beyond wooden
+spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what would happen. All the crowd
+of islanders had rushed to the lake edge where they stood staring at us
+stupidly. Bastin, thinking the occasion opportune, lifted the hideous head of
+the idol which he had carefully washed, and began to preach on the downfall of
+&ldquo;the god of the Grove.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in the minds of
+his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was concerned&mdash;I do not
+know. At any rate, one of the priests shouted something, whereon everybody
+began to talk at once. Then, stooping down, they threw water from the lake over
+themselves and rubbed its sand and mud into their hair, all the while making
+genuflexions toward the mountain in the middle, after which they turned and
+departed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you think we had better go back?&rdquo; asked Bastin.
+&ldquo;Evidently my words have touched them and their minds are melting beneath
+the light of Truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! by all means,&rdquo; replied Bickley with sarcasm; &ldquo;for then
+their spears will touch <i>us</i>, and our bodies will soon be melting above
+the fires of that pit.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps you are right,&rdquo; said Bastin; &ldquo;at least, I admit that
+you have made matters very difficult by your unjustifiable homicide of that
+priest who I do not think meant to injure you seriously, and really was not at
+all a bad fellow, though opinionated in some ways. Also, I do not suppose that
+anybody is expected, as it were, to run his head into the martyr&rsquo;s crown.
+When it settles there of itself it is another matter.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Like a butterfly!&rdquo; exclaimed the enraged Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, if you like to put it that way, though the simile seems a very poor
+one; like a sunbeam would be better.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here Bickley gave way with his paddle so vigorously that the canoe was as
+nearly as possible upset into the lake.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In due course we reached the flat Rock of Offerings, which proved to be quite
+as wide as a double croquet lawn and much longer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What are those?&rdquo; I asked, pointing to certain knobs on the edge of
+the rock at a spot where a curved projecting point made a little harbour.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley examined them, and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should say that they are the remains of stone mooring-posts worn down
+by many thousands of years of weather. Yes, look, there is the cut of the
+cables upon the base of that one, and very big cables they must have
+been.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We stared at one another&mdash;that is, Bickley and I did, for Bastin was still
+engaged in contemplating the blackened head of the god which he had overthrown.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.<br />
+The Island in the Lake</h2>
+
+<p>
+We made the canoe fast and landed on the great rock, to perceive that it was
+really a peninsula. That is to say, it was joined to the main land of the lake
+island by a broad roadway quite fifty yards across, which appeared to end in
+the mouth of the cave. On this causeway we noted a very remarkable thing,
+namely, two grooves separated by an exact distance of nine feet which ran into
+the mouth of the cave and vanished there.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Explain!&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Paths,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;worn by countless feet walking on them for
+thousands of years.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You should cultivate the art of observation, Arbuthnot. What do you say,
+Bastin?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He stared at the grooves through his spectacles, and replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t say anything, except that I can&rsquo;t see anybody to
+make paths here. Indeed, the place seems quite unpopulated, and all the
+Orofenans told me that they never landed on it because if they did they would
+die. It is a part of their superstitious nonsense. If you have any idea in your
+head you had better tell us quickly before we breakfast. I am very
+hungry.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You always are,&rdquo; remarked Bickley; &ldquo;even when most
+people&rsquo;s appetites might have been affected. Well, I think that this
+great plateau was once a landing-place for flying machines, and that there is
+the air-shed or garage.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin stared at him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you think we had better breakfast?&rdquo; he said.
+&ldquo;There are two roast pigs in that canoe, and lots of other food, enough
+to last us a week, I should say. Of course, I understand that the blood you
+have shed has thrown you off your balance. I believe it has that effect, except
+on the most hardened. Flying machines were only invented a few years ago by the
+brothers Wright in America.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;I begin to regret that I did not
+leave you to take part in another breakfast yonder&mdash;I mean as the
+principal dish.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It was Providence, not you, who prevented it, Bickley, doubtless because
+I am unworthy of such a glorious end.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then it is lucky that Providence is a good shot with a pistol. Stop
+talking nonsense and listen. If those were paths worn by feet they would run to
+the edge of the rock. They do not. They begin there in that gentle depression
+and slope upwards somewhat steeply. The air machines, which were evidently
+large, lit in the depression, possibly as a bird does, and then ran on wheels
+or sledge skids along the grooves to the air-shed in the mountain. Come to the
+cave and you will see.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not till we have breakfast,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;I will get out a
+pig. As a matter of fact, I had no supper last night, as I was taking a class
+of native boys and making some arrangements of my own.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As for me, I only whistled. It all seemed very feasible. And yet how could such
+things be?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We unloaded the canoe and ate. Bastin&rsquo;s appetite was splendid. Indeed, I
+had to ask him to remember that when this supply was done I did not know where
+we should find any more.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Take no thought for the morrow,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I have no
+doubt it will come from somewhere,&rdquo; and he helped himself to another
+chop.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Never had I admired him so much. Not a couple of hours before he was about to
+be cruelly murdered and eaten. But this did not seem to affect him in the
+least. Bastin was the only man I have ever known with a really perfect faith.
+It is a quality worth having and one that makes for happiness. What a great
+thing not to care whether you are breakfasted on, or breakfast!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I see that there is lots of driftwood about here,&rdquo; he remarked,
+&ldquo;but unfortunately we have no tea, so in this climate it is of little
+use, unless indeed we can catch some fish and cook them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Stop talking about eating and help us to haul up the canoe,&rdquo; said
+Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Between the three of us we dragged and carried the canoe a long way from the
+lake, fearing lest the natives should come and bear it off with our provisions.
+Then, having given Tommy his breakfast off the scraps, we walked to the cave. I
+glanced at my companions. Bickley&rsquo;s face was alight with scientific
+eagerness. Here are not dreams or speculations, but facts to be learned, it
+seemed to say, and I will learn them. The past is going to show me some of its
+secrets, to tell me how men of long ago lived and died and how far they had
+advanced to that point on the road of civilisation at which I stand in my
+little hour of existence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That of Bastin was mildly interested, no more. Obviously, with half his mind he
+was thinking of something else, probably of his converts on the main island and
+of the school class fixed for this hour which circumstances prevented him from
+attending. Indeed, like Lot&rsquo;s wife he was casting glances behind him
+towards the wicked place from which he had been forced to flee.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Neither the past nor the future had much real interest for Bastin; any more
+than they had for Bickley, though for different reasons. The former was done
+with; the latter he was quite content to leave in other hands. If he had any
+clear idea thereof, probably that undiscovered land appeared to him as a big,
+pleasant place where are no unbelievers or erroneous doctrines, and all sinners
+will be sternly repressed, in which, clad in a white surplice with all proper
+ecclesiastical trappings, he would argue eternally with the Early Fathers and
+in due course utterly annihilate Bickley, that is in a moral sense. Personally
+and as a man he was extremely attached to Bickley as a necessary and
+wrong-headed nuisance to which he had become accustomed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And I! What did I feel? I do not know; I cannot describe. An extraordinary
+attraction, a semi-spiritual exaltation, I think. That cave mouth might have
+been a magnet drawing my soul. With my body I should have been afraid, as I
+daresay I was, for our circumstances were sufficiently desperate. Here we were,
+castaways upon an island, probably uncharted, one of thousands in the recesses
+of a vast ocean, from which we had little chance of escape. More, having
+offended the religious instincts of the primeval inhabitants of that island, we
+had been forced to flee to a rocky mountain in the centre of a lake, where,
+after the food we had brought with us by accident was consumed, we should no
+doubt be forced to choose between death by starvation, or, if we attempted to
+retreat, at the hands of justly infuriated savages. Yet these facts did not
+oppress me, for I was being drawn, drawn to I knew not what, and if it were to
+doom&mdash;well, no matter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Therefore, none of us cared: Bastin because his faith was equal to any
+emergency and there was always that white-robed heaven waiting for him beyond
+which his imagination did not go (I often wondered whether he pictured Mrs.
+Bastin as also waiting; if so, he never said anything about her); Bickley
+because as a child of the Present and a servant of knowledge he feared no
+future, believing it to be for him non-existent, and was careless as to when
+his strenuous hour of life should end; and I because I felt that yonder lay my
+true future; yes, and my true past, even though to discover them I must pass
+through that portal which we know as Death.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We reached the mouth of the cave. It was a vast place; perhaps the arch of it
+was a hundred feet high, and I could see that once all this arch had been
+adorned with sculptures. Protected as these were by the overhanging rock, for
+the sculptured mouth of the cave was cut deep into the mountain face, they were
+still so worn that it was impossible to discern their details. Time had eaten
+them away like an acid. But what length of time? I could not guess, but it must
+have been stupendous to have worked thus upon that hard and sheltered rock.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This came home to me with added force when, from subsequent examination, we
+learned that the entire mouth of this cave had been sealed up for unnumbered
+ages. It will be remembered that Marama told me the mountain in the lake had
+risen much during the frightful cyclone in which we were wrecked and with it
+the cave mouth which previously had been invisible. From the markings on the
+mountain side it was obvious that something of the sort had happened very
+recently, at any rate on this eastern face. That is, either the flat rock had
+sunk or the volcano had been thrown upwards.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Once in the far past the cave had been as it was when we found it. Then it had
+gone down in such a way that the table-rock entirely sealed the entrance. Now
+this entrance was once more open, and although of course there was a break in
+them, the grooves of which I have spoken ran on into the cave at only a
+slightly different level from that at which they lay upon the flat rock. And
+yet, although they had been thus sheltered by a great stone curtain in front of
+them, still these sculptures were worn away by the tooth of Time. Of course,
+however, this may have happened to them <i>before</i> they were buried in some
+ancient cataclysm, to be thus resurrected at the hour of our arrival upon the
+island.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Without pausing to make any closer examination of these crumbled carvings, we
+entered the yawning mouth of that great place, following and indeed walking in
+the deep grooves that I have mentioned. Presently it seemed to open out as a
+courtyard might at the end of a passage; yes, to open on to some vast place
+whereof in that gloom we could not see the roof or the limits. All we knew was
+that it must be enormous&mdash;the echoes of our voices and footsteps told us
+as much, for these seemed to come back to us from high, high above and from
+far, far away. Bickley and I said nothing; we were too overcome. But Bastin
+remarked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Did you ever go to Olympia? I did once to see a kind of play where the
+people said nothing, only ran about dressed up. They told me it was religious,
+the sort of thing a clergyman should study. I didn&rsquo;t think it religious
+at all. It was all about a nun who had a baby.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, what of it?&rdquo; snapped Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing particular, except that nuns don&rsquo;t have babies, or if they
+do the fact should not be advertised. But I wasn&rsquo;t thinking of that. I
+was thinking that this place is like an underground Olympia.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh, be quiet!&rdquo; I said, for though Bastin&rsquo;s description was
+not bad, his monotonous, drawling voice jarred on me in that solemnity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be careful where you walk,&rdquo; whispered Bickley, for even he seemed
+awed, &ldquo;there may be pits in this floor.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wish we had a light,&rdquo; I said, halting.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If candles are of any use,&rdquo; broke in Bastin, &ldquo;as it happens
+I have a packet in my pocket. I took them with me this morning for a certain
+purpose.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not unconnected with the paraffin and the burning of the idol, I
+suppose?&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;Hand them over.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes; if I had been allowed a little more time I intended&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Never mind what you intended; we know what you did and that&rsquo;s
+enough,&rdquo; said Bickley as he snatched the packet from Bastin&rsquo;s hand
+and proceeded to undo it, adding, &ldquo;By heaven! I have no matches, nor have
+you, Arbuthnot!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I have a dozen boxes of wax vestas in my other pocket,&rdquo; said
+Bastin. &ldquo;You see, they burn so well when you want to get up a fire on a
+damp idol. As you may have noticed, the dew is very heavy here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In due course these too were produced. I took possession of them as they were
+too valuable to be left in the charge of Bastin, and, extracting a box from the
+packet, lit two of the candles which were of the short thick variety, like
+those used in carriage-lamps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently they burned up, making two faint stars of light which, however, were
+not strong enough to show us either the roof or the sides of that vast place.
+By their aid we pursued our path, still following the grooves till suddenly
+these came to an end. Now all around us was a flat floor of rock which, as we
+perceived clearly when we pushed aside the dust that had gathered thickly on it
+in the course of ages, doubtless from the gradual disintegration of the stony
+walls, had once been polished till it resembled black marble. Indeed, certain
+cracks in the floor appeared to have been filled in with some dark-coloured
+cement. I stood looking at them while Bickley wandered off to the right and a
+little forward, and presently called to me. I walked to him, Bastin sticking
+close to me as I had the other candle, as did the little dog, Tommy, who did
+not like these new surroundings and would not leave my heels.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look,&rdquo; said Bickley, holding up his candle, &ldquo;and tell
+me&mdash;what&rsquo;s that?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Before me, faintly shown, was some curious structure of gleaming rods made of
+yellowish metal, which rods appeared to be connected by wires. The structure
+might have been forty feet high and perhaps a hundred long. Its bottom part was
+buried in dust.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is that?&rdquo; asked Bickley again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I made no answer, for I was thinking. Bastin, however, replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It&rsquo;s difficult to be sure in this light, but I should think that
+it may be the remains of a cage in which some people who lived here kept
+monkeys, or perhaps it was an aviary. Look at those little ladders for the
+monkeys to climb by, or possibly for the birds to sit on.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Are you sure it wasn&rsquo;t tame angels?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What a ridiculous remark! How can you keep an angel in a cage?
+I&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Aeroplane!&rdquo; I almost whispered to Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got it!&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;The framework of an
+aeroplane and a jolly large one, too. Only why hasn&rsquo;t it oxidised?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Some indestructible metal,&rdquo; I suggested. &ldquo;Gold, for
+instance, does not oxidise.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He nodded and said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We shall have to dig it out. The dust is feet thick about it; we can do
+nothing without spades. Come on.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went round to the end of the structure, whatever it might be, and presently
+came to another. Again we went on and came to another, all of them being
+berthed exactly in line.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What did I tell you?&rdquo; said Bickley in a voice of triumph. &ldquo;A
+whole garage full, a regular fleet of aeroplanes!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That must be nonsense,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;for I am quite sure
+that these Orofenans cannot make such things. Indeed they have no metal, and
+even cut the throats of pigs with wooden knives.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now I began to walk forward, bearing to the left so as to regain our former
+line. We could do nothing with these metal skeletons, and I felt that there
+must be more to find beyond. Presently I saw something looming ahead of me and
+quickened my pace, only to recoil. For there, not thirty feet away and perhaps
+three hundred yards from the mouth of the cave, suddenly appeared what looked
+like a gigantic man. Tommy saw it also and barked as dogs do when they are
+frightened, and the sound of his yaps echoed endlessly from every quarter,
+which scared him to silence. Recovering myself I went forward, for now I
+guessed the truth. It was not a man but a statue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The thing stood upon a huge base which lessened by successive steps, eight of
+them, I think, to its summit. The foot of this base may have been a square of
+fifty feet or rather more; the real support or pedestal of the statue, however,
+was only a square of about six feet. The figure itself was little above
+life-size, or at any rate above our life-size, say seven feet in height. It was
+very peculiar in sundry ways.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To begin with, nothing of the body was visible, for it was swathed like a
+corpse. From these wrappings projected one arm, the right, in the hand of which
+was the likeness of a lighted torch. The head was not veiled. It was that of a
+man, long-nosed, thin-lipped, stern-visaged; the countenance pervaded by an
+awful and unutterable calm, as deep as that of Buddha only less benign. On the
+brow was a wreathed head-dress, not unlike an Eastern turban, from which sprang
+two little wings resembling in some degree those on the famous Greek head of
+Hypnos, lord of Sleep. Between the folds of the wrappings on the back sprang
+two other wings, enormous wings bent like those of a bird about to take flight.
+Indeed the whole attitude of the figure suggested that it was springing from
+earth to air. It was executed in black basalt or some stone of the sort, and
+very highly finished. For instance, on the bare feet and the arm which held the
+torch could be felt every muscle and even some of the veins. In the same way
+the details of the skull were perfectly perceptible to the touch, although at
+first sight not visible on the marble surface. This was ascertained by climbing
+on the pedestal and feeling the face with our hands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I may say that its modelling as well as that of the feet and the arm
+filled Bickley, who, of course, was a highly trained anatomist, with absolute
+amazement. He said that he would never have thought it possible that such
+accuracy could have been reached by an artist working in so hard a material.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When the others had arrived we studied this relic as closely as our two candles
+would allow, and in turn expressed our opinions of its significance. Bastin
+thought that if those things down there were really the remains of aeroplanes,
+which he did not believe, the statue had something to do with flying, as was
+shown by the fact that it had wings on its head and shoulders. Also, he added,
+after examining the face, the head was uncommonly like that of the idol that he
+had blown up. It had the same long nose and severe shut mouth. If he was right,
+this was probably another effigy of Oro which we should do well to destroy at
+once before the islanders came to worship it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley ground his teeth as he listened to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Destroy that!&rdquo; he gasped. &ldquo;Destroy! Oh! you, you&mdash;early
+Christian.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I may state that Bastin was quite right, as we proved subsequently when we
+compared the head of the fetish, which, as it will be remembered, he had
+brought away with him, with that of the statue. Allowing for an enormous
+debasement of art, they were essentially identical in the facial
+characteristics. This would suggest the descent of a tradition through
+countless generations. Or of course it may have been accidental. I am sure I do
+not know, but I think it possible that for unknown centuries other old statues
+may have existed in Orofena from which the idol was copied. Or some daring and
+impious spirit may have found his way to the cave in past ages and fashioned
+the local god upon this ancient model.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley was struck at once, as I had been, with the resemblance of the figure
+to that of the Egyptian Osiris. Of course there were differences. For instance,
+instead of the crook and the scourge, this divinity held a torch. Again, in
+place of the crown of Egypt it wore a winged head-dress, though it is true this
+was not very far removed from the winged disc of that country. The wings that
+sprang from its shoulders, however, suggested Babylonia rather than Egypt, or
+the Assyrian bulls that are similarly adorned. All of these symbolical ideas
+might have been taken from that figure. But what was it? What was it?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In a flash the answer came to me. A representation of the spirit of Death!
+Neither more nor less. There was the shroud; there the cold, inscrutable
+countenance suggesting mysteries that it hid. But the torch and the wings?
+Well, the torch was that which lighted souls to the other world, and on the
+wings they flew thither. Whoever fashioned that statue hoped for another life,
+or so I was convinced.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I explained my ideas. Bastin thought them fanciful and preferred his notion of
+a flying man, since by constitution he was unable to discover anything
+spiritual in any religion except his own. Bickley agreed that it was probably
+an allegorical representation of death but sniffed at my interpretation of the
+wings and the torch, since by constitution he could not believe that the folly
+of a belief in immortality could have developed so early in the world, that is,
+among a highly civilised people such as must have produced this statue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What we could none of us understand was why this ominous image with its dead,
+cold face should have been placed in an aerodrome, nor in fact did we ever
+discover. Possibly it was there long before the cave was put to this use. At
+first the place may have been a temple and have so remained until circumstances
+forced the worshippers to change their habits, or even their Faith.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We examined this wondrous work and the pedestal on which it stood as closely as
+we were able by the dim light of our candles. I was anxious to go further and
+see what lay beyond it; indeed we did walk a few paces, twenty perhaps, onward
+into the recesses of the cave.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Bickley discovered something that looked like the mouth of a well down
+which he nearly tumbled, and Bastin began to complain that he was hot and very
+thirsty; also to point out that he wished for no more caves and idols at
+present.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here, Arbuthnot,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;these candles are
+burning low and we don&rsquo;t want to use up more if we can prevent it, for we
+may need what we have got very badly later on. Now, according to my pocket
+compass the mouth of this cave points due east; probably at the beginning it
+was orientated to the rising sun for purposes of astronomical observation or of
+worship at certain periods of the year. From the position of the sun when we
+landed on the rock this morning I imagine that just now it rises almost exactly
+opposite to the mouth of the cave. If this is so, to-morrow at dawn, for a time
+at least, the light should penetrate as far as the statue, and perhaps further.
+What I suggest is that we should wait till then to explore.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I agreed with him, especially as I was feeling tired, being exhausted by
+wonder, and wanted time to think. So we turned back. As we did so I missed
+Tommy and inquired anxiously where he was, being afraid lest he might have
+tumbled down the well-like hole.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He&rsquo;s all right,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;I saw him sniffing at
+the base of that statue. I expect there is a rat in there, or perhaps a
+snake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Sure enough when we reached it there was Tommy with his black nose pressed
+against the lowest of the tiers that formed the base of the statue, and
+sniffing loudly. Also he was scratching in the dust as a dog does when he has
+winded a rabbit in a hole. So engrossed was he in this occupation that it was
+with difficulty that I coaxed him to leave the place.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I did not think much of the incident at that time, but afterwards it came back
+to me, and I determined to investigate those stones at the first opportunity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Passing the wrecks of the machines, we emerged on to the causeway without
+accident. After we had rested and washed we set to work to draw our canoe with
+its precious burden of food right into the mouth of the cave, where we hid it
+as well as we could.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This done we went for a walk round the base of the peak. This proved to be a
+great deal larger than we had imagined, over two miles in circumference indeed.
+All about it was a belt of fertile land, as I suppose deposited there by the
+waters of the great lake and resulting from the decay of vegetation. Much of
+this belt was covered with ancient forest ending in mud flats that appeared to
+have been thrown up recently, perhaps at the time of the tidal wave which bore
+us to Orofena. On the higher part of the belt were many of the extraordinary
+crater-like holes that I have mentioned as being prevalent on the main island;
+indeed the place had all the appearance of having been subjected to a terrific
+and continuous bombardment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we had completed its circuit we set to work to climb the peak in order to
+explore the terraces of which I have spoken and the ruins which I had seen
+through my field-glasses. It was quite true; they were terraces cut with
+infinite labour out of the solid rock, and on them had once stood a city, now
+pounded into dust and fragments. We struggled over the broken blocks of stone
+to what we had taken for a temple, which stood near the lip of the crater, for
+without doubt this mound was an extinct volcano, or rather its crest. All we
+could make out when we arrived was that here had once stood some great
+building, for its courts could still be traced; also there lay about fragments
+of steps and pillars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Apparently the latter had once been carved, but the passage of innumerable ages
+had obliterated the work and we could not turn these great blocks over to
+discover if any remained beneath. It was as though the god Thor had broken up
+the edifice with his hammer, or Jove had shattered it with his thunderbolts;
+nothing else would account for that utter wreck, except, as Bickley remarked
+significantly, the scientific use of high explosives.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Following the line of what seemed to have been a road, we came to the edge of
+the volcano and found, as we expected, the usual depression out of which fire
+and lava had once been cast, as from Hecla or Vesuvius. It was now a lake more
+than a quarter of a mile across. Indeed it had been thus in the ancient days
+when the buildings stood upon the terraces, for we saw the remains of steps
+leading down to the water. Perhaps it had served as the sacred lake of the
+temple.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We gazed with wonderment and then, wearied out, scrambled back through the
+ruins, which, by the way, were of a different stone from the lava of the
+mountain, to the mouth of the great cave.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.<br />
+The Dwellers in the Tomb</h2>
+
+<p>
+By now it was drawing towards sunset, so we made such preparations as we could
+for the night. One of these was to collect dry driftwood, of which an abundance
+lay upon the shore, to serve us for firing, though unfortunately we had nothing
+that we could cook for our meal.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While we were thus engaged we saw a canoe approaching the table-rock and
+perceived that in it were the chief Marama and a priest. After hovering about
+for a while they paddled the canoe near enough to allow of conversation which,
+taking no notice of their presence, we left it to them to begin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;O, Friend-from-the-Sea,&rdquo; called Marama, addressing myself,
+&ldquo;we come to pray you and the Great Healer to return to us to be our
+guests as before. The people are covered with darkness because of the loss of
+your wisdom, and the sick cry aloud for the Healer; indeed two of those whom he
+has cut with knives are dying.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And what of the Bellower?&rdquo; I asked, indicating Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We should like to see him back also, Friend-from-the-Sea, that we may
+sacrifice and eat him, who destroyed our god with fire and caused the Healer to
+kill his priest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is most unjust,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin. &ldquo;I deeply regret the
+blood that was shed on the occasion, unnecessarily as I think.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then go and atone for it with your own,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;and
+everybody will be pleased.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Waving to them to be silent, I said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Are you mad, Marama, that you should ask us to return to sojourn among
+people who tried to kill us, merely because the Bellower caused fire to burn an
+image of wood and its head to fly from its shoulders, just to show you that it
+had no power to hold itself together, although you call it a god? Not so, we
+wash our hands of you; we leave you to go your own way while we go ours, till
+perchance in a day to come, after many misfortunes have overtaken you, you
+creep about our feet and with prayers and offerings beg us to return.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I paused to observe the effect of my words. It was excellent, for both Marama
+and the priest wrung their hands and groaned. Then I went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Meanwhile we have something to tell you. We have entered the cave where
+you said no man might set a foot, and have seen him who sits within, the true
+god.&rdquo; (Here Bastin tried to interrupt, but was suppressed by Bickley.)
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They looked at each other in a frightened way and groaned more loudly than
+before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He sends you a message, which, as he told us of your approach, we came
+to the shore to deliver to you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How can you say that?&rdquo; began Bastin, but was again violently
+suppressed by Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is that he, the real Oro, rejoices that the false Oro, whose face is
+copied from his face, has been destroyed. It is that he commands you day by day
+to bring food in plenty and lay it upon the Rock of Offerings, not forgetting a
+supply of fresh fish from the sea, and with it all those things that are stored
+in the house wherein we, the strangers from the sea, deigned to dwell awhile
+until we left you because in your wickedness you wished to murder us.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And if we refuse&mdash;what then?&rdquo; asked the priest, speaking for
+the first time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then Oro will send death and destruction upon you. Then your food shall
+fail and you shall perish of sickness and want, and the Oromatuas, the spirits
+of the great dead, shall haunt you in your sleep, and Oro shall eat up your
+souls.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At these horrible threats both of them uttered a kind of wail, after which,
+Marama asked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And if we consent, what then, Friend-from-the-Sea?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then, perchance,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;in some day to come we may
+return to you, that I may give you of my wisdom and the Great Healer may cure
+your sick and the Bellower may lead you through his gate, and in his kindness
+make you to see with his eyes.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This last clause of my ultimatum did not seem to appeal to the priest, who
+argued a while with Marama, though what he said we could not hear. In the end
+he appeared to give way. At any rate Marama called out that all should be done
+as we wished, and that meanwhile they prayed us to intercede with Oro in the
+cave, and to keep back the ghosts from haunting them, and to protect them from
+misfortune. I replied that we would do our best, but could guarantee nothing
+since their offence was very great.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, to show that the conversation was at an end, we walked away with dignity,
+pushing Bastin in front of us, lest he should spoil the effect by some of his
+ill-timed and often over-true remarks.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s capital,&rdquo; said Bickley, when we were out of hearing.
+&ldquo;The enemy has capitulated. We can stop here as long as we like,
+provisioned from the mainland, and if for any reason we wish to leave, be sure
+of our line of retreat.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know what you call capital,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin.
+&ldquo;It seems to me that all the lies which Arbuthnot has just told are
+sufficient to bring a judgment upon us. Indeed, I think that I will go back
+with Marama and explain the truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I never before knew anybody who was so anxious to be cooked and
+eaten,&rdquo; remarked Bickley. &ldquo;Moreover, you are too late, for the
+canoe is a hundred yards away by now, and you shan&rsquo;t have ours. Remember
+the Pauline maxims, old fellow, which you are so fond of quoting, and be all
+things to all men, and another that is more modern, that when you are at Rome,
+you must do as the Romans do; also a third, that necessity has no law, and for
+the matter of that, a fourth, that all is fair in love and war.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sure, Bickley, that Paul never meant his words to bear the debased
+sense which you attribute to them&mdash;&rdquo; began Bastin, but at this point
+I hustled him off to light a fire&mdash;a process at which I pointed out he had
+shown himself an expert.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We slept that night under the overhanging rock just to one side of the cave,
+not in the mouth, because of the draught which drew in and out of the great
+place. In that soft and balmy clime this was no hardship, although we lacked
+blankets. And yet, tired though I was, I could not rest as I should have done.
+Bastin snored away contentedly, quite unaffected by his escape which to him was
+merely an incident in the day&rsquo;s work; and so, too, slumbered Bickley,
+except that he did not snore. But the amazement and the mystery of all that we
+had discovered and of all that might be left for us to discover, held me back
+from sleep.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What did it mean? What could it mean? My nerves were taut as harp strings and
+seemed to vibrate to the touch of invisible fingers, although I could not
+interpret the music that they made. Once or twice also I thought I heard actual
+music with my physical ears, and that of a strange quality. Soft and low and
+dreamful, it appeared to well from the recesses of the vast cave, a wailing
+song in an unknown tongue from the lips of women, or of a woman, multiplied
+mysteriously by echoes. This, however, must have been pure fancy, since there
+was no singer there.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently I dozed off, to be awakened by the sudden sound of a great fish
+leaping in the lake. I sat up and stared, fearing lest it might be the splash
+of a paddle, for I could not put from my mind the possibility of attack. All I
+saw, however, was the low line of the distant shore, and above it the bright
+and setting stars that heralded the coming of the sun. Then I woke the others,
+and we washed and ate, since once the sun rose time would be precious.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length it appeared, splendid in a cloudless sky, and, as I had hoped,
+directly opposite to the mouth of the cave. Taking our candles and some stout
+pieces of driftwood which, with our knives, we had shaped on the previous
+evening to serve us as levers and rough shovels, we entered the cave. Bickley
+and I were filled with excitement and hope of what we knew not, but Bastin
+showed little enthusiasm for our quest. His heart was with his half-converted
+savages beyond the lake, and of them, quite rightly I have no doubt, he thought
+more than he did of all the archaeological treasures in the whole earth. Still,
+he came, bearing the blackened head of Oro with him which, with unconscious
+humour, he had used as a pillow through the night because, as he said,
+&ldquo;it was after all softer than stone.&rdquo; Also, I believe that in his
+heart he hoped that he might find an opportunity of destroying the bigger and
+earlier edition of Oro in the cave, before it was discovered by the natives who
+might wish to make it an object of worship. Tommy came also, with greater
+alacrity than I expected, since dogs do not as a rule like dark places. When we
+reached the statue I learned the reason; he remembered the smell he had
+detected at its base on the previous day, which Bastin supposed to proceed from
+a rat, and was anxious to continue his investigations.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went straight to the statue, although Bickley passed the half-buried
+machines with evident regret. As we had hoped, the strong light of the rising
+sun fell upon it in a vivid ray, revealing all its wondrous workmanship and the
+majesty&mdash;for no other word describes it&mdash;of the somewhat terrifying
+countenance that appeared above the wrappings of the shroud. Indeed, I was
+convinced that originally this monument had been placed here in order that on
+certain days of the year the sun might fall upon it thus, when probably
+worshippers assembled to adore their hallowed symbol. After all, this was
+common in ancient days: witness the instance of the awful Three who sit in the
+deepest recesses of the temple of Abu Simbel, on the Nile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We gazed and gazed our fill, at least Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+occupied in making a careful comparison between the head of his wooden Oro and
+that of the statue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is no doubt that they are very much alike,&rdquo; he said.
+&ldquo;Why, whatever is that dog doing? I think it is going mad,&rdquo; and he
+pointed to Tommy who was digging furiously at the base of the lowest step, as
+at home I have seen him do at roots that sheltered a rabbit.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Tommy&rsquo;s energy was so remarkable that at length it seriously attracted
+our attention. Evidently he meant that it should do so, for occasionally he
+sprang back to me barking, then returned and sniffed and scratched. Bickley
+knelt down and smelt at the stone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is an odd thing, Humphrey,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but there is a
+strange odour here, a very pleasant odour like that of sandal-wood or attar of
+roses.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I never heard of a rat that smelt like sandal-wood or attar of
+roses,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;Look out that it isn&rsquo;t a snake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I knelt down beside Bickley, and in clearing away the deep dust from what
+seemed to be the bottom of the step, which was perhaps four feet in height, by
+accident thrust my amateur spade somewhat strongly against its base where it
+rested upon the rocky floor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next moment a wonder came to pass. The whole massive rock began to turn
+outwards as though upon a pivot! I saw it coming and grabbed Bickley by the
+collar, dragging him back so that we just rolled clear before the great block,
+which must have weighed several tons, fell down and crushed us. Tommy saw it
+too, and fled, though a little late, for the edge of the block caught the tip
+of his tail and caused him to emit a most piercing howl. But we did not think
+of Tommy and his woes; we did not think of our own escape or of anything else
+because of the marvel that appeared to us. Seated there upon the ground, after
+our backward tumble, we could see into the space which lay behind the fallen
+step, for there the light of the sun penetrated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The first idea it gave me was that of the jewelled shrine of some mediaeval
+saint which, by good fortune, had escaped the plunderers; there are still such
+existing in the world. It shone and glittered, apparently with gold and
+diamonds, although, as a matter of fact, there were no diamonds, nor was it
+gold which gleamed, but some ancient metal, or rather amalgam, which is now
+lost to the world, the same that was used in the tubes of the air-machines. I
+think that it contained gold, but I do not know. At any rate, it was equally
+lasting and even more beautiful, though lighter in colour.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the rest this adorned recess which resembled that of a large funeral vault,
+occupying the whole space beneath the base of the statue that was supported on
+its arch, was empty save for two flashing objects that lay side by side but
+with nearly the whole width of the vault between them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I pointed at them to Bickley with my finger, for really I could not speak.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Coffins, by Jove!&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;Glass or crystal coffins
+and people in them. Come on!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A few seconds later we were crawling into that vault while Bastin, still
+nursing the head of Oro as though it were a baby, stood confused outside
+muttering something about desecrating hallowed graves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just as we reached the interior, owing to the heightening of the sun, the light
+passed away, leaving us in a kind of twilight. Bickley produced carriage
+candles from his pocket and fumbled for matches. While he was doing so I
+noticed two things&mdash;firstly, that the place really did smell like a
+scent-shop, and, secondly, that the coffins seemed to glow with a kind of
+phosphorescent light of their own, not very strong, but sufficient to reveal
+their outlines in the gloom. Then the candles burnt up and we saw.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Within the coffin that stood on our left hand as we entered, for this crystal
+was as transparent as plate glass, lay a most wonderful old man, clad in a
+gleaming, embroidered robe. His long hair, which was parted in the middle, as
+we could see beneath the edge of the pearl-sewn and broidered cap he wore, also
+his beard were snowy white. The man was tall, at least six feet four inches in
+height, and rather spare. His hands were long and thin, very delicately made,
+as were his sandalled feet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But it was his face that fixed our gaze, for it was marvelous, like the face of
+a god, and, as we noticed at once, with some resemblance to that of the statue
+above. Thus the brow was broad and massive, the nose straight and long, the
+mouth stern and clear-cut, while the cheekbones were rather high, and the
+eyebrows arched. Such are the characteristics of many handsome old men of good
+blood, and as the mummies of Seti and others show us, such they have been for
+thousands of years. Only this man differed from all others because of the
+fearful dignity stamped upon his features. Looking at him I began to think at
+once of the prophet Elijah as he must have appeared rising to heaven, enhanced
+by the more earthly glory of Solomon, for although the appearance of these
+patriarchs is unknown, of them one conceives ideas. Only it seemed probable
+that Elijah may have looked more benign. Here there was no benignity, only
+terrible force and infinite wisdom.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Contemplating him I shivered a little and felt thankful that he was dead. For
+to tell the truth I was afraid of that awesome countenance which, I should add,
+was of the whiteness of paper, although the cheeks still showed tinges of
+colour, so perfect was the preservation of the corpse.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I was still gazing at it when Bickley said in a voice of amazement:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I say, look here, in the other coffin.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I turned, looked, and nearly collapsed on the floor of the vault, since beauty
+can sometimes strike us like a blow. Oh! there before me lay all loveliness,
+such loveliness that there burst from my lips an involuntary cry:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Alas! that she should be dead!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A young woman, I supposed, at least she looked young, perhaps five or six and
+twenty years of age, or so I judged. There she lay, her tall and delicate shape
+half hidden in masses of rich-hued hair in colour of a ruddy blackness. I know
+not how else to describe it, since never have I seen any of the same tint.
+Moreover, it shone with a life of its own as though it had been dusted with
+gold. From between the masses of this hair appeared a face which I can only
+call divine. There was every beauty that woman can boast, from the curving
+eyelashes of extraordinary length to the sweet and human mouth. To these charms
+also were added a wondrous smile and an air of kind dignity, very different
+from the fierce pride stamped upon the countenance of the old man who was her
+companion in death.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was clothed in some close-fitting robe of white broidered with gold; pearls
+were about her neck, lying far down upon the perfect bosom, a girdle of gold
+and shining gems encircled her slender waist, and on her little feet were
+sandals fastened with red stones like rubies. In truth, she was a splendid
+creature, and yet, I know not how, her beauty suggested more of the spirit than
+of the flesh. Indeed, in a way, it was unearthly. My senses were smitten, it
+pulled at my heart-strings, and yet its unutterable strangeness seemed to awake
+memories within me, though of what I could not tell. A wild fancy came to me
+that I must have known this heavenly creature in some past life.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By now Bastin had joined us, and, attracted by my exclamation and by the
+attitude of Bickley, who was staring down at the coffin with a fixed look upon
+his face, not unlike that of a pointer when he scents game, he began to
+contemplate the wonder within it in his slow way.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, I never!&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Do you think the Glittering Lady
+in there is human?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Glittering Lady is dead, but I suppose that she was human in her
+life,&rdquo; I answered in an awed whisper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course she is dead, otherwise she would not be in that glass coffin.
+I think I should like to read the Burial Service over her, which I daresay was
+never done when she was put in there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you know she is dead?&rdquo; asked Bickley in a sharp voice and
+speaking for the first time. &ldquo;I have seen hundreds of corpses, and
+mummies too, but never any that looked like these.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I stared at him. It was strange to hear Bickley, the scoffer at miracles,
+suggesting that this greatest of all miracles might be possible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They must have been here a long time,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;for although
+human, they are not, I think, of any people known to the world to-day; their
+dress, everything, shows it, though perhaps thousands of years
+ago&mdash;&rdquo; and I stopped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Quite so,&rdquo; answered Bickley; &ldquo;I agree. That is why I suggest
+that they may have belonged to a race who knew what we do not, namely, how to
+suspend animation for great periods of time.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I said no more, nor did Bastin, who was now engaged in studying the old man,
+and for once, wonderstruck and overcome. Bickley, however, took one of the
+candles and began to make a close examination of the coffins. So did Tommy, who
+sniffed along the join of that of the Glittering Lady until his nose reached a
+certain spot, where it remained, while his black tail began to wag in a
+delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away and investigated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;As I thought,&rdquo; he said&mdash;&ldquo;air-holes. See!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in a line with the
+face of its occupant, were a number of little holes that either by accident or
+design outlined the shape of a human mouth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They are not airtight,&rdquo; murmured Bickley; &ldquo;and if air can
+enter, how can dead flesh remain like that for ages?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he continued his search upon the other side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The lid of this coffin works on hinges,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Here they
+are, fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within could have pulled
+it down before the senses departed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; I answered; &ldquo;for look, here is a crystal bolt at the
+end and it is shot from without.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to examine the
+other coffin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got it!&rdquo; he exclaimed presently. &ldquo;The old god in
+here&rdquo; (somehow we all thought of this old man as not quite normal)
+&ldquo;shut down the Glittering Lady&rsquo;s coffin and bolted it. His own is
+not bolted, although the bolt exists in the same place. He just got in and
+pulled down the lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking&mdash;for how can such
+things be? Let us get out and think.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had begun to oppress
+us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the cave, where for a while we
+remained silent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am very thirsty,&rdquo; said Bastin presently. &ldquo;Those smells
+seem to have dried me up. I am going to get some tea&mdash;I mean water, as
+unfortunately there is no tea,&rdquo; and he set off towards the mouth of the
+cave.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We followed him, I don&rsquo;t quite know why, except that we wished to breathe
+freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and its contents would be as
+safe as they had been for&mdash;well, how long?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and down enjoying it
+sub-consciously, for really our&mdash;that is Bickley&rsquo;s and my
+own&mdash;intelligences were concentrated on that sepulchre and its contents.
+Where Bastin&rsquo;s may have been I do not know, perhaps in a visionary
+teapot, since I was sure that it would take him a day or two to appreciate the
+significance of our discoveries. At any rate, he wandered off, making no
+remarks about them, to drink water, I suppose.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the table-rock and we went to
+see the reason of his noise. It proved to be very satisfactory, for while we
+were in the cave the Orofenans had brought absolutely everything belonging to
+us, together with a large supply of food from the main island. Not a single
+article was missing; even our books, a can with the bottom out, and the broken
+pieces of a little pocket mirror had been religiously transported, and with
+these a few articles that had been stolen from us, notably my pocket-knife.
+Evidently a great taboo had been laid upon all our possessions. They were now
+carefully arranged in one of the grooves of the rock that Bickley supposed had
+been made by the wheels of aeroplanes, which was why we had not seen them at
+once.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Each of us rushed for what we desired most&mdash;Bastin for one of the
+canisters of tea, I for my diaries, and Bickley for his chest of instruments
+and medicines. These were removed to the mouth of the cave, and after them the
+other things and the food; also a bell tent and some camp furniture that we had
+brought from the ship. Then Bastin made some tea of which he drank four large
+pannikins, having first said grace over it with unwonted fervour. Nor did we
+disdain our share of the beverage, although Bickley preferred cocoa and I
+coffee. Cocoa and coffee we had no time to make then, and in view of that
+sepulchre in the cave, what had we to do with cocoa and coffee?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So Bickley and I said to each other, and yet presently he changed his mind and
+in a special metal machine carefully made some extremely strong black coffee
+which he poured into a thermos flask, previously warmed with hot water, adding
+thereto about a claret glass of brandy. Also he extracted certain drugs from
+his medicine-chest, and with them, as I noted, a hypodermic syringe, which he
+first boiled in a kettle and then shut up in a little tube with a glass
+stopper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+These preparations finished, he called to Tommy to give him the scraps of our
+meal. But there was no Tommy. The dog was missing, and though we hunted
+everywhere we could not find him. Finally we concluded that he had wandered off
+down the beach on business of his own and would return in due course. We could
+not bother about Tommy just then.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After making some further preparations and fidgeting about a little, Bickley
+announced that as we had now some proper paraffin lamps of the powerful sort
+which are known as &ldquo;hurricane,&rdquo; he proposed by their aid to carry
+out further examinations in the cave.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think I shall stop where I am,&rdquo; said Bastin, helping himself
+from the kettle to a fifth pannikin of tea. &ldquo;Those corpses are very
+interesting, but I don&rsquo;t see any use in staring at them again at present.
+One can always do that at any time. I have missed Marama once already by being
+away in that cave, and I have a lot to say to him about my people; I
+don&rsquo;t want to be absent in case he should return.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To wash up the things, I suppose,&rdquo; said Bickley with a sniff;
+&ldquo;or perhaps to eat the tea-leaves.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, as a matter of fact, I have noticed that these natives have a
+peculiar taste for tea-leaves. I think they believe them to be a medicine, but
+I don&rsquo;t suppose they would come so far for them, though perhaps they
+might in the hope of getting the head of Oro. Anyhow, I am going to stop
+here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Pray do,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;Are you ready, Humphrey?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I nodded, and he handed to me a felt-covered flask of the non-conducting kind,
+filled with boiling water, a tin of preserved milk, and a little bottle of meat
+extract of a most concentrated sort. Then, having lit two of the hurricane
+lamps and seen that they were full of oil, we started back up the cave.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.<br />
+Resurrection</h2>
+
+<p>
+We reached the sepulchre without stopping to look at the parked machines or
+even the marvelous statue that stood above it, for what did we care about
+machines or statues now? As we approached we were astonished to hear low and
+cavernous growlings.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is some wild beast in there,&rdquo; said Bickley, halting.
+&ldquo;No, by George! it&rsquo;s Tommy. What can the dog be after?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We peeped in, and there sure enough was Tommy lying on the top of the
+Glittering Lady&rsquo;s coffin and growling his very best with the hair
+standing up upon his back. When he saw who it was, however, he jumped off and
+frisked round, licking my hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s very strange,&rdquo; I exclaimed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not stranger than everything else,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What are you going to do?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Open these coffins,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;beginning with that of
+the old god, since I would rather experiment on him. I expect he will crumble
+into dust. But if by chance he doesn&rsquo;t I&rsquo;ll jam a little
+strychnine, mixed with some other drugs, of which you don&rsquo;t know the
+names, into one of his veins and see if anything happens. If it doesn&rsquo;t,
+it won&rsquo;t hurt him, and if it does&mdash;well, who knows? Now give me a
+hand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went to the left-hand coffin and by inserting the hook on the back of my
+knife, of which the real use is to pick stones out of horses&rsquo; hoofs, into
+one of the little air-holes I have described, managed to raise the heavy
+crystal lid sufficiently to enable us to force a piece of wood between it and
+the top. The rest was easy, for the hinges being of crystal had not corroded.
+In two minutes it was open.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+From the chest came an overpowering spicy odour, and with it a veritable breath
+of warm air before which we recoiled a little. Bickley took a pocket
+thermometer which he had at hand and glanced at it. It marked a temperature of
+82 degrees in the sepulchre. Having noted this, he thrust it into the coffin
+between the crystal wall and its occupant. Then we went out and waited a little
+while to give the odours time to dissipate, for they made the head reel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After five minutes or so we returned and examined the thermometer. It had risen
+to 98 degrees, the natural temperature of the human body.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you make of that if the man is dead?&rdquo; he whispered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I shook my head, and as we had agreed, set to helping him to lift the body from
+the coffin. It was a good weight, quite eleven stone I should say; moreover,
+<i>it was not stiff</i>, for the hip joints bent. We got it out and laid it on
+a blanket we had spread on the floor of the sepulchre. Whilst I was thus
+engaged I saw something that nearly caused me to loose my hold from
+astonishment. Beneath the head, the centre of the back and the feet were
+crystal boxes about eight inches square, or rather crystal blocks, for in them
+I could see no opening, and these boxes emitted a faint phosphorescent light. I
+touched one of them and found that it was quite warm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Great heavens!&rdquo; I exclaimed, &ldquo;here&rsquo;s magic.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no such thing,&rdquo; answered Bickley in his usual
+formula. Then an explanation seemed to strike him and he added, &ldquo;Not
+magic but radium or something of the sort. That&rsquo;s how the temperature was
+kept up. In sufficient quantity it is practically indestructible, you see. My
+word! this old gentleman knew a thing or two.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again we waited a little while to see if the body begun to crumble on exposure
+to the air, I taking the opportunity to make a rough sketch of it in my
+pocket-book in anticipation of that event. But it did not; it remained quite
+sound.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Here goes,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;If he should be alive, he will
+catch cold in his lungs after lying for ages in that baby incubator, as I
+suppose he has done. So it is now or never.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then bidding me hold the man&rsquo;s right arm, he took the sterilized syringe
+which he had prepared, and thrusting the needle into a vein he selected just
+above the wrist, injected the contents.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It would have been better over the heart,&rdquo; he whispered,
+&ldquo;but I thought I would try the arm first. I don&rsquo;t like risking
+chills by uncovering him.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I made no answer and again we waited and watched.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Great heavens, he&rsquo;s stirring!&rdquo; I gasped presently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Stirring he was, for his fingers began to move.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley bent down and placed his ear to the heart&mdash;I forgot to say that he
+had tested this before with a stethoscope, but had been unable to detect any
+movement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I believe it is beginning to beat,&rdquo; he said in an awed voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he applied the stethoscope, and added, &ldquo;It is, it is!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next he took a filament of cotton wool and laid it on the man&rsquo;s lips.
+Presently it moved; he was breathing, though very faintly. Bickley took more
+cotton wool and having poured something from his medicine-chest on to it,
+placed it over the mouth beneath the man&rsquo;s nostrils&mdash;I believe it
+was sal volatile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nothing further happened for a little while, and to relieve the strain on my
+mind I stared absently into the empty coffin. Here I saw what had escaped our
+notice, two small plates of white metal and cut upon them what I took to be
+star maps. Beyond these and the glowing boxes which I have mentioned, there was
+nothing else in the coffin. I had no time to examine them, for at that moment
+the old man opened his mouth and began to breathe, evidently with some
+discomfort and effort, as his empty lungs filled themselves with air. Then his
+eyelids lifted, revealing a wonderful pair of dark glowing eyes beneath. Next
+he tried to sit up but would have fallen, had not Bickley supported him with
+his arm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not think he saw Bickley, indeed he shut his eyes again as though the
+light hurt them, and went into a kind of faint. Then it was that Tommy, who all
+this while had been watching the proceedings with grave interest, came forward,
+wagging his tail, and licked the man&rsquo;s face. At the touch of the
+dog&rsquo;s red tongue, he opened his eyes for the second time. Now he
+saw&mdash;not us but Tommy, for after contemplating him for a few seconds,
+something like a smile appeared upon his fierce but noble face. More, he lifted
+his hand and laid it on the dog&rsquo;s head, as though to pat it kindly. Half
+a minute or so later his awakening senses appreciated our presence. The
+incipient smile vanished and was replaced by a somewhat terrible frown.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Meanwhile Bickley had poured out some of the hot coffee laced with brandy into
+the cup that was screwed on the top of the thermos flask. Advancing to the man
+whom I supported, he put it to his lips. He tasted and made a wry face, but
+presently he began to sip, and ultimately swallowed it all. The effect of the
+stimulant was wonderful, for in a few minutes he came to life completely and
+was even able to sit up without support.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For quite a long while he gazed at us gravely, taking us in and everything
+connected with us. For instance, Bickley&rsquo;s medicine-case which lay open
+showing the little vulcanite tubes, a few instruments and other outfit, engaged
+his particular attention, and I saw at once that he understood what it was.
+Thus his arm still smarted where the needle had been driven in and on the
+blanket lay the syringe. He looked at his arm, then looked at the syringe, and
+nodded. The paraffin hurricane lamps also seemed to interest and win his
+approval. We two men, as I thought, attracted him least of all; he just summed
+us up and our garments, more especially the garments, with a few shrewd
+glances, and then seemed to turn his thoughts to Tommy, who had seated himself
+quite contentedly at his side, evidently accepting him as a new addition to our
+party.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I confess that this behaviour on Tommy&rsquo;s part reassured me not a little.
+I am a great believer in the instincts of animals, especially of dogs, and I
+felt certain that if this man had not been in all essentials human like
+ourselves, Tommy would not have tolerated him. In the same way the
+sleeper&rsquo;s clear liking for Tommy, at whom he looked much oftener and with
+greater kindness than he did at us, suggested that there was goodness in him
+somewhere, since although a dog in its wonderful tolerance may love a bad
+person in whom it smells out hidden virtue, no really bad person ever loved a
+dog, or, I may add, a child or a flower.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As a matter of fact, the &ldquo;old god,&rdquo; as we had christened him while
+he was in his coffin, during all our association with him, cared infinitely
+more for Tommy than he did for any of us, a circumstance that ultimately was
+not without its influence upon our fortunes. But for this there was a reason as
+we learned afterwards, also he was not really so amiable as I hoped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we had looked at each other for a long while the sleeper began to arrange
+his beard, of which the length seemed to surprise him, especially as Tommy was
+seated on one end of it. Finding this out and apparently not wishing to disturb
+Tommy, he gave up the occupation, and after one or two attempts, for his tongue
+and lips still seemed to be stiff, addressed us in some sonorous and musical
+language, unlike any that we had ever heard. We shook our heads. Then by an
+afterthought I said &ldquo;Good day&rdquo; to him in the language of the
+Orofenans. He puzzled over the word as though it were more or less familiar to
+him, and when I repeated it, gave it back to me with a difference indeed, but
+in a way which convinced us that he quite understood what I meant. The
+conversation went no further at the moment because just then some memory seemed
+to strike him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was sitting with his back against the coffin of the Glittering Lady, whom
+therefore he had not seen. Now he began to turn round, and being too weak to do
+so, motioned me to help him. I obeyed, while Bickley, guessing his purpose,
+held up one of the hurricane lamps that he might see better. With a kind of
+fierce eagerness he surveyed her who lay within the coffin, and after he had
+done so, uttered a sigh as of intense relief.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next he pointed to the metal cup out of which he had drunk. Bickley filled it
+again from the thermos flask, which I observed excited his keen interest, for,
+having touched the flask with his hand and found that it was cool, he appeared
+to marvel that the fluid coming from it should be hot and steaming. Presently
+he smiled as though he had got the clue to the mystery, and swallowed his
+second drink of coffee and spirit. This done, he motioned to us to lift the lid
+of the lady&rsquo;s coffin, pointing out a certain catch in the bolts which at
+first we could not master, for it will be remembered that on this coffin these
+were shot.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the end, by pursuing the same methods that we had used in the instance of
+his own, we raised the coffin lid and once more were driven to retreat from the
+sepulchre for a while by the overpowering odour like to that of a whole
+greenhouse full of tuberoses, that flowed out of it, inducing a kind of
+stupefaction from which even Tommy fled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we returned it was to find the man kneeling by the side of the coffin, for
+as yet he could not stand, with his glowing eyes fixed upon the face of her who
+slept therein and waving his long arms above her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hypnotic business! Wonder if it will work,&rdquo; whispered Bickley.
+Then he lifted the syringe and looked inquiringly at the man, who shook his
+head, and went on with his mesmeric passes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I crept round him and took my stand by the sleeper&rsquo;s head, that I might
+watch her face, which was well worth watching, while Bickley, with his medicine
+at hand, remained near her feet, I think engaged in disinfecting the syringe in
+some spirit or acid. I believe he was about to make an attempt to use it when
+suddenly, as though beneath the influence of the hypnotic passes, a change
+appeared on the Glittering Lady&rsquo;s face. Hitherto, beautiful as it was, it
+had been a dead face though one of a person who had suddenly been cut off while
+in full health and vigour a few hours, or at the most a day or so before. Now
+it began to live again; it was as though the spirit were returning from afar,
+and not without toil and tribulation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Expression after expression flitted across the features; indeed these seemed to
+change so much from moment to moment that they might have belonged to several
+different individuals, though each was beautiful. The fact of these remarkable
+changes with the suggestion of multiform personalities which they conveyed
+impressed both Bickley and myself very much indeed. Then the breast heaved
+tumultuously; it even appeared to struggle. Next the eyes opened. They were
+full of wonder, even of fear, but oh! what marvelous eyes. I do not know how to
+describe them, I cannot even state their exact colour, except that it was dark,
+something like the blue of sapphires of the deepest tint, and yet not black;
+large, too, and soft as a deer&rsquo;s. They shut again as though the light
+hurt them, then once more opened and wandered about, apparently without seeing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length they found my face, for I was still bending over her, and, resting
+there, appeared to take it in by degrees. More, it seemed to touch and stir
+some human spring in the still-sleeping heart. At least the fear passed from
+her features and was replaced by a faint smile, such as a patient sometimes
+gives to one known and well loved, as the effects of chloroform pass away. For
+a while she looked at me with an earnest, searching gaze, then suddenly, for
+the first time moving her arms, lifted them and threw them round my neck.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The old man stared, bending his imperial brows into a little frown, but did
+nothing. Bickley stared also through his glasses and sniffed as though in
+disapproval, while I remained quite still, fighting with a wild impulse to kiss
+her on the lips as one would an awakening and beloved child. I doubt if I could
+have done so, however, for really I was immovable; my heart seemed to stop and
+all my muscles to be paralysed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not know for how long this endured, but I do know how it ended. Presently
+in the intense silence I heard Bastin&rsquo;s heavy voice and looking round,
+saw his big head projecting into the sepulchre.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, I never!&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you seem to have woke them up with
+a vengeance. If you begin like <i>that</i> with the lady, there will be
+complications before you have done, Arbuthnot.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Talk of being brought back to earth with a rush! I could have killed Bastin,
+and Bickley, turning on him like a tiger, told him to be off, find wood and
+light a large fire in front of the statue. I think he was about to argue when
+the Ancient gave him a glance of his fierce eyes, which alarmed him, and he
+departed, bewildered, to return presently with the wood.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But the sound of his voice had broken the spell. The Lady let her arms fall
+with a start, and shut her eyes again, seeming to faint. Bickley sprang forward
+with his sal volatile and applied it to her nostrils, the Ancient not
+interfering, for he seemed to recognise that he had to deal with a man of skill
+and one who meant well by them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the end we brought her round again and, to omit details, Bickley gave her,
+not coffee and brandy, but a mixture he compounded of hot water, preserved milk
+and meat essence. The effect of it on her was wonderful, since a few minutes
+after swallowing it she sat up in the coffin. Then we lifted her from that
+narrow bed in which she had slept for&mdash;ah! how long? and perceived that
+beneath her also were crystal boxes of the radiant, heat-giving substance. We
+sat her on the floor of the sepulchre, wrapping her also in a blanket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now it was that Tommy, after frisking round her as though in welcome of an old
+friend, calmly established himself beside her and laid his black head upon her
+knee. She noted it and smiled for the first time, a marvelously sweet and
+gentle smile. More, she placed her slender hand upon the dog and stroked him
+feebly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley tried to make her drink some more of his mixture, but she refused,
+motioning him to give it to Tommy. This, however, he would not do because there
+was but one cup. Presently both of the sleepers began to shiver, which caused
+Bickley anxiety. Abusing Bastin beneath his breath for being so long with the
+fire, he drew the blankets closer about them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then an idea came to him and he examined the glowing boxes in the coffin. They
+were loose, being merely set in prepared cavities in the crystal. Wrapping our
+handkerchiefs about his hand, he took them out and placed them around the
+wakened patients, a proceeding of which the Ancient nodded approval. Just then,
+too, Bastin returned with his first load of firewood, and soon we had a merry
+blaze going just outside the sepulchre. I saw that they observed the lighting
+of this fire by means of a match with much interest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now they grew warm again, as indeed we did also&mdash;too warm. Then in my turn
+I had an idea. I knew that by now the sun would be beating hotly against the
+rock of the mount, and suggested to Bickley, that, if possible, the best thing
+we could do would be to get them into its life-giving rays. He agreed, if we
+could make them understand and they were able to walk. So I tried. First I
+directed the Ancient&rsquo;s attention to the mouth of the cave which at this
+distance showed as a white circle of light. He looked at it and then at me with
+grave inquiry. I made motions to suggest that he should proceed there,
+repeating the word &ldquo;Sun&rdquo; in the Orofenan tongue. He understood at
+once, though whether he read my mind rather than what I said I am not sure.
+Apparently the Glittering Lady understood also and seemed to be most anxious to
+go. Only she looked rather pitifully at her feet and shook her head. This
+decided me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not know if I have mentioned anywhere that I am a tall man and very
+muscular. She was tall, also, but as I judged not so very heavy after her long
+fast. At any rate I felt quite certain that I could carry her for that
+distance. Stooping down, I lifted her up, signing to her to put her arms round
+my neck, which she did. Then calling to Bickley and Bastin to bring along the
+Ancient between them, with some difficulty I struggled out of the sepulchre,
+and started down the cave. She was more heavy than I thought, and yet I could
+have wished the journey longer. To begin with she seemed quite trustful and
+happy in my arms, where she lay with her head against my shoulder, smiling a
+little as a child might do, especially when I had to stop and throw her long
+hair round my neck like a muffler, to prevent it from trailing in the dust.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A bundle of lavender, or a truss of new-mown hay, could not have been more
+sweet to carry and there was something electric about the touch of her, which
+went through and through me. Very soon it was over, and we were out of the cave
+into the full glory of the tropical sun. At first, that her eyes might become
+accustomed to its light and her awakened body to its heat, I set her down where
+shadow fell from the overhanging rock, in a canvas deck chair that had been
+brought by Marama with the other things, throwing the rug about her to protect
+her from such wind as there was. She nestled gratefully into the soft seat and
+shut her eyes, for the motion had tired her. I noted, however, that she drew in
+the sweet air with long breaths.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I turned to observe the arrival of the Ancient, who was being borne
+between Bickley and Bastin in what children know as a dandy-chair, which is
+formed by two people crossing their hands in a peculiar fashion. It says much
+for the tremendous dignity of his presence that even thus, with one arm round
+the neck of Bickley and the other round that of Bastin, and his long white
+beard falling almost to the ground, he still looked most imposing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Unfortunately, however, just as they were emerging from the cave, Bastin,
+always the most awkward of creatures, managed to leave hold with one hand, so
+that his passenger nearly came to the ground. Never shall I forget the look
+that he gave him. Indeed, I think that from this moment he hated Bastin.
+Bickley he respected as a man of intelligence and learning, although in
+comparison with his own, the latter was infantile and crude; me he tolerated
+and even liked; but Bastin he detested. The only one of our party for whom he
+felt anything approaching real affection was the spaniel Tommy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We set him down, fortunately uninjured, on some rugs, and also in the shadow.
+Then, after a little while, we moved both of them into the sun. It was quite
+curious to see them expand there. As Bickley said, what happened to them might
+well be compared to the development of a butterfly which has just broken from
+the living grave of its chrysalis and crept into the full, hot radiance of the
+light. Its crinkled wings unfold, their brilliant tints develop; in an hour or
+two it is perfect, glorious, prepared for life and flight, a new creature.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So it was with this pair, from moment to moment they gathered strength and
+vigour. Near-by to them, as it happened, stood a large basket of the luscious
+native fruits brought that morning by the Orofenans, and at these the Lady
+looked with longing. With Bickley&rsquo;s permission, I offered them to her and
+to the Ancient, first peeling them with my fingers. They ate of them greedily,
+a full meal, and would have gone on had not the stern Bickley, fearing untoward
+consequences, removed the basket. Again the results were wonderful, for half an
+hour afterwards they seemed to be quite strong. With my assistance the
+Glittering Lady, as I still call her, for at that time I did not know her name,
+rose from the chair, and, leaning on me, tottered a few steps forward. Then she
+stood looking at the sky and all the lovely panorama of nature beneath, and
+stretching out her arms as though in worship. Oh! how beautiful she seemed with
+the sunlight shining on her heavenly face!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now for the first time I heard her voice. It was soft and deep, yet in it was a
+curious bell-like tone that seemed to vibrate like the sound of chimes heard
+from far away. Never have I listened to such another voice. She pointed to the
+sun whereof the light turned her radiant hair and garments to a kind of golden
+glory, and called it by some name that I could not understand. I shook my head,
+whereon she gave it a different name taken, I suppose, from another language.
+Again I shook my head and she tried a third time. To my delight this word was
+practically the same that the Orofenans used for &ldquo;sun.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I said, speaking very slowly, &ldquo;so it is called by the
+people of this land.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She understood, for she answered in much the same language:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What, then, do you call it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sun in the English tongue,&rdquo; I replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sun. English,&rdquo; she repeated after me, then added, &ldquo;How are
+you named, Wanderer?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey,&rdquo; I answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hum-fe-ry!&rdquo; she said as though she were learning the word,
+&ldquo;and those?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin and Bickley,&rdquo; I replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Over these patronymics she shook her head; as yet they were too much for her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How are you named, Sleeper?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva,&rdquo; she answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A beautiful name for one who is beautiful,&rdquo; I declared with
+enthusiasm, of course always in the rich Orofenan dialect which by now I could
+talk well enough.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She repeated the words once or twice, then of a sudden caught their meaning,
+for she smiled and even coloured, saying hastily with a wave of her hand
+towards the Ancient who stood at a distance between Bastin and Bickley,
+&ldquo;My father, Oro; great man; great king; great god!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this information I started, for it was startling to learn that here was the
+original Oro, who was still worshipped by the Orofenans, although of his actual
+existence they had known nothing for uncounted time. Also I was glad to learn
+that he was her father and not her old husband, for to me that would have been
+horrible, a desecration too deep for words.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How long did you sleep, Yva?&rdquo; I asked, pointing towards the
+sepulchre in the cave.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After a little thought she understood and shook her head hopelessly, then by an
+afterthought, she said,
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Stars tell Oro to-night.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had guessed as much
+from those plates in the coffin which seemed to have stars engraved on them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient himself
+approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged in an animated
+argument with Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For Heaven&rsquo;s sake!&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;keep your theology
+to yourself at present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a temper he
+may die.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him that he is
+a liar,&rdquo; replied Bastin obstinately.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which you did, Bastin, only fortunately he did not understand you. But
+for your own sake I advise you not to take liberties. He is not one, I think,
+with whom it is wise to trifle. I think he seems thirsty. Go and get some water
+from the rain pool, not from the lake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin departed and presently returned with an aluminum jug full of pure water
+and a glass. Bickley poured some of it into a glass and handed it to Yva who
+bent her head in thanks. Then she did a curious thing. Having first lifted the
+glass with both hands to the sky and held it so for a few seconds, she turned
+and with an obeisance poured a little of it on the ground before her
+father&rsquo;s feet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A libation, thought I to myself, and evidently Bastin agreed with me, for I
+heard him mutter,
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I believe she is making a heathen offering.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Doubtless we were right, for Oro accepted the homage by a little motion of the
+head. After this, at a sign from him she drank the water. Then the glass was
+refilled and handed to Oro who also held it towards the sky. He, however, made
+no libation but drank at once, two tumblers of it in rapid succession.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By now the direct sunlight was passing from the mouth of the cave, and though
+it was hot enough, both of them shivered a little. They spoke together in some
+language of which we could not understand a word, as though they were debating
+what their course of action should be. The dispute was long and earnest. Had we
+known what was passing, which I learned afterwards, it would have made us
+sufficiently anxious, for the point at issue was nothing less than whether we
+should or should not be forthwith destroyed&mdash;an end, it appears, that Oro
+was quite capable of bringing about if he so pleased. Yva, however, had very
+clear views of her own on the matter and, as I gather, even dared to threaten
+that she would protect us by the use of certain powers at her command, though
+what these were I do not know.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While the event hung doubtful Tommy, who was growing bored with these long
+proceedings, picked up a bough still covered with flowers which, after their
+pretty fashion, the Orofenans had placed on the top of one of the baskets of
+food. This small bough he brought and laid at the feet of Oro, no doubt in the
+hope that he would throw it for him to fetch, a game in which the dog
+delighted. For some reason Oro saw an omen in this simple canine performance,
+or he may have thought that the dog was making an offering to him, for he put
+his thin hand to his brow and thought a while, then motioned to Bastin to pick
+up the bough and give it to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next he spoke to his daughter as though assenting to something, for I saw her
+sigh in relief. No wonder, for he was conveying his decision to spare our lives
+and admit us to their fellowship.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After this again they talked, but in quite a different tone and manner. Then
+the Glittering Lady said to me in her slow and archaic Orofenan:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We go to rest. You must not follow. We come back perhaps tonight,
+perhaps next night. We are quite safe. You are quite safe under the beard of
+Oro. Spirit of Oro watch you. You understand?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I said I understood, whereon she answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good-bye, O Humfe-ry.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good-bye, O Yva,&rdquo; I replied, bowing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thereon they turned and refusing all assistance from us, vanished into the
+darkness of the cave leaning upon each other and walking slowly.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.<br />
+Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!</h2>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You seem to have made the best of your time, old fellow,&rdquo; said
+Bickley in rather a sour voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I never knew people begin to call each other by their Christian names so
+soon,&rdquo; added Bastin, looking at me with a suspicious eye.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know no other,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps not, but at any rate <i>you</i> have another, though you
+don&rsquo;t seem to have told it to her. Anyway, I am glad they are gone, for I
+was getting tired of being ordered by everybody to carry about wood and water
+for them. Also I am terribly hungry as I can&rsquo;t eat before it is light.
+They have taken most of the best fruit to which I was looking forward, but
+thank goodness they do not seem to care for pork.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So am I,&rdquo; said Bickley, who really looked exhausted. &ldquo;Get
+the food, there&rsquo;s a good fellow. We&rsquo;ll talk afterwards.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we had eaten, somewhat silently, I asked Bickley what he made of the
+business; also whither he thought the sleepers had gone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think I can answer the last question,&rdquo; interrupted Bastin.
+&ldquo;I expect it is to a place well known to students of the Bible which even
+Bickley mentions sometimes when he is angry. At any rate, they seem to be very
+fond of heat, for they wouldn&rsquo;t part from it even in their coffins, and
+you will admit that they are not quite natural, although that Glittering Lady
+is so attractive as regards her exterior.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley waved these remarks aside and addressed himself to me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know what to think of it,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;but as
+the experience is not natural and everything in the Universe, so far as we know
+it, has a natural explanation, I am inclined to the belief that we are
+suffering from hallucinations, which in their way are also quite natural. It
+does not seem possible that two people can really have been asleep for an
+unknown length of time enclosed in vessels of glass or crystal, kept warm by
+radium or some such substance, and then emerge from them comparatively strong
+and well. It is contrary to natural law.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How about microbes?&rdquo; I asked. &ldquo;They are said to last
+practically for ever, and they are living things. So in their case your natural
+law breaks down.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is true,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Some microbes in a sealed tube
+and under certain conditions do appear to possess indefinite powers of life.
+Also radium has an indefinite life, but that is a mineral. Only these people
+are not microbes nor are they minerals. Also, experience tells us that they
+could not have lived for more than a few months at the outside in such
+circumstances as we seemed to find them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then what do you suggest?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I suggest that we did not really find them at all; that we have all been
+dreaming. You know that there are certain gases which produce illusions,
+laughing gas is one of them, and that these gases are sometimes met with in
+caves. Now there were very peculiar odours in that place under the statue,
+which may have worked upon our imaginations in some such way. Otherwise we are
+up against a miracle, and, as you know, I do not believe in miracles.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;<i>I</i> do,&rdquo; said Bastin calmly. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll find all
+about it in the Bible if you will only take the trouble to read. Why do you
+talk such rubbish about gases?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because only gas, or something of the sort, could have made us imagine
+them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nonsense, Bickley! Those people were here right enough. Didn&rsquo;t
+they eat our fruit and drink the water I brought them without ever saying thank
+you? Only, they are not human. They are evil spirits, and for my part I
+don&rsquo;t want to see any more of them, though I have no doubt Arbuthnot
+does, as that Glittering Lady threw her arms round his neck when she woke up,
+and already he is calling her by her Christian name, if the word Christian can
+be used in connection with her. The old fellow had the impudence to tell us
+that he was a god, and it is remarkable that he should have called himself Oro,
+seeing that the devil they worship on the island is also called Oro and the
+place itself is named Orofena.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;As to where they have gone,&rdquo; continued Bickley, taking no notice
+of Bastin, &ldquo;I really don&rsquo;t know. My expectation is, however, that
+when we go to look tomorrow morning&mdash;and I suggest that we should not do
+so before then in order that we may give our minds time to clear&mdash;we shall
+find that sepulchre place quite empty, even perhaps without the crystal coffins
+we have imagined to stand there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps we shall find that there isn&rsquo;t a cave at all and that we
+are not sitting on a flat rock outside of it,&rdquo; suggested Bastin with
+heavy sarcasm, adding, &ldquo;You are clever in your way, Bickley, but you can
+talk more rubbish than any man I ever knew.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They told us they would come back tonight or tomorrow,&rdquo; I said.
+&ldquo;If they do, what will you say then, Bickley?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I will wait till they come to answer that question. Now let us go for a
+walk and try to change our thoughts. We are all over-strained and scarcely know
+what we are saying.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One more question,&rdquo; I said as we rose to start. &ldquo;Did Tommy
+suffer from hallucinations as well as ourselves?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; answered Bickley. &ldquo;He is an animal just as we are,
+or perhaps we thought we saw Tommy do the things he did.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;When you found that basket of fruit, Bastin, which the natives brought
+over in the canoe, was there a bough covered with red flowers lying on the top
+of it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Arbuthnot, one bough only; I threw it down on the rock as it got in
+the way when I was carrying the basket.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which flowering bough we all thought we saw the Sleeper Oro carry away
+after Tommy had brought it to him.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes; he made me pick it up and give it to him,&rdquo; said Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, if we did not see this it should still be lying on the rock, as
+there has been no wind and there are no animals here to carry it away. You will
+admit that, Bickley?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He nodded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then if it has gone you will admit also that the presumption is that we
+saw what we thought we did see?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not know how that conclusion can be avoided, at any rate so far as
+the incident of the bough is concerned,&rdquo; replied Bickley with caution.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, without more words, we started to look. At the spot where the bough
+should have been, there was no bough, but on the rock lay several of the red
+flowers, bitten off, I suppose, by Tommy while he was carrying it. Nor was this
+all. I think I have mentioned that the Glittering Lady wore sandals which were
+fastened with red studs that looked like rubies or carbuncles. On the rock lay
+one of these studs. I picked it up and we examined it. It had been sewn to the
+sandal-strap with golden thread or silk. Some of this substance hung from the
+hole drilled in the stone which served for an eye. It was as rotten as tinder,
+apparently with extreme age. Moreover, the hard gem itself was pitted as though
+the passage of time had taken effect upon it, though this may have been caused
+by other agencies, such as the action of the radium rays. I smiled at Bickley
+who looked disconcerted and even sad. In a way it is painful to see the effect
+upon an able and earnest man of the upsetting of his lifelong theories.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went for our walk, keeping to the flat lands at the foot of the volcano
+cone, for we seemed to have had enough of wonders and to desire to reassure
+ourselves, as it were, by the study of natural and familiar things. As it
+chanced, too, we were rewarded by sundry useful discoveries. Thus we found a
+place where the bread-tree and other fruits, most of them now ripe, grew in
+abundance, as did the yam. Also, we came to an inlet that we noticed was
+crowded with large and beautiful fish from the lake, which seemed to find it a
+favourite spot. Perhaps this was because a little stream of excellent water ran
+in here, overflowing from the great pool or mere which filled the crater above.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At these finds we rejoiced greatly, for now we knew that we need not fear
+starvation even should our supply of food from the main island be cut off.
+Indeed, by help of some palm-leaf stalks which we wove together roughly,
+Bastin, who was rather clever at this kind of thing, managed to trap four fish
+weighing two or three pounds apiece, wading into the water to do so. It was
+curious to observe with what ease he adapted himself to the manners and customs
+of primeval man, so much so, indeed, that Bickley remarked that if he could
+believe in re-incarnation, he would be absolutely certain that Bastin was a
+troglodyte in his last sojourn on the earth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+However this might be, Bastin&rsquo;s primeval instincts and abilities were of
+the utmost service to us. Before we had been many days on that island he had
+built us a kind of native hut or house roofed with palm leaves in which, until
+provided with a better, as happened afterwards, we ate and he and Bickley
+slept, leaving the tent to me. Moreover, he wove a net of palm fibre with which
+he caught abundance of fish, and made fishing-lines of the same material
+(fortunately we had some hooks) which he baited with freshwater mussels and the
+insides of fish. By means of these he secured some veritable monsters of the
+carp species that proved most excellent eating. His greatest triumph, however,
+was a decoy which he constructed of boughs, wherein he trapped a number of
+waterfowl. So that soon we kept a very good table of a sort, especially after
+he had learned how to cook our food upon the native plan by means of hot
+stones. This suited us admirably, as it enabled Bickley and myself to devote
+all our time to archaeological and other studies which did not greatly interest
+Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards evening, so we
+cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly exhausted, made ourselves as
+comfortable as we could and went to sleep. Even our marvelous experiences could
+not keep Bickley and myself from sleeping, and on Bastin such things had no
+effect. He accepted them and that was all, much more readily than we did,
+indeed. Triple-armed as he was in the mail of a child-like faith, he snapped
+his fingers at evil spirits which he supposed the Sleepers to be, and at
+everything else that other men might dread.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, as I have mentioned, after our talk with Marama, although we did not think
+it wise to adventure ourselves among them again at present, we had lost all
+fear of the Orofenans. In this attitude, so far as Marama himself and the
+majority of his people were concerned, we were quite justified, for they were
+our warm friends. But in the case of the sorcerers, the priests and all their
+rascally and superstitious brotherhood, we were by no means justified. They had
+not forgiven Bastin his sacrilege or for his undermining of their authority by
+the preaching of new doctrines which, if adopted, would destroy them as a
+hierarchy. Nor had they forgiven Bickley for shooting one of their number, or
+any of us for our escape from the vengeance of their god.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So it came about that they made a plot to seize us all and hale us off to be
+sacrificed to a substituted image of Oro, which by now they had set up. They
+knew exactly where we slept upon the rock; indeed, our fire showed it to them
+and so far they were not afraid to venture, since here they had been accustomed
+for generations to lay their offerings to the god of the Mountain. Secretly on
+the previous night, without the knowledge of Marama, they had carried two more
+canoes to the borders of the lake. Now on this night, just as the moon was
+setting about three in the morning, they made their attack, twenty-one men in
+all, for the three canoes were large, relying on the following darkness to get
+us away and convey us to the place of sacrifice to be offered up at dawn and
+before Marama could interfere.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The first we knew of the matter, for most foolishly we had neglected to keep a
+watch, was the unpleasant sensation of brawny savages kneeling on us and
+trussing us up with palm-fibre ropes. Also they thrust handfuls of dry grass
+into our mouths to prevent us from calling out, although as air came through
+the interstices of the grass, we did not suffocate. The thing was so well done
+that we never struck a blow in self-defence, and although we had our pistols at
+hand, much less could we fire a shot. Of course, we struggled as well as we
+were able, but it was quite useless; in three minutes we were as helpless as
+calves in a net and like calves were being conveyed to the butcher. Bastin
+managed to get the gag out of his mouth for a few seconds, and I heard him say
+in his slow, heavy voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This, Bickley, is what comes of trafficking with evil spirits in museum
+cases&mdash;&rdquo; There his speech stopped, for the grass wad was jammed down
+his throat again, but distinctly I heard the inarticulate Bickley snort as he
+conceived the repartee he was unable to utter. As for myself, I reflected that
+the business served us right for not keeping a watch, and abandoned the issue
+to fate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Still, to confess the truth, I was infinitely more sorry to die than I should
+have been forty-eight hours earlier. This is a dull and in most ways a dreadful
+world, one, if we could only summon the courage, that some of us would be glad
+to leave in search of new adventures. But here a great and unprecedented
+adventure had begun to befall me, and before its mystery was solved, before
+even I could formulate a theory concerning it, my body must be destroyed, and
+my intelligence that was caged therein, sent far afield; or, if Bickley were
+right, eclipsed. It seemed so sad just when the impossible, like an unguessed
+wandering moon, had risen over the grey flats of the ascertained and made them
+shine with hope and wonder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They carried us off to the canoes, not too gently; indeed, I heard the bony
+frame of Bastin bump into the bottom of one of them and reflected, not without
+venom, that it served him right as he was the fount and origin of our woes. Two
+stinking magicians, wearing on their heads undress editions of their court
+cages, since these were too cumbersome for active work of the sort, and painted
+all over with various pigments, were just about to swing me after him into the
+same, or another canoe, when something happened. I did not know what it was,
+but as a result, my captors left hold of me so that I fell to the rock, lying
+upon my back.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, within my line of vision, which, it must be remembered, was limited
+because I could not lift my head, appeared the upper part of the tall person of
+the Ancient who said that he was named Oro. I could only see him down to his
+middle, but I noted vaguely that he seemed to be much changed. For instance, he
+wore a different coloured dress, or rather robe; this time it was dark blue,
+which caused me to wonder where on earth it came from. Also, his tremendous
+beard had been trimmed and dressed, and on his head there was a simple black
+cap, strangely quilted, which looked as though it were made of velvet.
+Moreover, his face had plumped out. He still looked ancient, it is true, and
+unutterably wise, but now he resembled an antique youth, so great were his
+energy and vigour. Also, his dark and glowing eyes shone with a fearful
+intensity. In short, he seemed impressive and terrible almost beyond imagining.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He looked about him slowly, then asked in a deep, cold voice, speaking in the
+Orofenan tongue:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you, slaves?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No one seemed able to answer, they were too horror-stricken at this sudden
+vision of their fabled god, whose fierce features of wood had become flesh;
+they only turned to fly. He waved his thin hand and they came to a standstill,
+like animals which have reached the end of their tether and are checked by the
+chains that bind them. There they stood in all sorts of postures, immovable and
+looking extremely ridiculous in their paint and feathers, with dread
+unutterable stamped upon their evil faces.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The Sleeper spoke again:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You would murder as did your forefathers, O children of snakes and hogs
+fashioned in the shape of men. You would sacrifice those who dwell in my shadow
+to satisfy your hate because they are wiser than you. Come hither thou,&rdquo;
+and he beckoned with a bony finger to the chief magician.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The man advanced towards him in short jumps, as a mechanical toy might do, and
+stood before him, his miniature crate and feathers all awry and the sweat of
+terror melting the paint in streaks upon his face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look into the eyes of Oro, O worshipper of Oro,&rdquo; said the Sleeper,
+and he obeyed, his own eyes starting out of his head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Receive the curse of Oro,&rdquo; said the Ancient again. Then followed a
+terrible spectacle. The man went raving mad. He bounded into the air to a
+height inconceivable. He threw himself upon the ground and rolled upon the
+rock. He rose again and staggered round and round, tearing pieces out of his
+arms with his teeth. He yelled hideously like one possessed. He grovelled,
+beating his forehead against the rock. Then he sat up, slowly choked
+and&mdash;died.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His companions seemed to catch the infection of death as terrified savages
+often do. They too performed dreadful antics, all except three of them who
+stood paralysed. They rushed about battering each other with their fists and
+wooden weapons, looking like devils from hell in their hideous painted attire.
+They grappled and fought furiously. They separated and plunged into the lake,
+where with a last grimace they sank like stones.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It seemed to last a long while, but I think that as a matter of fact within
+five minutes it was over; they were all dead. Only the three paralysed ones
+remained standing and rolling their eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The Sleeper beckoned to them with his thin finger, and they walked forward in
+step like soldiers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Lift that man from the boat,&rdquo; he said, pointing to Bastin,
+&ldquo;cut his bonds and those of the others.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They obeyed with a wonderful alacrity. In a minute we stood at liberty and were
+pulling the grass gags from our mouths. The Ancient pointed to the head
+magician who lay dead upon the rock, his hideous, contorted countenance staring
+open-eyed at heaven.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Take that sorcerer and show him to the other sorcerers yonder,&rdquo; he
+said, &ldquo;and tell them where your fellows are if they would find them. Know
+by these signs that the Oro, god of the Mountain, who has slept a while, is
+awake, and ill will it go with them who question his power or dare to try to
+harm those who dwell in his house. Bring food day by day and await commands.
+Begone!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The dreadful-looking body was bundled into one of the canoes, that out of which
+Bastin had emerged. A rower sprang into each of them and presently was paddling
+as he had never done before. As the setting moon vanished, they vanished with
+it, and once more there was a great silence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am going to find my boots,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;This rock is
+hard and I hurt my feet kicking at those poor fellows who appear to have come
+to a bad end, how, I do not exactly understand. Personally, I think that more
+allowances should have been made for them, as I hope will be the case
+elsewhere, since after all they only acted according to their lights.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Curse their lights!&rdquo; ejaculated Bickley, feeling his throat which
+was bruised. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad they are out.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin limped away in search of his boots, but Bickley and I stood where we
+were contemplating the awakened Sleeper. All recollection of the recent
+tumultuous scene seemed to have passed from his mind, for he was engaged in a
+study of the heavens. They were wonderfully brilliant now that the moon was
+down, brilliant as they only can be in the tropics when the sky is clear.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Something caused me to look round, and there, coming towards us, was she who
+said her name was Yva. Evidently all her weakness had departed also, for now
+she needed no support, but walked with a peculiar gliding motion that reminded
+me of a swan floating forward on the water. Well had we named her the
+Glittering Lady, for in the starlight literally she seemed to glitter. I
+suppose the effect came from her golden raiment, which, however, I noticed, as
+in her father&rsquo;s case, was not the same that she had worn in the coffin;
+also from her hair that seemed to give out a light of its own. At least, she
+shimmered as she came, her tall shape swaying at every step like a willow in
+the wind. She drew near, and I saw that her face, too, had filled out and now
+was that of one in perfect health and vigour, while her eyes shone softly and
+seemed wondrous large.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In her hands she carried those two plates of metal which I had seen lying in
+the coffin of the Sleeper Oro. These she gave to him, then fell back out of his
+hearing&mdash;if it were ever possible to do this, a point on which I am not
+sure&mdash;and began to talk to me. I noted at once that in the few hours
+during which she was absent, her knowledge of the Orofenan tongue seemed to
+have improved greatly as though she had drunk deeply from some hidden fount of
+memory. Now she spoke it with readiness, as Oro had done when he addressed the
+sorcerers, although many of the words she used were not known to me, and the
+general form of her language appeared archaic, as for instance that of Spenser
+as compared with modern English. When she saw I did not comprehend her,
+however, she would stop and cast her sentences in a different shape, till at
+length I caught her meaning. Now I give the substance of what she said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are safe,&rdquo; she began, glancing first at the palm ropes that
+lay upon the rock and then at my wrists, one of which was cut.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Lady Yva, thanks to your father.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You should say thanks to me. My father was thinking of other things, but
+I was thinking of you strangers, and from where I was I saw those wicked ones
+coming to kill you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! from the top of the mountain, I suppose.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She shook her head and smiled but vouchsafed no further explanation, unless her
+following words can be so called. These were:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I can see otherwise than with my eyes, if I choose.&rdquo; A statement
+that caused Bickley, who was listening, to mutter:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Impossible! What the deuce can she mean? Telepathy, perhaps.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I saw,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;and told the Lord, my father. He
+came forth. Did he kill them? I did not look to learn.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes. They lie in the lake, all except three whom he sent away as
+messengers.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I thought so. Death is terrible, O Humphrey, but it is a sword which
+those who rule must use to smite the wicked and the savage.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Not wishing to pursue this subject, I asked her what her father was doing with
+the metal plates.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He reads the stars,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;to learn how long we
+have been asleep. Before we went to sleep he made two pictures of them, as they
+were then and as they should be at the time he had set for our
+awakening.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We set that time,&rdquo; interrupted Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not so, O Bickley,&rdquo; she answered, smiling again. &ldquo;In the
+divine Oro&rsquo;s head was the time set. You were the hand that executed his
+decree.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Bickley heard this I really thought he would have burst. However, he
+controlled himself nobly, being anxious to hear the end of this mysterious fib.
+</p>
+
+<div class="fig" style="width:100%;">
+<img src="images/fig01.jpg" width="443" height="600" alt="[Illustration]" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="fig" style="width:100%;">
+<img src="images/fig02.jpg" width="409" height="600" alt="[Illustration]" />
+</div>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How long was the time that the lord Oro set apart for sleep?&rdquo; I
+asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She paused as though puzzled to find words to express her meaning, then held up
+her hands and said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten,&rdquo; nodding at her fingers. By second thoughts she took
+Bickley&rsquo;s hands, not mine, and counted his ten fingers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten years,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;Well, of course, it is
+impossible, but perhaps&mdash;&rdquo; and he paused.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten tens,&rdquo; she went on with a deepening smile, &ldquo;one
+hundred.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;O!&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten hundreds, one thousand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I say!&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten times ten thousand, one hundred thousand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley became silent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Twice one hundred thousand and half a hundred thousand, two hundred and
+fifty thousand years. <i>That</i> was the space of time which the lord Oro, my
+father, set for our sleep. Whether it has been fulfilled he will know presently
+when he has read the book of the stars and made comparison of it with what he
+wrote before we laid us down to rest,&rdquo; and she pointed to the metal
+plates which the Ancient was studying.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley walked away, making sounds as though he were going to be ill and
+looking so absurd in his indignation that I nearly laughed. The Lady Yva
+actually did laugh, and very musical was that laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He does not believe,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;He is so clever he knows
+everything. But two hundred and fifty thousand years ago we should have thought
+him quite stupid. Then we could read the stars and calculate their movements
+for ever.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So can we,&rdquo; I answered, rather nettled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad, O Humphrey, since you will be able to show my father if in
+one of them he is wrong.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Secretly I hoped that this task would not be laid on me. Indeed, I thought it
+well to change the subject for the edification of Bickley who had recovered and
+was drawn back by his eager curiosity. Just then, too, Bastin joined us, happy
+in his regained boots.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You tell us, Lady Yva,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;that you slept, or should
+have slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years.&rdquo; Here Bastin opened
+his eyes. &ldquo;If that was so, where was your mind all this time?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If by my mind you mean spirit, O Humphrey, I have to answer that at
+present I do not know for certain. I think, however, that it dwelt elsewhere,
+perhaps in other bodies on the earth, or some different earth. At least, I know
+that my heart is very full of memories which as yet I cannot unroll and
+read.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Great heavens, this is madness!&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In the great heavens,&rdquo; she answered slowly, &ldquo;there are many
+things which you, poor man, would think to be madness, but yet are truth and
+perfect wisdom. These things, or some of them, soon I shall hope to show
+you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do if you can,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; interrupted Bastin. &ldquo;I think the lady&rsquo;s
+remarks quite reasonable. It seems to me highly improbable if really she has
+slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years, which, of course, I can&rsquo;t
+decide, that an immortal spirit would be allowed to remain idle for so long.
+That would be wallowing in a bed of idleness and shirking its duty which is to
+do its work. Also, as she tells you, Bickley, you are not half so clever as you
+think you are in your silly scepticism, and I have no doubt that there are many
+things in other worlds which would expose your ignorance, if only you could see
+them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this moment Oro turned and called his daughter. She went at once, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come, strangers, and you shall learn.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we followed her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Daughter,&rdquo; he said, speaking in Orofenan, I think that we might
+understand, &ldquo;ask these strangers to bring one of those lamps of theirs
+that by the light of it I may study these writings.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps this may serve,&rdquo; said Bickley, suddenly producing an
+electric torch from his pocket and flashing it into his face. It was his form
+of repartee for all he had suffered at the hands of this incomprehensible pair.
+Let me say at once that it was singularly successful. Perhaps the wisdom of the
+ages in which Oro flourished had overlooked so small a matter as electric
+torches, or perhaps he did not expect to meet with them in these degenerate
+days. At any rate for the first and last time in my intercourse with him I saw
+the god, or lord&mdash;the native word bears either meaning&mdash;Oro genuinely
+astonished. He started and stepped back, and for a moment or two seemed a
+little frightened. Then muttering something as to the cleverness of this
+light-producing instrument, he motioned to his daughter to take it from Bickley
+and hold it in a certain position. She obeyed, and in its illumination he began
+to study the engraved plates, holding one of them in either hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After a while he gave me one of the plates to hold, and with his disengaged
+hand pointed successively to the constellation of Orion, to the stars Castor,
+Pollux, Aldebaran, Rigel, the Pleiades, Sirius and others which with my very
+limited knowledge I could not recognise offhand. Then on the plate which I
+held, he showed us those same stars and constellations, checking them one by
+one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he remarked very quietly that all was in order, and handing the plate he
+held to Yva, said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The calculations made so long ago are correct, nor have the stars varied
+in their proper motions during what is after all but an hour of time. If you,
+Stranger, who, I understand, are named Humphrey, should be, as I gather, a
+heaven-master, naturally you will ask me how I could fix an exact date by the
+stars without an error of, let us say, from five to ten thousand years. I
+answer you that by the proper motion of the stars alone it would have been
+difficult. Therefore I remember that in order to be exact, I calculated the
+future conjunctions of those two planets,&rdquo; and he pointed to Saturn and
+Jupiter. &ldquo;Finding that one of these occurred near yonder star,&rdquo; and
+he indicated the bright orb, Spica, &ldquo;at a certain time, I determined that
+then I would awake. Behold! There are the stars as I engraved them from my
+foreknowledge, upon this chart, and there those two great planets hang in
+conjunction. Daughter Yva, my wisdom has not failed me. This world of ours has
+travelled round the sun neither less nor more than two hundred and fifty
+thousand times since we laid ourselves down to sleep. It is written here, and
+yonder,&rdquo; and he pointed, first to the engraved plates and then to the
+vast expanse of the starlit heavens.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Awe fell on me; I think that even Bickley and Bastin were awed, at any rate for
+the moment. It was a terrible thing to look on a being, to all appearance more
+or less human, who alleged that he had been asleep for two hundred and fifty
+thousand years, and proceeded to prove it by certain ancient star charts. Of
+course at the time I could not check those charts, lacking the necessary
+knowledge, but I have done so since and found that they are quite accurate.
+However this made no difference, since the circumstances and something in his
+manner convinced me that he spoke the absolute truth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He and his daughter had been asleep for two hundred and fifty thousand years.
+Oh! Heavens, <i>for two hundred and fifty thousand years!</i>
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.<br />
+Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues</h2>
+
+<p>
+The reader of what I have written, should there ever be such a person, may find
+the record marvelous, and therefore rashly conclude that because it is beyond
+experience, it could not be. It is not a wise deduction, as I think Bickley
+would admit today, because without doubt many things are which surpass our
+extremely limited experience. However, those who draw the veil from the Unknown
+and reveal the New, must expect incredulity, and accept it without grumbling.
+Was that not the fate, for instance, of those who in the Middle Ages, a few
+hundred years ago, discovered, or rather rediscovered the mighty movements of
+those constellations which served Oro for an almanac?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But the point I want to make is that if the sceptic plays a Bickleyan part as
+regards what has been written, it seems probable that his attitude will be
+accentuated as regards that which it still remains for me to write. If so, I
+cannot help it, and must decline entirely to water down or doctor facts and
+thus pander to his prejudice and ignorance. For my part I cannot attempt to
+explain these occurrences; I only know that they happened and that I set down
+what I saw, heard and felt, neither more nor less.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Immediately after Oro had triumphantly vindicated his stellar calculations he
+turned and departed into the cave, followed by his daughter, waving to us to
+remain where we were. As she passed us, however, the Glittering Lady
+whispered&mdash;this time to Bastin&mdash;that he would see them again in a few
+hours, adding:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We have much to learn and I hope that then you who, I understand, are a
+priest, will begin to teach us of your religion and other matters.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin was so astonished that he could make no reply, but when they had gone he
+said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which of you told her that I was a priest?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We shook our heads for neither of us could remember having done so.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, I did not,&rdquo; continued Bastin, &ldquo;since at present I have
+found no opportunity of saying a word in season. So I suppose she must have
+gathered it from my attire, though as a matter of fact I haven&rsquo;t been
+wearing a collar, and those men who wanted to cook me, pulled off my white tie
+and I didn&rsquo;t think it worth while dirtying a clean one.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;you imagine that you look like the
+minister of any religion ancient or modern in a grubby flannel shirt, a
+battered sun-helmet, a torn green and white umbrella and a pair of ragged duck
+trousers, you are mistaken, Bastin, that is all.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I admit that the costume is not appropriate, Bickley, but how otherwise
+could she have learned the truth?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;These people seem to have ways of learning a good many things. But in
+your case, Bastin, the cause is clear enough. You have been walking about with
+the head of that idol and always keep it close to you. No doubt they believe
+that you are a priest of the worship of the god of the Grove&mdash;Baal, you
+know, or something of that sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he heard this Bastin&rsquo;s face became a perfect picture. Never before
+did I see it so full of horror struggling with indignation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I must undeceive them without a moment&rsquo;s delay,&rdquo; he said,
+and was starting for the cave when we caught his arms and held him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Better wait till they come back, old fellow,&rdquo; I said, laughing.
+&ldquo;If you disobey that Lord Oro you may meet with another experience in the
+sacrifice line.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps you are right, Arbuthnot. I will occupy the interval in
+preparing a suitable address.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Much better occupy it in preparing breakfast,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+&ldquo;I have always noticed that you are at your best extempore.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the end he did prepare breakfast though in a <i>distrait</i> fashion; indeed
+I found him beginning to make tea in the frying-pan. Bastin felt that his
+opportunity had arrived, and was making ready to rise to the occasion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Also we felt, all three of us, that we were extremely shabby-looking objects,
+and though none of us said so, each did his best to improve his personal
+appearance. First of all Bickley cut Bastin&rsquo;s and my hair, after which I
+did him the same service. Then Bickley who was normally clean shaven, set to
+work to remove a beard of about a week&rsquo;s growth, and I who wore one of
+the pointed variety, trimmed up mine as best I could with the help of a
+hand-glass. Bastin, too, performed on his which was of the square and rather
+ragged type, wisely rejecting Bickley&rsquo;s advice to shave it off
+altogether, offered, I felt convinced, because he felt that the result on
+Bastin would be too hideous for words. After this we cut our nails, cleaned our
+teeth and bathed; I even caught Bickley applying hair tonic from his dressing
+case in secret, behind a projecting rock, and borrowed some myself. He gave it
+me on condition that I did not mention its existence to Bastin who, he
+remarked, would certainly use the lot and make himself smell horrible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next we found clean ducks among our store of spare clothes, for the Orofenans
+had brought these with our other possessions, and put them on, even adding silk
+cumberbunds and neckties. My tie I fastened with a pin that I had obtained in
+Egypt. It was a tiny gold statuette of very fine and early workmanship, of the
+god Osiris, wearing the crown of the Upper Land with the uraeus crest, and
+holding in his hands, which projected from the mummy wrappings, the emblems of
+the crook, the scourge and the <i>crux ansata</i>, or Sign of Life.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin, for his part, arrayed himself in full clerical costume, black coat and
+trousers, white tie and stick-up clergyman&rsquo;s collar which, as he
+remarked, made him feel extremely hot in that climate, and were unsuitable to
+domestic duties, such as washing-up. I offered to hold his coat while he did
+this office and told him he looked very nice indeed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Beautiful!&rdquo; remarked Bickley, &ldquo;but why don&rsquo;t you put
+on your surplice and biretta?&rdquo; (Being very High-Church Bastin did wear a
+biretta on festival Sundays at home.) &ldquo;There would be no mistake about
+you then.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not think it would be suitable,&rdquo; replied Bastin whose sense
+of humour was undeveloped. &ldquo;There is no service to be performed at
+present and no church, though perhaps that cave&mdash;&rdquo; and he stopped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we had finished these vain adornments and Bastin had put away the things
+and tidied up, we sat down, rather at a loose end. We should have liked to walk
+but refrained from doing so for fear lest we might dirty our clean clothes. So
+we just sat and thought. At least Bickley thought, and so did I for a while
+until I gave it up. What was the use of thinking, seeing that we were face to
+face with circumstances which baffled reason and beggared all recorded human
+experience? What Bastin did I am sure I do not know, but I think from the
+expression of his countenance that he was engaged in composing sermons for the
+benefit of Oro and the Glittering Lady.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One diversion we did have. About eleven o&rsquo;clock a canoe came from the
+main island laden with provisions and paddled by Marama and two of his people.
+We seized our weapons, remembering our experiences of the night, but Marama
+waved a bough in token of peace. So, carrying our revolvers, we went to the
+rock edge to meet him. He crept ashore and, chief though he was, prostrated
+himself upon his face before us, which told me that he had heard of the fate of
+the sorcerers. His apologies were abject. He explained that he had no part in
+the outrage of the attack, and besought us to intercede on behalf of him and
+his people with the awakened god of the Mountain whom he looked for with a
+terrified air.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We consoled him as well as we could, and told him that he had best be gone
+before the god of the Mountain appeared, and perhaps treated him as he had done
+the sorcerers. In his name, however, we commanded Marama to bring materials and
+build us a proper house upon the rock, also to be sure to keep up a regular and
+ample supply of provisions. If he did these things, and anything else we might
+from time to time command, we said that perhaps his life and those of his
+people would be spared. This, however, after the evil behaviour of some of them
+of course we could not guarantee.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Marama departed so thoroughly frightened that he even forgot to make any
+inquiries as to who this god of the Mountain might be, or where he came from,
+or whither he was going. Of course, the place had been sacred among his people
+from the beginning, whenever that may have been, but that its sacredness should
+materialise into an active god who brought sorcerers of the highest reputation
+to a most unpleasant end, just because they wished to translate their preaching
+into practice, was another matter. It was not to be explained even by the fact
+of which he himself had informed me, that during the dreadful storm of some
+months before, the cave mouth which previously was not visible on the volcano,
+had suddenly been lifted up above the level of the Rock of Offerings, although,
+of course, all religious and instructed persons would have expected something
+peculiar to happen after this event.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such I knew were his thoughts, but, as I have said, he was too frightened and
+too hurried to express them in questions that I should have found it extremely
+difficult to answer. As it was he departed quite uncertain as to whether one of
+us was not the real &ldquo;god of the Mountain,&rdquo; who had power to bring
+hideous death upon his molesters. After all, what had he to go on to the
+contrary, except the word of three priests who were so terrified that they
+could give no coherent account of what had happened? Of these events, it was
+true, there was evidence in the twisted carcass of their lamented high
+sorcerer, and, for the matter of that, of certain corpses which he had seen,
+that lay in shallow water at the bottom of the lake. Beyond all was vague, and
+in his heart I am sure that Marama believed that Bastin was the real &ldquo;god
+of the Mountain.&rdquo; Naturally, he would desire to work vengeance on those
+who tried to sacrifice and eat him. Moreover, had he not destroyed the image of
+the god of the Grove and borne away its head whence he had sucked magic and
+power?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus argued Marama, disbelieving the tale of the frightened sorcerers, for he
+admitted as much to me in after days.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Marama departed in a great hurry, fearing lest the &ldquo;god of the
+Mountain,&rdquo; or Bastin, whose new and splendid garb he regarded with much
+suspicion, might develop some evil energy against him. Then we went back to our
+camp, leaving the industrious Bastin, animated by a suggestion from Bickley
+that the fruit and food might spoil if left in the sun, to carry it into the
+shade of the cave. Owing to the terrors of the Orofenans the supply was so
+large that to do this he must make no fewer than seven journeys, which he did
+with great good will since Bastin loved physical exercise. The result on his
+clerical garments, however, was disastrous. His white tie went awry, squashed
+fruit and roast pig gravy ran down his waistcoat and trousers, and his high
+collar melted into limp crinkles in the moisture engendered by the tropical
+heat. Only his long coat escaped, since that Bickley kindly carried for him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was just as he arrived with the seventh load in this extremely dishevelled
+condition that Oro and his daughter emerged from the cave. Indeed Bastin, who,
+being shortsighted, always wore spectacles that, owing to his heated state were
+covered with mist, not seeing that dignitary, dumped down the last basket on to
+his toes, exclaiming:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There, you lazy beggar, I told you I would bring it all, and I
+have.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In fact he thought he was addressing Bickley and playing off on him a
+troglodytic practical joke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro, however, who at his age did not appreciate jokes, resented it and was
+about to do something unpleasant when with extraordinary tact his daughter
+remarked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin the priest makes you offerings. Thank him, O Lord my
+father.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So Oro thanked him, not too cordially for evidently he still had feeling in his
+toes, and once more Bastin escaped. Becoming aware of his error, he began to
+apologise profusely in English, while the lady Yva studied him carefully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is that the costume of the priests of your religion, O Bastin?&rdquo;
+she asked, surveying his dishevelled form. &ldquo;If so, you were better
+without it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Bastin retired to straighten his tie, and grabbing his coat from Bickley,
+who handed it to him with a malicious smile, forced his perspiring arms into it
+in a peculiarly awkward and elephantine fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Meanwhile Bickley and I produced two camp chairs which we had made ready, and
+on these the wondrous pair seated themselves side by side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We have come to learn,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;Teach!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not so, Father,&rdquo; interrupted Yva, who, I noted, was clothed in yet
+a third costume, though whence these came I could not imagine. &ldquo;First I
+would ask a question. Whence are you, Strangers, and how came you here?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We are from the country called England and a great storm shipwrecked us
+here; that, I think, which raised the mouth of the cave above the level of this
+rock,&rdquo; I answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The time appointed having come when it should be raised,&rdquo; said Oro
+as though to himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where is England?&rdquo; asked Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now among the books we had with us was a pocket atlas, quite a good one of its
+sort. By way of answer I opened it at the map of the world and showed her
+England. Also I showed, to within a thousand miles or so, that spot on the
+earth&rsquo;s surface where we spoke together.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The sight of this atlas excited the pair greatly. They had not the slightest
+difficulty in understanding everything about it and the shape of the world with
+its division into hemispheres seemed to be quite familiar to them. What
+appeared chiefly to interest them, and especially Oro, were the relative areas
+and positions of land and sea.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of this, Strangers,&rdquo; he said, pointing to the map, &ldquo;I shall
+have much to say to you when I have studied the pictures of your book and
+compared them with others of my own.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So he has got maps,&rdquo; said Bickley in English, &ldquo;as well as
+star charts. I wonder where he keeps them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;With his clothes, I expect,&rdquo; suggested Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Meanwhile Oro had hidden the atlas in his ample robe and motioned to his
+daughter to proceed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why do you come here from England so far away?&rdquo; the Lady Yva
+asked, a question to which each of us had an answer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To see new countries,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because the cyclone brought us,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To convert the heathen to my own Christian religion,&rdquo; said Bastin,
+which was not strictly true.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was on this last reply that she fixed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What does your religion teach?&rdquo; she asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It teaches that those who accept it and obey its commands will live
+again after death for ever in a better world where is neither sorrow nor
+sin,&rdquo; he answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a new thought and
+look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who are the heathen?&rdquo; Yva asked again after a pause, for she also
+seemed to be impressed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All who do not agree with Bastin&rsquo;s spiritual views,&rdquo;
+answered Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness of heart,
+do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose that your father and you
+are heathen,&rdquo; replied Bastin stoutly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This seemed to astonish them, but presently Yva caught his meaning and smiled,
+while Oro said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of this great matter of faith we will talk later. It is an old question
+in the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why,&rdquo; went on Yva, &ldquo;if you wished to travel so far did you
+come in a ship that so easily is wrecked? Why did you not journey through the
+air, or better still, pass through space, leaving your bodies asleep, as, being
+instructed, doubtless you can do?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;As regards your first question,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;there are no
+aircraft known that can make so long a journey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And as regards the second,&rdquo; broke in Bickley, &ldquo;we did not do
+so because it is impossible for men to transfer themselves to other places
+through space either with or without their bodies.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this information the Glittering Lady lifted her arched eyebrows and smiled a
+little, while Oro said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I perceive that the new world has advanced but a little way on the road
+of knowledge.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Fearing that Bastin was about to commence an argument, I began to ask questions
+in my turn.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Lord Oro and Lady Yva,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;we have told you something
+of ourselves and will tell you more when you desire it. But pardon us if first
+we pray you to tell us what we burn to know. Who are you? Of what race and
+country? And how came it that we found you sleeping yonder?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If it be your pleasure, answer, my Father,&rdquo; said Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro thought a moment, then replied in a calm voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am a king who once ruled most of the world as it was in my day, though
+it is true that much of it rebelled against me, my councillors and servants.
+Therefore I destroyed the world as it was then, save only certain portions
+whence life might spread to the new countries that I raised up. Having done
+this I put myself and my daughter to sleep for a space of two hundred and fifty
+thousand years, that there might be time for fresh civilisations to arise. Now
+I begin to think that I did not allot a sufficiency of ages, since I perceive
+from what you tell me, that the learning of the new races is as yet but
+small.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley and I looked at each other and were silent. Mentally we had collapsed.
+Who could begin to discuss statements built upon such a foundation of gigantic
+and paralysing falsehoods?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Well, Bastin could for one. With no more surprise in his voice than if he were
+talking about last night&rsquo;s dinner, he said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There must be a mistake somewhere, or perhaps I misunderstand you. It is
+obvious that you, being a man, could not have destroyed the world. That could
+only be done by the Power which made it and you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I trembled for the results of Bastin&rsquo;s methods of setting out the truth.
+To my astonishment, however, Oro replied:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You speak wisely, Priest, but the Power you name may use instruments to
+accomplish its decrees. I am such an instrument.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Quite so,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;just like anybody else. You have
+more knowledge of the truth than I thought. But pray, how did you destroy the
+world?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Using my wisdom to direct the forces that are at work in the heart of
+this great globe, I drowned it with a deluge, causing one part to sink and
+another to rise, also changes of climate which completed the work.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s quite right,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin delightedly. &ldquo;We
+know all about the Deluge, only <i>you</i> are not mentioned in connection with
+the matter. A man, Noah, had to do with it when he was six hundred years
+old.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Six hundred?&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;That is not very old. I myself had
+seen more than a thousand years when I lay down to sleep.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A thousand!&rdquo; remarked Bastin, mildly interested. &ldquo;That is
+unusual, though some of these mighty men of renown we know lived over nine
+hundred.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here Bickley snorted and exclaimed:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nine hundred moons, he means.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I did not know Noah,&rdquo; went on Oro. &ldquo;Perhaps he lived after
+my time and caused some other local deluge. Is there anything else you wish to
+ask me before I leave you that I may study this map writing?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;Why were you allowed to drown your
+world?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because it was evil, Priest, and disobeyed me and the Power I
+serve.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! thank you,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;that fits in exactly. It was
+just the same in Noah&rsquo;s time.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I pray that it is not just the same now,&rdquo; said Oro, rising.
+&ldquo;To-morrow we will return, or if I do not who have much that I must do,
+the lady my daughter will return and speak with you further.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He departed into the cave, Yva following at a little distance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I accompanied her as far as the mouth of the cave, as did Tommy, who all this
+time had been sitting contentedly upon the hem of her gorgeous robe, quite
+careless of its immemorial age, if it was immemorial and not woven yesterday, a
+point on which I had no information.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Lady Yva,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;did I rightly understand the Lord Oro to
+say that he was a thousand years old?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, O Humphrey, and really he is more, or so I think.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then are you a thousand years old also?&rdquo; I asked, aghast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she replied, shaking her head, &ldquo;I am young, quite
+young, for I do not count my time of sleep.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Certainly you look it,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;But what, Lady Yva, do you
+mean by young?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She answered my question by another.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What age are your women when they are as I am?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;None of our women were ever quite like you, Lady Yva. Yet, say from
+twenty-five to thirty years of age.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ah! I have been counting and now I remember. When my father sent me to
+sleep I was twenty-seven years old. No, I will not deceive you, I was
+twenty-seven years and three moons.&rdquo; Then, saying something to the effect
+that she would return, she departed, laughing a little in a mischievous way,
+and, although I did not observe this till afterwards, Tommy departed with her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I repeated what she had said to Bastin and Bickley, who were standing at a
+distance straining their ears and somewhat aggrieved, the former remarked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If she is twenty-seven her father must have married late in life, though
+of course it may have been a long while before he had children.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while, went off like a
+bomb.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you tell us, Bastin,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;that you believe one
+word of all this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan being a
+thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the rest?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it at
+present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept warm by a
+pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of the constellations at
+the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do most things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Even cause the Deluge,&rdquo; jeered Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know about <i>the</i> Deluge, but perhaps he may have been
+permitted to cause a deluge. Why not? You can&rsquo;t look at things from far
+enough off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you, you conclude that
+therefore it is impossible. The same Power which gives you skill to succeed in
+an operation, that hitherto was held impracticable, as I know you have done
+once or twice, may have given that old fellow power to cause a deluge. You
+should measure the universe and its possibilities by worlds and not by acres,
+Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And believe, I suppose, that a man can live a thousand years, whereas we
+know well that he cannot live more than about a hundred.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You don&rsquo;t <i>know</i> anything of the sort, Bickley. All you know
+is that over the brief period of history with which we are acquainted, say ten
+thousand years at most, men have only lived to about a hundred. But the very
+rocks which you are so fond of talking about, tell us that even this planet is
+millions upon millions of years of age. Who knows then but that at some time in
+its history, men did not live for a thousand years, and that lost civilisations
+did not exist of which this Oro and his daughter may be two survivors?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is no proof of anything of the sort,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know about proof, as you understand it, though I have read
+in Plato of a continent called Atlantis that was submerged, according to the
+story of old Egyptian priests. But personally I have every proof, for it is all
+written down in the Bible at which you turn up your nose, and I am very glad
+that I have been lucky enough to come across this unexpected confirmation of
+the story. Not that it matters much, since I should have learned all about it
+when it pleases Providence to remove me to a better world, which in our
+circumstances may happen any day. Now I must change my clothes before I see to
+the cooking and other things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am bound to admit,&rdquo; said Bickley, looking after him, &ldquo;that
+old Bastin is not so stupid as he seems. From his point of view the arguments
+he advances are quite logical. Moreover I think he is right when he says that
+we look at things through the wrong end of the telescope. After all the
+universe is very big and who knows what may happen there? Who knows even what
+may have happened on this little earth during the æons of its existence,
+whenever its balance chanced to shift, as the Ice Ages show us it has often
+done? Still I believe that old Oro to be a Prince of Liars.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That remains to be proved,&rdquo; I answered cautiously. &ldquo;All I
+know is that he is a wonderfully learned person of most remarkable appearance,
+and that his daughter is the loveliest creature I ever saw.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There I agree,&rdquo; said Bickley decidedly, &ldquo;and as brilliant as
+she is lovely. If she belongs to a past civilisation, it is a pity that it ever
+became extinct. Now let&rsquo;s go and have a nap. Bastin will call us when
+supper is ready.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.<br />
+The Under-world</h2>
+
+<p>
+That night we slept well and without fear, being quite certain that after their
+previous experience the Orofenans would make no further attempts upon us.
+Indeed our only anxiety was for Tommy, whom we could not find when the time
+came to give him his supper. Bastin, however, seemed to remember having seen
+him following the Glittering Lady into the cave. This, of course, was possible,
+as certainly he had taken an enormous fancy to her and sat himself down as
+close to her as he could on every occasion. He even seemed to like the ancient
+Oro, and was not afraid to jump up and plant his dirty paws upon that terrific
+person&rsquo;s gorgeous robe. Moreover Oro liked him, for several times I
+observed him pat the dog upon the head; as I think I have said, the only human
+touch that I had perceived about him. So we gave up searching and calling in
+the hope that he was safe with our supernatural friends.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next morning quite early the Lady Yva appeared alone; no, not alone, for
+with her came our lost Tommy looking extremely spry and well at ease. The
+faithless little wretch just greeted us in a casual fashion and then went and
+sat by Yva. In fact when the awkward Bastin managed to stumble over the end of
+her dress Tommy growled at him and showed his teeth. Moreover the dog was
+changed. He was blessed with a shiny black coat, but now this coat sparkled in
+the sunlight, like the Lady Yva&rsquo;s hair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Glittering Lady is all very well, but I&rsquo;m not sure that I care
+for a glittering dog. It doesn&rsquo;t look quite natural,&rdquo; said Bastin,
+contemplating him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why does Tommy shine, Lady?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because I washed him in certain waters that we have, so that now he
+looks beautiful and smells sweet,&rdquo; she answered, laughing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was true, the dog did smell sweet, which I may add had not always been the
+case with him, especially when there were dead fish about. Also he appeared to
+have been fed, for he turned up his nose at the bits we had saved for his
+breakfast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He has drunk of the Life-water,&rdquo; explained Yva, &ldquo;and will
+want no food for two days.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked incredulous.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You do not believe, O Bickley,&rdquo; she said, studying him gravely.
+&ldquo;Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I tell you many
+lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He is not sure; he thinks to
+himself, I will wait and find out whether or no these funny people cheat
+me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were contrary to
+experience, also that Tommy in a general way was rather a greedy little dog.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You, too, like to eat, Bickley&rdquo; (this was true, he had an
+excellent appetite), &ldquo;but when you have drunk the Life-water you will
+care much less.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad to hear it,&rdquo; interrupted Bastin, &ldquo;for Bickley
+wants a lot of cooking done, and I find it tedious.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You eat also, Lady,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, I eat sometimes because I like it, but I can go weeks and not eat,
+when I have the Life-water. Just now, after so long a sleep, I am hungry.
+Please give me some of that fruit. No, not the flesh, flesh I hate.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We handed it to her. She took two plantains, peeled and ate them with
+extraordinary grace. Indeed she reminded me, I do not know why, of some lovely
+butterfly drawing its food from a flower.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While she ate she observed us closely; nothing seemed to escape the quick
+glances of those beautiful eyes. Presently she said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What, O Humphrey, is that with which you fasten your neckdress?&rdquo;
+and she pointed to the little gold statue of Osiris that I used as a pin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I told her that it was a statuette of a god named Osiris and very, very
+ancient, probably quite five thousand years old, a statement at which she
+smiled a little; also that it came from Egypt.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;is it so? I asked because we have
+figures that are very like to that one, and they also hold in their hands a
+staff surmounted by a loop. They are figures of Sleep&rsquo;s
+brother&mdash;Death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So is this,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;Among the Egyptians Osiris was the god
+of Death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She nodded and replied that doubtless the symbol had come down to them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One day you shall take me to see this land which you call so very old.
+Or I will take you, which would be quicker,&rdquo; she added.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We all bowed and said we should be delighted. Even Bastin appeared anxious to
+revisit Egypt in such company, though when he was there it seemed to bore him.
+But what she meant about taking us I could not guess. Nor had we time to ask
+her, for she went on, watching our faces as she spoke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lord Oro sends you a message, Strangers. He asks whether it is your
+wish to see where we dwell. He adds that you are not to come if you do not
+desire, or if you fear danger.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We all answered that there was nothing we should like better, but Bastin added
+that he had already seen the tomb.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you think, Bastin, that we live in a tomb because we slept there for
+a while, awaiting the advent of you wanderers at the appointed hour?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t see where else it could be, unless it is further down that
+cave,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;The top of the mountain would not be
+convenient as a residence.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It has not been convenient for many an age, for reasons that I will show
+you. Think now, before you come. You have naught to fear from us, and I believe
+that no harm will happen to you. But you will see many strange things that will
+anger Bickley because he cannot understand them, and perhaps will weary Bastin
+because his heart turns from what is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey will
+rejoice in them because the doors of his soul are open and he longs&mdash;what
+do you long for, Humphrey?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That which I have lost and fear I shall never find again,&rdquo; I
+answered boldly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know that you have lost many things&mdash;last night, for instance,
+you lost Tommy, and when he slept with me he told me much about you
+and&mdash;others.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This is ridiculous,&rdquo; broke in Bastin. &ldquo;Can a dog
+talk?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Everything can talk, if you understand its language, Bastin. But keep a
+good heart, Humphrey, for the bold seeker finds in the end. Oh! foolish man, do
+you not understand that all is yours if you have but the soul to conceive and
+the will to grasp? All, all, below, between, above! Even I know that, I who
+have so much to learn.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So she spoke and became suddenly magnificent. Her face which had been but that
+of a super-lovely woman, took on grandeur. Her bosom swelled; her presence
+radiated some subtle power, much as her hair radiated light.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In a moment it was gone and she was smiling and jesting.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Will you come, Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go, down to the
+Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun? Perhaps you will do better to
+stay here in the sun, for the Under-world has terrors for weak hearts that were
+born but yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble in the dark.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I shall take my electric torch,&rdquo; said Bastin with decision,
+&ldquo;and I advise you fellows to do the same. I always hated cellars, and the
+catacombs at Rome are worse, though full of sacred interest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we started, Tommy frisking on ahead in a most provoking way as though he
+were bored by a visit to a strange house and going home, and Yva gliding
+forward with a smile upon her face that was half mystic and half mischievous.
+We passed the remains of the machines, and Bickley asked her what they were.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Carriages in which once we travelled through the skies, until we found a
+better way, and that the uninstructed used till the end,&rdquo; she answered
+carelessly, leaving me wondering what on earth she meant.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to the statue and the sepulchre beneath without trouble, for the glint
+of her hair, and I may add of Tommy&rsquo;s back, were quite sufficient to
+guide us through the gloom. The crystal coffins were still there, for Bastin
+flashed his torch and we saw them, but the boxes of radium had gone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let that light die,&rdquo; she said to Bastin. &ldquo;Humphrey, give me
+your right hand and give your left to Bickley. Let Bastin cling to him and fear
+nothing.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed to the end of the tomb and stood against what appeared to be a rock
+wall, all close together, as she directed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Fear nothing,&rdquo; she said again, but next second I was never more
+full of fear in my life, for we were whirling downwards at a speed that would
+have made an American elevator attendant turn pale.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t choke me,&rdquo; I heard Bickley say to Bastin, and the
+latter&rsquo;s murmured reply of:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I never could bear these moving staircases and tubelifts. They always
+make me feel sick.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I admit that for my part I also felt rather sick and clung tightly to the hand
+of the Glittering Lady. She, however, placed her other hand upon my shoulder,
+saying in a low voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Did I not tell you to have no fear?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I felt comforted, for somehow I knew that it was not her desire to harm
+and much less to destroy me. Also Tommy was seated quite at his ease with his
+head resting against my leg, and his absence of alarm was reassuring. The only
+stoic of the party was Bickley. I have no doubt that he was quite as frightened
+as we were, but rather than show it he would have died.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I presume this machinery is pneumatic,&rdquo; he began when suddenly and
+without shock, we arrived at the end of our journey. How far we had fallen I am
+sure I do not know, but I should judge from the awful speed at which we
+travelled, that it must have been several thousand feet, probably four or five.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Everything seems steady now,&rdquo; remarked Bastin, &ldquo;so I suppose
+this luggage lift has stopped. The odd thing is that I can&rsquo;t see anything
+of it. There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be standing on a level
+floor.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The odd thing is,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;that we can see at all.
+Where the devil does the light come from thousands of feet underground?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; answered Bastin, &ldquo;unless there is
+natural gas here, as I am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in
+Canada.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Natural gas be blowed,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;It is more like
+moonlight magnified ten times.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So it was. The whole place was filled with a soft radiance, equal to that of
+the sun at noon, but gentler and without heat.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where does it come from?&rdquo; I whispered to Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; she replied, as I thought evasively. &ldquo;It is the light
+of the Under-world which we know how to use. The earth is full of light, which
+is not wonderful, is it, seeing that its heart is fire? Now look about
+you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked and leant on her harder than ever, since amazement made me weak. We
+were in some vast place whereof the roof seemed almost as far off as the sky at
+night. At least all that I could make out was a dim and distant arch which
+might have been one of cloud. For the rest, in every direction stretched
+vastness, illuminated far as the eye could reach by the soft light of which I
+have spoken, that is, probably for several miles. But this vastness was not
+empty. On the contrary it was occupied by a great city. There were streets much
+wider than Piccadilly, all bordered by houses, though these, I observed, were
+roofless, very fine houses, some of them, built of white stone or marble. There
+were roadways and pavements worn by the passage of feet. There, farther on,
+were market-places or public squares, and there, lastly, was a huge central
+enclosure one or two hundred acres in extent, which was filled with majestic
+buildings that looked like palaces, or town-halls; and, in the midst of them
+all, a vast temple with courts and a central dome. For here, notwithstanding
+the lack of necessity, its builders seemed to have adhered to the Over-world
+tradition, and had roofed their fane.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And now came the terror. All of this enormous city was <i>dead</i>. Had it
+stood upon the moon it could not have been more dead. None paced its streets;
+none looked from its window-places. None trafficked in its markets, none
+worshipped in its temple. Swept, garnished, lighted, practically untouched by
+the hand of Time, here where no rains fell and no winds blew, it was yet a
+howling wilderness. For what wilderness is there to equal that which once has
+been the busy haunt of men? Let those who have stood among the buried cities of
+Central Asia, or of Anarajapura in Ceylon, or even amid the ruins of Salamis on
+the coast of Cyprus, answer the question. But here was something infinitely
+more awful. A huge human haunt in the bowels of the earth utterly devoid of
+human beings, and yet as perfect as on the day when these ceased to be.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not care for underground localities,&rdquo; remarked Bastin, his
+gruff voice echoing strangely in that terrible silence, &ldquo;but it does seem
+a pity that all these fine buildings should be wasted. I suppose their
+inhabitants left them in search of fresh air.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why did they leave them?&rdquo; I asked of Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because death took them,&rdquo; she answered solemnly. &ldquo;Even those
+who live a thousand years die at last, and if they have no children, with them
+dies the race.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then were you the last of your people?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Inquire of my father,&rdquo; she replied, and led the way through the
+massive arch of a great building.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It led into a walled courtyard in the centre of which was a plain cupola of
+marble with a gate of some pale metal that looked like platinum mixed with
+gold. This gate stood open. Within it was the statue of a woman beautifully
+executed in white marble and set in a niche of some black stone. The figure was
+draped as though to conceal the shape, and the face was stern and majestic
+rather than beautiful. The eyes of the statue were cunningly made of some
+enamel which gave them a strange and lifelike appearance. They stared upwards
+as though looking away from the earth and its concerns. The arms were
+outstretched. In the right hand was a cup of black marble, in the left a
+similar cup of white marble. From each of these cups trickled a thin stream of
+sparkling water, which two streams met and mingled at a distance of about three
+feet beneath the cups. Then they fell into a metal basin which, although it
+must have been quite a foot thick, was cut right through by their constant
+impact, and apparently vanished down some pipe beneath. Out of this metal basin
+Tommy, who gambolled into the place ahead of us, began to drink in a greedy and
+demonstrative fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Life-water?&rdquo; I said, looking at our guide.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She nodded and asked in her turn:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is the statue and what does it signify, Humphrey?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I hesitated, but Bastin answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Just a rather ugly woman who hid up her figure because it was bad.
+Probably she was a relation of the artist who wished to have her likeness done
+and sat for nothing.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The goddess of Health,&rdquo; suggested Bickley. &ldquo;Her proportions
+are perfect; a robust, a thoroughly normal woman.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now, Humphrey,&rdquo; said Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I stared at the work and had not an idea. Then it flashed on me with such
+suddenness and certainty that I am convinced the answer to the riddle was
+passed to me from her and did not originate in my own mind.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It seems quite easy,&rdquo; I said in a superior tone. &ldquo;The figure
+symbolises Life and is draped because we only see the face of Life, the rest is
+hidden. The arms are bare because Life is real and active. One cup is black and
+one is white because Life brings both good and evil gifts; that is why the
+streams mingle, to be lost beneath in the darkness of death. The features are
+stern and even terrifying rather than lovely, because such is the aspect of
+Life. The eyes look upward and far away from present things, because the real
+life is not here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course one may say anything,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;but I
+don&rsquo;t understand all that.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Imagination goes a long way,&rdquo; broke in Bickley, who was vexed that
+he had not thought of this interpretation himself. But Yva said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I begin to think that you are quite clever, Humphrey. I wonder whence
+the truth came to you, for such is the meaning of the figure and the cups. Had
+I told it to you myself, it could not have been better said,&rdquo; and she
+glanced at me out of the corners of her eyes. &ldquo;Now, Strangers, will you
+drink? Once that gate was guarded, and only at a great price or as a great
+reward were certain of the Highest Blood given the freedom of this fountain
+which might touch no common lips. Indeed it was one of the causes of our last
+war, for all the world which was, desired this water which now is lapped by a
+stranger&rsquo;s hound.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I suppose there is nothing medicinal in it?&rdquo; said Bastin.
+&ldquo;Once when I was very thirsty, I made a mistake and drank three tumblers
+of something of the sort in the dark, thinking that it was Apollinaris, and I
+don&rsquo;t want to do it again.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Just the sort of thing you would do,&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;But,
+Lady Yva, what are the properties of this water?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is very health-giving,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;and if drunk
+continually, not less than once each thirty days, it wards off sickness,
+lessens hunger and postpones death for many, many years. That is why those of
+the High Blood endured so long and became the rulers of the world, and that, as
+I have said, is the greatest of the reasons why the peoples who dwelt in the
+ancient outer countries and never wished to die, made war upon them, to win
+this secret fountain. Have no fear, O Bastin, for see, I will pledge you in
+this water.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she lifted a strange-looking, shallow, metal cup whereof the handles were
+formed of twisted serpents, that lay in the basin, filled it from the trickling
+stream, bowed to us and drank. But as she drank I noted with a thrill of joy
+that her eyes were fixed on mine as though it were me she pledged and me alone.
+Again she filled the cup with the sparkling water, for it did sparkle, like
+that French liqueur in which are mingled little flakes of gold, and handed it
+to me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I bowed to her and drank. I suppose the fluid was water, but to me it tasted
+more like strong champagne, dashed with Château Yquem. It was delicious. More,
+its effects were distinctly peculiar. Something quick and subtle ran through my
+veins; something that for a few moments seemed to burn away the obscureness
+which blurs our thought. I began to understand several problems that had
+puzzled me, and then lost their explanations in the midst of light, inner
+light, I mean. Moreover, of a sudden it seemed to me as though a window had
+been opened in the heart of that Glittering Lady who stood beside me. At least
+I knew that it was full of wonderful knowledge, wonderful memories and
+wonderful hopes, and that in the latter two of these I had some part; what part
+I could not tell. Also I knew that my heart was open to her and that she saw in
+it something which caused her to marvel and to sigh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In a few seconds, thirty perhaps, all this was gone. Nothing remained except
+that I felt extremely strong and well, happier, too, than I had been for years.
+Mutely I asked her for more of the water, but she shook her head and, taking
+the cup from me, filled it again and gave it to Bickley, who drank. He flushed,
+seemed to lose the self-control which was his very strong characteristic, and
+said in a rather thick voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Curious! but I do not think at this moment there is any operation that
+has ever been attempted which I could not tackle single-handed and with
+success.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he was silent, and Bastin&rsquo;s turn came. He drank rather noisily,
+after his fashion, and began:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My dear young lady, I think the time has come when I should expound to
+you&mdash;&rdquo; Here he broke off and commenced singing very badly, for his
+voice was somewhat raucous:
+</p>
+
+<p class="poem">
+From Greenland&rsquo;s icy mountains,<br />
+From India&rsquo;s coral strand,<br />
+Where Afric&rsquo;s sunny fountains<br />
+Roll down their golden sand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Ceasing from melody, he added:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I determined that I would drink nothing intoxicating while I was on this
+island that I might be a shining light in a dark place, and now I fear that
+quite unwittingly I have broken what I look upon as a promise.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he, too, grew silent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said Yva, &ldquo;my father, the Lord Oro, awaits
+you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We crossed the court of the Water of Life and mounted steps that led to a wide
+and impressive portico, Tommy frisking ahead of us in a most excited way for a
+dog of his experience. Evidently the water had produced its effect upon him as
+well as upon his masters. This portico was in a solemn style of architecture
+which I cannot describe, because it differed from any other that I know. It was
+not Egyptian and not Greek, although its solidity reminded me of the former,
+and the beauty and grace of some of the columns, of the latter. The profuseness
+and rather grotesque character of the carvings suggested the ruins of Mexico
+and Yucatan, and the enormous size of the blocks of stone, those of Peru and
+Baalbec. In short, all the known forms of ancient architecture might have found
+their inspiration here, and the general effect was tremendous.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The palace of the King,&rdquo; said Yva, &ldquo;whereof we approach the
+great hall.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We entered through mighty metal doors, one of which stood ajar, into a
+vestibule which from certain indications I gathered had once been a guard, or
+perhaps an assembly-room. It was about forty feet deep by a hundred wide.
+Thence she led us through a smaller door into the hall itself. It was a vast
+place without columns, for there was no roof to support. The walls of marble or
+limestone were sculptured like those of Egyptian temples, apparently with
+battle scenes, though of this I am not sure for I did not go near to them.
+Except for a broad avenue along the middle, up which we walked, the area was
+filled with marble benches that would, I presume, have accommodated several
+thousand people. But they were empty&mdash;empty, and oh! the loneliness of it
+all.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Far away at the head of the hall was a dais enclosed, and, as it were, roofed
+in by a towering structure that mingled grace and majesty to a wonderful
+degree. It was modelled on the pattern of a huge shell. The base of the shell
+was the platform; behind were the ribs, and above, the overhanging lip of the
+shell. On this platform was a throne of silvery metal. It was supported on the
+arched coils of snakes, whereof the tails formed the back and the heads the
+arms of the throne.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On this throne, arrayed in gorgeous robes, sat the Lord Oro, his white beard
+flowing over them, and a jewelled cap upon his head. In front of him was a low
+table on which lay graven sheets of metal, and among them a large ball of
+crystal.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There he sat, solemn and silent in the midst of this awful solitude, looking in
+very truth like a god, as we conceive such a being to appear. Small as he was
+in that huge expanse of buildings, he seemed yet to dominate it, in a sense to
+fill the emptiness which was accentuated by his presence. I know that the sight
+of him filled me with true fear which it had never done in the light of day,
+not even when he arose from his crystal coffin. Now for the first time I felt
+as though I were really in the presence of a Being Supernatural. Doubtless the
+surroundings heightened this impression. What were these mighty edifices in the
+bowels of the world? Whence came this wondrous, all-pervading and translucent
+light, whereof we could see no origin? Whither had vanished those who had
+reared and inhabited them? How did it happen that of them all, this man, if he
+were a man; and this lovely woman at my side, who, if I might trust my senses
+and instincts, was certainly a woman, alone survived of their departed
+multitudes?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The thing was crushing. I looked at Bickley for encouragement, but got none,
+for he only shook his head. Even Bastin, now that the first effects of the
+Life-water had departed, seemed overwhelmed, and muttered something about the
+halls of Hades.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Only the little dog Tommy remained quite cheerful. He trotted down the hall,
+jumped on to the dais and sat himself comfortably at the feet of its occupant.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I greet you,&rdquo; Oro said in his slow, resonant voice.
+&ldquo;Daughter, lead these strangers to me; I would speak with them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap15"></a>CHAPTER XV.<br />
+Oro in His House</h2>
+
+<p>
+We climbed on to the dais by some marble steps, and sat ourselves down in four
+curious chairs of metal that were more or less copied from that which served
+Oro as a throne; at least the arms ended in graven heads of snakes. These
+chairs were so comfortable that I concluded the seats were fixed on springs,
+also we noticed that they were beautifully polished.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder how they keep everything so clean,&rdquo; said Bastin as we
+mounted the dais. &ldquo;In this big place it must take a lot of housemaids,
+though I don&rsquo;t see any. But perhaps there is no dust here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I shrugged my shoulders while we seated ourselves, the Lady Yva and I on
+Oro&rsquo;s right, Bickley and Bastin on his left, as he indicated by pointing
+with his finger.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What say you of this city?&rdquo; Oro asked after a while of me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We do not know what to say,&rdquo; I replied. &ldquo;It amazes us. In
+our world there is nothing like to it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perchance there will be in the future when the nations grow more skilled
+in the arts of war,&rdquo; said Oro darkly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be pleased, Lord Oro,&rdquo; I went on, &ldquo;if it is your will, to
+tell us why the people who built this place chose to live in the bowels of the
+earth instead of upon its surface.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They did not choose; it was forced upon them,&rdquo; was the answer.
+&ldquo;This is a city of refuge that they occupied in time of war, not because
+they hated the sun. In time of peace and before the Barbarians dared to attack
+them, they dwelt in the city Pani which signifies Above. You may have noted
+some of its remaining ruins on the mount and throughout the island. The rest of
+them are now beneath the sea. But when trouble came and the foe rained fire on
+them from the air, they retreated to this town, Nyo, which signifies
+Beneath.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And then?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And then they died. The Water of Life may prolong life, but it cannot
+make women bear children. That they will only do beneath the blue of heaven,
+not deep in the belly of the world where Nature never designed that they should
+dwell. How would the voices of children sound in such halls as these? Tell me,
+you, Bickley, who are a physician.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot. I cannot imagine children in such a place, and if born here
+they would die,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro nodded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They did die, and if they went above to Pani they were murdered. So soon
+the habit of birth was lost and the Sons of Wisdom perished one by one. Yes,
+they who ruled the world and by tens of thousands of years of toil had gathered
+into their bosoms all the secrets of the world, perished, till only a few, and
+among them I and this daughter of mine, were left.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And then?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then, Humphrey, having power so to do, I did what long I had threatened,
+and unchained the forces that work at the world&rsquo;s heart, and destroyed
+them who were my enemies and evil, so that they perished by millions, and with
+them all their works. Afterwards we slept, leaving the others, our subjects who
+had not the secret of this Sleep, to die, as doubtless they did in the course
+of Nature or by the hand of the foe. The rest you know.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Can such a thing happen again?&rdquo; asked Bickley in a voice that did
+not hide his disbelief.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why do you question me, Bickley, you who believe nothing of what I tell
+you, and therefore make wrath? Still I will say this, that what I caused to
+happen I can cause once more&mdash;only once, I think&mdash;as perchance you
+shall learn before all is done. Now, since you do not believe, I will tell you
+no more of our mysteries, no, not whence this light comes nor what are the
+properties of the Water of Life, both of which you long to know, nor how to
+preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave of dreamless sleep, like a live
+jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor aught else. As to these matters, Daughter,
+I bid you also to be silent, since Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this
+around him, he who saw us rise from the coffins, still mocks at us in his
+heart. Therefore let him, this little man of a little day, when his few years
+are done go to the tomb in ignorance, and his companions with him, they who
+might have been as wise as I am.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus Oro spoke in a voice of icy rage, his deep eyes glowing like coals.
+Hearing him I cursed Bickley in my heart for I was sure that once spoken, his
+decree was like to that of the Medes and Persians and could not be altered.
+Bickley, however, was not in the least dismayed. Indeed he argued the point. He
+told Oro straight out that he would not believe in the impossible until it had
+been shown to him to be possible, and that the law of Nature never had been and
+never could be violated. It was no answer, he said, to show him wonders without
+explaining their cause, since all that he seemed to see might be but mental
+illusions produced he knew not how.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro listened patiently, then answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good. So be it, they are illusions. I am an illusion; those savages who
+died upon the rock will tell you so. This fair woman before you is an illusion;
+Humphrey, I am sure, knows it as you will also before you have done with her.
+These halls are illusions. Live on in your illusions, O little man of science,
+who because you see the face of things, think that you know the body and the
+heart, and can read the soul at work within. You are a worthy child of tens of
+thousands of your breed who were before you and are now forgotten.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley looked up to answer, then changed his mind and was silent, thinking
+further argument dangerous, and Oro went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now I differ from you, Bickley, in this way. I who have more wisdom in
+my finger-point than you with all the physicians of your world added to you,
+have in your brains and bodies, yet desire to learn from those who can give me
+knowledge. I understand from your words to my daughter that you, Bastin, teach
+a faith that is new to me, and that this faith tells of life eternal for the
+children of earth. Is it so?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is,&rdquo; said Bastin eagerly. &ldquo;I will set out&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro cut him short with a wave of the hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not now in the presence of Bickley who doubtless disbelieves your faith,
+as he does all else, holding it with justice or without, to be but another
+illusion. Yet you shall teach me and on it I will form my own judgment.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I shall be delighted,&rdquo; said Bastin. Then a doubt struck him, and
+he added: &ldquo;But why do you wish to learn? Not that you may make a mock of
+my religion, is it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I mock at no man&rsquo;s belief, because I think that what men believe
+is true&mdash;for them. I will tell you why I wish to hear of yours, since I
+never hide the truth. I who am so wise and old, yet must die; though that time
+may be far away, still I must die, for such is the lot of man born of woman.
+And I do not desire to die. Therefore I shall rejoice to learn of any faith
+that promises to the children of earth a life eternal beyond the earth.
+Tomorrow you shall begin to teach me. Now leave me, Strangers, for I have much
+to do,&rdquo; and he waved his hand towards the table.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We rose and bowed, wondering what he could have to do down in this luminous
+hole, he who had been for so many thousands of years out of touch with the
+world. It occurred to me, however, that during this long period he might have
+got in touch with other worlds, indeed he looked like it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Wait,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I have something to tell you. I have been
+studying this book of writings, or world pictures,&rdquo; and he pointed to my
+atlas which, as I now observed for the first time, was also lying upon the
+table. &ldquo;It interests me much. Your country is small, very small. When I
+caused it to be raised up I think that it was larger, but since then that seas
+have flowed in.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here Bickley groaned aloud.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This one is much greater,&rdquo; went on Oro, casting a glance at
+Bickley that must have penetrated him like a searchlight. Then he opened the
+map of Europe and with his finger indicated Germany and Austria-Hungary.
+&ldquo;I know nothing of the peoples of these lands,&rdquo; he added,
+&ldquo;but as you belong to one of them and are my guests, I trust that yours
+may succeed in the war.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What war?&rdquo; we asked with one voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Since Bickley is so clever, surely he should know better than an
+illusion such as I. All I can tell you is that I have learned that there is war
+between this country and that,&rdquo; and he pointed to Great Britain and to
+Germany upon the map; &ldquo;also between others.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is quite possible,&rdquo; I said, remembering many things. &ldquo;But
+how do you know?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If I told you, Humphrey, Bickley would not believe, so I will not tell.
+Perhaps I saw it in that crystal, as did the necromancers of the early world.
+Or perhaps the crystal serves some different purpose and I saw it
+otherwise&mdash;with my soul. At least what I say is true.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then who will win?&rdquo; asked Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot read the future, Preacher. If I could, should I ask you to
+expound to me your religion which probably is of no more worth than a score of
+others I have studied, just because it tells of the future? If I could read the
+future I should be a god instead of only an earth-lord.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Your daughter called you a god and you said that you knew we were coming
+to wake you up, which is reading the future,&rdquo; answered Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Every father is a god to his daughter, or should be; also in my day
+millions named me a god because I saw further and struck harder than they
+could. As for the rest, it came to me in a vision. Oh! Bickley, if you were
+wiser than you think you are, you would know that all things to come are born
+elsewhere and travel hither like the light from stars. Sometimes they come
+faster before their day into a single mind, and that is what men call prophecy.
+But this is a gift which cannot be commanded, even by me. Also I did not know
+that you would come. I knew only that we should awaken and by the help of men,
+for if none had been present at that destined hour we must have died for lack
+of warmth and sustenance.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I deny your hypothesis <i>in toto</i>,&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley, but
+nobody paid any attention to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My father,&rdquo; said Yva, rising and bowing before him with her
+swan-like grace, &ldquo;I have noted your commands. But do you permit that I
+show the temple to these strangers, also something of our past?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, yes,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It will save much talk in a savage
+tongue that is difficult to me. But bring them here no more without my command,
+save Bastin only. When the sun is four hours high in the upper world, let him
+come tomorrow to teach me, and afterwards if so I desire. Or if he wills, he
+can sleep here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think I would rather not,&rdquo; said Bastin hurriedly. &ldquo;I make
+no pretense to being particular, but this place does not appeal to me as a
+bedroom. There are degrees in the pleasures of solitude and, in short, I will
+not disturb your privacy at night.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro waved his hand and we departed down that awful and most dreary hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I hope you will spend a pleasant time here, Bastin,&rdquo; I said,
+looking back from the doorway at its cold, illuminated vastness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t expect to,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;but duty is duty,
+and if I can drag that old sinner back from the pit that awaits him, it will be
+worth doing. Only I have my doubts about him. To me he seems to bear a strong
+family resemblance to Beelzebub, and he&rsquo;s a bad companion week in and
+week out.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went through the portico, Yva leading us, and passed the fountain of
+Life-water, of which she cautioned us to drink no more at present, and to
+prevent him from doing so, dragged Tommy past it by his collar. Bickley,
+however, lingered under the pretence of making a further examination of the
+statue. As I had seen him emptying into his pocket the contents of a corked
+bottle of quinine tabloids which he always carried with him, I guessed very
+well that his object was to procure a sample of this water for future analysis.
+Of course I said nothing, and Yva and Bastin took no note of what he was doing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we were clear of the palace, of which we had only seen one hall, we walked
+across an open space made unutterably dreary by the absence of any vegetation
+or other sign of life, towards a huge building of glorious proportions that was
+constructed of black stone or marble. It is impossible for me to give any idea
+of the frightful solemnity of this domed edifice, for as I think I have said,
+it alone had a roof, standing there in the midst of that brilliant, unvarying
+and most unnatural illumination which came from nowhere and yet was everywhere.
+Thus, when one lifted a foot, there it was between the sole of the boot and the
+floor, or to express it better, the boot threw no shadow. I think this absence
+of shadows was perhaps the most terrifying circumstance connected with that
+universal and pervading light. Through it we walked on to the temple. We passed
+three courts, pillared all of them, and came to the building which was larger
+than St. Paul&rsquo;s in London. We entered through huge doors which still
+stood open, and presently found ourselves beneath the towering dome. There were
+no windows, why should there be in a place that was full of light? There was no
+ornamentation, there was nothing except black walls. And yet the general effect
+was magnificent in its majestic grace.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In this place,&rdquo; said Yva, and her sweet voice went whispering
+round the walls and the arching dome, &ldquo;were buried the Kings of the Sons
+of Wisdom. They lie beneath, each in his sepulchre. Its entrance is
+yonder,&rdquo; and she pointed to what seemed to be a chapel on the right.
+&ldquo;Would you wish to see them?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Somehow I don&rsquo;t care to,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;The place is
+dreary enough as it is without the company of a lot of dead kings.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should like to dissect one of them, but I suppose that would not be
+allowed,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;I think that the Lord Oro would not wish
+you to cut up his forefathers.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;When you and he went to sleep, why did you not choose the family
+vault?&rdquo; asked Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Would you have found us there?&rdquo; she queried by way of answer.
+Then, understanding that the invitation was refused by general consent, though
+personally I should have liked to accept it, and have never ceased regretting
+that I did not, she moved towards a colossal object which stood beneath the
+centre of the dome.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On a stepped base, not very different from that in the cave but much larger,
+sat a figure, draped in a cloak on which was graved a number of stars,
+doubtless to symbolise the heavens. The fastening of the cloak was shaped like
+the crescent moon, and the foot-stool on which rested the figure&rsquo;s feet
+was fashioned to suggest the orb of the sun. This was of gold or some such
+metal, the only spot of brightness in all that temple. It was impossible to say
+whether the figure were male or female, for the cloak falling in long, straight
+folds hid its outlines. Nor did the head tell us, for the hair also was hidden
+beneath the mantle and the face might have been that of either man or woman. It
+was terrible in its solemnity and calm, and its expression was as remote and
+mystic as that of Buddha, only more stern. Also without doubt it was blind; it
+was impossible to mistake the sightlessness of those staring orbs. Across the
+knees lay a naked sword and beneath the cloak the arms were hidden. In its
+complete simplicity the thing was marvelous.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On either side upon the pedestal knelt a figure of the size of life. One was an
+old and withered man with death stamped upon his face; the other was a
+beautiful, naked woman, her hands clasped in the attitude of prayer and with
+vague terror written on her vivid features.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such was this glorious group of which the meaning could not be mistaken. It was
+Fate throned upon the sun, wearing the constellations as his garment, armed
+with the sword of Destiny and worshipped by Life and Death. This interpretation
+I set out to the others.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva knelt before the statue for a little while, bowing her head in prayer, and
+really I felt inclined to follow her example, though in the end I compromised,
+as did Bickley, by taking off my hat, which, like the others, I still wore from
+force of habit, though in this place none were needed. Only Bastin remained
+covered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Behold the god of my people,&rdquo; said Yva. &ldquo;Have you no
+reverence for it, O Bastin?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not much,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;except as a work of art. You see I
+worship Fate&rsquo;s Master. I might add that <i>your</i> god doesn&rsquo;t
+seem to have done much for you, Lady Yva, as out of all your greatness
+there&rsquo;s nothing left but two people and a lot of old walls and
+caves.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At first she was inclined to be angry, for I saw her start. Then her mood
+changed, and she said with a sigh:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Fate&rsquo;s Master! Where does He dwell?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Here amongst other places,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll soon
+explain that to you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I thank you,&rdquo; she replied gravely. &ldquo;But why have you not
+explained it to Bickley?&rdquo; Then waving her hand to show that she wished
+for no answer, she went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Friends, would you wish to learn something of the history of my
+people?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very much,&rdquo; said the irrepressible Bastin, &ldquo;but I would
+rather the lecture took place in the open air.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is not possible,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;It must be here and
+now, or not at all. Come, stand by me. Be silent and do not move. I am about to
+set loose forces that are dangerous if disturbed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap16"></a>CHAPTER XVI.<br />
+Visions of the Past</h2>
+
+<p>
+She led us to the back of the statue and pointed to each of us where we should
+remain. Then she took her place at right angles to us, as a showman might do,
+and for a while stood immovable. Watching her face, once more I saw it, and
+indeed all her body, informed with that strange air of power, and noted that
+her eyes flashed and that her hair grew even more brilliant than was common, as
+though some abnormal strength were flowing through it and her. Presently she
+spoke, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I shall show you first our people in the day of their glory. Look in
+front of you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We looked and by degrees the vast space of the apse before us became alive with
+forms. At first these were vague and shadowy, not to be separated or
+distinguished. Then they became so real that until he was reproved by a kick,
+Tommy growled at them and threatened to break out into one of his peals of
+barking.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A wonderful scene appeared. There was a palace of white marble and in front of
+it a great courtyard upon which the sun beat vividly. At the foot of the steps
+of the palace, beneath a silken awning, sat a king enthroned, a crown upon his
+head and wearing glorious robes. In his hand was a jewelled sceptre. He was a
+noble-looking man of middle age and about him were gathered the glittering
+officers of his court. Fair women fanned him and to right and left, but a
+little behind, sat other fair and jewelled women who, I suppose, were his wives
+or daughters.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom new-crowned, receives the
+homage of the world,&rdquo; said Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As she spoke there appeared, walking in front of the throne one by one, other
+kings, for all were crowned and bore sceptres. At the foot of the throne each
+of them kneeled and kissed the foot of him who sat thereon, as he did so laying
+down his sceptre which at a sign he lifted again and passed away. Of these
+kings there must have been quite fifty, men of all colours and of various
+types, white men, black men, yellow men, red men.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then came their ministers bearing gifts, apparently of gold and jewels, which
+were piled on trays in front of the throne. I remember noting an incident. An
+old fellow with a lame leg stumbled and upset his tray, so that the contents
+rolled hither and thither. His attempts to recover them were ludicrous and
+caused the monarch on the throne to relax from his dignity and smile. I mention
+this to show that what we witnessed was no set scene but apparently a living
+piece of the past. Had it been so the absurdity of the bedizened old man
+tumbling down in the midst of the gorgeous pageant would certainly have been
+omitted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No, it must be life, real life, something that had happened, and the same may
+be said of what followed. For instance, there was what we call a review.
+Infantry marched, some of them armed with swords and spears, though these I
+took to be an ornamental bodyguard, and others with tubes like savage blowpipes
+of which I could not guess the use. There were no cannon, but carriages came by
+loaded with bags that had spouts to them. Probably these were charged with
+poisonous gases. There were some cavalry also, mounted on a different stamp of
+horse from ours, thicker set and nearer the ground, but with arched necks and
+fiery eyes and, I should say, very strong. These again, I take it, were
+ornamental. Then came other men upon a long machine, slung in pairs in armoured
+sacks, out of which only their heads and arms projected. This machine, which
+resembled an elongated bicycle, went by at a tremendous rate, though whence its
+motive power came did not appear. It carried twenty pairs of men, each of whom
+held in his hand some small but doubtless deadly weapon, that in appearance
+resembled an orange. Other similar machines which followed carried from forty
+to a hundred pairs of men.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The marvel of the piece, however, were the aircraft. These came by in great
+numbers. Sometimes they flew in flocks like wild geese, sometimes singly,
+sometimes in line and sometimes in ordered squadrons, with outpost and officer
+ships and an exact distance kept between craft and craft. None of them seemed
+to be very large or to carry more than four or five men, but they were
+extraordinarily swift and as agile as swallows. Moreover they flew as birds do
+by beating their wings, but again we could not guess whence came their motive
+power.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The review vanished, and next appeared a scene of festivity in a huge,
+illuminated hall. The Great King sat upon a dais and behind him was that statue
+of Fate, or one very similar to it, beneath which we stood. Below him in the
+hall were the feasters seated at long tables, clad in the various costumes of
+their countries. He rose and, turning, knelt before the statue of Fate. Indeed
+he prostrated himself thrice in prayer. Then taking his seat again, he lifted a
+cup of wine and pledged that vast company. They drank back to him and
+prostrated themselves before him as he had done before the image of Fate. Only
+I noted that certain men clad in sacerdotal garments not at all unlike those
+which are worn in the Greek Church to-day, remained standing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now all this exhibition of terrestrial pomp faded. The next scene was simple,
+that of the death-bed of this same king&mdash;we knew him by his wizened
+features. There he lay, terribly old and dying. Physicians, women, courtiers,
+all were there watching the end. The tableau vanished and in place of it
+appeared that of the youthful successor amidst cheering crowds, with joy
+breaking through the clouds of simulated grief upon his face. It vanished also.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Thus did great king succeed great king for ages upon ages,&rdquo; said
+Yva. &ldquo;There were eighty of them and the average of their reigns was 700
+years. They ruled the earth as it was in those days. They gathered up learning,
+they wielded power, their wealth was boundless. They nurtured the arts, they
+discovered secrets. They had intercourse with the stars; they were as gods. But
+like the gods they grew jealous. They and their councillors became a race apart
+who alone had the secret of long life. The rest of the world and the
+commonplace people about them suffered and died. They of the Household of
+Wisdom lived on in pomp for generations till the earth was mad with envy of
+them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Fewer and fewer grew the divine race of the Sons of Wisdom since
+children are not given to the aged and to those of an ancient, outworn blood.
+Then the World said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;They are great but they are not many; let us make an end of them
+by numbers and take their place and power and drink of their Life-water, that
+they will not give to us. If myriads of us perish by their arts, what does it
+matter, since we are countless?&rsquo; So the World made war upon the Sons of
+Wisdom. See!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again a picture formed. The sky was full of aircraft which rained down fire
+like flashes of lightning upon cities beneath. From these cities leapt up other
+fires that destroyed the swift-travelling things above, so that they fell in
+numbers like gnats burned by a lamp. Still more and more of them came till the
+cities crumbled away and the flashes that darted from them ceased to rush
+upwards. The Sons of Wisdom were driven from the face of the earth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again the scene changed. Now it showed this subterranean hall in which we
+stood. There was pomp here, yet it was but a shadow of that which had been in
+the earlier days upon the face of the earth. Courtiers moved about the palace
+and there were people in the radiant streets and the houses, for most of them
+were occupied, but rarely did the vision show children coming through their
+gates.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of a sudden this scene shifted. Now we saw that same hall in which we had
+visited Oro not an hour before. There he sat, yes, Oro himself, upon the dais
+beneath the overhanging marble shell. Round him were some ancient councillors.
+In the body of the hall on either side of the dais were men in military array,
+guards without doubt though their only weapon was a black rod not unlike a
+ruler, if indeed it were a weapon and not a badge of office.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Yva, whose face had suddenly grown strange and fixed, began to detail to us
+what was passing in this scene, in a curious monotone such as a person might
+use who was repeating something learned by heart. This was the substance of
+what she said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The case of the Sons of Wisdom is desperate. But few of them are left.
+Like other men they need food which is hard to come by, since the foe holds the
+upper earth and that which their doctors can make here in the Shades does not
+satisfy them, even though they drink the Life-water. They die and die. There
+comes an embassy from the High King of the confederated Nations to talk of
+terms of peace. See, it enters.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As she spoke, up the hall advanced the embassy. At the head of it walked a
+young man, tall, dark, handsome and commanding, whose aspect seemed in some way
+to be familiar to me. He was richly clothed in a purple cloak and wore upon his
+head a golden circlet that suggested royal rank. Those who followed him were
+mostly old men who had the astute faces of diplomatists, but a few seemed to be
+generals. Yva continued in her monotonous voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Comes the son of the King of the confederated Nations, the Prince who
+will be king. He bows before the Lord Oro. He says &lsquo;Great and Ancient
+Monarch of the divine blood, Heaven-born One, your strait, and that of those
+who remain to you, is sore. Yet on behalf of the Nations I am sent to offer
+terms of peace, but this I may only do in the presence of your child who is
+your heiress and the Queen-to-be of the Sons of Wisdom.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here, in the picture, Oro waved his hand and from behind the marble shell
+appeared Yva herself, gloriously apparelled, wearing royal ornaments and with
+her train held by waiting ladies. She bowed to the Prince and his company and
+they bowed back to her. More, we saw a glance of recognition pass between her
+and the Prince.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now the real Yva by our side pointed to the shadow Yva of the vision or the
+picture, whichever it might be called, a strange thing to see her do, and went
+on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The daughter of the Lord Oro comes. The Prince of the Nations salutes
+her. He says that the great war has endured for hundreds of years between the
+Children of Wisdom fighting for absolute rule and the common people of the
+earth fighting for liberty. In that war many millions of the Sons of the
+Nations had perished, brought to their death by fearful arts, by wizardries and
+by plagues sown among them by the Sons of Wisdom. Yet they were winning, for
+the glorious cities of the Sons of Wisdom were destroyed and those who remained
+of them were driven to dwell in the caves of the earth where with all their
+strength and magic they could not increase, but faded like flowers in the dark.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lord Oro asks what are the terms of peace proposed by the Nations.
+The Prince answers that they are these: That the Sons of Wisdom shall teach all
+their wisdom to the wise men among the Nations. That they shall give them to
+drink of the Life-water, so that their length of days also may be increased.
+That they shall cease to destroy them by sickness and their mastery of the
+forces which are hid in the womb of the world. If they will do these things,
+then the Nations on their part will cease from war, will rebuild the cities
+they have destroyed by means of their flying ships that rain down death, and
+will agree that the Lord Oro and his seed shall rule them for ever as the King
+of kings.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lord Oro asks if that be all. The Prince answers that it is not all.
+He says that when he dwelt a hostage at the court of the Sons of Wisdom he and
+the divine Lady, the daughter of the Lord Oro, and his only living child,
+learned to love each other. He demands, and the Nations demand, that she shall
+be given to him to wife, that in a day to come he may rule with her and their
+children after them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;See!&rdquo; went on Yva in her chanting, dreamy voice, &ldquo;the Lord
+Oro asks his daughter if this be true. She says,&rdquo; here the real Yva at my
+side turned and looked me straight in the eyes, &ldquo;that it is true; that
+she loves the Prince of the Nations and that if she lives a million years she
+will wed no other man, since she who is her father&rsquo;s slave in all else is
+still the mistress of herself, as has ever been the right of her royal mothers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;See again! The Lord Oro, the divine King, the Ancient, grows wroth. He
+says that it is enough and more than enough that the Barbarians should ask to
+eat of the bread of hidden learning and to drink of the Life-water of the Sons
+of Wisdom, gifts that were given to them of old by Heaven whence they sprang in
+the beginning. But that one of them, however highly placed, should dare to ask
+to mix his blood with that of the divine Lady, the Heiress, the Queen of the
+Earth to be, and claim to share her imperial throne that had been held by her
+pure race from age to age, was an insult that could only be purged by death.
+Sooner would he give his daughter in marriage to an ape than to a child of the
+Barbarians who had worked on them so many woes and striven to break the golden
+fetters of their rule.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look again!&rdquo; continued Yva. &ldquo;The Lord Oro, the divine, grows
+angrier still&rdquo; (which in truth he did, for never did I see such dreadful
+rage as that which the picture revealed in him). &ldquo;He warns, he threatens.
+He says that hitherto out of gentle love and pity he has held his hand; that he
+has strength at his command which will slay them, not by millions in slow war,
+but by tens of millions at one blow; that will blot them and their peoples from
+the face of earth and that will cause the deep seas to roll where now their
+pleasant lands are fruitful in the sun. They shrink before his fury; behold,
+their knees tremble because they know that he has this power. He mocks them,
+does the Lord Oro. He asks for their submission here and now, and that in the
+name of the Nations they should take the great oath which may not be broken,
+swearing to cease from war upon the Sons of Wisdom and to obey them in all
+things to the ends of the earth. Some of the ambassadors would yield. They look
+about them like wild things that are trapped. But madness takes the Prince. He
+cries that the oath of an ape is of no account, but that he will tear up the
+Children of Wisdom as an ape tears leaves, and afterwards take the divine Lady
+to be his wife.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look on the Lord Oro!&rdquo; continued the living Yva, &ldquo;his wrath
+leaves him. He grows cold and smiles. His daughter throws herself upon her
+knees and pleads with him. He thrusts her away. She would spring to the side of
+the Prince; he commands his councillors to hold her. She cries to the Prince
+that she loves him and him only, and that in a day to come him she will wed and
+no other. He thanks her, saying that as it is with her, so it is with him, and
+that because of his love he fears nothing. She swoons. The Lord Oro motions
+with his hand to the guard. They lift their death-rods. Fire leaps from them.
+The Prince and his companions, all save those who were afraid and would have
+sworn the oath, twist and writhe. They turn black; they die. The Lord Oro
+commands those who are left to enter their flying ships and bear to the Nations
+of the Earth tidings of what befalls those who dare to defy and insult him; to
+warn them also to eat and drink and be merry while they may, since for their
+wickedness they are about to perish.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+The scene faded and there followed another which really I cannot describe. It
+represented some vast underground place and what appeared to be a huge mountain
+of iron clothed in light, literally a thing like an alp, rocking and spinning
+down a declivity, which farther on separated into two branches because of a
+huge razor-edge precipice that rose between. There in the middle of this vast
+space with the dazzling mountain whirling towards him, stood Oro encased in
+some transparent armour, as though to keep off heat, and with him his daughter
+who under his direction was handling something in the rock behind her. Then
+there was a blinding flash and everything vanished. All of this picture passed
+so swiftly that we could not grasp its details; only a general impression
+remained.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lord Oro, using the strength that is in the world whereof he alone
+has the secret, changes the world&rsquo;s balance causing that which was land
+to become sea and that which was sea to become land,&rdquo; said Yva in her
+chanting, unnatural voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Another scene of stupendous and changing awfulness. Countries were sinking,
+cities crashing down, volcanoes were spouting fire; the end of the earth seemed
+to be at hand. We could see human beings running to and fro in thousands like
+ants. Then in huge waves hundreds and hundreds of feet high, the ocean flowed
+in and all was troubled, yeasty sea.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oro carries out his threat to destroy the Nations who had rebelled
+against him,&rdquo; said Yva. &ldquo;Much of the world sinks beneath the waves,
+but in place of it other lands arise above the waves, to be inhabited by the
+seed of those who remain living in those portions of the Earth that the deluge
+spared.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This horrible vision passed and was succeeded by one more, that of Oro standing
+in the sepulchre of the cave by the side of the crystal coffin which contained
+what appeared to be the body of his daughter. He gazed at her, then drank some
+potion and laid himself down in the companion coffin, that in which we had
+found him.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+All vanished away and Yva, appearing to wake from some kind of trance, smiled,
+and in her natural voice asked if we had seen enough.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Quite,&rdquo; I answered in a tone that caused her to say:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder what you have seen, Humphrey. Myself I do not know, since it is
+through me that you see at all and when you see I am in you who see.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo; I replied. &ldquo;Well, I will tell you about it
+later.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Thank you so much,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin, recovering suddenly from his
+amazement. &ldquo;I have heard a great deal of these moving-picture shows which
+are becoming so popular, but have always avoided attending them because their
+influence on the young is supposed to be doubtful, and a priest must set a good
+example to his congregation. Now I see that they can have a distinct
+educational value, even if it is presented in the form of romance.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How is it done?&rdquo; asked Bickley, almost fiercely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not altogether know,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;This I do know,
+however, that everything which has happened on this world can be seen from
+moment to moment at some point in the depths of space, for thither the
+sun&rsquo;s light takes it. There, too, it can be caught and thence in an
+instant returned to earth again, to be reflected in the mirror of the present
+by those who know how that mirror should be held. Ask me no more; one so wise
+as you, O Bickley, can solve such problems for himself.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t mind, Lady Yva,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;I think I
+should like to get out of this place, interesting as it is. I have food to cook
+up above and lots of things to attend to, especially as I understand I am to
+come back here tomorrow. Would you mind showing me the way to that lift or
+moving staircase?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come,&rdquo; she said, smiling.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we went past the image of Fate, out of the temple, down the vast and lonely
+streets so unnaturally illuminated, to the place where we had first found
+ourselves on arrival in the depths. There we stood.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A moment later and we were whirling up as we had whirled down. I suppose that
+Yva came with us though I never saw her do so, and the odd thing was that when
+we arrived in the sepulchre, she seemed already to be standing there waiting to
+direct us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Really,&rdquo; remarked Bastin, &ldquo;this is exactly like Maskelyne
+and Cook. Did you ever see their performance, Bickley? If so, it must have
+given you lots to explain for quite a long while.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in Orofena,&rdquo;
+replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from his pocket an end of
+candle to which he set light.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is jugglery?&rdquo; asked Bastin, and they departed arguing,
+leaving me alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What have I seen?&rdquo; I asked her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but perhaps
+something of the truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you swear
+yourself to a man for ever.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, and this I did. What of it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Only that it might be hard for another man.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, for another man it might be hard. You were once married, were you
+not, Humphrey, to a wife who died?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, I was married.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And did you not swear to that wife that you would never look in love
+upon another woman?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I did,&rdquo; I answered in a shamed voice. &ldquo;But how do you know?
+I never told you so.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! I know you and therefore guessed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, what of it, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing, except that you must find your wife before you love again, and
+before I love again I must find him whom I wish to be my husband.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How can that happen,&rdquo; I asked, &ldquo;when both are dead?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How did all that you have seen to-day in Nyo happen?&rdquo; she replied,
+laughing softly. &ldquo;Perhaps you are very blind, Humphrey, or perhaps we
+both are blind. If so, mayhap light will come to us. Meanwhile do not be sad.
+Tomorrow I will meet you and you shall teach me&mdash;your English tongue,
+Humphrey, and other things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then let it be in the sunlight, Yva. I do not love those darksome halls
+of Nyo that glow like something dead.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is fitting, for are they not dead?&rdquo; she answered, with a little
+laugh. &ldquo;So be it. Bastin shall teach my father down below, since sun and
+shade are the same to him who only thinks of his religion, and you shall teach
+me up above.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not so certain about Bastin and of what he thinks,&rdquo; I said
+doubtfully. &ldquo;Also will the Lord Oro permit you to come?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, for in such matters I rule myself. Also,&rdquo; she added
+meaningly, &ldquo;he remembers my oath that I will wed no man&mdash;save one
+who is dead. Now farewell a while and bid Bastin be here when the sun is three
+hours high, not before or after.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I left her.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap17"></a>CHAPTER XVII.<br />
+Yva Explains</h2>
+
+<p>
+When I reached the rock I was pleased to find Marama and about twenty of his
+people engaged in erecting the house that we had ordered them to build for our
+accommodation. Indeed, it was nearly finished, since house-building in Orofena
+is a simple business. The framework of poles let into palm trunks, since they
+could not be driven into the rock, had been put together on the further shore
+and towed over bodily by canoes. The overhanging rock formed one side of the
+house; the ends were of palm leaves tied to the poles, and the roof was of the
+same material. The other side was left open for the present, which in that
+equable and balmy clime was no disadvantage. The whole edifice was about thirty
+feet long by fifteen deep and divided into two portions, one for sleeping and
+one for living, by a palm leaf partition. Really, it was quite a comfortable
+abode, cool and rainproof, especially after Bastin had built his hut in which
+to cook.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and implored us to
+visit them on the main island. I answered that perhaps we would later on, as we
+wished to procure certain things from the wreck. Also, he requested Bastin to
+continue his ministrations as the latter greatly desired to do. But to this
+proposal I would not allow him to give any direct answer at the moment. Indeed,
+I dared not do so until I was sure of Oro&rsquo;s approval.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind them the usual
+ample store of provisions.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had said about the
+Life-water was quite true, since we had but little appetite for solid food,
+though this returned upon the following day. The same thing happened upon every
+occasion after drinking of that water which certainly was a most invigorating
+fluid. Never for years had any of us felt so well as it caused us to do.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of these, indeed,
+we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them as something out of the
+common, of course, but as facts which admitted of no discussion. After all, he
+said, the Old Testament told much the same story of people called the Sons of
+God who lived very long lives and ran after the daughters of men whom they
+should have left alone, and thus became the progenitors of a remarkable race.
+Of this race, he presumed that Oro and his daughter were survivors, especially
+as they spoke of their family as &ldquo;Heaven born.&rdquo; How they came to
+survive was more than he could understand and really scarcely worth bothering
+over, since there they were.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although naturally Oro
+spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly exaggerated, when he declared that he
+had caused this catastrophe, unless indeed he was talking about a totally
+different deluge, though even then <i>he</i> could not have brought it about.
+It was curious, however, that the people drowned were said to have been wicked,
+and Oro had the same opinion about those whom he claimed to have drowned,
+though for the matter of that, he could not conceive anyone more wicked than
+Oro himself. On his own showing he was a most revengeful person and one who
+declined to agree to a quite suitable alliance, apparently desired by both
+parties, merely because it offended his family pride. No, on reflection he
+might be unjust to Oro in this particular, since <i>he</i> never told that
+story; it was only shown in some pictures which very likely were just made up
+to astonish us. Meanwhile, it was his business to preach to this old sinner
+down in that hole, and he confessed honestly that he did not like the job.
+Still, it must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek
+inspiration, which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause
+another just to show that you are wrong,&rdquo; called Bickley after him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t help that,&rdquo; answered Bastin. &ldquo;Certainly I
+shall not hide the truth to save Oro&rsquo;s feelings, if he has got any. If he
+revenges himself upon us in any way, we must just put up with it like other
+martyrs.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t the slightest ambition to be a martyr,&rdquo; said
+Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; shouted Bastin from a little distance, &ldquo;I am quite
+aware of that, as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you become one,
+I am sorry to say that I do not see how you can expect any benefit. You would
+only be like a man who puts a sovereign into the offertory bag in mistake for a
+shilling. The extra nineteen shillings will do him no good at all, since in his
+heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could have them back.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Arbuthnot,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I have come to the conclusion that I
+have gone quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of homicidal mania, which
+I feel developing in me where Bastin is concerned, or of other abnormal
+violence, that you will take whatever steps you consider necessary, even to
+putting me out of the way if that is imperative.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked. &ldquo;You seem sane enough.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great number of
+things which I know it to be quite impossible that I should have seen or
+experienced. The only explanation is that I am suffering from delusions.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t agree with you, Bickley&mdash;about Bastin, I mean. I am
+by no means certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He has a
+faith and he sticks to it, as millions have done before him, and that is better
+than making spiritual experiments, as I am sorry to say I do, or rejecting
+things because one cannot understand them, as you do, which is only a form of
+intellectual vanity.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I won&rsquo;t argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat
+that I am mad, and Bastin is mad.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I mad,
+too?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn&rsquo;t enough to drive a man mad
+when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly impossible moving-picture
+show exhibited by an utterly impossible young woman in an utterly impossible
+underground city, then I don&rsquo;t know what is.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked, starting.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Mean? Well, if you didn&rsquo;t notice it, there&rsquo;s hope for
+you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Notice what?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do you admit
+that?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course; there could be no mistake on that point.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very well. Then according to my version there came a man, still young,
+dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions of peace and wanted to
+marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is that right?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Absolutely.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, and didn&rsquo;t you recognise the man?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose appearance
+reminded me of someone.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I suppose it must be true,&rdquo; mused Bickley, &ldquo;that we do not
+know ourselves.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be our special
+study. &lsquo;Know thyself,&rsquo; you remember.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean to tell
+me that you did not recognise your own double in that man? Shave off your beard
+and put on his clothes and no one could distinguish you apart.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now you mention it,&rdquo; I said slowly, &ldquo;I suppose there was a
+resemblance. I didn&rsquo;t look at him very much; I was studying the
+simulacrum of Yva. Also, you know it is some time since&mdash;I mean, there are
+no pier-glasses in Orofena.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The man was <i>you</i>,&rdquo; went on Bickley with conviction.
+&ldquo;If I were superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I
+am not, I know that I must be mad.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble each
+other.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There are degrees in resemblance,&rdquo; said Bickley with one of his
+contemptuous snorts. &ldquo;It won&rsquo;t do, Humphrey, my boy,&rdquo; he
+added. &ldquo;I can only think of one possible explanation&mdash;outside of the
+obvious one of madness.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is that?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that cinematograph show
+in some way or other, did she not? She said that in order to do this she loosed
+some hidden forces. I suggest that she did nothing of the sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then whence did the pictures come and why?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-bull,
+fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally fill the role of
+the lover of the piece with the last man who had happened to impress her. Hence
+the resemblance.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural cunning and
+unexampled hypnotic influence. I don&rsquo;t know, first, why she should be so
+anxious to add another impression to the many we have received in this place;
+and, secondly, if she was, how she managed to mesmerise three average but
+totally different men into seeing the same things. <i>My</i> explanation is
+that you were deceived as to the likeness, which, mind you, I did not
+recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask Yva
+herself. She ought to know. Now I&rsquo;m off to try to analyse that confounded
+Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary spring variety, lightened up
+with natural carbonic acid gas and possibly not uninfluenced by radium. The
+trouble is that here I can only apply some very elementary tests.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was left alone with
+Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting continually to wander off into the
+cave, whence I must recall him. I suppose that my experiences of the day,
+reviewed beneath the sweet influences of the wonderful tropical night, affected
+me. At any rate, that mystical side of my nature, to which I think I alluded at
+the beginning of this record, sprang into active and, in a sense, unholy life.
+The normal vanished, the abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most
+of us creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British. I lost
+my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in strange places; of
+course, always supposing that we have a spirit, which Bickley would deny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not unpleasant
+process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see and accept is but the
+merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps only a refraction thereof? Supposing
+that we do live again and again, and that our animating principle, whatever it
+might be, does inhabit various bodies, which, naturally enough, it would shape
+to its own taste and likeness? Would that taste and likeness vary so very much
+over, let us say, a million years or so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a
+minute, in the æons of Eternity?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect that it may be
+true, was it impossible that I and that murdered man of the far past were in
+fact identical? If the woman were the same, preserved across the gulf in some
+unknown fashion, why should not her lover be the same? What did I say&mdash;her
+lover? Was I her lover? No, I was the lover of one who had died&mdash;my lost
+wife. Well, if I had died and lived again, why should not&mdash;why should not
+that Sleeper&mdash;have lived again during her long sleep? Through all those
+years the spirit must have had some home, and, if so, in what shapes did it
+live? There were points, similarities, which rushed in upon me&mdash;oh! it was
+ridiculous. Bickley was right. We were all mad!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war with Germany. If
+this were so, how could he know it? Such knowledge would presume powers of
+telepathy or vision beyond those given to man. I could not believe that he
+possessed these; as Bickley said, it would be past experience. Yet it was most
+strange that he who was uninformed as to our national history and dangers,
+should have hit upon a country with which we might well have been plunged into
+sudden struggle. Here again I was bewildered and overcome. My brain rocked. I
+would seek sleep, and in it escape, or at any rate rest from all these
+mysteries.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+On the following morning we despatched Bastin to keep his rendezvous in the
+sepulchre at the proper time. Had we not done so I felt sure that he would have
+forgotten it, for on this occasion he was for once an unwilling missioner. He
+tried to persuade one of us to come with him&mdash;even Bickley would have been
+welcome; but we both declared that we could not dream of interfering in such a
+professional matter; also that our presence was forbidden, and would certainly
+distract the attention of his pupil.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What you mean,&rdquo; said the gloomy Bastin, &ldquo;is that you intend
+to enjoy yourselves up here in the female companionship of the Glittering Lady
+whilst I sit thousands of feet underground attempting to lighten the darkness
+of a violent old sinner whom I suspect of being in league with Satan.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;With whom you should be proud to break a lance,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So I am, in the daylight. For instance, when he uses <i>your</i> mouth
+to advance his arguments, Bickley, but this is another matter. However, if I do
+not appear again you will know that I died in a good cause, and, I hope, try to
+recover my remains and give them decent burial. Also, you might inform the
+Bishop of how I came to my end, that is, if you ever get an opportunity, which
+is more than doubtful.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hurry up, Bastin, hurry up!&rdquo; said the unfeeling Bickley, &ldquo;or
+you will be late for your appointment and put your would-be neophyte into a bad
+temper.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed in the language
+of the South Sea Islands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous robes which, being a
+man, it is quite impossible for me to describe. She saw us looking at these,
+and, after greeting us both, also Tommy, who was enraptured at her coming,
+asked us how the ladies of our country attired themselves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We tried to explain, with no striking success.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the Old
+World,&rdquo; she said, shaking her head and laughing. &ldquo;I thought that
+you had with you pictures of ladies you have known which would show me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, in fact, I had in a pocket-book a photograph of my wife in evening-dress,
+also a miniature of her head and bust painted on ivory, a beautiful piece of
+work done by a master hand, which I always wore. These, after a moment&rsquo;s
+hesitation, I produced and showed to her, Bickley having gone away for a little
+while to see about something connected with his attempted analysis of the
+Life-water. She examined them with great eagerness, and as she did so I noted
+that her face grew tender and troubled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This was your wife,&rdquo; she said as one who states what she knows to
+be a fact. I nodded, and she went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I am, I
+think.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;she lacked height; given that she would
+have been a lovely woman.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad you think that women should be tall,&rdquo; she said, glancing
+at her shadow. &ldquo;The eyes were such as mine, were they not&mdash;in
+colour, I mean?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be angry if I
+tried it? I weary of this old fashion.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why should I be angry?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the details of the
+dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than had been the custom among
+the women of her people, but was very pretty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is because we are still barbarians,&rdquo; said Bickley; &ldquo;at
+least, our women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods of attraction,
+like the savages yonder.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the photograph and the
+miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear this picture
+on your heart, as well as in it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you must be a very remarkable woman,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+&ldquo;Never before did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man was
+faithful to somebody else.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so angry to
+us women?&rdquo; asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without waiting for an
+answer, she inquired of him whether he had been successful in his analysis of
+the Life-water.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did Bastin tell
+you?&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the descent to Nyo;
+that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I do, and that he thought that
+my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil or evil spirit from some Under-world which
+he called hell.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth,&rdquo; said Bickley,
+&ldquo;for which I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady Yva, and
+tell us who and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what are you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord Oro and I
+are two who have lived on from the old time when the world was different, and
+yet, I think, the same. He is a man and not a god, and I am a woman. His powers
+are great because of his knowledge, which he has gathered from his forefathers
+and in a life of a thousand years before he went to sleep. He can do things you
+cannot do. Thus, he can pass through space and take others with him, and return
+again. He can learn what is happening in far-off parts of the world, as he did
+when he told you of the war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible
+powers; for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he knows
+the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can change its turning so
+that earthquakes happen and sea becomes land, and land sea, and the places that
+were hot grow cold, and those that were cold grow hot.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All of which things have happened many times in the history of the
+globe,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;without the help of the Lord Oro.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless will have
+knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge, and knowledge is
+strength.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I interposed, &ldquo;but such powers as you attribute to
+your father are not given to man.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks that he
+has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is not so. Hundreds of
+thousands of years ago men knew more than it seems they do today, ten times
+more, as they lived ten times longer, or so you tell me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Men?&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations supposed them
+to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and terrors of man. He desires
+power which is ambition, and when the world refused his rule, he destroyed that
+part of it which rebelled, which is revenge. Moreover, above all things he
+dreads death, which is fear. That is why he suspended life in himself and me
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years, as his knowledge gave him strength to
+do, because death was near and he thought that sleep was better than
+death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why should he dread to die,&rdquo; asked Bickley, &ldquo;seeing that
+sleep and death are the same?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because his knowledge tells him that Sleep and Death are <i>not</i> the
+same, as you, in your foolishness, believe, for there Bastin is wiser than you.
+Because for all his wisdom he remains ignorant of what happens to man when the
+Light of Life is blown out by the breath of Fate. That is why he fears to die
+and why he talks with Bastin the Preacher, who says he has the secret of the
+future.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And do you fear to die?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Humphrey,&rdquo; she answered gently. &ldquo;Because I think that
+there is no death, and, having done no wrong, I dread no evil. I had dreams
+while I was asleep, O Humphrey, and it seemed to me that&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here she ceased and glanced at where she knew the miniature was hanging upon my
+breast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now,&rdquo; she continued, after a little pause, &ldquo;tell me of your
+world, of its history, of its languages, of what happens there, for I long to
+know.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So then and there, assisted by Bickley, I began the education of the Lady Yva.
+I do not suppose that there was ever a more apt pupil in the whole earth. To
+begin with, she was better acquainted with every subject on which I touched
+than I was myself; all she lacked was information as to its modern aspect. Her
+knowledge ended two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, at which date,
+however, it would seem that civilisation had already touched a higher
+water-mark than it has ever since attained. Thus, this vanished people
+understood astronomy, natural magnetism, the force of gravity, steam, also
+electricity to some subtle use of which, I gathered, the lighting of their
+underground city was to be attributed. They had mastered architecture and the
+arts, as their buildings and statues showed; they could fly through the air
+better than we have learned to do within the last few years.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+More, they, or some of them, had learned the use of the Fourth Dimension, that
+is their most instructed individuals, could move <i>through</i> opposing
+things, as well as over them, up into them and across them. This power these
+possessed in a two-fold form. I mean, that they could either disintegrate their
+bodies at one spot and cause them to integrate again at another, or they could
+project what the old Egyptians called the Ka or Double, and modern Theosophists
+name the Astral Shape, to any distance. Moreover, this Double, or Astral Shape,
+while itself invisible, still, so to speak, had the use of its senses. It could
+see, it could hear, and it could remember, and, on returning to the body, it
+could avail itself of the experience thus acquired.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus, at least, said Yva, while Bickley contemplated her with a cold and
+unbelieving eye. She even went further and alleged that in certain instances,
+individuals of her extinct race had been able to pass through the ether and to
+visit other worlds in the depths of space.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Have you ever done that?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Once or twice I dreamed that I did,&rdquo; she replied quietly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We can all dream,&rdquo; he answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it was my lot to make acquaintance with this strange and uncanny power at a
+later date, I will say no more of it now.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Telepathy, she declared, was also a developed gift among the Sons of Wisdom;
+indeed, they seem to have used it as we use wireless messages. Only, in their
+case, the sending and receiving stations were skilled and susceptible human
+beings who went on duty for so many hours at a time. Thus intelligence was
+transmitted with accuracy and despatch. Those who had this faculty were, she
+said, also very apt at reading the minds of others and therefore not easy to
+deceive.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is that how you know that I had been trying to analyse your
+Life-water?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she answered, with her unvarying smile. &ldquo;At the moment
+I spoke thereof you were wondering whether my father would be angry if he knew
+that you had taken the water in a little flask.&rdquo; She studied him for a
+moment, then added: &ldquo;Now you are wondering, first, whether I did not see
+you take the water from the fountain and guess the purpose, and, secondly,
+whether perhaps Bastin did not tell me what you were doing with it when we met
+in the sepulchre.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; said the exasperated Bickley, &ldquo;I admit that
+telepathy and thought-reading are possible to a certain limited extent. But
+supposing that you possess those powers, as I think in English, and you do not
+know English, how can you interpret what is passing in my mind?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps you have been teaching me English all this while without knowing
+it, Bickley. In any case, it matters little, seeing that what I read is the
+thought, not the language with which it is clothed. The thought comes from your
+mind to mine&mdash;that is, if I wish it, which is not often&mdash;and I
+interpret it in my own or other tongues.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad to hear it is not often, Lady Yva, since thoughts are
+generally considered private.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, and therefore I will read yours no more. Why should I, when they
+are so full of disbelief of all I tell you, and sometimes of other things about
+myself which I do not seek to know?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No wonder that, according to the story in the pictures, those Nations,
+whom you named Barbarians, made an end of your people, Lady Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are mistaken, Bickley; the Lord Oro made an end of the Nations,
+though against my prayer,&rdquo; she added with a sigh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Bickley departed in a rage, and did not appear again for an hour.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He is angry,&rdquo; she said, looking after him; &ldquo;nor do I wonder.
+It is hard for the very clever like Bickley, who think that they have mastered
+all things, to find that after all they are quite ignorant. I am sorry for him,
+and I like him very much.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you would be sorry for me also, Lady Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she asked with a dazzling smile, &ldquo;when your heart is
+athirst for knowledge, gaping for it like a fledgling&rsquo;s mouth for food,
+and, as it chances, though I am not very wise, I can satisfy something of your
+soul-hunger.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not very wise!&rdquo; I repeated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Humphrey. I think that Bastin, who in many ways is so stupid, has
+more true wisdom than I have, because he can believe and accept without
+question. After all, the wisdom of my people is all of the universe and its
+wonders. What you think magic is not magic; it is only gathered knowledge and
+the finding out of secrets. Bickley will tell you the same, although as yet he
+does not believe that the mind of man can stretch so far.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You mean that your wisdom has in it nothing of the spirit?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Humphrey, that is what I mean. I do not even know if there is such
+a thing as spirit. Our god was Fate; Bastin&rsquo;s god is a spirit, and I
+think yours also.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Therefore, I wish you and Bastin to teach me of your god, as does Oro,
+my father. I want&mdash;oh! so much, Humphrey, to learn whether we live after
+death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You!&rdquo; I exclaimed. &ldquo;You who, according to the story, have
+slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years! You, who have, unless I
+mistake, hinted that during that sleep you may have lived in other shapes! Do
+you doubt whether we can live after death?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes. Sleep induced by secret arts is not death, and during that sleep
+the <i>I</i> within might wander and inhabit other shapes, because it is
+forbidden to be idle. Moreover, what seems to be death may not be death, only
+another form of sleep from which the <i>I</i> awakes again upon the world. But
+at last comes the real death, when the <i>I</i> is extinguished to the world.
+That much I know, because my people learned it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You mean, you know that men and women may live again and again upon the
+world?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Humphrey, I do. For in the world there is only a certain store of
+life which in many forms travels on and on, till the lot of each <i>I</i> is
+fulfilled. Then comes the real death, and after that&mdash;what,
+oh!&mdash;what?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You must ask Bastin,&rdquo; I said humbly. &ldquo;I cannot dare to teach
+of such matters.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, but you can and do believe, and that helps me, Humphrey, who am in
+tune with you. Yes, it helps me much more than do Bastin and his new religion,
+because such is woman&rsquo;s way. Now, I think Bickley will soon return, so
+let us talk of other matters. Tell me of the history of your people, Humphrey,
+that my father says are now at war.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap18"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.<br />
+The Accident</h2>
+
+<p>
+Bickley did return, having recovered his temper, since after all it was
+impossible for anyone to remain angry with the Lady Yva for long, and we spent
+a very happy time together. We instructed and she was the humble pupil.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+How swift and nimble was her intelligence! In that one morning she learned all
+our alphabet and how to write our letters. It appeared that among her people,
+at any rate in their later periods, the only form of writing that was used was
+a highly concentrated shorthand which saved labour. They had no journals, since
+news which arrived telepathically or by some form of wireless was proclaimed to
+those who cared to listen, and on it all formed their own judgments. In the
+same way poems and even romances were repeated, as in Homer&rsquo;s day or in
+the time of the Norse <i>sagas</i>, by word of mouth. None of their secret
+knowledge was written down. Like the ritual of Freemasonry it was considered
+too sacred.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Moreover, when men lived for hundreds of years this was not so necessary,
+especially as their great fear was lest it should fall into the hands of the
+outside nations, whom they called Barbarians. For, be it remembered, these Sons
+of Wisdom were always a very small people who ruled by the weight of their
+intelligence and the strength of their accumulated lore. Indeed, they could
+scarcely be called a people; rather were they a few families, all of them more
+or less connected with the original ruling Dynasty which considered itself half
+divine. These families were waited upon by a multitude of servants or slaves
+drawn from the subject nations, for the most part skilled in one art or
+another, or perhaps, remarkable for their personal beauty. Still they remained
+outside the pale.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The Sons of Wisdom did not intermarry with them or teach them their learning,
+or even allow them to drink of their Life-water. They ruled them as men rule
+dogs, treating them with kindness, but no more, and as many dogs run their
+course and die in the lifetime of one master, so did many of these slaves in
+that of one of the Sons of Wisdom. Therefore, the slaves came to regard their
+lords not as men, but gods. They lived but three score years and ten like the
+rest of us, and went their way, they, whose great-great-grandfathers had served
+the same master and whose great-great-great-grandchildren would still serve
+him. What should we think of a lord who we knew was already adult in the time
+of William the Conqueror, and who remained still vigorous and all-powerful in
+that of George V? One, moreover, who commanded almost infinite knowledge to
+which we were denied the key? We might tremble before him and look upon him as
+half-divine, but should we not long to kill him and possess his knowledge and
+thereby prolong our own existence to his wondrous measure?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such, said Yva, was the case with their slaves and the peoples from whence
+these sprang. They grew mad with jealous hate, till at length came the end we
+knew.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus we talked on for hours till the time came for us to eat. As before Yva
+partook of fruit and we of such meats as we had at hand. These, we noticed,
+disgusted her, because, as she explained, the Children of Wisdom, unless driven
+thereto by necessity, touched no flesh, but lived on the fruits of the earth
+and wine alone. Only the slaves and the Barbarians ate flesh. In these views
+Bickley for once agreed with her, that is, except as regards the wine, for in
+theory, if not in practice&mdash;he was a vegetarian.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I will bring you more of the Life-water,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;and
+then you will grow to hate these dead things, as I do. And now farewell. My
+father calls me. I hear him though you do not. To-morrow I cannot come, but the
+day after I will come and bring you the Life-water. Nay, accompany me not, but
+as I see he wishes it, let Tommy go with me. I will care for him, and he is a
+friend in all that lonely place.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So she went, and with her Tommy, rejoicing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ungrateful little devil!&rdquo; said Bickley. &ldquo;Here we&rsquo;ve
+fed and petted him from puppyhood, or at least you have, and yet he skips off
+with the first stranger. I never saw him behave like that to any woman, except
+your poor wife.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;I cannot understand it. Hullo! here
+comes Bastin.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin it was, dishevelled and looking much the worse for wear, also minus his
+Bible in the native tongue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, how have you been getting on?&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should like some tea, also anything there is to eat.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We supplied him with these necessaries, and after a while he said slowly and
+solemnly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot help thinking of a childish story which Bickley told or
+invented one night at your house at home. I remember he had an argument with my
+wife, which he said put him in mind of it, I am sure I don&rsquo;t know why. It
+was about a monkey and a parrot that were left together under a sofa for a long
+while, where they were so quiet that everybody forgot them. Then the parrot
+came out with only one feather left in its tail and none at all on its body,
+saying, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ve had no end of a time!&rsquo; after which it dropped
+down and died. Do you know, I feel just like that parrot, only I don&rsquo;t
+mean to die, and I think I gave the monkey quite as good as he gave me!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What happened?&rdquo; I asked, intensely interested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! the Glittering Lady took me into that palace hall where Oro was
+sitting like a spider in a web, and left me there. I got to work at once. He
+was much interested in the Old Testament stories and said there were points of
+truth about them, although they had evidently come down to the modern
+writer&mdash;he called him a <i>modern</i> writer&mdash;in a legendary form. I
+thought his remarks impertinent and with difficulty refrained from saying so.
+Leaving the story of the Deluge and all that, I spoke of other matters, telling
+him of eternal life and Heaven and Hell, of which the poor benighted man had
+never heard. I pointed out especially that unless he repented, his life, by all
+accounts, had been so wicked, that he was certainly destined to the latter
+place.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What did he say to that?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you know, I think it frightened him, if one could imagine Oro being
+frightened. At any rate he remarked that the truth or falsity of what I said
+was an urgent matter for him, as he could not expect to live more than a few
+hundred years longer, though perhaps he might prolong the period by another
+spell of sleep. Then he asked me why I thought him so wicked. I replied because
+he himself said that he had drowned millions of people, which showed an evil
+heart and intention even if it were not a fact. He thought a long while and
+asked what could be done in the circumstances. I replied that repentance and
+reparation were the only courses open to him.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Reparation!&rdquo; I exclaimed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, reparation was what I said, though I think I made a mistake there,
+as you will see. As nearly as I can remember, he answered that he was beginning
+to repent, as from all he had learned from us, he gathered that the races which
+had arisen as a consequence of his action, were worse than those which he had
+destroyed. As regards reparation, what he had done once he could do again. He
+would think the matter over seriously, and see if it were possible and
+advisable to raise those parts of the world which had been sunk, and sink those
+which had been raised. If so, he thought that would make very handsome amends
+to the departed nations and set him quite right with any superior Power, if
+such a thing existed. What are you laughing at, Bickley? I don&rsquo;t think it
+a laughing matter, since such remarks do not seem to me to indicate any real
+change in Oro&rsquo;s heart, which is what I was trying to effect.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley, who was convulsed with merriment, wiped his eyes and said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You dear old donkey, don&rsquo;t you see what you have done, or rather
+would have done if there were a word of truth in all this ridiculous story
+about a deluge? You would be in the way of making your precious pupil, who
+certainly is the most masterly old liar in the world, repeat his offence and
+send Europe to the bottom of the sea.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That did occur to me, but it doesn&rsquo;t much matter as I am quite
+certain that such a thing would never be allowed. Of course there was a real
+deluge once, but Oro had no more to do with it than I had. Don&rsquo;t you
+agree, Arbuthnot?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think so,&rdquo; I answered cautiously, &ldquo;but really in this
+place I am beginning to lose count of what is or is not possible. Also, of
+course, there may have been many deluges; indeed the history of the world shows
+that this was so; it is written in its geological strata. What was the end of
+it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The end was that he took the South Sea Bible and, after I had explained
+a little about our letters, seemed to be able to read it at once. I suppose he
+was acquainted with the art of printing in his youth. At any rate he said that
+he would study it, I don&rsquo;t know how, unless he can read, and that in two
+days&rsquo; time he would let me know what he thought about the matter of my
+religion. Then he told me to go. I said that I did not know the way and was
+afraid of losing myself. Thereupon he waved his hand, and I really can&rsquo;t
+say what happened.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Did you levitate up here,&rdquo; asked Bickley, &ldquo;like the late
+lamented Mr. Home at the spiritualistic seances?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, I did not exactly levitate, but something or someone seemed to get a
+hold of me, and I was just rushed along in a most tumultuous fashion. The next
+thing I knew was that I was standing at the door of that sepulchre, though I
+have no recollection of going up in the lift, or whatever it is. I believe
+those beastly caves are full of ghosts, or devils, and the worst of it is that
+they have kept my solar-tope, which I put on this morning forgetting that it
+would be useless there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lady Yva&rsquo;s Fourth Dimension in action,&rdquo; I suggested,
+&ldquo;only it wouldn&rsquo;t work on solar-topes.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know what you are talking about,&rdquo; said Bastin,
+&ldquo;but if my hat had to be left, why not my boots and other garments?
+Please stop your nonsense and pass the tea. Thank goodness I haven&rsquo;t got
+to go down there tomorrow, as he seems to have had enough of me for the
+present, so I vote we all pay a visit to the ship. It will be a very pleasant
+change. I couldn&rsquo;t stand two days running with that old fiend, and his
+ghosts or devils in the cave.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Next morning accordingly, fearing no harm from the Orofenans, we took the canoe
+and rowed to the main island. Marama had evidently seen us coming, for he and a
+number of his people met us with every demonstration of delight, and escorted
+us to the ship. Here we found things just as we had left them, for there had
+been no attempt at theft or other mischief.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While we were in the cabin a fit of moral weakness seemed to overcome Bickley,
+the first and I may add the last from which I ever saw him suffer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you know,&rdquo; he said, addressing us, &ldquo;I think that we
+should do well to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal of the
+marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here, it is still obvious
+that we find ourselves in very peculiar and unhealthy surroundings. I mean
+mentally unhealthy, indeed I think that if we stay here much longer we shall
+probably go off our heads. Now that boat on the deck remains sound and
+seaworthy. Why should not we provision her and take our chance? We know more or
+less which way to steer.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Wouldn&rsquo;t it be rather a risky job in an open boat?&rdquo; he
+asked. &ldquo;However, that doesn&rsquo;t matter much because I don&rsquo;t
+take any account of risks, knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow and
+that the hairs of my head are all numbered.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They might be numbered under water as well as above it,&rdquo; muttered
+Bickley, &ldquo;and I feel sure that on your own showing, you would be as
+valuable dead as alive.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What I seem to feel,&rdquo; went on Bastin, &ldquo;is that I have work
+to my hand here. Also, the <i>locum tenens</i> at Fulcombe no doubt runs the
+parish as well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man for the place
+than I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but I do not despair of him
+yet, and besides him there is the Glittering Lady, a most open-minded person,
+whom I have not yet had any real opportunity of approaching in a spiritual
+sense. Then there are all these natives who cannot learn without a teacher. So
+on the whole I think I would rather stay where I am until Providence points out
+some other path.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons,&rdquo; I
+said. &ldquo;I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of men to come
+in touch with such things as we have found upon this island. They may be
+illusions, but at least they are very interesting illusions. One might live ten
+lifetimes and find nothing else of the sort. Therefore I should like to see the
+end of the dream.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley reflected a little, then said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am terribly
+afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear and see, and that way
+madness lies. It is better to die than to go mad.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You&rsquo;ll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean
+decease, of course,&rdquo; interrupted Bastin. &ldquo;And who knows, perhaps
+all this is an opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes, which, I must
+say, are singularly blind. You think you know everything there is to learn, but
+the fact is that like the rest of us, you know nothing at all, and good man
+though you are, obstinately refuse to admit the truth and to seek support
+elsewhere. For my part I believe that you are afraid of falling in love with
+that Glittering Lady and of being convinced by her that you are wrong in your
+most unsatisfactory conclusions.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am out-voted anyway,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;and for the rest,
+Bastin, look after yourself and leave me alone. I will add that on the whole I
+think you are both right, and that it is wisest for us to stop where we are,
+for after all we can only die once.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not so sure, Bickley. There is a thing called the second death,
+which is what is troubling that old scoundrel, Oro. Now I will go and look for
+those books.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So the idea of flight was abandoned, although I admit that even to myself it
+had attractions. For I felt that I was being wrapped in a net of mysteries from
+which I saw no escape. Yes, and of more than mysteries; I who had sworn that I
+would never look upon another woman, was learning to love this sweet and
+wondrous Yva, and of that what could be the end?
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+We collected all we had come to seek, and started homewards escorted by Marama
+and his people, including a number of young women who danced before us in a
+light array of flowers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Passing our old house, we came to the grove where the idol Oro had stood and
+Bastin was so nearly sacrificed. There was another idol there now which he
+wished to examine, but in the end did not as the natives so obviously objected.
+Indeed Marama told me that notwithstanding the mysterious death of the
+sorcerers on the Rock of Offerings, there was still a strong party in the
+island who would be glad to do us a mischief if any further affront were
+offered to their hereditary god.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He questioned us also tentatively about the apparition, for such he conceived
+it to be, which had appeared upon the rock and killed the sorcerers, and I
+answered him as I thought wisest, telling him that a terrible Power was afoot
+in the land, which he would do well to obey.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;the God of the Mountain of whom the
+tradition has come down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he sees,
+he hears and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O
+Friend-from-the-Sea.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick bush. Suddenly from
+out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore a mask upon his face, but from
+his shape could not have been more than thirteen or fourteen years of age. In
+his hand was a wooden club. He ran forward, stopped, and with a yell of hate
+hurled it, I think at Bastin, but it hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and
+remembered no more.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do not know. It
+seemed to me that through them continually I saw the stately figure of old Oro
+contemplating me gravely, as though he were making up his mind about something
+in which I must play a part. Then there was another figure, that of the
+gracious but imperial Yva, who from time to time, as I thought, leant over me
+and whispered in my ear words of rest and comfort. Nor was this all, since her
+shape had a way of changing suddenly into that of my lost wife who would speak
+with her voice. Or perhaps my wife would speak with Yva&rsquo;s voice. To my
+disordered sense it was as though they were one personality, having two shapes,
+either of which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me
+most blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the dead, and in the
+dead the living. More, I took journeys, or rather some unknown part of me
+seemed to do so. One of these I remember, for its majestic character stamped
+itself upon my mind in such a fashion that all the waters of delirium could not
+wash it out nor all its winds blow away that memory.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster than light can
+flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near, they grew into enormous,
+flaming Glories round which circled world upon world. They became small,
+dwindled to points of light and disappeared.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous white city wherein
+were buildings with domes of crystal and alabaster, in the latter of which were
+set windows made of great jewels; sapphires or rubies they seemed to me. We
+went on up a lovely valley. To the left were hills, down which tumbled
+waterfalls; to the right was a river broad and deep that seemed to overflow its
+banks as does the Nile. Behind were high mountains on the slopes of which grew
+forests of glorious trees, some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up
+their crests stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
+guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was lit with a light
+such as that of the moon, only intensified and of many colours. Indeed looking
+up, I saw that above us floated three moons, each of them bigger than our own
+at the full, and gathered that here it was night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to a house set amid scented gardens and having in front of it terraces
+of flowers. It seemed not unlike my own house at home, but I took little note
+of it, because of a woman who sat upon the verandah, if I may call it so. She
+was clad in garments of white silk fastened about her middle with a jewelled
+girdle. On her neck also was a collar of jewels. I forget the colour; indeed
+this seemed to change continually as the light from the different moons struck
+when she moved, but I think its prevailing tinge was blue. In her arms this
+woman nursed a beauteous, sleeping child, singing happily as she rocked it to
+and fro. Yva went towards the woman who looked up at her step and uttered a
+little cry. Then for the first time I saw the woman&rsquo;s face. It was that
+of my dead wife!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I followed in my dream, a little cloud of mist seemed to cover both my wife
+and Yva, and when I reached the place Yva was gone. Only my wife remained, she
+and the child. There she stood, solemn and sweet. While I drew near she laid
+down the child upon the cushioned seat from which she had risen. She stretched
+out her arms and flung them about me. She embraced me and I embraced her in a
+rapture of reunion. Then turning she lifted up the child, it was a girl, for me
+to kiss.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;See your daughter,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;and behold all that I am
+making ready for you where we shall dwell in a day to come.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I grew confused.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;Where is Yva who brought me here? Did she go
+into the house?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she answered happily. &ldquo;Yva went into the house. Look
+again!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked and it was Yva&rsquo;s face that was pressed against my own, and
+Yva&rsquo;s eyes that gazed into mine. Only she was garbed as my wife had been,
+and on her bosom hung the changeful necklace.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You may not stay,&rdquo; she whispered, and lo! it was my wife that
+spoke, not Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Tell me what it means?&rdquo; I implored.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;There are mysteries that you may
+not know as yet. Love Yva if you will and I shall not be jealous, for in loving
+Yva you love me. You cannot understand? Then know this, that the spirit has
+many shapes, and yet is the same spirit&mdash;sometimes. Now I who am far, yet
+near, bid you farewell a while.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then all passed in a flash and the dream ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such was the only one of those visions which I can recall.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+I seemed to wake up as from a long and tumultuous sleep. The first thing I saw
+was the palm roof of our house upon the rock. I knew it was our house, for just
+above me was a palm leaf of which I had myself tied the stalk to the framework
+with a bit of coloured ribbon that I had chanced to find in my pocket. It came
+originally from the programme card of a dance that I had attended at Honolulu
+and I had kept it because I thought it might be useful. Finally I used it to
+secure that loose leaf. I stared at the ribbon which brought back a flood of
+memories, and as I was thus engaged I heard voices talking, and
+listened&mdash;Bickley&rsquo;s voice, and the Lady Yva&rsquo;s.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; Bickley was saying, &ldquo;he will do well now, but he went
+near, very near.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I knew he would not die,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;because my father
+said so.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There are two sorts of deaths,&rdquo; replied Bickley, &ldquo;that of
+the body and that of the mind. I was afraid that even if he lived, his reason
+would go, but from certain indications I do not think that will happen now. He
+will get quite well again&mdash;though&mdash;&rdquo; and he stopped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am very glad to hear you say so,&rdquo; chimed in Bastin. &ldquo;For
+weeks I thought that I should have to read the Burial Service over poor
+Arbuthnot. Indeed I was much puzzled as to the best place to bury him. Finally
+I found a very suitable spot round the corner there, where it isn&rsquo;t rock,
+in which one can&rsquo;t dig and the soil is not liable to be flooded. In fact
+I went so far as to clear away the bush and to mark out the grave with its foot
+to the east. In this climate one can&rsquo;t delay, you know.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Weak as I was, I smiled. This practical proceeding was so exactly like Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, you wasted your labour,&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, I am glad to say I did. But I don&rsquo;t think it was your
+operations and the rest that cured him, Bickley, although you take all the
+credit. I believe it was the Life-water that the Lady Yva made him drink and
+the stuff that Oro sent which we gave him when you weren&rsquo;t
+looking.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then I hope that in the future you will not interfere with my
+cases,&rdquo; said the indignant Bickley, and either the voices passed away or
+I went to sleep.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my side watching me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out walking,&rdquo;
+she said slowly in English.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who taught you my language?&rdquo; I asked, astonished.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin and Bickley, while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man
+just same now as he was hundred thousand years ago,&rdquo; she added
+enigmatically. &ldquo;All think one woman beautiful when no other woman
+there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo; I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part of
+Bastin and Bickley she alluded. Could that self-centred pair&mdash;oh! it was
+impossible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How long have I been ill?&rdquo; I asked to escape the subject which I
+felt to be uncomfortable.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She lifted her beautiful eyes in search of words and began to count upon her
+fingers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Two moon, one half moon, yes, ten week, counting Sabbath,&rdquo; she
+answered triumphantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ten weeks!&rdquo; I exclaimed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Humphrey, ten whole weeks and three days you first bad, then mad.
+Oh!&rdquo; she went on, breaking into the Orofenan tongue which she spoke so
+perfectly, although it was not her own. That language of hers I never learned,
+but I know she thought in it and only translated into Orofenan, because of the
+great difficulty which she had in rendering her high and refined ideas into its
+simpler metaphor, and the strange words which often she introduced. &ldquo;Oh!
+you have been very ill, friend of my heart. At times I thought that you were
+going to die, and wept and wept. Bickley thinks that he saved you and he is
+very clever. But he could not have saved you; that wanted more knowledge than
+any of your people have; only I pray you, do not tell him so because it would
+hurt his pride.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What was the matter with me then, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All was the matter. First, the weapon which that youth threw&mdash;he
+was the son of the sorcerer whom my father destroyed&mdash;crushed in the bone
+of your head. He is dead for his crime and may he be accursed for ever,&rdquo;
+she added in the only outbreak of rage and vindictiveness in which I ever saw
+her indulge.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One must make excuses for him; his father had been killed,&rdquo; I
+said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, that is what Bastin tells me, and it is true. Still, for that young
+man I can make no excuse; it was cowardly and wicked. Well, Bickley performed
+what he calls operation, and the Lord Oro, he came up from his house and helped
+him, because Bastin is no good in such things. Then he can only turn away his
+head and pray. I, too, helped, holding hot water and linen and jar of the stuff
+that made you feel like nothing, although the sight made me feel more sick than
+anything since I saw one I loved killed, oh, long, long ago.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Was the operation successful?&rdquo; I asked, for I did not dare to
+begin to thank her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, that clever man, Bickley, lifted the bone which had been crushed
+in. Only then something broke in your head and you began to bleed here,&rdquo;
+and she touched what I believe is called the temporal artery. &ldquo;The vein
+had been crushed by the blow, and gave way. Bickley worked and worked, and just
+in time he tied it up before you died. Oh! then I felt as though I loved
+Bickley, though afterwards Bastin said that I ought to have loved <i>him</i>,
+since it was not Bickley who stopped the bleeding, but his prayer.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps it was both,&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps, Humphrey, at least you were saved. Then came another trouble.
+You took fever. Bickley said that it was because a certain gnat had bitten you
+when you went down to the ship, and my father, the Lord Oro, told me that this
+was right. At the least you grew very weak and lost your mind, and it seemed as
+though you must die. Then, Humphrey, I went to the Lord Oro and kneeled before
+him and prayed for your life, for I knew that he could cure you if he would,
+though Bickley&rsquo;s skill was at an end.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Daughter,&rsquo; he said to me, &lsquo;not once but again and
+again you have set up your will against mine in the past. Why then should I
+trouble myself to grant this desire of yours in the present, and save a man who
+is nothing to me?&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I rose to my feet and answered, &lsquo;I do not know, my Father, yet I
+am certain that for your own sake it will be well to do so. I am sure that of
+everything even you must give an account at last, great though you be, and who
+knows, perhaps one life which you have saved may turn the balance in your
+favour.&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Surely the priest Bastin has been talking to you,&rsquo; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;He has,&rsquo; I answered, &lsquo;and not he alone. Many voices
+have been talking to me.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What did you mean by that?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It matters nothing what I meant, Humphrey. Be still and listen to my
+story. My father thought a while and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;I am jealous of this stranger. What is he but a short-lived
+half-barbarian such as we knew in the old days? And yet already you think more
+of him than you do of me, your father, the divine Oro who has lived a thousand
+years. At first I helped that physician to save him, but now I think I wish him
+dead.&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;If you let this man die, my Father,&rsquo; I answered,
+&lsquo;then we part. Remember that I also have of the wisdom of our people, and
+can use it if I will.&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Then save him yourself,&rsquo; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Perhaps I shall, my Father,&rsquo; I answered, &lsquo;but if so
+it will not be here. I say that if so we part and you shall be left to rule in
+your majesty alone.&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now this frightened the Lord Oro, for he has the weakness that he hates
+to be alone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;If I do what you will, do you swear never to leave me,
+Yva?&rsquo; he asked. &lsquo;Know that if you will not swear, the man
+dies.&rsquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;I swear,&rsquo; I answered&mdash;for your sake,
+Humphrey&mdash;though I did not love the oath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then he gave me a certain medicine to mix with the Life-water, and when
+you were almost gone that medicine cured you, though Bickley does not know it,
+as nothing else could have done. Now I have told you the truth, for your own
+ear only, Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva,&rdquo; I asked, &ldquo;why did you do all this for me?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey, I do not know,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;but I think because
+I must. Now sleep a while.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap19"></a>CHAPTER XIX.<br />
+The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley</h2>
+
+<p>
+So far as my body was concerned I grew well with great rapidity, though it was
+long before I got back my strength. Thus I could not walk far or endure any
+sustained exertion. With my mind it was otherwise. I can not explain what had
+happened to it; indeed I do not know, but in a sense it seemed to have become
+detached and to have assumed a kind of personality of its own. At times it felt
+as though it were no longer an inhabitant of the body, but rather its more or
+less independent partner. I was perfectly clear-headed and of insanity I
+experienced no symptoms. Yet my mind, I use that term from lack of a better,
+was not entirely under my control. For one thing, at night it appeared to
+wander far away, though whither it went and what it saw there I could never
+remember.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I record this because possibly it explains certain mysterious events, if they
+were events and not dreams, which shortly I must set out. I spoke to Bickley
+about the matter. He put it by lightly, saying that it was only a result of my
+long and most severe illness and that I should steady down in time, especially
+if we could escape from that island and its unnatural atmosphere. Yet as he
+spoke he glanced at me shrewdly with his quick eyes, and when he turned to go
+away I heard him mutter something to himself about &ldquo;unholy
+influences&rdquo; and &ldquo;that confounded old Oro.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The words were spoken to himself and quite beneath his breath, and of course
+not meant to reach me. But one of the curious concomitants of my state was that
+all my senses, and especially my hearing, had become most abnormally acute. A
+whisper far away was now to me like a loud remark made in a room.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley&rsquo;s reflection, for I can scarcely call it more, set me thinking.
+Yva had said that Oro sent me medicine which was administered to me without
+Bickley&rsquo;s knowledge, and as she believed, saved my life, or certainly my
+reason. What was in it? I wondered. Then there was that Life-water which Yva
+brought and insisted upon my drinking every day. Undoubtedly it was a marvelous
+tonic and did me good. But it had other effects also. Thus, as she said would
+be the case, after a course of it I conceived the greatest dislike, which I may
+add has never entirely left me, of any form of meat, also of alcohol. All I
+seemed to want was this water with fruit, or such native vegetables as there
+were. Bickley disapproved and made me eat fish occasionally, but even this
+revolted me, and since I gained steadily in weight, as we found out by a simple
+contrivance, and remained healthy in every other way, soon he allowed me to
+choose my own diet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About this time Oro began to pay me frequent visits. He always came at night,
+and what is more I knew when he was coming, although he never gave me warning.
+Here I should explain that during my illness Bastin, who was so ingenious in
+such matters, had built another hut in which he and Bickley slept, of course
+when they were not watching me, leaving our old bed-chamber to myself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Well, I would wake up and be aware that Oro was coming. Then he appeared in a
+silent and mysterious way, as though he had materialised in the room, for I
+never saw him pass the doorway. In the moonlight, or the starlight, which
+flowed through the entrance and the side of the hut that was only enclosed with
+latticework, I perceived him seat himself upon a certain stool, looking like a
+most majestic ghost with his flowing robes, long white beard, hooked nose and
+hawk eyes. In the day-time he much resembled the late General Booth whom I had
+often seen, except for certain added qualities of height and classic beauty of
+countenance. At night, however, he resembled no one but himself, indeed there
+was something mighty and godlike in his appearance, something that made one
+feel that he was not as are other men.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a while he would sit and look at me. Then he began to speak in a low,
+vibrant voice. What did he speak of? Well, many matters. It was as though he
+were unburdening that hoary soul of his because it could no longer endure the
+grandeur of its own loneliness. Amongst sundry secret things, he told me of the
+past history of this world of ours, and of the mighty civilisations which for
+uncounted ages he and his forefathers had ruled by the strength of their will
+and knowledge, of the dwindling of their race and of the final destruction of
+its enemies, although I noticed that now he no longer said that this was his
+work alone. One night I asked him if he did not miss all such pomp and power.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then suddenly he broke out, and for the first time I really learned what
+ambition can be when it utterly possesses the soul of man.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Are you mad,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;that you suppose that I, Oro, the
+King of kings, can be content to dwell solitary in a great cave with none but
+the shadows of the dead to serve me? Nay, I must rule again and be even greater
+than before, or else I too will die. Better to face the future, even if it
+means oblivion, than to remain thus a relic of a glorious past, still living
+and yet dead, like that statue of the great god Fate which you saw in the
+temple of my worship.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin does not think that the future means oblivion,&rdquo; I remarked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know it. I have studied his faith and find it too humble for my taste,
+also too new. Shall I, Oro, creep a suppliant before any Power, and confess
+what Bastin is pleased to call my sins? Nay, I who am great will be the equal
+of all greatness, or nothing.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He paused a while, then went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin speaks of &lsquo;eternity.&rsquo; Where and what then is this
+eternity which if it has no end can have had no beginning? I know the secret of
+the suns and their attendant worlds, and they are no more eternal than the
+insect which glitters for an hour. Out of shapeless, rushing gases they
+gathered to live their day, and into gases at last they dissolve again with all
+they bore.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;but they reform into new worlds.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That have no part with the old. This world, too, will melt, departing to
+whence it came, as your sacred writings say, and what then of those who dwelt
+and dwell thereon? No, Man of today, give me Time in which I rule and keep your
+dreams of an Eternity that is not, and in which you must still crawl and serve,
+even if it were. Yet, if I might, I confess it, I would live on for ever, but
+as Master not as Slave.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+On another night he began to tempt me, very subtly. &ldquo;I see a spark of
+greatness in you, Humphrey,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and it comes into my heart
+that you, too, might learn to rule. With Yva, the last of my blood, it is
+otherwise. She is the child of my age and of a race outworn; too gentle, too
+much all womanly. The soul that triumphs must shine like steel in the sun, and
+cut if need be; not merely be beauteous and shed perfume like a lily in the
+shade. Yet she is very wise and fair,&rdquo; here he looked at me,
+&ldquo;perchance of her might come children such as were their forefathers, who
+again would wield the sceptre of the dominion of the earth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I made no answer, wondering what he meant exactly and thinking it wisest to be
+silent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are of the short-lived races,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;yet very
+much a man, not without intelligence, and by the arts I have I can so
+strengthen your frame that it will endure the shocks of time for three such
+lives as yours, or perchance for more, and then&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again he paused and went on:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Daughter of kings likes you also, perhaps because you
+resemble&mdash;&rdquo; here he fixed me with his piercing eyes, &ldquo;a
+certain kinglet of base blood whom once she also liked, but whom it was my duty
+to destroy. Well, I must think. I must study this world of yours also and
+therein you may help me. Perhaps afterwards I will tell you how. Now
+sleep.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In another moment he was gone, but notwithstanding his powerful command, for a
+while I could not sleep. I understood that he was offering Yva to me, but upon
+what terms? That was the question. With her was to go great dominion over the
+kingdoms of the earth. I could not help remembering that always this has been
+and still is Satan&rsquo;s favourite bait. To me it did not particularly
+appeal. I had been ambitious in my time&mdash;who is not that is worth his
+salt? I could have wished to excel in something, literature or art, or whatever
+it might be, and thus to ensure the memory of my name in the world.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of course this is a most futile desire, seeing that soon or late every name
+must fade out of the world like an unfixed photograph which is exposed to the
+sun. Even if it could endure, as the old demigod, or demidevil, Oro, had
+pointed out, very shortly, by comparison with Time&rsquo;s unmeasured vastness,
+the whole solar system will also fade. So of what use is this feeble love of
+fame and this vain attempt to be remembered that animates us so strongly?
+Moreover, the idea of enjoying mere temporal as opposed to intellectual power,
+appealed to me not at all. I am a student of history and I know what has been
+the lot of kings and the evil that, often enough, they work in their little
+day.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Also if I needed any further example, there was that of Oro himself. He had
+outlived the greatness of his House, as a royal family is called, and after
+some gigantic murder, if his own story was to be believed, indulged in a
+prolonged sleep. Now he awoke to find himself quite alone in the world, save
+for a daughter with whom he did not agree or sympathise. In short, he was but a
+kind of animated mummy inspired by one idea which I felt quite sure would be
+disappointed, namely, to renew his former greatness. To me he seemed as
+miserable a figure as one could imagine, brooding and plotting in his
+illuminated cave, at the end of an extended but misspent life.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Also I wondered what he, or rather his <i>ego</i>, had been doing during all
+those two hundred and fifty thousand years of sleep. Possibly if Yva&rsquo;s
+theory, as I understood it, were correct, he had reincarnated as Attila, or
+Tamerlane, or Napoleon, or even as Chaka the terrible Zulu king. At any rate
+there he was still in the world, filled with the dread of death, but consumed
+now as ever by his insatiable and most useless finite ambitions.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva, also! Her case was his, but yet how different. In all this long night of
+Time she had but ripened into one of the sweetest and most gentle women that
+ever the world bore. She, too, was great in her way, it appeared in her every
+word and gesture, but where was the ferocity of her father? Where his desire to
+reach to splendour by treading on a blood-stained road paved with broken human
+hearts? It did not exist. Her nature was different although her body came of a
+long line of these power-loving kings. Why this profound difference of the
+spirit? Like everything else it was a mystery. The two were as far apart as the
+Poles. Everyone must have hated Oro, from the beginning, however much he feared
+him, but everyone who came in touch with her must have loved Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Here I may break into my personal narrative to say that this, by their own
+confession, proved to be true of two such various persons as Bastin and
+Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The truth, which I am sure it would be wrong to hide from you,
+Arbuthnot,&rdquo; said the former to me one day, &ldquo;is that during your
+long illness I fell in love, I suppose that is the right word, with the
+Glittering Lady. After thinking the matter over also, I conceived that it would
+be proper to tell her so if only to clear the air and prevent future
+misunderstandings. As I remarked to her on that occasion, I had hesitated long,
+as I was not certain how she would fill the place of the wife of the incumbent
+of an English parish.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Mothers&rsquo; Meetings, and the rest,&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Exactly so, Arbuthnot. Also there were the views of the Bishop to be
+considered, who might have objected to the introduction into the diocese of a
+striking person who so recently had been a heathen, and to one in such strong
+contrast to my late beloved wife.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I suppose you didn&rsquo;t consider the late Mrs. Bastin&rsquo;s views
+on the subject of re-marriage. I remember that they were strong,&rdquo; I
+remarked rather maliciously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, I did not think it necessary, since the Scriptural instructions on
+the matter are very clear, and in another world no doubt all jealousies, even
+Sarah&rsquo;s, will be obliterated. Upon that point my conscience was quite
+easy. So when I found that, unlike her parent, the Lady Yva was much inclined
+to accept the principles of the faith in which it is my privilege to instruct
+her, I thought it proper to say to her that if ultimately she made up her mind
+to do so&mdash;of course <i>this</i> was a <i>sine qua non</i>&mdash;I should
+be much honoured, and as a man, not as a priest, it would make me most happy if
+she would take me as a husband. Of course I explained to her that I considered,
+under the circumstances, I could quite lawfully perform the marriage ceremony
+myself with you and Bickley as witnesses, even should Oro refuse to give her
+away. Also I told her that although after her varied experiences in the past,
+life at Fulcombe, if we could ever get there, might be a little monotonous,
+still it would not be entirely devoid of interest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You mean Christmas decorations and that sort of thing?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, and choir treats and entertaining Deputations and attending other
+Church activities.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, and what did she say, Bastin?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! she was most kind and flattering. Indeed that hour will always
+remain the pleasantest of my life. I don&rsquo;t know how it happened, but when
+it was over I felt quite delighted that she had refused me. Indeed on second
+thoughts, I am not certain but that I shall be much happier in the capacities
+of a brother and teacher which she asked me to fill, than I should have been as
+her husband. To tell you the truth, Arbuthnot, there are moments when I am not
+sure whether I entirely understand the Lady Yva. It was rather like proposing
+to one&rsquo;s guardian angel.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;that&rsquo;s about it, old fellow.
+&lsquo;Guardian Angel&rsquo; is not a bad name for her.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look here, Arbuthnot,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I want to own up to
+something. I think I ought to, because of certain things I have observed, in
+order to prevent possible future misunderstandings.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; I asked innocently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed bachelor on
+principle. Women introduce too many complications into life, and although it
+involves some sacrifice, on the whole, I have thought it best to do without
+them and leave the carrying on of the world to others.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Only this. While you were ill the sweetness of that Lady Yva and her
+wonderful qualities as a nurse overcame me. I went to pieces all of a sudden. I
+saw in her a realisation of every ideal I had ever entertained of perfect
+womanhood. So to speak, my resolves of a lifetime melted like wax in the sun.
+Notwithstanding her queer history and the marvels with which she is mixed up, I
+wished to marry her. No doubt her physical loveliness was at the bottom of it,
+but, however that may be, there it was.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;She is beautiful,&rdquo; I commented; &ldquo;though I daresay older than
+she looks.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is a point on which I made no inquiries, and I should advise you,
+when your turn comes, as no doubt it will, to follow my example. You know,
+Arbuthnot,&rdquo; he mused, &ldquo;however lovely a woman may be, it would put
+one off if suddenly she announced that she was&mdash;let us say&mdash;a hundred
+and fifty years old.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I admitted, &ldquo;for nobody wants to marry the
+contemporary of his great-grandmother. However, she gave her age as
+twenty-seven years and three moons.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And doubtless for once did not tell the truth. But, as she does not look
+more than twenty-five, I think that we may all agree to let it stand at that,
+namely, twenty-seven, plus an indefinite period of sleep. At any rate, she is a
+sweet and most gracious woman, apparently in the bloom of youth, and, to cut it
+short, I fell in love with her.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Like Bastin,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bastin!&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley indignantly. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t
+mean to say that clerical oaf presumed&mdash;well, well, after all, I suppose
+that he is a man, so one mustn&rsquo;t be hard on him. But who could have
+thought that he would run so cunning, even when he knew my sentiments towards
+the lady? I hope she told him her mind.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The point is, what did she tell <i>you</i>, Bickley?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure to be
+refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one&rsquo;s ease.&rdquo; (Here,
+remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to hide a smile.)
+&ldquo;She said&mdash;what did she say exactly? Such a lot that it is difficult
+to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking of marriage. Also, that she had not
+yet recovered from some recent love affair which left her heart sore, since the
+time of her sleep did not count. Also, that her father would never consent, and
+that the mere idea of such a thing would excite his animosity against all of
+us.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is that all?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and extremely
+honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her. She hoped, however, that
+I should never repeat it or even allude to the matter again, as her dearest
+wish was to be able to look upon me as her most intimate friend to whom she
+could always come for sympathy and counsel.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What happened then?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she wished,
+and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore and upset, but I am
+getting over it, having always practised self-control.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sorry for you, old fellow.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Are you?&rdquo; he asked suspiciously. &ldquo;Then perhaps you have
+tried your luck, too?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing how lately
+you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin. Perhaps you will get
+over it&mdash;recent marriage, I mean&mdash;as he has.&rdquo; He hesitated a
+while, then went on: &ldquo;Of course you will, old fellow; I know it, and,
+what is more, I seem to know that when your turn comes you will get a different
+answer. If so, it will keep her in the family as it were&mdash;and good luck to
+you. Only&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Only what?&rdquo; I asked anxiously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don&rsquo;t think that there will be real
+good luck for any one of us over this woman&mdash;not in the ordinary sense, I
+mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman. Is she quite a woman,
+and could she really marry a man as others do?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is curious that you should talk like that,&rdquo; I said uneasily.
+&ldquo;I thought that you had made up your mind that the whole business was
+either illusion or trickery&mdash;I mean, the odd side of it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If it is illusion, Arbuthnot, then a man cannot marry an illusion. And
+if it is trickery, then he will certainly be tricked. But, supposing that I am
+wrong, what then?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You mean, supposing things are as they seem to be?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes. In that event, Arbuthnot, I am sure that something will occur to
+prevent your being united to a woman who lived thousands of years ago. I am
+sorry to say it, but Fate will intervene. Remember, it is the god of her people
+that I suppose she worships, and, I may add, to which the whole world
+bows.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At his words a kind of chill fell upon me. I think he saw or divined it, for
+after a few remarks upon some indifferent matter, he turned and went away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Shortly after this Yva came to sit with me. She studied me for a while and I
+studied her. I had reason to do so, for I observed that of late her dress had
+become much more modern, and on the present occasion this struck me forcibly. I
+do not know exactly in what the change, or changes, consisted, because I am not
+skilled in such matters and can only judge of a woman&rsquo;s garments by their
+general effect. At any rate, the gorgeous sweeping robes were gone, and though
+her attire still looked foreign and somewhat oriental, with a touch of barbaric
+splendour about it&mdash;it was simpler than it had been and showed more of her
+figure, which was delicate, yet gracious.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You have changed your robes, Lady,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Humphrey. Bastin gave me pictures of those your women wear.&rdquo;
+(On further investigation I found that this referred to an old copy of the
+<i>Queen</i> newspaper, which, somehow or other, had been brought with the
+books from the ship.) &ldquo;I have tried to copy them a little,&rdquo; she
+added doubtfully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you do it? Where do you get the material?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; she answered with an airy wave of her hand, &ldquo;I make
+it&mdash;it is there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t understand,&rdquo; I said, but she only smiled radiantly,
+offering no further explanation. Then, before I could pursue the subject, she
+asked me suddenly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What has Bickley been saying to you about me?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I fenced, answering: &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know. Bastin and Bickley talk of
+little else. You seem to have been a great deal with them while I was
+ill.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, a great deal. They are the nearest to you who were so sick. Is it
+not so?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; I answered again. &ldquo;In my illness it
+seemed to me that <i>you</i> were the nearest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;About Bastin&rsquo;s words I can guess,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;But I
+ask again&mdash;what has Bickley been saying to you about me? Of the first
+part, let it be; tell me the rest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I intended to evade her question, but she fixed those violet, compelling eyes
+upon me and I was obliged to answer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I believe you know as well as I do,&rdquo; I said; &ldquo;but if you
+will have it, it was that you are not as other human women are, and that he who
+would treat you as such, must suffer; that was the gist of it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Some might be content to suffer for such as I,&rdquo; she answered with
+quiet sweetness. &ldquo;Even Bastin and Bickley may be content to suffer in
+their own little ways.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You know that is not what I meant,&rdquo; I interrupted angrily, for I
+felt that she was throwing reflections on me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No; you meant that you agreed with Bickley that I am not quite a woman,
+as you know women.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I was silent, for her words were true.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she blazed out into one of her flashes of splendour, like something that
+takes fire on an instant; like the faint and distant star which flames into
+sudden glory before the watcher&rsquo;s telescope.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is true that I am not as your women are&mdash;your poor, pale women,
+the shadows of an hour with night behind them and before. Because I am humble
+and patient, do you therefore suppose that I am not great? Man from the little
+country across the sea, I lived when the world was young, and gathered up the
+ancient wisdom of a greater race than yours, and when the world is old I think
+that I still shall live, though not in this shape or here, with all that
+wisdom&rsquo;s essence burning in my breast, and with all beauty in my eyes.
+Bickley does not believe although he worships. You only half believe and do not
+worship, because memory holds you back, and I myself do not understand. I only
+know though knowing so much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble
+road called Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an immortal
+city.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nor do I understand how all this can be, Yva,&rdquo; I said feebly, for
+she dazzled and overwhelmed me with her blaze of power.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, you do not understand. How can you, when even I cannot? Thus for two
+hundred and fifty thousand years I slept, and they went by as a lightning
+flash. One moment my father gave me the draught and I laid me down, the next I
+awoke with you bending over me, or so it seemed. Yet where was I through all
+those centuries when for me time had ceased? Tell me, Humphrey, did you dream
+at all while you were ill? I ask because down in that lonely cavern where I
+sleep a strange dream came to me one night. It was of a journey which, as I
+thought, you and I seemed to make together, past suns and universes to a very
+distant earth. It meant nothing, Humphrey. If you and I chanced to have dreamed
+the same thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is most
+common, or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I am not altogether as
+your women are, and I can bring no happiness to any man, or at the least, to
+one who cannot wait. Therefore, perhaps you would do well to think less of me,
+as I have counselled Bastin and Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then again she gazed at me with her wonderful, great eyes, and, shaking her
+glittering head a little, smiled and went.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But oh! that smile drew my heart after her.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap20"></a>CHAPTER XX.<br />
+Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night</h2>
+
+<p>
+As time went on, Oro began to visit me more and more frequently, till at last
+scarcely a night went by that he did not appear mysteriously in my
+sleeping-place. The odd thing was that neither Bickley nor Bastin seemed to be
+aware of these nocturnal calls. Indeed, when I mentioned them on one or two
+occasions, they stared at me and said it was strange that he should have come
+and gone as they saw nothing of him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On my speaking again of the matter, Bickley at once turned the conversation,
+from which I gathered that he believed me to be suffering from delusions
+consequent on my illness, or perhaps to have taken to dreaming. This was not
+wonderful since, as I learned afterwards, Bickley, after he was sure that I was
+asleep, made a practice of tying a thread across my doorway and of ascertaining
+at the dawn that it remained unbroken. But Oro was not to be caught in that
+way. I suppose, as it was impossible for him to pass through the latticework of
+the open side of the house, that he undid the thread and fastened it again when
+he left; at least, that was Bastin&rsquo;s explanation, or, rather, one of
+them. Another was that he crawled beneath it, but this I could not believe. I
+am quite certain that during all his prolonged existence Oro never crawled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At any rate, he came, or seemed to come, and pumped me&mdash;I can use no other
+word&mdash;most energetically as to existing conditions in the world,
+especially those of the civilised countries, their methods of government, their
+social state, the physical characteristics of the various races, their
+religions, the exact degrees of civilisation that they had developed, their
+attainments in art, science and literature, their martial capacities, their
+laws, and I know not what besides.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I told him all I could, but did not in the least seem to satisfy his perennial
+thirst for information.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should prefer to judge for myself,&rdquo; he said at last.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why are you so anxious to learn about all these nations, Oro?&rdquo; I
+asked, exhausted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because the knowledge I gather may affect my plans for the
+future,&rdquo; he replied darkly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am told, Oro, that your people acquired the power of transporting
+themselves from place to place.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is true that the lords of the Sons of Wisdom had such power, and that
+I have it still, O Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then why do you not go to look with your own eyes?&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because I should need a guide; one who could explain much in a short
+time,&rdquo; he said, contemplating me with his burning glance until I began to
+feel uncomfortable.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To change the subject I asked him whether he had any further information about
+the war, which he had told me was raging in Europe.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He answered: &ldquo;Not much; only that it was going on with varying success,
+and would continue to do so until the nations involved therein were
+exhausted,&rdquo; or so he believed. The war did not seem greatly to interest
+Oro. It was, he remarked, but a small affair compared to those which he had
+known in the old days. Then he departed, and I went to sleep.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next night he appeared again, and, after talking a little on different
+subjects, remarked quietly that he had been thinking over what I had said as to
+his visiting the modern world, and intended to act upon the suggestion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;When?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Now,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I am going to visit this England of yours
+and the town you call London, and <i>you</i> will accompany me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is not possible!&rdquo; I exclaimed. &ldquo;We have no ship.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We can travel without a ship,&rdquo; said Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a much better
+companion than I should in my present weak state.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues, would be
+useless,&rdquo; he replied sharply. &ldquo;You shall come and you only.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly&mdash;which, indeed, I did do, in
+another sense.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand to and fro above
+my head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog, which I knew
+could belong to one place only&mdash;London, in December, and at my side was
+Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is this the climate of your wonderful city?&rdquo; he asked, or seemed
+to ask, in an aggrieved tone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and began to look
+about me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of buildings, looking
+dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I recognised the Houses of Parliament
+and Westminster Abbey, for both could be seen from where we stood in front of
+the Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their identity to Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Let us enter your Place of Talk.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But I am not a member, and we have no passes for the Strangers&rsquo;
+Gallery,&rdquo; I expostulated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We shall not need any,&rdquo; he replied contemptuously. &ldquo;Lead
+on.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus adjured, I crossed the road, Oro following me. Looking round, to my horror
+I saw him right in the path of a motor-bus which seemed to go over him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There&rsquo;s an end to Oro,&rdquo; thought I to myself. &ldquo;Well, at
+any rate, I have got home.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next instant he was at my side quite undisturbed by the incident of the bus. We
+came to a policeman at the door and I hesitated, expecting to be challenged.
+But the policeman seemed absolutely indifferent to our presence, even when Oro
+marched past him in his flowing robes. So I followed with a like success. Then
+I understood that we must be invisible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed to the lobby, where members were hurrying to and fro, and
+constituents and pressmen were gathered, and so on into the House. Oro walked
+up its floor and took his stand by the table, in front of the Speaker. I
+followed him, none saying us No.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it chanced there was what is called a scene in progress&mdash;I think it was
+over Irish matters; the details are of no account. Members shouted, Ministers
+prevaricated and grew angry, the Speaker intervened. On the whole, it was
+rather a degrading spectacle. I stood, or seemed to stand, and watched it all.
+Oro, in his sweeping robes, which looked so incongruous in that place, stepped,
+or seemed to step, up to the principal personages of the Government and
+Opposition, whom I indicated to him, and inspected them one by one, as a
+naturalist might examine strange insects. Then, returning to me, he said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come away; I have seen and heard enough. Who would have thought that
+this nation of yours was struggling for its life in war?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed out of the House and somehow came to Trafalgar Square. A meeting was
+in progress there, convened, apparently, to advocate the rights of Labour, also
+those of women, also to protest against things in general, especially the
+threat of Conscription in the service of the country.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here the noise was tremendous, and, the fog having lifted somewhat, we could
+see everything. Speakers bawled from the base of Nelson&rsquo;s column. Their
+supporters cheered, their adversaries rushed at them, and in one or two
+instances succeeded in pulling them down. A woman climbed up and began to
+scream out something which could only be heard by a few reporters gathered
+round her. I thought her an unpleasant-looking person, and evidently her
+remarks were not palatable to the majority of her auditors. There was a rush,
+and she was dragged from the base of one of Landseer&rsquo;s lions on which she
+stood. Her skirt was half rent off her and her bodice split down the back.
+Finally, she was conveyed away, kicking, biting, and scratching, by a number of
+police. It was a disgusting sight, and tumult ensued.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let us go,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;Your officers of order are good; the
+rest is not good.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Later we found ourselves opposite to the doors of a famous restaurant where a
+magnificent and gigantic commissionaire helped ladies from motor-cars,
+receiving in return money from the men who attended on them. We entered; it was
+the hour of dinner. The place sparkled with gems, and the naked backs of the
+women gleamed in the electric light. Course followed upon course; champagne
+flowed, a fine band played, everything was costly; everything was, in a sense,
+repellent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;These are the wealthy citizens of a nation engaged in fighting for its
+life,&rdquo; remarked Oro to me, stroking his long beard. &ldquo;It is
+interesting, very interesting. Let us go.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went out and on, passing a public-house crowded with women who had left
+their babies in charge of children in the icy street. It was a day of
+Intercession for the success of England in the war. This was placarded
+everywhere. We entered, or, rather, Oro did, I following him, one of the
+churches in the Strand where an evening service was in progress. The preacher
+in the pulpit, a very able man, was holding forth upon the necessity for
+national repentance and self-denial; also of prayer. In the body of the church
+exactly thirty-two people, most of them elderly women, were listening to him
+with an air of placid acceptance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The priest talks well, but his hearers are not many,&rdquo; said Oro.
+&ldquo;Let us go.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to the flaunting doors of a great music-hall and passed through them,
+though to others this would have been impossible, for the place was filled from
+floor to roof. In its promenades men were drinking and smoking, while gaudy
+women, painted and low-robed, leered at them. On the stage girls danced,
+throwing their legs above their heads. Then they vanished amidst applause, and
+a woman in a yellow robe, who pretended to be tipsy, sang a horrible and vulgar
+song full of topical allusions, which was received with screams of delight by
+the enormous audience.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Here the hearers are very many, but those to whom they listen do not
+talk well. Let us go,&rdquo; said Oro, and we went.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At a recruiting station we paused a moment to consider posters supposed to be
+attractive, the very sight of which sent a thrill of shame through me. I
+remember that the inscription under one of them was: &ldquo;What will your best
+girl say?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is that how you gather your soldiers? Later it will be otherwise,&rdquo;
+said Oro, and passed on.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We reached Blackfriars and entered a hall at the doors of which stood women in
+poke-bonnets, very sweet-faced, earnest-looking women. Their countenances
+seemed to strike Oro, and he motioned me to follow him into the hall. It was
+quite full of a miserable-looking congregation of perhaps a thousand people. A
+man in the blue and red uniform of the Salvation Army was preaching of duty to
+God and country, of self-denial, hope and forgiveness. He seemed a humble
+person, but his words were earnest, and love flowed from him. Some of his
+miserable congregation wept, others stared at him open-mouthed, a few, who were
+very weary, slept. He called them up to receive pardon, and a number, led by
+the sweet-faced women, came and knelt before him. He and others whispered to
+them, then seemed to bless them, and they rose with their faces changed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let us go,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;I do not understand these rites, but
+at last in your great and wonderful city I have seen something that is pure and
+noble.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went out. In the streets there was great excitement. People ran to and fro
+pointing upwards. Searchlights, like huge fingers of flame, stole across the
+sky; guns boomed. At last, in the glare of a searchlight, we saw a long and
+sinister object floating high above us and gleaming as though it were made of
+silver. Flashes came from it followed by terrible booming reports that grew
+nearer and nearer. A house collapsed with a crash just behind us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Oro, with a smile. &ldquo;I know this&mdash;it is war,
+war as it was when the world was different and yet the same.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he spoke, a motor-bus rumbled past. Another flash and explosion. A man,
+walking with his arms round the waist of a girl just ahead of us; seemed to be
+tossed up and to melt. The girl fell in a heap on the pavement; somehow her
+head and her feet had come quite close together and yet she appeared to be
+sitting down. The motor-bus burst into fragments and its passengers hurtled
+through the air, mere hideous lumps that had been men and women. The head of
+one of them came dancing down the pavement towards us, a cigar still stuck in
+the corner of its mouth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, this is war,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;It makes me young again to see
+it. But does this city of yours understand?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We watched a while. A crowd gathered. Policemen ran up, ambulances came. The
+place was cleared, and all that was left they carried away. A few minutes later
+another man passed by with his arm round the waist of another girl. Another
+motor-bus rumbled up, and, avoiding the hole in the roadway, travelled on, its
+conductor keeping a keen look-out for fares.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The street was cleared by the police; the airship continued its course,
+spawning bombs in the distance, and vanished. The incident was closed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let us go home,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;I have seen enough of your great
+and wonderful city. I would rest in the quiet of Nyo and think.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next thing that I remember was the voice of Bastin, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t mind, Arbuthnot, I wish that you would get up. The
+Glittering Lady (he still called her that) is coming here to have a talk with
+me which I should prefer to be private. Excuse me for disturbing you, but you
+have overslept yourself; indeed, I think it must be nine o&rsquo;clock, so far
+as I can judge by the sun, for my watch is very erratic now, ever since Bickley
+tried to clean it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sorry, my dear fellow,&rdquo; I said sleepily, &ldquo;but do you
+know I thought I was in London&mdash;in fact, I could swear that I have been
+there.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then,&rdquo; interrupted Bickley, who had followed Bastin into the hut,
+giving me that doubtful glance with which I was now familiar, &ldquo;I wish to
+goodness that you had brought back an evening paper with you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+A night or two later I was again suddenly awakened to feel that Oro was
+approaching. He appeared like a ghost in the bright moonlight, greeted me, and
+said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Tonight, Humphrey, we must make another journey. I would visit the seat
+of the war.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not wish to go,&rdquo; I said feebly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What you wish does not matter,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;<i>I</i> wish
+that you should go, and therefore you must.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Listen, Oro,&rdquo; I exclaimed. &ldquo;I do not like this business; it
+seems dangerous to me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is no danger if you are obedient, Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think there is. I do not understand what happens. Do you make use of
+what the Lady Yva called the Fourth Dimension, so that our bodies pass over the
+seas and through mountains, like the vibrations of our Wireless, of which I was
+speaking to you?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Humphrey. That method is good and easy, but I do not use it because
+if I did we should be visible in the places which we visit, since there all the
+atoms that make a man would collect together again and be a man.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What, then, do you do?&rdquo; I asked, exasperated.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Man, Humphrey, is not one; he is many. Thus, amongst other things he has
+a Double, which can see and hear, as he can in the flesh, if it is separated
+from the flesh.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The old Egyptians believed that,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Did they? Doubtless they inherited the knowledge from us, the Sons of
+Wisdom. The cup of our learning was so full that, keep it secret as we would,
+from time to time some of it overflowed among the vulgar, and doubtless thus
+the light of our knowledge still burns feebly in the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I reflected to myself that whatever might be their other characteristics, the
+Sons of Wisdom had lost that of modesty, but I only asked how he used his
+Double, supposing that it existed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very easily,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;In sleep it can be drawn from
+the body and sent upon its mission by one that is its master.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then while you were asleep for all those thousands of years your Double
+must have made many journeys.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; he replied quietly, &ldquo;and my spirit also, which is
+another part of me that may have dwelt in the bodies of other men. But
+unhappily, if so I forget, and that is why I have so much to learn and must
+even make use of such poor instruments as you, Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then if I sleep and you distil my Double out of me, I suppose that you
+sleep too. In that case who distils your Double out of <i>you</i>, Lord
+Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He grew angry and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ask no more questions, blind and ignorant as you are. It is your part
+not to examine, but to obey. Sleep now,&rdquo; and again he waved his hand over
+me.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+In an instant, as it seemed, we were standing in a grey old town that I judged
+from its appearance must be either in northern France or Belgium. It was much
+shattered by bombardment; the church, for instance, was a ruin; also many of
+the houses had been burnt. Now, however, no firing was going on for the town
+had been taken. The streets were full of armed men wearing the German uniform
+and helmet. We passed down them and were able to see into the houses. In some
+of these were German soldiers engaged in looting and in other things so
+horrible that even the unmoved Oro turned away his head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to the market-place. It was crowded with German troops, also with a
+great number of the inhabitants of the town, most of them elderly men and women
+with children, who had fallen into their power. The Germans, under the command
+of officers, were dragging the men from the arms of their wives and children to
+one side, and with rifle-butts beating back the screaming women. Among the men
+I noticed two or three priests who were doing their best to soothe their
+companions and even giving them absolution in hurried whispers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length the separation was effected, whereon at a hoarse word of command, a
+company of soldiers began to fire at the men and continued doing so until all
+had fallen. Then petty officers went among the slaughtered and with pistols
+blew out the brains of any who still moved.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;These butchers, you say, are Germans?&rdquo; asked Oro of me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered, sick with horror, for though I was in the mind
+and not in the body, I could feel as the mind does. Had I been in the body
+also, I should have fainted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then we need not waste time in visiting their country. It is enough; let
+us go on.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed out into the open land and came to a village. It was in the
+occupation of German cavalry. Two of them held a little girl of nine or ten,
+one by her body, the other by her right hand. An officer stood between them
+with a drawn sword fronting the terrified child. He was a horrible,
+coarse-faced man who looked to me as though he had been drinking.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll teach the young devil to show us the wrong road and let those
+French swine escape,&rdquo; he shouted, and struck with the sword. The
+girl&rsquo;s right hand fell to the ground.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;War as practised by the Germans!&rdquo; remarked Oro. Then he stepped,
+or seemed to step up to the man and whispered, or seemed to whisper, in his
+ear.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not know what tongue or what spirit speech he used, or what he said, but
+the bloated-faced brute turned pale. Yes, he drew sick with fear.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think there are spirits in this place,&rdquo; he said with a German
+oath. &ldquo;I could have sworn that something told me that I was going to die.
+Mount!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The Uhlans mounted and began to ride away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Watch,&rdquo; said Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he spoke out of a dark cloud appeared an aeroplane. Its pilot saw the band
+of Germans beneath and dropped a bomb. The aim was good, for the missile
+exploded in the midst of them, causing a great cloud of dust from which arose
+the screams of men and horses.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come and see,&rdquo; said Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We were there. Out of the cloud of dust appeared one man galloping furiously.
+He was a young fellow who, as I noted, had turned his head away and hidden his
+eyes with his hand when the horror was done yonder. All the others were dead
+except the officer who had worked the deed. He was still living, but both his
+hands and one of his feet had been blown away. Presently he died, screaming to
+God for mercy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed on and came to a barn with wide doors that swung a little in the
+wind, causing the rusted hinges to scream like a creature in pain. On each of
+these doors hung a dead man crucified. The hat of one of them lay upon the
+ground, and I knew from the shape of it that he was a Colonial soldier.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Did you not tell me,&rdquo; said Oro after surveying them, &ldquo;that
+these Germans are of your Christian faith?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes; and the Name of God is always on their ruler&rsquo;s lips.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I am glad that I worship Fate. Bastin the
+priest need trouble me no more.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There is something behind Fate,&rdquo; I said, quoting Bastin himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Perhaps. So indeed I have always held, but after much study I cannot
+understand the manner of its working. Fate is enough for me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We went on and came to a flat country that was lined with ditches, all of them
+full of men, Germans on one side, English and French upon the other. A terrible
+bombardment shook the earth, the shells raining upon the ditches. Presently
+that from the English guns ceased and out of the trenches in front of them
+thousands of men were vomited, who ran forward through a hail of fire in which
+scores and hundreds fell, across an open piece of ground that was pitted with
+shell craters. They came to barbed wire defenses, or what remained of them, cut
+the wire with nippers and pulled up the posts. Then through the gaps they
+surged in, shouting and hurling hand grenades. They reached the German
+trenches, they leapt into them and from those holes arose a hellish din.
+Pistols were fired and everywhere bayonets flashed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Behind them rushed a horde of little, dark-skinned men, Indians who carried
+great knives in their hands. Those leapt over the first trench and running on
+with wild yells, dived into the second, those who were left of them, and there
+began hacking with their knives at the defenders and the soldiers who worked
+the spitting maxim guns. In twenty minutes it was over; those lines of trenches
+were taken, and once more from either side the guns began to boom.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;War again,&rdquo; said Oro, &ldquo;clean, honest war, such as the god I
+call Fate decrees for man. I have seen enough. Now I would visit those whom you
+call Turks. I understand they have another worship and perhaps they are nobler
+than these Christians.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to a hilly country which I recognised as Armenia, for once I travelled
+there, and stopped on a seashore. Here were the Turks in thousands. They were
+engaged in driving before them mobs of men, women and children in countless
+numbers. On and on they drove them till they reached the shore. There they
+massacred them with bayonets, with bullets, or by drowning. I remember a
+dreadful scene of a poor woman standing up to her waist in the water. Three
+children were clinging to her&mdash;but I cannot go on, really I cannot go on.
+In the end a Turk waded out and bayoneted her while she strove to protect the
+last living child with her poor body whence it sprang.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;These, I understand,&rdquo; said Oro, pointing to the Turkish soldiers,
+&ldquo;worship a prophet who they say is the voice of God.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;and therefore they massacre these who are
+Christians because they worship God without a prophet.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And what do the Christians massacre each other for?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Power and the wealth and territories that are power. That is, the King
+of the Germans wishes to rule the world, but the other Nations do not desire
+his dominion. Therefore they fight for Liberty and Justice.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;As it was, so it is and shall be,&rdquo; remarked Oro, &ldquo;only with
+this difference. In the old world some were wise, but here&mdash;&rdquo; and he
+stopped, his eyes fixed upon the Armenian woman struggling in her death agony
+while the murderer drowned her child, then added: &ldquo;Let us go.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Our road ran across the sea. On it we saw a ship so large that it attracted
+Oro&rsquo;s attention, and for once he expressed astonishment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In my day,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we had no vessels of this greatness in
+the world. I wish to look upon it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We landed on the deck of the ship, or rather the floating palace, and examined
+her. She carried many passengers, some English, some American, and I pointed
+out to Oro the differences between the two peoples. These were not, he
+remarked, very wide except that the American women wore more jewels, also that
+some of the American men, to whom we listened as they conversed, spoke of the
+greatness of their country, whereas the Englishmen, if they said anything
+concerning it, belittled their country.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently, on the surface of the sea at a little distance appeared something
+strange, a small and ominous object like a can on the top of a pole. A voice
+cried out &ldquo;<i>Submarine!</i>&rdquo; and everyone near rushed to look.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If those Germans try any of their monkey tricks on us, I guess the
+United States will give them hell,&rdquo; said another voice near by.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then from the direction of the pole with the tin can on the top of it, came
+something which caused a disturbance in the smooth water and bubbles to rise in
+its wake.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A torpedo!&rdquo; cried some.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Shut your mouth,&rdquo; said the voice. &ldquo;Who dare torpedo a vessel
+full of the citizens of the United States?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next came a booming crash and a flood of upthrown water, in the wash of which
+that speaker was carried away into the deep. Then horror! horror! horror!
+indescribable, as the mighty vessel went wallowing to her doom. Boats launched;
+boats overset; boats dragged under by her rush through the water which could
+not be stayed. Maddened men and women running to and fro, their eyes starting
+from their heads, clasping children, fastening lifebelts over their costly
+gowns, or appearing from their cabins, their hands filled with jewels that they
+sought to save. Orders cried from high places by stern-faced officers doing
+their duty to the last. And a little way off that thin pole with a tin can on
+the top of it watching its work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the plunge of the enormous ship into the deep, its huge screws still
+whirling in the air and the boom of the bursting boilers. Lastly everything
+gone save a few boats floating on the quiet sea and around them dots that were
+the heads of struggling human beings.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Let us go home,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;I grow tired of this war of your
+Christian peoples. It is no better than that of the barbarian nations of the
+early world. Indeed it is worse, since then we worshipped Fate and but a few of
+us had wisdom. Now you all claim wisdom and declare that you worship a God of
+Mercy.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+With these words still ringing in my ears I woke up upon the Island of Orofena,
+filled with terror at the horrible possibilities of nightmare.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What else could it be? There was the brown and ancient cone of the extinct
+volcano. There were the tall palms of the main island and the lake glittering
+in the sunlight between. There was Bastin conducting a kind of Sunday school of
+Orofenans upon the point of the Rock of Offerings, as now he had obtained the
+leave of Oro to do. There was the mouth of the cave, and issuing from it
+Bickley, who by help of one of the hurricane lamps had been making an
+examination of the buried remains of what he supposed to be flying machines.
+Without doubt it was nightmare, and I would say nothing to them about it for
+fear of mockery.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yet two nights later Oro came again and after the usual preliminaries, said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey, this night we will visit that mighty American nation, of which
+you have told me so much, and the other Neutral Countries.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+[At this point there is a gap in Mr. Arbuthnot&rsquo;s M.S., so Oro&rsquo;s
+reflections on the Neutral Nations, if any, remain unrecorded. It continues:]
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+On our homeward way we passed over Australia, making a detour to do so. Of the
+cities Oro took no account. He said that they were too large and too many, but
+the country interested him so much that I gathered he must have given great
+attention to agriculture at some time in the past. He pointed out to me that
+the climate was fine, and the land so fertile that with a proper system of
+irrigation and water-storage it could support tens of millions and feed not
+only itself but a great part of the outlying world.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But where are the people?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;Outside of those huge
+hives,&rdquo; and he indicated the great cities, &ldquo;I see few of them,
+though doubtless some of the men are fighting in this war. Well, in the days to
+come this must be remedied.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Over New Zealand, which he found beautiful, he shook his head for the same
+reason.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On another night we visited the East. China with its teeming millions
+interested him extremely, partly because he declared these to be the
+descendants of one of the barbarian nations of his own day. He made a remark to
+the effect that this race had always possessed points and capacities, and that
+he thought that with proper government and instruction their Chinese offspring
+would be of use in a regenerated world.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the Japanese and all that they had done in two short generations, he went
+so far as to express real admiration, a very rare thing with Oro, who was by
+nature critical. I could see that mentally he put a white mark against their
+name.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+India, too, really moved him. He admired the ancient buildings at Delhi and
+Agra, especially the Taj Mahal. This, he declared, was reminiscent of some of
+the palaces that stood at Pani, the capital city of the Sons of Wisdom, before
+it was destroyed by the Barbarians.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The English administration of the country also attracted a word of praise from
+him, I think because of its rather autocratic character. Indeed he went so far
+as to declare that, with certain modifications, it should be continued in the
+future, and even to intimate that he would bear the matter in mind. Democratic
+forms of government had no charms for Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Amongst other places, we stopped at Benares and watched the funeral rites in
+progress upon the banks of the holy Ganges. The bearers of the dead brought the
+body of a woman wrapped in a red shroud that glittered with tinsel ornaments.
+Coming forward at a run and chanting as they ran, they placed it upon the
+stones for a little while, then lifted it up again and carried it down the
+steps to the edge of the river. Here they took water and poured it over the
+corpse, thus performing the rite of the baptism of death. This done, they
+placed its feet in the water and left it looking very small and lonely.
+Presently appeared a tall, white-draped woman who took her stand by the body
+and wailed. It was the dead one&rsquo;s mother. Again the bearers approached
+and laid the corpse upon the flaming pyre.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;These rites are ancient,&rdquo; said Oro. &ldquo;When I ruled as King of
+the World they were practised in this very place. It is pleasant to me to find
+something that has survived the changefulness of Time. Let it continue till the
+end.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Here I will cease. These experiences that I have recorded are but samples, for
+also we visited Russia and other countries. Perhaps, too, they were not
+experiences at all, but only dreams consequent on my state of health. I cannot
+say for certain, though much of what I seemed to see fitted in very well indeed
+with what I learned in after days, and certainly at the time they appeared as
+real as though Oro and I had stood together upon those various shores.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap21"></a>CHAPTER XXI.<br />
+Love&rsquo;s Eternal Altar</h2>
+
+<p>
+Now of all these happenings I said very little to Bastin and Bickley. The
+former would not have understood them, and the latter attributed what I did
+tell him to mental delusions following on my illness. To Yva I did speak about
+them, however, imploring her to explain their origin and to tell me whether or
+not they were but visions of the night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She listened to me, as I thought not without anxiety, from which I gathered
+that she too feared for my mind. It was not so, however, for she said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am glad, O Humphrey, that your journeyings are done, since such things
+are not without danger. He who travels far out of the body may chance to return
+there no more.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But were they journeyings, or dreams?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She evaded a direct answer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot say. My father has great powers. I do not know them all. It is
+possible that they were neither journeyings nor dreams. Mayhap he used you as
+the sorcerers in the old days used the magic glass, and after he had put his
+spell upon you, read in your mind that which passes elsewhere.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I understood her to refer to what we call clairvoyance, when the person
+entranced reveals secret or distant things to the entrancer. This is a more or
+less established phenomenon and much less marvelous than the actual
+transportation of the spiritual self through space. Only I never knew of an
+instance in which the seer, on awaking, remembered the things that he had seen,
+as in my case. There, however, the matter rested, or rests, for I could extract
+nothing more from Yva, who appeared to me to have her orders on the point.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nor did Oro ever talk of what I had seemed to see in his company, although he
+continued from time to time to visit me at night. But now our conversation was
+of other matters. As Bastin had discovered, by some extraordinary gift he had
+soon learned how to read the English language, although he never spoke a single
+word in that tongue. Among our reference books that we brought from the yacht,
+was a thin paper edition of the <i>Encyclopædia Britannica</i>, which he
+borrowed when he discovered that it contained compressed information about the
+various countries of the world, also concerning almost every other matter. My
+belief is that within a month or so that marvelous old man not only read this
+stupendous work from end to end, but that he remembered everything of interest
+which it contained. At least, he would appear and show the fullest acquaintance
+with certain subjects or places, seeking further light from me concerning them,
+which very often I was quite unable to give him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+An accident, as it chanced, whereof I need not set out the details, caused me
+to discover that his remarkable knowledge was limited. Thus, at one period, he
+knew little about any modern topic which began with a letter later in the
+alphabet than, let us say, C. A few days afterwards he was acquainted with
+those up to F, or G; and so on till he reached Z, when he appeared to me to
+know everything, and returned the book. Now, indeed, he was a monument of
+learning, very ancient and very new, and with some Encyclopedia-garnered facts
+or deductions of what had happened between.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Moreover, he took to astronomical research, for more than once we saw him
+standing on the rock at night studying the heavens. On one of these occasions,
+when he had the two metal plates, of which I have spoken, in his hands, I
+ventured to approach and ask what he did. He replied that he was checking his
+calculations that he found to be quite correct, an exact period of two hundred
+and fifty thousand years having gone by since he laid himself down to sleep.
+Then, by aid of the plates, he pointed out to me certain alterations that had
+happened during that period in the positions of some of the stars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For instance, he showed me one which, by help of my glasses, I recognised as
+Sirius, and remarked that two hundred and fifty thousand years ago it was
+further away and much smaller. Now it was precisely in the place and of the
+size which he had predicted, and he pointed to it on his prophetic map. Again
+he indicated a star that the night-glass told me was Capella, which, I suppose,
+is one of the most brilliant stars in the sky, and showed me that on the map he
+had made two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, it did not exist, as then it
+was too far north to appear thereon. Still, he observed, the passage of this
+vast period of time had produced but little effect upon the face of the
+heavens. To the human eye the majority of the stars had not moved so very far.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And yet they travel fast, O Humphrey,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Consider
+then how great is their journey between the time they gather and that day when,
+worn-out, once more they melt to vaporous gas. You think me long-lived who
+compared to them exist but a tiny fraction of a second, nearly all of which I
+have been doomed to pass in sleep. And, Humphrey, I desire to live&mdash;I, who
+have great plans and would shake the world. But my day draws in; a few brief
+centuries and I shall be gone, and&mdash;whither, whither?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you lived as long as those stars, the end would be the same,
+Oro.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, but the life of the stars is very long, millions of millions of
+years; also, after death, they reform, as other stars. But shall I reform as
+another Oro? With all my wisdom, I do not know. It is known to Fate
+only&mdash;Fate-the master of worlds and men and the gods they
+worship&mdash;Fate, whom it may please to spill my gathered knowledge, to be
+lost in the sands of Time.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It seems that you are great,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;and have lived long
+and learned much. Yet the end of it is that your lot is neither worse nor
+better than that of us creatures of an hour.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is so, Humphrey. Presently you will die, and within a few centuries I
+shall die also and be as you are. You believe that you will live again
+eternally. It may be so because you <i>do</i> believe, since Fate allows Faith
+to shape the future, if only for a little while. But in me Wisdom has destroyed
+Faith and therefore I must die. Even if I sleep again for tens of thousands of
+years, what will it help me, seeing that sleep is unconsciousness and that I
+shall only wake again to die, since sleep does not restore to us our
+youth?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He ceased, and walked up and down the rock with a troubled mien. Then he stood
+in front of me and said in a triumphant voice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At least, while I live I will rule, and then let come what may come. I
+know that you do not believe, and the first victory of this new day of mine
+shall be to make you believe. I have great powers and you shall see them at
+work, and afterwards, if things go right, rule with me for a little while,
+perhaps, as the first of my subjects. Hearken now; in one small matter my
+calculations, made so long ago, have gone wrong. They showed me that at this
+time a day of earthquakes, such as those that again and again have rocked and
+split the world, would recur. But now it seems that there is an error, a tiny
+error of eleven hundred years, which must go by before those earthquakes
+come.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Are you sure,&rdquo; I suggested humbly, &ldquo;that there is not also
+an error in those star-maps you hold?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sure, Humphrey. Some day, who knows? You may return to your world
+of modern men who, I gather, have knowledge of the great science of astronomy.
+Take now these maps with which I have done, and submit them to the most learned
+of those men, and let them tell you whether I was right or wrong in what I
+wrote upon this metal two hundred and fifty thousand years ago. Whatever else
+is false, at least the stars in their motions can never die.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he handed me the maps and was gone. I have them today, and if ever this
+book is published, they will appear with it, that those who are qualified may
+judge of them and of the truth or otherwise of Oro&rsquo;s words.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+From that night forward for quite a long time I saw Oro no more. Nor indeed did
+any of us, since for some reason of his own he forbade us to visit the
+underground city of Nyo. Oddly enough, however, he commanded Yva to bring down
+the spaniel, Tommy, to be with him from time to time. When I asked her why, she
+said it was because he was lonely and desired the dog&rsquo;s companionship. It
+seemed to us very strange that this super-man, who had the wisdom of ten
+Solomons gathered in one within his breast, should yet desire the company of a
+little dog. What then was the worth of learning and long life, or, indeed, of
+anything? Well, Solomon himself asked the question ages since, and could give
+no answer save that all is vanity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I noted about this time that Yva began to grow very sad and troubled; indeed,
+looking at her suddenly on two or three occasions, I saw that her beautiful
+eyes were aswim with tears. Also, I noted that always as she grew sadder she
+became, in a sense, more human. In the beginning she was, as it were, far away.
+One could never forget that she was the child of some alien race whose eyes had
+looked upon the world when, by comparison, humanity was young; at times,
+indeed, she might have been the denizen of another planet, strayed to earth.
+Although she never flaunted it, one felt that her simplest word hid secret
+wisdom; that to her books were open in which we could not read. Moreover, as I
+have said, occasionally power flamed out of her, power that was beyond our ken
+and understanding.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yet with all this there was nothing elfish about her, nothing uncanny. She was
+always kind, and, as we could feel, innately good and gentle-hearted, just a
+woman made half-divine by gifts and experience that others lack. She did not
+even make use of her wondrous beauty to madden men, as she might well have done
+had she been so minded. It is true that both Bastin and Bickley fell in love
+with her, but that was only because all with whom she had to do must love her,
+and then, when she told them that it might not be, it was in such a fashion
+that no soreness was left behind. They went on loving her, that was all, but as
+men love their sisters or their daughters; as we conceive that they may love in
+that land where there is no marrying or giving in marriage.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But now, in her sadness, she drew ever nearer to us, and especially to myself,
+more in tune with our age and thought. In truth, save for her royal and
+glittering loveliness in which there was some quality which proclaimed her of
+another blood, and for that reserve of hidden power which at times would look
+out of her eyes or break through her words, she might in most ways have been
+some singularly gifted and beautiful modern woman.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The time has come when I must speak of my relations with Yva and of their
+climax. As may have been guessed, from the first I began to love her. While the
+weeks went on that love grew and grew, until it utterly possessed me, although
+for a certain reason connected with one dead, at first I fought against it. Yet
+it did not develop quite in the fashion that might have been expected. There
+was no blazing up of passion&rsquo;s fire; rather was there an ever-increasing
+glow of the holiest affection, till at last it became a lamp by which I must
+guide my feet through life and death. This love of mine seemed not of earth but
+from the stars. As yet I had said nothing to her of it because in some way I
+felt that she did not wish me to do so, felt also that she was well aware of
+all that passed within my heart, and desired, as it were, to give it time to
+ripen there. Then one day there came a change, and though no glance or touch of
+Yva&rsquo;s told me so, I knew that the bars were taken down and that I might
+speak.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+It was a night of full moon. All that afternoon she had been talking to Bastin
+apart, I suppose about religion, for I saw that he had some books in his hand
+from which he was expounding something to her in his slow, earnest way. Then
+she came and sat with us while we took our evening meal. I remember that mine
+consisted of some of the Life-water which she had brought with her and fruit,
+for, as I think I have said, I had acquired her dislike to meat, also that she
+ate some plantains, throwing the skins for Tommy to fetch and laughing at his
+play. When it was over, Bastin and Bickley went away together, whether by
+chance or design I do not know, and she said to me suddenly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey, you have often asked me about the city Pani, of which a little
+portion of the ruins remains upon this island, the rest being buried beneath
+the waters. If you wish I will show you where our royal palace was before the
+barbarians destroyed it with their airships. The moon is very bright, and by it
+we can see.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I nodded, for, knowing what she meant, somehow I could not answer her, and we
+began the ascent of the hill. She explained to me the plan of the palace when
+we reached the ruins, showing me where her own apartments had been, and the
+rest. It was very strange to hear her quietly telling of buildings which had
+stood and of things that had happened over two hundred and fifty thousand years
+before, much as any modern lady might do of a house that had been destroyed a
+month ago by an earthquake or a Zeppelin bomb, while she described the details
+of a disaster which now frightened her no more. I think it was then that for
+the first time I really began to believe that in fact Yva had lived all those
+æons since and been as she still appeared.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We passed from the palace to the ruins of the temple, through what, as she
+said, had been a pleasure-garden, pointing out where a certain avenue of rare
+palms had grown, down which once it was her habit to walk in the cool of the
+day. Or, rather, there were two terraced temples, one dedicated to Fate like
+that in the underground city of Nyo, and the other to Love. Of the temple to
+Fate she told me her father had been the High Priest, and of the temple to Love
+she was the High Priestess.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then it was that I understood why she had brought me here.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She led the way to a marble block covered with worn-out carvings and almost
+buried in the debris. This, she said, was the altar of offerings. I asked her
+what offerings, and she replied with a smile:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Only wine, to signify the spirit of life, and flowers to symbolise its
+fragrance,&rdquo; and she laid her finger on a cup-like depression, still
+apparent in the marble, into which the wine was poured.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Indeed, I gathered that there was nothing coarse or bacchanalian about this
+worship of a prototype of Aphrodite; on the contrary, that it was more or less
+spiritual and ethereal. We sat down on the altar stone. I wondered a little
+that she should have done so, but she read my thought, and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sometimes we change our faiths, Humphrey, or perhaps they grow. Also,
+have I not told you that sacrifices were offered on this altar?&rdquo; and she
+sighed and smiled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I do not know which was the sweeter, the smile or the sigh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We looked at the water glimmering in the crater beneath us on the edge of which
+we sat. We looked at heaven above in which the great moon sailed royally. Then
+we looked into each other&rsquo;s eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I love you,&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; she answered gently. &ldquo;You have loved me from the
+first, have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you began to love me,
+but until you dreamed a certain dream you would not admit it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I cannot say, Humphrey. But I tell you this. As you will learn in time,
+one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the flesh.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words brought to my
+mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and I answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere, for
+certainly I should find her. Doubtless she meant beyond the shores of
+death&mdash;or perhaps she also dreamed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey. As you dream
+and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed. Of dreams, then, let us say no more, since
+I think that they have served their purpose, and all three of us
+understand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon her perfumed
+breast. She lifted it and kissed me on the lips, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;With this kiss again I give myself to you. But oh! Humphrey, do not ask
+too much of the god of my people, Fate,&rdquo; and she looked me in the eyes
+and sighed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked, trembling.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Many, many things. Among them, that happiness is not for mortals, and
+remember that though my life began long ago, I am mortal as you are, and that
+in eternity time makes no difference.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who said it? Not I. Humphrey, I tell you this. Nor earth, nor heaven,
+nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst its way towards reunion
+and completeness. Only there must be love, manifested in many shapes and at
+many times, but ever striving to its end, which is not of the flesh. Aye, love
+that has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated, love that seems false, love
+betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering through the worlds, love asleep and
+living in its sleep, love awake and yet sleeping; all love that has in it the
+germ of life. It matters not what form love takes. If it be true I tell you
+that it will win its way, and in the many that it has seemed to worship, still
+find the one, though perchance not here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not here? Then where?&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ask your dead wife, Humphrey. Ask the dumb stars. Ask the God you
+worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word&mdash;Somewhere! Man, be not
+afraid. Do you think that such as you and I can be lost in the aching abysms of
+space? I know but little, yet I tell you that we are its rulers. I tell you
+that we, too, are gods, if only we can aspire and believe. For the doubting and
+timid there is naught. For those who see with the eyes of the soul and stretch
+out their hands to grasp there is all. Even Bastin will tell you this.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;life is short. Those worlds are far away, and
+you are near.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She became wonderful, mysterious.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Near I am far,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;and far I am near, if only this
+love of yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp. And, Humphrey, it needs
+strength, for here I am afraid that it will bear little of such fruit as men
+desire to pluck.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for I did not know what to
+say or ask.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Listen,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;Already my father has offered me to
+you in marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not understand?
+Believe me, it is one that you should never pay, since the rule of the world
+can be too dearly bought by the slaughter of half the world. And if you would
+pay it, I cannot.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But this is madness!&rdquo; I exclaimed. &ldquo;Your father has no
+powers over our earth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I would that I could think so, Humphrey. I tell you that he has powers
+and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done before. You, too, he
+would use, and me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves. Let us take each other while
+we may. Bastin is a priest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment Oro
+watches us in his thought and laughs. Only in death, Humphrey, shall we pass
+beyond his reach and become lords of ourselves.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is monstrous!&rdquo; I cried. &ldquo;There is the boat, let us fly
+away.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god of my
+people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we must wait our
+doom.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Doom,&rdquo; I said&mdash;&ldquo;doom? What then is about to
+happen?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey. Or, rather, it will not
+happen.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not, if it must?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Beloved,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;Bastin has expounded to me a new
+faith whereof the master-word is Sacrifice. The terrible thing will not happen
+<i>because of sacrifice!</i> Ask me no more.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the ancient altar of
+sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her face and making her mysterious.
+Then she threw it back, showing her lovely eyes and glittering hair, and
+laughed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We have still an earthly hour,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;therefore let us
+forget the far, dead past and the eternities to come and be joyful in that
+hour. Now throw your arms about me and I will tell you strange stories of lost
+days, and you shall look into my eyes and learn wisdom, and you shall kiss my
+lips and taste of bliss&mdash;you, who were and are and shall be&mdash;you, the
+beloved of Yva from the beginning to the end of Time.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap22"></a>CHAPTER XXII.<br />
+The Command</h2>
+
+<p>
+I think that both Bastin and Bickley, by instinct as it were, knew what had
+passed between Yva and myself and that she had promised herself to me. They
+showed this by the way in which they avoided any mention of her name. Also they
+began to talk of their own plans for the future as matters in which I had no
+part. Thus I heard them discussing the possibility of escape from the island
+whereof suddenly they seemed to have grown weary, and whether by any means two
+men (two, not three) could manage to sail and steer the lifeboat that remained
+upon the wreck. In short, as in all such cases, the woman had come between;
+also the pressure of a common loss caused them to forget their differences and
+to draw closer together. I who had succeeded where they both had failed, was,
+they seemed to think, out of their lives, so much that our ancient intimacy had
+ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This attitude hurt me, perhaps because in many respects the situation was
+awkward. They had, it is true, taken their failures extremely well, still the
+fact remained that both of them had fallen in love with the wonderful creature,
+woman and yet more than woman, who had bound herself to me. How then could we
+go on living together, I in prospective possession of the object that all had
+desired, and they without the pale?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Moreover, they were jealous in another and quite a different fashion because
+they both loved me in their own ways and were convinced that I who had hitherto
+loved them, henceforward should have no affection left to spare, since surely
+this Glittering Lady, this marvel of wisdom and physical perfections would take
+it all. Of course they were in error, since even if I could have been so base
+and selfish, this was no conduct that Yva would have wished or even suffered.
+Still that was their thought.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then spoke straight out
+to them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My friends,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;as I see that you have guessed, Yva
+and I are affianced to each other and love each other perfectly.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Arbuthnot,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;we saw that in your face, and
+in hers as she bade us good night before she went into the cave, and we
+congratulate you and wish you every happiness.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We wish you every happiness, old fellow,&rdquo; chimed in Bickley. He
+paused a while, then added, &ldquo;But to be honest, I am not sure that I
+congratulate you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not, Bickley?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not because
+you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be expected that you would
+do, but on account of something totally different. I told you a while ago and
+repetition is useless and painful. I need only add therefore that since then my
+conviction has strengthened and I am sure, sorry as I am to say it, that in
+this matter you must prepare for disappointment and calamity. That woman, if
+woman she really is, will never be the wife of mortal man. Now be angry with me
+if you like, or laugh as you have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and
+yourself, I also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak what I
+believe to be the truth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Like Cassandra,&rdquo; I suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person.&rdquo; At first I was
+inclined to resent Bickley&rsquo;s words&mdash;who would not have been in the
+circumstances? Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my mind the conviction
+that he spoke the truth. In this world Yva was not for me or any man. Moreover
+she knew it, the knowledge peeped out of every word she spoke in our passionate
+love scene by the lake. She was aware, and subconsciously I was aware, that we
+were plighting our troth, not for time but for eternity. With time we had
+little left to do; not for long would she wear the ring I gave her on that holy
+night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt that the situation
+was strained and awkward and broke in with a curious air of forced
+satisfaction:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It&rsquo;s uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to have a
+clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you in a respectable
+fashion. Of course I can&rsquo;t say that the Glittering Lady is as yet
+absolutely converted to our faith, but I am certain that she has absorbed
+enough of its principles to justify me in uniting her in Christian
+wedlock.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;she has absorbed its principles; she told
+me as much herself. Sacrifice, for instance,&rdquo; and as I spoke the word my
+eyes filled with tears.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sacrifice!&rdquo; broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he needed a
+vent to his mental disturbance. &ldquo;Rubbish. Why should every religion
+demand sacrifice as savages do? By it alone they stand condemned.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of all life
+that is worth the living,&rdquo; I answered sadly enough. &ldquo;Anyhow I
+believe you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will not be troubled to marry
+us.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You don&rsquo;t mean,&rdquo; broke in Bastin with a horrified air,
+&ldquo;that you propose to dispense&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Bastin, I don&rsquo;t mean that. What I mean is that it comes upon
+me that something will prevent this marriage. Sacrifice, perhaps, though in
+what shape I do not know. And now good night. I am tired.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+That night in the chill dead hour before the dawn Oro came again. I woke up to
+see him seated by my bed, majestic, and, as it seemed to me, lambent, though
+this may have been my imagination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You take strange liberties with my daughter, Barbarian, or she takes
+strange liberties with you, it does not matter which,&rdquo; he said, regarding
+me with his calm and terrible eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why do you presume to call me Barbarian?&rdquo; I asked, avoiding the
+main issue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For this reason, Humphrey. All men are the same. They have the same
+organs, the same instincts, the same desires, which in essence are but two,
+food and rebirth that Nature commands; though it is true that millions of years
+before I was born, as I have learned from the records of the Sons of Wisdom, it
+was said that they were half ape. Yet being the same there is between them a
+whole sea of difference, since some have knowledge and others none, or little.
+Those who have none or little, among whom you must be numbered, are Barbarians.
+Those who have much, among whom my daughter and I are the sole survivors, are
+the Instructed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There are nearly two thousand millions of living people in this
+world,&rdquo; I said, &ldquo;and you name all of them Barbarians?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All, Humphrey, excepting, of course, myself and my daughter who are not
+known to be alive. You think that you have learned much, whereas in truth you
+are most ignorant. The commonest of the outer nations, when I destroyed them,
+knew more than your wisest know today.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are mistaken, Oro; since then we have learned something of the
+soul.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;that interests me and perhaps it is
+true. Also, if true it is very important, as I have told you before&mdash;or
+was it Bastin? If a man has a soul, he lives, whereas even we Sons of Wisdom
+die, and in Death what is the use of Wisdom? Because you can believe, you have
+souls and are therefore, perhaps, heirs to life, foolish and ignorant as you
+are today. Therefore I admit you and Bastin to be my equals, though Bickley,
+who like myself believes nothing, is but a common chemist and doctor of
+disease.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you bow to Faith, Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, and I think that my god Fate also bows to Faith. Perhaps, indeed,
+Faith shapes Fate, not Fate, Faith. But whence comes that faith which even I
+with all my learning cannot command? Why is it denied to me and given to you
+and Bastin?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because as Bastin would tell you, it is a gift, though one that is never
+granted to the proud and self-sufficient. Become humble as a child, Oro, and
+perchance you too may acquire faith.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And how shall I become humble?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;By putting away all dreams of power and its exercise, if such you have,
+and in repentance walking quietly to the Gates of Death,&rdquo; I replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For you, Humphrey, who have little or none of these things, that may be
+easy. But for me who have much, if not all, it is otherwise. You ask me to
+abandon the certain for the uncertain, the known for the unknown, and from a
+half-god communing with the stars, to become an earthworm crawling in mud and
+lifting blind eyes towards the darkness of everlasting night.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A god who must die is no god, half or whole, Oro; the earthworm that
+lives on is greater than he.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Mayhap. Yet while I endure I will be as a god, so that when night comes,
+if come it must, I shall have played my part and left my mark upon this little
+world of ours. Have done!&rdquo; he added with a burst of impatience.
+&ldquo;What will you of my daughter?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What man has always willed of woman&mdash;herself, body and soul.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Her soul perchance is yours, if she has one, but her body is mine to
+give or withhold. Yet it can be bought at a price,&rdquo; he added slowly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So she told me, Oro.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I can guess what she told you. Did I not watch you yonder by the lake
+when you gave her a ring graved with the signs of Life and Everlastingness? The
+question is, will you pay the price?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not so; the question is&mdash;what is the price?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This; to enter my service and henceforth do my will&mdash;without debate
+or cavil.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For what reward, Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yva and the dominion of the earth while you shall live, neither more nor
+less.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And what is your will?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That you shall learn in due course. On the second night from this I
+command the three of you to wait upon me at sundown in the buried halls of Nyo.
+Till then you see no more of Yva, for I do not trust her. She, too, has powers,
+though as yet she does not use them, and perchance she would forget her oaths,
+and following some new star of love, for a little while vanish with you out of
+my reach. Be in the sepulchre at the hour of sundown on the second day from
+this, all three of you, if you would continue to live upon the earth.
+Afterwards you shall learn my will and make your choice between Yva with
+majesty and her loss with death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then suddenly he was gone.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Next morning I told the others what had passed, and we talked the matter over.
+The trouble was, of course, that Bickley did not believe me. He had no faith in
+my alleged interviews with Oro, which he set down to delusions of a
+semi-mesmeric character. This was not strange, since it appeared that on the
+previous night he had watched the door of my sleeping-place until dawn broke,
+which it did long after Oro had departed, and he had not seen him either come
+or go, although the moon was shining brightly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he told me this I could only answer that all the same he had been there
+as, if he could speak, Tommy would have been able to certify. As it chanced the
+dog was sleeping with me and at the first sound of the approach of someone,
+woke up and growled. Then recognising Oro, he went to him, wagged his tail and
+curled himself up at his feet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bastin believed my story readily enough, saying that Oro was a peculiar person
+who no doubt had ways of coming and going which we did not understand. His
+point was, however, that he did not in the least wish to visit Nyo any more.
+The wonders of its underground palaces and temples had no charms for him. Also
+he did not think he could do any good by going, since after &ldquo;sucking him
+as dry as an orange&rdquo; with reference to religious matters &ldquo;that old
+vampire-bat Oro had just thrown him away like the rind,&rdquo; and, he might
+add, &ldquo;seemed no better for the juice he had absorbed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I doubt,&rdquo; continued Bastin, &ldquo;whether St. Paul himself could
+have converted Oro, even if he performed miracles before him. What is the use
+of showing miracles to a man who could always work a bigger one himself?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In short, Bastin&rsquo;s one idea, and Bickley&rsquo;s also for the matter of
+that, was to get away to the main island and thence escape by means of the
+boat, or in some other fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I pointed out that Oro had said we must obey at the peril of our lives; indeed
+that he had put it even more strongly, using words to the effect that if we did
+not he would kill us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;d take the risk,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;since I believe
+that you dreamt it all, Arbuthnot. However, putting that aside, there is a
+natural reason why you should wish to go, and for my own part, so do I in a
+way. I want to see what that old fellow has up his extremely long sleeve, if
+there is anything there at all.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, if you ask me, Bickley,&rdquo; I answered, &ldquo;I believe it is
+the destruction of half the earth, or some little matter of that sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this suggestion Bickley only snorted, but Bastin said cheerfully:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I dare say. He is bad enough even for that. But as I am quite convinced
+that it will never be allowed, his intentions do not trouble me.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I remarked that he seemed to have carried them out once before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! you mean the Deluge. Well, no doubt there was a deluge, but I am
+sure that Oro had no more to do with it than you or I, as I think I have said
+already. Anyhow it is impossible to leave you to descend into that hole alone.
+I suggest, therefore, that we should go into the sepulchre at the time which
+you believe Oro appointed, and see what happens. If you are not mistaken, the
+Glittering Lady will come there to fetch us, since it is quite certain that we
+cannot work the lift or whatever it is, alone. If you are mistaken we can just
+go back to bed as usual.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, that&rsquo;s the best plan,&rdquo; said Bickley, shortly, after
+which the conversation came to an end.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All that day and the next I watched and waited in vain for the coming of Yva,
+but no Yva appeared. I even went as far as the sepulchre, but it was as empty
+as were the two crystal coffins, and after waiting a while I returned. Although
+I did not say so to Bickley, to me it was evident that Oro, as he had said, was
+determined to cut off all communication between us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The second day drew to its close. Our simple preparations were complete. They
+consisted mainly in making ready our hurricane lamps and packing up a little
+food, enough to keep us for three or four days if necessary, together with some
+matches and a good supply of oil, since, as Bastin put it, he was determined
+not to be caught like the foolish virgins in the parable.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You see,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;one never knows when it might please
+that old wretch to turn off the incandescent gas or electric light, or whatever
+it is he uses to illumine his family catacombs, and then it would be awkward if
+we had no oil.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;For the matter of that he might steal our lamps,&rdquo; suggested
+Bickley, &ldquo;in which case we should be where Moses was when the light went
+out.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I have considered that possibility,&rdquo; answered Bastin, &ldquo;and
+therefore, although it is a dangerous weapon to carry loaded, I am determined
+to take my revolver. If necessary I shall consider myself quite justified in
+shooting him to save our lives and those of thousands of others.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this we both laughed; somehow the idea of Bastin trying to shoot Oro struck
+us as intensely ludicrous. Yet that very thing was to happen.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+It was a peculiarly beautiful sunset over the southern seas. To the west the
+great flaming orb sank into the ocean, to the east appeared the silver circle
+of the full moon. To my excited fancy they were like scales hanging from the
+hand of a materialised spirit of calm. Over the volcano and the lake, over the
+island with its palm trees, over the seas beyond, this calm brooded. Save for a
+few travelling birds the sky was empty; no cloud disturbed its peace; the world
+seemed steeped in innocence and quiet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All these things struck me, as I think they did the others, because by the
+action of some simultaneous thought it came to our minds that very probably we
+were looking on them for the last time. It is all very well to talk of the
+Unknown and the Infinite whereof we are assured we are the heirs, but that does
+not make it any easier for us to part with the Known and the Finite. The
+contemplation of the wonders of Eternity does not conceal the advantages of
+actual and existent Time. In short there is no one of us, from a sainted
+archbishop down to a sinful suicide, who does not regret the necessity of
+farewell to the pleasant light and the kindly race of men wherewith we are
+acquainted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For after all, who can be quite certain of the Beyond? It may be splendid, but
+it will probably be strange, and from strangeness, after a certain age, we
+shrink. We know that all things will be different there; that our human
+relationships will be utterly changed, that perhaps sex which shapes so many of
+them, will vanish to be replaced by something unknown, that ambitions will lose
+their hold of us, and that, at the best, the mere loss of hopes and fears will
+leave us empty. So at least we think, who seek not variation but continuance,
+since the spirit must differ from the body and that thought alarms our
+intelligence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At least some of us think so; others, like Bickley, write down the future as a
+black and endless night, which after all has its consolations since, as has
+been wisely suggested, perhaps oblivion is better than any memories. Others
+again, like Bastin, would say of it with the Frenchman, <i>plus ça change, plus
+c&rsquo;est la même chose</i>. Yet others, like Oro, consider it as a realm of
+possibilities, probably unpleasant and perhaps non-existent; just this and
+nothing more. Only one thing is certain, that no creature which has life
+desires to leap into the fire and from the dross of doubts, to resolve the
+gold&mdash;or the lead&mdash;of certainty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is time to be going,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;In these skies the
+sun seems to tumble down, not to set decently as it does in England, and if we
+wait any longer we shall be late for our appointment in the sepulchre. I am
+sorry because although I don&rsquo;t often notice scenery, everything looks
+rather beautiful this evening. That star, for instance, I think it is called
+Venus.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And therefore one that Arbuthnot should admire,&rdquo; broke in Bickley,
+attempting to lighten matters with a joke. &ldquo;But come on and let us be rid
+of this fool&rsquo;s errand. Certainly the world is a lovely place after all,
+and for my part I hope that we haven&rsquo;t seen the last of it,&rdquo; he
+added with a sigh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So do I,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;though of course, Faith teaches us
+that there are much better ones beyond. It is no use bothering about what they
+are like, but I hope that the road to them doesn&rsquo;t run through the hole
+that the old reprobate, Oro, calls Nyo.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A few minutes later we started, each of us carrying his share of the
+impedimenta. I think that Tommy was the only really cheerful member of the
+party, for he skipped about and barked, running backwards and forwards into the
+mouth of the cave, as though to hurry our movements.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Really,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;it is quite unholy to see an animal
+going on in that way when it knows that it is about to descend into the bowels
+of the earth. I suppose it must like them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! no,&rdquo; commented Bickley, &ldquo;it only likes what is in
+them&mdash;like Arbuthnot. Since that little beast came in contact with the
+Lady Yva, it has never been happy out of her company.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think that is so,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;At any rate I have
+noticed that it has been moping for the last two days, as it always does when
+she is not present. It even seems to like Oro who gives me the creeps, perhaps
+because he is her father. Dogs must be very charitable animals.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By now we were in the cave marching past the wrecks of the half-buried
+flying-machines, which Bickley, as he remarked regretfully, had never found
+time thoroughly to examine. Indeed, to do so would have needed more digging
+than we could do without proper instruments, since the machines were big and
+deeply entombed in dust.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We came to the sepulchre and entered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Bickley, seating himself on the edge of one of the
+coffins and holding up his lamp to look about him, &ldquo;this place seems
+fairly empty. No one is keeping the assignation, Arbuthnot, although the sun is
+well down.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he spoke the words Yva stood before us. Whence she came we did not see, for
+all our backs were turned at the moment of her arrival. But there she was,
+calm, beautiful, radiating light.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap23"></a>CHAPTER XXIII.<br />
+In the Temple of Fate</h2>
+
+<p>
+Yva glanced at me, and in her eyes I read tenderness and solicitude, also
+something of inquiry. It seemed to me as though she were wondering what I
+should do under circumstances that might, or would, arise, and in some secret
+fashion of which I was but half conscious, drawing an answer from my soul. Then
+she turned, and, smiling in her dazzling way, said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So, Bickley, as usual, you did not believe? Because <i>you</i> did not
+see him, therefore the Lord Oro, my father, never spoke with Humphrey. As
+though the Lord Oro could not pass you without your knowledge, or, perchance,
+send thoughts clothed in his own shape to work his errand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you know that I did not believe Arbuthnot&rsquo;s story?&rdquo;
+Bickley asked in a rather cross voice and avoiding the direct issue. &ldquo;Do
+you also send thoughts to work <i>your</i> errands clothed in your own shape,
+Lady Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Alas! not so, though perhaps I could if I might. It is very simple,
+Bickley. Standing here, I heard you say that although the sun was well down
+there was no one to meet you as Humphrey had expected, and from those words and
+your voice I guessed the rest.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Your knowledge of the English language is improving fast, Lady Yva.
+Also, when I spoke, you were not here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At least I was very near, Bickley, and these walls are thinner than you
+think,&rdquo; she answered, contemplating what seemed to be solid rock with
+eyes that were full of innocence. &ldquo;Oh! friend,&rdquo; she went on
+suddenly, &ldquo;I wonder what there is which will cause you to believe that
+you do not know all; that there exist many things beyond the reach of your
+learning and imagination? Well, in a day or two, perhaps, even you will admit
+as much, and confess it to me&mdash;elsewhere,&rdquo; and she sighed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am ready to confess now that much happens which I do not understand at
+present, because I have not the key to the trick,&rdquo; he replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva shook her head at him and smiled again. Then she motioned to all of us to
+stand close to her, and, stooping, lifted Tommy in her arms. Next moment that
+marvel happened which I have described already, and we were whirling downwards
+through space, to find ourselves in a very little time standing safe in the
+caves of Nyo, breathless with the swiftness of our descent. How and on what we
+descended neither I nor the others ever learned. It was and must remain one of
+the unexplained mysteries of our great experience.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Whither now, Yva?&rdquo; I asked, staring about me at the radiant
+vastness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lord Oro would speak with you, Humphrey. Follow. And I pray you all
+do not make him wrath, for his mood is not gentle.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So once more we proceeded down the empty streets of that underground abode
+which, except that it was better illuminated, reminded me of the Greek
+conception of Hades. We came to the sacred fountain over which stood the
+guardian statue of Life, pouring from the cups she held the waters of Good and
+Ill that mingled into one health-giving wine.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Drink, all of you,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;for I think before the sun
+sets again upon the earth we shall need strength, every one of us.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So we drank, and she drank herself, and once more felt the blood go dancing
+through our veins as though the draught had been some nectar of the gods. Then,
+having extinguished the lanterns which we still carried, for here they were
+needless, and we wished to save our oil, we followed her through the great
+doors into the vast hall of audience and advanced up it between the endless,
+empty seats. At its head, on the dais beneath the arching shell, sat Oro on his
+throne. As before, he wore the jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes,
+while the table in front of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which
+he wrote with a pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his own fierce
+eyes. Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to ascend the dais.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are here. It is well,&rdquo; he said, which was all his greeting.
+Only when Tommy ran up to him he bent down and patted the dog&rsquo;s head with
+his long, thin hand, and, as he did so, his face softened. It was evident to me
+that Tommy was more welcome to him than were the rest of us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was a long silence while, one by one, he searched us with his piercing
+glance. It rested on me, the last of the three of us, and from me travelled to
+Yva.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder why I have sent for you?&rdquo; he said at length, with a
+mirthless laugh. &ldquo;I think it must be that I may convince Bickley, the
+sceptic, that there are powers which he does not understand, but that I have
+the strength to move. Also, perhaps, that your lives may be spared for my own
+purposes in that which is about to happen. Hearken! My labours are finished; my
+calculations are complete,&rdquo; and he pointed to the sheets of metal before
+him that were covered with cabalistic signs. &ldquo;Tomorrow I am about to do
+what once before I did and to plunge half the world in the deeps of ocean and
+lift again from the depths that which has been buried for a quarter of a
+million years.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Which half?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is my secret, Physician, and the answer to it lies written here in
+signs you cannot read. Certain countries will vanish, others will be spared. I
+say that it is my secret.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then, Oro, if you could do what you threaten, you would drown hundreds
+of millions of people.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If I could do! If I could do!&rdquo; he exclaimed, glaring at Bickley.
+&ldquo;Well, tomorrow you shall see what I can do. Oh! why do I grow angry with
+this fool? For the rest, yes, they must drown. What does it matter? Their end
+will be swift; some few minutes of terror, that is all, and in one short
+century every one of them would have been dead.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+An expression of horror gathered on Bastin&rsquo;s face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you really mean to murder hundreds of millions of people?&rdquo; he
+asked, in a thick, slow voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I have said that I intend to send them to that heaven or that hell of
+which you are so fond of talking, Preacher, somewhat more quickly than
+otherwise they would have found their way thither. They have disappointed me,
+they have failed; therefore, let them go and make room for others who will
+succeed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you are a greater assassin than any that the world has bred, or
+than all of them put together. There is nobody as bad, even in the Book of
+Revelation!&rdquo; shouted Bastin, in a kind of fury. &ldquo;Moreover, I am not
+like Bickley. I know enough of you and your hellish powers to believe that what
+you plan, that you can do.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I believe it also,&rdquo; sneered Oro. &ldquo;But how comes it that the
+Great One whom you worship does not prevent the deed, if He exists, and it be
+evil?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He <i>will</i> prevent it!&rdquo; raved Bastin. &ldquo;Even now He
+commands me to prevent it, and I obey!&rdquo; Then, drawing the revolver from
+his pocket, he pointed it at Oro&rsquo;s breast, adding: &ldquo;Swear not to
+commit this crime, or I will kill you!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So the man of peace would become a man of blood,&rdquo; mused Oro,
+&ldquo;and kill that <i>I</i> may not kill for the good of the world? Why, what
+is the matter with that toy of yours, Preacher?&rdquo; and he pointed to the
+pistol.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Well might he ask, for as he spoke the revolver flew out of Bastin&rsquo;s
+hand. High into the air it flew, and as it went discharged itself, all the six
+chambers of it, in rapid succession, while Bastin stood staring at his arm and
+hand which he seemed unable to withdraw.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you still threaten me with that outstretched hand, Preacher?&rdquo;
+mocked Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t move it,&rdquo; said Bastin; &ldquo;it seems turned to
+stone.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be thankful that you also are not turned to stone. But, because your
+courage pleases me, I will spare you, yes, and will advance you in my New
+Kingdom. What shall you be? Controller of Religions, I think, since all the
+qualities that a high priest should have are yours&mdash;faith, fanaticism and
+folly.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is very strange,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;but all of a sudden my
+arm and hand are quite well again. I suppose it must have been &lsquo;pins and
+needles&rsquo; or something of that sort which made me throw away the pistol
+and pull the trigger when I didn&rsquo;t mean to do so.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he went to fetch that article which had fallen beyond the dais, and quite
+forgot his intention of executing Oro in the interest of testing its mechanism,
+which proved to be destroyed. To his proposed appointment he made no illusion.
+If he comprehended what was meant, which I doubt, he took it as a joke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hearken all of you,&rdquo; said Oro, lifting his head suddenly, for
+while Bastin recovered the revolver he had been brooding. &ldquo;The great
+thing which I shall do tomorrow must be witnessed by you because thereby only
+can you come to understand my powers. Also yonder where I bring it about in the
+bowels of the earth, you will be safer than elsewhere, since when and perhaps
+before it happens, the whole world will heave and shake and tremble, and I know
+not what may chance, even in these caves. For this reason also, do not forget
+to bring the little hound with you, since him least of all of you would I see
+come to harm, perhaps because once, hundreds of generations ago as you reckon
+time, I had a dog very like to him. Your mother loved him much, Yva, and when
+she died, this dog died also. He lies embalmed with her on her coffin yonder in
+the temple, and yesterday I went to look at both of them. The beasts are
+wonderfully alike, which shows the everlastingness of blood.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He paused a while, lost in thought, then continued: &ldquo;After the deed is
+done I&rsquo;ll speak with you and you shall choose, Strangers, whether you
+will die your own masters, or live on to serve me. Now there is one problem
+that is left to me to solve&mdash;whether I can save a certain land&mdash;do
+not ask which it is, Humphrey, though I see the question in your eyes&mdash;or
+must let it go with the rest. I only answer you that I will do my best because
+you love it. So farewell for a while, and, Preacher, be advised by me and do
+not aim too high again.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It doesn&rsquo;t matter where I aim,&rdquo; answered Bastin sturdily,
+&ldquo;or whether I hit or miss, since there is something much bigger than me
+waiting to deal with you. The countries that you think you are going to destroy
+will sleep quite as well tomorrow as they do tonight, Oro.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Much better, I think, Preacher, since by then they will have left sorrow
+and pain and wickedness and war far behind them.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Where are we to go?&rdquo; I asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The Lady Yva will show you,&rdquo; he answered, waving his hand, and
+once more bent over his endless calculations.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva beckoned to us and we turned and followed her down the hall. She led us to
+a street near the gateway of the temple and thence into one of the houses.
+There was a portico to it leading to a court out of which opened rooms somewhat
+in the Pompeian fashion. We did not enter the rooms, for at the end of the
+court were a metal table and three couches also of metal, on which were spread
+rich-looking rugs. Whence these came I do not know and never asked, but I
+remember that they were very beautiful and soft as velvet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Here you may sleep,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;if sleep you can, and eat of
+the food that you have brought with you. Tomorrow early I will call you when it
+is time for us to start upon our journey into the bowels of the earth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t want to go any deeper than we are,&rdquo; said Bastin
+doubtfully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think that none of us want to go, Bastin,&rdquo; she answered with a
+sigh. &ldquo;Yet go we must. I pray of you, anger the Lord Oro no more on this
+or any other matter. In your folly you tried to kill him, and as it chanced he
+bore it well because he loves courage. But another time he may strike back, and
+then, Bastin&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not afraid of him,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;but I do not like
+tunnels. Still, perhaps it would be better to accompany you than to be left in
+this place alone. Now I will unpack the food.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva turned to go.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I must leave you,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;since my father needs my help.
+The matter has to do with the Force that he would let loose tomorrow, and its
+measurements; also with the preparation of the robes that we must wear lest it
+should harm us in its leap.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Something in her eyes told me that she wished me to follow her, and I did so.
+Outside the portico where we stood in the desolate, lighted street, she halted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are not afraid,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;meet me at midnight by
+the statue of Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you, Humphrey,
+where, if anywhere, we may be alone.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I will come, Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You know the road, and the gates are open, Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she gave me her hand to kiss and glided away. I returned to the others and
+we ate, somewhat sparingly, for we wished to save our food in case of need, and
+having drunk of the Life-water, were not hungry. Also we talked a little, but
+by common consent avoided the subject of the morrow and what it might bring
+forth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We knew that terrible things were afoot, but lacking any knowledge of what
+these might be, thought it useless to discuss them. Indeed we were too
+depressed, so much so that even Bastin and Bickley ceased from arguing. The
+latter was so overcome by the exhibition of Oro&rsquo;s powers when he caused
+the pistol to leap into the air and discharge itself, that he could not even
+pluck up courage to laugh at the failure of Bastin&rsquo;s efforts to do
+justice on the old Super-man, or rather to prevent him from attempting a
+colossal crime.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At length we lay down on the couches to rest, Bastin remarking that he wished
+he could turn off the light, also that he did not in the least regret having
+tried to kill Oro. Sleep seemed to come to the others quickly, but I could only
+doze, to wake up from time to time. Of this I was not sorry, since whenever I
+dropped off dreams seemed to pursue me. For the most part they were of my dead
+wife. She appeared to be trying to console me for some loss, but the strange
+thing was that sometimes she spoke with her own voice and sometimes with
+Yva&rsquo;s, and sometimes looked at me with her own eyes and sometimes with
+those of Yva. I remember nothing else about these dreams, which were very
+confused.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After one of them, the most vivid of all, I awoke and looked at my watch. It
+was half-past eleven, almost time for me to be starting. The other two seemed
+to be fast asleep. Presently I rose and crept down the court without waking
+them. Outside the portico, which by the way was a curious example of the
+survival of custom in architecture, since none was needed in that weatherless
+place, I turned to the right and followed the wide street to the temple
+enclosure. Through the pillared courts I went, my footsteps, although I walked
+as softly as I could, echoing loudly in that intense silence, through the great
+doors into the utter solitude of the vast and perfect fane.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Words can not tell the loneliness of that place. It flowed over me like a sea
+and seemed to swallow up my being, so that even the wildest and most dangerous
+beast would have been welcome as a companion. I was as terrified as a child
+that wakes to find itself deserted in the dark. Also an uncanny sense of
+terrors to come oppressed me, till I could have cried aloud if only to hear the
+sound of a mortal voice. Yonder was the grim statue of Fate, the Oracle of the
+Kings of the Sons of Wisdom, which was believed to bow its stony head in answer
+to their prayers. I ran to it, eager for its terrible shelter, for on either
+side of it were figures of human beings. Even their cold marble was company of
+a sort, though alas! over all frowned Fate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Let anyone imagine himself standing alone beneath the dome of St. Paul&rsquo;s;
+in the centre of that cathedral brilliant with mysterious light, and stretched
+all about it a London that had been dead and absolutely unpeopled for tens of
+thousands of years. If he can do this he will gather some idea of my physical
+state. Let him add to his mind-picture a knowledge that on the following day
+something was to happen not unlike the end of the world, as prognosticated by
+the Book of Revelation and by most astronomers, and he will have some idea of
+my mental perturbations. Add to the mixture a most mystic yet very real love
+affair and an assignation before that symbol of the cold fate which seems to
+sway the universes down to the tiniest detail of individual lives, and he may
+begin to understand what I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, experienced during my vigil in
+this sanctuary of a vanished race.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It seemed long before Yva came, but at last she did come. I caught sight of her
+far away beyond the temple gate, flitting through the unholy brightness of the
+pillared courts like a white moth at night and seeming quite as small. She
+approached; now she was as a ghost, and then drawing near, changed into a
+living, breathing, lovely woman. I opened my arms, and with something like a
+sob she sank into them and we kissed as mortals do.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I could not come more quickly,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;The Lord Oro
+needed me, and those calculations were long and difficult. Also twice he must
+visit the place whither we shall go tomorrow, and that took time.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then it is close at hand?&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey, be not foolish. Do you not remember, who have travelled with
+him, that Oro can throw his soul afar and bring it back again laden with
+knowledge, as the feet of a bee are laden with golden dust? Well, he went and
+went again, and I must wait. And then the robes and shields; they must be
+prepared by his arts and mine. Oh! ask not what they are, there is no time to
+tell, and it matters nothing. Some folk are wise and some are foolish, but all
+which matters is that within them flows the blood of life and that life breeds
+love, and that love, as I believe, although Oro does not, breeds immortality.
+And if so, what is Time but as a grain of sand upon the shore?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This, Yva; it is ours, who can count on nothing else.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! Humphrey, if I thought that, no more wretched creature would breathe
+tonight upon this great world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked, growing fearful, more at her manner
+and her look than at her words.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nothing, nothing, except that Time is so very short. A kiss, a touch, a
+little light and a little darkness, and it is gone. Ask my father Oro who has
+lived a thousand years and slept for tens of thousands, as I have, and he will
+say the same. It is against Time that he fights; he who, believing in nothing
+beyond, will inherit nothing, as Bastin says; he to whom Time has brought
+nothing save a passing, blood-stained greatness, and triumph ending in darkness
+and disaster, and hope that will surely suffer hope&rsquo;s eclipse, and power
+that must lay down its coronet in dust.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And what has it brought to you, Yva, beyond a fair body and a soul of
+strength?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It has brought a spirit, Humphrey. Between them the body and the soul
+have bred a spirit, and in the fires of tribulation from that spirit has been
+distilled the essence of eternal love. That is Time&rsquo;s gift to me, and
+therefore, although still he rules me here, I mock at Fate,&rdquo; and she
+waved her hand with a gesture of defiance at the stern-faced, sexless effigy
+which sat above us, the sword across its knees.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Look! Look!&rdquo; she went on in a swelling voice of music, pointing to
+the statues of the dotard and the beauteous woman. &ldquo;They implore Fate,
+they worship Fate. <i>I</i> do not implore, <i>I</i> do not worship or ask a
+sign as even Oro does and as did his forefathers. <i>I</i> rise above and
+triumph. As Fate, the god of my people, sets his foot upon the sun, so I set my
+foot upon Fate, and thence, like a swimmer from a rock, leap into the waters of
+Immortality.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked at her whose presence, as happened from time to time, had grown
+majestic beyond that of woman; I studied her deep eyes which were full of
+lights, not of this world, and I grew afraid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; I asked. &ldquo;Yva, you talk like one who has
+finished with life.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It passes,&rdquo; she answered quickly. &ldquo;Life passes like breath
+fading from a mirror. So should all talk who breathe beneath the sun.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Yva, but if you went and left me still breathing on that mocking
+glass&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If so, what of it? Will not your breath fade also and join mine where
+all vapours go? Or if it were yours that faded and mine that remained for some
+few hours, is it not the same? I think, Humphrey, that already you have seen a
+beloved breath melt from the glass of life,&rdquo; she added, looking at me
+earnestly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I bowed my head and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, and therefore I am ashamed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! why should you be ashamed, Humphrey, who are not sure but that two
+breaths may yet be one breath? How do you know that there is a difference
+between them?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You drive me mad, Yva. I cannot understand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nor can I altogether, Humphrey. Why should I, seeing that I am no more
+than woman, as you are no more than man? I would always have you remember,
+Humphrey, that I am no spirit or sorceress, but just a woman&mdash;like her you
+lost.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked at her doubtfully and answered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Women do not sleep for two hundred thousand years. Women do not take
+dream journeys to the stars. Women do not make the dead past live again before
+the watcher&rsquo;s eyes. Their hair does not glimmer in the dusk nor do their
+bodies gleam, nor have they such strength of soul or eyes so wonderful, or
+loveliness so great.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+These words appeared to distress her who, as it seemed to me, was above all
+things anxious to prove herself woman and no more.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All these qualities are nothing, Humphrey,&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;As
+for the beauty, such as it is, it comes to me with my blood, and with it the
+glitter of my hair which is the heritage of those who for generations have
+drunk of the Life-water. My mother was lovelier than I, as was her mother, or
+so I have heard, since only the fairest were the wives of the Kings of the
+Children of Wisdom. For the rest, such arts as I have spring not from magic,
+but from knowledge which your people will acquire in days to come, that is, if
+Oro spares them. Surely you above all should know that I am only woman,&rdquo;
+she added very slowly and searching my face with her eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why, Yva? During the little while that we have been together I have seen
+much which makes me doubt. Even Bickley the sceptic doubts also.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I will tell you, though I am not sure that you will believe me.&rdquo;
+She glanced about her as though she were frightened lest someone should
+overhear her words or read her thoughts. Then she stretched out her hands and
+drawing my head towards her, put her lips to my ear and whispered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because once you saw me <i>die</i>, as women often die&mdash;giving life
+for life.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I saw <i>you</i> die?&rdquo; I gasped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She nodded, then continued to whisper in my ear, not in her own voice, but
+another&rsquo;s:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;<i>Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in
+which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me. Good-bye for a
+little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!</i>&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I knew the voice as I knew the words, and knowing, I think that I should have
+fallen to the ground, had she not supported me with her strong arms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who told you?&rdquo; I stammered. &ldquo;Was it Bickley or Bastin? They
+knew, though neither of them heard those holy words.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not Bickley nor Bastin,&rdquo; she answered, shaking her head,
+&ldquo;no, nor you yourself, awake or sleeping, though once, by the lake
+yonder, you said to me that when a certain one lay dying, she bade you seek her
+elsewhere, for certainly you would find her. Humphrey, I cannot say who told me
+those words because I do not know. <i>I think they are a memory,
+Humphrey!</i>&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That would mean that you, Yva, are the same as one who was&mdash;not
+called Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The same as one who was called <i>Natalie</i>, Humphrey,&rdquo; she
+replied in solemn accents. &ldquo;One whom you loved and whom you lost.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then you think that we live again upon this earth?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Again and yet again, until the time comes for us to leave the earth for
+ever. Of this, indeed, I am sure, for that knowledge was part of the secret
+wisdom of my people.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;But you were not dead. You only slept.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The sleep was a death-sleep which went by like a flash, yes, in an
+instant, or so it seemed. Only the shell of the body remained preserved by
+mortal arts, and when the returning spirit and the light of life were poured
+into it again, it awoke. But during this long death-sleep, that spirit may have
+spoken through other lips and that light may have shone through other eyes,
+though of these I remember nothing.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then that dream of our visit to a certain star may be no dream?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think no dream, and you, too, have thought as much.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;In a way, yes, Yva. But I could not believe and turned from what I held
+to be a phantasy.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It was natural, Humphrey, that you should not believe. Hearken! In this
+temple a while ago I showed you a picture of myself and of a man who loved me
+and whom I loved, and of his death at Oro&rsquo;s hands. Did you note anything
+about that man?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bickley did,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;Was he right?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think that he was right, since otherwise I should not have loved you,
+Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I remember nothing of that man, Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is probable that you would not, since you and he are very far apart,
+while between you and him flow wide seas of death, wherein are set islands of
+life; perhaps many of them. But I remember much who seem to have left him but a
+very little while ago.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;When you awoke in your coffin and threw your arms about me, what did you
+think, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I thought <i>you</i> were that man, Humphrey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was silence between us and in that silence the truth came home to me.
+Then there before the effigy of Fate and in the desolate, glowing temple we
+plighted anew our troth made holy by a past that thus so wonderfully lived
+again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of this consecrated hour I say no more. Let each picture it as he will. A glory
+as of heaven fell upon us and in it we dwelt a space.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+&ldquo;Beloved,&rdquo; she whispered at length in a voice that was choked as
+though with tears, &ldquo;if it chances that we should be separated again for a
+little while, you will not grieve over much?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Knowing all I should try not to grieve, Yva, seeing that in truth we
+never can be parted. But do you mean that I shall die?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Being mortal either of us might seem to die, Humphrey,&rdquo; and she
+bent her head as though to hide her face. &ldquo;You know we go into dangers
+this day.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Does Oro really purpose to destroy much of the world and has he in truth
+the power, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He does so purpose and most certainly he has the power,
+unless&mdash;unless some other Power should stay his hand.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What other power, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh! perhaps that which you worship, that which is called Love. The love
+of man may avert the massacre of men. I hope so with all my heart. Hist! Oro
+comes. I feel, I know that he comes, though not in search of us who are very
+far from his thought tonight. Follow me. Swiftly.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She sped across the temple to where a chapel opened out of it, which was full
+of the statues of dead kings, for here was the entrance to their burial vault.
+We reached it and hid behind the base of one of these statues. By standing to
+our full height, without being seen we still could see between the feet of the
+statue that stood upon a pedestal.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Then Oro came.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap24"></a>CHAPTER XXIV.<br />
+The Chariot of the Pit</h2>
+
+<p>
+Oro came and of necessity alone. Yet there was that in his air as he advanced
+into the temple, which suggested a monarch surrounded by the pomp and panoply
+of a great court. He marched, his head held high, as though heralds and
+pursuivants went in front of him, as though nobles surrounded him and guards or
+regiments followed after him. Let it be admitted that he was a great figure in
+his gorgeous robes, with his long white beard, his hawk-like features, his tall
+shape and his glittering eyes, which even at that distance I could see. Indeed
+once or twice I thought that he glanced out of the corners of them towards the
+chapel where we were hid. But this I think was fancy. For as Yva said, his
+thoughts were set elsewhere.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He reached the statue of Fate and stood for a while contemplating it and the
+suppliant figures on either side, as though he were waiting for his invisible
+court to arrange itself. Then he doffed his jewelled cap to the effigy, and
+knelt before it. Yes, Oro the Ancient, the Super-man, the God, as the early
+peoples of the earth fancied such a being, namely, one full of wrath, revenge,
+jealousy, caprice and power, knelt in supplication to this image of stone which
+he believed to be the home of a spirit, thereby showing himself to be after all
+not so far removed from the savages whose idol Bastin had destroyed. More, in a
+clear and resonant voice which reached us even across that great space, he put
+up his prayer. It ran something as follows, for although I did not understand
+the language in which he spoke Yva translated it to me in a whisper:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;God of the Sons of Wisdom, God of the whole earth, only God to whom must
+bow every other Power and Dominion, to thee I, Oro the Great King, make prayer
+and offer sacrifice. Twenty times ten thousand years and more have gone by
+since I, Oro, visited this, thy temple and knelt before this, thy living
+effigy, yet thou, ruler of the world, dost remember the prayer I made and the
+sacrifice I offered. The prayer was for triumph over my enemies and the
+sacrifice a promise of the lives of half of those who in that day dwelt upon
+the earth. Thou heardest the prayer, thou didst bow thy head and accept the
+sacrifice. Yea, the prayer was granted and the sacrifice was made, and in it
+were counted the number of my foes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then I slept. Through countless generations I slept on and at my side
+was the one child of my body that was left to me. What chanced to my spirit and
+to hers during that sleep, thou knowest alone, but doubtless they went forth to
+work thy ends.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At the appointed time which thou didst decree, I awoke again and found
+in my house strangers from another land. In the company of one of those whose
+spirit I drew forth, I visited the peoples of the new earth, and found them
+even baser and more evil than those whom I had known. Therefore, since they
+cannot be bettered. I purpose to destroy them also, and on their wreck to
+rebuild a glorious empire, such as was that of the Sons of Wisdom at its prime.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;A sign! O Fate, ruler of the world, give me a sign that my desire shall
+be fulfilled.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He paused, stretching out his arms and staring upwards. While he waited I felt
+the solid rock on which I stood quiver and sway beneath my feet so that Yva and
+I clung to each other lest we should fall. This chanced also. The shock of the
+earth tremor, for such without doubt it was, threw down the figures of the
+ancient man and the lovely woman which knelt as though making prayers to Fate,
+and shook the marble sword from off its knees. As it fell Oro caught it by the
+hilt, and, rising, waved it in triumph.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I thank thee, God of my people from the beginning,&rdquo; he cried.
+&ldquo;Thou hast given to me, thy last servant, thine own sword and I will use
+it well. For these worshippers of thine who have fallen, thou shalt have
+others, yes, all those who dwell in the new world that is to be. My daughter
+and the man whom she has chosen to be the father of the kings of the earth, and
+with him his companions, shall be the first of the hundreds of millions that
+are to follow, for they shall kiss thy feet or perish. Thou shalt set thy foot
+upon the necks of all other gods; thou shalt rule and thou alone, and, as of
+old, Oro be thy minister.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Still holding the sword, he flung himself down as though in an ecstasy, and was
+silent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I read the omen otherwise,&rdquo; whispered Yva. &ldquo;The worshippers
+of Fate are overthrown. His sword of power is fallen, but not into the hands
+that clasped it, and he totters on his throne. A greater God asserts dominion
+of the world and this Fate is but his instrument.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro rose again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One prayer more,&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Give me life, long life, that I
+may execute thy decrees. By word or gesture show me a sign that I shall be
+satisfied with life, a year for every year that I have lived, or twain!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He waited, staring about him, but no token came; the idol did not speak or bow
+its head, as Yva had told me it was wont to do in sign of accepted prayer, how,
+she knew not. Only I thought I heard the echo of Oro&rsquo;s cries run in a
+whisper of mockery round the soaring dome.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Once more Oro flung himself upon his knees and began to pray in a veritable
+agony.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;God of my forefathers, God of my lost people, I will hide naught from
+thee,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I who fear nothing else, fear death. The
+priest-fool yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering words of judgment
+and damnation which, though I do not believe them, yet stick in my heart like
+arrows. I will stamp out his faith, and with this ancient sword of thine drive
+back the new gods into the darkness whence they came. Yet what if some water of
+Truth flows through the channel of his leaden lips, and what if because I have
+ruled and will rule as thou didst decree, therefore, in some dim place of
+souls, I must bear these burdens of terror and of doom which I have bound upon
+the backs of others! Nay, it cannot be, for what power is there in all the
+universe that dares to make a slave of Oro and to afflict him with stripes?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my path in the
+ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless and forgotten as are
+those who went before me, while my crown of Power shines on younger brows.
+Alas! I grow old, since æons of sleep have not renewed my strength. My time is
+short and yet I would not die as mortals must. Oh! God of my people, whom I
+have served so well, save me from the death I dread. For I would not die. Give
+me a sign; give me the ancient, sacred sign!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So he spoke, lifting his proud and splendid head and watching the statue with
+wide, expectant eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Thou dost not answer,&rdquo; he cried again. &ldquo;Wouldst thou desert
+me, Fate? Then beware lest I set up some new god against thee and hurl thee
+from thine immemorial throne. While I live I still have powers, I who am the
+last of thy worshippers, since it seems that my daughter turns her back on
+thee. I will get me to the sepulchre of the kings and take counsel with the
+dust of that wizard who first taught me wisdom. Even from the depths of death
+he must come to my call clad in a mockery of life, and comfort me. A little
+while yet I will wait, and if thou answer not, then Fate, soon I&rsquo;ll tear
+the sceptre from thy hand, and thou shalt join the company of dead gods.&rdquo;
+And throwing aside the sword, again Oro laid down his head upon the ground and
+stretched out his arms in the last abasement of supplication.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come,&rdquo; whispered Yva, &ldquo;while there is yet time. Presently he
+will seek this place to descend to the sepulchre, and if he learns that we have
+read his heart and know him for a coward deserted of his outworn god, surely he
+will blot us out. Come, and be swift and silent.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We crept out of the chapel, Yva leading, and along the circle of the great dome
+till we reached the gates. Here I glanced back and perceived that Oro, looking
+unutterably small in that vastness, looking like a dead man, still lay
+outstretched before the stern-faced, unanswering Effigy which, with all his
+wisdom, he believed to be living and divine. Perhaps once it was, but if so its
+star had set for ever, like those of Amon, Jupiter and Baal, and he was its
+last worshipper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now we were safe, but still we sped on till we reached the portico of our
+sleeping place. Then Yva turned and spoke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is horrible,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;and my soul sickens. Oh, I thank
+the Strength which made it that I have no desire to rule the earth, and, being
+innocent of death, do not fear to die and cross his threshold.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, it is horrible,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;Yet all men fear
+death.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not when they have found love, Humphrey, for that I think is his true
+name, and, with it written on his brow, he stands upon the neck of Fate who is
+still my father&rsquo;s god.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then he is not yours, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nay. Once it was so, but now I reject him; he is no longer mine. As Oro
+threatens, and perchance dare do in his rage, I have broken his chain, though
+in another fashion. Ask me no more; perhaps one day you will learn the path I
+trod to freedom.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then before I could speak, she went off:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Rest now, for within a few hours I must come to lead you and your
+companions to a terrible place. Yet whatever you may see or hear, be not
+afraid, Humphrey, for I think that Oro&rsquo;s god has no power over you,
+strong though he was, and that Oro&rsquo;s plans will fail, while I, who too
+have knowledge, shall find strength to save the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then of a sudden, once again she grew splendid, almost divine; no more a woman
+but as it were an angel. Some fire of pure purpose seemed to burn up in her and
+to shine out of her eyes. Yet she said little. Only this indeed:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To everyone, I think, there comes the moment of opportunity when choice
+must be made between what is great and what is small, between self and its
+desires and the good of other wanderers in the way. This day that moment may
+draw near to you or me, and if so, surely we shall greet it well. Such is
+Bastin&rsquo;s lesson, which I have striven to learn.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she flung her arms about me and kissed me on the brow as a mother might,
+and was gone.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Strangely enough, perhaps because of my mental exhaustion, for what I had
+passed through seemed to overwhelm me so that I could no longer so much as
+think with clearness, even after all that I have described I slept like a child
+and awoke refreshed and well.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked at my watch to find that it was now eight o&rsquo;clock in the morning
+in this horrible place where there was neither morn, nor noon, nor night, but
+only an eternal brightness that came I knew not whence, and never learned.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I found that I was alone, since Bickley and Bastin had gone to fill our bottles
+with the Life-water. Presently they returned and we ate a little; with that
+water to drink one did not need much food. It was a somewhat silent meal, for
+our circumstances were a check on talk; moreover, I thought that the others
+looked at me rather oddly. Perhaps they guessed something of my midnight visit
+to the temple, but if so they thought it wisest to say nothing. Nor did I
+enlighten them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Shortly after we had finished Yva appeared. She was wonderfully quiet and
+gentle in her manner, calm also, and greeted all of us with much sweetness. Of
+our experiences during the night she said no word to me, even when we were
+alone. One difference I noticed about her, however; that she was clothed in
+garments such as I had never seen her wear before. They were close fitting,
+save for a flowing cape, and made of some grey material, not unlike a coarse
+homespun or even asbestos cloth. Still they became her very well, and when I
+remarked upon them, all she answered was that part of our road would be rough.
+Even her feet were shod with high buskins of this grey stuff.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Presently she touched Bastin on the shoulder and said that she would speak with
+him apart. They went together into one of the chambers of that dwelling and
+there remained for perhaps the half of an hour. It was towards the end of this
+time that in the intense silence I heard a crash from the direction of the
+temple, as though something heavy had fallen to the rocky floor. Bickley also
+heard this sound. When the two reappeared I noticed that though still quite
+calm, Yva looked radiant, and, if I may say so, even more human and womanly
+than I had ever seen her, while Bastin also seemed very happy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;One has strange experiences in life, yes, very strange,&rdquo; he
+remarked, apparently addressing the air, which left me wondering to what
+particular experience he might refer. Well, I thought that I could guess.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Friends,&rdquo; said Yva, &ldquo;it is time for us to be going and I am
+your guide. You will meet the Lord Oro at the end of your journey. I pray you
+to bring those lamps of yours with you, since all the road is not lightened
+like this place.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I should like to ask,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;whither we go and for
+what object, points on which up to the present we have had no definite
+information.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We go, friend Bickley, deep into the bowels of the world, far deeper, I
+think, than any mortal men have gone hitherto, that is, of your race.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then we shall perish of heat,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;for with every
+thousand feet the temperature rises many degrees.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Not so. You will pass through a zone of heat, but so swiftly that if you
+hold your breath you will not suffer overmuch. Then you will come to a place
+where a great draught blows which will keep you cool, and thence travel on to
+the end.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, but to what end, Lady Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That you will see for yourselves, and with it other wondrous
+things.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here some new idea seemed to strike her, and after a little hesitation she
+added:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yet why should you go? Oro has commanded it, it is true, but I think
+that at the last he will forget. It must be decided swiftly. There is yet time.
+I can place you in safety in the sepulchre of Sleep where you found us. Thence
+cross to the main island and sail away quickly in your boat out into the great
+sea, where I believe you will find succour. Know that after disobeying him, you
+must meet Oro no more lest it should be the worse for you. If that be your
+will, let us start. What say you?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I say, Yva, that I am willing to go if you come with us. Not
+otherwise.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I say,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;that I want to see all this
+supernatural rubbish thoroughly exploded, and that therefore I should prefer to
+go on with the business.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And I say,&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;that my most earnest desire is to
+be clear of the whole thing, which wearies and perplexes me more than I can
+tell. Only I am not going to run away, unless you think it desirable to do so
+too, Lady Yva. I want you to understand that I am not in the least afraid of
+the Lord Oro, and do not for one moment believe that he will be allowed to
+bring about disaster to the world, as I understand is his wicked object.
+Therefore on the whole I am indifferent and quite prepared to accept any
+decision at which the rest of you may arrive.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be it understood,&rdquo; said Yva with a little smile when Bastin had
+finished his sermonette, &ldquo;that I must join my father in the bowels of the
+earth for a reason which will be made plain afterwards. Therefore, if you go we
+part, as I think to meet no more. Still my advice is that you should
+go.&rdquo;<a href="#fn-1" name="fnref-1" id="fnref-1"><sup>[1]</sup></a>
+</p>
+
+<p class="footnote">
+<a name="fn-1" id="fn-1"></a> <a href="#fnref-1">[1]</a>
+It is fortunate that we did not accept Yva&rsquo;s offer. Had we done so we
+should have found ourselves shut in, and perished, as shall be told.&mdash;H.
+A.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To this our only answer was to attend to the lighting of our lamps and the
+disposal of our small impedimenta, such as our tins of oil and water bottles.
+Yva noted this and laughed outright.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Courage did not die with the Sons of Wisdom,&rdquo; she said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we set out, Yva walking ahead of us and Tommy frisking at her side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Our road led us through the temple. As we passed the great gates I started, for
+there, in the centre of that glorious building, I perceived a change. The
+statue of Fate was no more! It lay broken upon the pavement among those
+fragments of its two worshippers which I had seen shaken down some hours
+before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What does this mean?&rdquo; I whispered to Yva. &ldquo;I have felt no
+other earthquake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;or if I know I may not say.
+Yet learn that no god can live on without a single worshipper, and, in a
+fashion, that idol was alive, though this you will not believe.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How very remarkable,&rdquo; said Bastin, contemplating the ruin.
+&ldquo;If I were superstitious, which I am not, I should say that this
+occurrence was an omen indicating the final fall of a false god. At any rate it
+is dead now, and I wonder what caused it?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I felt an earth tremor last night,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;though it
+is odd that it should only have affected this particular statue. A thousand
+pities, for it was a wonderful work of art.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I remembered and reminded Bickley of the crash which we had heard while
+Yva and Bastin were absent on some secret business in the chamber.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Walking the length of the great church, if so it could be called, we came to an
+apse at the head of it where, had it been Christian, the altar would have
+stood. In this apse was a little open door through which we passed. Beyond it
+lay a space of rough rock that looked as though it had been partially prepared
+for the erection of buildings and then abandoned. All this space was lighted,
+however, like the rest of the City of Nyo, and in the same mysterious way. Led
+by Yva, we threaded our path between the rough stones, following a steep
+downward slope. Thus we walked for perhaps half a mile, till at length we came
+to the mouth of a huge pit that must, I imagine, have lain quite a thousand
+feet below the level of the temple.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked over the edge of this pit and shrank back terrified. It seemed to be
+bottomless. Moreover, a great wind rushed up it with a roaring sound like to
+that of an angry sea. Or rather there were two winds, perhaps draughts would be
+a better term, if I may apply it to an air movement of so fierce and terrible a
+nature. One of these rushed up the pit, and one rushed down. Or it may have
+been that the up rush alternated with the down rush. Really it is impossible to
+say.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What is this place?&rdquo; I asked, clinging to the others and shrinking
+back in alarm from its sheer edge and bottomless depth, for that this was
+enormous we could see by the shaft of light which flowed downwards farther than
+the eye could follow.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It is a vent up and down which air passes from and to the central
+hollows of the earth,&rdquo; Yva answered. &ldquo;Doubtless in the beginning
+through it travelled that mighty force which blew out these caves in the heated
+rocks, as the craftsman blows out glass.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I understand,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;Just like one blows out a
+bubble on a pipe, only on a larger scale. Well, it is very interesting, but I
+have seen enough of it. Also I am afraid of being blown away.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I fear that you must see more,&rdquo; answered Yva with a smile,
+&ldquo;since we are about to descend this pit.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you mean that we are to go down that hole, and if so, how? I
+don&rsquo;t see any lift, or moving staircase, or anything of that sort.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Easily and safely enough, Bastin. See.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As she spoke a great flat rock of the size of a small room appeared, borne
+upwards, as I suppose, by the terrific draught which roared past us on its
+upward course. When it reached the lip of the shaft, it hung a little while,
+then moved across and began to descend with such incredible swiftness that in a
+few seconds it had vanished from view.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said Bastin, with his eyes almost starting out of his head,
+&ldquo;that&rsquo;s the lift, is it? Well, I tell you at once I don&rsquo;t
+like the look of the thing. It gives me the creeps. Suppose it tilted.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It does not tilt,&rdquo; answered Yva, still smiling. &ldquo;I tell you,
+Bastin, that there is naught to fear. Only yesterday, I rode this rock and
+returned unharmed.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is all very well, Lady Yva, but you may know how to balance it;
+also when to get on and off.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are afraid, Bastin, remain here until your companions return.
+They, I think, will make the journey.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the truth, if less frank
+we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, I&rsquo;ll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as any
+other, and if anything were to happen to them and I were left alone, it would
+be worse still.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then be prepared,&rdquo; said Yva, &ldquo;for presently this air-chariot
+of ours will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge, step on to it and
+throw yourselves upon your faces and all will be well. At the foot of the shaft
+the motion lessens till it almost stops, and it is easy to spring, or even
+crawl to the firm earth.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she stooped down and lifted Tommy who was sniffing suspiciously at the
+edge of the pit, his long ears blown straight above his head, holding him
+beneath her left arm and under her cloak, that he might not see and be
+frightened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We waited a while in silence, perhaps for five or six minutes, among the most
+disagreeable, I think, that I ever passed. Then far down in the brightness
+below appeared a black speck that seemed to grow in size as it rushed upwards.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;It comes,&rdquo; said Yva. &ldquo;Prepare and do as I do. Do not spring,
+or run, lest you should go too far. Step gently on to the rock and to its
+centre, and there lie down. Trust in me, all of you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There&rsquo;s nothing else to do,&rdquo; groaned Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The great stone appeared and, as before, hung at the edge of the pit. Yva
+stepped on to it quietly, as she did so, catching hold of my wrist with her
+disengaged hand. I followed her feeling very sick, and promptly sat down. Then
+came Bickley with the air of the virtuous hero of a romance walking a
+pirate&rsquo;s plank, and also sat down. Only Bastin hesitated until the stone
+began to move away. Then with an ejaculation of &ldquo;Here goes!&rdquo; he
+jumped over the intervening crack of space and landed in the middle of us like
+a sack of coal. Had I not been seated really I think he would have knocked me
+off the rock. As it was, with one hand he gripped me by the beard and with the
+other grasped Yva&rsquo;s robe, of neither of which would he leave go for quite
+a long time, although we forced him on to his face. The lantern which he held
+flew from his grasp and descended the shaft on its own account.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You silly fool!&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley whose perturbation showed
+itself in anger. &ldquo;There goes one of our lamps.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hang the lamp!&rdquo; muttered the prostrate Bastin. &ldquo;We
+shan&rsquo;t want it in Heaven, or the other place either.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now the stone which had quivered a little beneath the impact of Bastin,
+steadied itself again and with a slow and majestic movement sailed to the other
+side of the gulf. There it felt the force of gravity, or perhaps the weight of
+the returning air pressed on it, which I do not know. At any rate it began to
+fall, slowly at first, then more swiftly, and afterwards at an incredible pace,
+so that in a few seconds the mouth of the pit above us grew small and presently
+vanished quite away. I looked up at Yva who was standing composedly in the
+midst of our prostrate shapes. She bent down and called in my ear:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All is well. The heat begins, but it will not endure for long.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I nodded and glanced over the edge of the stone at Bastin&rsquo;s lantern which
+was sailing alongside of us, till presently we passed it. Bastin had lit it
+before we started, I think in a moment of aberration, and it burned for quite a
+long while, showing like a star when the shaft grew darker as it did by
+degrees, a circumstance that testifies to the excellence of the make, which is
+one advertised not to go out in any wind. Not that we felt wind, or even
+draught, perhaps because we were travelling with it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we entered the heat zone. About this there was no doubt, for the
+perspiration burst out all over me and the burning air scorched my lungs. Also
+Tommy thrust his head from beneath the cloak with his tongue hanging out and
+his mouth wide open.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Hold your breaths!&rdquo; cried Yva, and we obeyed until we nearly
+burst. At least I did, but what happened to the others I do not know.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Fortunately it was soon over and the air began to grow cool again. By now we
+had travelled an enormous distance, it seemed to be miles on miles, and I
+noticed that our terrific speed was slackening, also that the shaft grew more
+narrow, till at length there were only a few feet between the edge of the stone
+and its walls. The result of this, or so I supposed, was that the compressed
+air acted as a buffer, lessening our momentum, till at length the huge stone
+moved but very slowly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Be ready to follow me,&rdquo; cried Yva again, and we rose to our feet,
+that is, Bickley and I did, but poor Bastin was semi-comatose. The stone
+stopped and Yva sprang from it to a rock platform level with which it lay. We
+followed, dragging Bastin between us. As we did so something hit me gently on
+the head. It was Bastin&rsquo;s lamp, which I seized.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We are safe. Sit down and rest,&rdquo; said Yva, leading us a few paces
+away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We obeyed and presently by the dim light saw the stone begin to stir again,
+this time upwards. In another twenty seconds it was away on its never-ending
+journey.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Does it always go on like that?&rdquo; said Bastin, sitting up and
+staring after it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Tens of thousands of years ago it was journeying thus, and tens of
+thousands of years hence it will still be journeying, or so I think,&rdquo; she
+replied. &ldquo;Why not, since the strength of the draught never changes and
+there is nothing to wear it except the air?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Somehow the vision of this huge stone, first loosed and set in motion by heaven
+knows what agency, travelling from aeon to aeon up and down that shaft in
+obedience to some law I did not understand, impressed my imagination like a
+nightmare. Indeed I often dream of it to this day.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked about me. We were in some cavernous place that could be but dimly
+seen, for here the light that flowed down the shaft from the upper caves where
+it was mysteriously created, scarcely shone, and often indeed was entirely cut
+off, when the ever-journeying stone was in the narrowest parts of the passage.
+I could see, however, that this cavern stretched away both to right and left of
+us, while I felt that from the left, as we sat facing the shaft, there drew
+down a strong blast of fresh air which suggested that somewhere, however far
+away, it must open on to the upper world. For the rest its bottom and walls
+seemed to be smooth as though they had been planed in the past ages by the
+action of cosmic forces. Bickley noticed this the first and pointed it out to
+me. We had little time to observe, however, for presently Yva said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you are rested, friends, I pray you light those lamps of yours, since
+we must walk a while in darkness.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We did and started, still travelling downhill. Yva walked ahead with me and
+Tommy who seemed somewhat depressed and clung close to our heels. The other two
+followed, arguing strenuously about I know not what. It was their way of
+working off irritation and alarms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I asked Yva what was about to happen, for a great fear oppressed me.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not sure, Beloved,&rdquo; she answered in a sweet and gentle voice,
+&ldquo;who do not know all Oro&rsquo;s secrets, but as I think, great things.
+We are now deep in the bowels of the world, and presently, perhaps, you will
+see some of its mighty forces whereof your ignorant races have no knowledge,
+doing their everlasting work.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then how is it that we can breathe here?&rdquo; I asked. &ldquo;Because
+this road that we are following connects with the upper air or used to do so,
+since once I followed it. It is a long road and the climb is steep, but at last
+it leads to the light of the blessed sun, nor are there any pitfalls in the
+path. Would that we might tread it together, Humphrey,&rdquo; she added with
+passion, &ldquo;and be rid of mysteries and the gloom, or that light which is
+worse than gloom.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; I asked eagerly. &ldquo;Why should we not turn and
+flee?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Who can flee from my father, the Lord Oro?&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;He
+would snare us before we had gone a mile. Moreover, if we fled, by tomorrow
+half the world must perish.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And how can we save it by not flying, Yva?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not know, Humphrey, yet I think it will be saved, perchance by
+sacrifice. That is the keystone of your faith, is it not? Therefore if it is
+asked of you to save the world, you will not shrink from it, will you,
+Humphrey?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I hope not,&rdquo; I replied, without enthusiasm, I admit. Indeed it
+struck me that a business of this sort was better fitted to Bastin than to
+myself, or at any rate to his profession. I think she guessed my thoughts, for
+by the light of the lamp I saw her smile in her dazzling way. Then after a
+swift glance behind her, she turned and suddenly kissed me, as she did so
+calling down everlasting blessings on my head and on my spirit. There was
+something very wonderful about this benediction of Yva&rsquo;s and it thrilled
+me through and through, so that to it I could make no answer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next moment it was too late to retreat, for our narrowing passage turned and we
+found ourselves in a wondrous place. I call it wondrous because of it we could
+see neither the beginning nor the end, nor the roof, nor aught else save the
+rock on which we walked, and the side or wall that our hands touched. Nor was
+this because of darkness, since although it was not illuminated like the upper
+caverns, light of a sort was present. It was a very strange light, consisting
+of brilliant and intermittent flashes, or globes of blue and lambent flame
+which seemed to leap from nowhere into nowhere, or sometimes to hang poised in
+mid air.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How odd they are,&rdquo; said the voice of Bastin behind me. &ldquo;They
+remind me of those blue sparks which jump up from the wires of the tramways in
+London on a dark night. You know, don&rsquo;t you, Bickley? I mean when the
+conductor pulls round that long stick with an iron wheel on the top of
+it.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Nobody but you could have thought of such a comparison, Bastin,&rdquo;
+answered Bickley. &ldquo;Still, multiplied a thousandfold they are not
+unlike.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nor indeed were they, except that each blue flash was as big as the full moon
+and in one place or another they were so continuous that one could have read a
+letter by their light. Also the effect of them was ghastly and most unnatural,
+terrifying, too, since even their brilliance could not reveal the extent of
+that gigantic hollow in the bowels of the world wherein they leapt to and fro
+like lightnings, or hung like huge, uncanny lanterns.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap25"></a>CHAPTER XXV.<br />
+Sacrifice</h2>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The air in this place must be charged with some form of electricity, but
+the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm us,&rdquo; said Bickley in a
+matter-of-fact fashion as though he were determined not to be astonished.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights, though how
+these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know,&rdquo; I answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above. It resembled a
+shooting star or a meteor more than anything else that I had ever seen, and
+made me wonder whether we were not perhaps standing beneath some inky, unseen
+sky.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light, which made him
+terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in front of us clad in a long
+cloak.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Dear me!&rdquo; said Bastin, &ldquo;he looks just like the devil,
+doesn&rsquo;t he, and now I come to think of it, this isn&rsquo;t at all a bad
+imitation of hell.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you know it is an imitation?&rdquo; asked Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it were, the
+Lady Yva and I should not be here.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the argument went no
+further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent the knee in greeting to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So you have come, all of you,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I thought that
+perhaps there were one or two who would not find courage to ride the flying
+stone. I am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he who had shown himself a
+coward should have had no share in the rule of that new world which is to be.
+Therefore I chose yonder road that it might test you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to return by, I
+shall be much obliged to you, Oro,&rdquo; said Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible, Preacher?
+How do you know indeed that this is not your last journey from which there is
+no return?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of course I can&rsquo;t be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the
+question is one which you might more appropriately put to yourself. According
+to your own showing you are now extremely old and therefore your end is likely
+to come at any moment. Of course, however, if it did you would have one more
+journey to make, but it wouldn&rsquo;t be polite for me to say in what
+direction.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden rage. Remembering
+the scene in the temple where he had grovelled before his god, uttering
+agonised, unanswered prayers for added days, I understood the reason of his
+wrath. It was so great that I feared lest he should kill Bastin (who only a few
+hours before, be it remembered, had tried to kill <i>him</i>) then and there,
+as doubtless he could have done if he wished. Fortunately, if he felt it; the
+impulse passed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Miserable fool!&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I warn you to keep a watch upon
+your words. Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy. Today you stab me
+with your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I silence it for ever.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that <i>you</i>
+can&rsquo;t hurt me at all any more than I could hurt you last night because,
+you see, it wasn&rsquo;t permitted. When the time comes for me to die, I shall
+go, but <i>you</i> will have nothing to do with that. To tell the truth, I am
+very sorry for you, as with all your greatness, your soul is of the earth,
+earthy, also sensual and devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I am afraid, very
+malignant, and you will have a great deal to answer for shortly. Yours
+<i>won&rsquo;t</i> be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you glory in
+your sins and don&rsquo;t know what repentance means.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the most unbounded
+admiration for Bastin&rsquo;s fearless courage which enabled him thus to beard
+this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed were we all, for I read it in
+Yva&rsquo;s face and heard Bickley mutter:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his heart, for he
+stared at the man and made no answer. In the language of the ring, he was quite
+&ldquo;knocked out&rdquo; and, almost humbly, changed the subject.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;We have yet a little while,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;before that happens
+which I have decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of the marvels
+of this bubble blown in the bowels of the world,&rdquo; and he motioned to us
+to pick up the lanterns.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it was, for a distance
+of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here suddenly we came to a great groove
+in the rocky floor, as broad as a very wide roadway, and mayhap four feet in
+depth. The bottom of this groove was polished and glittered; indeed it gave us
+the impression of being iron, or other ore which had been welded together
+beneath the grinding of some immeasurable weight. Just at the spot where we
+struck the groove, it divided into two, for this reason.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been, rose, the
+fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more sharply, and this at a spot
+where the groove had a somewhat steep downward dip which appeared to extend
+onwards I know not how far.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a mile, I should
+think, we observed that it became ever more pronounced, till at length it ended
+in a razor-edge cliff which stretched up higher than we could see, even by the
+light of the electrical discharges. Standing against the edge of this cliff, we
+perceived that at a distance from it there were now <i>two</i> grooves of about
+equal width. One of these ran away into the darkness on our right as we faced
+the sharp edge, and at an ever-widening angle, while the other, at a similar
+angle, ran into the darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves now lay within
+hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter of a mile, for be it
+remembered we had followed the rising rock between them. To put it quite
+clearly, it was exactly as though one line of rails had separated into two
+lines of rails, as often enough they do, and an observer standing on high
+ground between could see them both vanishing into tunnels to the right and
+left, but far apart.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where first we saw it
+at the point of separation, was not polished like the left-hand groove,
+although at some time or other it seemed to have been subjected to the pressure
+of the same terrific weight which cut its fellow out of the bed of rock or
+iron, as the sharp wheels of a heavily laden wagon sink ruts into a roadway.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What does it all mean, Lord Oro?&rdquo; I asked when he had led us back
+to the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves, that is, a mile or so
+away from the razor-edged cliff.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;This, Humphrey,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;That which travels along
+yonder road, when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the left-hand
+path which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could a giant at that moment
+of its touching this exact spot on which I lay my hand, thrust it with
+sufficient strength, it would leave the left-hand road and take the right-hand
+road.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough upon its
+way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and great things would happen
+in the world above, as once they happened in bygone days. Now do you
+understand, Humphrey?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;But
+fortunately there is no such giant.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up with a fiendish
+exultation, as he cried:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned the balance
+of the world from the right-hand road which now is dull with disuse, to the
+left-hand road which glitters so brightly to your eyes, and the face of the
+earth was changed. Now again I will turn it from the left-hand road to the
+right-hand road in which for millions of years it was wont to run, and once
+more the face of the earth shall change, and those who are left living upon the
+earth, or who in the course of ages shall come to live upon the new earth, must
+bow down to Oro and take him and his seed to be their gods and kings.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also I remembered a
+certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us in the Temple of Nyo. But
+supported by his disbelief, Bickley asked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And how often does the balance of which you speak come this way, Lord
+Oro?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley,&rdquo; he
+replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble us,&rdquo;
+remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Do you think so, you learned Bickley?&rdquo; asked Oro. &ldquo;If so, I
+do not. Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone awry, that
+Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us. Hearken now! What is
+that sound we hear?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs of a dreadful
+music. I cannot describe it in words because that is impossible, but it was
+something like to the buzz of a thousand humming-tops such as are loved by
+children because of their weird song.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Back to the wall!&rdquo; cried Oro triumphantly. &ldquo;The time is
+short!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us with long,
+determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side and, as I thought, now and
+again glanced at my face with a look that was half anxious and half pitiful.
+Also twice she stooped and patted Tommy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had started to
+examine the grooved roads. At least I think this was so, since now for the
+first time I observed a kind of little window in its rocky face. It stood about
+five feet from its floor level, and was perhaps ten inches square, not more. In
+short, except for its shape it resembled a ship&rsquo;s porthole rather than a
+window. Its substance appeared to be talc, or some such material, and inches
+thick, yet through it, after Oro had cast aside some sort of covering, came a
+glare like that of a search-light. In fact it was a search-light so far as
+concerned one of its purposes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four objects which looked
+like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown metal or material. Very deftly,
+very quietly, Yva lifted these cloaks and wrapped one of them about each of us,
+and while she was thus employed I noticed that they were of a substance very
+similar to that of the gown she wore, which I have described, but harder. Next
+she gave one of the metal-like shields to each of us, bidding us hold them in
+front of our bodies and heads, and only to look through certain slits in them
+in which were eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the
+searchlight window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row with our backs
+against the rock wall, at certain spots which she indicated with great
+precision, and whatever we saw or heard on no account to move.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin. Then Yva took the
+fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one than ours, and placed herself
+between me and the search-light or porthole. On the other side of this was Oro
+who had no shield.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+These arrangements took some minutes and during that time occupied all our
+attention. When they were completed, however, our curiosity and fear began to
+reassert themselves. I looked about me and perceived that Oro had his right
+hand upon what seemed to be a rough stone rod, in shape not unlike that with
+which railway points are moved. He shouted to us to stand still and keep the
+shields over our faces. Then very gently he pressed upon the lever. The
+porthole sank the fraction of an inch, and instantly there leapt from it a most
+terrific blaze of lightning, which shot across the blackness in front and, as
+lightning does, revealed far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that
+against which we leant.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;All works well,&rdquo; exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting his
+hand from the rod, &ldquo;and the strength which I have stored will be more
+than enough.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I say,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;as you know, I have been sceptical,
+but I don&rsquo;t like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Sink half the world beneath the seas,&rdquo; said Oro, &ldquo;and raise
+up that which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as you do not
+believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you ask such questions?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;<i>I</i> believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
+yesterday,&rdquo; said Bastin. &ldquo;For your soul&rsquo;s sake I beg you to
+desist from an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but which will
+certainly involve your eternal damnation, since the failure will be no fault of
+yours.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then I spoke also, saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not know exactly
+how much or how little you can do, but I understand that your object is to slay
+men by millions in order to raise up another world of which you will be the
+absolute king, as you were of some past empire that has been destroyed, either
+through your agency or otherwise. No good can come of such ambitions. Like
+Bastin, for your soul&rsquo;s sake I pray you to let them be.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What Humphrey says I repeat,&rdquo; said Yva. &ldquo;My Father, although
+you know it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you sow you will
+harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not dream. Moreover, your plans
+will fail. Now I who am, like yourself, of the Children of Wisdom, have spoken,
+for the first and last time, and my words are true. I pray you give them
+weight, my Father.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro heard, and grew furious.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What!&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Are you against me, every one, and my own
+daughter also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a new world; I
+would destroy your vile civilisations which I have studied with my eyes, that I
+may build better! To you, Humphrey, I would give my only child in marriage that
+from you may spring a divine race of kings! And yet you are against me and set
+up your puny scruples as a barrier across my path of wisdom. Well, I tread them
+down, I go on my appointed way. But beware how you try to hold me back. If any
+one of you should attempt to come between me and my ends, know that I will
+destroy you all. Obey or die.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Well, he has had his chance and he won&rsquo;t take it,&rdquo; said
+Bastin in the silence that followed. &ldquo;The man must go to the devil his
+own way and there is nothing more to be said.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant humming grew to a
+roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound which presently drowned all
+attempts at ordinary speech.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away there appeared
+something terrible. I can only describe its appearance as that of an attenuated
+mountain on fire. When it drew nearer I perceived that it was more like a
+ballet-dancer whirling round and round upon her toes, or rather all the
+ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and then multiplied a million times
+in size. No, it was like a mushroom with two stalks, one above and one below,
+or a huge top with a point on which it spun, a swelling belly and another point
+above. But what a top! It must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an
+inch, and its circumference who could measure?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate inconceivable, so that it
+looked like a gigantic wheel of fire. Yet it was not fire that clothed it but
+rather some phosphorescence, since from it came no heat. Yes, a phosphorescence
+arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red, with streaks of other colours
+running up between, and a kind of waving fringe of purple.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of avalanches or of
+icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to the sea. Its terrific aspect
+was appalling, and its weight caused the solid rock to quiver like a leaf.
+Watching it, we felt as ants might feel at the advent of the crack of doom, for
+its mere height and girth and size overwhelmed us. We could not even speak. The
+last words I heard were from the mouth of Oro who screamed out:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men, and behold
+me change its path&mdash;turning it as the steersman turns a ship!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them approached the
+porthole or search-light to which she did something that I could not
+distinguish. The effect was to make the beam of light much stronger and
+sharper, also to shift it on to the point or foot of the spinning mountain and,
+by an aiming of the lens from time to time, to keep it there.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not travel fast
+notwithstanding the frightful speed of its revolutions. I should doubt indeed
+if it advanced more quickly than a man could walk; at any rate so it seemed to
+us. But we had no means of judging its real rate of progress whereof we knew as
+little as we did of the course it followed in the bowels of the earth. Perhaps
+that was spiral, from the world&rsquo;s deep heart upwards, and this was the
+highest point it reached. Or perhaps it remained stationary, but still
+spinning, for scores or hundreds of years in some central powerhouse of its
+own, whence, in obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these
+terrific journeys.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the information to
+himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate there it was, travelling
+towards us on its giant butt, the peg of the top as it were, which, hidden in a
+cloud of friction-born sparks that enveloped it like the cup of a curving
+flower of fire, whirled round and round at an infinite speed. It was on this
+flaming flower that the search-light played steadily, doubtless that Oro might
+mark and measure its monstrous progress.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand path,&rdquo; I
+shouted into Bickley&rsquo;s ear.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens of
+millions of tons one inch,&rdquo; Bickley roared back, trying to look
+confident.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a sudden she cast
+down her shield and, throwing herself upon her knees, stretched out her hands
+in supplication to her father. I understood, as did we all, that she was
+imploring him to abandon his hellish purpose. He glared at her and shook his
+head. Then, as she still went on praying, he struck her across the face with
+his hand and pushed her to her feet again. My blood boiled as I saw it and I
+think I should have sprung at him, had not Bickley caught hold of me, shouting,
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t, or he will kill her and us too.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the blue discharges
+which now flashed almost continuously, and the phosphorescent glare of the
+advancing mountain, I saw that though her beautiful face worked beneath the
+pain of the blow, her eyes remained serene and purposeful. Even then I
+wondered&mdash;what was the purpose shining through them. Also I wondered if I
+was about to be called upon to make that sacrifice of which she had spoken, and
+if so, how. Of one thing I was determined&mdash;that if the call came it should
+not find me deaf. Yet all the while I was horribly afraid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens&mdash;again, being
+alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The beam of light shifted and
+wandered till, far away, it fell exactly upon that spot where the rock began to
+rise into the ridge which separated the two grooves or roads and ended in the
+razor-edged cliff. Moreover I observed that Oro, who left it the last of us,
+had either placed something white to mark this first infinitesimal bulging of
+the floor of the groove, or had smeared it with chalk or shining pigment. I
+observed also what I had not been able to see before, that a thin white line
+ran across the floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of this painted
+rise of rock, and that the glare of the search-light now lay exactly over that
+line.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature&rsquo;s workshop, for such
+without doubt it was, was drawing near, emitting as it came a tumult of sounds
+which, with the echoes that they caused, almost over-whelmed our senses. Poor
+little Tommy, already cowed, although he was a bold-natured beast, broke down
+entirely, and I could see from his open mouth that he was howling with terror.
+He stared about him, then ran to Yva and pawed at her, evidently asking to be
+taken into her arms. She thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me
+to lift him up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting sadly
+that if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I even thought of
+passing him on to Bickley, but had no time. Indeed I could not attract his
+attention, for Bickley was staring with all his eyes at the nightmare-like
+spectacle which was in progress about us. Indeed no nightmare, no wild
+imagination of which the mind of man is capable, could rival the aspect of its
+stupendous facts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by those globes of
+ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and now shot upwards, downwards,
+across, apparently without origin or end, like a stream of meteors that had
+gone mad. Then the travelling mountain, two thousand feet in height, or more,
+with its enormous saucer-like rim painted round with bands of lurid red and
+blue, and about its grinding foot the tulip bloom of emitted flame. Then the
+fierce-faced Oro at his post, his hand upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to
+drown half of this great world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a
+saint in hell and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a saint
+might bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And lastly we three men
+flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which it was given to
+our human eyes to witness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And all the while, bending, bowing towards us&mdash;away from us&mdash;making
+obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to the path behind as
+though in farewell; instinct with a horrible life, with a hideous and gigantic
+grace, that titanic Terror whirled onwards to the mark of fate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive and did not know
+its awful mission. Visions flashed across my mind. I thought of the peoples of
+the world sleeping in their beds, or going about their business, or engaged
+even in the work of war. I thought of the ships upon the seas steaming steadily
+towards their far-off ports. Then I thought of what presently might happen to
+them, of the tremors followed by convulsions, of the sudden crashing down of
+cities, such as we had seen in the picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the
+inflow of the waters of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and
+desolation as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following death. So I
+thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect of the Universe to
+stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin of His handiwork.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod, his hair and
+long beard seemed to bristle with furious and delighted excitement. The
+purple-fringed rim of the Monster had long overshadowed the whited patch of
+rock; its grinding foot was scarce ten yards away. Oro made more signs to Yva
+who, beneath the shelter of her shield, again bent down and did something that
+I could not see. Then, as though her part were played, she rose, drew the grey
+hood of her cloak all about her face so that her eyes alone remained visible,
+took one step towards me and in the broken English we had taught her, called
+into my ear.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not me!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and next instant with
+a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending himself double, thrust upon the
+rod, as I could see from his open mouth, shouting while he thrust.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately in front of the
+lens or window, so that the metallic shield with which she covered herself
+pressed against its substance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out a rush of living
+flame. It struck on Yva&rsquo;s shield and expanded to right and left. The
+insulated shield and garments that she wore seemed to resist it. For a fraction
+of time she stood there like a glowing angel, wrapped in fire.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little distance dissolved like
+a ghost and vanished from our sight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had received the full
+blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet whilst destroying, it turned away
+from her, seeking the free paths of the air. So it came about that its
+obstructed strength struck the foot of the travelling gyroscope, diffused and
+did not suffice to thrust it that one necessary inch on which depended the fate
+of half the world, or missing it altogether, passed away on either side. Even
+so the huge, gleaming mountain rocked and trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it
+bowed itself towards us as though in majestic homage to greatness passed away.
+For a second, too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
+and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of fire went out,
+while I was thrown to the ground.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more sailing
+majestically upon its way and <i>down the accustomed left-hand path!</i>
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook&mdash;but Yva had saved
+the world!
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap26"></a>CHAPTER XXVI.<br />
+Tommy</h2>
+
+<p>
+I lay still a while, on my back as I had fallen, and beneath the shield-like
+defence which Yva had given to me. Notwithstanding the fire-resisting,
+metalised stuff of which it was made, I noted that it was twisted and almost
+burnt through. Doubtless the stored-up electricity or earth magnetism, or
+whatever it may have been that had leapt out of that hole, being diffused by
+the resistance with which it was met, had grazed me with its outer edge, and
+had it not been for the shield and cloak, I also should have been burned up. I
+wished, oh! how I wished that it had been so. Then, by now all must have
+finished and I should have known the truth as to what awaits us beyond the
+change: sleep, or dreams, or perchance the fullest life. Also I should not have
+learned alone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Lying there thus, idly, as though in a half-sleep, I felt Tommy licking my
+face, and throwing my arm about the poor little frightened beast, I watched the
+great world-balance as it retreated on its eternal journey. At one time its
+vast projecting rim had overshadowed us and almost seemed to touch the cliff of
+rock against which we leant. I remember that the effect of that shining arch a
+thousand feet or so above our heads was wonderful. It reminded me of a canopy
+of blackest thunder clouds supported upon a framework of wheeling rainbows,
+while beneath it all the children of the devil shouted together in joy. I noted
+this effect only a few seconds before Yva spoke to me and leapt into the path
+of the flash.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, however, it was far away, a mere flaming wheel that became gradually
+smaller, and its Satanic voices were growing faint. As I have said, I watched
+its disappearance idly, reflecting that I should never look upon its like
+again; also that it was something well worth going forth to see. Then I became
+aware that the humming, howling din had decreased sufficiently to enable me to
+hear human voices without effort. Bastin was addressing Bickley&mdash;like
+myself they were both upon the ground.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Her translation, as you may have noticed, Bickley, if you were not too
+frightened, was really very remarkable. No doubt it will have reminded you, as
+it did me, of that of Elijah. She had exactly the appearance of a person going
+up to Heaven in a vehicle of fire. The destination was certainly the same, and
+even the cloak she wore added a familiar touch and increased the
+similarity.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At any rate it did not fall upon you,&rdquo; answered Bickley with
+something like a sob, in a voice of mingled awe and exasperation. &ldquo;For
+goodness&rsquo; sake! Bastin, stop your Biblical parallels and let us adore,
+yes, let us adore the divinest creature that the earth has borne!&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Never have I loved Bickley more than when I heard him utter those words.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Divinest&rsquo; is a large term, Bickley, and one to which I
+hesitate to subscribe, remembering as I do certain of the prophets and the
+Early Fathers with all their faults, not of course to mention the Apostles.
+But&mdash;&rdquo; here he paused, for suddenly all three of us became aware of
+Oro.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He also has been thrown to the ground by the strength of the prisoned forces
+which he gathered and loosed upon their unholy errand, but, as I rejoiced to
+observe, had suffered from them much more than ourselves. Doubtless this was
+owing to the fact that he had sprung forward in a last wild effort to save his
+daughter, or to prevent her from interfering with his experiment, I know not
+which. As a result his right cheek was much scorched, his right arm was
+withered and helpless, and his magnificent beard was half burnt off him.
+Further, very evidently he was suffering from severe shock, for he rocked upon
+his feet and shook like an aspen leaf. All this, however, did not interfere
+with the liveliness of his grief and rage.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There he stood, a towering shape, like a lightning-smitten statue, and cursed
+us, especially Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My daughter has gone!&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;burned up by the fiery
+power that is my servant. Nothing remains of her but dust, and, Priest, this is
+your doing. You poisoned her heart with your childish doctrines of mercy and
+sacrifice, and the rest, so that she threw herself into the path of the flash
+to save some miserable races that she had never even known.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He paused exhausted, whereon Bastin answered him with spirit:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Oro, she being a holy woman, has gone where you will never follow
+her. Also it is your own fault since you should have listened to her entreaties
+instead of boxing her ears like the brute you are.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;My daughter is gone,&rdquo; went on Oro, recovering his strength,
+&ldquo;and my great designs are ruined. Yet only for a while,&rdquo; he added,
+&ldquo;for the world-balance will return again, if not till long after your
+life-spans are done.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t doctor yourself, Lord Oro,&rdquo; said Bickley, also
+rising, &ldquo;I may tell you as one who understands such things, that most
+likely it will be after your life-span is done also. Although their effect may
+be delayed, severe shocks from burns and over-excitement are apt to prove fatal
+to the aged.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Oro snarled at him; no other word describes it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And there are other things, Physician,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;which are
+apt to prove fatal to the young. At least now you will no longer deny my
+power.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not so sure,&rdquo; answered Bickley, &ldquo;since it seems that
+there is a greater Power, namely that of a woman&rsquo;s love and
+sacrifice.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And a greater still,&rdquo; interrupted Bastin, &ldquo;Which put those
+ideas into her head.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;As for you, Humphrey,&rdquo; went on Oro, &ldquo;I rejoice to think that
+you at least have lost two things that man desires above all other
+things&mdash;the woman you sought and the future kingship of the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I stood up and faced him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The first I have gained, although how, you do not understand,
+Oro,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;And of the second, seeing that it would have
+come through you, on your conditions, I am indeed glad to be rid. I wish no
+power that springs from murder, and no gifts from one who answered his
+daughter&rsquo;s prayer with blows.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment he seemed remorseful.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;She vexed me with her foolishness,&rdquo; he said. Then his rage blazed
+up again:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And it was you who taught it to her,&rdquo; he went on. &ldquo;You are
+guilty, all three of you, and therefore I am left with none to serve me in my
+age; therefore also my mighty schemes are overthrown.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Also, Oro, if you speak truth, therefore half the world is saved,&rdquo;
+I added quietly, &ldquo;and one has left it of whom it was unworthy.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You think that these civilisations of yours, as you are pleased to call
+them, are saved, do you?&rdquo; he sneered. &ldquo;Yet, even if Bickley were
+right and I should die and become powerless, I tell you that they are already
+damned. I have studied them in your books and seen them with my eyes, and I say
+that they are rotten before ever they are ripe, and that their end shall be the
+end of the Sons of Wisdom, to die for lack of increase. That is why I would
+have saved the East, because in it alone there is increase, and thence alone
+can rise the great last race of man which I would have given to your children
+for an heritage. Moreover, think not that you Westerners have done with wars. I
+tell you that they are but begun and that the sword shall eat you up, and what
+the sword spares class shall snatch from class in the struggle for supremacy
+and ease.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus he spoke with extraordinary and concentrated bitterness that I confess
+would have frightened me, had I been capable of fear, which at the moment I was
+not. Who is afraid when he has lost all?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nor was Bastin alarmed, if for other reasons.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I think it right to tell you, Oro,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that the only
+future you need trouble about is your own. God Almighty will look after the
+western civilisations in whatever way He may think best, as you may remember He
+did just now. Only I am sure you won&rsquo;t be here to see how it is
+done.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again fury blazed in Oro&rsquo;s eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;At least I will look after you, you half-bred dogs, who yap out
+ill-omened prophecies of death into my face. Since the three of you loved my
+daughter whom you brought to her doom, and were by her beloved, if differently,
+I think it best that you should follow on her road. How? That is the question?
+Shall I leave you to starve in these great caves?&mdash;Nay, look not towards
+the road of escape which doubtless she pointed out to you, for, as Humphrey
+knows, I can travel swiftly and I will make sure that you find it blocked. Or
+shall I&mdash;&rdquo; and he glanced upwards at the great globes of wandering
+fire, as though he purposed to summon them to be our death, as doubtless he
+could have done.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not care what you do,&rdquo; I answered wearily. &ldquo;Only I
+would beg you to strike quickly. Yet for my friends I am sorry, since it was I
+who led them on this quest, and for you, too, Tommy,&rdquo; I added, looking at
+the poor little hound. &ldquo;You were foolish, Tommy,&rdquo; I went on,
+&ldquo;when you scented out that old tyrant in his coffin, at least for our own
+sake.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Indeed the dog was terribly scared. He whined continually and from time to time
+ran a little way and then returned to us, suggesting that we should go from
+this horror-haunted spot. Lastly, as though he understood that it was Oro who
+kept us there, he went to him and jumping up, licked his hand in a beseeching
+fashion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The super-man looked at the dog and as he looked the rage went out of his face
+and was replaced by something resembling pity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I do not wish the beast to die,&rdquo; he muttered to himself in low
+reflective tones, as though he thought aloud, &ldquo;for of them all it alone
+liked and did not fear me. I might take it with me but still it would perish of
+grief in the loneliness of the caves. Moreover, she loved it whom I shall see
+no more; yes, Yva&mdash;&rdquo; as he spoke the name his voice broke a little.
+&ldquo;Yet if I suffer them to escape they will tell my story to the world and
+make me a laughingstock. Well, if they do, what does it matter? None of those
+Western fools would believe it; thinking that they knew all; like Bickley they
+would mock and say that they were mad, or liars.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again Tommy licked his hand, but more confidently, as though instinct told him
+something of what was passing in Oro&rsquo;s mind. I watched with an idle
+wonder, marvelling whether it were possible that this merciless being would
+after all spare us for the sake of the dog.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So, strange to say, it came about, for suddenly Oro looked up and said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Get you gone, and quickly, before my mood changes. The hound has saved
+you. For its sake I give you your lives, who otherwise should certainly have
+died. She who has gone pointed out to you, I doubt not, a road that runs to the
+upper air. I think that it is still open. Indeed,&rdquo; he added, closing his
+eyes for a moment, &ldquo;I see that it is still open, if long and difficult.
+Follow it, and should you win through, take your boat and sail away as swiftly
+as you can. Whether you die or live I care nothing, but my hands will be clean
+of your blood, although yours are stained with Yva&rsquo;s. Begone! and my
+curse go with you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Without waiting for further words we went to fetch our lanterns, water-bottles
+and bag of food which we had laid down at a little distance. As we approached
+them I looked up and saw Oro standing some way off. The light from one of the
+blue globes of fire which passed close above his head, shone upon him and made
+him ghastly. Moreover, it seemed to me as though approaching death had written
+its name upon his malevolent countenance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I turned my head away, for about his aspect in those sinister surroundings
+there was something horrible, something menacing and repellent to man and of
+him I wished to see no more. Nor indeed did I, for when I glanced in that
+direction again Oro was gone. I suppose that he had retreated into the shadows
+where no light played.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+We gathered up our gear, and while the others were relighting the lanterns, I
+walked a few paces forward to the spot where Yva had been dissolved in the
+devouring fire. Something caught my eye upon the rocky floor. I picked it up.
+It was the ring, or rather the remains of the ring that I had given her on that
+night when we declared our love amidst the ruins by the crater lake. She had
+never worn it on her hand but for her own reasons, as she told me, suspended it
+upon her breast beneath her robe. It was an ancient ring that I had bought in
+Egypt, fashioned of gold in which was set a very hard basalt or other black
+stone. On this was engraved the <i>ank</i> or looped cross, which was the
+Egyptian symbol of Life, and round it a snake, the symbol of Eternity. The gold
+was for the most part melted, but the stone, being so hard and protected by the
+shield and asbestos cloak, for such I suppose it was, had resisted the fury of
+the flash. Only now it was white instead of black, like a burnt onyx that had
+known the funeral pyre. Indeed, perhaps it was an onyx. I kissed it and hid it
+away, for it seemed to me to convey a greeting and with it a promise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we started, a very sad and dejected trio. Leaving with a shudder that vast
+place where the blue lights played eternally, we came to the shaft up and down
+which the travelling stone pursued its endless path, and saw it arrive and
+depart again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I wonder he did not send us that way,&rdquo; said Bickley, pointing to
+it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sure I am very glad it never occurred to him,&rdquo; answered
+Bastin, &ldquo;for I am certain that we could not have made the journey again
+without our guide, Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I looked at him and he ceased. Somehow I could not bear, as yet, to hear her
+beloved name spoken by other lips.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we entered the passage that she pointed out to us, and began a most
+terrible journey which, so far as we could judge, for we lost any exact count
+of time, took us about sixty hours. The road, it is true, was smooth and
+unblocked, but the ascent was fearfully steep and slippery; so much so that
+often we were obliged to pull each other up it and lie down to rest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Had it not been for those large, felt-covered bottles of Life-water, I am sure
+we should never have won through. But this marvelous elixir, drunk a little at
+a time, always re-invigorated us and gave us strength to push on. Also we had
+some food, and fortunately our spare oil held out, for the darkness in that
+tunnel was complete. Tommy became so exhausted that at length we must carry him
+by turns. He would have died had it not been for the water; indeed I thought
+that he was going to die.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to begin to recover,
+and generally there was something in his manner which suggested to us that he
+knew himself to be not far from the surface of the earth towards which we had
+crawled upwards for thousands upon thousands of feet, fortunately without
+meeting with any zone of heat which was not bearable.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little further, suddenly
+Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished. Then we heard him barking but where we
+could not see, since the tunnel appeared to take a turn and continue, but this
+time on a downward course, while the sound of the barks came from our right. We
+searched with the lanterns which were now beginning to die and found a little
+hole almost filled with fallen pieces of rock. We scooped these away with our
+hands, making an aperture large enough to creep through. A few more yards and
+we saw light, the blessed light of the moon, and in it stood Tommy barking
+hoarsely. Next we heard the sound of the sea. We struggled on desperately and
+presently pushed our way through bushes and vegetation on to a steep declivity.
+Down this we rolled and scrambled, to find ourselves at last lying upon a sandy
+beach, whilst above us the full moon shone in the heavens.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here, with a prayer of thankfulness, we flung ourselves down and slept.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+If it had not been for Tommy and we had gone further along the tunnel, which I
+have little doubt stretched on beneath the sea, where, I wonder, should we have
+slept that night?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When we woke the sun was shining high in the heavens. Evidently there had been
+rain towards the dawn, though as we were lying beneath the shelter of some
+broad-leaved tree, from it we had suffered little inconvenience. Oh! how
+beautiful, after our sojourn in those unholy caves, were the sun and the sea
+and the sweet air and the raindrops hanging on the leaves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+We did not wake of ourselves; indeed if we had been left alone I am sure that
+we should have slept the clock round, for we were terribly exhausted. What woke
+us was the chatter of a crowd of Orofenans who were gathered at a distance from
+the tree and engaged in staring at us in a frightened way, also the barks of
+Tommy who objected to their intrusion. Among the people I recognised our old
+friend the chief Marama by his feather cloak, and sitting up, beckoned to him
+to approach. After a good deal of hesitation he came, walking delicately like
+Agag, and stopping from time to time to study us, as though he were not sure
+that we were real.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;What frightens you, Marama?&rdquo; I asked him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You frighten us, O Friend-from-the-Sea. Whence did you and the Healer
+and the Bellower come and why do your faces look like those of ghosts and why
+is the little black beast so large-eyed and so thin? Over the lake we know you
+did not come, for we have watched day and night; moreover there is no canoe
+upon the shore. Also it would not have been possible.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; I asked idly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Come and see,&rdquo; he answered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Rising stiffly we emerged from beneath the tree and perceived that we were at
+the foot of the cliff against which the remains of the yacht had been borne by
+the great tempest. Indeed there it was within a couple of hundred yards of us.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Following Marama we climbed the sloping path which ran up the cliff and
+ascended a knoll whence we could see the lake and the cone of the volcano in
+its centre. At least we used to be able to see this cone, but now, at any rate
+with the naked eye, we could make out nothing, except a small brown spot in the
+midst of the waters of the lake.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;The mountain which rose up many feet in that storm which brought you to
+Orofena, Friend-from-the-Sea, has now sunk till only the very top of it is to
+be seen,&rdquo; said Marama solemnly. &ldquo;Even the Rock of Offerings has
+vanished beneath the water, and with it the house that we built for you.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I said, affecting no surprise. &ldquo;But when did that
+happen?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Five nights ago the world shook, Friend-from-the-Sea, and when the sun
+rose we saw that the mouth of the cave which appeared on the day of your
+coming, had vanished, and that the holy mountain itself had sunk deep, so that
+now only the crest of it is left above the water.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Such things happen,&rdquo; I replied carelessly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, Friend-from-the-Sea. Like many other marvels they happen where you
+and your companions are. Therefore we beg you who can arise out of the earth
+like spirits, to leave us at once before our island and all of us who dwell
+thereon are drowned beneath the ocean. Leave us before we kill you, if indeed
+you be men, or die at your hands if, as we think, you be evil spirits who can
+throw up mountains and drag them down, and create gods that slay, and move
+about in the bowels of the world.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;That is our intention, for our business here is done,&rdquo; I answered
+calmly. &ldquo;Come now and help us to depart. But first bring us food. Bring
+it in plenty, for we must victual our boat.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Marama bowed and issued the necessary orders. Indeed food sufficient for our
+immediate needs was already there as an offering, and of it we ate with
+thankfulness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then we boarded the ship and examined the lifeboat. Thanks to our precautions
+it was still in very fair order and only needed some little caulking which we
+did with grass fibre and pitch from the stores. After this with the help of the
+Orofenans who worked hard in their desperate desire to be rid of us, we drew
+the boat into the sea, and provisioned her with stores from the ship, and with
+an ample supply of water. Everything being ready at last, we waited for the
+evening wind which always blew off shore, to start. As it was not due for half
+an hour or more, I walked back to the tree under which we had slept and tried
+to find the hole whence we had emerged from the tunnel on to the face of the
+cliff.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+My hurried search proved useless. The declivity of the cliff was covered with
+tropical growth, and the heavy rain had washed away every trace of our descent,
+and very likely filled the hole itself with earth. At any rate, of it I could
+discover nothing. Then as the breeze began to blow I returned to the boat and
+here bade adieu to Marama, who gave me his feather cloak as a farewell gift.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good-bye, Friend-from-the-Sea,&rdquo; he said to me. &ldquo;We are glad
+to have seen you and thank you for many things. But we do not wish to see you
+any more.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Good-bye, Marama,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;What you say, we echo. At
+least you have now no great lump upon your neck and we have rid you of your
+wizards. But beware of the god Oro who dwells in the mountain, for if you anger
+him he will sink your island beneath the sea.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;And remember all that I have taught you,&rdquo; shouted Bastin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Marama shivered, though whether at the mention of the god Oro, of whose powers
+the Orofenans had so painful a recollection, or at the result of Bastin&rsquo;s
+teachings, I do not know. And that was the last we shall ever see of each other
+in this world.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The island faded behind us and, sore at heart because of all that we had found
+and lost again, for three days we sailed northward with a fair and steady wind.
+On the fourth evening by an extraordinary stroke of fortune, we fell in with an
+American tramp steamer, trading from the South Sea Islands to San Francisco. To
+the captain, who treated us very kindly, we said simply that we were a party of
+Englishmen whose yacht had been wrecked on a small island several hundreds of
+miles away, of which we knew neither the name, if it had one, nor the position.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This story was accepted without question, for such things often happen in those
+latitudes, and in due course we were landed at San Francisco, where we made
+certain depositions before the British Consul as to the loss of the yacht
+<i>Star of the South</i>. Then we crossed America, having obtained funds by
+cable, and sailed for England in a steamer flying the flag of the United
+States.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of the great war which made this desirable I do not speak since it has nothing,
+or rather little, to do with this history. In the end we arrived safely at
+Liverpool, and thence travelled to our homes in Devonshire.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Thus ended the history of our dealings with Oro, the super-man who began his
+life more than two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and with his daughter,
+Yva, whom Bastin still often calls the Glittering Lady.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap27"></a>CHAPTER XXVII.<br />
+Bastin Discovers a Resemblance</h2>
+
+<p>
+There is little more to tell.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman, volunteered for
+service at the front and departed in the uniform of the R.A.M.C. Before he left
+he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin how much better it was in such
+a national emergency as existed, to belong to a profession in which a man could
+do something to help the bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the
+common cause, than to one like his in which it was only possible to pelt them
+with vain words.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You think that, do you, Bickley?&rdquo; answered Bastin. &ldquo;Well, I
+hold that it is better to heal souls than bodies, because, as even you will
+have learned out there in Orofena, they last so much longer.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am not certain that I learned anything of the sort,&rdquo; said
+Bickley, &ldquo;or even that Oro was more than an ordinary old man. He said
+that he had lived a thousand years, but what was there to prove this except his
+word, which is worth nothing?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;There was the Lady Yva&rsquo;s word also, which is worth a great deal,
+Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes, but she may have meant a thousand moons. Further, as according to
+her own showing she was still quite young, how could she know her
+father&rsquo;s age?&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Quite so, Bickley. But all she actually said was that she was of the
+same age as one of our women of twenty-seven, which may have meant two hundred
+and seventy for all I know. However, putting that aside you will admit that
+they had both slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I admit that they slept, Bastin, because I helped to awaken them, but
+for how long there is nothing to show, except those star maps which are
+probably quite inaccurate.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;They are not inaccurate,&rdquo; I broke in, &ldquo;for I have had them
+checked by leading astronomers who say that they show a marvelous knowledge of
+the heavens as these were two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and are
+today.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Here I should state that those two metal maps and the ring which I gave to Yva
+and found again after the catastrophe, were absolutely the only things
+connected with her or with Oro that we brought away with us. The former I would
+never part with, feeling their value as evidence. Therefore, when we descended
+to the city Nyo and the depths beneath, I took them with me wrapped in cloth in
+my pocket. Thus they were preserved. Everything else went when the Rock of
+Offerings and the cave mouth sank beneath the waters of the lake.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This may have happened either in the earth tremor, which no doubt was caused by
+the advance of the terrific world-balance, or when the electric power, though
+diffused and turned by Yva&rsquo;s insulated body, struck the great
+gyroscope&rsquo;s travelling foot with sufficient strength, not to shift it
+indeed on to the right-hand path as Oro had designed, but still to cause it to
+stagger and even perhaps to halt for the fraction of a second. Even this pause
+may have been enough to cause convulsions of the earth above; indeed, I
+gathered from Marama and other Orofenans that such convulsions had occurred on
+and around the island at what must have corresponded with that moment of the
+loosing of the force.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This loss of our belongings in the house of the Rock of Offerings was the more
+grievous because among them were some Kodak photographs which I had taken,
+including portraits of Oro and one of Yva that was really excellent, to say
+nothing of pictures of the mouth of the cave and of the ruins and crater lake
+above. How bitterly I regret that I did not keep these photographs in my pocket
+with the map-plates.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Even if the star-maps are correct, still it proves nothing,&rdquo; said
+Bickley, &ldquo;since possibly Oro&rsquo;s astronomical skill might have
+enabled him to draw that of the sky at any period, though I allow this is
+impossible.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I doubt his taking so much trouble merely to deceive three wanderers who
+lacked the knowledge even to check them,&rdquo; I said. &ldquo;But all this
+misses the point, Bickley. However long they had slept, that man and woman did
+arise from seeming death. They did dwell in those marvelous caves with their
+evidences of departed civilisations, and they did show us that fearful,
+world-wandering gyroscope. These things we saw.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I admit that we saw them, Arbuthnot, and I admit that they are one and
+all beyond human comprehension. To that extent I am converted, and, I may add,
+humbled,&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;So you ought to be,&rdquo; exclaimed Bastin, &ldquo;seeing that you
+always swore that there was nothing in the world that is not capable of a
+perfectly natural explanation.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Of which all these things may be capable, Bastin, if only we held the
+key.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Very well, Bickley, but how do you explain what the Lady Yva did? I may
+tell you now what she commanded me to conceal at the time, namely, that she
+became a Christian; so much so that by her own will, I baptised and confirmed
+her on the very morning of her sacrifice. Doubtless it was this that changed
+her heart so much that she became willing, of course without my knowledge, to
+leave everything she cared for,&rdquo; here he looked hard at me, &ldquo;and
+lay down her life to save the world, half of which she believed was about to be
+drowned by Oro. Now, considering her history and upbringing, I call this a
+spiritual marvel, much greater than any you now admit, and one you can&rsquo;t
+explain, Bickley.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, I cannot explain, or, at any rate, I will not try,&rdquo; he
+answered, also staring hard at me. &ldquo;Whatever she believed, or did not
+believe, and whatever would or would not have happened, she was a great and
+wonderful woman whose memory I worship.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Quite so, Bickley, and now perhaps you see my point, that what you
+describe as mere vain words may also be helpful to mankind; more so, indeed,
+than your surgical instruments and pills.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You couldn&rsquo;t convert Oro, anyway,&rdquo; exclaimed Bickley, with
+irritation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, Bickley; but then I have always understood that the devil is beyond
+conversion because he is beyond repentance. You see, I think that if that old
+scoundrel was not the devil himself, at any rate he was a bit of him, and, if I
+am right, I am not ashamed to have failed in his case.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Even Oro was not utterly bad, Bastin,&rdquo; I said, reflecting on
+certain traits of mercy that he had shown, or that I dreamed him to have shown
+in the course of our mysterious midnight journeys to various parts of the
+earth. Also I remembered that he had loved Tommy and for his sake had spared
+our lives. Lastly, I do not altogether wonder that he came to certain hasty
+conclusions as to the value of our modern civilisations.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am very glad to hear it, Humphrey, since while there is a spark left
+the whole fire may burn up again, and I believe that to the Divine mercy there
+are no limits, though Oro will have a long road to travel before he finds it.
+And now I have something to say. It has troubled me very much that I was
+obliged to leave those Orofenans wandering in a kind of religious
+twilight.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You couldn&rsquo;t help that,&rdquo; said Bickley, &ldquo;seeing that if
+you had stopped, by now you would have been wandering in religious
+light.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Still, I am not sure that I ought not to have stopped. I seem to have
+deserted a field that was open to me. However, it can&rsquo;t be helped, since
+it is certain that we could never find that island again, even if Oro has not
+sunk it beneath the sea, as he is quite capable of doing, to cover his tracks,
+so to speak. So I mean to do my best in another field by way of
+atonement.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You are not going to become a missionary?&rdquo; I said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;No, but with the consent of the Bishop, who, I think, believes that my
+<i>locum</i> got on better in the parish than I do, as no doubt was the case,
+I, too, have volunteered for the Front, and been accepted as a chaplain of the
+201st Division.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Why, that&rsquo;s mine!&rdquo; said Bickley.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Is it? I am very glad, since now we shall be able to pursue our pleasant
+arguments and to do our best to open each other&rsquo;s minds.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;You fellows are more fortunate than I am,&rdquo; I remarked. &ldquo;I
+also volunteered, but they wouldn&rsquo;t take me, even as a Tommy, although I
+misstated my age. They told me, or at least a specialist whom I saw did
+afterwards, that the blow I got on the head from that sorcerer&rsquo;s
+boy&mdash;&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I know, I know!&rdquo; broke in Bickley almost roughly. &ldquo;Of
+course, things might go wrong at any time. But with care you may live to old
+age.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;I am sorry to hear it,&rdquo; I said with a sigh, &ldquo;at least I
+think I am. Meanwhile, fortunately there is much that I can do at home; indeed
+a course of action has been suggested to me by an old friend who is now in
+authority.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Once more Bickley and Bastin in their war-stained uniforms were dining at my
+table and on the very night of their return from the Front, which was
+unexpected. Indeed Tommy nearly died of joy on hearing their voices in the
+hall. They, who played a worthy part in the great struggle, had much to tell
+me, and naturally their more recent experiences had overlaid to some extent
+those which we shared in the mysterious island of Orofena. Indeed we did not
+speak of these until, just as they were going away, Bastin paused beneath a
+very beautiful portrait of my late wife, the work of an artist famous for his
+power of bringing out the inner character, or what some might call the soul, of
+the sitter. He stared at it for a while in his short-sighted way, then said:
+&ldquo;Do you know, Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more
+than at this moment, that although they were different in height and so on,
+there was a really curious physical resemblance between your late wife and the
+Lady Yva.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; I answered. &ldquo;I think so too.&rdquo;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he did so I saw him
+start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
+</p>
+
+<p class="p2">
+Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life. It is, I admit,
+an odd story and one which suggests problems that I cannot solve. Bastin deals
+with such things by that acceptance which is the privilege and hall-mark of
+faith; Bickley disposes, or used to dispose, of them by a blank denial which
+carries no conviction, and least of all to himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves learned? A round,
+short but still with time and to spare wherein to be dull and lonesome; a
+fateful treadmill to which we were condemned we know not how, but apparently
+through the casual passions of those who went before us and are now forgotten,
+causing us, as the Bible says, to be born in sin; up which we walk wearily we
+know not why, seeming never to make progress; off which we fall outworn we know
+not when or whither.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such upon the surface it appears to be, nor in fact does our ascertained
+knowledge, as Bickley would sum it up, take us much further. No prophet has yet
+arisen who attempted to define either the origin or the reasons of life. Even
+the very Greatest of them Himself is quite silent on this matter. We are
+tempted to wonder why. Is it because life as expressed in the higher of human
+beings, is, or will be too vast, too multiform and too glorious for any
+definition which we could understand? Is it because in the end it will involve
+for some, if not for all, majesty on unfathomed majesty, and glory upon
+unimaginable glory such as at present far outpass the limits of our thought?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The experiences which I have recorded in these pages awake in my heart a hope
+that this may be so. Bastin is wont, like many others, to talk in a light
+fashion of Eternity without in the least comprehending what he means by that
+gigantic term. It is not too much to say that Eternity, something without
+beginning and without end, and involving, it would appear, an everlasting
+changelessness, is a state beyond human comprehension. As a matter of fact we
+mortals do not think in constellations, so to speak, or in æons, but by the
+measures of our own small earth and of our few days thereon. We cannot really
+conceive of an existence stretching over even one thousand years, such as that
+which Oro claimed and the Bible accords to a certain early race of men,
+omitting of course his two thousand five hundred centuries of sleep. And yet
+what is this but one grain in the hourglass of time, one day in the lost record
+of our earth, of its sisters the planets and its father the sun, to say nothing
+of the universes beyond?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It is because I have come in touch with a prolonged though perfectly finite
+existence of the sort, that I try to pass on the reflections which the fact of
+it awoke in me. There are other reflections connected with Yva and the marvel
+of her love and its various manifestations which arise also. But these I keep
+to myself. They concern the wonder of woman&rsquo;s heart, which is a microcosm
+of the hopes and fears and desires and despairs of this humanity of ours
+whereof from age to age she is the mother.
+</p>
+
+<p class="right">
+H<small>UMPHREY</small> A<small>RBUTHNOT</small>.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div class="chapter">
+
+<h2><a name="chap28"></a>NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.</h2>
+
+<p>
+Within about six months of the date on which he wrote the last words of this
+history of our joint adventures, my dear friend, Humphrey Arbuthnot, died
+suddenly, as I had foreseen that probably he would do, from the results of the
+injury he received in the island of Orofena.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He left me the sole executor to his will, under which he divided his property
+into three parts. One third he bequeathed to me, one third (which is strictly
+tied up) to Bastin, and one third to be devoted, under my direction, to the
+advancement of Science.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His end appears to have been instantaneous, resulting from an effusion of blood
+upon the brain. When I was summoned I found him lying dead by the writing desk
+in his library at Fulcombe Priory. He had been writing at the desk, for on it
+was a piece of paper on which appear these words: &ldquo;<i>I have seen her.
+I</i>&mdash;&rdquo; There the writing ends, not stating whom he thought he had
+seen in the moments of mental disturbance or delusion which preceded his
+decease.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Save for certain verbal corrections, I publish this manuscript without comment
+as the will directs, only adding that it sets out our mutual experiences very
+faithfully, though Arbuthnot&rsquo;s deductions from them are not always my
+own.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I would say also that I am contemplating another visit to the South Sea
+Islands, where I wish to make some further investigations. I dare say, however,
+that these will be barren of results, as the fountain of Life-water is buried
+for ever, nor, as I think, will any human being stand again in the Hades-like
+halls of Nyo. It is probable also that it would prove impossible to rediscover
+the island of Orofena, if indeed that volcanic land still remains above the
+waters of the deep.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now that he is a very wealthy man, Bastin talks of accompanying me for purposes
+quite different from my own, but on the whole I hope he will abandon this idea.
+I may add that when he learned of his unexpected inheritance he talked much of
+the &ldquo;deceitfulness of riches,&rdquo; but that he has not as yet taken any
+steps to escape their golden snare. Indeed he now converses of his added
+&ldquo;opportunities of usefulness,&rdquo; I gather in connection with
+missionary enterprise.
+</p>
+
+<p class="right">
+J. R. B<small>ICKLEY</small>.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+<i>P.S</i>.&mdash;I forgot to state that the spaniel Tommy died within three
+days of his owner. The poor little beast was present in the room at the time of
+Arbuthnot&rsquo;s passing away, and when found seemed to be suffering from
+shock. From that moment Tommy refused food and finally was discovered quite
+dead and lying by the body on Marama&rsquo;s feather cloak, which Arbuthnot
+often used as a dressing-gown. As Bastin raised some religious objections, I
+arranged without his knowledge that the dog&rsquo;s ashes should rest not far
+from those of the master and mistress whom it loved so well.
+</p>
+
+<p class="right">
+J.R.B.
+</p>
+
+</div><!--end chapter-->
+
+<div style='display:block;margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***</div>
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@@ -0,0 +1,13244 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: When the World Shook
+       Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+Author: H. Rider Haggard
+
+Posting Date: September 18, 2008 [EBook #1368]
+Release Date: June, 1998
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Anthony Matonak
+
+
+
+
+
+WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK
+
+Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+by H. Rider Haggard
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+Ditchingham, 1918.
+
+MY DEAR CURZON,
+
+More than thirty years ago you tried to protect me, then a stranger to
+you, from one of the falsest and most malignant accusations ever made
+against a writer.
+
+So complete was your exposure of the methods of those at work to blacken
+a person whom they knew to be innocent, that, as you will remember,
+they refused to publish your analysis which destroyed their charges and,
+incidentally, revealed their motives.
+
+Although for this reason vindication came otherwise, your kindness is
+one that I have never forgotten, since, whatever the immediate issue of
+any effort, in the end it is the intention that avails.
+
+Therefore in gratitude and memory I ask you to accept this romance, as
+I know that you do not disdain the study of romance in the intervals of
+your Imperial work.
+
+The application of its parable to our state and possibilities--beneath
+or beyond these glimpses of the moon--I leave to your discernment.
+
+
+Believe me,
+
+Ever sincerely yours,
+
+H. RIDER HAGGARD.
+
+
+
+
+          To
+          The Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G.
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+      1.  ARBUTHNOT DESCRIBES HIMSELF
+
+      2.  BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+      3.  NATALIE
+
+      4.  DEATH AND DEPARTURE
+
+      5.  THE CYCLONE
+
+      6.  LAND
+
+      7.  THE OROFENANS
+
+      8.  BASTIN ATTEMPTS THE MARTYR'S CROWN
+
+      9.  THE ISLAND IN THE LAKE
+
+     10.  THE DWELLERS IN THE TOMB
+
+     11.  RESURRECTION
+
+     12.  TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND YEARS!
+
+     13.  ORO SPEAKS AND BASTIN ARGUES
+
+     14.  THE UNDER-WORLD
+
+     15.  ORO IN HIS HOUSE
+
+     16.  VISIONS OF THE PAST
+
+     17.  YVA EXPLAINS
+
+     18.  THE ACCIDENT
+
+     19.  THE PROPOSALS OF BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+     20.  ORO AND ARBUTHNOT TRAVEL BY NIGHT
+
+     21.  LOVE'S ETERNAL ALTAR
+
+     22.  THE COMMAND
+
+     23.  IN THE TEMPLE OF FATE
+
+     24.  THE CHARIOT OF THE PIT
+
+     25.  SACRIFICE
+
+     26.  TOMMY
+
+     27.  BASTIN DISCOVERS A RESEMBLANCE
+
+     28.  NOTE BY J. R. BICKLEY, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK
+
+
+
+Chapter I. Arbuthnot Describes Himself
+
+
+I suppose that I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, should begin this history in
+which Destiny has caused me to play so prominent a part, with some short
+account of myself and of my circumstances.
+
+I was born forty years ago in this very Devonshire village in which I
+write, but not in the same house. Now I live in the Priory, an ancient
+place and a fine one in its way, with its panelled rooms, its beautiful
+gardens where, in this mild climate, in addition to our own, flourish
+so many plants which one would only expect to find in countries that
+lie nearer to the sun, and its green, undulating park studded with great
+timber trees. The view, too, is perfect; behind and around the rich
+Devonshire landscape with its hills and valleys and its scarped faces
+of red sandstone, and at a distance in front, the sea. There are little
+towns quite near too, that live for the most part on visitors, but these
+are so hidden away by the contours of the ground that from the Priory
+one cannot see them. Such is Fulcombe where I live, though for obvious
+reasons I do not give it its real name.
+
+Many years ago my father, the Rev. Humphrey Arbuthnot, whose only child
+I am, after whom also I am named Humphrey, was the vicar of this place
+with which our family is said to have some rather vague hereditary
+connection. If so, it was severed in the Carolian times because my
+ancestors fought on the side of Parliament.
+
+My father was a recluse, and a widower, for my mother, a Scotswoman,
+died at or shortly after my birth. Being very High Church for those
+days he was not popular with the family that owned the Priory before me.
+Indeed its head, a somewhat vulgar person of the name of Enfield who had
+made money in trade, almost persecuted him, as he was in a position to
+do, being the local magnate and the owner of the rectorial tithes.
+
+I mention this fact because owing to it as a boy I made up my mind that
+one day I would buy that place and sit in his seat, a wild enough idea
+at the time. Yet it became engrained in me, as do such aspirations of
+our youth, and when the opportunity arose in after years I carried
+it out. Poor old Enfield! He fell on evil fortunes, for in trying to
+bolster up a favourite son who was a gambler, a spendthrift, and an
+ungrateful scamp, in the end he was practically ruined and when the
+bad times came, was forced to sell the Fulcombe estate. I think of him
+kindly now, for after all he was good to me and gave me many a day's
+shooting and leave to fish for trout in the river.
+
+By the poor people, however, of all the district round, for the parish
+itself is very small, my father was much beloved, although he did
+practise confession, wear vestments and set lighted candles on the
+altar, and was even said to have openly expressed the wish, to which
+however he never attained, that he could see a censer swinging in the
+chancel. Indeed the church which, as monks built it, is very large and
+fine, was always full on Sundays, though many of the worshippers came
+from far away, some of them doubtless out of curiosity because of its
+papistical repute, also because, in a learned fashion, my father's
+preaching was very good indeed.
+
+For my part I feel that I owe much to these High-Church views. They
+opened certain doors to me and taught me something of the mysteries
+which lie at the back of all religions and therefore have their home
+in the inspired soul of man whence religions are born. Only the pity
+is that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred he never discovers, never
+even guesses at that entombed aspiration, never sinks a shaft down on to
+this secret but most precious vein of ore.
+
+I have said that my father was learned; but this is a mild description,
+for never did I know anyone quite so learned. He was one of those
+men who is so good all round that he became pre-eminent in nothing. A
+classic of the first water, a very respectable mathematician, an expert
+in theology, a student of sundry foreign languages and literature in
+his lighter moments, an inquirer into sociology, a theoretical musician
+though his playing of the organ excruciated most people because it was
+too correct, a really first-class authority upon flint instruments and
+the best grower of garden vegetables in the county, also of apples--such
+were some of his attainments. That was what made his sermons so popular,
+since at times one or the other of these subjects would break out into
+them, his theory being that God spoke to us through all of these things.
+
+But if I began to drift into an analysis of my father's abilities, I
+should never stop. It would take a book to describe them. And yet mark
+this, with them all his name is as dead to the world to-day as though he
+had never been. Light reflected from a hundred facets dissipates itself
+in space and is lost; that concentrated in one tremendous ray pierces to
+the stars.
+
+Now I am going to be frank about myself, for without frankness what
+is the value of such a record as this? Then it becomes simply another
+convention, or rather conventional method of expressing the octoroon
+kind of truths with which the highly civilised races feed themselves,
+as fastidious ladies eat cakes and bread from which all but the smallest
+particle of nourishment has been extracted.
+
+The fact is, therefore, that I inherited most of my father's abilities,
+except his love for flint instruments which always bored me to
+distraction, because although they are by association really the most
+human of things, somehow to me they never convey any idea of humanity.
+In addition I have a practical side which he lacked; had he possessed it
+surely he must have become an archbishop instead of dying the vicar of
+an unknown parish. Also I have a spiritual sense, mayhap mystical would
+be a better term, which with all this religion was missing from my
+father's nature.
+
+For I think that notwithstanding his charity and devotion he never quite
+got away from the shell of things, never cracked it and set his teeth in
+the kernel which alone can feed our souls. His keen intellect, to take
+an example, recognised every one of the difficulties of our faith and
+flashed hither and thither in the darkness, seeking explanation, seeking
+light, trying to reconcile, to explain. He was not great enough to
+put all this aside and go straight to the informing Soul beneath that
+strives to express itself everywhere, even through those husks which are
+called the World, the Flesh and the Devil, and as yet does not always
+quite succeed.
+
+It is this boggling over exteriors, this peering into pitfalls, this
+desire to prove that what such senses as we have tell us is impossible,
+is in fact possible, which causes the overthrow of many an earnest,
+seeking heart and renders its work, conducted on false lines, quite
+nugatory. These will trust to themselves and their own intelligence and
+not be content to spring from the cliffs of human experience into the
+everlasting arms of that Infinite which are stretched out to receive
+them and to give them rest and the keys of knowledge. When will man
+learn what was taught to him of old, that faith is the only plank
+wherewith he can float upon this sea and that his miserable works avail
+him nothing; also that it is a plank made of many sorts of wood, perhaps
+to suit our different weights?
+
+So to be honest, in a sense I believe myself to be my father's superior,
+and I know that he agreed with me. Perhaps this is owing to the blood
+of my Scotch mother which mixed well with his own; perhaps because the
+essential spirit given to me, though cast in his mould, was in fact
+quite different--or of another alloy. Do we, I wonder, really understand
+that there are millions and billions of these alloys, so many indeed
+that Nature, or whatever is behind Nature, never uses the same twice
+over? That is why no two human beings are or ever will be quite
+identical. Their flesh, the body of their humiliation, is identical in
+all, any chemist will prove it to you, but that which animates the
+flesh is distinct and different because it comes from the home of that
+infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate evolution of the
+good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and hell.
+
+Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another advantage
+over my father, which certainly came to me from my mother, who was, as
+I judge from all descriptions and such likenesses as remain of her, an
+extremely handsome woman. I was born much better looking. He was small
+and dark, a little man with deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also
+dark, but tall above the average, and well made. I do not know that I
+need say more about my personal appearance, to me not a very attractive
+subject, but the fact remains that they called me "handsome Humphrey"
+at the University, and I was the captain of my college boat and won many
+prizes at athletic sports when I had time to train for them.
+
+Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because he knew
+that he could do it better than anyone else, and partly to save school
+expenses. The experiment was very successful, as my love of all outdoor
+sports and of any small hazardous adventure that came to my hand, also
+of associating with fisherfolk whom the dangers of the deep make men
+among men, saved me from becoming a milksop. For the rest I learned more
+from my father, whom I always desired to please because I loved him,
+than I should have done at the best and most costly of schools. This was
+shown when at last I went to college with a scholarship, for there I did
+very well indeed, as search would still reveal.
+
+Here I had better set out some of my shortcomings, which in their sum
+have made a failure of me. Yes, a failure in the highest sense, though
+I trust what Stevenson calls "a faithful failure." These have their root
+in fastidiousness and that lack of perseverance, which really means a
+lack of faith, again using the word in its higher and wider sense. For
+if one had real faith one would always persevere, knowing that in every
+work undertaken with high aim, there is an element of nobility, however
+humble and unrecognised that work may seem to be. God after all is the
+God of Work, it is written large upon the face of the Universe. I will
+not expand upon the thought; it would lead me too far afield, but those
+who have understanding will know what I mean.
+
+As regards what I interpret as fastidiousness, this is not very easy
+to express. Perhaps a definition will help. I am like a man with an
+over-developed sense of smell, who when walking through a foreign city,
+however clean and well kept, can always catch the evil savours that
+are inseparable from such cities. More, his keen perception of them
+interferes with all other perceptions and spoils his walks. The result
+is that in after years, whenever he thinks of that beautiful city,
+he remembers, not its historic buildings or its wide boulevards, or
+whatever it has to boast, but rather its ancient, fish-like smell. At
+least he remembers that first owing to this defect in his temperament.
+
+So it is with everything. A lovely woman is spoiled for such a one
+because she eats too much or has too high a voice; he does not care for
+his shooting because the scenery is flat, or for his fishing because
+the gnats bite as well as the trout. In short he is out of tune with
+the world as it is. Moreover, this is a quality which, where it exists,
+cannot be overcome; it affects day-labourers as well as gentlemen at
+large. It is bred in the bone.
+
+Probably the second failure-breeding fault, lack of perseverance, has
+its roots in the first, at any rate in my case. At least on leaving
+college with some reputation, I was called to the Bar where, owing to
+certain solicitor and other connections, I had a good opening. Also,
+owing to the excellence of my memory and powers of work, I began very
+well, making money even during my first year. Then, as it happened, a
+certain case came my way and, my leader falling ill suddenly after it
+was opened, was left in my hands. The man whose cause I was pleading
+was, I think, one of the biggest scoundrels it is possible to conceive.
+It was a will case and if he won, the effect would be to beggar two most
+estimable middle-aged women who were justly entitled to the property,
+to which end personally I am convinced he had committed forgery; the
+perjury that accompanied it I do not even mention.
+
+Well, he did win, thanks to me, and the estimable middle-aged ladies
+were beggared, and as I heard afterwards, driven to such extremities
+that one of them died of her misery and the other became a lodging-house
+keeper. The details do not matter, but I may explain that these ladies
+were unattractive in appearance and manner and broke down beneath my
+cross-examination which made them appear to be telling falsehoods,
+whereas they were only completely confused. Further, I invented an
+ingenious theory of the facts which, although the judge regarded it with
+suspicion, convinced an unusually stupid jury who gave me their verdict.
+
+Everybody congratulated me and at the time I was triumphant, especially
+as my leader had declared that our case was impossible. Afterwards,
+however, my conscience smote me sorely, so much so that arguing from
+the false premise of this business, I came to the conclusion that the
+practice of the Law was not suited to an honest man. I did not take the
+large view that such matters average themselves up and that if I had
+done harm in this instance, I might live to do good in many others, and
+perhaps become a just judge, even a great judge. Here I may mention that
+in after years, when I grew rich, I rescued that surviving old lady from
+her lodging-house, although to this day she does not know the name of
+her anonymous friend. So by degrees, without saying anything, for I kept
+on my chambers, I slipped out of practice, to the great disappointment
+of everybody connected with me, and took to authorship.
+
+A marvel came to pass, my first book was an enormous success. The whole
+world talked of it. A leading journal, delighted to have discovered
+someone, wrote it up; other journals followed suit to be in the
+movement. One of them, I remember, which had already dismissed it with
+three or four sneering lines, came out with a second and two-column
+notice. It sold like wildfire and I suppose had some merits, for it is
+still read, though few know that I wrote it, since fortunately it was
+published under a pseudonym.
+
+Again I was much elated and set to work to write another and, as I
+believe, a much better book. But jealousies had been excited by this
+leaping into fame of a totally unknown person, which were, moreover,
+accentuated through a foolish article that I published in answer to some
+criticisms, wherein I spoke my mind with an insane freedom and biting
+sarcasm. Indeed I was even mad enough to quote names and to give the
+example of the very powerful journal which at first carped at my work
+and then gushed over it when it became the fashion. All of this made me
+many bitter enemies, as I found out when my next book appeared.
+
+It was torn to shreds, it was reviled as subversive of morality
+and religion, good arrows in those days. It was called puerile,
+half-educated stuff--I half-educated! More, an utterly false charge of
+plagiarism was cooked up against me and so well and venomously run that
+vast numbers of people concluded that I was a thief of the lowest order.
+Lastly, my father, from whom the secret could no longer be kept, sternly
+disapproved of both these books which I admit were written from a very
+radical and somewhat anti-church point of view. The result was our first
+quarrel and before it was made up, he died suddenly.
+
+
+Now again fastidiousness and my lack of perseverance did their work, and
+solemnly I swore that I would never write another book, an oath which I
+have kept till this moment, at least so far as publication is concerned,
+and now break only because I consider it my duty so to do and am not
+animated by any pecuniary object.
+
+Thus came to an end my second attempt at carving out a career. By now
+I had grown savage and cynical, rather revengeful also, I fear. Knowing
+myself to possess considerable abilities in sundry directions, I sat
+down, as it were, to think things over and digest my past experiences.
+Then it was that the truth of a very ancient adage struck upon my mind,
+namely, that money is power. Had I sufficient money I could laugh at
+unjust critics for example; indeed they or their papers would scarcely
+dare to criticise me for fear lest it should be in my power to do them
+a bad turn. Again I could follow my own ideas in life and perhaps work
+good in the world, and live in such surroundings as commended themselves
+to me. It was as clear as daylight, but--how to make the money?
+
+I had some capital as the result of my father's death, about �8,000 in
+all, plus a little more that my two books had brought in. In what way
+could I employ it to the best advantage? I remembered that a cousin of
+my father and therefore my own, was a successful stock-broker, also
+that there had been some affection between them. I went to him, he was
+a good, easy-natured man who was frankly glad to see me, and offered to
+put �5,000 into his business, for I was not minded to risk every thing I
+had, if he would give me a share in the profits. He laughed heartily at
+my audacity.
+
+"Why, my boy," he said, "being totally inexperienced at this game, you
+might lose us more than that in a month. But I like your courage, I like
+your courage, and the truth is that I do want help. I will think it over
+and write to you."
+
+He thought it over and in the end offered to try me for a year at a
+fixed salary with a promise of some kind of a partnership if I suited
+him. Meanwhile my �5,000 remained in my pocket.
+
+I accepted, not without reluctance since with the impatience of youth
+I wanted everything at once. I worked hard in that office and soon
+mastered the business, for my knowledge of figures--I had taken a
+first-class mathematical degree at college--came to my aid, as in a way
+did my acquaintance with Law and Literature. Moreover I had a certain
+aptitude for what is called high finance. Further, Fortune, as usual,
+showed me a favourable face.
+
+In one year I got the partnership with a small share in the large
+profits of the business. In two the partner above me retired, and I took
+his place with a third share of the firm. In three my cousin, satisfied
+that it was in able hands, began to cease his attendance at the office
+and betook himself to gardening which was his hobby. In four I paid him
+out altogether, although to do this I had to borrow money on our credit,
+for by agreement the title of the firm was continued. Then came that
+extraordinary time of boom which many will remember to their cost. I
+made a bold stroke and won. On a certain Saturday when the books were
+made up, I found that after discharging all liabilities, I should not
+be worth more than �20,000. On the following Saturday but two when the
+books were made up, I was worth �153,000! L'appetit vient en mangeant.
+It seemed nothing to me when so many were worth millions.
+
+For the next year I worked as few have done, and when I struck a balance
+at the end of it, I found that on the most conservative estimate I was
+the owner of a million and a half in hard cash, or its equivalent. I was
+so tired out that I remember this discovery did not excite me at all. I
+felt utterly weary of all wealth-hunting and of the City and its ways.
+Moreover my old fastidiousness and lack of perseverance re-asserted
+themselves. I reflected, rather late in the day perhaps, on the
+ruin that this speculation was bringing to thousands, of which some
+lamentable instances had recently come to my notice, and once more
+considered whether it were a suitable career for an upright man. I had
+wealth; why should I not take it and enjoy life?
+
+Also--and here my business acumen came in, I was sure that these times
+could not last. It is easy to make money on a rising market, but when
+it is falling the matter is very different. In five minutes I made up
+my mind. I sent for my junior partners, for I had taken in two, and told
+them that I intended to retire at once. They were dismayed both at my
+loss, for really I was the firm, and because, as they pointed out, if
+I withdrew all my capital, there would not be sufficient left to enable
+them to carry on.
+
+One of them, a blunt and honest man, said to my face that it would be
+dishonourable of me to do so. I was inclined to answer him sharply, then
+remembered that his words were true.
+
+"Very well," I said, "I will leave you �600,000 on which you shall pay
+me five per cent interest, but no share of the profits."
+
+On these terms we dissolved the partnership and in a year they had
+lost the �600,000, for the slump came with a vengeance. It saved them,
+however, and to-day they are earning a reasonable income. But I have
+never asked them for that �600,000.
+
+
+
+Chapter II. Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+Behold me once more a man without an occupation, but now the possessor
+of about �900,000. It was a very considerable fortune, if not a large
+one in England; nothing like the millions of which I had dreamed, but
+still enough. To make the most of it and to be sure that it remained, I
+invested it very well, mostly in large mortgages at four per cent which,
+if the security is good, do not depreciate in capital value. Never again
+did I touch a single speculative stock, who desired to think no more
+about money. It was at this time that I bought the Fulcombe property.
+It cost me about �120,000 of my capital, or with alterations, repairs,
+etc., say �150,000, on which sum it may pay a net two and a half per
+cent, not more.
+
+This �3,700 odd I have always devoted to the upkeep of the place, which
+is therefore in first-rate order. The rest I live on, or save.
+
+These arrangements, with the beautifying and furnishing of the house
+and the restoration of the church in memory of my father, occupied and
+amused me for a year or so, but when they were finished time began to
+hang heavy on my hands. What was the use of possessing about �20,000 a
+year when there was nothing upon which it could be spent? For after
+all my own wants were few and simple and the acquisition of valuable
+pictures and costly furniture is limited by space. Oh! in my small way
+I was like the weary King Ecclesiast. For I too made me great works
+and had possessions of great and small cattle (I tried farming and
+lost money over it!) and gathered me silver and gold and the peculiar
+treasure of kings, which I presume means whatever a man in authority
+chiefly desires, and so forth. But "behold all was vanity and vexation
+of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun."
+
+So, notwithstanding my wealth and health and the deference which is
+the rich man's portion, especially when the limit of his riches is not
+known, it came about that I too "hated life," and this when I was not
+much over thirty. I did not know what to do; for Society as the word
+is generally understood, I had no taste; it bored me; horse-racing and
+cards I loathed, who had already gambled too much on a big scale. The
+killing of creatures under the name of sport palled upon me, indeed I
+began to doubt if it were right, while the office of a junior county
+magistrate in a place where there was no crime, only occupied me an hour
+or two a month.
+
+Lastly my neighbours were few and with all due deference to them,
+extremely dull. At least I could not understand them because in them
+there did not seem to be anything to understand, and I am quite certain
+that they did not understand me. More, when they came to learn that I
+was radical in my views and had written certain "dreadful" and
+somewhat socialistic books in the form of fiction, they both feared and
+mistrusted me as an enemy to their particular section of the race. As
+I had not married and showed no inclination to do so, their womenkind
+also, out of their intimate knowledge, proclaimed that I led an immoral
+life, though a little reflection would have shown them that there was
+no one in the neighbourhood which for a time I seldom left, who could
+possibly have tempted an educated creature to such courses.
+
+Terrible is the lot of a man who, while still young and possessing the
+intellect necessary to achievement, is deprived of all ambition. And
+I had none at all. I did not even wish to purchase a peerage or a
+baronetcy in this fashion or in that, and, as in my father's case, my
+tastes were so many and so catholic that I could not lose myself in any
+one of them. They never became more than diversions to me. A hobby is
+only really amusing when it becomes an obsession.
+
+At length my lonesome friendlessness oppressed me so much that I took
+steps to mitigate it. In my college life I had two particular friends
+whom I think I must have selected because they were so absolutely
+different from myself.
+
+They were named Bastin and Bickley. Bastin--Basil was his Christian
+name--was an uncouth, shock-headed, flat-footed person of large, rugged
+frame and equally rugged honesty, with a mind almost incredibly simple.
+Nothing surprised him because he lacked the faculty of surprise. He was
+like that kind of fish which lies at the bottom of the sea and takes
+every kind of food into its great maw without distinguishing its
+flavour. Metaphorically speaking, heavenly manna and decayed cabbage
+were just the same to Bastin. He was not fastidious and both were mental
+pabulum--of a sort--together with whatever lay between these extremes.
+Yet he was good, so painfully good that one felt that without exertion
+to himself he had booked a first-class ticket straight to Heaven; indeed
+that his guardian angel had tied it round his neck at birth lest he
+should lose it, already numbered and dated like an identification disc.
+
+I am bound to add that Bastin never went wrong because he never felt the
+slightest temptation to do so. This I suppose constitutes real virtue,
+since, in view of certain Bible sayings, the person who is tempted and
+would like to yield to the temptation, is equally a sinner with the
+person who does yield. To be truly good one should be too good to be
+tempted, or too weak to make the effort worth the tempter's while--in
+short not deserving of his powder and shot.
+
+I need hardly add that Bastin went into the Church; indeed, he could not
+have gone anywhere else; it absorbed him naturally, as doubtless Heaven
+will do in due course. Only I think it likely that until they get to
+know him he will bore the angels so much that they will continually move
+him up higher. Also if they have any susceptibilities left, probably
+he will tread upon their toes--an art in which I never knew his equal.
+However, I always loved Bastin, perhaps because no one else did, a fact
+of which he remained totally unconscious, or perhaps because of his
+brutal way of telling one what he conceived to be the truth, which, as
+he had less imagination than a dormouse, generally it was not. For if
+the truth is a jewel, it is one coloured and veiled by many different
+lights and atmospheres.
+
+It only remains to add that he was learned in his theological fashion
+and that among his further peculiarities were the slow, monotonous
+voice in which he uttered his views in long sentences, and his total
+indifference to adverse argument however sound and convincing.
+
+My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different character.
+Like Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced another way.
+If Bastin's omnivorous throat could swallow a camel, especially
+a theological camel, Bickley's would strain at the smallest gnat,
+especially a theological gnat. The very best and most upright of men,
+yet he believed in nothing that he could not taste, see or handle. He
+was convinced, for instance, that man is a brute-descended accident and
+no more, that what we call the soul or the mind is produced by a certain
+action of the grey matter of the brain; that everything apparently
+inexplicable has a perfectly mundane explanation, if only one could find
+it; that miracles certainly never did happen, and never will; that all
+religions are the fruit of human hopes and fears and the most convincing
+proof of human weakness; that notwithstanding our infinite variations we
+are the subjects of Nature's single law and the victims of blind, black
+and brutal chance.
+
+Such was Bickley with his clever, well-cut face that always reminded
+me of a cameo, and thoughtful brow; his strong, capable hands and his
+rather steely mouth, the mere set of which suggested controversy of
+an uncompromising kind. Naturally as the Church had claimed Bastin, so
+medicine claimed Bickley.
+
+Now as it happened the man who succeeded my father as vicar of Fulcombe
+was given a better living and went away shortly after I had purchased
+the place and with it the advowson. Just at this time also I received
+a letter written in the large, sprawling hand of Bastin from whom I
+had not heard for years. It went straight to the point, saying that he,
+Bastin, had seen in a Church paper that the last incumbent had resigned
+the living of Fulcombe which was in my gift. He would therefore be
+obliged if I would give it to him as the place he was at in Yorkshire
+did not suit his wife's health.
+
+Here I may state that afterwards I learned that what did not suit Mrs.
+Bastin was the organist, who was pretty. She was by nature a woman
+with a temperament so insanely jealous that actually she managed to be
+suspicious of Bastin, whom she had captured in an unguarded moment when
+he was thinking of something else and who would as soon have thought of
+even looking at any woman as he would of worshipping Baal. As a matter
+of fact it took him months to know one female from another. Except as
+possible providers of subscriptions and props of Mothers' Meetings,
+women had no interest for him.
+
+To return--with that engaging honesty which I have mentioned--Bastin's
+letter went on to set out all his own disabilities, which, he added,
+would probably render him unsuitable for the place he desired to fill.
+He was a High Churchman, a fact which would certainly offend many; he
+had no claims to being a preacher although he was extraordinarily well
+acquainted with the writings of the Early Fathers. (What on earth had
+that to do with the question, I wondered.) On the other hand he had
+generally been considered a good visitor and was fond of walking (he
+meant to call on distant parishioners, but did not say so).
+
+Then followed a page and a half on the evils of the existing system
+of the presentation to livings by private persons, ending with the
+suggestion that I had probably committed a sin in buying this particular
+advowson in order to increase my local authority, that is, if I had
+bought it, a point on which he was ignorant. Finally he informed me that
+as he had to christen a sick baby five miles away on a certain moor
+and it was too wet for him to ride his bicycle, he must stop. And he
+stopped.
+
+There was, however, a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows:
+
+"Someone told me that you were dead a few years ago, and of course it
+may be another man of the same name who owns Fulcombe. If so, no doubt
+the Post Office will send back this letter."
+
+That was his only allusion to my humble self in all those diffuse pages.
+It was a long while since I had received an epistle which made me laugh
+so much, and of course I gave him the living by return of post, and
+even informed him that I would increase its stipend to a sum which I
+considered suitable to the position.
+
+About ten days later I received another letter from Bastin which, as
+a scrawl on the flap of the envelope informed me, he had carried for
+a week in his pocket and forgotten to post. Except by inference it
+returned no thanks for my intended benefits. What it did say, however,
+was that he thought it wrong of me to have settled a matter of such
+spiritual importance in so great a hurry, though he had observed that
+rich men were nearly always selfish where their time was concerned.
+Moreover, he considered that I ought first to have made inquiries as to
+his present character and attainments, etc., etc.
+
+To this epistle I replied by telegraph to the effect that I should as
+soon think of making inquiries about the character of an archangel,
+or that of one of his High Church saints. This telegram, he told me
+afterwards, he considered unseemly and even ribald, especially as it had
+given great offence to the postmaster, who was one of the sidesmen in
+his church.
+
+Thus it came about that I appointed the Rev. Basil Bastin to the
+living of Fulcombe, feeling sure that he would provide me with endless
+amusement and act as a moral tonic and discipline. Also I appreciated
+the man's blunt candour. In due course he arrived, and I confess that
+after a few Sundays of experience I began to have doubts as to the
+wisdom of my choice, glad as I was to see him personally. His sermons at
+once bored me, and, when they did not send me to sleep, excited in me
+a desire for debate. How could he be so profoundly acquainted with
+mysteries before which the world had stood amazed for ages? Was there
+nothing too hot or too heavy in the spiritual way for him to dismiss in
+a few blundering and casual words, as he might any ordinary incident of
+every-day life, I wondered? Also his idea of High Church observances was
+not mine, or, I imagine, that of anybody else. But I will not attempt to
+set it out.
+
+His peculiarities, however, were easy to excuse and entirely swallowed
+up by the innate goodness of his nature which soon made him beloved of
+everyone in the place, for although he thought that probably most things
+were sins, I never knew him to discover a sin which he considered to be
+beyond the reach of forgiveness. Bastin was indeed a most charitable man
+and in his way wide-minded.
+
+The person whom I could not tolerate, however, was his wife, who, to
+my fancy, more resembled a vessel, a very unattractive vessel, full of
+vinegar than a woman. Her name was Sarah and she was small, plain, flat,
+sandy-haired and odious, quite obsessed, moreover, with her jealousies
+of the Rev. Basil, at whom it pleased her to suppose that every woman in
+the countryside under fifty was throwing herself.
+
+Here I will confess that to the best of my ability I took care that they
+did in outward seeming, that is, whenever she was present, instructing
+them to sit aside with him in darkened corners, to present him with
+flowers, and so forth. Several of them easily fell into the humour of
+the thing, and I have seen him depart from a dinner-party followed by
+that glowering Sarah, with a handful of rosebuds and violets, to say
+nothing of the traditional offerings of slippers, embroidered markers
+and the like. Well, it was my only way of coming even with her, which I
+think she knew, for she hated me poisonously.
+
+So much for Basil Bastin. Now for Bickley. Him I had met on several
+occasions since our college days, and after I was settled at the Priory
+from time to time I asked him to stay with me. At length he came, and
+I found out that he was not at all comfortable in his London practice
+which was of a nature uncongenial to him; further, that he did not get
+on with his partners. Then, after reflection, I made a suggestion
+to him. I pointed out that, owing to its popularity amongst seaside
+visitors, the neighbourhood of Fulcombe was a rising one, and that
+although there were doctors in it, there was no really first-class
+surgeon for miles.
+
+Now Bickley was a first-class surgeon, having held very high hospital
+appointments, and indeed still holding them. Why, I asked, should he
+not come and set up here on his own? I would appoint him doctor to
+the estate and also give him charge of a cottage hospital which I was
+endowing, with liberty to build and arrange it as he liked. Further, as
+I considered that it would be of great advantage to me to have a man of
+real ability within reach, I would guarantee for three years whatever
+income he was earning in London.
+
+He thanked me warmly and in the end acted on the idea, with startling
+results so far as his prospects were concerned. Very soon his really
+remarkable skill became known and he was earning more money than as an
+unmarried man he could possibly want. Indeed, scarcely a big operation
+took place at any town within twenty miles, and even much farther away,
+at which he was not called in to assist.
+
+Needless to say his advent was a great boon to me, for as he lived in a
+house I let him quite near by, whenever he had a spare evening he would
+drop in to dinner, and from our absolutely opposite standpoints we
+discussed all things human and divine. Thus I was enabled to sharpen
+my wits upon the hard steel of his clear intellect which was yet, in a
+sense, so limited.
+
+I must add that I never converted him to my way of thinking and he
+never converted me to his, any more than he converted Bastin, for
+whom, queerly enough, he had a liking. They pounded away at each other,
+Bickley frequently getting the best of it in the argument, and when at
+last Bastin rose to go, he generally made the same remark. It was:
+
+"It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your intellect
+so utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted you of error at
+least half a dozen times, and not to confess it is mere pigheadedness.
+Good night. I am sure that Sarah will be sitting up for me."
+
+"Silly old idiot!" Bickley would say, shaking his fist after him. "The
+only way to get him to see the truth would be to saw his head open and
+pour it in."
+
+Then we would both laugh.
+
+Such were my two most intimate friends, although I admit it was rather
+like the equator cultivating close relationships with the north and
+south poles. Certainly Bastin was as far from Bickley as those points
+of the earth are apart, while I. as it were, sat equally distant between
+the two. However, we were all very happy together, since in certain
+characters, there are few things that bind men more closely than
+profound differences of opinion.
+
+
+Now I must turn to my more personal affairs. After all, it is impossible
+for a man to satisfy his soul, if he has anything of the sort about him
+which in the remotest degree answers to that description, with the husks
+of wealth, luxury and indolence, supplemented by occasional theological
+and other arguments between his friends; Becoming profoundly convinced
+of this truth, I searched round for something to do and, like Noah's
+dove on the waste of waters, found nothing. Then I asked Bickley and
+Bastin for their opinions as to my best future course. Bickley proved a
+barren draw. He rubbed his nose and feebly suggested that I might go
+in for "research work," which, of course, only represented his own
+ambitions. I asked him indignantly how I could do such a thing without
+any scientific qualifications whatever. He admitted the difficulty, but
+replied that I might endow others who had the qualifications.
+
+"In short, become a mulch cow for sucking scientists," I replied, and
+broke off the conversation.
+
+Bastin's idea was, first, that I should teach in a Sunday School;
+secondly, that if this career did not satisfy all my aspirations, I
+might be ordained and become a missionary.
+
+On my rejection of this brilliant advice, he remarked that the only
+other thing he could think of was that I should get married and have a
+large family, which might possibly advantage the nation and ultimately
+enrich the Kingdom of Heaven, though of such things no one could
+be quite sure. At any rate, he was certain that at present I was in
+practice neglecting my duty, whatever it might be, and in fact one of
+those cumberers of the earth who, he observed in the newspaper he took
+in and read when he had time, were "very happily named--the idle rich."
+
+"Which reminds me," he added, "that the clothing-club finances are in
+a perfectly scandalous condition; in fact, it is �25 in debt, an amount
+that as the squire of the parish I consider it incumbent on you to make
+good, not as a charity but as an obligation."
+
+"Look here, my friend," I said, ignoring all the rest, "will you answer
+me a plain question? Have you found marriage such a success that you
+consider it your duty to recommend it to others? And if you have, why
+have you not got the large family of which you speak?"
+
+"Of course not," he replied with his usual frankness. "Indeed, it is in
+many ways so disagreeable that I am convinced it must be right and for
+the good of all concerned. As regards the family I am sure I do not
+know, but Sarah never liked babies, which perhaps has something to do
+with it."
+
+Then he sighed, adding, "You see, Arbuthnot, we have to take things as
+we find them in this world and hope for a better."
+
+"Which is just what I am trying to do, you unilluminating old donkey!" I
+exclaimed, and left him there shaking his head over matters in general,
+but I think principally over Sarah.
+
+By the way, I think that the villagers recognised this good lady's
+vinegary nature. At least, they used to call her "Sour Sal."
+
+
+
+Chapter III. Natalie
+
+
+Now what Bastin had said about marriage stuck in my mind as his
+blundering remarks had a way of doing, perhaps because of the grain
+of honest truth with which they were often permeated. Probably in my
+position it was more or less my duty to marry. But here came the rub;
+I had never experienced any leanings that way. I was as much a man as
+others, more so than many are, perhaps, and I liked women, but at the
+same time they repelled me.
+
+My old fastidiousness came in; to my taste there was always something
+wrong about them. While they attracted one part of my nature they
+revolted another part, and on the whole I preferred to do without their
+intimate society, rather than work violence to this second and higher
+part of me. Moreover, quite at the beginning of my career I had
+concluded from observation that a man gets on better in life alone,
+rather than with another to drag at his side, or by whom perhaps he must
+be dragged. Still true marriage, such as most men and some women have
+dreamed of in their youth, had always been one of my ideals; indeed it
+was on and around this vision that I wrote that first book of mine which
+was so successful. Since I knew this to be unattainable in our imperfect
+conditions, however, notwithstanding Bastin's strictures, again I
+dismissed the whole matter from my mind as a vain imagination.
+
+As an alternative I reflected upon a parliamentary career which I was
+not too old to begin, and even toyed with one or two opportunities that
+offered themselves, as these do to men of wealth and advanced views.
+They never came to anything, for in the end I decided that Party
+politics were so hateful and so dishonest, that I could not bring myself
+to put my neck beneath their yoke. I was sure that if I tried to do
+so, I should fail more completely than I had done at the Bar and in
+Literature. Here, too, I am quite certain that I was right.
+
+The upshot of it all was that I sought refuge in that last expedient of
+weary Englishmen, travel, not as a globe-trotter, but leisurely and with
+an inquiring mind, learning much but again finding, like the ancient
+writer whom I have quoted already, that there is no new thing under the
+sun; that with certain variations it is the same thing over and over
+again.
+
+No, I will make an exception, the East did interest me enormously. There
+it was, at Benares, that I came into touch with certain thinkers who
+opened my eyes to a great deal. They released some hidden spring in
+my nature which hitherto had always been striving to break through the
+crust of our conventions and inherited ideas. I know now that what I
+was seeking was nothing less than the Infinite; that I had "immortal
+longings in me." I listened to all their solemn talk of epochs and years
+measureless to man, and reflected with a thrill that after all man might
+have his part in every one of them. Yes, that bird of passage as he
+seemed to be, flying out of darkness into darkness, still he might have
+spread his wings in the light of other suns millions upon millions of
+years ago, and might still spread them, grown radiant and glorious,
+millions upon millions of years hence in a time unborn.
+
+If only I could know the truth. Was Life (according to Bickley) merely
+a short activity bounded by nothingness before and behind; or (according
+to Bastin) a conventional golden-harped and haloed immortality, a word
+of which he did not in the least understand the meaning?
+
+Or was it something quite different from either of these, something vast
+and splendid beyond the reach of vision, something God-sent, beginning
+and ending in the Eternal Absolute and at last partaking of His
+attributes and nature and from aeon to aeon shot through with His light?
+And how was the truth to be learned? I asked my Eastern friends, and
+they talked vaguely of long ascetic preparation, of years upon years of
+learning, from whom I could not quite discover. I was sure it could not
+be from them, because clearly they did not know; they only passed on
+what they had heard elsewhere, when or how they either could not or
+would not explain. So at length I gave it up, having satisfied myself
+that all this was but an effort of Oriental imagination called into life
+by the sweet influences of the Eastern stars.
+
+I gave it up and went away, thinking that I should forget. But I did
+not forget. I was quick with a new hope, or at any rate with a new
+aspiration, and that secret child of holy desire grew and grew within
+my soul, till at length it flashed upon me that this soul of mine was
+itself the hidden Master from which I must learn my lesson. No wonder
+that those Eastern friends could not give his name, seeing that whatever
+they really knew, as distinguished from what they had heard, and it was
+little enough, each of them had learned from the teaching of his own
+soul.
+
+Thus, then, I too became a dreamer with only one longing, the longing
+for wisdom, for that spirit touch which should open my eyes and enable
+me to see.
+
+Yet now it happened strangely enough that when I seemed within myself
+to have little further interest in the things of the world, and least
+of all in women, I, who had taken another guest to dwell with me,
+those things of the world came back to me and in the shape of Woman the
+Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed since is it not written that no
+man can live to himself alone, or lose himself in watching and nurturing
+the growth of his own soul?
+
+
+It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and stayed
+there a while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name in the book
+of our Minister to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred Upton, not because I
+wished him to ask me to dinner, but for the reason that I had heard of
+him as a man of archeological tastes and thought that he might enable me
+to see things which otherwise I should not see.
+
+As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire neighbours
+who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on the following
+night. I accepted and found myself one of a considerable party, some of
+them distinguished English people who wore Orders, as is customary when
+one dines with the representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and
+this shows that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first
+time in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
+Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in to
+dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even a lady as
+there was not one to spare.
+
+Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself seated
+between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither of whom could
+talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign language, not even French
+in which they addressed me, seeming surprised that I did not understand
+them. I was humiliated at my own ignorance, although in fact I was not
+ignorant, only my education had been classical. Indeed I was a good
+classic and had kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I
+became an idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
+countess might know Latin from which her own language was derived, and
+addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir Alfred, who was not
+far off and overheard me (he also knew Latin), burst into laughter and
+proceeded to explain the joke in a loud voice, first in French and
+then in English, to the assembled company, who all became infected with
+merriment and also stared at me as a curiosity.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to
+a mistake of my driver I had arrived rather late and had not been
+introduced to her. As her father's only daughter, her mother being dead,
+she was seated at the end of the table behind a fan-like arrangement of
+white Madonna lilies, and she had bent forward and, like the others, was
+looking at me, but in such a fashion that her head from that distance
+seemed as though it were surrounded and crowned with lilies. Indeed the
+greatest art could not have produced a more beautiful effect which was,
+however, really one of naked accident.
+
+An angel looking down upon earth through the lilies of Heaven--that was
+the rather absurd thought which flashed into my mind. I did not quite
+realise her face at first except that it seemed to be both dark and
+fair; as a fact her waving hair which grew rather low upon her forehead,
+was dark, and her large, soft eyes were grey. I did not know, and to
+this moment I do not know if she was really beautiful, but certainly the
+light that shone through those eyes of hers and seemed to be reflected
+upon her delicate features, was beauty itself. It was like that glowing
+through a thin vase of the purest alabaster within which a lamp is
+placed, and I felt this effect to arise from no chance, like that of the
+lily-setting, but, as it were, from the lamp of the spirit within.
+
+Our eyes met, and I suppose that she saw the wonder and admiration
+in mine. At any rate her amused smile faded, leaving the face rather
+serious, though still sweetly serious, and a tinge of colour crept over
+it as the first hue of dawn creeps into a pearly sky. Then she withdrew
+herself behind the screen of lilies and for the rest of that dinner
+which I thought was never coming to an end, practically I saw her no
+more. Only I noted as she passed out that although not tall, she
+was rounded and graceful in shape and that her hands were peculiarly
+delicate.
+
+Afterwards in the drawing-room her father, with whom I had talked at the
+table, introduced me to her, saying:
+
+"My daughter is the real archaeologist, Mr. Arbuthnot, and I think if
+you ask her, she may be able to help you."
+
+Then he bustled away to speak to some of his important guests, from whom
+I think he was seeking political information.
+
+"My father exaggerates," she said in a soft and very sympathetic voice,
+"but perhaps"--and she motioned me to a seat at her side.
+
+Then we talked of the places and things that I more particularly desired
+to see and, well, the end of it was that I went back to my hotel in love
+with Natalie; and as she afterwards confessed, she went to bed in love
+with me.
+
+It was a curious business, more like meeting a very old friend from whom
+one had been separated by circumstances for a score of years or so than
+anything else. We were, so to speak, intimate from the first; we
+knew all about each other, although here and there was something new,
+something different which we could not remember, lines of thought,
+veins of memory which we did not possess in common. On one point I am
+absolutely clear: it was not solely the everyday and ancient appeal of
+woman to man and man to woman which drew us together, though doubtless
+this had its part in our attachment as under our human conditions it
+must do, seeing that it is Nature's bait to ensure the continuance of
+the race. It was something more, something quite beyond that elementary
+impulse.
+
+At any rate we loved, and one evening in the shelter of the solemn
+walls of the great Coliseum at Rome, which at that hour were shut to
+all except ourselves, we confessed our love. I really think we must have
+chosen the spot by tacit but mutual consent because we felt it to be
+fitting. It was so old, so impregnated with every human experience,
+from the direst crime of the tyrant who thought himself a god, to the
+sublimest sacrifice of the martyr who already was half a god; with every
+vice and virtue also which lies between these extremes, that it seemed
+to be the most fitting altar whereon to offer our hearts and all that
+caused them to beat, each to the other.
+
+So Natalie and I were betrothed within a month of our first meeting.
+Within three we were married, for what was there to prevent or delay?
+Naturally Sir Alfred was delighted, seeing that he possessed but
+small private resources and I was able to make ample provision for
+his daughter who had hitherto shown herself somewhat difficult in this
+business of matrimony and now was bordering on her twenty-seventh year.
+Everybody was delighted, everything went smoothly as a sledge sliding
+down a slope of frozen snow and the mists of time hid whatever might be
+at the end of that slope. Probably a plain; at the worst the upward rise
+of ordinary life.
+
+That is what we thought, if we thought at all. Certainly we never
+dreamed of a precipice. Why should we, who were young, by comparison,
+quite healthy and very rich? Who thinks of precipices under such
+circumstances, when disaster seems to be eliminated and death is yet a
+long way off?
+
+And yet we ought to have done so, because we should have known that
+smooth surfaces without impediment to the runners often end in something
+of the kind.
+
+I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where of
+course we met with a great reception, including the ringing (out of
+tune) of the new peal of bells that I had given to the church, Bastin
+made haste to point this out.
+
+"Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot," he
+reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as usual,
+though what at I do not know, had been escorted from the room by
+Natalie, "and really, when I come to think of it, you are an unusually
+fortunate person. You possess a great deal of money, much more than you
+have any right to; which you seem to have done very little to earn and
+do not spend quite as I should like you to do, and this nice property,
+that ought to be owned by a great number of people, as, according to
+the views you express, I should have thought you would acknowledge, and
+everything else that a man can want. It is very strange that you should
+be so favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
+which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even in the
+end and you will get your share of troubles, like others. Perhaps Mrs.
+Arbuthnot will have no children as there is so much for them to take. Or
+perhaps you will lose all your money and have to work for your living,
+which might be good for you. Or," he added, still thinking aloud after
+his fashion, "perhaps she will die young--she has that kind of face,
+although, of course, I hope she won't," he added, waking up.
+
+I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the
+proverbial funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to them. I
+suppose it was because in a flash of intuition I knew that they would
+come true and that he was an appointed Cassandra. Perhaps this uncanny
+knowledge overcame my natural indignation at such super-gaucherie of
+which no one but Bastin could have been capable, and even prevented me
+from replying at all, so that I merely sat still and looked at him.
+
+But Bickley did reply with some vigour.
+
+"Forgive me for saying so, Bastin," he said, bristling all over as it
+were, "but your remarks, which may or may not be in accordance with the
+principles of your religion, seem to me to be in singularly bad taste.
+They would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians,
+who appear to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at
+any decent heathen feast your neck would have been wrung as that of a
+bird of ill omen."
+
+"Why?" asked Bastin blankly. "I only said what I thought to be the
+truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste."
+
+"Then I will say what I think also to be the truth," replied Bickley,
+growing furious. "It is that you use your Christianity as a cloak for
+bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy for others of which
+you seem to have none. Moreover, since you talk of the death of people's
+wives, I will tell you something about your own, as a doctor, which I
+can do as I never attended her. It is highly probable, in my opinion,
+that she will die before Mrs. Arbuthnot, who is quite a healthy person
+with a good prospect of life."
+
+"Perhaps," said Bastin. "If so, it will be God's will and I shall not
+complain" (here Bickley snorted), "though I do not see what you can know
+about it. But why should you cast reflections on the early Christians
+who were people of strong principle living in rough times, and had to
+wage war against an established devil-worship? I know you are angry
+because they smashed up the statues of Venus and so forth, but had I
+been in their place I should have done the same."
+
+"Of course you would, who doubts it? But as for the early Christians and
+their iconoclastic performances--well, curse them, that's all!" and he
+sprang up and left the room.
+
+I followed him.
+
+Let it not be supposed from the above scene that there was any
+ill-feeling between Bastin and Bickley. On the contrary they were much
+attached to each other, and this kind of quarrel meant no more than
+the strong expression of their individual views to which they were
+accustomed from their college days. For instance Bastin was always
+talking about the early Christians and missionaries, while Bickley
+loathed both, the early Christians because of the destruction which
+they had wrought in Egypt, Italy, Greece and elsewhere, of all that was
+beautiful; and the missionaries because, as he said, they were degrading
+and spoiling the native races and by inducing them to wear clothes,
+rendering them liable to disease. Bastin would answer that their souls
+were more important than their bodies, to which Bickley replied that as
+there was no such thing as a soul except in the stupid imagination of
+priests, he differed entirely on the point. As it was quite impossible
+for either to convince the other, there the conversation would end, or
+drift into something in which they were mutually interested, such as
+natural history and the hygiene of the neighbourhood.
+
+Here I may state that Bickley's keen professional eye was not mistaken
+when he diagnosed Mrs. Bastin's state of health as dangerous. As a
+matter of fact she was suffering from heart disease that a doctor can
+often recognise by the colour of the lips, etc., which brought about her
+death under the following circumstances:
+
+Her husband attended some ecclesiastical function at a town over twenty
+miles away and was to have returned by a train which would have brought
+him home about five o'clock. As he did not arrive she waited at
+the station for him until the last train came in about seven
+o'clock--without the beloved Basil. Then, on a winter's night she tore
+up to the Priory and begged me to lend her a dog-cart in which to drive
+to the said town to look for him. I expostulated against the folly of
+such a proceeding, saying that no doubt Basil was safe enough but had
+forgotten to telegraph, or thought that he would save the sixpence which
+the wire cost.
+
+Then it came out, to Natalie's and my intense amusement, that all this
+was the result of her jealous nature of which I have spoken. She said
+she had never slept a night away from her husband since they were
+married and with so many "designing persons" about she could not say
+what might happen if she did so, especially as he was "such a favourite
+and so handsome." (Bastin was a fine looking man in his rugged way.)
+
+I suggested that she might have a little confidence in him, to which she
+replied darkly that she had no confidence in anybody.
+
+The end of it was that I lent her the cart with a fast horse and a good
+driver, and off she went. Reaching the town in question some two and a
+half hours later, she searched high and low through wind and sleet, but
+found no Basil. He, it appeared, had gone on to Exeter, to look at the
+cathedral where some building was being done, and missing the last train
+had there slept the night.
+
+About one in the morning, after being nearly locked up as a mad woman,
+she drove back to the Vicarage, again to find no Basil. Even then she
+did not go to bed but raged about the house in her wet clothes, until
+she fell down utterly exhausted. When her husband did return on the
+following morning, full of information about the cathedral, she was
+dangerously ill, and actually passed away while uttering a violent
+tirade against him for his supposed suspicious proceedings.
+
+That was the end of this truly odious British matron.
+
+In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process, canonised her in
+his imagination as a kind of saint. "So loving," he would say, "such a
+devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can assure you that even in the
+midst of her death-struggle her last thoughts were of me," words that
+caused Bickley to snort with more than usual vigour, until I kicked him
+to silence beneath the table.
+
+
+
+Chapter IV. Death and Departure
+
+
+Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life to
+bitterness and my hopes to ashes.
+
+Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and Natalie.
+Mentally, physically, spiritually we were perfectly mated, and we loved
+each other dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet there was something about
+her which filled me with vague fears, especially after she found that
+she was to become a mother. I would talk to her of the child, but she
+would sigh and shake her head, her eyes filling with tears, and say that
+we must not count on the continuance of such happiness as ours, for it
+was too great.
+
+I tried to laugh away her doubts, though whenever I did so I seemed to
+hear Bastin's slow voice remarking casually that she might die, as he
+might have commented on the quality of the claret. At last, however, I
+grew terrified and asked her bluntly what she meant.
+
+"I don't quite know, dearest," she replied, "especially as I am
+wonderfully well. But--but--"
+
+"But what?" I asked.
+
+"But I think that our companionship is going to be broken for a little
+while."
+
+"For a little while!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey. I think that I shall be taken away from you--you know
+what I mean," and she nodded towards the churchyard.
+
+"Oh, my God!" I groaned.
+
+"I want to say this," she added quickly, "that if such a thing should
+happen, as it happens every day, I implore you, dearest Humphrey, not to
+be too much distressed, since I am sure that you will find me again.
+No, I can't explain how or when or where, because I do not know. I have
+prayed for light, but it has not come to me. All I know is that I am not
+talking of reunion in Mr. Bastin's kind of conventional heaven, which he
+speaks about as though to reach it one stumbled through darkness for
+a minute into a fine new house next door, where excellent servants had
+made everything ready for your arrival and all the lights were turned
+up. It is something quite different from that and very much more real."
+
+Then she bent down ostensibly to pat the head of a little black cocker
+spaniel called Tommy which had been given to her as a puppy, a highly
+intelligent and affectionate animal that we both adored and that loved
+her as only a dog can love. Really, I knew, it was to hide her tears,
+and fled from the room lest she should see mine.
+
+As I went I heard the dog whimpering in a peculiar way, as though some
+sympathetic knowledge had been communicated to its wonderful animal
+intelligence.
+
+That night I spoke to Bickley about the matter, repeating exactly what
+had passed. As I expected, he smiled in his grave, rather sarcastic way,
+and made light of it.
+
+"My dear Humphrey," he said, "don't torment yourself about such fancies.
+They are of everyday occurrence among women in your wife's condition.
+Sometimes they take one form, sometimes another. When she has got her
+baby you will hear no more of them."
+
+I tried to be comforted but in vain.
+
+The days and weeks went by like a long nightmare and in due course the
+event happened. Bickley was not attending the case; it was not in
+his line, he said, and he preferred that where a friend's wife was
+concerned, somebody else should be called in. So it was put in charge of
+a very good local man with a large experience in such domestic matters.
+
+How am I to tell of it? Everything went wrong; as for the details, let
+them be. Ultimately Bickley did operate, and if surpassing skill could
+have saved her, it would have been done. But the other man had misjudged
+the conditions; it was too late, nothing could help either mother or
+child, a little girl who died shortly after she was born but not before
+she had been christened, also by the name of Natalie.
+
+I was called in to say farewell to my wife and found her radiant,
+triumphant even in her weakness.
+
+"I know now," she whispered in a faint voice. "I understood as the
+chloroform passed away, but I cannot tell you. Everything is quite well,
+my darling. Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful
+place in which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me.
+Good-bye for a little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!"
+
+Then she died. And for a time I too seemed to die, but could not. I
+buried her and the child here at Fulcombe; or rather I buried their
+ashes since I could not endure that her beloved body should see
+corruption.
+
+
+Afterwards, when all was over, I spoke of these last words of Natalie's
+with both Bickley and Bastin, for somehow I seemed to wish to learn
+their separate views.
+
+The latter I may explain, had been present at the end in his spiritual
+capacity, but I do not think that he in the least understood the nature
+of the drama which was passing before his eyes. His prayers and the
+christening absorbed all his attention, and he never was a man who could
+think of more than one thing at a time.
+
+When I told him exactly what had happened and repeated the words that
+Natalie spoke, he was much interested in his own nebulous way, and said
+that it was delightful to meet with an example of a good Christian, such
+as my wife had been, who actually saw something of Heaven before she had
+gone there. His own faith was, he thanked God, fairly robust, but still
+an undoubted occurrence of the sort acted as a refreshment, "like rain
+on a pasture when it is rather dry, you know," he added, breaking into
+simile.
+
+I remarked that she had not seemed to speak in the sense he indicated,
+but appeared to allude to something quite near at hand and more or less
+immediate.
+
+"I don't know that there is anything nearer at hand than the Hereafter,"
+he answered. "I expect she meant that you will probably soon die and
+join her in Paradise, if you are worthy to do so. But of course it is
+not wise to put too much reliance upon words spoken by people at the
+last, because often they don't quite know what they are saying. Indeed
+sometimes I think this was so in the case of my own wife, who really
+seemed to me to talk a good deal of rubbish. Good-bye, I promised to see
+Widow Jenkins this afternoon about having her varicose veins cut out,
+and I mustn't stop here wasting time in pleasant conversation. She
+thinks just as much of her varicose veins as we do of the loss of our
+wives."
+
+I wonder what Bastin's ideas of unpleasant conversation may be, thought
+I to myself, as I watched him depart already wool-gathering on some
+other subject, probably the heresy of one of those "early fathers" who
+occupied most of his thoughts.
+
+Bickley listened to my tale in sympathetic silence, as a doctor does to
+a patient. When he was obliged to speak, he said that it was interesting
+as an example of a tendency of certain minds towards romantic vision
+which sometimes asserts itself, even in the throes of death.
+
+"You know," he added, "that I put faith in none of these things. I
+wish that I could, but reason and science both show me that they lack
+foundation. The world on the whole is a sad place, where we arrive
+through the passions of others implanted in them by Nature, which,
+although it cares nothing for individual death, is tender towards the
+impulse of races of every sort to preserve their collective life.
+Indeed the impulse is Nature, or at least its chief manifestation.
+Consequently, whether we be gnats or elephants, or anything between and
+beyond, even stars for aught I know, we must make the best of things as
+they are, taking the good and the evil as they come and getting all we
+can out of life until it leaves us, after which we need not trouble.
+You had a good time for a little while and were happy in it; now you
+are having a bad time and are wretched. Perhaps in the future, when your
+mental balance has re-asserted itself, you will have other good times in
+the afternoon of your days, and then follow twilight and the dark. That
+is all there is to hope for, and we may as well look the thing in the
+face. Only I confess, my dear fellow, that your experience convinces me
+that marriage should be avoided at whatever inconvenience. Indeed I
+have long wondered that anyone can take the responsibility of bringing
+a child into the world. But probably nobody does in cold blood, except
+misguided idiots like Bastin," he added. "He would have twenty, had not
+his luck intervened."
+
+"Then you believe in nothing, Friend," I said.
+
+"Nothing, I am sorry to say, except what I see and my five senses
+appreciate."
+
+"You reject all possibility of miracle, for instance?"
+
+"That depends on what you mean by miracle. Science shows us all kinds
+of wonders which our great grandfathers would have called miracles, but
+these are nothing but laws that we are beginning to understand. Give me
+an instance."
+
+"Well," I replied at hazard, "if you were assured by someone that a man
+could live for a thousand years?"
+
+"I should tell him that he was a fool or a liar, that is all. It is
+impossible."
+
+"Or that the same identity, spirit, animating principle--call it what
+you will--can flit from body to body, say in successive ages? Or that
+the dead can communicate with the living?"
+
+"Convince me of any of these things, Arbuthnot, and mind you I desire
+to be convinced, and I will take back every word I have said and walk
+through Fulcombe in a white sheet proclaiming myself the fool. Now, I
+must get off to the Cottage Hospital to cut out Widow Jenkins's varicose
+veins. They are tangible and real at any rate; about the largest I ever
+saw, indeed. Give up dreams, old boy, and take to something useful. You
+might go back to your fiction writing; you seem to have leanings that
+way, and you know you need not publish the stories, except privately for
+the edification of your friends."
+
+With this Parthian shaft Bickley took his departure to make a job of
+Widow Jenkins's legs.
+
+I took his advice. During the next few months I did write something
+which occupied my thoughts for a while, more or less. It lies in my safe
+to this minute, for somehow I have never been able to make up my mind to
+burn what cost me so much physical and mental toil.
+
+When it was finished my melancholy returned to me with added force.
+Everything in the house took a tongue and cried to me of past days.
+Its walls echoed a voice that I could never hear again; in the very
+looking-glasses I saw the reflection of a lost presence. Although I had
+moved myself for the purposes of sleep to a little room at the further
+end of the building, footsteps seemed to creep about my bed at night
+and I heard the rustle of a remembered dress without the door. The place
+grew hateful to me. I felt that I must get away from it or I should go
+mad.
+
+
+One afternoon Bastin arrived carrying a book and in a state of high
+indignation. This work, written, as he said, by some ribald traveller,
+grossly traduced the character of missionaries to the South Sea Islands,
+especially of those of the Society to which he subscribed, and he threw
+it on the table in his righteous wrath. Bickley picked it up and opened
+it at a photograph of a very pretty South Sea Island girl clad in a few
+flowers and nothing else, which he held towards Bastin, saying:
+
+"Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her distinctly
+attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus blooms with a
+difference to our women--a little lower down."
+
+"The devil is always attractive," replied Bastin gloomily. "Child of
+Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph is enough to
+make my poor Sarah turn in her grave."
+
+"Why?" asked Bickley; "seeing that wide seas roll between you and this
+dusky Venus. Also I thought that according to your Hebrew legend sin
+came in with bark garments."
+
+"You should search the Scriptures, Bickley," I broke in, "and cultivate
+accuracy. It was fig-leaves that symbolised its arrival. The garments,
+which I think were of skin, developed later."
+
+"Perhaps," went on Bickley, who had turned the page, "she" (he referred
+to the late Mrs. Bastin) "would have preferred her thus," and he held up
+another illustration of the same woman.
+
+In this the native belle appeared after conversion, clad in broken-down
+stays--I suppose they were stays--out of which she seemed to bulge and
+flow in every direction, a dirty white dress several sizes too small,
+a kind of Salvation Army bonnet without a crown and a prayer-book which
+she held pressed to her middle; the general effect being hideous, and in
+some curious way, improper.
+
+"Certainly," said Bastin, "though I admit her clothes do not seem to
+fit and she has not buttoned them up as she ought. But it is not of the
+pictures so much as of the letterpress with its false and scandalous
+accusations, that I complain."
+
+"Why do you complain?" asked Bickley. "Probably it is quite true, though
+that we could never ascertain without visiting the lady's home."
+
+"If I could afford it," exclaimed Bastin with rising anger, "I should
+like to go there and expose this vile traducer of my cloth."
+
+"So should I," answered Bickley, "and expose these introducers of
+consumption, measles and other European diseases, to say nothing of gin,
+among an innocent and Arcadian people."
+
+"How can you call them innocent, Bickley, when they murder and eat
+missionaries?"
+
+"I dare say we should all eat a missionary, Bastin, if we were hungry
+enough," was the answer, after which something occurred to change the
+conversation.
+
+But I kept the book and read it as a neutral observer, and came to the
+conclusion that these South Sea Islands, a land where it was always
+afternoon, must be a charming place, in which perhaps the stars of
+the Tropics and the scent of the flowers might enable one to forget a
+little, or at least take the edge off memory. Why should I not visit
+them and escape another long and dreary English winter? No, I could not
+do so alone. If Bastin and Bickley were there, their eternal arguments
+might amuse me. Well, why should they not come also? When one has money
+things can always be arranged.
+
+The idea, which had its root in this absurd conversation, took a curious
+hold on me. I thought of it all the evening, being alone, and that night
+it re-arose in my dreams. I dreamed that my lost Natalie appeared to me
+and showed me a picture. It was of a long, low land, a curving shore
+of which the ends were out of the picture, whereon grew tall palms, and
+where great combers broke upon gleaming sand.
+
+Then the picture seemed to become a reality and I saw Natalie herself,
+strangely changeful in her aspect, strangely varying in face and figure,
+strangely bright, standing in the mouth of a pass whereof the little
+bordering cliffs were covered with bushes and low trees, whose green
+was almost hid in lovely flowers. There in my dream she stood, smiling
+mysteriously, and stretched out her arms towards me.
+
+As I awoke I seemed to hear her voice, repeating her dying words: "Go
+where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in which
+you will find me, not knowing that you have found me."
+
+With some variations this dream visited me twice that night. In the
+morning I woke up quite determined that I would go to the South Sea
+Islands, even if I must do so alone. On that same evening Bastin and
+Bickley dined with me. I said nothing to them about my dream, for Bastin
+never dreamed and Bickley would have set it down to indigestion. But
+when the cloth had been cleared away and we were drinking our glass
+of port--both Bastin and Bickley only took one, the former because he
+considered port a sinful indulgence of the flesh, the latter because he
+feared it would give him gout--I remarked casually that they both looked
+very run down and as though they wanted a rest. They agreed, at least
+each of them said he had noticed it in the other. Indeed Bastin added
+that the damp and the cold in the church, in which he held daily
+services to no congregation except the old woman who cleaned it, had
+given him rheumatism, which prevented him from sleeping.
+
+"Do call things by their proper names," interrupted Bickley. "I told
+you yesterday that what you are suffering from is neuritis in your right
+arm, which will become chronic if you neglect it much longer. I have the
+same thing myself, so I ought to know, and unless I can stop operating
+for a while I believe my fingers will become useless. Also something is
+affecting my sight, overstrain, I suppose, so that I am obliged to wear
+stronger and stronger glasses. I think I shall have to leave Ogden" (his
+partner) "in charge for a while, and get away into the sun. There is
+none here before June."
+
+"I would if I could pay a locum tenens and were quite sure it isn't
+wrong," said Bastin.
+
+"I am glad you both think like that," I remarked, "as I have a
+suggestion to make to you. I want to go to the South Seas about which we
+were talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that Bickley has been
+advising for me, and I should be very grateful if you would both come as
+my guests. You, Bickley, make so much money out of cutting people about,
+that you can arrange your own affairs during your absence. But as for
+you, Bastin, I will see to the wherewithal for the locum tenens, and
+everything else."
+
+"You are very kind," said Bastin, "and certainly I should like to expose
+that misguided author, who probably published his offensive work without
+thinking that what he wrote might affect the subscriptions to the
+missionary societies, also to show Bickley that he is not always right,
+as he seems to think. But I could never dream of accepting without the
+full approval of the Bishop."
+
+"You might get that of your nurse also, if she happens to be still
+alive," mocked Bickley. "As for his Lordship, I don't think he will
+raise any objection when he sees the certificate I will give you about
+the state of your health. He is a great believer in me ever since I
+took that carbuncle out of his neck which he got because he will not eat
+enough. As for me, I mean to come if only to show you how continually
+and persistently you are wrong. But, Arbuthnot, how do you mean to go?"
+
+"I don't know. In a mail steamer, I suppose."
+
+"If you can run to it, a yacht would be much better."
+
+"That's a good idea, for one could get out of the beaten tracks and
+see the places that are never, or seldom, visited. I will make some
+inquiries. And now, to celebrate the occasion, let us all have another
+glass of port and drink a toast."
+
+They hesitated and were lost, Bastin murmuring something about doing
+without his stout next day as a penance. Then they both asked what was
+the toast, each of them, after thought, suggesting that it should be the
+utter confusion of the other.
+
+I shook my head, whereon as a result of further cogitation, Bastin
+submitted that the Unknown would be suitable. Bickley said that he
+thought this a foolish idea as everything worth knowing was already
+known, and what was the good of drinking to the rest? A toast to the
+Truth would be better.
+
+A notion came to me.
+
+"Let us combine them," I said, "and drink to the Unknown Truth."
+
+So we did, though Bastin grumbled that the performance made him feel
+like Pilate.
+
+"We are all Pilates in our way," I replied with a sigh.
+
+"That is what I think every time I diagnose a case," exclaimed Bickley.
+
+As for me I laughed and for some unknown reason felt happier than I
+had done for months. Oh! if only the writer of that tourist tale of the
+South Sea Islands could have guessed what fruit his light-thrown seed
+would yield to us and to the world!
+
+
+I made my inquiries through a London agency which hired out yachts or
+sold them to the idle rich. As I expected, there were plenty to be had,
+at a price, but wealthy as I was, the figure asked of the buyer of any
+suitable craft, staggered me. In the end, however, I chartered one
+for six months certain and at so much per month for as long as I liked
+afterwards. The owners paid insurance and everything else on condition
+that they appointed the captain and first mate, also the engineer, for
+this yacht, which was named Star of the South, could steam at about ten
+knots as well as sail.
+
+I know nothing about yachts, and therefore shall not attempt to describe
+her, further than to say that she was of five hundred and fifty tons
+burden, very well constructed, and smart to look at, as well she might
+be, seeing that a deceased millionaire from whose executors I hired her
+had spent a fortune in building and equipping her in the best possible
+style. In all, her crew consisted of thirty-two hands. A peculiarity of
+the vessel was that owing to some fancy of the late owner, the passenger
+accommodation, which was splendid, lay forward of the bridge, this with
+the ship's store-rooms, refrigerating chamber, etc., being almost in the
+bows. It was owing to these arrangements, which were unusual, that the
+executors found it impossible to sell, and were therefore glad to accept
+such an offer as mine in order to save expenses. Perhaps they hoped that
+she might go to the bottom, being heavily insured. If so, the Fates did
+not disappoint them.
+
+The captain, named Astley, was a jovial person who held every kind of
+certificate. He seemed so extraordinarily able at his business that
+personally I suspected him of having made mistakes in the course of his
+career, not unconnected with the worship of Bacchus. In this I believe
+I was right; otherwise a man of such attainments would have been
+commanding something bigger than a private yacht. The first mate,
+Jacobsen, was a melancholy Dane, a spiritualist who played the
+concertina, and seemed to be able to do without sleep. The crew were a
+mixed lot, good men for the most part and quite unobjectionable, more
+than half of them being Scandinavian. I think that is all I need say
+about the Star of the South.
+
+The arrangement was that the Star of the South should proceed through
+the Straits of Gibraltar to Marseilles, where we would join her, and
+thence travel via the Suez Canal, to Australia and on to the South Seas,
+returning home as our fancy or convenience might dictate.
+
+All the first part of the plan we carried out to the letter. Of the
+remainder I say nothing at present.
+
+The Star of the South was amply provided with every kind of store. Among
+them were medicines and surgical instruments, selected by Bickley, and
+a case of Bibles and other religious works in sundry languages of the
+South Seas, selected by Bastin, whose bishop, when he understood the
+pious objects of his journey, had rather encouraged than hindered
+his departure on sick leave, and a large number of novels, books of
+reference, etc., laid in by myself. She duly sailed from the Thames and
+reached Marseilles after a safe and easy passage, where all three of us
+boarded her.
+
+I forgot to add that she had another passenger, the little spaniel,
+Tommy. I had intended to leave him behind, but while I was packing up he
+followed me about with such evident understanding of my purpose that my
+heart was touched. When I entered the motor to drive to the station he
+escaped from the hands of the servant, whimpering, and took refuge on my
+knee. After this I felt that Destiny intended him to be our companion.
+Moreover, was he not linked with my dead past, and, had I but known it,
+with my living future also?
+
+
+
+Chapter V. The Cyclone
+
+
+We enjoyed our voyage exceedingly. In Egypt, a land I was glad to
+revisit, we only stopped a week while the Star of the South, which we
+rejoined at Suez, coaled and went through the Canal. This, however, gave
+us time to spend a few days in Cairo, visit the Pyramids and Sakkara
+which Bastin and Bickley had never seen before, and inspect the great
+Museum. The journey up the Nile was postponed until our return. It was
+a pleasant break and gave Bickley, a most omnivorous reader who was well
+acquainted with Egyptian history and theology, the opportunity of trying
+to prove to Bastin that Christianity was a mere development of the
+ancient Egyptian faith. The arguments that ensued may be imagined.
+It never seemed to occur to either of them that all faiths may be and
+indeed probably are progressive; in short, different rays of light
+thrown from the various facets of the same crystal, as in turn these are
+shone upon by the sun of Truth.
+
+Our passage down the Red Sea was cool and agreeable. Thence we shaped
+our course for Ceylon. Here again we stopped a little while to run up
+to Kandy and to visit the ruined city of Anarajapura with its great
+Buddhist topes that once again gave rise to religious argument between
+my two friends. Leaving Ceylon we struck across the Indian Ocean for
+Perth in Western Australia.
+
+It was a long voyage, since to save our coal we made most of it
+under canvas. However, we were not dull as Captain Astley was a good
+companion, and even out of the melancholy Dane, Jacobsen, we had
+entertainment. He insisted on holding seances in the cabin, at which the
+usual phenomena occurred. The table twisted about, voices were heard and
+Jacobsen's accordion wailed out tunes above our heads. These happenings
+drove Bickley to a kind of madness, for here were events which he could
+not explain. He was convinced that someone was playing tricks upon him,
+and devised the most elaborate snares to detect the rogue, entirely
+without result.
+
+First he accused Jacobsen, who was very indignant, and then me, who
+laughed. In the end Jacobsen and I left the "circle" and the cabin,
+which was locked behind us; only Bastin and Bickley remaining there in
+the dark. Presently we heard sounds of altercation, and Bickley emerged
+looking very red in the face, followed by Bastin, who was saying:
+
+"Can I help it if something pulled your nose and snatched off your
+eyeglasses, which anyhow are quite useless to you when there is no
+light? Again, is it possible for me, sitting on the other side of that
+table, to have placed the concertina on your head and made it play the
+National Anthem, a thing that I have not the slightest idea how to do?"
+
+"Please do not try to explain," snapped Bickley. "I am perfectly aware
+that you deceived me somehow, which no doubt you think a good joke."
+
+"My dear fellow," I interrupted, "is it possible to imagine old Basil
+deceiving anyone?"
+
+"Why not," snorted Bickley, "seeing that he deceives himself from one
+year's end to the other?"
+
+"I think," said Bastin, "that this is an unholy business and that we are
+both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do with it," and he
+departed to his cabin, probably to say some appropriate prayers.
+
+After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an instrument
+called a planchette and with difficulty persuaded Bickley to try it,
+which he did after many precautions. The thing, a heart-shaped piece
+of wood mounted on wheels and with a pencil stuck at its narrow end,
+cantered about the sheet of paper on which it was placed, Bickley, whose
+hands rested upon it, staring at the roof of the cabin. Then it began to
+scribble and after a while stopped still.
+
+"Will the Doctor look?" said Jacobsen. "Perhaps the spirits have told
+him something."
+
+"Oh! curse all this silly talk about spirits," exclaimed Bickley, as he
+arranged his eyeglasses and held up the paper to the light, for it was
+after dinner.
+
+He stared, then with an exclamation which I will not repeat, and a
+glance of savage suspicion at the poor Dane and the rest of us, threw
+it down and left the cabin. I picked it up and next moment was screaming
+with laughter. There on the top of the sheet was a rough but entirely
+recognizable portrait of Bickley with the accordion on his head, and
+underneath, written in a delicate, Italian female hand, absolutely
+different from his own, were these words taken from one of St. Paul's
+Epistles--"Oppositions of science falsely so called." Underneath them
+again in a scrawling, schoolboy fist, very like Bastin's, was inscribed,
+"Tell us how this is done, you silly doctor, who think yourself so
+clever."
+
+"It seems that the devil really can quote Scripture," was Bastin's only
+comment, while Jacobsen stared before him and smiled.
+
+Bickley never alluded to the matter, but for days afterwards I saw him
+experimenting with paper and chemicals, evidently trying to discover
+a form of invisible ink which would appear upon the application of the
+hand. As he never said anything about it, I fear that he failed.
+
+This planchette business had a somewhat curious ending. A few nights
+later Jacobsen was working it and asked me to put a question. To oblige
+him I inquired on what day we should reach Fremantle, the port of Perth.
+It wrote an answer which, I may remark, subsequently proved to be quite
+correct.
+
+"That is not a good question," said Jacobsen, "since as a sailor I might
+guess the reply. Try again, Mr. Arbuthnot."
+
+"Will anything remarkable happen on our voyage to the South Seas?" I
+inquired casually.
+
+The planchette hesitated a while then wrote rapidly and stopped.
+Jacobsen took up the paper and began to read the answer aloud--"To A,
+B the D, and B the C, the most remarkable things will happen that have
+happened to men living in the world."
+
+"That must mean me, Bickley the doctor and Bastin the clergyman," I
+said, laughing.
+
+Jacobsen paid no attention, for he was reading what followed. As he did
+so I saw his face turn white and his eyes begin to start from his head.
+Then suddenly he tore the paper in pieces which he thrust into his
+pocket. Lifting his great fist he uttered some Danish oath and with a
+single blow smashed the planchette to fragments, after which he strode
+away, leaving me astonished and somewhat disturbed. When I met him the
+next morning I asked him what was on the paper.
+
+"Oh!" he said quietly, "something I should not like you too-proper
+English gentlemens to see. Something not nice. You understand. Those
+spirits not always good; they do that kind of thing sometimes. That's
+why I broke up this planchette."
+
+Then he began to talk of something else and there the matter ended.
+
+I should have said that, principally with a view to putting themselves
+in a position to confute each other, ever since we had started from
+Marseilles both Bastin and Bickley spent a number of hours each day in
+assiduous study of the language of the South Sea Islands. It became a
+kind of competition between them as to which could learn the most.
+Now Bastin, although simple and even stupid in some ways, was a good
+scholar, and as I knew at college, had quite a faculty for acquiring
+languages in which he had taken high marks at examinations. Bickley,
+too, was an extraordinarily able person with an excellent memory,
+especially when he was on his mettle. The result was that before we
+ever reached a South Sea island they had a good working knowledge of the
+local tongues.
+
+As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife who,
+under some of the "white Australia" regulations, were not allowed to
+remain in the country and offered to work as servants in return for a
+passage to Apia where we proposed to call some time or other. With these
+people Bastin and Bickley talked all day long till really they became
+fairly proficient in their soft and beautiful dialect. They wished me to
+learn also, but I said that with two such excellent interpreters and the
+natives while they remained with us, it seemed quite unnecessary. Still,
+I picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as much as they did perhaps.
+
+At length, travelling on and on as a voyager to the planet Mars might
+do, we sighted the low shores of Australia and that same evening were
+towed, for our coal was quite exhausted, to the wharf at Fremantle.
+Here we spent a few days exploring the beautiful town of Perth and its
+neighbourhood where it was very hot just then, and eating peaches
+and grapes till we made ourselves ill, as a visitor often does who is
+unaware that fruit should not be taken in quantity in Australia while
+the sun is high. Then we departed for Melbourne almost before our
+arrival was generally known, since I did not wish to advertise our
+presence or the object of our journey.
+
+We crossed the Great Australian Bight, of evil reputation, in the most
+perfect weather; indeed it might have been a mill pond, and after a
+short stay at Melbourne, went on to Sydney, where we coaled again and
+laid in supplies.
+
+Then our real journey began. The plan we laid out was to sail to Suva
+in Fiji, about 1,700 miles away, and after a stay there, on to Hawaii
+or the Sandwich Islands, stopping perhaps at the Phoenix Islands and the
+Central Polynesian Sporades, such as Christmas and Fanning Isles. Then
+we proposed to turn south again through the Marshall Archipelago and
+the Caroline Islands, and so on to New Guinea and the Coral Sea.
+Particularly did we wish to visit Easter Island on account of
+its marvelous sculptures that are supposed to be the relics of a
+pre-historic race. In truth, however, we had no fixed plan except to go
+wherever circumstance and chance might take us. Chance, I may add, or
+something else, took full advantage of its opportunities.
+
+We came to Suva in safety and spent a while in exploring the beautiful
+Fiji Isles where both Bastin and Bickley made full inquiries about
+the work of the missionaries, each of them drawing exactly opposite
+conclusions from the same set of admitted facts. Thence we steamed to
+Samoa and put our two natives ashore at Apia, where we procured some
+coal. We did not stay long enough in these islands to investigate them,
+however, because persons of experience there assured us from certain
+familiar signs that one of the terrible hurricanes with which they are
+afflicted, was due to arrive shortly and that we should do well to put
+ourselves beyond its reach. So having coaled and watered we departed in
+a hurry.
+
+Up to this time I should state we had met with the most wonderful good
+fortune in the matter of weather, so good indeed that never on one
+occasion since we left Marseilles, had we been obliged to put the
+fiddles on the tables. With the superstition of a sailor Captain Astley,
+when I alluded to the matter, shook his head saying that doubtless we
+should pay for it later on, since "luck never goes all the way" and
+cyclones were reported to be about.
+
+Here I must tell that after we were clear of Apia, it was discovered
+that the Danish mate who was believed to be in his cabin unwell from
+something he had eaten, was missing. The question arose whether we
+should put back to find him, as we supposed that he had made a trip
+inland and met with an accident, or been otherwise delayed. I was
+in favour of doing so though the captain, thinking of the threatened
+hurricane, shook his head and said that Jacobsen was a queer fellow who
+might just as well have gone overboard as anywhere else, if he thought
+he heard "the spirits, of whom he was so fond," calling him. While the
+matter was still in suspense I happened to go into my own stateroom
+and there, stuck in the looking-glass, saw an envelope in the Dane's
+handwriting addressed to myself. On opening it I found another sealed
+letter, unaddressed, also a note that ran as follows:
+
+"Honoured Sir,
+
+"You will think very badly of me for leaving you, but the enclosed which
+I implore you not to open until you have seen the last of the Star of
+the South, will explain my reason and I hope clear my reputation.
+I thank you again and again for all your kindness and pray that the
+Spirits who rule the world may bless and preserve you, also the Doctor
+and Mr. Bastin."
+
+
+This letter, which left the fate of Jacobsen quite unsolved, for it
+might mean either that he had deserted or drowned himself, I put away
+with the enclosure in my pocket. Of course there was no obligation on me
+to refrain from opening the letter, but I shrank from doing so both from
+some kind of sense of honour and, to tell the truth, for fear of what
+it might contain. I felt that this would be disagreeable; also, although
+there was nothing to connect them together, I bethought me of the scene
+when Jacobsen had smashed the planchette.
+
+On my return to the deck I said nothing whatsoever about the discovery
+of the letter, but only remarked that on reflection I had changed my
+mind and agreed with the captain that it would be unwise to attempt
+to return in order to look for Jacobsen. So the boatswain, a capable
+individual who had seen better days, was promoted to take his watches
+and we went on as before. How curiously things come about in the world!
+For nautical reasons that were explained to me, but which I will not
+trouble to set down, if indeed I could remember them, I believe that
+if we had returned to Apia we should have missed the great gale and
+subsequent cyclone, and with these much else. But it was not so fated.
+
+It was on the fourth day, when we were roughly seven hundred miles or
+more north of Samoa, that we met the edge of this gale about sundown.
+The captain put on steam in the hope of pushing through it, but that
+night we dined for the first time with the fiddles on, and by eleven
+o'clock it was as much as one could do to stand in the cabin, while the
+water was washing freely over the deck. Fortunately, however, the
+wind veered more aft of us, so that by putting about her head a little
+(seamen must forgive me if I talk of these matters as a landlubber) we
+ran almost before the wind, though not quite in the direction that we
+wished to go.
+
+When the light came it was blowing very hard indeed, and the sky was
+utterly overcast, so that we got no glimpse of the sun, or of the
+stars on the following night. Unfortunately, there was no moon visible;
+indeed, if there had been I do not suppose that it would have helped us
+because of the thick pall of clouds. For quite seventy-two hours we
+ran on beneath bare poles before that gale. The little vessel behaved
+splendidly, riding the seas like a duck, but I could see that Captain
+Astley was growing alarmed. When I said something complimentary to him
+about the conduct of the Star of the South, he replied that she was
+forging ahead all right, but the question was--where to? He had been
+unable to take an observation of any sort since we left Samoa; both
+his patent logs had been carried away, so that now only the compass
+remained, and he had not the slightest idea where we were in that great
+ocean studded with atolls and islands.
+
+I asked him whether we could not steam back to our proper course, but
+he answered that to do so he would have to travel dead in the eye of the
+gale, and he doubted whether the engines would stand it. Also there was
+the question of coal to be considered. However, he had kept the fires
+going and would do what he could if the weather moderated.
+
+That night during dinner which now consisted of tinned foods and whisky
+and water, for the seas had got to the galley fire, suddenly the gale
+dropped, whereat we rejoiced exceedingly. The captain came down into the
+saloon very white and shaken, I thought, and I asked him to have a nip
+of whisky to warm him up, and to celebrate our good fortune in having
+run out of the wind. He took the bottle and, to my alarm, poured out
+a full half tumbler of spirit, which he swallowed undiluted in two or
+three gulps.
+
+"That's better!" he said with a hoarse laugh. "But man, what is it you
+are saying about having run out of the wind? Look at the glass!"
+
+"We have," said Bastin, "and it is wonderfully steady. About 29 degrees
+or a little over, which it has been for the last three days."
+
+Again Astley laughed in a mirthless fashion, as he answered:
+
+"Oh, that thing! That's the passengers' glass. I told the steward to put
+it out of gear so that you might not be frightened; it is an old trick.
+Look at this," and he produced one of the portable variety out of his
+pocket.
+
+We looked, and it stood somewhere between 27 degrees and 28 degrees.
+
+"That's the lowest glass I ever saw in the Polynesian or any other seas
+during thirty years. It's right, too, for I have tested it by three
+others," he said.
+
+"What does it mean?" I asked rather anxiously.
+
+"South Sea cyclone of the worst breed," he replied. "That cursed Dane
+knew it was coming and that's why he left the ship. Pray as you never
+prayed before," and again he stretched out his hand towards the whisky
+bottle. But I stepped between him and it, shaking my head. Thereon he
+laughed for the third time and left the cabin. Though I saw him once
+or twice afterwards, these were really the last words of intelligible
+conversation that I ever had with Captain Astley.
+
+"It seems that we are in some danger," said Bastin, in an unmoved kind
+of way. "I think that was a good idea of the captain's, to put up a
+petition, I mean, but as Bickley will scarcely care to join in it I will
+go into the cabin and do so myself."
+
+Bickley snorted, then said:
+
+"Confound that captain! Why did he play such a trick upon us about the
+barometer? Humphrey, I believe he had been drinking."
+
+"So do I," I said, looking at the whisky bottle. "Otherwise, after
+taking those precautions to keep us in the dark, he would not have let
+on like that."
+
+"Well," said Bickley, "he can't get to the liquor, except through this
+saloon, as it is locked up forward with the other stores."
+
+"That's nothing," I replied, "as doubtless he has a supply of his own;
+rum, I expect. We must take our chance."
+
+Bickley nodded, and suggested that we should go on deck to see what was
+happening. So we went. Not a breath of wind was stirring, and even the
+sea seemed to be settling down a little. At least, so we judged from
+the motion, for we could not see either it or the sky; everything was as
+black as pitch. We heard the sailors, however, engaged in rigging guide
+ropes fore and aft, and battening down the hatches with extra tarpaulins
+by the light of lanterns. Also they were putting ropes round the boats
+and doing something to the spars and topmasts.
+
+Presently Bastin joined us, having, I suppose, finished his devotions.
+
+"Really, it is quite pleasant here," he said. "One never knows how
+disagreeable so much wind is until it stops."
+
+I lit my pipe, making no answer, and the match burned quite steadily
+there in the open air.
+
+"What is that?" exclaimed Bickley, staring at something which now I saw
+for the first time. It looked like a line of white approaching through
+the gloom. With it came a hissing sound, and although there was still no
+wind, the rigging began to moan mysteriously like a thing in pain. A big
+drop of water also fell from the sides into my pipe and put it out. Then
+one of the sailors cried in a hoarse voice:
+
+"Get down below, governors, unless you want to go out to sea!"
+
+"Why?" inquired Bastin.
+
+"Why? Becos the 'urricane is coming, that's all. Coming as though the
+devil had kicked it out of 'ell."
+
+Bastin seemed inclined to remonstrate at this sort of language, but we
+pushed him down the companion and followed, propelling the spaniel Tommy
+in front of us. Next moment I heard the sailors battening the hatch with
+hurried blows, and when this was done to their satisfaction, heard their
+feet also as they ran into shelter.
+
+Another instant and we were all lying in a heap on the cabin floor with
+poor Tommy on top of us. The cyclone had struck the ship! Above the wash
+of water and the screaming of the gale we heard other mysterious sounds,
+which doubtless were caused by the yards hitting the seas, for the yacht
+was lying on her side. I thought that all was over, but presently there
+came a rending, crashing noise. The masts, or one of them, had gone, and
+by degrees we righted.
+
+"Near thing!" said Bickley. "Good heavens, what's that?"
+
+I listened, for the electric light had temporarily gone out, owing, I
+suppose, to the dynamo having stopped for a moment. A most unholy and
+hollow sound was rising from the cabin floor. It might have been
+caused by a bullock with its windpipe cut, trying to get its breath and
+groaning. Then the light came on again and we saw Bastin lying at full
+length on the carpet.
+
+"He's broken his neck or something," I said.
+
+Bickley crept to him and having looked, sang out:
+
+"It's all right! He's only sea-sick. I thought it would come to that if
+he drank so much tea."
+
+"Sea-sick," I said faintly--"sea-sick?"
+
+"That's all," said Bickley. "The nerves of the stomach acting on the
+brain or vice-versa--that is, if Bastin has a brain," he added sotto
+voce.
+
+"Oh!" groaned the prostrate clergyman. "I wish that I were dead!"
+
+"Don't trouble about that," answered Bickley. "I expect you soon will
+be. Here, drink some whisky, you donkey."
+
+Bastin sat up and obeyed, out of the bottle, for it was impossible to
+pour anything into a glass, with results too dreadful to narrate.
+
+"I call that a dirty trick," he said presently, in a feeble voice,
+glowering at Bickley.
+
+"I expect I shall have to play you a dirtier before long, for you are a
+pretty bad case, old fellow."
+
+As a matter of fact he had, for once Bastin had begun really we thought
+that he was going to die. Somehow we got him into his cabin, which
+opened off the saloon, and as he could drink nothing more, Bickley
+managed to inject morphia or some other compound into him, which made
+him insensible for a long while.
+
+"He must be in a poor way," he said, "for the needle went more than a
+quarter of an inch into him, and he never cried out or stirred. Couldn't
+help it in that rolling."
+
+But now I could hear the engines working, and I think that the bow
+of the vessel was got head on to the seas, for instead of rolling we
+pitched, or rather the ship stood first upon one end and then upon the
+other. This continued for a while until the first burst of the cyclone
+had gone by. Then suddenly the engines stopped; I suppose that they had
+broken down, but I never learned, and we seemed to veer about, nearly
+sinking in the process, and to run before the hurricane at terrific
+speed.
+
+"I wonder where we are going to?" I said to Bickley. "To the land of
+sleep, Humphrey, I imagine," he replied in a more gentle voice than I
+had often heard him use, adding: "Good-bye, old boy, we have been real
+friends, haven't we, notwithstanding my peculiarities? I only wish that
+I could think that there was anything in Bastin's views. But I can't, I
+can't. It's good night for us poor creatures!"
+
+
+
+Chapter VI. Land
+
+
+At last the electric light really went out. I had looked at my watch
+just before this happened and wound it up, which, Bickley remarked, was
+superfluous and a waste of energy. It then marked 3.20 in the morning.
+We had wedged Bastin, who was now snoring comfortably, into his berth,
+with pillows, and managed to tie a cord over him--no, it was a large
+bath towel, fixing one end of it to the little rack over his bed and
+the other to its framework. As for ourselves, we lay down on the floor
+between the table legs, which, of course, were screwed, and the settee,
+protecting ourselves as best we were able by help of the cushions, etc.,
+between two of which we thrust the terrified Tommy who had been sliding
+up and down the cabin floor. Thus we remained, expecting death every
+moment till the light of day, a very dim light, struggling through a
+port-hole of which the iron cover had somehow been wrenched off. Or
+perhaps it was never shut, I do not remember.
+
+About this time there came a lull in the hellish, howling hurricane; the
+fact being, I suppose, that we had reached the centre of the cyclone. I
+suggested that we should try to go on deck and see what was happening.
+So we started, only to find the entrance to the companion so faithfully
+secured that we could not by any means get out. We knocked and shouted,
+but no one answered. My belief is that at this time everyone on the
+yacht except ourselves had been washed away and drowned.
+
+Then we returned to the saloon, which, except for a little water
+trickling about the floor, was marvelously dry, and, being hungry,
+retrieved some bits of food and biscuit from its corners and ate. At
+this moment the cyclone began to blow again worse than ever, but it
+seemed to us, from another direction, and before it sped our poor
+derelict barque. It blew all day till for my part I grew utterly weary
+and even longed for the inevitable end. If my views were not quite those
+of Bastin, certainly they were not those of Bickley. I had believed from
+my youth up that the individuality of man, the ego, so to speak, does
+not die when life goes out of his poor body, and this faith did not
+desert me then. Therefore, I wished to have it over and learn what there
+might be upon the other side.
+
+We could not speak much because of the howling of the wind, but Bickley
+did manage to shout to me something to the effect that his partners
+would, in his opinion, make an end of their great practice within
+two years, which, he added, was a pity. I nodded my head, not caring
+twopence what happened to Bickley's partners or their business, or to my
+own property, or to anything else. When death is at hand most of us do
+not think much of such things because then we realise how small they
+are. Indeed I was wondering whether within a few minutes or hours I
+should or should not see Natalie again, and if this were the end to
+which she had seemed to beckon me in that dream.
+
+On we sped, and on. About four in the afternoon we heard sounds from
+Bastin's cabin which faintly reminded me of some tune. I crept to the
+door and listened. Evidently he had awakened and was singing or trying
+to sing, for music was not one of his strong points, "For those in peril
+on the sea." Devoutly did I wish that it might be heard. Presently it
+ceased, so I suppose he went to sleep again.
+
+The darkness gathered once more. Then of a sudden something fearful
+happened. There were stupendous noises of a kind I had never heard;
+there were convulsions. It seemed to us that the ship was flung right up
+into the air a hundred feet or more.
+
+"Tidal wave, I expect," shouted Bickley.
+
+Almost as he spoke she came down with the most appalling crash on to
+something hard and nearly jarred the senses out of us. Next the saloon
+was whirling round and round and yet being carried forward, and we felt
+air blowing upon us. Then our senses left us. As I clasped Tommy to my
+side, whimpering and licking my face, my last thought was that all was
+over, and that presently I should learn everything or nothing.
+
+
+I woke up feeling very bruised and sore and perceived that light was
+flowing into the saloon. The door was still shut, but it had been
+wrenched off its hinges, and that was where the light came in; also some
+of the teak planks of the decking, jagged and splintered, were sticking
+up through the carpet. The table had broken from its fastenings and lay
+upon its side. Everything else was one confusion. I looked at Bickley.
+Apparently he had not awakened. He was stretched out still wedged in
+with his cushions and bleeding from a wound in his head. I crept to him
+in terror and listened. He was not dead, for his breathing was regular
+and natural. The whisky bottle which had been corked was upon the floor
+unbroken and about a third full. I took a good pull at the spirit; to
+me it tasted like nectar from the gods. Then I tried to force some down
+Bickley's throat but could not, so I poured a little upon the cut on his
+head. The smart of it woke him in a hurry.
+
+"Where are we now?" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to tell me that Bastin
+is right after all and that we live again somewhere else? Oh! I could
+never bear that ignominy."
+
+"I don't know about living somewhere else," I said, "although my
+opinions on that matter differ from yours. But I do know that you and
+I are still on earth in what remains of the saloon of the Star of the
+South."
+
+"Thank God for that! Let's go and look for old Bastin," said Bickley. "I
+do pray that he is all right also."
+
+"It is most illogical of you, Bickley, and indeed wrong," groaned a deep
+voice from the other side of the cabin door, "to thank a God in Whom
+you do not believe, and to talk of praying for one of the worst and most
+inefficient of His servants when you have no faith in prayer."
+
+"Got you there, my friend," I said.
+
+Bickley murmured something about force of habit, and looked smaller than
+I had ever seen him do before.
+
+Somehow we forced that door open; it was not easy because it had jammed.
+Within the cabin, hanging on either side of the bath towel which had
+stood the strain nobly, something like a damp garment over a linen line,
+was Bastin most of whose bunk seemed to have disappeared. Yes--Bastin,
+pale and dishevelled and looking shrunk, with his hair touzled and his
+beard apparently growing all ways, but still Bastin alive, if very weak.
+
+Bickley ran at him and made a cursory examination with his fingers.
+
+"Nothing broken," he said triumphantly. "He's all right."
+
+"If you had hung over a towel for many hours in most violent weather you
+would not say that," groaned Bastin. "My inside is a pulp. But perhaps
+you would be kind enough to untie me."
+
+"Bosh!" said Bickley as he obeyed. "All you want is something to eat.
+Meanwhile, drink this," and he handed him the remains of the whisky.
+
+Bastin swallowed it every drop, murmuring something about taking a
+little wine for his stomach's sake, "one of the Pauline injunctions, you
+know," after which he was much more cheerful. Then we hunted about and
+found some more of the biscuits and other food with which we filled
+ourselves after a fashion.
+
+"I wonder what has happened," said Bastin. "I suppose that, thanks to
+the skill of the captain, we have after all reached the haven where we
+would be."
+
+Here he stopped, rubbed his eyes and looked towards the saloon door
+which, as I have said, had been wrenched off its hinges, but appeared
+to have opened wider than when I observed it last. Also Tommy, who was
+recovering his spirits, uttered a series of low growls.
+
+"It is a most curious thing," he went on, "and I suppose I must be
+suffering from hallucinations, but I could swear that just now I saw
+looking through that door the same improper young woman clothed in a
+few flowers and nothing else, whose photograph in that abominable and
+libellous book was indirectly the cause of our tempestuous voyage."
+
+"Indeed!" replied Bickley. "Well, so long as she has not got on the
+broken-down stays and the Salvation Army bonnet without a crown, which
+you may remember she wore after she had fallen into the hands of your
+fraternity, I am sure I do not mind. In fact I should be delighted to
+see anything so pleasant."
+
+At this moment a distinct sound of female tittering arose from beyond
+the door. Tommy barked and Bickley stepped towards it, but I called to
+him.
+
+"Look out! Where there are women there are sure to be men. Let us be
+ready against accidents."
+
+So we armed ourselves with pistols, that is Bickley and I did, Bastin
+being fortified solely with a Bible.
+
+Then we advanced, a remarkable and dilapidated trio, and dragged the
+door wide. Instantly there was a scurry and we caught sight of women's
+forms wearing only flowers, and but few of these, running over white
+sand towards groups of men armed with odd-looking clubs, some of which
+were fashioned to the shapes of swords and spears. To make an impression
+I fired two shots with my revolver into the air, whereupon both men and
+women fled into groves of trees and vanished.
+
+"They don't seem to be accustomed to white people," said Bickley. "Is it
+possible that we have found a shore upon which no missionary has set a
+foot?"
+
+"I hope so," said Bastin, "seeing that unworthy as I am, then the
+opportunities for me would be very great."
+
+We stood still and looked about us. This was what we saw. All the after
+part of the ship from forward of the bridge had vanished utterly; there
+was not a trace of it; she had as it were been cut in two. More, we were
+some considerable distance from the sea which was still raging over a
+quarter of a mile away where great white combers struck upon a reef
+and spouted into the air. Behind us was a cliff, apparently of rock but
+covered with earth and vegetation, and against this cliff, in which the
+prow of the ship was buried, she, or what remained of her, had come to
+anchor for the last time.
+
+"You see what has happened," I said. "A great tidal wave has carried us
+up here and retreated."
+
+"That's it," exclaimed Bickley. "Look at the debris," and he pointed to
+torn-up palms, bushes and seaweed piled into heaps which still ran salt
+water; also to a number of dead fish that lay about among them, adding,
+"Well, we are saved anyhow."
+
+"And yet there are people like you who say that there is no Providence!"
+ejaculated Bastin.
+
+"I wonder what the views of Captain Astley and the crew are, or rather
+were, upon that matter," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, looking about him vaguely. "It is true
+that I can't see any of them, but if they are drowned no doubt it is
+because their period of usefulness in this world had ended."
+
+"Let's get down and look about us," I remarked, being anxious to avoid
+further argument.
+
+So we scrambled from the remnant of the ship, like Noah descending out
+of the ark, as Bastin said, on to the beach beneath, where Tommy rushed
+to and fro, gambolling for joy. Here we discovered a path which ran
+diagonally up the side of a cliff which was nowhere more than fifty or
+sixty feet in height, and possibly had once formed the shore of this
+land, or perhaps that of a lake. Up this path we went, following the
+tracks of many human feet, and reaching the crest of the cliff, looked
+about us, basking as we did so in the beautiful morning sun, for the sky
+was now clear of clouds and with that last awful effort, which destroyed
+our ship, the cyclone had passed away.
+
+We were standing on a plain down which ran a little stream of good water
+whereof Tommy drank greedily, we following his example. To the right and
+left of this plain, further than we could see, stretched bushland over
+which towered many palms, rather ragged now because of the lashing of
+the gale. Looking inland we perceived that the ground sloped gently
+downwards, ending at a distance of some miles in a large lake. Far out
+in this lake something like the top of a mountain of a brown colour
+rose above the water, and on the edge of it was what from that distance
+appeared to be a tumbled ruin.
+
+"This is all very interesting," I said to Bickley. "What do you make of
+it?"
+
+"I don't quite know. At first sight I should say that we are standing on
+the lip of a crater of some vast extinct volcano. Look how it curves to
+north and south and at the slope running down to the lake."
+
+I nodded.
+
+"Lucky that the tidal wave did not get over the cliff," I said. "If it
+had the people here would have all been drowned out. I wonder where they
+have gone?"
+
+As I spoke Bastin pointed to the edge of the bush some hundreds of yards
+away, where we perceived brown figures slipping about among the trees. I
+suggested that we should go back to the mouth of our path, so as to have
+a line of retreat open in case of necessity, and await events. So we did
+and there stood still. By degrees the brown figures emerged on to the
+plain to the number of some hundreds, and we saw that they were both
+male and female. The women were clothed in nothing except flowers and a
+little girdle; the men were all armed with wooden weapons and also wore
+a girdle but no flowers. The children, of whom there were many, were
+quite naked.
+
+Among these people we observed a tall person clothed in what seemed to
+be a magnificent feather cloak, and, walking around and about him, a
+number of grotesque forms adorned with hideous masks and basket-like
+head-dresses that were surmounted by plumes.
+
+"The king or chief and his priests or medicine-men! This is splendid,"
+said Bickley triumphantly.
+
+Bastin also contemplated them with enthusiasm as raw material upon which
+he hoped to get to work.
+
+By degrees and very cautiously they approached us. To our joy, we
+perceived that behind them walked several young women who bore wooden
+trays of food or fruit.
+
+"That looks well," I said. "They would not make offerings unless they
+were friendly."
+
+"The food may be poisoned," remarked Bickley suspiciously.
+
+The crowd advanced, we standing quite still looking as dignified as we
+could, I as the tallest in the middle, with Tommy sitting at my feet.
+When they were about five and twenty yards away, however, that wretched
+little dog caught sight of the masked priests. He growled and then
+rushed at them barking, his long black ears flapping as he went.
+
+The effect was instantaneous. One and all they turned and fled
+precipitately, who evidently had never before seen a dog and looked
+upon it as a deadly creature. Yes, even the tall chief and his masked
+medicine-men fled like hares pursued by Tommy, who bit one of them in
+the leg, evoking a terrific howl. I called him back and took him into
+my arms. Seeing that he was safe for a while the crowd reformed and once
+again advanced.
+
+As they came we noted that they were a wonderfully handsome people, tall
+and straight with regularly shaped features and nothing of the negro
+about them. Some of the young women might even be called beautiful,
+though those who were elderly had become corpulent. The feather-clothed
+chief, however, was much disfigured by a huge growth with a narrow stalk
+to it that hung from his neck and rested on his shoulder.
+
+"I'll have that off him before he is a week older," said Bickley,
+surveying this deformity with great professional interest.
+
+On they came, the girls with the platters walking ahead. On one of these
+were what looked like joints of baked pork, on another some plantains
+and pear-shaped fruits. They knelt down and offered these to us. We
+contemplated them for a while. Then Bickley shook his head and began
+to rub his stomach with appropriate contortions. Clearly they were
+quick-minded enough for they saw the point. At some words the girls
+brought the platters to the chief and others, who took from them
+portions of the food at hazard and ate them to show that it was not
+poisoned, we watching their throats the while to make sure that it was
+swallowed. Then they returned again and we took some of the food though
+only Bickley ate, because, as I pointed out to him, being a doctor who
+understood the use of antidotes; clearly he should make the experiment.
+However, nothing happened; indeed he said that it was very good.
+
+After this there came a pause. Then suddenly Bastin took up his parable
+in the Polynesian tongue which--to a certain extent--he had acquired
+with so much pains.
+
+"What is this place called?" he asked slowly and distinctly, pausing
+between each word.
+
+His audience shook their heads and he tried again, putting the accents
+on different syllables. Behold! some bright spirit understood him and
+answered:
+
+"Orofena."
+
+"That means a hill, or an island, or a hill in an island," whispered
+Bickley to me.
+
+"Who is your God?" asked Bastin again.
+
+The point seemed one upon which they were a little doubtful, but at last
+the chief answered, "Oro. He who fights."
+
+"In other words, Mars," said Bickley.
+
+"I will give you a better one," said Bastin in the same slow fashion.
+
+Thinking that he referred to himself these children of Nature
+contemplated his angular form doubtfully and shook their heads. Then for
+the first time one of the men who was wearing a mask and a wicker crate
+on his head, spoke in a hollow voice, saying:
+
+"If you try Oro will eat you up."
+
+"Head priest!" said Bickley, nudging me. "Old Bastin had better be
+careful or he will get his teeth into him and call them Oro's."
+
+Another pause, after which the man in a feather cloak with the growth on
+his neck that a servant was supporting, said:
+
+"I am Marama, the chief of Orofena. We have never seen men like you
+before, if you are men. What brought you here and with you that fierce
+and terrible animal, or evil spirit which makes a noise and bites?"
+
+Now Bickley pretended to consult me who stood brooding and majestic,
+that is if I can be majestic. I whispered something and he answered:
+
+"The gods of the wind and the sea."
+
+"What nonsense," ejaculated Bastin, "there are no such things."
+
+"Shut up," I said, "we must use similes here," to which he replied:
+
+"I don't like similes that tamper with the truth."
+
+"Remember Neptune and Aeolus," I suggested, and he lapsed into
+consideration of the point.
+
+"We knew that you were coming," said Marama. "Our doctors told us all
+about you a moon ago. But we wish that you would come more gently, as
+you nearly washed away our country."
+
+After looking at me Bickley replied:
+
+"How thankful should you be that in our kindness we have spared you."
+
+"What do you come to do?" inquired Marama again. After the usual formula
+of consulting me Bickley answered:
+
+"We come to take that mountain (he meant lump) off your neck and make
+you beautiful; also to cure all the sickness among your people."
+
+"And I come," broke in Bastin, "to give you new hearts."
+
+These announcements evidently caused great excitement. After
+consultation Marama answered:
+
+"We do not want new hearts as the old ones are good, but we wish to be
+rid of lumps and sicknesses. If you can do this we will make you gods
+and worship you and give you many wives." (Here Bastin held up his hands
+in horror.) "When will you begin to take away the lumps?"
+
+"To-morrow," said Bickley. "But learn that if you try to harm us we will
+bring another wave which will drown all your country."
+
+Nobody seemed to doubt our capacities in this direction, but one
+inquiring spirit in a wicker crate did ask how it came about that if we
+controlled the ocean we had arrived in half a canoe instead of a whole
+one.
+
+Bickley replied to the effect that it was because the gods always
+travelled in half-canoes to show their higher nature, which seemed to
+satisfy everyone. Then we announced that we had seen enough of them for
+that day and would retire to think. Meanwhile we should be obliged if
+they would build us a house and keep us supplied with whatever food they
+had.
+
+"Do the gods eat?" asked the sceptic again.
+
+"That fellow is a confounded radical," I whispered to Bickley. "Tell him
+that they do when they come to Orofena."
+
+He did so, whereon the chief said:
+
+"Would the gods like a nice young girl cooked?"
+
+At this point Bastin retired down the path, realising that he had to do
+with cannibals. We said that we preferred to look at the girls alive and
+would meet them again to-morrow morning, when we hoped that the house
+would be ready.
+
+So our first interview with the inhabitants of Orofena came to an end,
+on which we congratulated ourselves.
+
+
+On reaching the remains of the Star of the South we set to work to take
+stock of what was left to us. Fortunately it proved to be a very great
+deal. As I think I mentioned, all the passenger part of the yacht lay
+forward of the bridge, just in front of which the vessel had been broken
+in two, almost as cleanly as though she were severed by a gigantic
+knife. Further our stores were forward and practically everything else
+that belonged to us, even down to Bickley's instruments and medicines
+and Bastin's religious works, to say nothing of a great quantity of
+tinned food and groceries. Lastly on the deck above the saloon had
+stood two large lifeboats. Although these were amply secured at the
+commencement of the gale one of them, that on the port side, was smashed
+to smithers; probably some spar had fallen upon it. The starboard
+boat, however, remained intact and so far as we could judge, seaworthy,
+although the bulwarks were broken by the waves.
+
+"There's something we can get away in if necessary," I said.
+
+"Where to?" remarked Bastin. "We don't know where we are or if there is
+any other land within a thousand miles. I think we had better stop here
+as Providence seems to have intended, especially when there is so much
+work to my hand."
+
+"Be careful," answered Bickley, "that the work to your hand does not end
+in the cutting of all our throats. It is an awkward thing interfering
+with the religion of savages, and I believe that these untutored
+children of Nature sometimes eat missionaries."
+
+"Yes, I have heard that," said Bastin; "they bake them first as they do
+pigs. But I don't know that they would care to eat me," and he glanced
+at his bony limbs, "especially when you are much plumper. Anyhow one
+can't stop for a risk of that sort."
+
+Deigning no reply, Bickley walked away to fetch some fine fish which
+had been washed up by the tidal wave and were still flapping about in
+a little pool of salt water. Then we took counsel as to how to make the
+best of our circumstances, and as a result set to work to tidy up the
+saloon and cabins, which was not difficult as what remained of the ship
+lay on an even keel. Also we got out some necessary stores, including
+paraffin for the swinging lamps with which the ship was fitted in case
+of accident to the electric light, candles, and the guns we had brought
+with us so that they might be handy in the event of attack. This done,
+by the aid of the tools that were in the storerooms, Bickley, who was an
+excellent carpenter, repaired the saloon door, all that was necessary to
+keep us private, as the bulkhead still remained.
+
+"Now," he said triumphantly when he had finished and got the lock and
+bolts to work to his satisfaction, "we can stand a siege if needed, for
+as the ship is iron built they can't even burn us out and that teak door
+would take some forcing. Also we can shore it up."
+
+"How about something to eat? I want my tea," said Bastin.
+
+"Then, my reverend friend," replied Bickley, "take a couple of the fire
+buckets and fetch some water from the stream. Also collect driftwood of
+which there is plenty about, clean those fish and grill them over the
+saloon stove."
+
+"I'll try," said Bastin, "but I never did any cooking before."
+
+"No," replied Bickley, "on second thoughts I will see to that myself,
+but you can get the fish ready."
+
+So, with due precautions, Bastin and I fetched water from the stream
+which we found flowed over the edge of the cliff quite close at hand
+into a beautiful coral basin that might have been designed for a bath of
+the nymphs. Indeed one at a time, while the other watched, we undressed
+and plunged into it, and never was a tub more welcome than after our
+long days of tempest. Then we returned to find that Bickley had already
+set the table and was engaged in frying the fish very skilfully on the
+saloon stove, which proved to be well adapted to the purpose. He was
+cross, however, when he found that we had bathed and that it was now too
+late for him to do likewise.
+
+While he was cleaning himself as well as he could in his cabin basin and
+Bastin was boiling water for tea, suddenly I remembered the letter from
+the Danish mate Jacobsen. Concluding that it might now be opened as we
+had certainly parted with most of the Star of the South for the last
+time, I read it. It was as follows:
+
+
+"The reason, honoured Sir, that I am leaving the ship is that on the
+night I tore up the paper, the spirit controlling the planchette wrote
+these words: 'After leaving Samoa the Star of the South will be wrecked
+in a hurricane and everybody on board drowned except A. B. and B. Get
+out of her! Get out of her! Don't be a fool, Jacob, unless you want to
+come over here at once. Take our advice and get out of her and you will
+live to be old.--SKOLL."
+
+
+"Sir, I am not a coward but I know that this will happen, for that
+spirit which signs itself Skoll never tells a lie. I did try to give
+the captain a hint to stop at Apia, but he had been drinking and openly
+cursed me and called me a sneaking cheat. So I am going to run away,
+of which I am very much ashamed. But I do not wish to be drowned yet as
+there is a girl whom I want to marry, and my mother I support. You will
+be safe and I hope you will not think too badly of me.--JACOB JACOBSEN.
+
+"P.S.--It is an awful thing to know the future. Never try to learn
+that."
+
+
+I gave this letter to Bastin and Bickley to read and asked them what
+they thought of it.
+
+"Coincidence," said Bickley. "The man is a weak-minded idiot and heard
+in Samoa that they expected a hurricane."
+
+"I think," chimed in Bastin, "that the devil knows how to look after his
+own at any rate for a little while. I dare say it would have been much
+better for him to be drowned."
+
+"At least he is a deserter and failed in his duty. I never wish to hear
+of him again," I said.
+
+As a matter of fact I never have. But the incident remains quite
+unexplained either by Bickley or Bastin.
+
+
+
+Chapter VII. The Orofenans
+
+
+To our shame we had a very pleasant supper that night off the grilled
+fish, which was excellent, and some tinned meat. I say to our shame, in
+a sense, for on our companions the sharks were supping and by rights we
+should have been sunk in woe. I suppose that the sense of our own escape
+intoxicated us. Also, notwithstanding his joviality, none of us had
+cared much for the captain, and his policy had been to keep us somewhat
+apart from the crew, of whom therefore we knew but little. It is true
+that Bastin held services on Sundays, for such as would attend, and
+Bickley had doctored a few of them for minor ailments, but there, except
+for a little casual conversation, our intercourse began and ended.
+
+Now the sad fact is that it is hard to be overwhelmed with grief for
+those with whom we are not intimate. We were very sorry and that is all
+that can be said, except that Bastin, being High Church, announced in
+a matter-of-fact way that he meant to put up some petitions for the
+welfare of their souls. To this Bickley retorted that from what he had
+seen of their bodies he was sure they needed them.
+
+Yes, it was a pleasant supper, not made less so by a bottle of champagne
+which Bickley and I shared. Bastin stuck to his tea, not because he did
+not like champagne, but because, as he explained, having now come
+in contact with the heathen it would never do for him to set them an
+example in the use of spirituous liquors.
+
+"However much we may differ, Bastin, I respect you for that sentiment,"
+commented Bickley.
+
+"I don't know why you should," answered Bastin; "but if so, you might
+follow my example."
+
+That night we slept like logs, trusting to our teak door which we
+barricaded, and to Tommy, who was a most excellent watch-dog, to guard
+us against surprise. At any rate we took the risk. As a matter of fact,
+nothing happened, though before dawn Tommy did growl a good deal, for
+I heard him, but as he sank into slumber again on my bed, I did not get
+up. In the morning I found from fresh footprints that two or three men
+had been prowling about the ship, though at a little distance.
+
+We rose early, and taking the necessary precautions, bathed in the pool.
+Then we breakfasted, and having filled every available receptacle with
+water, which took us a long time as these included a large tank that
+supplied the bath, so that we might have at least a week's supply in
+case of siege, we went on deck and debated what we should do. In the
+end we determined to stop where we were and await events, because, as
+I pointed out, it was necessary that we should discover whether these
+natives were hostile or friendly. In the former event we could hold our
+own on the ship, whereas away from it we must be overwhelmed; in the
+latter there was always time to move inland.
+
+About ten o'clock when we were seated on stools smoking, with our guns
+by our side--for here, owing to the overhanging cliff in which it will
+be remembered the prow of the ship was buried, we could not be reached
+by missiles thrown from above--we saw numbers of the islanders advancing
+upon us along the beach on either side. They were preceded as before
+by women who bore food on platters and in baskets. These people,
+all talking excitedly and laughing after their fashion, stopped at a
+distance, so we took no notice of them. Presently Marama, clad in
+his feather cloak, and again accompanied by priests or medicine-men,
+appeared walking down the path on the cliff face, and, standing below,
+made salutations and entered into a conversation with us of which I give
+the substance--that is, so far as we could understand it.
+
+He reproached us for not having come to him as he expected we would do.
+We replied that we preferred to remain where we were until we were sure
+of our greeting and asked him what was the position. He explained that
+only once before, in the time of his grandfather, had any people reached
+their shores, also during a great storm as we had done. They were
+dark-skinned men like themselves, three of them, but whence they came
+was never known, since they were at once seized and sacrificed to the
+god Oro, which was the right thing to do in such a case.
+
+We asked whether he would consider it right to sacrifice us. He replied:
+
+Certainly, unless we were too strong, being gods ourselves, or unless an
+arrangement could be concluded. We asked--what arrangement? He replied
+that we must make them gifts; also that we must do what we had promised
+and cure him--the chief--of the disease which had tormented him for
+years. In that event everything would be at our disposal and we, with
+all our belongings, should become taboo, holy, not to be touched. None
+would attempt to harm us, nothing should be stolen under penalty of
+death.
+
+We asked him to come up on the deck with only one companion that his
+sickness might be ascertained, and after much hesitation he consented to
+do so. Bickley made an examination of the growth and announced that he
+believed it could be removed with perfect safety as the attachment to
+the neck was very slight, but of course there was always a risk. This
+was explained to him with difficulty, and much talk followed between
+him and his followers who gathered on the beach beneath the ship. They
+seemed adverse to the experiment, till Marama grew furious with them
+and at last burst into tears saying that he could no longer drag this
+terrible burden about with him, and he touched the growth. He would
+rather die. Then they gave way.
+
+I will tell the rest as shortly as I can.
+
+A hideous wooden idol was brought on board, wrapped in leaves and
+feathers, and upon it the chief and his head people swore safety to
+us whether he lived or died, making us the guests of their land. There
+were, however, two provisos made, or as such we understood them. These
+seemed to be that we should offer no insult or injury to their god, and
+secondly, that we should not set foot on the island in the lake. It was
+not till afterwards that it occurred to me that this must refer to
+the mountain top which appeared in the inland sheet of water. To those
+stipulations we made no answer. Indeed, the Orofenans did all the
+talking. Finally, they ratified their oaths by a man who, I suppose, was
+a head priest, cutting his arm and rubbing the blood from it on the lips
+of the idol; also upon those of the chief. I should add that Bastin had
+retired as soon as he saw that false god appear, of which I was glad,
+since I felt sure that he would make a scene.
+
+The operation took place that afternoon and on the ship, for when once
+Marama had made up his mind to trust us he did so very thoroughly. It
+was performed on deck in the presence of an awed multitude who watched
+from the shore, and when they saw Bickley appear in a clean nightshirt
+and wash his hands, uttered a groan of wonder. Evidently they considered
+it a magical and religious ceremony; indeed ever afterwards they called
+Bickley the Great Priest, or sometimes the Great Healer in later days.
+This was a grievance to Bastin who considered that he had been robbed
+of his proper title, especially when he learned that among themselves he
+was only known as "the Bellower," because of the loud voice in which he
+addressed them. Nor did Bickley particularly appreciate the compliment.
+
+With my help he administered the chloroform, which was done under
+shelter of a sail for fear lest the people should think that we were
+smothering their chief. Then the operation went on to a satisfactory
+conclusion. I omit the details, but an electric battery and a red-hot
+wire came into play.
+
+"There," said Bickley triumphantly when he had finished tying the
+vessels and made everything neat and tidy with bandages, "I was afraid
+he might bleed to death, but I don't think there is any fear of that
+now, for I have made a real job of it." Then advancing with the horrid
+tumour in his hands he showed it in triumph to the crowd beneath, who
+groaned again and threw themselves on to their faces. Doubtless now it
+is the most sacred relic of Orofena.
+
+When Marama came out of the anesthetic, Bickley gave him something which
+sent him to sleep for twelve hours, during all which time his people
+waited beneath. This was our dangerous period, for our difficulty was
+to persuade them that he was not dead, although Bickley had assured them
+that he would sleep for a time while the magic worked. Still, I was very
+glad when he woke up on the following morning, and two or three of
+his leading men could see that he was alive. The rest was lengthy but
+simple, consisting merely in keeping him quiet and on a suitable diet
+until there was no fear of the wound opening. We achieved it somehow
+with the help of an intelligent native woman who, I suppose, was one
+of his wives, and five days later were enabled to present him healed,
+though rather tottery, to his affectionate subjects.
+
+It was a great scene, which may be imagined. They bore him away in a
+litter with the native woman to watch him and another to carry the relic
+preserved in a basket, and us they acclaimed as gods. Thenceforward we
+had nothing to fear in Orofena--except Bastin, though this we did not
+know at the time.
+
+All this while we had been living on our ship and growing very bored
+there, although we employed the empty hours in conversation with
+selected natives, thereby improving our knowledge of the language.
+Bickley had the best of it, since already patients began to arrive which
+occupied him. One of the first was that man whom Tommy had bitten. He
+was carried to us in an almost comatose state, suffering apparently from
+the symptoms of snake poisoning.
+
+Afterward it turned out that he conceived Tommy to be a divine but most
+venomous lizard that could make a very horrible noise, and began to
+suffer as one might do from the bite of such a creature. Nothing that
+Bickley could do was enough to save him and ultimately he died in
+convulsions, a circumstance that enormously enhanced Tommy's reputation.
+To tell the truth, we took advantage of it to explain that Tommy was
+in fact a supernatural animal, a sort of tame demon which only harmed
+people who had malevolent intentions towards those he served or who
+tried to steal any of their possessions or to intrude upon them at
+inconvenient hours, especially in the dark. So terrible was he, indeed,
+that even the skill of the Great Priest, i.e., Bickley, could not avail
+to save any whom once he had bitten in his rage. Even to be barked at by
+him was dangerous and conveyed a curse that might last for generations.
+
+All this we set out when Bastin was not there. He had wandered off,
+as he said, to look for shells, but as we knew, to practise religious
+orations in the Polynesian tongue with the waves for audience, as
+Demosthenes is said to have done to perfect himself as a political
+orator. Personally I admit that I relied more on the terrors of Tommy to
+safeguard us from theft and other troubles than I did upon those of the
+native taboo and the priestly oaths.
+
+The end of it all was that we left our ship, having padlocked up the
+door (the padlock, we explained, was a magical instrument that bit worse
+than Tommy), and moved inland in a kind of triumphal procession,
+priests and singers going before (the Orofenans sang extremely well) and
+minstrels following after playing upon instruments like flutes, while
+behind came the bearers carrying such goods as we needed. They took
+us to a beautiful place in a grove of palms on a ridge where grew many
+breadfruit trees, that commanded a view of the ocean upon one side and
+of the lake with the strange brown mountain top on the other. Here in
+the midst of the native gardens we found that a fine house had been
+built for us of a kind of mud brick and thatched with palm leaves,
+surrounded by a fenced courtyard of beaten earth and having wide
+overhanging verandahs; a very comfortable place indeed in that delicious
+climate. In it we took up our abode, visiting the ship occasionally to
+see that all was well there, and awaiting events.
+
+For Bickley these soon began to happen in the shape of an
+ever-increasing stream of patients. The population of the island was
+considerable, anything between five and ten thousand, so far as we
+could judge, and among these of course there were a number of sick.
+Ophthalmia, for instance, was a prevalent disease, as were the growths
+such as Marama had suffered from, to say nothing of surgical cases and
+those resulting from accident or from nervous ailments. With all of
+these Bickley was called upon to deal, which he did with remarkable
+success by help of his books on Tropical Diseases and his ample supplies
+of medical necessaries.
+
+At first he enjoyed it very much, but when we had been established in
+the house for about three weeks he remarked, after putting in a solid
+ten hours of work, that for all the holiday he was getting he might as
+well be back at his old practice, with the difference that there he was
+earning several thousands a year. Just then a poor woman arrived with a
+baby in convulsions to whose necessities he was obliged to sacrifice
+his supper, after which came a man who had fallen from a palm tree and
+broken his leg.
+
+Nor did I escape, since having somehow or other established a reputation
+for wisdom, as soon as I had mastered sufficient of the language, every
+kind of knotty case was laid before me for decision. In short, I
+became a sort of Chief Justice--not an easy office as it involved
+the acquirement of the native law which was intricate and peculiar,
+especially in matrimonial cases.
+
+At these oppressive activities Bastin looked on with a gloomy eye.
+
+"You fellows seem very busy," he said one evening; "but I can find
+nothing to do. They don't seem to want me, and merely to set a good
+example by drinking water or tea while you swallow whisky and their palm
+wine, or whatever it is, is very negative kind of work, especially as I
+am getting tired of planting things in the garden and playing policeman
+round the wreck which nobody goes near. Even Tommy is better off, for at
+least he can bark and hunt rats."
+
+"You see," said Bickley, "we are following our trades. Arbuthnot is a
+lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I may add a general--a
+very general--practitioner and work at medicine in an enormous and
+much-neglected practice. Therefore, you, being a clergyman, should go
+and do likewise. There are some ten thousand people here, but I do not
+observe that as yet you have converted a single one."
+
+Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his usual object
+of what is known as "getting a rise" out of Bastin. Little did he guess
+what he was doing.
+
+Bastin thought a while ponderously, then said:
+
+"It is very strange from what peculiar sources Providence sometimes
+sends inspirations. If wisdom flows from babes and sucklings, why should
+it not do so from the well of agnostics and mockers?"
+
+"There is no reason which I can see," scoffed Bickley, "except that as a
+rule wells do not flow."
+
+"Your jest is ill-timed and I may add foolish," continued Bastin. "What
+I was about to add was that you have given me an idea, as it was no
+doubt intended that you should do. I will, metaphorically speaking, gird
+up my loins and try to bear the light into all this heathen blackness."
+
+"Then it is one of the first you ever had, old fellow. But what's the
+need of girding up your loins in this hot climate?" inquired Bickley
+with innocence. "Pyjamas and that white and green umbrella of yours
+would do just as well."
+
+Bastin vouchsafed no reply and sat for the rest of that evening plunged
+in deep thought.
+
+On the following morning he approached Marama and asked his leave
+to teach the people about the gods. The chief readily granted this,
+thinking, I believe, that he alluded to ourselves, and orders were
+issued accordingly. They were to the effect that Bastin was to be
+allowed to go everywhere unmolested and to talk to whom he would about
+what he would, to which all must listen with respect.
+
+Thus he began his missionary career in Orofena, working at it, good and
+earnest man that he was, in a way that excited even the admiration of
+Bickley. He started a school for children, which was held under a fine,
+spreading tree. These listened well, and being of exceedingly quick
+intellect soon began to pick up the elements of knowledge. But when he
+tried to persuade them to clothe their little naked bodies his failure
+was complete, although after much supplication some of the bigger girls
+did arrive with a chaplet of flowers--round their necks!
+
+Also he preached to the adults, and here again was very successful in
+a way, especially after he became more familiar with the language. They
+listened; to a certain extent they understood; they argued and put to
+poor Bastin the most awful questions such as the whole Bench of Bishops
+could not have answered. Still he did answer them somehow, and they
+politely accepted his interpretation of their theological riddles. I
+observed that he got on best when he was telling them stories out of the
+Old Testament, such as the account of the creation of the world and
+of human beings, also of the Deluge, etc. Indeed one of their elders
+said--Yes, this was quite true. They had heard it all before from
+their fathers, and that once the Deluge had taken place round Orofena,
+swallowing up great countries, but sparing them because they were so
+good.
+
+Bastin, surprised, asked them who had caused the deluge. They replied,
+Oro which was the name of their god, Oro who dwelt yonder on the
+mountain in the lake, and whose representation they worshipped in
+idols. He said that God dwelt in Heaven, to which they replied with calm
+certainty:
+
+"No, no, he dwells on the mountain in the lake," which was why they
+never dared to approach that mountain.
+
+Indeed it was only by giving the name Oro to the Divinity and admitting
+that He might dwell in the mountain as well as everywhere else, that
+Bastin was able to make progress. Having conceded this, not without
+scruples, however, he did make considerable progress, so much, in fact,
+that I perceived that the priests of Oro were beginning to grow very
+jealous of him and of his increasing authority with the people. Bastin
+was naturally triumphant, and even exclaimed exultingly that within a
+year he would have half of the population baptised.
+
+"Within a year, my dear fellow," said Bickley, "you will have your
+throat cut as a sacrifice, and probably ours also. It is a pity, too,
+as within that time I should have stamped out ophthalmia and some other
+diseases in the island."
+
+Here, leaving Bastin and his good work aside for a while, I will say
+a little about the country. From information which I gathered on some
+journeys that I made and by inquiries from the chief Marama, who had
+become devoted to us, I found that Orofena was quite a large place. In
+shape the island was circular, a broad band of territory surrounding the
+great lake of which I have spoken, that in its turn surrounded a smaller
+island from which rose the mountain top. No other land was known to
+be near the shores of Orofena, which had never been visited by anyone
+except the strangers a hundred years ago or so, who were sacrificed and
+eaten. Most of the island was covered with forest which the inhabitants
+lacked the energy, and indeed had no tools, to fell. They were an
+extremely lazy people and would only cultivate enough bananas and other
+food to satisfy their immediate needs. In truth they lived mostly upon
+breadfruit and other products of the wild trees.
+
+Thus it came about that in years of scarcity through drought or climatic
+causes, which prevented the forest trees from bearing, they suffered
+very much from hunger. In such years hundreds of them would perish
+and the remainder resorted to the dreadful expedient of cannibalism.
+Sometimes, too, the shoals of fish avoided their shores, reducing them
+to great misery. Their only domestic animal was the pig which roamed
+about half wild and in no great numbers, for they had never taken the
+trouble to breed it in captivity. Their resources, therefore,
+were limited, which accounted for the comparative smallness of the
+population, further reduced as it was by a wicked habit of infanticide
+practised in order to lighten the burden of bringing up children.
+
+They had no traditions as to how they reached this land, their belief
+being that they had always been there but that their forefathers were
+much greater than they. They were poetical, and sang songs in a language
+which themselves they could not understand; they said that it was the
+tongue their forefathers had spoken. Also they had several strange
+customs of which they did not know the origin. My own opinion, which
+Bickley shared, was that they were in fact a shrunken and deteriorated
+remnant of some high race now coming to its end through age and
+inter-breeding. About them indeed, notwithstanding their primitive
+savagery which in its qualities much resembled that of other
+Polynesians, there was a very curious air of antiquity. One felt that
+they had known the older world and its mysteries, though now both
+were forgotten. Also their language, which in time we came to speak
+perfectly, was copious, musical, and expressive in its idioms.
+
+One circumstance I must mention. In walking about the country I observed
+all over it enormous holes, some of them measuring as much as a hundred
+yards across, with a depth of fifty feet or more, and this not on
+alluvial lands although there traces of them existed also, but in solid
+rock. What this rock was I do not know as none of us were geologists,
+but it seemed to me to partake of the nature of granite. Certainly
+it was not coral like that on and about the coast, but of a primeval
+formation.
+
+When I asked Marama what caused these holes, he only shrugged his
+shoulders and said he did not know, but their fathers had declared that
+they were made by stones falling from heaven. This, of course, suggested
+meteorites to my mind. I submitted the idea to Bickley, who, in one of
+his rare intervals of leisure, came with me to make an examination.
+
+"If they were meteorites," he said, "of which a shower struck the earth
+in some past geological age, all life must have been destroyed by them
+and their remains ought to exist at the bottom of the holes. To me they
+look more like the effect of high explosives, but that, of course,
+is impossible, though I don't know what else could have caused such
+craters."
+
+Then he went back to his work, for nothing that had to do with antiquity
+interested Bickley very much. The present and its problems were enough
+for him, he would say, who neither had lived in the past nor expected to
+have any share in the future.
+
+As I remained curious I made an opportunity to scramble to the bottom
+of one of these craters, taking with me some of the natives with their
+wooden tools. Here I found a good deal of soil either washed down from
+the surface or resulting from the decomposition of the rock, though
+oddly enough in it nothing grew. I directed them to dig. After a while
+to my astonishment there appeared a corner of a great worked stone
+quite unlike that of the crater, indeed it seemed to me to be a marble.
+Further examination showed that this block was most beautifully carved
+in bas-relief, apparently with a design of leaves and flowers. In the
+disturbed soil also I picked up a life-sized marble hand of a woman
+exquisitely finished and apparently broken from a statue that might
+have been the work of one of the great Greek sculptors. Moreover, on
+the third finger of this hand was a representation of a ring whereof,
+unfortunately, the bezel had been destroyed.
+
+I put the hand in my pocket, but as darkness was coming on, I could not
+pursue the research and disinter the block. When I wished to return the
+next day, I was informed politely by Marama that it would not be safe
+for me to do so as the priests of Oro declared that if I sought to
+meddle with the "buried things the god would grow angry and bring
+disaster on me."
+
+When I persisted he said that at least I must go alone since no native
+would accompany me, and added earnestly that he prayed me not to go. So
+to my great regret and disappointment I was obliged to give up the idea.
+
+
+
+Chapter VIII. Bastin Attempts the Martyr's Crown
+
+
+That carved stone and the marble hand took a great hold of my
+imagination. What did they mean? How could they have come to the bottom
+of that hole, unless indeed they were part of some building and its
+ornaments which had been destroyed in the neighbourhood? The stone of
+which we had only uncovered a corner seemed far too big to have been
+carried there from any ship; it must have weighed several tons. Besides,
+ships do not carry such things about the world, and none had visited
+this island during the last two centuries at any rate, or local
+tradition would have recorded so wonderful a fact. Were there, then,
+once edifices covered with elegant carving standing on this place, and
+were they adorned with lovely statues that would not have disgraced
+the best period of Greek art? The thing was incredible except on the
+supposition that these were relics of an utterly lost civilisation.
+
+Bickley was as much puzzled as myself. All he could say was that the
+world was infinitely old and many things might have happened in it
+whereof we had no record. Even Bastin was excited for a little while,
+but as his imagination was represented by zero, all he could say was:
+
+"I suppose someone left them there, and anyhow it doesn't matter much,
+does it?"
+
+But I, who have certain leanings towards the ancient and mysterious,
+could not be put off in this fashion. I remembered that unapproachable
+mountain in the midst of the lake and that on it appeared to be
+something which looked like ruins as seen from the top of the cliff
+through glasses. At any rate this was a point, that I might clear up.
+
+Saying nothing to anybody, one morning I slipped away and walked to the
+edge of the lake, a distance of five or six miles over rough country.
+Having arrived there I perceived that the cone-shaped mountain in the
+centre, which was about a mile from the lake shore, was much larger than
+I had thought, quite three hundred feet high indeed, and with a
+very large circumference. Further, its sides evidently once had been
+terraced, and it was on one of these broad terraces, half-way up and
+facing towards the rising sun, that the ruin-like remains were heaped.
+I examined them through my glasses. Undoubtedly it was a cyclopean
+ruin built of great blocks of coloured stone which seemed to have been
+shattered by earthquake or explosion. There were the pillars of a mighty
+gateway and the remains of walls.
+
+I trembled with excitement as I stared and stared. Could I not get to
+the place and see for myself? I observed that from the flat bush-clad
+land at the foot of the mountain, ran out what seemed to be the residue
+of a stone pier which ended in a large table-topped rock between two
+and three hundred feet across. But even this was too far to reach by
+swimming, besides for aught I knew there might be alligators in that
+lake. I walked up and down its borders, till presently I came to a path
+which led into a patch of some variety of cotton palm.
+
+Following this path I discovered a boat-house thatched over with palm
+leaves. Inside it were two good canoes with their paddles, floating and
+tied to the stumps of trees by fibre ropes. Instantly I made up my mind
+that I would paddle to the island and investigate. Just as I was about
+to step into one of the canoes the light was cut off. Looking up I saw
+that a man was crouching in the door-place of the boat-house in order to
+enter, and paused guiltily.
+
+"Friend-from-the-Sea" (that was the name that these islanders had given
+to me), said the voice of Marama, "say--what are you doing here?"
+
+"I am about to take a row on the lake, Chief," I answered carelessly.
+
+"Indeed, Friend. Have we then treated you so badly that you are tired of
+life?"
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked.
+
+"Come out into the sunlight, Friend, and I will explain to you."
+
+I hesitated till I saw Marama lifting the heavy wooden spear he carried
+and remembered that I was unarmed. Then I came out.
+
+"What does all this mean, Chief?" I asked angrily when we were clear of
+the patch of cotton palm.
+
+"I mean, Friend, that you have been very near to making a longer journey
+than you thought. Have patience now and listen to me. I saw you leaving
+the village this morning and followed, suspecting your purpose. Yes,
+I followed alone, saying nothing to the priests of Oro who fortunately
+were away watching the Bellower for their own reasons. I saw you
+searching out the secrets of the mountain with those magic tubes that
+make things big that are small, and things that are far off come near,
+and I followed you to the canoes."
+
+"All that is plain enough, Marama. But why?"
+
+"Have I not told you, Friend-from-the-Sea, that yonder hill which is
+called Orofena, whence this island takes its name, is sacred?"
+
+"You said so, but what of it?"
+
+"This: to set foot thereon is to die and, I suppose, great as you are,
+you, too, can die like others. At least, although I love you, had you
+not come away from that canoe I was about to discover whether this is
+so."
+
+"Then for what are the canoes used?" I asked with irritation.
+
+"You see that flat rock, Friend, with the hole beyond, which is the
+mouth of a cave that appeared only in the great storm that brought you
+to our land? They are used to convey offerings which are laid upon the
+rock. Beyond it no man may go, and since the beginning no man has ever
+gone."
+
+"Offerings to whom?"
+
+"To the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead who live there."
+
+"Oromatuas? Oro! It is always something to do with Oro. Who and what is
+Oro?"
+
+"Oro is a god, Friend, though it is true that the priests say that above
+him there is a greater god called Degai, the Creator, the Fate who made
+all things and directs all things."
+
+"Very well, but why do you suppose that Oro, the servant of Degai, lives
+in that mountain? I thought that he lived in a grove yonder where your
+priests, as I am told, have an image of him."
+
+"I do not know, Friend-from-the-Sea, but so it has been held from the
+beginning. The image in the grove is only visited by his spirit from
+time to time. Now, I pray you, come back and before the priests discover
+that you have been here, and forget that there are any canoes upon this
+lake."
+
+So, thinking it wisest, I turned the matter with a laugh and walked
+away with him to the village. On our road I tried to extract some more
+information but without success. He did not know who built the ruin upon
+the mountain, or who destroyed it. He did not know how the terraces
+came there. All he knew was that during the convulsion of Nature which
+resulted in the tidal wave that had thrown our ship upon the island,
+the mountain had been seen to quiver like a tree in the wind as though
+within it great forces were at work. Then it was observed to have risen
+a good many more feet above the surface of the lake, as might be noted
+by the water mark upon the shore, and then also the mouth of the cave
+had appeared. The priests said that all this was because the Oromatuas
+who dwelt there were stirring, which portended great things. Indeed
+great things had happened--for had we not arrived in their land?
+
+I thanked him for what he had told me, and, as there was nothing more
+to be learned, dropped the subject which was never mentioned between us
+again, at least not for a long while. But in my heart I determined that
+I would reach that mountain even though to do so I must risk my life.
+Something seemed to call me to the place; it was as though I were being
+drawn by a magnet.
+
+As it happened, before so very long I did go to the mountain, not of
+my own will but because I was obliged. It came about thus. One night I
+asked Bastin how he was getting on with his missionary work. He replied:
+Very well indeed, but there was one great obstacle in his path, the idol
+in the Grove. Were it not for this accursed image he believed that the
+whole island would become Christian. I asked him to be more plain.
+He explained that all his work was thwarted by this idol, since his
+converts declared that they did not dare to be baptised while it sat
+there in the Grove. If they did, the spirit that was in it would bewitch
+them and perhaps steal out at night and murder them.
+
+"The spirit being our friends the sorcerers," I suggested.
+
+"That's it, Arbuthnot. Do you know, I believe those devilish men
+sometimes offer human sacrifices to this satanic fetish, when there is a
+drought or anything of that sort."
+
+"I can quite believe it," I answered, "but as they will scarcely remove
+their god and with it their own livelihood and authority, I am afraid
+that as we don't want to be sacrificed, there is nothing to be done."
+
+At this moment I was called away. As I went I heard Bastin muttering
+something about martyrs, but paid no attention. Little did I guess
+what was going on in his pious but obstinate mind. In effect it was
+this--that if no one else would remove that idol he was quite ready to
+do it himself.
+
+However, he was very cunning over that business, almost Jesuitical
+indeed. Not one word did he breathe of his dark plans to me, and still
+less to Bickley. He just went on with his teaching, lamenting from time
+to time the stumbling-block of the idol and expressing wonder as to how
+it might be circumvented by a change in the hearts of the islanders, or
+otherwise. Sad as it is to record, in fact, dear old Bastin went as near
+to telling a fib in connection with this matter as I suppose he had ever
+done in his life. It happened thus. One day Bickley's sharp eye caught
+sight of Bastin walking about with what looked like a bottle of whisky
+in his pocket.
+
+"Hallo, old fellow," he said, "has the self-denying ordinance broken
+down? I didn't know that you took pegs on the sly," and he pointed to
+the bottle.
+
+"If you are insinuating, Bickley, that I absorb spirits surreptitiously,
+you are more mistaken than usual, which is saying a good deal. This
+bottle contains, not Scotch whisky but paraffin, although I admit
+that its label may have misled you, unintentionally, so far as I am
+concerned."
+
+"What are you going to do with the paraffin?" asked Bickley.
+
+Bastin coloured through his tan and replied awkwardly:
+
+"Paraffin is very good to keep away mosquitoes if one can stand the
+smell of it upon one's skin. Not that I have brought it here with that
+sole object. The truth is that I am anxious to experiment with a lamp of
+my own design made--um--of native wood," and he departed in a hurry.
+
+"When next old Bastin wants to tell a lie," commented Bickley, "he
+should make up his mind as to what it is to be, and stick to it. I
+wonder what he is after with that paraffin? Not going to dose any of
+my patients with it, I hope. He was arguing the other day that it is a
+great remedy taken internally, being quite unaware that the lamp variety
+is not used for that purpose."
+
+"Perhaps he means to swallow some himself, just to show that he is
+right," I suggested.
+
+"The stomach-pump is at hand," said Bickley, and the matter dropped.
+
+Next morning I got up before it was light. Having some elementary
+knowledge of the main facts of astronomy, which remained with me from
+boyhood when I had attended lectures on the subject, which I had tried
+to refresh by help of an encyclopedia I had brought from the ship,
+I wished to attempt to obtain an idea of our position by help of the
+stars. In this endeavour, I may say, I failed absolutely, as I did not
+know how to take a stellar or any other observation.
+
+On my way out of our native house I observed, by the lantern I carried,
+that the compartment of it occupied by Bastin was empty, and wondered
+whither he had gone at that hour. On arriving at my observation-post, a
+rocky eminence on open ground, where, with Tommy at my side, I took my
+seat with a telescope, I was astonished to see or rather to hear a great
+number of the natives walking past the base of the mound towards the
+bush. Then I remembered that some one, Marama, I think, had informed me
+that there was to be a great sacrifice to Oro at dawn on that day. After
+this I thought no more of the matter but occupied myself in a futile
+study of the heavenly bodies. At length the dawn broke and put a period
+to my labours.
+
+Glancing round me before I descended from the little hill, I saw a flame
+of light appear suddenly about half a mile or more away among those
+trees which I knew concealed the image of Oro. On this personally I had
+never had the curiosity to look, as I knew that it was only a hideous
+idol stuck over with feathers and other bedizenments. The flame shot
+suddenly straight into the still air and was followed a few seconds
+later by the sound of a dull explosion, after which it went out. Also it
+was followed by something else--a scream of rage from an infuriated mob.
+
+At the foot of the hill I stopped to wonder what these sounds might
+mean. Then of a sudden appeared Bickley, who had been attending some
+urgent case, and asked me who was exploding gunpowder. I told him that I
+had no idea.
+
+"Then I have," he answered. "It is that ass Bastin up to some game. Now
+I guess why he wanted that paraffin. Listen to the row. What are they
+after?"
+
+"Sacrificing Bastin, perhaps," I replied, half in jest. "Have you your
+revolver?"
+
+He nodded. We always wore our pistols if we went out during the dark
+hours.
+
+"Then perhaps we had better go to see."
+
+We started, and had not covered a hundred yards before a girl, whom
+I recognised as one of Bastin's converts, came flying towards us and
+screaming out, "Help! Help! They kill the Bellower with fire! They cook
+him like a pig!"
+
+"Just what I expected," said Bickley.
+
+Then we ran hard, as evidently there was no time to lose. While we went
+I extracted from the terrified girl, whom we forced to show us the way,
+that as the sacrifice was about to be offered Bastin had appeared,
+and, "making fire," applied it to the god Oro, who instantly burst into
+flame. Then he ran back, calling out that the devil was dead. As he did
+so there was a loud explosion and Oro flew into pieces. His burning
+head went a long way into the air and, falling on to one of the priests,
+killed him. Thereon the other priests and the people seized the Bellower
+and made him fast. Now they were engaged in heating an oven in which to
+put him to cook. When it was ready they would eat him in honour of Oro.
+
+"And serve him right too!" gasped Bickley, who, being stout, was not a
+good runner. "Why can't he leave other people's gods alone instead of
+blowing them up with gunpowder?"
+
+"Don't know," I answered. "Hope we shall get there in time!"
+
+"To be cooked and eaten with Bastin!" wheezed Bickley, after which his
+breath gave out.
+
+As it chanced we did, for these stone ovens take a long time to heat.
+There by the edge of his fiery grave with his hands and legs bound in
+palm-fibre shackles, stood Bastin, quite unmoved, smiling indeed, in a
+sort of seraphic way which irritated us both extremely. Round him danced
+the infuriated priests of Oro, and round them, shrieking and howling
+with rage, was most of the population of Orofena. We rushed up so
+suddenly that none tried to stop us, and took our stand on either side
+of him, producing our pistols as we did so.
+
+"Thank you for coming," said Bastin in the silence which followed;
+"though I don't think it is the least use. I cannot recall that any
+of the early martyrs were ever roasted and eaten, though, of course,
+throwing them into boiling oil or water was fairly common. I take it
+that the rite is sacrificial and even in a low sense, sacramental, not
+merely one of common cannibalism."
+
+I stared at him, and Bickley gasped out:
+
+"If you are to be eaten, what does it matter why you are eaten?"
+
+"Oh!" replied Bastin; "there is all the difference in the world, though
+it is one that I cannot expect you to appreciate. And now please be
+quiet as I wish to say my prayers. I imagine that those stones will be
+hot enough to do their office within twenty minutes or so, which is not
+very long."
+
+At that moment Marama appeared, evidently in a state of great
+perturbation. With him were some of the priests or sorcerers who were
+dancing about as I imagine the priests of Baal must have done, and
+filled with fury. They rolled their eyes, they stuck out their tongues,
+they uttered weird cries and shook their wooden knives at the placid
+Bastin.
+
+"What is the matter?" I asked sternly of the chief.
+
+"This, Friend-from-the-Sea. The Bellower there, when the sacrifice
+was about to be offered to Oro at the dawn, rushed forward, and having
+thrust something between the legs of the image of the god, poured yellow
+water over it, and with fire caused it to burst into fierce flame. Then
+he ran away and mocked the god who presently, with a loud report,
+flew into pieces and killed that man. Therefore the Bellower must be
+sacrificed."
+
+"What to?" I asked. "The image has gone and the piece of it that
+ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened if the god
+had been angry with him, but on one of its own priests, whom it killed.
+Therefore, having been sacrificed by the god itself, he it is that
+should be eaten, not the Bellower, who merely did what his Spirit bade
+him."
+
+This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon Marama, but
+to the priests it did not at all appeal.
+
+"Eat them all!" these cried. "They are the enemies of Oro and have
+worked sacrilege!"
+
+Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people seemed
+to agree with them. Things began to look very ugly. The priests rushed
+forward, threatening us with their wooden weapons, and one of them even
+aimed a blow at Bickley, which only missed him by an inch or two.
+
+"Look here, my friend," called the doctor whose temper was rising, "you
+name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you not? Well, be careful,
+lest I should show you that I can kill as well as heal!"
+
+Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great bedizened
+fellow who literally was foaming at the mouth with rage, rushed forward
+again, his club raised, apparently with the object of dashing out
+Bickley's brains.
+
+Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot through
+the heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face--stone dead. There
+was consternation, for these people had never seen us shoot anything
+before, and were quite unacquainted with the properties of firearms,
+which they supposed to be merely instruments for making a noise. They
+stared, they gasped in fear and astonishment, and then they fled,
+pursued by Tommy, barking, leaving us alone with the two dead men.
+
+"It was time to teach them a lesson," said Bickley as he replaced the
+empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled him into the burning
+pit.
+
+"Yes," I answered; "but presently, when they have got over their fright,
+they will come back to teach us one."
+
+Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had taken.
+
+"What do you suggest?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Flight," I answered.
+
+"Where to--the ship? We might hold that."
+
+"No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our road
+there. To the island in the lake where they dare not follow us, for it
+is holy ground."
+
+"How are we going to live on the island?" asked Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," I replied; "but I am quite certain that if we stay here
+we shall die."
+
+"Very well," he said; "let us try it."
+
+While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin's bonds. "Thank you," he
+said. "It is a great relief to stretch one's arms after they have been
+compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do not know that I am
+really grateful. The martyr's crown was hanging above me, so to speak,
+and now it has vanished into the pit, like that man whom Bickley
+murdered."
+
+"Look here," exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, "if you say much more,
+Bastin, I'll chuck you into the pit too, to look for your martyr's
+crown, for I think you have done enough mischief for one morning."
+
+"If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that unfortunate
+man's destruction on to me--"
+
+"Oh! shut it and trot," broke in Bickley. "Those infernal savages are
+coming with your blessed converts leading the van."
+
+So we "trotted" at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin stooped down
+and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as Atalanta in Academy
+pictures is represented as doing to the apples, and bore it away in
+triumph.
+
+"I know it is scorched," he ejaculated at intervals, "but they might
+trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original false god. Now
+they can't, for there's nothing left."
+
+As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our pursuit
+was very half-hearted indeed. To begin with, now that their first rage
+was over, the Orofenans who were fond of us had no particular wish to do
+us to death, while the ardour of their sorcerers, who wished this very
+much, had been greatly cooled by the mysterious annihilation of their
+idol and the violent deaths of two of their companions, which they
+thought might be reduplicated in their own persons. So it came about
+that the chase, if noisy, was neither close nor eager.
+
+We reached the edge of the lake where was the boat-house of which I
+have spoken already, travelling at little more than a walk. Here we
+made Bastin unfasten the better of the two canoes that by good luck was
+almost filled with offerings, which doubtless, according to custom,
+must be made upon the day of this feast to Oro, while we watched against
+surprise at the boat-house door. When he was ready we slipped in and
+took our seats, Tommy jumping in after us, and pushed the canoe, now
+very heavily laden, out into the lake.
+
+Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be beyond
+wooden spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what would happen.
+All the crowd of islanders had rushed to the lake edge where they stood
+staring at us stupidly. Bastin, thinking the occasion opportune, lifted
+the hideous head of the idol which he had carefully washed, and began to
+preach on the downfall of "the god of the Grove."
+
+This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in
+the minds of his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was
+concerned--I do not know. At any rate, one of the priests shouted
+something, whereon everybody began to talk at once. Then, stooping down,
+they threw water from the lake over themselves and rubbed its sand
+and mud into their hair, all the while making genuflexions toward the
+mountain in the middle, after which they turned and departed.
+
+"Don't you think we had better go back?" asked Bastin. "Evidently my
+words have touched them and their minds are melting beneath the light of
+Truth."
+
+"Oh! by all means," replied Bickley with sarcasm; "for then their spears
+will touch us, and our bodies will soon be melting above the fires of
+that pit."
+
+"Perhaps you are right," said Bastin; "at least, I admit that you have
+made matters very difficult by your unjustifiable homicide of that
+priest who I do not think meant to injure you seriously, and really was
+not at all a bad fellow, though opinionated in some ways. Also, I do not
+suppose that anybody is expected, as it were, to run his head into the
+martyr's crown. When it settles there of itself it is another matter."
+
+"Like a butterfly!" exclaimed the enraged Bickley.
+
+"Yes, if you like to put it that way, though the simile seems a very
+poor one; like a sunbeam would be better."
+
+Here Bickley gave way with his paddle so vigorously that the canoe was
+as nearly as possible upset into the lake.
+
+In due course we reached the flat Rock of Offerings, which proved to be
+quite as wide as a double croquet lawn and much longer.
+
+"What are those?" I asked, pointing to certain knobs on the edge of the
+rock at a spot where a curved projecting point made a little harbour.
+
+Bickley examined them, and answered:
+
+"I should say that they are the remains of stone mooring-posts worn down
+by many thousands of years of weather. Yes, look, there is the cut of
+the cables upon the base of that one, and very big cables they must have
+been."
+
+We stared at one another--that is, Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+still engaged in contemplating the blackened head of the god which he
+had overthrown.
+
+
+
+Chapter IX. The Island in the Lake
+
+
+We made the canoe fast and landed on the great rock, to perceive that it
+was really a peninsula. That is to say, it was joined to the main land
+of the lake island by a broad roadway quite fifty yards across, which
+appeared to end in the mouth of the cave. On this causeway we noted
+a very remarkable thing, namely, two grooves separated by an exact
+distance of nine feet which ran into the mouth of the cave and vanished
+there.
+
+"Explain!" said Bickley.
+
+"Paths," I said, "worn by countless feet walking on them for thousands
+of years."
+
+"You should cultivate the art of observation, Arbuthnot. What do you
+say, Bastin?"
+
+He stared at the grooves through his spectacles, and replied:
+
+"I don't say anything, except that I can't see anybody to make paths
+here. Indeed, the place seems quite unpopulated, and all the Orofenans
+told me that they never landed on it because if they did they would die.
+It is a part of their superstitious nonsense. If you have any idea in
+your head you had better tell us quickly before we breakfast. I am very
+hungry."
+
+"You always are," remarked Bickley; "even when most people's appetites
+might have been affected. Well, I think that this great plateau was once
+a landing-place for flying machines, and that there is the air-shed or
+garage."
+
+Bastin stared at him.
+
+"Don't you think we had better breakfast?" he said. "There are two roast
+pigs in that canoe, and lots of other food, enough to last us a week,
+I should say. Of course, I understand that the blood you have shed has
+thrown you off your balance. I believe it has that effect, except on the
+most hardened. Flying machines were only invented a few years ago by the
+brothers Wright in America."
+
+"Bastin," said Bickley, "I begin to regret that I did not leave you to
+take part in another breakfast yonder--I mean as the principal dish."
+
+"It was Providence, not you, who prevented it, Bickley, doubtless
+because I am unworthy of such a glorious end."
+
+"Then it is lucky that Providence is a good shot with a pistol. Stop
+talking nonsense and listen. If those were paths worn by feet they
+would run to the edge of the rock. They do not. They begin there in that
+gentle depression and slope upwards somewhat steeply. The air machines,
+which were evidently large, lit in the depression, possibly as a bird
+does, and then ran on wheels or sledge skids along the grooves to the
+air-shed in the mountain. Come to the cave and you will see."
+
+"Not till we have breakfast," said Bastin. "I will get out a pig. As a
+matter of fact, I had no supper last night, as I was taking a class of
+native boys and making some arrangements of my own."
+
+As for me, I only whistled. It all seemed very feasible. And yet how
+could such things be?
+
+We unloaded the canoe and ate. Bastin's appetite was splendid. Indeed, I
+had to ask him to remember that when this supply was done I did not know
+where we should find any more.
+
+"Take no thought for the morrow," he replied. "I have no doubt it will
+come from somewhere," and he helped himself to another chop.
+
+Never had I admired him so much. Not a couple of hours before he was
+about to be cruelly murdered and eaten. But this did not seem to affect
+him in the least. Bastin was the only man I have ever known with a
+really perfect faith. It is a quality worth having and one that
+makes for happiness. What a great thing not to care whether you are
+breakfasted on, or breakfast!
+
+"I see that there is lots of driftwood about here," he remarked, "but
+unfortunately we have no tea, so in this climate it is of little use,
+unless indeed we can catch some fish and cook them."
+
+"Stop talking about eating and help us to haul up the canoe," said
+Bickley.
+
+Between the three of us we dragged and carried the canoe a long way from
+the lake, fearing lest the natives should come and bear it off with our
+provisions. Then, having given Tommy his breakfast off the scraps,
+we walked to the cave. I glanced at my companions. Bickley's face was
+alight with scientific eagerness. Here are not dreams or speculations,
+but facts to be learned, it seemed to say, and I will learn them. The
+past is going to show me some of its secrets, to tell me how men of long
+ago lived and died and how far they had advanced to that point on the
+road of civilisation at which I stand in my little hour of existence.
+
+That of Bastin was mildly interested, no more. Obviously, with half his
+mind he was thinking of something else, probably of his converts on
+the main island and of the school class fixed for this hour which
+circumstances prevented him from attending. Indeed, like Lot's wife he
+was casting glances behind him towards the wicked place from which he
+had been forced to flee.
+
+Neither the past nor the future had much real interest for Bastin; any
+more than they had for Bickley, though for different reasons. The former
+was done with; the latter he was quite content to leave in other hands.
+If he had any clear idea thereof, probably that undiscovered land
+appeared to him as a big, pleasant place where are no unbelievers or
+erroneous doctrines, and all sinners will be sternly repressed,
+in which, clad in a white surplice with all proper ecclesiastical
+trappings, he would argue eternally with the Early Fathers and in due
+course utterly annihilate Bickley, that is in a moral sense. Personally
+and as a man he was extremely attached to Bickley as a necessary and
+wrong-headed nuisance to which he had become accustomed.
+
+And I! What did I feel? I do not know; I cannot describe. An
+extraordinary attraction, a semi-spiritual exaltation, I think. That
+cave mouth might have been a magnet drawing my soul. With my body I
+should have been afraid, as I daresay I was, for our circumstances were
+sufficiently desperate. Here we were, castaways upon an island, probably
+uncharted, one of thousands in the recesses of a vast ocean, from which
+we had little chance of escape. More, having offended the religious
+instincts of the primeval inhabitants of that island, we had been forced
+to flee to a rocky mountain in the centre of a lake, where, after the
+food we had brought with us by accident was consumed, we should no doubt
+be forced to choose between death by starvation, or, if we attempted to
+retreat, at the hands of justly infuriated savages. Yet these facts did
+not oppress me, for I was being drawn, drawn to I knew not what, and if
+it were to doom--well, no matter.
+
+Therefore, none of us cared: Bastin because his faith was equal to any
+emergency and there was always that white-robed heaven waiting for him
+beyond which his imagination did not go (I often wondered whether he
+pictured Mrs. Bastin as also waiting; if so, he never said anything
+about her); Bickley because as a child of the Present and a servant of
+knowledge he feared no future, believing it to be for him non-existent,
+and was careless as to when his strenuous hour of life should end; and
+I because I felt that yonder lay my true future; yes, and my true past,
+even though to discover them I must pass through that portal which we
+know as Death.
+
+We reached the mouth of the cave. It was a vast place; perhaps the arch
+of it was a hundred feet high, and I could see that once all this
+arch had been adorned with sculptures. Protected as these were by the
+overhanging rock, for the sculptured mouth of the cave was cut deep into
+the mountain face, they were still so worn that it was impossible to
+discern their details. Time had eaten them away like an acid. But what
+length of time? I could not guess, but it must have been stupendous to
+have worked thus upon that hard and sheltered rock.
+
+This came home to me with added force when, from subsequent examination,
+we learned that the entire mouth of this cave had been sealed up for
+unnumbered ages. It will be remembered that Marama told me the mountain
+in the lake had risen much during the frightful cyclone in which we were
+wrecked and with it the cave mouth which previously had been invisible.
+From the markings on the mountain side it was obvious that something of
+the sort had happened very recently, at any rate on this eastern face.
+That is, either the flat rock had sunk or the volcano had been thrown
+upwards.
+
+Once in the far past the cave had been as it was when we found it. Then
+it had gone down in such a way that the table-rock entirely sealed the
+entrance. Now this entrance was once more open, and although of course
+there was a break in them, the grooves of which I have spoken ran on
+into the cave at only a slightly different level from that at which they
+lay upon the flat rock. And yet, although they had been thus sheltered
+by a great stone curtain in front of them, still these sculptures
+were worn away by the tooth of Time. Of course, however, this may have
+happened to them before they were buried in some ancient cataclysm, to
+be thus resurrected at the hour of our arrival upon the island.
+
+Without pausing to make any closer examination of these crumbled
+carvings, we entered the yawning mouth of that great place, following
+and indeed walking in the deep grooves that I have mentioned. Presently
+it seemed to open out as a courtyard might at the end of a passage; yes,
+to open on to some vast place whereof in that gloom we could not see the
+roof or the limits. All we knew was that it must be enormous--the echoes
+of our voices and footsteps told us as much, for these seemed to come
+back to us from high, high above and from far, far away. Bickley and I
+said nothing; we were too overcome. But Bastin remarked:
+
+
+"Did you ever go to Olympia? I did once to see a kind of play where
+the people said nothing, only ran about dressed up. They told me it was
+religious, the sort of thing a clergyman should study. I didn't think it
+religious at all. It was all about a nun who had a baby."
+
+"Well, what of it?" snapped Bickley.
+
+"Nothing particular, except that nuns don't have babies, or if they do
+the fact should not be advertised. But I wasn't thinking of that. I was
+thinking that this place is like an underground Olympia."
+
+"Oh, be quiet!" I said, for though Bastin's description was not bad, his
+monotonous, drawling voice jarred on me in that solemnity.
+
+"Be careful where you walk," whispered Bickley, for even he seemed awed,
+"there may be pits in this floor."
+
+"I wish we had a light," I said, halting.
+
+"If candles are of any use," broke in Bastin, "as it happens I have
+a packet in my pocket. I took them with me this morning for a certain
+purpose."
+
+"Not unconnected with the paraffin and the burning of the idol, I
+suppose?" said Bickley. "Hand them over."
+
+"Yes; if I had been allowed a little more time I intended--"
+
+"Never mind what you intended; we know what you did and that's enough,"
+said Bickley as he snatched the packet from Bastin's hand and proceeded
+to undo it, adding, "By heaven! I have no matches, nor have you,
+Arbuthnot!"
+
+"I have a dozen boxes of wax vestas in my other pocket," said Bastin.
+"You see, they burn so well when you want to get up a fire on a damp
+idol. As you may have noticed, the dew is very heavy here."
+
+In due course these too were produced. I took possession of them as they
+were too valuable to be left in the charge of Bastin, and, extracting
+a box from the packet, lit two of the candles which were of the short
+thick variety, like those used in carriage-lamps.
+
+Presently they burned up, making two faint stars of light which,
+however, were not strong enough to show us either the roof or the sides
+of that vast place. By their aid we pursued our path, still following
+the grooves till suddenly these came to an end. Now all around us was a
+flat floor of rock which, as we perceived clearly when we pushed
+aside the dust that had gathered thickly on it in the course of ages,
+doubtless from the gradual disintegration of the stony walls, had once
+been polished till it resembled black marble. Indeed, certain cracks
+in the floor appeared to have been filled in with some dark-coloured
+cement. I stood looking at them while Bickley wandered off to the right
+and a little forward, and presently called to me. I walked to him,
+Bastin sticking close to me as I had the other candle, as did the little
+dog, Tommy, who did not like these new surroundings and would not leave
+my heels.
+
+"Look," said Bickley, holding up his candle, "and tell me--what's that?"
+
+Before me, faintly shown, was some curious structure of gleaming rods
+made of yellowish metal, which rods appeared to be connected by wires.
+The structure might have been forty feet high and perhaps a hundred
+long. Its bottom part was buried in dust.
+
+"What is that?" asked Bickley again.
+
+I made no answer, for I was thinking. Bastin, however, replied:
+
+"It's difficult to be sure in this light, but I should think that it
+may be the remains of a cage in which some people who lived here kept
+monkeys, or perhaps it was an aviary. Look at those little ladders for
+the monkeys to climb by, or possibly for the birds to sit on."
+
+"Are you sure it wasn't tame angels?" asked Bickley.
+
+"What a ridiculous remark! How can you keep an angel in a cage? I--"
+
+"Aeroplane!" I almost whispered to Bickley.
+
+"You've got it!" he answered. "The framework of an aeroplane and a jolly
+large one, too. Only why hasn't it oxidised?"
+
+"Some indestructible metal," I suggested. "Gold, for instance, does not
+oxidise."
+
+He nodded and said:
+
+"We shall have to dig it out. The dust is feet thick about it; we can do
+nothing without spades. Come on."
+
+We went round to the end of the structure, whatever it might be, and
+presently came to another. Again we went on and came to another, all of
+them being berthed exactly in line.
+
+"What did I tell you?" said Bickley in a voice of triumph. "A whole
+garage full, a regular fleet of aeroplanes!"
+
+"That must be nonsense," said Bastin, "for I am quite sure that these
+Orofenans cannot make such things. Indeed they have no metal, and even
+cut the throats of pigs with wooden knives."
+
+Now I began to walk forward, bearing to the left so as to regain our
+former line. We could do nothing with these metal skeletons, and I
+felt that there must be more to find beyond. Presently I saw something
+looming ahead of me and quickened my pace, only to recoil. For there,
+not thirty feet away and perhaps three hundred yards from the mouth of
+the cave, suddenly appeared what looked like a gigantic man. Tommy saw
+it also and barked as dogs do when they are frightened, and the sound
+of his yaps echoed endlessly from every quarter, which scared him to
+silence. Recovering myself I went forward, for now I guessed the truth.
+It was not a man but a statue.
+
+The thing stood upon a huge base which lessened by successive steps,
+eight of them, I think, to its summit. The foot of this base may have
+been a square of fifty feet or rather more; the real support or pedestal
+of the statue, however, was only a square of about six feet. The figure
+itself was little above life-size, or at any rate above our life-size,
+say seven feet in height. It was very peculiar in sundry ways.
+
+To begin with, nothing of the body was visible, for it was swathed like
+a corpse. From these wrappings projected one arm, the right, in the hand
+of which was the likeness of a lighted torch. The head was not veiled.
+It was that of a man, long-nosed, thin-lipped, stern-visaged; the
+countenance pervaded by an awful and unutterable calm, as deep as that
+of Buddha only less benign. On the brow was a wreathed head-dress, not
+unlike an Eastern turban, from which sprang two little wings resembling
+in some degree those on the famous Greek head of Hypnos, lord of Sleep.
+Between the folds of the wrappings on the back sprang two other wings,
+enormous wings bent like those of a bird about to take flight. Indeed
+the whole attitude of the figure suggested that it was springing from
+earth to air. It was executed in black basalt or some stone of the sort,
+and very highly finished. For instance, on the bare feet and the arm
+which held the torch could be felt every muscle and even some of
+the veins. In the same way the details of the skull were perfectly
+perceptible to the touch, although at first sight not visible on the
+marble surface. This was ascertained by climbing on the pedestal and
+feeling the face with our hands.
+
+Here I may say that its modelling as well as that of the feet and the
+arm filled Bickley, who, of course, was a highly trained anatomist, with
+absolute amazement. He said that he would never have thought it possible
+that such accuracy could have been reached by an artist working in so
+hard a material.
+
+When the others had arrived we studied this relic as closely as our
+two candles would allow, and in turn expressed our opinions of its
+significance. Bastin thought that if those things down there were really
+the remains of aeroplanes, which he did not believe, the statue had
+something to do with flying, as was shown by the fact that it had wings
+on its head and shoulders. Also, he added, after examining the face, the
+head was uncommonly like that of the idol that he had blown up. It had
+the same long nose and severe shut mouth. If he was right, this was
+probably another effigy of Oro which we should do well to destroy at
+once before the islanders came to worship it.
+
+Bickley ground his teeth as he listened to him.
+
+"Destroy that!" he gasped. "Destroy! Oh! you, you--early Christian."
+
+Here I may state that Bastin was quite right, as we proved subsequently
+when we compared the head of the fetish, which, as it will be
+remembered, he had brought away with him, with that of the statue.
+Allowing for an enormous debasement of art, they were essentially
+identical in the facial characteristics. This would suggest the descent
+of a tradition through countless generations. Or of course it may have
+been accidental. I am sure I do not know, but I think it possible that
+for unknown centuries other old statues may have existed in Orofena from
+which the idol was copied. Or some daring and impious spirit may have
+found his way to the cave in past ages and fashioned the local god upon
+this ancient model.
+
+Bickley was struck at once, as I had been, with the resemblance of the
+figure to that of the Egyptian Osiris. Of course there were differences.
+For instance, instead of the crook and the scourge, this divinity held
+a torch. Again, in place of the crown of Egypt it wore a winged
+head-dress, though it is true this was not very far removed from the
+winged disc of that country. The wings that sprang from its shoulders,
+however, suggested Babylonia rather than Egypt, or the Assyrian bulls
+that are similarly adorned. All of these symbolical ideas might have
+been taken from that figure. But what was it? What was it?
+
+In a flash the answer came to me. A representation of the spirit of
+Death! Neither more nor less. There was the shroud; there the cold,
+inscrutable countenance suggesting mysteries that it hid. But the torch
+and the wings? Well, the torch was that which lighted souls to the other
+world, and on the wings they flew thither. Whoever fashioned that statue
+hoped for another life, or so I was convinced.
+
+I explained my ideas. Bastin thought them fanciful and preferred his
+notion of a flying man, since by constitution he was unable to discover
+anything spiritual in any religion except his own. Bickley agreed that
+it was probably an allegorical representation of death but sniffed at
+my interpretation of the wings and the torch, since by constitution he
+could not believe that the folly of a belief in immortality could have
+developed so early in the world, that is, among a highly civilised
+people such as must have produced this statue.
+
+What we could none of us understand was why this ominous image with its
+dead, cold face should have been placed in an aerodrome, nor in fact did
+we ever discover. Possibly it was there long before the cave was put to
+this use. At first the place may have been a temple and have so remained
+until circumstances forced the worshippers to change their habits, or
+even their Faith.
+
+We examined this wondrous work and the pedestal on which it stood as
+closely as we were able by the dim light of our candles. I was anxious
+to go further and see what lay beyond it; indeed we did walk a few
+paces, twenty perhaps, onward into the recesses of the cave.
+
+Then Bickley discovered something that looked like the mouth of a well
+down which he nearly tumbled, and Bastin began to complain that he was
+hot and very thirsty; also to point out that he wished for no more caves
+and idols at present.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," said Bickley, "these candles are burning low and
+we don't want to use up more if we can prevent it, for we may need what
+we have got very badly later on. Now, according to my pocket compass
+the mouth of this cave points due east; probably at the beginning it was
+orientated to the rising sun for purposes of astronomical observation or
+of worship at certain periods of the year. From the position of the sun
+when we landed on the rock this morning I imagine that just now it
+rises almost exactly opposite to the mouth of the cave. If this is so,
+to-morrow at dawn, for a time at least, the light should penetrate as
+far as the statue, and perhaps further. What I suggest is that we should
+wait till then to explore."
+
+I agreed with him, especially as I was feeling tired, being exhausted
+by wonder, and wanted time to think. So we turned back. As we did so I
+missed Tommy and inquired anxiously where he was, being afraid lest he
+might have tumbled down the well-like hole.
+
+"He's all right," said Bastin. "I saw him sniffing at the base of that
+statue. I expect there is a rat in there, or perhaps a snake."
+
+Sure enough when we reached it there was Tommy with his black nose
+pressed against the lowest of the tiers that formed the base of the
+statue, and sniffing loudly. Also he was scratching in the dust as a dog
+does when he has winded a rabbit in a hole. So engrossed was he in this
+occupation that it was with difficulty that I coaxed him to leave the
+place.
+
+I did not think much of the incident at that time, but afterwards it
+came back to me, and I determined to investigate those stones at the
+first opportunity.
+
+Passing the wrecks of the machines, we emerged on to the causeway
+without accident. After we had rested and washed we set to work to draw
+our canoe with its precious burden of food right into the mouth of the
+cave, where we hid it as well as we could.
+
+This done we went for a walk round the base of the peak. This proved
+to be a great deal larger than we had imagined, over two miles in
+circumference indeed. All about it was a belt of fertile land, as I
+suppose deposited there by the waters of the great lake and resulting
+from the decay of vegetation. Much of this belt was covered with
+ancient forest ending in mud flats that appeared to have been thrown
+up recently, perhaps at the time of the tidal wave which bore us to
+Orofena. On the higher part of the belt were many of the extraordinary
+crater-like holes that I have mentioned as being prevalent on the main
+island; indeed the place had all the appearance of having been subjected
+to a terrific and continuous bombardment.
+
+When we had completed its circuit we set to work to climb the peak in
+order to explore the terraces of which I have spoken and the ruins
+which I had seen through my field-glasses. It was quite true; they were
+terraces cut with infinite labour out of the solid rock, and on them
+had once stood a city, now pounded into dust and fragments. We struggled
+over the broken blocks of stone to what we had taken for a temple, which
+stood near the lip of the crater, for without doubt this mound was an
+extinct volcano, or rather its crest. All we could make out when we
+arrived was that here had once stood some great building, for its courts
+could still be traced; also there lay about fragments of steps and
+pillars.
+
+Apparently the latter had once been carved, but the passage of
+innumerable ages had obliterated the work and we could not turn these
+great blocks over to discover if any remained beneath. It was as though
+the god Thor had broken up the edifice with his hammer, or Jove had
+shattered it with his thunderbolts; nothing else would account for that
+utter wreck, except, as Bickley remarked significantly, the scientific
+use of high explosives.
+
+Following the line of what seemed to have been a road, we came to the
+edge of the volcano and found, as we expected, the usual depression out
+of which fire and lava had once been cast, as from Hecla or Vesuvius. It
+was now a lake more than a quarter of a mile across. Indeed it had been
+thus in the ancient days when the buildings stood upon the terraces, for
+we saw the remains of steps leading down to the water. Perhaps it had
+served as the sacred lake of the temple.
+
+We gazed with wonderment and then, wearied out, scrambled back through
+the ruins, which, by the way, were of a different stone from the lava of
+the mountain, to the mouth of the great cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter X. The Dwellers in the Tomb
+
+
+By now it was drawing towards sunset, so we made such preparations as we
+could for the night. One of these was to collect dry driftwood, of
+which an abundance lay upon the shore, to serve us for firing, though
+unfortunately we had nothing that we could cook for our meal.
+
+While we were thus engaged we saw a canoe approaching the table-rock and
+perceived that in it were the chief Marama and a priest. After hovering
+about for a while they paddled the canoe near enough to allow of
+conversation which, taking no notice of their presence, we left it to
+them to begin.
+
+"O, Friend-from-the-Sea," called Marama, addressing myself, "we come
+to pray you and the Great Healer to return to us to be our guests as
+before. The people are covered with darkness because of the loss of your
+wisdom, and the sick cry aloud for the Healer; indeed two of those whom
+he has cut with knives are dying."
+
+"And what of the Bellower?" I asked, indicating Bastin.
+
+"We should like to see him back also, Friend-from-the-Sea, that we may
+sacrifice and eat him, who destroyed our god with fire and caused the
+Healer to kill his priest."
+
+"That is most unjust," exclaimed Bastin. "I deeply regret the blood that
+was shed on the occasion, unnecessarily as I think."
+
+"Then go and atone for it with your own," said Bickley, "and everybody
+will be pleased."
+
+Waving to them to be silent, I said:
+
+"Are you mad, Marama, that you should ask us to return to sojourn among
+people who tried to kill us, merely because the Bellower caused fire to
+burn an image of wood and its head to fly from its shoulders, just to
+show you that it had no power to hold itself together, although you call
+it a god? Not so, we wash our hands of you; we leave you to go your
+own way while we go ours, till perchance in a day to come, after many
+misfortunes have overtaken you, you creep about our feet and with
+prayers and offerings beg us to return."
+
+I paused to observe the effect of my words. It was excellent, for both
+Marama and the priest wrung their hands and groaned. Then I went on:
+
+"Meanwhile we have something to tell you. We have entered the cave where
+you said no man might set a foot, and have seen him who sits within,
+the true god." (Here Bastin tried to interrupt, but was suppressed by
+Bickley.)
+
+They looked at each other in a frightened way and groaned more loudly
+than before.
+
+"He sends you a message, which, as he told us of your approach, we came
+to the shore to deliver to you."
+
+"How can you say that?" began Bastin, but was again violently suppressed
+by Bickley.
+
+"It is that he, the real Oro, rejoices that the false Oro, whose face is
+copied from his face, has been destroyed. It is that he commands you day
+by day to bring food in plenty and lay it upon the Rock of Offerings,
+not forgetting a supply of fresh fish from the sea, and with it all
+those things that are stored in the house wherein we, the strangers
+from the sea, deigned to dwell awhile until we left you because in your
+wickedness you wished to murder us."
+
+"And if we refuse--what then?" asked the priest, speaking for the first
+time.
+
+"Then Oro will send death and destruction upon you. Then your food shall
+fail and you shall perish of sickness and want, and the Oromatuas, the
+spirits of the great dead, shall haunt you in your sleep, and Oro shall
+eat up your souls."
+
+At these horrible threats both of them uttered a kind of wail, after
+which, Marama asked:
+
+"And if we consent, what then, Friend-from-the-Sea?"
+
+"Then, perchance," I answered, "in some day to come we may return to
+you, that I may give you of my wisdom and the Great Healer may cure your
+sick and the Bellower may lead you through his gate, and in his kindness
+make you to see with his eyes."
+
+This last clause of my ultimatum did not seem to appeal to the priest,
+who argued a while with Marama, though what he said we could not hear.
+In the end he appeared to give way. At any rate Marama called out that
+all should be done as we wished, and that meanwhile they prayed us
+to intercede with Oro in the cave, and to keep back the ghosts from
+haunting them, and to protect them from misfortune. I replied that we
+would do our best, but could guarantee nothing since their offence was
+very great.
+
+Then, to show that the conversation was at an end, we walked away with
+dignity, pushing Bastin in front of us, lest he should spoil the effect
+by some of his ill-timed and often over-true remarks.
+
+"That's capital," said Bickley, when we were out of hearing. "The enemy
+has capitulated. We can stop here as long as we like, provisioned from
+the mainland, and if for any reason we wish to leave, be sure of our
+line of retreat."
+
+"I don't know what you call capital," exclaimed Bastin. "It seems to me
+that all the lies which Arbuthnot has just told are sufficient to bring
+a judgment upon us. Indeed, I think that I will go back with Marama and
+explain the truth."
+
+"I never before knew anybody who was so anxious to be cooked and eaten,"
+remarked Bickley. "Moreover, you are too late, for the canoe is a
+hundred yards away by now, and you shan't have ours. Remember the
+Pauline maxims, old fellow, which you are so fond of quoting, and be all
+things to all men, and another that is more modern, that when you are at
+Rome, you must do as the Romans do; also a third, that necessity has no
+law, and for the matter of that, a fourth, that all is fair in love and
+war."
+
+"I am sure, Bickley, that Paul never meant his words to bear the debased
+sense which you attribute to them--" began Bastin, but at this point I
+hustled him off to light a fire--a process at which I pointed out he had
+shown himself an expert.
+
+We slept that night under the overhanging rock just to one side of the
+cave, not in the mouth, because of the draught which drew in and out
+of the great place. In that soft and balmy clime this was no hardship,
+although we lacked blankets. And yet, tired though I was, I could
+not rest as I should have done. Bastin snored away contentedly, quite
+unaffected by his escape which to him was merely an incident in the
+day's work; and so, too, slumbered Bickley, except that he did not
+snore. But the amazement and the mystery of all that we had discovered
+and of all that might be left for us to discover, held me back from
+sleep.
+
+What did it mean? What could it mean? My nerves were taut as harp
+strings and seemed to vibrate to the touch of invisible fingers,
+although I could not interpret the music that they made. Once or twice
+also I thought I heard actual music with my physical ears, and that of a
+strange quality. Soft and low and dreamful, it appeared to well from the
+recesses of the vast cave, a wailing song in an unknown tongue from the
+lips of women, or of a woman, multiplied mysteriously by echoes. This,
+however, must have been pure fancy, since there was no singer there.
+
+Presently I dozed off, to be awakened by the sudden sound of a great
+fish leaping in the lake. I sat up and stared, fearing lest it might be
+the splash of a paddle, for I could not put from my mind the possibility
+of attack. All I saw, however, was the low line of the distant shore,
+and above it the bright and setting stars that heralded the coming of
+the sun. Then I woke the others, and we washed and ate, since once the
+sun rose time would be precious.
+
+At length it appeared, splendid in a cloudless sky, and, as I had hoped,
+directly opposite to the mouth of the cave. Taking our candles and some
+stout pieces of driftwood which, with our knives, we had shaped on the
+previous evening to serve us as levers and rough shovels, we entered the
+cave. Bickley and I were filled with excitement and hope of what we knew
+not, but Bastin showed little enthusiasm for our quest. His heart was
+with his half-converted savages beyond the lake, and of them, quite
+rightly I have no doubt, he thought more than he did of all the
+archaeological treasures in the whole earth. Still, he came, bearing the
+blackened head of Oro with him which, with unconscious humour, he had
+used as a pillow through the night because, as he said, "it was after
+all softer than stone." Also, I believe that in his heart he hoped
+that he might find an opportunity of destroying the bigger and earlier
+edition of Oro in the cave, before it was discovered by the natives
+who might wish to make it an object of worship. Tommy came also, with
+greater alacrity than I expected, since dogs do not as a rule like dark
+places. When we reached the statue I learned the reason; he remembered
+the smell he had detected at its base on the previous day, which
+Bastin supposed to proceed from a rat, and was anxious to continue his
+investigations.
+
+We went straight to the statue, although Bickley passed the half-buried
+machines with evident regret. As we had hoped, the strong light of
+the rising sun fell upon it in a vivid ray, revealing all its wondrous
+workmanship and the majesty--for no other word describes it--of the
+somewhat terrifying countenance that appeared above the wrappings of the
+shroud. Indeed, I was convinced that originally this monument had been
+placed here in order that on certain days of the year the sun might
+fall upon it thus, when probably worshippers assembled to adore their
+hallowed symbol. After all, this was common in ancient days: witness
+the instance of the awful Three who sit in the deepest recesses of the
+temple of Abu Simbel, on the Nile.
+
+We gazed and gazed our fill, at least Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+occupied in making a careful comparison between the head of his wooden
+Oro and that of the statue.
+
+"There is no doubt that they are very much alike," he said. "Why,
+whatever is that dog doing? I think it is going mad," and he pointed to
+Tommy who was digging furiously at the base of the lowest step, as at
+home I have seen him do at roots that sheltered a rabbit.
+
+Tommy's energy was so remarkable that at length it seriously attracted
+our attention. Evidently he meant that it should do so, for occasionally
+he sprang back to me barking, then returned and sniffed and scratched.
+Bickley knelt down and smelt at the stone.
+
+"It is an odd thing, Humphrey," he said, "but there is a strange odour
+here, a very pleasant odour like that of sandal-wood or attar of roses."
+
+"I never heard of a rat that smelt like sandal-wood or attar of roses,"
+said Bastin. "Look out that it isn't a snake."
+
+I knelt down beside Bickley, and in clearing away the deep dust from
+what seemed to be the bottom of the step, which was perhaps four feet
+in height, by accident thrust my amateur spade somewhat strongly against
+its base where it rested upon the rocky floor.
+
+Next moment a wonder came to pass. The whole massive rock began to turn
+outwards as though upon a pivot! I saw it coming and grabbed Bickley by
+the collar, dragging him back so that we just rolled clear before the
+great block, which must have weighed several tons, fell down and crushed
+us. Tommy saw it too, and fled, though a little late, for the edge
+of the block caught the tip of his tail and caused him to emit a most
+piercing howl. But we did not think of Tommy and his woes; we did not
+think of our own escape or of anything else because of the marvel that
+appeared to us. Seated there upon the ground, after our backward tumble,
+we could see into the space which lay behind the fallen step, for there
+the light of the sun penetrated.
+
+The first idea it gave me was that of the jewelled shrine of some
+mediaeval saint which, by good fortune, had escaped the plunderers;
+there are still such existing in the world. It shone and glittered,
+apparently with gold and diamonds, although, as a matter of fact, there
+were no diamonds, nor was it gold which gleamed, but some ancient metal,
+or rather amalgam, which is now lost to the world, the same that was
+used in the tubes of the air-machines. I think that it contained gold,
+but I do not know. At any rate, it was equally lasting and even more
+beautiful, though lighter in colour.
+
+For the rest this adorned recess which resembled that of a large funeral
+vault, occupying the whole space beneath the base of the statue that was
+supported on its arch, was empty save for two flashing objects that lay
+side by side but with nearly the whole width of the vault between them.
+
+I pointed at them to Bickley with my finger, for really I could not
+speak.
+
+"Coffins, by Jove!" he whispered. "Glass or crystal coffins and people
+in them. Come on!"
+
+A few seconds later we were crawling into that vault while Bastin, still
+nursing the head of Oro as though it were a baby, stood confused outside
+muttering something about desecrating hallowed graves.
+
+Just as we reached the interior, owing to the heightening of the
+sun, the light passed away, leaving us in a kind of twilight. Bickley
+produced carriage candles from his pocket and fumbled for matches. While
+he was doing so I noticed two things--firstly, that the place really did
+smell like a scent-shop, and, secondly, that the coffins seemed to glow
+with a kind of phosphorescent light of their own, not very strong, but
+sufficient to reveal their outlines in the gloom. Then the candles burnt
+up and we saw.
+
+Within the coffin that stood on our left hand as we entered, for this
+crystal was as transparent as plate glass, lay a most wonderful old man,
+clad in a gleaming, embroidered robe. His long hair, which was parted
+in the middle, as we could see beneath the edge of the pearl-sewn and
+broidered cap he wore, also his beard were snowy white. The man was
+tall, at least six feet four inches in height, and rather spare. His
+hands were long and thin, very delicately made, as were his sandalled
+feet.
+
+But it was his face that fixed our gaze, for it was marvelous, like the
+face of a god, and, as we noticed at once, with some resemblance to
+that of the statue above. Thus the brow was broad and massive, the nose
+straight and long, the mouth stern and clear-cut, while the cheekbones
+were rather high, and the eyebrows arched. Such are the characteristics
+of many handsome old men of good blood, and as the mummies of Seti and
+others show us, such they have been for thousands of years. Only this
+man differed from all others because of the fearful dignity stamped upon
+his features. Looking at him I began to think at once of the prophet
+Elijah as he must have appeared rising to heaven, enhanced by the
+more earthly glory of Solomon, for although the appearance of these
+patriarchs is unknown, of them one conceives ideas. Only it seemed
+probable that Elijah may have looked more benign. Here there was no
+benignity, only terrible force and infinite wisdom.
+
+Contemplating him I shivered a little and felt thankful that he was
+dead. For to tell the truth I was afraid of that awesome countenance
+which, I should add, was of the whiteness of paper, although the cheeks
+still showed tinges of colour, so perfect was the preservation of the
+corpse.
+
+I was still gazing at it when Bickley said in a voice of amazement:
+
+"I say, look here, in the other coffin."
+
+I turned, looked, and nearly collapsed on the floor of the vault, since
+beauty can sometimes strike us like a blow. Oh! there before me lay all
+loveliness, such loveliness that there burst from my lips an involuntary
+cry:
+
+"Alas! that she should be dead!"
+
+A young woman, I supposed, at least she looked young, perhaps five or
+six and twenty years of age, or so I judged. There she lay, her tall and
+delicate shape half hidden in masses of rich-hued hair in colour of a
+ruddy blackness. I know not how else to describe it, since never have I
+seen any of the same tint. Moreover, it shone with a life of its own
+as though it had been dusted with gold. From between the masses of
+this hair appeared a face which I can only call divine. There was every
+beauty that woman can boast, from the curving eyelashes of extraordinary
+length to the sweet and human mouth. To these charms also were added
+a wondrous smile and an air of kind dignity, very different from the
+fierce pride stamped upon the countenance of the old man who was her
+companion in death.
+
+She was clothed in some close-fitting robe of white broidered with gold;
+pearls were about her neck, lying far down upon the perfect bosom, a
+girdle of gold and shining gems encircled her slender waist, and on her
+little feet were sandals fastened with red stones like rubies. In
+truth, she was a splendid creature, and yet, I know not how, her beauty
+suggested more of the spirit than of the flesh. Indeed, in a way, it was
+unearthly. My senses were smitten, it pulled at my heart-strings, and
+yet its unutterable strangeness seemed to awake memories within me,
+though of what I could not tell. A wild fancy came to me that I must
+have known this heavenly creature in some past life.
+
+By now Bastin had joined us, and, attracted by my exclamation and by
+the attitude of Bickley, who was staring down at the coffin with a fixed
+look upon his face, not unlike that of a pointer when he scents game, he
+began to contemplate the wonder within it in his slow way.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said. "Do you think the Glittering Lady in there is
+human?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady is dead, but I suppose that she was human in her
+life," I answered in an awed whisper.
+
+"Of course she is dead, otherwise she would not be in that glass coffin.
+I think I should like to read the Burial Service over her, which I
+daresay was never done when she was put in there."
+
+"How do you know she is dead?" asked Bickley in a sharp voice and
+speaking for the first time. "I have seen hundreds of corpses, and
+mummies too, but never any that looked like these."
+
+I stared at him. It was strange to hear Bickley, the scoffer at
+miracles, suggesting that this greatest of all miracles might be
+possible.
+
+"They must have been here a long time," I said, "for although human,
+they are not, I think, of any people known to the world to-day; their
+dress, everything, shows it, though perhaps thousands of years ago--"
+and I stopped.
+
+"Quite so," answered Bickley; "I agree. That is why I suggest that they
+may have belonged to a race who knew what we do not, namely, how to
+suspend animation for great periods of time."
+
+I said no more, nor did Bastin, who was now engaged in studying the old
+man, and for once, wonderstruck and overcome. Bickley, however, took one
+of the candles and began to make a close examination of the coffins.
+So did Tommy, who sniffed along the join of that of the Glittering Lady
+until his nose reached a certain spot, where it remained, while his
+black tail began to wag in a delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away
+and investigated.
+
+"As I thought," he said--"air-holes. See!"
+
+I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in a line
+with the face of its occupant, were a number of little holes that either
+by accident or design outlined the shape of a human mouth.
+
+"They are not airtight," murmured Bickley; "and if air can enter, how
+can dead flesh remain like that for ages?"
+
+Then he continued his search upon the other side.
+
+"The lid of this coffin works on hinges," he said. "Here they are,
+fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within could have
+pulled it down before the senses departed."
+
+"No," I answered; "for look, here is a crystal bolt at the end and it is
+shot from without."
+
+This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to examine
+the other coffin.
+
+"I've got it!" he exclaimed presently. "The old god in here" (somehow
+we all thought of this old man as not quite normal) "shut down the
+Glittering Lady's coffin and bolted it. His own is not bolted, although
+the bolt exists in the same place. He just got in and pulled down the
+lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking--for how can such things be? Let us
+get out and think."
+
+So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had begun to
+oppress us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the cave, where for
+a while we remained silent.
+
+"I am very thirsty," said Bastin presently. "Those smells seem to have
+dried me up. I am going to get some tea--I mean water, as unfortunately
+there is no tea," and he set off towards the mouth of the cave.
+
+We followed him, I don't quite know why, except that we wished to
+breathe freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and its contents
+would be as safe as they had been for--well, how long?
+
+It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and down
+enjoying it sub-consciously, for really our--that is Bickley's and my
+own--intelligences were concentrated on that sepulchre and its contents.
+Where Bastin's may have been I do not know, perhaps in a visionary
+teapot, since I was sure that it would take him a day or two to
+appreciate the significance of our discoveries. At any rate, he wandered
+off, making no remarks about them, to drink water, I suppose.
+
+Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the table-rock and we
+went to see the reason of his noise. It proved to be very satisfactory,
+for while we were in the cave the Orofenans had brought absolutely
+everything belonging to us, together with a large supply of food from
+the main island. Not a single article was missing; even our books, a can
+with the bottom out, and the broken pieces of a little pocket mirror
+had been religiously transported, and with these a few articles that had
+been stolen from us, notably my pocket-knife. Evidently a great taboo
+had been laid upon all our possessions. They were now carefully arranged
+in one of the grooves of the rock that Bickley supposed had been made by
+the wheels of aeroplanes, which was why we had not seen them at once.
+
+Each of us rushed for what we desired most--Bastin for one of the
+canisters of tea, I for my diaries, and Bickley for his chest of
+instruments and medicines. These were removed to the mouth of the cave,
+and after them the other things and the food; also a bell tent and some
+camp furniture that we had brought from the ship. Then Bastin made some
+tea of which he drank four large pannikins, having first said grace over
+it with unwonted fervour. Nor did we disdain our share of the beverage,
+although Bickley preferred cocoa and I coffee. Cocoa and coffee we had
+no time to make then, and in view of that sepulchre in the cave, what
+had we to do with cocoa and coffee?
+
+So Bickley and I said to each other, and yet presently he changed his
+mind and in a special metal machine carefully made some extremely strong
+black coffee which he poured into a thermos flask, previously warmed
+with hot water, adding thereto about a claret glass of brandy. Also he
+extracted certain drugs from his medicine-chest, and with them, as I
+noted, a hypodermic syringe, which he first boiled in a kettle and then
+shut up in a little tube with a glass stopper.
+
+These preparations finished, he called to Tommy to give him the scraps
+of our meal. But there was no Tommy. The dog was missing, and though we
+hunted everywhere we could not find him. Finally we concluded that he
+had wandered off down the beach on business of his own and would return
+in due course. We could not bother about Tommy just then.
+
+After making some further preparations and fidgeting about a little,
+Bickley announced that as we had now some proper paraffin lamps of the
+powerful sort which are known as "hurricane," he proposed by their aid
+to carry out further examinations in the cave.
+
+"I think I shall stop where I am," said Bastin, helping himself from the
+kettle to a fifth pannikin of tea. "Those corpses are very interesting,
+but I don't see any use in staring at them again at present. One can
+always do that at any time. I have missed Marama once already by being
+away in that cave, and I have a lot to say to him about my people; I
+don't want to be absent in case he should return."
+
+"To wash up the things, I suppose," said Bickley with a sniff; "or
+perhaps to eat the tea-leaves."
+
+"Well, as a matter of fact, I have noticed that these natives have
+a peculiar taste for tea-leaves. I think they believe them to be a
+medicine, but I don't suppose they would come so far for them, though
+perhaps they might in the hope of getting the head of Oro. Anyhow, I am
+going to stop here."
+
+"Pray do," said Bickley. "Are you ready, Humphrey?"
+
+I nodded, and he handed to me a felt-covered flask of the non-conducting
+kind, filled with boiling water, a tin of preserved milk, and a little
+bottle of meat extract of a most concentrated sort. Then, having lit two
+of the hurricane lamps and seen that they were full of oil, we started
+back up the cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter XI. Resurrection
+
+
+We reached the sepulchre without stopping to look at the parked machines
+or even the marvelous statue that stood above it, for what did we care
+about machines or statues now? As we approached we were astonished to
+hear low and cavernous growlings.
+
+"There is some wild beast in there," said Bickley, halting. "No, by
+George! it's Tommy. What can the dog be after?"
+
+We peeped in, and there sure enough was Tommy lying on the top of
+the Glittering Lady's coffin and growling his very best with the hair
+standing up upon his back. When he saw who it was, however, he jumped
+off and frisked round, licking my hand.
+
+"That's very strange," I exclaimed.
+
+"Not stranger than everything else," said Bickley.
+
+"What are you going to do?" I asked.
+
+"Open these coffins," he answered, "beginning with that of the old god,
+since I would rather experiment on him. I expect he will crumble into
+dust. But if by chance he doesn't I'll jam a little strychnine, mixed
+with some other drugs, of which you don't know the names, into one of
+his veins and see if anything happens. If it doesn't, it won't hurt him,
+and if it does--well, who knows? Now give me a hand."
+
+We went to the left-hand coffin and by inserting the hook on the back of
+my knife, of which the real use is to pick stones out of horses' hoofs,
+into one of the little air-holes I have described, managed to raise the
+heavy crystal lid sufficiently to enable us to force a piece of wood
+between it and the top. The rest was easy, for the hinges being of
+crystal had not corroded. In two minutes it was open.
+
+From the chest came an overpowering spicy odour, and with it a veritable
+breath of warm air before which we recoiled a little. Bickley took a
+pocket thermometer which he had at hand and glanced at it. It marked a
+temperature of 82 degrees in the sepulchre. Having noted this, he thrust
+it into the coffin between the crystal wall and its occupant. Then we
+went out and waited a little while to give the odours time to dissipate,
+for they made the head reel.
+
+After five minutes or so we returned and examined the thermometer. It
+had risen to 98 degrees, the natural temperature of the human body.
+
+"What do you make of that if the man is dead?" he whispered.
+
+I shook my head, and as we had agreed, set to helping him to lift the
+body from the coffin. It was a good weight, quite eleven stone I should
+say; moreover, it was not stiff, for the hip joints bent. We got it out
+and laid it on a blanket we had spread on the floor of the sepulchre.
+Whilst I was thus engaged I saw something that nearly caused me to loose
+my hold from astonishment. Beneath the head, the centre of the back and
+the feet were crystal boxes about eight inches square, or rather crystal
+blocks, for in them I could see no opening, and these boxes emitted a
+faint phosphorescent light. I touched one of them and found that it was
+quite warm.
+
+"Great heavens!" I exclaimed, "here's magic."
+
+"There's no such thing," answered Bickley in his usual formula. Then an
+explanation seemed to strike him and he added, "Not magic but radium
+or something of the sort. That's how the temperature was kept up. In
+sufficient quantity it is practically indestructible, you see. My word!
+this old gentleman knew a thing or two."
+
+Again we waited a little while to see if the body begun to crumble on
+exposure to the air, I taking the opportunity to make a rough sketch of
+it in my pocket-book in anticipation of that event. But it did not; it
+remained quite sound.
+
+"Here goes," said Bickley. "If he should be alive, he will catch cold in
+his lungs after lying for ages in that baby incubator, as I suppose he
+has done. So it is now or never."
+
+Then bidding me hold the man's right arm, he took the sterilized syringe
+which he had prepared, and thrusting the needle into a vein he selected
+just above the wrist, injected the contents.
+
+"It would have been better over the heart," he whispered, "but I thought
+I would try the arm first. I don't like risking chills by uncovering
+him."
+
+I made no answer and again we waited and watched.
+
+"Great heavens, he's stirring!" I gasped presently.
+
+Stirring he was, for his fingers began to move.
+
+Bickley bent down and placed his ear to the heart--I forgot to say that
+he had tested this before with a stethoscope, but had been unable to
+detect any movement.
+
+"I believe it is beginning to beat," he said in an awed voice.
+
+Then he applied the stethoscope, and added, "It is, it is!"
+
+Next he took a filament of cotton wool and laid it on the man's lips.
+Presently it moved; he was breathing, though very faintly. Bickley took
+more cotton wool and having poured something from his medicine-chest on
+to it, placed it over the mouth beneath the man's nostrils--I believe it
+was sal volatile.
+
+Nothing further happened for a little while, and to relieve the strain
+on my mind I stared absently into the empty coffin. Here I saw what had
+escaped our notice, two small plates of white metal and cut upon them
+what I took to be star maps. Beyond these and the glowing boxes which I
+have mentioned, there was nothing else in the coffin. I had no time to
+examine them, for at that moment the old man opened his mouth and began
+to breathe, evidently with some discomfort and effort, as his empty
+lungs filled themselves with air. Then his eyelids lifted, revealing a
+wonderful pair of dark glowing eyes beneath. Next he tried to sit up but
+would have fallen, had not Bickley supported him with his arm.
+
+I do not think he saw Bickley, indeed he shut his eyes again as though
+the light hurt them, and went into a kind of faint. Then it was that
+Tommy, who all this while had been watching the proceedings with grave
+interest, came forward, wagging his tail, and licked the man's face.
+At the touch of the dog's red tongue, he opened his eyes for the second
+time. Now he saw--not us but Tommy, for after contemplating him for a
+few seconds, something like a smile appeared upon his fierce but noble
+face. More, he lifted his hand and laid it on the dog's head, as
+though to pat it kindly. Half a minute or so later his awakening senses
+appreciated our presence. The incipient smile vanished and was replaced
+by a somewhat terrible frown.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley had poured out some of the hot coffee laced with
+brandy into the cup that was screwed on the top of the thermos flask.
+Advancing to the man whom I supported, he put it to his lips. He tasted
+and made a wry face, but presently he began to sip, and ultimately
+swallowed it all. The effect of the stimulant was wonderful, for in
+a few minutes he came to life completely and was even able to sit up
+without support.
+
+For quite a long while he gazed at us gravely, talking us in and
+everything connected with us. For instance, Bickley's medicine-case
+which lay open showing the little vulcanite tubes, a few instruments and
+other outfit, engaged his particular attention, and I saw at once that
+he understood what it was. Thus his arm still smarted where the needle
+had been driven in and on the blanket lay the syringe. He looked at
+his arm, then looked at the syringe, and nodded. The paraffin hurricane
+lamps also seemed to interest and win his approval. We two men, as
+I thought, attracted him least of all; he just summed us up and our
+garments, more especially the garments, with a few shrewd glances, and
+then seemed to turn his thoughts to Tommy, who had seated himself quite
+contentedly at his side, evidently accepting him as a new addition to
+our party.
+
+I confess that this behaviour on Tommy's part reassured me not a little.
+I am a great believer in the instincts of animals, especially of dogs,
+and I felt certain that if this man had not been in all essentials human
+like ourselves, Tommy would not have tolerated him. In the same way the
+sleeper's clear liking for Tommy, at whom he looked much oftener and
+with greater kindness than he did at us, suggested that there was
+goodness in him somewhere, since although a dog in its wonderful
+tolerance may love a bad person in whom it smells out hidden virtue, no
+really bad person ever loved a dog, or, I may add, a child or a flower.
+
+As a matter of fact, the "old god," as we had christened him while he
+was in his coffin, during all our association with him, cared infinitely
+more for Tommy than he did for any of us, a circumstance that ultimately
+was not without its influence upon our fortunes. But for this there was
+a reason as we learned afterwards, also he was not really so amiable as
+I hoped.
+
+When we had looked at each other for a long while the sleeper began
+to arrange his beard, of which the length seemed to surprise him,
+especially as Tommy was seated on one end of it. Finding this out and
+apparently not wishing to disturb Tommy, he gave up the occupation, and
+after one or two attempts, for his tongue and lips still seemed to be
+stiff, addressed us in some sonorous and musical language, unlike any
+that we had ever heard. We shook our heads. Then by an afterthought I
+said "Good day" to him in the language of the Orofenans. He puzzled
+over the word as though it were more or less familiar to him, and when
+I repeated it, gave it back to me with a difference indeed, but in a
+way which convinced us that he quite understood what I meant. The
+conversation went no further at the moment because just then some memory
+seemed to strike him.
+
+He was sitting with his back against the coffin of the Glittering Lady,
+whom therefore he had not seen. Now he began to turn round, and being
+too weak to do so, motioned me to help him. I obeyed, while Bickley,
+guessing his purpose, held up one of the hurricane lamps that he might
+see better. With a kind of fierce eagerness he surveyed her who lay
+within the coffin, and after he had done so, uttered a sigh as of
+intense relief.
+
+Next he pointed to the metal cup out of which he had drunk. Bickley
+filled it again from the thermos flask, which I observed excited his
+keen interest, for, having touched the flask with his hand and found
+that it was cool, he appeared to marvel that the fluid coming from it
+should be hot and steaming. Presently he smiled as though he had got
+the clue to the mystery, and swallowed his second drink of coffee and
+spirit. This done, he motioned to us to lift the lid of the lady's
+coffin, pointing out a certain catch in the bolts which at first we
+could not master, for it will be remembered that on this coffin these
+were shot.
+
+In the end, by pursuing the same methods that we had used in the
+instance of his own, we raised the coffin lid and once more were driven
+to retreat from the sepulchre for a while by the overpowering odour like
+to that of a whole greenhouse full of tuberoses, that flowed out of it,
+inducing a kind of stupefaction from which even Tommy fled.
+
+When we returned it was to find the man kneeling by the side of the
+coffin, for as yet he could not stand, with his glowing eyes fixed upon
+the face of her who slept therein and waving his long arms above her.
+
+"Hypnotic business! Wonder if it will work," whispered Bickley. Then
+he lifted the syringe and looked inquiringly at the man, who shook his
+head, and went on with his mesmeric passes.
+
+I crept round him and took my stand by the sleeper's head, that I might
+watch her face, which was well worth watching, while Bickley, with
+his medicine at hand, remained near her feet, I think engaged in
+disinfecting the syringe in some spirit or acid. I believe he was
+about to make an attempt to use it when suddenly, as though beneath the
+influence of the hypnotic passes, a change appeared on the Glittering
+Lady's face. Hitherto, beautiful as it was, it had been a dead face
+though one of a person who had suddenly been cut off while in full
+health and vigour a few hours, or at the most a day or so before. Now
+it began to live again; it was as though the spirit were returning from
+afar, and not without toil and tribulation.
+
+Expression after expression flitted across the features; indeed these
+seemed to change so much from moment to moment that they might have
+belonged to several different individuals, though each was beautiful.
+The fact of these remarkable changes with the suggestion of multiform
+personalities which they conveyed impressed both Bickley and myself very
+much indeed. Then the breast heaved tumultuously; it even appeared to
+struggle. Next the eyes opened. They were full of wonder, even of fear,
+but oh! what marvelous eyes. I do not know how to describe them, I
+cannot even state their exact colour, except that it was dark, something
+like the blue of sapphires of the deepest tint, and yet not black;
+large, too, and soft as a deer's. They shut again as though the light
+hurt them, then once more opened and wandered about, apparently without
+seeing.
+
+At length they found my face, for I was still bending over her, and,
+resting there, appeared to take it in by degrees. More, it seemed to
+touch and stir some human spring in the still-sleeping heart. At least
+the fear passed from her features and was replaced by a faint smile,
+such as a patient sometimes gives to one known and well loved, as the
+effects of chloroform pass away. For a while she looked at me with an
+earnest, searching gaze, then suddenly, for the first time moving her
+arms, lifted them and threw them round my neck.
+
+The old man stared, bending his imperial brows into a little frown,
+but did nothing. Bickley stared also through his glasses and sniffed
+as though in disapproval, while I remained quite still, fighting with
+a wild impulse to kiss her on the lips as one would an awakening and
+beloved child. I doubt if I could have done so, however, for really
+I was immovable; my heart seemed to stop and all my muscles to be
+paralysed.
+
+I do not know for how long this endured, but I do know how it ended.
+Presently in the intense silence I heard Bastin's heavy voice and
+looking round, saw his big head projecting into the sepulchre.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said, "you seem to have woke them up with a
+vengeance. If you begin like that with the lady, there will be
+complications before you have done, Arbuthnot."
+
+Talk of being brought back to earth with a rush! I could have killed
+Bastin, and Bickley, turning on him like a tiger, told him to be off,
+find wood and light a large fire in front of the statue. I think he was
+about to argue when the Ancient gave him a glance of his fierce eyes,
+which alarmed him, and he departed, bewildered, to return presently with
+the wood.
+
+But the sound of his voice had broken the spell. The Lady let her arms
+fall with a start, and shut her eyes again, seeming to faint. Bickley
+sprang forward with his sal volatile and applied it to her nostrils, the
+Ancient not interfering, for he seemed to recognise that he had to deal
+with a man of skill and one who meant well by them.
+
+In the end we brought her round again and, to omit details, Bickley gave
+her, not coffee and brandy, but a mixture he compounded of hot water,
+preserved milk and meat essence. The effect of it on her was wonderful,
+since a few minutes after swallowing it she sat up in the coffin. Then
+we lifted her from that narrow bed in which she had slept for--ah! how
+long? and perceived that beneath her also were crystal boxes of
+the radiant, heat-giving substance. We sat her on the floor of the
+sepulchre, wrapping her also in a blanket.
+
+Now it was that Tommy, after frisking round her as though in welcome of
+an old friend, calmly established himself beside her and laid his
+black head upon her knee. She noted it and smiled for the first time,
+a marvelously sweet and gentle smile. More, she placed her slender hand
+upon the dog and stroked him feebly.
+
+Bickley tried to make her drink some more of his mixture, but she
+refused, motioning him to give it to Tommy. This, however, he would not
+do because there was but one cup. Presently both of the sleepers began
+to shiver, which caused Bickley anxiety. Abusing Bastin beneath his
+breath for being so long with the fire, he drew the blankets closer
+about them.
+
+Then an idea came to him and he examined the glowing boxes in the
+coffin. They were loose, being merely set in prepared cavities in the
+crystal. Wrapping our handkerchiefs about his hand, he took them out
+and placed them around the wakened patients, a proceeding of which the
+Ancient nodded approval. Just then, too, Bastin returned with his first
+load of firewood, and soon we had a merry blaze going just outside the
+sepulchre. I saw that they observed the lighting of this fire by means
+of a match with much interest.
+
+Now they grew warm again, as indeed we did also--too warm. Then in my
+turn I had an idea. I knew that by now the sun would be beating hotly
+against the rock of the mount, and suggested to Bickley, that, if
+possible, the best thing we could do would be to get them into its
+life-giving rays. He agreed, if we could make them understand and they
+were able to walk. So I tried. First I directed the Ancient's attention
+to the mouth of the cave which at this distance showed as a white circle
+of light. He looked at it and then at me with grave inquiry. I made
+motions to suggest that he should proceed there, repeating the word
+"Sun" in the Orofenan tongue. He understood at once, though whether
+he read my mind rather than what I said I am not sure. Apparently the
+Glittering Lady understood also and seemed to be most anxious to go.
+Only she looked rather pitifully at her feet and shook her head. This
+decided me.
+
+I do not know if I have mentioned anywhere that I am a tall man and very
+muscular. She was tall, also, but as I judged not so very heavy after
+her long fast. At any rate I felt quite certain that I could carry her
+for that distance. Stooping down, I lifted her up, signing to her to
+put her arms round my neck, which she did. Then calling to Bickley and
+Bastin to bring along the Ancient between them, with some difficulty I
+struggled out of the sepulchre, and started down the cave. She was more
+heavy than I thought, and yet I could have wished the journey longer. To
+begin with she seemed quite trustful and happy in my arms, where she lay
+with her head against my shoulder, smiling a little as a child might do,
+especially when I had to stop and throw her long hair round my neck like
+a muffler, to prevent it from trailing in the dust.
+
+A bundle of lavender, or a truss of new-mown hay, could not have been
+more sweet to carry and there was something electric about the touch of
+her, which went through and through me. Very soon it was over, and we
+were out of the cave into the full glory of the tropical sun. At first,
+that her eyes might become accustomed to its light and her awakened body
+to its heat, I set her down where shadow fell from the overhanging rock,
+in a canvas deck chair that had been brought by Marama with the other
+things, throwing the rug about her to protect her from such wind as
+there was. She nestled gratefully into the soft seat and shut her eyes,
+for the motion had tired her. I noted, however, that she drew in the
+sweet air with long breaths.
+
+Then I turned to observe the arrival of the Ancient, who was being borne
+between Bickley and Bastin in what children know as a dandy-chair, which
+is formed by two people crossing their hands in a peculiar fashion. It
+says much for the tremendous dignity of his presence that even thus,
+with one arm round the neck of Bickley and the other round that of
+Bastin, and his long white beard falling almost to the ground, he still
+looked most imposing.
+
+Unfortunately, however, just as they were emerging from the cave,
+Bastin, always the most awkward of creatures, managed to leave hold with
+one hand, so that his passenger nearly came to the ground. Never shall I
+forget the look that he gave him. Indeed, I think that from this moment
+he hated Bastin. Bickley he respected as a man of intelligence and
+learning, although in comparison with his own, the latter was infantile
+and crude; me he tolerated and even liked; but Bastin he detested.
+The only one of our party for whom he felt anything approaching real
+affection was the spaniel Tommy.
+
+We set him down, fortunately uninjured, on some rugs, and also in the
+shadow. Then, after a little while, we moved both of them into the sun.
+It was quite curious to see them expand there. As Bickley said,
+what happened to them might well be compared to the development of a
+butterfly which has just broken from the living grave of its chrysalis
+and crept into the full, hot radiance of the light. Its crinkled wings
+unfold, their brilliant tints develop; in an hour or two it is perfect,
+glorious, prepared for life and flight, a new creature.
+
+So it was with this pair, from moment to moment they gathered strength
+and vigour. Near-by to them, as it happened, stood a large basket of
+the luscious native fruits brought that morning by the Orofenans, and at
+these the Lady looked with longing. With Bickley's permission, I offered
+them to her and to the Ancient, first peeling them with my fingers. They
+ate of them greedily, a full meal, and would have gone on had not the
+stern Bickley, fearing untoward consequences, removed the basket. Again
+the results were wonderful, for half an hour afterwards they seemed to
+be quite strong. With my assistance the Glittering Lady, as I still call
+her, for at that time I did not know her name, rose from the chair, and,
+leaning on me, tottered a few steps forward. Then she stood looking at
+the sky and all the lovely panorama of nature beneath, and stretching
+out her arms as though in worship. Oh! how beautiful she seemed with the
+sunlight shining on her heavenly face!
+
+Now for the first time I heard her voice. It was soft and deep, yet in
+it was a curious bell-like tone that seemed to vibrate like the sound of
+chimes heard from far away. Never have I listened to such another voice.
+She pointed to the sun whereof the light turned her radiant hair and
+garments to a kind of golden glory, and called it by some name that I
+could not understand. I shook my head, whereon she gave it a different
+name taken, I suppose, from another language. Again I shook my head and
+she tried a third time. To my delight this word was practically the same
+that the Orofenans used for "sun."
+
+"Yes," I said, speaking very slowly, "so it is called by the people of
+this land."
+
+She understood, for she answered in much the same language:
+
+"What, then, do you call it?"
+
+"Sun in the English tongue," I replied.
+
+"Sun. English," she repeated after me, then added, "How are you named,
+Wanderer?"
+
+"Humphrey," I answered.
+
+"Hum-fe-ry!" she said as though she were learning the word, "and those?"
+
+"Bastin and Bickley," I replied.
+
+Over these patronymics she shook her head; as yet they were too much for
+her.
+
+"How are you named, Sleeper?" I asked.
+
+"Yva," she answered.
+
+"A beautiful name for one who is beautiful," I declared with enthusiasm,
+of course always in the rich Orofenan dialect which by now I could talk
+well enough.
+
+She repeated the words once or twice, then of a sudden caught their
+meaning, for she smiled and even coloured, saying hastily with a wave of
+her hand towards the Ancient who stood at a distance between Bastin and
+Bickley, "My father, Oro; great man; great king; great god!"
+
+At this information I started, for it was startling to learn that
+here was the original Oro, who was still worshipped by the Orofenans,
+although of his actual existence they had known nothing for uncounted
+time. Also I was glad to learn that he was her father and not her old
+husband, for to me that would have been horrible, a desecration too deep
+for words.
+
+"How long did you sleep, Yva?" I asked, pointing towards the sepulchre
+in the cave.
+
+After a little thought she understood and shook her head hopelessly,
+then by an afterthought, she said,
+
+"Stars tell Oro to-night."
+
+So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had guessed as
+much from those plates in the coffin which seemed to have stars engraved
+on them.
+
+At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient himself
+approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged in an animated
+argument with Bastin.
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" said Bickley, "keep your theology to yourself at
+present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a temper he may
+die."
+
+"If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him that he is
+a liar," replied Bastin obstinately.
+
+"Which you did, Bastin, only fortunately he did not understand you. But
+for your own sake I advise you not to take liberties. He is not one, I
+think, with whom it is wise to trifle. I think he seems thirsty. Go and
+get some water from the rain pool, not from the lake."
+
+Bastin departed and presently returned with an aluminum jug full of pure
+water and a glass. Bickley poured some of it into a glass and handed it
+to Yva who bent her head in thanks. Then she did a curious thing. Having
+first lifted the glass with both hands to the sky and held it so for a
+few seconds, she turned and with an obeisance poured a little of it on
+the ground before her father's feet.
+
+A libation, thought I to myself, and evidently Bastin agreed with me,
+for I heard him mutter,
+
+"I believe she is making a heathen offering."
+
+Doubtless we were right, for Oro accepted the homage by a little motion
+of the head. After this, at a sign from him she drank the water. Then
+the glass was refilled and handed to Oro who also held it towards the
+sky. He, however, made no libation but drank at once, two tumblers of it
+in rapid succession.
+
+By now the direct sunlight was passing from the mouth of the cave, and
+though it was hot enough, both of them shivered a little. They spoke
+together in some language of which we could not understand a word, as
+though they were debating what their course of action should be. The
+dispute was long and earnest. Had we known what was passing, which I
+learned afterwards, it would have made us sufficiently anxious, for the
+point at issue was nothing less than whether we should or should not be
+forthwith destroyed--an end, it appears, that Oro was quite capable of
+bringing about if he so pleased. Yva, however, had very clear views of
+her own on the matter and, as I gather, even dared to threaten that she
+would protect us by the use of certain powers at her command, though
+what these were I do not know.
+
+While the event hung doubtful Tommy, who was growing bored with these
+long proceedings, picked up a bough still covered with flowers which,
+after their pretty fashion, the Orofenans had placed on the top of one
+of the baskets of food. This small bough he brought and laid at the feet
+of Oro, no doubt in the hope that he would throw it for him to fetch, a
+game in which the dog delighted. For some reason Oro saw an omen in
+this simple canine performance, or he may have thought that the dog
+was making an offering to him, for he put his thin hand to his brow and
+thought a while, then motioned to Bastin to pick up the bough and give
+it to him.
+
+Next he spoke to his daughter as though assenting to something, for I
+saw her sigh in relief. No wonder, for he was conveying his decision to
+spare our lives and admit us to their fellowship.
+
+After this again they talked, but in quite a different tone and manner.
+Then the Glittering Lady said to me in her slow and archaic Orofenan:
+
+"We go to rest. You must not follow. We come back perhaps tonight,
+perhaps next night. We are quite safe. You are quite safe under the
+beard of Oro. Spirit of Oro watch you. You understand?"
+
+I said I understood, whereon she answered:
+
+"Good-bye, O Humfe-ry."
+
+"Good-bye, O Yva," I replied, bowing.
+
+Thereon they turned and refusing all assistance from us, vanished into
+the darkness of the cave leaning upon each other and walking slowly.
+
+
+
+Chapter XII. Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!
+
+
+"You seem to have made the best of your time, old fellow," said Bickley
+in rather a sour voice.
+
+"I never knew people begin to call each other by their Christian names
+so soon," added Bastin, looking at me with a suspicious eye.
+
+"I know no other," I said.
+
+"Perhaps not, but at any rate you have another, though you don't seem to
+have told it to her. Anyway, I am glad they are gone, for I was getting
+tired of being ordered by everybody to carry about wood and water for
+them. Also I am terribly hungry as I can't eat before it is light. They
+have taken most of the best fruit to which I was looking forward, but
+thank goodness they do not seem to care for pork."
+
+"So am I," said Bickley, who really looked exhausted. "Get the food,
+there's a good fellow. We'll talk afterwards."
+
+When we had eaten, somewhat silently, I asked Bickley what he made of
+the business; also whither he thought the sleepers had gone.
+
+"I think I can answer the last question," interrupted Bastin. "I expect
+it is to a place well known to students of the Bible which even Bickley
+mentions sometimes when he is angry. At any rate, they seem to be very
+fond of heat, for they wouldn't part from it even in their coffins, and
+you will admit that they are not quite natural, although that Glittering
+Lady is so attractive as regards her exterior."
+
+Bickley waved these remarks aside and addressed himself to me.
+
+"I don't know what to think of it," he said; "but as the experience is
+not natural and everything in the Universe, so far as we know it, has a
+natural explanation, I am inclined to the belief that we are suffering
+from hallucinations, which in their way are also quite natural. It does
+not seem possible that two people can really have been asleep for an
+unknown length of time enclosed in vessels of glass or crystal, kept
+warm by radium or some such substance, and then emerge from them
+comparatively strong and well. It is contrary to natural law."
+
+"How about microbes?" I asked. "They are said to last practically for
+ever, and they are living things. So in their case your natural law
+breaks down."
+
+"That is true," he answered. "Some microbes in a sealed tube and under
+certain conditions do appear to possess indefinite powers of life. Also
+radium has an indefinite life, but that is a mineral. Only these people
+are not microbes nor are they minerals. Also, experience tells us that
+they could not have lived for more than a few months at the outside in
+such circumstances as we seemed to find them."
+
+"Then what do you suggest?"
+
+"I suggest that we did not really find them at all; that we have all
+been dreaming. You know that there are certain gases which produce
+illusions, laughing gas is one of them, and that these gases are
+sometimes met with in caves. Now there were very peculiar odours in that
+place under the statue, which may have worked upon our imaginations in
+some such way. Otherwise we are up against a miracle, and, as you know,
+I do not believe in miracles."
+
+"I do," said Bastin calmly. "You'll find all about it in the Bible if
+you will only take the trouble to read. Why do you talk such rubbish
+about gases?"
+
+"Because only gas, or something of the sort, could have made us imagine
+them."
+
+"Nonsense, Bickley! Those people were here right enough. Didn't they eat
+our fruit and drink the water I brought them without ever saying thank
+you? Only, they are not human. They are evil spirits, and for my part
+I don't want to see any more of them, though I have no doubt Arbuthnot
+does, as that Glittering Lady threw her arms round his neck when she
+woke up, and already he is calling her by her Christian name, if the
+word Christian can be used in connection with her. The old fellow had
+the impudence to tell us that he was a god, and it is remarkable that
+he should have called himself Oro, seeing that the devil they worship on
+the island is also called Oro and the place itself is named Orofena."
+
+"As to where they have gone," continued Bickley, taking no notice of
+Bastin, "I really don't know. My expectation is, however, that when
+we go to look tomorrow morning--and I suggest that we should not do so
+before then in order that we may give our minds time to clear--we shall
+find that sepulchre place quite empty, even perhaps without the crystal
+coffins we have imagined to stand there."
+
+"Perhaps we shall find that there isn't a cave at all and that we are
+not sitting on a flat rock outside of it," suggested Bastin with heavy
+sarcasm, adding, "You are clever in your way, Bickley, but you can talk
+more rubbish than any man I ever knew."
+
+"They told us they would come back tonight or tomorrow," I said. "If
+they do, what will you say then, Bickley?"
+
+"I will wait till they come to answer that question. Now let us go for
+a walk and try to change our thoughts. We are all over-strained and
+scarcely know what we are saying."
+
+"One more question," I said as we rose to start. "Did Tommy suffer from
+hallucinations as well as ourselves?"
+
+"Why not?" answered Bickley. "He is an animal just as we are, or perhaps
+we thought we saw Tommy do the things he did."
+
+"When you found that basket of fruit, Bastin, which the natives brought
+over in the canoe, was there a bough covered with red flowers lying on
+the top of it?"
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot, one bough only; I threw it down on the rock as it got
+in the way when I was carrying the basket."
+
+"Which flowering bough we all thought we saw the Sleeper Oro carry away
+after Tommy had brought it to him."
+
+"Yes; he made me pick it up and give it to him," said Bastin.
+
+"Well, if we did not see this it should still be lying on the rock, as
+there has been no wind and there are no animals here to carry it away.
+You will admit that, Bickley?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Then if it has gone you will admit also that the presumption is that we
+saw what we thought we did see?"
+
+"I do not know how that conclusion can be avoided, at any rate so far as
+the incident of the bough is concerned," replied Bickley with caution.
+
+Then, without more words, we started to look. At the spot where the
+bough should have been, there was no bough, but on the rock lay several
+of the red flowers, bitten off, I suppose, by Tommy while he was
+carrying it. Nor was this all. I think I have mentioned that the
+Glittering Lady wore sandals which were fastened with red studs that
+looked like rubies or carbuncles. On the rock lay one of these studs.
+I picked it up and we examined it. It had been sewn to the sandal-strap
+with golden thread or silk. Some of this substance hung from the hole
+drilled in the stone which served for an eye. It was as rotten as
+tinder, apparently with extreme age. Moreover, the hard gem itself was
+pitted as though the passage of time had taken effect upon it, though
+this may have been caused by other agencies, such as the action of the
+radium rays. I smiled at Bickley who looked disconcerted and even sad.
+In a way it is painful to see the effect upon an able and earnest man of
+the upsetting of his lifelong theories.
+
+We went for our walk, keeping to the flat lands at the foot of the
+volcano cone, for we seemed to have had enough of wonders and to desire
+to reassure ourselves, as it were, by the study of natural and
+familiar things. As it chanced, too, we were rewarded by sundry useful
+discoveries. Thus we found a place where the bread-tree and other
+fruits, most of them now ripe, grew in abundance, as did the yam. Also,
+we came to an inlet that we noticed was crowded with large and beautiful
+fish from the lake, which seemed to find it a favourite spot. Perhaps
+this was because a little stream of excellent water ran in here,
+overflowing from the great pool or mere which filled the crater above.
+
+At these finds we rejoiced greatly, for now we knew that we need not
+fear starvation even should our supply of food from the main island be
+cut off. Indeed, by help of some palm-leaf stalks which we wove together
+roughly, Bastin, who was rather clever at this kind of thing, managed
+to trap four fish weighing two or three pounds apiece, wading into the
+water to do so. It was curious to observe with what ease he adapted
+himself to the manners and customs of primeval man, so much so, indeed,
+that Bickley remarked that if he could believe in re-incarnation, he
+would be absolutely certain that Bastin was a troglodyte in his last
+sojourn on the earth.
+
+However this might be, Bastin's primeval instincts and abilities were of
+the utmost service to us. Before we had been many days on that island
+he had built us a kind of native hut or house roofed with palm leaves in
+which, until provided with a better, as happened afterwards, we ate and
+he and Bickley slept, leaving the tent to me. Moreover, he wove a net
+of palm fibre with which he caught abundance of fish, and made
+fishing-lines of the same material (fortunately we had some hooks) which
+he baited with freshwater mussels and the insides of fish. By means of
+these he secured some veritable monsters of the carp species that proved
+most excellent eating. His greatest triumph, however, was a decoy which
+he constructed of boughs, wherein he trapped a number of waterfowl. So
+that soon we kept a very good table of a sort, especially after he
+had learned how to cook our food upon the native plan by means of hot
+stones. This suited us admirably, as it enabled Bickley and myself to
+devote all our time to archaeological and other studies which did not
+greatly interest Bastin.
+
+By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards evening,
+so we cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly exhausted, made
+ourselves as comfortable as we could and went to sleep. Even our
+marvelous experiences could not keep Bickley and myself from sleeping,
+and on Bastin such things had no effect. He accepted them and that was
+all, much more readily than we did, indeed. Triple-armed as he was in
+the mail of a child-like faith, he snapped his fingers at evil spirits
+which he supposed the Sleepers to be, and at everything else that other
+men might dread.
+
+Now, as I have mentioned, after our talk with Marama, although we did
+not think it wise to adventure ourselves among them again at present, we
+had lost all fear of the Orofenans. In this attitude, so far as Marama
+himself and the majority of his people were concerned, we were quite
+justified, for they were our warm friends. But in the case of the
+sorcerers, the priests and all their rascally and superstitious
+brotherhood, we were by no means justified. They had not forgiven Bastin
+his sacrilege or for his undermining of their authority by the preaching
+of new doctrines which, if adopted, would destroy them as a hierarchy.
+Nor had they forgiven Bickley for shooting one of their number, or any
+of us for our escape from the vengeance of their god.
+
+So it came about that they made a plot to seize us all and hale us off
+to be sacrificed to a substituted image of Oro, which by now they had
+set up. They knew exactly where we slept upon the rock; indeed, our fire
+showed it to them and so far they were not afraid to venture, since here
+they had been accustomed for generations to lay their offerings to
+the god of the Mountain. Secretly on the previous night, without the
+knowledge of Marama, they had carried two more canoes to the borders of
+the lake. Now on this night, just as the moon was setting about three
+in the morning, they made their attack, twenty-one men in all, for the
+three canoes were large, relying on the following darkness to get us
+away and convey us to the place of sacrifice to be offered up at dawn
+and before Marama could interfere.
+
+The first we knew of the matter, for most foolishly we had neglected to
+keep a watch, was the unpleasant sensation of brawny savages kneeling on
+us and trussing us up with palm-fibre ropes. Also they thrust handfuls
+of dry grass into our mouths to prevent us from calling out, although as
+air came through the interstices of the grass, we did not suffocate. The
+thing was so well done that we never struck a blow in self-defence, and
+although we had our pistols at hand, much less could we fire a shot. Of
+course, we struggled as well as we were able, but it was quite useless;
+in three minutes we were as helpless as calves in a net and like calves
+were being conveyed to the butcher. Bastin managed to get the gag out
+of his mouth for a few seconds, and I heard him say in his slow, heavy
+voice:
+
+"This, Bickley, is what comes of trafficking with evil spirits in museum
+cases--" There his speech stopped, for the grass wad was jammed down his
+throat again, but distinctly I heard the inarticulate Bickley snort
+as he conceived the repartee he was unable to utter. As for myself, I
+reflected that the business served us right for not keeping a watch, and
+abandoned the issue to fate.
+
+Still, to confess the truth, I was infinitely more sorry to die than I
+should have been forty-eight hours earlier. This is a dull and in most
+ways a dreadful world, one, if we could only summon the courage, that
+some of us would be glad to leave in search of new adventures. But here
+a great and unprecedented adventure had begun to befall me, and
+before its mystery was solved, before even I could formulate a theory
+concerning it, my body must be destroyed, and my intelligence that was
+caged therein, sent far afield; or, if Bickley were right, eclipsed.
+It seemed so sad just when the impossible, like an unguessed wandering
+moon, had risen over the grey flats of the ascertained and made them
+shine with hope and wonder.
+
+They carried us off to the canoes, not too gently; indeed, I heard the
+bony frame of Bastin bump into the bottom of one of them and reflected,
+not without venom, that it served him right as he was the fount and
+origin of our woes. Two stinking magicians, wearing on their heads
+undress editions of their court cages, since these were too cumbersome
+for active work of the sort, and painted all over with various pigments,
+were just about to swing me after him into the same, or another canoe,
+when something happened. I did not know what it was, but as a result, my
+captors left hold of me so that I fell to the rock, lying upon my back.
+
+Then, within my line of vision, which, it must be remembered, was
+limited because I could not lift my head, appeared the upper part of the
+tall person of the Ancient who said that he was named Oro. I could only
+see him down to his middle, but I noted vaguely that he seemed to be
+much changed. For instance, he wore a different coloured dress, or
+rather robe; this time it was dark blue, which caused me to wonder where
+on earth it came from. Also, his tremendous beard had been trimmed
+and dressed, and on his head there was a simple black cap, strangely
+quilted, which looked as though it were made of velvet. Moreover,
+his face had plumped out. He still looked ancient, it is true, and
+unutterably wise, but now he resembled an antique youth, so great were
+his energy and vigour. Also, his dark and glowing eyes shone with a
+fearful intensity. In short, he seemed impressive and terrible almost
+beyond imagining.
+
+He looked about him slowly, then asked in a deep, cold voice, speaking
+in the Orofenan tongue:
+
+"What do you, slaves?"
+
+No one seemed able to answer, they were too horror-stricken at this
+sudden vision of their fabled god, whose fierce features of wood had
+become flesh; they only turned to fly. He waved his thin hand and they
+came to a standstill, like animals which have reached the end of their
+tether and are checked by the chains that bind them. There they stood
+in all sorts of postures, immovable and looking extremely ridiculous in
+their paint and feathers, with dread unutterable stamped upon their evil
+faces.
+
+The Sleeper spoke again:
+
+"You would murder as did your forefathers, O children of snakes and hogs
+fashioned in the shape of men. You would sacrifice those who dwell in my
+shadow to satisfy your hate because they are wiser than you. Come hither
+thou," and he beckoned with a bony finger to the chief magician.
+
+The man advanced towards him in short jumps, as a mechanical toy might
+do, and stood before him, his miniature crate and feathers all awry and
+the sweat of terror melting the paint in streaks upon his face.
+
+"Look into the eyes of Oro, O worshipper of Oro," said the Sleeper, and
+he obeyed, his own eyes starting out of his head.
+
+"Receive the curse of Oro," said the Ancient again. Then followed a
+terrible spectacle. The man went raving mad. He bounded into the air to
+a height inconceivable. He threw himself upon the ground and rolled upon
+the rock. He rose again and staggered round and round, tearing pieces
+out of his arms with his teeth. He yelled hideously like one possessed.
+He grovelled, beating his forehead against the rock. Then he sat up,
+slowly choked and--died.
+
+His companions seemed to catch the infection of death as terrified
+savages often do. They too performed dreadful antics, all except three
+of them who stood paralysed. They rushed about battering each other with
+their fists and wooden weapons, looking like devils from hell in
+their hideous painted attire. They grappled and fought furiously. They
+separated and plunged into the lake, where with a last grimace they sank
+like stones.
+
+It seemed to last a long while, but I think that as a matter of fact
+within five minutes it was over; they were all dead. Only the three
+paralysed ones remained standing and rolling their eyes.
+
+The Sleeper beckoned to them with his thin finger, and they walked
+forward in step like soldiers.
+
+"Lift that man from the boat," he said, pointing to Bastin, "cut his
+bonds and those of the others."
+
+They obeyed with a wonderful alacrity. In a minute we stood at liberty
+and were pulling the grass gags from our mouths. The Ancient pointed
+to the head magician who lay dead upon the rock, his hideous, contorted
+countenance staring open-eyed at heaven.
+
+"Take that sorcerer and show him to the other sorcerers yonder," he
+said, "and tell them where your fellows are if they would find them.
+Know by these signs that the Oro, god of the Mountain, who has slept a
+while, is awake, and ill will it go with them who question his power or
+dare to try to harm those who dwell in his house. Bring food day by day
+and await commands. Begone!"
+
+The dreadful-looking body was bundled into one of the canoes, that
+out of which Bastin had emerged. A rower sprang into each of them and
+presently was paddling as he had never done before. As the setting
+moon vanished, they vanished with it, and once more there was a great
+silence.
+
+"I am going to find my boots," said Bastin. "This rock is hard and I
+hurt my feet kicking at those poor fellows who appear to have come to a
+bad end, how, I do not exactly understand. Personally, I think that more
+allowances should have been made for them, as I hope will be the case
+elsewhere, since after all they only acted according to their lights."
+
+"Curse their lights!" ejaculated Bickley, feeling his throat which was
+bruised. "I'm glad they are out."
+
+Bastin limped away in search of his boots, but Bickley and I stood where
+we were contemplating the awakened Sleeper. All recollection of the
+recent tumultuous scene seemed to have passed from his mind, for he was
+engaged in a study of the heavens. They were wonderfully brilliant now
+that the moon was down, brilliant as they only can be in the tropics
+when the sky is clear.
+
+Something caused me to look round, and there, coming towards us, was she
+who said her name was Yva. Evidently all her weakness had departed also,
+for now she needed no support, but walked with a peculiar gliding motion
+that reminded me of a swan floating forward on the water. Well had we
+named her the Glittering Lady, for in the starlight literally she seemed
+to glitter. I suppose the effect came from her golden raiment, which,
+however, I noticed, as in her father's case, was not the same that she
+had worn in the coffin; also from her hair that seemed to give out a
+light of its own. At least, she shimmered as she came, her tall shape
+swaying at every step like a willow in the wind. She drew near, and
+I saw that her face, too, had filled out and now was that of one in
+perfect health and vigour, while her eyes shone softly and seemed
+wondrous large.
+
+In her hands she carried those two plates of metal which I had seen
+lying in the coffin of the Sleeper Oro. These she gave to him, then fell
+back out of his hearing--if it were ever possible to do this, a point
+on which I am not sure--and began to talk to me. I noted at once that in
+the few hours during which she was absent, her knowledge of the Orofenan
+tongue seemed to have improved greatly as though she had drunk deeply
+from some hidden fount of memory. Now she spoke it with readiness, as
+Oro had done when he addressed the sorcerers, although many of the words
+she used were not known to me, and the general form of her language
+appeared archaic, as for instance that of Spenser is compared with
+modern English. When she saw I did not comprehend her, however, she
+would stop and cast her sentences in a different shape, till at length I
+caught her meaning. Now I give the substance of what she said.
+
+"You are safe," she began, glancing first at the palm ropes that lay
+upon the rock and then at my wrists, one of which was cut.
+
+"Yes, Lady Yva, thanks to your father."
+
+"You should say thanks to me. My father was thinking of other things,
+but I was thinking of you strangers, and from where I was I saw those
+wicked ones coming to kill you."
+
+"Oh! from the top of the mountain, I suppose."
+
+She shook her head and smiled but vouchsafed no further explanation,
+unless her following words can be so called. These were:
+
+"I can see otherwise than with my eyes, if I choose." A statement that
+caused Bickley, who was listening, to mutter:
+
+"Impossible! What the deuce can she mean? Telepathy, perhaps."
+
+"I saw," she continued, "and told the Lord, my father. He came forth.
+Did he kill them? I did not look to learn."
+
+"Yes. They lie in the lake, all except three whom he sent away as
+messengers."
+
+"I thought so. Death is terrible, O Humphrey, but it is a sword which
+those who rule must use to smite the wicked and the savage."
+
+Not wishing to pursue this subject, I asked her what her father was
+doing with the metal plates.
+
+"He reads the stars," she answered, "to learn how long we have been
+asleep. Before we went to sleep he made two pictures of them, as
+they were then and as they should be at the time he had set for our
+awakening."
+
+"We set that time," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"Not so, O Bickley," she answered, smiling again. "In the divine Oro's
+head was the time set. You were the hand that executed his decree."
+
+When Bickley heard this I really thought he would have burst. However,
+he controlled himself nobly, being anxious to hear the end of this
+mysterious fib.
+
+"How long was the time that the lord Oro set apart for sleep?" I asked.
+
+She paused as though puzzled to find words to express her meaning, then
+held up her hands and said:
+
+"Ten," nodding at her fingers. By second thoughts she took Bickley's
+hands, not mine, and counted his ten fingers.
+
+"Ten years," said Bickley. "Well, of course, it is impossible, but
+perhaps--" and he paused.
+
+"Ten tens," she went on with a deepening smile, "one hundred."
+
+"O!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten hundreds, one thousand."
+
+"I say!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten times ten thousand, one hundred thousand."
+
+Bickley became silent.
+
+"Twice one hundred thousand and half a hundred thousand, two hundred and
+fifty thousand years. That was the space of time which the lord Oro, my
+father, set for our sleep. Whether it has been fulfilled he will know
+presently when he has read the book of the stars and made comparison of
+it with what he wrote before we laid us down to rest," and she pointed
+to the metal plates which the Ancient was studying.
+
+Bickley walked away, making sounds as though he were going to be ill and
+looking so absurd in his indignation that I nearly laughed. The Lady Yva
+actually did laugh, and very musical was that laugh.
+
+"He does not believe," she said. "He is so clever he knows everything.
+But two hundred and fifty thousand years ago we should have thought him
+quite stupid. Then we could read the stars and calculate their movements
+for ever."
+
+"So can we," I answered, rather nettled.
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, since you will be able to show my father if in
+one of them he is wrong."
+
+Secretly I hoped that this task would not be laid on me. Indeed, I
+thought it well to change the subject for the edification of Bickley who
+had recovered and was drawn back by his eager curiosity. Just then, too,
+Bastin joined us, happy in his regained boots.
+
+"You tell us, Lady Yva," I said, "that you slept, or should have slept
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years." Here Bastin opened his eyes.
+"If that was so, where was your mind all this time?"
+
+"If by my mind you mean spirit, O Humphrey, I have to answer that at
+present I do not know for certain. I think, however, that it dwelt
+elsewhere, perhaps in other bodies on the earth, or some different
+earth. At least, I know that my heart is very full of memories which as
+yet I cannot unroll and read."
+
+"Great heavens, this is madness!" said Bickley.
+
+"In the great heavens," she answered slowly, "there are many things
+which you, poor man, would think to be madness, but yet are truth and
+perfect wisdom. These things, or some of them, soon I shall hope to show
+you."
+
+"Do if you can," said Bickley.
+
+"Why not?" interrupted Bastin. "I think the lady's remarks quite
+reasonable. It seems to me highly improbable if really she has slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years, which, of course, I can't decide,
+that an immortal spirit would be allowed to remain idle for so long.
+That would be wallowing in a bed of idleness and shirking its duty which
+is to do its work. Also, as she tells you, Bickley, you are not half
+so clever as you think you are in your silly scepticism, and I have no
+doubt that there are many things in other worlds which would expose your
+ignorance, if only you could see them."
+
+At this moment Oro turned and called his daughter. She went at once,
+saying:
+
+"Come, strangers, and you shall learn."
+
+So we followed her.
+
+"Daughter," he said, speaking in Orofenan, I think that we might
+understand, "ask these strangers to bring one of those lamps of theirs
+that by the light of it I may study these writings."
+
+"Perhaps this may serve," said Bickley, suddenly producing an electric
+torch from his pocket and flashing it into his face. It was his form of
+repartee for all he had suffered at the hands of this incomprehensible
+pair. Let me say at once that it was singularly successful. Perhaps the
+wisdom of the ages in which Oro flourished had overlooked so small a
+matter as electric torches, or perhaps he did not expect to meet with
+them in these degenerate days. At any rate for the first and last time
+in my intercourse with him I saw the god, or lord--the native word bears
+either meaning--Oro genuinely astonished. He started and stepped back,
+and for a moment or two seemed a little frightened. Then muttering
+something as to the cleverness of this light-producing instrument,
+he motioned to his daughter to take it from Bickley and hold it in a
+certain position. She obeyed, and in its illumination he began to study
+the engraved plates, holding one of them in either hand.
+
+After a while he gave me one of the plates to hold, and with his
+disengaged hand pointed successively to the constellation of Orion, to
+the stars Castor, Pollux, Aldebaran, Rigel, the Pleiades, Sirius and
+others which with my very limited knowledge I could not recognise
+offhand. Then on the plate which I held, he showed us those same stars
+and constellations, checking them one by one.
+
+Then he remarked very quietly that all was in order, and handing the
+plate he held to Yva, said:
+
+"The calculations made so long ago are correct, nor have the stars
+varied in their proper motions during what is after all but an hour of
+time. If you, Stranger, who, I understand, are named Humphrey, should
+be, as I gather, a heaven-master, naturally you will ask me how I could
+fix an exact date by the stars without an error of, let us say, from
+five to ten thousand years. I answer you that by the proper motion of
+the stars alone it would have been difficult. Therefore I remember that
+in order to be exact, I calculated the future conjunctions of those two
+planets," and he pointed to Saturn and Jupiter. "Finding that one of
+these occurred near yonder star," and he indicated the bright orb,
+Spica, "at a certain time, I determined that then I would awake. Behold!
+There are the stars as I engraved them from my foreknowledge, upon this
+chart, and there those two great planets hang in conjunction. Daughter
+Yva, my wisdom has not failed me. This world of ours has travelled round
+the sun neither less nor more than two hundred and fifty thousand times
+since we laid ourselves down to sleep. It is written here, and yonder,"
+and he pointed, first to the engraved plates and then to the vast
+expanse of the starlit heavens.
+
+Awe fell on me; I think that even Bickley and Bastin were awed, at any
+rate for the moment. It was a terrible thing to look on a being, to all
+appearance more or less human, who alleged that he had been asleep
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years, and proceeded to prove it by
+certain ancient star charts. Of course at the time I could not check
+those charts, lacking the necessary knowledge, but I have done so since
+and found that they are quite accurate. However this made no difference,
+since the circumstances and something in his manner convinced me that he
+spoke the absolute truth.
+
+He and his daughter had been asleep for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years. Oh! Heavens, for two hundred and fifty thousand years!
+
+
+
+Chapter XIII. Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues
+
+
+The reader of what I have written, should there ever be such a person,
+may find the record marvelous, and therefore rashly conclude that
+because it is beyond experience, it could not be. It is not a wise
+deduction, as I think Bickley would admit today, because without doubt
+many things are which surpass our extremely limited experience. However,
+those who draw the veil from the Unknown and reveal the New, must expect
+incredulity, and accept it without grumbling. Was that not the fate,
+for instance, of those who in the Middle Ages, a few hundred years
+ago, discovered, or rather rediscovered the mighty movements of those
+constellations which served Oro for an almanac?
+
+But the point I want to make is that if the sceptic plays a Bickleyan
+part as regards what has been written, it seems probable that his
+attitude will be accentuated as regards that which it still remains for
+me to write. If so, I cannot help it, and must decline entirely to water
+down or doctor facts and thus pander to his prejudice and ignorance. For
+my part I cannot attempt to explain these occurrences; I only know that
+they happened and that I set down what I saw, heard and felt, neither
+more nor less.
+
+Immediately after Oro had triumphantly vindicated his stellar
+calculations he turned and departed into the cave, followed by his
+daughter, waving to us to remain where we were. As she passed us,
+however, the Glittering Lady whispered--this time to Bastin--that he
+would see them again in a few hours, adding:
+
+"We have much to learn and I hope that then you who, I understand, are a
+priest, will begin to teach us of your religion and other matters."
+
+Bastin was so astonished that he could make no reply, but when they had
+gone he said:
+
+"Which of you told her that I was a priest?"
+
+We shook our heads for neither of us could remember having done so.
+
+"Well, I did not," continued Bastin, "since at present I have found
+no opportunity of saying a word in season. So I suppose she must have
+gathered it from my attire, though as a matter of fact I haven't been
+wearing a collar, and those men who wanted to cook me, pulled off my
+white tie and I didn't think it worth while dirtying a clean one."
+
+"If," said Bickley, "you imagine that you look like the minister of
+any religion ancient or modern in a grubby flannel shirt, a battered
+sun-helmet, a torn green and white umbrella and a pair of ragged duck
+trousers, you are mistaken, Bastin, that is all."
+
+"I admit that the costume is not appropriate, Bickley, but how otherwise
+could she have learned the truth?"
+
+"These people seem to have ways of learning a good many things. But
+in your case, Bastin, the cause is clear enough. You have been walking
+about with the head of that idol and always keep it close to you. No
+doubt they believe that you are a priest of the worship of the god of
+the Grove--Baal, you know, or something of that sort."
+
+When he heard this Bastin's face became a perfect picture. Never before
+did I see it so full of horror struggling with indignation.
+
+"I must undeceive them without a moment's delay," he said, and was
+starting for the cave when we caught his arms and held him.
+
+"Better wait till they come back, old fellow," I said, laughing. "If
+you disobey that Lord Oro you may meet with another experience in the
+sacrifice line."
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Arbuthnot. I will occupy the interval in
+preparing a suitable address."
+
+"Much better occupy it in preparing breakfast," said Bickley. "I have
+always noticed that you are at your best extempore."
+
+In the end he did prepare breakfast though in a distrait fashion; indeed
+I found him beginning to make tea in the frying-pan. Bastin felt
+that his opportunity had arrived, and was making ready to rise to the
+occasion.
+
+Also we felt, all three of us, that we were extremely shabby-looking
+objects, and though none of us said so, each did his best to improve
+his personal appearance. First of all Bickley cut Bastin's and my hair,
+after which I did him the same service. Then Bickley who was normally
+clean shaven, set to work to remove a beard of about a week's growth,
+and I who wore one of the pointed variety, trimmed up mine as best I
+could with the help of a hand-glass. Bastin, too, performed on his which
+was of the square and rather ragged type, wisely rejecting Bickley's
+advice to shave it off altogether, offered, I felt convinced, because
+he felt that the result on Bastin would be too hideous for words. After
+this we cut our nails, cleaned our teeth and bathed; I even caught
+Bickley applying hair tonic from his dressing case in secret, behind a
+projecting rock, and borrowed some myself. He gave it me on condition
+that I did not mention its existence to Bastin who, he remarked, would
+certainly use the lot and make himself smell horrible.
+
+Next we found clean ducks among our store of spare clothes, for the
+Orofenans had brought these with our other possessions, and put them on,
+even adding silk cumberbunds and neckties. My tie I fastened with a pin
+that I had obtained in Egypt. It was a tiny gold statuette of very fine
+and early workmanship, of the god Osiris, wearing the crown of the Upper
+Land with the uraeus crest, and holding in his hands, which projected
+from the mummy wrappings, the emblems of the crook, the scourge and the
+crux ansata, or Sign of Life.
+
+Bastin, for his part, arrayed himself in full clerical costume, black
+coat and trousers, white tie and stick-up clergyman's collar which,
+as he remarked, made him feel extremely hot in that climate, and were
+unsuitable to domestic duties, such as washing-up. I offered to hold his
+coat while he did this office and told him he looked very nice indeed.
+
+"Beautiful!" remarked Bickley, "but why don't you put on your surplice
+and biretta?" (Being very High-Church Bastin did wear a biretta on
+festival Sundays at home.) "There would be no mistake about you then."
+
+"I do not think it would be suitable," replied Bastin whose sense of
+humour was undeveloped. "There is no service to be performed at present
+and no church, though perhaps that cave--" and he stopped.
+
+When we had finished these vain adornments and Bastin had put away the
+things and tidied up, we sat down, rather at a loose end. We should have
+liked to walk but refrained from doing so for fear lest we might dirty
+our clean clothes. So we just sat and thought. At least Bickley thought,
+and so did I for a while until I gave it up. What was the use of
+thinking, seeing that we were face to face with circumstances which
+baffled reason and beggared all recorded human experience? What Bastin
+did I am sure I do not know, but I think from the expression of his
+countenance that he was engaged in composing sermons for the benefit of
+Oro and the Glittering Lady.
+
+One diversion we did have. About eleven o'clock a canoe came from the
+main island laden with provisions and paddled by Marama and two of his
+people. We seized our weapons, remembering our experiences of the night,
+but Marama waved a bough in token of peace. So, carrying our revolvers,
+we went to the rock edge to meet him. He crept ashore and, chief though
+he was, prostrated himself upon his face before us, which told me that
+he had heard of the fate of the sorcerers. His apologies were abject. He
+explained that he had no part in the outrage of the attack, and besought
+us to intercede on behalf of him and his people with the awakened god of
+the Mountain whom he looked for with a terrified air.
+
+We consoled him as well as we could, and told him that he had best be
+gone before the god of the Mountain appeared, and perhaps treated him as
+he had done the sorcerers. In his name, however, we commanded Marama to
+bring materials and build us a proper house upon the rock, also to be
+sure to keep up a regular and ample supply of provisions. If he did
+these things, and anything else we might from time to time command,
+we said that perhaps his life and those of his people would be spared.
+This, however, after the evil behaviour of some of them of course we
+could not guarantee.
+
+Marama departed so thoroughly frightened that he even forgot to make any
+inquiries as to who this god of the Mountain might be, or where he came
+from, or whither he was going. Of course, the place had been sacred
+among his people from the beginning, whenever that may have been, but
+that its sacredness should materialise into an active god who brought
+sorcerers of the highest reputation to a most unpleasant end, just
+because they wished to translate their preaching into practice, was
+another matter. It was not to be explained even by the fact of which he
+himself had informed me, that during the dreadful storm of some months
+before, the cave mouth which previously was not visible on the volcano,
+had suddenly been lifted up above the level of the Rock of Offerings,
+although, of course, all religious and instructed persons would have
+expected something peculiar to happen after this event.
+
+Such I knew were his thoughts, but, as I have said, he was too
+frightened and too hurried to express them in questions that I should
+have found it extremely difficult to answer. As it was he departed
+quite uncertain as to whether one of us was not the real "god of the
+Mountain," who had power to bring hideous death upon his molesters.
+After all, what had he to go on to the contrary, except the word of
+three priests who were so terrified that they could give no coherent
+account of what had happened? Of these events, it was true, there was
+evidence in the twisted carcass of their lamented high sorcerer, and,
+for the matter of that, of certain corpses which he had seen, that lay
+in shallow water at the bottom of the lake. Beyond all was vague, and in
+his heart I am sure that Marama believed that Bastin was the real "god
+of the Mountain." Naturally, he would desire to work vengeance on those
+who tried to sacrifice and eat him. Moreover, had he not destroyed the
+image of the god of the Grove and borne away its head whence he had
+sucked magic and power?
+
+Thus argued Marama, disbelieving the tale of the frightened sorcerers,
+for he admitted as much to me in after days.
+
+Marama departed in a great hurry, fearing lest the "god of the
+Mountain," or Bastin, whose new and splendid garb he regarded with much
+suspicion, might develop some evil energy against him. Then we went back
+to our camp, leaving the industrious Bastin, animated by a suggestion
+from Bickley that the fruit and food might spoil if left in the sun,
+to carry it into the shade of the cave. Owing to the terrors of the
+Orofenans the supply was so large that to do this he must make no fewer
+than seven journeys, which he did with great good will since Bastin
+loved physical exercise. The result on his clerical garments, however,
+was disastrous. His white tie went awry, squashed fruit and roast pig
+gravy ran down his waistcoat and trousers, and his high collar melted
+into limp crinkles in the moisture engendered by the tropical heat. Only
+his long coat escaped, since that Bickley kindly carried for him.
+
+It was just as he arrived with the seventh load in this extremely
+dishevelled condition that Oro and his daughter emerged from the cave.
+Indeed Bastin, who, being shortsighted, always wore spectacles that,
+owing to his heated state were covered with mist, not seeing that
+dignitary, dumped down the last basket on to his toes, exclaiming:
+
+"There, you lazy beggar, I told you I would bring it all, and I have."
+
+In fact he thought he was addressing Bickley and playing off on him a
+troglodytic practical joke.
+
+Oro, however, who at his age did not appreciate jokes, resented it and
+was about to do something unpleasant when with extraordinary tact his
+daughter remarked:
+
+"Bastin the priest makes you offerings. Thank him, O Lord my father."
+
+So Oro thanked him, not too cordially for evidently he still had feeling
+in his toes, and once more Bastin escaped. Becoming aware of his error,
+he began to apologise profusely in English, while the lady Yva studied
+him carefully.
+
+"Is that the costume of the priests of your religion, O Bastin?" she
+asked, surveying his dishevelled form. "If so, you were better without
+it."
+
+Then Bastin retired to straighten his tie, and grabbing his coat
+from Bickley, who handed it to him with a malicious smile, forced his
+perspiring arms into it in a peculiarly awkward and elephantine fashion.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley and I produced two camp chairs which we had made
+ready, and on these the wondrous pair seated themselves side by side.
+
+"We have come to learn," said Oro. "Teach!"
+
+"Not so, Father," interrupted Yva, who, I noted, was clothed in yet a
+third costume, though whence these came I could not imagine. "First I
+would ask a question. Whence are you, Strangers, and how came you here?"
+
+"We are from the country called England and a great storm shipwrecked us
+here; that, I think, which raised the mouth of the cave above the level
+of this rock," I answered.
+
+"The time appointed having come when it should be raised," said Oro as
+though to himself.
+
+"Where is England?" asked Yva.
+
+Now among the books we had with us was a pocket atlas, quite a good one
+of its sort. By way of answer I opened it at the map of the world and
+showed her England. Also I showed, to within a thousand miles or so,
+that spot on the earth's surface where we spoke together.
+
+The sight of this atlas excited the pair greatly. They had not the
+slightest difficulty in understanding everything about it and the shape
+of the world with its division into hemispheres seemed to be quite
+familiar to them. What appeared chiefly to interest them, and especially
+Oro, were the relative areas and positions of land and sea.
+
+"Of this, Strangers," he said, pointing to the map, "I shall have much
+to say to you when I have studied the pictures of your book and compared
+them with others of my own."
+
+"So he has got maps," said Bickley in English, "as well as star charts.
+I wonder where he keeps them."
+
+"With his clothes, I expect," suggested Bastin.
+
+Meanwhile Oro had hidden the atlas in his ample robe and motioned to his
+daughter to proceed.
+
+"Why do you come here from England so far away?" the Lady Yva asked, a
+question to which each of us had an answer.
+
+"To see new countries," I said.
+
+"Because the cyclone brought us," said Bickley.
+
+"To convert the heathen to my own Christian religion," said Bastin,
+which was not strictly true.
+
+It was on this last reply that she fixed.
+
+"What does your religion teach?" she asked.
+
+"It teaches that those who accept it and obey its commands will live
+again after death for ever in a better world where is neither sorrow nor
+sin," he answered.
+
+When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a new
+thought and look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
+
+"Who are the heathen?" Yva asked again after a pause, for she also
+seemed to be impressed.
+
+"All who do not agree with Bastin's spiritual views," answered Bickley.
+
+"Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness of heart,
+do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose that your father
+and you are heathen," replied Bastin stoutly.
+
+This seemed to astonish them, but presently Yva caught his meaning and
+smiled, while Oro said:
+
+"Of this great matter of faith we will talk later. It is an old question
+in the world."
+
+"Why," went on Yva, "if you wished to travel so far did you come in a
+ship that so easily is wrecked? Why did you not journey through the air,
+or better still, pass through space, leaving your bodies asleep, as,
+being instructed, doubtless you can do?"
+
+"As regards your first question," I answered, "there are no aircraft
+known that can make so long a journey."
+
+"And as regards the second," broke in Bickley, "we did not do so because
+it is impossible for men to transfer themselves to other places through
+space either with or without their bodies."
+
+At this information the Glittering Lady lifted her arched eyebrows and
+smiled a little, while Oro said:
+
+"I perceive that the new world has advanced but a little way on the road
+of knowledge."
+
+Fearing that Bastin was about to commence an argument, I began to ask
+questions in my turn.
+
+"Lord Oro and Lady Yva," I said, "we have told you something of
+ourselves and will tell you more when you desire it. But pardon us if
+first we pray you to tell us what we burn to know. Who are you? Of what
+race and country? And how came it that we found you sleeping yonder?"
+
+"If it be your pleasure, answer, my Father," said Yva.
+
+Oro thought a moment, then replied in a calm voice:
+
+"I am a king who once ruled most of the world as it was in my day,
+though it is true that much of it rebelled against me, my councillors
+and servants. Therefore I destroyed the world as it was then, save only
+certain portions whence life might spread to the new countries that I
+raised up. Having done this I put myself and my daughter to sleep for a
+space of two hundred and fifty thousand years, that there might be time
+for fresh civilisations to arise. Now I begin to think that I did not
+allot a sufficiency of ages, since I perceive from what you tell me,
+that the learning of the new races is as yet but small."
+
+Bickley and I looked at each other and were silent. Mentally we had
+collapsed. Who could begin to discuss statements built upon such a
+foundation of gigantic and paralysing falsehoods?
+
+Well, Bastin could for one. With no more surprise in his voice than if
+he were talking about last night's dinner, he said:
+
+"There must be a mistake somewhere, or perhaps I misunderstand you. It
+is obvious that you, being a man, could not have destroyed the world.
+That could only be done by the Power which made it and you."
+
+I trembled for the results of Bastin's methods of setting out the truth.
+To my astonishment, however, Oro replied:
+
+"You speak wisely, Priest, but the Power you name may use instruments to
+accomplish its decrees. I am such an instrument."
+
+"Quite so," said Bastin, "just like anybody else. You have more
+knowledge of the truth than I thought. But pray, how did you destroy the
+world?"
+
+"Using my wisdom to direct the forces that are at work in the heart of
+this great globe, I drowned it with a deluge, causing one part to sink
+and another to rise, also changes of climate which completed the work."
+
+"That's quite right," exclaimed Bastin delightedly. "We know all about
+the Deluge, only you are not mentioned in connection with the matter. A
+man, Noah, had to do with it when he was six hundred years old."
+
+"Six hundred?" said Oro. "That is not very old. I myself had seen more
+than a thousand years when I lay down to sleep."
+
+"A thousand!" remarked Bastin, mildly interested. "That is unusual,
+though some of these mighty men of renown we know lived over nine
+hundred."
+
+Here Bickley snorted and exclaimed:
+
+"Nine hundred moons, he means."
+
+"I did not know Noah," went on Oro. "Perhaps he lived after my time and
+caused some other local deluge. Is there anything else you wish to ask
+me before I leave you that I may study this map writing?"
+
+"Yes," said Bastin. "Why were you allowed to drown your world?"
+
+"Because it was evil, Priest, and disobeyed me and the Power I serve."
+
+"Oh! thank you," said Bastin, "that fits in exactly. It was just the
+same in Noah's time."
+
+"I pray that it is not just the same now," said Oro, rising. "To-morrow
+we will return, or if I do not who have much that I must do, the lady my
+daughter will return and speak with you further."
+
+He departed into the cave, Yva following at a little distance.
+
+I accompanied her as far as the mouth of the cave, as did Tommy, who
+all this time had been sitting contentedly upon the hem of her gorgeous
+robe, quite careless of its immemorial age, if it was immemorial and not
+woven yesterday, a point on which I had no information.
+
+"Lady Yva," I said, "did I rightly understand the Lord Oro to say that
+he was a thousand years old?"
+
+"Yes, O Humphrey, and really he is more, or so I think."
+
+"Then are you a thousand years old also?" I asked, aghast.
+
+"No, no," she replied, shaking her head, "I am young, quite young, for I
+do not count my time of sleep."
+
+"Certainly you look it," I said. "But what, Lady Yva, do you mean by
+young?"
+
+She answered my question by another.
+
+"What age are your women when they are as I am?"
+
+"None of our women were ever quite like you, Lady Yva. Yet, say from
+twenty-five to thirty years of age."
+
+"Ah! I have been counting and now I remember. When my father sent me to
+sleep I was twenty-seven years old. No, I will not deceive you, I was
+twenty-seven years and three moons." Then, saying something to the
+effect that she would return, she departed, laughing a little in a
+mischievous way, and, although I did not observe this till afterwards,
+Tommy departed with her.
+
+When I repeated what she had said to Bastin and Bickley, who were
+standing at a distance straining their ears and somewhat aggrieved, the
+former remarked:
+
+"If she is twenty-seven her father must have married late in life,
+though of course it may have been a long while before he had children."
+
+Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while, went off
+like a bomb.
+
+"Do you tell us, Bastin," he asked, "that you believe one word of
+all this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan being a
+thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the rest?"
+
+"If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it at
+present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept warm by
+a pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of the
+constellations at the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do most things."
+
+"Even cause the Deluge," jeered Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about the Deluge, but perhaps he may have been permitted
+to cause a deluge. Why not? You can't look at things from far enough
+off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you, you conclude that
+therefore it is impossible. The same Power which gives you skill to
+succeed in an operation, that hitherto was held impracticable, as I know
+you have done once or twice, may have given that old fellow power to
+cause a deluge. You should measure the universe and its possibilities by
+worlds and not by acres, Bickley."
+
+"And believe, I suppose, that a man can live a thousand years, whereas
+we know well that he cannot live more than about a hundred."
+
+"You don't know anything of the sort, Bickley. All you know is that
+over the brief period of history with which we are acquainted, say ten
+thousand years at most, men have only lived to about a hundred. But the
+very rocks which you are so fond of talking about, tell us that even
+this planet is millions upon millions of years of age. Who knows then
+but that at some time in its history, men did not live for a thousand
+years, and that lost civilisations did not exist of which this Oro and
+his daughter may be two survivors?"
+
+"There is no proof of anything of the sort," said Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about proof, as you understand it, though I have read in
+Plato of a continent called Atlantis that was submerged, according to
+the story of old Egyptian priests. But personally I have every proof,
+for it is all written down in the Bible at which you turn tip your nose,
+and I am very glad that I have been lucky enough to come across this
+unexpected confirmation of the story. Not that it matters much, since I
+should have learned all about it when it pleases Providence to remove me
+to a better world, which in our circumstances may happen any day. Now I
+must change my clothes before I see to the cooking and other things."
+
+"I am bound to admit," said Bickley, looking after him, "that old Bastin
+is not so stupid as he seems. From his point of view the arguments he
+advances are quite logical. Moreover I think he is right when he says
+that we look at things through the wrong end of the telescope. After all
+the universe is very big and who knows what may happen there? Who knows
+even what may have happened on this little earth during the aeons of its
+existence, whenever its balance chanced to shift, as the Ice Ages show
+us it has often done? Still I believe that old Oro to be a Prince of
+Liars."
+
+"That remains to be proved," I answered cautiously. "All I know is that
+he is a wonderfully learned person of most remarkable appearance, and
+that his daughter is the loveliest creature I ever saw."
+
+"There I agree," said Bickley decidedly, "and as brilliant as she is
+lovely. If she belongs to a past civilisation, it is a pity that it ever
+became extinct. Now let's go and have a nap. Bastin will call us when
+supper is ready."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIV. The Under-world
+
+
+That night we slept well and without fear, being quite certain that
+after their previous experience the Orofenans would make no further
+attempts upon us. Indeed our only anxiety was for Tommy, whom we could
+not find when the time came to give him his supper. Bastin, however,
+seemed to remember having seen him following the Glittering Lady into
+the cave. This, of course, was possible, as certainly he had taken an
+enormous fancy to her and sat himself down as close to her as he could
+on every occasion. He even seemed to like the ancient Oro, and was not
+afraid to jump up and plant his dirty paws upon that terrific person's
+gorgeous robe. Moreover Oro liked him, for several times I observed him
+pat the dog upon the head; as I think I have said, the only human touch
+that I had perceived about him. So we gave up searching and calling in
+the hope that he was safe with our supernatural friends.
+
+The next morning quite early the Lady Yva appeared alone; no, not alone,
+for with her came our lost Tommy looking extremely spry and well at
+ease. The faithless little wretch just greeted us in a casual fashion
+and then went and sat by Yva. In fact when the awkward Bastin managed
+to stumble over the end of her dress Tommy growled at him and showed his
+teeth. Moreover the dog was changed. He was blessed with a shiny black
+coat, but now this coat sparkled in the sunlight, like the Lady Yva's
+hair.
+
+"The Glittering Lady is all very well, but I'm not sure that I care
+for a glittering dog. It doesn't look quite natural," said Bastin,
+contemplating him.
+
+"Why does Tommy shine, Lady?" I asked.
+
+"Because I washed him in certain waters that we have, so that now he
+looks beautiful and smells sweet," she answered, laughing.
+
+It was true, the dog did smell sweet, which I may add had not always
+been the case with him, especially when there were dead fish about. Also
+he appeared to have been fed, for he turned up his nose at the bits we
+had saved for his breakfast.
+
+"He has drunk of the Life-water," explained Yva, "and will want no food
+for two days."
+
+Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked incredulous.
+
+"You do not believe, O Bickley," she said, studying him gravely.
+"Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I tell you many
+lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He is not sure; he thinks
+to himself, I will wait and find out whether or no these funny people
+cheat me."
+
+Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were contrary
+to experience, also that Tommy in a general way was rather a greedy
+little dog.
+
+"You, too, like to eat, Bickley" (this was true, he had an excellent
+appetite), "but when you have drunk the Life-water you will care much
+less."
+
+"I am glad to hear it," interrupted Bastin, "for Bickley wants a lot of
+cooking done, and I find it tedious."
+
+"You eat also, Lady," said Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I eat sometimes because I like it, but I can go weeks and not
+eat, when I have the Life-water. Just now, after so long a sleep, I am
+hungry. Please give me some of that fruit. No, not the flesh, flesh I
+hate."
+
+We handed it to her. She took two plantains, peeled and ate them with
+extraordinary grace. Indeed she reminded me, I do not know why, of some
+lovely butterfly drawing its food from a flower.
+
+While she ate she observed us closely; nothing seemed to escape the
+quick glances of those beautiful eyes. Presently she said:
+
+"What, O Humphrey, is that with which you fasten your neckdress?" and
+she pointed to the little gold statue of Osiris that I used as a pin.
+
+I told her that it was a statuette of a god named Osiris and very, very
+ancient, probably quite five thousand years old, a statement at which
+she smiled a little; also that it came from Egypt.
+
+"Ah!" she answered, "is it so? I asked because we have figures that
+are very like to that one, and they also hold in their hands a staff
+surmounted by a loop. They are figures of Sleep's brother--Death."
+
+"So is this," I said. "Among the Egyptians Osiris was the god of Death."
+
+She nodded and replied that doubtless the symbol had come down to them.
+
+"One day you shall take me to see this land which you call so very old.
+Or I will take you, which would be quicker," she added.
+
+We all bowed and said we should be delighted. Even Bastin appeared
+anxious to revisit Egypt in such company, though when he was there
+it seemed to bore him. But what she meant about taking us I could not
+guess. Nor had we time to ask her, for she went on, watching our faces
+as she spoke.
+
+"The Lord Oro sends you a message, Strangers. He asks whether it is your
+wish to see where we dwell. He adds that you are not to come if you do
+not desire, or if you fear danger."
+
+We all answered that there was nothing we should like better, but Bastin
+added that he had already seen the tomb.
+
+"Do you think, Bastin, that we live in a tomb because we slept there for
+a while, awaiting the advent of you wanderers at the appointed hour?"
+
+"I don't see where else it could be, unless it is further down that
+cave," said Bastin. "The top of the mountain would not be convenient as
+a residence."
+
+"It has not been convenient for many an age, for reasons that I will
+show you. Think now, before you come. You have naught to fear from us,
+and I believe that no harm will happen to you. But you will see many
+strange things that will anger Bickley because he cannot understand
+them, and perhaps will weary Bastin because his heart turns from what
+is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey will rejoice in them because
+the doors of his soul are open and he longs--what do you long for,
+Humphrey?"
+
+"That which I have lost and fear I shall never find again," I answered
+boldly.
+
+"I know that you have lost many things--last night, for instance,
+you lost Tommy, and when he slept with me he told me much about you
+and--others."
+
+"This is ridiculous," broke in Bastin. "Can a dog talk?"
+
+"Everything can talk, if you understand its language, Bastin. But keep a
+good heart, Humphrey, for the bold seeker finds in the end. Oh! foolish
+man, do you not understand that all is yours if you have but the soul to
+conceive and the will to grasp? All, all, below, between, above! Even I
+know that, I who have so much to learn."
+
+So she spoke and became suddenly magnificent. Her face which had been
+but that of a super-lovely woman, took on grandeur. Her bosom swelled;
+her presence radiated some subtle power, much as her hair radiated
+light.
+
+In a moment it was gone and she was smiling and jesting.
+
+"Will you come, Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go, down to
+the Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun? Perhaps you will do
+better to stay here in the sun, for the Under-world has terrors for weak
+hearts that were born but yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble in the
+dark."
+
+"I shall take my electric torch," said Bastin with decision, "and I
+advise you fellows to do the same. I always hated cellars, and the
+catacombs at Rome are worse, though full of sacred interest."
+
+Then we started, Tommy frisking on ahead in a most provoking way as
+though he were bored by a visit to a strange house and going home, and
+Yva gliding forward with a smile upon her face that was half mystic and
+half mischievous. We passed the remains of the machines, and Bickley
+asked her what they were.
+
+"Carriages in which once we travelled through the skies, until we found
+a better way, and that the uninstructed used till the end," she answered
+carelessly, leaving me wondering what on earth she meant.
+
+We came to the statue and the sepulchre beneath without trouble, for the
+glint of her hair, and I may add of Tommy's back, were quite sufficient
+to guide us through the gloom. The crystal coffins were still there, for
+Bastin flashed his torch and we saw them, but the boxes of radium had
+gone.
+
+"Let that light die," she said to Bastin. "Humphrey, give me your right
+hand and give your left to Bickley. Let Bastin cling to him and fear
+nothing."
+
+We passed to the end of the tomb and stood against what appeared to be a
+rock wall, all close together, as she directed.
+
+"Fear nothing," she said again, but next second I was never more full
+of fear in my life, for we were whirling downwards at a speed that would
+have made an American elevator attendant turn pale.
+
+"Don't choke me," I heard Bickley say to Bastin, and the latter's
+murmured reply of:
+
+"I never could bear these moving staircases and tubelifts. They always
+make me feel sick."
+
+I admit that for my part I also felt rather sick and clung tightly to
+the hand of the Glittering Lady. She, however, placed her other hand
+upon my shoulder, saying in a low voice:
+
+"Did I not tell you to have no fear?"
+
+Then I felt comforted, for somehow I knew that it was not her desire
+to harm and much less to destroy me. Also Tommy was seated quite at his
+ease with his head resting against my leg, and his absence of alarm was
+reassuring. The only stoic of the party was Bickley. I have no doubt
+that he was quite as frightened as we were, but rather than show it he
+would have died.
+
+"I presume this machinery is pneumatic," he began when suddenly and
+without shock, we arrived at the end of our journey. How far we had
+fallen I am sure I do not know, but I should judge from the awful speed
+at which we travelled, that it must have been several thousand feet,
+probably four or five.
+
+"Everything seems steady now," remarked Bastin, "so I suppose this
+luggage lift has stopped. The odd thing is that I can't see anything
+of it. There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be standing on a level
+floor."
+
+"The odd thing is," said Bickley, "that we can see at all. Where the
+devil does the light come from thousands of feet underground?"
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, "unless there is natural gas here, as I
+am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in Canada."
+
+"Natural gas be blowed," said Bickley. "It is more like moonlight
+magnified ten times."
+
+So it was. The whole place was filled with a soft radiance, equal to
+that of the sun at noon, but gentler and without heat.
+
+"Where does it come from?" I whispered to Yva.
+
+"Oh!" she replied, as I thought evasively. "It is the light of the
+Under-world which we know how to use. The earth is full of light, which
+is not wonderful, is it, seeing that its heart is fire? Now look about
+you."
+
+I looked and leant on her harder than ever, since amazement made me
+weak. We were in some vast place whereof the roof seemed almost as far
+off as the sky at night. At least all that I could make out was a dim
+and distant arch which might have been one of cloud. For the rest, in
+every direction stretched vastness, illuminated far as the eye could
+reach by the soft light of which I have spoken, that is, probably for
+several miles. But this vastness was not empty. On the contrary it was
+occupied by a great city. There were streets much wider than Piccadilly,
+all bordered by houses, though these, I observed, were roofless, very
+fine houses, some of them, built of white stone or marble. There were
+roadways and pavements worn by the passage of feet. There, farther on,
+were market-places or public squares, and there, lastly, was a huge
+central enclosure one or two hundred acres in extent, which was filled
+with majestic buildings that looked like palaces, or town-halls; and, in
+the midst of them all, a vast temple with courts and a central dome. For
+here, notwithstanding the lack of necessity, its builders seemed to have
+adhered to the Over-world tradition, and had roofed their fane.
+
+And now came the terror. All of this enormous city was dead. Had it
+stood upon the moon it could not have been more dead. None paced its
+streets; none looked from its window-places. None trafficked in its
+markets, none worshipped in its temple. Swept, garnished, lighted,
+practically untouched by the hand of Time, here where no rains fell and
+no winds blew, it was yet a howling wilderness. For what wilderness is
+there to equal that which once has been the busy haunt of men? Let
+those who have stood among the buried cities of Central Asia, or of
+Anarajapura in Ceylon, or even amid the ruins of Salamis on the coast
+of Cyprus, answer the question. But here was something infinitely more
+awful. A huge human haunt in the bowels of the earth utterly devoid of
+human beings, and yet as perfect as on the day when these ceased to be.
+
+"I do not care for underground localities," remarked Bastin, his gruff
+voice echoing strangely in that terrible silence, "but it does seem a
+pity that all these fine buildings should be wasted. I suppose their
+inhabitants left them in search of fresh air."
+
+"Why did they leave them?" I asked of Yva.
+
+"Because death took them," she answered solemnly. "Even those who live a
+thousand years die at last, and if they have no children, with them dies
+the race."
+
+"Then were you the last of your people?" I asked.
+
+"Inquire of my father," she replied, and led the way through the massive
+arch of a great building.
+
+It led into a walled courtyard in the centre of which was a plain cupola
+of marble with a gate of some pale metal that looked like platinum mixed
+with gold. This gate stood open. Within it was the statue of a woman
+beautifully executed in white marble and set in a niche of some black
+stone. The figure was draped as though to conceal the shape, and the
+face was stern and majestic rather than beautiful. The eyes of the
+statue were cunningly made of some enamel which gave them a strange and
+lifelike appearance. They stared upwards as though looking away from the
+earth and its concerns. The arms were outstretched. In the right hand
+was a cup of black marble, in the left a similar cup of white marble.
+From each of these cups trickled a thin stream of sparkling water, which
+two streams met and mingled at a distance of about three feet beneath
+the cups. Then they fell into a metal basin which, although it must have
+been quite a foot thick, was cut right through by their constant impact,
+and apparently vanished down some pipe beneath. Out of this metal basin
+Tommy, who gambolled into the place ahead of us, began to drink in a
+greedy and demonstrative fashion.
+
+"The Life-water?" I said, looking at our guide.
+
+She nodded and asked in her turn:
+
+"What is the statue and what does it signify, Humphrey?"
+
+I hesitated, but Bastin answered:
+
+"Just a rather ugly woman who hid up her figure because it was bad.
+Probably she was a relation of the artist who wished to have her
+likeness done and sat for nothing."
+
+"The goddess of Health," suggested Bickley. "Her proportions are
+perfect; a robust, a thoroughly normal woman."
+
+"Now, Humphrey," said Yva.
+
+I stared at the work and had not an idea. Then it flashed on me with
+such suddenness and certainty that I am convinced the answer to the
+riddle was passed to me from her and did not originate in my own mind.
+
+"It seems quite easy," I said in a superior tone. "The figure symbolises
+Life and is draped because we only see the face of Life, the rest is
+hidden. The arms are bare because Life is real and active. One cup is
+black and one is white because Life brings both good and evil gifts;
+that is why the streams mingle, to be lost beneath in the darkness of
+death. The features are stern and even terrifying rather than lovely,
+because such is the aspect of Life. The eyes look upward and far away
+from present things, because the real life is not here."
+
+"Of course one may say anything," said Bastin, "but I don't understand
+all that."
+
+"Imagination goes a long way," broke in Bickley, who was vexed that he
+had not thought of this interpretation himself. But Yva said:
+
+"I begin to think that you are quite clever, Humphrey. I wonder whence
+the truth came to you, for such is the meaning of the figure and the
+cups. Had I told it to you myself, it could not have been better said,"
+and she glanced at me out of the corners of her eyes. "Now, Strangers,
+will you drink? Once that gate was guarded, and only at a great price or
+as a great reward were certain of the Highest Blood given the freedom of
+this fountain which might touch no common lips. Indeed it was one of the
+causes of our last war, for all the world which was, desired this water
+which now is lapped by a stranger's hound."
+
+"I suppose there is nothing medicinal in it?" said Bastin. "Once when I
+was very thirsty, I made a mistake and drank three tumblers of something
+of the sort in the dark, thinking that it was Apollinaris, and I don't
+want to do it again."
+
+"Just the sort of thing you would do," said Bickley. "But, Lady Yva,
+what are the properties of this water?"
+
+"It is very health-giving," she answered, "and if drunk continually, not
+less than once each thirty days, it wards off sickness, lessens hunger
+and postpones death for many, many years. That is why those of the High
+Blood endured so long and became the rulers of the world, and that, as
+I have said, is the greatest of the reasons why the peoples who dwelt in
+the ancient outer countries and never wished to die, made war upon them,
+to win this secret fountain. Have no fear, O Bastin, for see, I will
+pledge you in this water."
+
+Then she lifted a strange-looking, shallow, metal cup whereof the
+handles were formed of twisted serpents, that lay in the basin, filled
+it from the trickling stream, bowed to us and drank. But as she drank I
+noted with a thrill of joy that her eyes were fixed on mine as though
+it were me she pledged and me alone. Again she filled the cup with the
+sparkling water, for it did sparkle, like that French liqueur in which
+are mingled little flakes of gold, and handed it to me.
+
+I bowed to her and drank. I suppose the fluid was water, but to me it
+tasted more like strong champagne, dashed with Chateau Yquem. It was
+delicious. More, its effects were distinctly peculiar. Something quick
+and subtle ran through my veins; something that for a few moments
+seemed to burn away the obscureness which blurs our thought. I began
+to understand several problems that had puzzled me, and then lost their
+explanations in the midst of light, inner light, I mean. Moreover, of a
+sudden it seemed to me as though a window had been opened in the heart
+of that Glittering Lady who stood beside me. At least I knew that it was
+full of wonderful knowledge, wonderful memories and wonderful hopes, and
+that in the latter two of these I had some part; what part I could not
+tell. Also I knew that my heart was open to her and that she saw in it
+something which caused her to marvel and to sigh.
+
+In a few seconds, thirty perhaps, all this was gone. Nothing remained
+except that I felt extremely strong and well, happier, too, than I had
+been for years. Mutely I asked her for more of the water, but she shook
+her head and, taking the cup from me, filled it again and gave it to
+Bickley, who drank. He flushed, seemed to lose the self-control which
+was his very strong characteristic, and said in a rather thick voice:
+
+"Curious! but I do not think at this moment there is any operation that
+has ever been attempted which I could not tackle single-handed and with
+success."
+
+Then he was silent, and Bastin's turn came. He drank rather noisily,
+after his fashion, and began:
+
+"My dear young lady, I think the time has come when I should expound to
+you--" Here he broke off and commenced singing very badly, for his voice
+was somewhat raucous:
+
+     From Greenland's icy mountains,
+       From India's coral strand,
+     Where Afric's sunny fountains
+       Roll down their golden sand.
+
+Ceasing from melody, he added:
+
+"I determined that I would drink nothing intoxicating while I was on
+this island that I might be a shining light in a dark place, and now
+I fear that quite unwittingly I have broken what I look upon as a
+promise."
+
+Then he, too, grew silent.
+
+"Come," said Yva, "my father, the Lord Oro, awaits you."
+
+We crossed the court of the Water of Life and mounted steps that led
+to a wide and impressive portico, Tommy frisking ahead of us in a
+most excited way for a dog of his experience. Evidently the water had
+produced its effect upon him as well as upon his masters. This portico
+was in a solemn style of architecture which I cannot describe, because
+it differed from any other that I know. It was not Egyptian and not
+Greek, although its solidity reminded me of the former, and the beauty
+and grace of some of the columns, of the latter. The profuseness and
+rather grotesque character of the carvings suggested the ruins of Mexico
+and Yucatan, and the enormous size of the blocks of stone, those of Peru
+and Baalbec. In short, all the known forms of ancient architecture
+might have found their inspiration here, and the general effect was
+tremendous.
+
+"The palace of the King," said Yva, "whereof we approach the great
+hall."
+
+We entered through mighty metal doors, one of which stood ajar, into
+a vestibule which from certain indications I gathered had once been a
+guard, or perhaps an assembly-room. It was about forty feet deep by a
+hundred wide. Thence she led us through a smaller door into the hall
+itself. It was a vast place without columns, for there was no roof to
+support. The walls of marble or limestone were sculptured like those of
+Egyptian temples, apparently with battle scenes, though of this I am not
+sure for I did not go near to them. Except for a broad avenue along the
+middle, up which we walked, the area was filled with marble benches that
+would, I presume, have accommodated several thousand people. But they
+were empty--empty, and oh! the loneliness of it all.
+
+Far away at the head of the hall was a dais enclosed, and, as it were,
+roofed in by a towering structure that mingled grace and majesty to a
+wonderful degree. It was modelled on the pattern of a huge shell. The
+base of the shell was the platform; behind were the ribs, and above, the
+overhanging lip of the shell. On this platform was a throne of silvery
+metal. It was supported on the arched coils of snakes, whereof the tails
+formed the back and the heads the arms of the throne.
+
+On this throne, arrayed in gorgeous robes, sat the Lord Oro, his white
+beard flowing over them, and a jewelled cap upon his head. In front of
+him was a low table on which lay graven sheets of metal, and among them
+a large ball of crystal.
+
+There he sat, solemn and silent in the midst of this awful solitude,
+looking in very truth like a god, as we conceive such a being to appear.
+Small as he was in that huge expanse of buildings, he seemed yet to
+dominate it, in a sense to fill the emptiness which was accentuated
+by his presence. I know that the sight of him filled me with true fear
+which it had never done in the light of day, not even when he arose
+from his crystal coffin. Now for the first time I felt as though I
+were really in the presence of a Being Supernatural. Doubtless the
+surroundings heightened this impression. What were these mighty edifices
+in the bowels of the world? Whence came this wondrous, all-pervading and
+translucent light, whereof we could see no origin? Whither had vanished
+those who had reared and inhabited them? How did it happen that of them
+all, this man, if he were a man; and this lovely woman at my side, who,
+if I might trust my senses and instincts, was certainly a woman, alone
+survived of their departed multitudes?
+
+The thing was crushing. I looked at Bickley for encouragement, but
+got none, for he only shook his head. Even Bastin, now that the first
+effects of the Life-water had departed, seemed overwhelmed, and muttered
+something about the halls of Hades.
+
+Only the little dog Tommy remained quite cheerful. He trotted down the
+hall, jumped on to the dais and sat himself comfortably at the feet of
+its occupant.
+
+"I greet you," Oro said in his slow, resonant voice. "Daughter, lead
+these strangers to me; I would speak with them."
+
+
+
+Chapter XV. Oro in His House
+
+
+We climbed on to the dais by some marble steps, and sat ourselves down
+in four curious chairs of metal that were more or less copied from that
+which served Oro as a throne; at least the arms ended in graven heads of
+snakes. These chairs were so comfortable that I concluded the seats were
+fixed on springs, also we noticed that they were beautifully polished.
+
+"I wonder how they keep everything so clean," said Bastin as we mounted
+the dais. "In this big place it must take a lot of housemaids, though I
+don't see any. But perhaps there is no dust here."
+
+I shrugged my shoulders while we seated ourselves, the Lady Yva and I on
+Oro's right, Bickley and Bastin on his left, as he indicated by pointing
+with his finger.
+
+"What say you of this city?" Oro asked after a while of me.
+
+"We do not know what to say," I replied. "It amazes us. In our world
+there is nothing like to it."
+
+"Perchance there will be in the future when the nations grow more
+skilled in the arts of war," said Oro darkly.
+
+"Be pleased, Lord Oro," I went on, "if it is your will, to tell us why
+the people who built this place chose to live in the bowels of the earth
+instead of upon its surface."
+
+"They did not choose; it was forced upon them," was the answer. "This
+is a city of refuge that they occupied in time of war, not because
+they hated the sun. In time of peace and before the Barbarians dared to
+attack them, they dwelt in the city Pani which signifies Above. You may
+have noted some of its remaining ruins on the mount and throughout the
+island. The rest of them are now beneath the sea. But when trouble came
+and the foe rained fire on them from the air, they retreated to this
+town, Nyo, which signifies Beneath."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"And then they died. The Water of Life may prolong life, but it cannot
+make women bear children. That they will only do beneath the blue of
+heaven, not deep in the belly of the world where Nature never designed
+that they should dwell. How would the voices of children sound in such
+halls as these? Tell me, you, Bickley, who are a physician."
+
+"I cannot. I cannot imagine children in such a place, and if born here
+they would die," said Bickley.
+
+Oro nodded.
+
+"They did die, and if they went above to Pani they were murdered. So
+soon the habit of birth was lost and the Sons of Wisdom perished one by
+one. Yes, they who ruled the world and by tens of thousands of years
+of toil had gathered into their bosoms all the secrets of the world,
+perished, till only a few, and among them I and this daughter of mine,
+were left."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then, Humphrey, having power so to do, I did what long I had
+threatened, and unchained the forces that work at the world's heart, and
+destroyed them who were my enemies and evil, so that they perished by
+millions, and with them all their works. Afterwards we slept, leaving
+the others, our subjects who had not the secret of this Sleep, to die,
+as doubtless they did in the course of Nature or by the hand of the foe.
+The rest you know."
+
+"Can such a thing happen again?" asked Bickley in a voice that did not
+hide his disbelief.
+
+"Why do you question me, Bickley, you who believe nothing of what I tell
+you, and therefore make wrath? Still I will say this, that what I caused
+to happen I can cause once more--only once, I think--as perchance you
+shall learn before all is done. Now, since you do not believe, I will
+tell you no more of our mysteries, no, not whence this light comes nor
+what are the properties of the Water of Life, both of which you long
+to know, nor how to preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave of
+dreamless sleep, like a live jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor aught
+else. As to these matters, Daughter, I bid you also to be silent, since
+Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this around him, he who saw us rise
+from the coffins, still mocks at us in his heart. Therefore let him,
+this little man of a little day, when his few years are done go to the
+tomb in ignorance, and his companions with him, they who might have been
+as wise as I am."
+
+Thus Oro spoke in a voice of icy rage, his deep eyes glowing like
+coals. Hearing him I cursed Bickley in my heart for I was sure that once
+spoken, his decree was like to that of the Medes and Persians and could
+not be altered. Bickley, however, was not in the least dismayed. Indeed
+he argued the point. He told Oro straight out that he would not believe
+in the impossible until it had been shown to him to be possible, and
+that the law of Nature never had been and never could be violated. It
+was no answer, he said, to show him wonders without explaining their
+cause, since all that he seemed to see might be but mental illusions
+produced he knew not how.
+
+Oro listened patiently, then answered:
+
+"Good. So be it, they are illusions. I am an illusion; those savages who
+died upon the rock will tell you so. This fair woman before you is an
+illusion; Humphrey, I am sure, knows it as you will also before you have
+done with her. These halls are illusions. Live on in your illusions,
+O little man of science, who because you see the face of things, think
+that you know the body and the heart, and can read the soul at work
+within. You are a worthy child of tens of thousands of your breed who
+were before you and are now forgotten."
+
+Bickley looked up to answer, then changed his mind and was silent,
+thinking further argument dangerous, and Oro went on:
+
+"Now I differ from you, Bickley, in this way. I who have more wisdom in
+my finger-point than you with all the physicians of your world added to
+you, have in your brains and bodies, yet desire to learn from those who
+can give me knowledge. I understand from your words to my daughter that
+you, Bastin, teach a faith that is new to me, and that this faith tells
+of life eternal for the children of earth. Is it so?"
+
+"It is," said Bastin eagerly. "I will set out--"
+
+Oro cut him short with a wave of the hand.
+
+"Not now in the presence of Bickley who doubtless disbelieves your
+faith, as he does all else, holding it with justice or without, to be
+but another illusion. Yet you shall teach me and on it I will form my
+own judgment."
+
+"I shall be delighted," said Bastin. Then a doubt struck him, and he
+added: "But why do you wish to learn? Not that you may make a mock of my
+religion, is it?"
+
+"I mock at no man's belief, because I think that what men believe is
+true--for them. I will tell you why I wish to hear of yours, since I
+never hide the truth. I who am so wise and old, yet must die; though
+that time may be far away, still I must die, for such is the lot of man
+born of woman. And I do not desire to die. Therefore I shall rejoice to
+learn of any faith that promises to the children of earth a life eternal
+beyond the earth. Tomorrow you shall begin to teach me. Now leave me,
+Strangers, for I have much to do," and he waved his hand towards the
+table.
+
+We rose and bowed, wondering what he could have to do down in this
+luminous hole, he who had been for so many thousands of years out of
+touch with the world. It occurred to me, however, that during this long
+period he might have got in touch with other worlds, indeed he looked
+like it.
+
+"Wait," he said, "I have something to tell you. I have been studying
+this book of writings, or world pictures," and he pointed to my atlas
+which, as I now observed for the first time, was also lying upon the
+table. "It interests me much. Your country is small, very small. When
+I caused it to be raised up I think that it was larger, but since then
+that seas have flowed in."
+
+Here Bickley groaned aloud.
+
+"This one is much greater," went on Oro, casting a glance at Bickley
+that must have penetrated him like a searchlight. Then he opened the map
+of Europe and with his finger indicated Germany and Austria-Hungary.
+"I know nothing of the peoples of these lands," he added, "but as you
+belong to one of them and are my guests, I trust that yours may succeed
+in the war."
+
+"What war?" we asked with one voice.
+
+"Since Bickley is so clever, surely he should know better than an
+illusion such as I. All I can tell you is that I have learned that there
+is war between this country and that," and he pointed to Great Britain
+and to Germany upon the map; "also between others."
+
+"It is quite possible," I said, remembering many things. "But how do you
+know?"
+
+"If I told you, Humphrey, Bickley would not believe, so I will not tell.
+Perhaps I saw it in that crystal, as did the necromancers of the early
+world. Or perhaps the crystal serves some different purpose and I saw it
+otherwise--with my soul. At least what I say is true."
+
+"Then who will win?" asked Bastin.
+
+"I cannot read the future, Preacher. If I could, should I ask you to
+expound to me your religion which probably is of no more worth than a
+score of others I have studied, just because it tells of the future?
+If I could read the future I should be a god instead of only an
+earth-lord."
+
+"Your daughter called you a god and you said that you knew we were
+coming to wake you up, which is reading the future," answered Bastin.
+
+"Every father is a god to his daughter, or should be; also in my day
+millions named me a god because I saw further and struck harder than
+they could. As for the rest, it came to me in a vision. Oh! Bickley, if
+you were wiser than you think you are, you would know that all things
+to come are born elsewhere and travel hither like the light from stars.
+Sometimes they come faster before their day into a single mind, and that
+is what men call prophecy. But this is a gift which cannot be commanded,
+even by me. Also I did not know that you would come. I knew only that
+we should awaken and by the help of men, for if none had been present at
+that destined hour we must have died for lack of warmth and sustenance."
+
+"I deny your hypothesis in toto," exclaimed Bickley, but nobody paid any
+attention to him.
+
+"My father," said Yva, rising and bowing before him with her swan-like
+grace, "I have noted your commands. But do you permit that I show the
+temple to these strangers, also something of our past?"
+
+"Yes, yes," he said. "It will save much talk in a savage tongue that is
+difficult to me. But bring them here no more without my command, save
+Bastin only. When the sun is four hours high in the upper world, let
+him come tomorrow to teach me, and afterwards if so I desire. Or if he
+wills, he can sleep here."
+
+"I think I would rather not," said Bastin hurriedly. "I make no pretense
+to being particular, but this place does not appeal to me as a bedroom.
+There are degrees in the pleasures of solitude and, in short, I will not
+disturb your privacy at night."
+
+Oro waved his hand and we departed down that awful and most dreary hall.
+
+"I hope you will spend a pleasant time here, Bastin," I said, looking
+back from the doorway at its cold, illuminated vastness.
+
+"I don't expect to," he answered, "but duty is duty, and if I can drag
+that old sinner back from the pit that awaits him, it will be worth
+doing. Only I have my doubts about him. To me he seems to bear a strong
+family resemblance to Beelzebub, and he's a bad companion week in and
+week out."
+
+We went through the portico, Yva leading us, and passed the fountain of
+Life-water, of which she cautioned us to drink no more at present,
+and to prevent him from doing so, dragged Tommy past it by his collar.
+Bickley, however, lingered under the pretence of making a further
+examination of the statue. As I had seen him emptying into his pocket
+the contents of a corked bottle of quinine tabloids which he always
+carried with him, I guessed very well that his object was to procure a
+sample of this water for future analysis. Of course I said nothing, and
+Yva and Bastin took no note of what he was doing.
+
+When we were clear of the palace, of which we had only seen one hall,
+we walked across an open space made unutterably dreary by the absence
+of any vegetation or other sign of life, towards a huge building of
+glorious proportions that was constructed of black stone or marble. It
+is impossible for me to give any idea of the frightful solemnity of
+this doomed edifice, for as I think I have said, it alone had a roof,
+standing there in the midst of that brilliant, unvarying and most
+unnatural illumination which came from nowhere and yet was everywhere.
+Thus, when one lifted a foot, there it was between the sole of the boot
+and the floor, or to express it better, the boot threw no shadow.
+I think this absence of shadows was perhaps the most terrifying
+circumstance connected with that universal and pervading light. Through
+it we walked on to the temple. We passed three courts, pillared all
+of them, and came to the building which was larger than St. Paul's
+in London. We entered through huge doors which still stood open, and
+presently found ourselves beneath the towering dome. There were no
+windows, why should there be in a place that was full of light? There
+was no ornamentation, there was nothing except black walls. And yet the
+general effect was magnificent in its majestic grace.
+
+"In this place," said Yva, and her sweet voice went whispering round
+the walls and the arching dome, "were buried the Kings of the Sons
+of Wisdom. They lie beneath, each in his sepulchre. Its entrance is
+yonder," and she pointed to what seemed to be a chapel on the right.
+"Would you wish to see them?"
+
+"Somehow I don't care to," said Bastin. "The place is dreary enough as
+it is without the company of a lot of dead kings."
+
+"I should like to dissect one of them, but I suppose that would not be
+allowed," said Bickley.
+
+"No," she answered. "I think that the Lord Oro would not wish you to cut
+up his forefathers."
+
+"When you and he went to sleep, why did you not choose the family
+vault?" asked Bastin.
+
+"Would you have found us there?" she queried by way of answer. Then,
+understanding that the invitation was refused by general consent, though
+personally I should have liked to accept it, and have never ceased
+regretting that I did not, she moved towards a colossal object which
+stood beneath the centre of the dome.
+
+On a stepped base, not very different from that in the cave but much
+larger, sat a figure, draped in a cloak on which was graved a number of
+stars, doubtless to symbolise the heavens. The fastening of the cloak
+was shaped like the crescent moon, and the foot-stool on which rested
+the figure's feet was fashioned to suggest the orb of the sun. This
+was of gold or some such metal, the only spot of brightness in all that
+temple. It was impossible to say whether the figure were male or female,
+for the cloak falling in long, straight folds hid its outlines. Nor did
+the head tell us, for the hair also was hidden beneath the mantle and
+the face might have been that of either man or woman. It was terrible in
+its solemnity and calm, and its expression was as remote and mystic as
+that of Buddha, only more stern. Also without doubt it was blind; it was
+impossible to mistake the sightlessness of those staring orbs. Across
+the knees lay a naked sword and beneath the cloak the arms were hidden.
+In its complete simplicity the thing was marvelous.
+
+On either side upon the pedestal knelt a figure of the size of life. One
+was an old and withered man with death stamped upon his face; the other
+was a beautiful, naked woman, her hands clasped in the attitude of
+prayer and with vague terror written on her vivid features.
+
+Such was this glorious group of which the meaning could not be mistaken.
+It was Fate throned upon the sun, wearing the constellations as his
+garment, armed with the sword of Destiny and worshipped by Life and
+Death. This interpretation I set out to the others.
+
+Yva knelt before the statue for a little while, bowing her head in
+prayer, and really I felt inclined to follow her example, though in the
+end I compromised, as did Bickley, by taking off my hat, which, like the
+others, I still wore from force of habit, though in this place none were
+needed. Only Bastin remained covered.
+
+"Behold the god of my people," said Yva. "Have you no reverence for it,
+O Bastin?"
+
+"Not much," he answered, "except as a work of art. You see I worship
+Fate's Master. I might add that your god doesn't seem to have done much
+for you, Lady Yva, as out of all your greatness there's nothing left but
+two people and a lot of old walls and caves."
+
+At first she was inclined to be angry, for I saw her start. Then her
+mood changed, and she said with a sigh:
+
+"Fate's Master! Where does He dwell?"
+
+"Here amongst other places," said Bastin. "I'll soon explain that to
+you."
+
+"I thank you," she replied gravely. "But why have you not explained it
+to Bickley?" Then waving her hand to show that she wished for no answer,
+she went on:
+
+"Friends, would you wish to learn something of the history of my
+people?"
+
+"Very much," said the irrepressible Bastin, "but I would rather the
+lecture took place in the open air."
+
+"That is not possible," she answered. "It must be here and now, or not
+at all. Come, stand by me. Be silent and do not move. I am about to set
+loose forces that are dangerous if disturbed."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVI. Visions of the Past
+
+
+She led us to the back of the statue and pointed to each of us where
+we should remain. Then she took her place at right angles to us, as a
+showman might do, and for a while stood immovable. Watching her face,
+once more I saw it, and indeed all her body, informed with that strange
+air of power, and noted that her eyes flashed and that her hair grew
+even more brilliant than was common, as though some abnormal strength
+were flowing through it and her. Presently she spoke, saying:
+
+"I shall show you first our people in the day of their glory. Look in
+front of you."
+
+We looked and by degrees the vast space of the apse before us became
+alive with forms. At first these were vague and shadowy, not to be
+separated or distinguished. Then they became so real that until he was
+reproved by a kick, Tommy growled at them and threatened to break out
+into one of his peals of barking.
+
+A wonderful scene appeared. There was a palace of white marble and in
+front of it a great courtyard upon which the sun beat vividly. At the
+foot of the steps of the palace, beneath a silken awning, sat a king
+enthroned, a crown upon his head and wearing glorious robes. In his hand
+was a jewelled sceptre. He was a noble-looking man of middle age and
+about him were gathered the glittering officers of his court. Fair women
+fanned him and to right and left, but a little behind, sat other fair
+and jewelled women who, I suppose, were his wives or daughters.
+
+"One of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom new-crowned, receives the
+homage of the world," said Yva.
+
+As she spoke there appeared, walking in front of the throne one by one,
+other kings, for all were crowned and bore sceptres. At the foot of the
+throne each of them kneeled and kissed the foot of him who sat thereon,
+as he did so laying down his sceptre which at a sign he lifted again and
+passed away. Of these kings there must have been quite fifty, men of all
+colours and of various types, white men, black men, yellow men, red men.
+
+Then came their ministers bearing gifts, apparently of gold and jewels,
+which were piled on trays in front of the throne. I remember noting an
+incident. An old fellow with a lame leg stumbled and upset his tray,
+so that the contents rolled hither and thither. His attempts to recover
+them were ludicrous and caused the monarch on the throne to relax from
+his dignity and smile. I mention this to show that what we witnessed was
+no set scene but apparently a living piece of the past. Had it been so
+the absurdity of the bedizened old man tumbling down in the midst of the
+gorgeous pageant would certainly have been omitted.
+
+No, it must be life, real life, something that had happened, and the
+same may be said of what followed. For instance, there was what we call
+a review. Infantry marched, some of them armed with swords and spears,
+though these I took to be an ornamental bodyguard, and others with tubes
+like savage blowpipes of which I could not guess the use. There were no
+cannon, but carriages came by loaded with bags that had spouts to
+them. Probably these were charged with poisonous gases. There were some
+cavalry also, mounted on a different stamp of horse from ours, thicker
+set and nearer the ground, but with arched necks and fiery eyes and, I
+should say, very strong. These again, I take it, were ornamental. Then
+came other men upon a long machine, slung in pairs in armoured sacks,
+out of which only their heads and arms projected. This machine, which
+resembled an elongated bicycle, went by at a tremendous rate, though
+whence its motive power came did not appear. It carried twenty pairs
+of men, each of whom held in his hand some small but doubtless deadly
+weapon, that in appearance resembled an orange. Other similar machines
+which followed carried from forty to a hundred pairs of men.
+
+The marvel of the piece, however, were the aircraft. These came by in
+great numbers. Sometimes they flew in flocks like wild geese, sometimes
+singly, sometimes in line and sometimes in ordered squadrons, with
+outpost and officer ships and an exact distance kept between craft and
+craft. None of them seemed to be very large or to carry more than
+four or five men, but they were extraordinarily swift and as agile as
+swallows. Moreover they flew as birds do by beating their wings, but
+again we could not guess whence came their motive power.
+
+The review vanished, and next appeared a scene of festivity in a huge,
+illuminated hall. The Great King sat upon a dais and behind him was that
+statue of Fate, or one very similar to it, beneath which we stood. Below
+him in the hall were the feasters seated at long tables, clad in the
+various costumes of their countries. He rose and, turning, knelt before
+the statue of Fate. Indeed he prostrated himself thrice in prayer. Then
+taking his seat again, he lifted a cup of wine and pledged that vast
+company. They drank back to him and prostrated themselves before him as
+he had done before the image of Fate. Only I noted that certain men clad
+in sacerdotal garments not at all unlike those which are worn in the
+Greek Church to-day, remained standing.
+
+Now all this exhibition of terrestrial pomp faded. The next scene was
+simple, that of the death-bed of this same king--we knew him by his
+wizened features. There he lay, terribly old and dying. Physicians,
+women, courtiers, all were there watching the end. The tableau vanished
+and in place of it appeared that of the youthful successor amidst
+cheering crowds, with joy breaking through the clouds of simulated grief
+upon his face. It vanished also.
+
+"Thus did great king succeed great king for ages upon ages," said Yva.
+"There were eighty of them and the average of their reigns was 700
+years. They ruled the earth as it was in those days. They gathered up
+learning, they wielded power, their wealth was boundless. They nurtured
+the arts, they discovered secrets. They had intercourse with the stars;
+they were as gods. But like the gods they grew jealous. They and their
+councillors became a race apart who alone had the secret of long life.
+The rest of the world and the commonplace people about them suffered and
+died. They of the Household of Wisdom lived on in pomp for generations
+till the earth was mad with envy of them.
+
+"Fewer and fewer grew the divine race of the Sons of Wisdom since
+children are not given to the aged and to those of an ancient, outworn
+blood. Then the World said:
+
+"'They are great but they are not many; let us make an end of them by
+numbers and take their place and power and drink of their Life-water,
+that they will not give to us. If myriads of us perish by their arts,
+what does it matter, since we are countless?' So the World made war upon
+the Sons of Wisdom. See!"
+
+Again a picture formed. The sky was full of aircraft which rained down
+fire like flashes of lightning upon cities beneath. From these cities
+leapt up other fires that destroyed the swift-travelling things above,
+so that they fell in numbers like gnats burned by a lamp. Still more
+and more of them came till the cities crumbled away and the flashes that
+darted from them ceased to rush upwards. The Sons of Wisdom were driven
+from the face of the earth.
+
+Again the scene changed. Now it showed this subterranean hall in which
+we stood. There was pomp here, yet it was but a shadow of that which
+had been in the earlier days upon the face of the earth. Courtiers moved
+about the palace and there were people in the radiant streets and the
+houses, for most of them were occupied, but rarely did the vision show
+children coming through their gates.
+
+Of a sudden this scene shifted. Now we saw that same hall in which we
+had visited Oro not an hour before. There he sat, yes, Oro himself,
+upon the dais beneath the overhanging marble shell. Round him were some
+ancient councillors. In the body of the hall on either side of the
+dais were men in military array, guards without doubt though their only
+weapon was a black rod not unlike a ruler, if indeed it were a weapon
+and not a badge of office.
+
+
+Yva, whose face had suddenly grown strange and fixed, began to detail
+to us what was passing in this scene, in a curious monotone such as a
+person might use who was repeating something learned by heart. This was
+the substance of what she said:
+
+"The case of the Sons of Wisdom is desperate. But few of them are left.
+Like other men they need food which is hard to come by, since the foe
+holds the upper earth and that which their doctors can make here in the
+Shades does not satisfy them, even though they drink the Life-water.
+They die and die. There comes an embassy from the High King of the
+confederated Nations to talk of terms of peace. See, it enters."
+
+As she spoke, up the hall advanced the embassy. At the head of it walked
+a young man, tall, dark, handsome and commanding, whose aspect seemed in
+some way to be familiar to me. He was richly clothed in a purple cloak
+and wore upon his head a golden circlet that suggested royal rank.
+Those who followed him were mostly old men who had the astute faces
+of diplomatists, but a few seemed to be generals. Yva continued in her
+monotonous voice:
+
+"Comes the son of the King of the confederated Nations, the Prince who
+will be king. He bows before the Lord Oro. He says 'Great and Ancient
+Monarch of the divine blood, Heaven-born One, your strait, and that of
+those who remain to you, is sore. Yet on behalf of the Nations I am sent
+to offer terms of peace, but this I may only do in the presence of your
+child who is your heiress and the Queen-to-be of the Sons of Wisdom.'"
+
+Here, in the picture, Oro waved his hand and from behind the marble
+shell appeared Yva herself, gloriously apparelled, wearing royal
+ornaments and with her train held by waiting ladies. She bowed to the
+Prince and his company and they bowed back to her. More, we saw a glance
+of recognition pass between her and the Prince.
+
+Now the real Yva by our side pointed to the shadow Yva of the vision or
+the picture, whichever it might be called, a strange thing to see her
+do, and went on:
+
+"The daughter of the Lord Oro comes. The Prince of the Nations salutes
+her. He says that the great war has endured for hundreds of years
+between the Children of Wisdom fighting for absolute rule and the common
+people of the earth fighting for liberty. In that war many millions of
+the Sons of the Nations had perished, brought to their death by fearful
+arts, by wizardries and by plagues sown among them by the Sons of
+Wisdom. Yet they were winning, for the glorious cities of the Sons of
+Wisdom were destroyed and those who remained of them were driven to
+dwell in the caves of the earth where with all their strength and magic
+they could not increase, but faded like flowers in the dark.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks what are the terms of peace proposed by the Nations.
+The Prince answers that they are these: That the Sons of Wisdom shall
+teach all their wisdom to the wise men among the Nations. That they
+shall give them to drink of the Life-water, so that their length of days
+also may be increased. That they shall cease to destroy them by sickness
+and their mastery of the forces which are hid in the womb of the world.
+If they will do these things, then the Nations on their part will cease
+from war, will rebuild the cities they have destroyed by means of their
+flying ships that rain down death, and will agree that the Lord Oro and
+his seed shall rule them for ever as the King of kings.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks if that be all. The Prince answers that it is not
+all. He says that when he dwelt a hostage at the court of the Sons of
+Wisdom he and the divine Lady, the daughter of the Lord Oro, and his
+only living child, learned to love each other. He demands, and the
+Nations demand, that she shall be given to him to wife, that in a day to
+come he may rule with her and their children after them.
+
+"See!" went on Yva in her chanting, dreamy voice, "the Lord Oro asks his
+daughter if this be true. She says," here the real Yva at my side turned
+and looked me straight in the eyes, "that it is true; that she loves the
+Prince of the Nations and that if she lives a million years she will wed
+no other man, since she who is her father's slave in all else is
+still the mistress of herself, as has ever been the right of her royal
+mothers.
+
+"See again! The Lord Oro, the divine King, the Ancient, grows wroth. He
+says that it is enough and more than enough that the Barbarians
+should ask to eat of the bread of hidden learning and to drink of the
+Life-water of the Sons of Wisdom, gifts that were given to them of old
+by Heaven whence they sprang in the beginning. But that one of them,
+however highly placed, should dare to ask to mix his blood with that of
+the divine Lady, the Heiress, the Queen of the Earth to be, and claim to
+share her imperial throne that had been held by her pure race from age
+to age, was an insult that could only be purged by death. Sooner would
+he give his daughter in marriage to an ape than to a child of the
+Barbarians who had worked on them so many woes and striven to break the
+golden fetters of their rule.
+
+"Look again!" continued Yva. "The Lord Oro, the divine, grows angrier
+still" (which in truth he did, for never did I see such dreadful rage
+as that which the picture revealed in him). "He warns, he threatens.
+He says that hitherto out of gentle love and pity he has held his
+hand; that he has strength at his command which will slay them, not by
+millions in slow war, but by tens of millions at one blow; that will
+blot them and their peoples from the face of earth and that will cause
+the deep seas to roll where now their pleasant lands are fruitful in the
+sun. They shrink before his fury; behold, their knees tremble because
+they know that he has this power. He mocks them, does the Lord Oro.
+He asks for their submission here and now, and that in the name of
+the Nations they should take the great oath which may not be broken,
+swearing to cease from war upon the Sons of Wisdom and to obey them
+in all things to the ends of the earth. Some of the ambassadors would
+yield. They look about them like wild things that are trapped. But
+madness takes the Prince. He cries that the oath of an ape is of no
+account, but that he will tear up the Children of Wisdom as an ape tears
+leaves, and afterwards take the divine Lady to be his wife.
+
+"Look on the Lord Oro!" continued the living Yva, "his wrath leaves him.
+He grows cold and smiles. His daughter throws herself upon her knees and
+pleads with him. He thrusts her away. She would spring to the side of
+the Prince; he commands his councillors to hold her. She cries to the
+Prince that she loves him and him only, and that in a day to come him
+she will wed and no other. He thanks her, saying that as it is with her,
+so it is with him, and that because of his love he fears nothing. She
+swoons. The Lord Oro motions with his hand to the guard. They lift their
+death-rods. Fire leaps from them. The Prince and his companions, all
+save those who were afraid and would have sworn the oath, twist and
+writhe. They turn black; they die. The Lord Oro commands those who are
+left to enter their flying ships and bear to the Nations of the Earth
+tidings of what befalls those who dare to defy and insult him; to warn
+them also to eat and drink and be merry while they may, since for their
+wickedness they are about to perish."
+
+
+The scene faded and there followed another which really I cannot
+describe. It represented some vast underground place and what appeared
+to be a huge mountain of iron clothed in light, literally a thing
+like an alp, rocking and spinning down a declivity, which farther on
+separated into two branches because of a huge razor-edge precipice that
+rose between. There in the middle of this vast space with the dazzling
+mountain whirling towards him, stood Oro encased in some transparent
+armour, as though to keep off heat, and with him his daughter who under
+his direction was handling something in the rock behind her. Then there
+was a blinding flash and everything vanished. All of this picture
+passed so swiftly that we could not grasp its details; only a general
+impression remained.
+
+"The Lord Oro, using the strength that is in the world whereof he alone
+has the secret, changes the world's balance causing that which was land
+to become sea and that which was sea to become land," said Yva in her
+chanting, unnatural voice.
+
+Another scene of stupendous and changing awfulness. Countries were
+sinking, cities crashing down, volcanoes were spouting fire; the end of
+the earth seemed to be at hand. We could see human beings running to and
+fro in thousands like ants. Then in huge waves hundreds and hundreds of
+feet high, the ocean flowed in and all was troubled, yeasty sea.
+
+"Oro carries out his threat to destroy the Nations who had rebelled
+against him," said Yva. "Much of the world sinks beneath the waves, but
+in place of it other lands arise above the waves, to be inhabited by the
+seed of those who remain living in those portions of the Earth that the
+deluge spared."
+
+This horrible vision passed and was succeeded by one more, that of Oro
+standing in the sepulchre of the cave by the side of the crystal coffin
+which contained what appeared to be the body of his daughter. He gazed
+at her, then drank some potion and laid himself down in the companion
+coffin, that in which we had found him.
+
+
+All vanished away and Yva, appearing to wake from some kind of trance,
+smiled, and in her natural voice asked if we had seen enough.
+
+"Quite," I answered in a tone that caused her to say:
+
+"I wonder what you have seen, Humphrey. Myself I do not know, since it
+is through me that you see at all and when you see I am in you who see."
+
+"Indeed," I replied. "Well, I will tell you about it later."
+
+"Thank you so much," exclaimed Bastin, recovering suddenly from his
+amazement. "I have heard a great deal of these moving-picture shows
+which are becoming so popular, but have always avoided attending them
+because their influence on the young is supposed to be doubtful, and a
+priest must set a good example to his congregation. Now I see that they
+can have a distinct educational value, even if it is presented in the
+form of romance."
+
+"How is it done?" asked Bickley, almost fiercely.
+
+"I do not altogether know," she answered. "This I do know, however, that
+everything which has happened on this world can be seen from moment to
+moment at some point in the depths of space, for thither the sun's light
+takes it. There, too, it can be caught and thence in an instant returned
+to earth again, to be reflected in the mirror of the present by those
+who know how that mirror should be held. Ask me no more; one so wise as
+you, O Bickley, can solve such problems for himself."
+
+"If you don't mind, Lady Yva," said Bastin, "I think I should like to
+get out of this place, interesting as it is. I have food to cook up
+above and lots of things to attend to, especially as I understand I am
+to come back here tomorrow. Would you mind showing me the way to that
+lift or moving staircase?"
+
+"Come," she said, smiling.
+
+So we went past the image of Fate, out of the temple, down the vast and
+lonely streets so unnaturally illuminated, to the place where we had
+first found ourselves on arrival in the depths. There we stood.
+
+A moment later and we were whirling up as we had whirled down. I suppose
+that Yva came with us though I never saw her do so, and the odd thing
+was that when we arrived in the sepulchre, she seemed already to be
+standing there waiting to direct us.
+
+"Really," remarked Bastin, "this is exactly like Maskelyne and Cook. Did
+you ever see their performance, Bickley? If so, it must have given you
+lots to explain for quite a long while."
+
+"Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in Orofena,"
+replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from his pocket an end
+of candle to which he set light.
+
+"What is jugglery?" asked Bastin, and they departed arguing, leaving me
+alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
+
+"What have I seen?" I asked her.
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but perhaps
+something of the truth."
+
+"I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you swear
+yourself to a man for ever."
+
+"Yes, and this I did. What of it?"
+
+"Only that it might be hard for another man."
+
+"Yes, for another man it might be hard. You were once married, were you
+not, Humphrey, to a wife who died?"
+
+"Yes, I was married."
+
+"And did you not swear to that wife that you would never look in love
+upon another woman?"
+
+"I did," I answered in a shamed voice. "But how do you know? I never
+told you so."
+
+"Oh! I know you and therefore guessed."
+
+"Well, what of it, Yva?"
+
+"Nothing, except that you must find your wife before you love again, and
+before I love again I must find him whom I wish to be my husband."
+
+"How can that happen," I asked, "when both are dead?"
+
+"How did all that you have seen to-day in Nyo happen?" she replied,
+laughing softly. "Perhaps you are very blind, Humphrey, or perhaps we
+both are blind. If so, mayhap light will come to us. Meanwhile do not
+be sad. Tomorrow I will meet you and you shall teach me--your English
+tongue, Humphrey, and other things."
+
+"Then let it be in the sunlight, Yva. I do not love those darksome halls
+of Nyo that glow like something dead."
+
+"It is fitting, for are they not dead?" she answered, with a little
+laugh. "So be it. Bastin shall teach my father down below, since sun and
+shade are the same to him who only thinks of his religion, and you shall
+teach me up above."
+
+"I am not so certain about Bastin and of what he thinks," I said
+doubtfully. "Also will the Lord Oro permit you to come?"
+
+"Yes, for in such matters I rule myself. Also," she added meaningly,
+"he remembers my oath that I will wed no man--save one who is dead.
+Now farewell a while and bid Bastin be here when the sun is three hours
+high, not before or after."
+
+Then I left her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XVII. Yva Explains
+
+
+When I reached the rock I was pleased to find Marama and about twenty
+of his people engaged in erecting the house that we had ordered them
+to build for our accommodation. Indeed, it was nearly finished, since
+house-building in Orofena is a simple business. The framework of poles
+let into palm trunks, since they could not be driven into the rock, had
+been put together on the further shore and towed over bodily by canoes.
+The overhanging rock formed one side of the house; the ends were of palm
+leaves tied to the poles, and the roof was of the same material. The
+other side was left open for the present, which in that equable and
+balmy clime was no disadvantage. The whole edifice was about thirty feet
+long by fifteen deep and divided into two portions, one for sleeping
+and one for living, by a palm leaf partition. Really, it was quite a
+comfortable abode, cool and rainproof, especially after Bastin had built
+his hut in which to cook.
+
+Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and implored
+us to visit them on the main island. I answered that perhaps we would
+later on, as we wished to procure certain things from the wreck. Also,
+he requested Bastin to continue his ministrations as the latter greatly
+desired to do. But to this proposal I would not allow him to give any
+direct answer at the moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure
+of Oro's approval.
+
+Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind them the
+usual ample store of provisions.
+
+We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had said
+about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little appetite
+for solid food, though this returned upon the following day. The same
+thing happened upon every occasion after drinking of that water which
+certainly was a most invigorating fluid. Never for years had any of us
+felt so well as it caused us to do.
+
+So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of these,
+indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them as something
+out of the common, of course, but as facts which admitted of no
+discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament told much the same
+story of people called the Sons of God who lived very long lives and ran
+after the daughters of men whom they should have left alone, and thus
+became the progenitors of a remarkable race. Of this race, he presumed
+that Oro and his daughter were survivors, especially as they spoke of
+their family as "Heaven born." How they came to survive was more than he
+could understand and really scarcely worth bothering over, since there
+they were.
+
+It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although naturally
+Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly exaggerated, when he
+declared that he had caused this catastrophe, unless indeed he was
+talking about a totally different deluge, though even then he could not
+have brought it about. It was curious, however, that the people drowned
+were said to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion about those
+whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of that, he could
+not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his own showing he
+was a most revengeful person and one who declined to agree to a quite
+suitable alliance, apparently desired by both parties, merely because it
+offended his family pride. No, on reflection he might be unjust to Oro
+in this particular, since he never told that story; it was only shown
+in some pictures which very likely were just made up to astonish us.
+Meanwhile, it was his business to preach to this old sinner down in that
+hole, and he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
+must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek inspiration,
+which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
+
+Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
+
+"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause another
+just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after him.
+
+"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not hide the
+truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he revenges himself
+upon us in any way, we must just put up with it like other martyrs."
+
+"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said Bickley.
+
+"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware of that,
+as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you become one, I am
+sorry to say that I do not see how you can expect any benefit. You
+would only be like a man who puts a sovereign into the offertory bag in
+mistake for a shilling. The extra nineteen shillings will do him no good
+at all, since in his heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could
+have them back."
+
+Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not laugh.
+
+"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I have gone
+quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of homicidal mania, which
+I feel developing in me where Bastin is concerned, or of other abnormal
+violence, that you will take whatever steps you consider necessary, even
+to putting me out of the way if that is imperative."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."
+
+"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great number of
+things which I know it to be quite impossible that I should have seen
+or experienced. The only explanation is that I am suffering from
+delusions."
+
+"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"
+
+"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."
+
+"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by no means
+certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He has a faith and
+he sticks to it, as millions have done before him, and that is better
+than making spiritual experiments, as I am sorry to say I do, or
+rejecting things because one cannot understand them, as you do, which is
+only a form of intellectual vanity."
+
+"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat that I
+am mad, and Bastin is mad."
+
+"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I mad, too?"
+
+"You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn't enough to drive a man mad
+when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly impossible
+moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible young woman in an
+utterly impossible underground city, then I don't know what is."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, starting.
+
+"Mean? Well, if you didn't notice it, there's hope for you."
+
+"Notice what?"
+
+"All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do you admit
+that?"
+
+"Of course; there could be no mistake on that point."
+
+"Very well. Then according to my version there came a man, still young,
+dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions of peace and wanted
+to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is that right?"
+
+"Absolutely."
+
+"Well, and didn't you recognise the man?"
+
+"No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose appearance
+reminded me of someone."
+
+"I suppose it must be true," mused Bickley, "that we do not know
+ourselves."
+
+"So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be our
+special study. 'Know thyself,' you remember."
+
+"I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean to tell
+me that you did not recognise your own double in that man? Shave off
+your beard and put on his clothes and no one could distinguish you
+apart."
+
+I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
+
+"Now you mention it," I said slowly, "I suppose there was a resemblance.
+I didn't look at him very much; I was studying the simulacrum of Yva.
+Also, you know it is some time since--I mean, there are no pier-glasses
+in Orofena."
+
+"The man was you," went on Bickley with conviction. "If I were
+superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am not, I
+know that I must be mad."
+
+"Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble each
+other."
+
+"There are degrees in resemblance," said Bickley with one of his
+contemptuous snorts. "It won't do, Humphrey, my boy," he added. "I can
+only think of one possible explanation--outside of the obvious one of
+madness."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that cinematograph show
+in some way or other, did she not? She said that in order to do this she
+loosed some hidden forces. I suggest that she did nothing of the sort."
+
+"Then whence did the pictures come and why?"
+
+"From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-bull,
+fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally fill the
+role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had happened to
+impress her. Hence the resemblance."
+
+"You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural cunning
+and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don't know, first, why she should
+be so anxious to add another impression to the many we have received
+in this place; and, secondly, if she was, how she managed to mesmerise
+three average but totally different men into seeing the same things. My
+explanation is that you were deceived as to the likeness, which, mind
+you, I did not recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin."
+
+"Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask
+Yva herself. She ought to know. Now I'm off to try to analyse that
+confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary spring
+variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and possibly not
+uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I can only apply some
+very elementary tests."
+
+So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was left
+alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting continually to
+wander off into the cave, whence I must recall him. I suppose that my
+experiences of the day, reviewed beneath the sweet influences of the
+wonderful tropical night, affected me. At any rate, that mystical
+side of my nature, to which I think I alluded at the beginning of this
+record, sprang into active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal
+vanished, the abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of us
+creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British. I lost
+my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in strange places;
+of course, always supposing that we have a spirit, which Bickley would
+deny.
+
+I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
+unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see and
+accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps only a
+refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and again, and that
+our animating principle, whatever it might be, does inhabit various
+bodies, which, naturally enough, it would shape to its own taste and
+likeness? Would that taste and likeness vary so very much over, let
+us say, a million years or so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a
+minute, in the aeons of Eternity?
+
+On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect that it
+may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered man of the
+far past were in fact identical? If the woman were the same, preserved
+across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why should not her lover be the
+same? What did I say--her lover? Was I her lover? No, I was the lover of
+one who had died--my lost wife. Well, if I had died and lived again,
+why should not--why should not that Sleeper--have lived again during her
+long sleep? Through all those years the spirit must have had some home,
+and, if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points, similarities,
+which rushed in upon me--oh! it was ridiculous. Bickley was right. We
+were all mad!
+
+There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war with
+Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such knowledge would
+presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond those given to man. I could
+not believe that he possessed these; as Bickley said, it would be past
+experience. Yet it was most strange that he who was uninformed as to our
+national history and dangers, should have hit upon a country with which
+we might well have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here again I was
+bewildered and overcome. My brain rocked. I would seek sleep, and in it
+escape, or at any rate rest from all these mysteries.
+
+
+On the following morning we despatched Bastin to keep his rendezvous in
+the sepulchre at the proper time. Had we not done so I felt sure that
+he would have forgotten it, for on this occasion he was for once
+an unwilling missioner. He tried to persuade one of us to come with
+him--even Bickley would have been welcome; but we both declared that we
+could not dream of interfering in such a professional matter; also that
+our presence was forbidden, and would certainly distract the attention
+of his pupil.
+
+"What you mean," said the gloomy Bastin, "is that you intend to enjoy
+yourselves up here in the female companionship of the Glittering Lady
+whilst I sit thousands of feet underground attempting to lighten the
+darkness of a violent old sinner whom I suspect of being in league with
+Satan."
+
+"With whom you should be proud to break a lance," said Bickley.
+
+"So I am, in the daylight. For instance, when he uses your mouth to
+advance his arguments. Bickley, but this is another matter. However, if
+I do not appear again you will know that I died in a good cause, and, I
+hope, try to recover my remains and give them decent burial. Also, you
+might inform the Bishop of how I came to my end, that is, if you ever
+get an opportunity, which is more than doubtful."
+
+"Hurry up, Bastin, hurry up!" said the unfeeling Bickley, "or you will
+be late for your appointment and put your would-be neophyte into a bad
+temper."
+
+Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed in the
+language of the South Sea Islands.
+
+A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous robes which,
+being a man, it is quite impossible for me to describe. She saw us
+looking at these, and, after greeting us both, also Tommy, who was
+enraptured at her coming, asked us how the ladies of our country attired
+themselves.
+
+We tried to explain, with no striking success.
+
+"You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the Old World,"
+she said, shaking her head and laughing. "I thought that you had with
+you pictures of ladies you have known which would show me."
+
+Now, in fact, I had in a pocket-book a photograph of my wife in
+evening-dress, also a miniature of her head and bust painted on ivory,
+a beautiful piece of work done by a master hand, which I always wore.
+These, after a moment's hesitation, I produced and showed to her,
+Bickley having gone away for a little while to see about something
+connected with his attempted analysis of the Life-water. She examined
+them with great eagerness, and as she did so I noted that her face grew
+tender and troubled.
+
+"This was your wife," she said as one who states what she knows to be a
+fact. I nodded, and she went on:
+
+"She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I am, I
+think."
+
+"No," I answered, "she lacked height; given that she would have been a
+lovely woman."
+
+"I am glad you think that women should be tall," she said, glancing at
+her shadow. "The eyes were such as mine, were they not--in colour, I
+mean?"
+
+"Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger."
+
+"That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be angry if I
+tried it? I weary of this old fashion."
+
+"Why should I be angry?" I asked.
+
+At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the details
+of the dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than had been the
+custom among the women of her people, but was very pretty.
+
+"That is because we are still barbarians," said Bickley; "at least, our
+women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods of attraction, like
+the savages yonder."
+
+She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the photograph
+and the miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
+
+"I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear this picture
+on your heart, as well as in it."
+
+"Then you must be a very remarkable woman," said Bickley. "Never
+before did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man was faithful to
+somebody else."
+
+"Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so angry
+to us women?" asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without waiting for
+an answer, she inquired of him whether he had been successful in his
+analysis of the Life-water.
+
+"How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did Bastin tell
+you?" exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the descent to
+Nyo; that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I do, and that he
+thought that my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil or evil spirit from
+some Under-world which he called hell."
+
+"Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth," said Bickley, "for which
+I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady Yva, and tell us who
+and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what are you."
+
+"Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord Oro and
+I are two who have lived on from the old time when the world was
+different, and yet, I think, the same. He is a man and not a god, and I
+am a woman. His powers are great because of his knowledge, which he has
+gathered from his forefathers and in a life of a thousand years before
+he went to sleep. He can do things you cannot do. Thus, he can pass
+through space and take others with him, and return again. He can learn
+what is happening in far-off parts of the world, as he did when he
+told you of the war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible
+powers; for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he
+knows the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can change its
+turning so that earthquakes happen and sea becomes land, and land sea,
+and the places that were hot grow cold, and those that were cold grow
+hot."
+
+"All of which things have happened many times in the history of the
+globe," said Bickley, "without the help of the Lord Oro."
+
+"Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless will have
+knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge, and knowledge is
+strength."
+
+"Yes," I interposed, "but such powers as you attribute to your father
+are not given to man."
+
+"You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks that he
+has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is not so. Hundreds
+of thousands of years ago men knew more than it seems they do today, ten
+times more, as they lived ten times longer, or so you tell me."
+
+"Men?" I said.
+
+"Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations supposed
+them to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and terrors of man.
+He desires power which is ambition, and when the world refused his rule,
+he destroyed that part of it which rebelled, which is revenge. Moreover,
+above all things he dreads death, which is fear. That is why he
+suspended life in himself and me for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years, as his knowledge gave him strength to do, because death was near
+and he thought that sleep was better than death."
+
+"Why should he dread to die," asked Bickley, "seeing that sleep and
+death are the same?"
+
+"Because his knowledge tells him that Sleep and Death are not the same,
+as you, in your foolishness, believe, for there Bastin is wiser than
+you. Because for all his wisdom he remains ignorant of what happens to
+man when the Light of Life is blown out by the breath of Fate. That is
+why he fears to die and why he talks with Bastin the Preacher, who says
+he has the secret of the future."
+
+"And do you fear to die?" I asked.
+
+"No, Humphrey," she answered gently. "Because I think that there is no
+death, and, having done no wrong, I dread no evil. I had dreams while I
+was asleep, O Humphrey, and it seemed to me that--"
+
+Here she ceased and glanced at where she knew the miniature was hanging
+upon my breast.
+
+"Now," she continued, after a little pause, "tell me of your world,
+of its history, of its languages, of what happens there, for I long to
+know."
+
+So then and there, assisted by Bickley, I began the education of the
+Lady Yva. I do not suppose that there was ever a more apt pupil in the
+whole earth. To begin with, she was better acquainted with every subject
+on which I touched than I was myself; all she lacked was information as
+to its modern aspect. Her knowledge ended two hundred and fifty thousand
+years ago, at which date, however, it would seem that civilisation had
+already touched a higher water-mark than it has ever since attained.
+Thus, this vanished people understood astronomy, natural magnetism, the
+force of gravity, steam, also electricity to some subtle use of which,
+I gathered, the lighting of their underground city was to be attributed.
+They had mastered architecture and the arts, as their buildings and
+statues showed; they could fly through the air better than we have
+learned to do within the last few years.
+
+More, they, or some of them, had learned the use of the Fourth
+Dimension, that is their most instructed individuals, could move through
+opposing things, as well as over them, up into them and across them.
+This power these possessed in a two-fold form. I mean, that they could
+either disintegrate their bodies at one spot and cause them to integrate
+again at another, or they could project what the old Egyptians called
+the Ka or Double, and modern Theosophists name the Astral Shape, to
+any distance. Moreover, this Double, or Astral Shape, while itself
+invisible, still, so to speak, had the use of its senses. It could see,
+it could hear, and it could remember, and, on returning to the body, it
+could avail itself of the experience thus acquired.
+
+Thus, at least, said Yva, while Bickley contemplated her with a cold
+and unbelieving eye. She even went further and alleged that in certain
+instances, individuals of her extinct race had been able to pass through
+the ether and to visit other worlds in the depths of space.
+
+"Have you ever done that?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Once or twice I dreamed that I did," she replied quietly.
+
+"We can all dream," he answered.
+
+As it was my lot to make acquaintance with this strange and uncanny
+power at a later date, I will say no more of it now.
+
+Telepathy, she declared, was also a developed gift among the Sons of
+Wisdom; indeed, they seem to have used it as we use wireless messages.
+Only, in their case, the sending and receiving stations were skilled and
+susceptible human beings who went on duty for so many hours at a time.
+Thus intelligence was transmitted with accuracy and despatch. Those who
+had this faculty were, she said, also very apt at reading the minds of
+others and therefore not easy to deceive.
+
+"Is that how you know that I had been trying to analyse your
+Life-water?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Yes," she answered, with her unvarying smile. "At the moment I spoke
+thereof you were wondering whether my father would be angry if he knew
+that you had taken the water in a little flask." She studied him for a
+moment, then added: "Now you are wondering, first, whether I did not
+see you take the water from the fountain and guess the purpose, and,
+secondly, whether perhaps Bastin did not tell me what you were doing
+with it when we met in the sepulchre."
+
+"Look here," said the exasperated Bickley, "I admit that telepathy and
+thought-reading are possible to a certain limited extent. But supposing
+that you possess those powers, as I think in English, and you do not
+know English, how can you interpret what is passing in my mind?"
+
+"Perhaps you have been teaching me English all this while without
+knowing it, Bickley. In any case, it matters little, seeing that what
+I read is the thought, not the language with which it is clothed. The
+thought comes from your mind to mine--that is, if I wish it, which is
+not often--and I interpret it in my own or other tongues."
+
+"I am glad to hear it is not often, Lady Yva, since thoughts are
+generally considered private."
+
+"Yes, and therefore I will read yours no more. Why should I, when they
+are so full of disbelief of all I tell you, and sometimes of other
+things about myself which I do not seek to know?"
+
+"No wonder that, according to the story in the pictures, those Nations,
+whom you named Barbarians, made an end of your people, Lady Yva."
+
+"You are mistaken, Bickley; the Lord Oro made an end of the Nations,
+though against my prayer," she added with a sigh.
+
+Then Bickley departed in a rage, and did not appear again for an hour.
+
+"He is angry," she said, looking after him; "nor do I wonder. It is hard
+for the very clever like Bickley, who think that they have mastered all
+things, to find that after all they are quite ignorant. I am sorry for
+him, and I like him very much."
+
+"Then you would be sorry for me also, Lady Yva?"
+
+"Why?" she asked with a dazzling smile, "when your heart is athirst for
+knowledge, gaping for it like a fledgling's mouth for food, and, as
+it chances, though I am not very wise, I can satisfy something of your
+soul-hunger."
+
+"Not very wise!" I repeated.
+
+"No, Humphrey. I think that Bastin, who in many ways is so stupid, has
+more true wisdom than I have, because he can believe and accept without
+question. After all, the wisdom of my people is all of the universe
+and its wonders. What you think magic is not magic; it is only gathered
+knowledge and the finding out of secrets. Bickley will tell you the
+same, although as yet he does not believe that the mind of man can
+stretch so far."
+
+"You mean that your wisdom has in it nothing of the spirit?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, that is what I mean. I do not even know if there is such
+a thing as spirit. Our god was Fate; Bastin's god is a spirit, and I
+think yours also."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Therefore, I wish you and Bastin to teach me of your god, as does Oro,
+my father. I want--oh! so much, Humphrey, to learn whether we live after
+death."
+
+"You!" I exclaimed. "You who, according to the story, have slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years! You, who have, unless I mistake,
+hinted that during that sleep you may have lived in other shapes! Do you
+doubt whether we can live after death?"
+
+"Yes. Sleep induced by secret arts is not death, and during that sleep
+the I within might wander and inhabit other shapes, because it is
+forbidden to be idle. Moreover, what seems to be death may not be death,
+only another form of sleep from which the I awakes again upon the world.
+But at last comes the real death, when the I is extinguished to the
+world. That much I know, because my people learned it."
+
+"You mean, you know that men and women may live again and again upon the
+world?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, I do. For in the world there is only a certain store of
+life which in many forms travels on and on, till the lot of each I is
+fulfilled. Then comes the real death, and after that--what, oh!--what?"
+
+"You must ask Bastin," I said humbly. "I cannot dare to teach of such
+matters."
+
+"No, but you can and do believe, and that helps me, Humphrey, who am
+in tune with you. Yes, it helps me much more than do Bastin and his new
+religion, because such is woman's way. Now, I think Bickley will soon
+return, so let us talk of other matters. Tell me of the history of your
+people, Humphrey, that my father says are now at war."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVIII. The Accident
+
+
+Bickley did return, having recovered his temper, since after all it was
+impossible for anyone to remain angry with the Lady Yva for long, and we
+spent a very happy time together. We instructed and she was the humble
+pupil.
+
+How swift and nimble was her intelligence! In that one morning she
+learned all our alphabet and how to write our letters. It appeared that
+among her people, at any rate in their later periods, the only form of
+writing that was used was a highly concentrated shorthand which saved
+labour. They had no journals, since news which arrived telepathically
+or by some form of wireless was proclaimed to those who cared to listen,
+and on it all formed their own judgments. In the same way poems and even
+romances were repeated, as in Homer's day or in the time of the Norse
+sagas, by word of mouth. None of their secret knowledge was written
+down. Like the ritual of Freemasonry it was considered too sacred.
+
+Moreover, when men lived for hundreds of years this was not so
+necessary, especially as their great fear was lest it should fall into
+the hands of the outside nations, whom they called Barbarians. For, be
+it remembered, these Sons of Wisdom were always a very small people
+who ruled by the weight of their intelligence and the strength of their
+accumulated lore. Indeed, they could scarcely be called a people; rather
+were they a few families, all of them more or less connected with the
+original ruling Dynasty which considered itself half divine. These
+families were waited upon by a multitude of servants or slaves drawn
+from the subject nations, for the most part skilled in one art or
+another, or perhaps, remarkable for their personal beauty. Still they
+remained outside the pale.
+
+The Sons of Wisdom did not intermarry with them or teach them their
+learning, or even allow them to drink of their Life-water. They ruled
+them as men rule dogs, treating them with kindness, but no more, and as
+many dogs run their course and die in the lifetime of one master, so did
+many of these slaves in that of one of the Sons of Wisdom. Therefore,
+the slaves came to regard their lords not as men, but gods. They lived
+but three score years and ten like the rest of us, and went their way,
+they, whose great-great-grandfathers had served the same master and
+whose great-great-great-grandchildren would still serve him. What should
+we think of a lord who we knew was already adult in the time of William
+the Conqueror, and who remained still vigorous and all-powerful in that
+of George V? One, moreover, who commanded almost infinite knowledge to
+which we were denied the key? We might tremble before him and look upon
+him as half-divine, but should we not long to kill him and possess his
+knowledge and thereby prolong our own existence to his wondrous measure?
+
+Such, said Yva, was the case with their slaves and the peoples from
+whence these sprang. They grew mad with jealous hate, till at length
+came the end we knew.
+
+Thus we talked on for hours till the time came for us to eat. As before
+Yva partook of fruit and we of such meats as we had at hand. These,
+we noticed, disgusted her, because, as she explained, the Children of
+Wisdom, unless driven thereto by necessity, touched no flesh, but lived
+on the fruits of the earth and wine alone. Only the slaves and the
+Barbarians ate flesh. In these views Bickley for once agreed with
+her, that is, except as regards the wine, for in theory, if not in
+practice--he was a vegetarian.
+
+"I will bring you more of the Life-water," she said, "and then you will
+grow to hate these dead things, as I do. And now farewell. My father
+calls me. I hear him though you do not. To-morrow I cannot come, but the
+day after I will come and bring you the Life-water. Nay, accompany me
+not, but as I see he wishes it, let Tommy go with me. I will care for
+him, and he is a friend in all that lonely place."
+
+So she went, and with her Tommy, rejoicing.
+
+"Ungrateful little devil!" said Bickley. "Here we've fed and petted
+him from puppyhood, or at least you have, and yet he skips off with the
+first stranger. I never saw him behave like that to any woman, except
+your poor wife."
+
+"I know," I answered. "I cannot understand it. Hullo! here comes
+Bastin."
+
+Bastin it was, dishevelled and looking much the worse for wear, also
+minus his Bible in the native tongue.
+
+"Well, how have you been getting on?" said Bickley.
+
+"I should like some tea, also anything there is to eat."
+
+We supplied him with these necessaries, and after a while he said slowly
+and solemnly:
+
+"I cannot help thinking of a childish story which Bickley told or
+invented one night at your house at home. I remember he had an argument
+with my wife, which he said put him in mind of it, I am sure I don't
+know why. It was about a monkey and a parrot that were left together
+under a sofa for a long while, where they were so quiet that everybody
+forgot them. Then the parrot came out with only one feather left in its
+tail and none at all on its body, saying, 'I've had no end of a time!'
+after which it dropped down and died. Do you know, I feel just like that
+parrot, only I don't mean to die, and I think I gave the monkey quite as
+good as he gave me!"
+
+"What happened?" I asked, intensely interested.
+
+"Oh! the Glittering Lady took me into that palace hall where Oro was
+sitting like a spider in a web, and left me there. I got to work at
+once. He was much interested in the Old Testament stories and said there
+were points of truth about them, although they had evidently come down
+to the modern writer--he called him a modern writer--in a legendary
+form. I thought his remarks impertinent and with difficulty refrained
+from saying so. Leaving the story of the Deluge and all that, I spoke of
+other matters, telling him of eternal life and Heaven and Hell, of which
+the poor benighted man had never heard. I pointed out especially that
+unless he repented, his life, by all accounts, had been so wicked, that
+he was certainly destined to the latter place."
+
+"What did he say to that?" I asked.
+
+"Do you know, I think it frightened him, if one could imagine Oro being
+frightened. At any rate he remarked that the truth or falsity of what I
+said was an urgent matter for him, as he could not expect to live more
+than a few hundred years longer, though perhaps he might prolong the
+period by another spell of sleep. Then he asked me why I thought him so
+wicked. I replied because he himself said that he had drowned millions
+of people, which showed an evil heart and intention even if it were
+not a fact. He thought a long while and asked what could be done in the
+circumstances. I replied that repentance and reparation were the only
+courses open to him."
+
+"Reparation!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, reparation was what I said, though I think I made a mistake there,
+as you will see. As nearly as I can remember, he answered that he was
+beginning to repent, as from all he had learned from us, he gathered
+that the races which had arisen as a consequence of his action, were
+worse than those which he had destroyed. As regards reparation, what
+he had done once he could do again. He would think the matter over
+seriously, and see if it were possible and advisable to raise those
+parts of the world which had been sunk, and sink those which had been
+raised. If so, he thought that would make very handsome amends to the
+departed nations and set him quite right with any superior Power, if
+such a thing existed. What are you laughing at, Bickley? I don't think
+it a laughing matter, since such remarks do not seem to me to indicate
+any real change in Oro's heart, which is what I was trying to effect."
+
+Bickley, who was convulsed with merriment, wiped his eyes and said:
+
+"You dear old donkey, don't you see what you have done, or rather would
+have done if there were a word of truth in all this ridiculous story
+about a deluge? You would be in the way of making your precious pupil,
+who certainly is the most masterly old liar in the world, repeat his
+offence and send Europe to the bottom of the sea."
+
+"That did occur to me, but it doesn't much matter as I am quite certain
+that such a thing would never be allowed. Of course there was a real
+deluge once, but Oro had no more to do with it than I had. Don't you
+agree, Arbuthnot?"
+
+"I think so," I answered cautiously, "but really in this place I am
+beginning to lose count of what is or is not possible. Also, of course,
+there may have been many deluges; indeed the history of the world shows
+that this was so; it is written in its geological strata. What was the
+end of it?"
+
+"The end was that he took the South Sea Bible and, after I had explained
+a little about our letters, seemed to be able to read it at once. I
+suppose he was acquainted with the art of printing in his youth. At any
+rate he said that he would study it, I don't know how, unless he can
+read, and that in two days' time he would let me know what he thought
+about the matter of my religion. Then he told me to go. I said that I
+did not know the way and was afraid of losing myself. Thereupon he waved
+his hand, and I really can't say what happened."
+
+"Did you levitate up here," asked Bickley, "like the late lamented Mr.
+Home at the spiritualistic seances?"
+
+"No, I did not exactly levitate, but something or someone seemed to get
+a hold of me, and I was just rushed along in a most tumultuous fashion.
+The next thing I knew was that I was standing at the door of that
+sepulchre, though I have no recollection of going up in the lift, or
+whatever it is. I believe those beastly caves are full of ghosts, or
+devils, and the worst of it is that they have kept my solar-tope, which
+I put on this morning forgetting that it would be useless there."
+
+"The Lady Yva's Fourth Dimension in action," I suggested, "only it
+wouldn't work on solar-topes."
+
+"I don't know what you are talking about," said Bastin, "but if my hat
+had to be left, why not my boots and other garments? Please stop your
+nonsense and pass the tea. Thank goodness I haven't got to go down there
+tomorrow, as he seems to have had enough of me for the present, so I
+vote we all pay a visit to the ship. It will be a very pleasant change.
+I couldn't stand two days running with that old fiend, and his ghosts or
+devils in the cave."
+
+
+Next morning accordingly, fearing no harm from the Orofenans, we took
+the canoe and rowed to the main island. Marama had evidently seen
+us coming, for he and a number of his people met us with every
+demonstration of delight, and escorted us to the ship. Here we found
+things just as we had left them, for there had been no attempt at theft
+or other mischief.
+
+While we were in the cabin a fit of moral weakness seemed to overcome
+Bickley, the first and I may add the last from which I ever saw him
+suffer.
+
+"Do you know," he said, addressing us, "I think that we should do
+well to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal of the
+marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here, it is
+still obvious that we find ourselves in very peculiar and unhealthy
+surroundings. I mean mentally unhealthy, indeed I think that if we stay
+here much longer we shall probably go off our heads. Now that boat on
+the deck remains sound and seaworthy. Why should not we provision her
+and take our chance? We know more or less which way to steer."
+
+Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.
+
+"Wouldn't it be rather a risky job in an open boat?" he asked. "However,
+that doesn't matter much because I don't take any account of risks,
+knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow and that the hairs of my
+head are all numbered."
+
+"They might be numbered under water as well as above it," muttered
+Bickley, "and I feel sure that on your own showing, you would be as
+valuable dead as alive."
+
+"What I seem to feel," went on Bastin, "is that I have work to my hand
+here. Also, the locum tenens at Fulcombe no doubt runs the parish as
+well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man for the place than
+I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but I do not despair of him
+yet, and besides him there is the Glittering Lady, a most open-minded
+person, whom I have not yet had any real opportunity of approaching in
+a spiritual sense. Then there are all these natives who cannot learn
+without a teacher. So on the whole I think I would rather stay where I
+am until Providence points out some other path."
+
+"I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons," I said.
+"I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of men to come in
+touch with such things as we have found upon this island. They may be
+illusions, but at least they are very interesting illusions. One might
+live ten lifetimes and find nothing else of the sort. Therefore I should
+like to see the end of the dream."
+
+Bickley reflected a little, then said:
+
+"On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am terribly
+afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear and see, and
+that way madness lies. It is better to die than to go mad."
+
+"You'll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean decease,
+of course," interrupted Bastin. "And who knows, perhaps all this is an
+opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes, which, I must say,
+are singularly blind. You think you know everything there is to learn,
+but the fact is that like the rest of us, you know nothing at all, and
+good man though you are, obstinately refuse to admit the truth and to
+seek support elsewhere. For my part I believe that you are afraid of
+falling in love with that Glittering Lady and of being convinced by her
+that you are wrong in your most unsatisfactory conclusions."
+
+"I am out-voted anyway," said Bickley, "and for the rest, Bastin, look
+after yourself and leave me alone. I will add that on the whole I think
+you are both right, and that it is wisest for us to stop where we are,
+for after all we can only die once."
+
+"I am not so sure, Bickley. There is a thing called the second death,
+which is what is troubling that old scoundrel, Oro. Now I will go and
+look for those books."
+
+So the idea of flight was abandoned, although I admit that even to
+myself it had attractions. For I felt that I was being wrapped in a
+net of mysteries from which I saw no escape. Yes, and of more than
+mysteries; I who had sworn that I would never look upon another woman,
+was learning to love this sweet and wondrous Yva, and of that what could
+be the end?
+
+
+We collected all we had come to seek, and started homewards escorted
+by Marama and his people, including a number of young women who danced
+before us in a light array of flowers.
+
+Passing our old house, we came to the grove where the idol Oro had stood
+and Bastin was so nearly sacrificed. There was another idol there now
+which he wished to examine, but in the end did not as the natives so
+obviously objected. Indeed Marama told me that notwithstanding the
+mysterious death of the sorcerers on the Rock of Offerings, there was
+still a strong party in the island who would be glad to do us a mischief
+if any further affront were offered to their hereditary god.
+
+He questioned us also tentatively about the apparition, for such he
+conceived it to be, which had appeared upon the rock and killed the
+sorcerers, and I answered him as I thought wisest, telling him that a
+terrible Power was afoot in the land, which he would do well to obey.
+
+"Yes," he said; "the God of the Mountain of whom the tradition has come
+down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he sees, he hears
+and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O Friend-from-the-Sea."
+
+As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick bush.
+Suddenly from out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore a mask upon
+his face, but from his shape could not have been more than thirteen or
+fourteen years of age. In his hand was a wooden club. He ran forward,
+stopped, and with a yell of hate hurled it, I think at Bastin, but it
+hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and remembered no more.
+
+Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do not know.
+It seemed to me that through them continually I saw the stately figure
+of old Oro contemplating me gravely, as though he were making up his
+mind about something in which I must play a part. Then there was another
+figure, that of the gracious but imperial Yva, who from time to time,
+as I thought, leant over me and whispered in my ear words of rest
+and comfort. Nor was this all, since her shape had a way of changing
+suddenly into that of my lost wife who would speak with her voice. Or
+perhaps my wife would speak with Yva's voice. To my disordered sense it
+was as though they were one personality, having two shapes, either of
+which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me most
+blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the dead, and in the
+dead the living. More, I took journeys, or rather some unknown part of
+me seemed to do so. One of these I remember, for its majestic character
+stamped itself upon my mind in such a fashion that all the waters of
+delirium could not wash it out nor all its winds blow away that memory.
+
+I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster than
+light can flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near, they grew into
+enormous, flaming Glories round which circled world upon world. They
+became small, dwindled to points of light and disappeared.
+
+We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous white city
+wherein were buildings with domes of crystal and alabaster, in the
+latter of which were set windows made of great jewels; sapphires or
+rubies they seemed to me. We went on up a lovely valley. To the left
+were hills, down which tumbled waterfalls; to the right was a river
+broad and deep that seemed to overflow its banks as does the Nile.
+Behind were high mountains on the slopes of which grew forests of
+glorious trees, some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up their
+crests stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
+guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was lit with
+a light such as that of the moon, only intensified and of many colours.
+Indeed looking up, I saw that above us floated three moons, each of them
+bigger than our own at the full, and gathered that here it was night.
+
+We came to a house set amid scented gardens and having in front of it
+terraces of flowers. It seemed not unlike my own house at home, but I
+took little note of it, because of a woman who sat upon the verandah, if
+I may call it so. She was clad in garments of white silk fastened about
+her middle with a jewelled girdle. On her neck also was a collar of
+jewels. I forget the colour; indeed this seemed to change continually
+as the light from the different moons struck when she moved, but I
+think its prevailing tinge was blue. In her arms this woman nursed a
+beauteous, sleeping child, singing happily as she rocked it to and
+fro. Yva went towards the woman who looked up at her step and uttered a
+little cry. Then for the first time I saw the woman's face. It was that
+of my dead wife!
+
+As I followed in my dream, a little cloud of mist seemed to cover both
+my wife and Yva, and when I reached the place Yva was gone. Only my wife
+remained, she and the child. There she stood, solemn and sweet. While I
+drew near she laid down the child upon the cushioned seat from which
+she had risen. She stretched out her arms and flung them about me. She
+embraced me and I embraced her in a rapture of reunion. Then turning she
+lifted up the child, it was a girl, for me to kiss.
+
+"See your daughter," she said, "and behold all that I am making ready
+for you where we shall dwell in a day to come."
+
+I grew confused.
+
+"Yva," I said. "Where is Yva who brought me here? Did she go into the
+house?"
+
+"Yes," she answered happily. "Yva went into the house. Look again!"
+
+I looked and it was Yva's face that was pressed against my own, and
+Yva's eyes that gazed into mine. Only she was garbed as my wife had
+been, and on her bosom hung the changeful necklace.
+
+"You may not stay," she whispered, and lo! it was my wife that spoke,
+not Yva.
+
+"Tell me what it means?" I implored.
+
+"I cannot," she answered. "There are mysteries that you may not know as
+yet. Love Yva if you will and I shall not be jealous, for in loving Yva
+you love me. You cannot understand? Then know this, that the spirit has
+many shapes, and yet is the same spirit--sometimes. Now I who am far,
+yet near, bid you farewell a while."
+
+Then all passed in a flash and the dream ended.
+
+Such was the only one of those visions which I can recall.
+
+
+I seemed to wake up as from a long and tumultuous sleep. The first thing
+I saw was the palm roof of our house upon the rock. I knew it was our
+house, for just above me was a palm leaf of which I had myself tied the
+stalk to the framework with a bit of coloured ribbon that I had chanced
+to find in my pocket. It came originally from the programme card of
+a dance that I had attended at Honolulu and I had kept it because I
+thought it might be useful. Finally I used it to secure that loose leaf.
+I stared at the ribbon which brought back a flood of memories, and as I
+was thus engaged I heard voices talking, and listened--Bickley's voice,
+and the Lady Yva's.
+
+"Yes," Bickley was saying, "he will do well now, but he went near, very
+near."
+
+"I knew he would not die," she answered, "because my father said so."
+
+"There are two sorts of deaths," replied Bickley, "that of the body and
+that of the mind. I was afraid that even if he lived, his reason would
+go, but from certain indications I do not think that will happen now. He
+will get quite well again--though--" and he stopped.
+
+"I am very glad to hear you say so," chimed in Bastin. "For weeks
+I thought that I should have to read the Burial Service over poor
+Arbuthnot. Indeed I was much puzzled as to the best place to bury him.
+Finally I found a very suitable spot round the corner there, where it
+isn't rock, in which one can't dig and the soil is not liable to be
+flooded. In fact I went so far as to clear away the bush and to mark out
+the grave with its foot to the east. In this climate one can't delay,
+you know."
+
+Weak as I was, I smiled. This practical proceeding was so exactly like
+Bastin.
+
+"Well, you wasted your labour," exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I am glad to say I did. But I don't think it was your operations
+and the rest that cured him, Bickley, although you take all the credit.
+I believe it was the Life-water that the Lady Yva made him drink and the
+stuff that Oro sent which we gave him when you weren't looking."
+
+"Then I hope that in the future you will not interfere with my cases,"
+said the indignant Bickley, and either the voices passed away or I went
+to sleep.
+
+When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my side
+watching me.
+
+"Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out walking," she
+said slowly in English.
+
+"Who taught you my language?" I asked, astonished. "Bastin and Bickley,
+while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man just same now as he
+was hundred thousand years ago," she added enigmatically. "All think one
+woman beautiful when no other woman there."
+
+"Indeed," I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part of
+Bastin and Bickley she alluded. Could that self-centred pair--oh! it was
+impossible.
+
+"How long have I been ill?" I asked to escape the subject which I felt
+to be uncomfortable.
+
+She lifted her beautiful eyes in search of words and began to count upon
+her fingers.
+
+"Two moon, one half moon, yes, ten week, counting Sabbath," she answered
+triumphantly.
+
+"Ten weeks!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, ten whole weeks and three days you first bad, then mad.
+Oh!" she went on, breaking into the Orofenan tongue which she spoke so
+perfectly, although it was not her own. That language of hers I never
+learned, but I know she thought in it and only translated into Orofenan,
+because of the great difficulty which she had in rendering her high and
+refined ideas into its simpler metaphor, and the strange words which
+often she introduced. "Oh! you have been very ill, friend of my heart.
+At times I thought that you were going to die, and wept and wept.
+Bickley thinks that he saved you and he is very clever. But he could not
+have saved you; that wanted more knowledge than any of your people have;
+only I pray you, do not tell him so because it would hurt his pride."
+
+"What was the matter with me then, Yva?"
+
+"All was the matter. First, the weapon which that youth threw--he was
+the son of the sorcerer whom my father destroyed--crushed in the bone
+of your head. He is dead for his crime and may he be accursed for ever,"
+she added in the only outbreak of rage and vindictiveness in which I
+ever saw her indulge.
+
+"One must make excuses for him; his father had been killed," I said.
+
+"Yes, that is what Bastin tells me, and it is true. Still, for that
+young man I can make no excuse; it was cowardly and wicked. Well,
+Bickley performed what he calls operation, and the Lord Oro, he came up
+from his house and helped him, because Bastin is no good in such things.
+Then he can only turn away his head and pray. I, too, helped, holding
+hot water and linen and jar of the stuff that made you feel like
+nothing, although the sight made me feel more sick than anything since I
+saw one I loved killed, oh, long, long ago."
+
+"Was the operation successful?" I asked, for I did not dare to begin to
+thank her.
+
+"Yes, that clever man, Bickley, lifted the bone which had been crushed
+in. Only then something broke in your head and you began to bleed here,"
+and she touched what I believe is called the temporal artery. "The vein
+had been crushed by the blow, and gave way. Bickley worked and worked,
+and just in time he tied it up before you died. Oh! then I felt as
+though I loved Bickley, though afterwards Bastin said that I ought to
+have loved him, since it was not Bickley who stopped the bleeding, but
+his prayer."
+
+"Perhaps it was both," I suggested.
+
+"Perhaps, Humphrey, at least you were saved. Then came another trouble.
+You took fever. Bickley said that it was because a certain gnat had
+bitten you when you went down to the ship, and my father, the Lord Oro,
+told me that this was right. At the least you grew very weak and lost
+your mind, and it seemed as though you must die. Then, Humphrey, I went
+to the Lord Oro and kneeled before him and prayed for your life, for I
+knew that he could cure you if he would, though Bickley's skill was at
+an end.
+
+"'Daughter,' he said to me, 'not once but again and again you have set
+up your will against mine in the past. Why then should I trouble myself
+to grant this desire of yours in the present, and save a man who is
+nothing to me?'
+
+"I rose to my feet and answered, 'I do not know, my Father, yet I am
+certain that for your own sake it will be well to do so. I am sure that
+of everything even you must give an account at last, great though you
+be, and who knows, perhaps one life which you have saved may turn the
+balance in your favour.'
+
+"'Surely the priest Bastin has been talking to you,' he said.
+
+"'He has,' I answered, 'and not he alone. Many voices have been talking
+to me.'"
+
+"What did you mean by that?" I asked.
+
+"It matters nothing what I meant, Humphrey. Be still and listen to my
+story. My father thought a while and answered:
+
+"'I am jealous of this stranger. What is he but a short-lived
+half-barbarian such as we knew in the old days? And yet already you
+think more of him than you do of me, your father, the divine Oro who has
+lived a thousand years. At first I helped that physician to save him,
+but now I think I wish him dead.'
+
+"'If you let this man die, my Father,' I answered, 'then we part.
+Remember that I also have of the wisdom of our people, and can use it if
+I will.'
+
+"'Then save him yourself,' he said.
+
+"'Perhaps I shall, my Father,' I answered, 'but if so it will not be
+here. I say that if so we part and you shall be left to rule in your
+majesty alone.'
+
+"Now this frightened the Lord Oro, for he has the weakness that he hates
+to be alone.
+
+"'If I do what you will, do you swear never to leave me, Yva?' he asked.
+'Know that if you will not swear, the man dies.'
+
+"'I swear,' I answered--for your sake, Humphrey--though I did not love
+the oath.
+
+"Then he gave me a certain medicine to mix with the Life-water, and when
+you were almost gone that medicine cured you, though Bickley does not
+know it, as nothing else could have done. Now I have told you the truth,
+for your own ear only, Humphrey."
+
+"Yva," I asked, "why did you do all this for me?"
+
+"Humphrey, I do not know," she answered, "but I think because I must.
+Now sleep a while."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIX. The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+So far as my body was concerned I grew well with great rapidity, though
+it was long before I got back my strength. Thus I could not walk far or
+endure any sustained exertion. With my mind it was otherwise. I can not
+explain what had happened to it; indeed I do not know, but in a sense it
+seemed to have become detached and to have assumed a kind of personality
+of its own. At times it felt as though it were no longer an inhabitant
+of the body, but rather its more or less independent partner. I was
+perfectly clear-headed and of insanity I experienced no symptoms. Yet my
+mind, I use that term from lack of a better, was not entirely under my
+control. For one thing, at night it appeared to wander far away, though
+whither it went and what it saw there I could never remember.
+
+I record this because possibly it explains certain mysterious events, if
+they were events and not dreams, which shortly I must set out. I spoke
+to Bickley about the matter. He put it by lightly, saying that it was
+only a result of my long and most severe illness and that I should
+steady down in time, especially if we could escape from that island and
+its unnatural atmosphere. Yet as he spoke he glanced at me shrewdly
+with his quick eyes, and when he turned to go away I heard him mutter
+something to himself about "unholy influences" and "that confounded old
+Oro."
+
+The words were spoken to himself and quite beneath his breath, and of
+course not meant to reach me. But one of the curious concomitants of my
+state was that all my senses, and especially my hearing, had become most
+abnormally acute. A whisper far away was now to me like a loud remark
+made in a room.
+
+Bickley's reflection, for I can scarcely call it more, set me thinking.
+Yva had said that Oro sent me medicine which was administered to me
+without Bickley's knowledge, and as she believed, saved my life, or
+certainly my reason. What was in it? I wondered. Then there was that
+Life-water which Yva brought and insisted upon my drinking every day.
+Undoubtedly it was a marvelous tonic and did me good. But it had other
+effects also. Thus, as she said would be the case, after a course of
+it I conceived the greatest dislike, which I may add has never entirely
+left me, of any form of meat, also of alcohol. All I seemed to want was
+this water with fruit, or such native vegetables as there were. Bickley
+disapproved and made me eat fish occasionally, but even this revolted
+me, and since I gained steadily in weight, as we found out by a simple
+contrivance, and remained healthy in every other way, soon he allowed me
+to choose my own diet.
+
+About this time Oro began to pay me frequent visits. He always came at
+night, and what is more I knew when he was coming, although he never
+gave me warning. Here I should explain that during my illness Bastin,
+who was so ingenious in such matters, had built another hut in which he
+and Bickley slept, of course when they were not watching me, leaving our
+old bed-chamber to myself.
+
+Well, I would wake up and be aware that Oro was coming. Then he appeared
+in a silent and mysterious way, as though he had materialised in the
+room, for I never saw him pass the doorway. In the moonlight, or the
+starlight, which flowed through the entrance and the side of the hut
+that was only enclosed with latticework, I perceived him seat himself
+upon a certain stool, looking like a most majestic ghost with his
+flowing robes, long white beard, hooked nose and hawk eyes. In the
+day-time he much resembled the late General Booth whom I had often
+seen, except for certain added qualities of height and classic beauty of
+countenance. At night, however, he resembled no one but himself, indeed
+there was something mighty and godlike in his appearance, something that
+made one feel that he was not as are other men.
+
+For a while he would sit and look at me. Then he began to speak in a
+low, vibrant voice. What did he speak of? Well, many matters. It was as
+though he were unburdening that hoary soul of his because it could no
+longer endure the grandeur of its own loneliness. Amongst sundry secret
+things, he told me of the past history of this world of ours, and of the
+mighty civilisations which for uncounted ages he and his forefathers had
+ruled by the strength of their will and knowledge, of the dwindling
+of their race and of the final destruction of its enemies, although I
+noticed that now he no longer said that this was his work alone. One
+night I asked him if he did not miss all such pomp and power.
+
+Then suddenly he broke out, and for the first time I really learned what
+ambition can be when it utterly possesses the soul of man.
+
+"Are you mad," he asked, "that you suppose that I, Oro, the King of
+kings, can be content to dwell solitary in a great cave with none but
+the shadows of the dead to serve me? Nay, I must rule again and be even
+greater than before, or else I too will die. Better to face the future,
+even if it means oblivion, than to remain thus a relic of a glorious
+past, still living and yet dead, like that statue of the great god Fate
+which you saw in the temple of my worship."
+
+"Bastin does not think that the future means oblivion," I remarked.
+
+"I know it. I have studied his faith and find it too humble for my
+taste, also too new. Shall I, Oro, creep a suppliant before any Power,
+and confess what Bastin is pleased to call my sins? Nay, I who am great
+will be the equal of all greatness, or nothing."
+
+He paused a while, then went on:
+
+"Bastin speaks of 'eternity.' Where and what then is this eternity which
+if it has no end can have had no beginning? I know the secret of the
+suns and their attendant worlds, and they are no more eternal than the
+insect which glitters for an hour. Out of shapeless, rushing gases they
+gathered to live their day, and into gases at last they dissolve again
+with all they bore."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "but they reform into new worlds."
+
+"That have no part with the old. This world, too, will melt, departing
+to whence it came, as your sacred writings say, and what then of those
+who dwelt and dwell thereon? No, Man of today, give me Time in which I
+rule and keep your dreams of an Eternity that is not, and in which you
+must still crawl and serve, even if it were. Yet, if I might, I confess
+it, I would live on for ever, but as Master not as Slave."
+
+
+On another night he began to tempt me, very subtly. "I see a spark of
+greatness in you, Humphrey," he said, "and it comes into my heart that
+you, too, might learn to rule. With Yva, the last of my blood, it is
+otherwise. She is the child of my age and of a race outworn; too gentle,
+too much all womanly. The soul that triumphs must shine like steel in
+the sun, and cut if need be; not merely be beauteous and shed perfume
+like a lily in the shade. Yet she is very wise and fair," here he
+looked at me, "perchance of her might come children such as were their
+forefathers, who again would wield the sceptre of the dominion of the
+earth."
+
+I made no answer, wondering what he meant exactly and thinking it wisest
+to be silent.
+
+"You are of the short-lived races," he went on, "yet very much a man,
+not without intelligence, and by the arts I have I can so strengthen
+your frame that it will endure the shocks of time for three such lives
+as yours, or perchance for more, and then--"
+
+Again he paused and went on:
+
+"The Daughter of kings likes you also, perhaps because you resemble--"
+here he fixed me with his piercing eyes, "a certain kinglet of base
+blood whom once she also liked, but whom it was my duty to destroy.
+Well, I must think. I must study this world of yours also and therein
+you may help me. Perhaps afterwards I will tell you how. Now sleep."
+
+In another moment he was gone, but notwithstanding his powerful command,
+for a while I could not sleep. I understood that he was offering Yva to
+me, but upon what terms? That was the question. With her was to go great
+dominion over the kingdoms of the earth. I could not help remembering
+that always this has been and still is Satan's favourite bait. To me it
+did not particularly appeal. I had been ambitious in my time--who is
+not that is worth his salt? I could have wished to excel in something,
+literature or art, or whatever it might be, and thus to ensure the
+memory of my name in the world.
+
+Of course this is a most futile desire, seeing that soon or late every
+name must fade out of the world like an unfixed photograph which is
+exposed to the sun. Even if it could endure, as the old demigod, or
+demidevil, Oro, had pointed out, very shortly, by comparison with Time's
+unmeasured vastness, the whole solar system will also fade. So of what
+use is this feeble love of fame and this vain attempt to be remembered
+that animates us so strongly? Moreover, the idea of enjoying mere
+temporal as opposed to intellectual power, appealed to me not at all.
+I am a student of history and I know what has been the lot of kings and
+the evil that, often enough, they work in their little day.
+
+Also if I needed any further example, there was that of Oro himself. He
+had outlived the greatness of his House, as a royal family is called,
+and after some gigantic murder, if his own story was to be believed,
+indulged in a prolonged sleep. Now he awoke to find himself quite
+alone in the world, save for a daughter with whom he did not agree or
+sympathise. In short, he was but a kind of animated mummy inspired by
+one idea which I felt quite sure would be disappointed, namely, to renew
+his former greatness. To me he seemed as miserable a figure as one could
+imagine, brooding and plotting in his illuminated cave, at the end of an
+extended but misspent life.
+
+Also I wondered what he, or rather his ego, had been doing during all
+those two hundred and fifty thousand years of sleep. Possibly if Yva's
+theory, as I understood it, were correct, he had reincarnated as Attila,
+or Tamerlane, or Napoleon, or even as Chaka the terrible Zulu king.
+At any rate there he was still in the world, filled with the dread
+of death, but consumed now as ever by his insatiable and most useless
+finite ambitions.
+
+Yva, also! Her case was his, but yet how different. In all this long
+night of Time she had but ripened into one of the sweetest and most
+gentle women that ever the world bore. She, too, was great in her way,
+it appeared in her every word and gesture, but where was the ferocity
+of her father? Where his desire to reach to splendour by treading on a
+blood-stained road paved with broken human hearts? It did not exist.
+Her nature was different although her body came of a long line of these
+power-loving kings. Why this profound difference of the spirit? Like
+everything else it was a mystery. The two were as far apart as the
+Poles. Everyone must have hated Oro, from the beginning, however much he
+feared him, but everyone who came in touch with her must have loved Yva.
+
+
+Here I may break into my personal narrative to say that this, by their
+own confession, proved to be true of two such various persons as Bastin
+and Bickley.
+
+"The truth, which I am sure it would be wrong to hide from you,
+Arbuthnot," said the former to me one day, "is that during your long
+illness I fell in love, I suppose that is the right word, with the
+Glittering Lady. After thinking the matter over also, I conceived that
+it would be proper to tell her so if only to clear the air and prevent
+future misunderstandings. As I remarked to her on that occasion, I had
+hesitated long, as I was not certain how she would fill the place of the
+wife of the incumbent of an English parish."
+
+"Mothers' Meetings, and the rest," I suggested.
+
+"Exactly so, Arbuthnot. Also there were the views of the Bishop to be
+considered, who might have objected to the introduction into the diocese
+of a striking person who so recently had been a heathen, and to one in
+such strong contrast to my late beloved wife."
+
+"I suppose you didn't consider the late Mrs. Bastin's views on the
+subject of re-marriage. I remember that they were strong," I remarked
+rather maliciously.
+
+"No, I did not think it necessary, since the Scriptural instructions on
+the matter are very clear, and in another world no doubt all jealousies,
+even Sarah's, will be obliterated. Upon that point my conscience was
+quite easy. So when I found that, unlike her parent, the Lady Yva was
+much inclined to accept the principles of the faith in which it is my
+privilege to instruct her, I thought it proper to say to her that if
+ultimately she made up her mind to do so--of course this was a sine qua
+non--I should be much honoured, and as a man, not as a priest, it
+would make me most happy if she would take me as a husband. Of course
+I explained to her that I considered, under the circumstances, I could
+quite lawfully perform the marriage ceremony myself with you and Bickley
+as witnesses, even should Oro refuse to give her away. Also I told
+her that although after her varied experiences in the past, life at
+Fulcombe, if we could ever get there, might be a little monotonous,
+still it would not be entirely devoid of interest."
+
+"You mean Christmas decorations and that sort of thing?"
+
+"Yes, and choir treats and entertaining Deputations and attending other
+Church activities."
+
+"Well, and what did she say, Bastin?"
+
+"Oh! she was most kind and flattering. Indeed that hour will always
+remain the pleasantest of my life. I don't know how it happened, but
+when it was over I felt quite delighted that she had refused me. Indeed
+on second thoughts, I am not certain but that I shall be much happier in
+the capacities of a brother and teacher which she asked me to fill, than
+I should have been as her husband. To tell you the truth, Arbuthnot,
+there are moments when I am not sure whether I entirely understand the
+Lady Yva. It was rather like proposing to one's guardian angel."
+
+"Yes," I said, "that's about it, old fellow. 'Guardian Angel' is not a
+bad name for her."
+
+Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," he said. "I want to own up to something. I
+think I ought to, because of certain things I have observed, in order to
+prevent possible future misunderstandings."
+
+"What's that?" I asked innocently.
+
+"Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed bachelor
+on principle. Women introduce too many complications into life, and
+although it involves some sacrifice, on the whole, I have thought
+it best to do without them and leave the carrying on of the world to
+others."
+
+"Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley."
+
+"Only this. While you were ill the sweetness of that Lady Yva and her
+wonderful qualities as a nurse overcame me. I went to pieces all of a
+sudden. I saw in her a realisation of every ideal I had ever entertained
+of perfect womanhood. So to speak, my resolves of a lifetime melted like
+wax in the sun. Notwithstanding her queer history and the marvels with
+which she is mixed up, I wished to marry her. No doubt her physical
+loveliness was at the bottom of it, but, however that may be, there it
+was."
+
+"She is beautiful," I commented; "though I daresay older than she
+looks."
+
+"That is a point on which I made no inquiries, and I should advise you,
+when your turn comes, as no doubt it will, to follow my example. You
+know, Arbuthnot," he mused, "however lovely a woman may be, it would put
+one off if suddenly she announced that she was--let us say--a hundred
+and fifty years old."
+
+"Yes," I admitted, "for nobody wants to marry the contemporary of his
+great-grandmother. However, she gave her age as twenty-seven years and
+three moons."
+
+"And doubtless for once did not tell the truth. But, as she does not
+look more than twenty-five, I think that we may all agree to let it
+stand at that, namely, twenty-seven, plus an indefinite period of sleep.
+At any rate, she is a sweet and most gracious woman, apparently in the
+bloom of youth, and, to cut it short, I fell in love with her."
+
+"Like Bastin," I said.
+
+"Bastin!" exclaimed Bickley indignantly. "You don't mean to say that
+clerical oaf presumed--well, well, after all, I suppose that he is a
+man, so one mustn't be hard on him. But who could have thought that he
+would run so cunning, even when he knew my sentiments towards the lady?
+I hope she told him her mind."
+
+"The point is, what did she tell you, Bickley?"
+
+"Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure to be
+refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one's ease." (Here,
+remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to hide a
+smile.) "She said--what did she say exactly? Such a lot that it is
+difficult to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking of marriage. Also,
+that she had not yet recovered from some recent love affair which left
+her heart sore, since the time of her sleep did not count. Also, that
+her father would never consent, and that the mere idea of such a thing
+would excite his animosity against all of us."
+
+"Is that all?" I asked.
+
+"Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and extremely
+honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her. She hoped,
+however, that I should never repeat it or even allude to the matter
+again, as her dearest wish was to be able to look upon me as her most
+intimate friend to whom she could always come for sympathy and counsel."
+
+"What happened then?"
+
+"Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she wished,
+and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore and upset, but
+I am getting over it, having always practised self-control."
+
+"I am sorry for you, old fellow."
+
+"Are you?" he asked suspiciously. "Then perhaps you have tried your
+luck, too?"
+
+"No, Bickley."
+
+His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
+
+"Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing how lately
+you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin. Perhaps you will
+get over it--recent marriage, I mean--as he has." He hesitated a while,
+then went on: "Of course you will, old fellow; I know it, and, what is
+more, I seem to know that when your turn comes you will get a different
+answer. If so, it will keep her in the family as it were--and good luck
+to you. Only--"
+
+"Only what?" I asked anxiously.
+
+"To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don't think that there will be real good
+luck for any one of us over this woman--not in the ordinary sense, I
+mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman. Is she quite a
+woman, and could she really marry a man as others do?"
+
+"It is curious that you should talk like that," I said uneasily. "I
+thought that you had made up your mind that the whole business was
+either illusion or trickery--I mean, the odd side of it."
+
+"If it is illusion, Arbuthnot, then a man cannot marry an illusion. And
+if it is trickery, then he will certainly be tricked. But, supposing
+that I am wrong, what then?"
+
+"You mean, supposing things are as they seem to be?"
+
+"Yes. In that event, Arbuthnot, I am sure that something will occur to
+prevent your being united to a woman who lived thousands of years ago. I
+am sorry to say it, but Fate will intervene. Remember, it is the god
+of her people that I suppose she worships, and, I may add, to which the
+whole world bows."
+
+At his words a kind of chill fell upon me. I think he saw or divined it,
+for after a few remarks upon some indifferent matter, he turned and went
+away.
+
+Shortly after this Yva came to sit with me. She studied me for a while
+and I studied her. I had reason to do so, for I observed that of late
+her dress had become much more modern, and on the present occasion
+this struck me forcibly. I do not know exactly in what the change, or
+changes, consisted, because I am not skilled in such matters and can
+only judge of a woman's garments by their general effect. At any rate,
+the gorgeous sweeping robes were gone, and though her attire still
+looked foreign and somewhat oriental, with a touch of barbaric splendour
+about it--it was simpler than it had been and showed more of her figure,
+which was delicate, yet gracious.
+
+"You have changed your robes, Lady," I said. "Yes, Humphrey. Bastin gave
+me pictures of those your women wear." (On further investigation I found
+that this referred to an old copy of the Queen newspaper, which, somehow
+or other, had been brought with the books from the ship.) "I have tried
+to copy them a little," she added doubtfully.
+
+"How do you do it? Where do you get the material?" I asked.
+
+"Oh!" she answered with an airy wave of her hand, "I make it--it is
+there."
+
+"I don't understand," I said, but she only smiled radiantly, offering no
+further explanation. Then, before I could pursue the subject, she asked
+me suddenly:
+
+"What has Bickley been saying to you about me?" I fenced, answering:
+"I don't know. Bastin and Bickley talk of little else. You seem to have
+been a great deal with them while I was ill."
+
+"Yes, a great deal. They are the nearest to you who were so sick. Is it
+not so?"
+
+"I don't know," I answered again. "In my illness it seemed to me that
+you were the nearest."
+
+"About Bastin's words I can guess," she went on. "But I ask again--what
+has Bickley been saying to you about me? Of the first part, let it be;
+tell me the rest."
+
+I intended to evade her question, but she fixed those violet, compelling
+eyes upon me and I was obliged to answer.
+
+"I believe you know as well as I do," I said; "but if you will have it,
+it was that you are not as other human women are, and that he who would
+treat you as such, must suffer; that was the gist of it."
+
+"Some might be content to suffer for such as I," she answered with quiet
+sweetness. "Even Bastin and Bickley may be content to suffer in their
+own little ways."
+
+"You know that is not what I meant," I interrupted angrily, for I felt
+that she was throwing reflections on me.
+
+"No; you meant that you agreed with Bickley that I am not quite a woman,
+as you know women."
+
+I was silent, for her words were true.
+
+Then she blazed out into one of her flashes of splendour, like something
+that takes fire on an instant; like the faint and distant star which
+flames into sudden glory before the watcher's telescope.
+
+"It is true that I am not as your women are--your poor, pale women,
+the shadows of an hour with night behind them and before. Because I am
+humble and patient, do you therefore suppose that I am not great? Man
+from the little country across the sea, I lived when the world was
+young, and gathered up the ancient wisdom of a greater race than yours,
+and when the world is old I think that I still shall live, though not in
+this shape or here, with all that wisdom's essence burning in my breast,
+and with all beauty in my eyes. Bickley does not believe although he
+worships. You only half believe and do not worship, because memory holds
+you back, and I myself do not understand. I only know though knowing
+so much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble road called
+Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an immortal city."
+
+"Nor do I understand how all this can be, Yva," I said feebly, for she
+dazzled and overwhelmed me with her blaze of power.
+
+"No, you do not understand. How can you, when even I cannot? Thus for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years I slept, and they went by as a
+lightning flash. One moment my father gave me the draught and I laid me
+down, the next I awoke with you bending over me, or so it seemed. Yet
+where was I through all those centuries when for me time had ceased?
+Tell me, Humphrey, did you dream at all while you were ill? I ask
+because down in that lonely cavern where I sleep a strange dream came to
+me one night. It was of a journey which, as I thought, you and I seemed
+to make together, past suns and universes to a very distant earth. It
+meant nothing, Humphrey. If you and I chanced to have dreamed the same
+thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is most common,
+or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I am not altogether
+as your women are, and I can bring no happiness to any man, or at the
+least, to one who cannot wait. Therefore, perhaps you would do well to
+think less of me, as I have counselled Bastin and Bickley."
+
+Then again she gazed at me with her wonderful, great eyes, and, shaking
+her glittering head a little, smiled and went.
+
+But oh! that smile drew my heart after her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XX. Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night
+
+
+As time went on, Oro began to visit me more and more frequently, till at
+last scarcely a night went by that he did not appear mysteriously in my
+sleeping-place. The odd thing was that neither Bickley nor Bastin seemed
+to be aware of these nocturnal calls. Indeed, when I mentioned them on
+one or two occasions, they stared at me and said it was strange that he
+should have come and gone as they saw nothing of him.
+
+On my speaking again of the matter, Bickley at once turned the
+conversation, from which I gathered that he believed me to be suffering
+from delusions consequent on my illness, or perhaps to have taken
+to dreaming. This was not wonderful since, as I learned afterwards,
+Bickley, after he was sure that I was asleep, made a practice of tying
+a thread across my doorway and of ascertaining at the dawn that it
+remained unbroken. But Oro was not to be caught in that way. I suppose,
+as it was impossible for him to pass through the latticework of the open
+side of the house, that he undid the thread and fastened it again when
+he left; at least, that was Bastin's explanation, or, rather, one of
+them. Another was that he crawled beneath it, but this I could not
+believe. I am quite certain that during all his prolonged existence Oro
+never crawled.
+
+At any rate, he came, or seemed to come, and pumped me--I can use no
+other word--most energetically as to existing conditions in the
+world, especially those of the civilised countries, their methods of
+government, their social state, the physical characteristics of the
+various races, their religions, the exact degrees of civilisation that
+they had developed, their attainments in art, science and literature,
+their martial capacities, their laws, and I know not what besides.
+
+I told him all I could, but did not in the least seem to satisfy his
+perennial thirst for information.
+
+"I should prefer to judge for myself," he said at last. "Why are you so
+anxious to learn about all these nations, Oro?" I asked, exhausted.
+
+"Because the knowledge I gather may affect my plans for the future," he
+replied darkly.
+
+"I am told, Oro, that your people acquired the power of transporting
+themselves from place to place."
+
+"It is true that the lords of the Sons of Wisdom had such power, and
+that I have it still, O Humphrey."
+
+"Then why do you not go to look with your own eyes?" I suggested.
+
+"Because I should need a guide; one who could explain much in a short
+time," he said, contemplating me with his burning glance until I began
+to feel uncomfortable.
+
+To change the subject I asked him whether he had any further information
+about the war, which he had told me was raging in Europe.
+
+He answered: "Not much; only that it was going on with varying success,
+and would continue to do so until the nations involved therein were
+exhausted," or so he believed. The war did not seem greatly to interest
+Oro. It was, he remarked, but a small affair compared to those which he
+had known in the old days. Then he departed, and I went to sleep.
+
+Next night he appeared again, and, after talking a little on different
+subjects, remarked quietly that he had been thinking over what I had
+said as to his visiting the modern world, and intended to act upon the
+suggestion.
+
+"When?" I asked.
+
+"Now," he said. "I am going to visit this England of yours and the town
+you call London, and you will accompany me."
+
+"It is not possible!" I exclaimed. "We have no ship."
+
+"We can travel without a ship," said Oro.
+
+I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a much
+better companion than I should in my present weak state.
+
+"An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues, would be
+useless," he replied sharply. "You shall come and you only."
+
+I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly--which, indeed, I did do, in
+another sense.
+
+But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand to and fro
+above my head.
+
+My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
+
+
+They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog, which I
+knew could belong to one place only--London, in December, and at my side
+was Oro.
+
+"Is this the climate of your wonderful city?" he asked, or seemed to
+ask, in an aggrieved tone.
+
+I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and began to
+look about me.
+
+Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of buildings,
+looking dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I recognised the Houses
+of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, for both could be seen from where
+we stood in front of the Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their
+identity to Oro.
+
+"Good," he said. "Let us enter your Place of Talk."
+
+"But I am not a member, and we have no passes for the Strangers'
+Gallery," I expostulated.
+
+"We shall not need any," he replied contemptuously. "Lead on."
+
+Thus adjured, I crossed the road, Oro following me. Looking round, to
+my horror I saw him right in the path of a motor-bus which seemed to go
+over him.
+
+"There's an end to Oro," thought I to myself. "Well, at any rate, I have
+got home."
+
+Next instant he was at my side quite undisturbed by the incident of the
+bus. We came to a policeman at the door and I hesitated, expecting to
+be challenged. But the policeman seemed absolutely indifferent to our
+presence, even when Oro marched past him in his flowing robes. So
+I followed with a like success. Then I understood that we must be
+invisible.
+
+We passed to the lobby, where members were hurrying to and fro, and
+constituents and pressmen were gathered, and so on into the House. Oro
+walked up its floor and took his stand by the table, in front of the
+Speaker. I followed him, none saying us No.
+
+As it chanced there was what is called a scene in progress--I think it
+was over Irish matters; the details are of no account. Members shouted,
+Ministers prevaricated and grew angry, the Speaker intervened. On the
+whole, it was rather a degrading spectacle. I stood, or seemed to
+stand, and watched it all. Oro, in his sweeping robes, which looked
+so incongruous in that place, stepped, or seemed to step, up to the
+principal personages of the Government and Opposition, whom I indicated
+to him, and inspected them one by one, as a naturalist might examine
+strange insects. Then, returning to me, he said:
+
+"Come away; I have seen and heard enough. Who would have thought that
+this nation of yours was struggling for its life in war?"
+
+We passed out of the House and somehow came to Trafalgar Square. A
+meeting was in progress there, convened, apparently, to advocate the
+rights of Labour, also those of women, also to protest against things
+in general, especially the threat of Conscription in the service of the
+country.
+
+Here the noise was tremendous, and, the fog having lifted somewhat, we
+could see everything. Speakers bawled from the base of Nelson's column.
+Their supporters cheered, their adversaries rushed at them, and in one
+or two instances succeeded in pulling them down. A woman climbed up
+and began to scream out something which could only be heard by a few
+reporters gathered round her. I thought her an unpleasant-looking
+person, and evidently her remarks were not palatable to the majority of
+her auditors. There was a rush, and she was dragged from the base of one
+of Landseer's lions on which she stood. Her skirt was half rent off
+her and her bodice split down the back. Finally, she was conveyed
+away, kicking, biting, and scratching, by a number of police. It was a
+disgusting sight, and tumult ensued.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "Your officers of order are good; the rest is not
+good."
+
+Later we found ourselves opposite to the doors of a famous restaurant
+where a magnificent and gigantic commissionaire helped ladies from
+motor-cars, receiving in return money from the men who attended on them.
+We entered; it was the hour of dinner. The place sparkled with gems,
+and the naked backs of the women gleamed in the electric light. Course
+followed upon course; champagne flowed, a fine band played, everything
+was costly; everything was, in a sense, repellent.
+
+"These are the wealthy citizens of a nation engaged in fighting for its
+life," remarked Oro to me, stroking his long beard. "It is interesting,
+very interesting. Let us go."
+
+We went out and on, passing a public-house crowded with women who had
+left their babies in charge of children in the icy street. It was a
+day of Intercession for the success of England in the war. This was
+placarded everywhere. We entered, or, rather, Oro did, I following
+him, one of the churches in the Strand where an evening service was in
+progress. The preacher in the pulpit, a very able man, was holding forth
+upon the necessity for national repentance and self-denial; also of
+prayer. In the body of the church exactly thirty-two people, most
+of them elderly women, were listening to him with an air of placid
+acceptance.
+
+"The priest talks well, but his hearers are not many," said Oro. "Let us
+go."
+
+We came to the flaunting doors of a great music-hall and passed through
+them, though to others this would have been impossible, for the place
+was filled from floor to roof. In its promenades men were drinking and
+smoking, while gaudy women, painted and low-robed, leered at them. On
+the stage girls danced, throwing their legs above their heads. Then they
+vanished amidst applause, and a woman in a yellow robe, who pretended
+to be tipsy, sang a horrible and vulgar song full of topical allusions,
+which was received with screams of delight by the enormous audience.
+
+"Here the hearers are very many, but those to whom they listen do not
+talk well. Let us go," said Oro, and we went.
+
+At a recruiting station we paused a moment to consider posters supposed
+to be attractive, the very sight of which sent a thrill of shame through
+me. I remember that the inscription under one of them was: "What will
+your best girl say?"
+
+"Is that how you gather your soldiers? Later it will be otherwise," said
+Oro, and passed on.
+
+We reached Blackfriars and entered a hall at the doors of which stood
+women in poke-bonnets, very sweet-faced, earnest-looking women. Their
+countenances seemed to strike Oro, and he motioned me to follow him
+into the hall. It was quite full of a miserable-looking congregation
+of perhaps a thousand people. A man in the blue and red uniform of the
+Salvation Army was preaching of duty to God and country, of self-denial,
+hope and forgiveness. He seemed a humble person, but his words were
+earnest, and love flowed from him. Some of his miserable congregation
+wept, others stared at him open-mouthed, a few, who were very weary,
+slept. He called them up to receive pardon, and a number, led by the
+sweet-faced women, came and knelt before him. He and others whispered to
+them, then seemed to bless them, and they rose with their faces changed.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "I do not understand these rites, but at last
+in your great and wonderful city I have seen something that is pure and
+noble."
+
+We went out. In the streets there was great excitement. People ran to
+and fro pointing upwards. Searchlights, like huge fingers of flame,
+stole across the sky; guns boomed. At last, in the glare of a
+searchlight, we saw a long and sinister object floating high above us
+and gleaming as though it were made of silver. Flashes came from it
+followed by terrible booming reports that grew nearer and nearer. A
+house collapsed with a crash just behind us.
+
+"Ah!" said Oro, with a smile. "I know this--it is war, war as it was
+when the world was different and yet the same."
+
+As he spoke, a motor-bus rumbled past. Another flash and explosion. A
+man, walking with his arms round the waist of a girl just ahead of
+us; seemed to be tossed up and to melt. The girl fell in a heap on the
+pavement; somehow her head and her feet had come quite close together
+and yet she appeared to be sitting down. The motor-bus burst into
+fragments and its passengers hurtled through the air, mere hideous lumps
+that had been men and women. The head of one of them came dancing down
+the pavement towards us, a cigar still stuck in the corner of its mouth.
+
+"Yes, this is war," said Oro. "It makes me young again to see it. But
+does this city of yours understand?"
+
+We watched a while. A crowd gathered. Policemen ran up, ambulances came.
+The place was cleared, and all that was left they carried away. A few
+minutes later another man passed by with his arm round the waist of
+another girl. Another motor-bus rumbled up, and, avoiding the hole in
+the roadway, travelled on, its conductor keeping a keen look-out for
+fares.
+
+The street was cleared by the police; the airship continued its course,
+spawning bombs in the distance, and vanished. The incident was closed.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I have seen enough of your great and
+wonderful city. I would rest in the quiet of Nyo and think."
+
+The next thing that I remember was the voice of Bastin, saying:
+
+"If you don't mind, Arbuthnot, I wish that you would get up. The
+Glittering Lady (he still called her that) is coming here to have a talk
+with me which I should prefer to be private. Excuse me for disturbing
+you, but you have overslept yourself; indeed, I think it must be nine
+o'clock, so far as I can judge by the sun, for my watch is very erratic
+now, ever since Bickley tried to clean it."
+
+"I am sorry, my dear fellow," I said sleepily, "but do you know I
+thought I was in London--in fact, I could swear that I have been there."
+
+"Then," interrupted Bickley, who had followed Bastin into the hut,
+giving me that doubtful glance with which I was now familiar, "I wish to
+goodness that you had brought back an evening paper with you."
+
+A night or two later I was again suddenly awakened to feel that Oro was
+approaching. He appeared like a ghost in the bright moonlight, greeted
+me, and said:
+
+"Tonight, Humphrey, we must make another journey. I would visit the seat
+of the war."
+
+"I do not wish to go," I said feebly.
+
+"What you wish does not matter," he replied. "I wish that you should go,
+and therefore you must."
+
+"Listen, Oro," I exclaimed. "I do not like this business; it seems
+dangerous to me."
+
+"There is no danger if you are obedient, Humphrey."
+
+"I think there is. I do not understand what happens. Do you make use of
+what the Lady Yva called the Fourth Dimension, so that our bodies
+pass over the seas and through mountains, like the vibrations of our
+Wireless, of which I was speaking to you?"
+
+"No, Humphrey. That method is good and easy, but I do not use it because
+if I did we should be visible in the places which we visit, since there
+all the atoms that make a man would collect together again and be a
+man."
+
+"What, then, do you do?" I asked, exasperated.
+
+"Man, Humphrey, is not one; he is many. Thus, amongst other things he
+has a Double, which can see and hear, as he can in the flesh, if it is
+separated from the flesh."
+
+"The old Egyptians believed that," I said.
+
+"Did they? Doubtless they inherited the knowledge from us, the Sons of
+Wisdom. The cup of our learning was so full that, keep it secret as we
+would, from time to time some of it overflowed among the vulgar, and
+doubtless thus the light of our knowledge still burns feebly in the
+world."
+
+I reflected to myself that whatever might be their other
+characteristics, the Sons of Wisdom had lost that of modesty, but I only
+asked how he used his Double, supposing that it existed.
+
+"Very easily," he answered. "In sleep it can be drawn from the body and
+sent upon its mission by one that is its master."
+
+"Then while you were asleep for all those thousands of years your Double
+must have made many journeys."
+
+"Perhaps," he replied quietly, "and my spirit also, which is another
+part of me that may have dwelt in the bodies of other men. But
+unhappily, if so I forget, and that is why I have so much to learn and
+must even make use of such poor instruments as you, Humphrey."
+
+"Then if I sleep and you distil my Double out of me, I suppose that you
+sleep too. In that case who distils your Double out of you, Lord Oro?"
+
+He grew angry and answered:
+
+"Ask no more questions, blind and ignorant as you are. It is your part
+not to examine, but to obey. Sleep now," and again he waved his hand
+over me.
+
+
+In an instant, as it seemed, we were standing in a grey old town that I
+judged from its appearance must be either in northern France or Belgium.
+It was much shattered by bombardment; the church, for instance, was a
+ruin; also many of the houses had been burnt. Now, however, no firing
+was going on for the town had been taken. The streets were full of armed
+men wearing the German uniform and helmet. We passed down them and
+were able to see into the houses. In some of these were German soldiers
+engaged in looting and in other things so horrible that even the unmoved
+Oro turned away his head.
+
+We came to the market-place. It was crowded with German troops, also
+with a great number of the inhabitants of the town, most of them elderly
+men and women with children, who had fallen into their power. The
+Germans, under the command of officers, were dragging the men from
+the arms of their wives and children to one side, and with rifle-butts
+beating back the screaming women. Among the men I noticed two or three
+priests who were doing their best to soothe their companions and even
+giving them absolution in hurried whispers.
+
+At length the separation was effected, whereon at a hoarse word of
+command, a company of soldiers began to fire at the men and continued
+doing so until all had fallen. Then petty officers went among the
+slaughtered and with pistols blew out the brains of any who still moved.
+
+"These butchers, you say, are Germans?" asked Oro of me.
+
+"Yes," I answered, sick with horror, for though I was in the mind and
+not in the body, I could feel as the mind does. Had I been in the body
+also, I should have fainted.
+
+"Then we need not waste time in visiting their country. It is enough;
+let us go on."
+
+We passed out into the open land and came to a village. It was in the
+occupation of German cavalry. Two of them held a little girl of nine
+or ten, one by her body, the other by her right hand. An officer stood
+between them with a drawn sword fronting the terrified child. He was
+a horrible, coarse-faced man who looked to me as though he had been
+drinking.
+
+"I'll teach the young devil to show us the wrong road and let those
+French swine escape," he shouted, and struck with the sword. The girl's
+right hand fell to the ground.
+
+"War as practised by the Germans!" remarked Oro. Then he stepped, or
+seemed to step up to the man and whispered, or seemed to whisper, in his
+ear.
+
+I do not know what tongue or what spirit speech he used, or what he
+said, but the bloated-faced brute turned pale. Yes, he drew sick with
+fear.
+
+"I think there are spirits in this place," he said with a German oath.
+"I could have sworn that something told me that I was going to die.
+Mount!"
+
+The Uhlans mounted and began to ride away.
+
+"Watch," said Oro.
+
+As he spoke out of a dark cloud appeared an aeroplane. Its pilot saw the
+band of Germans beneath and dropped a bomb. The aim was good, for the
+missile exploded in the midst of them, causing a great cloud of dust
+from which arose the screams of men and horses.
+
+"Come and see," said Oro.
+
+We were there. Out of the cloud of dust appeared one man galloping
+furiously. He was a young fellow who, as I noted, had turned his head
+away and hidden his eyes with his hand when the horror was done yonder.
+All the others were dead except the officer who had worked the deed. He
+was still living, but both his hands and one of his feet had been blown
+away. Presently he died, screaming to God for mercy.
+
+We passed on and came to a barn with wide doors that swung a little in
+the wind, causing the rusted hinges to scream like a creature in pain.
+On each of these doors hung a dead man crucified. The hat of one of
+them lay upon the ground, and I knew from the shape of it that he was a
+Colonial soldier.
+
+"Did you not tell me," said Oro after surveying them, "that these
+Germans are of your Christian faith?"
+
+"Yes; and the Name of God is always on their ruler's lips."
+
+"Ah!" he said, "I am glad that I worship Fate. Bastin the priest need
+trouble me no more."
+
+"There is something behind Fate," I said, quoting Bastin himself.
+
+"Perhaps. So indeed I have always held, but after much study I cannot
+understand the manner of its working. Fate is enough for me."
+
+We went on and came to a flat country that was lined with ditches, all
+of them full of men, Germans on one side, English and French upon the
+other. A terrible bombardment shook the earth, the shells raining upon
+the ditches. Presently that from the English guns ceased and out of the
+trenches in front of them thousands of men were vomited, who ran forward
+through a hail of fire in which scores and hundreds fell, across an open
+piece of ground that was pitted with shell craters. They came to barbed
+wire defenses, or what remained of them, cut the wire with nippers and
+pulled up the posts. Then through the gaps they surged in, shouting and
+hurling hand grenades. They reached the German trenches, they leapt into
+them and from those holes arose a hellish din. Pistols were fired and
+everywhere bayonets flashed.
+
+Behind them rushed a horde of little, dark-skinned men, Indians who
+carried great knives in their hands. Those leapt over the first trench
+and running on with wild yells, dived into the second, those who were
+left of them, and there began hacking with their knives at the defenders
+and the soldiers who worked the spitting maxim guns. In twenty minutes
+it was over; those lines of trenches were taken, and once more from
+either side the guns began to boom.
+
+"War again," said Oro, "clean, honest war, such as the god I call Fate
+decrees for man. I have seen enough. Now I would visit those whom you
+call Turks. I understand they have another worship and perhaps they are
+nobler than these Christians."
+
+We came to a hilly country which I recognised as Armenia, for once I
+travelled there, and stopped on an seashore. Here were the Turks in
+thousands. They were engaged in driving before them mobs of men, women
+and children in countless numbers. On and on they drove them till
+they reached the shore. There they massacred them with bayonets, with
+bullets, or by drowning. I remember a dreadful scene of a poor woman
+standing up to her waist in the water. Three children were clinging to
+her--but I cannot go on, really I cannot go on. In the end a Turk waded
+out and bayoneted her while she strove to protect the last living child
+with her poor body whence it sprang.
+
+"These, I understand," said Oro, pointing to the Turkish soldiers,
+"worship a prophet who they say is the voice of God."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "and therefore they massacre these who are Christians
+because they worship God without a prophet."
+
+"And what do the Christians massacre each other for?"
+
+"Power and the wealth and territories that are power. That is, the King
+of the Germans wishes to rule the world, but the other Nations do not
+desire his dominion. Therefore they fight for Liberty and Justice."
+
+"As it was, so it is and shall be," remarked Oro, "only with this
+difference. In the old world some were wise, but here--" and he stopped,
+his eyes fixed upon the Armenian woman struggling in her death agony
+while the murderer drowned her child, then added: "Let us go."
+
+Our road ran across the sea. On it we saw a ship so large that it
+attracted Oro's attention, and for once he expressed astonishment.
+
+"In my day," he said, "we had no vessels of this greatness in the world.
+I wish to look upon it."
+
+We landed on the deck of the ship, or rather the floating palace, and
+examined her. She carried many passengers, some English, some American,
+and I pointed out to Oro the differences between the two peoples. These
+were not, he remarked, very wide except that the American women wore
+more jewels, also that some of the American men, to whom we listened
+as they conversed, spoke of the greatness of their country, whereas
+the Englishmen, if they said anything concerning it, belittled their
+country.
+
+Presently, on the surface of the sea at a little distance appeared
+something strange, a small and ominous object like a can on the top of a
+pole. A voice cried out "Submarine!" and everyone near rushed to look.
+
+"If those Germans try any of their monkey tricks on us, I guess the
+United States will give them hell," said another voice near by.
+
+Then from the direction of the pole with the tin can on the top of
+it, came something which caused a disturbance in the smooth water and
+bubbles to rise in its wake.
+
+"A torpedo!" cried some.
+
+"Shut your mouth," said the voice. "Who dare torpedo a vessel full of
+the citizens of the United States?"
+
+Next came a booming crash and a flood of upthrown water, in the wash of
+which that speaker was carried away into the deep. Then horror! horror!
+horror! indescribable, as the mighty vessel went wallowing to her doom.
+Boats launched; boats overset; boats dragged under by her rush through
+the water which could not be stayed. Maddened men and women running
+to and fro, their eyes starting from their heads, clasping children,
+fastening lifebelts over their costly gowns, or appearing from their
+cabins, their hands filled with jewels that they sought to save. Orders
+cried from high places by stern-faced officers doing their duty to the
+last. And a little way off that thin pole with a tin can on the top of
+it watching its work.
+
+Then the plunge of the enormous ship into the deep, its huge screws
+still whirling in the air and the boom of the bursting boilers. Lastly
+everything gone save a few boats floating on the quiet sea and around
+them dots that were the heads of struggling human beings.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I grow tired of this war of your Christian
+peoples. It is no better than that of the barbarian nations of the early
+world. Indeed it is worse, since then we worshipped Fate and but a few
+of us had wisdom. Now you all claim wisdom and declare that you worship
+a God of Mercy."
+
+
+With these words still ringing in my ears I woke up upon the Island of
+Orofena, filled with terror at the horrible possibilities of nightmare.
+
+What else could it be? There was the brown and ancient cone of the
+extinct volcano. There were the tall palms of the main island and the
+lake glittering in the sunlight between. There was Bastin conducting
+a kind of Sunday school of Orofenans upon the point of the Rock of
+Offerings, as now he had obtained the leave of Oro to do. There was the
+mouth of the cave, and issuing from it Bickley, who by help of one of
+the hurricane lamps had been making an examination of the buried
+remains of what he supposed to be flying machines. Without doubt it was
+nightmare, and I would say nothing to them about it for fear of mockery.
+
+Yet two nights later Oro came again and after the usual preliminaries,
+said:
+
+"Humphrey, this night we will visit that mighty American nation, of
+which you have told me so much, and the other Neutral Countries."
+
+
+[At this point there is a gap in Mr. Arbuthnot's M.S., so Oro's
+reflections on the Neutral Nations, if any, remain unrecorded. It
+continues:]
+
+
+On our homeward way we passed over Australia, making a detour to do so.
+Of the cities Oro took no account. He said that they were too large and
+too many, but the country interested him so much that I gathered he must
+have given great attention to agriculture at some time in the past. He
+pointed out to me that the climate was fine, and the land so fertile
+that with a proper system of irrigation and water-storage it could
+support tens of millions and feed not only itself but a great part of
+the outlying world.
+
+"But where are the people?" he asked. "Outside of those huge hives," and
+he indicated the great cities, "I see few of them, though doubtless some
+of the men are fighting in this war. Well, in the days to come this must
+be remedied."
+
+Over New Zealand, which he found beautiful, he shook his head for the
+same reason.
+
+On another night we visited the East. China with its teeming millions
+interested him extremely, partly because he declared these to be the
+descendants of one of the barbarian nations of his own day. He made
+a remark to the effect that this race had always possessed points
+and capacities, and that he thought that with proper government and
+instruction their Chinese offspring would be of use in a regenerated
+world.
+
+For the Japanese and all that they had done in two short generations, he
+went so far as to express real admiration, a very rare thing with Oro,
+who was by nature critical. I could see that mentally he put a white
+mark against their name.
+
+India, too, really moved him. He admired the ancient buildings at Delhi
+and Agra, especially the Taj Mahal. This, he declared, was reminiscent
+of some of the palaces that stood at Pani, the capital city of the Sons
+of Wisdom, before it was destroyed by the Barbarians.
+
+The English administration of the country also attracted a word of
+praise from him, I think because of its rather autocratic character.
+Indeed he went so far as to declare that, with certain modifications,
+it should be continued in the future, and even to intimate that he would
+bear the matter in mind. Democratic forms of government had no charms
+for Oro.
+
+Amongst other places, we stopped at Benares and watched the funeral
+rites in progress upon the banks of the holy Ganges. The bearers of the
+dead brought the body of a woman wrapped in a red shroud that glittered
+with tinsel ornaments. Coming forward at a run and chanting as they ran,
+they placed it upon the stones for a little while, then lifted it up
+again and carried it down the steps to the edge of the river. Here they
+took water and poured it over the corpse, thus performing the rite of
+the baptism of death. This done, they placed its feet in the water
+and left it looking very small and lonely. Presently appeared a tall,
+white-draped woman who took her stand by the body and wailed. It was the
+dead one's mother. Again the bearers approached and laid the corpse upon
+the flaming pyre.
+
+"These rites are ancient," said Oro. "When I ruled as King of the World
+they were practised in this very place. It is pleasant to me to find
+something that has survived the changefulness of Time. Let it continue
+till the end."
+
+
+Here I will cease. These experiences that I have recorded are but
+samples, for also we visited Russia and other countries. Perhaps, too,
+they were not experiences at all, but only dreams consequent on my state
+of health. I cannot say for certain, though much of what I seemed to
+see fitted in very well indeed with what I learned in after days, and
+certainly at the time they appeared as real as though Oro and I had
+stood together upon those various shores.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXI. Love's Eternal Altar
+
+
+Now of all these happenings I said very little to Bastin and Bickley.
+The former would not have understood them, and the latter attributed
+what I did tell him to mental delusions following on my illness. To Yva
+I did speak about them, however, imploring her to explain their origin
+and to tell me whether or not they were but visions of the night.
+
+She listened to me, as I thought not without anxiety, from which I
+gathered that she too feared for my mind. It was not so, however, for
+she said:
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, that your journeyings are done, since such
+things are not without danger. He who travels far out of the body may
+chance to return there no more."
+
+"But were they journeyings, or dreams?" I asked.
+
+She evaded a direct answer.
+
+"I cannot say. My father has great powers. I do not know them all. It is
+possible that they were neither journeyings nor dreams. Mayhap he used
+you as the sorcerers in the old days used the magic glass, and after
+he had put his spell upon you, read in your mind that which passes
+elsewhere."
+
+I understood her to refer to what we call clairvoyance, when the person
+entranced reveals secret or distant things to the entrancer. This is
+a more or less established phenomenon and much less marvelous than the
+actual transportation of the spiritual self through space. Only I never
+knew of an instance in which the seer, on awaking, remembered the things
+that he had seen, as in my case. There, however, the matter rested, or
+rests, for I could extract nothing more from Yva, who appeared to me to
+have her orders on the point.
+
+Nor did Oro ever talk of what I had seemed to see in his company,
+although he continued from time to time to visit me at night. But now
+our conversation was of other matters. As Bastin had discovered, by some
+extraordinary gift he had soon learned how to read the English language,
+although he never spoke a single word in that tongue. Among our
+reference books that we brought from the yacht, was a thin paper edition
+of the Encyclopedia Britannica, which he borrowed when he discovered
+that it contained compressed information about the various countries of
+the world, also concerning almost every other matter. My belief is
+that within a month or so that marvelous old man not only read this
+stupendous work from end to end, but that he remembered everything of
+interest which it contained. At least, he would appear and show the
+fullest acquaintance with certain subjects or places, seeking further
+light from me concerning them, which very often I was quite unable to
+give him.
+
+An accident, as it chanced, whereof I need not set out the details,
+caused me to discover that his remarkable knowledge was limited. Thus,
+at one period, he knew little about any modern topic which began with a
+letter later in the alphabet than, let us say, C. A few days afterwards
+he was acquainted with those up to F, or G; and so on till he reached Z,
+when he appeared to me to know everything, and returned the book. Now,
+indeed, he was a monument of learning, very ancient and very new, and
+with some Encyclopedia-garnered facts or deductions of what had happened
+between.
+
+Moreover, he took to astronomical research, for more than once we saw
+him standing on the rock at night studying the heavens. On one of these
+occasions, when he had the two metal plates, of which I have spoken, in
+his hands, I ventured to approach and ask what he did. He replied that
+he was checking his calculations that he found to be quite correct,
+an exact period of two hundred and fifty thousand years having gone
+by since he laid himself down to sleep. Then, by aid of the plates,
+he pointed out to me certain alterations that had happened during that
+period in the positions of some of the stars.
+
+For instance, he showed me one which, by help of my glasses, I
+recognised as Sirius, and remarked that two hundred and fifty thousand
+years ago it was further away and much smaller. Now it was precisely in
+the place and of the size which he had predicted, and he pointed to it
+on his prophetic map. Again he indicated a star that the night-glass
+told me was Capella, which, I suppose, is one of the most brilliant
+stars in the sky, and showed me that on the map he had made two hundred
+and fifty thousand years ago, it did not exist, as then it was too far
+north to appear thereon. Still, he observed, the passage of this vast
+period of time had produced but little effect upon the face of the
+heavens. To the human eye the majority of the stars had not moved so
+very far.
+
+"And yet they travel fast, O Humphrey," he said. "Consider then how
+great is their journey between the time they gather and that day when,
+worn-out, once more they melt to vaporous gas. You think me long-lived
+who compared to them exist but a tiny fraction of a second, nearly all
+of which I have been doomed to pass in sleep. And, Humphrey, I desire
+to live--I, who have great plans and would shake the world. But my
+day draws in; a few brief centuries and I shall be gone, and--whither,
+whither?"
+
+"If you lived as long as those stars, the end would be the same, Oro."
+
+"Yes, but the life of the stars is very long, millions of millions
+of years; also, after death, they reform, as other stars. But shall I
+reform as another Oro? With all my wisdom, I do not know. It is known
+to Fate only--Fate-the master of worlds and men and the gods they
+worship--Fate, whom it may please to spill my gathered knowledge, to be
+lost in the sands of Time."
+
+"It seems that you are great," I said, "and have lived long and learned
+much. Yet the end of it is that your lot is neither worse nor better
+than that of us creatures of an hour."
+
+"It is so, Humphrey. Presently you will die, and within a few centuries
+I shall die also and be as you are. You believe that you will live again
+eternally. It may be so because you do believe, since Fate allows Faith
+to shape the future, if only for a little while. But in me Wisdom has
+destroyed Faith and therefore I must die. Even if I sleep again for
+tens of thousands of years, what will it help me, seeing that sleep is
+unconsciousness and that I shall only wake again to die, since sleep
+does not restore to us our youth?"
+
+He ceased, and walked up and down the rock with a troubled mien. Then he
+stood in front of me and said in a triumphant voice:
+
+"At least, while I live I will rule, and then let come what may come. I
+know that you do not believe, and the first victory of this new day of
+mine shall be to make you believe. I have great powers and you shall
+see them at work, and afterwards, if things go right, rule with me for a
+little while, perhaps, as the first of my subjects. Hearken now; in one
+small matter my calculations, made so long ago, have gone wrong. They
+showed me that at this time a day of earthquakes, such as those that
+again and again have rocked and split the world, would recur. But now
+it seems that there is an error, a tiny error of eleven hundred years,
+which must go by before those earthquakes come."
+
+"Are you sure," I suggested humbly, "that there is not also an error in
+those star-maps you hold?"
+
+"I am sure, Humphrey. Some day, who knows? You may return to your world
+of modern men who, I gather, have knowledge of the great science of
+astronomy. Take now these maps with which I have done, and submit them
+to the most learned of those men, and let them tell you whether I was
+right or wrong in what I wrote upon this metal two hundred and fifty
+thousand years ago. Whatever else is false, at least the stars in their
+motions can never die."
+
+Then he handed me the maps and was gone. I have them today, and if ever
+this book is published, they will appear with it, that those who are
+qualified may judge of them and of the truth or otherwise of Oro's
+words.
+
+From that night forward for quite a long time I saw Oro no more. Nor
+indeed did any of us, since for some reason of his own he forbade us to
+visit the under ground city of Nyo. Oddly enough, however, he commanded
+Yva to bring down the spaniel, Tommy, to be with him from time to time.
+When I asked her why, she said it was because he was lonely and
+desired the dog's companionship. It seemed to us very strange that this
+super-man, who had the wisdom of ten Solomons gathered in one within his
+breast, should yet desire the company of a little dog. What then was the
+worth of learning and long life, or, indeed, of anything? Well, Solomon
+himself asked the question ages since, and could give no answer save
+that all is vanity.
+
+I noted about this time that Yva began to grow very sad and troubled;
+indeed, looking at her suddenly on two or three occasions, I saw that
+her beautiful eyes were aswim with tears. Also, I noted that always as
+she grew sadder she became, in a sense, more human. In the beginning she
+was, as it were, far away. One could never forget that she was the
+child of some alien race whose eyes had looked upon the world when, by
+comparison, humanity was young; at times, indeed, she might have been
+the denizen of another planet, strayed to earth. Although she never
+flaunted it, one felt that her simplest word hid secret wisdom; that
+to her books were open in which we could not read. Moreover, as I have
+said, occasionally power flamed out of her, power that was beyond our
+ken and understanding.
+
+Yet with all this there was nothing elfish about her, nothing
+uncanny. She was always kind, and, as we could feel, innately good and
+gentle-hearted, just a woman made half-divine by gifts and experience
+that others lack. She did not even make use of her wondrous beauty to
+madden men, as she might well have done had she been so minded. It is
+true that both Bastin and Bickley fell in love with her, but that was
+only because all with whom she had to do must love her, and then, when
+she told them that it might not be, it was in such a fashion that no
+soreness was left behind. They went on loving her, that was all, but as
+men love their sisters or their daughters; as we conceive that they may
+love in that land where there is no marrying or giving in marriage.
+
+But now, in her sadness, she drew ever nearer to us, and especially to
+myself, more in tune with our age and thought. In truth, save for her
+royal and glittering loveliness in which there was some quality which
+proclaimed her of another blood, and for that reserve of hidden power
+which at times would look out of her eyes or break through her words,
+she might in most ways have been some singularly gifted and beautiful
+modern woman.
+
+The time has come when I must speak of my relations with Yva and of
+their climax. As may have been guessed, from the first I began to love
+her. While the weeks went on that love grew and grew, until it utterly
+possessed me, although for a certain reason connected with one dead, at
+first I fought against it. Yet it did not develop quite in the fashion
+that might have been expected. There was no blazing up of passion's
+fire; rather was there an ever-increasing glow of the holiest affection,
+till at last it became a lamp by which I must guide my feet through life
+and death. This love of mine seemed not of earth but from the stars. As
+yet I had said nothing to her of it because in some way I felt that she
+did not wish me to do so, felt also that she was well aware of all that
+passed within my heart, and desired, as it were, to give it time to
+ripen there. Then one day there came a change, and though no glance or
+touch of Yva's told me so, I knew that the bars were taken down and that
+I might speak.
+
+
+It was a night of full moon. All that afternoon she had been talking to
+Bastin apart, I suppose about religion, for I saw that he had some books
+in his hand from which he was expounding something to her in his slow,
+earnest way. Then she came and sat with us while we took our evening
+meal. I remember that mine consisted of some of the Life-water which
+she had brought with her and fruit, for, as I think I have said, I had
+acquired her dislike to meat, also that she ate some plantains, throwing
+the skins for Tommy to fetch and laughing at his play. When it was over,
+Bastin and Bickley went away together, whether by chance or design I do
+not know, and she said to me suddenly:
+
+"Humphrey, you have often asked me about the city Pani, of which a
+little portion of the ruins remains upon this island, the rest being
+buried beneath the waters. If you wish I will show you where our royal
+palace was before the barbarians destroyed it with their airships. The
+moon is very bright, and by it we can see."
+
+I nodded, for, knowing what she meant, somehow I could not answer her,
+and we began the ascent of the hill. She explained to me the plan of the
+palace when we reached the ruins, showing me where her own apartments
+had been, and the rest. It was very strange to hear her quietly telling
+of buildings which had stood and of things that had happened over two
+hundred and fifty thousand years before, much as any modern lady might
+do of a house that had been destroyed a month ago by an earthquake or a
+Zeppelin bomb, while she described the details of a disaster which now
+frightened her no more. I think it was then that for the first time I
+really began to believe that in fact Yva had lived all those aeons since
+and been as she still appeared.
+
+We passed from the palace to the ruins of the temple, through what,
+as she said, had been a pleasure-garden, pointing out where a certain
+avenue of rare palms had grown, down which once it was her habit to walk
+in the cool of the day. Or, rather, there were two terraced temples,
+one dedicated to Fate like that in the underground city of Nyo, and the
+other to Love. Of the temple to Fate she told me her father had been the
+High Priest, and of the temple to Love she was the High Priestess.
+
+Then it was that I understood why she had brought me here.
+
+She led the way to a marble block covered with worn-out carvings and
+almost buried in the debris. This, she said, was the altar of offerings.
+I asked her what offerings, and she replied with a smile:
+
+"Only wine, to signify the spirit of life, and flowers to symbolise
+its fragrance," and she laid her finger on a cup-like depression, still
+apparent in the marble, into which the wine was poured.
+
+Indeed, I gathered that there was nothing coarse or bacchanalian about
+this worship of a prototype of Aphrodite; on the contrary, that it was
+more or less spiritual and ethereal. We sat down on the altar stone. I
+wondered a little that she should have done so, but she read my thought,
+and answered:
+
+"Sometimes we change our faiths, Humphrey, or perhaps they grow. Also,
+have I not told you that sacrifices were offered on this altar?" and she
+sighed and smiled.
+
+I do not know which was the sweeter, the smile or the sigh.
+
+We looked at the water glimmering in the crater beneath us on the edge
+of which we sat. We looked at heaven above in which the great moon
+sailed royally. Then we looked into each other's eyes.
+
+"I love you," I said.
+
+"I know it," she answered gently. "You have loved me from the first,
+have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you began to love me,
+but until you dreamed a certain dream you would not admit it."
+
+"Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?"
+
+"I cannot say, Humphrey. But I tell you this. As you will learn in time,
+one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the flesh."
+
+I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words brought to
+my mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and I answered:
+
+"Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere, for
+certainly I should find her. Doubtless she meant beyond the shores of
+death--or perhaps she also dreamed."
+
+She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
+
+"Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey. As you dream
+and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed. Of dreams, then, let us say no more,
+since I think that they have served their purpose, and all three of us
+understand."
+
+Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon her
+perfumed breast. She lifted it and kissed me on the lips, saying:
+
+"With this kiss again I give myself to you. But oh! Humphrey, do not ask
+too much of the god of my people, Fate," and she looked me in the eyes
+and sighed.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, trembling.
+
+"Many, many things. Among them, that happiness is not for mortals, and
+remember that though my life began long ago, I am mortal as you are, and
+that in eternity time makes no difference."
+
+"And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?"
+
+"Who said it? Not I. Humphrey, I tell you this. Nor earth, nor heaven,
+nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst its way towards
+reunion and completeness. Only there must be love, manifested in many
+shapes and at many times, but ever striving to its end, which is not of
+the flesh. Aye, love that has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated,
+love that seems false, love betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering
+through the worlds, love asleep and living in its sleep, love awake and
+yet sleeping; all love that has in it the germ of life. It matters not
+what form love takes. If it be true I tell you that it will win its
+way, and in the many that it has seemed to worship, still find the one,
+though perchance not here."
+
+At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
+
+"Not here? Then where?" I said.
+
+"Ask your dead wife, Humphrey. Ask the dumb stars. Ask the God you
+worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word--Somewhere! Man, be not
+afraid. Do you think that such as you and I can be lost in the aching
+abysms of space? I know but little, yet I tell you that we are its
+rulers. I tell you that we, too, are gods, if only we can aspire and
+believe. For the doubting and timid there is naught. For those who see
+with the eyes of the soul and stretch out their hands to grasp there is
+all. Even Bastin will tell you this."
+
+"But," I said, "life is short. Those worlds are far away, and you are
+near."
+
+She became wonderful, mysterious.
+
+"Near I am far," she said; "and far I am near, if only this love of
+yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp. And, Humphrey, it needs
+strength, for here I am afraid that it will bear little of such fruit as
+men desire to pluck."
+
+Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for I did not know
+what to say or ask.
+
+"Listen," she went on. "Already my father has offered me to you in
+marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not understand?
+Believe me, it is one that you should never pay, since the rule of the
+world can be too dearly bought by the slaughter of half the world. And
+if you would pay it, I cannot."
+
+"But this is madness!" I exclaimed. "Your father has no powers over our
+earth."
+
+"I would that I could think so, Humphrey. I tell you that he has powers
+and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done before. You, too,
+he would use, and me."
+
+"And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves. Let us take each other
+while we may. Bastin is a priest."
+
+"Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment Oro
+watches us in his thought and laughs. Only in death, Humphrey, shall we
+pass beyond his reach and become lords of ourselves."
+
+"It is monstrous!" I cried. "There is the boat, let us fly away."
+
+"What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god of my
+people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we must wait our
+doom."
+
+"Doom," I said--"doom? What then is about to happen?"
+
+"A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey. Or, rather, it will not
+happen."
+
+"Why not, if it must?"
+
+"Beloved," she whispered, "Bastin has expounded to me a new faith
+whereof the master-word is Sacrifice. The terrible thing will not happen
+because of sacrifice! Ask me no more."
+
+She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the ancient altar
+of sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her face and making
+her mysterious. Then she threw it back, showing her lovely eyes and
+glittering hair, and laughed.
+
+"We have still an earthly hour," she said; "therefore let us forget the
+far, dead past and the eternities to come and be joyful in that hour.
+Now throw your arms about me and I will tell you strange stories of lost
+days, and you shall look into my eyes and learn wisdom, and you shall
+kiss my lips and taste of bliss--you, who were and are and shall
+be--you, the beloved of Yva from the beginning to the end of Time."
+
+
+
+Chapter XXII. The Command
+
+
+I think that both Bastin and Bickley, by instinct as it were, knew what
+had passed between Yva and myself and that she had promised herself to
+me. They showed this by the way in which they avoided any mention of
+her name. Also they began to talk of their own plans for the future
+as matters in which I had no part. Thus I heard them discussing the
+possibility of escape from the island whereof suddenly they seemed to
+have grown weary, and whether by any means two men (two, not three)
+could manage to sail and steer the lifeboat that remained upon the
+wreck. In short, as in all such cases, the woman had come between; also
+the pressure of a common loss caused them to forget their differences
+and to draw closer together. I who had succeeded where they both had
+failed, was, they seemed to think, out of their lives, so much that our
+ancient intimacy had ended.
+
+This attitude hurt me, perhaps because in many respects the situation
+was awkward. They had, it is true, taken their failures extremely well,
+still the fact remained that both of them had fallen in love with the
+wonderful creature, woman and yet more than woman, who had bound
+herself to me. How then could we go on living together, I in prospective
+possession of the object that all had desired, and they without the
+pale?
+
+Moreover, they were jealous in another and quite a different fashion
+because they both loved me in their own ways and were convinced that I
+who had hitherto loved them, henceforward should have no affection left
+to spare, since surely this Glittering Lady, this marvel of wisdom and
+physical perfections would take it all. Of course they were in error,
+since even if I could have been so base and selfish, this was no conduct
+that Yva would have wished or even suffered. Still that was their
+thought.
+
+Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then spoke
+straight out to them.
+
+"My friends," I said, "as I see that you have guessed, Yva and I are
+affianced to each other and love each other perfectly."
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot," said Bastin, "we saw that in your face, and in hers
+as she bade us good night before she went into the cave, and we
+congratulate you and wish you every happiness."
+
+"We wish you every happiness, old fellow," chimed in Bickley. He
+paused a while, then added, "But to be honest, I am not sure that I
+congratulate you."
+
+"Why not, Bickley?"
+
+"Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not because
+you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be expected that you
+would do, but on account of something totally different. I told you
+a while ago and repetition is useless and painful. I need only add
+therefore that since then my conviction has strengthened and I am
+sure, sorry as I am to say it, that in this matter you must prepare for
+disappointment and calamity. That woman, if woman she really is, will
+never be the wife of mortal man. Now be angry with me if you like, or
+laugh as you have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and yourself,
+I also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak what I
+believe to be the truth."
+
+"Like Cassandra," I suggested.
+
+"Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person." At first I was
+inclined to resent Bickley's words--who would not have been in the
+circumstances? Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my mind the
+conviction that he spoke the truth. In this world Yva was not for me or
+any man. Moreover she knew it, the knowledge peeped out of every word
+she spoke in our passionate love scene by the lake. She was aware, and
+subconsciously I was aware, that we were plighting our troth, not for
+time but for eternity. With time we had little left to do; not for long
+would she wear the ring I gave her on that holy night.
+
+Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt that the
+situation was strained and awkward and broke in with a curious air of
+forced satisfaction:
+
+"It's uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to have
+a clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you in a
+respectable fashion. Of course I can't say that the Glittering Lady is
+as yet absolutely converted to our faith, but I am certain that she
+has absorbed enough of its principles to justify me in uniting her in
+Christian wedlock."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "she has absorbed its principles; she told me as
+much herself. Sacrifice, for instance," and as I spoke the word my eyes
+filled with tears.
+
+"Sacrifice!" broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he needed a vent
+to his mental disturbance. "Rubbish. Why should every religion demand
+sacrifice as savages do? By it alone they stand condemned."
+
+"Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of all life
+that is worth the living," I answered sadly enough. "Anyhow I believe
+you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will not be troubled to marry
+us."
+
+"You don't mean," broke in Bastin with a horrified air, "that you
+propose to dispense--"
+
+"No, Bastin, I don't mean that. What I mean is that it comes upon me
+that something will prevent this marriage. Sacrifice, perhaps, though in
+what shape I do not know. And now good night. I am tired."
+
+
+That night in the chill dead hour before the dawn Oro came again. I
+woke up to see him seated by my bed, majestic, and, as it seemed to me,
+lambent, though this may have been my imagination.
+
+"You take strange liberties with my daughter, Barbarian, or she
+takes strange liberties with you, it does not matter which," he said,
+regarding me with his calm and terrible eyes.
+
+"Why do you presume to call me Barbarian?" I asked, avoiding the main
+issue.
+
+"For this reason, Humphrey. All men are the same. They have the same
+organs, the same instincts, the same desires, which in essence are
+but two, food and rebirth that Nature commands; though it is true that
+millions of years before I was born, as I have learned from the records
+of the Sons of Wisdom, it was said that they were half ape. Yet being
+the same there is between them a whole sea of difference, since some
+have knowledge and others none, or little. Those who have none or
+little, among whom you must be numbered, are Barbarians. Those who
+have much, among whom my daughter and I are the sole survivors, are the
+Instructed."
+
+"There are nearly two thousand millions of living people in this world,"
+I said, "and you name all of them Barbarians?"
+
+"All, Humphrey, excepting, of course, myself and my daughter who are
+not known to be alive. You think that you have learned much, whereas in
+truth you are most ignorant. The commonest of the outer nations, when I
+destroyed them, knew more than your wisest know today."
+
+"You are mistaken, Oro; since then we have learned something of the
+soul."
+
+"Ah!" he exclaimed, "that interests me and perhaps it is true. Also, if
+true it is very important, as I have told you before--or was it Bastin?
+If a man has a soul, he lives, whereas even we Sons of Wisdom die, and
+in Death what is the use of Wisdom? Because you can believe, you have
+souls and are therefore, perhaps, heirs to life, foolish and ignorant as
+you are today. Therefore I admit you and Bastin to be my equals, though
+Bickley, who like myself believes nothing, is but a common chemist and
+doctor of disease."
+
+"Then you bow to Faith, Oro?"
+
+"Yes, and I think that my god Fate also bows to Faith. Perhaps, indeed,
+Faith shapes Fate, not Fate, Faith. But whence comes that faith which
+even I with all my learning cannot command? Why is it denied to me and
+given to you and Bastin?"
+
+"Because as Bastin would tell you, it is a gift, though one that is
+never granted to the proud and self-sufficient. Become humble as a
+child, Oro, and perchance you too may acquire faith."
+
+"And how shall I become humble?"
+
+"By putting away all dreams of power and its exercise, if such you have,
+and in repentance walking quietly to the Gates of Death," I replied.
+
+"For you, Humphrey, who have little or none of these things, that may be
+easy. But for me who have much, if not all, it is otherwise. You ask me
+to abandon the certain for the uncertain, the known for the unknown,
+and from a half-god communing with the stars, to become an earthworm
+crawling in mud and lifting blind eyes towards the darkness of
+everlasting night."
+
+"A god who must die is no god, half or whole, Oro; the earthworm that
+lives on is greater than he."
+
+"Mayhap. Yet while I endure I will be as a god, so that when night
+comes, if come it must, I shall have played my part and left my mark
+upon this little world of ours. Have done!" he added with a burst of
+impatience. "What will you of my daughter?"
+
+"What man has always willed of woman--herself, body and soul."
+
+"Her soul perchance is yours, if she has one, but her body is mine to
+give or withhold. Yet it can be bought at a price," he added slowly.
+
+"So she told me, Oro."
+
+"I can guess what she told you. Did I not watch you yonder by the
+lake when you gave her a ring graved with the signs of Life and
+Everlastingness? The question is, will you pay the price?"
+
+"Not so; the question is--what is the price?"
+
+"This; to enter my service and henceforth do my will--without debate or
+cavil."
+
+"For what reward, Oro?"
+
+"Yva and the dominion of the earth while you shall live, neither more
+nor less."
+
+"And what is your will?"
+
+"That you shall learn in due course. On the second night from this I
+command the three of you to wait upon me at sundown in the buried halls
+of Nyo. Till then you see no more of Yva, for I do not trust her. She,
+too, has powers, though as yet she does not use them, and perchance
+she would forget her oaths, and following some new star of love, for a
+little while vanish with you out of my reach. Be in the sepulchre at the
+hour of sundown on the second day from this, all three of you, if you
+would continue to live upon the earth. Afterwards you shall learn my
+will and make your choice between Yva with majesty and her loss with
+death."
+
+Then suddenly he was gone.
+
+
+Next morning I told the others what had passed, and we talked the matter
+over. The trouble was, of course, that Bickley did not believe me. He
+had no faith in my alleged interviews with Oro, which he set down to
+delusions of a semi-mesmeric character. This was not strange, since
+it appeared that on the previous night he had watched the door of
+my sleeping-place until dawn broke, which it did long after Oro had
+departed, and he had not seen him either come or go, although the moon
+was shining brightly.
+
+When he told me this I could only answer that all the same he had been
+there as, if he could speak, Tommy would have been able to certify. As
+it chanced the dog was sleeping with me and at the first sound of the
+approach of someone, woke up and growled. Then recognising Oro, he went
+to him, wagged his tail and curled himself up at his feet.
+
+Bastin believed my story readily enough, saying that Oro was a peculiar
+person who no doubt had ways of coming and going which we did not
+understand. His point was, however, that he did not in the least wish to
+visit Nyo any more. The wonders of its underground palaces and temples
+had no charms for him. Also he did not think he could do any good by
+going, since after "sucking him as dry as an orange" with reference to
+religious matters "that old vampire-bat Oro had just thrown him away
+like the rind," and, he might add, "seemed no better for the juice he
+had absorbed."
+
+"I doubt," continued Bastin, "whether St. Paul himself could have
+converted Oro, even if he performed miracles before him. What is the
+use of showing miracles to a man who could always work a bigger one
+himself?"
+
+In short, Bastin's one idea, and Bickley's also for the matter of that,
+was to get away to the main island and thence escape by means of the
+boat, or in some other fashion.
+
+I pointed out that Oro had said we must obey at the peril of our lives;
+indeed that he had put it even more strongly, using words to the effect
+that if we did not he would kill us.
+
+"I'd take the risk," said Bickley, "since I believe that you dreamt it
+all, Arbuthnot. However, putting that aside, there is a natural reason
+why you should wish to go, and for my own part, so do I in a way. I want
+to see what that old fellow has up his extremely long sleeve, if there
+is anything there at all."
+
+"Well, if you ask me, Bickley," I answered, "I believe it is the
+destruction of half the earth, or some little matter of that sort."
+
+At this suggestion Bickley only snorted, but Bastin said cheerfully:
+
+"I dare say. He is bad enough even for that. But as I am quite convinced
+that it will never be allowed, his intentions do not trouble me."
+
+I remarked that he seemed to have carried them out once before.
+
+"Oh! you mean the Deluge. Well, no doubt there was a deluge, but I am
+sure that Oro had no more to do with it than you or I, as I think I have
+said already. Anyhow it is impossible to leave you to descend into that
+hole alone. I suggest, therefore, that we should go into the sepulchre
+at the time which you believe Oro appointed, and see what happens. If
+you are not mistaken, the Glittering Lady will come there to fetch us,
+since it is quite certain that we cannot work the lift or whatever it
+is, alone. If you are mistaken we can just go back to bed as usual."
+
+"Yes, that's the best plan," said Bickley, shortly, after which the
+conversation came to an end.
+
+All that day and the next I watched and waited in vain for the coming
+of Yva, but no Yva appeared. I even went as far as the sepulchre, but it
+was as empty as were the two crystal coffins, and after waiting a while
+I returned. Although I did not say so to Bickley, to me it was evident
+that Oro, as he had said, was determined to cut off all communication
+between us.
+
+The second day drew to its close. Our simple preparations were complete.
+They consisted mainly in making ready our hurricane lamps and packing
+up a little food, enough to keep us for three or four days if necessary,
+together with some matches and a good supply of oil, since, as Bastin
+put it, he was determined not to be caught like the foolish virgins in
+the parable.
+
+"You see," he added, "one never knows when it might please that old
+wretch to turn off the incandescent gas or electric light, or whatever
+it is he uses to illumine his family catacombs, and then it would be
+awkward if we had no oil."
+
+"For the matter of that he might steal our lamps," suggested Bickley,
+"in which case we should be where Moses was when the light went out."
+
+"I have considered that possibility," answered Bastin, "and therefore,
+although it is a dangerous weapon to carry loaded, I am determined to
+take my revolver. If necessary I shall consider myself quite justified
+in shooting him to save our lives and those of thousands of others."
+
+At this we both laughed; somehow the idea of Bastin trying to shoot Oro
+struck us as intensely ludicrous. Yet that very thing was to happen.
+
+
+It was a peculiarly beautiful sunset over the southern seas. To the
+west the great flaming orb sank into the ocean, to the east appeared
+the silver circle of the full moon. To my excited fancy they were like
+scales hanging from the hand of a materialised spirit of calm. Over the
+volcano and the lake, over the island with its palm trees, over the seas
+beyond, this calm brooded. Save for a few travelling birds the sky
+was empty; no cloud disturbed its peace; the world seemed steeped in
+innocence and quiet.
+
+All these things struck me, as I think they did the others, because by
+the action of some simultaneous thought it came to our minds that very
+probably we were looking on them for the last time. It is all very well
+to talk of the Unknown and the Infinite whereof we are assured we are
+the heirs, but that does not make it any easier for us to part with the
+Known and the Finite. The contemplation of the wonders of Eternity does
+not conceal the advantages of actual and existent Time. In short there
+is no one of us, from a sainted archbishop down to a sinful suicide, who
+does not regret the necessity of farewell to the pleasant light and the
+kindly race of men wherewith we are acquainted.
+
+For after all, who can be quite certain of the Beyond? It may be
+splendid, but it will probably be strange, and from strangeness, after a
+certain age, we shrink. We know that all things will be different there;
+that our human relationships will be utterly changed, that perhaps sex
+which shapes so many of them, will vanish to be replaced by something
+unknown, that ambitions will lose their hold of us, and that, at the
+best, the mere loss of hopes and fears will leave us empty. So at least
+we think, who seek not variation but continuance, since the spirit must
+differ from the body and that thought alarms our intelligence.
+
+At least some of us think so; others, like Bickley, write down
+the future as a black and endless night, which after all has its
+consolations since, as has been wisely suggested, perhaps oblivion is
+better than any memories. Others again, like Bastin, would say of
+it with the Frenchman, plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. Yet
+others, like Oro, consider it as a realm of possibilities, probably
+unpleasant and perhaps non-existent; just this and nothing more. Only
+one thing is certain, that no creature which has life desires to leap
+into the fire and from the dross of doubts, to resolve the gold--or the
+lead--of certainty.
+
+"It is time to be going," said Bastin. "In these skies the sun seems to
+tumble down, not to set decently as it does in England, and if we wait
+any longer we shall be late for our appointment in the sepulchre. I am
+sorry because although I don't often notice scenery, everything looks
+rather beautiful this evening. That star, for instance, I think it is
+called Venus."
+
+"And therefore one that Arbuthnot should admire," broke in Bickley,
+attempting to lighten matters with a joke. "But come on and let us be
+rid of this fool's errand. Certainly the world is a lovely place after
+all, and for my part I hope that we haven't seen the last of it," he
+added with a sigh.
+
+"So do I," said Bastin, "though of course, Faith teaches us that there
+are much better ones beyond. It is no use bothering about what they are
+like, but I hope that the road to them doesn't run through the hole that
+the old reprobate, Oro, calls Nyo."
+
+A few minutes later we started, each of us carrying his share of the
+impedimenta. I think that Tommy was the only really cheerful member
+of the party, for he skipped about and barked, running backwards and
+forwards into the mouth of the cave, as though to hurry our movements.
+
+"Really," said Bastin, "it is quite unholy to see an animal going on in
+that way when it knows that it is about to descend into the bowels of
+the earth. I suppose it must like them."
+
+"Oh! no," commented Bickley, "it only likes what is in them--like
+Arbuthnot. Since that little beast came in contact with the Lady Yva, it
+has never been happy out of her company."
+
+"I think that is so," said Bastin. "At any rate I have noticed that it
+has been moping for the last two days, as it always does when she is
+not present. It even seems to like Oro who gives me the creeps, perhaps
+because he is her father. Dogs must be very charitable animals."
+
+By now we were in the cave marching past the wrecks of the half-buried
+flying-machines, which Bickley, as he remarked regretfully, had never
+found time thoroughly to examine. Indeed, to do so would have needed
+more digging than we could do without proper instruments, since the
+machines were big and deeply entombed in dust.
+
+We came to the sepulchre and entered.
+
+"Well," said Bickley, seating himself on the edge of one of the coffins
+and holding up his lamp to look about him, "this place seems fairly
+empty. No one is keeping the assignation, Arbuthnot, although the sun is
+well down."
+
+As he spoke the words Yva stood before us. Whence she came we did not
+see, for all our backs were turned at the moment of her arrival. But
+there she was, calm, beautiful, radiating light.
+
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIII. In the Temple of Fate
+
+
+Yva glanced at me, and in her eyes I read tenderness and solicitude,
+also something of inquiry. It seemed to me as though she were wondering
+what I should do under circumstances that might, or would, arise, and in
+some secret fashion of which I was but half conscious, drawing an answer
+from my soul. Then she turned, and, smiling in her dazzling way, said:
+
+"So, Bickley, as usual, you did not believe? Because you did not see
+him, therefore the Lord Oro, my father, never spoke with Humphrey.
+As though the Lord Oro could not pass you without your knowledge, or,
+perchance, send thoughts clothed in his own shape to work his errand."
+
+"How do you know that I did not believe Arbuthnot's story?" Bickley
+asked in a rather cross voice and avoiding the direct issue. "Do you
+also send thoughts to work your errands clothed in your own shape, Lady
+Yva?"
+
+"Alas! not so, though perhaps I could if I might. It is very simple,
+Bickley. Standing here, I heard you say that although the sun was well
+down there was no one to meet you as Humphrey had expected, and from
+those words and your voice I guessed the rest."
+
+"Your knowledge of the English language is improving fast, Lady Yva.
+Also, when I spoke, you were not here."
+
+"At least I was very near, Bickley, and these walls are thinner than you
+think," she answered, contemplating what seemed to be solid rock with
+eyes that were full of innocence. "Oh! friend," she went on suddenly,
+"I wonder what there is which will cause you to believe that you do not
+know all; that there exist many things beyond the reach of your learning
+and imagination? Well, in a day or two, perhaps, even you will admit as
+much, and confess it to me--elsewhere," and she sighed.
+
+"I am ready to confess now that much happens which I do not understand
+at present, because I have not the key to the trick," he replied.
+
+Yva shook her head at him and smiled again. Then she motioned to all of
+us to stand close to her, and, stooping, lifted Tommy in her arms. Next
+moment that marvel happened which I have described already, and we were
+whirling downwards through space, to find ourselves in a very little
+time standing safe in the caves of Nyo, breathless with the swiftness of
+our descent. How and on what we descended neither I nor the others ever
+learned. It was and must remain one of the unexplained mysteries of our
+great experience.
+
+"Whither now, Yva?" I asked, staring about me at the radiant vastness.
+
+"The Lord Oro would speak with you, Humphrey. Follow. And I pray you all
+do not make him wrath, for his mood is not gentle."
+
+So once more we proceeded down the empty streets of that underground
+abode which, except that it was better illuminated, reminded me of the
+Greek conception of Hades. We came to the sacred fountain over which
+stood the guardian statue of Life, pouring from the cups she held the
+waters of Good and Ill that mingled into one health-giving wine.
+
+"Drink, all of you," she said; "for I think before the sun sets again
+upon the earth we shall need strength, every one of us."
+
+So we drank, and she drank herself, and once more felt the blood go
+dancing through our veins as though the draught had been some nectar of
+the gods. Then, having extinguished the lanterns which we still carried,
+for here they were needless, and we wished to save our oil, we followed
+her through the great doors into the vast hall of audience and advanced
+up it between the endless, empty seats. At its head, on the dais
+beneath the arching shell, sat Oro on his throne. As before, he wore the
+jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes, while the table in front
+of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which he wrote with a
+pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his own fierce eyes.
+Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to ascend the dais.
+
+"You are here. It is well," he said, which was all his greeting. Only
+when Tommy ran up to him he bent down and patted the dog's head with his
+long, thin hand, and, as he did so, his face softened. It was evident to
+me that Tommy was more welcome to him than were the rest of us.
+
+There was a long silence while, one by one, he searched us with his
+piercing glance. It rested on me, the last of the three of us, and from
+me travelled to Yva.
+
+"I wonder why I have sent for you?" he said at length, with a mirthless
+laugh. "I think it must be that I may convince Bickley, the sceptic,
+that there are powers which he does not understand, but that I have the
+strength to move. Also, perhaps, that your lives may be spared for my
+own purposes in that which is about to happen. Hearken! My labours are
+finished; my calculations are complete," and he pointed to the sheets of
+metal before him that were covered with cabalistic signs. "Tomorrow I am
+about to do what once before I did and to plunge half the world in the
+deeps of ocean and lift again from the depths that which has been buried
+for a quarter of a million years."
+
+"Which half?" asked Bickley.
+
+"That is my secret, Physician, and the answer to it lies written here
+in signs you cannot read. Certain countries will vanish, others will be
+spared. I say that it is my secret."
+
+"Then, Oro, if you could do what you threaten, you would drown hundreds
+of millions of people."
+
+"If I could do! If I could do!" he exclaimed, glaring at Bickley. "Well,
+tomorrow you shall see what I can do. Oh! why do I grow angry with this
+fool? For the rest, yes, they must drown. What does it matter? Their end
+will be swift; some few minutes of terror, that is all, and in one short
+century every one of them would have been dead."
+
+An expression of horror gathered on Bastin's face.
+
+"Do you really mean to murder hundreds of millions of people?" he asked,
+in a thick, slow voice.
+
+"I have said that I intend to send them to that heaven or that hell of
+which you are so fond of talking, Preacher, somewhat more quickly
+than otherwise they would have found their way thither. They have
+disappointed me, they have failed; therefore, let them go and make room
+for others who will succeed."
+
+"Then you are a greater assassin than any that the world has bred, or
+than all of them put together. There is nobody as bad, even in the Book
+of Revelation!" shouted Bastin, in a kind of fury. "Moreover, I am not
+like Bickley. I know enough of you and your hellish powers to believe
+that what you plan, that you can do."
+
+"I believe it also," sneered Oro. "But how comes it that the Great One
+whom you worship does not prevent the deed, if He exists, and it be
+evil?"
+
+"He will prevent it!" raved Bastin. "Even now He commands me to prevent
+it, and I obey!" Then, drawing the revolver from his pocket, he pointed
+it at Oro's breast, adding: "Swear not to commit this crime, or I will
+kill you!"
+
+"So the man of peace would become a man of blood," mused Oro, "and kill
+that I may not kill for the good of the world? Why, what is the matter
+with that toy of yours, Preacher?" and he pointed to the pistol.
+
+Well might he ask, for as he spoke the revolver flew out of Bastin's
+hand. High into the air it flew, and as it went discharged itself, all
+the six chambers of it, in rapid succession, while Bastin stood staring
+at his arm and hand which he seemed unable to withdraw.
+
+"Do you still threaten me with that outstretched hand, Preacher?" mocked
+Oro.
+
+"I can't move it," said Bastin; "it seems turned to stone."
+
+"Be thankful that you also are not turned to stone. But, because your
+courage pleases me, I will spare you, yes, and will advance you in my
+New Kingdom. What shall you be? Controller of Religions, I think, since
+all the qualities that a high priest should have are yours--faith,
+fanaticism and folly."
+
+"It is very strange," said Bastin, "but all of a sudden my arm and hand
+are quite well again. I suppose it must have been 'pins and needles' or
+something of that sort which made me throw away the pistol and pull the
+trigger when I didn't mean to do so."
+
+Then he went to fetch that article which had fallen beyond the dais, and
+quite forgot his intention of executing Oro in the interest of testing
+its mechanism, which proved to be destroyed. To his proposed appointment
+he made no illusion. If he comprehended what was meant, which I doubt,
+he took it as a joke.
+
+"Hearken all of you," said Oro, lifting his head suddenly, for while
+Bastin recovered the revolver he had been brooding. "The great thing
+which I shall do tomorrow must be witnessed by you because thereby only
+can you come to understand my powers. Also yonder where I bring it about
+in the bowels of the earth, you will be safer than elsewhere, since when
+and perhaps before it happens, the whole world will heave and shake and
+tremble, and I know not what may chance, even in these caves. For this
+reason also, do not forget to bring the little hound with you, since
+him least of all of you would I see come to harm, perhaps because once,
+hundreds of generations ago as you reckon time, I had a dog very like to
+him. Your mother loved him much, Yva, and when she died, this dog died
+also. He lies embalmed with her on her coffin yonder in the temple, and
+yesterday I went to look at both of them. The beasts are wonderfully
+alike, which shows the everlastingness of blood."
+
+He paused a while, lost in thought, then continued: "After the deed is
+done I'll speak with you and you shall choose, Strangers, whether you
+will die your own masters, or live on to serve me. Now there is one
+problem that is left to me to solve--whether I can save a certain
+land--do not ask which it is, Humphrey, though I see the question in
+your eyes--or must let it go with the rest. I only answer you that
+I will do my best because you love it. So farewell for a while, and,
+Preacher, be advised by me and do not aim too high again."
+
+"It doesn't matter where I aim," answered Bastin sturdily, "or whether
+I hit or miss, since there is something much bigger than me waiting to
+deal with you. The countries that you think you are going to destroy
+will sleep quite as well tomorrow as they do tonight, Oro."
+
+"Much better, I think, Preacher, since by then they will have left
+sorrow and pain and wickedness and war far behind them."
+
+"Where are we to go?" I asked.
+
+"The Lady Yva will show you," he answered, waving his hand, and once
+more bent over his endless calculations.
+
+Yva beckoned to us and we turned and followed her down the hall. She led
+us to a street near the gateway of the temple and thence into one of the
+houses. There was a portico to it leading to a court out of which opened
+rooms somewhat in the Pompeian fashion. We did not enter the rooms, for
+at the end of the court were a metal table and three couches also of
+metal, on which were spread rich-looking rugs. Whence these came I do
+not know and never asked, but I remember that they were very beautiful
+and soft as velvet.
+
+"Here you may sleep," she said, "if sleep you can, and eat of the food
+that you have brought with you. Tomorrow early I will call you when it
+is time for us to start upon our journey into the bowels of the earth."
+
+"I don't want to go any deeper than we are," said Bastin doubtfully.
+
+"I think that none of us want to go, Bastin," she answered with a sigh.
+"Yet go we must. I pray of you, anger the Lord Oro no more on this or
+any other matter. In your folly you tried to kill him, and as it chanced
+he bore it well because he loves courage. But another time he may strike
+back, and then, Bastin--"
+
+"I am not afraid of him," he answered, "but I do not like tunnels.
+Still, perhaps it would be better to accompany you than to be left in
+this place alone. Now I will unpack the food."
+
+Yva turned to go.
+
+"I must leave you," she said, "since my father needs my help. The matter
+has to do with the Force that he would let loose tomorrow, and its
+measurements; also with the preparation of the robes that we must wear
+lest it should harm us in its leap."
+
+Something in her eyes told me that she wished me to follow her, and
+I did so. Outside the portico where we stood in the desolate, lighted
+street, she halted.
+
+"If you are not afraid," she said, "meet me at midnight by the statue of
+Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you, Humphrey, where,
+if anywhere, we may be alone."
+
+"I will come, Yva."
+
+"You know the road, and the gates are open, Humphrey."
+
+Then she gave me her hand to kiss and glided away. I returned to the
+others and we ate, somewhat sparingly, for we wished to save our food in
+case of need, and having drunk of the Life-water, were not hungry. Also
+we talked a little, but by common consent avoided the subject of the
+morrow and what it might bring forth.
+
+We knew that terrible things were afoot, but lacking any knowledge of
+what these might be, thought it useless to discuss them. Indeed we
+were too depressed, so much so that even Bastin and Bickley ceased from
+arguing. The latter was so overcome by the exhibition of Oro's powers
+when he caused the pistol to leap into the air and discharge itself,
+that he could not even pluck up courage to laugh at the failure of
+Bastin's efforts to do justice on the old Super-man, or rather to
+prevent him from attempting a colossal crime.
+
+At length we lay down on the couches to rest, Bastin remarking that he
+wished he could turn off the light, also that he did not in the least
+regret having tried to kill Oro. Sleep seemed to come to the others
+quickly, but I could only doze, to wake up from time to time. Of this I
+was not sorry, since whenever I dropped off dreams seemed to pursue me.
+For the most part they were of my dead wife. She appeared to be trying
+to console me for some loss, but the strange thing was that sometimes
+she spoke with her own voice and sometimes with Yva's, and sometimes
+looked at me with her own eyes and sometimes with those of Yva. I
+remember nothing else about these dreams, which were very confused.
+
+After one of them, the most vivid of all, I awoke and looked at my
+watch. It was half-past eleven, almost time for me to be starting. The
+other two seemed to be fast asleep. Presently I rose and crept down the
+court without waking them. Outside the portico, which by the way was a
+curious example of the survival of custom in architecture, since none
+was needed in that weatherless place, I turned to the right and followed
+the wide street to the temple enclosure. Through the pillared courts
+I went, my footsteps, although I walked as softly as I could, echoing
+loudly in that intense silence, through the great doors into the utter
+solitude of the vast and perfect fane.
+
+Words can not tell the loneliness of that place. It flowed over me like
+a sea and seemed to swallow up my being, so that even the wildest and
+most dangerous beast would have been welcome as a companion. I was as
+terrified as a child that wakes to find itself deserted in the dark.
+Also an uncanny sense of terrors to come oppressed me, till I could have
+cried aloud if only to hear the sound of a mortal voice. Yonder was
+the grim statue of Fate, the Oracle of the Kings of the Sons of Wisdom,
+which was believed to bow its stony head in answer to their prayers. I
+ran to it, eager for its terrible shelter, for on either side of it were
+figures of human beings. Even their cold marble was company of a sort,
+though alas! over all frowned Fate.
+
+Let anyone imagine himself standing alone beneath the dome of St.
+Paul's; in the centre of that cathedral brilliant with mysterious light,
+and stretched all about it a London that had been dead and absolutely
+unpeopled for tens of thousands of years. If he can do this he will
+gather some idea of my physical state. Let him add to his mind-picture
+a knowledge that on the following day something was to happen not unlike
+the end of the world, as prognosticated by the Book of Revelation and by
+most astronomers, and he will have some idea of my mental perturbations.
+Add to the mixture a most mystic yet very real love affair and an
+assignation before that symbol of the cold fate which seems to sway the
+universes down to the tiniest detail of individual lives, and he may
+begin to understand what I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, experienced during my
+vigil in this sanctuary of a vanished race.
+
+It seemed long before Yva came, but at last she did come. I caught sight
+of her far away beyond the temple gate, flitting through the unholy
+brightness of the pillared courts like a white moth at night and seeming
+quite as small. She approached; now she was as a ghost, and then drawing
+near, changed into a living, breathing, lovely woman. I opened my
+arms, and with something like a sob she sank into them and we kissed as
+mortals do.
+
+"I could not come more quickly," she said. "The Lord Oro needed me, and
+those calculations were long and difficult. Also twice he must visit the
+place whither we shall go tomorrow, and that took time."
+
+"Then it is close at hand?" I said.
+
+"Humphrey, be not foolish. Do you not remember, who have travelled with
+him, that Oro can throw his soul afar and bring it back again laden with
+knowledge, as the feet of a bee are laden with golden dust? Well, he
+went and went again, and I must wait. And then the robes and shields;
+they must be prepared by his arts and mine. Oh! ask not what they are,
+there is no time to tell, and it matters nothing. Some folk are wise and
+some are foolish, but all which matters is that within them flows the
+blood of life and that life breeds love, and that love, as I believe,
+although Oro does not, breeds immortality. And if so, what is Time but
+as a grain of sand upon the shore?"
+
+"This, Yva; it is ours, who can count on nothing else."
+
+"Oh! Humphrey, if I thought that, no more wretched creature would
+breathe tonight upon this great world."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, growing fearful, more at her manner and her
+look than at her words.
+
+"Nothing, nothing, except that Time is so very short. A kiss, a touch,
+a little light and a little darkness, and it is gone. Ask my father Oro
+who has lived a thousand years and slept for tens of thousands, as I
+have, and he will say the same. It is against Time that he fights; he
+who, believing in nothing beyond, will inherit nothing, as Bastin
+says; he to whom Time has brought nothing save a passing, blood-stained
+greatness, and triumph ending in darkness and disaster, and hope that
+will surely suffer hope's eclipse, and power that must lay down its
+coronet in dust."
+
+"And what has it brought to you, Yva, beyond a fair body and a soul of
+strength?"
+
+"It has brought a spirit, Humphrey. Between them the body and the soul
+have bred a spirit, and in the fires of tribulation from that spirit has
+been distilled the essence of eternal love. That is Time's gift to me,
+and therefore, although still he rules me here, I mock at Fate," and she
+waved her hand with a gesture of defiance at the stern-faced, sexless
+effigy which sat above us, the sword across its knees.
+
+"Look! Look!" she went on in a swelling voice of music, pointing to the
+statues of the dotard and the beauteous woman. "They implore Fate, they
+worship Fate. I do not implore, I do not worship or ask a sign as even
+Oro does and as did his forefathers. I rise above and triumph. As Fate,
+the god of my people, sets his foot upon the sun, so I set my foot upon
+Fate, and thence, like a swimmer from a rock, leap into the waters of
+Immortality."
+
+I looked at her whose presence, as happened from time to time, had grown
+majestic beyond that of woman; I studied her deep eyes which were full
+of lights, not of this world, and I grew afraid.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "Yva, you talk like one who has finished
+with life."
+
+"It passes," she answered quickly. "Life passes like breath fading from
+a mirror. So should all talk who breathe beneath the sun."
+
+"Yes, Yva, but if you went and left me still breathing on that mocking
+glass--"
+
+"If so, what of it? Will not your breath fade also and join mine where
+all vapours go? Or if it were yours that faded and mine that remained
+for some few hours, is it not the same? I think, Humphrey, that already
+you have seen a beloved breath melt from the glass of life," she added,
+looking at me earnestly.
+
+I bowed my head and answered:
+
+"Yes, and therefore I am ashamed."
+
+"Oh! why should you be ashamed, Humphrey, who are not sure but that
+two breaths may yet be one breath? How do you know that there is a
+difference between them?"
+
+"You drive me mad, Yva. I cannot understand."
+
+"Nor can I altogether, Humphrey. Why should I, seeing that I am no
+more than woman, as you are no more than man? I would always have
+you remember, Humphrey, that I am no spirit or sorceress, but just a
+woman--like her you lost."
+
+I looked at her doubtfully and answered:
+
+"Women do not sleep for two hundred thousand years. Women do not take
+dream journeys to the stars. Women do not make the dead past live again
+before the watcher's eyes. Their hair does not glimmer in the dusk nor
+do their bodies gleam, nor have they such strength of soul or eyes so
+wonderful, or loveliness so great."
+
+These words appeared to distress her who, as it seemed to me, was above
+all things anxious to prove herself woman and no more.
+
+"All these qualities are nothing, Humphrey," she cried. "As for the
+beauty, such as it is, it comes to me with my blood, and with it the
+glitter of my hair which is the heritage of those who for generations
+have drunk of the Life-water. My mother was lovelier than I, as was her
+mother, or so I have heard, since only the fairest were the wives of
+the Kings of the Children of Wisdom. For the rest, such arts as I have
+spring not from magic, but from knowledge which your people will acquire
+in days to come, that is, if Oro spares them. Surely you above all
+should know that I am only woman," she added very slowly and searching
+my face with her eyes.
+
+"Why, Yva? During the little while that we have been together I have
+seen much which makes me doubt. Even Bickley the sceptic doubts also."
+
+"I will tell you, though I am not sure that you will believe me." She
+glanced about her as though she were frightened lest someone should
+overhear her words or read her thoughts. Then she stretched out her
+hands and drawing my head towards her, put her lips to my ear and
+whispered:
+
+"Because once you saw me die, as women often die--giving life for life."
+
+"I saw you die?" I gasped.
+
+She nodded, then continued to whisper in my ear, not in her own voice,
+but another's:
+
+"Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in
+which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me. Good-bye for
+a little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!"
+
+I knew the voice as I knew the words, and knowing, I think that I should
+have fallen to the ground, had she not supported me with her strong
+arms.
+
+"Who told you?" I stammered. "Was it Bickley or Bastin? They knew,
+though neither of them heard those holy words."
+
+"Not Bickley nor Bastin," she answered, shaking her head, "no, nor you
+yourself, awake or sleeping, though once, by the lake yonder, you
+said to me that when a certain one lay dying, she bade you seek her
+elsewhere, for certainly you would find her. Humphrey, I cannot say who
+told me those words because I do not know. I think they are a memory,
+Humphrey!"
+
+"That would mean that you, Yva, are the same as one who was--not called
+Yva."
+
+"The same as one who was called Natalie, Humphrey," she replied in
+solemn accents. "One whom you loved and whom you lost."
+
+"Then you think that we live again upon this earth?"
+
+"Again and yet again, until the time comes for us to leave the earth
+for ever. Of this, indeed, I am sure, for that knowledge was part of the
+secret wisdom of my people."
+
+"But you were not dead. You only slept."
+
+"The sleep was a death-sleep which went by like a flash, yes, in an
+instant, or so it seemed. Only the shell of the body remained preserved
+by mortal arts, and when the returning spirit and the light of life were
+poured into it again, it awoke. But during this long death-sleep, that
+spirit may have spoken through other lips and that light may have shone
+through other eyes, though of these I remember nothing."
+
+"Then that dream of our visit to a certain star may be no dream?"
+
+"I think no dream, and you, too, have thought as much."
+
+"In a way, yes, Yva. But I could not believe and turned from what I held
+to be a phantasy."
+
+"It was natural, Humphrey, that you should not believe. Hearken! In this
+temple a while ago I showed you a picture of myself and of a man who
+loved me and whom I loved, and of his death at Oro's hands. Did you note
+anything about that man?"
+
+"Bickley did," I answered. "Was he right?"
+
+"I think that he was right, since otherwise I should not have loved you,
+Humphrey."
+
+"I remember nothing of that man, Yva."
+
+"It is probable that you would not, since you and he are very far apart,
+while between you and him flow wide seas of death, wherein are set
+islands of life; perhaps many of them. But I remember much who seem to
+have left him but a very little while ago."
+
+"When you awoke in your coffin and threw your arms about me, what did
+you think, Yva?"
+
+"I thought you were that man, Humphrey."
+
+There was silence between us and in that silence the truth came home to
+me. Then there before the effigy of Fate and in the desolate, glowing
+temple we plighted anew our troth made holy by a past that thus so
+wonderfully lived again.
+
+Of this consecrated hour I say no more. Let each picture it as he will.
+A glory as of heaven fell upon us and in it we dwelt a space.
+
+
+"Beloved," she whispered at length in a voice that was choked as though
+with tears, "if it chances that we should be separated again for a
+little while, you will not grieve over much?"
+
+"Knowing all I should try not to grieve, Yva, seeing that in truth we
+never can be parted. But do you mean that I shall die?"
+
+"Being mortal either of us might seem to die, Humphrey," and she bent
+her head as though to hide her face. "You know we go into dangers this
+day."
+
+"Does Oro really purpose to destroy much of the world and has he in
+truth the power, Yva?"
+
+"He does so purpose and most certainly he has the power, unless--unless
+some other Power should stay his hand."
+
+"What other power, Yva?"
+
+"Oh! perhaps that which you worship, that which is called Love. The love
+of man may avert the massacre of men. I hope so with all my heart. Hist!
+Oro comes. I feel, I know that he comes, though not in search of us who
+are very far from his thought tonight. Follow me. Swiftly."
+
+She sped across the temple to where a chapel opened out of it, which was
+full of the statues of dead kings, for here was the entrance to their
+burial vault. We reached it and hid behind the base of one of these
+statues. By standing to our full height, without being seen we still
+could see between the feet of the statue that stood upon a pedestal.
+
+Then Oro came.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIV. The Chariot of the Pit
+
+
+Oro came and of necessity alone. Yet there was that in his air as he
+advanced into the temple, which suggested a monarch surrounded by the
+pomp and panoply of a great court. He marched, his head held high, as
+though heralds and pursuivants went in front of him, as though nobles
+surrounded him and guards or regiments followed after him. Let it be
+admitted that he was a great figure in his gorgeous robes, with his long
+white beard, his hawk-like features, his tall shape and his glittering
+eyes, which even at that distance I could see. Indeed once or twice I
+thought that he glanced out of the corners of them towards the chapel
+where we were hid. But this I think was fancy. For as Yva said, his
+thoughts were set elsewhere.
+
+He reached the statue of Fate and stood for a while contemplating it and
+the suppliant figures on either side, as though he were waiting for his
+invisible court to arrange itself. Then he doffed his jewelled cap to
+the effigy, and knelt before it. Yes, Oro the Ancient, the Super-man,
+the God, as the early peoples of the earth fancied such a being, namely,
+one full of wrath, revenge, jealousy, caprice and power, knelt in
+supplication to this image of stone which he believed to be the home
+of a spirit, thereby showing himself to be after all not so far removed
+from the savages whose idol Bastin had destroyed. More, in a clear and
+resonant voice which reached us even across that great space, he put
+up his prayer. It ran something as follows, for although I did not
+understand the language in which he spoke Yva translated it to me in a
+whisper:
+
+"God of the Sons of Wisdom, God of the whole earth, only God to whom
+must bow every other Power and Dominion, to thee I, Oro the Great King,
+make prayer and offer sacrifice. Twenty times ten thousand years and
+more have gone by since I, Oro, visited this, thy temple and knelt
+before this, thy living effigy, yet thou, ruler of the world, dost
+remember the prayer I made and the sacrifice I offered. The prayer was
+for triumph over my enemies and the sacrifice a promise of the lives of
+half of those who in that day dwelt upon the earth. Thou heardest the
+prayer, thou didst bow thy head and accept the sacrifice. Yea, the
+prayer was granted and the sacrifice was made, and in it were counted
+the number of my foes.
+
+"Then I slept. Through countless generations I slept on and at my side
+was the one child of my body that was left to me. What chanced to my
+spirit and to hers during that sleep, thou knowest alone, but doubtless
+they went forth to work thy ends.
+
+"At the appointed time which thou didst decree, I awoke again and found
+in my house strangers from another land. In the company of one of those
+whose spirit I drew forth, I visited the peoples of the new earth,
+and found them even baser and more evil than those whom I had known.
+Therefore, since they cannot be bettered. I purpose to destroy them
+also, and on their wreck to rebuild a glorious empire, such as was that
+of the Sons of Wisdom at its prime.
+
+"A sign! O Fate, ruler of the world, give me a sign that my desire shall
+be fulfilled."
+
+He paused, stretching out his arms and staring upwards. While he waited
+I felt the solid rock on which I stood quiver and sway beneath my feet
+so that Yva and I clung to each other lest we should fall. This chanced
+also. The shock of the earth tremor, for such without doubt it was,
+threw down the figures of the ancient man and the lovely woman which
+knelt as though making prayers to Fate, and shook the marble sword from
+off its knees. As it fell Oro caught it by the hilt, and, rising, waved
+it in triumph.
+
+"I thank thee, God of my people from the beginning," he cried. "Thou
+hast given to me, thy last servant, thine own sword and I will use it
+well. For these worshippers of thine who have fallen, thou shalt have
+others, yes, all those who dwell in the new world that is to be. My
+daughter and the man whom she has chosen to be the father of the kings
+of the earth, and with him his companions, shall be the first of the
+hundreds of millions that are to follow, for they shall kiss thy feet or
+perish. Thou shalt set thy foot upon the necks of all other gods; thou
+shalt rule and thou alone, and, as of old, Oro be thy minister."
+
+Still holding the sword, he flung himself down as though in an ecstasy,
+and was silent.
+
+"I read the omen otherwise," whispered Yva. "The worshippers of Fate are
+overthrown. His sword of power is fallen, but not into the hands that
+clasped it, and he totters on his throne. A greater God asserts dominion
+of the world and this Fate is but his instrument."
+
+Oro rose again.
+
+"One prayer more," he cried. "Give me life, long life, that I may
+execute thy decrees. By word or gesture show me a sign that I shall be
+satisfied with life, a year for every year that I have lived, or twain!"
+
+He waited, staring about him, but no token came; the idol did not
+speak or bow its head, as Yva had told me it was wont to do in sign of
+accepted prayer, how, she knew not. Only I thought I heard the echo of
+Oro's cries run in a whisper of mockery round the soaring dome.
+
+Once more Oro flung himself upon his knees and began to pray in a
+veritable agony.
+
+"God of my forefathers, God of my lost people, I will hide naught from
+thee," he said. "I who fear nothing else, fear death. The priest-fool
+yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering words of judgment and
+damnation which, though I do not believe them, yet stick in my heart
+like arrows. I will stamp out his faith, and with this ancient sword of
+thine drive back the new gods into the darkness whence they came. Yet
+what if some water of Truth flows through the channel of his leaden
+lips, and what if because I have ruled and will rule as thou didst
+decree, therefore, in some dim place of souls, I must bear these burdens
+of terror and of doom which I have bound upon the backs of others! Nay,
+it cannot be, for what power is there in all the universe that dares to
+make a slave of Oro and to afflict him with stripes?
+
+"Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my path in
+the ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless and forgotten
+as are those who went before me, while my crown of Power shines on
+younger brows. Alas! I grow old, since aeons of sleep have not renewed
+my strength. My time is short and yet I would not die as mortals must.
+Oh! God of my people, whom I have served so well, save me from the
+death I dread. For I would not die. Give me a sign; give me the ancient,
+sacred sign!"
+
+So he spoke, lifting his proud and splendid head and watching the statue
+with wide, expectant eyes.
+
+"Thou dost not answer," he cried again. "Wouldst thou desert me, Fate?
+Then beware lest I set up some new god against thee and hurl thee from
+thine immemorial throne. While I live I still have powers, I who am the
+last of thy worshippers, since it seems that my daughter turns her back
+on thee. I will get me to the sepulchre of the kings and take counsel
+with the dust of that wizard who first taught me wisdom. Even from the
+depths of death he must come to my call clad in a mockery of life, and
+comfort me. A little while yet I will wait, and if thou answer not, then
+Fate, soon I'll tear the sceptre from thy hand, and thou shalt join the
+company of dead gods." And throwing aside the sword, again Oro laid
+down his head upon the ground and stretched out his arms in the last
+abasement of supplication.
+
+"Come," whispered Yva, "while there is yet time. Presently he will seek
+this place to descend to the sepulchre, and if he learns that we have
+read his heart and know him for a coward deserted of his outworn god,
+surely he will blot us out. Come, and be swift and silent."
+
+We crept out of the chapel, Yva leading, and along the circle of the
+great dome till we reached the gates. Here I glanced back and perceived
+that Oro, looking unutterably small in that vastness, looking like a
+dead man, still lay outstretched before the stern-faced, unanswering
+Effigy which, with all his wisdom, he believed to be living and divine.
+Perhaps once it was, but if so its star had set for ever, like those of
+Amon, Jupiter and Baal, and he was its last worshipper.
+
+Now we were safe, but still we sped on till we reached the portico of
+our sleeping place. Then Yva turned and spoke.
+
+"It is horrible," she said, "and my soul sickens. Oh, I thank the
+Strength which made it that I have no desire to rule the earth, and,
+being innocent of death, do not fear to die and cross his threshold."
+
+"Yes, it is horrible," I answered. "Yet all men fear death."
+
+"Not when they have found love, Humphrey, for that I think is his true
+name, and, with it written on his brow, he stands upon the neck of Fate
+who is still my father's god."
+
+"Then he is not yours, Yva?"
+
+"Nay. Once it was so, but now I reject him; he is no longer mine. As Oro
+threatens, and perchance dare do in his rage, I have broken his chain,
+though in another fashion. Ask me no more; perhaps one day you will
+learn the path I trod to freedom."
+
+Then before I could speak, she went off:
+
+"Rest now, for within a few hours I must come to lead you and your
+companions to a terrible place. Yet whatever you may see or hear, be
+not afraid, Humphrey, for I think that Oro's god has no power over you,
+strong though he was, and that Oro's plans will fail, while I, who too
+have knowledge, shall find strength to save the world."
+
+Then of a sudden, once again she grew splendid, almost divine; no more a
+woman but as it were an angel. Some fire of pure purpose seemed to burn
+up in her and to shine out of her eyes. Yet she said little. Only this
+indeed:
+
+"To everyone, I think, there comes the moment of opportunity when choice
+must be made between what is great and what is small, between self and
+its desires and the good of other wanderers in the way. This day that
+moment may draw near to you or me, and if so, surely we shall greet it
+well. Such is Bastin's lesson, which I have striven to learn."
+
+Then she flung her arms about me and kissed me on the brow as a mother
+might, and was gone.
+
+
+Strangely enough, perhaps because of my mental exhaustion, for what I
+had passed through seemed to overwhelm me so that I could no longer so
+much as think with clearness, even after all that I have described I
+slept like a child and awoke refreshed and well.
+
+I looked at my watch to find that it was now eight o'clock in the
+morning in this horrible place where there was neither morn, nor noon,
+nor night, but only an eternal brightness that came I knew not whence,
+and never learned.
+
+I found that I was alone, since Bickley and Bastin had gone to fill
+our bottles with the Life-water. Presently they returned and we ate a
+little; with that water to drink one did not need much food. It was
+a somewhat silent meal, for our circumstances were a check on talk;
+moreover, I thought that the others looked at me rather oddly. Perhaps
+they guessed something of my midnight visit to the temple, but if so
+they thought it wisest to say nothing. Nor did I enlighten them.
+
+Shortly after we had finished Yva appeared. She was wonderfully quiet
+and gentle in her manner, calm also, and greeted all of us with much
+sweetness. Of our experiences during the night she said no word to me,
+even when we were alone. One difference I noticed about her, however;
+that she was clothed in garments such as I had never seen her wear
+before. They were close fitting, save for a flowing cape, and made of
+some grey material, not unlike a coarse homespun or even asbestos cloth.
+Still they became her very well, and when I remarked upon them, all she
+answered was that part of our road would be rough. Even her feet were
+shod with high buskins of this grey stuff.
+
+Presently she touched Bastin on the shoulder and said that she would
+speak with him apart. They went together into one of the chambers of
+that dwelling and there remained for perhaps the half of an hour. It was
+towards the end of this time that in the intense silence I heard a crash
+from the direction of the temple, as though something heavy had
+fallen to the rocky floor. Bickley also heard this sound. When the two
+reappeared I noticed that though still quite calm, Yva looked radiant,
+and, if I may say so, even more human and womanly than I had ever seen
+her, while Bastin also seemed very happy.
+
+"One has strange experiences in life, yes, very strange," he remarked,
+apparently addressing the air, which left me wondering to what
+particular experience he might refer. Well, I thought that I could
+guess.
+
+"Friends," said Yva, "it is time for us to be going and I am your guide.
+You will meet the Lord Oro at the end of your journey. I pray you to
+bring those lamps of yours with you, since all the road is not lightened
+like this place."
+
+"I should like to ask," said Bickley, "whither we go and for what
+object, points on which up to the present we have had no definite
+information."
+
+"We go, friend Bickley, deep into the bowels of the world, far deeper, I
+think, than any mortal men have gone hitherto, that is, of your race."
+
+"Then we shall perish of heat," said Bickley, "for with every thousand
+feet the temperature rises many degrees."
+
+"Not so. You will pass through a zone of heat, but so swiftly that if
+you hold your breath you will not suffer overmuch. Then you will come to
+a place where a great draught blows which will keep you cool, and thence
+travel on to the end."
+
+"Yes, but to what end, Lady Yva?"
+
+"That you will see for yourselves, and with it other wondrous things."
+
+Here some new idea seemed to strike her, and after a little hesitation
+she added:
+
+"Yet why should you go? Oro has commanded it, it is true, but I think
+that at the last he will forget. It must be decided swiftly. There is
+yet time. I can place you in safety in the sepulchre of Sleep where you
+found us. Thence cross to the main island and sail away quickly in your
+boat out into the great sea, where I believe you will find succour. Know
+that after disobeying him, you must meet Oro no more lest it should be
+the worse for you. If that be your will, let us start. What say you?"
+
+She looked at me.
+
+"I say, Yva, that I am willing to go if you come with us. Not
+otherwise."
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "that I want to see all this supernatural rubbish
+thoroughly exploded, and that therefore I should prefer to go on with
+the business."
+
+"And I say," said Bastin, "that my most earnest desire is to be clear
+of the whole thing, which wearies and perplexes me more than I can tell.
+Only I am not going to run away, unless you think it desirable to do
+so too, Lady Yva. I want you to understand that I am not in the least
+afraid of the Lord Oro, and do not for one moment believe that he will
+be allowed to bring about disaster to the world, as I understand is
+his wicked object. Therefore on the whole I am indifferent and quite
+prepared to accept any decision at which the rest of you may arrive."
+
+"Be it understood," said Yva with a little smile when Bastin had
+finished his sermonette, "that I must join my father in the bowels of
+the earth for a reason which will be made plain afterwards. Therefore,
+if you go we part, as I think to meet no more. Still my advice is that
+you should go." [*]
+
+     [ * It is fortunate that we did not accept Yva's offer. Had
+     we done so we should have found ourselves shut in, and
+     perished, as shall be told.--H. A. ]
+
+
+To this our only answer was to attend to the lighting of our lamps and
+the disposal of our small impedimenta, such as our tins of oil and water
+bottles. Yva noted this and laughed outright.
+
+"Courage did not die with the Sons of Wisdom," she said.
+
+Then we set out, Yva walking ahead of us and Tommy frisking at her side.
+
+Our road led us through the temple. As we passed the great gates I
+started, for there, in the centre of that glorious building, I perceived
+a change. The statue of Fate was no more! It lay broken upon the
+pavement among those fragments of its two worshippers which I had seen
+shaken down some hours before.
+
+"What does this mean?" I whispered to Yva. "I have felt no other
+earthquake."
+
+"I do not know," she answered, "or if I know I may not say. Yet learn
+that no god can live on without a single worshipper, and, in a fashion,
+that idol was alive, though this you will not believe."
+
+"How very remarkable," said Bastin, contemplating the ruin. "If I were
+superstitious, which I am not, I should say that this occurrence was an
+omen indicating the final fall of a false god. At any rate it is dead
+now, and I wonder what caused it?"
+
+"I felt an earth tremor last night," said Bickley, "though it is odd
+that it should only have affected this particular statue. A thousand
+pities, for it was a wonderful work of art."
+
+Then I remembered and reminded Bickley of the crash which we had heard
+while Yva and Bastin were absent on some secret business in the chamber.
+
+Walking the length of the great church, if so it could be called, we
+came to an apse at the head of it where, had it been Christian, the
+altar would have stood. In this apse was a little open door through
+which we passed. Beyond it lay a space of rough rock that looked as
+though it had been partially prepared for the erection of buildings and
+then abandoned. All this space was lighted, however, like the rest of
+the City of Nyo, and in the same mysterious way. Led by Yva, we threaded
+our path between the rough stones, following a steep downward slope.
+Thus we walked for perhaps half a mile, till at length we came to the
+mouth of a huge pit that must, I imagine, have lain quite a thousand
+feet below the level of the temple.
+
+I looked over the edge of this pit and shrank back terrified. It seemed
+to be bottomless. Moreover, a great wind rushed up it with a roaring
+sound like to that of an angry sea. Or rather there were two winds,
+perhaps draughts would be a better term, if I may apply it to an air
+movement of so fierce and terrible a nature. One of these rushed up
+the pit, and one rushed down. Or it may have been that the up rush
+alternated with the down rush. Really it is impossible to say.
+
+"What is this place?" I asked, clinging to the others and shrinking back
+in alarm from its sheer edge and bottomless depth, for that this was
+enormous we could see by the shaft of light which flowed downwards
+farther than the eye could follow.
+
+"It is a vent up and down which air passes from and to the central
+hollows of the earth," Yva answered. "Doubtless in the beginning through
+it travelled that mighty force which blew out these caves in the heated
+rocks, as the craftsman blows out glass."
+
+"I understand," said Bastin. "Just like one blows out a bubble on a
+pipe, only on a larger scale. Well, it is very interesting, but I have
+seen enough of it. Also I am afraid of being blown away."
+
+"I fear that you must see more," answered Yva with a smile, "since we
+are about to descend this pit."
+
+"Do you mean that we are to go down that hole, and if so, how? I don't
+see any lift, or moving staircase, or anything of that sort."
+
+"Easily and safely enough, Bastin. See."
+
+As she spoke a great flat rock of the size of a small room appeared,
+borne upwards, as I suppose, by the terrific draught which roared past
+us on its upward course. When it reached the lip of the shaft, it hung
+a little while, then moved across and began to descend with such
+incredible swiftness that in a few seconds it had vanished from view.
+
+"Oh!" said Bastin, with his eyes almost starting out of his head,
+"that's the lift, is it? Well, I tell you at once I don't like the look
+of the thing. It gives me the creeps. Suppose it tilted."
+
+"It does not tilt," answered Yva, still smiling. "I tell you, Bastin,
+that there is naught to fear. Only yesterday, I rode this rock and
+returned unharmed."
+
+"That is all very well, Lady Yva, but you may know how to balance it;
+also when to get on and off."
+
+"If you are afraid, Bastin, remain here until your companions return.
+They, I think, will make the journey."
+
+Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the truth, if less
+frank we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
+
+"No, I'll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as any other,
+and if anything were to happen to them and I were left alone, it would
+be worse still."
+
+"Then be prepared," said Yva, "for presently this air-chariot of ours
+will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge, step on to it and
+throw yourselves upon your faces and all will be well. At the foot of
+the shaft the motion lessens till it almost stops, and it is easy to
+spring, or even crawl to the firm earth."
+
+Then she stooped down and lifted Tommy who was sniffing suspiciously
+at the edge of the pit, his long ears blown straight above his head,
+holding him beneath her left arm and under her cloak, that he might not
+see and be frightened.
+
+We waited a while in silence, perhaps for five or six minutes, among
+the most disagreeable, I think, that I ever passed. Then far down in the
+brightness below appeared a black speck that seemed to grow in size as
+it rushed upwards.
+
+"It comes," said Yva. "Prepare and do as I do. Do not spring, or run,
+lest you should go too far. Step gently on to the rock and to its
+centre, and there lie down. Trust in me, all of you."
+
+"There's nothing else to do," groaned Bastin.
+
+The great stone appeared and, as before, hung at the edge of the pit.
+Yva stepped on to it quietly, as she did so, catching hold of my wrist
+with her disengaged hand. I followed her feeling very sick, and promptly
+sat down. Then came Bickley with the air of the virtuous hero of
+a romance walking a pirate's plank, and also sat down. Only Bastin
+hesitated until the stone began to move away. Then with an ejaculation
+of "Here goes!" he jumped over the intervening crack of space and landed
+in the middle of us like a sack of coal. Had I not been seated really I
+think he would have knocked me off the rock. As it was, with one hand
+he gripped me by the beard and with the other grasped Yva's robe, of
+neither of which would he leave go for quite a long time, although we
+forced him on to his face. The lantern which he held flew from his grasp
+and descended the shaft on its own account.
+
+"You silly fool!" exclaimed Bickley whose perturbation showed itself in
+anger. "There goes one of our lamps."
+
+"Hang the lamp!" muttered the prostrate Bastin. "We shan't want it in
+Heaven, or the other place either."
+
+Now the stone which had quivered a little beneath the impact of Bastin,
+steadied itself again and with a slow and majestic movement sailed
+to the other side of the gulf. There it felt the force of gravity, or
+perhaps the weight of the returning air pressed on it, which I do not
+know. At any rate it began to fall, slowly at first, then more swiftly,
+and afterwards at an incredible pace, so that in a few seconds the mouth
+of the pit above us grew small and presently vanished quite away.
+I looked up at Yva who was standing composedly in the midst of our
+prostrate shapes. She bent down and called in my ear:
+
+"All is well. The heat begins, but it will not endure for long."
+
+I nodded and glanced over the edge of the stone at Bastin's lantern
+which was sailing alongside of us, till presently we passed it. Bastin
+had lit it before we started, I think in a moment of aberration, and it
+burned for quite a long while, showing like a star when the shaft
+grew darker as it did by degrees, a circumstance that testifies to the
+excellence of the make, which is one advertised not to go out in any
+wind. Not that we felt wind, or even draught, perhaps because we were
+travelling with it.
+
+Then we entered the heat zone. About this there was no doubt, for the
+perspiration burst out all over me and the burning air scorched my
+lungs. Also Tommy thrust his head from beneath the cloak with his tongue
+hanging out and his mouth wide open.
+
+"Hold your breaths!" cried Yva, and we obeyed until we nearly burst. At
+least I did, but what happened to the others I do not know.
+
+Fortunately it was soon over and the air began to grow cool again. By
+now we had travelled an enormous distance, it seemed to be miles on
+miles, and I noticed that our terrific speed was slackening, also that
+the shaft grew more narrow, till at length there were only a few feet
+between the edge of the stone and its walls. The result of this, or so
+I supposed, was that the compressed air acted as a buffer, lessening our
+momentum, till at length the huge stone moved but very slowly.
+
+"Be ready to follow me," cried Yva again, and we rose to our feet, that
+is, Bickley and I did, but poor Bastin was semi-comatose. The stone
+stopped and Yva sprang from it to a rock platform level with which it
+lay. We followed, dragging Bastin between us. As we did so something hit
+me gently on the head. It was Bastin's lamp, which I seized.
+
+"We are safe. Sit down and rest," said Yva, leading us a few paces away.
+
+We obeyed and presently by the dim light saw the stone begin to stir
+again, this time upwards. In another twenty seconds it was away on its
+never-ending journey.
+
+"Does it always go on like that?" said Bastin, sitting up and staring
+after it.
+
+"Tens of thousands of years ago it was journeying thus, and tens of
+thousands of years hence it will still be journeying, or so I think,"
+she replied. "Why not, since the strength of the draught never changes
+and there is nothing to wear it except the air?"
+
+Somehow the vision of this huge stone, first loosed and set in motion by
+heaven knows what agency, travelling from aeon to aeon up and down
+that shaft in obedience to some law I did not understand, impressed my
+imagination like a nightmare. Indeed I often dream of it to this day.
+
+I looked about me. We were in some cavernous place that could be but
+dimly seen, for here the light that flowed down the shaft from the
+upper caves where it was mysteriously created, scarcely shone, and often
+indeed was entirely cut off, when the ever-journeying stone was in the
+narrowest parts of the passage. I could see, however, that this cavern
+stretched away both to right and left of us, while I felt that from
+the left, as we sat facing the shaft, there drew down a strong blast of
+fresh air which suggested that somewhere, however far away, it must open
+on to the upper world. For the rest its bottom and walls seemed to be
+smooth as though they had been planed in the past ages by the action of
+cosmic forces. Bickley noticed this the first and pointed it out to me.
+We had little time to observe, however, for presently Yva said:
+
+"If you are rested, friends, I pray you light those lamps of yours,
+since we must walk a while in darkness."
+
+We did and started, still travelling downhill. Yva walked ahead with me
+and Tommy who seemed somewhat depressed and clung close to our heels.
+The other two followed, arguing strenuously about I know not what. It
+was their way of working off irritation and alarms.
+
+I asked Yva what was about to happen, for a great fear oppressed me.
+
+"I am not sure, Beloved," she answered in a sweet and gentle voice, "who
+do not know all Oro's secrets, but as I think, great things. We are now
+deep in the bowels of the world, and presently, perhaps, you will see
+some of its mighty forces whereof your ignorant races have no knowledge,
+doing their everlasting work."
+
+"Then how is it that we can breathe here?" I asked. "Because this road
+that we are following connects with the upper air or used to do so,
+since once I followed it. It is a long road and the climb is steep,
+but at last it leads to the light of the blessed sun, nor are there any
+pitfalls in the path. Would that we might tread it together, Humphrey,"
+she added with passion, "and be rid of mysteries and the gloom, or that
+light which is worse than gloom."
+
+"Why not?" I asked eagerly. "Why should we not turn and flee?"
+
+"Who can flee from my father, the Lord Oro?" she replied. "He would
+snare us before we had gone a mile. Moreover, if we fled, by tomorrow
+half the world must perish."
+
+"And how can we save it by not flying, Yva?"
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey, yet I think it will be saved, perchance by
+sacrifice. That is the keystone of your faith, is it not? Therefore if
+it is asked of you to save the world, you will not shrink from it, will
+you, Humphrey?"
+
+"I hope not," I replied, without enthusiasm, I admit. Indeed it struck
+me that a business of this sort was better fitted to Bastin than
+to myself, or at any rate to his profession. I think she guessed my
+thoughts, for by the light of the lamp I saw her smile in her dazzling
+way. Then after a swift glance behind her, she turned and suddenly
+kissed me, as she did so calling down everlasting blessings on my
+head and on my spirit. There was something very wonderful about this
+benediction of Yva's and it thrilled me through and through, so that to
+it I could make no answer.
+
+Next moment it was too late to retreat, for our narrowing passage turned
+and we found ourselves in a wondrous place. I call it wondrous because
+of it we could see neither the beginning nor the end, nor the roof, nor
+aught else save the rock on which we walked, and the side or wall that
+our hands touched. Nor was this because of darkness, since although it
+was not illuminated like the upper caverns, light of a sort was present.
+It was a very strange light, consisting of brilliant and intermittent
+flashes, or globes of blue and lambent flame which seemed to leap from
+nowhere into nowhere, or sometimes to hang poised in mid air.
+
+"How odd they are," said the voice of Bastin behind me. "They remind
+me of those blue sparks which jump up from the wires of the tramways in
+London on a dark night. You know, don't you, Bickley? I mean when the
+conductor pulls round that long stick with an iron wheel on the top of
+it."
+
+"Nobody but you could have thought of such a comparison, Bastin,"
+answered Bickley. "Still, multiplied a thousandfold they are not
+unlike."
+
+Nor indeed were they, except that each blue flash was as big as the full
+moon and in one place or another they were so continuous that one could
+have read a letter by their light. Also the effect of them was ghastly
+and most unnatural, terrifying, too, since even their brilliance could
+not reveal the extent of that gigantic hollow in the bowels of the
+world wherein they leapt to and fro like lightnings, or hung like huge,
+uncanny lanterns.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXV. Sacrifice
+
+
+"The air in this place must be charged with some form of electricity,
+but the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm us," said Bickley
+in a matter-of-fact fashion as though he were determined not to be
+astonished.
+
+"To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights, though how
+these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know," I answered.
+
+As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above. It
+resembled a shooting star or a meteor more than anything else that I
+had ever seen, and made me wonder whether we were not perhaps standing
+beneath some inky, unseen sky.
+
+Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light, which
+made him terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in front of us
+clad in a long cloak.
+
+"Dear me!" said Bastin, "he looks just like the devil, doesn't he, and
+now I come to think of it, this isn't at all a bad imitation of hell."
+
+"How do you know it is an imitation?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it were, the
+Lady Yva and I should not be here."
+
+Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the argument
+went no further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent the knee in
+greeting to him.
+
+"So you have come, all of you," he said. "I thought that perhaps there
+were one or two who would not find courage to ride the flying stone. I
+am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he who had shown himself a
+coward should have had no share in the rule of that new world which is
+to be. Therefore I chose yonder road that it might test you."
+
+"Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to return by, I
+shall be much obliged to you, Oro," said Bastin.
+
+"How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible, Preacher?
+How do you know indeed that this is not your last journey from which
+there is no return?"
+
+"Of course I can't be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the question
+is one which you might more appropriately put to yourself. According
+to your own showing you are now extremely old and therefore your end is
+likely to come at any moment. Of course, however, if it did you would
+have one more journey to make, but it wouldn't be polite for me to say
+in what direction."
+
+Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden rage.
+Remembering the scene in the temple where he had grovelled before his
+god, uttering agonised, unanswered prayers for added days, I understood
+the reason of his wrath. It was so great that I feared lest he should
+kill Bastin (who only a few hours before, be it remembered, had tried to
+kill him) then and there, as doubtless he could have done if he wished.
+Fortunately, if he felt it; the impulse passed.
+
+"Miserable fool!" he said. "I warn you to keep a watch upon your words.
+Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy. Today you stab me with
+your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I silence it for ever."
+
+"I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that you can't hurt
+me at all any more than I could hurt you last night because, you see, it
+wasn't permitted. When the time comes for me to die, I shall go, but you
+will have nothing to do with that. To tell the truth, I am very sorry
+for you, as with all your greatness, your soul is of the earth, earthy,
+also sensual and devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I am afraid, very
+malignant, and you will have a great deal to answer for shortly. Yours
+won't be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you glory in your sins
+and don't know what repentance means."
+
+I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the most
+unbounded admiration for Bastin's fearless courage which enabled him
+thus to beard this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed were we all, for I
+read it in Yva's face and heard Bickley mutter:
+
+"Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!"
+
+Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his heart, for
+he stared at the man and made no answer. In the language of the ring, he
+was quite "knocked out" and, almost humbly, changed the subject.
+
+"We have yet a little while," he said, "before that happens which I have
+decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of the marvels of this
+bubble blown in the bowels of the world," and he motioned to us to pick
+up the lanterns.
+
+Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it was, for a
+distance of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here suddenly we came to
+a great groove in the rocky floor, as broad as a very wide roadway, and
+mayhap four feet in depth. The bottom of this groove was polished and
+glittered; indeed it gave us the impression of being iron, or other ore
+which had been welded together beneath the grinding of some immeasurable
+weight. Just at the spot where we struck the groove, it divided into
+two, for this reason.
+
+In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been, rose, the
+fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more sharply, and this at
+a spot where the groove had a somewhat steep downward dip which appeared
+to extend onwards I know not how far.
+
+Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a mile, I
+should think, we observed that it became ever more pronounced, till at
+length it ended in a razor-edge cliff which stretched up higher than
+we could see, even by the light of the electrical discharges. Standing
+against the edge of this cliff, we perceived that at a distance from it
+there were now two grooves of about equal width. One of these ran away
+into the darkness on our right as we faced the sharp edge, and at an
+ever-widening angle, while the other, at a similar angle, ran into the
+darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
+
+No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves now lay
+within hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter of a mile, for
+be it remembered we had followed the rising rock between them. To put it
+quite clearly, it was exactly as though one line of rails had separated
+into two lines of rails, as often enough they do, and an observer
+standing on high ground between could see them both vanishing into
+tunnels to the right and left, but far apart.
+
+The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where first we
+saw it at the point of separation, was not polished like the left-hand
+groove, although at some time or other it seemed to have been subjected
+to the pressure of the same terrific weight which cut its fellow out of
+the bed of rock or iron, as the sharp wheels of a heavily laden wagon
+sink ruts into a roadway.
+
+"What does it all mean, Lord Oro?" I asked when he had led us back to
+the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves, that is, a mile
+or so away from the razor-edged cliff.
+
+"This, Humphrey," he answered. "That which travels along yonder road,
+when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the left-hand path
+which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could a giant at that moment
+of its touching this exact spot on which I lay my hand, thrust it with
+sufficient strength, it would leave the left-hand road and take the
+right-hand road."
+
+"And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?"
+
+"Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough upon its
+way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and great things would
+happen in the world above, as once they happened in bygone days. Now do
+you understand, Humphrey?"
+
+"Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now," I answered. "But fortunately
+there is no such giant."
+
+Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up with a
+fiendish exultation, as he cried:
+
+"Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned the balance
+of the world from the right-hand road which now is dull with disuse, to
+the left-hand road which glitters so brightly to your eyes, and the face
+of the earth was changed. Now again I will turn it from the left-hand
+road to the right-hand road in which for millions of years it was wont
+to run, and once more the face of the earth shall change, and those who
+are left living upon the earth, or who in the course of ages shall come
+to live upon the new earth, must bow down to Oro and take him and his
+seed to be their gods and kings."
+
+When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also I
+remembered a certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us in the
+Temple of Nyo. But supported by his disbelief, Bickley asked:
+
+"And how often does the balance of which you speak come this way, Lord
+Oro?"
+
+"Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley," he replied.
+
+"Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble us,"
+remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
+
+"Do you think so, you learned Bickley?" asked Oro. "If so, I do not.
+Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone awry, that
+Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us. Hearken now! What
+is that sound we hear?"
+
+As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs of
+a dreadful music. I cannot describe it in words because that is
+impossible, but it was something like to the buzz of a thousand
+humming-tops such as are loved by children because of their weird song.
+
+"Back to the wall!" cried Oro triumphantly. "The time is short!"
+
+So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us with long,
+determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side and, as I thought,
+now and again glanced at my face with a look that was half anxious and
+half pitiful. Also twice she stooped and patted Tommy.
+
+We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had started
+to examine the grooved roads. At least I think this was so, since now
+for the first time I observed a kind of little window in its rocky
+face. It stood about five feet from its floor level, and was perhaps ten
+inches square, not more. In short, except for its shape it resembled a
+ship's porthole rather than a window. Its substance appeared to be talc,
+or some such material, and inches thick, yet through it, after Oro
+had cast aside some sort of covering, came a glare like that of a
+search-light. In fact it was a search-light so far as concerned one of
+its purposes.
+
+By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four objects which
+looked like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown metal or material.
+Very deftly, very quietly, Yva lifted these cloaks and wrapped one of
+them about each of us, and while she was thus employed I noticed that
+they were of a substance very similar to that of the gown she wore,
+which I have described, but harder. Next she gave one of the metal-like
+shields to each of us, bidding us hold them in front of our bodies and
+heads, and only to look through certain slits in them in which were
+eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the searchlight
+window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row with our backs
+against the rock wall, at certain spots which she indicated with great
+precision, and whatever we saw or heard on no account to move.
+
+So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin. Then Yva
+took the fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one than ours, and
+placed herself between me and the search-light or porthole. On the other
+side of this was Oro who had no shield.
+
+These arrangements took some minutes and during that time occupied all
+our attention. When they were completed, however, our curiosity and fear
+began to reassert themselves. I looked about me and perceived that Oro
+had his right hand upon what seemed to be a rough stone rod, in shape
+not unlike that with which railway points are moved. He shouted to us
+to stand still and keep the shields over our faces. Then very gently he
+pressed upon the lever. The porthole sank the fraction of an inch, and
+instantly there leapt from it a most terrific blaze of lightning, which
+shot across the blackness in front and, as lightning does, revealed
+far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that against which we
+leant.
+
+"All works well," exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting his hand
+from the rod, "and the strength which I have stored will be more than
+enough."
+
+Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "as you know, I have been sceptical, but I don't
+like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?"
+
+"Sink half the world beneath the seas," said Oro, "and raise up that
+which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as you do not
+believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you ask such questions?"
+
+"I believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
+yesterday," said Bastin. "For your soul's sake I beg you to desist from
+an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but which will certainly
+involve your eternal damnation, since the failure will be no fault of
+yours."
+
+Then I spoke also, saying:
+
+"I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not know exactly
+how much or how little you can do, but I understand that your object is
+to slay men by millions in order to raise up another world of which you
+will be the absolute king, as you were of some past empire that has been
+destroyed, either through your agency or otherwise. No good can come of
+such ambitions. Like Bastin, for your soul's sake I pray you to let them
+be."
+
+"What Humphrey says I repeat," said Yva. "My Father, although you know
+it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you sow you will
+harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not dream. Moreover, your
+plans will fail. Now I who am, like yourself, of the Children of Wisdom,
+have spoken, for the first and last time, and my words are true. I pray
+you give them weight, my Father."
+
+Oro heard, and grew furious.
+
+"What!" he said. "Are you against me, every one, and my own daughter
+also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a new world; I
+would destroy your vile civilisations which I have studied with my eyes,
+that I may build better! To you, Humphrey, I would give my only child
+in marriage that from you may spring a divine race of kings! And yet you
+are against me and set up your puny scruples as a barrier across my path
+of wisdom. Well, I tread them down, I go on my appointed way. But beware
+how you try to hold me back. If any one of you should attempt to come
+between me and my ends, know that I will destroy you all. Obey or die."
+
+"Well, he has had his chance and he won't take it," said Bastin in the
+silence that followed. "The man must go to the devil his own way and
+there is nothing more to be said."
+
+I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant humming grew
+to a roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound which presently
+drowned all attempts at ordinary speech.
+
+Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away there
+appeared something terrible. I can only describe its appearance as that
+of an attenuated mountain on fire. When it drew nearer I perceived that
+it was more like a ballet-dancer whirling round and round upon her toes,
+or rather all the ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and then
+multiplied a million times in size. No, it was like a mushroom with two
+stalks, one above and one below, or a huge top with a point on which it
+spun, a swelling belly and another point above. But what a top! It
+must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an inch, and its
+circumference who could measure?
+
+On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate inconceivable, so
+that it looked like a gigantic wheel of fire. Yet it was not fire that
+clothed it but rather some phosphorescence, since from it came no heat.
+Yes, a phosphorescence arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red,
+with streaks of other colours running up between, and a kind of waving
+fringe of purple.
+
+The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of avalanches
+or of icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to the sea. Its
+terrific aspect was appalling, and its weight caused the solid rock
+to quiver like a leaf. Watching it, we felt as ants might feel at the
+advent of the crack of doom, for its mere height and girth and size
+overwhelmed us. We could not even speak. The last words I heard were
+from the mouth of Oro who screamed out:
+
+"Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men, and
+behold me change its path--turning it as the steersman turns a ship!"
+
+Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them approached
+the porthole or search-light to which she did something that I could not
+distinguish. The effect was to make the beam of light much stronger
+and sharper, also to shift it on to the point or foot of the spinning
+mountain and, by an aiming of the lens from time to time, to keep it
+there.
+
+This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not travel fast
+notwithstanding the frightful speed of its revolutions. I should doubt
+indeed if it advanced more quickly than a man could walk; at any rate
+so it seemed to us. But we had no means of judging its real rate of
+progress whereof we knew as little as we did of the course it followed
+in the bowels of the earth. Perhaps that was spiral, from the world's
+deep heart upwards, and this was the highest point it reached. Or
+perhaps it remained stationary, but still spinning, for scores or
+hundreds of years in some central powerhouse of its own, whence, in
+obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these terrific
+journeys.
+
+No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the
+information to himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate there it
+was, travelling towards us on its giant butt, the peg of the top as it
+were, which, hidden in a cloud of friction-born sparks that enveloped it
+like the cup of a curving flower of fire, whirled round and round at
+an infinite speed. It was on this flaming flower that the search-light
+played steadily, doubtless that Oro might mark and measure its monstrous
+progress.
+
+"He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand path," I
+shouted into Bickley's ear.
+
+"Can't be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens of
+millions of tons one inch," Bickley roared back, trying to look
+confident.
+
+Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a sudden she
+cast down her shield and, throwing herself upon her knees, stretched out
+her hands in supplication to her father. I understood, as did we all,
+that she was imploring him to abandon his hellish purpose. He glared at
+her and shook his head. Then, as she still went on praying, he struck
+her across the face with his hand and pushed her to her feet again. My
+blood boiled as I saw it and I think I should have sprung at him, had
+not Bickley caught hold of me, shouting, "Don't, or he will kill her and
+us too."
+
+Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the blue
+discharges which now flashed almost continuously, and the phosphorescent
+glare of the advancing mountain, I saw that though her beautiful face
+worked beneath the pain of the blow, her eyes remained serene and
+purposeful. Even then I wondered--what was the purpose shining through
+them. Also I wondered if I was about to be called upon to make that
+sacrifice of which she had spoken, and if so, how. Of one thing I was
+determined--that if the call came it should not find me deaf. Yet all
+the while I was horribly afraid.
+
+At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens--again,
+being alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The beam of light
+shifted and wandered till, far away, it fell exactly upon that spot
+where the rock began to rise into the ridge which separated the two
+grooves or roads and ended in the razor-edged cliff. Moreover I observed
+that Oro, who left it the last of us, had either placed something white
+to mark this first infinitesimal bulging of the floor of the groove, or
+had smeared it with chalk or shining pigment. I observed also what I
+had not been able to see before, that a thin white line ran across the
+floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of this painted rise of
+rock, and that the glare of the search-light now lay exactly over that
+line.
+
+The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature's workshop, for
+such without doubt it was, was drawing near, emitting as it came
+a tumult of sounds which, with the echoes that they caused, almost
+over-whelmed our senses. Poor little Tommy, already cowed, although he
+was a bold-natured beast, broke down entirely, and I could see from his
+open mouth that he was howling with terror. He stared about him, then
+ran to Yva and pawed at her, evidently asking to be taken into her arms.
+She thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me to lift him
+up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting sadly that
+if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I even thought of
+passing him on to Bickley, but had no time. Indeed I could not attract
+his attention, for Bickley was staring with all his eyes at the
+nightmare-like spectacle which was in progress about us. Indeed no
+nightmare, no wild imagination of which the mind of man is capable,
+could rival the aspect of its stupendous facts.
+
+Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by those
+globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and now shot
+upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or end, like a
+stream of meteors that had gone mad. Then the travelling mountain, two
+thousand feet in height, or more, with its enormous saucer-like rim
+painted round with bands of lurid red and blue, and about its grinding
+foot the tulip bloom of emitted flame. Then the fierce-faced Oro at his
+post, his hand upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to drown half of this
+great world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a saint in hell
+and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a saint might
+bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And lastly we three
+men flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
+
+Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which it was
+given to our human eyes to witness.
+
+And all the while, bending, bowing towards us--away from us--making
+obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to the path behind
+as though in farewell; instinct with a horrible life, with a hideous and
+gigantic grace, that titanic Terror whirled onwards to the mark of fate.
+
+At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive and did
+not know its awful mission. Visions flashed across my mind. I thought
+of the peoples of the world sleeping in their beds, or going about their
+business, or engaged even in the work of war. I thought of the ships
+upon the seas steaming steadily towards their far-off ports. Then I
+thought of what presently might happen to them, of the tremors followed
+by convulsions, of the sudden crashing down of cities, such as we had
+seen in the picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the inflow of the
+waters of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and desolation
+as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following death. So
+I thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect of the
+Universe to stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin of His
+handiwork.
+
+Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod, his hair
+and long beard seemed to bristle with furious and delighted excitement.
+The purple-fringed rim of the Monster had long overshadowed the whited
+patch of rock; its grinding foot was scarce ten yards away. Oro made
+more signs to Yva who, beneath the shelter of her shield, again bent
+down and did something that I could not see. Then, as though her part
+were played, she rose, drew the grey hood of her cloak all about her
+face so that her eyes alone remained visible, took one step towards me
+and in the broken English we had taught her, called into my ear.
+
+"Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not me!"
+
+She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and next
+instant with a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending himself double,
+thrust upon the rod, as I could see from his open mouth, shouting while
+he thrust.
+
+At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately in
+front of the lens or window, so that the metallic shield with which she
+covered herself pressed against its substance.
+
+Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
+
+Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out a rush of
+living flame. It struck on Yva's shield and expanded to right and left.
+The insulated shield and garments that she wore seemed to resist it.
+For a fraction of time she stood there like a glowing angel, wrapped in
+fire.
+
+Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little distance
+dissolved like a ghost and vanished from our sight.
+
+Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
+
+
+And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had received the
+full blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet whilst destroying, it
+turned away from her, seeking the free paths of the air. So it came
+about that its obstructed strength struck the foot of the travelling
+gyroscope, diffused and did not suffice to thrust it that one necessary
+inch on which depended the fate of half the world, or missing it
+altogether, passed away on either side. Even so the huge, gleaming
+mountain rocked and trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it bowed itself
+towards us as though in majestic homage to greatness passed away. For a
+second, too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
+and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of fire
+went out, while I was thrown to the ground.
+
+When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more sailing
+majestically upon its way and down the accustomed left-hand path!
+
+
+Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook--but Yva had saved
+the world!
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVI. Tommy
+
+
+I lay still a while, on my back as I had fallen, and beneath the
+shield-like defence which Yva had given to me. Notwithstanding the
+fire-resisting, metalised stuff of which it was made, I noted that
+it was twisted and almost burnt through. Doubtless the stored-up
+electricity or earth magnetism, or whatever it may have been that had
+leapt out of that hole, being diffused by the resistance with which it
+was met, had grazed me with its outer edge, and had it not been for the
+shield and cloak, I also should have been burned up. I wished, oh! how
+I wished that it had been so. Then, by now all must have finished and
+I should have known the truth as to what awaits us beyond the change:
+sleep, or dreams, or perchance the fullest life. Also I should not have
+learned alone.
+
+Lying there thus, idly, as though in a half-sleep, I felt Tommy licking
+my face, and throwing my arm about the poor little frightened beast, I
+watched the great world-balance as it retreated on its eternal journey.
+At one time its vast projecting rim had overshadowed us and almost
+seemed to touch the cliff of rock against which we leant. I remember
+that the effect of that shining arch a thousand feet or so above our
+heads was wonderful. It reminded me of a canopy of blackest thunder
+clouds supported upon a framework of wheeling rainbows, while beneath
+it all the children of the devil shouted together in joy. I noted this
+effect only a few seconds before Yva spoke to me and leapt into the path
+of the flash.
+
+Now, however, it was far away, a mere flaming wheel that became
+gradually smaller, and its Satanic voices were growing faint. As I have
+said, I watched its disappearance idly, reflecting that I should never
+look upon its like again; also that it was something well worth going
+forth to see. Then I became aware that the humming, howling din had
+decreased sufficiently to enable me to hear human voices without effort.
+Bastin was addressing Bickley--like myself they were both upon the
+ground.
+
+"Her translation, as you may have noticed, Bickley, if you were not too
+frightened, was really very remarkable. No doubt it will have reminded
+you, as it did me, of that of Elijah. She had exactly the appearance of
+a person going up to Heaven in a vehicle of fire. The destination was
+certainly the same, and even the cloak she wore added a familiar touch
+and increased the similarity."
+
+"At any rate it did not fall upon you," answered Bickley with something
+like a sob, in a voice of mingled awe and exasperation. "For goodness'
+sake! Bastin, stop your Biblical parallels and let us adore, yes, let us
+adore the divinest creature that the earth has borne!"
+
+Never have I loved Bickley more than when I heard him utter those words.
+
+"'Divinest' is a large term, Bickley, and one to which I hesitate to
+subscribe, remembering as I do certain of the prophets and the Early
+Fathers with all their faults, not of course to mention the Apostles.
+But--" here he paused, for suddenly all three of us became aware of Oro.
+
+He also has been thrown to the ground by the strength of the prisoned
+forces which he gathered and loosed upon their unholy errand, but, as
+I rejoiced to observe, had suffered from them much more than ourselves.
+Doubtless this was owing to the fact that he had sprung forward in
+a last wild effort to save his daughter, or to prevent her from
+interfering with his experiment, I know not which. As a result his right
+cheek was much scorched, his right arm was withered and helpless, and
+his magnificent beard was half burnt off him. Further, very evidently he
+was suffering from severe shock, for he rocked upon his feet and shook
+like an aspen leaf. All this, however, did not interfere with the
+liveliness of his grief and rage.
+
+There he stood, a towering shape, like a lightning-smitten statue, and
+cursed us, especially Bastin.
+
+"My daughter has gone!" he cried, "burned up by the fiery power that is
+my servant. Nothing remains of her but dust, and, Priest, this is your
+doing. You poisoned her heart with your childish doctrines of mercy and
+sacrifice, and the rest, so that she threw herself into the path of the
+flash to save some miserable races that she had never even known."
+
+He paused exhausted, whereon Bastin answered him with spirit:
+
+"Yes, Oro, she being a holy woman, has gone where you will never follow
+her. Also it is your own fault since you should have listened to her
+entreaties instead of boxing her ears like the brute you are."
+
+"My daughter is gone," went on Oro, recovering his strength, "and my
+great designs are ruined. Yet only for a while," he added, "for the
+world-balance will return again, if not till long after your life-spans
+are done."
+
+"If you don't doctor yourself, Lord Oro," said Bickley, also rising,
+"I may tell you as one who understands such things, that most likely it
+will be after your life-span is done also. Although their effect may be
+delayed, severe shocks from burns and over-excitement are apt to prove
+fatal to the aged."
+
+Oro snarled at him; no other word describes it.
+
+"And there are other things, Physician," he said, "which are apt to
+prove fatal to the young. At least now you will no longer deny my
+power."
+
+"I am not so sure," answered Bickley, "since it seems that there is a
+greater Power, namely that of a woman's love and sacrifice."
+
+"And a greater still," interrupted Bastin, "Which put those ideas into
+her head."
+
+"As for you, Humphrey," went on Oro, "I rejoice to think that you at
+least have lost two things that man desires above all other things--the
+woman you sought and the future kingship of the world."
+
+I stood up and faced him.
+
+"The first I have gained, although how, you do not understand, Oro,"
+I answered. "And of the second, seeing that it would have come through
+you, on your conditions, I am indeed glad to be rid. I wish no power
+that springs from murder, and no gifts from one who answered his
+daughter's prayer with blows."
+
+For a moment he seemed remorseful.
+
+"She vexed me with her foolishness," he said. Then his rage blazed up
+again:
+
+"And it was you who taught it to her," he went on. "You are guilty, all
+three of you, and therefore I am left with none to serve me in my age;
+therefore also my mighty schemes are overthrown."
+
+"Also, Oro, if you speak truth, therefore half the world is saved," I
+added quietly, "and one has left it of whom it was unworthy."
+
+"You think that these civilisations of yours, as you are pleased to call
+them, are saved, do you?" he sneered. "Yet, even if Bickley were right
+and I should die and become powerless, I tell you that they are already
+damned. I have studied them in your books and seen them with my eyes,
+and I say that they are rotten before ever they are ripe, and that their
+end shall be the end of the Sons of Wisdom, to die for lack of increase.
+That is why I would have saved the East, because in it alone there is
+increase, and thence alone can rise the great last race of man which I
+would have given to your children for an heritage. Moreover, think not
+that you Westerners have done with wars. I tell you that they are but
+begun and that the sword shall eat you up, and what the sword spares
+class shall snatch from class in the struggle for supremacy and ease."
+
+Thus he spoke with extraordinary and concentrated bitterness that I
+confess would have frightened me, had I been capable of fear, which at
+the moment I was not. Who is afraid when he has lost all?
+
+Nor was Bastin alarmed, if for other reasons.
+
+"I think it right to tell you, Oro," he said, "that the only future you
+need trouble about is your own. God Almighty will look after the western
+civilisations in whatever way He may think best, as you may remember He
+did just now. Only I am sure you won't be here to see how it is done."
+
+Again fury blazed in Oro's eyes.
+
+"At least I will look after you, you half-bred dogs, who yap out
+ill-omened prophecies of death into my face. Since the three of you
+loved my daughter whom you brought to her doom, and were by her beloved,
+if differently, I think it best that you should follow on her road.
+How? That is the question? Shall I leave you to starve in these great
+caves?--Nay, look not towards the road of escape which doubtless she
+pointed out to you, for, as Humphrey knows, I can travel swiftly and I
+will make sure that you find it blocked. Or shall I--" and he glanced
+upwards at the great globes of wandering fire, as though he purposed to
+summon them to be our death, as doubtless he could have done.
+
+"I do not care what you do," I answered wearily. "Only I would beg you
+to strike quickly. Yet for my friends I am sorry, since it was I who led
+them on this quest, and for you, too, Tommy," I added, looking at the
+poor little hound. "You were foolish, Tommy," I went on, "when you
+scented out that old tyrant in his coffin, at least for our own sake."
+
+Indeed the dog was terribly scared. He whined continually and from time
+to time ran a little way and then returned to us, suggesting that we
+should go from this horror-haunted spot. Lastly, as though he understood
+that it was Oro who kept us there, he went to him and jumping up, licked
+his hand in a beseeching fashion.
+
+The super-man looked at the dog and as he looked the rage went out of
+his face and was replaced by something resembling pity.
+
+"I do not wish the beast to die," he muttered to himself in low
+reflective tones, as though he thought aloud, "for of them all it alone
+liked and did not fear me. I might take it with me but still it would
+perish of grief in the loneliness of the caves. Moreover, she loved it
+whom I shall see no more; yes, Yva--" as he spoke the name his voice
+broke a little. "Yet if I suffer them to escape they will tell my story
+to the world and make me a laughingstock. Well, if they do, what does it
+matter? None of those Western fools would believe it; thinking that they
+knew all; like Bickley they would mock and say that they were mad, or
+liars."
+
+Again Tommy licked his hand, but more confidently, as though instinct
+told him something of what was passing in Oro's mind. I watched with
+an idle wonder, marvelling whether it were possible that this merciless
+being would after all spare us for the sake of the dog.
+
+So, strange to say, it came about, for suddenly Oro looked up and said:
+
+"Get you gone, and quickly, before my mood changes. The hound has saved
+you. For its sake I give you your lives, who otherwise should certainly
+have died. She who has gone pointed out to you, I doubt not, a road that
+runs to the upper air. I think that it is still open. Indeed," he added,
+closing his eyes for a moment, "I see that it is still open, if long
+and difficult. Follow it, and should you win through, take your boat and
+sail away as swiftly as you can. Whether you die or live I care nothing,
+but my hands will be clean of your blood, although yours are stained
+with Yva's. Begone! and my curse go with you."
+
+Without waiting for further words we went to fetch our lanterns,
+water-bottles and bag of food which we had laid down at a little
+distance. As we approached them I looked up and saw Oro standing some
+way off. The light from one of the blue globes of fire which passed
+close above his head, shone upon him and made him ghastly. Moreover, it
+seemed to me as though approaching death had written its name upon his
+malevolent countenance.
+
+I turned my head away, for about his aspect in those sinister
+surroundings there was something horrible, something menacing and
+repellent to man and of him I wished to see no more. Nor indeed did I,
+for when I glanced in that direction again Oro was gone. I suppose that
+he had retreated into the shadows where no light played.
+
+
+We gathered up our gear, and while the others were relighting the
+lanterns, I walked a few paces forward to the spot where Yva had been
+dissolved in the devouring fire. Something caught my eye upon the rocky
+floor. I picked it up. It was the ring, or rather the remains of the
+ring that I had given her on that night when we declared our love amidst
+the ruins by the crater lake. She had never worn it on her hand but for
+her own reasons, as she told me, suspended it upon her breast beneath
+her robe. It was an ancient ring that I had bought in Egypt, fashioned
+of gold in which was set a very hard basalt or other black stone. On
+this was engraved the ank or looped cross, which was the Egyptian symbol
+of Life, and round it a snake, the symbol of Eternity. The gold was for
+the most part melted, but the stone, being so hard and protected by the
+shield and asbestos cloak, for such I suppose it was, had resisted the
+fury of the flash. Only now it was white instead of black, like a burnt
+onyx that had known the funeral pyre. Indeed, perhaps it was an onyx. I
+kissed it and hid it away, for it seemed to me to convey a greeting and
+with it a promise.
+
+Then we started, a very sad and dejected trio. Leaving with a shudder
+that vast place where the blue lights played eternally, we came to the
+shaft up and down which the travelling stone pursued its endless path,
+and saw it arrive and depart again.
+
+"I wonder he did not send us that way," said Bickley, pointing to it.
+
+"I am sure I am very glad it never occurred to him," answered Bastin,
+"for I am certain that we could not have made the journey again without
+our guide, Yva."
+
+I looked at him and he ceased. Somehow I could not bear, as yet, to hear
+her beloved name spoken by other lips.
+
+Then we entered the passage that she pointed out to us, and began a most
+terrible journey which, so far as we could judge, for we lost any exact
+count of time, took us about sixty hours. The road, it is true, was
+smooth and unblocked, but the ascent was fearfully steep and slippery;
+so much so that often we were obliged to pull each other up it and lie
+down to rest.
+
+Had it not been for those large, felt-covered bottles of Life-water,
+I am sure we should never have won through. But this marvelous elixir,
+drunk a little at a time, always re-invigorated us and gave us strength
+to push on. Also we had some food, and fortunately our spare oil held
+out, for the darkness in that tunnel was complete. Tommy became so
+exhausted that at length we must carry him by turns. He would have died
+had it not been for the water; indeed I thought that he was going to
+die.
+
+After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to begin to
+recover, and generally there was something in his manner which suggested
+to us that he knew himself to be not far from the surface of the earth
+towards which we had crawled upwards for thousands upon thousands of
+feet, fortunately without meeting with any zone of heat which was not
+bearable.
+
+We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little further,
+suddenly Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished. Then we heard him barking
+but where we could not see, since the tunnel appeared to take a turn
+and continue, but this time on a downward course, while the sound of the
+barks came from our right. We searched with the lanterns which were
+now beginning to die and found a little hole almost filled with fallen
+pieces of rock. We scooped these away with our hands, making an aperture
+large enough to creep through. A few more yards and we saw light, the
+blessed light of the moon, and in it stood Tommy barking hoarsely. Next
+we heard the sound of the sea. We struggled on desperately and presently
+pushed our way through bushes and vegetation on to a steep declivity.
+Down this we rolled and scrambled, to find ourselves at last lying upon
+a sandy beach, whilst above us the full moon shone in the heavens.
+
+Here, with a prayer of thankfulness, we flung ourselves down and slept.
+
+If it had not been for Tommy and we had gone further along the tunnel,
+which I have little doubt stretched on beneath the sea, where, I wonder,
+should we have slept that night?
+
+When we woke the sun was shining high in the heavens. Evidently there
+had been rain towards the dawn, though as we were lying beneath the
+shelter of some broad-leaved tree, from it we had suffered little
+inconvenience. Oh! how beautiful, after our sojourn in those unholy
+caves, were the sun and the sea and the sweet air and the raindrops
+hanging on the leaves.
+
+We did not wake of ourselves; indeed if we had been left alone I am
+sure that we should have slept the clock round, for we were terribly
+exhausted. What woke us was the chatter of a crowd of Orofenans who were
+gathered at a distance from the tree and engaged in staring at us in a
+frightened way, also the barks of Tommy who objected to their intrusion.
+Among the people I recognised our old friend the chief Marama by his
+feather cloak, and sitting up, beckoned to him to approach. After a good
+deal of hesitation he came, walking delicately like Agag, and stopping
+from time to time to study us, as though he were not sure that we were
+real.
+
+"What frightens you, Marama?" I asked him.
+
+"You frighten us, O Friend-from-the-Sea. Whence did you and the Healer
+and the Bellower come and why do your faces look like those of ghosts
+and why is the little black beast so large-eyed and so thin? Over
+the lake we know you did not come, for we have watched day and night;
+moreover there is no canoe upon the shore. Also it would not have been
+possible."
+
+"Why not?" I asked idly.
+
+"Come and see," he answered.
+
+Rising stiffly we emerged from beneath the tree and perceived that we
+were at the foot of the cliff against which the remains of the yacht had
+been borne by the great tempest. Indeed there it was within a couple of
+hundred yards of us.
+
+Following Marama we climbed the sloping path which ran up the cliff
+and ascended a knoll whence we could see the lake and the cone of the
+volcano in its centre. At least we used to be able to see this cone, but
+now, at any rate with the naked eye, we could make out nothing, except a
+small brown spot in the midst of the waters of the lake.
+
+"The mountain which rose up many feet in that storm which brought you to
+Orofena, Friend-from-the-Sea, has now sunk till only the very top of it
+is to be seen," said Marama solemnly. "Even the Rock of Offerings has
+vanished beneath the water, and with it the house that we built for
+you."
+
+"Yes," I said, affecting no surprise. "But when did that happen?"
+
+"Five nights ago the world shook, Friend-from-the-Sea, and when the sun
+rose we saw that the mouth of the cave which appeared on the day of your
+coming, had vanished, and that the holy mountain itself had sunk deep,
+so that now only the crest of it is left above the water."
+
+"Such things happen," I replied carelessly.
+
+"Yes, Friend-from-the-Sea. Like many other marvels they happen where you
+and your companions are. Therefore we beg you who can arise out of the
+earth like spirits, to leave us at once before our island and all of us
+who dwell thereon are drowned beneath the ocean. Leave us before we kill
+you, if indeed you be men, or die at your hands if, as we think, you be
+evil spirits who can throw up mountains and drag them down, and create
+gods that slay, and move about in the bowels of the world."
+
+"That is our intention, for our business here is done," I answered
+calmly. "Come now and help us to depart. But first bring us food. Bring
+it in plenty, for we must victual our boat."
+
+Marama bowed and issued the necessary orders. Indeed food sufficient for
+our immediate needs was already there as an offering, and of it we ate
+with thankfulness.
+
+Then we boarded the ship and examined the lifeboat. Thanks to our
+precautions it was still in very fair order and only needed some little
+caulking which we did with grass fibre and pitch from the stores. After
+this with the help of the Orofenans who worked hard in their desperate
+desire to be rid of us, we drew the boat into the sea, and provisioned
+her with stores from the ship, and with an ample supply of water.
+Everything being ready at last, we waited for the evening wind which
+always blew off shore, to start. As it was not due for half an hour or
+more, I walked back to the tree under which we had slept and tried to
+find the hole whence we had emerged from the tunnel on to the face of
+the cliff.
+
+My hurried search proved useless. The declivity of the cliff was covered
+with tropical growth, and the heavy rain had washed away every trace of
+our descent, and very likely filled the hole itself with earth. At any
+rate, of it I could discover nothing. Then as the breeze began to blow
+I returned to the boat and here bade adieu to Marama, who gave me his
+feather cloak as a farewell gift.
+
+"Good-bye, Friend-from-the-Sea," he said to me. "We are glad to have
+seen you and thank you for many things. But we do not wish to see you
+any more."
+
+"Good-bye, Marama," I answered. "What you say, we echo. At least you
+have now no great lump upon your neck and we have rid you of your
+wizards. But beware of the god Oro who dwells in the mountain, for if
+you anger him he will sink your island beneath the sea."
+
+"And remember all that I have taught you," shouted Bastin.
+
+Marama shivered, though whether at the mention of the god Oro, of whose
+powers the Orofenans had so painful a recollection, or at the result of
+Bastin's teachings, I do not know. And that was the last we shall ever
+see of each other in this world.
+
+The island faded behind us and, sore at heart because of all that we had
+found and lost again, for three days we sailed northward with a fair
+and steady wind. On the fourth evening by an extraordinary stroke of
+fortune, we fell in with an American tramp steamer, trading from the
+South Sea Islands to San Francisco. To the captain, who treated us very
+kindly, we said simply that we were a party of Englishmen whose yacht
+had been wrecked on a small island several hundreds of miles away, of
+which we knew neither the name, if it had one, nor the position.
+
+This story was accepted without question, for such things often happen
+in those latitudes, and in due course we were landed at San Francisco,
+where we made certain depositions before the British Consul as to the
+loss of the yacht Star of the South. Then we crossed America, having
+obtained funds by cable, and sailed for England in a steamer flying the
+flag of the United States.
+
+Of the great war which made this desirable I do not speak since it
+has nothing, or rather little, to do with this history. In the end
+we arrived safely at Liverpool, and thence travelled to our homes in
+Devonshire.
+
+
+Thus ended the history of our dealings with Oro, the super-man who began
+his life more than two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and with
+his daughter, Yva, whom Bastin still often calls the Glittering Lady.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVII. Bastin Discovers a Resemblance
+
+
+There is little more to tell.
+
+Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman,
+volunteered for service at the front and departed in the uniform of the
+R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin
+how much better it was in such a national emergency as existed, to
+belong to a profession in which a man could do something to help the
+bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the common cause, than
+to one like his in which it was only possible to pelt them with vain
+words.
+
+"You think that, do you, Bickley?" answered Bastin. "Well, I hold that
+it is better to heal souls than bodies, because, as even you will have
+learned out there in Orofena, they last so much longer."
+
+"I am not certain that I learned anything of the sort," said Bickley,
+"or even that Oro was more than an ordinary old man. He said that he
+had lived a thousand years, but what was there to prove this except his
+word, which is worth nothing?"
+
+"There was the Lady Yva's word also, which is worth a great deal,
+Bickley."
+
+"Yes, but she may have meant a thousand moons. Further, as according
+to her own showing she was still quite young, how could she know her
+father's age?"
+
+"Quite so, Bickley. But all she actually said was that she was of the
+same age as one of our women of twenty-seven, which may have meant two
+hundred and seventy for all I know. However, putting that aside you
+will admit that they had both slept for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years."
+
+"I admit that they slept, Bastin, because I helped to awaken them, but
+for how long there is nothing to show, except those star maps which are
+probably quite inaccurate."
+
+"They are not inaccurate," I broke in, "for I have had them checked by
+leading astronomers who say that they show a marvelous knowledge of the
+heavens as these were two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and are
+today."
+
+Here I should state that those two metal maps and the ring which I gave
+to Yva and found again after the catastrophe, were absolutely the only
+things connected with her or with Oro that we brought away with us.
+The former I would never part with, feeling their value as evidence.
+Therefore, when we descended to the city Nyo and the depths beneath,
+I took them with me wrapped in cloth in my pocket. Thus they were
+preserved. Everything else went when the Rock of Offerings and the cave
+mouth sank beneath the waters of the lake.
+
+This may have happened either in the earth tremor, which no doubt
+was caused by the advance of the terrific world-balance, or when the
+electric power, though diffused and turned by Yva's insulated body,
+struck the great gyroscope's travelling foot with sufficient strength,
+not to shift it indeed on to the right-hand path as Oro had designed,
+but still to cause it to stagger and even perhaps to halt for the
+fraction of a second. Even this pause may have been enough to cause
+convulsions of the earth above; indeed, I gathered from Marama and other
+Orofenans that such convulsions had occurred on and around the island
+at what must have corresponded with that moment of the loosing of the
+force.
+
+This loss of our belongings in the house of the Rock of Offerings was
+the more grievous because among them were some Kodak photographs which
+I had taken, including portraits of Oro and one of Yva that was really
+excellent, to say nothing of pictures of the mouth of the cave and of
+the ruins and crater lake above. How bitterly I regret that I did not
+keep these photographs in my pocket with the map-plates.
+
+"Even if the star-maps are correct, still it proves nothing," said
+Bickley, "since possibly Oro's astronomical skill might have enabled
+him to draw that of the sky at any period, though I allow this is
+impossible."
+
+"I doubt his taking so much trouble merely to deceive three wanderers
+who lacked the knowledge even to check them," I said. "But all this
+misses the point, Bickley. However long they had slept, that man and
+woman did arise from seeming death. They did dwell in those marvelous
+caves with their evidences of departed civilisations, and they did show
+us that fearful, world-wandering gyroscope. These things we saw."
+
+"I admit that we saw them, Arbuthnot, and I admit that they are one and
+all beyond human comprehension. To that extent I am converted, and, I
+may add, humbled," said Bickley.
+
+"So you ought to be," exclaimed Bastin, "seeing that you always swore
+that there was nothing in the world that is not capable of a perfectly
+natural explanation."
+
+"Of which all these things may be capable, Bastin, if only we held the
+key."
+
+"Very well, Bickley, but how do you explain what the Lady Yva did? I may
+tell you now what she commanded me to conceal at the time, namely, that
+she became a Christian; so much so that by her own will, I baptised and
+confirmed her on the very morning of her sacrifice. Doubtless it was
+this that changed her heart so much that she became willing, of course
+without my knowledge, to leave everything she cared for," here he looked
+hard at me, "and lay down her life to save the world, half of which she
+believed was about to be drowned by Oro. Now, considering her history
+and upbringing, I call this a spiritual marvel, much greater than any
+you now admit, and one you can't explain, Bickley."
+
+"No, I cannot explain, or, at any rate, I will not try," he answered,
+also staring hard at me. "Whatever she believed, or did not believe, and
+whatever would or would not have happened, she was a great and wonderful
+woman whose memory I worship."
+
+"Quite so, Bickley, and now perhaps you see my point, that what you
+describe as mere vain words may also be helpful to mankind; more so,
+indeed, than your surgical instruments and pills."
+
+"You couldn't convert Oro, anyway," exclaimed Bickley, with irritation.
+
+"No, Bickley; but then I have always understood that the devil is beyond
+conversion because he is beyond repentance. You see, I think that if
+that old scoundrel was not the devil himself, at any rate he was a
+bit of him, and, if I am right, I am not ashamed to have failed in his
+case."
+
+"Even Oro was not utterly bad, Bastin," I said, reflecting on certain
+traits of mercy that he had shown, or that I dreamed him to have shown
+in the course of our mysterious midnight journeys to various parts of
+the earth. Also I remembered that he had loved Tommy and for his sake
+had spared our lives. Lastly, I do not altogether wonder that he came to
+certain hasty conclusions as to the value of our modern civilisations.
+
+"I am very glad to hear it, Humphrey, since while there is a spark left
+the whole fire may burn up again, and I believe that to the Divine mercy
+there are no limits, though Oro will have a long road to travel before
+he finds it. And now I have something to say. It has troubled me very
+much that I was obliged to leave those Orofenans wandering in a kind of
+religious twilight."
+
+"You couldn't help that," said Bickley, "seeing that if you had stopped,
+by now you would have been wandering in religious light."
+
+"Still, I am not sure that I ought not to have stopped. I seem to have
+deserted a field that was open to me. However, it can't be helped, since
+it is certain that we could never find that island again, even if Oro
+has not sunk it beneath the sea, as he is quite capable of doing, to
+cover his tracks, so to speak. So I mean to do my best in another field
+by way of atonement."
+
+"You are not going to become a missionary?" I said.
+
+"No, but with the consent of the Bishop, who, I think, believes that my
+locum got on better in the parish than I do, as no doubt was the case,
+I, too, have volunteered for the Front, and been accepted as a chaplain
+of the 201st Division."
+
+"Why, that's mine!" said Bickley.
+
+"Is it? I am very glad, since now we shall be able to pursue our
+pleasant arguments and to do our best to open each other's minds."
+
+"You fellows are more fortunate than I am," I remarked. "I also
+volunteered, but they wouldn't take me, even as a Tommy, although I
+misstated my age. They told me, or at least a specialist whom I saw did
+afterwards, that the blow I got on the head from that sorcerer's boy--"
+
+"I know, I know!" broke in Bickley almost roughly. "Of course, things
+might go wrong at any time. But with care you may live to old age."
+
+"I am sorry to hear it," I said with a sigh, "at least I think I am.
+Meanwhile, fortunately there is much that I can do at home; indeed a
+course of action has been suggested to me by an old friend who is now in
+authority."
+
+
+Once more Bickley and Bastin in their war-stained uniforms were dining
+at my table and on the very night of their return from the Front, which
+was unexpected. Indeed Tommy nearly died of joy on hearing their voices
+in the hall. They, who played a worthy part in the great struggle,
+had much to tell me, and naturally their more recent experiences had
+overlaid to some extent those which we shared in the mysterious island
+of Orofena. Indeed we did not speak of these until, just as they were
+going away, Bastin paused beneath a very beautiful portrait of my late
+wife, the work of an artist famous for his power of bringing out the
+inner character, or what some might call the soul, of the sitter. He
+stared at it for a while in his short-sighted way, then said: "Do you
+know, Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more than
+at this moment, that although they were different in height and so on,
+there was a really curious physical resemblance between your late wife
+and the Lady Yva."
+
+"Yes," I answered. "I think so too."
+
+Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he did so I
+saw him start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
+
+Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life. It is, I
+admit, an odd story and one which suggests problems that I cannot solve.
+Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance which is the privilege
+and hall-mark of faith; Bickley disposes, or used to dispose, of them by
+a blank denial which carries no conviction, and least of all to himself.
+
+What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves learned?
+A round, short but still with time and to spare wherein to be dull and
+lonesome; a fateful treadmill to which we were condemned we know not
+how, but apparently through the casual passions of those who went before
+us and are now forgotten, causing us, as the Bible says, to be born in
+sin; up which we walk wearily we know not why, seeming never to make
+progress; off which we fall outworn we know not when or whither.
+
+Such upon the surface it appears to be, nor in fact does our ascertained
+knowledge, as Bickley would sum it up, take us much further. No prophet
+has yet arisen who attempted to define either the origin or the reasons
+of life. Even the very Greatest of them Himself is quite silent on this
+matter. We are tempted to wonder why. Is it because life as expressed in
+the higher of human beings, is, or will be too vast, too multiform and
+too glorious for any definition which we could understand? Is it
+because in the end it will involve for some, if not for all, majesty on
+unfathomed majesty, and glory upon unimaginable glory such as at present
+far outpass the limits of our thought?
+
+The experiences which I have recorded in these pages awake in my heart a
+hope that this may be so. Bastin is wont, like many others, to talk in
+a light fashion of Eternity without in the least comprehending what he
+means by that gigantic term. It is not too much to say that Eternity,
+something without beginning and without end, and involving, it
+would appear, an everlasting changelessness, is a state beyond
+human comprehension. As a matter of fact we mortals do not think in
+constellations, so to speak, or in aeons, but by the measures of our own
+small earth and of our few days thereon. We cannot really conceive of
+an existence stretching over even one thousand years, such as that
+which Oro claimed and the Bible accords to a certain early race of men,
+omitting of course his two thousand five hundred centuries of sleep. And
+yet what is this but one grain in the hourglass of time, one day in the
+lost record of our earth, of its sisters the planets and its father the
+sun, to say nothing of the universes beyond?
+
+It is because I have come in touch with a prolonged though perfectly
+finite existence of the sort, that I try to pass on the reflections
+which the fact of it awoke in me. There are other reflections connected
+with Yva and the marvel of her love and its various manifestations
+which arise also. But these I keep to myself. They concern the wonder of
+woman's heart, which is a microcosm of the hopes and fears and desires
+and despairs of this humanity of ours whereof from age to age she is the
+mother.
+
+HUMPHREY ARBUTHNOT.
+
+
+
+
+NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+Within about six months of the date on which he wrote the last words
+of this history of our joint adventures, my dear friend, Humphrey
+Arbuthnot, died suddenly, as I had foreseen that probably he would do,
+from the results of the injury he received in the island of Orofena.
+
+He left me the sole executor to his will, under which he divided his
+property into three parts. One third he bequeathed to me, one third
+(which is strictly tied up) to Bastin, and one third to be devoted,
+under my direction, to the advancement of Science.
+
+His end appears to have been instantaneous, resulting from an effusion
+of blood upon the brain. When I was summoned I found him lying dead by
+the writing desk in his library at Fulcombe Priory. He had been writing
+at the desk, for on it was a piece of paper on which appear these words:
+"I have seen her. I--" There the writing ends, not stating whom he
+thought he had seen in the moments of mental disturbance or delusion
+which preceded his decease.
+
+Save for certain verbal corrections, I publish this manuscript without
+comment as the will directs, only adding that it sets out our mutual
+experiences very faithfully, though Arbuthnot's deductions from them are
+not always my own.
+
+I would say also that I am contemplating another visit to the South Sea
+Islands, where I wish to make some further investigations. I dare
+say, however, that these will be barren of results, as the fountain of
+Life-water is buried for ever, nor, as I think, will any human being
+stand again in the Hades-like halls of Nyo. It is probable also that it
+would prove impossible to rediscover the island of Orofena, if indeed
+that volcanic land still remains above the waters of the deep.
+
+Now that he is a very wealthy man, Bastin talks of accompanying me for
+purposes quite different from my own, but on the whole I hope he will
+abandon this idea. I may add that when he learned of his unexpected
+inheritance he talked much of the "deceitfulness of riches," but that he
+has not as yet taken any steps to escape their golden snare. Indeed he
+now converses of his added "opportunities of usefulness," I gather in
+connection with missionary enterprise.
+
+
+J. R. BICKLEY.
+
+
+P.S.--I forgot to state that the spaniel Tommy died within three days of
+his owner. The poor little beast was present in the room at the time
+of Arbuthnot's passing away, and when found seemed to be suffering from
+shock. From that moment Tommy refused food and finally was discovered
+quite dead and lying by the body on Marama's feather cloak, which
+Arbuthnot often used as a dressing-gown. As Bastin raised some religious
+objections, I arranged without his knowledge that the dog's ashes should
+rest not far from those of the master and mistress whom it loved so
+well.
+
+J.R.B.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard
+
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diff --git a/old/old/1368.txt b/old/old/1368.txt
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: When the World Shook
+       Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+Author: H. Rider Haggard
+
+Posting Date: September 18, 2008 [EBook #1368]
+Release Date: June, 1998
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Anthony Matonak
+
+
+
+
+
+WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK
+
+Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+by H. Rider Haggard
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+Ditchingham, 1918.
+
+MY DEAR CURZON,
+
+More than thirty years ago you tried to protect me, then a stranger to
+you, from one of the falsest and most malignant accusations ever made
+against a writer.
+
+So complete was your exposure of the methods of those at work to blacken
+a person whom they knew to be innocent, that, as you will remember,
+they refused to publish your analysis which destroyed their charges and,
+incidentally, revealed their motives.
+
+Although for this reason vindication came otherwise, your kindness is
+one that I have never forgotten, since, whatever the immediate issue of
+any effort, in the end it is the intention that avails.
+
+Therefore in gratitude and memory I ask you to accept this romance, as
+I know that you do not disdain the study of romance in the intervals of
+your Imperial work.
+
+The application of its parable to our state and possibilities--beneath
+or beyond these glimpses of the moon--I leave to your discernment.
+
+
+Believe me,
+
+Ever sincerely yours,
+
+H. RIDER HAGGARD.
+
+
+
+
+          To
+          The Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G.
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+      1.  ARBUTHNOT DESCRIBES HIMSELF
+
+      2.  BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+      3.  NATALIE
+
+      4.  DEATH AND DEPARTURE
+
+      5.  THE CYCLONE
+
+      6.  LAND
+
+      7.  THE OROFENANS
+
+      8.  BASTIN ATTEMPTS THE MARTYR'S CROWN
+
+      9.  THE ISLAND IN THE LAKE
+
+     10.  THE DWELLERS IN THE TOMB
+
+     11.  RESURRECTION
+
+     12.  TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND YEARS!
+
+     13.  ORO SPEAKS AND BASTIN ARGUES
+
+     14.  THE UNDER-WORLD
+
+     15.  ORO IN HIS HOUSE
+
+     16.  VISIONS OF THE PAST
+
+     17.  YVA EXPLAINS
+
+     18.  THE ACCIDENT
+
+     19.  THE PROPOSALS OF BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+     20.  ORO AND ARBUTHNOT TRAVEL BY NIGHT
+
+     21.  LOVE'S ETERNAL ALTAR
+
+     22.  THE COMMAND
+
+     23.  IN THE TEMPLE OF FATE
+
+     24.  THE CHARIOT OF THE PIT
+
+     25.  SACRIFICE
+
+     26.  TOMMY
+
+     27.  BASTIN DISCOVERS A RESEMBLANCE
+
+     28.  NOTE BY J. R. BICKLEY, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK
+
+
+
+Chapter I. Arbuthnot Describes Himself
+
+
+I suppose that I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, should begin this history in
+which Destiny has caused me to play so prominent a part, with some short
+account of myself and of my circumstances.
+
+I was born forty years ago in this very Devonshire village in which I
+write, but not in the same house. Now I live in the Priory, an ancient
+place and a fine one in its way, with its panelled rooms, its beautiful
+gardens where, in this mild climate, in addition to our own, flourish
+so many plants which one would only expect to find in countries that
+lie nearer to the sun, and its green, undulating park studded with great
+timber trees. The view, too, is perfect; behind and around the rich
+Devonshire landscape with its hills and valleys and its scarped faces
+of red sandstone, and at a distance in front, the sea. There are little
+towns quite near too, that live for the most part on visitors, but these
+are so hidden away by the contours of the ground that from the Priory
+one cannot see them. Such is Fulcombe where I live, though for obvious
+reasons I do not give it its real name.
+
+Many years ago my father, the Rev. Humphrey Arbuthnot, whose only child
+I am, after whom also I am named Humphrey, was the vicar of this place
+with which our family is said to have some rather vague hereditary
+connection. If so, it was severed in the Carolian times because my
+ancestors fought on the side of Parliament.
+
+My father was a recluse, and a widower, for my mother, a Scotswoman,
+died at or shortly after my birth. Being very High Church for those
+days he was not popular with the family that owned the Priory before me.
+Indeed its head, a somewhat vulgar person of the name of Enfield who had
+made money in trade, almost persecuted him, as he was in a position to
+do, being the local magnate and the owner of the rectorial tithes.
+
+I mention this fact because owing to it as a boy I made up my mind that
+one day I would buy that place and sit in his seat, a wild enough idea
+at the time. Yet it became engrained in me, as do such aspirations of
+our youth, and when the opportunity arose in after years I carried
+it out. Poor old Enfield! He fell on evil fortunes, for in trying to
+bolster up a favourite son who was a gambler, a spendthrift, and an
+ungrateful scamp, in the end he was practically ruined and when the
+bad times came, was forced to sell the Fulcombe estate. I think of him
+kindly now, for after all he was good to me and gave me many a day's
+shooting and leave to fish for trout in the river.
+
+By the poor people, however, of all the district round, for the parish
+itself is very small, my father was much beloved, although he did
+practise confession, wear vestments and set lighted candles on the
+altar, and was even said to have openly expressed the wish, to which
+however he never attained, that he could see a censer swinging in the
+chancel. Indeed the church which, as monks built it, is very large and
+fine, was always full on Sundays, though many of the worshippers came
+from far away, some of them doubtless out of curiosity because of its
+papistical repute, also because, in a learned fashion, my father's
+preaching was very good indeed.
+
+For my part I feel that I owe much to these High-Church views. They
+opened certain doors to me and taught me something of the mysteries
+which lie at the back of all religions and therefore have their home
+in the inspired soul of man whence religions are born. Only the pity
+is that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred he never discovers, never
+even guesses at that entombed aspiration, never sinks a shaft down on to
+this secret but most precious vein of ore.
+
+I have said that my father was learned; but this is a mild description,
+for never did I know anyone quite so learned. He was one of those
+men who is so good all round that he became pre-eminent in nothing. A
+classic of the first water, a very respectable mathematician, an expert
+in theology, a student of sundry foreign languages and literature in
+his lighter moments, an inquirer into sociology, a theoretical musician
+though his playing of the organ excruciated most people because it was
+too correct, a really first-class authority upon flint instruments and
+the best grower of garden vegetables in the county, also of apples--such
+were some of his attainments. That was what made his sermons so popular,
+since at times one or the other of these subjects would break out into
+them, his theory being that God spoke to us through all of these things.
+
+But if I began to drift into an analysis of my father's abilities, I
+should never stop. It would take a book to describe them. And yet mark
+this, with them all his name is as dead to the world to-day as though he
+had never been. Light reflected from a hundred facets dissipates itself
+in space and is lost; that concentrated in one tremendous ray pierces to
+the stars.
+
+Now I am going to be frank about myself, for without frankness what
+is the value of such a record as this? Then it becomes simply another
+convention, or rather conventional method of expressing the octoroon
+kind of truths with which the highly civilised races feed themselves,
+as fastidious ladies eat cakes and bread from which all but the smallest
+particle of nourishment has been extracted.
+
+The fact is, therefore, that I inherited most of my father's abilities,
+except his love for flint instruments which always bored me to
+distraction, because although they are by association really the most
+human of things, somehow to me they never convey any idea of humanity.
+In addition I have a practical side which he lacked; had he possessed it
+surely he must have become an archbishop instead of dying the vicar of
+an unknown parish. Also I have a spiritual sense, mayhap mystical would
+be a better term, which with all this religion was missing from my
+father's nature.
+
+For I think that notwithstanding his charity and devotion he never quite
+got away from the shell of things, never cracked it and set his teeth in
+the kernel which alone can feed our souls. His keen intellect, to take
+an example, recognised every one of the difficulties of our faith and
+flashed hither and thither in the darkness, seeking explanation, seeking
+light, trying to reconcile, to explain. He was not great enough to
+put all this aside and go straight to the informing Soul beneath that
+strives to express itself everywhere, even through those husks which are
+called the World, the Flesh and the Devil, and as yet does not always
+quite succeed.
+
+It is this boggling over exteriors, this peering into pitfalls, this
+desire to prove that what such senses as we have tell us is impossible,
+is in fact possible, which causes the overthrow of many an earnest,
+seeking heart and renders its work, conducted on false lines, quite
+nugatory. These will trust to themselves and their own intelligence and
+not be content to spring from the cliffs of human experience into the
+everlasting arms of that Infinite which are stretched out to receive
+them and to give them rest and the keys of knowledge. When will man
+learn what was taught to him of old, that faith is the only plank
+wherewith he can float upon this sea and that his miserable works avail
+him nothing; also that it is a plank made of many sorts of wood, perhaps
+to suit our different weights?
+
+So to be honest, in a sense I believe myself to be my father's superior,
+and I know that he agreed with me. Perhaps this is owing to the blood
+of my Scotch mother which mixed well with his own; perhaps because the
+essential spirit given to me, though cast in his mould, was in fact
+quite different--or of another alloy. Do we, I wonder, really understand
+that there are millions and billions of these alloys, so many indeed
+that Nature, or whatever is behind Nature, never uses the same twice
+over? That is why no two human beings are or ever will be quite
+identical. Their flesh, the body of their humiliation, is identical in
+all, any chemist will prove it to you, but that which animates the
+flesh is distinct and different because it comes from the home of that
+infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate evolution of the
+good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and hell.
+
+Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another advantage
+over my father, which certainly came to me from my mother, who was, as
+I judge from all descriptions and such likenesses as remain of her, an
+extremely handsome woman. I was born much better looking. He was small
+and dark, a little man with deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also
+dark, but tall above the average, and well made. I do not know that I
+need say more about my personal appearance, to me not a very attractive
+subject, but the fact remains that they called me "handsome Humphrey"
+at the University, and I was the captain of my college boat and won many
+prizes at athletic sports when I had time to train for them.
+
+Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because he knew
+that he could do it better than anyone else, and partly to save school
+expenses. The experiment was very successful, as my love of all outdoor
+sports and of any small hazardous adventure that came to my hand, also
+of associating with fisherfolk whom the dangers of the deep make men
+among men, saved me from becoming a milksop. For the rest I learned more
+from my father, whom I always desired to please because I loved him,
+than I should have done at the best and most costly of schools. This was
+shown when at last I went to college with a scholarship, for there I did
+very well indeed, as search would still reveal.
+
+Here I had better set out some of my shortcomings, which in their sum
+have made a failure of me. Yes, a failure in the highest sense, though
+I trust what Stevenson calls "a faithful failure." These have their root
+in fastidiousness and that lack of perseverance, which really means a
+lack of faith, again using the word in its higher and wider sense. For
+if one had real faith one would always persevere, knowing that in every
+work undertaken with high aim, there is an element of nobility, however
+humble and unrecognised that work may seem to be. God after all is the
+God of Work, it is written large upon the face of the Universe. I will
+not expand upon the thought; it would lead me too far afield, but those
+who have understanding will know what I mean.
+
+As regards what I interpret as fastidiousness, this is not very easy
+to express. Perhaps a definition will help. I am like a man with an
+over-developed sense of smell, who when walking through a foreign city,
+however clean and well kept, can always catch the evil savours that
+are inseparable from such cities. More, his keen perception of them
+interferes with all other perceptions and spoils his walks. The result
+is that in after years, whenever he thinks of that beautiful city,
+he remembers, not its historic buildings or its wide boulevards, or
+whatever it has to boast, but rather its ancient, fish-like smell. At
+least he remembers that first owing to this defect in his temperament.
+
+So it is with everything. A lovely woman is spoiled for such a one
+because she eats too much or has too high a voice; he does not care for
+his shooting because the scenery is flat, or for his fishing because
+the gnats bite as well as the trout. In short he is out of tune with
+the world as it is. Moreover, this is a quality which, where it exists,
+cannot be overcome; it affects day-labourers as well as gentlemen at
+large. It is bred in the bone.
+
+Probably the second failure-breeding fault, lack of perseverance, has
+its roots in the first, at any rate in my case. At least on leaving
+college with some reputation, I was called to the Bar where, owing to
+certain solicitor and other connections, I had a good opening. Also,
+owing to the excellence of my memory and powers of work, I began very
+well, making money even during my first year. Then, as it happened, a
+certain case came my way and, my leader falling ill suddenly after it
+was opened, was left in my hands. The man whose cause I was pleading
+was, I think, one of the biggest scoundrels it is possible to conceive.
+It was a will case and if he won, the effect would be to beggar two most
+estimable middle-aged women who were justly entitled to the property,
+to which end personally I am convinced he had committed forgery; the
+perjury that accompanied it I do not even mention.
+
+Well, he did win, thanks to me, and the estimable middle-aged ladies
+were beggared, and as I heard afterwards, driven to such extremities
+that one of them died of her misery and the other became a lodging-house
+keeper. The details do not matter, but I may explain that these ladies
+were unattractive in appearance and manner and broke down beneath my
+cross-examination which made them appear to be telling falsehoods,
+whereas they were only completely confused. Further, I invented an
+ingenious theory of the facts which, although the judge regarded it with
+suspicion, convinced an unusually stupid jury who gave me their verdict.
+
+Everybody congratulated me and at the time I was triumphant, especially
+as my leader had declared that our case was impossible. Afterwards,
+however, my conscience smote me sorely, so much so that arguing from
+the false premise of this business, I came to the conclusion that the
+practice of the Law was not suited to an honest man. I did not take the
+large view that such matters average themselves up and that if I had
+done harm in this instance, I might live to do good in many others, and
+perhaps become a just judge, even a great judge. Here I may mention that
+in after years, when I grew rich, I rescued that surviving old lady from
+her lodging-house, although to this day she does not know the name of
+her anonymous friend. So by degrees, without saying anything, for I kept
+on my chambers, I slipped out of practice, to the great disappointment
+of everybody connected with me, and took to authorship.
+
+A marvel came to pass, my first book was an enormous success. The whole
+world talked of it. A leading journal, delighted to have discovered
+someone, wrote it up; other journals followed suit to be in the
+movement. One of them, I remember, which had already dismissed it with
+three or four sneering lines, came out with a second and two-column
+notice. It sold like wildfire and I suppose had some merits, for it is
+still read, though few know that I wrote it, since fortunately it was
+published under a pseudonym.
+
+Again I was much elated and set to work to write another and, as I
+believe, a much better book. But jealousies had been excited by this
+leaping into fame of a totally unknown person, which were, moreover,
+accentuated through a foolish article that I published in answer to some
+criticisms, wherein I spoke my mind with an insane freedom and biting
+sarcasm. Indeed I was even mad enough to quote names and to give the
+example of the very powerful journal which at first carped at my work
+and then gushed over it when it became the fashion. All of this made me
+many bitter enemies, as I found out when my next book appeared.
+
+It was torn to shreds, it was reviled as subversive of morality
+and religion, good arrows in those days. It was called puerile,
+half-educated stuff--I half-educated! More, an utterly false charge of
+plagiarism was cooked up against me and so well and venomously run that
+vast numbers of people concluded that I was a thief of the lowest order.
+Lastly, my father, from whom the secret could no longer be kept, sternly
+disapproved of both these books which I admit were written from a very
+radical and somewhat anti-church point of view. The result was our first
+quarrel and before it was made up, he died suddenly.
+
+
+Now again fastidiousness and my lack of perseverance did their work, and
+solemnly I swore that I would never write another book, an oath which I
+have kept till this moment, at least so far as publication is concerned,
+and now break only because I consider it my duty so to do and am not
+animated by any pecuniary object.
+
+Thus came to an end my second attempt at carving out a career. By now
+I had grown savage and cynical, rather revengeful also, I fear. Knowing
+myself to possess considerable abilities in sundry directions, I sat
+down, as it were, to think things over and digest my past experiences.
+Then it was that the truth of a very ancient adage struck upon my mind,
+namely, that money is power. Had I sufficient money I could laugh at
+unjust critics for example; indeed they or their papers would scarcely
+dare to criticise me for fear lest it should be in my power to do them
+a bad turn. Again I could follow my own ideas in life and perhaps work
+good in the world, and live in such surroundings as commended themselves
+to me. It was as clear as daylight, but--how to make the money?
+
+I had some capital as the result of my father's death, about L8,000 in
+all, plus a little more that my two books had brought in. In what way
+could I employ it to the best advantage? I remembered that a cousin of
+my father and therefore my own, was a successful stock-broker, also
+that there had been some affection between them. I went to him, he was
+a good, easy-natured man who was frankly glad to see me, and offered to
+put L5,000 into his business, for I was not minded to risk every thing I
+had, if he would give me a share in the profits. He laughed heartily at
+my audacity.
+
+"Why, my boy," he said, "being totally inexperienced at this game, you
+might lose us more than that in a month. But I like your courage, I like
+your courage, and the truth is that I do want help. I will think it over
+and write to you."
+
+He thought it over and in the end offered to try me for a year at a
+fixed salary with a promise of some kind of a partnership if I suited
+him. Meanwhile my L5,000 remained in my pocket.
+
+I accepted, not without reluctance since with the impatience of youth
+I wanted everything at once. I worked hard in that office and soon
+mastered the business, for my knowledge of figures--I had taken a
+first-class mathematical degree at college--came to my aid, as in a way
+did my acquaintance with Law and Literature. Moreover I had a certain
+aptitude for what is called high finance. Further, Fortune, as usual,
+showed me a favourable face.
+
+In one year I got the partnership with a small share in the large
+profits of the business. In two the partner above me retired, and I took
+his place with a third share of the firm. In three my cousin, satisfied
+that it was in able hands, began to cease his attendance at the office
+and betook himself to gardening which was his hobby. In four I paid him
+out altogether, although to do this I had to borrow money on our credit,
+for by agreement the title of the firm was continued. Then came that
+extraordinary time of boom which many will remember to their cost. I
+made a bold stroke and won. On a certain Saturday when the books were
+made up, I found that after discharging all liabilities, I should not
+be worth more than L20,000. On the following Saturday but two when the
+books were made up, I was worth L153,000! L'appetit vient en mangeant.
+It seemed nothing to me when so many were worth millions.
+
+For the next year I worked as few have done, and when I struck a balance
+at the end of it, I found that on the most conservative estimate I was
+the owner of a million and a half in hard cash, or its equivalent. I was
+so tired out that I remember this discovery did not excite me at all. I
+felt utterly weary of all wealth-hunting and of the City and its ways.
+Moreover my old fastidiousness and lack of perseverance re-asserted
+themselves. I reflected, rather late in the day perhaps, on the
+ruin that this speculation was bringing to thousands, of which some
+lamentable instances had recently come to my notice, and once more
+considered whether it were a suitable career for an upright man. I had
+wealth; why should I not take it and enjoy life?
+
+Also--and here my business acumen came in, I was sure that these times
+could not last. It is easy to make money on a rising market, but when
+it is falling the matter is very different. In five minutes I made up
+my mind. I sent for my junior partners, for I had taken in two, and told
+them that I intended to retire at once. They were dismayed both at my
+loss, for really I was the firm, and because, as they pointed out, if
+I withdrew all my capital, there would not be sufficient left to enable
+them to carry on.
+
+One of them, a blunt and honest man, said to my face that it would be
+dishonourable of me to do so. I was inclined to answer him sharply, then
+remembered that his words were true.
+
+"Very well," I said, "I will leave you L600,000 on which you shall pay
+me five per cent interest, but no share of the profits."
+
+On these terms we dissolved the partnership and in a year they had
+lost the L600,000, for the slump came with a vengeance. It saved them,
+however, and to-day they are earning a reasonable income. But I have
+never asked them for that L600,000.
+
+
+
+Chapter II. Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+Behold me once more a man without an occupation, but now the possessor
+of about L900,000. It was a very considerable fortune, if not a large
+one in England; nothing like the millions of which I had dreamed, but
+still enough. To make the most of it and to be sure that it remained, I
+invested it very well, mostly in large mortgages at four per cent which,
+if the security is good, do not depreciate in capital value. Never again
+did I touch a single speculative stock, who desired to think no more
+about money. It was at this time that I bought the Fulcombe property.
+It cost me about L120,000 of my capital, or with alterations, repairs,
+etc., say L150,000, on which sum it may pay a net two and a half per
+cent, not more.
+
+This L3,700 odd I have always devoted to the upkeep of the place, which
+is therefore in first-rate order. The rest I live on, or save.
+
+These arrangements, with the beautifying and furnishing of the house
+and the restoration of the church in memory of my father, occupied and
+amused me for a year or so, but when they were finished time began to
+hang heavy on my hands. What was the use of possessing about L20,000 a
+year when there was nothing upon which it could be spent? For after
+all my own wants were few and simple and the acquisition of valuable
+pictures and costly furniture is limited by space. Oh! in my small way
+I was like the weary King Ecclesiast. For I too made me great works
+and had possessions of great and small cattle (I tried farming and
+lost money over it!) and gathered me silver and gold and the peculiar
+treasure of kings, which I presume means whatever a man in authority
+chiefly desires, and so forth. But "behold all was vanity and vexation
+of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun."
+
+So, notwithstanding my wealth and health and the deference which is
+the rich man's portion, especially when the limit of his riches is not
+known, it came about that I too "hated life," and this when I was not
+much over thirty. I did not know what to do; for Society as the word
+is generally understood, I had no taste; it bored me; horse-racing and
+cards I loathed, who had already gambled too much on a big scale. The
+killing of creatures under the name of sport palled upon me, indeed I
+began to doubt if it were right, while the office of a junior county
+magistrate in a place where there was no crime, only occupied me an hour
+or two a month.
+
+Lastly my neighbours were few and with all due deference to them,
+extremely dull. At least I could not understand them because in them
+there did not seem to be anything to understand, and I am quite certain
+that they did not understand me. More, when they came to learn that I
+was radical in my views and had written certain "dreadful" and
+somewhat socialistic books in the form of fiction, they both feared and
+mistrusted me as an enemy to their particular section of the race. As
+I had not married and showed no inclination to do so, their womenkind
+also, out of their intimate knowledge, proclaimed that I led an immoral
+life, though a little reflection would have shown them that there was
+no one in the neighbourhood which for a time I seldom left, who could
+possibly have tempted an educated creature to such courses.
+
+Terrible is the lot of a man who, while still young and possessing the
+intellect necessary to achievement, is deprived of all ambition. And
+I had none at all. I did not even wish to purchase a peerage or a
+baronetcy in this fashion or in that, and, as in my father's case, my
+tastes were so many and so catholic that I could not lose myself in any
+one of them. They never became more than diversions to me. A hobby is
+only really amusing when it becomes an obsession.
+
+At length my lonesome friendlessness oppressed me so much that I took
+steps to mitigate it. In my college life I had two particular friends
+whom I think I must have selected because they were so absolutely
+different from myself.
+
+They were named Bastin and Bickley. Bastin--Basil was his Christian
+name--was an uncouth, shock-headed, flat-footed person of large, rugged
+frame and equally rugged honesty, with a mind almost incredibly simple.
+Nothing surprised him because he lacked the faculty of surprise. He was
+like that kind of fish which lies at the bottom of the sea and takes
+every kind of food into its great maw without distinguishing its
+flavour. Metaphorically speaking, heavenly manna and decayed cabbage
+were just the same to Bastin. He was not fastidious and both were mental
+pabulum--of a sort--together with whatever lay between these extremes.
+Yet he was good, so painfully good that one felt that without exertion
+to himself he had booked a first-class ticket straight to Heaven; indeed
+that his guardian angel had tied it round his neck at birth lest he
+should lose it, already numbered and dated like an identification disc.
+
+I am bound to add that Bastin never went wrong because he never felt the
+slightest temptation to do so. This I suppose constitutes real virtue,
+since, in view of certain Bible sayings, the person who is tempted and
+would like to yield to the temptation, is equally a sinner with the
+person who does yield. To be truly good one should be too good to be
+tempted, or too weak to make the effort worth the tempter's while--in
+short not deserving of his powder and shot.
+
+I need hardly add that Bastin went into the Church; indeed, he could not
+have gone anywhere else; it absorbed him naturally, as doubtless Heaven
+will do in due course. Only I think it likely that until they get to
+know him he will bore the angels so much that they will continually move
+him up higher. Also if they have any susceptibilities left, probably
+he will tread upon their toes--an art in which I never knew his equal.
+However, I always loved Bastin, perhaps because no one else did, a fact
+of which he remained totally unconscious, or perhaps because of his
+brutal way of telling one what he conceived to be the truth, which, as
+he had less imagination than a dormouse, generally it was not. For if
+the truth is a jewel, it is one coloured and veiled by many different
+lights and atmospheres.
+
+It only remains to add that he was learned in his theological fashion
+and that among his further peculiarities were the slow, monotonous
+voice in which he uttered his views in long sentences, and his total
+indifference to adverse argument however sound and convincing.
+
+My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different character.
+Like Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced another way.
+If Bastin's omnivorous throat could swallow a camel, especially
+a theological camel, Bickley's would strain at the smallest gnat,
+especially a theological gnat. The very best and most upright of men,
+yet he believed in nothing that he could not taste, see or handle. He
+was convinced, for instance, that man is a brute-descended accident and
+no more, that what we call the soul or the mind is produced by a certain
+action of the grey matter of the brain; that everything apparently
+inexplicable has a perfectly mundane explanation, if only one could find
+it; that miracles certainly never did happen, and never will; that all
+religions are the fruit of human hopes and fears and the most convincing
+proof of human weakness; that notwithstanding our infinite variations we
+are the subjects of Nature's single law and the victims of blind, black
+and brutal chance.
+
+Such was Bickley with his clever, well-cut face that always reminded
+me of a cameo, and thoughtful brow; his strong, capable hands and his
+rather steely mouth, the mere set of which suggested controversy of
+an uncompromising kind. Naturally as the Church had claimed Bastin, so
+medicine claimed Bickley.
+
+Now as it happened the man who succeeded my father as vicar of Fulcombe
+was given a better living and went away shortly after I had purchased
+the place and with it the advowson. Just at this time also I received
+a letter written in the large, sprawling hand of Bastin from whom I
+had not heard for years. It went straight to the point, saying that he,
+Bastin, had seen in a Church paper that the last incumbent had resigned
+the living of Fulcombe which was in my gift. He would therefore be
+obliged if I would give it to him as the place he was at in Yorkshire
+did not suit his wife's health.
+
+Here I may state that afterwards I learned that what did not suit Mrs.
+Bastin was the organist, who was pretty. She was by nature a woman
+with a temperament so insanely jealous that actually she managed to be
+suspicious of Bastin, whom she had captured in an unguarded moment when
+he was thinking of something else and who would as soon have thought of
+even looking at any woman as he would of worshipping Baal. As a matter
+of fact it took him months to know one female from another. Except as
+possible providers of subscriptions and props of Mothers' Meetings,
+women had no interest for him.
+
+To return--with that engaging honesty which I have mentioned--Bastin's
+letter went on to set out all his own disabilities, which, he added,
+would probably render him unsuitable for the place he desired to fill.
+He was a High Churchman, a fact which would certainly offend many; he
+had no claims to being a preacher although he was extraordinarily well
+acquainted with the writings of the Early Fathers. (What on earth had
+that to do with the question, I wondered.) On the other hand he had
+generally been considered a good visitor and was fond of walking (he
+meant to call on distant parishioners, but did not say so).
+
+Then followed a page and a half on the evils of the existing system
+of the presentation to livings by private persons, ending with the
+suggestion that I had probably committed a sin in buying this particular
+advowson in order to increase my local authority, that is, if I had
+bought it, a point on which he was ignorant. Finally he informed me that
+as he had to christen a sick baby five miles away on a certain moor
+and it was too wet for him to ride his bicycle, he must stop. And he
+stopped.
+
+There was, however, a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows:
+
+"Someone told me that you were dead a few years ago, and of course it
+may be another man of the same name who owns Fulcombe. If so, no doubt
+the Post Office will send back this letter."
+
+That was his only allusion to my humble self in all those diffuse pages.
+It was a long while since I had received an epistle which made me laugh
+so much, and of course I gave him the living by return of post, and
+even informed him that I would increase its stipend to a sum which I
+considered suitable to the position.
+
+About ten days later I received another letter from Bastin which, as
+a scrawl on the flap of the envelope informed me, he had carried for
+a week in his pocket and forgotten to post. Except by inference it
+returned no thanks for my intended benefits. What it did say, however,
+was that he thought it wrong of me to have settled a matter of such
+spiritual importance in so great a hurry, though he had observed that
+rich men were nearly always selfish where their time was concerned.
+Moreover, he considered that I ought first to have made inquiries as to
+his present character and attainments, etc., etc.
+
+To this epistle I replied by telegraph to the effect that I should as
+soon think of making inquiries about the character of an archangel,
+or that of one of his High Church saints. This telegram, he told me
+afterwards, he considered unseemly and even ribald, especially as it had
+given great offence to the postmaster, who was one of the sidesmen in
+his church.
+
+Thus it came about that I appointed the Rev. Basil Bastin to the
+living of Fulcombe, feeling sure that he would provide me with endless
+amusement and act as a moral tonic and discipline. Also I appreciated
+the man's blunt candour. In due course he arrived, and I confess that
+after a few Sundays of experience I began to have doubts as to the
+wisdom of my choice, glad as I was to see him personally. His sermons at
+once bored me, and, when they did not send me to sleep, excited in me
+a desire for debate. How could he be so profoundly acquainted with
+mysteries before which the world had stood amazed for ages? Was there
+nothing too hot or too heavy in the spiritual way for him to dismiss in
+a few blundering and casual words, as he might any ordinary incident of
+every-day life, I wondered? Also his idea of High Church observances was
+not mine, or, I imagine, that of anybody else. But I will not attempt to
+set it out.
+
+His peculiarities, however, were easy to excuse and entirely swallowed
+up by the innate goodness of his nature which soon made him beloved of
+everyone in the place, for although he thought that probably most things
+were sins, I never knew him to discover a sin which he considered to be
+beyond the reach of forgiveness. Bastin was indeed a most charitable man
+and in his way wide-minded.
+
+The person whom I could not tolerate, however, was his wife, who, to
+my fancy, more resembled a vessel, a very unattractive vessel, full of
+vinegar than a woman. Her name was Sarah and she was small, plain, flat,
+sandy-haired and odious, quite obsessed, moreover, with her jealousies
+of the Rev. Basil, at whom it pleased her to suppose that every woman in
+the countryside under fifty was throwing herself.
+
+Here I will confess that to the best of my ability I took care that they
+did in outward seeming, that is, whenever she was present, instructing
+them to sit aside with him in darkened corners, to present him with
+flowers, and so forth. Several of them easily fell into the humour of
+the thing, and I have seen him depart from a dinner-party followed by
+that glowering Sarah, with a handful of rosebuds and violets, to say
+nothing of the traditional offerings of slippers, embroidered markers
+and the like. Well, it was my only way of coming even with her, which I
+think she knew, for she hated me poisonously.
+
+So much for Basil Bastin. Now for Bickley. Him I had met on several
+occasions since our college days, and after I was settled at the Priory
+from time to time I asked him to stay with me. At length he came, and
+I found out that he was not at all comfortable in his London practice
+which was of a nature uncongenial to him; further, that he did not get
+on with his partners. Then, after reflection, I made a suggestion
+to him. I pointed out that, owing to its popularity amongst seaside
+visitors, the neighbourhood of Fulcombe was a rising one, and that
+although there were doctors in it, there was no really first-class
+surgeon for miles.
+
+Now Bickley was a first-class surgeon, having held very high hospital
+appointments, and indeed still holding them. Why, I asked, should he
+not come and set up here on his own? I would appoint him doctor to
+the estate and also give him charge of a cottage hospital which I was
+endowing, with liberty to build and arrange it as he liked. Further, as
+I considered that it would be of great advantage to me to have a man of
+real ability within reach, I would guarantee for three years whatever
+income he was earning in London.
+
+He thanked me warmly and in the end acted on the idea, with startling
+results so far as his prospects were concerned. Very soon his really
+remarkable skill became known and he was earning more money than as an
+unmarried man he could possibly want. Indeed, scarcely a big operation
+took place at any town within twenty miles, and even much farther away,
+at which he was not called in to assist.
+
+Needless to say his advent was a great boon to me, for as he lived in a
+house I let him quite near by, whenever he had a spare evening he would
+drop in to dinner, and from our absolutely opposite standpoints we
+discussed all things human and divine. Thus I was enabled to sharpen
+my wits upon the hard steel of his clear intellect which was yet, in a
+sense, so limited.
+
+I must add that I never converted him to my way of thinking and he
+never converted me to his, any more than he converted Bastin, for
+whom, queerly enough, he had a liking. They pounded away at each other,
+Bickley frequently getting the best of it in the argument, and when at
+last Bastin rose to go, he generally made the same remark. It was:
+
+"It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your intellect
+so utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted you of error at
+least half a dozen times, and not to confess it is mere pigheadedness.
+Good night. I am sure that Sarah will be sitting up for me."
+
+"Silly old idiot!" Bickley would say, shaking his fist after him. "The
+only way to get him to see the truth would be to saw his head open and
+pour it in."
+
+Then we would both laugh.
+
+Such were my two most intimate friends, although I admit it was rather
+like the equator cultivating close relationships with the north and
+south poles. Certainly Bastin was as far from Bickley as those points
+of the earth are apart, while I. as it were, sat equally distant between
+the two. However, we were all very happy together, since in certain
+characters, there are few things that bind men more closely than
+profound differences of opinion.
+
+
+Now I must turn to my more personal affairs. After all, it is impossible
+for a man to satisfy his soul, if he has anything of the sort about him
+which in the remotest degree answers to that description, with the husks
+of wealth, luxury and indolence, supplemented by occasional theological
+and other arguments between his friends; Becoming profoundly convinced
+of this truth, I searched round for something to do and, like Noah's
+dove on the waste of waters, found nothing. Then I asked Bickley and
+Bastin for their opinions as to my best future course. Bickley proved a
+barren draw. He rubbed his nose and feebly suggested that I might go
+in for "research work," which, of course, only represented his own
+ambitions. I asked him indignantly how I could do such a thing without
+any scientific qualifications whatever. He admitted the difficulty, but
+replied that I might endow others who had the qualifications.
+
+"In short, become a mulch cow for sucking scientists," I replied, and
+broke off the conversation.
+
+Bastin's idea was, first, that I should teach in a Sunday School;
+secondly, that if this career did not satisfy all my aspirations, I
+might be ordained and become a missionary.
+
+On my rejection of this brilliant advice, he remarked that the only
+other thing he could think of was that I should get married and have a
+large family, which might possibly advantage the nation and ultimately
+enrich the Kingdom of Heaven, though of such things no one could
+be quite sure. At any rate, he was certain that at present I was in
+practice neglecting my duty, whatever it might be, and in fact one of
+those cumberers of the earth who, he observed in the newspaper he took
+in and read when he had time, were "very happily named--the idle rich."
+
+"Which reminds me," he added, "that the clothing-club finances are in
+a perfectly scandalous condition; in fact, it is L25 in debt, an amount
+that as the squire of the parish I consider it incumbent on you to make
+good, not as a charity but as an obligation."
+
+"Look here, my friend," I said, ignoring all the rest, "will you answer
+me a plain question? Have you found marriage such a success that you
+consider it your duty to recommend it to others? And if you have, why
+have you not got the large family of which you speak?"
+
+"Of course not," he replied with his usual frankness. "Indeed, it is in
+many ways so disagreeable that I am convinced it must be right and for
+the good of all concerned. As regards the family I am sure I do not
+know, but Sarah never liked babies, which perhaps has something to do
+with it."
+
+Then he sighed, adding, "You see, Arbuthnot, we have to take things as
+we find them in this world and hope for a better."
+
+"Which is just what I am trying to do, you unilluminating old donkey!" I
+exclaimed, and left him there shaking his head over matters in general,
+but I think principally over Sarah.
+
+By the way, I think that the villagers recognised this good lady's
+vinegary nature. At least, they used to call her "Sour Sal."
+
+
+
+Chapter III. Natalie
+
+
+Now what Bastin had said about marriage stuck in my mind as his
+blundering remarks had a way of doing, perhaps because of the grain
+of honest truth with which they were often permeated. Probably in my
+position it was more or less my duty to marry. But here came the rub;
+I had never experienced any leanings that way. I was as much a man as
+others, more so than many are, perhaps, and I liked women, but at the
+same time they repelled me.
+
+My old fastidiousness came in; to my taste there was always something
+wrong about them. While they attracted one part of my nature they
+revolted another part, and on the whole I preferred to do without their
+intimate society, rather than work violence to this second and higher
+part of me. Moreover, quite at the beginning of my career I had
+concluded from observation that a man gets on better in life alone,
+rather than with another to drag at his side, or by whom perhaps he must
+be dragged. Still true marriage, such as most men and some women have
+dreamed of in their youth, had always been one of my ideals; indeed it
+was on and around this vision that I wrote that first book of mine which
+was so successful. Since I knew this to be unattainable in our imperfect
+conditions, however, notwithstanding Bastin's strictures, again I
+dismissed the whole matter from my mind as a vain imagination.
+
+As an alternative I reflected upon a parliamentary career which I was
+not too old to begin, and even toyed with one or two opportunities that
+offered themselves, as these do to men of wealth and advanced views.
+They never came to anything, for in the end I decided that Party
+politics were so hateful and so dishonest, that I could not bring myself
+to put my neck beneath their yoke. I was sure that if I tried to do
+so, I should fail more completely than I had done at the Bar and in
+Literature. Here, too, I am quite certain that I was right.
+
+The upshot of it all was that I sought refuge in that last expedient of
+weary Englishmen, travel, not as a globe-trotter, but leisurely and with
+an inquiring mind, learning much but again finding, like the ancient
+writer whom I have quoted already, that there is no new thing under the
+sun; that with certain variations it is the same thing over and over
+again.
+
+No, I will make an exception, the East did interest me enormously. There
+it was, at Benares, that I came into touch with certain thinkers who
+opened my eyes to a great deal. They released some hidden spring in
+my nature which hitherto had always been striving to break through the
+crust of our conventions and inherited ideas. I know now that what I
+was seeking was nothing less than the Infinite; that I had "immortal
+longings in me." I listened to all their solemn talk of epochs and years
+measureless to man, and reflected with a thrill that after all man might
+have his part in every one of them. Yes, that bird of passage as he
+seemed to be, flying out of darkness into darkness, still he might have
+spread his wings in the light of other suns millions upon millions of
+years ago, and might still spread them, grown radiant and glorious,
+millions upon millions of years hence in a time unborn.
+
+If only I could know the truth. Was Life (according to Bickley) merely
+a short activity bounded by nothingness before and behind; or (according
+to Bastin) a conventional golden-harped and haloed immortality, a word
+of which he did not in the least understand the meaning?
+
+Or was it something quite different from either of these, something vast
+and splendid beyond the reach of vision, something God-sent, beginning
+and ending in the Eternal Absolute and at last partaking of His
+attributes and nature and from aeon to aeon shot through with His light?
+And how was the truth to be learned? I asked my Eastern friends, and
+they talked vaguely of long ascetic preparation, of years upon years of
+learning, from whom I could not quite discover. I was sure it could not
+be from them, because clearly they did not know; they only passed on
+what they had heard elsewhere, when or how they either could not or
+would not explain. So at length I gave it up, having satisfied myself
+that all this was but an effort of Oriental imagination called into life
+by the sweet influences of the Eastern stars.
+
+I gave it up and went away, thinking that I should forget. But I did
+not forget. I was quick with a new hope, or at any rate with a new
+aspiration, and that secret child of holy desire grew and grew within
+my soul, till at length it flashed upon me that this soul of mine was
+itself the hidden Master from which I must learn my lesson. No wonder
+that those Eastern friends could not give his name, seeing that whatever
+they really knew, as distinguished from what they had heard, and it was
+little enough, each of them had learned from the teaching of his own
+soul.
+
+Thus, then, I too became a dreamer with only one longing, the longing
+for wisdom, for that spirit touch which should open my eyes and enable
+me to see.
+
+Yet now it happened strangely enough that when I seemed within myself
+to have little further interest in the things of the world, and least
+of all in women, I, who had taken another guest to dwell with me,
+those things of the world came back to me and in the shape of Woman the
+Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed since is it not written that no
+man can live to himself alone, or lose himself in watching and nurturing
+the growth of his own soul?
+
+
+It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and stayed
+there a while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name in the book
+of our Minister to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred Upton, not because I
+wished him to ask me to dinner, but for the reason that I had heard of
+him as a man of archeological tastes and thought that he might enable me
+to see things which otherwise I should not see.
+
+As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire neighbours
+who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on the following
+night. I accepted and found myself one of a considerable party, some of
+them distinguished English people who wore Orders, as is customary when
+one dines with the representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and
+this shows that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first
+time in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
+Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in to
+dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even a lady as
+there was not one to spare.
+
+Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself seated
+between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither of whom could
+talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign language, not even French
+in which they addressed me, seeming surprised that I did not understand
+them. I was humiliated at my own ignorance, although in fact I was not
+ignorant, only my education had been classical. Indeed I was a good
+classic and had kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I
+became an idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
+countess might know Latin from which her own language was derived, and
+addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir Alfred, who was not
+far off and overheard me (he also knew Latin), burst into laughter and
+proceeded to explain the joke in a loud voice, first in French and
+then in English, to the assembled company, who all became infected with
+merriment and also stared at me as a curiosity.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to
+a mistake of my driver I had arrived rather late and had not been
+introduced to her. As her father's only daughter, her mother being dead,
+she was seated at the end of the table behind a fan-like arrangement of
+white Madonna lilies, and she had bent forward and, like the others, was
+looking at me, but in such a fashion that her head from that distance
+seemed as though it were surrounded and crowned with lilies. Indeed the
+greatest art could not have produced a more beautiful effect which was,
+however, really one of naked accident.
+
+An angel looking down upon earth through the lilies of Heaven--that was
+the rather absurd thought which flashed into my mind. I did not quite
+realise her face at first except that it seemed to be both dark and
+fair; as a fact her waving hair which grew rather low upon her forehead,
+was dark, and her large, soft eyes were grey. I did not know, and to
+this moment I do not know if she was really beautiful, but certainly the
+light that shone through those eyes of hers and seemed to be reflected
+upon her delicate features, was beauty itself. It was like that glowing
+through a thin vase of the purest alabaster within which a lamp is
+placed, and I felt this effect to arise from no chance, like that of the
+lily-setting, but, as it were, from the lamp of the spirit within.
+
+Our eyes met, and I suppose that she saw the wonder and admiration
+in mine. At any rate her amused smile faded, leaving the face rather
+serious, though still sweetly serious, and a tinge of colour crept over
+it as the first hue of dawn creeps into a pearly sky. Then she withdrew
+herself behind the screen of lilies and for the rest of that dinner
+which I thought was never coming to an end, practically I saw her no
+more. Only I noted as she passed out that although not tall, she
+was rounded and graceful in shape and that her hands were peculiarly
+delicate.
+
+Afterwards in the drawing-room her father, with whom I had talked at the
+table, introduced me to her, saying:
+
+"My daughter is the real archaeologist, Mr. Arbuthnot, and I think if
+you ask her, she may be able to help you."
+
+Then he bustled away to speak to some of his important guests, from whom
+I think he was seeking political information.
+
+"My father exaggerates," she said in a soft and very sympathetic voice,
+"but perhaps"--and she motioned me to a seat at her side.
+
+Then we talked of the places and things that I more particularly desired
+to see and, well, the end of it was that I went back to my hotel in love
+with Natalie; and as she afterwards confessed, she went to bed in love
+with me.
+
+It was a curious business, more like meeting a very old friend from whom
+one had been separated by circumstances for a score of years or so than
+anything else. We were, so to speak, intimate from the first; we
+knew all about each other, although here and there was something new,
+something different which we could not remember, lines of thought,
+veins of memory which we did not possess in common. On one point I am
+absolutely clear: it was not solely the everyday and ancient appeal of
+woman to man and man to woman which drew us together, though doubtless
+this had its part in our attachment as under our human conditions it
+must do, seeing that it is Nature's bait to ensure the continuance of
+the race. It was something more, something quite beyond that elementary
+impulse.
+
+At any rate we loved, and one evening in the shelter of the solemn
+walls of the great Coliseum at Rome, which at that hour were shut to
+all except ourselves, we confessed our love. I really think we must have
+chosen the spot by tacit but mutual consent because we felt it to be
+fitting. It was so old, so impregnated with every human experience,
+from the direst crime of the tyrant who thought himself a god, to the
+sublimest sacrifice of the martyr who already was half a god; with every
+vice and virtue also which lies between these extremes, that it seemed
+to be the most fitting altar whereon to offer our hearts and all that
+caused them to beat, each to the other.
+
+So Natalie and I were betrothed within a month of our first meeting.
+Within three we were married, for what was there to prevent or delay?
+Naturally Sir Alfred was delighted, seeing that he possessed but
+small private resources and I was able to make ample provision for
+his daughter who had hitherto shown herself somewhat difficult in this
+business of matrimony and now was bordering on her twenty-seventh year.
+Everybody was delighted, everything went smoothly as a sledge sliding
+down a slope of frozen snow and the mists of time hid whatever might be
+at the end of that slope. Probably a plain; at the worst the upward rise
+of ordinary life.
+
+That is what we thought, if we thought at all. Certainly we never
+dreamed of a precipice. Why should we, who were young, by comparison,
+quite healthy and very rich? Who thinks of precipices under such
+circumstances, when disaster seems to be eliminated and death is yet a
+long way off?
+
+And yet we ought to have done so, because we should have known that
+smooth surfaces without impediment to the runners often end in something
+of the kind.
+
+I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where of
+course we met with a great reception, including the ringing (out of
+tune) of the new peal of bells that I had given to the church, Bastin
+made haste to point this out.
+
+"Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot," he
+reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as usual,
+though what at I do not know, had been escorted from the room by
+Natalie, "and really, when I come to think of it, you are an unusually
+fortunate person. You possess a great deal of money, much more than you
+have any right to; which you seem to have done very little to earn and
+do not spend quite as I should like you to do, and this nice property,
+that ought to be owned by a great number of people, as, according to
+the views you express, I should have thought you would acknowledge, and
+everything else that a man can want. It is very strange that you should
+be so favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
+which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even in the
+end and you will get your share of troubles, like others. Perhaps Mrs.
+Arbuthnot will have no children as there is so much for them to take. Or
+perhaps you will lose all your money and have to work for your living,
+which might be good for you. Or," he added, still thinking aloud after
+his fashion, "perhaps she will die young--she has that kind of face,
+although, of course, I hope she won't," he added, waking up.
+
+I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the
+proverbial funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to them. I
+suppose it was because in a flash of intuition I knew that they would
+come true and that he was an appointed Cassandra. Perhaps this uncanny
+knowledge overcame my natural indignation at such super-gaucherie of
+which no one but Bastin could have been capable, and even prevented me
+from replying at all, so that I merely sat still and looked at him.
+
+But Bickley did reply with some vigour.
+
+"Forgive me for saying so, Bastin," he said, bristling all over as it
+were, "but your remarks, which may or may not be in accordance with the
+principles of your religion, seem to me to be in singularly bad taste.
+They would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians,
+who appear to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at
+any decent heathen feast your neck would have been wrung as that of a
+bird of ill omen."
+
+"Why?" asked Bastin blankly. "I only said what I thought to be the
+truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste."
+
+"Then I will say what I think also to be the truth," replied Bickley,
+growing furious. "It is that you use your Christianity as a cloak for
+bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy for others of which
+you seem to have none. Moreover, since you talk of the death of people's
+wives, I will tell you something about your own, as a doctor, which I
+can do as I never attended her. It is highly probable, in my opinion,
+that she will die before Mrs. Arbuthnot, who is quite a healthy person
+with a good prospect of life."
+
+"Perhaps," said Bastin. "If so, it will be God's will and I shall not
+complain" (here Bickley snorted), "though I do not see what you can know
+about it. But why should you cast reflections on the early Christians
+who were people of strong principle living in rough times, and had to
+wage war against an established devil-worship? I know you are angry
+because they smashed up the statues of Venus and so forth, but had I
+been in their place I should have done the same."
+
+"Of course you would, who doubts it? But as for the early Christians and
+their iconoclastic performances--well, curse them, that's all!" and he
+sprang up and left the room.
+
+I followed him.
+
+Let it not be supposed from the above scene that there was any
+ill-feeling between Bastin and Bickley. On the contrary they were much
+attached to each other, and this kind of quarrel meant no more than
+the strong expression of their individual views to which they were
+accustomed from their college days. For instance Bastin was always
+talking about the early Christians and missionaries, while Bickley
+loathed both, the early Christians because of the destruction which
+they had wrought in Egypt, Italy, Greece and elsewhere, of all that was
+beautiful; and the missionaries because, as he said, they were degrading
+and spoiling the native races and by inducing them to wear clothes,
+rendering them liable to disease. Bastin would answer that their souls
+were more important than their bodies, to which Bickley replied that as
+there was no such thing as a soul except in the stupid imagination of
+priests, he differed entirely on the point. As it was quite impossible
+for either to convince the other, there the conversation would end, or
+drift into something in which they were mutually interested, such as
+natural history and the hygiene of the neighbourhood.
+
+Here I may state that Bickley's keen professional eye was not mistaken
+when he diagnosed Mrs. Bastin's state of health as dangerous. As a
+matter of fact she was suffering from heart disease that a doctor can
+often recognise by the colour of the lips, etc., which brought about her
+death under the following circumstances:
+
+Her husband attended some ecclesiastical function at a town over twenty
+miles away and was to have returned by a train which would have brought
+him home about five o'clock. As he did not arrive she waited at
+the station for him until the last train came in about seven
+o'clock--without the beloved Basil. Then, on a winter's night she tore
+up to the Priory and begged me to lend her a dog-cart in which to drive
+to the said town to look for him. I expostulated against the folly of
+such a proceeding, saying that no doubt Basil was safe enough but had
+forgotten to telegraph, or thought that he would save the sixpence which
+the wire cost.
+
+Then it came out, to Natalie's and my intense amusement, that all this
+was the result of her jealous nature of which I have spoken. She said
+she had never slept a night away from her husband since they were
+married and with so many "designing persons" about she could not say
+what might happen if she did so, especially as he was "such a favourite
+and so handsome." (Bastin was a fine looking man in his rugged way.)
+
+I suggested that she might have a little confidence in him, to which she
+replied darkly that she had no confidence in anybody.
+
+The end of it was that I lent her the cart with a fast horse and a good
+driver, and off she went. Reaching the town in question some two and a
+half hours later, she searched high and low through wind and sleet, but
+found no Basil. He, it appeared, had gone on to Exeter, to look at the
+cathedral where some building was being done, and missing the last train
+had there slept the night.
+
+About one in the morning, after being nearly locked up as a mad woman,
+she drove back to the Vicarage, again to find no Basil. Even then she
+did not go to bed but raged about the house in her wet clothes, until
+she fell down utterly exhausted. When her husband did return on the
+following morning, full of information about the cathedral, she was
+dangerously ill, and actually passed away while uttering a violent
+tirade against him for his supposed suspicious proceedings.
+
+That was the end of this truly odious British matron.
+
+In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process, canonised her in
+his imagination as a kind of saint. "So loving," he would say, "such a
+devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can assure you that even in the
+midst of her death-struggle her last thoughts were of me," words that
+caused Bickley to snort with more than usual vigour, until I kicked him
+to silence beneath the table.
+
+
+
+Chapter IV. Death and Departure
+
+
+Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life to
+bitterness and my hopes to ashes.
+
+Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and Natalie.
+Mentally, physically, spiritually we were perfectly mated, and we loved
+each other dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet there was something about
+her which filled me with vague fears, especially after she found that
+she was to become a mother. I would talk to her of the child, but she
+would sigh and shake her head, her eyes filling with tears, and say that
+we must not count on the continuance of such happiness as ours, for it
+was too great.
+
+I tried to laugh away her doubts, though whenever I did so I seemed to
+hear Bastin's slow voice remarking casually that she might die, as he
+might have commented on the quality of the claret. At last, however, I
+grew terrified and asked her bluntly what she meant.
+
+"I don't quite know, dearest," she replied, "especially as I am
+wonderfully well. But--but--"
+
+"But what?" I asked.
+
+"But I think that our companionship is going to be broken for a little
+while."
+
+"For a little while!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey. I think that I shall be taken away from you--you know
+what I mean," and she nodded towards the churchyard.
+
+"Oh, my God!" I groaned.
+
+"I want to say this," she added quickly, "that if such a thing should
+happen, as it happens every day, I implore you, dearest Humphrey, not to
+be too much distressed, since I am sure that you will find me again.
+No, I can't explain how or when or where, because I do not know. I have
+prayed for light, but it has not come to me. All I know is that I am not
+talking of reunion in Mr. Bastin's kind of conventional heaven, which he
+speaks about as though to reach it one stumbled through darkness for
+a minute into a fine new house next door, where excellent servants had
+made everything ready for your arrival and all the lights were turned
+up. It is something quite different from that and very much more real."
+
+Then she bent down ostensibly to pat the head of a little black cocker
+spaniel called Tommy which had been given to her as a puppy, a highly
+intelligent and affectionate animal that we both adored and that loved
+her as only a dog can love. Really, I knew, it was to hide her tears,
+and fled from the room lest she should see mine.
+
+As I went I heard the dog whimpering in a peculiar way, as though some
+sympathetic knowledge had been communicated to its wonderful animal
+intelligence.
+
+That night I spoke to Bickley about the matter, repeating exactly what
+had passed. As I expected, he smiled in his grave, rather sarcastic way,
+and made light of it.
+
+"My dear Humphrey," he said, "don't torment yourself about such fancies.
+They are of everyday occurrence among women in your wife's condition.
+Sometimes they take one form, sometimes another. When she has got her
+baby you will hear no more of them."
+
+I tried to be comforted but in vain.
+
+The days and weeks went by like a long nightmare and in due course the
+event happened. Bickley was not attending the case; it was not in
+his line, he said, and he preferred that where a friend's wife was
+concerned, somebody else should be called in. So it was put in charge of
+a very good local man with a large experience in such domestic matters.
+
+How am I to tell of it? Everything went wrong; as for the details, let
+them be. Ultimately Bickley did operate, and if surpassing skill could
+have saved her, it would have been done. But the other man had misjudged
+the conditions; it was too late, nothing could help either mother or
+child, a little girl who died shortly after she was born but not before
+she had been christened, also by the name of Natalie.
+
+I was called in to say farewell to my wife and found her radiant,
+triumphant even in her weakness.
+
+"I know now," she whispered in a faint voice. "I understood as the
+chloroform passed away, but I cannot tell you. Everything is quite well,
+my darling. Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful
+place in which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me.
+Good-bye for a little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!"
+
+Then she died. And for a time I too seemed to die, but could not. I
+buried her and the child here at Fulcombe; or rather I buried their
+ashes since I could not endure that her beloved body should see
+corruption.
+
+
+Afterwards, when all was over, I spoke of these last words of Natalie's
+with both Bickley and Bastin, for somehow I seemed to wish to learn
+their separate views.
+
+The latter I may explain, had been present at the end in his spiritual
+capacity, but I do not think that he in the least understood the nature
+of the drama which was passing before his eyes. His prayers and the
+christening absorbed all his attention, and he never was a man who could
+think of more than one thing at a time.
+
+When I told him exactly what had happened and repeated the words that
+Natalie spoke, he was much interested in his own nebulous way, and said
+that it was delightful to meet with an example of a good Christian, such
+as my wife had been, who actually saw something of Heaven before she had
+gone there. His own faith was, he thanked God, fairly robust, but still
+an undoubted occurrence of the sort acted as a refreshment, "like rain
+on a pasture when it is rather dry, you know," he added, breaking into
+simile.
+
+I remarked that she had not seemed to speak in the sense he indicated,
+but appeared to allude to something quite near at hand and more or less
+immediate.
+
+"I don't know that there is anything nearer at hand than the Hereafter,"
+he answered. "I expect she meant that you will probably soon die and
+join her in Paradise, if you are worthy to do so. But of course it is
+not wise to put too much reliance upon words spoken by people at the
+last, because often they don't quite know what they are saying. Indeed
+sometimes I think this was so in the case of my own wife, who really
+seemed to me to talk a good deal of rubbish. Good-bye, I promised to see
+Widow Jenkins this afternoon about having her varicose veins cut out,
+and I mustn't stop here wasting time in pleasant conversation. She
+thinks just as much of her varicose veins as we do of the loss of our
+wives."
+
+I wonder what Bastin's ideas of unpleasant conversation may be, thought
+I to myself, as I watched him depart already wool-gathering on some
+other subject, probably the heresy of one of those "early fathers" who
+occupied most of his thoughts.
+
+Bickley listened to my tale in sympathetic silence, as a doctor does to
+a patient. When he was obliged to speak, he said that it was interesting
+as an example of a tendency of certain minds towards romantic vision
+which sometimes asserts itself, even in the throes of death.
+
+"You know," he added, "that I put faith in none of these things. I
+wish that I could, but reason and science both show me that they lack
+foundation. The world on the whole is a sad place, where we arrive
+through the passions of others implanted in them by Nature, which,
+although it cares nothing for individual death, is tender towards the
+impulse of races of every sort to preserve their collective life.
+Indeed the impulse is Nature, or at least its chief manifestation.
+Consequently, whether we be gnats or elephants, or anything between and
+beyond, even stars for aught I know, we must make the best of things as
+they are, taking the good and the evil as they come and getting all we
+can out of life until it leaves us, after which we need not trouble.
+You had a good time for a little while and were happy in it; now you
+are having a bad time and are wretched. Perhaps in the future, when your
+mental balance has re-asserted itself, you will have other good times in
+the afternoon of your days, and then follow twilight and the dark. That
+is all there is to hope for, and we may as well look the thing in the
+face. Only I confess, my dear fellow, that your experience convinces me
+that marriage should be avoided at whatever inconvenience. Indeed I
+have long wondered that anyone can take the responsibility of bringing
+a child into the world. But probably nobody does in cold blood, except
+misguided idiots like Bastin," he added. "He would have twenty, had not
+his luck intervened."
+
+"Then you believe in nothing, Friend," I said.
+
+"Nothing, I am sorry to say, except what I see and my five senses
+appreciate."
+
+"You reject all possibility of miracle, for instance?"
+
+"That depends on what you mean by miracle. Science shows us all kinds
+of wonders which our great grandfathers would have called miracles, but
+these are nothing but laws that we are beginning to understand. Give me
+an instance."
+
+"Well," I replied at hazard, "if you were assured by someone that a man
+could live for a thousand years?"
+
+"I should tell him that he was a fool or a liar, that is all. It is
+impossible."
+
+"Or that the same identity, spirit, animating principle--call it what
+you will--can flit from body to body, say in successive ages? Or that
+the dead can communicate with the living?"
+
+"Convince me of any of these things, Arbuthnot, and mind you I desire
+to be convinced, and I will take back every word I have said and walk
+through Fulcombe in a white sheet proclaiming myself the fool. Now, I
+must get off to the Cottage Hospital to cut out Widow Jenkins's varicose
+veins. They are tangible and real at any rate; about the largest I ever
+saw, indeed. Give up dreams, old boy, and take to something useful. You
+might go back to your fiction writing; you seem to have leanings that
+way, and you know you need not publish the stories, except privately for
+the edification of your friends."
+
+With this Parthian shaft Bickley took his departure to make a job of
+Widow Jenkins's legs.
+
+I took his advice. During the next few months I did write something
+which occupied my thoughts for a while, more or less. It lies in my safe
+to this minute, for somehow I have never been able to make up my mind to
+burn what cost me so much physical and mental toil.
+
+When it was finished my melancholy returned to me with added force.
+Everything in the house took a tongue and cried to me of past days.
+Its walls echoed a voice that I could never hear again; in the very
+looking-glasses I saw the reflection of a lost presence. Although I had
+moved myself for the purposes of sleep to a little room at the further
+end of the building, footsteps seemed to creep about my bed at night
+and I heard the rustle of a remembered dress without the door. The place
+grew hateful to me. I felt that I must get away from it or I should go
+mad.
+
+
+One afternoon Bastin arrived carrying a book and in a state of high
+indignation. This work, written, as he said, by some ribald traveller,
+grossly traduced the character of missionaries to the South Sea Islands,
+especially of those of the Society to which he subscribed, and he threw
+it on the table in his righteous wrath. Bickley picked it up and opened
+it at a photograph of a very pretty South Sea Island girl clad in a few
+flowers and nothing else, which he held towards Bastin, saying:
+
+"Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her distinctly
+attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus blooms with a
+difference to our women--a little lower down."
+
+"The devil is always attractive," replied Bastin gloomily. "Child of
+Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph is enough to
+make my poor Sarah turn in her grave."
+
+"Why?" asked Bickley; "seeing that wide seas roll between you and this
+dusky Venus. Also I thought that according to your Hebrew legend sin
+came in with bark garments."
+
+"You should search the Scriptures, Bickley," I broke in, "and cultivate
+accuracy. It was fig-leaves that symbolised its arrival. The garments,
+which I think were of skin, developed later."
+
+"Perhaps," went on Bickley, who had turned the page, "she" (he referred
+to the late Mrs. Bastin) "would have preferred her thus," and he held up
+another illustration of the same woman.
+
+In this the native belle appeared after conversion, clad in broken-down
+stays--I suppose they were stays--out of which she seemed to bulge and
+flow in every direction, a dirty white dress several sizes too small,
+a kind of Salvation Army bonnet without a crown and a prayer-book which
+she held pressed to her middle; the general effect being hideous, and in
+some curious way, improper.
+
+"Certainly," said Bastin, "though I admit her clothes do not seem to
+fit and she has not buttoned them up as she ought. But it is not of the
+pictures so much as of the letterpress with its false and scandalous
+accusations, that I complain."
+
+"Why do you complain?" asked Bickley. "Probably it is quite true, though
+that we could never ascertain without visiting the lady's home."
+
+"If I could afford it," exclaimed Bastin with rising anger, "I should
+like to go there and expose this vile traducer of my cloth."
+
+"So should I," answered Bickley, "and expose these introducers of
+consumption, measles and other European diseases, to say nothing of gin,
+among an innocent and Arcadian people."
+
+"How can you call them innocent, Bickley, when they murder and eat
+missionaries?"
+
+"I dare say we should all eat a missionary, Bastin, if we were hungry
+enough," was the answer, after which something occurred to change the
+conversation.
+
+But I kept the book and read it as a neutral observer, and came to the
+conclusion that these South Sea Islands, a land where it was always
+afternoon, must be a charming place, in which perhaps the stars of
+the Tropics and the scent of the flowers might enable one to forget a
+little, or at least take the edge off memory. Why should I not visit
+them and escape another long and dreary English winter? No, I could not
+do so alone. If Bastin and Bickley were there, their eternal arguments
+might amuse me. Well, why should they not come also? When one has money
+things can always be arranged.
+
+The idea, which had its root in this absurd conversation, took a curious
+hold on me. I thought of it all the evening, being alone, and that night
+it re-arose in my dreams. I dreamed that my lost Natalie appeared to me
+and showed me a picture. It was of a long, low land, a curving shore
+of which the ends were out of the picture, whereon grew tall palms, and
+where great combers broke upon gleaming sand.
+
+Then the picture seemed to become a reality and I saw Natalie herself,
+strangely changeful in her aspect, strangely varying in face and figure,
+strangely bright, standing in the mouth of a pass whereof the little
+bordering cliffs were covered with bushes and low trees, whose green
+was almost hid in lovely flowers. There in my dream she stood, smiling
+mysteriously, and stretched out her arms towards me.
+
+As I awoke I seemed to hear her voice, repeating her dying words: "Go
+where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in which
+you will find me, not knowing that you have found me."
+
+With some variations this dream visited me twice that night. In the
+morning I woke up quite determined that I would go to the South Sea
+Islands, even if I must do so alone. On that same evening Bastin and
+Bickley dined with me. I said nothing to them about my dream, for Bastin
+never dreamed and Bickley would have set it down to indigestion. But
+when the cloth had been cleared away and we were drinking our glass
+of port--both Bastin and Bickley only took one, the former because he
+considered port a sinful indulgence of the flesh, the latter because he
+feared it would give him gout--I remarked casually that they both looked
+very run down and as though they wanted a rest. They agreed, at least
+each of them said he had noticed it in the other. Indeed Bastin added
+that the damp and the cold in the church, in which he held daily
+services to no congregation except the old woman who cleaned it, had
+given him rheumatism, which prevented him from sleeping.
+
+"Do call things by their proper names," interrupted Bickley. "I told
+you yesterday that what you are suffering from is neuritis in your right
+arm, which will become chronic if you neglect it much longer. I have the
+same thing myself, so I ought to know, and unless I can stop operating
+for a while I believe my fingers will become useless. Also something is
+affecting my sight, overstrain, I suppose, so that I am obliged to wear
+stronger and stronger glasses. I think I shall have to leave Ogden" (his
+partner) "in charge for a while, and get away into the sun. There is
+none here before June."
+
+"I would if I could pay a locum tenens and were quite sure it isn't
+wrong," said Bastin.
+
+"I am glad you both think like that," I remarked, "as I have a
+suggestion to make to you. I want to go to the South Seas about which we
+were talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that Bickley has been
+advising for me, and I should be very grateful if you would both come as
+my guests. You, Bickley, make so much money out of cutting people about,
+that you can arrange your own affairs during your absence. But as for
+you, Bastin, I will see to the wherewithal for the locum tenens, and
+everything else."
+
+"You are very kind," said Bastin, "and certainly I should like to expose
+that misguided author, who probably published his offensive work without
+thinking that what he wrote might affect the subscriptions to the
+missionary societies, also to show Bickley that he is not always right,
+as he seems to think. But I could never dream of accepting without the
+full approval of the Bishop."
+
+"You might get that of your nurse also, if she happens to be still
+alive," mocked Bickley. "As for his Lordship, I don't think he will
+raise any objection when he sees the certificate I will give you about
+the state of your health. He is a great believer in me ever since I
+took that carbuncle out of his neck which he got because he will not eat
+enough. As for me, I mean to come if only to show you how continually
+and persistently you are wrong. But, Arbuthnot, how do you mean to go?"
+
+"I don't know. In a mail steamer, I suppose."
+
+"If you can run to it, a yacht would be much better."
+
+"That's a good idea, for one could get out of the beaten tracks and
+see the places that are never, or seldom, visited. I will make some
+inquiries. And now, to celebrate the occasion, let us all have another
+glass of port and drink a toast."
+
+They hesitated and were lost, Bastin murmuring something about doing
+without his stout next day as a penance. Then they both asked what was
+the toast, each of them, after thought, suggesting that it should be the
+utter confusion of the other.
+
+I shook my head, whereon as a result of further cogitation, Bastin
+submitted that the Unknown would be suitable. Bickley said that he
+thought this a foolish idea as everything worth knowing was already
+known, and what was the good of drinking to the rest? A toast to the
+Truth would be better.
+
+A notion came to me.
+
+"Let us combine them," I said, "and drink to the Unknown Truth."
+
+So we did, though Bastin grumbled that the performance made him feel
+like Pilate.
+
+"We are all Pilates in our way," I replied with a sigh.
+
+"That is what I think every time I diagnose a case," exclaimed Bickley.
+
+As for me I laughed and for some unknown reason felt happier than I
+had done for months. Oh! if only the writer of that tourist tale of the
+South Sea Islands could have guessed what fruit his light-thrown seed
+would yield to us and to the world!
+
+
+I made my inquiries through a London agency which hired out yachts or
+sold them to the idle rich. As I expected, there were plenty to be had,
+at a price, but wealthy as I was, the figure asked of the buyer of any
+suitable craft, staggered me. In the end, however, I chartered one
+for six months certain and at so much per month for as long as I liked
+afterwards. The owners paid insurance and everything else on condition
+that they appointed the captain and first mate, also the engineer, for
+this yacht, which was named Star of the South, could steam at about ten
+knots as well as sail.
+
+I know nothing about yachts, and therefore shall not attempt to describe
+her, further than to say that she was of five hundred and fifty tons
+burden, very well constructed, and smart to look at, as well she might
+be, seeing that a deceased millionaire from whose executors I hired her
+had spent a fortune in building and equipping her in the best possible
+style. In all, her crew consisted of thirty-two hands. A peculiarity of
+the vessel was that owing to some fancy of the late owner, the passenger
+accommodation, which was splendid, lay forward of the bridge, this with
+the ship's store-rooms, refrigerating chamber, etc., being almost in the
+bows. It was owing to these arrangements, which were unusual, that the
+executors found it impossible to sell, and were therefore glad to accept
+such an offer as mine in order to save expenses. Perhaps they hoped that
+she might go to the bottom, being heavily insured. If so, the Fates did
+not disappoint them.
+
+The captain, named Astley, was a jovial person who held every kind of
+certificate. He seemed so extraordinarily able at his business that
+personally I suspected him of having made mistakes in the course of his
+career, not unconnected with the worship of Bacchus. In this I believe
+I was right; otherwise a man of such attainments would have been
+commanding something bigger than a private yacht. The first mate,
+Jacobsen, was a melancholy Dane, a spiritualist who played the
+concertina, and seemed to be able to do without sleep. The crew were a
+mixed lot, good men for the most part and quite unobjectionable, more
+than half of them being Scandinavian. I think that is all I need say
+about the Star of the South.
+
+The arrangement was that the Star of the South should proceed through
+the Straits of Gibraltar to Marseilles, where we would join her, and
+thence travel via the Suez Canal, to Australia and on to the South Seas,
+returning home as our fancy or convenience might dictate.
+
+All the first part of the plan we carried out to the letter. Of the
+remainder I say nothing at present.
+
+The Star of the South was amply provided with every kind of store. Among
+them were medicines and surgical instruments, selected by Bickley, and
+a case of Bibles and other religious works in sundry languages of the
+South Seas, selected by Bastin, whose bishop, when he understood the
+pious objects of his journey, had rather encouraged than hindered
+his departure on sick leave, and a large number of novels, books of
+reference, etc., laid in by myself. She duly sailed from the Thames and
+reached Marseilles after a safe and easy passage, where all three of us
+boarded her.
+
+I forgot to add that she had another passenger, the little spaniel,
+Tommy. I had intended to leave him behind, but while I was packing up he
+followed me about with such evident understanding of my purpose that my
+heart was touched. When I entered the motor to drive to the station he
+escaped from the hands of the servant, whimpering, and took refuge on my
+knee. After this I felt that Destiny intended him to be our companion.
+Moreover, was he not linked with my dead past, and, had I but known it,
+with my living future also?
+
+
+
+Chapter V. The Cyclone
+
+
+We enjoyed our voyage exceedingly. In Egypt, a land I was glad to
+revisit, we only stopped a week while the Star of the South, which we
+rejoined at Suez, coaled and went through the Canal. This, however, gave
+us time to spend a few days in Cairo, visit the Pyramids and Sakkara
+which Bastin and Bickley had never seen before, and inspect the great
+Museum. The journey up the Nile was postponed until our return. It was
+a pleasant break and gave Bickley, a most omnivorous reader who was well
+acquainted with Egyptian history and theology, the opportunity of trying
+to prove to Bastin that Christianity was a mere development of the
+ancient Egyptian faith. The arguments that ensued may be imagined.
+It never seemed to occur to either of them that all faiths may be and
+indeed probably are progressive; in short, different rays of light
+thrown from the various facets of the same crystal, as in turn these are
+shone upon by the sun of Truth.
+
+Our passage down the Red Sea was cool and agreeable. Thence we shaped
+our course for Ceylon. Here again we stopped a little while to run up
+to Kandy and to visit the ruined city of Anarajapura with its great
+Buddhist topes that once again gave rise to religious argument between
+my two friends. Leaving Ceylon we struck across the Indian Ocean for
+Perth in Western Australia.
+
+It was a long voyage, since to save our coal we made most of it
+under canvas. However, we were not dull as Captain Astley was a good
+companion, and even out of the melancholy Dane, Jacobsen, we had
+entertainment. He insisted on holding seances in the cabin, at which the
+usual phenomena occurred. The table twisted about, voices were heard and
+Jacobsen's accordion wailed out tunes above our heads. These happenings
+drove Bickley to a kind of madness, for here were events which he could
+not explain. He was convinced that someone was playing tricks upon him,
+and devised the most elaborate snares to detect the rogue, entirely
+without result.
+
+First he accused Jacobsen, who was very indignant, and then me, who
+laughed. In the end Jacobsen and I left the "circle" and the cabin,
+which was locked behind us; only Bastin and Bickley remaining there in
+the dark. Presently we heard sounds of altercation, and Bickley emerged
+looking very red in the face, followed by Bastin, who was saying:
+
+"Can I help it if something pulled your nose and snatched off your
+eyeglasses, which anyhow are quite useless to you when there is no
+light? Again, is it possible for me, sitting on the other side of that
+table, to have placed the concertina on your head and made it play the
+National Anthem, a thing that I have not the slightest idea how to do?"
+
+"Please do not try to explain," snapped Bickley. "I am perfectly aware
+that you deceived me somehow, which no doubt you think a good joke."
+
+"My dear fellow," I interrupted, "is it possible to imagine old Basil
+deceiving anyone?"
+
+"Why not," snorted Bickley, "seeing that he deceives himself from one
+year's end to the other?"
+
+"I think," said Bastin, "that this is an unholy business and that we are
+both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do with it," and he
+departed to his cabin, probably to say some appropriate prayers.
+
+After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an instrument
+called a planchette and with difficulty persuaded Bickley to try it,
+which he did after many precautions. The thing, a heart-shaped piece
+of wood mounted on wheels and with a pencil stuck at its narrow end,
+cantered about the sheet of paper on which it was placed, Bickley, whose
+hands rested upon it, staring at the roof of the cabin. Then it began to
+scribble and after a while stopped still.
+
+"Will the Doctor look?" said Jacobsen. "Perhaps the spirits have told
+him something."
+
+"Oh! curse all this silly talk about spirits," exclaimed Bickley, as he
+arranged his eyeglasses and held up the paper to the light, for it was
+after dinner.
+
+He stared, then with an exclamation which I will not repeat, and a
+glance of savage suspicion at the poor Dane and the rest of us, threw
+it down and left the cabin. I picked it up and next moment was screaming
+with laughter. There on the top of the sheet was a rough but entirely
+recognizable portrait of Bickley with the accordion on his head, and
+underneath, written in a delicate, Italian female hand, absolutely
+different from his own, were these words taken from one of St. Paul's
+Epistles--"Oppositions of science falsely so called." Underneath them
+again in a scrawling, schoolboy fist, very like Bastin's, was inscribed,
+"Tell us how this is done, you silly doctor, who think yourself so
+clever."
+
+"It seems that the devil really can quote Scripture," was Bastin's only
+comment, while Jacobsen stared before him and smiled.
+
+Bickley never alluded to the matter, but for days afterwards I saw him
+experimenting with paper and chemicals, evidently trying to discover
+a form of invisible ink which would appear upon the application of the
+hand. As he never said anything about it, I fear that he failed.
+
+This planchette business had a somewhat curious ending. A few nights
+later Jacobsen was working it and asked me to put a question. To oblige
+him I inquired on what day we should reach Fremantle, the port of Perth.
+It wrote an answer which, I may remark, subsequently proved to be quite
+correct.
+
+"That is not a good question," said Jacobsen, "since as a sailor I might
+guess the reply. Try again, Mr. Arbuthnot."
+
+"Will anything remarkable happen on our voyage to the South Seas?" I
+inquired casually.
+
+The planchette hesitated a while then wrote rapidly and stopped.
+Jacobsen took up the paper and began to read the answer aloud--"To A,
+B the D, and B the C, the most remarkable things will happen that have
+happened to men living in the world."
+
+"That must mean me, Bickley the doctor and Bastin the clergyman," I
+said, laughing.
+
+Jacobsen paid no attention, for he was reading what followed. As he did
+so I saw his face turn white and his eyes begin to start from his head.
+Then suddenly he tore the paper in pieces which he thrust into his
+pocket. Lifting his great fist he uttered some Danish oath and with a
+single blow smashed the planchette to fragments, after which he strode
+away, leaving me astonished and somewhat disturbed. When I met him the
+next morning I asked him what was on the paper.
+
+"Oh!" he said quietly, "something I should not like you too-proper
+English gentlemens to see. Something not nice. You understand. Those
+spirits not always good; they do that kind of thing sometimes. That's
+why I broke up this planchette."
+
+Then he began to talk of something else and there the matter ended.
+
+I should have said that, principally with a view to putting themselves
+in a position to confute each other, ever since we had started from
+Marseilles both Bastin and Bickley spent a number of hours each day in
+assiduous study of the language of the South Sea Islands. It became a
+kind of competition between them as to which could learn the most.
+Now Bastin, although simple and even stupid in some ways, was a good
+scholar, and as I knew at college, had quite a faculty for acquiring
+languages in which he had taken high marks at examinations. Bickley,
+too, was an extraordinarily able person with an excellent memory,
+especially when he was on his mettle. The result was that before we
+ever reached a South Sea island they had a good working knowledge of the
+local tongues.
+
+As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife who,
+under some of the "white Australia" regulations, were not allowed to
+remain in the country and offered to work as servants in return for a
+passage to Apia where we proposed to call some time or other. With these
+people Bastin and Bickley talked all day long till really they became
+fairly proficient in their soft and beautiful dialect. They wished me to
+learn also, but I said that with two such excellent interpreters and the
+natives while they remained with us, it seemed quite unnecessary. Still,
+I picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as much as they did perhaps.
+
+At length, travelling on and on as a voyager to the planet Mars might
+do, we sighted the low shores of Australia and that same evening were
+towed, for our coal was quite exhausted, to the wharf at Fremantle.
+Here we spent a few days exploring the beautiful town of Perth and its
+neighbourhood where it was very hot just then, and eating peaches
+and grapes till we made ourselves ill, as a visitor often does who is
+unaware that fruit should not be taken in quantity in Australia while
+the sun is high. Then we departed for Melbourne almost before our
+arrival was generally known, since I did not wish to advertise our
+presence or the object of our journey.
+
+We crossed the Great Australian Bight, of evil reputation, in the most
+perfect weather; indeed it might have been a mill pond, and after a
+short stay at Melbourne, went on to Sydney, where we coaled again and
+laid in supplies.
+
+Then our real journey began. The plan we laid out was to sail to Suva
+in Fiji, about 1,700 miles away, and after a stay there, on to Hawaii
+or the Sandwich Islands, stopping perhaps at the Phoenix Islands and the
+Central Polynesian Sporades, such as Christmas and Fanning Isles. Then
+we proposed to turn south again through the Marshall Archipelago and
+the Caroline Islands, and so on to New Guinea and the Coral Sea.
+Particularly did we wish to visit Easter Island on account of
+its marvelous sculptures that are supposed to be the relics of a
+pre-historic race. In truth, however, we had no fixed plan except to go
+wherever circumstance and chance might take us. Chance, I may add, or
+something else, took full advantage of its opportunities.
+
+We came to Suva in safety and spent a while in exploring the beautiful
+Fiji Isles where both Bastin and Bickley made full inquiries about
+the work of the missionaries, each of them drawing exactly opposite
+conclusions from the same set of admitted facts. Thence we steamed to
+Samoa and put our two natives ashore at Apia, where we procured some
+coal. We did not stay long enough in these islands to investigate them,
+however, because persons of experience there assured us from certain
+familiar signs that one of the terrible hurricanes with which they are
+afflicted, was due to arrive shortly and that we should do well to put
+ourselves beyond its reach. So having coaled and watered we departed in
+a hurry.
+
+Up to this time I should state we had met with the most wonderful good
+fortune in the matter of weather, so good indeed that never on one
+occasion since we left Marseilles, had we been obliged to put the
+fiddles on the tables. With the superstition of a sailor Captain Astley,
+when I alluded to the matter, shook his head saying that doubtless we
+should pay for it later on, since "luck never goes all the way" and
+cyclones were reported to be about.
+
+Here I must tell that after we were clear of Apia, it was discovered
+that the Danish mate who was believed to be in his cabin unwell from
+something he had eaten, was missing. The question arose whether we
+should put back to find him, as we supposed that he had made a trip
+inland and met with an accident, or been otherwise delayed. I was
+in favour of doing so though the captain, thinking of the threatened
+hurricane, shook his head and said that Jacobsen was a queer fellow who
+might just as well have gone overboard as anywhere else, if he thought
+he heard "the spirits, of whom he was so fond," calling him. While the
+matter was still in suspense I happened to go into my own stateroom
+and there, stuck in the looking-glass, saw an envelope in the Dane's
+handwriting addressed to myself. On opening it I found another sealed
+letter, unaddressed, also a note that ran as follows:
+
+"Honoured Sir,
+
+"You will think very badly of me for leaving you, but the enclosed which
+I implore you not to open until you have seen the last of the Star of
+the South, will explain my reason and I hope clear my reputation.
+I thank you again and again for all your kindness and pray that the
+Spirits who rule the world may bless and preserve you, also the Doctor
+and Mr. Bastin."
+
+
+This letter, which left the fate of Jacobsen quite unsolved, for it
+might mean either that he had deserted or drowned himself, I put away
+with the enclosure in my pocket. Of course there was no obligation on me
+to refrain from opening the letter, but I shrank from doing so both from
+some kind of sense of honour and, to tell the truth, for fear of what
+it might contain. I felt that this would be disagreeable; also, although
+there was nothing to connect them together, I bethought me of the scene
+when Jacobsen had smashed the planchette.
+
+On my return to the deck I said nothing whatsoever about the discovery
+of the letter, but only remarked that on reflection I had changed my
+mind and agreed with the captain that it would be unwise to attempt
+to return in order to look for Jacobsen. So the boatswain, a capable
+individual who had seen better days, was promoted to take his watches
+and we went on as before. How curiously things come about in the world!
+For nautical reasons that were explained to me, but which I will not
+trouble to set down, if indeed I could remember them, I believe that
+if we had returned to Apia we should have missed the great gale and
+subsequent cyclone, and with these much else. But it was not so fated.
+
+It was on the fourth day, when we were roughly seven hundred miles or
+more north of Samoa, that we met the edge of this gale about sundown.
+The captain put on steam in the hope of pushing through it, but that
+night we dined for the first time with the fiddles on, and by eleven
+o'clock it was as much as one could do to stand in the cabin, while the
+water was washing freely over the deck. Fortunately, however, the
+wind veered more aft of us, so that by putting about her head a little
+(seamen must forgive me if I talk of these matters as a landlubber) we
+ran almost before the wind, though not quite in the direction that we
+wished to go.
+
+When the light came it was blowing very hard indeed, and the sky was
+utterly overcast, so that we got no glimpse of the sun, or of the
+stars on the following night. Unfortunately, there was no moon visible;
+indeed, if there had been I do not suppose that it would have helped us
+because of the thick pall of clouds. For quite seventy-two hours we
+ran on beneath bare poles before that gale. The little vessel behaved
+splendidly, riding the seas like a duck, but I could see that Captain
+Astley was growing alarmed. When I said something complimentary to him
+about the conduct of the Star of the South, he replied that she was
+forging ahead all right, but the question was--where to? He had been
+unable to take an observation of any sort since we left Samoa; both
+his patent logs had been carried away, so that now only the compass
+remained, and he had not the slightest idea where we were in that great
+ocean studded with atolls and islands.
+
+I asked him whether we could not steam back to our proper course, but
+he answered that to do so he would have to travel dead in the eye of the
+gale, and he doubted whether the engines would stand it. Also there was
+the question of coal to be considered. However, he had kept the fires
+going and would do what he could if the weather moderated.
+
+That night during dinner which now consisted of tinned foods and whisky
+and water, for the seas had got to the galley fire, suddenly the gale
+dropped, whereat we rejoiced exceedingly. The captain came down into the
+saloon very white and shaken, I thought, and I asked him to have a nip
+of whisky to warm him up, and to celebrate our good fortune in having
+run out of the wind. He took the bottle and, to my alarm, poured out
+a full half tumbler of spirit, which he swallowed undiluted in two or
+three gulps.
+
+"That's better!" he said with a hoarse laugh. "But man, what is it you
+are saying about having run out of the wind? Look at the glass!"
+
+"We have," said Bastin, "and it is wonderfully steady. About 29 degrees
+or a little over, which it has been for the last three days."
+
+Again Astley laughed in a mirthless fashion, as he answered:
+
+"Oh, that thing! That's the passengers' glass. I told the steward to put
+it out of gear so that you might not be frightened; it is an old trick.
+Look at this," and he produced one of the portable variety out of his
+pocket.
+
+We looked, and it stood somewhere between 27 degrees and 28 degrees.
+
+"That's the lowest glass I ever saw in the Polynesian or any other seas
+during thirty years. It's right, too, for I have tested it by three
+others," he said.
+
+"What does it mean?" I asked rather anxiously.
+
+"South Sea cyclone of the worst breed," he replied. "That cursed Dane
+knew it was coming and that's why he left the ship. Pray as you never
+prayed before," and again he stretched out his hand towards the whisky
+bottle. But I stepped between him and it, shaking my head. Thereon he
+laughed for the third time and left the cabin. Though I saw him once
+or twice afterwards, these were really the last words of intelligible
+conversation that I ever had with Captain Astley.
+
+"It seems that we are in some danger," said Bastin, in an unmoved kind
+of way. "I think that was a good idea of the captain's, to put up a
+petition, I mean, but as Bickley will scarcely care to join in it I will
+go into the cabin and do so myself."
+
+Bickley snorted, then said:
+
+"Confound that captain! Why did he play such a trick upon us about the
+barometer? Humphrey, I believe he had been drinking."
+
+"So do I," I said, looking at the whisky bottle. "Otherwise, after
+taking those precautions to keep us in the dark, he would not have let
+on like that."
+
+"Well," said Bickley, "he can't get to the liquor, except through this
+saloon, as it is locked up forward with the other stores."
+
+"That's nothing," I replied, "as doubtless he has a supply of his own;
+rum, I expect. We must take our chance."
+
+Bickley nodded, and suggested that we should go on deck to see what was
+happening. So we went. Not a breath of wind was stirring, and even the
+sea seemed to be settling down a little. At least, so we judged from
+the motion, for we could not see either it or the sky; everything was as
+black as pitch. We heard the sailors, however, engaged in rigging guide
+ropes fore and aft, and battening down the hatches with extra tarpaulins
+by the light of lanterns. Also they were putting ropes round the boats
+and doing something to the spars and topmasts.
+
+Presently Bastin joined us, having, I suppose, finished his devotions.
+
+"Really, it is quite pleasant here," he said. "One never knows how
+disagreeable so much wind is until it stops."
+
+I lit my pipe, making no answer, and the match burned quite steadily
+there in the open air.
+
+"What is that?" exclaimed Bickley, staring at something which now I saw
+for the first time. It looked like a line of white approaching through
+the gloom. With it came a hissing sound, and although there was still no
+wind, the rigging began to moan mysteriously like a thing in pain. A big
+drop of water also fell from the sides into my pipe and put it out. Then
+one of the sailors cried in a hoarse voice:
+
+"Get down below, governors, unless you want to go out to sea!"
+
+"Why?" inquired Bastin.
+
+"Why? Becos the 'urricane is coming, that's all. Coming as though the
+devil had kicked it out of 'ell."
+
+Bastin seemed inclined to remonstrate at this sort of language, but we
+pushed him down the companion and followed, propelling the spaniel Tommy
+in front of us. Next moment I heard the sailors battening the hatch with
+hurried blows, and when this was done to their satisfaction, heard their
+feet also as they ran into shelter.
+
+Another instant and we were all lying in a heap on the cabin floor with
+poor Tommy on top of us. The cyclone had struck the ship! Above the wash
+of water and the screaming of the gale we heard other mysterious sounds,
+which doubtless were caused by the yards hitting the seas, for the yacht
+was lying on her side. I thought that all was over, but presently there
+came a rending, crashing noise. The masts, or one of them, had gone, and
+by degrees we righted.
+
+"Near thing!" said Bickley. "Good heavens, what's that?"
+
+I listened, for the electric light had temporarily gone out, owing, I
+suppose, to the dynamo having stopped for a moment. A most unholy and
+hollow sound was rising from the cabin floor. It might have been
+caused by a bullock with its windpipe cut, trying to get its breath and
+groaning. Then the light came on again and we saw Bastin lying at full
+length on the carpet.
+
+"He's broken his neck or something," I said.
+
+Bickley crept to him and having looked, sang out:
+
+"It's all right! He's only sea-sick. I thought it would come to that if
+he drank so much tea."
+
+"Sea-sick," I said faintly--"sea-sick?"
+
+"That's all," said Bickley. "The nerves of the stomach acting on the
+brain or vice-versa--that is, if Bastin has a brain," he added sotto
+voce.
+
+"Oh!" groaned the prostrate clergyman. "I wish that I were dead!"
+
+"Don't trouble about that," answered Bickley. "I expect you soon will
+be. Here, drink some whisky, you donkey."
+
+Bastin sat up and obeyed, out of the bottle, for it was impossible to
+pour anything into a glass, with results too dreadful to narrate.
+
+"I call that a dirty trick," he said presently, in a feeble voice,
+glowering at Bickley.
+
+"I expect I shall have to play you a dirtier before long, for you are a
+pretty bad case, old fellow."
+
+As a matter of fact he had, for once Bastin had begun really we thought
+that he was going to die. Somehow we got him into his cabin, which
+opened off the saloon, and as he could drink nothing more, Bickley
+managed to inject morphia or some other compound into him, which made
+him insensible for a long while.
+
+"He must be in a poor way," he said, "for the needle went more than a
+quarter of an inch into him, and he never cried out or stirred. Couldn't
+help it in that rolling."
+
+But now I could hear the engines working, and I think that the bow
+of the vessel was got head on to the seas, for instead of rolling we
+pitched, or rather the ship stood first upon one end and then upon the
+other. This continued for a while until the first burst of the cyclone
+had gone by. Then suddenly the engines stopped; I suppose that they had
+broken down, but I never learned, and we seemed to veer about, nearly
+sinking in the process, and to run before the hurricane at terrific
+speed.
+
+"I wonder where we are going to?" I said to Bickley. "To the land of
+sleep, Humphrey, I imagine," he replied in a more gentle voice than I
+had often heard him use, adding: "Good-bye, old boy, we have been real
+friends, haven't we, notwithstanding my peculiarities? I only wish that
+I could think that there was anything in Bastin's views. But I can't, I
+can't. It's good night for us poor creatures!"
+
+
+
+Chapter VI. Land
+
+
+At last the electric light really went out. I had looked at my watch
+just before this happened and wound it up, which, Bickley remarked, was
+superfluous and a waste of energy. It then marked 3.20 in the morning.
+We had wedged Bastin, who was now snoring comfortably, into his berth,
+with pillows, and managed to tie a cord over him--no, it was a large
+bath towel, fixing one end of it to the little rack over his bed and
+the other to its framework. As for ourselves, we lay down on the floor
+between the table legs, which, of course, were screwed, and the settee,
+protecting ourselves as best we were able by help of the cushions, etc.,
+between two of which we thrust the terrified Tommy who had been sliding
+up and down the cabin floor. Thus we remained, expecting death every
+moment till the light of day, a very dim light, struggling through a
+port-hole of which the iron cover had somehow been wrenched off. Or
+perhaps it was never shut, I do not remember.
+
+About this time there came a lull in the hellish, howling hurricane; the
+fact being, I suppose, that we had reached the centre of the cyclone. I
+suggested that we should try to go on deck and see what was happening.
+So we started, only to find the entrance to the companion so faithfully
+secured that we could not by any means get out. We knocked and shouted,
+but no one answered. My belief is that at this time everyone on the
+yacht except ourselves had been washed away and drowned.
+
+Then we returned to the saloon, which, except for a little water
+trickling about the floor, was marvelously dry, and, being hungry,
+retrieved some bits of food and biscuit from its corners and ate. At
+this moment the cyclone began to blow again worse than ever, but it
+seemed to us, from another direction, and before it sped our poor
+derelict barque. It blew all day till for my part I grew utterly weary
+and even longed for the inevitable end. If my views were not quite those
+of Bastin, certainly they were not those of Bickley. I had believed from
+my youth up that the individuality of man, the ego, so to speak, does
+not die when life goes out of his poor body, and this faith did not
+desert me then. Therefore, I wished to have it over and learn what there
+might be upon the other side.
+
+We could not speak much because of the howling of the wind, but Bickley
+did manage to shout to me something to the effect that his partners
+would, in his opinion, make an end of their great practice within
+two years, which, he added, was a pity. I nodded my head, not caring
+twopence what happened to Bickley's partners or their business, or to my
+own property, or to anything else. When death is at hand most of us do
+not think much of such things because then we realise how small they
+are. Indeed I was wondering whether within a few minutes or hours I
+should or should not see Natalie again, and if this were the end to
+which she had seemed to beckon me in that dream.
+
+On we sped, and on. About four in the afternoon we heard sounds from
+Bastin's cabin which faintly reminded me of some tune. I crept to the
+door and listened. Evidently he had awakened and was singing or trying
+to sing, for music was not one of his strong points, "For those in peril
+on the sea." Devoutly did I wish that it might be heard. Presently it
+ceased, so I suppose he went to sleep again.
+
+The darkness gathered once more. Then of a sudden something fearful
+happened. There were stupendous noises of a kind I had never heard;
+there were convulsions. It seemed to us that the ship was flung right up
+into the air a hundred feet or more.
+
+"Tidal wave, I expect," shouted Bickley.
+
+Almost as he spoke she came down with the most appalling crash on to
+something hard and nearly jarred the senses out of us. Next the saloon
+was whirling round and round and yet being carried forward, and we felt
+air blowing upon us. Then our senses left us. As I clasped Tommy to my
+side, whimpering and licking my face, my last thought was that all was
+over, and that presently I should learn everything or nothing.
+
+
+I woke up feeling very bruised and sore and perceived that light was
+flowing into the saloon. The door was still shut, but it had been
+wrenched off its hinges, and that was where the light came in; also some
+of the teak planks of the decking, jagged and splintered, were sticking
+up through the carpet. The table had broken from its fastenings and lay
+upon its side. Everything else was one confusion. I looked at Bickley.
+Apparently he had not awakened. He was stretched out still wedged in
+with his cushions and bleeding from a wound in his head. I crept to him
+in terror and listened. He was not dead, for his breathing was regular
+and natural. The whisky bottle which had been corked was upon the floor
+unbroken and about a third full. I took a good pull at the spirit; to
+me it tasted like nectar from the gods. Then I tried to force some down
+Bickley's throat but could not, so I poured a little upon the cut on his
+head. The smart of it woke him in a hurry.
+
+"Where are we now?" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to tell me that Bastin
+is right after all and that we live again somewhere else? Oh! I could
+never bear that ignominy."
+
+"I don't know about living somewhere else," I said, "although my
+opinions on that matter differ from yours. But I do know that you and
+I are still on earth in what remains of the saloon of the Star of the
+South."
+
+"Thank God for that! Let's go and look for old Bastin," said Bickley. "I
+do pray that he is all right also."
+
+"It is most illogical of you, Bickley, and indeed wrong," groaned a deep
+voice from the other side of the cabin door, "to thank a God in Whom
+you do not believe, and to talk of praying for one of the worst and most
+inefficient of His servants when you have no faith in prayer."
+
+"Got you there, my friend," I said.
+
+Bickley murmured something about force of habit, and looked smaller than
+I had ever seen him do before.
+
+Somehow we forced that door open; it was not easy because it had jammed.
+Within the cabin, hanging on either side of the bath towel which had
+stood the strain nobly, something like a damp garment over a linen line,
+was Bastin most of whose bunk seemed to have disappeared. Yes--Bastin,
+pale and dishevelled and looking shrunk, with his hair touzled and his
+beard apparently growing all ways, but still Bastin alive, if very weak.
+
+Bickley ran at him and made a cursory examination with his fingers.
+
+"Nothing broken," he said triumphantly. "He's all right."
+
+"If you had hung over a towel for many hours in most violent weather you
+would not say that," groaned Bastin. "My inside is a pulp. But perhaps
+you would be kind enough to untie me."
+
+"Bosh!" said Bickley as he obeyed. "All you want is something to eat.
+Meanwhile, drink this," and he handed him the remains of the whisky.
+
+Bastin swallowed it every drop, murmuring something about taking a
+little wine for his stomach's sake, "one of the Pauline injunctions, you
+know," after which he was much more cheerful. Then we hunted about and
+found some more of the biscuits and other food with which we filled
+ourselves after a fashion.
+
+"I wonder what has happened," said Bastin. "I suppose that, thanks to
+the skill of the captain, we have after all reached the haven where we
+would be."
+
+Here he stopped, rubbed his eyes and looked towards the saloon door
+which, as I have said, had been wrenched off its hinges, but appeared
+to have opened wider than when I observed it last. Also Tommy, who was
+recovering his spirits, uttered a series of low growls.
+
+"It is a most curious thing," he went on, "and I suppose I must be
+suffering from hallucinations, but I could swear that just now I saw
+looking through that door the same improper young woman clothed in a
+few flowers and nothing else, whose photograph in that abominable and
+libellous book was indirectly the cause of our tempestuous voyage."
+
+"Indeed!" replied Bickley. "Well, so long as she has not got on the
+broken-down stays and the Salvation Army bonnet without a crown, which
+you may remember she wore after she had fallen into the hands of your
+fraternity, I am sure I do not mind. In fact I should be delighted to
+see anything so pleasant."
+
+At this moment a distinct sound of female tittering arose from beyond
+the door. Tommy barked and Bickley stepped towards it, but I called to
+him.
+
+"Look out! Where there are women there are sure to be men. Let us be
+ready against accidents."
+
+So we armed ourselves with pistols, that is Bickley and I did, Bastin
+being fortified solely with a Bible.
+
+Then we advanced, a remarkable and dilapidated trio, and dragged the
+door wide. Instantly there was a scurry and we caught sight of women's
+forms wearing only flowers, and but few of these, running over white
+sand towards groups of men armed with odd-looking clubs, some of which
+were fashioned to the shapes of swords and spears. To make an impression
+I fired two shots with my revolver into the air, whereupon both men and
+women fled into groves of trees and vanished.
+
+"They don't seem to be accustomed to white people," said Bickley. "Is it
+possible that we have found a shore upon which no missionary has set a
+foot?"
+
+"I hope so," said Bastin, "seeing that unworthy as I am, then the
+opportunities for me would be very great."
+
+We stood still and looked about us. This was what we saw. All the after
+part of the ship from forward of the bridge had vanished utterly; there
+was not a trace of it; she had as it were been cut in two. More, we were
+some considerable distance from the sea which was still raging over a
+quarter of a mile away where great white combers struck upon a reef
+and spouted into the air. Behind us was a cliff, apparently of rock but
+covered with earth and vegetation, and against this cliff, in which the
+prow of the ship was buried, she, or what remained of her, had come to
+anchor for the last time.
+
+"You see what has happened," I said. "A great tidal wave has carried us
+up here and retreated."
+
+"That's it," exclaimed Bickley. "Look at the debris," and he pointed to
+torn-up palms, bushes and seaweed piled into heaps which still ran salt
+water; also to a number of dead fish that lay about among them, adding,
+"Well, we are saved anyhow."
+
+"And yet there are people like you who say that there is no Providence!"
+ejaculated Bastin.
+
+"I wonder what the views of Captain Astley and the crew are, or rather
+were, upon that matter," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, looking about him vaguely. "It is true
+that I can't see any of them, but if they are drowned no doubt it is
+because their period of usefulness in this world had ended."
+
+"Let's get down and look about us," I remarked, being anxious to avoid
+further argument.
+
+So we scrambled from the remnant of the ship, like Noah descending out
+of the ark, as Bastin said, on to the beach beneath, where Tommy rushed
+to and fro, gambolling for joy. Here we discovered a path which ran
+diagonally up the side of a cliff which was nowhere more than fifty or
+sixty feet in height, and possibly had once formed the shore of this
+land, or perhaps that of a lake. Up this path we went, following the
+tracks of many human feet, and reaching the crest of the cliff, looked
+about us, basking as we did so in the beautiful morning sun, for the sky
+was now clear of clouds and with that last awful effort, which destroyed
+our ship, the cyclone had passed away.
+
+We were standing on a plain down which ran a little stream of good water
+whereof Tommy drank greedily, we following his example. To the right and
+left of this plain, further than we could see, stretched bushland over
+which towered many palms, rather ragged now because of the lashing of
+the gale. Looking inland we perceived that the ground sloped gently
+downwards, ending at a distance of some miles in a large lake. Far out
+in this lake something like the top of a mountain of a brown colour
+rose above the water, and on the edge of it was what from that distance
+appeared to be a tumbled ruin.
+
+"This is all very interesting," I said to Bickley. "What do you make of
+it?"
+
+"I don't quite know. At first sight I should say that we are standing on
+the lip of a crater of some vast extinct volcano. Look how it curves to
+north and south and at the slope running down to the lake."
+
+I nodded.
+
+"Lucky that the tidal wave did not get over the cliff," I said. "If it
+had the people here would have all been drowned out. I wonder where they
+have gone?"
+
+As I spoke Bastin pointed to the edge of the bush some hundreds of yards
+away, where we perceived brown figures slipping about among the trees. I
+suggested that we should go back to the mouth of our path, so as to have
+a line of retreat open in case of necessity, and await events. So we did
+and there stood still. By degrees the brown figures emerged on to the
+plain to the number of some hundreds, and we saw that they were both
+male and female. The women were clothed in nothing except flowers and a
+little girdle; the men were all armed with wooden weapons and also wore
+a girdle but no flowers. The children, of whom there were many, were
+quite naked.
+
+Among these people we observed a tall person clothed in what seemed to
+be a magnificent feather cloak, and, walking around and about him, a
+number of grotesque forms adorned with hideous masks and basket-like
+head-dresses that were surmounted by plumes.
+
+"The king or chief and his priests or medicine-men! This is splendid,"
+said Bickley triumphantly.
+
+Bastin also contemplated them with enthusiasm as raw material upon which
+he hoped to get to work.
+
+By degrees and very cautiously they approached us. To our joy, we
+perceived that behind them walked several young women who bore wooden
+trays of food or fruit.
+
+"That looks well," I said. "They would not make offerings unless they
+were friendly."
+
+"The food may be poisoned," remarked Bickley suspiciously.
+
+The crowd advanced, we standing quite still looking as dignified as we
+could, I as the tallest in the middle, with Tommy sitting at my feet.
+When they were about five and twenty yards away, however, that wretched
+little dog caught sight of the masked priests. He growled and then
+rushed at them barking, his long black ears flapping as he went.
+
+The effect was instantaneous. One and all they turned and fled
+precipitately, who evidently had never before seen a dog and looked
+upon it as a deadly creature. Yes, even the tall chief and his masked
+medicine-men fled like hares pursued by Tommy, who bit one of them in
+the leg, evoking a terrific howl. I called him back and took him into
+my arms. Seeing that he was safe for a while the crowd reformed and once
+again advanced.
+
+As they came we noted that they were a wonderfully handsome people, tall
+and straight with regularly shaped features and nothing of the negro
+about them. Some of the young women might even be called beautiful,
+though those who were elderly had become corpulent. The feather-clothed
+chief, however, was much disfigured by a huge growth with a narrow stalk
+to it that hung from his neck and rested on his shoulder.
+
+"I'll have that off him before he is a week older," said Bickley,
+surveying this deformity with great professional interest.
+
+On they came, the girls with the platters walking ahead. On one of these
+were what looked like joints of baked pork, on another some plantains
+and pear-shaped fruits. They knelt down and offered these to us. We
+contemplated them for a while. Then Bickley shook his head and began
+to rub his stomach with appropriate contortions. Clearly they were
+quick-minded enough for they saw the point. At some words the girls
+brought the platters to the chief and others, who took from them
+portions of the food at hazard and ate them to show that it was not
+poisoned, we watching their throats the while to make sure that it was
+swallowed. Then they returned again and we took some of the food though
+only Bickley ate, because, as I pointed out to him, being a doctor who
+understood the use of antidotes; clearly he should make the experiment.
+However, nothing happened; indeed he said that it was very good.
+
+After this there came a pause. Then suddenly Bastin took up his parable
+in the Polynesian tongue which--to a certain extent--he had acquired
+with so much pains.
+
+"What is this place called?" he asked slowly and distinctly, pausing
+between each word.
+
+His audience shook their heads and he tried again, putting the accents
+on different syllables. Behold! some bright spirit understood him and
+answered:
+
+"Orofena."
+
+"That means a hill, or an island, or a hill in an island," whispered
+Bickley to me.
+
+"Who is your God?" asked Bastin again.
+
+The point seemed one upon which they were a little doubtful, but at last
+the chief answered, "Oro. He who fights."
+
+"In other words, Mars," said Bickley.
+
+"I will give you a better one," said Bastin in the same slow fashion.
+
+Thinking that he referred to himself these children of Nature
+contemplated his angular form doubtfully and shook their heads. Then for
+the first time one of the men who was wearing a mask and a wicker crate
+on his head, spoke in a hollow voice, saying:
+
+"If you try Oro will eat you up."
+
+"Head priest!" said Bickley, nudging me. "Old Bastin had better be
+careful or he will get his teeth into him and call them Oro's."
+
+Another pause, after which the man in a feather cloak with the growth on
+his neck that a servant was supporting, said:
+
+"I am Marama, the chief of Orofena. We have never seen men like you
+before, if you are men. What brought you here and with you that fierce
+and terrible animal, or evil spirit which makes a noise and bites?"
+
+Now Bickley pretended to consult me who stood brooding and majestic,
+that is if I can be majestic. I whispered something and he answered:
+
+"The gods of the wind and the sea."
+
+"What nonsense," ejaculated Bastin, "there are no such things."
+
+"Shut up," I said, "we must use similes here," to which he replied:
+
+"I don't like similes that tamper with the truth."
+
+"Remember Neptune and Aeolus," I suggested, and he lapsed into
+consideration of the point.
+
+"We knew that you were coming," said Marama. "Our doctors told us all
+about you a moon ago. But we wish that you would come more gently, as
+you nearly washed away our country."
+
+After looking at me Bickley replied:
+
+"How thankful should you be that in our kindness we have spared you."
+
+"What do you come to do?" inquired Marama again. After the usual formula
+of consulting me Bickley answered:
+
+"We come to take that mountain (he meant lump) off your neck and make
+you beautiful; also to cure all the sickness among your people."
+
+"And I come," broke in Bastin, "to give you new hearts."
+
+These announcements evidently caused great excitement. After
+consultation Marama answered:
+
+"We do not want new hearts as the old ones are good, but we wish to be
+rid of lumps and sicknesses. If you can do this we will make you gods
+and worship you and give you many wives." (Here Bastin held up his hands
+in horror.) "When will you begin to take away the lumps?"
+
+"To-morrow," said Bickley. "But learn that if you try to harm us we will
+bring another wave which will drown all your country."
+
+Nobody seemed to doubt our capacities in this direction, but one
+inquiring spirit in a wicker crate did ask how it came about that if we
+controlled the ocean we had arrived in half a canoe instead of a whole
+one.
+
+Bickley replied to the effect that it was because the gods always
+travelled in half-canoes to show their higher nature, which seemed to
+satisfy everyone. Then we announced that we had seen enough of them for
+that day and would retire to think. Meanwhile we should be obliged if
+they would build us a house and keep us supplied with whatever food they
+had.
+
+"Do the gods eat?" asked the sceptic again.
+
+"That fellow is a confounded radical," I whispered to Bickley. "Tell him
+that they do when they come to Orofena."
+
+He did so, whereon the chief said:
+
+"Would the gods like a nice young girl cooked?"
+
+At this point Bastin retired down the path, realising that he had to do
+with cannibals. We said that we preferred to look at the girls alive and
+would meet them again to-morrow morning, when we hoped that the house
+would be ready.
+
+So our first interview with the inhabitants of Orofena came to an end,
+on which we congratulated ourselves.
+
+
+On reaching the remains of the Star of the South we set to work to take
+stock of what was left to us. Fortunately it proved to be a very great
+deal. As I think I mentioned, all the passenger part of the yacht lay
+forward of the bridge, just in front of which the vessel had been broken
+in two, almost as cleanly as though she were severed by a gigantic
+knife. Further our stores were forward and practically everything else
+that belonged to us, even down to Bickley's instruments and medicines
+and Bastin's religious works, to say nothing of a great quantity of
+tinned food and groceries. Lastly on the deck above the saloon had
+stood two large lifeboats. Although these were amply secured at the
+commencement of the gale one of them, that on the port side, was smashed
+to smithers; probably some spar had fallen upon it. The starboard
+boat, however, remained intact and so far as we could judge, seaworthy,
+although the bulwarks were broken by the waves.
+
+"There's something we can get away in if necessary," I said.
+
+"Where to?" remarked Bastin. "We don't know where we are or if there is
+any other land within a thousand miles. I think we had better stop here
+as Providence seems to have intended, especially when there is so much
+work to my hand."
+
+"Be careful," answered Bickley, "that the work to your hand does not end
+in the cutting of all our throats. It is an awkward thing interfering
+with the religion of savages, and I believe that these untutored
+children of Nature sometimes eat missionaries."
+
+"Yes, I have heard that," said Bastin; "they bake them first as they do
+pigs. But I don't know that they would care to eat me," and he glanced
+at his bony limbs, "especially when you are much plumper. Anyhow one
+can't stop for a risk of that sort."
+
+Deigning no reply, Bickley walked away to fetch some fine fish which
+had been washed up by the tidal wave and were still flapping about in
+a little pool of salt water. Then we took counsel as to how to make the
+best of our circumstances, and as a result set to work to tidy up the
+saloon and cabins, which was not difficult as what remained of the ship
+lay on an even keel. Also we got out some necessary stores, including
+paraffin for the swinging lamps with which the ship was fitted in case
+of accident to the electric light, candles, and the guns we had brought
+with us so that they might be handy in the event of attack. This done,
+by the aid of the tools that were in the storerooms, Bickley, who was an
+excellent carpenter, repaired the saloon door, all that was necessary to
+keep us private, as the bulkhead still remained.
+
+"Now," he said triumphantly when he had finished and got the lock and
+bolts to work to his satisfaction, "we can stand a siege if needed, for
+as the ship is iron built they can't even burn us out and that teak door
+would take some forcing. Also we can shore it up."
+
+"How about something to eat? I want my tea," said Bastin.
+
+"Then, my reverend friend," replied Bickley, "take a couple of the fire
+buckets and fetch some water from the stream. Also collect driftwood of
+which there is plenty about, clean those fish and grill them over the
+saloon stove."
+
+"I'll try," said Bastin, "but I never did any cooking before."
+
+"No," replied Bickley, "on second thoughts I will see to that myself,
+but you can get the fish ready."
+
+So, with due precautions, Bastin and I fetched water from the stream
+which we found flowed over the edge of the cliff quite close at hand
+into a beautiful coral basin that might have been designed for a bath of
+the nymphs. Indeed one at a time, while the other watched, we undressed
+and plunged into it, and never was a tub more welcome than after our
+long days of tempest. Then we returned to find that Bickley had already
+set the table and was engaged in frying the fish very skilfully on the
+saloon stove, which proved to be well adapted to the purpose. He was
+cross, however, when he found that we had bathed and that it was now too
+late for him to do likewise.
+
+While he was cleaning himself as well as he could in his cabin basin and
+Bastin was boiling water for tea, suddenly I remembered the letter from
+the Danish mate Jacobsen. Concluding that it might now be opened as we
+had certainly parted with most of the Star of the South for the last
+time, I read it. It was as follows:
+
+
+"The reason, honoured Sir, that I am leaving the ship is that on the
+night I tore up the paper, the spirit controlling the planchette wrote
+these words: 'After leaving Samoa the Star of the South will be wrecked
+in a hurricane and everybody on board drowned except A. B. and B. Get
+out of her! Get out of her! Don't be a fool, Jacob, unless you want to
+come over here at once. Take our advice and get out of her and you will
+live to be old.--SKOLL."
+
+
+"Sir, I am not a coward but I know that this will happen, for that
+spirit which signs itself Skoll never tells a lie. I did try to give
+the captain a hint to stop at Apia, but he had been drinking and openly
+cursed me and called me a sneaking cheat. So I am going to run away,
+of which I am very much ashamed. But I do not wish to be drowned yet as
+there is a girl whom I want to marry, and my mother I support. You will
+be safe and I hope you will not think too badly of me.--JACOB JACOBSEN.
+
+"P.S.--It is an awful thing to know the future. Never try to learn
+that."
+
+
+I gave this letter to Bastin and Bickley to read and asked them what
+they thought of it.
+
+"Coincidence," said Bickley. "The man is a weak-minded idiot and heard
+in Samoa that they expected a hurricane."
+
+"I think," chimed in Bastin, "that the devil knows how to look after his
+own at any rate for a little while. I dare say it would have been much
+better for him to be drowned."
+
+"At least he is a deserter and failed in his duty. I never wish to hear
+of him again," I said.
+
+As a matter of fact I never have. But the incident remains quite
+unexplained either by Bickley or Bastin.
+
+
+
+Chapter VII. The Orofenans
+
+
+To our shame we had a very pleasant supper that night off the grilled
+fish, which was excellent, and some tinned meat. I say to our shame, in
+a sense, for on our companions the sharks were supping and by rights we
+should have been sunk in woe. I suppose that the sense of our own escape
+intoxicated us. Also, notwithstanding his joviality, none of us had
+cared much for the captain, and his policy had been to keep us somewhat
+apart from the crew, of whom therefore we knew but little. It is true
+that Bastin held services on Sundays, for such as would attend, and
+Bickley had doctored a few of them for minor ailments, but there, except
+for a little casual conversation, our intercourse began and ended.
+
+Now the sad fact is that it is hard to be overwhelmed with grief for
+those with whom we are not intimate. We were very sorry and that is all
+that can be said, except that Bastin, being High Church, announced in
+a matter-of-fact way that he meant to put up some petitions for the
+welfare of their souls. To this Bickley retorted that from what he had
+seen of their bodies he was sure they needed them.
+
+Yes, it was a pleasant supper, not made less so by a bottle of champagne
+which Bickley and I shared. Bastin stuck to his tea, not because he did
+not like champagne, but because, as he explained, having now come
+in contact with the heathen it would never do for him to set them an
+example in the use of spirituous liquors.
+
+"However much we may differ, Bastin, I respect you for that sentiment,"
+commented Bickley.
+
+"I don't know why you should," answered Bastin; "but if so, you might
+follow my example."
+
+That night we slept like logs, trusting to our teak door which we
+barricaded, and to Tommy, who was a most excellent watch-dog, to guard
+us against surprise. At any rate we took the risk. As a matter of fact,
+nothing happened, though before dawn Tommy did growl a good deal, for
+I heard him, but as he sank into slumber again on my bed, I did not get
+up. In the morning I found from fresh footprints that two or three men
+had been prowling about the ship, though at a little distance.
+
+We rose early, and taking the necessary precautions, bathed in the pool.
+Then we breakfasted, and having filled every available receptacle with
+water, which took us a long time as these included a large tank that
+supplied the bath, so that we might have at least a week's supply in
+case of siege, we went on deck and debated what we should do. In the
+end we determined to stop where we were and await events, because, as
+I pointed out, it was necessary that we should discover whether these
+natives were hostile or friendly. In the former event we could hold our
+own on the ship, whereas away from it we must be overwhelmed; in the
+latter there was always time to move inland.
+
+About ten o'clock when we were seated on stools smoking, with our guns
+by our side--for here, owing to the overhanging cliff in which it will
+be remembered the prow of the ship was buried, we could not be reached
+by missiles thrown from above--we saw numbers of the islanders advancing
+upon us along the beach on either side. They were preceded as before
+by women who bore food on platters and in baskets. These people,
+all talking excitedly and laughing after their fashion, stopped at a
+distance, so we took no notice of them. Presently Marama, clad in
+his feather cloak, and again accompanied by priests or medicine-men,
+appeared walking down the path on the cliff face, and, standing below,
+made salutations and entered into a conversation with us of which I give
+the substance--that is, so far as we could understand it.
+
+He reproached us for not having come to him as he expected we would do.
+We replied that we preferred to remain where we were until we were sure
+of our greeting and asked him what was the position. He explained that
+only once before, in the time of his grandfather, had any people reached
+their shores, also during a great storm as we had done. They were
+dark-skinned men like themselves, three of them, but whence they came
+was never known, since they were at once seized and sacrificed to the
+god Oro, which was the right thing to do in such a case.
+
+We asked whether he would consider it right to sacrifice us. He replied:
+
+Certainly, unless we were too strong, being gods ourselves, or unless an
+arrangement could be concluded. We asked--what arrangement? He replied
+that we must make them gifts; also that we must do what we had promised
+and cure him--the chief--of the disease which had tormented him for
+years. In that event everything would be at our disposal and we, with
+all our belongings, should become taboo, holy, not to be touched. None
+would attempt to harm us, nothing should be stolen under penalty of
+death.
+
+We asked him to come up on the deck with only one companion that his
+sickness might be ascertained, and after much hesitation he consented to
+do so. Bickley made an examination of the growth and announced that he
+believed it could be removed with perfect safety as the attachment to
+the neck was very slight, but of course there was always a risk. This
+was explained to him with difficulty, and much talk followed between
+him and his followers who gathered on the beach beneath the ship. They
+seemed adverse to the experiment, till Marama grew furious with them
+and at last burst into tears saying that he could no longer drag this
+terrible burden about with him, and he touched the growth. He would
+rather die. Then they gave way.
+
+I will tell the rest as shortly as I can.
+
+A hideous wooden idol was brought on board, wrapped in leaves and
+feathers, and upon it the chief and his head people swore safety to
+us whether he lived or died, making us the guests of their land. There
+were, however, two provisos made, or as such we understood them. These
+seemed to be that we should offer no insult or injury to their god, and
+secondly, that we should not set foot on the island in the lake. It was
+not till afterwards that it occurred to me that this must refer to
+the mountain top which appeared in the inland sheet of water. To those
+stipulations we made no answer. Indeed, the Orofenans did all the
+talking. Finally, they ratified their oaths by a man who, I suppose, was
+a head priest, cutting his arm and rubbing the blood from it on the lips
+of the idol; also upon those of the chief. I should add that Bastin had
+retired as soon as he saw that false god appear, of which I was glad,
+since I felt sure that he would make a scene.
+
+The operation took place that afternoon and on the ship, for when once
+Marama had made up his mind to trust us he did so very thoroughly. It
+was performed on deck in the presence of an awed multitude who watched
+from the shore, and when they saw Bickley appear in a clean nightshirt
+and wash his hands, uttered a groan of wonder. Evidently they considered
+it a magical and religious ceremony; indeed ever afterwards they called
+Bickley the Great Priest, or sometimes the Great Healer in later days.
+This was a grievance to Bastin who considered that he had been robbed
+of his proper title, especially when he learned that among themselves he
+was only known as "the Bellower," because of the loud voice in which he
+addressed them. Nor did Bickley particularly appreciate the compliment.
+
+With my help he administered the chloroform, which was done under
+shelter of a sail for fear lest the people should think that we were
+smothering their chief. Then the operation went on to a satisfactory
+conclusion. I omit the details, but an electric battery and a red-hot
+wire came into play.
+
+"There," said Bickley triumphantly when he had finished tying the
+vessels and made everything neat and tidy with bandages, "I was afraid
+he might bleed to death, but I don't think there is any fear of that
+now, for I have made a real job of it." Then advancing with the horrid
+tumour in his hands he showed it in triumph to the crowd beneath, who
+groaned again and threw themselves on to their faces. Doubtless now it
+is the most sacred relic of Orofena.
+
+When Marama came out of the anesthetic, Bickley gave him something which
+sent him to sleep for twelve hours, during all which time his people
+waited beneath. This was our dangerous period, for our difficulty was
+to persuade them that he was not dead, although Bickley had assured them
+that he would sleep for a time while the magic worked. Still, I was very
+glad when he woke up on the following morning, and two or three of
+his leading men could see that he was alive. The rest was lengthy but
+simple, consisting merely in keeping him quiet and on a suitable diet
+until there was no fear of the wound opening. We achieved it somehow
+with the help of an intelligent native woman who, I suppose, was one
+of his wives, and five days later were enabled to present him healed,
+though rather tottery, to his affectionate subjects.
+
+It was a great scene, which may be imagined. They bore him away in a
+litter with the native woman to watch him and another to carry the relic
+preserved in a basket, and us they acclaimed as gods. Thenceforward we
+had nothing to fear in Orofena--except Bastin, though this we did not
+know at the time.
+
+All this while we had been living on our ship and growing very bored
+there, although we employed the empty hours in conversation with
+selected natives, thereby improving our knowledge of the language.
+Bickley had the best of it, since already patients began to arrive which
+occupied him. One of the first was that man whom Tommy had bitten. He
+was carried to us in an almost comatose state, suffering apparently from
+the symptoms of snake poisoning.
+
+Afterward it turned out that he conceived Tommy to be a divine but most
+venomous lizard that could make a very horrible noise, and began to
+suffer as one might do from the bite of such a creature. Nothing that
+Bickley could do was enough to save him and ultimately he died in
+convulsions, a circumstance that enormously enhanced Tommy's reputation.
+To tell the truth, we took advantage of it to explain that Tommy was
+in fact a supernatural animal, a sort of tame demon which only harmed
+people who had malevolent intentions towards those he served or who
+tried to steal any of their possessions or to intrude upon them at
+inconvenient hours, especially in the dark. So terrible was he, indeed,
+that even the skill of the Great Priest, i.e., Bickley, could not avail
+to save any whom once he had bitten in his rage. Even to be barked at by
+him was dangerous and conveyed a curse that might last for generations.
+
+All this we set out when Bastin was not there. He had wandered off,
+as he said, to look for shells, but as we knew, to practise religious
+orations in the Polynesian tongue with the waves for audience, as
+Demosthenes is said to have done to perfect himself as a political
+orator. Personally I admit that I relied more on the terrors of Tommy to
+safeguard us from theft and other troubles than I did upon those of the
+native taboo and the priestly oaths.
+
+The end of it all was that we left our ship, having padlocked up the
+door (the padlock, we explained, was a magical instrument that bit worse
+than Tommy), and moved inland in a kind of triumphal procession,
+priests and singers going before (the Orofenans sang extremely well) and
+minstrels following after playing upon instruments like flutes, while
+behind came the bearers carrying such goods as we needed. They took
+us to a beautiful place in a grove of palms on a ridge where grew many
+breadfruit trees, that commanded a view of the ocean upon one side and
+of the lake with the strange brown mountain top on the other. Here in
+the midst of the native gardens we found that a fine house had been
+built for us of a kind of mud brick and thatched with palm leaves,
+surrounded by a fenced courtyard of beaten earth and having wide
+overhanging verandahs; a very comfortable place indeed in that delicious
+climate. In it we took up our abode, visiting the ship occasionally to
+see that all was well there, and awaiting events.
+
+For Bickley these soon began to happen in the shape of an
+ever-increasing stream of patients. The population of the island was
+considerable, anything between five and ten thousand, so far as we
+could judge, and among these of course there were a number of sick.
+Ophthalmia, for instance, was a prevalent disease, as were the growths
+such as Marama had suffered from, to say nothing of surgical cases and
+those resulting from accident or from nervous ailments. With all of
+these Bickley was called upon to deal, which he did with remarkable
+success by help of his books on Tropical Diseases and his ample supplies
+of medical necessaries.
+
+At first he enjoyed it very much, but when we had been established in
+the house for about three weeks he remarked, after putting in a solid
+ten hours of work, that for all the holiday he was getting he might as
+well be back at his old practice, with the difference that there he was
+earning several thousands a year. Just then a poor woman arrived with a
+baby in convulsions to whose necessities he was obliged to sacrifice
+his supper, after which came a man who had fallen from a palm tree and
+broken his leg.
+
+Nor did I escape, since having somehow or other established a reputation
+for wisdom, as soon as I had mastered sufficient of the language, every
+kind of knotty case was laid before me for decision. In short, I
+became a sort of Chief Justice--not an easy office as it involved
+the acquirement of the native law which was intricate and peculiar,
+especially in matrimonial cases.
+
+At these oppressive activities Bastin looked on with a gloomy eye.
+
+"You fellows seem very busy," he said one evening; "but I can find
+nothing to do. They don't seem to want me, and merely to set a good
+example by drinking water or tea while you swallow whisky and their palm
+wine, or whatever it is, is very negative kind of work, especially as I
+am getting tired of planting things in the garden and playing policeman
+round the wreck which nobody goes near. Even Tommy is better off, for at
+least he can bark and hunt rats."
+
+"You see," said Bickley, "we are following our trades. Arbuthnot is a
+lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I may add a general--a
+very general--practitioner and work at medicine in an enormous and
+much-neglected practice. Therefore, you, being a clergyman, should go
+and do likewise. There are some ten thousand people here, but I do not
+observe that as yet you have converted a single one."
+
+Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his usual object
+of what is known as "getting a rise" out of Bastin. Little did he guess
+what he was doing.
+
+Bastin thought a while ponderously, then said:
+
+"It is very strange from what peculiar sources Providence sometimes
+sends inspirations. If wisdom flows from babes and sucklings, why should
+it not do so from the well of agnostics and mockers?"
+
+"There is no reason which I can see," scoffed Bickley, "except that as a
+rule wells do not flow."
+
+"Your jest is ill-timed and I may add foolish," continued Bastin. "What
+I was about to add was that you have given me an idea, as it was no
+doubt intended that you should do. I will, metaphorically speaking, gird
+up my loins and try to bear the light into all this heathen blackness."
+
+"Then it is one of the first you ever had, old fellow. But what's the
+need of girding up your loins in this hot climate?" inquired Bickley
+with innocence. "Pyjamas and that white and green umbrella of yours
+would do just as well."
+
+Bastin vouchsafed no reply and sat for the rest of that evening plunged
+in deep thought.
+
+On the following morning he approached Marama and asked his leave
+to teach the people about the gods. The chief readily granted this,
+thinking, I believe, that he alluded to ourselves, and orders were
+issued accordingly. They were to the effect that Bastin was to be
+allowed to go everywhere unmolested and to talk to whom he would about
+what he would, to which all must listen with respect.
+
+Thus he began his missionary career in Orofena, working at it, good and
+earnest man that he was, in a way that excited even the admiration of
+Bickley. He started a school for children, which was held under a fine,
+spreading tree. These listened well, and being of exceedingly quick
+intellect soon began to pick up the elements of knowledge. But when he
+tried to persuade them to clothe their little naked bodies his failure
+was complete, although after much supplication some of the bigger girls
+did arrive with a chaplet of flowers--round their necks!
+
+Also he preached to the adults, and here again was very successful in
+a way, especially after he became more familiar with the language. They
+listened; to a certain extent they understood; they argued and put to
+poor Bastin the most awful questions such as the whole Bench of Bishops
+could not have answered. Still he did answer them somehow, and they
+politely accepted his interpretation of their theological riddles. I
+observed that he got on best when he was telling them stories out of the
+Old Testament, such as the account of the creation of the world and
+of human beings, also of the Deluge, etc. Indeed one of their elders
+said--Yes, this was quite true. They had heard it all before from
+their fathers, and that once the Deluge had taken place round Orofena,
+swallowing up great countries, but sparing them because they were so
+good.
+
+Bastin, surprised, asked them who had caused the deluge. They replied,
+Oro which was the name of their god, Oro who dwelt yonder on the
+mountain in the lake, and whose representation they worshipped in
+idols. He said that God dwelt in Heaven, to which they replied with calm
+certainty:
+
+"No, no, he dwells on the mountain in the lake," which was why they
+never dared to approach that mountain.
+
+Indeed it was only by giving the name Oro to the Divinity and admitting
+that He might dwell in the mountain as well as everywhere else, that
+Bastin was able to make progress. Having conceded this, not without
+scruples, however, he did make considerable progress, so much, in fact,
+that I perceived that the priests of Oro were beginning to grow very
+jealous of him and of his increasing authority with the people. Bastin
+was naturally triumphant, and even exclaimed exultingly that within a
+year he would have half of the population baptised.
+
+"Within a year, my dear fellow," said Bickley, "you will have your
+throat cut as a sacrifice, and probably ours also. It is a pity, too,
+as within that time I should have stamped out ophthalmia and some other
+diseases in the island."
+
+Here, leaving Bastin and his good work aside for a while, I will say
+a little about the country. From information which I gathered on some
+journeys that I made and by inquiries from the chief Marama, who had
+become devoted to us, I found that Orofena was quite a large place. In
+shape the island was circular, a broad band of territory surrounding the
+great lake of which I have spoken, that in its turn surrounded a smaller
+island from which rose the mountain top. No other land was known to
+be near the shores of Orofena, which had never been visited by anyone
+except the strangers a hundred years ago or so, who were sacrificed and
+eaten. Most of the island was covered with forest which the inhabitants
+lacked the energy, and indeed had no tools, to fell. They were an
+extremely lazy people and would only cultivate enough bananas and other
+food to satisfy their immediate needs. In truth they lived mostly upon
+breadfruit and other products of the wild trees.
+
+Thus it came about that in years of scarcity through drought or climatic
+causes, which prevented the forest trees from bearing, they suffered
+very much from hunger. In such years hundreds of them would perish
+and the remainder resorted to the dreadful expedient of cannibalism.
+Sometimes, too, the shoals of fish avoided their shores, reducing them
+to great misery. Their only domestic animal was the pig which roamed
+about half wild and in no great numbers, for they had never taken the
+trouble to breed it in captivity. Their resources, therefore,
+were limited, which accounted for the comparative smallness of the
+population, further reduced as it was by a wicked habit of infanticide
+practised in order to lighten the burden of bringing up children.
+
+They had no traditions as to how they reached this land, their belief
+being that they had always been there but that their forefathers were
+much greater than they. They were poetical, and sang songs in a language
+which themselves they could not understand; they said that it was the
+tongue their forefathers had spoken. Also they had several strange
+customs of which they did not know the origin. My own opinion, which
+Bickley shared, was that they were in fact a shrunken and deteriorated
+remnant of some high race now coming to its end through age and
+inter-breeding. About them indeed, notwithstanding their primitive
+savagery which in its qualities much resembled that of other
+Polynesians, there was a very curious air of antiquity. One felt that
+they had known the older world and its mysteries, though now both
+were forgotten. Also their language, which in time we came to speak
+perfectly, was copious, musical, and expressive in its idioms.
+
+One circumstance I must mention. In walking about the country I observed
+all over it enormous holes, some of them measuring as much as a hundred
+yards across, with a depth of fifty feet or more, and this not on
+alluvial lands although there traces of them existed also, but in solid
+rock. What this rock was I do not know as none of us were geologists,
+but it seemed to me to partake of the nature of granite. Certainly
+it was not coral like that on and about the coast, but of a primeval
+formation.
+
+When I asked Marama what caused these holes, he only shrugged his
+shoulders and said he did not know, but their fathers had declared that
+they were made by stones falling from heaven. This, of course, suggested
+meteorites to my mind. I submitted the idea to Bickley, who, in one of
+his rare intervals of leisure, came with me to make an examination.
+
+"If they were meteorites," he said, "of which a shower struck the earth
+in some past geological age, all life must have been destroyed by them
+and their remains ought to exist at the bottom of the holes. To me they
+look more like the effect of high explosives, but that, of course,
+is impossible, though I don't know what else could have caused such
+craters."
+
+Then he went back to his work, for nothing that had to do with antiquity
+interested Bickley very much. The present and its problems were enough
+for him, he would say, who neither had lived in the past nor expected to
+have any share in the future.
+
+As I remained curious I made an opportunity to scramble to the bottom
+of one of these craters, taking with me some of the natives with their
+wooden tools. Here I found a good deal of soil either washed down from
+the surface or resulting from the decomposition of the rock, though
+oddly enough in it nothing grew. I directed them to dig. After a while
+to my astonishment there appeared a corner of a great worked stone
+quite unlike that of the crater, indeed it seemed to me to be a marble.
+Further examination showed that this block was most beautifully carved
+in bas-relief, apparently with a design of leaves and flowers. In the
+disturbed soil also I picked up a life-sized marble hand of a woman
+exquisitely finished and apparently broken from a statue that might
+have been the work of one of the great Greek sculptors. Moreover, on
+the third finger of this hand was a representation of a ring whereof,
+unfortunately, the bezel had been destroyed.
+
+I put the hand in my pocket, but as darkness was coming on, I could not
+pursue the research and disinter the block. When I wished to return the
+next day, I was informed politely by Marama that it would not be safe
+for me to do so as the priests of Oro declared that if I sought to
+meddle with the "buried things the god would grow angry and bring
+disaster on me."
+
+When I persisted he said that at least I must go alone since no native
+would accompany me, and added earnestly that he prayed me not to go. So
+to my great regret and disappointment I was obliged to give up the idea.
+
+
+
+Chapter VIII. Bastin Attempts the Martyr's Crown
+
+
+That carved stone and the marble hand took a great hold of my
+imagination. What did they mean? How could they have come to the bottom
+of that hole, unless indeed they were part of some building and its
+ornaments which had been destroyed in the neighbourhood? The stone of
+which we had only uncovered a corner seemed far too big to have been
+carried there from any ship; it must have weighed several tons. Besides,
+ships do not carry such things about the world, and none had visited
+this island during the last two centuries at any rate, or local
+tradition would have recorded so wonderful a fact. Were there, then,
+once edifices covered with elegant carving standing on this place, and
+were they adorned with lovely statues that would not have disgraced
+the best period of Greek art? The thing was incredible except on the
+supposition that these were relics of an utterly lost civilisation.
+
+Bickley was as much puzzled as myself. All he could say was that the
+world was infinitely old and many things might have happened in it
+whereof we had no record. Even Bastin was excited for a little while,
+but as his imagination was represented by zero, all he could say was:
+
+"I suppose someone left them there, and anyhow it doesn't matter much,
+does it?"
+
+But I, who have certain leanings towards the ancient and mysterious,
+could not be put off in this fashion. I remembered that unapproachable
+mountain in the midst of the lake and that on it appeared to be
+something which looked like ruins as seen from the top of the cliff
+through glasses. At any rate this was a point, that I might clear up.
+
+Saying nothing to anybody, one morning I slipped away and walked to the
+edge of the lake, a distance of five or six miles over rough country.
+Having arrived there I perceived that the cone-shaped mountain in the
+centre, which was about a mile from the lake shore, was much larger than
+I had thought, quite three hundred feet high indeed, and with a
+very large circumference. Further, its sides evidently once had been
+terraced, and it was on one of these broad terraces, half-way up and
+facing towards the rising sun, that the ruin-like remains were heaped.
+I examined them through my glasses. Undoubtedly it was a cyclopean
+ruin built of great blocks of coloured stone which seemed to have been
+shattered by earthquake or explosion. There were the pillars of a mighty
+gateway and the remains of walls.
+
+I trembled with excitement as I stared and stared. Could I not get to
+the place and see for myself? I observed that from the flat bush-clad
+land at the foot of the mountain, ran out what seemed to be the residue
+of a stone pier which ended in a large table-topped rock between two
+and three hundred feet across. But even this was too far to reach by
+swimming, besides for aught I knew there might be alligators in that
+lake. I walked up and down its borders, till presently I came to a path
+which led into a patch of some variety of cotton palm.
+
+Following this path I discovered a boat-house thatched over with palm
+leaves. Inside it were two good canoes with their paddles, floating and
+tied to the stumps of trees by fibre ropes. Instantly I made up my mind
+that I would paddle to the island and investigate. Just as I was about
+to step into one of the canoes the light was cut off. Looking up I saw
+that a man was crouching in the door-place of the boat-house in order to
+enter, and paused guiltily.
+
+"Friend-from-the-Sea" (that was the name that these islanders had given
+to me), said the voice of Marama, "say--what are you doing here?"
+
+"I am about to take a row on the lake, Chief," I answered carelessly.
+
+"Indeed, Friend. Have we then treated you so badly that you are tired of
+life?"
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked.
+
+"Come out into the sunlight, Friend, and I will explain to you."
+
+I hesitated till I saw Marama lifting the heavy wooden spear he carried
+and remembered that I was unarmed. Then I came out.
+
+"What does all this mean, Chief?" I asked angrily when we were clear of
+the patch of cotton palm.
+
+"I mean, Friend, that you have been very near to making a longer journey
+than you thought. Have patience now and listen to me. I saw you leaving
+the village this morning and followed, suspecting your purpose. Yes,
+I followed alone, saying nothing to the priests of Oro who fortunately
+were away watching the Bellower for their own reasons. I saw you
+searching out the secrets of the mountain with those magic tubes that
+make things big that are small, and things that are far off come near,
+and I followed you to the canoes."
+
+"All that is plain enough, Marama. But why?"
+
+"Have I not told you, Friend-from-the-Sea, that yonder hill which is
+called Orofena, whence this island takes its name, is sacred?"
+
+"You said so, but what of it?"
+
+"This: to set foot thereon is to die and, I suppose, great as you are,
+you, too, can die like others. At least, although I love you, had you
+not come away from that canoe I was about to discover whether this is
+so."
+
+"Then for what are the canoes used?" I asked with irritation.
+
+"You see that flat rock, Friend, with the hole beyond, which is the
+mouth of a cave that appeared only in the great storm that brought you
+to our land? They are used to convey offerings which are laid upon the
+rock. Beyond it no man may go, and since the beginning no man has ever
+gone."
+
+"Offerings to whom?"
+
+"To the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead who live there."
+
+"Oromatuas? Oro! It is always something to do with Oro. Who and what is
+Oro?"
+
+"Oro is a god, Friend, though it is true that the priests say that above
+him there is a greater god called Degai, the Creator, the Fate who made
+all things and directs all things."
+
+"Very well, but why do you suppose that Oro, the servant of Degai, lives
+in that mountain? I thought that he lived in a grove yonder where your
+priests, as I am told, have an image of him."
+
+"I do not know, Friend-from-the-Sea, but so it has been held from the
+beginning. The image in the grove is only visited by his spirit from
+time to time. Now, I pray you, come back and before the priests discover
+that you have been here, and forget that there are any canoes upon this
+lake."
+
+So, thinking it wisest, I turned the matter with a laugh and walked
+away with him to the village. On our road I tried to extract some more
+information but without success. He did not know who built the ruin upon
+the mountain, or who destroyed it. He did not know how the terraces
+came there. All he knew was that during the convulsion of Nature which
+resulted in the tidal wave that had thrown our ship upon the island,
+the mountain had been seen to quiver like a tree in the wind as though
+within it great forces were at work. Then it was observed to have risen
+a good many more feet above the surface of the lake, as might be noted
+by the water mark upon the shore, and then also the mouth of the cave
+had appeared. The priests said that all this was because the Oromatuas
+who dwelt there were stirring, which portended great things. Indeed
+great things had happened--for had we not arrived in their land?
+
+I thanked him for what he had told me, and, as there was nothing more
+to be learned, dropped the subject which was never mentioned between us
+again, at least not for a long while. But in my heart I determined that
+I would reach that mountain even though to do so I must risk my life.
+Something seemed to call me to the place; it was as though I were being
+drawn by a magnet.
+
+As it happened, before so very long I did go to the mountain, not of
+my own will but because I was obliged. It came about thus. One night I
+asked Bastin how he was getting on with his missionary work. He replied:
+Very well indeed, but there was one great obstacle in his path, the idol
+in the Grove. Were it not for this accursed image he believed that the
+whole island would become Christian. I asked him to be more plain.
+He explained that all his work was thwarted by this idol, since his
+converts declared that they did not dare to be baptised while it sat
+there in the Grove. If they did, the spirit that was in it would bewitch
+them and perhaps steal out at night and murder them.
+
+"The spirit being our friends the sorcerers," I suggested.
+
+"That's it, Arbuthnot. Do you know, I believe those devilish men
+sometimes offer human sacrifices to this satanic fetish, when there is a
+drought or anything of that sort."
+
+"I can quite believe it," I answered, "but as they will scarcely remove
+their god and with it their own livelihood and authority, I am afraid
+that as we don't want to be sacrificed, there is nothing to be done."
+
+At this moment I was called away. As I went I heard Bastin muttering
+something about martyrs, but paid no attention. Little did I guess
+what was going on in his pious but obstinate mind. In effect it was
+this--that if no one else would remove that idol he was quite ready to
+do it himself.
+
+However, he was very cunning over that business, almost Jesuitical
+indeed. Not one word did he breathe of his dark plans to me, and still
+less to Bickley. He just went on with his teaching, lamenting from time
+to time the stumbling-block of the idol and expressing wonder as to how
+it might be circumvented by a change in the hearts of the islanders, or
+otherwise. Sad as it is to record, in fact, dear old Bastin went as near
+to telling a fib in connection with this matter as I suppose he had ever
+done in his life. It happened thus. One day Bickley's sharp eye caught
+sight of Bastin walking about with what looked like a bottle of whisky
+in his pocket.
+
+"Hallo, old fellow," he said, "has the self-denying ordinance broken
+down? I didn't know that you took pegs on the sly," and he pointed to
+the bottle.
+
+"If you are insinuating, Bickley, that I absorb spirits surreptitiously,
+you are more mistaken than usual, which is saying a good deal. This
+bottle contains, not Scotch whisky but paraffin, although I admit
+that its label may have misled you, unintentionally, so far as I am
+concerned."
+
+"What are you going to do with the paraffin?" asked Bickley.
+
+Bastin coloured through his tan and replied awkwardly:
+
+"Paraffin is very good to keep away mosquitoes if one can stand the
+smell of it upon one's skin. Not that I have brought it here with that
+sole object. The truth is that I am anxious to experiment with a lamp of
+my own design made--um--of native wood," and he departed in a hurry.
+
+"When next old Bastin wants to tell a lie," commented Bickley, "he
+should make up his mind as to what it is to be, and stick to it. I
+wonder what he is after with that paraffin? Not going to dose any of
+my patients with it, I hope. He was arguing the other day that it is a
+great remedy taken internally, being quite unaware that the lamp variety
+is not used for that purpose."
+
+"Perhaps he means to swallow some himself, just to show that he is
+right," I suggested.
+
+"The stomach-pump is at hand," said Bickley, and the matter dropped.
+
+Next morning I got up before it was light. Having some elementary
+knowledge of the main facts of astronomy, which remained with me from
+boyhood when I had attended lectures on the subject, which I had tried
+to refresh by help of an encyclopedia I had brought from the ship,
+I wished to attempt to obtain an idea of our position by help of the
+stars. In this endeavour, I may say, I failed absolutely, as I did not
+know how to take a stellar or any other observation.
+
+On my way out of our native house I observed, by the lantern I carried,
+that the compartment of it occupied by Bastin was empty, and wondered
+whither he had gone at that hour. On arriving at my observation-post, a
+rocky eminence on open ground, where, with Tommy at my side, I took my
+seat with a telescope, I was astonished to see or rather to hear a great
+number of the natives walking past the base of the mound towards the
+bush. Then I remembered that some one, Marama, I think, had informed me
+that there was to be a great sacrifice to Oro at dawn on that day. After
+this I thought no more of the matter but occupied myself in a futile
+study of the heavenly bodies. At length the dawn broke and put a period
+to my labours.
+
+Glancing round me before I descended from the little hill, I saw a flame
+of light appear suddenly about half a mile or more away among those
+trees which I knew concealed the image of Oro. On this personally I had
+never had the curiosity to look, as I knew that it was only a hideous
+idol stuck over with feathers and other bedizenments. The flame shot
+suddenly straight into the still air and was followed a few seconds
+later by the sound of a dull explosion, after which it went out. Also it
+was followed by something else--a scream of rage from an infuriated mob.
+
+At the foot of the hill I stopped to wonder what these sounds might
+mean. Then of a sudden appeared Bickley, who had been attending some
+urgent case, and asked me who was exploding gunpowder. I told him that I
+had no idea.
+
+"Then I have," he answered. "It is that ass Bastin up to some game. Now
+I guess why he wanted that paraffin. Listen to the row. What are they
+after?"
+
+"Sacrificing Bastin, perhaps," I replied, half in jest. "Have you your
+revolver?"
+
+He nodded. We always wore our pistols if we went out during the dark
+hours.
+
+"Then perhaps we had better go to see."
+
+We started, and had not covered a hundred yards before a girl, whom
+I recognised as one of Bastin's converts, came flying towards us and
+screaming out, "Help! Help! They kill the Bellower with fire! They cook
+him like a pig!"
+
+"Just what I expected," said Bickley.
+
+Then we ran hard, as evidently there was no time to lose. While we went
+I extracted from the terrified girl, whom we forced to show us the way,
+that as the sacrifice was about to be offered Bastin had appeared,
+and, "making fire," applied it to the god Oro, who instantly burst into
+flame. Then he ran back, calling out that the devil was dead. As he did
+so there was a loud explosion and Oro flew into pieces. His burning
+head went a long way into the air and, falling on to one of the priests,
+killed him. Thereon the other priests and the people seized the Bellower
+and made him fast. Now they were engaged in heating an oven in which to
+put him to cook. When it was ready they would eat him in honour of Oro.
+
+"And serve him right too!" gasped Bickley, who, being stout, was not a
+good runner. "Why can't he leave other people's gods alone instead of
+blowing them up with gunpowder?"
+
+"Don't know," I answered. "Hope we shall get there in time!"
+
+"To be cooked and eaten with Bastin!" wheezed Bickley, after which his
+breath gave out.
+
+As it chanced we did, for these stone ovens take a long time to heat.
+There by the edge of his fiery grave with his hands and legs bound in
+palm-fibre shackles, stood Bastin, quite unmoved, smiling indeed, in a
+sort of seraphic way which irritated us both extremely. Round him danced
+the infuriated priests of Oro, and round them, shrieking and howling
+with rage, was most of the population of Orofena. We rushed up so
+suddenly that none tried to stop us, and took our stand on either side
+of him, producing our pistols as we did so.
+
+"Thank you for coming," said Bastin in the silence which followed;
+"though I don't think it is the least use. I cannot recall that any
+of the early martyrs were ever roasted and eaten, though, of course,
+throwing them into boiling oil or water was fairly common. I take it
+that the rite is sacrificial and even in a low sense, sacramental, not
+merely one of common cannibalism."
+
+I stared at him, and Bickley gasped out:
+
+"If you are to be eaten, what does it matter why you are eaten?"
+
+"Oh!" replied Bastin; "there is all the difference in the world, though
+it is one that I cannot expect you to appreciate. And now please be
+quiet as I wish to say my prayers. I imagine that those stones will be
+hot enough to do their office within twenty minutes or so, which is not
+very long."
+
+At that moment Marama appeared, evidently in a state of great
+perturbation. With him were some of the priests or sorcerers who were
+dancing about as I imagine the priests of Baal must have done, and
+filled with fury. They rolled their eyes, they stuck out their tongues,
+they uttered weird cries and shook their wooden knives at the placid
+Bastin.
+
+"What is the matter?" I asked sternly of the chief.
+
+"This, Friend-from-the-Sea. The Bellower there, when the sacrifice
+was about to be offered to Oro at the dawn, rushed forward, and having
+thrust something between the legs of the image of the god, poured yellow
+water over it, and with fire caused it to burst into fierce flame. Then
+he ran away and mocked the god who presently, with a loud report,
+flew into pieces and killed that man. Therefore the Bellower must be
+sacrificed."
+
+"What to?" I asked. "The image has gone and the piece of it that
+ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened if the god
+had been angry with him, but on one of its own priests, whom it killed.
+Therefore, having been sacrificed by the god itself, he it is that
+should be eaten, not the Bellower, who merely did what his Spirit bade
+him."
+
+This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon Marama, but
+to the priests it did not at all appeal.
+
+"Eat them all!" these cried. "They are the enemies of Oro and have
+worked sacrilege!"
+
+Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people seemed
+to agree with them. Things began to look very ugly. The priests rushed
+forward, threatening us with their wooden weapons, and one of them even
+aimed a blow at Bickley, which only missed him by an inch or two.
+
+"Look here, my friend," called the doctor whose temper was rising, "you
+name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you not? Well, be careful,
+lest I should show you that I can kill as well as heal!"
+
+Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great bedizened
+fellow who literally was foaming at the mouth with rage, rushed forward
+again, his club raised, apparently with the object of dashing out
+Bickley's brains.
+
+Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot through
+the heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face--stone dead. There
+was consternation, for these people had never seen us shoot anything
+before, and were quite unacquainted with the properties of firearms,
+which they supposed to be merely instruments for making a noise. They
+stared, they gasped in fear and astonishment, and then they fled,
+pursued by Tommy, barking, leaving us alone with the two dead men.
+
+"It was time to teach them a lesson," said Bickley as he replaced the
+empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled him into the burning
+pit.
+
+"Yes," I answered; "but presently, when they have got over their fright,
+they will come back to teach us one."
+
+Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had taken.
+
+"What do you suggest?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Flight," I answered.
+
+"Where to--the ship? We might hold that."
+
+"No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our road
+there. To the island in the lake where they dare not follow us, for it
+is holy ground."
+
+"How are we going to live on the island?" asked Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," I replied; "but I am quite certain that if we stay here
+we shall die."
+
+"Very well," he said; "let us try it."
+
+While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin's bonds. "Thank you," he
+said. "It is a great relief to stretch one's arms after they have been
+compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do not know that I am
+really grateful. The martyr's crown was hanging above me, so to speak,
+and now it has vanished into the pit, like that man whom Bickley
+murdered."
+
+"Look here," exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, "if you say much more,
+Bastin, I'll chuck you into the pit too, to look for your martyr's
+crown, for I think you have done enough mischief for one morning."
+
+"If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that unfortunate
+man's destruction on to me--"
+
+"Oh! shut it and trot," broke in Bickley. "Those infernal savages are
+coming with your blessed converts leading the van."
+
+So we "trotted" at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin stooped down
+and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as Atalanta in Academy
+pictures is represented as doing to the apples, and bore it away in
+triumph.
+
+"I know it is scorched," he ejaculated at intervals, "but they might
+trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original false god. Now
+they can't, for there's nothing left."
+
+As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our pursuit
+was very half-hearted indeed. To begin with, now that their first rage
+was over, the Orofenans who were fond of us had no particular wish to do
+us to death, while the ardour of their sorcerers, who wished this very
+much, had been greatly cooled by the mysterious annihilation of their
+idol and the violent deaths of two of their companions, which they
+thought might be reduplicated in their own persons. So it came about
+that the chase, if noisy, was neither close nor eager.
+
+We reached the edge of the lake where was the boat-house of which I
+have spoken already, travelling at little more than a walk. Here we
+made Bastin unfasten the better of the two canoes that by good luck was
+almost filled with offerings, which doubtless, according to custom,
+must be made upon the day of this feast to Oro, while we watched against
+surprise at the boat-house door. When he was ready we slipped in and
+took our seats, Tommy jumping in after us, and pushed the canoe, now
+very heavily laden, out into the lake.
+
+Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be beyond
+wooden spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what would happen.
+All the crowd of islanders had rushed to the lake edge where they stood
+staring at us stupidly. Bastin, thinking the occasion opportune, lifted
+the hideous head of the idol which he had carefully washed, and began to
+preach on the downfall of "the god of the Grove."
+
+This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in
+the minds of his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was
+concerned--I do not know. At any rate, one of the priests shouted
+something, whereon everybody began to talk at once. Then, stooping down,
+they threw water from the lake over themselves and rubbed its sand
+and mud into their hair, all the while making genuflexions toward the
+mountain in the middle, after which they turned and departed.
+
+"Don't you think we had better go back?" asked Bastin. "Evidently my
+words have touched them and their minds are melting beneath the light of
+Truth."
+
+"Oh! by all means," replied Bickley with sarcasm; "for then their spears
+will touch us, and our bodies will soon be melting above the fires of
+that pit."
+
+"Perhaps you are right," said Bastin; "at least, I admit that you have
+made matters very difficult by your unjustifiable homicide of that
+priest who I do not think meant to injure you seriously, and really was
+not at all a bad fellow, though opinionated in some ways. Also, I do not
+suppose that anybody is expected, as it were, to run his head into the
+martyr's crown. When it settles there of itself it is another matter."
+
+"Like a butterfly!" exclaimed the enraged Bickley.
+
+"Yes, if you like to put it that way, though the simile seems a very
+poor one; like a sunbeam would be better."
+
+Here Bickley gave way with his paddle so vigorously that the canoe was
+as nearly as possible upset into the lake.
+
+In due course we reached the flat Rock of Offerings, which proved to be
+quite as wide as a double croquet lawn and much longer.
+
+"What are those?" I asked, pointing to certain knobs on the edge of the
+rock at a spot where a curved projecting point made a little harbour.
+
+Bickley examined them, and answered:
+
+"I should say that they are the remains of stone mooring-posts worn down
+by many thousands of years of weather. Yes, look, there is the cut of
+the cables upon the base of that one, and very big cables they must have
+been."
+
+We stared at one another--that is, Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+still engaged in contemplating the blackened head of the god which he
+had overthrown.
+
+
+
+Chapter IX. The Island in the Lake
+
+
+We made the canoe fast and landed on the great rock, to perceive that it
+was really a peninsula. That is to say, it was joined to the main land
+of the lake island by a broad roadway quite fifty yards across, which
+appeared to end in the mouth of the cave. On this causeway we noted
+a very remarkable thing, namely, two grooves separated by an exact
+distance of nine feet which ran into the mouth of the cave and vanished
+there.
+
+"Explain!" said Bickley.
+
+"Paths," I said, "worn by countless feet walking on them for thousands
+of years."
+
+"You should cultivate the art of observation, Arbuthnot. What do you
+say, Bastin?"
+
+He stared at the grooves through his spectacles, and replied:
+
+"I don't say anything, except that I can't see anybody to make paths
+here. Indeed, the place seems quite unpopulated, and all the Orofenans
+told me that they never landed on it because if they did they would die.
+It is a part of their superstitious nonsense. If you have any idea in
+your head you had better tell us quickly before we breakfast. I am very
+hungry."
+
+"You always are," remarked Bickley; "even when most people's appetites
+might have been affected. Well, I think that this great plateau was once
+a landing-place for flying machines, and that there is the air-shed or
+garage."
+
+Bastin stared at him.
+
+"Don't you think we had better breakfast?" he said. "There are two roast
+pigs in that canoe, and lots of other food, enough to last us a week,
+I should say. Of course, I understand that the blood you have shed has
+thrown you off your balance. I believe it has that effect, except on the
+most hardened. Flying machines were only invented a few years ago by the
+brothers Wright in America."
+
+"Bastin," said Bickley, "I begin to regret that I did not leave you to
+take part in another breakfast yonder--I mean as the principal dish."
+
+"It was Providence, not you, who prevented it, Bickley, doubtless
+because I am unworthy of such a glorious end."
+
+"Then it is lucky that Providence is a good shot with a pistol. Stop
+talking nonsense and listen. If those were paths worn by feet they
+would run to the edge of the rock. They do not. They begin there in that
+gentle depression and slope upwards somewhat steeply. The air machines,
+which were evidently large, lit in the depression, possibly as a bird
+does, and then ran on wheels or sledge skids along the grooves to the
+air-shed in the mountain. Come to the cave and you will see."
+
+"Not till we have breakfast," said Bastin. "I will get out a pig. As a
+matter of fact, I had no supper last night, as I was taking a class of
+native boys and making some arrangements of my own."
+
+As for me, I only whistled. It all seemed very feasible. And yet how
+could such things be?
+
+We unloaded the canoe and ate. Bastin's appetite was splendid. Indeed, I
+had to ask him to remember that when this supply was done I did not know
+where we should find any more.
+
+"Take no thought for the morrow," he replied. "I have no doubt it will
+come from somewhere," and he helped himself to another chop.
+
+Never had I admired him so much. Not a couple of hours before he was
+about to be cruelly murdered and eaten. But this did not seem to affect
+him in the least. Bastin was the only man I have ever known with a
+really perfect faith. It is a quality worth having and one that
+makes for happiness. What a great thing not to care whether you are
+breakfasted on, or breakfast!
+
+"I see that there is lots of driftwood about here," he remarked, "but
+unfortunately we have no tea, so in this climate it is of little use,
+unless indeed we can catch some fish and cook them."
+
+"Stop talking about eating and help us to haul up the canoe," said
+Bickley.
+
+Between the three of us we dragged and carried the canoe a long way from
+the lake, fearing lest the natives should come and bear it off with our
+provisions. Then, having given Tommy his breakfast off the scraps,
+we walked to the cave. I glanced at my companions. Bickley's face was
+alight with scientific eagerness. Here are not dreams or speculations,
+but facts to be learned, it seemed to say, and I will learn them. The
+past is going to show me some of its secrets, to tell me how men of long
+ago lived and died and how far they had advanced to that point on the
+road of civilisation at which I stand in my little hour of existence.
+
+That of Bastin was mildly interested, no more. Obviously, with half his
+mind he was thinking of something else, probably of his converts on
+the main island and of the school class fixed for this hour which
+circumstances prevented him from attending. Indeed, like Lot's wife he
+was casting glances behind him towards the wicked place from which he
+had been forced to flee.
+
+Neither the past nor the future had much real interest for Bastin; any
+more than they had for Bickley, though for different reasons. The former
+was done with; the latter he was quite content to leave in other hands.
+If he had any clear idea thereof, probably that undiscovered land
+appeared to him as a big, pleasant place where are no unbelievers or
+erroneous doctrines, and all sinners will be sternly repressed,
+in which, clad in a white surplice with all proper ecclesiastical
+trappings, he would argue eternally with the Early Fathers and in due
+course utterly annihilate Bickley, that is in a moral sense. Personally
+and as a man he was extremely attached to Bickley as a necessary and
+wrong-headed nuisance to which he had become accustomed.
+
+And I! What did I feel? I do not know; I cannot describe. An
+extraordinary attraction, a semi-spiritual exaltation, I think. That
+cave mouth might have been a magnet drawing my soul. With my body I
+should have been afraid, as I daresay I was, for our circumstances were
+sufficiently desperate. Here we were, castaways upon an island, probably
+uncharted, one of thousands in the recesses of a vast ocean, from which
+we had little chance of escape. More, having offended the religious
+instincts of the primeval inhabitants of that island, we had been forced
+to flee to a rocky mountain in the centre of a lake, where, after the
+food we had brought with us by accident was consumed, we should no doubt
+be forced to choose between death by starvation, or, if we attempted to
+retreat, at the hands of justly infuriated savages. Yet these facts did
+not oppress me, for I was being drawn, drawn to I knew not what, and if
+it were to doom--well, no matter.
+
+Therefore, none of us cared: Bastin because his faith was equal to any
+emergency and there was always that white-robed heaven waiting for him
+beyond which his imagination did not go (I often wondered whether he
+pictured Mrs. Bastin as also waiting; if so, he never said anything
+about her); Bickley because as a child of the Present and a servant of
+knowledge he feared no future, believing it to be for him non-existent,
+and was careless as to when his strenuous hour of life should end; and
+I because I felt that yonder lay my true future; yes, and my true past,
+even though to discover them I must pass through that portal which we
+know as Death.
+
+We reached the mouth of the cave. It was a vast place; perhaps the arch
+of it was a hundred feet high, and I could see that once all this
+arch had been adorned with sculptures. Protected as these were by the
+overhanging rock, for the sculptured mouth of the cave was cut deep into
+the mountain face, they were still so worn that it was impossible to
+discern their details. Time had eaten them away like an acid. But what
+length of time? I could not guess, but it must have been stupendous to
+have worked thus upon that hard and sheltered rock.
+
+This came home to me with added force when, from subsequent examination,
+we learned that the entire mouth of this cave had been sealed up for
+unnumbered ages. It will be remembered that Marama told me the mountain
+in the lake had risen much during the frightful cyclone in which we were
+wrecked and with it the cave mouth which previously had been invisible.
+From the markings on the mountain side it was obvious that something of
+the sort had happened very recently, at any rate on this eastern face.
+That is, either the flat rock had sunk or the volcano had been thrown
+upwards.
+
+Once in the far past the cave had been as it was when we found it. Then
+it had gone down in such a way that the table-rock entirely sealed the
+entrance. Now this entrance was once more open, and although of course
+there was a break in them, the grooves of which I have spoken ran on
+into the cave at only a slightly different level from that at which they
+lay upon the flat rock. And yet, although they had been thus sheltered
+by a great stone curtain in front of them, still these sculptures
+were worn away by the tooth of Time. Of course, however, this may have
+happened to them before they were buried in some ancient cataclysm, to
+be thus resurrected at the hour of our arrival upon the island.
+
+Without pausing to make any closer examination of these crumbled
+carvings, we entered the yawning mouth of that great place, following
+and indeed walking in the deep grooves that I have mentioned. Presently
+it seemed to open out as a courtyard might at the end of a passage; yes,
+to open on to some vast place whereof in that gloom we could not see the
+roof or the limits. All we knew was that it must be enormous--the echoes
+of our voices and footsteps told us as much, for these seemed to come
+back to us from high, high above and from far, far away. Bickley and I
+said nothing; we were too overcome. But Bastin remarked:
+
+
+"Did you ever go to Olympia? I did once to see a kind of play where
+the people said nothing, only ran about dressed up. They told me it was
+religious, the sort of thing a clergyman should study. I didn't think it
+religious at all. It was all about a nun who had a baby."
+
+"Well, what of it?" snapped Bickley.
+
+"Nothing particular, except that nuns don't have babies, or if they do
+the fact should not be advertised. But I wasn't thinking of that. I was
+thinking that this place is like an underground Olympia."
+
+"Oh, be quiet!" I said, for though Bastin's description was not bad, his
+monotonous, drawling voice jarred on me in that solemnity.
+
+"Be careful where you walk," whispered Bickley, for even he seemed awed,
+"there may be pits in this floor."
+
+"I wish we had a light," I said, halting.
+
+"If candles are of any use," broke in Bastin, "as it happens I have
+a packet in my pocket. I took them with me this morning for a certain
+purpose."
+
+"Not unconnected with the paraffin and the burning of the idol, I
+suppose?" said Bickley. "Hand them over."
+
+"Yes; if I had been allowed a little more time I intended--"
+
+"Never mind what you intended; we know what you did and that's enough,"
+said Bickley as he snatched the packet from Bastin's hand and proceeded
+to undo it, adding, "By heaven! I have no matches, nor have you,
+Arbuthnot!"
+
+"I have a dozen boxes of wax vestas in my other pocket," said Bastin.
+"You see, they burn so well when you want to get up a fire on a damp
+idol. As you may have noticed, the dew is very heavy here."
+
+In due course these too were produced. I took possession of them as they
+were too valuable to be left in the charge of Bastin, and, extracting
+a box from the packet, lit two of the candles which were of the short
+thick variety, like those used in carriage-lamps.
+
+Presently they burned up, making two faint stars of light which,
+however, were not strong enough to show us either the roof or the sides
+of that vast place. By their aid we pursued our path, still following
+the grooves till suddenly these came to an end. Now all around us was a
+flat floor of rock which, as we perceived clearly when we pushed
+aside the dust that had gathered thickly on it in the course of ages,
+doubtless from the gradual disintegration of the stony walls, had once
+been polished till it resembled black marble. Indeed, certain cracks
+in the floor appeared to have been filled in with some dark-coloured
+cement. I stood looking at them while Bickley wandered off to the right
+and a little forward, and presently called to me. I walked to him,
+Bastin sticking close to me as I had the other candle, as did the little
+dog, Tommy, who did not like these new surroundings and would not leave
+my heels.
+
+"Look," said Bickley, holding up his candle, "and tell me--what's that?"
+
+Before me, faintly shown, was some curious structure of gleaming rods
+made of yellowish metal, which rods appeared to be connected by wires.
+The structure might have been forty feet high and perhaps a hundred
+long. Its bottom part was buried in dust.
+
+"What is that?" asked Bickley again.
+
+I made no answer, for I was thinking. Bastin, however, replied:
+
+"It's difficult to be sure in this light, but I should think that it
+may be the remains of a cage in which some people who lived here kept
+monkeys, or perhaps it was an aviary. Look at those little ladders for
+the monkeys to climb by, or possibly for the birds to sit on."
+
+"Are you sure it wasn't tame angels?" asked Bickley.
+
+"What a ridiculous remark! How can you keep an angel in a cage? I--"
+
+"Aeroplane!" I almost whispered to Bickley.
+
+"You've got it!" he answered. "The framework of an aeroplane and a jolly
+large one, too. Only why hasn't it oxidised?"
+
+"Some indestructible metal," I suggested. "Gold, for instance, does not
+oxidise."
+
+He nodded and said:
+
+"We shall have to dig it out. The dust is feet thick about it; we can do
+nothing without spades. Come on."
+
+We went round to the end of the structure, whatever it might be, and
+presently came to another. Again we went on and came to another, all of
+them being berthed exactly in line.
+
+"What did I tell you?" said Bickley in a voice of triumph. "A whole
+garage full, a regular fleet of aeroplanes!"
+
+"That must be nonsense," said Bastin, "for I am quite sure that these
+Orofenans cannot make such things. Indeed they have no metal, and even
+cut the throats of pigs with wooden knives."
+
+Now I began to walk forward, bearing to the left so as to regain our
+former line. We could do nothing with these metal skeletons, and I
+felt that there must be more to find beyond. Presently I saw something
+looming ahead of me and quickened my pace, only to recoil. For there,
+not thirty feet away and perhaps three hundred yards from the mouth of
+the cave, suddenly appeared what looked like a gigantic man. Tommy saw
+it also and barked as dogs do when they are frightened, and the sound
+of his yaps echoed endlessly from every quarter, which scared him to
+silence. Recovering myself I went forward, for now I guessed the truth.
+It was not a man but a statue.
+
+The thing stood upon a huge base which lessened by successive steps,
+eight of them, I think, to its summit. The foot of this base may have
+been a square of fifty feet or rather more; the real support or pedestal
+of the statue, however, was only a square of about six feet. The figure
+itself was little above life-size, or at any rate above our life-size,
+say seven feet in height. It was very peculiar in sundry ways.
+
+To begin with, nothing of the body was visible, for it was swathed like
+a corpse. From these wrappings projected one arm, the right, in the hand
+of which was the likeness of a lighted torch. The head was not veiled.
+It was that of a man, long-nosed, thin-lipped, stern-visaged; the
+countenance pervaded by an awful and unutterable calm, as deep as that
+of Buddha only less benign. On the brow was a wreathed head-dress, not
+unlike an Eastern turban, from which sprang two little wings resembling
+in some degree those on the famous Greek head of Hypnos, lord of Sleep.
+Between the folds of the wrappings on the back sprang two other wings,
+enormous wings bent like those of a bird about to take flight. Indeed
+the whole attitude of the figure suggested that it was springing from
+earth to air. It was executed in black basalt or some stone of the sort,
+and very highly finished. For instance, on the bare feet and the arm
+which held the torch could be felt every muscle and even some of
+the veins. In the same way the details of the skull were perfectly
+perceptible to the touch, although at first sight not visible on the
+marble surface. This was ascertained by climbing on the pedestal and
+feeling the face with our hands.
+
+Here I may say that its modelling as well as that of the feet and the
+arm filled Bickley, who, of course, was a highly trained anatomist, with
+absolute amazement. He said that he would never have thought it possible
+that such accuracy could have been reached by an artist working in so
+hard a material.
+
+When the others had arrived we studied this relic as closely as our
+two candles would allow, and in turn expressed our opinions of its
+significance. Bastin thought that if those things down there were really
+the remains of aeroplanes, which he did not believe, the statue had
+something to do with flying, as was shown by the fact that it had wings
+on its head and shoulders. Also, he added, after examining the face, the
+head was uncommonly like that of the idol that he had blown up. It had
+the same long nose and severe shut mouth. If he was right, this was
+probably another effigy of Oro which we should do well to destroy at
+once before the islanders came to worship it.
+
+Bickley ground his teeth as he listened to him.
+
+"Destroy that!" he gasped. "Destroy! Oh! you, you--early Christian."
+
+Here I may state that Bastin was quite right, as we proved subsequently
+when we compared the head of the fetish, which, as it will be
+remembered, he had brought away with him, with that of the statue.
+Allowing for an enormous debasement of art, they were essentially
+identical in the facial characteristics. This would suggest the descent
+of a tradition through countless generations. Or of course it may have
+been accidental. I am sure I do not know, but I think it possible that
+for unknown centuries other old statues may have existed in Orofena from
+which the idol was copied. Or some daring and impious spirit may have
+found his way to the cave in past ages and fashioned the local god upon
+this ancient model.
+
+Bickley was struck at once, as I had been, with the resemblance of the
+figure to that of the Egyptian Osiris. Of course there were differences.
+For instance, instead of the crook and the scourge, this divinity held
+a torch. Again, in place of the crown of Egypt it wore a winged
+head-dress, though it is true this was not very far removed from the
+winged disc of that country. The wings that sprang from its shoulders,
+however, suggested Babylonia rather than Egypt, or the Assyrian bulls
+that are similarly adorned. All of these symbolical ideas might have
+been taken from that figure. But what was it? What was it?
+
+In a flash the answer came to me. A representation of the spirit of
+Death! Neither more nor less. There was the shroud; there the cold,
+inscrutable countenance suggesting mysteries that it hid. But the torch
+and the wings? Well, the torch was that which lighted souls to the other
+world, and on the wings they flew thither. Whoever fashioned that statue
+hoped for another life, or so I was convinced.
+
+I explained my ideas. Bastin thought them fanciful and preferred his
+notion of a flying man, since by constitution he was unable to discover
+anything spiritual in any religion except his own. Bickley agreed that
+it was probably an allegorical representation of death but sniffed at
+my interpretation of the wings and the torch, since by constitution he
+could not believe that the folly of a belief in immortality could have
+developed so early in the world, that is, among a highly civilised
+people such as must have produced this statue.
+
+What we could none of us understand was why this ominous image with its
+dead, cold face should have been placed in an aerodrome, nor in fact did
+we ever discover. Possibly it was there long before the cave was put to
+this use. At first the place may have been a temple and have so remained
+until circumstances forced the worshippers to change their habits, or
+even their Faith.
+
+We examined this wondrous work and the pedestal on which it stood as
+closely as we were able by the dim light of our candles. I was anxious
+to go further and see what lay beyond it; indeed we did walk a few
+paces, twenty perhaps, onward into the recesses of the cave.
+
+Then Bickley discovered something that looked like the mouth of a well
+down which he nearly tumbled, and Bastin began to complain that he was
+hot and very thirsty; also to point out that he wished for no more caves
+and idols at present.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," said Bickley, "these candles are burning low and
+we don't want to use up more if we can prevent it, for we may need what
+we have got very badly later on. Now, according to my pocket compass
+the mouth of this cave points due east; probably at the beginning it was
+orientated to the rising sun for purposes of astronomical observation or
+of worship at certain periods of the year. From the position of the sun
+when we landed on the rock this morning I imagine that just now it
+rises almost exactly opposite to the mouth of the cave. If this is so,
+to-morrow at dawn, for a time at least, the light should penetrate as
+far as the statue, and perhaps further. What I suggest is that we should
+wait till then to explore."
+
+I agreed with him, especially as I was feeling tired, being exhausted
+by wonder, and wanted time to think. So we turned back. As we did so I
+missed Tommy and inquired anxiously where he was, being afraid lest he
+might have tumbled down the well-like hole.
+
+"He's all right," said Bastin. "I saw him sniffing at the base of that
+statue. I expect there is a rat in there, or perhaps a snake."
+
+Sure enough when we reached it there was Tommy with his black nose
+pressed against the lowest of the tiers that formed the base of the
+statue, and sniffing loudly. Also he was scratching in the dust as a dog
+does when he has winded a rabbit in a hole. So engrossed was he in this
+occupation that it was with difficulty that I coaxed him to leave the
+place.
+
+I did not think much of the incident at that time, but afterwards it
+came back to me, and I determined to investigate those stones at the
+first opportunity.
+
+Passing the wrecks of the machines, we emerged on to the causeway
+without accident. After we had rested and washed we set to work to draw
+our canoe with its precious burden of food right into the mouth of the
+cave, where we hid it as well as we could.
+
+This done we went for a walk round the base of the peak. This proved
+to be a great deal larger than we had imagined, over two miles in
+circumference indeed. All about it was a belt of fertile land, as I
+suppose deposited there by the waters of the great lake and resulting
+from the decay of vegetation. Much of this belt was covered with
+ancient forest ending in mud flats that appeared to have been thrown
+up recently, perhaps at the time of the tidal wave which bore us to
+Orofena. On the higher part of the belt were many of the extraordinary
+crater-like holes that I have mentioned as being prevalent on the main
+island; indeed the place had all the appearance of having been subjected
+to a terrific and continuous bombardment.
+
+When we had completed its circuit we set to work to climb the peak in
+order to explore the terraces of which I have spoken and the ruins
+which I had seen through my field-glasses. It was quite true; they were
+terraces cut with infinite labour out of the solid rock, and on them
+had once stood a city, now pounded into dust and fragments. We struggled
+over the broken blocks of stone to what we had taken for a temple, which
+stood near the lip of the crater, for without doubt this mound was an
+extinct volcano, or rather its crest. All we could make out when we
+arrived was that here had once stood some great building, for its courts
+could still be traced; also there lay about fragments of steps and
+pillars.
+
+Apparently the latter had once been carved, but the passage of
+innumerable ages had obliterated the work and we could not turn these
+great blocks over to discover if any remained beneath. It was as though
+the god Thor had broken up the edifice with his hammer, or Jove had
+shattered it with his thunderbolts; nothing else would account for that
+utter wreck, except, as Bickley remarked significantly, the scientific
+use of high explosives.
+
+Following the line of what seemed to have been a road, we came to the
+edge of the volcano and found, as we expected, the usual depression out
+of which fire and lava had once been cast, as from Hecla or Vesuvius. It
+was now a lake more than a quarter of a mile across. Indeed it had been
+thus in the ancient days when the buildings stood upon the terraces, for
+we saw the remains of steps leading down to the water. Perhaps it had
+served as the sacred lake of the temple.
+
+We gazed with wonderment and then, wearied out, scrambled back through
+the ruins, which, by the way, were of a different stone from the lava of
+the mountain, to the mouth of the great cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter X. The Dwellers in the Tomb
+
+
+By now it was drawing towards sunset, so we made such preparations as we
+could for the night. One of these was to collect dry driftwood, of
+which an abundance lay upon the shore, to serve us for firing, though
+unfortunately we had nothing that we could cook for our meal.
+
+While we were thus engaged we saw a canoe approaching the table-rock and
+perceived that in it were the chief Marama and a priest. After hovering
+about for a while they paddled the canoe near enough to allow of
+conversation which, taking no notice of their presence, we left it to
+them to begin.
+
+"O, Friend-from-the-Sea," called Marama, addressing myself, "we come
+to pray you and the Great Healer to return to us to be our guests as
+before. The people are covered with darkness because of the loss of your
+wisdom, and the sick cry aloud for the Healer; indeed two of those whom
+he has cut with knives are dying."
+
+"And what of the Bellower?" I asked, indicating Bastin.
+
+"We should like to see him back also, Friend-from-the-Sea, that we may
+sacrifice and eat him, who destroyed our god with fire and caused the
+Healer to kill his priest."
+
+"That is most unjust," exclaimed Bastin. "I deeply regret the blood that
+was shed on the occasion, unnecessarily as I think."
+
+"Then go and atone for it with your own," said Bickley, "and everybody
+will be pleased."
+
+Waving to them to be silent, I said:
+
+"Are you mad, Marama, that you should ask us to return to sojourn among
+people who tried to kill us, merely because the Bellower caused fire to
+burn an image of wood and its head to fly from its shoulders, just to
+show you that it had no power to hold itself together, although you call
+it a god? Not so, we wash our hands of you; we leave you to go your
+own way while we go ours, till perchance in a day to come, after many
+misfortunes have overtaken you, you creep about our feet and with
+prayers and offerings beg us to return."
+
+I paused to observe the effect of my words. It was excellent, for both
+Marama and the priest wrung their hands and groaned. Then I went on:
+
+"Meanwhile we have something to tell you. We have entered the cave where
+you said no man might set a foot, and have seen him who sits within,
+the true god." (Here Bastin tried to interrupt, but was suppressed by
+Bickley.)
+
+They looked at each other in a frightened way and groaned more loudly
+than before.
+
+"He sends you a message, which, as he told us of your approach, we came
+to the shore to deliver to you."
+
+"How can you say that?" began Bastin, but was again violently suppressed
+by Bickley.
+
+"It is that he, the real Oro, rejoices that the false Oro, whose face is
+copied from his face, has been destroyed. It is that he commands you day
+by day to bring food in plenty and lay it upon the Rock of Offerings,
+not forgetting a supply of fresh fish from the sea, and with it all
+those things that are stored in the house wherein we, the strangers
+from the sea, deigned to dwell awhile until we left you because in your
+wickedness you wished to murder us."
+
+"And if we refuse--what then?" asked the priest, speaking for the first
+time.
+
+"Then Oro will send death and destruction upon you. Then your food shall
+fail and you shall perish of sickness and want, and the Oromatuas, the
+spirits of the great dead, shall haunt you in your sleep, and Oro shall
+eat up your souls."
+
+At these horrible threats both of them uttered a kind of wail, after
+which, Marama asked:
+
+"And if we consent, what then, Friend-from-the-Sea?"
+
+"Then, perchance," I answered, "in some day to come we may return to
+you, that I may give you of my wisdom and the Great Healer may cure your
+sick and the Bellower may lead you through his gate, and in his kindness
+make you to see with his eyes."
+
+This last clause of my ultimatum did not seem to appeal to the priest,
+who argued a while with Marama, though what he said we could not hear.
+In the end he appeared to give way. At any rate Marama called out that
+all should be done as we wished, and that meanwhile they prayed us
+to intercede with Oro in the cave, and to keep back the ghosts from
+haunting them, and to protect them from misfortune. I replied that we
+would do our best, but could guarantee nothing since their offence was
+very great.
+
+Then, to show that the conversation was at an end, we walked away with
+dignity, pushing Bastin in front of us, lest he should spoil the effect
+by some of his ill-timed and often over-true remarks.
+
+"That's capital," said Bickley, when we were out of hearing. "The enemy
+has capitulated. We can stop here as long as we like, provisioned from
+the mainland, and if for any reason we wish to leave, be sure of our
+line of retreat."
+
+"I don't know what you call capital," exclaimed Bastin. "It seems to me
+that all the lies which Arbuthnot has just told are sufficient to bring
+a judgment upon us. Indeed, I think that I will go back with Marama and
+explain the truth."
+
+"I never before knew anybody who was so anxious to be cooked and eaten,"
+remarked Bickley. "Moreover, you are too late, for the canoe is a
+hundred yards away by now, and you shan't have ours. Remember the
+Pauline maxims, old fellow, which you are so fond of quoting, and be all
+things to all men, and another that is more modern, that when you are at
+Rome, you must do as the Romans do; also a third, that necessity has no
+law, and for the matter of that, a fourth, that all is fair in love and
+war."
+
+"I am sure, Bickley, that Paul never meant his words to bear the debased
+sense which you attribute to them--" began Bastin, but at this point I
+hustled him off to light a fire--a process at which I pointed out he had
+shown himself an expert.
+
+We slept that night under the overhanging rock just to one side of the
+cave, not in the mouth, because of the draught which drew in and out
+of the great place. In that soft and balmy clime this was no hardship,
+although we lacked blankets. And yet, tired though I was, I could
+not rest as I should have done. Bastin snored away contentedly, quite
+unaffected by his escape which to him was merely an incident in the
+day's work; and so, too, slumbered Bickley, except that he did not
+snore. But the amazement and the mystery of all that we had discovered
+and of all that might be left for us to discover, held me back from
+sleep.
+
+What did it mean? What could it mean? My nerves were taut as harp
+strings and seemed to vibrate to the touch of invisible fingers,
+although I could not interpret the music that they made. Once or twice
+also I thought I heard actual music with my physical ears, and that of a
+strange quality. Soft and low and dreamful, it appeared to well from the
+recesses of the vast cave, a wailing song in an unknown tongue from the
+lips of women, or of a woman, multiplied mysteriously by echoes. This,
+however, must have been pure fancy, since there was no singer there.
+
+Presently I dozed off, to be awakened by the sudden sound of a great
+fish leaping in the lake. I sat up and stared, fearing lest it might be
+the splash of a paddle, for I could not put from my mind the possibility
+of attack. All I saw, however, was the low line of the distant shore,
+and above it the bright and setting stars that heralded the coming of
+the sun. Then I woke the others, and we washed and ate, since once the
+sun rose time would be precious.
+
+At length it appeared, splendid in a cloudless sky, and, as I had hoped,
+directly opposite to the mouth of the cave. Taking our candles and some
+stout pieces of driftwood which, with our knives, we had shaped on the
+previous evening to serve us as levers and rough shovels, we entered the
+cave. Bickley and I were filled with excitement and hope of what we knew
+not, but Bastin showed little enthusiasm for our quest. His heart was
+with his half-converted savages beyond the lake, and of them, quite
+rightly I have no doubt, he thought more than he did of all the
+archaeological treasures in the whole earth. Still, he came, bearing the
+blackened head of Oro with him which, with unconscious humour, he had
+used as a pillow through the night because, as he said, "it was after
+all softer than stone." Also, I believe that in his heart he hoped
+that he might find an opportunity of destroying the bigger and earlier
+edition of Oro in the cave, before it was discovered by the natives
+who might wish to make it an object of worship. Tommy came also, with
+greater alacrity than I expected, since dogs do not as a rule like dark
+places. When we reached the statue I learned the reason; he remembered
+the smell he had detected at its base on the previous day, which
+Bastin supposed to proceed from a rat, and was anxious to continue his
+investigations.
+
+We went straight to the statue, although Bickley passed the half-buried
+machines with evident regret. As we had hoped, the strong light of
+the rising sun fell upon it in a vivid ray, revealing all its wondrous
+workmanship and the majesty--for no other word describes it--of the
+somewhat terrifying countenance that appeared above the wrappings of the
+shroud. Indeed, I was convinced that originally this monument had been
+placed here in order that on certain days of the year the sun might
+fall upon it thus, when probably worshippers assembled to adore their
+hallowed symbol. After all, this was common in ancient days: witness
+the instance of the awful Three who sit in the deepest recesses of the
+temple of Abu Simbel, on the Nile.
+
+We gazed and gazed our fill, at least Bickley and I did, for Bastin was
+occupied in making a careful comparison between the head of his wooden
+Oro and that of the statue.
+
+"There is no doubt that they are very much alike," he said. "Why,
+whatever is that dog doing? I think it is going mad," and he pointed to
+Tommy who was digging furiously at the base of the lowest step, as at
+home I have seen him do at roots that sheltered a rabbit.
+
+Tommy's energy was so remarkable that at length it seriously attracted
+our attention. Evidently he meant that it should do so, for occasionally
+he sprang back to me barking, then returned and sniffed and scratched.
+Bickley knelt down and smelt at the stone.
+
+"It is an odd thing, Humphrey," he said, "but there is a strange odour
+here, a very pleasant odour like that of sandal-wood or attar of roses."
+
+"I never heard of a rat that smelt like sandal-wood or attar of roses,"
+said Bastin. "Look out that it isn't a snake."
+
+I knelt down beside Bickley, and in clearing away the deep dust from
+what seemed to be the bottom of the step, which was perhaps four feet
+in height, by accident thrust my amateur spade somewhat strongly against
+its base where it rested upon the rocky floor.
+
+Next moment a wonder came to pass. The whole massive rock began to turn
+outwards as though upon a pivot! I saw it coming and grabbed Bickley by
+the collar, dragging him back so that we just rolled clear before the
+great block, which must have weighed several tons, fell down and crushed
+us. Tommy saw it too, and fled, though a little late, for the edge
+of the block caught the tip of his tail and caused him to emit a most
+piercing howl. But we did not think of Tommy and his woes; we did not
+think of our own escape or of anything else because of the marvel that
+appeared to us. Seated there upon the ground, after our backward tumble,
+we could see into the space which lay behind the fallen step, for there
+the light of the sun penetrated.
+
+The first idea it gave me was that of the jewelled shrine of some
+mediaeval saint which, by good fortune, had escaped the plunderers;
+there are still such existing in the world. It shone and glittered,
+apparently with gold and diamonds, although, as a matter of fact, there
+were no diamonds, nor was it gold which gleamed, but some ancient metal,
+or rather amalgam, which is now lost to the world, the same that was
+used in the tubes of the air-machines. I think that it contained gold,
+but I do not know. At any rate, it was equally lasting and even more
+beautiful, though lighter in colour.
+
+For the rest this adorned recess which resembled that of a large funeral
+vault, occupying the whole space beneath the base of the statue that was
+supported on its arch, was empty save for two flashing objects that lay
+side by side but with nearly the whole width of the vault between them.
+
+I pointed at them to Bickley with my finger, for really I could not
+speak.
+
+"Coffins, by Jove!" he whispered. "Glass or crystal coffins and people
+in them. Come on!"
+
+A few seconds later we were crawling into that vault while Bastin, still
+nursing the head of Oro as though it were a baby, stood confused outside
+muttering something about desecrating hallowed graves.
+
+Just as we reached the interior, owing to the heightening of the
+sun, the light passed away, leaving us in a kind of twilight. Bickley
+produced carriage candles from his pocket and fumbled for matches. While
+he was doing so I noticed two things--firstly, that the place really did
+smell like a scent-shop, and, secondly, that the coffins seemed to glow
+with a kind of phosphorescent light of their own, not very strong, but
+sufficient to reveal their outlines in the gloom. Then the candles burnt
+up and we saw.
+
+Within the coffin that stood on our left hand as we entered, for this
+crystal was as transparent as plate glass, lay a most wonderful old man,
+clad in a gleaming, embroidered robe. His long hair, which was parted
+in the middle, as we could see beneath the edge of the pearl-sewn and
+broidered cap he wore, also his beard were snowy white. The man was
+tall, at least six feet four inches in height, and rather spare. His
+hands were long and thin, very delicately made, as were his sandalled
+feet.
+
+But it was his face that fixed our gaze, for it was marvelous, like the
+face of a god, and, as we noticed at once, with some resemblance to
+that of the statue above. Thus the brow was broad and massive, the nose
+straight and long, the mouth stern and clear-cut, while the cheekbones
+were rather high, and the eyebrows arched. Such are the characteristics
+of many handsome old men of good blood, and as the mummies of Seti and
+others show us, such they have been for thousands of years. Only this
+man differed from all others because of the fearful dignity stamped upon
+his features. Looking at him I began to think at once of the prophet
+Elijah as he must have appeared rising to heaven, enhanced by the
+more earthly glory of Solomon, for although the appearance of these
+patriarchs is unknown, of them one conceives ideas. Only it seemed
+probable that Elijah may have looked more benign. Here there was no
+benignity, only terrible force and infinite wisdom.
+
+Contemplating him I shivered a little and felt thankful that he was
+dead. For to tell the truth I was afraid of that awesome countenance
+which, I should add, was of the whiteness of paper, although the cheeks
+still showed tinges of colour, so perfect was the preservation of the
+corpse.
+
+I was still gazing at it when Bickley said in a voice of amazement:
+
+"I say, look here, in the other coffin."
+
+I turned, looked, and nearly collapsed on the floor of the vault, since
+beauty can sometimes strike us like a blow. Oh! there before me lay all
+loveliness, such loveliness that there burst from my lips an involuntary
+cry:
+
+"Alas! that she should be dead!"
+
+A young woman, I supposed, at least she looked young, perhaps five or
+six and twenty years of age, or so I judged. There she lay, her tall and
+delicate shape half hidden in masses of rich-hued hair in colour of a
+ruddy blackness. I know not how else to describe it, since never have I
+seen any of the same tint. Moreover, it shone with a life of its own
+as though it had been dusted with gold. From between the masses of
+this hair appeared a face which I can only call divine. There was every
+beauty that woman can boast, from the curving eyelashes of extraordinary
+length to the sweet and human mouth. To these charms also were added
+a wondrous smile and an air of kind dignity, very different from the
+fierce pride stamped upon the countenance of the old man who was her
+companion in death.
+
+She was clothed in some close-fitting robe of white broidered with gold;
+pearls were about her neck, lying far down upon the perfect bosom, a
+girdle of gold and shining gems encircled her slender waist, and on her
+little feet were sandals fastened with red stones like rubies. In
+truth, she was a splendid creature, and yet, I know not how, her beauty
+suggested more of the spirit than of the flesh. Indeed, in a way, it was
+unearthly. My senses were smitten, it pulled at my heart-strings, and
+yet its unutterable strangeness seemed to awake memories within me,
+though of what I could not tell. A wild fancy came to me that I must
+have known this heavenly creature in some past life.
+
+By now Bastin had joined us, and, attracted by my exclamation and by
+the attitude of Bickley, who was staring down at the coffin with a fixed
+look upon his face, not unlike that of a pointer when he scents game, he
+began to contemplate the wonder within it in his slow way.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said. "Do you think the Glittering Lady in there is
+human?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady is dead, but I suppose that she was human in her
+life," I answered in an awed whisper.
+
+"Of course she is dead, otherwise she would not be in that glass coffin.
+I think I should like to read the Burial Service over her, which I
+daresay was never done when she was put in there."
+
+"How do you know she is dead?" asked Bickley in a sharp voice and
+speaking for the first time. "I have seen hundreds of corpses, and
+mummies too, but never any that looked like these."
+
+I stared at him. It was strange to hear Bickley, the scoffer at
+miracles, suggesting that this greatest of all miracles might be
+possible.
+
+"They must have been here a long time," I said, "for although human,
+they are not, I think, of any people known to the world to-day; their
+dress, everything, shows it, though perhaps thousands of years ago--"
+and I stopped.
+
+"Quite so," answered Bickley; "I agree. That is why I suggest that they
+may have belonged to a race who knew what we do not, namely, how to
+suspend animation for great periods of time."
+
+I said no more, nor did Bastin, who was now engaged in studying the old
+man, and for once, wonderstruck and overcome. Bickley, however, took one
+of the candles and began to make a close examination of the coffins.
+So did Tommy, who sniffed along the join of that of the Glittering Lady
+until his nose reached a certain spot, where it remained, while his
+black tail began to wag in a delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away
+and investigated.
+
+"As I thought," he said--"air-holes. See!"
+
+I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in a line
+with the face of its occupant, were a number of little holes that either
+by accident or design outlined the shape of a human mouth.
+
+"They are not airtight," murmured Bickley; "and if air can enter, how
+can dead flesh remain like that for ages?"
+
+Then he continued his search upon the other side.
+
+"The lid of this coffin works on hinges," he said. "Here they are,
+fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within could have
+pulled it down before the senses departed."
+
+"No," I answered; "for look, here is a crystal bolt at the end and it is
+shot from without."
+
+This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to examine
+the other coffin.
+
+"I've got it!" he exclaimed presently. "The old god in here" (somehow
+we all thought of this old man as not quite normal) "shut down the
+Glittering Lady's coffin and bolted it. His own is not bolted, although
+the bolt exists in the same place. He just got in and pulled down the
+lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking--for how can such things be? Let us
+get out and think."
+
+So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had begun to
+oppress us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the cave, where for
+a while we remained silent.
+
+"I am very thirsty," said Bastin presently. "Those smells seem to have
+dried me up. I am going to get some tea--I mean water, as unfortunately
+there is no tea," and he set off towards the mouth of the cave.
+
+We followed him, I don't quite know why, except that we wished to
+breathe freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and its contents
+would be as safe as they had been for--well, how long?
+
+It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and down
+enjoying it sub-consciously, for really our--that is Bickley's and my
+own--intelligences were concentrated on that sepulchre and its contents.
+Where Bastin's may have been I do not know, perhaps in a visionary
+teapot, since I was sure that it would take him a day or two to
+appreciate the significance of our discoveries. At any rate, he wandered
+off, making no remarks about them, to drink water, I suppose.
+
+Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the table-rock and we
+went to see the reason of his noise. It proved to be very satisfactory,
+for while we were in the cave the Orofenans had brought absolutely
+everything belonging to us, together with a large supply of food from
+the main island. Not a single article was missing; even our books, a can
+with the bottom out, and the broken pieces of a little pocket mirror
+had been religiously transported, and with these a few articles that had
+been stolen from us, notably my pocket-knife. Evidently a great taboo
+had been laid upon all our possessions. They were now carefully arranged
+in one of the grooves of the rock that Bickley supposed had been made by
+the wheels of aeroplanes, which was why we had not seen them at once.
+
+Each of us rushed for what we desired most--Bastin for one of the
+canisters of tea, I for my diaries, and Bickley for his chest of
+instruments and medicines. These were removed to the mouth of the cave,
+and after them the other things and the food; also a bell tent and some
+camp furniture that we had brought from the ship. Then Bastin made some
+tea of which he drank four large pannikins, having first said grace over
+it with unwonted fervour. Nor did we disdain our share of the beverage,
+although Bickley preferred cocoa and I coffee. Cocoa and coffee we had
+no time to make then, and in view of that sepulchre in the cave, what
+had we to do with cocoa and coffee?
+
+So Bickley and I said to each other, and yet presently he changed his
+mind and in a special metal machine carefully made some extremely strong
+black coffee which he poured into a thermos flask, previously warmed
+with hot water, adding thereto about a claret glass of brandy. Also he
+extracted certain drugs from his medicine-chest, and with them, as I
+noted, a hypodermic syringe, which he first boiled in a kettle and then
+shut up in a little tube with a glass stopper.
+
+These preparations finished, he called to Tommy to give him the scraps
+of our meal. But there was no Tommy. The dog was missing, and though we
+hunted everywhere we could not find him. Finally we concluded that he
+had wandered off down the beach on business of his own and would return
+in due course. We could not bother about Tommy just then.
+
+After making some further preparations and fidgeting about a little,
+Bickley announced that as we had now some proper paraffin lamps of the
+powerful sort which are known as "hurricane," he proposed by their aid
+to carry out further examinations in the cave.
+
+"I think I shall stop where I am," said Bastin, helping himself from the
+kettle to a fifth pannikin of tea. "Those corpses are very interesting,
+but I don't see any use in staring at them again at present. One can
+always do that at any time. I have missed Marama once already by being
+away in that cave, and I have a lot to say to him about my people; I
+don't want to be absent in case he should return."
+
+"To wash up the things, I suppose," said Bickley with a sniff; "or
+perhaps to eat the tea-leaves."
+
+"Well, as a matter of fact, I have noticed that these natives have
+a peculiar taste for tea-leaves. I think they believe them to be a
+medicine, but I don't suppose they would come so far for them, though
+perhaps they might in the hope of getting the head of Oro. Anyhow, I am
+going to stop here."
+
+"Pray do," said Bickley. "Are you ready, Humphrey?"
+
+I nodded, and he handed to me a felt-covered flask of the non-conducting
+kind, filled with boiling water, a tin of preserved milk, and a little
+bottle of meat extract of a most concentrated sort. Then, having lit two
+of the hurricane lamps and seen that they were full of oil, we started
+back up the cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter XI. Resurrection
+
+
+We reached the sepulchre without stopping to look at the parked machines
+or even the marvelous statue that stood above it, for what did we care
+about machines or statues now? As we approached we were astonished to
+hear low and cavernous growlings.
+
+"There is some wild beast in there," said Bickley, halting. "No, by
+George! it's Tommy. What can the dog be after?"
+
+We peeped in, and there sure enough was Tommy lying on the top of
+the Glittering Lady's coffin and growling his very best with the hair
+standing up upon his back. When he saw who it was, however, he jumped
+off and frisked round, licking my hand.
+
+"That's very strange," I exclaimed.
+
+"Not stranger than everything else," said Bickley.
+
+"What are you going to do?" I asked.
+
+"Open these coffins," he answered, "beginning with that of the old god,
+since I would rather experiment on him. I expect he will crumble into
+dust. But if by chance he doesn't I'll jam a little strychnine, mixed
+with some other drugs, of which you don't know the names, into one of
+his veins and see if anything happens. If it doesn't, it won't hurt him,
+and if it does--well, who knows? Now give me a hand."
+
+We went to the left-hand coffin and by inserting the hook on the back of
+my knife, of which the real use is to pick stones out of horses' hoofs,
+into one of the little air-holes I have described, managed to raise the
+heavy crystal lid sufficiently to enable us to force a piece of wood
+between it and the top. The rest was easy, for the hinges being of
+crystal had not corroded. In two minutes it was open.
+
+From the chest came an overpowering spicy odour, and with it a veritable
+breath of warm air before which we recoiled a little. Bickley took a
+pocket thermometer which he had at hand and glanced at it. It marked a
+temperature of 82 degrees in the sepulchre. Having noted this, he thrust
+it into the coffin between the crystal wall and its occupant. Then we
+went out and waited a little while to give the odours time to dissipate,
+for they made the head reel.
+
+After five minutes or so we returned and examined the thermometer. It
+had risen to 98 degrees, the natural temperature of the human body.
+
+"What do you make of that if the man is dead?" he whispered.
+
+I shook my head, and as we had agreed, set to helping him to lift the
+body from the coffin. It was a good weight, quite eleven stone I should
+say; moreover, it was not stiff, for the hip joints bent. We got it out
+and laid it on a blanket we had spread on the floor of the sepulchre.
+Whilst I was thus engaged I saw something that nearly caused me to loose
+my hold from astonishment. Beneath the head, the centre of the back and
+the feet were crystal boxes about eight inches square, or rather crystal
+blocks, for in them I could see no opening, and these boxes emitted a
+faint phosphorescent light. I touched one of them and found that it was
+quite warm.
+
+"Great heavens!" I exclaimed, "here's magic."
+
+"There's no such thing," answered Bickley in his usual formula. Then an
+explanation seemed to strike him and he added, "Not magic but radium
+or something of the sort. That's how the temperature was kept up. In
+sufficient quantity it is practically indestructible, you see. My word!
+this old gentleman knew a thing or two."
+
+Again we waited a little while to see if the body begun to crumble on
+exposure to the air, I taking the opportunity to make a rough sketch of
+it in my pocket-book in anticipation of that event. But it did not; it
+remained quite sound.
+
+"Here goes," said Bickley. "If he should be alive, he will catch cold in
+his lungs after lying for ages in that baby incubator, as I suppose he
+has done. So it is now or never."
+
+Then bidding me hold the man's right arm, he took the sterilized syringe
+which he had prepared, and thrusting the needle into a vein he selected
+just above the wrist, injected the contents.
+
+"It would have been better over the heart," he whispered, "but I thought
+I would try the arm first. I don't like risking chills by uncovering
+him."
+
+I made no answer and again we waited and watched.
+
+"Great heavens, he's stirring!" I gasped presently.
+
+Stirring he was, for his fingers began to move.
+
+Bickley bent down and placed his ear to the heart--I forgot to say that
+he had tested this before with a stethoscope, but had been unable to
+detect any movement.
+
+"I believe it is beginning to beat," he said in an awed voice.
+
+Then he applied the stethoscope, and added, "It is, it is!"
+
+Next he took a filament of cotton wool and laid it on the man's lips.
+Presently it moved; he was breathing, though very faintly. Bickley took
+more cotton wool and having poured something from his medicine-chest on
+to it, placed it over the mouth beneath the man's nostrils--I believe it
+was sal volatile.
+
+Nothing further happened for a little while, and to relieve the strain
+on my mind I stared absently into the empty coffin. Here I saw what had
+escaped our notice, two small plates of white metal and cut upon them
+what I took to be star maps. Beyond these and the glowing boxes which I
+have mentioned, there was nothing else in the coffin. I had no time to
+examine them, for at that moment the old man opened his mouth and began
+to breathe, evidently with some discomfort and effort, as his empty
+lungs filled themselves with air. Then his eyelids lifted, revealing a
+wonderful pair of dark glowing eyes beneath. Next he tried to sit up but
+would have fallen, had not Bickley supported him with his arm.
+
+I do not think he saw Bickley, indeed he shut his eyes again as though
+the light hurt them, and went into a kind of faint. Then it was that
+Tommy, who all this while had been watching the proceedings with grave
+interest, came forward, wagging his tail, and licked the man's face.
+At the touch of the dog's red tongue, he opened his eyes for the second
+time. Now he saw--not us but Tommy, for after contemplating him for a
+few seconds, something like a smile appeared upon his fierce but noble
+face. More, he lifted his hand and laid it on the dog's head, as
+though to pat it kindly. Half a minute or so later his awakening senses
+appreciated our presence. The incipient smile vanished and was replaced
+by a somewhat terrible frown.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley had poured out some of the hot coffee laced with
+brandy into the cup that was screwed on the top of the thermos flask.
+Advancing to the man whom I supported, he put it to his lips. He tasted
+and made a wry face, but presently he began to sip, and ultimately
+swallowed it all. The effect of the stimulant was wonderful, for in
+a few minutes he came to life completely and was even able to sit up
+without support.
+
+For quite a long while he gazed at us gravely, talking us in and
+everything connected with us. For instance, Bickley's medicine-case
+which lay open showing the little vulcanite tubes, a few instruments and
+other outfit, engaged his particular attention, and I saw at once that
+he understood what it was. Thus his arm still smarted where the needle
+had been driven in and on the blanket lay the syringe. He looked at
+his arm, then looked at the syringe, and nodded. The paraffin hurricane
+lamps also seemed to interest and win his approval. We two men, as
+I thought, attracted him least of all; he just summed us up and our
+garments, more especially the garments, with a few shrewd glances, and
+then seemed to turn his thoughts to Tommy, who had seated himself quite
+contentedly at his side, evidently accepting him as a new addition to
+our party.
+
+I confess that this behaviour on Tommy's part reassured me not a little.
+I am a great believer in the instincts of animals, especially of dogs,
+and I felt certain that if this man had not been in all essentials human
+like ourselves, Tommy would not have tolerated him. In the same way the
+sleeper's clear liking for Tommy, at whom he looked much oftener and
+with greater kindness than he did at us, suggested that there was
+goodness in him somewhere, since although a dog in its wonderful
+tolerance may love a bad person in whom it smells out hidden virtue, no
+really bad person ever loved a dog, or, I may add, a child or a flower.
+
+As a matter of fact, the "old god," as we had christened him while he
+was in his coffin, during all our association with him, cared infinitely
+more for Tommy than he did for any of us, a circumstance that ultimately
+was not without its influence upon our fortunes. But for this there was
+a reason as we learned afterwards, also he was not really so amiable as
+I hoped.
+
+When we had looked at each other for a long while the sleeper began
+to arrange his beard, of which the length seemed to surprise him,
+especially as Tommy was seated on one end of it. Finding this out and
+apparently not wishing to disturb Tommy, he gave up the occupation, and
+after one or two attempts, for his tongue and lips still seemed to be
+stiff, addressed us in some sonorous and musical language, unlike any
+that we had ever heard. We shook our heads. Then by an afterthought I
+said "Good day" to him in the language of the Orofenans. He puzzled
+over the word as though it were more or less familiar to him, and when
+I repeated it, gave it back to me with a difference indeed, but in a
+way which convinced us that he quite understood what I meant. The
+conversation went no further at the moment because just then some memory
+seemed to strike him.
+
+He was sitting with his back against the coffin of the Glittering Lady,
+whom therefore he had not seen. Now he began to turn round, and being
+too weak to do so, motioned me to help him. I obeyed, while Bickley,
+guessing his purpose, held up one of the hurricane lamps that he might
+see better. With a kind of fierce eagerness he surveyed her who lay
+within the coffin, and after he had done so, uttered a sigh as of
+intense relief.
+
+Next he pointed to the metal cup out of which he had drunk. Bickley
+filled it again from the thermos flask, which I observed excited his
+keen interest, for, having touched the flask with his hand and found
+that it was cool, he appeared to marvel that the fluid coming from it
+should be hot and steaming. Presently he smiled as though he had got
+the clue to the mystery, and swallowed his second drink of coffee and
+spirit. This done, he motioned to us to lift the lid of the lady's
+coffin, pointing out a certain catch in the bolts which at first we
+could not master, for it will be remembered that on this coffin these
+were shot.
+
+In the end, by pursuing the same methods that we had used in the
+instance of his own, we raised the coffin lid and once more were driven
+to retreat from the sepulchre for a while by the overpowering odour like
+to that of a whole greenhouse full of tuberoses, that flowed out of it,
+inducing a kind of stupefaction from which even Tommy fled.
+
+When we returned it was to find the man kneeling by the side of the
+coffin, for as yet he could not stand, with his glowing eyes fixed upon
+the face of her who slept therein and waving his long arms above her.
+
+"Hypnotic business! Wonder if it will work," whispered Bickley. Then
+he lifted the syringe and looked inquiringly at the man, who shook his
+head, and went on with his mesmeric passes.
+
+I crept round him and took my stand by the sleeper's head, that I might
+watch her face, which was well worth watching, while Bickley, with
+his medicine at hand, remained near her feet, I think engaged in
+disinfecting the syringe in some spirit or acid. I believe he was
+about to make an attempt to use it when suddenly, as though beneath the
+influence of the hypnotic passes, a change appeared on the Glittering
+Lady's face. Hitherto, beautiful as it was, it had been a dead face
+though one of a person who had suddenly been cut off while in full
+health and vigour a few hours, or at the most a day or so before. Now
+it began to live again; it was as though the spirit were returning from
+afar, and not without toil and tribulation.
+
+Expression after expression flitted across the features; indeed these
+seemed to change so much from moment to moment that they might have
+belonged to several different individuals, though each was beautiful.
+The fact of these remarkable changes with the suggestion of multiform
+personalities which they conveyed impressed both Bickley and myself very
+much indeed. Then the breast heaved tumultuously; it even appeared to
+struggle. Next the eyes opened. They were full of wonder, even of fear,
+but oh! what marvelous eyes. I do not know how to describe them, I
+cannot even state their exact colour, except that it was dark, something
+like the blue of sapphires of the deepest tint, and yet not black;
+large, too, and soft as a deer's. They shut again as though the light
+hurt them, then once more opened and wandered about, apparently without
+seeing.
+
+At length they found my face, for I was still bending over her, and,
+resting there, appeared to take it in by degrees. More, it seemed to
+touch and stir some human spring in the still-sleeping heart. At least
+the fear passed from her features and was replaced by a faint smile,
+such as a patient sometimes gives to one known and well loved, as the
+effects of chloroform pass away. For a while she looked at me with an
+earnest, searching gaze, then suddenly, for the first time moving her
+arms, lifted them and threw them round my neck.
+
+The old man stared, bending his imperial brows into a little frown,
+but did nothing. Bickley stared also through his glasses and sniffed
+as though in disapproval, while I remained quite still, fighting with
+a wild impulse to kiss her on the lips as one would an awakening and
+beloved child. I doubt if I could have done so, however, for really
+I was immovable; my heart seemed to stop and all my muscles to be
+paralysed.
+
+I do not know for how long this endured, but I do know how it ended.
+Presently in the intense silence I heard Bastin's heavy voice and
+looking round, saw his big head projecting into the sepulchre.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said, "you seem to have woke them up with a
+vengeance. If you begin like that with the lady, there will be
+complications before you have done, Arbuthnot."
+
+Talk of being brought back to earth with a rush! I could have killed
+Bastin, and Bickley, turning on him like a tiger, told him to be off,
+find wood and light a large fire in front of the statue. I think he was
+about to argue when the Ancient gave him a glance of his fierce eyes,
+which alarmed him, and he departed, bewildered, to return presently with
+the wood.
+
+But the sound of his voice had broken the spell. The Lady let her arms
+fall with a start, and shut her eyes again, seeming to faint. Bickley
+sprang forward with his sal volatile and applied it to her nostrils, the
+Ancient not interfering, for he seemed to recognise that he had to deal
+with a man of skill and one who meant well by them.
+
+In the end we brought her round again and, to omit details, Bickley gave
+her, not coffee and brandy, but a mixture he compounded of hot water,
+preserved milk and meat essence. The effect of it on her was wonderful,
+since a few minutes after swallowing it she sat up in the coffin. Then
+we lifted her from that narrow bed in which she had slept for--ah! how
+long? and perceived that beneath her also were crystal boxes of
+the radiant, heat-giving substance. We sat her on the floor of the
+sepulchre, wrapping her also in a blanket.
+
+Now it was that Tommy, after frisking round her as though in welcome of
+an old friend, calmly established himself beside her and laid his
+black head upon her knee. She noted it and smiled for the first time,
+a marvelously sweet and gentle smile. More, she placed her slender hand
+upon the dog and stroked him feebly.
+
+Bickley tried to make her drink some more of his mixture, but she
+refused, motioning him to give it to Tommy. This, however, he would not
+do because there was but one cup. Presently both of the sleepers began
+to shiver, which caused Bickley anxiety. Abusing Bastin beneath his
+breath for being so long with the fire, he drew the blankets closer
+about them.
+
+Then an idea came to him and he examined the glowing boxes in the
+coffin. They were loose, being merely set in prepared cavities in the
+crystal. Wrapping our handkerchiefs about his hand, he took them out
+and placed them around the wakened patients, a proceeding of which the
+Ancient nodded approval. Just then, too, Bastin returned with his first
+load of firewood, and soon we had a merry blaze going just outside the
+sepulchre. I saw that they observed the lighting of this fire by means
+of a match with much interest.
+
+Now they grew warm again, as indeed we did also--too warm. Then in my
+turn I had an idea. I knew that by now the sun would be beating hotly
+against the rock of the mount, and suggested to Bickley, that, if
+possible, the best thing we could do would be to get them into its
+life-giving rays. He agreed, if we could make them understand and they
+were able to walk. So I tried. First I directed the Ancient's attention
+to the mouth of the cave which at this distance showed as a white circle
+of light. He looked at it and then at me with grave inquiry. I made
+motions to suggest that he should proceed there, repeating the word
+"Sun" in the Orofenan tongue. He understood at once, though whether
+he read my mind rather than what I said I am not sure. Apparently the
+Glittering Lady understood also and seemed to be most anxious to go.
+Only she looked rather pitifully at her feet and shook her head. This
+decided me.
+
+I do not know if I have mentioned anywhere that I am a tall man and very
+muscular. She was tall, also, but as I judged not so very heavy after
+her long fast. At any rate I felt quite certain that I could carry her
+for that distance. Stooping down, I lifted her up, signing to her to
+put her arms round my neck, which she did. Then calling to Bickley and
+Bastin to bring along the Ancient between them, with some difficulty I
+struggled out of the sepulchre, and started down the cave. She was more
+heavy than I thought, and yet I could have wished the journey longer. To
+begin with she seemed quite trustful and happy in my arms, where she lay
+with her head against my shoulder, smiling a little as a child might do,
+especially when I had to stop and throw her long hair round my neck like
+a muffler, to prevent it from trailing in the dust.
+
+A bundle of lavender, or a truss of new-mown hay, could not have been
+more sweet to carry and there was something electric about the touch of
+her, which went through and through me. Very soon it was over, and we
+were out of the cave into the full glory of the tropical sun. At first,
+that her eyes might become accustomed to its light and her awakened body
+to its heat, I set her down where shadow fell from the overhanging rock,
+in a canvas deck chair that had been brought by Marama with the other
+things, throwing the rug about her to protect her from such wind as
+there was. She nestled gratefully into the soft seat and shut her eyes,
+for the motion had tired her. I noted, however, that she drew in the
+sweet air with long breaths.
+
+Then I turned to observe the arrival of the Ancient, who was being borne
+between Bickley and Bastin in what children know as a dandy-chair, which
+is formed by two people crossing their hands in a peculiar fashion. It
+says much for the tremendous dignity of his presence that even thus,
+with one arm round the neck of Bickley and the other round that of
+Bastin, and his long white beard falling almost to the ground, he still
+looked most imposing.
+
+Unfortunately, however, just as they were emerging from the cave,
+Bastin, always the most awkward of creatures, managed to leave hold with
+one hand, so that his passenger nearly came to the ground. Never shall I
+forget the look that he gave him. Indeed, I think that from this moment
+he hated Bastin. Bickley he respected as a man of intelligence and
+learning, although in comparison with his own, the latter was infantile
+and crude; me he tolerated and even liked; but Bastin he detested.
+The only one of our party for whom he felt anything approaching real
+affection was the spaniel Tommy.
+
+We set him down, fortunately uninjured, on some rugs, and also in the
+shadow. Then, after a little while, we moved both of them into the sun.
+It was quite curious to see them expand there. As Bickley said,
+what happened to them might well be compared to the development of a
+butterfly which has just broken from the living grave of its chrysalis
+and crept into the full, hot radiance of the light. Its crinkled wings
+unfold, their brilliant tints develop; in an hour or two it is perfect,
+glorious, prepared for life and flight, a new creature.
+
+So it was with this pair, from moment to moment they gathered strength
+and vigour. Near-by to them, as it happened, stood a large basket of
+the luscious native fruits brought that morning by the Orofenans, and at
+these the Lady looked with longing. With Bickley's permission, I offered
+them to her and to the Ancient, first peeling them with my fingers. They
+ate of them greedily, a full meal, and would have gone on had not the
+stern Bickley, fearing untoward consequences, removed the basket. Again
+the results were wonderful, for half an hour afterwards they seemed to
+be quite strong. With my assistance the Glittering Lady, as I still call
+her, for at that time I did not know her name, rose from the chair, and,
+leaning on me, tottered a few steps forward. Then she stood looking at
+the sky and all the lovely panorama of nature beneath, and stretching
+out her arms as though in worship. Oh! how beautiful she seemed with the
+sunlight shining on her heavenly face!
+
+Now for the first time I heard her voice. It was soft and deep, yet in
+it was a curious bell-like tone that seemed to vibrate like the sound of
+chimes heard from far away. Never have I listened to such another voice.
+She pointed to the sun whereof the light turned her radiant hair and
+garments to a kind of golden glory, and called it by some name that I
+could not understand. I shook my head, whereon she gave it a different
+name taken, I suppose, from another language. Again I shook my head and
+she tried a third time. To my delight this word was practically the same
+that the Orofenans used for "sun."
+
+"Yes," I said, speaking very slowly, "so it is called by the people of
+this land."
+
+She understood, for she answered in much the same language:
+
+"What, then, do you call it?"
+
+"Sun in the English tongue," I replied.
+
+"Sun. English," she repeated after me, then added, "How are you named,
+Wanderer?"
+
+"Humphrey," I answered.
+
+"Hum-fe-ry!" she said as though she were learning the word, "and those?"
+
+"Bastin and Bickley," I replied.
+
+Over these patronymics she shook her head; as yet they were too much for
+her.
+
+"How are you named, Sleeper?" I asked.
+
+"Yva," she answered.
+
+"A beautiful name for one who is beautiful," I declared with enthusiasm,
+of course always in the rich Orofenan dialect which by now I could talk
+well enough.
+
+She repeated the words once or twice, then of a sudden caught their
+meaning, for she smiled and even coloured, saying hastily with a wave of
+her hand towards the Ancient who stood at a distance between Bastin and
+Bickley, "My father, Oro; great man; great king; great god!"
+
+At this information I started, for it was startling to learn that
+here was the original Oro, who was still worshipped by the Orofenans,
+although of his actual existence they had known nothing for uncounted
+time. Also I was glad to learn that he was her father and not her old
+husband, for to me that would have been horrible, a desecration too deep
+for words.
+
+"How long did you sleep, Yva?" I asked, pointing towards the sepulchre
+in the cave.
+
+After a little thought she understood and shook her head hopelessly,
+then by an afterthought, she said,
+
+"Stars tell Oro to-night."
+
+So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had guessed as
+much from those plates in the coffin which seemed to have stars engraved
+on them.
+
+At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient himself
+approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged in an animated
+argument with Bastin.
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" said Bickley, "keep your theology to yourself at
+present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a temper he may
+die."
+
+"If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him that he is
+a liar," replied Bastin obstinately.
+
+"Which you did, Bastin, only fortunately he did not understand you. But
+for your own sake I advise you not to take liberties. He is not one, I
+think, with whom it is wise to trifle. I think he seems thirsty. Go and
+get some water from the rain pool, not from the lake."
+
+Bastin departed and presently returned with an aluminum jug full of pure
+water and a glass. Bickley poured some of it into a glass and handed it
+to Yva who bent her head in thanks. Then she did a curious thing. Having
+first lifted the glass with both hands to the sky and held it so for a
+few seconds, she turned and with an obeisance poured a little of it on
+the ground before her father's feet.
+
+A libation, thought I to myself, and evidently Bastin agreed with me,
+for I heard him mutter,
+
+"I believe she is making a heathen offering."
+
+Doubtless we were right, for Oro accepted the homage by a little motion
+of the head. After this, at a sign from him she drank the water. Then
+the glass was refilled and handed to Oro who also held it towards the
+sky. He, however, made no libation but drank at once, two tumblers of it
+in rapid succession.
+
+By now the direct sunlight was passing from the mouth of the cave, and
+though it was hot enough, both of them shivered a little. They spoke
+together in some language of which we could not understand a word, as
+though they were debating what their course of action should be. The
+dispute was long and earnest. Had we known what was passing, which I
+learned afterwards, it would have made us sufficiently anxious, for the
+point at issue was nothing less than whether we should or should not be
+forthwith destroyed--an end, it appears, that Oro was quite capable of
+bringing about if he so pleased. Yva, however, had very clear views of
+her own on the matter and, as I gather, even dared to threaten that she
+would protect us by the use of certain powers at her command, though
+what these were I do not know.
+
+While the event hung doubtful Tommy, who was growing bored with these
+long proceedings, picked up a bough still covered with flowers which,
+after their pretty fashion, the Orofenans had placed on the top of one
+of the baskets of food. This small bough he brought and laid at the feet
+of Oro, no doubt in the hope that he would throw it for him to fetch, a
+game in which the dog delighted. For some reason Oro saw an omen in
+this simple canine performance, or he may have thought that the dog
+was making an offering to him, for he put his thin hand to his brow and
+thought a while, then motioned to Bastin to pick up the bough and give
+it to him.
+
+Next he spoke to his daughter as though assenting to something, for I
+saw her sigh in relief. No wonder, for he was conveying his decision to
+spare our lives and admit us to their fellowship.
+
+After this again they talked, but in quite a different tone and manner.
+Then the Glittering Lady said to me in her slow and archaic Orofenan:
+
+"We go to rest. You must not follow. We come back perhaps tonight,
+perhaps next night. We are quite safe. You are quite safe under the
+beard of Oro. Spirit of Oro watch you. You understand?"
+
+I said I understood, whereon she answered:
+
+"Good-bye, O Humfe-ry."
+
+"Good-bye, O Yva," I replied, bowing.
+
+Thereon they turned and refusing all assistance from us, vanished into
+the darkness of the cave leaning upon each other and walking slowly.
+
+
+
+Chapter XII. Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!
+
+
+"You seem to have made the best of your time, old fellow," said Bickley
+in rather a sour voice.
+
+"I never knew people begin to call each other by their Christian names
+so soon," added Bastin, looking at me with a suspicious eye.
+
+"I know no other," I said.
+
+"Perhaps not, but at any rate you have another, though you don't seem to
+have told it to her. Anyway, I am glad they are gone, for I was getting
+tired of being ordered by everybody to carry about wood and water for
+them. Also I am terribly hungry as I can't eat before it is light. They
+have taken most of the best fruit to which I was looking forward, but
+thank goodness they do not seem to care for pork."
+
+"So am I," said Bickley, who really looked exhausted. "Get the food,
+there's a good fellow. We'll talk afterwards."
+
+When we had eaten, somewhat silently, I asked Bickley what he made of
+the business; also whither he thought the sleepers had gone.
+
+"I think I can answer the last question," interrupted Bastin. "I expect
+it is to a place well known to students of the Bible which even Bickley
+mentions sometimes when he is angry. At any rate, they seem to be very
+fond of heat, for they wouldn't part from it even in their coffins, and
+you will admit that they are not quite natural, although that Glittering
+Lady is so attractive as regards her exterior."
+
+Bickley waved these remarks aside and addressed himself to me.
+
+"I don't know what to think of it," he said; "but as the experience is
+not natural and everything in the Universe, so far as we know it, has a
+natural explanation, I am inclined to the belief that we are suffering
+from hallucinations, which in their way are also quite natural. It does
+not seem possible that two people can really have been asleep for an
+unknown length of time enclosed in vessels of glass or crystal, kept
+warm by radium or some such substance, and then emerge from them
+comparatively strong and well. It is contrary to natural law."
+
+"How about microbes?" I asked. "They are said to last practically for
+ever, and they are living things. So in their case your natural law
+breaks down."
+
+"That is true," he answered. "Some microbes in a sealed tube and under
+certain conditions do appear to possess indefinite powers of life. Also
+radium has an indefinite life, but that is a mineral. Only these people
+are not microbes nor are they minerals. Also, experience tells us that
+they could not have lived for more than a few months at the outside in
+such circumstances as we seemed to find them."
+
+"Then what do you suggest?"
+
+"I suggest that we did not really find them at all; that we have all
+been dreaming. You know that there are certain gases which produce
+illusions, laughing gas is one of them, and that these gases are
+sometimes met with in caves. Now there were very peculiar odours in that
+place under the statue, which may have worked upon our imaginations in
+some such way. Otherwise we are up against a miracle, and, as you know,
+I do not believe in miracles."
+
+"I do," said Bastin calmly. "You'll find all about it in the Bible if
+you will only take the trouble to read. Why do you talk such rubbish
+about gases?"
+
+"Because only gas, or something of the sort, could have made us imagine
+them."
+
+"Nonsense, Bickley! Those people were here right enough. Didn't they eat
+our fruit and drink the water I brought them without ever saying thank
+you? Only, they are not human. They are evil spirits, and for my part
+I don't want to see any more of them, though I have no doubt Arbuthnot
+does, as that Glittering Lady threw her arms round his neck when she
+woke up, and already he is calling her by her Christian name, if the
+word Christian can be used in connection with her. The old fellow had
+the impudence to tell us that he was a god, and it is remarkable that
+he should have called himself Oro, seeing that the devil they worship on
+the island is also called Oro and the place itself is named Orofena."
+
+"As to where they have gone," continued Bickley, taking no notice of
+Bastin, "I really don't know. My expectation is, however, that when
+we go to look tomorrow morning--and I suggest that we should not do so
+before then in order that we may give our minds time to clear--we shall
+find that sepulchre place quite empty, even perhaps without the crystal
+coffins we have imagined to stand there."
+
+"Perhaps we shall find that there isn't a cave at all and that we are
+not sitting on a flat rock outside of it," suggested Bastin with heavy
+sarcasm, adding, "You are clever in your way, Bickley, but you can talk
+more rubbish than any man I ever knew."
+
+"They told us they would come back tonight or tomorrow," I said. "If
+they do, what will you say then, Bickley?"
+
+"I will wait till they come to answer that question. Now let us go for
+a walk and try to change our thoughts. We are all over-strained and
+scarcely know what we are saying."
+
+"One more question," I said as we rose to start. "Did Tommy suffer from
+hallucinations as well as ourselves?"
+
+"Why not?" answered Bickley. "He is an animal just as we are, or perhaps
+we thought we saw Tommy do the things he did."
+
+"When you found that basket of fruit, Bastin, which the natives brought
+over in the canoe, was there a bough covered with red flowers lying on
+the top of it?"
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot, one bough only; I threw it down on the rock as it got
+in the way when I was carrying the basket."
+
+"Which flowering bough we all thought we saw the Sleeper Oro carry away
+after Tommy had brought it to him."
+
+"Yes; he made me pick it up and give it to him," said Bastin.
+
+"Well, if we did not see this it should still be lying on the rock, as
+there has been no wind and there are no animals here to carry it away.
+You will admit that, Bickley?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Then if it has gone you will admit also that the presumption is that we
+saw what we thought we did see?"
+
+"I do not know how that conclusion can be avoided, at any rate so far as
+the incident of the bough is concerned," replied Bickley with caution.
+
+Then, without more words, we started to look. At the spot where the
+bough should have been, there was no bough, but on the rock lay several
+of the red flowers, bitten off, I suppose, by Tommy while he was
+carrying it. Nor was this all. I think I have mentioned that the
+Glittering Lady wore sandals which were fastened with red studs that
+looked like rubies or carbuncles. On the rock lay one of these studs.
+I picked it up and we examined it. It had been sewn to the sandal-strap
+with golden thread or silk. Some of this substance hung from the hole
+drilled in the stone which served for an eye. It was as rotten as
+tinder, apparently with extreme age. Moreover, the hard gem itself was
+pitted as though the passage of time had taken effect upon it, though
+this may have been caused by other agencies, such as the action of the
+radium rays. I smiled at Bickley who looked disconcerted and even sad.
+In a way it is painful to see the effect upon an able and earnest man of
+the upsetting of his lifelong theories.
+
+We went for our walk, keeping to the flat lands at the foot of the
+volcano cone, for we seemed to have had enough of wonders and to desire
+to reassure ourselves, as it were, by the study of natural and
+familiar things. As it chanced, too, we were rewarded by sundry useful
+discoveries. Thus we found a place where the bread-tree and other
+fruits, most of them now ripe, grew in abundance, as did the yam. Also,
+we came to an inlet that we noticed was crowded with large and beautiful
+fish from the lake, which seemed to find it a favourite spot. Perhaps
+this was because a little stream of excellent water ran in here,
+overflowing from the great pool or mere which filled the crater above.
+
+At these finds we rejoiced greatly, for now we knew that we need not
+fear starvation even should our supply of food from the main island be
+cut off. Indeed, by help of some palm-leaf stalks which we wove together
+roughly, Bastin, who was rather clever at this kind of thing, managed
+to trap four fish weighing two or three pounds apiece, wading into the
+water to do so. It was curious to observe with what ease he adapted
+himself to the manners and customs of primeval man, so much so, indeed,
+that Bickley remarked that if he could believe in re-incarnation, he
+would be absolutely certain that Bastin was a troglodyte in his last
+sojourn on the earth.
+
+However this might be, Bastin's primeval instincts and abilities were of
+the utmost service to us. Before we had been many days on that island
+he had built us a kind of native hut or house roofed with palm leaves in
+which, until provided with a better, as happened afterwards, we ate and
+he and Bickley slept, leaving the tent to me. Moreover, he wove a net
+of palm fibre with which he caught abundance of fish, and made
+fishing-lines of the same material (fortunately we had some hooks) which
+he baited with freshwater mussels and the insides of fish. By means of
+these he secured some veritable monsters of the carp species that proved
+most excellent eating. His greatest triumph, however, was a decoy which
+he constructed of boughs, wherein he trapped a number of waterfowl. So
+that soon we kept a very good table of a sort, especially after he
+had learned how to cook our food upon the native plan by means of hot
+stones. This suited us admirably, as it enabled Bickley and myself to
+devote all our time to archaeological and other studies which did not
+greatly interest Bastin.
+
+By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards evening,
+so we cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly exhausted, made
+ourselves as comfortable as we could and went to sleep. Even our
+marvelous experiences could not keep Bickley and myself from sleeping,
+and on Bastin such things had no effect. He accepted them and that was
+all, much more readily than we did, indeed. Triple-armed as he was in
+the mail of a child-like faith, he snapped his fingers at evil spirits
+which he supposed the Sleepers to be, and at everything else that other
+men might dread.
+
+Now, as I have mentioned, after our talk with Marama, although we did
+not think it wise to adventure ourselves among them again at present, we
+had lost all fear of the Orofenans. In this attitude, so far as Marama
+himself and the majority of his people were concerned, we were quite
+justified, for they were our warm friends. But in the case of the
+sorcerers, the priests and all their rascally and superstitious
+brotherhood, we were by no means justified. They had not forgiven Bastin
+his sacrilege or for his undermining of their authority by the preaching
+of new doctrines which, if adopted, would destroy them as a hierarchy.
+Nor had they forgiven Bickley for shooting one of their number, or any
+of us for our escape from the vengeance of their god.
+
+So it came about that they made a plot to seize us all and hale us off
+to be sacrificed to a substituted image of Oro, which by now they had
+set up. They knew exactly where we slept upon the rock; indeed, our fire
+showed it to them and so far they were not afraid to venture, since here
+they had been accustomed for generations to lay their offerings to
+the god of the Mountain. Secretly on the previous night, without the
+knowledge of Marama, they had carried two more canoes to the borders of
+the lake. Now on this night, just as the moon was setting about three
+in the morning, they made their attack, twenty-one men in all, for the
+three canoes were large, relying on the following darkness to get us
+away and convey us to the place of sacrifice to be offered up at dawn
+and before Marama could interfere.
+
+The first we knew of the matter, for most foolishly we had neglected to
+keep a watch, was the unpleasant sensation of brawny savages kneeling on
+us and trussing us up with palm-fibre ropes. Also they thrust handfuls
+of dry grass into our mouths to prevent us from calling out, although as
+air came through the interstices of the grass, we did not suffocate. The
+thing was so well done that we never struck a blow in self-defence, and
+although we had our pistols at hand, much less could we fire a shot. Of
+course, we struggled as well as we were able, but it was quite useless;
+in three minutes we were as helpless as calves in a net and like calves
+were being conveyed to the butcher. Bastin managed to get the gag out
+of his mouth for a few seconds, and I heard him say in his slow, heavy
+voice:
+
+"This, Bickley, is what comes of trafficking with evil spirits in museum
+cases--" There his speech stopped, for the grass wad was jammed down his
+throat again, but distinctly I heard the inarticulate Bickley snort
+as he conceived the repartee he was unable to utter. As for myself, I
+reflected that the business served us right for not keeping a watch, and
+abandoned the issue to fate.
+
+Still, to confess the truth, I was infinitely more sorry to die than I
+should have been forty-eight hours earlier. This is a dull and in most
+ways a dreadful world, one, if we could only summon the courage, that
+some of us would be glad to leave in search of new adventures. But here
+a great and unprecedented adventure had begun to befall me, and
+before its mystery was solved, before even I could formulate a theory
+concerning it, my body must be destroyed, and my intelligence that was
+caged therein, sent far afield; or, if Bickley were right, eclipsed.
+It seemed so sad just when the impossible, like an unguessed wandering
+moon, had risen over the grey flats of the ascertained and made them
+shine with hope and wonder.
+
+They carried us off to the canoes, not too gently; indeed, I heard the
+bony frame of Bastin bump into the bottom of one of them and reflected,
+not without venom, that it served him right as he was the fount and
+origin of our woes. Two stinking magicians, wearing on their heads
+undress editions of their court cages, since these were too cumbersome
+for active work of the sort, and painted all over with various pigments,
+were just about to swing me after him into the same, or another canoe,
+when something happened. I did not know what it was, but as a result, my
+captors left hold of me so that I fell to the rock, lying upon my back.
+
+Then, within my line of vision, which, it must be remembered, was
+limited because I could not lift my head, appeared the upper part of the
+tall person of the Ancient who said that he was named Oro. I could only
+see him down to his middle, but I noted vaguely that he seemed to be
+much changed. For instance, he wore a different coloured dress, or
+rather robe; this time it was dark blue, which caused me to wonder where
+on earth it came from. Also, his tremendous beard had been trimmed
+and dressed, and on his head there was a simple black cap, strangely
+quilted, which looked as though it were made of velvet. Moreover,
+his face had plumped out. He still looked ancient, it is true, and
+unutterably wise, but now he resembled an antique youth, so great were
+his energy and vigour. Also, his dark and glowing eyes shone with a
+fearful intensity. In short, he seemed impressive and terrible almost
+beyond imagining.
+
+He looked about him slowly, then asked in a deep, cold voice, speaking
+in the Orofenan tongue:
+
+"What do you, slaves?"
+
+No one seemed able to answer, they were too horror-stricken at this
+sudden vision of their fabled god, whose fierce features of wood had
+become flesh; they only turned to fly. He waved his thin hand and they
+came to a standstill, like animals which have reached the end of their
+tether and are checked by the chains that bind them. There they stood
+in all sorts of postures, immovable and looking extremely ridiculous in
+their paint and feathers, with dread unutterable stamped upon their evil
+faces.
+
+The Sleeper spoke again:
+
+"You would murder as did your forefathers, O children of snakes and hogs
+fashioned in the shape of men. You would sacrifice those who dwell in my
+shadow to satisfy your hate because they are wiser than you. Come hither
+thou," and he beckoned with a bony finger to the chief magician.
+
+The man advanced towards him in short jumps, as a mechanical toy might
+do, and stood before him, his miniature crate and feathers all awry and
+the sweat of terror melting the paint in streaks upon his face.
+
+"Look into the eyes of Oro, O worshipper of Oro," said the Sleeper, and
+he obeyed, his own eyes starting out of his head.
+
+"Receive the curse of Oro," said the Ancient again. Then followed a
+terrible spectacle. The man went raving mad. He bounded into the air to
+a height inconceivable. He threw himself upon the ground and rolled upon
+the rock. He rose again and staggered round and round, tearing pieces
+out of his arms with his teeth. He yelled hideously like one possessed.
+He grovelled, beating his forehead against the rock. Then he sat up,
+slowly choked and--died.
+
+His companions seemed to catch the infection of death as terrified
+savages often do. They too performed dreadful antics, all except three
+of them who stood paralysed. They rushed about battering each other with
+their fists and wooden weapons, looking like devils from hell in
+their hideous painted attire. They grappled and fought furiously. They
+separated and plunged into the lake, where with a last grimace they sank
+like stones.
+
+It seemed to last a long while, but I think that as a matter of fact
+within five minutes it was over; they were all dead. Only the three
+paralysed ones remained standing and rolling their eyes.
+
+The Sleeper beckoned to them with his thin finger, and they walked
+forward in step like soldiers.
+
+"Lift that man from the boat," he said, pointing to Bastin, "cut his
+bonds and those of the others."
+
+They obeyed with a wonderful alacrity. In a minute we stood at liberty
+and were pulling the grass gags from our mouths. The Ancient pointed
+to the head magician who lay dead upon the rock, his hideous, contorted
+countenance staring open-eyed at heaven.
+
+"Take that sorcerer and show him to the other sorcerers yonder," he
+said, "and tell them where your fellows are if they would find them.
+Know by these signs that the Oro, god of the Mountain, who has slept a
+while, is awake, and ill will it go with them who question his power or
+dare to try to harm those who dwell in his house. Bring food day by day
+and await commands. Begone!"
+
+The dreadful-looking body was bundled into one of the canoes, that
+out of which Bastin had emerged. A rower sprang into each of them and
+presently was paddling as he had never done before. As the setting
+moon vanished, they vanished with it, and once more there was a great
+silence.
+
+"I am going to find my boots," said Bastin. "This rock is hard and I
+hurt my feet kicking at those poor fellows who appear to have come to a
+bad end, how, I do not exactly understand. Personally, I think that more
+allowances should have been made for them, as I hope will be the case
+elsewhere, since after all they only acted according to their lights."
+
+"Curse their lights!" ejaculated Bickley, feeling his throat which was
+bruised. "I'm glad they are out."
+
+Bastin limped away in search of his boots, but Bickley and I stood where
+we were contemplating the awakened Sleeper. All recollection of the
+recent tumultuous scene seemed to have passed from his mind, for he was
+engaged in a study of the heavens. They were wonderfully brilliant now
+that the moon was down, brilliant as they only can be in the tropics
+when the sky is clear.
+
+Something caused me to look round, and there, coming towards us, was she
+who said her name was Yva. Evidently all her weakness had departed also,
+for now she needed no support, but walked with a peculiar gliding motion
+that reminded me of a swan floating forward on the water. Well had we
+named her the Glittering Lady, for in the starlight literally she seemed
+to glitter. I suppose the effect came from her golden raiment, which,
+however, I noticed, as in her father's case, was not the same that she
+had worn in the coffin; also from her hair that seemed to give out a
+light of its own. At least, she shimmered as she came, her tall shape
+swaying at every step like a willow in the wind. She drew near, and
+I saw that her face, too, had filled out and now was that of one in
+perfect health and vigour, while her eyes shone softly and seemed
+wondrous large.
+
+In her hands she carried those two plates of metal which I had seen
+lying in the coffin of the Sleeper Oro. These she gave to him, then fell
+back out of his hearing--if it were ever possible to do this, a point
+on which I am not sure--and began to talk to me. I noted at once that in
+the few hours during which she was absent, her knowledge of the Orofenan
+tongue seemed to have improved greatly as though she had drunk deeply
+from some hidden fount of memory. Now she spoke it with readiness, as
+Oro had done when he addressed the sorcerers, although many of the words
+she used were not known to me, and the general form of her language
+appeared archaic, as for instance that of Spenser is compared with
+modern English. When she saw I did not comprehend her, however, she
+would stop and cast her sentences in a different shape, till at length I
+caught her meaning. Now I give the substance of what she said.
+
+"You are safe," she began, glancing first at the palm ropes that lay
+upon the rock and then at my wrists, one of which was cut.
+
+"Yes, Lady Yva, thanks to your father."
+
+"You should say thanks to me. My father was thinking of other things,
+but I was thinking of you strangers, and from where I was I saw those
+wicked ones coming to kill you."
+
+"Oh! from the top of the mountain, I suppose."
+
+She shook her head and smiled but vouchsafed no further explanation,
+unless her following words can be so called. These were:
+
+"I can see otherwise than with my eyes, if I choose." A statement that
+caused Bickley, who was listening, to mutter:
+
+"Impossible! What the deuce can she mean? Telepathy, perhaps."
+
+"I saw," she continued, "and told the Lord, my father. He came forth.
+Did he kill them? I did not look to learn."
+
+"Yes. They lie in the lake, all except three whom he sent away as
+messengers."
+
+"I thought so. Death is terrible, O Humphrey, but it is a sword which
+those who rule must use to smite the wicked and the savage."
+
+Not wishing to pursue this subject, I asked her what her father was
+doing with the metal plates.
+
+"He reads the stars," she answered, "to learn how long we have been
+asleep. Before we went to sleep he made two pictures of them, as
+they were then and as they should be at the time he had set for our
+awakening."
+
+"We set that time," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"Not so, O Bickley," she answered, smiling again. "In the divine Oro's
+head was the time set. You were the hand that executed his decree."
+
+When Bickley heard this I really thought he would have burst. However,
+he controlled himself nobly, being anxious to hear the end of this
+mysterious fib.
+
+"How long was the time that the lord Oro set apart for sleep?" I asked.
+
+She paused as though puzzled to find words to express her meaning, then
+held up her hands and said:
+
+"Ten," nodding at her fingers. By second thoughts she took Bickley's
+hands, not mine, and counted his ten fingers.
+
+"Ten years," said Bickley. "Well, of course, it is impossible, but
+perhaps--" and he paused.
+
+"Ten tens," she went on with a deepening smile, "one hundred."
+
+"O!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten hundreds, one thousand."
+
+"I say!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten times ten thousand, one hundred thousand."
+
+Bickley became silent.
+
+"Twice one hundred thousand and half a hundred thousand, two hundred and
+fifty thousand years. That was the space of time which the lord Oro, my
+father, set for our sleep. Whether it has been fulfilled he will know
+presently when he has read the book of the stars and made comparison of
+it with what he wrote before we laid us down to rest," and she pointed
+to the metal plates which the Ancient was studying.
+
+Bickley walked away, making sounds as though he were going to be ill and
+looking so absurd in his indignation that I nearly laughed. The Lady Yva
+actually did laugh, and very musical was that laugh.
+
+"He does not believe," she said. "He is so clever he knows everything.
+But two hundred and fifty thousand years ago we should have thought him
+quite stupid. Then we could read the stars and calculate their movements
+for ever."
+
+"So can we," I answered, rather nettled.
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, since you will be able to show my father if in
+one of them he is wrong."
+
+Secretly I hoped that this task would not be laid on me. Indeed, I
+thought it well to change the subject for the edification of Bickley who
+had recovered and was drawn back by his eager curiosity. Just then, too,
+Bastin joined us, happy in his regained boots.
+
+"You tell us, Lady Yva," I said, "that you slept, or should have slept
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years." Here Bastin opened his eyes.
+"If that was so, where was your mind all this time?"
+
+"If by my mind you mean spirit, O Humphrey, I have to answer that at
+present I do not know for certain. I think, however, that it dwelt
+elsewhere, perhaps in other bodies on the earth, or some different
+earth. At least, I know that my heart is very full of memories which as
+yet I cannot unroll and read."
+
+"Great heavens, this is madness!" said Bickley.
+
+"In the great heavens," she answered slowly, "there are many things
+which you, poor man, would think to be madness, but yet are truth and
+perfect wisdom. These things, or some of them, soon I shall hope to show
+you."
+
+"Do if you can," said Bickley.
+
+"Why not?" interrupted Bastin. "I think the lady's remarks quite
+reasonable. It seems to me highly improbable if really she has slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years, which, of course, I can't decide,
+that an immortal spirit would be allowed to remain idle for so long.
+That would be wallowing in a bed of idleness and shirking its duty which
+is to do its work. Also, as she tells you, Bickley, you are not half
+so clever as you think you are in your silly scepticism, and I have no
+doubt that there are many things in other worlds which would expose your
+ignorance, if only you could see them."
+
+At this moment Oro turned and called his daughter. She went at once,
+saying:
+
+"Come, strangers, and you shall learn."
+
+So we followed her.
+
+"Daughter," he said, speaking in Orofenan, I think that we might
+understand, "ask these strangers to bring one of those lamps of theirs
+that by the light of it I may study these writings."
+
+"Perhaps this may serve," said Bickley, suddenly producing an electric
+torch from his pocket and flashing it into his face. It was his form of
+repartee for all he had suffered at the hands of this incomprehensible
+pair. Let me say at once that it was singularly successful. Perhaps the
+wisdom of the ages in which Oro flourished had overlooked so small a
+matter as electric torches, or perhaps he did not expect to meet with
+them in these degenerate days. At any rate for the first and last time
+in my intercourse with him I saw the god, or lord--the native word bears
+either meaning--Oro genuinely astonished. He started and stepped back,
+and for a moment or two seemed a little frightened. Then muttering
+something as to the cleverness of this light-producing instrument,
+he motioned to his daughter to take it from Bickley and hold it in a
+certain position. She obeyed, and in its illumination he began to study
+the engraved plates, holding one of them in either hand.
+
+After a while he gave me one of the plates to hold, and with his
+disengaged hand pointed successively to the constellation of Orion, to
+the stars Castor, Pollux, Aldebaran, Rigel, the Pleiades, Sirius and
+others which with my very limited knowledge I could not recognise
+offhand. Then on the plate which I held, he showed us those same stars
+and constellations, checking them one by one.
+
+Then he remarked very quietly that all was in order, and handing the
+plate he held to Yva, said:
+
+"The calculations made so long ago are correct, nor have the stars
+varied in their proper motions during what is after all but an hour of
+time. If you, Stranger, who, I understand, are named Humphrey, should
+be, as I gather, a heaven-master, naturally you will ask me how I could
+fix an exact date by the stars without an error of, let us say, from
+five to ten thousand years. I answer you that by the proper motion of
+the stars alone it would have been difficult. Therefore I remember that
+in order to be exact, I calculated the future conjunctions of those two
+planets," and he pointed to Saturn and Jupiter. "Finding that one of
+these occurred near yonder star," and he indicated the bright orb,
+Spica, "at a certain time, I determined that then I would awake. Behold!
+There are the stars as I engraved them from my foreknowledge, upon this
+chart, and there those two great planets hang in conjunction. Daughter
+Yva, my wisdom has not failed me. This world of ours has travelled round
+the sun neither less nor more than two hundred and fifty thousand times
+since we laid ourselves down to sleep. It is written here, and yonder,"
+and he pointed, first to the engraved plates and then to the vast
+expanse of the starlit heavens.
+
+Awe fell on me; I think that even Bickley and Bastin were awed, at any
+rate for the moment. It was a terrible thing to look on a being, to all
+appearance more or less human, who alleged that he had been asleep
+for two hundred and fifty thousand years, and proceeded to prove it by
+certain ancient star charts. Of course at the time I could not check
+those charts, lacking the necessary knowledge, but I have done so since
+and found that they are quite accurate. However this made no difference,
+since the circumstances and something in his manner convinced me that he
+spoke the absolute truth.
+
+He and his daughter had been asleep for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years. Oh! Heavens, for two hundred and fifty thousand years!
+
+
+
+Chapter XIII. Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues
+
+
+The reader of what I have written, should there ever be such a person,
+may find the record marvelous, and therefore rashly conclude that
+because it is beyond experience, it could not be. It is not a wise
+deduction, as I think Bickley would admit today, because without doubt
+many things are which surpass our extremely limited experience. However,
+those who draw the veil from the Unknown and reveal the New, must expect
+incredulity, and accept it without grumbling. Was that not the fate,
+for instance, of those who in the Middle Ages, a few hundred years
+ago, discovered, or rather rediscovered the mighty movements of those
+constellations which served Oro for an almanac?
+
+But the point I want to make is that if the sceptic plays a Bickleyan
+part as regards what has been written, it seems probable that his
+attitude will be accentuated as regards that which it still remains for
+me to write. If so, I cannot help it, and must decline entirely to water
+down or doctor facts and thus pander to his prejudice and ignorance. For
+my part I cannot attempt to explain these occurrences; I only know that
+they happened and that I set down what I saw, heard and felt, neither
+more nor less.
+
+Immediately after Oro had triumphantly vindicated his stellar
+calculations he turned and departed into the cave, followed by his
+daughter, waving to us to remain where we were. As she passed us,
+however, the Glittering Lady whispered--this time to Bastin--that he
+would see them again in a few hours, adding:
+
+"We have much to learn and I hope that then you who, I understand, are a
+priest, will begin to teach us of your religion and other matters."
+
+Bastin was so astonished that he could make no reply, but when they had
+gone he said:
+
+"Which of you told her that I was a priest?"
+
+We shook our heads for neither of us could remember having done so.
+
+"Well, I did not," continued Bastin, "since at present I have found
+no opportunity of saying a word in season. So I suppose she must have
+gathered it from my attire, though as a matter of fact I haven't been
+wearing a collar, and those men who wanted to cook me, pulled off my
+white tie and I didn't think it worth while dirtying a clean one."
+
+"If," said Bickley, "you imagine that you look like the minister of
+any religion ancient or modern in a grubby flannel shirt, a battered
+sun-helmet, a torn green and white umbrella and a pair of ragged duck
+trousers, you are mistaken, Bastin, that is all."
+
+"I admit that the costume is not appropriate, Bickley, but how otherwise
+could she have learned the truth?"
+
+"These people seem to have ways of learning a good many things. But
+in your case, Bastin, the cause is clear enough. You have been walking
+about with the head of that idol and always keep it close to you. No
+doubt they believe that you are a priest of the worship of the god of
+the Grove--Baal, you know, or something of that sort."
+
+When he heard this Bastin's face became a perfect picture. Never before
+did I see it so full of horror struggling with indignation.
+
+"I must undeceive them without a moment's delay," he said, and was
+starting for the cave when we caught his arms and held him.
+
+"Better wait till they come back, old fellow," I said, laughing. "If
+you disobey that Lord Oro you may meet with another experience in the
+sacrifice line."
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Arbuthnot. I will occupy the interval in
+preparing a suitable address."
+
+"Much better occupy it in preparing breakfast," said Bickley. "I have
+always noticed that you are at your best extempore."
+
+In the end he did prepare breakfast though in a distrait fashion; indeed
+I found him beginning to make tea in the frying-pan. Bastin felt
+that his opportunity had arrived, and was making ready to rise to the
+occasion.
+
+Also we felt, all three of us, that we were extremely shabby-looking
+objects, and though none of us said so, each did his best to improve
+his personal appearance. First of all Bickley cut Bastin's and my hair,
+after which I did him the same service. Then Bickley who was normally
+clean shaven, set to work to remove a beard of about a week's growth,
+and I who wore one of the pointed variety, trimmed up mine as best I
+could with the help of a hand-glass. Bastin, too, performed on his which
+was of the square and rather ragged type, wisely rejecting Bickley's
+advice to shave it off altogether, offered, I felt convinced, because
+he felt that the result on Bastin would be too hideous for words. After
+this we cut our nails, cleaned our teeth and bathed; I even caught
+Bickley applying hair tonic from his dressing case in secret, behind a
+projecting rock, and borrowed some myself. He gave it me on condition
+that I did not mention its existence to Bastin who, he remarked, would
+certainly use the lot and make himself smell horrible.
+
+Next we found clean ducks among our store of spare clothes, for the
+Orofenans had brought these with our other possessions, and put them on,
+even adding silk cumberbunds and neckties. My tie I fastened with a pin
+that I had obtained in Egypt. It was a tiny gold statuette of very fine
+and early workmanship, of the god Osiris, wearing the crown of the Upper
+Land with the uraeus crest, and holding in his hands, which projected
+from the mummy wrappings, the emblems of the crook, the scourge and the
+crux ansata, or Sign of Life.
+
+Bastin, for his part, arrayed himself in full clerical costume, black
+coat and trousers, white tie and stick-up clergyman's collar which,
+as he remarked, made him feel extremely hot in that climate, and were
+unsuitable to domestic duties, such as washing-up. I offered to hold his
+coat while he did this office and told him he looked very nice indeed.
+
+"Beautiful!" remarked Bickley, "but why don't you put on your surplice
+and biretta?" (Being very High-Church Bastin did wear a biretta on
+festival Sundays at home.) "There would be no mistake about you then."
+
+"I do not think it would be suitable," replied Bastin whose sense of
+humour was undeveloped. "There is no service to be performed at present
+and no church, though perhaps that cave--" and he stopped.
+
+When we had finished these vain adornments and Bastin had put away the
+things and tidied up, we sat down, rather at a loose end. We should have
+liked to walk but refrained from doing so for fear lest we might dirty
+our clean clothes. So we just sat and thought. At least Bickley thought,
+and so did I for a while until I gave it up. What was the use of
+thinking, seeing that we were face to face with circumstances which
+baffled reason and beggared all recorded human experience? What Bastin
+did I am sure I do not know, but I think from the expression of his
+countenance that he was engaged in composing sermons for the benefit of
+Oro and the Glittering Lady.
+
+One diversion we did have. About eleven o'clock a canoe came from the
+main island laden with provisions and paddled by Marama and two of his
+people. We seized our weapons, remembering our experiences of the night,
+but Marama waved a bough in token of peace. So, carrying our revolvers,
+we went to the rock edge to meet him. He crept ashore and, chief though
+he was, prostrated himself upon his face before us, which told me that
+he had heard of the fate of the sorcerers. His apologies were abject. He
+explained that he had no part in the outrage of the attack, and besought
+us to intercede on behalf of him and his people with the awakened god of
+the Mountain whom he looked for with a terrified air.
+
+We consoled him as well as we could, and told him that he had best be
+gone before the god of the Mountain appeared, and perhaps treated him as
+he had done the sorcerers. In his name, however, we commanded Marama to
+bring materials and build us a proper house upon the rock, also to be
+sure to keep up a regular and ample supply of provisions. If he did
+these things, and anything else we might from time to time command,
+we said that perhaps his life and those of his people would be spared.
+This, however, after the evil behaviour of some of them of course we
+could not guarantee.
+
+Marama departed so thoroughly frightened that he even forgot to make any
+inquiries as to who this god of the Mountain might be, or where he came
+from, or whither he was going. Of course, the place had been sacred
+among his people from the beginning, whenever that may have been, but
+that its sacredness should materialise into an active god who brought
+sorcerers of the highest reputation to a most unpleasant end, just
+because they wished to translate their preaching into practice, was
+another matter. It was not to be explained even by the fact of which he
+himself had informed me, that during the dreadful storm of some months
+before, the cave mouth which previously was not visible on the volcano,
+had suddenly been lifted up above the level of the Rock of Offerings,
+although, of course, all religious and instructed persons would have
+expected something peculiar to happen after this event.
+
+Such I knew were his thoughts, but, as I have said, he was too
+frightened and too hurried to express them in questions that I should
+have found it extremely difficult to answer. As it was he departed
+quite uncertain as to whether one of us was not the real "god of the
+Mountain," who had power to bring hideous death upon his molesters.
+After all, what had he to go on to the contrary, except the word of
+three priests who were so terrified that they could give no coherent
+account of what had happened? Of these events, it was true, there was
+evidence in the twisted carcass of their lamented high sorcerer, and,
+for the matter of that, of certain corpses which he had seen, that lay
+in shallow water at the bottom of the lake. Beyond all was vague, and in
+his heart I am sure that Marama believed that Bastin was the real "god
+of the Mountain." Naturally, he would desire to work vengeance on those
+who tried to sacrifice and eat him. Moreover, had he not destroyed the
+image of the god of the Grove and borne away its head whence he had
+sucked magic and power?
+
+Thus argued Marama, disbelieving the tale of the frightened sorcerers,
+for he admitted as much to me in after days.
+
+Marama departed in a great hurry, fearing lest the "god of the
+Mountain," or Bastin, whose new and splendid garb he regarded with much
+suspicion, might develop some evil energy against him. Then we went back
+to our camp, leaving the industrious Bastin, animated by a suggestion
+from Bickley that the fruit and food might spoil if left in the sun,
+to carry it into the shade of the cave. Owing to the terrors of the
+Orofenans the supply was so large that to do this he must make no fewer
+than seven journeys, which he did with great good will since Bastin
+loved physical exercise. The result on his clerical garments, however,
+was disastrous. His white tie went awry, squashed fruit and roast pig
+gravy ran down his waistcoat and trousers, and his high collar melted
+into limp crinkles in the moisture engendered by the tropical heat. Only
+his long coat escaped, since that Bickley kindly carried for him.
+
+It was just as he arrived with the seventh load in this extremely
+dishevelled condition that Oro and his daughter emerged from the cave.
+Indeed Bastin, who, being shortsighted, always wore spectacles that,
+owing to his heated state were covered with mist, not seeing that
+dignitary, dumped down the last basket on to his toes, exclaiming:
+
+"There, you lazy beggar, I told you I would bring it all, and I have."
+
+In fact he thought he was addressing Bickley and playing off on him a
+troglodytic practical joke.
+
+Oro, however, who at his age did not appreciate jokes, resented it and
+was about to do something unpleasant when with extraordinary tact his
+daughter remarked:
+
+"Bastin the priest makes you offerings. Thank him, O Lord my father."
+
+So Oro thanked him, not too cordially for evidently he still had feeling
+in his toes, and once more Bastin escaped. Becoming aware of his error,
+he began to apologise profusely in English, while the lady Yva studied
+him carefully.
+
+"Is that the costume of the priests of your religion, O Bastin?" she
+asked, surveying his dishevelled form. "If so, you were better without
+it."
+
+Then Bastin retired to straighten his tie, and grabbing his coat
+from Bickley, who handed it to him with a malicious smile, forced his
+perspiring arms into it in a peculiarly awkward and elephantine fashion.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley and I produced two camp chairs which we had made
+ready, and on these the wondrous pair seated themselves side by side.
+
+"We have come to learn," said Oro. "Teach!"
+
+"Not so, Father," interrupted Yva, who, I noted, was clothed in yet a
+third costume, though whence these came I could not imagine. "First I
+would ask a question. Whence are you, Strangers, and how came you here?"
+
+"We are from the country called England and a great storm shipwrecked us
+here; that, I think, which raised the mouth of the cave above the level
+of this rock," I answered.
+
+"The time appointed having come when it should be raised," said Oro as
+though to himself.
+
+"Where is England?" asked Yva.
+
+Now among the books we had with us was a pocket atlas, quite a good one
+of its sort. By way of answer I opened it at the map of the world and
+showed her England. Also I showed, to within a thousand miles or so,
+that spot on the earth's surface where we spoke together.
+
+The sight of this atlas excited the pair greatly. They had not the
+slightest difficulty in understanding everything about it and the shape
+of the world with its division into hemispheres seemed to be quite
+familiar to them. What appeared chiefly to interest them, and especially
+Oro, were the relative areas and positions of land and sea.
+
+"Of this, Strangers," he said, pointing to the map, "I shall have much
+to say to you when I have studied the pictures of your book and compared
+them with others of my own."
+
+"So he has got maps," said Bickley in English, "as well as star charts.
+I wonder where he keeps them."
+
+"With his clothes, I expect," suggested Bastin.
+
+Meanwhile Oro had hidden the atlas in his ample robe and motioned to his
+daughter to proceed.
+
+"Why do you come here from England so far away?" the Lady Yva asked, a
+question to which each of us had an answer.
+
+"To see new countries," I said.
+
+"Because the cyclone brought us," said Bickley.
+
+"To convert the heathen to my own Christian religion," said Bastin,
+which was not strictly true.
+
+It was on this last reply that she fixed.
+
+"What does your religion teach?" she asked.
+
+"It teaches that those who accept it and obey its commands will live
+again after death for ever in a better world where is neither sorrow nor
+sin," he answered.
+
+When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a new
+thought and look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
+
+"Who are the heathen?" Yva asked again after a pause, for she also
+seemed to be impressed.
+
+"All who do not agree with Bastin's spiritual views," answered Bickley.
+
+"Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness of heart,
+do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose that your father
+and you are heathen," replied Bastin stoutly.
+
+This seemed to astonish them, but presently Yva caught his meaning and
+smiled, while Oro said:
+
+"Of this great matter of faith we will talk later. It is an old question
+in the world."
+
+"Why," went on Yva, "if you wished to travel so far did you come in a
+ship that so easily is wrecked? Why did you not journey through the air,
+or better still, pass through space, leaving your bodies asleep, as,
+being instructed, doubtless you can do?"
+
+"As regards your first question," I answered, "there are no aircraft
+known that can make so long a journey."
+
+"And as regards the second," broke in Bickley, "we did not do so because
+it is impossible for men to transfer themselves to other places through
+space either with or without their bodies."
+
+At this information the Glittering Lady lifted her arched eyebrows and
+smiled a little, while Oro said:
+
+"I perceive that the new world has advanced but a little way on the road
+of knowledge."
+
+Fearing that Bastin was about to commence an argument, I began to ask
+questions in my turn.
+
+"Lord Oro and Lady Yva," I said, "we have told you something of
+ourselves and will tell you more when you desire it. But pardon us if
+first we pray you to tell us what we burn to know. Who are you? Of what
+race and country? And how came it that we found you sleeping yonder?"
+
+"If it be your pleasure, answer, my Father," said Yva.
+
+Oro thought a moment, then replied in a calm voice:
+
+"I am a king who once ruled most of the world as it was in my day,
+though it is true that much of it rebelled against me, my councillors
+and servants. Therefore I destroyed the world as it was then, save only
+certain portions whence life might spread to the new countries that I
+raised up. Having done this I put myself and my daughter to sleep for a
+space of two hundred and fifty thousand years, that there might be time
+for fresh civilisations to arise. Now I begin to think that I did not
+allot a sufficiency of ages, since I perceive from what you tell me,
+that the learning of the new races is as yet but small."
+
+Bickley and I looked at each other and were silent. Mentally we had
+collapsed. Who could begin to discuss statements built upon such a
+foundation of gigantic and paralysing falsehoods?
+
+Well, Bastin could for one. With no more surprise in his voice than if
+he were talking about last night's dinner, he said:
+
+"There must be a mistake somewhere, or perhaps I misunderstand you. It
+is obvious that you, being a man, could not have destroyed the world.
+That could only be done by the Power which made it and you."
+
+I trembled for the results of Bastin's methods of setting out the truth.
+To my astonishment, however, Oro replied:
+
+"You speak wisely, Priest, but the Power you name may use instruments to
+accomplish its decrees. I am such an instrument."
+
+"Quite so," said Bastin, "just like anybody else. You have more
+knowledge of the truth than I thought. But pray, how did you destroy the
+world?"
+
+"Using my wisdom to direct the forces that are at work in the heart of
+this great globe, I drowned it with a deluge, causing one part to sink
+and another to rise, also changes of climate which completed the work."
+
+"That's quite right," exclaimed Bastin delightedly. "We know all about
+the Deluge, only you are not mentioned in connection with the matter. A
+man, Noah, had to do with it when he was six hundred years old."
+
+"Six hundred?" said Oro. "That is not very old. I myself had seen more
+than a thousand years when I lay down to sleep."
+
+"A thousand!" remarked Bastin, mildly interested. "That is unusual,
+though some of these mighty men of renown we know lived over nine
+hundred."
+
+Here Bickley snorted and exclaimed:
+
+"Nine hundred moons, he means."
+
+"I did not know Noah," went on Oro. "Perhaps he lived after my time and
+caused some other local deluge. Is there anything else you wish to ask
+me before I leave you that I may study this map writing?"
+
+"Yes," said Bastin. "Why were you allowed to drown your world?"
+
+"Because it was evil, Priest, and disobeyed me and the Power I serve."
+
+"Oh! thank you," said Bastin, "that fits in exactly. It was just the
+same in Noah's time."
+
+"I pray that it is not just the same now," said Oro, rising. "To-morrow
+we will return, or if I do not who have much that I must do, the lady my
+daughter will return and speak with you further."
+
+He departed into the cave, Yva following at a little distance.
+
+I accompanied her as far as the mouth of the cave, as did Tommy, who
+all this time had been sitting contentedly upon the hem of her gorgeous
+robe, quite careless of its immemorial age, if it was immemorial and not
+woven yesterday, a point on which I had no information.
+
+"Lady Yva," I said, "did I rightly understand the Lord Oro to say that
+he was a thousand years old?"
+
+"Yes, O Humphrey, and really he is more, or so I think."
+
+"Then are you a thousand years old also?" I asked, aghast.
+
+"No, no," she replied, shaking her head, "I am young, quite young, for I
+do not count my time of sleep."
+
+"Certainly you look it," I said. "But what, Lady Yva, do you mean by
+young?"
+
+She answered my question by another.
+
+"What age are your women when they are as I am?"
+
+"None of our women were ever quite like you, Lady Yva. Yet, say from
+twenty-five to thirty years of age."
+
+"Ah! I have been counting and now I remember. When my father sent me to
+sleep I was twenty-seven years old. No, I will not deceive you, I was
+twenty-seven years and three moons." Then, saying something to the
+effect that she would return, she departed, laughing a little in a
+mischievous way, and, although I did not observe this till afterwards,
+Tommy departed with her.
+
+When I repeated what she had said to Bastin and Bickley, who were
+standing at a distance straining their ears and somewhat aggrieved, the
+former remarked:
+
+"If she is twenty-seven her father must have married late in life,
+though of course it may have been a long while before he had children."
+
+Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while, went off
+like a bomb.
+
+"Do you tell us, Bastin," he asked, "that you believe one word of
+all this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan being a
+thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the rest?"
+
+"If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it at
+present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept warm by
+a pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of the
+constellations at the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do most things."
+
+"Even cause the Deluge," jeered Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about the Deluge, but perhaps he may have been permitted
+to cause a deluge. Why not? You can't look at things from far enough
+off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you, you conclude that
+therefore it is impossible. The same Power which gives you skill to
+succeed in an operation, that hitherto was held impracticable, as I know
+you have done once or twice, may have given that old fellow power to
+cause a deluge. You should measure the universe and its possibilities by
+worlds and not by acres, Bickley."
+
+"And believe, I suppose, that a man can live a thousand years, whereas
+we know well that he cannot live more than about a hundred."
+
+"You don't know anything of the sort, Bickley. All you know is that
+over the brief period of history with which we are acquainted, say ten
+thousand years at most, men have only lived to about a hundred. But the
+very rocks which you are so fond of talking about, tell us that even
+this planet is millions upon millions of years of age. Who knows then
+but that at some time in its history, men did not live for a thousand
+years, and that lost civilisations did not exist of which this Oro and
+his daughter may be two survivors?"
+
+"There is no proof of anything of the sort," said Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about proof, as you understand it, though I have read in
+Plato of a continent called Atlantis that was submerged, according to
+the story of old Egyptian priests. But personally I have every proof,
+for it is all written down in the Bible at which you turn tip your nose,
+and I am very glad that I have been lucky enough to come across this
+unexpected confirmation of the story. Not that it matters much, since I
+should have learned all about it when it pleases Providence to remove me
+to a better world, which in our circumstances may happen any day. Now I
+must change my clothes before I see to the cooking and other things."
+
+"I am bound to admit," said Bickley, looking after him, "that old Bastin
+is not so stupid as he seems. From his point of view the arguments he
+advances are quite logical. Moreover I think he is right when he says
+that we look at things through the wrong end of the telescope. After all
+the universe is very big and who knows what may happen there? Who knows
+even what may have happened on this little earth during the aeons of its
+existence, whenever its balance chanced to shift, as the Ice Ages show
+us it has often done? Still I believe that old Oro to be a Prince of
+Liars."
+
+"That remains to be proved," I answered cautiously. "All I know is that
+he is a wonderfully learned person of most remarkable appearance, and
+that his daughter is the loveliest creature I ever saw."
+
+"There I agree," said Bickley decidedly, "and as brilliant as she is
+lovely. If she belongs to a past civilisation, it is a pity that it ever
+became extinct. Now let's go and have a nap. Bastin will call us when
+supper is ready."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIV. The Under-world
+
+
+That night we slept well and without fear, being quite certain that
+after their previous experience the Orofenans would make no further
+attempts upon us. Indeed our only anxiety was for Tommy, whom we could
+not find when the time came to give him his supper. Bastin, however,
+seemed to remember having seen him following the Glittering Lady into
+the cave. This, of course, was possible, as certainly he had taken an
+enormous fancy to her and sat himself down as close to her as he could
+on every occasion. He even seemed to like the ancient Oro, and was not
+afraid to jump up and plant his dirty paws upon that terrific person's
+gorgeous robe. Moreover Oro liked him, for several times I observed him
+pat the dog upon the head; as I think I have said, the only human touch
+that I had perceived about him. So we gave up searching and calling in
+the hope that he was safe with our supernatural friends.
+
+The next morning quite early the Lady Yva appeared alone; no, not alone,
+for with her came our lost Tommy looking extremely spry and well at
+ease. The faithless little wretch just greeted us in a casual fashion
+and then went and sat by Yva. In fact when the awkward Bastin managed
+to stumble over the end of her dress Tommy growled at him and showed his
+teeth. Moreover the dog was changed. He was blessed with a shiny black
+coat, but now this coat sparkled in the sunlight, like the Lady Yva's
+hair.
+
+"The Glittering Lady is all very well, but I'm not sure that I care
+for a glittering dog. It doesn't look quite natural," said Bastin,
+contemplating him.
+
+"Why does Tommy shine, Lady?" I asked.
+
+"Because I washed him in certain waters that we have, so that now he
+looks beautiful and smells sweet," she answered, laughing.
+
+It was true, the dog did smell sweet, which I may add had not always
+been the case with him, especially when there were dead fish about. Also
+he appeared to have been fed, for he turned up his nose at the bits we
+had saved for his breakfast.
+
+"He has drunk of the Life-water," explained Yva, "and will want no food
+for two days."
+
+Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked incredulous.
+
+"You do not believe, O Bickley," she said, studying him gravely.
+"Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I tell you many
+lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He is not sure; he thinks
+to himself, I will wait and find out whether or no these funny people
+cheat me."
+
+Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were contrary
+to experience, also that Tommy in a general way was rather a greedy
+little dog.
+
+"You, too, like to eat, Bickley" (this was true, he had an excellent
+appetite), "but when you have drunk the Life-water you will care much
+less."
+
+"I am glad to hear it," interrupted Bastin, "for Bickley wants a lot of
+cooking done, and I find it tedious."
+
+"You eat also, Lady," said Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I eat sometimes because I like it, but I can go weeks and not
+eat, when I have the Life-water. Just now, after so long a sleep, I am
+hungry. Please give me some of that fruit. No, not the flesh, flesh I
+hate."
+
+We handed it to her. She took two plantains, peeled and ate them with
+extraordinary grace. Indeed she reminded me, I do not know why, of some
+lovely butterfly drawing its food from a flower.
+
+While she ate she observed us closely; nothing seemed to escape the
+quick glances of those beautiful eyes. Presently she said:
+
+"What, O Humphrey, is that with which you fasten your neckdress?" and
+she pointed to the little gold statue of Osiris that I used as a pin.
+
+I told her that it was a statuette of a god named Osiris and very, very
+ancient, probably quite five thousand years old, a statement at which
+she smiled a little; also that it came from Egypt.
+
+"Ah!" she answered, "is it so? I asked because we have figures that
+are very like to that one, and they also hold in their hands a staff
+surmounted by a loop. They are figures of Sleep's brother--Death."
+
+"So is this," I said. "Among the Egyptians Osiris was the god of Death."
+
+She nodded and replied that doubtless the symbol had come down to them.
+
+"One day you shall take me to see this land which you call so very old.
+Or I will take you, which would be quicker," she added.
+
+We all bowed and said we should be delighted. Even Bastin appeared
+anxious to revisit Egypt in such company, though when he was there
+it seemed to bore him. But what she meant about taking us I could not
+guess. Nor had we time to ask her, for she went on, watching our faces
+as she spoke.
+
+"The Lord Oro sends you a message, Strangers. He asks whether it is your
+wish to see where we dwell. He adds that you are not to come if you do
+not desire, or if you fear danger."
+
+We all answered that there was nothing we should like better, but Bastin
+added that he had already seen the tomb.
+
+"Do you think, Bastin, that we live in a tomb because we slept there for
+a while, awaiting the advent of you wanderers at the appointed hour?"
+
+"I don't see where else it could be, unless it is further down that
+cave," said Bastin. "The top of the mountain would not be convenient as
+a residence."
+
+"It has not been convenient for many an age, for reasons that I will
+show you. Think now, before you come. You have naught to fear from us,
+and I believe that no harm will happen to you. But you will see many
+strange things that will anger Bickley because he cannot understand
+them, and perhaps will weary Bastin because his heart turns from what
+is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey will rejoice in them because
+the doors of his soul are open and he longs--what do you long for,
+Humphrey?"
+
+"That which I have lost and fear I shall never find again," I answered
+boldly.
+
+"I know that you have lost many things--last night, for instance,
+you lost Tommy, and when he slept with me he told me much about you
+and--others."
+
+"This is ridiculous," broke in Bastin. "Can a dog talk?"
+
+"Everything can talk, if you understand its language, Bastin. But keep a
+good heart, Humphrey, for the bold seeker finds in the end. Oh! foolish
+man, do you not understand that all is yours if you have but the soul to
+conceive and the will to grasp? All, all, below, between, above! Even I
+know that, I who have so much to learn."
+
+So she spoke and became suddenly magnificent. Her face which had been
+but that of a super-lovely woman, took on grandeur. Her bosom swelled;
+her presence radiated some subtle power, much as her hair radiated
+light.
+
+In a moment it was gone and she was smiling and jesting.
+
+"Will you come, Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go, down to
+the Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun? Perhaps you will do
+better to stay here in the sun, for the Under-world has terrors for weak
+hearts that were born but yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble in the
+dark."
+
+"I shall take my electric torch," said Bastin with decision, "and I
+advise you fellows to do the same. I always hated cellars, and the
+catacombs at Rome are worse, though full of sacred interest."
+
+Then we started, Tommy frisking on ahead in a most provoking way as
+though he were bored by a visit to a strange house and going home, and
+Yva gliding forward with a smile upon her face that was half mystic and
+half mischievous. We passed the remains of the machines, and Bickley
+asked her what they were.
+
+"Carriages in which once we travelled through the skies, until we found
+a better way, and that the uninstructed used till the end," she answered
+carelessly, leaving me wondering what on earth she meant.
+
+We came to the statue and the sepulchre beneath without trouble, for the
+glint of her hair, and I may add of Tommy's back, were quite sufficient
+to guide us through the gloom. The crystal coffins were still there, for
+Bastin flashed his torch and we saw them, but the boxes of radium had
+gone.
+
+"Let that light die," she said to Bastin. "Humphrey, give me your right
+hand and give your left to Bickley. Let Bastin cling to him and fear
+nothing."
+
+We passed to the end of the tomb and stood against what appeared to be a
+rock wall, all close together, as she directed.
+
+"Fear nothing," she said again, but next second I was never more full
+of fear in my life, for we were whirling downwards at a speed that would
+have made an American elevator attendant turn pale.
+
+"Don't choke me," I heard Bickley say to Bastin, and the latter's
+murmured reply of:
+
+"I never could bear these moving staircases and tubelifts. They always
+make me feel sick."
+
+I admit that for my part I also felt rather sick and clung tightly to
+the hand of the Glittering Lady. She, however, placed her other hand
+upon my shoulder, saying in a low voice:
+
+"Did I not tell you to have no fear?"
+
+Then I felt comforted, for somehow I knew that it was not her desire
+to harm and much less to destroy me. Also Tommy was seated quite at his
+ease with his head resting against my leg, and his absence of alarm was
+reassuring. The only stoic of the party was Bickley. I have no doubt
+that he was quite as frightened as we were, but rather than show it he
+would have died.
+
+"I presume this machinery is pneumatic," he began when suddenly and
+without shock, we arrived at the end of our journey. How far we had
+fallen I am sure I do not know, but I should judge from the awful speed
+at which we travelled, that it must have been several thousand feet,
+probably four or five.
+
+"Everything seems steady now," remarked Bastin, "so I suppose this
+luggage lift has stopped. The odd thing is that I can't see anything
+of it. There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be standing on a level
+floor."
+
+"The odd thing is," said Bickley, "that we can see at all. Where the
+devil does the light come from thousands of feet underground?"
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, "unless there is natural gas here, as I
+am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in Canada."
+
+"Natural gas be blowed," said Bickley. "It is more like moonlight
+magnified ten times."
+
+So it was. The whole place was filled with a soft radiance, equal to
+that of the sun at noon, but gentler and without heat.
+
+"Where does it come from?" I whispered to Yva.
+
+"Oh!" she replied, as I thought evasively. "It is the light of the
+Under-world which we know how to use. The earth is full of light, which
+is not wonderful, is it, seeing that its heart is fire? Now look about
+you."
+
+I looked and leant on her harder than ever, since amazement made me
+weak. We were in some vast place whereof the roof seemed almost as far
+off as the sky at night. At least all that I could make out was a dim
+and distant arch which might have been one of cloud. For the rest, in
+every direction stretched vastness, illuminated far as the eye could
+reach by the soft light of which I have spoken, that is, probably for
+several miles. But this vastness was not empty. On the contrary it was
+occupied by a great city. There were streets much wider than Piccadilly,
+all bordered by houses, though these, I observed, were roofless, very
+fine houses, some of them, built of white stone or marble. There were
+roadways and pavements worn by the passage of feet. There, farther on,
+were market-places or public squares, and there, lastly, was a huge
+central enclosure one or two hundred acres in extent, which was filled
+with majestic buildings that looked like palaces, or town-halls; and, in
+the midst of them all, a vast temple with courts and a central dome. For
+here, notwithstanding the lack of necessity, its builders seemed to have
+adhered to the Over-world tradition, and had roofed their fane.
+
+And now came the terror. All of this enormous city was dead. Had it
+stood upon the moon it could not have been more dead. None paced its
+streets; none looked from its window-places. None trafficked in its
+markets, none worshipped in its temple. Swept, garnished, lighted,
+practically untouched by the hand of Time, here where no rains fell and
+no winds blew, it was yet a howling wilderness. For what wilderness is
+there to equal that which once has been the busy haunt of men? Let
+those who have stood among the buried cities of Central Asia, or of
+Anarajapura in Ceylon, or even amid the ruins of Salamis on the coast
+of Cyprus, answer the question. But here was something infinitely more
+awful. A huge human haunt in the bowels of the earth utterly devoid of
+human beings, and yet as perfect as on the day when these ceased to be.
+
+"I do not care for underground localities," remarked Bastin, his gruff
+voice echoing strangely in that terrible silence, "but it does seem a
+pity that all these fine buildings should be wasted. I suppose their
+inhabitants left them in search of fresh air."
+
+"Why did they leave them?" I asked of Yva.
+
+"Because death took them," she answered solemnly. "Even those who live a
+thousand years die at last, and if they have no children, with them dies
+the race."
+
+"Then were you the last of your people?" I asked.
+
+"Inquire of my father," she replied, and led the way through the massive
+arch of a great building.
+
+It led into a walled courtyard in the centre of which was a plain cupola
+of marble with a gate of some pale metal that looked like platinum mixed
+with gold. This gate stood open. Within it was the statue of a woman
+beautifully executed in white marble and set in a niche of some black
+stone. The figure was draped as though to conceal the shape, and the
+face was stern and majestic rather than beautiful. The eyes of the
+statue were cunningly made of some enamel which gave them a strange and
+lifelike appearance. They stared upwards as though looking away from the
+earth and its concerns. The arms were outstretched. In the right hand
+was a cup of black marble, in the left a similar cup of white marble.
+From each of these cups trickled a thin stream of sparkling water, which
+two streams met and mingled at a distance of about three feet beneath
+the cups. Then they fell into a metal basin which, although it must have
+been quite a foot thick, was cut right through by their constant impact,
+and apparently vanished down some pipe beneath. Out of this metal basin
+Tommy, who gambolled into the place ahead of us, began to drink in a
+greedy and demonstrative fashion.
+
+"The Life-water?" I said, looking at our guide.
+
+She nodded and asked in her turn:
+
+"What is the statue and what does it signify, Humphrey?"
+
+I hesitated, but Bastin answered:
+
+"Just a rather ugly woman who hid up her figure because it was bad.
+Probably she was a relation of the artist who wished to have her
+likeness done and sat for nothing."
+
+"The goddess of Health," suggested Bickley. "Her proportions are
+perfect; a robust, a thoroughly normal woman."
+
+"Now, Humphrey," said Yva.
+
+I stared at the work and had not an idea. Then it flashed on me with
+such suddenness and certainty that I am convinced the answer to the
+riddle was passed to me from her and did not originate in my own mind.
+
+"It seems quite easy," I said in a superior tone. "The figure symbolises
+Life and is draped because we only see the face of Life, the rest is
+hidden. The arms are bare because Life is real and active. One cup is
+black and one is white because Life brings both good and evil gifts;
+that is why the streams mingle, to be lost beneath in the darkness of
+death. The features are stern and even terrifying rather than lovely,
+because such is the aspect of Life. The eyes look upward and far away
+from present things, because the real life is not here."
+
+"Of course one may say anything," said Bastin, "but I don't understand
+all that."
+
+"Imagination goes a long way," broke in Bickley, who was vexed that he
+had not thought of this interpretation himself. But Yva said:
+
+"I begin to think that you are quite clever, Humphrey. I wonder whence
+the truth came to you, for such is the meaning of the figure and the
+cups. Had I told it to you myself, it could not have been better said,"
+and she glanced at me out of the corners of her eyes. "Now, Strangers,
+will you drink? Once that gate was guarded, and only at a great price or
+as a great reward were certain of the Highest Blood given the freedom of
+this fountain which might touch no common lips. Indeed it was one of the
+causes of our last war, for all the world which was, desired this water
+which now is lapped by a stranger's hound."
+
+"I suppose there is nothing medicinal in it?" said Bastin. "Once when I
+was very thirsty, I made a mistake and drank three tumblers of something
+of the sort in the dark, thinking that it was Apollinaris, and I don't
+want to do it again."
+
+"Just the sort of thing you would do," said Bickley. "But, Lady Yva,
+what are the properties of this water?"
+
+"It is very health-giving," she answered, "and if drunk continually, not
+less than once each thirty days, it wards off sickness, lessens hunger
+and postpones death for many, many years. That is why those of the High
+Blood endured so long and became the rulers of the world, and that, as
+I have said, is the greatest of the reasons why the peoples who dwelt in
+the ancient outer countries and never wished to die, made war upon them,
+to win this secret fountain. Have no fear, O Bastin, for see, I will
+pledge you in this water."
+
+Then she lifted a strange-looking, shallow, metal cup whereof the
+handles were formed of twisted serpents, that lay in the basin, filled
+it from the trickling stream, bowed to us and drank. But as she drank I
+noted with a thrill of joy that her eyes were fixed on mine as though
+it were me she pledged and me alone. Again she filled the cup with the
+sparkling water, for it did sparkle, like that French liqueur in which
+are mingled little flakes of gold, and handed it to me.
+
+I bowed to her and drank. I suppose the fluid was water, but to me it
+tasted more like strong champagne, dashed with Chateau Yquem. It was
+delicious. More, its effects were distinctly peculiar. Something quick
+and subtle ran through my veins; something that for a few moments
+seemed to burn away the obscureness which blurs our thought. I began
+to understand several problems that had puzzled me, and then lost their
+explanations in the midst of light, inner light, I mean. Moreover, of a
+sudden it seemed to me as though a window had been opened in the heart
+of that Glittering Lady who stood beside me. At least I knew that it was
+full of wonderful knowledge, wonderful memories and wonderful hopes, and
+that in the latter two of these I had some part; what part I could not
+tell. Also I knew that my heart was open to her and that she saw in it
+something which caused her to marvel and to sigh.
+
+In a few seconds, thirty perhaps, all this was gone. Nothing remained
+except that I felt extremely strong and well, happier, too, than I had
+been for years. Mutely I asked her for more of the water, but she shook
+her head and, taking the cup from me, filled it again and gave it to
+Bickley, who drank. He flushed, seemed to lose the self-control which
+was his very strong characteristic, and said in a rather thick voice:
+
+"Curious! but I do not think at this moment there is any operation that
+has ever been attempted which I could not tackle single-handed and with
+success."
+
+Then he was silent, and Bastin's turn came. He drank rather noisily,
+after his fashion, and began:
+
+"My dear young lady, I think the time has come when I should expound to
+you--" Here he broke off and commenced singing very badly, for his voice
+was somewhat raucous:
+
+     From Greenland's icy mountains,
+       From India's coral strand,
+     Where Afric's sunny fountains
+       Roll down their golden sand.
+
+Ceasing from melody, he added:
+
+"I determined that I would drink nothing intoxicating while I was on
+this island that I might be a shining light in a dark place, and now
+I fear that quite unwittingly I have broken what I look upon as a
+promise."
+
+Then he, too, grew silent.
+
+"Come," said Yva, "my father, the Lord Oro, awaits you."
+
+We crossed the court of the Water of Life and mounted steps that led
+to a wide and impressive portico, Tommy frisking ahead of us in a
+most excited way for a dog of his experience. Evidently the water had
+produced its effect upon him as well as upon his masters. This portico
+was in a solemn style of architecture which I cannot describe, because
+it differed from any other that I know. It was not Egyptian and not
+Greek, although its solidity reminded me of the former, and the beauty
+and grace of some of the columns, of the latter. The profuseness and
+rather grotesque character of the carvings suggested the ruins of Mexico
+and Yucatan, and the enormous size of the blocks of stone, those of Peru
+and Baalbec. In short, all the known forms of ancient architecture
+might have found their inspiration here, and the general effect was
+tremendous.
+
+"The palace of the King," said Yva, "whereof we approach the great
+hall."
+
+We entered through mighty metal doors, one of which stood ajar, into
+a vestibule which from certain indications I gathered had once been a
+guard, or perhaps an assembly-room. It was about forty feet deep by a
+hundred wide. Thence she led us through a smaller door into the hall
+itself. It was a vast place without columns, for there was no roof to
+support. The walls of marble or limestone were sculptured like those of
+Egyptian temples, apparently with battle scenes, though of this I am not
+sure for I did not go near to them. Except for a broad avenue along the
+middle, up which we walked, the area was filled with marble benches that
+would, I presume, have accommodated several thousand people. But they
+were empty--empty, and oh! the loneliness of it all.
+
+Far away at the head of the hall was a dais enclosed, and, as it were,
+roofed in by a towering structure that mingled grace and majesty to a
+wonderful degree. It was modelled on the pattern of a huge shell. The
+base of the shell was the platform; behind were the ribs, and above, the
+overhanging lip of the shell. On this platform was a throne of silvery
+metal. It was supported on the arched coils of snakes, whereof the tails
+formed the back and the heads the arms of the throne.
+
+On this throne, arrayed in gorgeous robes, sat the Lord Oro, his white
+beard flowing over them, and a jewelled cap upon his head. In front of
+him was a low table on which lay graven sheets of metal, and among them
+a large ball of crystal.
+
+There he sat, solemn and silent in the midst of this awful solitude,
+looking in very truth like a god, as we conceive such a being to appear.
+Small as he was in that huge expanse of buildings, he seemed yet to
+dominate it, in a sense to fill the emptiness which was accentuated
+by his presence. I know that the sight of him filled me with true fear
+which it had never done in the light of day, not even when he arose
+from his crystal coffin. Now for the first time I felt as though I
+were really in the presence of a Being Supernatural. Doubtless the
+surroundings heightened this impression. What were these mighty edifices
+in the bowels of the world? Whence came this wondrous, all-pervading and
+translucent light, whereof we could see no origin? Whither had vanished
+those who had reared and inhabited them? How did it happen that of them
+all, this man, if he were a man; and this lovely woman at my side, who,
+if I might trust my senses and instincts, was certainly a woman, alone
+survived of their departed multitudes?
+
+The thing was crushing. I looked at Bickley for encouragement, but
+got none, for he only shook his head. Even Bastin, now that the first
+effects of the Life-water had departed, seemed overwhelmed, and muttered
+something about the halls of Hades.
+
+Only the little dog Tommy remained quite cheerful. He trotted down the
+hall, jumped on to the dais and sat himself comfortably at the feet of
+its occupant.
+
+"I greet you," Oro said in his slow, resonant voice. "Daughter, lead
+these strangers to me; I would speak with them."
+
+
+
+Chapter XV. Oro in His House
+
+
+We climbed on to the dais by some marble steps, and sat ourselves down
+in four curious chairs of metal that were more or less copied from that
+which served Oro as a throne; at least the arms ended in graven heads of
+snakes. These chairs were so comfortable that I concluded the seats were
+fixed on springs, also we noticed that they were beautifully polished.
+
+"I wonder how they keep everything so clean," said Bastin as we mounted
+the dais. "In this big place it must take a lot of housemaids, though I
+don't see any. But perhaps there is no dust here."
+
+I shrugged my shoulders while we seated ourselves, the Lady Yva and I on
+Oro's right, Bickley and Bastin on his left, as he indicated by pointing
+with his finger.
+
+"What say you of this city?" Oro asked after a while of me.
+
+"We do not know what to say," I replied. "It amazes us. In our world
+there is nothing like to it."
+
+"Perchance there will be in the future when the nations grow more
+skilled in the arts of war," said Oro darkly.
+
+"Be pleased, Lord Oro," I went on, "if it is your will, to tell us why
+the people who built this place chose to live in the bowels of the earth
+instead of upon its surface."
+
+"They did not choose; it was forced upon them," was the answer. "This
+is a city of refuge that they occupied in time of war, not because
+they hated the sun. In time of peace and before the Barbarians dared to
+attack them, they dwelt in the city Pani which signifies Above. You may
+have noted some of its remaining ruins on the mount and throughout the
+island. The rest of them are now beneath the sea. But when trouble came
+and the foe rained fire on them from the air, they retreated to this
+town, Nyo, which signifies Beneath."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"And then they died. The Water of Life may prolong life, but it cannot
+make women bear children. That they will only do beneath the blue of
+heaven, not deep in the belly of the world where Nature never designed
+that they should dwell. How would the voices of children sound in such
+halls as these? Tell me, you, Bickley, who are a physician."
+
+"I cannot. I cannot imagine children in such a place, and if born here
+they would die," said Bickley.
+
+Oro nodded.
+
+"They did die, and if they went above to Pani they were murdered. So
+soon the habit of birth was lost and the Sons of Wisdom perished one by
+one. Yes, they who ruled the world and by tens of thousands of years
+of toil had gathered into their bosoms all the secrets of the world,
+perished, till only a few, and among them I and this daughter of mine,
+were left."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then, Humphrey, having power so to do, I did what long I had
+threatened, and unchained the forces that work at the world's heart, and
+destroyed them who were my enemies and evil, so that they perished by
+millions, and with them all their works. Afterwards we slept, leaving
+the others, our subjects who had not the secret of this Sleep, to die,
+as doubtless they did in the course of Nature or by the hand of the foe.
+The rest you know."
+
+"Can such a thing happen again?" asked Bickley in a voice that did not
+hide his disbelief.
+
+"Why do you question me, Bickley, you who believe nothing of what I tell
+you, and therefore make wrath? Still I will say this, that what I caused
+to happen I can cause once more--only once, I think--as perchance you
+shall learn before all is done. Now, since you do not believe, I will
+tell you no more of our mysteries, no, not whence this light comes nor
+what are the properties of the Water of Life, both of which you long
+to know, nor how to preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave of
+dreamless sleep, like a live jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor aught
+else. As to these matters, Daughter, I bid you also to be silent, since
+Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this around him, he who saw us rise
+from the coffins, still mocks at us in his heart. Therefore let him,
+this little man of a little day, when his few years are done go to the
+tomb in ignorance, and his companions with him, they who might have been
+as wise as I am."
+
+Thus Oro spoke in a voice of icy rage, his deep eyes glowing like
+coals. Hearing him I cursed Bickley in my heart for I was sure that once
+spoken, his decree was like to that of the Medes and Persians and could
+not be altered. Bickley, however, was not in the least dismayed. Indeed
+he argued the point. He told Oro straight out that he would not believe
+in the impossible until it had been shown to him to be possible, and
+that the law of Nature never had been and never could be violated. It
+was no answer, he said, to show him wonders without explaining their
+cause, since all that he seemed to see might be but mental illusions
+produced he knew not how.
+
+Oro listened patiently, then answered:
+
+"Good. So be it, they are illusions. I am an illusion; those savages who
+died upon the rock will tell you so. This fair woman before you is an
+illusion; Humphrey, I am sure, knows it as you will also before you have
+done with her. These halls are illusions. Live on in your illusions,
+O little man of science, who because you see the face of things, think
+that you know the body and the heart, and can read the soul at work
+within. You are a worthy child of tens of thousands of your breed who
+were before you and are now forgotten."
+
+Bickley looked up to answer, then changed his mind and was silent,
+thinking further argument dangerous, and Oro went on:
+
+"Now I differ from you, Bickley, in this way. I who have more wisdom in
+my finger-point than you with all the physicians of your world added to
+you, have in your brains and bodies, yet desire to learn from those who
+can give me knowledge. I understand from your words to my daughter that
+you, Bastin, teach a faith that is new to me, and that this faith tells
+of life eternal for the children of earth. Is it so?"
+
+"It is," said Bastin eagerly. "I will set out--"
+
+Oro cut him short with a wave of the hand.
+
+"Not now in the presence of Bickley who doubtless disbelieves your
+faith, as he does all else, holding it with justice or without, to be
+but another illusion. Yet you shall teach me and on it I will form my
+own judgment."
+
+"I shall be delighted," said Bastin. Then a doubt struck him, and he
+added: "But why do you wish to learn? Not that you may make a mock of my
+religion, is it?"
+
+"I mock at no man's belief, because I think that what men believe is
+true--for them. I will tell you why I wish to hear of yours, since I
+never hide the truth. I who am so wise and old, yet must die; though
+that time may be far away, still I must die, for such is the lot of man
+born of woman. And I do not desire to die. Therefore I shall rejoice to
+learn of any faith that promises to the children of earth a life eternal
+beyond the earth. Tomorrow you shall begin to teach me. Now leave me,
+Strangers, for I have much to do," and he waved his hand towards the
+table.
+
+We rose and bowed, wondering what he could have to do down in this
+luminous hole, he who had been for so many thousands of years out of
+touch with the world. It occurred to me, however, that during this long
+period he might have got in touch with other worlds, indeed he looked
+like it.
+
+"Wait," he said, "I have something to tell you. I have been studying
+this book of writings, or world pictures," and he pointed to my atlas
+which, as I now observed for the first time, was also lying upon the
+table. "It interests me much. Your country is small, very small. When
+I caused it to be raised up I think that it was larger, but since then
+that seas have flowed in."
+
+Here Bickley groaned aloud.
+
+"This one is much greater," went on Oro, casting a glance at Bickley
+that must have penetrated him like a searchlight. Then he opened the map
+of Europe and with his finger indicated Germany and Austria-Hungary.
+"I know nothing of the peoples of these lands," he added, "but as you
+belong to one of them and are my guests, I trust that yours may succeed
+in the war."
+
+"What war?" we asked with one voice.
+
+"Since Bickley is so clever, surely he should know better than an
+illusion such as I. All I can tell you is that I have learned that there
+is war between this country and that," and he pointed to Great Britain
+and to Germany upon the map; "also between others."
+
+"It is quite possible," I said, remembering many things. "But how do you
+know?"
+
+"If I told you, Humphrey, Bickley would not believe, so I will not tell.
+Perhaps I saw it in that crystal, as did the necromancers of the early
+world. Or perhaps the crystal serves some different purpose and I saw it
+otherwise--with my soul. At least what I say is true."
+
+"Then who will win?" asked Bastin.
+
+"I cannot read the future, Preacher. If I could, should I ask you to
+expound to me your religion which probably is of no more worth than a
+score of others I have studied, just because it tells of the future?
+If I could read the future I should be a god instead of only an
+earth-lord."
+
+"Your daughter called you a god and you said that you knew we were
+coming to wake you up, which is reading the future," answered Bastin.
+
+"Every father is a god to his daughter, or should be; also in my day
+millions named me a god because I saw further and struck harder than
+they could. As for the rest, it came to me in a vision. Oh! Bickley, if
+you were wiser than you think you are, you would know that all things
+to come are born elsewhere and travel hither like the light from stars.
+Sometimes they come faster before their day into a single mind, and that
+is what men call prophecy. But this is a gift which cannot be commanded,
+even by me. Also I did not know that you would come. I knew only that
+we should awaken and by the help of men, for if none had been present at
+that destined hour we must have died for lack of warmth and sustenance."
+
+"I deny your hypothesis in toto," exclaimed Bickley, but nobody paid any
+attention to him.
+
+"My father," said Yva, rising and bowing before him with her swan-like
+grace, "I have noted your commands. But do you permit that I show the
+temple to these strangers, also something of our past?"
+
+"Yes, yes," he said. "It will save much talk in a savage tongue that is
+difficult to me. But bring them here no more without my command, save
+Bastin only. When the sun is four hours high in the upper world, let
+him come tomorrow to teach me, and afterwards if so I desire. Or if he
+wills, he can sleep here."
+
+"I think I would rather not," said Bastin hurriedly. "I make no pretense
+to being particular, but this place does not appeal to me as a bedroom.
+There are degrees in the pleasures of solitude and, in short, I will not
+disturb your privacy at night."
+
+Oro waved his hand and we departed down that awful and most dreary hall.
+
+"I hope you will spend a pleasant time here, Bastin," I said, looking
+back from the doorway at its cold, illuminated vastness.
+
+"I don't expect to," he answered, "but duty is duty, and if I can drag
+that old sinner back from the pit that awaits him, it will be worth
+doing. Only I have my doubts about him. To me he seems to bear a strong
+family resemblance to Beelzebub, and he's a bad companion week in and
+week out."
+
+We went through the portico, Yva leading us, and passed the fountain of
+Life-water, of which she cautioned us to drink no more at present,
+and to prevent him from doing so, dragged Tommy past it by his collar.
+Bickley, however, lingered under the pretence of making a further
+examination of the statue. As I had seen him emptying into his pocket
+the contents of a corked bottle of quinine tabloids which he always
+carried with him, I guessed very well that his object was to procure a
+sample of this water for future analysis. Of course I said nothing, and
+Yva and Bastin took no note of what he was doing.
+
+When we were clear of the palace, of which we had only seen one hall,
+we walked across an open space made unutterably dreary by the absence
+of any vegetation or other sign of life, towards a huge building of
+glorious proportions that was constructed of black stone or marble. It
+is impossible for me to give any idea of the frightful solemnity of
+this doomed edifice, for as I think I have said, it alone had a roof,
+standing there in the midst of that brilliant, unvarying and most
+unnatural illumination which came from nowhere and yet was everywhere.
+Thus, when one lifted a foot, there it was between the sole of the boot
+and the floor, or to express it better, the boot threw no shadow.
+I think this absence of shadows was perhaps the most terrifying
+circumstance connected with that universal and pervading light. Through
+it we walked on to the temple. We passed three courts, pillared all
+of them, and came to the building which was larger than St. Paul's
+in London. We entered through huge doors which still stood open, and
+presently found ourselves beneath the towering dome. There were no
+windows, why should there be in a place that was full of light? There
+was no ornamentation, there was nothing except black walls. And yet the
+general effect was magnificent in its majestic grace.
+
+"In this place," said Yva, and her sweet voice went whispering round
+the walls and the arching dome, "were buried the Kings of the Sons
+of Wisdom. They lie beneath, each in his sepulchre. Its entrance is
+yonder," and she pointed to what seemed to be a chapel on the right.
+"Would you wish to see them?"
+
+"Somehow I don't care to," said Bastin. "The place is dreary enough as
+it is without the company of a lot of dead kings."
+
+"I should like to dissect one of them, but I suppose that would not be
+allowed," said Bickley.
+
+"No," she answered. "I think that the Lord Oro would not wish you to cut
+up his forefathers."
+
+"When you and he went to sleep, why did you not choose the family
+vault?" asked Bastin.
+
+"Would you have found us there?" she queried by way of answer. Then,
+understanding that the invitation was refused by general consent, though
+personally I should have liked to accept it, and have never ceased
+regretting that I did not, she moved towards a colossal object which
+stood beneath the centre of the dome.
+
+On a stepped base, not very different from that in the cave but much
+larger, sat a figure, draped in a cloak on which was graved a number of
+stars, doubtless to symbolise the heavens. The fastening of the cloak
+was shaped like the crescent moon, and the foot-stool on which rested
+the figure's feet was fashioned to suggest the orb of the sun. This
+was of gold or some such metal, the only spot of brightness in all that
+temple. It was impossible to say whether the figure were male or female,
+for the cloak falling in long, straight folds hid its outlines. Nor did
+the head tell us, for the hair also was hidden beneath the mantle and
+the face might have been that of either man or woman. It was terrible in
+its solemnity and calm, and its expression was as remote and mystic as
+that of Buddha, only more stern. Also without doubt it was blind; it was
+impossible to mistake the sightlessness of those staring orbs. Across
+the knees lay a naked sword and beneath the cloak the arms were hidden.
+In its complete simplicity the thing was marvelous.
+
+On either side upon the pedestal knelt a figure of the size of life. One
+was an old and withered man with death stamped upon his face; the other
+was a beautiful, naked woman, her hands clasped in the attitude of
+prayer and with vague terror written on her vivid features.
+
+Such was this glorious group of which the meaning could not be mistaken.
+It was Fate throned upon the sun, wearing the constellations as his
+garment, armed with the sword of Destiny and worshipped by Life and
+Death. This interpretation I set out to the others.
+
+Yva knelt before the statue for a little while, bowing her head in
+prayer, and really I felt inclined to follow her example, though in the
+end I compromised, as did Bickley, by taking off my hat, which, like the
+others, I still wore from force of habit, though in this place none were
+needed. Only Bastin remained covered.
+
+"Behold the god of my people," said Yva. "Have you no reverence for it,
+O Bastin?"
+
+"Not much," he answered, "except as a work of art. You see I worship
+Fate's Master. I might add that your god doesn't seem to have done much
+for you, Lady Yva, as out of all your greatness there's nothing left but
+two people and a lot of old walls and caves."
+
+At first she was inclined to be angry, for I saw her start. Then her
+mood changed, and she said with a sigh:
+
+"Fate's Master! Where does He dwell?"
+
+"Here amongst other places," said Bastin. "I'll soon explain that to
+you."
+
+"I thank you," she replied gravely. "But why have you not explained it
+to Bickley?" Then waving her hand to show that she wished for no answer,
+she went on:
+
+"Friends, would you wish to learn something of the history of my
+people?"
+
+"Very much," said the irrepressible Bastin, "but I would rather the
+lecture took place in the open air."
+
+"That is not possible," she answered. "It must be here and now, or not
+at all. Come, stand by me. Be silent and do not move. I am about to set
+loose forces that are dangerous if disturbed."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVI. Visions of the Past
+
+
+She led us to the back of the statue and pointed to each of us where
+we should remain. Then she took her place at right angles to us, as a
+showman might do, and for a while stood immovable. Watching her face,
+once more I saw it, and indeed all her body, informed with that strange
+air of power, and noted that her eyes flashed and that her hair grew
+even more brilliant than was common, as though some abnormal strength
+were flowing through it and her. Presently she spoke, saying:
+
+"I shall show you first our people in the day of their glory. Look in
+front of you."
+
+We looked and by degrees the vast space of the apse before us became
+alive with forms. At first these were vague and shadowy, not to be
+separated or distinguished. Then they became so real that until he was
+reproved by a kick, Tommy growled at them and threatened to break out
+into one of his peals of barking.
+
+A wonderful scene appeared. There was a palace of white marble and in
+front of it a great courtyard upon which the sun beat vividly. At the
+foot of the steps of the palace, beneath a silken awning, sat a king
+enthroned, a crown upon his head and wearing glorious robes. In his hand
+was a jewelled sceptre. He was a noble-looking man of middle age and
+about him were gathered the glittering officers of his court. Fair women
+fanned him and to right and left, but a little behind, sat other fair
+and jewelled women who, I suppose, were his wives or daughters.
+
+"One of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom new-crowned, receives the
+homage of the world," said Yva.
+
+As she spoke there appeared, walking in front of the throne one by one,
+other kings, for all were crowned and bore sceptres. At the foot of the
+throne each of them kneeled and kissed the foot of him who sat thereon,
+as he did so laying down his sceptre which at a sign he lifted again and
+passed away. Of these kings there must have been quite fifty, men of all
+colours and of various types, white men, black men, yellow men, red men.
+
+Then came their ministers bearing gifts, apparently of gold and jewels,
+which were piled on trays in front of the throne. I remember noting an
+incident. An old fellow with a lame leg stumbled and upset his tray,
+so that the contents rolled hither and thither. His attempts to recover
+them were ludicrous and caused the monarch on the throne to relax from
+his dignity and smile. I mention this to show that what we witnessed was
+no set scene but apparently a living piece of the past. Had it been so
+the absurdity of the bedizened old man tumbling down in the midst of the
+gorgeous pageant would certainly have been omitted.
+
+No, it must be life, real life, something that had happened, and the
+same may be said of what followed. For instance, there was what we call
+a review. Infantry marched, some of them armed with swords and spears,
+though these I took to be an ornamental bodyguard, and others with tubes
+like savage blowpipes of which I could not guess the use. There were no
+cannon, but carriages came by loaded with bags that had spouts to
+them. Probably these were charged with poisonous gases. There were some
+cavalry also, mounted on a different stamp of horse from ours, thicker
+set and nearer the ground, but with arched necks and fiery eyes and, I
+should say, very strong. These again, I take it, were ornamental. Then
+came other men upon a long machine, slung in pairs in armoured sacks,
+out of which only their heads and arms projected. This machine, which
+resembled an elongated bicycle, went by at a tremendous rate, though
+whence its motive power came did not appear. It carried twenty pairs
+of men, each of whom held in his hand some small but doubtless deadly
+weapon, that in appearance resembled an orange. Other similar machines
+which followed carried from forty to a hundred pairs of men.
+
+The marvel of the piece, however, were the aircraft. These came by in
+great numbers. Sometimes they flew in flocks like wild geese, sometimes
+singly, sometimes in line and sometimes in ordered squadrons, with
+outpost and officer ships and an exact distance kept between craft and
+craft. None of them seemed to be very large or to carry more than
+four or five men, but they were extraordinarily swift and as agile as
+swallows. Moreover they flew as birds do by beating their wings, but
+again we could not guess whence came their motive power.
+
+The review vanished, and next appeared a scene of festivity in a huge,
+illuminated hall. The Great King sat upon a dais and behind him was that
+statue of Fate, or one very similar to it, beneath which we stood. Below
+him in the hall were the feasters seated at long tables, clad in the
+various costumes of their countries. He rose and, turning, knelt before
+the statue of Fate. Indeed he prostrated himself thrice in prayer. Then
+taking his seat again, he lifted a cup of wine and pledged that vast
+company. They drank back to him and prostrated themselves before him as
+he had done before the image of Fate. Only I noted that certain men clad
+in sacerdotal garments not at all unlike those which are worn in the
+Greek Church to-day, remained standing.
+
+Now all this exhibition of terrestrial pomp faded. The next scene was
+simple, that of the death-bed of this same king--we knew him by his
+wizened features. There he lay, terribly old and dying. Physicians,
+women, courtiers, all were there watching the end. The tableau vanished
+and in place of it appeared that of the youthful successor amidst
+cheering crowds, with joy breaking through the clouds of simulated grief
+upon his face. It vanished also.
+
+"Thus did great king succeed great king for ages upon ages," said Yva.
+"There were eighty of them and the average of their reigns was 700
+years. They ruled the earth as it was in those days. They gathered up
+learning, they wielded power, their wealth was boundless. They nurtured
+the arts, they discovered secrets. They had intercourse with the stars;
+they were as gods. But like the gods they grew jealous. They and their
+councillors became a race apart who alone had the secret of long life.
+The rest of the world and the commonplace people about them suffered and
+died. They of the Household of Wisdom lived on in pomp for generations
+till the earth was mad with envy of them.
+
+"Fewer and fewer grew the divine race of the Sons of Wisdom since
+children are not given to the aged and to those of an ancient, outworn
+blood. Then the World said:
+
+"'They are great but they are not many; let us make an end of them by
+numbers and take their place and power and drink of their Life-water,
+that they will not give to us. If myriads of us perish by their arts,
+what does it matter, since we are countless?' So the World made war upon
+the Sons of Wisdom. See!"
+
+Again a picture formed. The sky was full of aircraft which rained down
+fire like flashes of lightning upon cities beneath. From these cities
+leapt up other fires that destroyed the swift-travelling things above,
+so that they fell in numbers like gnats burned by a lamp. Still more
+and more of them came till the cities crumbled away and the flashes that
+darted from them ceased to rush upwards. The Sons of Wisdom were driven
+from the face of the earth.
+
+Again the scene changed. Now it showed this subterranean hall in which
+we stood. There was pomp here, yet it was but a shadow of that which
+had been in the earlier days upon the face of the earth. Courtiers moved
+about the palace and there were people in the radiant streets and the
+houses, for most of them were occupied, but rarely did the vision show
+children coming through their gates.
+
+Of a sudden this scene shifted. Now we saw that same hall in which we
+had visited Oro not an hour before. There he sat, yes, Oro himself,
+upon the dais beneath the overhanging marble shell. Round him were some
+ancient councillors. In the body of the hall on either side of the
+dais were men in military array, guards without doubt though their only
+weapon was a black rod not unlike a ruler, if indeed it were a weapon
+and not a badge of office.
+
+
+Yva, whose face had suddenly grown strange and fixed, began to detail
+to us what was passing in this scene, in a curious monotone such as a
+person might use who was repeating something learned by heart. This was
+the substance of what she said:
+
+"The case of the Sons of Wisdom is desperate. But few of them are left.
+Like other men they need food which is hard to come by, since the foe
+holds the upper earth and that which their doctors can make here in the
+Shades does not satisfy them, even though they drink the Life-water.
+They die and die. There comes an embassy from the High King of the
+confederated Nations to talk of terms of peace. See, it enters."
+
+As she spoke, up the hall advanced the embassy. At the head of it walked
+a young man, tall, dark, handsome and commanding, whose aspect seemed in
+some way to be familiar to me. He was richly clothed in a purple cloak
+and wore upon his head a golden circlet that suggested royal rank.
+Those who followed him were mostly old men who had the astute faces
+of diplomatists, but a few seemed to be generals. Yva continued in her
+monotonous voice:
+
+"Comes the son of the King of the confederated Nations, the Prince who
+will be king. He bows before the Lord Oro. He says 'Great and Ancient
+Monarch of the divine blood, Heaven-born One, your strait, and that of
+those who remain to you, is sore. Yet on behalf of the Nations I am sent
+to offer terms of peace, but this I may only do in the presence of your
+child who is your heiress and the Queen-to-be of the Sons of Wisdom.'"
+
+Here, in the picture, Oro waved his hand and from behind the marble
+shell appeared Yva herself, gloriously apparelled, wearing royal
+ornaments and with her train held by waiting ladies. She bowed to the
+Prince and his company and they bowed back to her. More, we saw a glance
+of recognition pass between her and the Prince.
+
+Now the real Yva by our side pointed to the shadow Yva of the vision or
+the picture, whichever it might be called, a strange thing to see her
+do, and went on:
+
+"The daughter of the Lord Oro comes. The Prince of the Nations salutes
+her. He says that the great war has endured for hundreds of years
+between the Children of Wisdom fighting for absolute rule and the common
+people of the earth fighting for liberty. In that war many millions of
+the Sons of the Nations had perished, brought to their death by fearful
+arts, by wizardries and by plagues sown among them by the Sons of
+Wisdom. Yet they were winning, for the glorious cities of the Sons of
+Wisdom were destroyed and those who remained of them were driven to
+dwell in the caves of the earth where with all their strength and magic
+they could not increase, but faded like flowers in the dark.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks what are the terms of peace proposed by the Nations.
+The Prince answers that they are these: That the Sons of Wisdom shall
+teach all their wisdom to the wise men among the Nations. That they
+shall give them to drink of the Life-water, so that their length of days
+also may be increased. That they shall cease to destroy them by sickness
+and their mastery of the forces which are hid in the womb of the world.
+If they will do these things, then the Nations on their part will cease
+from war, will rebuild the cities they have destroyed by means of their
+flying ships that rain down death, and will agree that the Lord Oro and
+his seed shall rule them for ever as the King of kings.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks if that be all. The Prince answers that it is not
+all. He says that when he dwelt a hostage at the court of the Sons of
+Wisdom he and the divine Lady, the daughter of the Lord Oro, and his
+only living child, learned to love each other. He demands, and the
+Nations demand, that she shall be given to him to wife, that in a day to
+come he may rule with her and their children after them.
+
+"See!" went on Yva in her chanting, dreamy voice, "the Lord Oro asks his
+daughter if this be true. She says," here the real Yva at my side turned
+and looked me straight in the eyes, "that it is true; that she loves the
+Prince of the Nations and that if she lives a million years she will wed
+no other man, since she who is her father's slave in all else is
+still the mistress of herself, as has ever been the right of her royal
+mothers.
+
+"See again! The Lord Oro, the divine King, the Ancient, grows wroth. He
+says that it is enough and more than enough that the Barbarians
+should ask to eat of the bread of hidden learning and to drink of the
+Life-water of the Sons of Wisdom, gifts that were given to them of old
+by Heaven whence they sprang in the beginning. But that one of them,
+however highly placed, should dare to ask to mix his blood with that of
+the divine Lady, the Heiress, the Queen of the Earth to be, and claim to
+share her imperial throne that had been held by her pure race from age
+to age, was an insult that could only be purged by death. Sooner would
+he give his daughter in marriage to an ape than to a child of the
+Barbarians who had worked on them so many woes and striven to break the
+golden fetters of their rule.
+
+"Look again!" continued Yva. "The Lord Oro, the divine, grows angrier
+still" (which in truth he did, for never did I see such dreadful rage
+as that which the picture revealed in him). "He warns, he threatens.
+He says that hitherto out of gentle love and pity he has held his
+hand; that he has strength at his command which will slay them, not by
+millions in slow war, but by tens of millions at one blow; that will
+blot them and their peoples from the face of earth and that will cause
+the deep seas to roll where now their pleasant lands are fruitful in the
+sun. They shrink before his fury; behold, their knees tremble because
+they know that he has this power. He mocks them, does the Lord Oro.
+He asks for their submission here and now, and that in the name of
+the Nations they should take the great oath which may not be broken,
+swearing to cease from war upon the Sons of Wisdom and to obey them
+in all things to the ends of the earth. Some of the ambassadors would
+yield. They look about them like wild things that are trapped. But
+madness takes the Prince. He cries that the oath of an ape is of no
+account, but that he will tear up the Children of Wisdom as an ape tears
+leaves, and afterwards take the divine Lady to be his wife.
+
+"Look on the Lord Oro!" continued the living Yva, "his wrath leaves him.
+He grows cold and smiles. His daughter throws herself upon her knees and
+pleads with him. He thrusts her away. She would spring to the side of
+the Prince; he commands his councillors to hold her. She cries to the
+Prince that she loves him and him only, and that in a day to come him
+she will wed and no other. He thanks her, saying that as it is with her,
+so it is with him, and that because of his love he fears nothing. She
+swoons. The Lord Oro motions with his hand to the guard. They lift their
+death-rods. Fire leaps from them. The Prince and his companions, all
+save those who were afraid and would have sworn the oath, twist and
+writhe. They turn black; they die. The Lord Oro commands those who are
+left to enter their flying ships and bear to the Nations of the Earth
+tidings of what befalls those who dare to defy and insult him; to warn
+them also to eat and drink and be merry while they may, since for their
+wickedness they are about to perish."
+
+
+The scene faded and there followed another which really I cannot
+describe. It represented some vast underground place and what appeared
+to be a huge mountain of iron clothed in light, literally a thing
+like an alp, rocking and spinning down a declivity, which farther on
+separated into two branches because of a huge razor-edge precipice that
+rose between. There in the middle of this vast space with the dazzling
+mountain whirling towards him, stood Oro encased in some transparent
+armour, as though to keep off heat, and with him his daughter who under
+his direction was handling something in the rock behind her. Then there
+was a blinding flash and everything vanished. All of this picture
+passed so swiftly that we could not grasp its details; only a general
+impression remained.
+
+"The Lord Oro, using the strength that is in the world whereof he alone
+has the secret, changes the world's balance causing that which was land
+to become sea and that which was sea to become land," said Yva in her
+chanting, unnatural voice.
+
+Another scene of stupendous and changing awfulness. Countries were
+sinking, cities crashing down, volcanoes were spouting fire; the end of
+the earth seemed to be at hand. We could see human beings running to and
+fro in thousands like ants. Then in huge waves hundreds and hundreds of
+feet high, the ocean flowed in and all was troubled, yeasty sea.
+
+"Oro carries out his threat to destroy the Nations who had rebelled
+against him," said Yva. "Much of the world sinks beneath the waves, but
+in place of it other lands arise above the waves, to be inhabited by the
+seed of those who remain living in those portions of the Earth that the
+deluge spared."
+
+This horrible vision passed and was succeeded by one more, that of Oro
+standing in the sepulchre of the cave by the side of the crystal coffin
+which contained what appeared to be the body of his daughter. He gazed
+at her, then drank some potion and laid himself down in the companion
+coffin, that in which we had found him.
+
+
+All vanished away and Yva, appearing to wake from some kind of trance,
+smiled, and in her natural voice asked if we had seen enough.
+
+"Quite," I answered in a tone that caused her to say:
+
+"I wonder what you have seen, Humphrey. Myself I do not know, since it
+is through me that you see at all and when you see I am in you who see."
+
+"Indeed," I replied. "Well, I will tell you about it later."
+
+"Thank you so much," exclaimed Bastin, recovering suddenly from his
+amazement. "I have heard a great deal of these moving-picture shows
+which are becoming so popular, but have always avoided attending them
+because their influence on the young is supposed to be doubtful, and a
+priest must set a good example to his congregation. Now I see that they
+can have a distinct educational value, even if it is presented in the
+form of romance."
+
+"How is it done?" asked Bickley, almost fiercely.
+
+"I do not altogether know," she answered. "This I do know, however, that
+everything which has happened on this world can be seen from moment to
+moment at some point in the depths of space, for thither the sun's light
+takes it. There, too, it can be caught and thence in an instant returned
+to earth again, to be reflected in the mirror of the present by those
+who know how that mirror should be held. Ask me no more; one so wise as
+you, O Bickley, can solve such problems for himself."
+
+"If you don't mind, Lady Yva," said Bastin, "I think I should like to
+get out of this place, interesting as it is. I have food to cook up
+above and lots of things to attend to, especially as I understand I am
+to come back here tomorrow. Would you mind showing me the way to that
+lift or moving staircase?"
+
+"Come," she said, smiling.
+
+So we went past the image of Fate, out of the temple, down the vast and
+lonely streets so unnaturally illuminated, to the place where we had
+first found ourselves on arrival in the depths. There we stood.
+
+A moment later and we were whirling up as we had whirled down. I suppose
+that Yva came with us though I never saw her do so, and the odd thing
+was that when we arrived in the sepulchre, she seemed already to be
+standing there waiting to direct us.
+
+"Really," remarked Bastin, "this is exactly like Maskelyne and Cook. Did
+you ever see their performance, Bickley? If so, it must have given you
+lots to explain for quite a long while."
+
+"Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in Orofena,"
+replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from his pocket an end
+of candle to which he set light.
+
+"What is jugglery?" asked Bastin, and they departed arguing, leaving me
+alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
+
+"What have I seen?" I asked her.
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but perhaps
+something of the truth."
+
+"I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you swear
+yourself to a man for ever."
+
+"Yes, and this I did. What of it?"
+
+"Only that it might be hard for another man."
+
+"Yes, for another man it might be hard. You were once married, were you
+not, Humphrey, to a wife who died?"
+
+"Yes, I was married."
+
+"And did you not swear to that wife that you would never look in love
+upon another woman?"
+
+"I did," I answered in a shamed voice. "But how do you know? I never
+told you so."
+
+"Oh! I know you and therefore guessed."
+
+"Well, what of it, Yva?"
+
+"Nothing, except that you must find your wife before you love again, and
+before I love again I must find him whom I wish to be my husband."
+
+"How can that happen," I asked, "when both are dead?"
+
+"How did all that you have seen to-day in Nyo happen?" she replied,
+laughing softly. "Perhaps you are very blind, Humphrey, or perhaps we
+both are blind. If so, mayhap light will come to us. Meanwhile do not
+be sad. Tomorrow I will meet you and you shall teach me--your English
+tongue, Humphrey, and other things."
+
+"Then let it be in the sunlight, Yva. I do not love those darksome halls
+of Nyo that glow like something dead."
+
+"It is fitting, for are they not dead?" she answered, with a little
+laugh. "So be it. Bastin shall teach my father down below, since sun and
+shade are the same to him who only thinks of his religion, and you shall
+teach me up above."
+
+"I am not so certain about Bastin and of what he thinks," I said
+doubtfully. "Also will the Lord Oro permit you to come?"
+
+"Yes, for in such matters I rule myself. Also," she added meaningly,
+"he remembers my oath that I will wed no man--save one who is dead.
+Now farewell a while and bid Bastin be here when the sun is three hours
+high, not before or after."
+
+Then I left her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XVII. Yva Explains
+
+
+When I reached the rock I was pleased to find Marama and about twenty
+of his people engaged in erecting the house that we had ordered them
+to build for our accommodation. Indeed, it was nearly finished, since
+house-building in Orofena is a simple business. The framework of poles
+let into palm trunks, since they could not be driven into the rock, had
+been put together on the further shore and towed over bodily by canoes.
+The overhanging rock formed one side of the house; the ends were of palm
+leaves tied to the poles, and the roof was of the same material. The
+other side was left open for the present, which in that equable and
+balmy clime was no disadvantage. The whole edifice was about thirty feet
+long by fifteen deep and divided into two portions, one for sleeping
+and one for living, by a palm leaf partition. Really, it was quite a
+comfortable abode, cool and rainproof, especially after Bastin had built
+his hut in which to cook.
+
+Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and implored
+us to visit them on the main island. I answered that perhaps we would
+later on, as we wished to procure certain things from the wreck. Also,
+he requested Bastin to continue his ministrations as the latter greatly
+desired to do. But to this proposal I would not allow him to give any
+direct answer at the moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure
+of Oro's approval.
+
+Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind them the
+usual ample store of provisions.
+
+We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had said
+about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little appetite
+for solid food, though this returned upon the following day. The same
+thing happened upon every occasion after drinking of that water which
+certainly was a most invigorating fluid. Never for years had any of us
+felt so well as it caused us to do.
+
+So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of these,
+indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them as something
+out of the common, of course, but as facts which admitted of no
+discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament told much the same
+story of people called the Sons of God who lived very long lives and ran
+after the daughters of men whom they should have left alone, and thus
+became the progenitors of a remarkable race. Of this race, he presumed
+that Oro and his daughter were survivors, especially as they spoke of
+their family as "Heaven born." How they came to survive was more than he
+could understand and really scarcely worth bothering over, since there
+they were.
+
+It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although naturally
+Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly exaggerated, when he
+declared that he had caused this catastrophe, unless indeed he was
+talking about a totally different deluge, though even then he could not
+have brought it about. It was curious, however, that the people drowned
+were said to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion about those
+whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of that, he could
+not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his own showing he
+was a most revengeful person and one who declined to agree to a quite
+suitable alliance, apparently desired by both parties, merely because it
+offended his family pride. No, on reflection he might be unjust to Oro
+in this particular, since he never told that story; it was only shown
+in some pictures which very likely were just made up to astonish us.
+Meanwhile, it was his business to preach to this old sinner down in that
+hole, and he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
+must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek inspiration,
+which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
+
+Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
+
+"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause another
+just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after him.
+
+"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not hide the
+truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he revenges himself
+upon us in any way, we must just put up with it like other martyrs."
+
+"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said Bickley.
+
+"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware of that,
+as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you become one, I am
+sorry to say that I do not see how you can expect any benefit. You
+would only be like a man who puts a sovereign into the offertory bag in
+mistake for a shilling. The extra nineteen shillings will do him no good
+at all, since in his heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could
+have them back."
+
+Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not laugh.
+
+"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I have gone
+quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of homicidal mania, which
+I feel developing in me where Bastin is concerned, or of other abnormal
+violence, that you will take whatever steps you consider necessary, even
+to putting me out of the way if that is imperative."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."
+
+"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great number of
+things which I know it to be quite impossible that I should have seen
+or experienced. The only explanation is that I am suffering from
+delusions."
+
+"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"
+
+"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."
+
+"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by no means
+certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He has a faith and
+he sticks to it, as millions have done before him, and that is better
+than making spiritual experiments, as I am sorry to say I do, or
+rejecting things because one cannot understand them, as you do, which is
+only a form of intellectual vanity."
+
+"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat that I
+am mad, and Bastin is mad."
+
+"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I mad, too?"
+
+"You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn't enough to drive a man mad
+when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly impossible
+moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible young woman in an
+utterly impossible underground city, then I don't know what is."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, starting.
+
+"Mean? Well, if you didn't notice it, there's hope for you."
+
+"Notice what?"
+
+"All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do you admit
+that?"
+
+"Of course; there could be no mistake on that point."
+
+"Very well. Then according to my version there came a man, still young,
+dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions of peace and wanted
+to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is that right?"
+
+"Absolutely."
+
+"Well, and didn't you recognise the man?"
+
+"No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose appearance
+reminded me of someone."
+
+"I suppose it must be true," mused Bickley, "that we do not know
+ourselves."
+
+"So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be our
+special study. 'Know thyself,' you remember."
+
+"I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean to tell
+me that you did not recognise your own double in that man? Shave off
+your beard and put on his clothes and no one could distinguish you
+apart."
+
+I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
+
+"Now you mention it," I said slowly, "I suppose there was a resemblance.
+I didn't look at him very much; I was studying the simulacrum of Yva.
+Also, you know it is some time since--I mean, there are no pier-glasses
+in Orofena."
+
+"The man was you," went on Bickley with conviction. "If I were
+superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am not, I
+know that I must be mad."
+
+"Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble each
+other."
+
+"There are degrees in resemblance," said Bickley with one of his
+contemptuous snorts. "It won't do, Humphrey, my boy," he added. "I can
+only think of one possible explanation--outside of the obvious one of
+madness."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that cinematograph show
+in some way or other, did she not? She said that in order to do this she
+loosed some hidden forces. I suggest that she did nothing of the sort."
+
+"Then whence did the pictures come and why?"
+
+"From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-bull,
+fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally fill the
+role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had happened to
+impress her. Hence the resemblance."
+
+"You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural cunning
+and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don't know, first, why she should
+be so anxious to add another impression to the many we have received
+in this place; and, secondly, if she was, how she managed to mesmerise
+three average but totally different men into seeing the same things. My
+explanation is that you were deceived as to the likeness, which, mind
+you, I did not recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin."
+
+"Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask
+Yva herself. She ought to know. Now I'm off to try to analyse that
+confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary spring
+variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and possibly not
+uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I can only apply some
+very elementary tests."
+
+So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was left
+alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting continually to
+wander off into the cave, whence I must recall him. I suppose that my
+experiences of the day, reviewed beneath the sweet influences of the
+wonderful tropical night, affected me. At any rate, that mystical
+side of my nature, to which I think I alluded at the beginning of this
+record, sprang into active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal
+vanished, the abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of us
+creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British. I lost
+my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in strange places;
+of course, always supposing that we have a spirit, which Bickley would
+deny.
+
+I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
+unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see and
+accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps only a
+refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and again, and that
+our animating principle, whatever it might be, does inhabit various
+bodies, which, naturally enough, it would shape to its own taste and
+likeness? Would that taste and likeness vary so very much over, let
+us say, a million years or so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a
+minute, in the aeons of Eternity?
+
+On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect that it
+may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered man of the
+far past were in fact identical? If the woman were the same, preserved
+across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why should not her lover be the
+same? What did I say--her lover? Was I her lover? No, I was the lover of
+one who had died--my lost wife. Well, if I had died and lived again,
+why should not--why should not that Sleeper--have lived again during her
+long sleep? Through all those years the spirit must have had some home,
+and, if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points, similarities,
+which rushed in upon me--oh! it was ridiculous. Bickley was right. We
+were all mad!
+
+There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war with
+Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such knowledge would
+presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond those given to man. I could
+not believe that he possessed these; as Bickley said, it would be past
+experience. Yet it was most strange that he who was uninformed as to our
+national history and dangers, should have hit upon a country with which
+we might well have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here again I was
+bewildered and overcome. My brain rocked. I would seek sleep, and in it
+escape, or at any rate rest from all these mysteries.
+
+
+On the following morning we despatched Bastin to keep his rendezvous in
+the sepulchre at the proper time. Had we not done so I felt sure that
+he would have forgotten it, for on this occasion he was for once
+an unwilling missioner. He tried to persuade one of us to come with
+him--even Bickley would have been welcome; but we both declared that we
+could not dream of interfering in such a professional matter; also that
+our presence was forbidden, and would certainly distract the attention
+of his pupil.
+
+"What you mean," said the gloomy Bastin, "is that you intend to enjoy
+yourselves up here in the female companionship of the Glittering Lady
+whilst I sit thousands of feet underground attempting to lighten the
+darkness of a violent old sinner whom I suspect of being in league with
+Satan."
+
+"With whom you should be proud to break a lance," said Bickley.
+
+"So I am, in the daylight. For instance, when he uses your mouth to
+advance his arguments. Bickley, but this is another matter. However, if
+I do not appear again you will know that I died in a good cause, and, I
+hope, try to recover my remains and give them decent burial. Also, you
+might inform the Bishop of how I came to my end, that is, if you ever
+get an opportunity, which is more than doubtful."
+
+"Hurry up, Bastin, hurry up!" said the unfeeling Bickley, "or you will
+be late for your appointment and put your would-be neophyte into a bad
+temper."
+
+Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed in the
+language of the South Sea Islands.
+
+A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous robes which,
+being a man, it is quite impossible for me to describe. She saw us
+looking at these, and, after greeting us both, also Tommy, who was
+enraptured at her coming, asked us how the ladies of our country attired
+themselves.
+
+We tried to explain, with no striking success.
+
+"You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the Old World,"
+she said, shaking her head and laughing. "I thought that you had with
+you pictures of ladies you have known which would show me."
+
+Now, in fact, I had in a pocket-book a photograph of my wife in
+evening-dress, also a miniature of her head and bust painted on ivory,
+a beautiful piece of work done by a master hand, which I always wore.
+These, after a moment's hesitation, I produced and showed to her,
+Bickley having gone away for a little while to see about something
+connected with his attempted analysis of the Life-water. She examined
+them with great eagerness, and as she did so I noted that her face grew
+tender and troubled.
+
+"This was your wife," she said as one who states what she knows to be a
+fact. I nodded, and she went on:
+
+"She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I am, I
+think."
+
+"No," I answered, "she lacked height; given that she would have been a
+lovely woman."
+
+"I am glad you think that women should be tall," she said, glancing at
+her shadow. "The eyes were such as mine, were they not--in colour, I
+mean?"
+
+"Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger."
+
+"That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be angry if I
+tried it? I weary of this old fashion."
+
+"Why should I be angry?" I asked.
+
+At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the details
+of the dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than had been the
+custom among the women of her people, but was very pretty.
+
+"That is because we are still barbarians," said Bickley; "at least, our
+women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods of attraction, like
+the savages yonder."
+
+She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the photograph
+and the miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
+
+"I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear this picture
+on your heart, as well as in it."
+
+"Then you must be a very remarkable woman," said Bickley. "Never
+before did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man was faithful to
+somebody else."
+
+"Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so angry
+to us women?" asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without waiting for
+an answer, she inquired of him whether he had been successful in his
+analysis of the Life-water.
+
+"How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did Bastin tell
+you?" exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the descent to
+Nyo; that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I do, and that he
+thought that my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil or evil spirit from
+some Under-world which he called hell."
+
+"Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth," said Bickley, "for which
+I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady Yva, and tell us who
+and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what are you."
+
+"Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord Oro and
+I are two who have lived on from the old time when the world was
+different, and yet, I think, the same. He is a man and not a god, and I
+am a woman. His powers are great because of his knowledge, which he has
+gathered from his forefathers and in a life of a thousand years before
+he went to sleep. He can do things you cannot do. Thus, he can pass
+through space and take others with him, and return again. He can learn
+what is happening in far-off parts of the world, as he did when he
+told you of the war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible
+powers; for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he
+knows the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can change its
+turning so that earthquakes happen and sea becomes land, and land sea,
+and the places that were hot grow cold, and those that were cold grow
+hot."
+
+"All of which things have happened many times in the history of the
+globe," said Bickley, "without the help of the Lord Oro."
+
+"Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless will have
+knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge, and knowledge is
+strength."
+
+"Yes," I interposed, "but such powers as you attribute to your father
+are not given to man."
+
+"You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks that he
+has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is not so. Hundreds
+of thousands of years ago men knew more than it seems they do today, ten
+times more, as they lived ten times longer, or so you tell me."
+
+"Men?" I said.
+
+"Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations supposed
+them to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and terrors of man.
+He desires power which is ambition, and when the world refused his rule,
+he destroyed that part of it which rebelled, which is revenge. Moreover,
+above all things he dreads death, which is fear. That is why he
+suspended life in himself and me for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years, as his knowledge gave him strength to do, because death was near
+and he thought that sleep was better than death."
+
+"Why should he dread to die," asked Bickley, "seeing that sleep and
+death are the same?"
+
+"Because his knowledge tells him that Sleep and Death are not the same,
+as you, in your foolishness, believe, for there Bastin is wiser than
+you. Because for all his wisdom he remains ignorant of what happens to
+man when the Light of Life is blown out by the breath of Fate. That is
+why he fears to die and why he talks with Bastin the Preacher, who says
+he has the secret of the future."
+
+"And do you fear to die?" I asked.
+
+"No, Humphrey," she answered gently. "Because I think that there is no
+death, and, having done no wrong, I dread no evil. I had dreams while I
+was asleep, O Humphrey, and it seemed to me that--"
+
+Here she ceased and glanced at where she knew the miniature was hanging
+upon my breast.
+
+"Now," she continued, after a little pause, "tell me of your world,
+of its history, of its languages, of what happens there, for I long to
+know."
+
+So then and there, assisted by Bickley, I began the education of the
+Lady Yva. I do not suppose that there was ever a more apt pupil in the
+whole earth. To begin with, she was better acquainted with every subject
+on which I touched than I was myself; all she lacked was information as
+to its modern aspect. Her knowledge ended two hundred and fifty thousand
+years ago, at which date, however, it would seem that civilisation had
+already touched a higher water-mark than it has ever since attained.
+Thus, this vanished people understood astronomy, natural magnetism, the
+force of gravity, steam, also electricity to some subtle use of which,
+I gathered, the lighting of their underground city was to be attributed.
+They had mastered architecture and the arts, as their buildings and
+statues showed; they could fly through the air better than we have
+learned to do within the last few years.
+
+More, they, or some of them, had learned the use of the Fourth
+Dimension, that is their most instructed individuals, could move through
+opposing things, as well as over them, up into them and across them.
+This power these possessed in a two-fold form. I mean, that they could
+either disintegrate their bodies at one spot and cause them to integrate
+again at another, or they could project what the old Egyptians called
+the Ka or Double, and modern Theosophists name the Astral Shape, to
+any distance. Moreover, this Double, or Astral Shape, while itself
+invisible, still, so to speak, had the use of its senses. It could see,
+it could hear, and it could remember, and, on returning to the body, it
+could avail itself of the experience thus acquired.
+
+Thus, at least, said Yva, while Bickley contemplated her with a cold
+and unbelieving eye. She even went further and alleged that in certain
+instances, individuals of her extinct race had been able to pass through
+the ether and to visit other worlds in the depths of space.
+
+"Have you ever done that?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Once or twice I dreamed that I did," she replied quietly.
+
+"We can all dream," he answered.
+
+As it was my lot to make acquaintance with this strange and uncanny
+power at a later date, I will say no more of it now.
+
+Telepathy, she declared, was also a developed gift among the Sons of
+Wisdom; indeed, they seem to have used it as we use wireless messages.
+Only, in their case, the sending and receiving stations were skilled and
+susceptible human beings who went on duty for so many hours at a time.
+Thus intelligence was transmitted with accuracy and despatch. Those who
+had this faculty were, she said, also very apt at reading the minds of
+others and therefore not easy to deceive.
+
+"Is that how you know that I had been trying to analyse your
+Life-water?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Yes," she answered, with her unvarying smile. "At the moment I spoke
+thereof you were wondering whether my father would be angry if he knew
+that you had taken the water in a little flask." She studied him for a
+moment, then added: "Now you are wondering, first, whether I did not
+see you take the water from the fountain and guess the purpose, and,
+secondly, whether perhaps Bastin did not tell me what you were doing
+with it when we met in the sepulchre."
+
+"Look here," said the exasperated Bickley, "I admit that telepathy and
+thought-reading are possible to a certain limited extent. But supposing
+that you possess those powers, as I think in English, and you do not
+know English, how can you interpret what is passing in my mind?"
+
+"Perhaps you have been teaching me English all this while without
+knowing it, Bickley. In any case, it matters little, seeing that what
+I read is the thought, not the language with which it is clothed. The
+thought comes from your mind to mine--that is, if I wish it, which is
+not often--and I interpret it in my own or other tongues."
+
+"I am glad to hear it is not often, Lady Yva, since thoughts are
+generally considered private."
+
+"Yes, and therefore I will read yours no more. Why should I, when they
+are so full of disbelief of all I tell you, and sometimes of other
+things about myself which I do not seek to know?"
+
+"No wonder that, according to the story in the pictures, those Nations,
+whom you named Barbarians, made an end of your people, Lady Yva."
+
+"You are mistaken, Bickley; the Lord Oro made an end of the Nations,
+though against my prayer," she added with a sigh.
+
+Then Bickley departed in a rage, and did not appear again for an hour.
+
+"He is angry," she said, looking after him; "nor do I wonder. It is hard
+for the very clever like Bickley, who think that they have mastered all
+things, to find that after all they are quite ignorant. I am sorry for
+him, and I like him very much."
+
+"Then you would be sorry for me also, Lady Yva?"
+
+"Why?" she asked with a dazzling smile, "when your heart is athirst for
+knowledge, gaping for it like a fledgling's mouth for food, and, as
+it chances, though I am not very wise, I can satisfy something of your
+soul-hunger."
+
+"Not very wise!" I repeated.
+
+"No, Humphrey. I think that Bastin, who in many ways is so stupid, has
+more true wisdom than I have, because he can believe and accept without
+question. After all, the wisdom of my people is all of the universe
+and its wonders. What you think magic is not magic; it is only gathered
+knowledge and the finding out of secrets. Bickley will tell you the
+same, although as yet he does not believe that the mind of man can
+stretch so far."
+
+"You mean that your wisdom has in it nothing of the spirit?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, that is what I mean. I do not even know if there is such
+a thing as spirit. Our god was Fate; Bastin's god is a spirit, and I
+think yours also."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Therefore, I wish you and Bastin to teach me of your god, as does Oro,
+my father. I want--oh! so much, Humphrey, to learn whether we live after
+death."
+
+"You!" I exclaimed. "You who, according to the story, have slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years! You, who have, unless I mistake,
+hinted that during that sleep you may have lived in other shapes! Do you
+doubt whether we can live after death?"
+
+"Yes. Sleep induced by secret arts is not death, and during that sleep
+the I within might wander and inhabit other shapes, because it is
+forbidden to be idle. Moreover, what seems to be death may not be death,
+only another form of sleep from which the I awakes again upon the world.
+But at last comes the real death, when the I is extinguished to the
+world. That much I know, because my people learned it."
+
+"You mean, you know that men and women may live again and again upon the
+world?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, I do. For in the world there is only a certain store of
+life which in many forms travels on and on, till the lot of each I is
+fulfilled. Then comes the real death, and after that--what, oh!--what?"
+
+"You must ask Bastin," I said humbly. "I cannot dare to teach of such
+matters."
+
+"No, but you can and do believe, and that helps me, Humphrey, who am
+in tune with you. Yes, it helps me much more than do Bastin and his new
+religion, because such is woman's way. Now, I think Bickley will soon
+return, so let us talk of other matters. Tell me of the history of your
+people, Humphrey, that my father says are now at war."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVIII. The Accident
+
+
+Bickley did return, having recovered his temper, since after all it was
+impossible for anyone to remain angry with the Lady Yva for long, and we
+spent a very happy time together. We instructed and she was the humble
+pupil.
+
+How swift and nimble was her intelligence! In that one morning she
+learned all our alphabet and how to write our letters. It appeared that
+among her people, at any rate in their later periods, the only form of
+writing that was used was a highly concentrated shorthand which saved
+labour. They had no journals, since news which arrived telepathically
+or by some form of wireless was proclaimed to those who cared to listen,
+and on it all formed their own judgments. In the same way poems and even
+romances were repeated, as in Homer's day or in the time of the Norse
+sagas, by word of mouth. None of their secret knowledge was written
+down. Like the ritual of Freemasonry it was considered too sacred.
+
+Moreover, when men lived for hundreds of years this was not so
+necessary, especially as their great fear was lest it should fall into
+the hands of the outside nations, whom they called Barbarians. For, be
+it remembered, these Sons of Wisdom were always a very small people
+who ruled by the weight of their intelligence and the strength of their
+accumulated lore. Indeed, they could scarcely be called a people; rather
+were they a few families, all of them more or less connected with the
+original ruling Dynasty which considered itself half divine. These
+families were waited upon by a multitude of servants or slaves drawn
+from the subject nations, for the most part skilled in one art or
+another, or perhaps, remarkable for their personal beauty. Still they
+remained outside the pale.
+
+The Sons of Wisdom did not intermarry with them or teach them their
+learning, or even allow them to drink of their Life-water. They ruled
+them as men rule dogs, treating them with kindness, but no more, and as
+many dogs run their course and die in the lifetime of one master, so did
+many of these slaves in that of one of the Sons of Wisdom. Therefore,
+the slaves came to regard their lords not as men, but gods. They lived
+but three score years and ten like the rest of us, and went their way,
+they, whose great-great-grandfathers had served the same master and
+whose great-great-great-grandchildren would still serve him. What should
+we think of a lord who we knew was already adult in the time of William
+the Conqueror, and who remained still vigorous and all-powerful in that
+of George V? One, moreover, who commanded almost infinite knowledge to
+which we were denied the key? We might tremble before him and look upon
+him as half-divine, but should we not long to kill him and possess his
+knowledge and thereby prolong our own existence to his wondrous measure?
+
+Such, said Yva, was the case with their slaves and the peoples from
+whence these sprang. They grew mad with jealous hate, till at length
+came the end we knew.
+
+Thus we talked on for hours till the time came for us to eat. As before
+Yva partook of fruit and we of such meats as we had at hand. These,
+we noticed, disgusted her, because, as she explained, the Children of
+Wisdom, unless driven thereto by necessity, touched no flesh, but lived
+on the fruits of the earth and wine alone. Only the slaves and the
+Barbarians ate flesh. In these views Bickley for once agreed with
+her, that is, except as regards the wine, for in theory, if not in
+practice--he was a vegetarian.
+
+"I will bring you more of the Life-water," she said, "and then you will
+grow to hate these dead things, as I do. And now farewell. My father
+calls me. I hear him though you do not. To-morrow I cannot come, but the
+day after I will come and bring you the Life-water. Nay, accompany me
+not, but as I see he wishes it, let Tommy go with me. I will care for
+him, and he is a friend in all that lonely place."
+
+So she went, and with her Tommy, rejoicing.
+
+"Ungrateful little devil!" said Bickley. "Here we've fed and petted
+him from puppyhood, or at least you have, and yet he skips off with the
+first stranger. I never saw him behave like that to any woman, except
+your poor wife."
+
+"I know," I answered. "I cannot understand it. Hullo! here comes
+Bastin."
+
+Bastin it was, dishevelled and looking much the worse for wear, also
+minus his Bible in the native tongue.
+
+"Well, how have you been getting on?" said Bickley.
+
+"I should like some tea, also anything there is to eat."
+
+We supplied him with these necessaries, and after a while he said slowly
+and solemnly:
+
+"I cannot help thinking of a childish story which Bickley told or
+invented one night at your house at home. I remember he had an argument
+with my wife, which he said put him in mind of it, I am sure I don't
+know why. It was about a monkey and a parrot that were left together
+under a sofa for a long while, where they were so quiet that everybody
+forgot them. Then the parrot came out with only one feather left in its
+tail and none at all on its body, saying, 'I've had no end of a time!'
+after which it dropped down and died. Do you know, I feel just like that
+parrot, only I don't mean to die, and I think I gave the monkey quite as
+good as he gave me!"
+
+"What happened?" I asked, intensely interested.
+
+"Oh! the Glittering Lady took me into that palace hall where Oro was
+sitting like a spider in a web, and left me there. I got to work at
+once. He was much interested in the Old Testament stories and said there
+were points of truth about them, although they had evidently come down
+to the modern writer--he called him a modern writer--in a legendary
+form. I thought his remarks impertinent and with difficulty refrained
+from saying so. Leaving the story of the Deluge and all that, I spoke of
+other matters, telling him of eternal life and Heaven and Hell, of which
+the poor benighted man had never heard. I pointed out especially that
+unless he repented, his life, by all accounts, had been so wicked, that
+he was certainly destined to the latter place."
+
+"What did he say to that?" I asked.
+
+"Do you know, I think it frightened him, if one could imagine Oro being
+frightened. At any rate he remarked that the truth or falsity of what I
+said was an urgent matter for him, as he could not expect to live more
+than a few hundred years longer, though perhaps he might prolong the
+period by another spell of sleep. Then he asked me why I thought him so
+wicked. I replied because he himself said that he had drowned millions
+of people, which showed an evil heart and intention even if it were
+not a fact. He thought a long while and asked what could be done in the
+circumstances. I replied that repentance and reparation were the only
+courses open to him."
+
+"Reparation!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, reparation was what I said, though I think I made a mistake there,
+as you will see. As nearly as I can remember, he answered that he was
+beginning to repent, as from all he had learned from us, he gathered
+that the races which had arisen as a consequence of his action, were
+worse than those which he had destroyed. As regards reparation, what
+he had done once he could do again. He would think the matter over
+seriously, and see if it were possible and advisable to raise those
+parts of the world which had been sunk, and sink those which had been
+raised. If so, he thought that would make very handsome amends to the
+departed nations and set him quite right with any superior Power, if
+such a thing existed. What are you laughing at, Bickley? I don't think
+it a laughing matter, since such remarks do not seem to me to indicate
+any real change in Oro's heart, which is what I was trying to effect."
+
+Bickley, who was convulsed with merriment, wiped his eyes and said:
+
+"You dear old donkey, don't you see what you have done, or rather would
+have done if there were a word of truth in all this ridiculous story
+about a deluge? You would be in the way of making your precious pupil,
+who certainly is the most masterly old liar in the world, repeat his
+offence and send Europe to the bottom of the sea."
+
+"That did occur to me, but it doesn't much matter as I am quite certain
+that such a thing would never be allowed. Of course there was a real
+deluge once, but Oro had no more to do with it than I had. Don't you
+agree, Arbuthnot?"
+
+"I think so," I answered cautiously, "but really in this place I am
+beginning to lose count of what is or is not possible. Also, of course,
+there may have been many deluges; indeed the history of the world shows
+that this was so; it is written in its geological strata. What was the
+end of it?"
+
+"The end was that he took the South Sea Bible and, after I had explained
+a little about our letters, seemed to be able to read it at once. I
+suppose he was acquainted with the art of printing in his youth. At any
+rate he said that he would study it, I don't know how, unless he can
+read, and that in two days' time he would let me know what he thought
+about the matter of my religion. Then he told me to go. I said that I
+did not know the way and was afraid of losing myself. Thereupon he waved
+his hand, and I really can't say what happened."
+
+"Did you levitate up here," asked Bickley, "like the late lamented Mr.
+Home at the spiritualistic seances?"
+
+"No, I did not exactly levitate, but something or someone seemed to get
+a hold of me, and I was just rushed along in a most tumultuous fashion.
+The next thing I knew was that I was standing at the door of that
+sepulchre, though I have no recollection of going up in the lift, or
+whatever it is. I believe those beastly caves are full of ghosts, or
+devils, and the worst of it is that they have kept my solar-tope, which
+I put on this morning forgetting that it would be useless there."
+
+"The Lady Yva's Fourth Dimension in action," I suggested, "only it
+wouldn't work on solar-topes."
+
+"I don't know what you are talking about," said Bastin, "but if my hat
+had to be left, why not my boots and other garments? Please stop your
+nonsense and pass the tea. Thank goodness I haven't got to go down there
+tomorrow, as he seems to have had enough of me for the present, so I
+vote we all pay a visit to the ship. It will be a very pleasant change.
+I couldn't stand two days running with that old fiend, and his ghosts or
+devils in the cave."
+
+
+Next morning accordingly, fearing no harm from the Orofenans, we took
+the canoe and rowed to the main island. Marama had evidently seen
+us coming, for he and a number of his people met us with every
+demonstration of delight, and escorted us to the ship. Here we found
+things just as we had left them, for there had been no attempt at theft
+or other mischief.
+
+While we were in the cabin a fit of moral weakness seemed to overcome
+Bickley, the first and I may add the last from which I ever saw him
+suffer.
+
+"Do you know," he said, addressing us, "I think that we should do
+well to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal of the
+marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here, it is
+still obvious that we find ourselves in very peculiar and unhealthy
+surroundings. I mean mentally unhealthy, indeed I think that if we stay
+here much longer we shall probably go off our heads. Now that boat on
+the deck remains sound and seaworthy. Why should not we provision her
+and take our chance? We know more or less which way to steer."
+
+Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.
+
+"Wouldn't it be rather a risky job in an open boat?" he asked. "However,
+that doesn't matter much because I don't take any account of risks,
+knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow and that the hairs of my
+head are all numbered."
+
+"They might be numbered under water as well as above it," muttered
+Bickley, "and I feel sure that on your own showing, you would be as
+valuable dead as alive."
+
+"What I seem to feel," went on Bastin, "is that I have work to my hand
+here. Also, the locum tenens at Fulcombe no doubt runs the parish as
+well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man for the place than
+I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but I do not despair of him
+yet, and besides him there is the Glittering Lady, a most open-minded
+person, whom I have not yet had any real opportunity of approaching in
+a spiritual sense. Then there are all these natives who cannot learn
+without a teacher. So on the whole I think I would rather stay where I
+am until Providence points out some other path."
+
+"I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons," I said.
+"I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of men to come in
+touch with such things as we have found upon this island. They may be
+illusions, but at least they are very interesting illusions. One might
+live ten lifetimes and find nothing else of the sort. Therefore I should
+like to see the end of the dream."
+
+Bickley reflected a little, then said:
+
+"On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am terribly
+afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear and see, and
+that way madness lies. It is better to die than to go mad."
+
+"You'll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean decease,
+of course," interrupted Bastin. "And who knows, perhaps all this is an
+opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes, which, I must say,
+are singularly blind. You think you know everything there is to learn,
+but the fact is that like the rest of us, you know nothing at all, and
+good man though you are, obstinately refuse to admit the truth and to
+seek support elsewhere. For my part I believe that you are afraid of
+falling in love with that Glittering Lady and of being convinced by her
+that you are wrong in your most unsatisfactory conclusions."
+
+"I am out-voted anyway," said Bickley, "and for the rest, Bastin, look
+after yourself and leave me alone. I will add that on the whole I think
+you are both right, and that it is wisest for us to stop where we are,
+for after all we can only die once."
+
+"I am not so sure, Bickley. There is a thing called the second death,
+which is what is troubling that old scoundrel, Oro. Now I will go and
+look for those books."
+
+So the idea of flight was abandoned, although I admit that even to
+myself it had attractions. For I felt that I was being wrapped in a
+net of mysteries from which I saw no escape. Yes, and of more than
+mysteries; I who had sworn that I would never look upon another woman,
+was learning to love this sweet and wondrous Yva, and of that what could
+be the end?
+
+
+We collected all we had come to seek, and started homewards escorted
+by Marama and his people, including a number of young women who danced
+before us in a light array of flowers.
+
+Passing our old house, we came to the grove where the idol Oro had stood
+and Bastin was so nearly sacrificed. There was another idol there now
+which he wished to examine, but in the end did not as the natives so
+obviously objected. Indeed Marama told me that notwithstanding the
+mysterious death of the sorcerers on the Rock of Offerings, there was
+still a strong party in the island who would be glad to do us a mischief
+if any further affront were offered to their hereditary god.
+
+He questioned us also tentatively about the apparition, for such he
+conceived it to be, which had appeared upon the rock and killed the
+sorcerers, and I answered him as I thought wisest, telling him that a
+terrible Power was afoot in the land, which he would do well to obey.
+
+"Yes," he said; "the God of the Mountain of whom the tradition has come
+down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he sees, he hears
+and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O Friend-from-the-Sea."
+
+As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick bush.
+Suddenly from out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore a mask upon
+his face, but from his shape could not have been more than thirteen or
+fourteen years of age. In his hand was a wooden club. He ran forward,
+stopped, and with a yell of hate hurled it, I think at Bastin, but it
+hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and remembered no more.
+
+Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do not know.
+It seemed to me that through them continually I saw the stately figure
+of old Oro contemplating me gravely, as though he were making up his
+mind about something in which I must play a part. Then there was another
+figure, that of the gracious but imperial Yva, who from time to time,
+as I thought, leant over me and whispered in my ear words of rest
+and comfort. Nor was this all, since her shape had a way of changing
+suddenly into that of my lost wife who would speak with her voice. Or
+perhaps my wife would speak with Yva's voice. To my disordered sense it
+was as though they were one personality, having two shapes, either of
+which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me most
+blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the dead, and in the
+dead the living. More, I took journeys, or rather some unknown part of
+me seemed to do so. One of these I remember, for its majestic character
+stamped itself upon my mind in such a fashion that all the waters of
+delirium could not wash it out nor all its winds blow away that memory.
+
+I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster than
+light can flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near, they grew into
+enormous, flaming Glories round which circled world upon world. They
+became small, dwindled to points of light and disappeared.
+
+We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous white city
+wherein were buildings with domes of crystal and alabaster, in the
+latter of which were set windows made of great jewels; sapphires or
+rubies they seemed to me. We went on up a lovely valley. To the left
+were hills, down which tumbled waterfalls; to the right was a river
+broad and deep that seemed to overflow its banks as does the Nile.
+Behind were high mountains on the slopes of which grew forests of
+glorious trees, some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up their
+crests stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
+guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was lit with
+a light such as that of the moon, only intensified and of many colours.
+Indeed looking up, I saw that above us floated three moons, each of them
+bigger than our own at the full, and gathered that here it was night.
+
+We came to a house set amid scented gardens and having in front of it
+terraces of flowers. It seemed not unlike my own house at home, but I
+took little note of it, because of a woman who sat upon the verandah, if
+I may call it so. She was clad in garments of white silk fastened about
+her middle with a jewelled girdle. On her neck also was a collar of
+jewels. I forget the colour; indeed this seemed to change continually
+as the light from the different moons struck when she moved, but I
+think its prevailing tinge was blue. In her arms this woman nursed a
+beauteous, sleeping child, singing happily as she rocked it to and
+fro. Yva went towards the woman who looked up at her step and uttered a
+little cry. Then for the first time I saw the woman's face. It was that
+of my dead wife!
+
+As I followed in my dream, a little cloud of mist seemed to cover both
+my wife and Yva, and when I reached the place Yva was gone. Only my wife
+remained, she and the child. There she stood, solemn and sweet. While I
+drew near she laid down the child upon the cushioned seat from which
+she had risen. She stretched out her arms and flung them about me. She
+embraced me and I embraced her in a rapture of reunion. Then turning she
+lifted up the child, it was a girl, for me to kiss.
+
+"See your daughter," she said, "and behold all that I am making ready
+for you where we shall dwell in a day to come."
+
+I grew confused.
+
+"Yva," I said. "Where is Yva who brought me here? Did she go into the
+house?"
+
+"Yes," she answered happily. "Yva went into the house. Look again!"
+
+I looked and it was Yva's face that was pressed against my own, and
+Yva's eyes that gazed into mine. Only she was garbed as my wife had
+been, and on her bosom hung the changeful necklace.
+
+"You may not stay," she whispered, and lo! it was my wife that spoke,
+not Yva.
+
+"Tell me what it means?" I implored.
+
+"I cannot," she answered. "There are mysteries that you may not know as
+yet. Love Yva if you will and I shall not be jealous, for in loving Yva
+you love me. You cannot understand? Then know this, that the spirit has
+many shapes, and yet is the same spirit--sometimes. Now I who am far,
+yet near, bid you farewell a while."
+
+Then all passed in a flash and the dream ended.
+
+Such was the only one of those visions which I can recall.
+
+
+I seemed to wake up as from a long and tumultuous sleep. The first thing
+I saw was the palm roof of our house upon the rock. I knew it was our
+house, for just above me was a palm leaf of which I had myself tied the
+stalk to the framework with a bit of coloured ribbon that I had chanced
+to find in my pocket. It came originally from the programme card of
+a dance that I had attended at Honolulu and I had kept it because I
+thought it might be useful. Finally I used it to secure that loose leaf.
+I stared at the ribbon which brought back a flood of memories, and as I
+was thus engaged I heard voices talking, and listened--Bickley's voice,
+and the Lady Yva's.
+
+"Yes," Bickley was saying, "he will do well now, but he went near, very
+near."
+
+"I knew he would not die," she answered, "because my father said so."
+
+"There are two sorts of deaths," replied Bickley, "that of the body and
+that of the mind. I was afraid that even if he lived, his reason would
+go, but from certain indications I do not think that will happen now. He
+will get quite well again--though--" and he stopped.
+
+"I am very glad to hear you say so," chimed in Bastin. "For weeks
+I thought that I should have to read the Burial Service over poor
+Arbuthnot. Indeed I was much puzzled as to the best place to bury him.
+Finally I found a very suitable spot round the corner there, where it
+isn't rock, in which one can't dig and the soil is not liable to be
+flooded. In fact I went so far as to clear away the bush and to mark out
+the grave with its foot to the east. In this climate one can't delay,
+you know."
+
+Weak as I was, I smiled. This practical proceeding was so exactly like
+Bastin.
+
+"Well, you wasted your labour," exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I am glad to say I did. But I don't think it was your operations
+and the rest that cured him, Bickley, although you take all the credit.
+I believe it was the Life-water that the Lady Yva made him drink and the
+stuff that Oro sent which we gave him when you weren't looking."
+
+"Then I hope that in the future you will not interfere with my cases,"
+said the indignant Bickley, and either the voices passed away or I went
+to sleep.
+
+When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my side
+watching me.
+
+"Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out walking," she
+said slowly in English.
+
+"Who taught you my language?" I asked, astonished. "Bastin and Bickley,
+while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man just same now as he
+was hundred thousand years ago," she added enigmatically. "All think one
+woman beautiful when no other woman there."
+
+"Indeed," I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part of
+Bastin and Bickley she alluded. Could that self-centred pair--oh! it was
+impossible.
+
+"How long have I been ill?" I asked to escape the subject which I felt
+to be uncomfortable.
+
+She lifted her beautiful eyes in search of words and began to count upon
+her fingers.
+
+"Two moon, one half moon, yes, ten week, counting Sabbath," she answered
+triumphantly.
+
+"Ten weeks!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, ten whole weeks and three days you first bad, then mad.
+Oh!" she went on, breaking into the Orofenan tongue which she spoke so
+perfectly, although it was not her own. That language of hers I never
+learned, but I know she thought in it and only translated into Orofenan,
+because of the great difficulty which she had in rendering her high and
+refined ideas into its simpler metaphor, and the strange words which
+often she introduced. "Oh! you have been very ill, friend of my heart.
+At times I thought that you were going to die, and wept and wept.
+Bickley thinks that he saved you and he is very clever. But he could not
+have saved you; that wanted more knowledge than any of your people have;
+only I pray you, do not tell him so because it would hurt his pride."
+
+"What was the matter with me then, Yva?"
+
+"All was the matter. First, the weapon which that youth threw--he was
+the son of the sorcerer whom my father destroyed--crushed in the bone
+of your head. He is dead for his crime and may he be accursed for ever,"
+she added in the only outbreak of rage and vindictiveness in which I
+ever saw her indulge.
+
+"One must make excuses for him; his father had been killed," I said.
+
+"Yes, that is what Bastin tells me, and it is true. Still, for that
+young man I can make no excuse; it was cowardly and wicked. Well,
+Bickley performed what he calls operation, and the Lord Oro, he came up
+from his house and helped him, because Bastin is no good in such things.
+Then he can only turn away his head and pray. I, too, helped, holding
+hot water and linen and jar of the stuff that made you feel like
+nothing, although the sight made me feel more sick than anything since I
+saw one I loved killed, oh, long, long ago."
+
+"Was the operation successful?" I asked, for I did not dare to begin to
+thank her.
+
+"Yes, that clever man, Bickley, lifted the bone which had been crushed
+in. Only then something broke in your head and you began to bleed here,"
+and she touched what I believe is called the temporal artery. "The vein
+had been crushed by the blow, and gave way. Bickley worked and worked,
+and just in time he tied it up before you died. Oh! then I felt as
+though I loved Bickley, though afterwards Bastin said that I ought to
+have loved him, since it was not Bickley who stopped the bleeding, but
+his prayer."
+
+"Perhaps it was both," I suggested.
+
+"Perhaps, Humphrey, at least you were saved. Then came another trouble.
+You took fever. Bickley said that it was because a certain gnat had
+bitten you when you went down to the ship, and my father, the Lord Oro,
+told me that this was right. At the least you grew very weak and lost
+your mind, and it seemed as though you must die. Then, Humphrey, I went
+to the Lord Oro and kneeled before him and prayed for your life, for I
+knew that he could cure you if he would, though Bickley's skill was at
+an end.
+
+"'Daughter,' he said to me, 'not once but again and again you have set
+up your will against mine in the past. Why then should I trouble myself
+to grant this desire of yours in the present, and save a man who is
+nothing to me?'
+
+"I rose to my feet and answered, 'I do not know, my Father, yet I am
+certain that for your own sake it will be well to do so. I am sure that
+of everything even you must give an account at last, great though you
+be, and who knows, perhaps one life which you have saved may turn the
+balance in your favour.'
+
+"'Surely the priest Bastin has been talking to you,' he said.
+
+"'He has,' I answered, 'and not he alone. Many voices have been talking
+to me.'"
+
+"What did you mean by that?" I asked.
+
+"It matters nothing what I meant, Humphrey. Be still and listen to my
+story. My father thought a while and answered:
+
+"'I am jealous of this stranger. What is he but a short-lived
+half-barbarian such as we knew in the old days? And yet already you
+think more of him than you do of me, your father, the divine Oro who has
+lived a thousand years. At first I helped that physician to save him,
+but now I think I wish him dead.'
+
+"'If you let this man die, my Father,' I answered, 'then we part.
+Remember that I also have of the wisdom of our people, and can use it if
+I will.'
+
+"'Then save him yourself,' he said.
+
+"'Perhaps I shall, my Father,' I answered, 'but if so it will not be
+here. I say that if so we part and you shall be left to rule in your
+majesty alone.'
+
+"Now this frightened the Lord Oro, for he has the weakness that he hates
+to be alone.
+
+"'If I do what you will, do you swear never to leave me, Yva?' he asked.
+'Know that if you will not swear, the man dies.'
+
+"'I swear,' I answered--for your sake, Humphrey--though I did not love
+the oath.
+
+"Then he gave me a certain medicine to mix with the Life-water, and when
+you were almost gone that medicine cured you, though Bickley does not
+know it, as nothing else could have done. Now I have told you the truth,
+for your own ear only, Humphrey."
+
+"Yva," I asked, "why did you do all this for me?"
+
+"Humphrey, I do not know," she answered, "but I think because I must.
+Now sleep a while."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIX. The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+So far as my body was concerned I grew well with great rapidity, though
+it was long before I got back my strength. Thus I could not walk far or
+endure any sustained exertion. With my mind it was otherwise. I can not
+explain what had happened to it; indeed I do not know, but in a sense it
+seemed to have become detached and to have assumed a kind of personality
+of its own. At times it felt as though it were no longer an inhabitant
+of the body, but rather its more or less independent partner. I was
+perfectly clear-headed and of insanity I experienced no symptoms. Yet my
+mind, I use that term from lack of a better, was not entirely under my
+control. For one thing, at night it appeared to wander far away, though
+whither it went and what it saw there I could never remember.
+
+I record this because possibly it explains certain mysterious events, if
+they were events and not dreams, which shortly I must set out. I spoke
+to Bickley about the matter. He put it by lightly, saying that it was
+only a result of my long and most severe illness and that I should
+steady down in time, especially if we could escape from that island and
+its unnatural atmosphere. Yet as he spoke he glanced at me shrewdly
+with his quick eyes, and when he turned to go away I heard him mutter
+something to himself about "unholy influences" and "that confounded old
+Oro."
+
+The words were spoken to himself and quite beneath his breath, and of
+course not meant to reach me. But one of the curious concomitants of my
+state was that all my senses, and especially my hearing, had become most
+abnormally acute. A whisper far away was now to me like a loud remark
+made in a room.
+
+Bickley's reflection, for I can scarcely call it more, set me thinking.
+Yva had said that Oro sent me medicine which was administered to me
+without Bickley's knowledge, and as she believed, saved my life, or
+certainly my reason. What was in it? I wondered. Then there was that
+Life-water which Yva brought and insisted upon my drinking every day.
+Undoubtedly it was a marvelous tonic and did me good. But it had other
+effects also. Thus, as she said would be the case, after a course of
+it I conceived the greatest dislike, which I may add has never entirely
+left me, of any form of meat, also of alcohol. All I seemed to want was
+this water with fruit, or such native vegetables as there were. Bickley
+disapproved and made me eat fish occasionally, but even this revolted
+me, and since I gained steadily in weight, as we found out by a simple
+contrivance, and remained healthy in every other way, soon he allowed me
+to choose my own diet.
+
+About this time Oro began to pay me frequent visits. He always came at
+night, and what is more I knew when he was coming, although he never
+gave me warning. Here I should explain that during my illness Bastin,
+who was so ingenious in such matters, had built another hut in which he
+and Bickley slept, of course when they were not watching me, leaving our
+old bed-chamber to myself.
+
+Well, I would wake up and be aware that Oro was coming. Then he appeared
+in a silent and mysterious way, as though he had materialised in the
+room, for I never saw him pass the doorway. In the moonlight, or the
+starlight, which flowed through the entrance and the side of the hut
+that was only enclosed with latticework, I perceived him seat himself
+upon a certain stool, looking like a most majestic ghost with his
+flowing robes, long white beard, hooked nose and hawk eyes. In the
+day-time he much resembled the late General Booth whom I had often
+seen, except for certain added qualities of height and classic beauty of
+countenance. At night, however, he resembled no one but himself, indeed
+there was something mighty and godlike in his appearance, something that
+made one feel that he was not as are other men.
+
+For a while he would sit and look at me. Then he began to speak in a
+low, vibrant voice. What did he speak of? Well, many matters. It was as
+though he were unburdening that hoary soul of his because it could no
+longer endure the grandeur of its own loneliness. Amongst sundry secret
+things, he told me of the past history of this world of ours, and of the
+mighty civilisations which for uncounted ages he and his forefathers had
+ruled by the strength of their will and knowledge, of the dwindling
+of their race and of the final destruction of its enemies, although I
+noticed that now he no longer said that this was his work alone. One
+night I asked him if he did not miss all such pomp and power.
+
+Then suddenly he broke out, and for the first time I really learned what
+ambition can be when it utterly possesses the soul of man.
+
+"Are you mad," he asked, "that you suppose that I, Oro, the King of
+kings, can be content to dwell solitary in a great cave with none but
+the shadows of the dead to serve me? Nay, I must rule again and be even
+greater than before, or else I too will die. Better to face the future,
+even if it means oblivion, than to remain thus a relic of a glorious
+past, still living and yet dead, like that statue of the great god Fate
+which you saw in the temple of my worship."
+
+"Bastin does not think that the future means oblivion," I remarked.
+
+"I know it. I have studied his faith and find it too humble for my
+taste, also too new. Shall I, Oro, creep a suppliant before any Power,
+and confess what Bastin is pleased to call my sins? Nay, I who am great
+will be the equal of all greatness, or nothing."
+
+He paused a while, then went on:
+
+"Bastin speaks of 'eternity.' Where and what then is this eternity which
+if it has no end can have had no beginning? I know the secret of the
+suns and their attendant worlds, and they are no more eternal than the
+insect which glitters for an hour. Out of shapeless, rushing gases they
+gathered to live their day, and into gases at last they dissolve again
+with all they bore."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "but they reform into new worlds."
+
+"That have no part with the old. This world, too, will melt, departing
+to whence it came, as your sacred writings say, and what then of those
+who dwelt and dwell thereon? No, Man of today, give me Time in which I
+rule and keep your dreams of an Eternity that is not, and in which you
+must still crawl and serve, even if it were. Yet, if I might, I confess
+it, I would live on for ever, but as Master not as Slave."
+
+
+On another night he began to tempt me, very subtly. "I see a spark of
+greatness in you, Humphrey," he said, "and it comes into my heart that
+you, too, might learn to rule. With Yva, the last of my blood, it is
+otherwise. She is the child of my age and of a race outworn; too gentle,
+too much all womanly. The soul that triumphs must shine like steel in
+the sun, and cut if need be; not merely be beauteous and shed perfume
+like a lily in the shade. Yet she is very wise and fair," here he
+looked at me, "perchance of her might come children such as were their
+forefathers, who again would wield the sceptre of the dominion of the
+earth."
+
+I made no answer, wondering what he meant exactly and thinking it wisest
+to be silent.
+
+"You are of the short-lived races," he went on, "yet very much a man,
+not without intelligence, and by the arts I have I can so strengthen
+your frame that it will endure the shocks of time for three such lives
+as yours, or perchance for more, and then--"
+
+Again he paused and went on:
+
+"The Daughter of kings likes you also, perhaps because you resemble--"
+here he fixed me with his piercing eyes, "a certain kinglet of base
+blood whom once she also liked, but whom it was my duty to destroy.
+Well, I must think. I must study this world of yours also and therein
+you may help me. Perhaps afterwards I will tell you how. Now sleep."
+
+In another moment he was gone, but notwithstanding his powerful command,
+for a while I could not sleep. I understood that he was offering Yva to
+me, but upon what terms? That was the question. With her was to go great
+dominion over the kingdoms of the earth. I could not help remembering
+that always this has been and still is Satan's favourite bait. To me it
+did not particularly appeal. I had been ambitious in my time--who is
+not that is worth his salt? I could have wished to excel in something,
+literature or art, or whatever it might be, and thus to ensure the
+memory of my name in the world.
+
+Of course this is a most futile desire, seeing that soon or late every
+name must fade out of the world like an unfixed photograph which is
+exposed to the sun. Even if it could endure, as the old demigod, or
+demidevil, Oro, had pointed out, very shortly, by comparison with Time's
+unmeasured vastness, the whole solar system will also fade. So of what
+use is this feeble love of fame and this vain attempt to be remembered
+that animates us so strongly? Moreover, the idea of enjoying mere
+temporal as opposed to intellectual power, appealed to me not at all.
+I am a student of history and I know what has been the lot of kings and
+the evil that, often enough, they work in their little day.
+
+Also if I needed any further example, there was that of Oro himself. He
+had outlived the greatness of his House, as a royal family is called,
+and after some gigantic murder, if his own story was to be believed,
+indulged in a prolonged sleep. Now he awoke to find himself quite
+alone in the world, save for a daughter with whom he did not agree or
+sympathise. In short, he was but a kind of animated mummy inspired by
+one idea which I felt quite sure would be disappointed, namely, to renew
+his former greatness. To me he seemed as miserable a figure as one could
+imagine, brooding and plotting in his illuminated cave, at the end of an
+extended but misspent life.
+
+Also I wondered what he, or rather his ego, had been doing during all
+those two hundred and fifty thousand years of sleep. Possibly if Yva's
+theory, as I understood it, were correct, he had reincarnated as Attila,
+or Tamerlane, or Napoleon, or even as Chaka the terrible Zulu king.
+At any rate there he was still in the world, filled with the dread
+of death, but consumed now as ever by his insatiable and most useless
+finite ambitions.
+
+Yva, also! Her case was his, but yet how different. In all this long
+night of Time she had but ripened into one of the sweetest and most
+gentle women that ever the world bore. She, too, was great in her way,
+it appeared in her every word and gesture, but where was the ferocity
+of her father? Where his desire to reach to splendour by treading on a
+blood-stained road paved with broken human hearts? It did not exist.
+Her nature was different although her body came of a long line of these
+power-loving kings. Why this profound difference of the spirit? Like
+everything else it was a mystery. The two were as far apart as the
+Poles. Everyone must have hated Oro, from the beginning, however much he
+feared him, but everyone who came in touch with her must have loved Yva.
+
+
+Here I may break into my personal narrative to say that this, by their
+own confession, proved to be true of two such various persons as Bastin
+and Bickley.
+
+"The truth, which I am sure it would be wrong to hide from you,
+Arbuthnot," said the former to me one day, "is that during your long
+illness I fell in love, I suppose that is the right word, with the
+Glittering Lady. After thinking the matter over also, I conceived that
+it would be proper to tell her so if only to clear the air and prevent
+future misunderstandings. As I remarked to her on that occasion, I had
+hesitated long, as I was not certain how she would fill the place of the
+wife of the incumbent of an English parish."
+
+"Mothers' Meetings, and the rest," I suggested.
+
+"Exactly so, Arbuthnot. Also there were the views of the Bishop to be
+considered, who might have objected to the introduction into the diocese
+of a striking person who so recently had been a heathen, and to one in
+such strong contrast to my late beloved wife."
+
+"I suppose you didn't consider the late Mrs. Bastin's views on the
+subject of re-marriage. I remember that they were strong," I remarked
+rather maliciously.
+
+"No, I did not think it necessary, since the Scriptural instructions on
+the matter are very clear, and in another world no doubt all jealousies,
+even Sarah's, will be obliterated. Upon that point my conscience was
+quite easy. So when I found that, unlike her parent, the Lady Yva was
+much inclined to accept the principles of the faith in which it is my
+privilege to instruct her, I thought it proper to say to her that if
+ultimately she made up her mind to do so--of course this was a sine qua
+non--I should be much honoured, and as a man, not as a priest, it
+would make me most happy if she would take me as a husband. Of course
+I explained to her that I considered, under the circumstances, I could
+quite lawfully perform the marriage ceremony myself with you and Bickley
+as witnesses, even should Oro refuse to give her away. Also I told
+her that although after her varied experiences in the past, life at
+Fulcombe, if we could ever get there, might be a little monotonous,
+still it would not be entirely devoid of interest."
+
+"You mean Christmas decorations and that sort of thing?"
+
+"Yes, and choir treats and entertaining Deputations and attending other
+Church activities."
+
+"Well, and what did she say, Bastin?"
+
+"Oh! she was most kind and flattering. Indeed that hour will always
+remain the pleasantest of my life. I don't know how it happened, but
+when it was over I felt quite delighted that she had refused me. Indeed
+on second thoughts, I am not certain but that I shall be much happier in
+the capacities of a brother and teacher which she asked me to fill, than
+I should have been as her husband. To tell you the truth, Arbuthnot,
+there are moments when I am not sure whether I entirely understand the
+Lady Yva. It was rather like proposing to one's guardian angel."
+
+"Yes," I said, "that's about it, old fellow. 'Guardian Angel' is not a
+bad name for her."
+
+Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," he said. "I want to own up to something. I
+think I ought to, because of certain things I have observed, in order to
+prevent possible future misunderstandings."
+
+"What's that?" I asked innocently.
+
+"Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed bachelor
+on principle. Women introduce too many complications into life, and
+although it involves some sacrifice, on the whole, I have thought
+it best to do without them and leave the carrying on of the world to
+others."
+
+"Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley."
+
+"Only this. While you were ill the sweetness of that Lady Yva and her
+wonderful qualities as a nurse overcame me. I went to pieces all of a
+sudden. I saw in her a realisation of every ideal I had ever entertained
+of perfect womanhood. So to speak, my resolves of a lifetime melted like
+wax in the sun. Notwithstanding her queer history and the marvels with
+which she is mixed up, I wished to marry her. No doubt her physical
+loveliness was at the bottom of it, but, however that may be, there it
+was."
+
+"She is beautiful," I commented; "though I daresay older than she
+looks."
+
+"That is a point on which I made no inquiries, and I should advise you,
+when your turn comes, as no doubt it will, to follow my example. You
+know, Arbuthnot," he mused, "however lovely a woman may be, it would put
+one off if suddenly she announced that she was--let us say--a hundred
+and fifty years old."
+
+"Yes," I admitted, "for nobody wants to marry the contemporary of his
+great-grandmother. However, she gave her age as twenty-seven years and
+three moons."
+
+"And doubtless for once did not tell the truth. But, as she does not
+look more than twenty-five, I think that we may all agree to let it
+stand at that, namely, twenty-seven, plus an indefinite period of sleep.
+At any rate, she is a sweet and most gracious woman, apparently in the
+bloom of youth, and, to cut it short, I fell in love with her."
+
+"Like Bastin," I said.
+
+"Bastin!" exclaimed Bickley indignantly. "You don't mean to say that
+clerical oaf presumed--well, well, after all, I suppose that he is a
+man, so one mustn't be hard on him. But who could have thought that he
+would run so cunning, even when he knew my sentiments towards the lady?
+I hope she told him her mind."
+
+"The point is, what did she tell you, Bickley?"
+
+"Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure to be
+refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one's ease." (Here,
+remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to hide a
+smile.) "She said--what did she say exactly? Such a lot that it is
+difficult to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking of marriage. Also,
+that she had not yet recovered from some recent love affair which left
+her heart sore, since the time of her sleep did not count. Also, that
+her father would never consent, and that the mere idea of such a thing
+would excite his animosity against all of us."
+
+"Is that all?" I asked.
+
+"Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and extremely
+honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her. She hoped,
+however, that I should never repeat it or even allude to the matter
+again, as her dearest wish was to be able to look upon me as her most
+intimate friend to whom she could always come for sympathy and counsel."
+
+"What happened then?"
+
+"Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she wished,
+and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore and upset, but
+I am getting over it, having always practised self-control."
+
+"I am sorry for you, old fellow."
+
+"Are you?" he asked suspiciously. "Then perhaps you have tried your
+luck, too?"
+
+"No, Bickley."
+
+His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
+
+"Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing how lately
+you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin. Perhaps you will
+get over it--recent marriage, I mean--as he has." He hesitated a while,
+then went on: "Of course you will, old fellow; I know it, and, what is
+more, I seem to know that when your turn comes you will get a different
+answer. If so, it will keep her in the family as it were--and good luck
+to you. Only--"
+
+"Only what?" I asked anxiously.
+
+"To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don't think that there will be real good
+luck for any one of us over this woman--not in the ordinary sense, I
+mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman. Is she quite a
+woman, and could she really marry a man as others do?"
+
+"It is curious that you should talk like that," I said uneasily. "I
+thought that you had made up your mind that the whole business was
+either illusion or trickery--I mean, the odd side of it."
+
+"If it is illusion, Arbuthnot, then a man cannot marry an illusion. And
+if it is trickery, then he will certainly be tricked. But, supposing
+that I am wrong, what then?"
+
+"You mean, supposing things are as they seem to be?"
+
+"Yes. In that event, Arbuthnot, I am sure that something will occur to
+prevent your being united to a woman who lived thousands of years ago. I
+am sorry to say it, but Fate will intervene. Remember, it is the god
+of her people that I suppose she worships, and, I may add, to which the
+whole world bows."
+
+At his words a kind of chill fell upon me. I think he saw or divined it,
+for after a few remarks upon some indifferent matter, he turned and went
+away.
+
+Shortly after this Yva came to sit with me. She studied me for a while
+and I studied her. I had reason to do so, for I observed that of late
+her dress had become much more modern, and on the present occasion
+this struck me forcibly. I do not know exactly in what the change, or
+changes, consisted, because I am not skilled in such matters and can
+only judge of a woman's garments by their general effect. At any rate,
+the gorgeous sweeping robes were gone, and though her attire still
+looked foreign and somewhat oriental, with a touch of barbaric splendour
+about it--it was simpler than it had been and showed more of her figure,
+which was delicate, yet gracious.
+
+"You have changed your robes, Lady," I said. "Yes, Humphrey. Bastin gave
+me pictures of those your women wear." (On further investigation I found
+that this referred to an old copy of the Queen newspaper, which, somehow
+or other, had been brought with the books from the ship.) "I have tried
+to copy them a little," she added doubtfully.
+
+"How do you do it? Where do you get the material?" I asked.
+
+"Oh!" she answered with an airy wave of her hand, "I make it--it is
+there."
+
+"I don't understand," I said, but she only smiled radiantly, offering no
+further explanation. Then, before I could pursue the subject, she asked
+me suddenly:
+
+"What has Bickley been saying to you about me?" I fenced, answering:
+"I don't know. Bastin and Bickley talk of little else. You seem to have
+been a great deal with them while I was ill."
+
+"Yes, a great deal. They are the nearest to you who were so sick. Is it
+not so?"
+
+"I don't know," I answered again. "In my illness it seemed to me that
+you were the nearest."
+
+"About Bastin's words I can guess," she went on. "But I ask again--what
+has Bickley been saying to you about me? Of the first part, let it be;
+tell me the rest."
+
+I intended to evade her question, but she fixed those violet, compelling
+eyes upon me and I was obliged to answer.
+
+"I believe you know as well as I do," I said; "but if you will have it,
+it was that you are not as other human women are, and that he who would
+treat you as such, must suffer; that was the gist of it."
+
+"Some might be content to suffer for such as I," she answered with quiet
+sweetness. "Even Bastin and Bickley may be content to suffer in their
+own little ways."
+
+"You know that is not what I meant," I interrupted angrily, for I felt
+that she was throwing reflections on me.
+
+"No; you meant that you agreed with Bickley that I am not quite a woman,
+as you know women."
+
+I was silent, for her words were true.
+
+Then she blazed out into one of her flashes of splendour, like something
+that takes fire on an instant; like the faint and distant star which
+flames into sudden glory before the watcher's telescope.
+
+"It is true that I am not as your women are--your poor, pale women,
+the shadows of an hour with night behind them and before. Because I am
+humble and patient, do you therefore suppose that I am not great? Man
+from the little country across the sea, I lived when the world was
+young, and gathered up the ancient wisdom of a greater race than yours,
+and when the world is old I think that I still shall live, though not in
+this shape or here, with all that wisdom's essence burning in my breast,
+and with all beauty in my eyes. Bickley does not believe although he
+worships. You only half believe and do not worship, because memory holds
+you back, and I myself do not understand. I only know though knowing
+so much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble road called
+Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an immortal city."
+
+"Nor do I understand how all this can be, Yva," I said feebly, for she
+dazzled and overwhelmed me with her blaze of power.
+
+"No, you do not understand. How can you, when even I cannot? Thus for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years I slept, and they went by as a
+lightning flash. One moment my father gave me the draught and I laid me
+down, the next I awoke with you bending over me, or so it seemed. Yet
+where was I through all those centuries when for me time had ceased?
+Tell me, Humphrey, did you dream at all while you were ill? I ask
+because down in that lonely cavern where I sleep a strange dream came to
+me one night. It was of a journey which, as I thought, you and I seemed
+to make together, past suns and universes to a very distant earth. It
+meant nothing, Humphrey. If you and I chanced to have dreamed the same
+thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is most common,
+or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I am not altogether
+as your women are, and I can bring no happiness to any man, or at the
+least, to one who cannot wait. Therefore, perhaps you would do well to
+think less of me, as I have counselled Bastin and Bickley."
+
+Then again she gazed at me with her wonderful, great eyes, and, shaking
+her glittering head a little, smiled and went.
+
+But oh! that smile drew my heart after her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XX. Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night
+
+
+As time went on, Oro began to visit me more and more frequently, till at
+last scarcely a night went by that he did not appear mysteriously in my
+sleeping-place. The odd thing was that neither Bickley nor Bastin seemed
+to be aware of these nocturnal calls. Indeed, when I mentioned them on
+one or two occasions, they stared at me and said it was strange that he
+should have come and gone as they saw nothing of him.
+
+On my speaking again of the matter, Bickley at once turned the
+conversation, from which I gathered that he believed me to be suffering
+from delusions consequent on my illness, or perhaps to have taken
+to dreaming. This was not wonderful since, as I learned afterwards,
+Bickley, after he was sure that I was asleep, made a practice of tying
+a thread across my doorway and of ascertaining at the dawn that it
+remained unbroken. But Oro was not to be caught in that way. I suppose,
+as it was impossible for him to pass through the latticework of the open
+side of the house, that he undid the thread and fastened it again when
+he left; at least, that was Bastin's explanation, or, rather, one of
+them. Another was that he crawled beneath it, but this I could not
+believe. I am quite certain that during all his prolonged existence Oro
+never crawled.
+
+At any rate, he came, or seemed to come, and pumped me--I can use no
+other word--most energetically as to existing conditions in the
+world, especially those of the civilised countries, their methods of
+government, their social state, the physical characteristics of the
+various races, their religions, the exact degrees of civilisation that
+they had developed, their attainments in art, science and literature,
+their martial capacities, their laws, and I know not what besides.
+
+I told him all I could, but did not in the least seem to satisfy his
+perennial thirst for information.
+
+"I should prefer to judge for myself," he said at last. "Why are you so
+anxious to learn about all these nations, Oro?" I asked, exhausted.
+
+"Because the knowledge I gather may affect my plans for the future," he
+replied darkly.
+
+"I am told, Oro, that your people acquired the power of transporting
+themselves from place to place."
+
+"It is true that the lords of the Sons of Wisdom had such power, and
+that I have it still, O Humphrey."
+
+"Then why do you not go to look with your own eyes?" I suggested.
+
+"Because I should need a guide; one who could explain much in a short
+time," he said, contemplating me with his burning glance until I began
+to feel uncomfortable.
+
+To change the subject I asked him whether he had any further information
+about the war, which he had told me was raging in Europe.
+
+He answered: "Not much; only that it was going on with varying success,
+and would continue to do so until the nations involved therein were
+exhausted," or so he believed. The war did not seem greatly to interest
+Oro. It was, he remarked, but a small affair compared to those which he
+had known in the old days. Then he departed, and I went to sleep.
+
+Next night he appeared again, and, after talking a little on different
+subjects, remarked quietly that he had been thinking over what I had
+said as to his visiting the modern world, and intended to act upon the
+suggestion.
+
+"When?" I asked.
+
+"Now," he said. "I am going to visit this England of yours and the town
+you call London, and you will accompany me."
+
+"It is not possible!" I exclaimed. "We have no ship."
+
+"We can travel without a ship," said Oro.
+
+I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a much
+better companion than I should in my present weak state.
+
+"An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues, would be
+useless," he replied sharply. "You shall come and you only."
+
+I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly--which, indeed, I did do, in
+another sense.
+
+But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand to and fro
+above my head.
+
+My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
+
+
+They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog, which I
+knew could belong to one place only--London, in December, and at my side
+was Oro.
+
+"Is this the climate of your wonderful city?" he asked, or seemed to
+ask, in an aggrieved tone.
+
+I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and began to
+look about me.
+
+Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of buildings,
+looking dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I recognised the Houses
+of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, for both could be seen from where
+we stood in front of the Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their
+identity to Oro.
+
+"Good," he said. "Let us enter your Place of Talk."
+
+"But I am not a member, and we have no passes for the Strangers'
+Gallery," I expostulated.
+
+"We shall not need any," he replied contemptuously. "Lead on."
+
+Thus adjured, I crossed the road, Oro following me. Looking round, to
+my horror I saw him right in the path of a motor-bus which seemed to go
+over him.
+
+"There's an end to Oro," thought I to myself. "Well, at any rate, I have
+got home."
+
+Next instant he was at my side quite undisturbed by the incident of the
+bus. We came to a policeman at the door and I hesitated, expecting to
+be challenged. But the policeman seemed absolutely indifferent to our
+presence, even when Oro marched past him in his flowing robes. So
+I followed with a like success. Then I understood that we must be
+invisible.
+
+We passed to the lobby, where members were hurrying to and fro, and
+constituents and pressmen were gathered, and so on into the House. Oro
+walked up its floor and took his stand by the table, in front of the
+Speaker. I followed him, none saying us No.
+
+As it chanced there was what is called a scene in progress--I think it
+was over Irish matters; the details are of no account. Members shouted,
+Ministers prevaricated and grew angry, the Speaker intervened. On the
+whole, it was rather a degrading spectacle. I stood, or seemed to
+stand, and watched it all. Oro, in his sweeping robes, which looked
+so incongruous in that place, stepped, or seemed to step, up to the
+principal personages of the Government and Opposition, whom I indicated
+to him, and inspected them one by one, as a naturalist might examine
+strange insects. Then, returning to me, he said:
+
+"Come away; I have seen and heard enough. Who would have thought that
+this nation of yours was struggling for its life in war?"
+
+We passed out of the House and somehow came to Trafalgar Square. A
+meeting was in progress there, convened, apparently, to advocate the
+rights of Labour, also those of women, also to protest against things
+in general, especially the threat of Conscription in the service of the
+country.
+
+Here the noise was tremendous, and, the fog having lifted somewhat, we
+could see everything. Speakers bawled from the base of Nelson's column.
+Their supporters cheered, their adversaries rushed at them, and in one
+or two instances succeeded in pulling them down. A woman climbed up
+and began to scream out something which could only be heard by a few
+reporters gathered round her. I thought her an unpleasant-looking
+person, and evidently her remarks were not palatable to the majority of
+her auditors. There was a rush, and she was dragged from the base of one
+of Landseer's lions on which she stood. Her skirt was half rent off
+her and her bodice split down the back. Finally, she was conveyed
+away, kicking, biting, and scratching, by a number of police. It was a
+disgusting sight, and tumult ensued.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "Your officers of order are good; the rest is not
+good."
+
+Later we found ourselves opposite to the doors of a famous restaurant
+where a magnificent and gigantic commissionaire helped ladies from
+motor-cars, receiving in return money from the men who attended on them.
+We entered; it was the hour of dinner. The place sparkled with gems,
+and the naked backs of the women gleamed in the electric light. Course
+followed upon course; champagne flowed, a fine band played, everything
+was costly; everything was, in a sense, repellent.
+
+"These are the wealthy citizens of a nation engaged in fighting for its
+life," remarked Oro to me, stroking his long beard. "It is interesting,
+very interesting. Let us go."
+
+We went out and on, passing a public-house crowded with women who had
+left their babies in charge of children in the icy street. It was a
+day of Intercession for the success of England in the war. This was
+placarded everywhere. We entered, or, rather, Oro did, I following
+him, one of the churches in the Strand where an evening service was in
+progress. The preacher in the pulpit, a very able man, was holding forth
+upon the necessity for national repentance and self-denial; also of
+prayer. In the body of the church exactly thirty-two people, most
+of them elderly women, were listening to him with an air of placid
+acceptance.
+
+"The priest talks well, but his hearers are not many," said Oro. "Let us
+go."
+
+We came to the flaunting doors of a great music-hall and passed through
+them, though to others this would have been impossible, for the place
+was filled from floor to roof. In its promenades men were drinking and
+smoking, while gaudy women, painted and low-robed, leered at them. On
+the stage girls danced, throwing their legs above their heads. Then they
+vanished amidst applause, and a woman in a yellow robe, who pretended
+to be tipsy, sang a horrible and vulgar song full of topical allusions,
+which was received with screams of delight by the enormous audience.
+
+"Here the hearers are very many, but those to whom they listen do not
+talk well. Let us go," said Oro, and we went.
+
+At a recruiting station we paused a moment to consider posters supposed
+to be attractive, the very sight of which sent a thrill of shame through
+me. I remember that the inscription under one of them was: "What will
+your best girl say?"
+
+"Is that how you gather your soldiers? Later it will be otherwise," said
+Oro, and passed on.
+
+We reached Blackfriars and entered a hall at the doors of which stood
+women in poke-bonnets, very sweet-faced, earnest-looking women. Their
+countenances seemed to strike Oro, and he motioned me to follow him
+into the hall. It was quite full of a miserable-looking congregation
+of perhaps a thousand people. A man in the blue and red uniform of the
+Salvation Army was preaching of duty to God and country, of self-denial,
+hope and forgiveness. He seemed a humble person, but his words were
+earnest, and love flowed from him. Some of his miserable congregation
+wept, others stared at him open-mouthed, a few, who were very weary,
+slept. He called them up to receive pardon, and a number, led by the
+sweet-faced women, came and knelt before him. He and others whispered to
+them, then seemed to bless them, and they rose with their faces changed.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "I do not understand these rites, but at last
+in your great and wonderful city I have seen something that is pure and
+noble."
+
+We went out. In the streets there was great excitement. People ran to
+and fro pointing upwards. Searchlights, like huge fingers of flame,
+stole across the sky; guns boomed. At last, in the glare of a
+searchlight, we saw a long and sinister object floating high above us
+and gleaming as though it were made of silver. Flashes came from it
+followed by terrible booming reports that grew nearer and nearer. A
+house collapsed with a crash just behind us.
+
+"Ah!" said Oro, with a smile. "I know this--it is war, war as it was
+when the world was different and yet the same."
+
+As he spoke, a motor-bus rumbled past. Another flash and explosion. A
+man, walking with his arms round the waist of a girl just ahead of
+us; seemed to be tossed up and to melt. The girl fell in a heap on the
+pavement; somehow her head and her feet had come quite close together
+and yet she appeared to be sitting down. The motor-bus burst into
+fragments and its passengers hurtled through the air, mere hideous lumps
+that had been men and women. The head of one of them came dancing down
+the pavement towards us, a cigar still stuck in the corner of its mouth.
+
+"Yes, this is war," said Oro. "It makes me young again to see it. But
+does this city of yours understand?"
+
+We watched a while. A crowd gathered. Policemen ran up, ambulances came.
+The place was cleared, and all that was left they carried away. A few
+minutes later another man passed by with his arm round the waist of
+another girl. Another motor-bus rumbled up, and, avoiding the hole in
+the roadway, travelled on, its conductor keeping a keen look-out for
+fares.
+
+The street was cleared by the police; the airship continued its course,
+spawning bombs in the distance, and vanished. The incident was closed.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I have seen enough of your great and
+wonderful city. I would rest in the quiet of Nyo and think."
+
+The next thing that I remember was the voice of Bastin, saying:
+
+"If you don't mind, Arbuthnot, I wish that you would get up. The
+Glittering Lady (he still called her that) is coming here to have a talk
+with me which I should prefer to be private. Excuse me for disturbing
+you, but you have overslept yourself; indeed, I think it must be nine
+o'clock, so far as I can judge by the sun, for my watch is very erratic
+now, ever since Bickley tried to clean it."
+
+"I am sorry, my dear fellow," I said sleepily, "but do you know I
+thought I was in London--in fact, I could swear that I have been there."
+
+"Then," interrupted Bickley, who had followed Bastin into the hut,
+giving me that doubtful glance with which I was now familiar, "I wish to
+goodness that you had brought back an evening paper with you."
+
+A night or two later I was again suddenly awakened to feel that Oro was
+approaching. He appeared like a ghost in the bright moonlight, greeted
+me, and said:
+
+"Tonight, Humphrey, we must make another journey. I would visit the seat
+of the war."
+
+"I do not wish to go," I said feebly.
+
+"What you wish does not matter," he replied. "I wish that you should go,
+and therefore you must."
+
+"Listen, Oro," I exclaimed. "I do not like this business; it seems
+dangerous to me."
+
+"There is no danger if you are obedient, Humphrey."
+
+"I think there is. I do not understand what happens. Do you make use of
+what the Lady Yva called the Fourth Dimension, so that our bodies
+pass over the seas and through mountains, like the vibrations of our
+Wireless, of which I was speaking to you?"
+
+"No, Humphrey. That method is good and easy, but I do not use it because
+if I did we should be visible in the places which we visit, since there
+all the atoms that make a man would collect together again and be a
+man."
+
+"What, then, do you do?" I asked, exasperated.
+
+"Man, Humphrey, is not one; he is many. Thus, amongst other things he
+has a Double, which can see and hear, as he can in the flesh, if it is
+separated from the flesh."
+
+"The old Egyptians believed that," I said.
+
+"Did they? Doubtless they inherited the knowledge from us, the Sons of
+Wisdom. The cup of our learning was so full that, keep it secret as we
+would, from time to time some of it overflowed among the vulgar, and
+doubtless thus the light of our knowledge still burns feebly in the
+world."
+
+I reflected to myself that whatever might be their other
+characteristics, the Sons of Wisdom had lost that of modesty, but I only
+asked how he used his Double, supposing that it existed.
+
+"Very easily," he answered. "In sleep it can be drawn from the body and
+sent upon its mission by one that is its master."
+
+"Then while you were asleep for all those thousands of years your Double
+must have made many journeys."
+
+"Perhaps," he replied quietly, "and my spirit also, which is another
+part of me that may have dwelt in the bodies of other men. But
+unhappily, if so I forget, and that is why I have so much to learn and
+must even make use of such poor instruments as you, Humphrey."
+
+"Then if I sleep and you distil my Double out of me, I suppose that you
+sleep too. In that case who distils your Double out of you, Lord Oro?"
+
+He grew angry and answered:
+
+"Ask no more questions, blind and ignorant as you are. It is your part
+not to examine, but to obey. Sleep now," and again he waved his hand
+over me.
+
+
+In an instant, as it seemed, we were standing in a grey old town that I
+judged from its appearance must be either in northern France or Belgium.
+It was much shattered by bombardment; the church, for instance, was a
+ruin; also many of the houses had been burnt. Now, however, no firing
+was going on for the town had been taken. The streets were full of armed
+men wearing the German uniform and helmet. We passed down them and
+were able to see into the houses. In some of these were German soldiers
+engaged in looting and in other things so horrible that even the unmoved
+Oro turned away his head.
+
+We came to the market-place. It was crowded with German troops, also
+with a great number of the inhabitants of the town, most of them elderly
+men and women with children, who had fallen into their power. The
+Germans, under the command of officers, were dragging the men from
+the arms of their wives and children to one side, and with rifle-butts
+beating back the screaming women. Among the men I noticed two or three
+priests who were doing their best to soothe their companions and even
+giving them absolution in hurried whispers.
+
+At length the separation was effected, whereon at a hoarse word of
+command, a company of soldiers began to fire at the men and continued
+doing so until all had fallen. Then petty officers went among the
+slaughtered and with pistols blew out the brains of any who still moved.
+
+"These butchers, you say, are Germans?" asked Oro of me.
+
+"Yes," I answered, sick with horror, for though I was in the mind and
+not in the body, I could feel as the mind does. Had I been in the body
+also, I should have fainted.
+
+"Then we need not waste time in visiting their country. It is enough;
+let us go on."
+
+We passed out into the open land and came to a village. It was in the
+occupation of German cavalry. Two of them held a little girl of nine
+or ten, one by her body, the other by her right hand. An officer stood
+between them with a drawn sword fronting the terrified child. He was
+a horrible, coarse-faced man who looked to me as though he had been
+drinking.
+
+"I'll teach the young devil to show us the wrong road and let those
+French swine escape," he shouted, and struck with the sword. The girl's
+right hand fell to the ground.
+
+"War as practised by the Germans!" remarked Oro. Then he stepped, or
+seemed to step up to the man and whispered, or seemed to whisper, in his
+ear.
+
+I do not know what tongue or what spirit speech he used, or what he
+said, but the bloated-faced brute turned pale. Yes, he drew sick with
+fear.
+
+"I think there are spirits in this place," he said with a German oath.
+"I could have sworn that something told me that I was going to die.
+Mount!"
+
+The Uhlans mounted and began to ride away.
+
+"Watch," said Oro.
+
+As he spoke out of a dark cloud appeared an aeroplane. Its pilot saw the
+band of Germans beneath and dropped a bomb. The aim was good, for the
+missile exploded in the midst of them, causing a great cloud of dust
+from which arose the screams of men and horses.
+
+"Come and see," said Oro.
+
+We were there. Out of the cloud of dust appeared one man galloping
+furiously. He was a young fellow who, as I noted, had turned his head
+away and hidden his eyes with his hand when the horror was done yonder.
+All the others were dead except the officer who had worked the deed. He
+was still living, but both his hands and one of his feet had been blown
+away. Presently he died, screaming to God for mercy.
+
+We passed on and came to a barn with wide doors that swung a little in
+the wind, causing the rusted hinges to scream like a creature in pain.
+On each of these doors hung a dead man crucified. The hat of one of
+them lay upon the ground, and I knew from the shape of it that he was a
+Colonial soldier.
+
+"Did you not tell me," said Oro after surveying them, "that these
+Germans are of your Christian faith?"
+
+"Yes; and the Name of God is always on their ruler's lips."
+
+"Ah!" he said, "I am glad that I worship Fate. Bastin the priest need
+trouble me no more."
+
+"There is something behind Fate," I said, quoting Bastin himself.
+
+"Perhaps. So indeed I have always held, but after much study I cannot
+understand the manner of its working. Fate is enough for me."
+
+We went on and came to a flat country that was lined with ditches, all
+of them full of men, Germans on one side, English and French upon the
+other. A terrible bombardment shook the earth, the shells raining upon
+the ditches. Presently that from the English guns ceased and out of the
+trenches in front of them thousands of men were vomited, who ran forward
+through a hail of fire in which scores and hundreds fell, across an open
+piece of ground that was pitted with shell craters. They came to barbed
+wire defenses, or what remained of them, cut the wire with nippers and
+pulled up the posts. Then through the gaps they surged in, shouting and
+hurling hand grenades. They reached the German trenches, they leapt into
+them and from those holes arose a hellish din. Pistols were fired and
+everywhere bayonets flashed.
+
+Behind them rushed a horde of little, dark-skinned men, Indians who
+carried great knives in their hands. Those leapt over the first trench
+and running on with wild yells, dived into the second, those who were
+left of them, and there began hacking with their knives at the defenders
+and the soldiers who worked the spitting maxim guns. In twenty minutes
+it was over; those lines of trenches were taken, and once more from
+either side the guns began to boom.
+
+"War again," said Oro, "clean, honest war, such as the god I call Fate
+decrees for man. I have seen enough. Now I would visit those whom you
+call Turks. I understand they have another worship and perhaps they are
+nobler than these Christians."
+
+We came to a hilly country which I recognised as Armenia, for once I
+travelled there, and stopped on an seashore. Here were the Turks in
+thousands. They were engaged in driving before them mobs of men, women
+and children in countless numbers. On and on they drove them till
+they reached the shore. There they massacred them with bayonets, with
+bullets, or by drowning. I remember a dreadful scene of a poor woman
+standing up to her waist in the water. Three children were clinging to
+her--but I cannot go on, really I cannot go on. In the end a Turk waded
+out and bayoneted her while she strove to protect the last living child
+with her poor body whence it sprang.
+
+"These, I understand," said Oro, pointing to the Turkish soldiers,
+"worship a prophet who they say is the voice of God."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "and therefore they massacre these who are Christians
+because they worship God without a prophet."
+
+"And what do the Christians massacre each other for?"
+
+"Power and the wealth and territories that are power. That is, the King
+of the Germans wishes to rule the world, but the other Nations do not
+desire his dominion. Therefore they fight for Liberty and Justice."
+
+"As it was, so it is and shall be," remarked Oro, "only with this
+difference. In the old world some were wise, but here--" and he stopped,
+his eyes fixed upon the Armenian woman struggling in her death agony
+while the murderer drowned her child, then added: "Let us go."
+
+Our road ran across the sea. On it we saw a ship so large that it
+attracted Oro's attention, and for once he expressed astonishment.
+
+"In my day," he said, "we had no vessels of this greatness in the world.
+I wish to look upon it."
+
+We landed on the deck of the ship, or rather the floating palace, and
+examined her. She carried many passengers, some English, some American,
+and I pointed out to Oro the differences between the two peoples. These
+were not, he remarked, very wide except that the American women wore
+more jewels, also that some of the American men, to whom we listened
+as they conversed, spoke of the greatness of their country, whereas
+the Englishmen, if they said anything concerning it, belittled their
+country.
+
+Presently, on the surface of the sea at a little distance appeared
+something strange, a small and ominous object like a can on the top of a
+pole. A voice cried out "Submarine!" and everyone near rushed to look.
+
+"If those Germans try any of their monkey tricks on us, I guess the
+United States will give them hell," said another voice near by.
+
+Then from the direction of the pole with the tin can on the top of
+it, came something which caused a disturbance in the smooth water and
+bubbles to rise in its wake.
+
+"A torpedo!" cried some.
+
+"Shut your mouth," said the voice. "Who dare torpedo a vessel full of
+the citizens of the United States?"
+
+Next came a booming crash and a flood of upthrown water, in the wash of
+which that speaker was carried away into the deep. Then horror! horror!
+horror! indescribable, as the mighty vessel went wallowing to her doom.
+Boats launched; boats overset; boats dragged under by her rush through
+the water which could not be stayed. Maddened men and women running
+to and fro, their eyes starting from their heads, clasping children,
+fastening lifebelts over their costly gowns, or appearing from their
+cabins, their hands filled with jewels that they sought to save. Orders
+cried from high places by stern-faced officers doing their duty to the
+last. And a little way off that thin pole with a tin can on the top of
+it watching its work.
+
+Then the plunge of the enormous ship into the deep, its huge screws
+still whirling in the air and the boom of the bursting boilers. Lastly
+everything gone save a few boats floating on the quiet sea and around
+them dots that were the heads of struggling human beings.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I grow tired of this war of your Christian
+peoples. It is no better than that of the barbarian nations of the early
+world. Indeed it is worse, since then we worshipped Fate and but a few
+of us had wisdom. Now you all claim wisdom and declare that you worship
+a God of Mercy."
+
+
+With these words still ringing in my ears I woke up upon the Island of
+Orofena, filled with terror at the horrible possibilities of nightmare.
+
+What else could it be? There was the brown and ancient cone of the
+extinct volcano. There were the tall palms of the main island and the
+lake glittering in the sunlight between. There was Bastin conducting
+a kind of Sunday school of Orofenans upon the point of the Rock of
+Offerings, as now he had obtained the leave of Oro to do. There was the
+mouth of the cave, and issuing from it Bickley, who by help of one of
+the hurricane lamps had been making an examination of the buried
+remains of what he supposed to be flying machines. Without doubt it was
+nightmare, and I would say nothing to them about it for fear of mockery.
+
+Yet two nights later Oro came again and after the usual preliminaries,
+said:
+
+"Humphrey, this night we will visit that mighty American nation, of
+which you have told me so much, and the other Neutral Countries."
+
+
+[At this point there is a gap in Mr. Arbuthnot's M.S., so Oro's
+reflections on the Neutral Nations, if any, remain unrecorded. It
+continues:]
+
+
+On our homeward way we passed over Australia, making a detour to do so.
+Of the cities Oro took no account. He said that they were too large and
+too many, but the country interested him so much that I gathered he must
+have given great attention to agriculture at some time in the past. He
+pointed out to me that the climate was fine, and the land so fertile
+that with a proper system of irrigation and water-storage it could
+support tens of millions and feed not only itself but a great part of
+the outlying world.
+
+"But where are the people?" he asked. "Outside of those huge hives," and
+he indicated the great cities, "I see few of them, though doubtless some
+of the men are fighting in this war. Well, in the days to come this must
+be remedied."
+
+Over New Zealand, which he found beautiful, he shook his head for the
+same reason.
+
+On another night we visited the East. China with its teeming millions
+interested him extremely, partly because he declared these to be the
+descendants of one of the barbarian nations of his own day. He made
+a remark to the effect that this race had always possessed points
+and capacities, and that he thought that with proper government and
+instruction their Chinese offspring would be of use in a regenerated
+world.
+
+For the Japanese and all that they had done in two short generations, he
+went so far as to express real admiration, a very rare thing with Oro,
+who was by nature critical. I could see that mentally he put a white
+mark against their name.
+
+India, too, really moved him. He admired the ancient buildings at Delhi
+and Agra, especially the Taj Mahal. This, he declared, was reminiscent
+of some of the palaces that stood at Pani, the capital city of the Sons
+of Wisdom, before it was destroyed by the Barbarians.
+
+The English administration of the country also attracted a word of
+praise from him, I think because of its rather autocratic character.
+Indeed he went so far as to declare that, with certain modifications,
+it should be continued in the future, and even to intimate that he would
+bear the matter in mind. Democratic forms of government had no charms
+for Oro.
+
+Amongst other places, we stopped at Benares and watched the funeral
+rites in progress upon the banks of the holy Ganges. The bearers of the
+dead brought the body of a woman wrapped in a red shroud that glittered
+with tinsel ornaments. Coming forward at a run and chanting as they ran,
+they placed it upon the stones for a little while, then lifted it up
+again and carried it down the steps to the edge of the river. Here they
+took water and poured it over the corpse, thus performing the rite of
+the baptism of death. This done, they placed its feet in the water
+and left it looking very small and lonely. Presently appeared a tall,
+white-draped woman who took her stand by the body and wailed. It was the
+dead one's mother. Again the bearers approached and laid the corpse upon
+the flaming pyre.
+
+"These rites are ancient," said Oro. "When I ruled as King of the World
+they were practised in this very place. It is pleasant to me to find
+something that has survived the changefulness of Time. Let it continue
+till the end."
+
+
+Here I will cease. These experiences that I have recorded are but
+samples, for also we visited Russia and other countries. Perhaps, too,
+they were not experiences at all, but only dreams consequent on my state
+of health. I cannot say for certain, though much of what I seemed to
+see fitted in very well indeed with what I learned in after days, and
+certainly at the time they appeared as real as though Oro and I had
+stood together upon those various shores.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXI. Love's Eternal Altar
+
+
+Now of all these happenings I said very little to Bastin and Bickley.
+The former would not have understood them, and the latter attributed
+what I did tell him to mental delusions following on my illness. To Yva
+I did speak about them, however, imploring her to explain their origin
+and to tell me whether or not they were but visions of the night.
+
+She listened to me, as I thought not without anxiety, from which I
+gathered that she too feared for my mind. It was not so, however, for
+she said:
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, that your journeyings are done, since such
+things are not without danger. He who travels far out of the body may
+chance to return there no more."
+
+"But were they journeyings, or dreams?" I asked.
+
+She evaded a direct answer.
+
+"I cannot say. My father has great powers. I do not know them all. It is
+possible that they were neither journeyings nor dreams. Mayhap he used
+you as the sorcerers in the old days used the magic glass, and after
+he had put his spell upon you, read in your mind that which passes
+elsewhere."
+
+I understood her to refer to what we call clairvoyance, when the person
+entranced reveals secret or distant things to the entrancer. This is
+a more or less established phenomenon and much less marvelous than the
+actual transportation of the spiritual self through space. Only I never
+knew of an instance in which the seer, on awaking, remembered the things
+that he had seen, as in my case. There, however, the matter rested, or
+rests, for I could extract nothing more from Yva, who appeared to me to
+have her orders on the point.
+
+Nor did Oro ever talk of what I had seemed to see in his company,
+although he continued from time to time to visit me at night. But now
+our conversation was of other matters. As Bastin had discovered, by some
+extraordinary gift he had soon learned how to read the English language,
+although he never spoke a single word in that tongue. Among our
+reference books that we brought from the yacht, was a thin paper edition
+of the Encyclopedia Britannica, which he borrowed when he discovered
+that it contained compressed information about the various countries of
+the world, also concerning almost every other matter. My belief is
+that within a month or so that marvelous old man not only read this
+stupendous work from end to end, but that he remembered everything of
+interest which it contained. At least, he would appear and show the
+fullest acquaintance with certain subjects or places, seeking further
+light from me concerning them, which very often I was quite unable to
+give him.
+
+An accident, as it chanced, whereof I need not set out the details,
+caused me to discover that his remarkable knowledge was limited. Thus,
+at one period, he knew little about any modern topic which began with a
+letter later in the alphabet than, let us say, C. A few days afterwards
+he was acquainted with those up to F, or G; and so on till he reached Z,
+when he appeared to me to know everything, and returned the book. Now,
+indeed, he was a monument of learning, very ancient and very new, and
+with some Encyclopedia-garnered facts or deductions of what had happened
+between.
+
+Moreover, he took to astronomical research, for more than once we saw
+him standing on the rock at night studying the heavens. On one of these
+occasions, when he had the two metal plates, of which I have spoken, in
+his hands, I ventured to approach and ask what he did. He replied that
+he was checking his calculations that he found to be quite correct,
+an exact period of two hundred and fifty thousand years having gone
+by since he laid himself down to sleep. Then, by aid of the plates,
+he pointed out to me certain alterations that had happened during that
+period in the positions of some of the stars.
+
+For instance, he showed me one which, by help of my glasses, I
+recognised as Sirius, and remarked that two hundred and fifty thousand
+years ago it was further away and much smaller. Now it was precisely in
+the place and of the size which he had predicted, and he pointed to it
+on his prophetic map. Again he indicated a star that the night-glass
+told me was Capella, which, I suppose, is one of the most brilliant
+stars in the sky, and showed me that on the map he had made two hundred
+and fifty thousand years ago, it did not exist, as then it was too far
+north to appear thereon. Still, he observed, the passage of this vast
+period of time had produced but little effect upon the face of the
+heavens. To the human eye the majority of the stars had not moved so
+very far.
+
+"And yet they travel fast, O Humphrey," he said. "Consider then how
+great is their journey between the time they gather and that day when,
+worn-out, once more they melt to vaporous gas. You think me long-lived
+who compared to them exist but a tiny fraction of a second, nearly all
+of which I have been doomed to pass in sleep. And, Humphrey, I desire
+to live--I, who have great plans and would shake the world. But my
+day draws in; a few brief centuries and I shall be gone, and--whither,
+whither?"
+
+"If you lived as long as those stars, the end would be the same, Oro."
+
+"Yes, but the life of the stars is very long, millions of millions
+of years; also, after death, they reform, as other stars. But shall I
+reform as another Oro? With all my wisdom, I do not know. It is known
+to Fate only--Fate-the master of worlds and men and the gods they
+worship--Fate, whom it may please to spill my gathered knowledge, to be
+lost in the sands of Time."
+
+"It seems that you are great," I said, "and have lived long and learned
+much. Yet the end of it is that your lot is neither worse nor better
+than that of us creatures of an hour."
+
+"It is so, Humphrey. Presently you will die, and within a few centuries
+I shall die also and be as you are. You believe that you will live again
+eternally. It may be so because you do believe, since Fate allows Faith
+to shape the future, if only for a little while. But in me Wisdom has
+destroyed Faith and therefore I must die. Even if I sleep again for
+tens of thousands of years, what will it help me, seeing that sleep is
+unconsciousness and that I shall only wake again to die, since sleep
+does not restore to us our youth?"
+
+He ceased, and walked up and down the rock with a troubled mien. Then he
+stood in front of me and said in a triumphant voice:
+
+"At least, while I live I will rule, and then let come what may come. I
+know that you do not believe, and the first victory of this new day of
+mine shall be to make you believe. I have great powers and you shall
+see them at work, and afterwards, if things go right, rule with me for a
+little while, perhaps, as the first of my subjects. Hearken now; in one
+small matter my calculations, made so long ago, have gone wrong. They
+showed me that at this time a day of earthquakes, such as those that
+again and again have rocked and split the world, would recur. But now
+it seems that there is an error, a tiny error of eleven hundred years,
+which must go by before those earthquakes come."
+
+"Are you sure," I suggested humbly, "that there is not also an error in
+those star-maps you hold?"
+
+"I am sure, Humphrey. Some day, who knows? You may return to your world
+of modern men who, I gather, have knowledge of the great science of
+astronomy. Take now these maps with which I have done, and submit them
+to the most learned of those men, and let them tell you whether I was
+right or wrong in what I wrote upon this metal two hundred and fifty
+thousand years ago. Whatever else is false, at least the stars in their
+motions can never die."
+
+Then he handed me the maps and was gone. I have them today, and if ever
+this book is published, they will appear with it, that those who are
+qualified may judge of them and of the truth or otherwise of Oro's
+words.
+
+From that night forward for quite a long time I saw Oro no more. Nor
+indeed did any of us, since for some reason of his own he forbade us to
+visit the under ground city of Nyo. Oddly enough, however, he commanded
+Yva to bring down the spaniel, Tommy, to be with him from time to time.
+When I asked her why, she said it was because he was lonely and
+desired the dog's companionship. It seemed to us very strange that this
+super-man, who had the wisdom of ten Solomons gathered in one within his
+breast, should yet desire the company of a little dog. What then was the
+worth of learning and long life, or, indeed, of anything? Well, Solomon
+himself asked the question ages since, and could give no answer save
+that all is vanity.
+
+I noted about this time that Yva began to grow very sad and troubled;
+indeed, looking at her suddenly on two or three occasions, I saw that
+her beautiful eyes were aswim with tears. Also, I noted that always as
+she grew sadder she became, in a sense, more human. In the beginning she
+was, as it were, far away. One could never forget that she was the
+child of some alien race whose eyes had looked upon the world when, by
+comparison, humanity was young; at times, indeed, she might have been
+the denizen of another planet, strayed to earth. Although she never
+flaunted it, one felt that her simplest word hid secret wisdom; that
+to her books were open in which we could not read. Moreover, as I have
+said, occasionally power flamed out of her, power that was beyond our
+ken and understanding.
+
+Yet with all this there was nothing elfish about her, nothing
+uncanny. She was always kind, and, as we could feel, innately good and
+gentle-hearted, just a woman made half-divine by gifts and experience
+that others lack. She did not even make use of her wondrous beauty to
+madden men, as she might well have done had she been so minded. It is
+true that both Bastin and Bickley fell in love with her, but that was
+only because all with whom she had to do must love her, and then, when
+she told them that it might not be, it was in such a fashion that no
+soreness was left behind. They went on loving her, that was all, but as
+men love their sisters or their daughters; as we conceive that they may
+love in that land where there is no marrying or giving in marriage.
+
+But now, in her sadness, she drew ever nearer to us, and especially to
+myself, more in tune with our age and thought. In truth, save for her
+royal and glittering loveliness in which there was some quality which
+proclaimed her of another blood, and for that reserve of hidden power
+which at times would look out of her eyes or break through her words,
+she might in most ways have been some singularly gifted and beautiful
+modern woman.
+
+The time has come when I must speak of my relations with Yva and of
+their climax. As may have been guessed, from the first I began to love
+her. While the weeks went on that love grew and grew, until it utterly
+possessed me, although for a certain reason connected with one dead, at
+first I fought against it. Yet it did not develop quite in the fashion
+that might have been expected. There was no blazing up of passion's
+fire; rather was there an ever-increasing glow of the holiest affection,
+till at last it became a lamp by which I must guide my feet through life
+and death. This love of mine seemed not of earth but from the stars. As
+yet I had said nothing to her of it because in some way I felt that she
+did not wish me to do so, felt also that she was well aware of all that
+passed within my heart, and desired, as it were, to give it time to
+ripen there. Then one day there came a change, and though no glance or
+touch of Yva's told me so, I knew that the bars were taken down and that
+I might speak.
+
+
+It was a night of full moon. All that afternoon she had been talking to
+Bastin apart, I suppose about religion, for I saw that he had some books
+in his hand from which he was expounding something to her in his slow,
+earnest way. Then she came and sat with us while we took our evening
+meal. I remember that mine consisted of some of the Life-water which
+she had brought with her and fruit, for, as I think I have said, I had
+acquired her dislike to meat, also that she ate some plantains, throwing
+the skins for Tommy to fetch and laughing at his play. When it was over,
+Bastin and Bickley went away together, whether by chance or design I do
+not know, and she said to me suddenly:
+
+"Humphrey, you have often asked me about the city Pani, of which a
+little portion of the ruins remains upon this island, the rest being
+buried beneath the waters. If you wish I will show you where our royal
+palace was before the barbarians destroyed it with their airships. The
+moon is very bright, and by it we can see."
+
+I nodded, for, knowing what she meant, somehow I could not answer her,
+and we began the ascent of the hill. She explained to me the plan of the
+palace when we reached the ruins, showing me where her own apartments
+had been, and the rest. It was very strange to hear her quietly telling
+of buildings which had stood and of things that had happened over two
+hundred and fifty thousand years before, much as any modern lady might
+do of a house that had been destroyed a month ago by an earthquake or a
+Zeppelin bomb, while she described the details of a disaster which now
+frightened her no more. I think it was then that for the first time I
+really began to believe that in fact Yva had lived all those aeons since
+and been as she still appeared.
+
+We passed from the palace to the ruins of the temple, through what,
+as she said, had been a pleasure-garden, pointing out where a certain
+avenue of rare palms had grown, down which once it was her habit to walk
+in the cool of the day. Or, rather, there were two terraced temples,
+one dedicated to Fate like that in the underground city of Nyo, and the
+other to Love. Of the temple to Fate she told me her father had been the
+High Priest, and of the temple to Love she was the High Priestess.
+
+Then it was that I understood why she had brought me here.
+
+She led the way to a marble block covered with worn-out carvings and
+almost buried in the debris. This, she said, was the altar of offerings.
+I asked her what offerings, and she replied with a smile:
+
+"Only wine, to signify the spirit of life, and flowers to symbolise
+its fragrance," and she laid her finger on a cup-like depression, still
+apparent in the marble, into which the wine was poured.
+
+Indeed, I gathered that there was nothing coarse or bacchanalian about
+this worship of a prototype of Aphrodite; on the contrary, that it was
+more or less spiritual and ethereal. We sat down on the altar stone. I
+wondered a little that she should have done so, but she read my thought,
+and answered:
+
+"Sometimes we change our faiths, Humphrey, or perhaps they grow. Also,
+have I not told you that sacrifices were offered on this altar?" and she
+sighed and smiled.
+
+I do not know which was the sweeter, the smile or the sigh.
+
+We looked at the water glimmering in the crater beneath us on the edge
+of which we sat. We looked at heaven above in which the great moon
+sailed royally. Then we looked into each other's eyes.
+
+"I love you," I said.
+
+"I know it," she answered gently. "You have loved me from the first,
+have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you began to love me,
+but until you dreamed a certain dream you would not admit it."
+
+"Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?"
+
+"I cannot say, Humphrey. But I tell you this. As you will learn in time,
+one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the flesh."
+
+I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words brought to
+my mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and I answered:
+
+"Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere, for
+certainly I should find her. Doubtless she meant beyond the shores of
+death--or perhaps she also dreamed."
+
+She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
+
+"Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey. As you dream
+and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed. Of dreams, then, let us say no more,
+since I think that they have served their purpose, and all three of us
+understand."
+
+Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon her
+perfumed breast. She lifted it and kissed me on the lips, saying:
+
+"With this kiss again I give myself to you. But oh! Humphrey, do not ask
+too much of the god of my people, Fate," and she looked me in the eyes
+and sighed.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, trembling.
+
+"Many, many things. Among them, that happiness is not for mortals, and
+remember that though my life began long ago, I am mortal as you are, and
+that in eternity time makes no difference."
+
+"And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?"
+
+"Who said it? Not I. Humphrey, I tell you this. Nor earth, nor heaven,
+nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst its way towards
+reunion and completeness. Only there must be love, manifested in many
+shapes and at many times, but ever striving to its end, which is not of
+the flesh. Aye, love that has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated,
+love that seems false, love betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering
+through the worlds, love asleep and living in its sleep, love awake and
+yet sleeping; all love that has in it the germ of life. It matters not
+what form love takes. If it be true I tell you that it will win its
+way, and in the many that it has seemed to worship, still find the one,
+though perchance not here."
+
+At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
+
+"Not here? Then where?" I said.
+
+"Ask your dead wife, Humphrey. Ask the dumb stars. Ask the God you
+worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word--Somewhere! Man, be not
+afraid. Do you think that such as you and I can be lost in the aching
+abysms of space? I know but little, yet I tell you that we are its
+rulers. I tell you that we, too, are gods, if only we can aspire and
+believe. For the doubting and timid there is naught. For those who see
+with the eyes of the soul and stretch out their hands to grasp there is
+all. Even Bastin will tell you this."
+
+"But," I said, "life is short. Those worlds are far away, and you are
+near."
+
+She became wonderful, mysterious.
+
+"Near I am far," she said; "and far I am near, if only this love of
+yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp. And, Humphrey, it needs
+strength, for here I am afraid that it will bear little of such fruit as
+men desire to pluck."
+
+Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for I did not know
+what to say or ask.
+
+"Listen," she went on. "Already my father has offered me to you in
+marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not understand?
+Believe me, it is one that you should never pay, since the rule of the
+world can be too dearly bought by the slaughter of half the world. And
+if you would pay it, I cannot."
+
+"But this is madness!" I exclaimed. "Your father has no powers over our
+earth."
+
+"I would that I could think so, Humphrey. I tell you that he has powers
+and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done before. You, too,
+he would use, and me."
+
+"And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves. Let us take each other
+while we may. Bastin is a priest."
+
+"Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment Oro
+watches us in his thought and laughs. Only in death, Humphrey, shall we
+pass beyond his reach and become lords of ourselves."
+
+"It is monstrous!" I cried. "There is the boat, let us fly away."
+
+"What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god of my
+people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we must wait our
+doom."
+
+"Doom," I said--"doom? What then is about to happen?"
+
+"A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey. Or, rather, it will not
+happen."
+
+"Why not, if it must?"
+
+"Beloved," she whispered, "Bastin has expounded to me a new faith
+whereof the master-word is Sacrifice. The terrible thing will not happen
+because of sacrifice! Ask me no more."
+
+She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the ancient altar
+of sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her face and making
+her mysterious. Then she threw it back, showing her lovely eyes and
+glittering hair, and laughed.
+
+"We have still an earthly hour," she said; "therefore let us forget the
+far, dead past and the eternities to come and be joyful in that hour.
+Now throw your arms about me and I will tell you strange stories of lost
+days, and you shall look into my eyes and learn wisdom, and you shall
+kiss my lips and taste of bliss--you, who were and are and shall
+be--you, the beloved of Yva from the beginning to the end of Time."
+
+
+
+Chapter XXII. The Command
+
+
+I think that both Bastin and Bickley, by instinct as it were, knew what
+had passed between Yva and myself and that she had promised herself to
+me. They showed this by the way in which they avoided any mention of
+her name. Also they began to talk of their own plans for the future
+as matters in which I had no part. Thus I heard them discussing the
+possibility of escape from the island whereof suddenly they seemed to
+have grown weary, and whether by any means two men (two, not three)
+could manage to sail and steer the lifeboat that remained upon the
+wreck. In short, as in all such cases, the woman had come between; also
+the pressure of a common loss caused them to forget their differences
+and to draw closer together. I who had succeeded where they both had
+failed, was, they seemed to think, out of their lives, so much that our
+ancient intimacy had ended.
+
+This attitude hurt me, perhaps because in many respects the situation
+was awkward. They had, it is true, taken their failures extremely well,
+still the fact remained that both of them had fallen in love with the
+wonderful creature, woman and yet more than woman, who had bound
+herself to me. How then could we go on living together, I in prospective
+possession of the object that all had desired, and they without the
+pale?
+
+Moreover, they were jealous in another and quite a different fashion
+because they both loved me in their own ways and were convinced that I
+who had hitherto loved them, henceforward should have no affection left
+to spare, since surely this Glittering Lady, this marvel of wisdom and
+physical perfections would take it all. Of course they were in error,
+since even if I could have been so base and selfish, this was no conduct
+that Yva would have wished or even suffered. Still that was their
+thought.
+
+Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then spoke
+straight out to them.
+
+"My friends," I said, "as I see that you have guessed, Yva and I are
+affianced to each other and love each other perfectly."
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot," said Bastin, "we saw that in your face, and in hers
+as she bade us good night before she went into the cave, and we
+congratulate you and wish you every happiness."
+
+"We wish you every happiness, old fellow," chimed in Bickley. He
+paused a while, then added, "But to be honest, I am not sure that I
+congratulate you."
+
+"Why not, Bickley?"
+
+"Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not because
+you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be expected that you
+would do, but on account of something totally different. I told you
+a while ago and repetition is useless and painful. I need only add
+therefore that since then my conviction has strengthened and I am
+sure, sorry as I am to say it, that in this matter you must prepare for
+disappointment and calamity. That woman, if woman she really is, will
+never be the wife of mortal man. Now be angry with me if you like, or
+laugh as you have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and yourself,
+I also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak what I
+believe to be the truth."
+
+"Like Cassandra," I suggested.
+
+"Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person." At first I was
+inclined to resent Bickley's words--who would not have been in the
+circumstances? Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my mind the
+conviction that he spoke the truth. In this world Yva was not for me or
+any man. Moreover she knew it, the knowledge peeped out of every word
+she spoke in our passionate love scene by the lake. She was aware, and
+subconsciously I was aware, that we were plighting our troth, not for
+time but for eternity. With time we had little left to do; not for long
+would she wear the ring I gave her on that holy night.
+
+Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt that the
+situation was strained and awkward and broke in with a curious air of
+forced satisfaction:
+
+"It's uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to have
+a clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you in a
+respectable fashion. Of course I can't say that the Glittering Lady is
+as yet absolutely converted to our faith, but I am certain that she
+has absorbed enough of its principles to justify me in uniting her in
+Christian wedlock."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "she has absorbed its principles; she told me as
+much herself. Sacrifice, for instance," and as I spoke the word my eyes
+filled with tears.
+
+"Sacrifice!" broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he needed a vent
+to his mental disturbance. "Rubbish. Why should every religion demand
+sacrifice as savages do? By it alone they stand condemned."
+
+"Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of all life
+that is worth the living," I answered sadly enough. "Anyhow I believe
+you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will not be troubled to marry
+us."
+
+"You don't mean," broke in Bastin with a horrified air, "that you
+propose to dispense--"
+
+"No, Bastin, I don't mean that. What I mean is that it comes upon me
+that something will prevent this marriage. Sacrifice, perhaps, though in
+what shape I do not know. And now good night. I am tired."
+
+
+That night in the chill dead hour before the dawn Oro came again. I
+woke up to see him seated by my bed, majestic, and, as it seemed to me,
+lambent, though this may have been my imagination.
+
+"You take strange liberties with my daughter, Barbarian, or she
+takes strange liberties with you, it does not matter which," he said,
+regarding me with his calm and terrible eyes.
+
+"Why do you presume to call me Barbarian?" I asked, avoiding the main
+issue.
+
+"For this reason, Humphrey. All men are the same. They have the same
+organs, the same instincts, the same desires, which in essence are
+but two, food and rebirth that Nature commands; though it is true that
+millions of years before I was born, as I have learned from the records
+of the Sons of Wisdom, it was said that they were half ape. Yet being
+the same there is between them a whole sea of difference, since some
+have knowledge and others none, or little. Those who have none or
+little, among whom you must be numbered, are Barbarians. Those who
+have much, among whom my daughter and I are the sole survivors, are the
+Instructed."
+
+"There are nearly two thousand millions of living people in this world,"
+I said, "and you name all of them Barbarians?"
+
+"All, Humphrey, excepting, of course, myself and my daughter who are
+not known to be alive. You think that you have learned much, whereas in
+truth you are most ignorant. The commonest of the outer nations, when I
+destroyed them, knew more than your wisest know today."
+
+"You are mistaken, Oro; since then we have learned something of the
+soul."
+
+"Ah!" he exclaimed, "that interests me and perhaps it is true. Also, if
+true it is very important, as I have told you before--or was it Bastin?
+If a man has a soul, he lives, whereas even we Sons of Wisdom die, and
+in Death what is the use of Wisdom? Because you can believe, you have
+souls and are therefore, perhaps, heirs to life, foolish and ignorant as
+you are today. Therefore I admit you and Bastin to be my equals, though
+Bickley, who like myself believes nothing, is but a common chemist and
+doctor of disease."
+
+"Then you bow to Faith, Oro?"
+
+"Yes, and I think that my god Fate also bows to Faith. Perhaps, indeed,
+Faith shapes Fate, not Fate, Faith. But whence comes that faith which
+even I with all my learning cannot command? Why is it denied to me and
+given to you and Bastin?"
+
+"Because as Bastin would tell you, it is a gift, though one that is
+never granted to the proud and self-sufficient. Become humble as a
+child, Oro, and perchance you too may acquire faith."
+
+"And how shall I become humble?"
+
+"By putting away all dreams of power and its exercise, if such you have,
+and in repentance walking quietly to the Gates of Death," I replied.
+
+"For you, Humphrey, who have little or none of these things, that may be
+easy. But for me who have much, if not all, it is otherwise. You ask me
+to abandon the certain for the uncertain, the known for the unknown,
+and from a half-god communing with the stars, to become an earthworm
+crawling in mud and lifting blind eyes towards the darkness of
+everlasting night."
+
+"A god who must die is no god, half or whole, Oro; the earthworm that
+lives on is greater than he."
+
+"Mayhap. Yet while I endure I will be as a god, so that when night
+comes, if come it must, I shall have played my part and left my mark
+upon this little world of ours. Have done!" he added with a burst of
+impatience. "What will you of my daughter?"
+
+"What man has always willed of woman--herself, body and soul."
+
+"Her soul perchance is yours, if she has one, but her body is mine to
+give or withhold. Yet it can be bought at a price," he added slowly.
+
+"So she told me, Oro."
+
+"I can guess what she told you. Did I not watch you yonder by the
+lake when you gave her a ring graved with the signs of Life and
+Everlastingness? The question is, will you pay the price?"
+
+"Not so; the question is--what is the price?"
+
+"This; to enter my service and henceforth do my will--without debate or
+cavil."
+
+"For what reward, Oro?"
+
+"Yva and the dominion of the earth while you shall live, neither more
+nor less."
+
+"And what is your will?"
+
+"That you shall learn in due course. On the second night from this I
+command the three of you to wait upon me at sundown in the buried halls
+of Nyo. Till then you see no more of Yva, for I do not trust her. She,
+too, has powers, though as yet she does not use them, and perchance
+she would forget her oaths, and following some new star of love, for a
+little while vanish with you out of my reach. Be in the sepulchre at the
+hour of sundown on the second day from this, all three of you, if you
+would continue to live upon the earth. Afterwards you shall learn my
+will and make your choice between Yva with majesty and her loss with
+death."
+
+Then suddenly he was gone.
+
+
+Next morning I told the others what had passed, and we talked the matter
+over. The trouble was, of course, that Bickley did not believe me. He
+had no faith in my alleged interviews with Oro, which he set down to
+delusions of a semi-mesmeric character. This was not strange, since
+it appeared that on the previous night he had watched the door of
+my sleeping-place until dawn broke, which it did long after Oro had
+departed, and he had not seen him either come or go, although the moon
+was shining brightly.
+
+When he told me this I could only answer that all the same he had been
+there as, if he could speak, Tommy would have been able to certify. As
+it chanced the dog was sleeping with me and at the first sound of the
+approach of someone, woke up and growled. Then recognising Oro, he went
+to him, wagged his tail and curled himself up at his feet.
+
+Bastin believed my story readily enough, saying that Oro was a peculiar
+person who no doubt had ways of coming and going which we did not
+understand. His point was, however, that he did not in the least wish to
+visit Nyo any more. The wonders of its underground palaces and temples
+had no charms for him. Also he did not think he could do any good by
+going, since after "sucking him as dry as an orange" with reference to
+religious matters "that old vampire-bat Oro had just thrown him away
+like the rind," and, he might add, "seemed no better for the juice he
+had absorbed."
+
+"I doubt," continued Bastin, "whether St. Paul himself could have
+converted Oro, even if he performed miracles before him. What is the
+use of showing miracles to a man who could always work a bigger one
+himself?"
+
+In short, Bastin's one idea, and Bickley's also for the matter of that,
+was to get away to the main island and thence escape by means of the
+boat, or in some other fashion.
+
+I pointed out that Oro had said we must obey at the peril of our lives;
+indeed that he had put it even more strongly, using words to the effect
+that if we did not he would kill us.
+
+"I'd take the risk," said Bickley, "since I believe that you dreamt it
+all, Arbuthnot. However, putting that aside, there is a natural reason
+why you should wish to go, and for my own part, so do I in a way. I want
+to see what that old fellow has up his extremely long sleeve, if there
+is anything there at all."
+
+"Well, if you ask me, Bickley," I answered, "I believe it is the
+destruction of half the earth, or some little matter of that sort."
+
+At this suggestion Bickley only snorted, but Bastin said cheerfully:
+
+"I dare say. He is bad enough even for that. But as I am quite convinced
+that it will never be allowed, his intentions do not trouble me."
+
+I remarked that he seemed to have carried them out once before.
+
+"Oh! you mean the Deluge. Well, no doubt there was a deluge, but I am
+sure that Oro had no more to do with it than you or I, as I think I have
+said already. Anyhow it is impossible to leave you to descend into that
+hole alone. I suggest, therefore, that we should go into the sepulchre
+at the time which you believe Oro appointed, and see what happens. If
+you are not mistaken, the Glittering Lady will come there to fetch us,
+since it is quite certain that we cannot work the lift or whatever it
+is, alone. If you are mistaken we can just go back to bed as usual."
+
+"Yes, that's the best plan," said Bickley, shortly, after which the
+conversation came to an end.
+
+All that day and the next I watched and waited in vain for the coming
+of Yva, but no Yva appeared. I even went as far as the sepulchre, but it
+was as empty as were the two crystal coffins, and after waiting a while
+I returned. Although I did not say so to Bickley, to me it was evident
+that Oro, as he had said, was determined to cut off all communication
+between us.
+
+The second day drew to its close. Our simple preparations were complete.
+They consisted mainly in making ready our hurricane lamps and packing
+up a little food, enough to keep us for three or four days if necessary,
+together with some matches and a good supply of oil, since, as Bastin
+put it, he was determined not to be caught like the foolish virgins in
+the parable.
+
+"You see," he added, "one never knows when it might please that old
+wretch to turn off the incandescent gas or electric light, or whatever
+it is he uses to illumine his family catacombs, and then it would be
+awkward if we had no oil."
+
+"For the matter of that he might steal our lamps," suggested Bickley,
+"in which case we should be where Moses was when the light went out."
+
+"I have considered that possibility," answered Bastin, "and therefore,
+although it is a dangerous weapon to carry loaded, I am determined to
+take my revolver. If necessary I shall consider myself quite justified
+in shooting him to save our lives and those of thousands of others."
+
+At this we both laughed; somehow the idea of Bastin trying to shoot Oro
+struck us as intensely ludicrous. Yet that very thing was to happen.
+
+
+It was a peculiarly beautiful sunset over the southern seas. To the
+west the great flaming orb sank into the ocean, to the east appeared
+the silver circle of the full moon. To my excited fancy they were like
+scales hanging from the hand of a materialised spirit of calm. Over the
+volcano and the lake, over the island with its palm trees, over the seas
+beyond, this calm brooded. Save for a few travelling birds the sky
+was empty; no cloud disturbed its peace; the world seemed steeped in
+innocence and quiet.
+
+All these things struck me, as I think they did the others, because by
+the action of some simultaneous thought it came to our minds that very
+probably we were looking on them for the last time. It is all very well
+to talk of the Unknown and the Infinite whereof we are assured we are
+the heirs, but that does not make it any easier for us to part with the
+Known and the Finite. The contemplation of the wonders of Eternity does
+not conceal the advantages of actual and existent Time. In short there
+is no one of us, from a sainted archbishop down to a sinful suicide, who
+does not regret the necessity of farewell to the pleasant light and the
+kindly race of men wherewith we are acquainted.
+
+For after all, who can be quite certain of the Beyond? It may be
+splendid, but it will probably be strange, and from strangeness, after a
+certain age, we shrink. We know that all things will be different there;
+that our human relationships will be utterly changed, that perhaps sex
+which shapes so many of them, will vanish to be replaced by something
+unknown, that ambitions will lose their hold of us, and that, at the
+best, the mere loss of hopes and fears will leave us empty. So at least
+we think, who seek not variation but continuance, since the spirit must
+differ from the body and that thought alarms our intelligence.
+
+At least some of us think so; others, like Bickley, write down
+the future as a black and endless night, which after all has its
+consolations since, as has been wisely suggested, perhaps oblivion is
+better than any memories. Others again, like Bastin, would say of
+it with the Frenchman, plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. Yet
+others, like Oro, consider it as a realm of possibilities, probably
+unpleasant and perhaps non-existent; just this and nothing more. Only
+one thing is certain, that no creature which has life desires to leap
+into the fire and from the dross of doubts, to resolve the gold--or the
+lead--of certainty.
+
+"It is time to be going," said Bastin. "In these skies the sun seems to
+tumble down, not to set decently as it does in England, and if we wait
+any longer we shall be late for our appointment in the sepulchre. I am
+sorry because although I don't often notice scenery, everything looks
+rather beautiful this evening. That star, for instance, I think it is
+called Venus."
+
+"And therefore one that Arbuthnot should admire," broke in Bickley,
+attempting to lighten matters with a joke. "But come on and let us be
+rid of this fool's errand. Certainly the world is a lovely place after
+all, and for my part I hope that we haven't seen the last of it," he
+added with a sigh.
+
+"So do I," said Bastin, "though of course, Faith teaches us that there
+are much better ones beyond. It is no use bothering about what they are
+like, but I hope that the road to them doesn't run through the hole that
+the old reprobate, Oro, calls Nyo."
+
+A few minutes later we started, each of us carrying his share of the
+impedimenta. I think that Tommy was the only really cheerful member
+of the party, for he skipped about and barked, running backwards and
+forwards into the mouth of the cave, as though to hurry our movements.
+
+"Really," said Bastin, "it is quite unholy to see an animal going on in
+that way when it knows that it is about to descend into the bowels of
+the earth. I suppose it must like them."
+
+"Oh! no," commented Bickley, "it only likes what is in them--like
+Arbuthnot. Since that little beast came in contact with the Lady Yva, it
+has never been happy out of her company."
+
+"I think that is so," said Bastin. "At any rate I have noticed that it
+has been moping for the last two days, as it always does when she is
+not present. It even seems to like Oro who gives me the creeps, perhaps
+because he is her father. Dogs must be very charitable animals."
+
+By now we were in the cave marching past the wrecks of the half-buried
+flying-machines, which Bickley, as he remarked regretfully, had never
+found time thoroughly to examine. Indeed, to do so would have needed
+more digging than we could do without proper instruments, since the
+machines were big and deeply entombed in dust.
+
+We came to the sepulchre and entered.
+
+"Well," said Bickley, seating himself on the edge of one of the coffins
+and holding up his lamp to look about him, "this place seems fairly
+empty. No one is keeping the assignation, Arbuthnot, although the sun is
+well down."
+
+As he spoke the words Yva stood before us. Whence she came we did not
+see, for all our backs were turned at the moment of her arrival. But
+there she was, calm, beautiful, radiating light.
+
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIII. In the Temple of Fate
+
+
+Yva glanced at me, and in her eyes I read tenderness and solicitude,
+also something of inquiry. It seemed to me as though she were wondering
+what I should do under circumstances that might, or would, arise, and in
+some secret fashion of which I was but half conscious, drawing an answer
+from my soul. Then she turned, and, smiling in her dazzling way, said:
+
+"So, Bickley, as usual, you did not believe? Because you did not see
+him, therefore the Lord Oro, my father, never spoke with Humphrey.
+As though the Lord Oro could not pass you without your knowledge, or,
+perchance, send thoughts clothed in his own shape to work his errand."
+
+"How do you know that I did not believe Arbuthnot's story?" Bickley
+asked in a rather cross voice and avoiding the direct issue. "Do you
+also send thoughts to work your errands clothed in your own shape, Lady
+Yva?"
+
+"Alas! not so, though perhaps I could if I might. It is very simple,
+Bickley. Standing here, I heard you say that although the sun was well
+down there was no one to meet you as Humphrey had expected, and from
+those words and your voice I guessed the rest."
+
+"Your knowledge of the English language is improving fast, Lady Yva.
+Also, when I spoke, you were not here."
+
+"At least I was very near, Bickley, and these walls are thinner than you
+think," she answered, contemplating what seemed to be solid rock with
+eyes that were full of innocence. "Oh! friend," she went on suddenly,
+"I wonder what there is which will cause you to believe that you do not
+know all; that there exist many things beyond the reach of your learning
+and imagination? Well, in a day or two, perhaps, even you will admit as
+much, and confess it to me--elsewhere," and she sighed.
+
+"I am ready to confess now that much happens which I do not understand
+at present, because I have not the key to the trick," he replied.
+
+Yva shook her head at him and smiled again. Then she motioned to all of
+us to stand close to her, and, stooping, lifted Tommy in her arms. Next
+moment that marvel happened which I have described already, and we were
+whirling downwards through space, to find ourselves in a very little
+time standing safe in the caves of Nyo, breathless with the swiftness of
+our descent. How and on what we descended neither I nor the others ever
+learned. It was and must remain one of the unexplained mysteries of our
+great experience.
+
+"Whither now, Yva?" I asked, staring about me at the radiant vastness.
+
+"The Lord Oro would speak with you, Humphrey. Follow. And I pray you all
+do not make him wrath, for his mood is not gentle."
+
+So once more we proceeded down the empty streets of that underground
+abode which, except that it was better illuminated, reminded me of the
+Greek conception of Hades. We came to the sacred fountain over which
+stood the guardian statue of Life, pouring from the cups she held the
+waters of Good and Ill that mingled into one health-giving wine.
+
+"Drink, all of you," she said; "for I think before the sun sets again
+upon the earth we shall need strength, every one of us."
+
+So we drank, and she drank herself, and once more felt the blood go
+dancing through our veins as though the draught had been some nectar of
+the gods. Then, having extinguished the lanterns which we still carried,
+for here they were needless, and we wished to save our oil, we followed
+her through the great doors into the vast hall of audience and advanced
+up it between the endless, empty seats. At its head, on the dais
+beneath the arching shell, sat Oro on his throne. As before, he wore the
+jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes, while the table in front
+of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which he wrote with a
+pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his own fierce eyes.
+Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to ascend the dais.
+
+"You are here. It is well," he said, which was all his greeting. Only
+when Tommy ran up to him he bent down and patted the dog's head with his
+long, thin hand, and, as he did so, his face softened. It was evident to
+me that Tommy was more welcome to him than were the rest of us.
+
+There was a long silence while, one by one, he searched us with his
+piercing glance. It rested on me, the last of the three of us, and from
+me travelled to Yva.
+
+"I wonder why I have sent for you?" he said at length, with a mirthless
+laugh. "I think it must be that I may convince Bickley, the sceptic,
+that there are powers which he does not understand, but that I have the
+strength to move. Also, perhaps, that your lives may be spared for my
+own purposes in that which is about to happen. Hearken! My labours are
+finished; my calculations are complete," and he pointed to the sheets of
+metal before him that were covered with cabalistic signs. "Tomorrow I am
+about to do what once before I did and to plunge half the world in the
+deeps of ocean and lift again from the depths that which has been buried
+for a quarter of a million years."
+
+"Which half?" asked Bickley.
+
+"That is my secret, Physician, and the answer to it lies written here
+in signs you cannot read. Certain countries will vanish, others will be
+spared. I say that it is my secret."
+
+"Then, Oro, if you could do what you threaten, you would drown hundreds
+of millions of people."
+
+"If I could do! If I could do!" he exclaimed, glaring at Bickley. "Well,
+tomorrow you shall see what I can do. Oh! why do I grow angry with this
+fool? For the rest, yes, they must drown. What does it matter? Their end
+will be swift; some few minutes of terror, that is all, and in one short
+century every one of them would have been dead."
+
+An expression of horror gathered on Bastin's face.
+
+"Do you really mean to murder hundreds of millions of people?" he asked,
+in a thick, slow voice.
+
+"I have said that I intend to send them to that heaven or that hell of
+which you are so fond of talking, Preacher, somewhat more quickly
+than otherwise they would have found their way thither. They have
+disappointed me, they have failed; therefore, let them go and make room
+for others who will succeed."
+
+"Then you are a greater assassin than any that the world has bred, or
+than all of them put together. There is nobody as bad, even in the Book
+of Revelation!" shouted Bastin, in a kind of fury. "Moreover, I am not
+like Bickley. I know enough of you and your hellish powers to believe
+that what you plan, that you can do."
+
+"I believe it also," sneered Oro. "But how comes it that the Great One
+whom you worship does not prevent the deed, if He exists, and it be
+evil?"
+
+"He will prevent it!" raved Bastin. "Even now He commands me to prevent
+it, and I obey!" Then, drawing the revolver from his pocket, he pointed
+it at Oro's breast, adding: "Swear not to commit this crime, or I will
+kill you!"
+
+"So the man of peace would become a man of blood," mused Oro, "and kill
+that I may not kill for the good of the world? Why, what is the matter
+with that toy of yours, Preacher?" and he pointed to the pistol.
+
+Well might he ask, for as he spoke the revolver flew out of Bastin's
+hand. High into the air it flew, and as it went discharged itself, all
+the six chambers of it, in rapid succession, while Bastin stood staring
+at his arm and hand which he seemed unable to withdraw.
+
+"Do you still threaten me with that outstretched hand, Preacher?" mocked
+Oro.
+
+"I can't move it," said Bastin; "it seems turned to stone."
+
+"Be thankful that you also are not turned to stone. But, because your
+courage pleases me, I will spare you, yes, and will advance you in my
+New Kingdom. What shall you be? Controller of Religions, I think, since
+all the qualities that a high priest should have are yours--faith,
+fanaticism and folly."
+
+"It is very strange," said Bastin, "but all of a sudden my arm and hand
+are quite well again. I suppose it must have been 'pins and needles' or
+something of that sort which made me throw away the pistol and pull the
+trigger when I didn't mean to do so."
+
+Then he went to fetch that article which had fallen beyond the dais, and
+quite forgot his intention of executing Oro in the interest of testing
+its mechanism, which proved to be destroyed. To his proposed appointment
+he made no illusion. If he comprehended what was meant, which I doubt,
+he took it as a joke.
+
+"Hearken all of you," said Oro, lifting his head suddenly, for while
+Bastin recovered the revolver he had been brooding. "The great thing
+which I shall do tomorrow must be witnessed by you because thereby only
+can you come to understand my powers. Also yonder where I bring it about
+in the bowels of the earth, you will be safer than elsewhere, since when
+and perhaps before it happens, the whole world will heave and shake and
+tremble, and I know not what may chance, even in these caves. For this
+reason also, do not forget to bring the little hound with you, since
+him least of all of you would I see come to harm, perhaps because once,
+hundreds of generations ago as you reckon time, I had a dog very like to
+him. Your mother loved him much, Yva, and when she died, this dog died
+also. He lies embalmed with her on her coffin yonder in the temple, and
+yesterday I went to look at both of them. The beasts are wonderfully
+alike, which shows the everlastingness of blood."
+
+He paused a while, lost in thought, then continued: "After the deed is
+done I'll speak with you and you shall choose, Strangers, whether you
+will die your own masters, or live on to serve me. Now there is one
+problem that is left to me to solve--whether I can save a certain
+land--do not ask which it is, Humphrey, though I see the question in
+your eyes--or must let it go with the rest. I only answer you that
+I will do my best because you love it. So farewell for a while, and,
+Preacher, be advised by me and do not aim too high again."
+
+"It doesn't matter where I aim," answered Bastin sturdily, "or whether
+I hit or miss, since there is something much bigger than me waiting to
+deal with you. The countries that you think you are going to destroy
+will sleep quite as well tomorrow as they do tonight, Oro."
+
+"Much better, I think, Preacher, since by then they will have left
+sorrow and pain and wickedness and war far behind them."
+
+"Where are we to go?" I asked.
+
+"The Lady Yva will show you," he answered, waving his hand, and once
+more bent over his endless calculations.
+
+Yva beckoned to us and we turned and followed her down the hall. She led
+us to a street near the gateway of the temple and thence into one of the
+houses. There was a portico to it leading to a court out of which opened
+rooms somewhat in the Pompeian fashion. We did not enter the rooms, for
+at the end of the court were a metal table and three couches also of
+metal, on which were spread rich-looking rugs. Whence these came I do
+not know and never asked, but I remember that they were very beautiful
+and soft as velvet.
+
+"Here you may sleep," she said, "if sleep you can, and eat of the food
+that you have brought with you. Tomorrow early I will call you when it
+is time for us to start upon our journey into the bowels of the earth."
+
+"I don't want to go any deeper than we are," said Bastin doubtfully.
+
+"I think that none of us want to go, Bastin," she answered with a sigh.
+"Yet go we must. I pray of you, anger the Lord Oro no more on this or
+any other matter. In your folly you tried to kill him, and as it chanced
+he bore it well because he loves courage. But another time he may strike
+back, and then, Bastin--"
+
+"I am not afraid of him," he answered, "but I do not like tunnels.
+Still, perhaps it would be better to accompany you than to be left in
+this place alone. Now I will unpack the food."
+
+Yva turned to go.
+
+"I must leave you," she said, "since my father needs my help. The matter
+has to do with the Force that he would let loose tomorrow, and its
+measurements; also with the preparation of the robes that we must wear
+lest it should harm us in its leap."
+
+Something in her eyes told me that she wished me to follow her, and
+I did so. Outside the portico where we stood in the desolate, lighted
+street, she halted.
+
+"If you are not afraid," she said, "meet me at midnight by the statue of
+Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you, Humphrey, where,
+if anywhere, we may be alone."
+
+"I will come, Yva."
+
+"You know the road, and the gates are open, Humphrey."
+
+Then she gave me her hand to kiss and glided away. I returned to the
+others and we ate, somewhat sparingly, for we wished to save our food in
+case of need, and having drunk of the Life-water, were not hungry. Also
+we talked a little, but by common consent avoided the subject of the
+morrow and what it might bring forth.
+
+We knew that terrible things were afoot, but lacking any knowledge of
+what these might be, thought it useless to discuss them. Indeed we
+were too depressed, so much so that even Bastin and Bickley ceased from
+arguing. The latter was so overcome by the exhibition of Oro's powers
+when he caused the pistol to leap into the air and discharge itself,
+that he could not even pluck up courage to laugh at the failure of
+Bastin's efforts to do justice on the old Super-man, or rather to
+prevent him from attempting a colossal crime.
+
+At length we lay down on the couches to rest, Bastin remarking that he
+wished he could turn off the light, also that he did not in the least
+regret having tried to kill Oro. Sleep seemed to come to the others
+quickly, but I could only doze, to wake up from time to time. Of this I
+was not sorry, since whenever I dropped off dreams seemed to pursue me.
+For the most part they were of my dead wife. She appeared to be trying
+to console me for some loss, but the strange thing was that sometimes
+she spoke with her own voice and sometimes with Yva's, and sometimes
+looked at me with her own eyes and sometimes with those of Yva. I
+remember nothing else about these dreams, which were very confused.
+
+After one of them, the most vivid of all, I awoke and looked at my
+watch. It was half-past eleven, almost time for me to be starting. The
+other two seemed to be fast asleep. Presently I rose and crept down the
+court without waking them. Outside the portico, which by the way was a
+curious example of the survival of custom in architecture, since none
+was needed in that weatherless place, I turned to the right and followed
+the wide street to the temple enclosure. Through the pillared courts
+I went, my footsteps, although I walked as softly as I could, echoing
+loudly in that intense silence, through the great doors into the utter
+solitude of the vast and perfect fane.
+
+Words can not tell the loneliness of that place. It flowed over me like
+a sea and seemed to swallow up my being, so that even the wildest and
+most dangerous beast would have been welcome as a companion. I was as
+terrified as a child that wakes to find itself deserted in the dark.
+Also an uncanny sense of terrors to come oppressed me, till I could have
+cried aloud if only to hear the sound of a mortal voice. Yonder was
+the grim statue of Fate, the Oracle of the Kings of the Sons of Wisdom,
+which was believed to bow its stony head in answer to their prayers. I
+ran to it, eager for its terrible shelter, for on either side of it were
+figures of human beings. Even their cold marble was company of a sort,
+though alas! over all frowned Fate.
+
+Let anyone imagine himself standing alone beneath the dome of St.
+Paul's; in the centre of that cathedral brilliant with mysterious light,
+and stretched all about it a London that had been dead and absolutely
+unpeopled for tens of thousands of years. If he can do this he will
+gather some idea of my physical state. Let him add to his mind-picture
+a knowledge that on the following day something was to happen not unlike
+the end of the world, as prognosticated by the Book of Revelation and by
+most astronomers, and he will have some idea of my mental perturbations.
+Add to the mixture a most mystic yet very real love affair and an
+assignation before that symbol of the cold fate which seems to sway the
+universes down to the tiniest detail of individual lives, and he may
+begin to understand what I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, experienced during my
+vigil in this sanctuary of a vanished race.
+
+It seemed long before Yva came, but at last she did come. I caught sight
+of her far away beyond the temple gate, flitting through the unholy
+brightness of the pillared courts like a white moth at night and seeming
+quite as small. She approached; now she was as a ghost, and then drawing
+near, changed into a living, breathing, lovely woman. I opened my
+arms, and with something like a sob she sank into them and we kissed as
+mortals do.
+
+"I could not come more quickly," she said. "The Lord Oro needed me, and
+those calculations were long and difficult. Also twice he must visit the
+place whither we shall go tomorrow, and that took time."
+
+"Then it is close at hand?" I said.
+
+"Humphrey, be not foolish. Do you not remember, who have travelled with
+him, that Oro can throw his soul afar and bring it back again laden with
+knowledge, as the feet of a bee are laden with golden dust? Well, he
+went and went again, and I must wait. And then the robes and shields;
+they must be prepared by his arts and mine. Oh! ask not what they are,
+there is no time to tell, and it matters nothing. Some folk are wise and
+some are foolish, but all which matters is that within them flows the
+blood of life and that life breeds love, and that love, as I believe,
+although Oro does not, breeds immortality. And if so, what is Time but
+as a grain of sand upon the shore?"
+
+"This, Yva; it is ours, who can count on nothing else."
+
+"Oh! Humphrey, if I thought that, no more wretched creature would
+breathe tonight upon this great world."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, growing fearful, more at her manner and her
+look than at her words.
+
+"Nothing, nothing, except that Time is so very short. A kiss, a touch,
+a little light and a little darkness, and it is gone. Ask my father Oro
+who has lived a thousand years and slept for tens of thousands, as I
+have, and he will say the same. It is against Time that he fights; he
+who, believing in nothing beyond, will inherit nothing, as Bastin
+says; he to whom Time has brought nothing save a passing, blood-stained
+greatness, and triumph ending in darkness and disaster, and hope that
+will surely suffer hope's eclipse, and power that must lay down its
+coronet in dust."
+
+"And what has it brought to you, Yva, beyond a fair body and a soul of
+strength?"
+
+"It has brought a spirit, Humphrey. Between them the body and the soul
+have bred a spirit, and in the fires of tribulation from that spirit has
+been distilled the essence of eternal love. That is Time's gift to me,
+and therefore, although still he rules me here, I mock at Fate," and she
+waved her hand with a gesture of defiance at the stern-faced, sexless
+effigy which sat above us, the sword across its knees.
+
+"Look! Look!" she went on in a swelling voice of music, pointing to the
+statues of the dotard and the beauteous woman. "They implore Fate, they
+worship Fate. I do not implore, I do not worship or ask a sign as even
+Oro does and as did his forefathers. I rise above and triumph. As Fate,
+the god of my people, sets his foot upon the sun, so I set my foot upon
+Fate, and thence, like a swimmer from a rock, leap into the waters of
+Immortality."
+
+I looked at her whose presence, as happened from time to time, had grown
+majestic beyond that of woman; I studied her deep eyes which were full
+of lights, not of this world, and I grew afraid.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "Yva, you talk like one who has finished
+with life."
+
+"It passes," she answered quickly. "Life passes like breath fading from
+a mirror. So should all talk who breathe beneath the sun."
+
+"Yes, Yva, but if you went and left me still breathing on that mocking
+glass--"
+
+"If so, what of it? Will not your breath fade also and join mine where
+all vapours go? Or if it were yours that faded and mine that remained
+for some few hours, is it not the same? I think, Humphrey, that already
+you have seen a beloved breath melt from the glass of life," she added,
+looking at me earnestly.
+
+I bowed my head and answered:
+
+"Yes, and therefore I am ashamed."
+
+"Oh! why should you be ashamed, Humphrey, who are not sure but that
+two breaths may yet be one breath? How do you know that there is a
+difference between them?"
+
+"You drive me mad, Yva. I cannot understand."
+
+"Nor can I altogether, Humphrey. Why should I, seeing that I am no
+more than woman, as you are no more than man? I would always have
+you remember, Humphrey, that I am no spirit or sorceress, but just a
+woman--like her you lost."
+
+I looked at her doubtfully and answered:
+
+"Women do not sleep for two hundred thousand years. Women do not take
+dream journeys to the stars. Women do not make the dead past live again
+before the watcher's eyes. Their hair does not glimmer in the dusk nor
+do their bodies gleam, nor have they such strength of soul or eyes so
+wonderful, or loveliness so great."
+
+These words appeared to distress her who, as it seemed to me, was above
+all things anxious to prove herself woman and no more.
+
+"All these qualities are nothing, Humphrey," she cried. "As for the
+beauty, such as it is, it comes to me with my blood, and with it the
+glitter of my hair which is the heritage of those who for generations
+have drunk of the Life-water. My mother was lovelier than I, as was her
+mother, or so I have heard, since only the fairest were the wives of
+the Kings of the Children of Wisdom. For the rest, such arts as I have
+spring not from magic, but from knowledge which your people will acquire
+in days to come, that is, if Oro spares them. Surely you above all
+should know that I am only woman," she added very slowly and searching
+my face with her eyes.
+
+"Why, Yva? During the little while that we have been together I have
+seen much which makes me doubt. Even Bickley the sceptic doubts also."
+
+"I will tell you, though I am not sure that you will believe me." She
+glanced about her as though she were frightened lest someone should
+overhear her words or read her thoughts. Then she stretched out her
+hands and drawing my head towards her, put her lips to my ear and
+whispered:
+
+"Because once you saw me die, as women often die--giving life for life."
+
+"I saw you die?" I gasped.
+
+She nodded, then continued to whisper in my ear, not in her own voice,
+but another's:
+
+"Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful place in
+which you will find me, not knowing that you have found me. Good-bye for
+a little while; only for a little while, my own, my own!"
+
+I knew the voice as I knew the words, and knowing, I think that I should
+have fallen to the ground, had she not supported me with her strong
+arms.
+
+"Who told you?" I stammered. "Was it Bickley or Bastin? They knew,
+though neither of them heard those holy words."
+
+"Not Bickley nor Bastin," she answered, shaking her head, "no, nor you
+yourself, awake or sleeping, though once, by the lake yonder, you
+said to me that when a certain one lay dying, she bade you seek her
+elsewhere, for certainly you would find her. Humphrey, I cannot say who
+told me those words because I do not know. I think they are a memory,
+Humphrey!"
+
+"That would mean that you, Yva, are the same as one who was--not called
+Yva."
+
+"The same as one who was called Natalie, Humphrey," she replied in
+solemn accents. "One whom you loved and whom you lost."
+
+"Then you think that we live again upon this earth?"
+
+"Again and yet again, until the time comes for us to leave the earth
+for ever. Of this, indeed, I am sure, for that knowledge was part of the
+secret wisdom of my people."
+
+"But you were not dead. You only slept."
+
+"The sleep was a death-sleep which went by like a flash, yes, in an
+instant, or so it seemed. Only the shell of the body remained preserved
+by mortal arts, and when the returning spirit and the light of life were
+poured into it again, it awoke. But during this long death-sleep, that
+spirit may have spoken through other lips and that light may have shone
+through other eyes, though of these I remember nothing."
+
+"Then that dream of our visit to a certain star may be no dream?"
+
+"I think no dream, and you, too, have thought as much."
+
+"In a way, yes, Yva. But I could not believe and turned from what I held
+to be a phantasy."
+
+"It was natural, Humphrey, that you should not believe. Hearken! In this
+temple a while ago I showed you a picture of myself and of a man who
+loved me and whom I loved, and of his death at Oro's hands. Did you note
+anything about that man?"
+
+"Bickley did," I answered. "Was he right?"
+
+"I think that he was right, since otherwise I should not have loved you,
+Humphrey."
+
+"I remember nothing of that man, Yva."
+
+"It is probable that you would not, since you and he are very far apart,
+while between you and him flow wide seas of death, wherein are set
+islands of life; perhaps many of them. But I remember much who seem to
+have left him but a very little while ago."
+
+"When you awoke in your coffin and threw your arms about me, what did
+you think, Yva?"
+
+"I thought you were that man, Humphrey."
+
+There was silence between us and in that silence the truth came home to
+me. Then there before the effigy of Fate and in the desolate, glowing
+temple we plighted anew our troth made holy by a past that thus so
+wonderfully lived again.
+
+Of this consecrated hour I say no more. Let each picture it as he will.
+A glory as of heaven fell upon us and in it we dwelt a space.
+
+
+"Beloved," she whispered at length in a voice that was choked as though
+with tears, "if it chances that we should be separated again for a
+little while, you will not grieve over much?"
+
+"Knowing all I should try not to grieve, Yva, seeing that in truth we
+never can be parted. But do you mean that I shall die?"
+
+"Being mortal either of us might seem to die, Humphrey," and she bent
+her head as though to hide her face. "You know we go into dangers this
+day."
+
+"Does Oro really purpose to destroy much of the world and has he in
+truth the power, Yva?"
+
+"He does so purpose and most certainly he has the power, unless--unless
+some other Power should stay his hand."
+
+"What other power, Yva?"
+
+"Oh! perhaps that which you worship, that which is called Love. The love
+of man may avert the massacre of men. I hope so with all my heart. Hist!
+Oro comes. I feel, I know that he comes, though not in search of us who
+are very far from his thought tonight. Follow me. Swiftly."
+
+She sped across the temple to where a chapel opened out of it, which was
+full of the statues of dead kings, for here was the entrance to their
+burial vault. We reached it and hid behind the base of one of these
+statues. By standing to our full height, without being seen we still
+could see between the feet of the statue that stood upon a pedestal.
+
+Then Oro came.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIV. The Chariot of the Pit
+
+
+Oro came and of necessity alone. Yet there was that in his air as he
+advanced into the temple, which suggested a monarch surrounded by the
+pomp and panoply of a great court. He marched, his head held high, as
+though heralds and pursuivants went in front of him, as though nobles
+surrounded him and guards or regiments followed after him. Let it be
+admitted that he was a great figure in his gorgeous robes, with his long
+white beard, his hawk-like features, his tall shape and his glittering
+eyes, which even at that distance I could see. Indeed once or twice I
+thought that he glanced out of the corners of them towards the chapel
+where we were hid. But this I think was fancy. For as Yva said, his
+thoughts were set elsewhere.
+
+He reached the statue of Fate and stood for a while contemplating it and
+the suppliant figures on either side, as though he were waiting for his
+invisible court to arrange itself. Then he doffed his jewelled cap to
+the effigy, and knelt before it. Yes, Oro the Ancient, the Super-man,
+the God, as the early peoples of the earth fancied such a being, namely,
+one full of wrath, revenge, jealousy, caprice and power, knelt in
+supplication to this image of stone which he believed to be the home
+of a spirit, thereby showing himself to be after all not so far removed
+from the savages whose idol Bastin had destroyed. More, in a clear and
+resonant voice which reached us even across that great space, he put
+up his prayer. It ran something as follows, for although I did not
+understand the language in which he spoke Yva translated it to me in a
+whisper:
+
+"God of the Sons of Wisdom, God of the whole earth, only God to whom
+must bow every other Power and Dominion, to thee I, Oro the Great King,
+make prayer and offer sacrifice. Twenty times ten thousand years and
+more have gone by since I, Oro, visited this, thy temple and knelt
+before this, thy living effigy, yet thou, ruler of the world, dost
+remember the prayer I made and the sacrifice I offered. The prayer was
+for triumph over my enemies and the sacrifice a promise of the lives of
+half of those who in that day dwelt upon the earth. Thou heardest the
+prayer, thou didst bow thy head and accept the sacrifice. Yea, the
+prayer was granted and the sacrifice was made, and in it were counted
+the number of my foes.
+
+"Then I slept. Through countless generations I slept on and at my side
+was the one child of my body that was left to me. What chanced to my
+spirit and to hers during that sleep, thou knowest alone, but doubtless
+they went forth to work thy ends.
+
+"At the appointed time which thou didst decree, I awoke again and found
+in my house strangers from another land. In the company of one of those
+whose spirit I drew forth, I visited the peoples of the new earth,
+and found them even baser and more evil than those whom I had known.
+Therefore, since they cannot be bettered. I purpose to destroy them
+also, and on their wreck to rebuild a glorious empire, such as was that
+of the Sons of Wisdom at its prime.
+
+"A sign! O Fate, ruler of the world, give me a sign that my desire shall
+be fulfilled."
+
+He paused, stretching out his arms and staring upwards. While he waited
+I felt the solid rock on which I stood quiver and sway beneath my feet
+so that Yva and I clung to each other lest we should fall. This chanced
+also. The shock of the earth tremor, for such without doubt it was,
+threw down the figures of the ancient man and the lovely woman which
+knelt as though making prayers to Fate, and shook the marble sword from
+off its knees. As it fell Oro caught it by the hilt, and, rising, waved
+it in triumph.
+
+"I thank thee, God of my people from the beginning," he cried. "Thou
+hast given to me, thy last servant, thine own sword and I will use it
+well. For these worshippers of thine who have fallen, thou shalt have
+others, yes, all those who dwell in the new world that is to be. My
+daughter and the man whom she has chosen to be the father of the kings
+of the earth, and with him his companions, shall be the first of the
+hundreds of millions that are to follow, for they shall kiss thy feet or
+perish. Thou shalt set thy foot upon the necks of all other gods; thou
+shalt rule and thou alone, and, as of old, Oro be thy minister."
+
+Still holding the sword, he flung himself down as though in an ecstasy,
+and was silent.
+
+"I read the omen otherwise," whispered Yva. "The worshippers of Fate are
+overthrown. His sword of power is fallen, but not into the hands that
+clasped it, and he totters on his throne. A greater God asserts dominion
+of the world and this Fate is but his instrument."
+
+Oro rose again.
+
+"One prayer more," he cried. "Give me life, long life, that I may
+execute thy decrees. By word or gesture show me a sign that I shall be
+satisfied with life, a year for every year that I have lived, or twain!"
+
+He waited, staring about him, but no token came; the idol did not
+speak or bow its head, as Yva had told me it was wont to do in sign of
+accepted prayer, how, she knew not. Only I thought I heard the echo of
+Oro's cries run in a whisper of mockery round the soaring dome.
+
+Once more Oro flung himself upon his knees and began to pray in a
+veritable agony.
+
+"God of my forefathers, God of my lost people, I will hide naught from
+thee," he said. "I who fear nothing else, fear death. The priest-fool
+yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering words of judgment and
+damnation which, though I do not believe them, yet stick in my heart
+like arrows. I will stamp out his faith, and with this ancient sword of
+thine drive back the new gods into the darkness whence they came. Yet
+what if some water of Truth flows through the channel of his leaden
+lips, and what if because I have ruled and will rule as thou didst
+decree, therefore, in some dim place of souls, I must bear these burdens
+of terror and of doom which I have bound upon the backs of others! Nay,
+it cannot be, for what power is there in all the universe that dares to
+make a slave of Oro and to afflict him with stripes?
+
+"Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my path in
+the ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless and forgotten
+as are those who went before me, while my crown of Power shines on
+younger brows. Alas! I grow old, since aeons of sleep have not renewed
+my strength. My time is short and yet I would not die as mortals must.
+Oh! God of my people, whom I have served so well, save me from the
+death I dread. For I would not die. Give me a sign; give me the ancient,
+sacred sign!"
+
+So he spoke, lifting his proud and splendid head and watching the statue
+with wide, expectant eyes.
+
+"Thou dost not answer," he cried again. "Wouldst thou desert me, Fate?
+Then beware lest I set up some new god against thee and hurl thee from
+thine immemorial throne. While I live I still have powers, I who am the
+last of thy worshippers, since it seems that my daughter turns her back
+on thee. I will get me to the sepulchre of the kings and take counsel
+with the dust of that wizard who first taught me wisdom. Even from the
+depths of death he must come to my call clad in a mockery of life, and
+comfort me. A little while yet I will wait, and if thou answer not, then
+Fate, soon I'll tear the sceptre from thy hand, and thou shalt join the
+company of dead gods." And throwing aside the sword, again Oro laid
+down his head upon the ground and stretched out his arms in the last
+abasement of supplication.
+
+"Come," whispered Yva, "while there is yet time. Presently he will seek
+this place to descend to the sepulchre, and if he learns that we have
+read his heart and know him for a coward deserted of his outworn god,
+surely he will blot us out. Come, and be swift and silent."
+
+We crept out of the chapel, Yva leading, and along the circle of the
+great dome till we reached the gates. Here I glanced back and perceived
+that Oro, looking unutterably small in that vastness, looking like a
+dead man, still lay outstretched before the stern-faced, unanswering
+Effigy which, with all his wisdom, he believed to be living and divine.
+Perhaps once it was, but if so its star had set for ever, like those of
+Amon, Jupiter and Baal, and he was its last worshipper.
+
+Now we were safe, but still we sped on till we reached the portico of
+our sleeping place. Then Yva turned and spoke.
+
+"It is horrible," she said, "and my soul sickens. Oh, I thank the
+Strength which made it that I have no desire to rule the earth, and,
+being innocent of death, do not fear to die and cross his threshold."
+
+"Yes, it is horrible," I answered. "Yet all men fear death."
+
+"Not when they have found love, Humphrey, for that I think is his true
+name, and, with it written on his brow, he stands upon the neck of Fate
+who is still my father's god."
+
+"Then he is not yours, Yva?"
+
+"Nay. Once it was so, but now I reject him; he is no longer mine. As Oro
+threatens, and perchance dare do in his rage, I have broken his chain,
+though in another fashion. Ask me no more; perhaps one day you will
+learn the path I trod to freedom."
+
+Then before I could speak, she went off:
+
+"Rest now, for within a few hours I must come to lead you and your
+companions to a terrible place. Yet whatever you may see or hear, be
+not afraid, Humphrey, for I think that Oro's god has no power over you,
+strong though he was, and that Oro's plans will fail, while I, who too
+have knowledge, shall find strength to save the world."
+
+Then of a sudden, once again she grew splendid, almost divine; no more a
+woman but as it were an angel. Some fire of pure purpose seemed to burn
+up in her and to shine out of her eyes. Yet she said little. Only this
+indeed:
+
+"To everyone, I think, there comes the moment of opportunity when choice
+must be made between what is great and what is small, between self and
+its desires and the good of other wanderers in the way. This day that
+moment may draw near to you or me, and if so, surely we shall greet it
+well. Such is Bastin's lesson, which I have striven to learn."
+
+Then she flung her arms about me and kissed me on the brow as a mother
+might, and was gone.
+
+
+Strangely enough, perhaps because of my mental exhaustion, for what I
+had passed through seemed to overwhelm me so that I could no longer so
+much as think with clearness, even after all that I have described I
+slept like a child and awoke refreshed and well.
+
+I looked at my watch to find that it was now eight o'clock in the
+morning in this horrible place where there was neither morn, nor noon,
+nor night, but only an eternal brightness that came I knew not whence,
+and never learned.
+
+I found that I was alone, since Bickley and Bastin had gone to fill
+our bottles with the Life-water. Presently they returned and we ate a
+little; with that water to drink one did not need much food. It was
+a somewhat silent meal, for our circumstances were a check on talk;
+moreover, I thought that the others looked at me rather oddly. Perhaps
+they guessed something of my midnight visit to the temple, but if so
+they thought it wisest to say nothing. Nor did I enlighten them.
+
+Shortly after we had finished Yva appeared. She was wonderfully quiet
+and gentle in her manner, calm also, and greeted all of us with much
+sweetness. Of our experiences during the night she said no word to me,
+even when we were alone. One difference I noticed about her, however;
+that she was clothed in garments such as I had never seen her wear
+before. They were close fitting, save for a flowing cape, and made of
+some grey material, not unlike a coarse homespun or even asbestos cloth.
+Still they became her very well, and when I remarked upon them, all she
+answered was that part of our road would be rough. Even her feet were
+shod with high buskins of this grey stuff.
+
+Presently she touched Bastin on the shoulder and said that she would
+speak with him apart. They went together into one of the chambers of
+that dwelling and there remained for perhaps the half of an hour. It was
+towards the end of this time that in the intense silence I heard a crash
+from the direction of the temple, as though something heavy had
+fallen to the rocky floor. Bickley also heard this sound. When the two
+reappeared I noticed that though still quite calm, Yva looked radiant,
+and, if I may say so, even more human and womanly than I had ever seen
+her, while Bastin also seemed very happy.
+
+"One has strange experiences in life, yes, very strange," he remarked,
+apparently addressing the air, which left me wondering to what
+particular experience he might refer. Well, I thought that I could
+guess.
+
+"Friends," said Yva, "it is time for us to be going and I am your guide.
+You will meet the Lord Oro at the end of your journey. I pray you to
+bring those lamps of yours with you, since all the road is not lightened
+like this place."
+
+"I should like to ask," said Bickley, "whither we go and for what
+object, points on which up to the present we have had no definite
+information."
+
+"We go, friend Bickley, deep into the bowels of the world, far deeper, I
+think, than any mortal men have gone hitherto, that is, of your race."
+
+"Then we shall perish of heat," said Bickley, "for with every thousand
+feet the temperature rises many degrees."
+
+"Not so. You will pass through a zone of heat, but so swiftly that if
+you hold your breath you will not suffer overmuch. Then you will come to
+a place where a great draught blows which will keep you cool, and thence
+travel on to the end."
+
+"Yes, but to what end, Lady Yva?"
+
+"That you will see for yourselves, and with it other wondrous things."
+
+Here some new idea seemed to strike her, and after a little hesitation
+she added:
+
+"Yet why should you go? Oro has commanded it, it is true, but I think
+that at the last he will forget. It must be decided swiftly. There is
+yet time. I can place you in safety in the sepulchre of Sleep where you
+found us. Thence cross to the main island and sail away quickly in your
+boat out into the great sea, where I believe you will find succour. Know
+that after disobeying him, you must meet Oro no more lest it should be
+the worse for you. If that be your will, let us start. What say you?"
+
+She looked at me.
+
+"I say, Yva, that I am willing to go if you come with us. Not
+otherwise."
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "that I want to see all this supernatural rubbish
+thoroughly exploded, and that therefore I should prefer to go on with
+the business."
+
+"And I say," said Bastin, "that my most earnest desire is to be clear
+of the whole thing, which wearies and perplexes me more than I can tell.
+Only I am not going to run away, unless you think it desirable to do
+so too, Lady Yva. I want you to understand that I am not in the least
+afraid of the Lord Oro, and do not for one moment believe that he will
+be allowed to bring about disaster to the world, as I understand is
+his wicked object. Therefore on the whole I am indifferent and quite
+prepared to accept any decision at which the rest of you may arrive."
+
+"Be it understood," said Yva with a little smile when Bastin had
+finished his sermonette, "that I must join my father in the bowels of
+the earth for a reason which will be made plain afterwards. Therefore,
+if you go we part, as I think to meet no more. Still my advice is that
+you should go." [*]
+
+     [ * It is fortunate that we did not accept Yva's offer. Had
+     we done so we should have found ourselves shut in, and
+     perished, as shall be told.--H. A. ]
+
+
+To this our only answer was to attend to the lighting of our lamps and
+the disposal of our small impedimenta, such as our tins of oil and water
+bottles. Yva noted this and laughed outright.
+
+"Courage did not die with the Sons of Wisdom," she said.
+
+Then we set out, Yva walking ahead of us and Tommy frisking at her side.
+
+Our road led us through the temple. As we passed the great gates I
+started, for there, in the centre of that glorious building, I perceived
+a change. The statue of Fate was no more! It lay broken upon the
+pavement among those fragments of its two worshippers which I had seen
+shaken down some hours before.
+
+"What does this mean?" I whispered to Yva. "I have felt no other
+earthquake."
+
+"I do not know," she answered, "or if I know I may not say. Yet learn
+that no god can live on without a single worshipper, and, in a fashion,
+that idol was alive, though this you will not believe."
+
+"How very remarkable," said Bastin, contemplating the ruin. "If I were
+superstitious, which I am not, I should say that this occurrence was an
+omen indicating the final fall of a false god. At any rate it is dead
+now, and I wonder what caused it?"
+
+"I felt an earth tremor last night," said Bickley, "though it is odd
+that it should only have affected this particular statue. A thousand
+pities, for it was a wonderful work of art."
+
+Then I remembered and reminded Bickley of the crash which we had heard
+while Yva and Bastin were absent on some secret business in the chamber.
+
+Walking the length of the great church, if so it could be called, we
+came to an apse at the head of it where, had it been Christian, the
+altar would have stood. In this apse was a little open door through
+which we passed. Beyond it lay a space of rough rock that looked as
+though it had been partially prepared for the erection of buildings and
+then abandoned. All this space was lighted, however, like the rest of
+the City of Nyo, and in the same mysterious way. Led by Yva, we threaded
+our path between the rough stones, following a steep downward slope.
+Thus we walked for perhaps half a mile, till at length we came to the
+mouth of a huge pit that must, I imagine, have lain quite a thousand
+feet below the level of the temple.
+
+I looked over the edge of this pit and shrank back terrified. It seemed
+to be bottomless. Moreover, a great wind rushed up it with a roaring
+sound like to that of an angry sea. Or rather there were two winds,
+perhaps draughts would be a better term, if I may apply it to an air
+movement of so fierce and terrible a nature. One of these rushed up
+the pit, and one rushed down. Or it may have been that the up rush
+alternated with the down rush. Really it is impossible to say.
+
+"What is this place?" I asked, clinging to the others and shrinking back
+in alarm from its sheer edge and bottomless depth, for that this was
+enormous we could see by the shaft of light which flowed downwards
+farther than the eye could follow.
+
+"It is a vent up and down which air passes from and to the central
+hollows of the earth," Yva answered. "Doubtless in the beginning through
+it travelled that mighty force which blew out these caves in the heated
+rocks, as the craftsman blows out glass."
+
+"I understand," said Bastin. "Just like one blows out a bubble on a
+pipe, only on a larger scale. Well, it is very interesting, but I have
+seen enough of it. Also I am afraid of being blown away."
+
+"I fear that you must see more," answered Yva with a smile, "since we
+are about to descend this pit."
+
+"Do you mean that we are to go down that hole, and if so, how? I don't
+see any lift, or moving staircase, or anything of that sort."
+
+"Easily and safely enough, Bastin. See."
+
+As she spoke a great flat rock of the size of a small room appeared,
+borne upwards, as I suppose, by the terrific draught which roared past
+us on its upward course. When it reached the lip of the shaft, it hung
+a little while, then moved across and began to descend with such
+incredible swiftness that in a few seconds it had vanished from view.
+
+"Oh!" said Bastin, with his eyes almost starting out of his head,
+"that's the lift, is it? Well, I tell you at once I don't like the look
+of the thing. It gives me the creeps. Suppose it tilted."
+
+"It does not tilt," answered Yva, still smiling. "I tell you, Bastin,
+that there is naught to fear. Only yesterday, I rode this rock and
+returned unharmed."
+
+"That is all very well, Lady Yva, but you may know how to balance it;
+also when to get on and off."
+
+"If you are afraid, Bastin, remain here until your companions return.
+They, I think, will make the journey."
+
+Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the truth, if less
+frank we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
+
+"No, I'll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as any other,
+and if anything were to happen to them and I were left alone, it would
+be worse still."
+
+"Then be prepared," said Yva, "for presently this air-chariot of ours
+will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge, step on to it and
+throw yourselves upon your faces and all will be well. At the foot of
+the shaft the motion lessens till it almost stops, and it is easy to
+spring, or even crawl to the firm earth."
+
+Then she stooped down and lifted Tommy who was sniffing suspiciously
+at the edge of the pit, his long ears blown straight above his head,
+holding him beneath her left arm and under her cloak, that he might not
+see and be frightened.
+
+We waited a while in silence, perhaps for five or six minutes, among
+the most disagreeable, I think, that I ever passed. Then far down in the
+brightness below appeared a black speck that seemed to grow in size as
+it rushed upwards.
+
+"It comes," said Yva. "Prepare and do as I do. Do not spring, or run,
+lest you should go too far. Step gently on to the rock and to its
+centre, and there lie down. Trust in me, all of you."
+
+"There's nothing else to do," groaned Bastin.
+
+The great stone appeared and, as before, hung at the edge of the pit.
+Yva stepped on to it quietly, as she did so, catching hold of my wrist
+with her disengaged hand. I followed her feeling very sick, and promptly
+sat down. Then came Bickley with the air of the virtuous hero of
+a romance walking a pirate's plank, and also sat down. Only Bastin
+hesitated until the stone began to move away. Then with an ejaculation
+of "Here goes!" he jumped over the intervening crack of space and landed
+in the middle of us like a sack of coal. Had I not been seated really I
+think he would have knocked me off the rock. As it was, with one hand
+he gripped me by the beard and with the other grasped Yva's robe, of
+neither of which would he leave go for quite a long time, although we
+forced him on to his face. The lantern which he held flew from his grasp
+and descended the shaft on its own account.
+
+"You silly fool!" exclaimed Bickley whose perturbation showed itself in
+anger. "There goes one of our lamps."
+
+"Hang the lamp!" muttered the prostrate Bastin. "We shan't want it in
+Heaven, or the other place either."
+
+Now the stone which had quivered a little beneath the impact of Bastin,
+steadied itself again and with a slow and majestic movement sailed
+to the other side of the gulf. There it felt the force of gravity, or
+perhaps the weight of the returning air pressed on it, which I do not
+know. At any rate it began to fall, slowly at first, then more swiftly,
+and afterwards at an incredible pace, so that in a few seconds the mouth
+of the pit above us grew small and presently vanished quite away.
+I looked up at Yva who was standing composedly in the midst of our
+prostrate shapes. She bent down and called in my ear:
+
+"All is well. The heat begins, but it will not endure for long."
+
+I nodded and glanced over the edge of the stone at Bastin's lantern
+which was sailing alongside of us, till presently we passed it. Bastin
+had lit it before we started, I think in a moment of aberration, and it
+burned for quite a long while, showing like a star when the shaft
+grew darker as it did by degrees, a circumstance that testifies to the
+excellence of the make, which is one advertised not to go out in any
+wind. Not that we felt wind, or even draught, perhaps because we were
+travelling with it.
+
+Then we entered the heat zone. About this there was no doubt, for the
+perspiration burst out all over me and the burning air scorched my
+lungs. Also Tommy thrust his head from beneath the cloak with his tongue
+hanging out and his mouth wide open.
+
+"Hold your breaths!" cried Yva, and we obeyed until we nearly burst. At
+least I did, but what happened to the others I do not know.
+
+Fortunately it was soon over and the air began to grow cool again. By
+now we had travelled an enormous distance, it seemed to be miles on
+miles, and I noticed that our terrific speed was slackening, also that
+the shaft grew more narrow, till at length there were only a few feet
+between the edge of the stone and its walls. The result of this, or so
+I supposed, was that the compressed air acted as a buffer, lessening our
+momentum, till at length the huge stone moved but very slowly.
+
+"Be ready to follow me," cried Yva again, and we rose to our feet, that
+is, Bickley and I did, but poor Bastin was semi-comatose. The stone
+stopped and Yva sprang from it to a rock platform level with which it
+lay. We followed, dragging Bastin between us. As we did so something hit
+me gently on the head. It was Bastin's lamp, which I seized.
+
+"We are safe. Sit down and rest," said Yva, leading us a few paces away.
+
+We obeyed and presently by the dim light saw the stone begin to stir
+again, this time upwards. In another twenty seconds it was away on its
+never-ending journey.
+
+"Does it always go on like that?" said Bastin, sitting up and staring
+after it.
+
+"Tens of thousands of years ago it was journeying thus, and tens of
+thousands of years hence it will still be journeying, or so I think,"
+she replied. "Why not, since the strength of the draught never changes
+and there is nothing to wear it except the air?"
+
+Somehow the vision of this huge stone, first loosed and set in motion by
+heaven knows what agency, travelling from aeon to aeon up and down
+that shaft in obedience to some law I did not understand, impressed my
+imagination like a nightmare. Indeed I often dream of it to this day.
+
+I looked about me. We were in some cavernous place that could be but
+dimly seen, for here the light that flowed down the shaft from the
+upper caves where it was mysteriously created, scarcely shone, and often
+indeed was entirely cut off, when the ever-journeying stone was in the
+narrowest parts of the passage. I could see, however, that this cavern
+stretched away both to right and left of us, while I felt that from
+the left, as we sat facing the shaft, there drew down a strong blast of
+fresh air which suggested that somewhere, however far away, it must open
+on to the upper world. For the rest its bottom and walls seemed to be
+smooth as though they had been planed in the past ages by the action of
+cosmic forces. Bickley noticed this the first and pointed it out to me.
+We had little time to observe, however, for presently Yva said:
+
+"If you are rested, friends, I pray you light those lamps of yours,
+since we must walk a while in darkness."
+
+We did and started, still travelling downhill. Yva walked ahead with me
+and Tommy who seemed somewhat depressed and clung close to our heels.
+The other two followed, arguing strenuously about I know not what. It
+was their way of working off irritation and alarms.
+
+I asked Yva what was about to happen, for a great fear oppressed me.
+
+"I am not sure, Beloved," she answered in a sweet and gentle voice, "who
+do not know all Oro's secrets, but as I think, great things. We are now
+deep in the bowels of the world, and presently, perhaps, you will see
+some of its mighty forces whereof your ignorant races have no knowledge,
+doing their everlasting work."
+
+"Then how is it that we can breathe here?" I asked. "Because this road
+that we are following connects with the upper air or used to do so,
+since once I followed it. It is a long road and the climb is steep,
+but at last it leads to the light of the blessed sun, nor are there any
+pitfalls in the path. Would that we might tread it together, Humphrey,"
+she added with passion, "and be rid of mysteries and the gloom, or that
+light which is worse than gloom."
+
+"Why not?" I asked eagerly. "Why should we not turn and flee?"
+
+"Who can flee from my father, the Lord Oro?" she replied. "He would
+snare us before we had gone a mile. Moreover, if we fled, by tomorrow
+half the world must perish."
+
+"And how can we save it by not flying, Yva?"
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey, yet I think it will be saved, perchance by
+sacrifice. That is the keystone of your faith, is it not? Therefore if
+it is asked of you to save the world, you will not shrink from it, will
+you, Humphrey?"
+
+"I hope not," I replied, without enthusiasm, I admit. Indeed it struck
+me that a business of this sort was better fitted to Bastin than
+to myself, or at any rate to his profession. I think she guessed my
+thoughts, for by the light of the lamp I saw her smile in her dazzling
+way. Then after a swift glance behind her, she turned and suddenly
+kissed me, as she did so calling down everlasting blessings on my
+head and on my spirit. There was something very wonderful about this
+benediction of Yva's and it thrilled me through and through, so that to
+it I could make no answer.
+
+Next moment it was too late to retreat, for our narrowing passage turned
+and we found ourselves in a wondrous place. I call it wondrous because
+of it we could see neither the beginning nor the end, nor the roof, nor
+aught else save the rock on which we walked, and the side or wall that
+our hands touched. Nor was this because of darkness, since although it
+was not illuminated like the upper caverns, light of a sort was present.
+It was a very strange light, consisting of brilliant and intermittent
+flashes, or globes of blue and lambent flame which seemed to leap from
+nowhere into nowhere, or sometimes to hang poised in mid air.
+
+"How odd they are," said the voice of Bastin behind me. "They remind
+me of those blue sparks which jump up from the wires of the tramways in
+London on a dark night. You know, don't you, Bickley? I mean when the
+conductor pulls round that long stick with an iron wheel on the top of
+it."
+
+"Nobody but you could have thought of such a comparison, Bastin,"
+answered Bickley. "Still, multiplied a thousandfold they are not
+unlike."
+
+Nor indeed were they, except that each blue flash was as big as the full
+moon and in one place or another they were so continuous that one could
+have read a letter by their light. Also the effect of them was ghastly
+and most unnatural, terrifying, too, since even their brilliance could
+not reveal the extent of that gigantic hollow in the bowels of the
+world wherein they leapt to and fro like lightnings, or hung like huge,
+uncanny lanterns.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXV. Sacrifice
+
+
+"The air in this place must be charged with some form of electricity,
+but the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm us," said Bickley
+in a matter-of-fact fashion as though he were determined not to be
+astonished.
+
+"To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights, though how
+these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know," I answered.
+
+As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above. It
+resembled a shooting star or a meteor more than anything else that I
+had ever seen, and made me wonder whether we were not perhaps standing
+beneath some inky, unseen sky.
+
+Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light, which
+made him terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in front of us
+clad in a long cloak.
+
+"Dear me!" said Bastin, "he looks just like the devil, doesn't he, and
+now I come to think of it, this isn't at all a bad imitation of hell."
+
+"How do you know it is an imitation?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it were, the
+Lady Yva and I should not be here."
+
+Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the argument
+went no further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent the knee in
+greeting to him.
+
+"So you have come, all of you," he said. "I thought that perhaps there
+were one or two who would not find courage to ride the flying stone. I
+am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he who had shown himself a
+coward should have had no share in the rule of that new world which is
+to be. Therefore I chose yonder road that it might test you."
+
+"Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to return by, I
+shall be much obliged to you, Oro," said Bastin.
+
+"How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible, Preacher?
+How do you know indeed that this is not your last journey from which
+there is no return?"
+
+"Of course I can't be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the question
+is one which you might more appropriately put to yourself. According
+to your own showing you are now extremely old and therefore your end is
+likely to come at any moment. Of course, however, if it did you would
+have one more journey to make, but it wouldn't be polite for me to say
+in what direction."
+
+Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden rage.
+Remembering the scene in the temple where he had grovelled before his
+god, uttering agonised, unanswered prayers for added days, I understood
+the reason of his wrath. It was so great that I feared lest he should
+kill Bastin (who only a few hours before, be it remembered, had tried to
+kill him) then and there, as doubtless he could have done if he wished.
+Fortunately, if he felt it; the impulse passed.
+
+"Miserable fool!" he said. "I warn you to keep a watch upon your words.
+Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy. Today you stab me with
+your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I silence it for ever."
+
+"I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that you can't hurt
+me at all any more than I could hurt you last night because, you see, it
+wasn't permitted. When the time comes for me to die, I shall go, but you
+will have nothing to do with that. To tell the truth, I am very sorry
+for you, as with all your greatness, your soul is of the earth, earthy,
+also sensual and devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I am afraid, very
+malignant, and you will have a great deal to answer for shortly. Yours
+won't be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you glory in your sins
+and don't know what repentance means."
+
+I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the most
+unbounded admiration for Bastin's fearless courage which enabled him
+thus to beard this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed were we all, for I
+read it in Yva's face and heard Bickley mutter:
+
+"Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!"
+
+Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his heart, for
+he stared at the man and made no answer. In the language of the ring, he
+was quite "knocked out" and, almost humbly, changed the subject.
+
+"We have yet a little while," he said, "before that happens which I have
+decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of the marvels of this
+bubble blown in the bowels of the world," and he motioned to us to pick
+up the lanterns.
+
+Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it was, for a
+distance of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here suddenly we came to
+a great groove in the rocky floor, as broad as a very wide roadway, and
+mayhap four feet in depth. The bottom of this groove was polished and
+glittered; indeed it gave us the impression of being iron, or other ore
+which had been welded together beneath the grinding of some immeasurable
+weight. Just at the spot where we struck the groove, it divided into
+two, for this reason.
+
+In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been, rose, the
+fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more sharply, and this at
+a spot where the groove had a somewhat steep downward dip which appeared
+to extend onwards I know not how far.
+
+Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a mile, I
+should think, we observed that it became ever more pronounced, till at
+length it ended in a razor-edge cliff which stretched up higher than
+we could see, even by the light of the electrical discharges. Standing
+against the edge of this cliff, we perceived that at a distance from it
+there were now two grooves of about equal width. One of these ran away
+into the darkness on our right as we faced the sharp edge, and at an
+ever-widening angle, while the other, at a similar angle, ran into the
+darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
+
+No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves now lay
+within hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter of a mile, for
+be it remembered we had followed the rising rock between them. To put it
+quite clearly, it was exactly as though one line of rails had separated
+into two lines of rails, as often enough they do, and an observer
+standing on high ground between could see them both vanishing into
+tunnels to the right and left, but far apart.
+
+The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where first we
+saw it at the point of separation, was not polished like the left-hand
+groove, although at some time or other it seemed to have been subjected
+to the pressure of the same terrific weight which cut its fellow out of
+the bed of rock or iron, as the sharp wheels of a heavily laden wagon
+sink ruts into a roadway.
+
+"What does it all mean, Lord Oro?" I asked when he had led us back to
+the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves, that is, a mile
+or so away from the razor-edged cliff.
+
+"This, Humphrey," he answered. "That which travels along yonder road,
+when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the left-hand path
+which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could a giant at that moment
+of its touching this exact spot on which I lay my hand, thrust it with
+sufficient strength, it would leave the left-hand road and take the
+right-hand road."
+
+"And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?"
+
+"Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough upon its
+way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and great things would
+happen in the world above, as once they happened in bygone days. Now do
+you understand, Humphrey?"
+
+"Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now," I answered. "But fortunately
+there is no such giant."
+
+Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up with a
+fiendish exultation, as he cried:
+
+"Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned the balance
+of the world from the right-hand road which now is dull with disuse, to
+the left-hand road which glitters so brightly to your eyes, and the face
+of the earth was changed. Now again I will turn it from the left-hand
+road to the right-hand road in which for millions of years it was wont
+to run, and once more the face of the earth shall change, and those who
+are left living upon the earth, or who in the course of ages shall come
+to live upon the new earth, must bow down to Oro and take him and his
+seed to be their gods and kings."
+
+When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also I
+remembered a certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us in the
+Temple of Nyo. But supported by his disbelief, Bickley asked:
+
+"And how often does the balance of which you speak come this way, Lord
+Oro?"
+
+"Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley," he replied.
+
+"Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble us,"
+remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
+
+"Do you think so, you learned Bickley?" asked Oro. "If so, I do not.
+Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone awry, that
+Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us. Hearken now! What
+is that sound we hear?"
+
+As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs of
+a dreadful music. I cannot describe it in words because that is
+impossible, but it was something like to the buzz of a thousand
+humming-tops such as are loved by children because of their weird song.
+
+"Back to the wall!" cried Oro triumphantly. "The time is short!"
+
+So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us with long,
+determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side and, as I thought,
+now and again glanced at my face with a look that was half anxious and
+half pitiful. Also twice she stooped and patted Tommy.
+
+We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had started
+to examine the grooved roads. At least I think this was so, since now
+for the first time I observed a kind of little window in its rocky
+face. It stood about five feet from its floor level, and was perhaps ten
+inches square, not more. In short, except for its shape it resembled a
+ship's porthole rather than a window. Its substance appeared to be talc,
+or some such material, and inches thick, yet through it, after Oro
+had cast aside some sort of covering, came a glare like that of a
+search-light. In fact it was a search-light so far as concerned one of
+its purposes.
+
+By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four objects which
+looked like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown metal or material.
+Very deftly, very quietly, Yva lifted these cloaks and wrapped one of
+them about each of us, and while she was thus employed I noticed that
+they were of a substance very similar to that of the gown she wore,
+which I have described, but harder. Next she gave one of the metal-like
+shields to each of us, bidding us hold them in front of our bodies and
+heads, and only to look through certain slits in them in which were
+eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the searchlight
+window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row with our backs
+against the rock wall, at certain spots which she indicated with great
+precision, and whatever we saw or heard on no account to move.
+
+So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin. Then Yva
+took the fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one than ours, and
+placed herself between me and the search-light or porthole. On the other
+side of this was Oro who had no shield.
+
+These arrangements took some minutes and during that time occupied all
+our attention. When they were completed, however, our curiosity and fear
+began to reassert themselves. I looked about me and perceived that Oro
+had his right hand upon what seemed to be a rough stone rod, in shape
+not unlike that with which railway points are moved. He shouted to us
+to stand still and keep the shields over our faces. Then very gently he
+pressed upon the lever. The porthole sank the fraction of an inch, and
+instantly there leapt from it a most terrific blaze of lightning, which
+shot across the blackness in front and, as lightning does, revealed
+far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that against which we
+leant.
+
+"All works well," exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting his hand
+from the rod, "and the strength which I have stored will be more than
+enough."
+
+Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "as you know, I have been sceptical, but I don't
+like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?"
+
+"Sink half the world beneath the seas," said Oro, "and raise up that
+which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as you do not
+believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you ask such questions?"
+
+"I believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
+yesterday," said Bastin. "For your soul's sake I beg you to desist from
+an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but which will certainly
+involve your eternal damnation, since the failure will be no fault of
+yours."
+
+Then I spoke also, saying:
+
+"I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not know exactly
+how much or how little you can do, but I understand that your object is
+to slay men by millions in order to raise up another world of which you
+will be the absolute king, as you were of some past empire that has been
+destroyed, either through your agency or otherwise. No good can come of
+such ambitions. Like Bastin, for your soul's sake I pray you to let them
+be."
+
+"What Humphrey says I repeat," said Yva. "My Father, although you know
+it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you sow you will
+harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not dream. Moreover, your
+plans will fail. Now I who am, like yourself, of the Children of Wisdom,
+have spoken, for the first and last time, and my words are true. I pray
+you give them weight, my Father."
+
+Oro heard, and grew furious.
+
+"What!" he said. "Are you against me, every one, and my own daughter
+also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a new world; I
+would destroy your vile civilisations which I have studied with my eyes,
+that I may build better! To you, Humphrey, I would give my only child
+in marriage that from you may spring a divine race of kings! And yet you
+are against me and set up your puny scruples as a barrier across my path
+of wisdom. Well, I tread them down, I go on my appointed way. But beware
+how you try to hold me back. If any one of you should attempt to come
+between me and my ends, know that I will destroy you all. Obey or die."
+
+"Well, he has had his chance and he won't take it," said Bastin in the
+silence that followed. "The man must go to the devil his own way and
+there is nothing more to be said."
+
+I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant humming grew
+to a roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound which presently
+drowned all attempts at ordinary speech.
+
+Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away there
+appeared something terrible. I can only describe its appearance as that
+of an attenuated mountain on fire. When it drew nearer I perceived that
+it was more like a ballet-dancer whirling round and round upon her toes,
+or rather all the ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and then
+multiplied a million times in size. No, it was like a mushroom with two
+stalks, one above and one below, or a huge top with a point on which it
+spun, a swelling belly and another point above. But what a top! It
+must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an inch, and its
+circumference who could measure?
+
+On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate inconceivable, so
+that it looked like a gigantic wheel of fire. Yet it was not fire that
+clothed it but rather some phosphorescence, since from it came no heat.
+Yes, a phosphorescence arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red,
+with streaks of other colours running up between, and a kind of waving
+fringe of purple.
+
+The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of avalanches
+or of icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to the sea. Its
+terrific aspect was appalling, and its weight caused the solid rock
+to quiver like a leaf. Watching it, we felt as ants might feel at the
+advent of the crack of doom, for its mere height and girth and size
+overwhelmed us. We could not even speak. The last words I heard were
+from the mouth of Oro who screamed out:
+
+"Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men, and
+behold me change its path--turning it as the steersman turns a ship!"
+
+Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them approached
+the porthole or search-light to which she did something that I could not
+distinguish. The effect was to make the beam of light much stronger
+and sharper, also to shift it on to the point or foot of the spinning
+mountain and, by an aiming of the lens from time to time, to keep it
+there.
+
+This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not travel fast
+notwithstanding the frightful speed of its revolutions. I should doubt
+indeed if it advanced more quickly than a man could walk; at any rate
+so it seemed to us. But we had no means of judging its real rate of
+progress whereof we knew as little as we did of the course it followed
+in the bowels of the earth. Perhaps that was spiral, from the world's
+deep heart upwards, and this was the highest point it reached. Or
+perhaps it remained stationary, but still spinning, for scores or
+hundreds of years in some central powerhouse of its own, whence, in
+obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these terrific
+journeys.
+
+No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the
+information to himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate there it
+was, travelling towards us on its giant butt, the peg of the top as it
+were, which, hidden in a cloud of friction-born sparks that enveloped it
+like the cup of a curving flower of fire, whirled round and round at
+an infinite speed. It was on this flaming flower that the search-light
+played steadily, doubtless that Oro might mark and measure its monstrous
+progress.
+
+"He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand path," I
+shouted into Bickley's ear.
+
+"Can't be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens of
+millions of tons one inch," Bickley roared back, trying to look
+confident.
+
+Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a sudden she
+cast down her shield and, throwing herself upon her knees, stretched out
+her hands in supplication to her father. I understood, as did we all,
+that she was imploring him to abandon his hellish purpose. He glared at
+her and shook his head. Then, as she still went on praying, he struck
+her across the face with his hand and pushed her to her feet again. My
+blood boiled as I saw it and I think I should have sprung at him, had
+not Bickley caught hold of me, shouting, "Don't, or he will kill her and
+us too."
+
+Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the blue
+discharges which now flashed almost continuously, and the phosphorescent
+glare of the advancing mountain, I saw that though her beautiful face
+worked beneath the pain of the blow, her eyes remained serene and
+purposeful. Even then I wondered--what was the purpose shining through
+them. Also I wondered if I was about to be called upon to make that
+sacrifice of which she had spoken, and if so, how. Of one thing I was
+determined--that if the call came it should not find me deaf. Yet all
+the while I was horribly afraid.
+
+At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens--again,
+being alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The beam of light
+shifted and wandered till, far away, it fell exactly upon that spot
+where the rock began to rise into the ridge which separated the two
+grooves or roads and ended in the razor-edged cliff. Moreover I observed
+that Oro, who left it the last of us, had either placed something white
+to mark this first infinitesimal bulging of the floor of the groove, or
+had smeared it with chalk or shining pigment. I observed also what I
+had not been able to see before, that a thin white line ran across the
+floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of this painted rise of
+rock, and that the glare of the search-light now lay exactly over that
+line.
+
+The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature's workshop, for
+such without doubt it was, was drawing near, emitting as it came
+a tumult of sounds which, with the echoes that they caused, almost
+over-whelmed our senses. Poor little Tommy, already cowed, although he
+was a bold-natured beast, broke down entirely, and I could see from his
+open mouth that he was howling with terror. He stared about him, then
+ran to Yva and pawed at her, evidently asking to be taken into her arms.
+She thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me to lift him
+up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting sadly that
+if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I even thought of
+passing him on to Bickley, but had no time. Indeed I could not attract
+his attention, for Bickley was staring with all his eyes at the
+nightmare-like spectacle which was in progress about us. Indeed no
+nightmare, no wild imagination of which the mind of man is capable,
+could rival the aspect of its stupendous facts.
+
+Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by those
+globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and now shot
+upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or end, like a
+stream of meteors that had gone mad. Then the travelling mountain, two
+thousand feet in height, or more, with its enormous saucer-like rim
+painted round with bands of lurid red and blue, and about its grinding
+foot the tulip bloom of emitted flame. Then the fierce-faced Oro at his
+post, his hand upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to drown half of this
+great world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a saint in hell
+and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a saint might
+bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And lastly we three
+men flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
+
+Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which it was
+given to our human eyes to witness.
+
+And all the while, bending, bowing towards us--away from us--making
+obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to the path behind
+as though in farewell; instinct with a horrible life, with a hideous and
+gigantic grace, that titanic Terror whirled onwards to the mark of fate.
+
+At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive and did
+not know its awful mission. Visions flashed across my mind. I thought
+of the peoples of the world sleeping in their beds, or going about their
+business, or engaged even in the work of war. I thought of the ships
+upon the seas steaming steadily towards their far-off ports. Then I
+thought of what presently might happen to them, of the tremors followed
+by convulsions, of the sudden crashing down of cities, such as we had
+seen in the picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the inflow of the
+waters of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and desolation
+as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following death. So
+I thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect of the
+Universe to stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin of His
+handiwork.
+
+Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod, his hair
+and long beard seemed to bristle with furious and delighted excitement.
+The purple-fringed rim of the Monster had long overshadowed the whited
+patch of rock; its grinding foot was scarce ten yards away. Oro made
+more signs to Yva who, beneath the shelter of her shield, again bent
+down and did something that I could not see. Then, as though her part
+were played, she rose, drew the grey hood of her cloak all about her
+face so that her eyes alone remained visible, took one step towards me
+and in the broken English we had taught her, called into my ear.
+
+"Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not me!"
+
+She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and next
+instant with a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending himself double,
+thrust upon the rod, as I could see from his open mouth, shouting while
+he thrust.
+
+At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately in
+front of the lens or window, so that the metallic shield with which she
+covered herself pressed against its substance.
+
+Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
+
+Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out a rush of
+living flame. It struck on Yva's shield and expanded to right and left.
+The insulated shield and garments that she wore seemed to resist it.
+For a fraction of time she stood there like a glowing angel, wrapped in
+fire.
+
+Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little distance
+dissolved like a ghost and vanished from our sight.
+
+Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
+
+
+And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had received the
+full blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet whilst destroying, it
+turned away from her, seeking the free paths of the air. So it came
+about that its obstructed strength struck the foot of the travelling
+gyroscope, diffused and did not suffice to thrust it that one necessary
+inch on which depended the fate of half the world, or missing it
+altogether, passed away on either side. Even so the huge, gleaming
+mountain rocked and trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it bowed itself
+towards us as though in majestic homage to greatness passed away. For a
+second, too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
+and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of fire
+went out, while I was thrown to the ground.
+
+When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more sailing
+majestically upon its way and down the accustomed left-hand path!
+
+
+Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook--but Yva had saved
+the world!
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVI. Tommy
+
+
+I lay still a while, on my back as I had fallen, and beneath the
+shield-like defence which Yva had given to me. Notwithstanding the
+fire-resisting, metalised stuff of which it was made, I noted that
+it was twisted and almost burnt through. Doubtless the stored-up
+electricity or earth magnetism, or whatever it may have been that had
+leapt out of that hole, being diffused by the resistance with which it
+was met, had grazed me with its outer edge, and had it not been for the
+shield and cloak, I also should have been burned up. I wished, oh! how
+I wished that it had been so. Then, by now all must have finished and
+I should have known the truth as to what awaits us beyond the change:
+sleep, or dreams, or perchance the fullest life. Also I should not have
+learned alone.
+
+Lying there thus, idly, as though in a half-sleep, I felt Tommy licking
+my face, and throwing my arm about the poor little frightened beast, I
+watched the great world-balance as it retreated on its eternal journey.
+At one time its vast projecting rim had overshadowed us and almost
+seemed to touch the cliff of rock against which we leant. I remember
+that the effect of that shining arch a thousand feet or so above our
+heads was wonderful. It reminded me of a canopy of blackest thunder
+clouds supported upon a framework of wheeling rainbows, while beneath
+it all the children of the devil shouted together in joy. I noted this
+effect only a few seconds before Yva spoke to me and leapt into the path
+of the flash.
+
+Now, however, it was far away, a mere flaming wheel that became
+gradually smaller, and its Satanic voices were growing faint. As I have
+said, I watched its disappearance idly, reflecting that I should never
+look upon its like again; also that it was something well worth going
+forth to see. Then I became aware that the humming, howling din had
+decreased sufficiently to enable me to hear human voices without effort.
+Bastin was addressing Bickley--like myself they were both upon the
+ground.
+
+"Her translation, as you may have noticed, Bickley, if you were not too
+frightened, was really very remarkable. No doubt it will have reminded
+you, as it did me, of that of Elijah. She had exactly the appearance of
+a person going up to Heaven in a vehicle of fire. The destination was
+certainly the same, and even the cloak she wore added a familiar touch
+and increased the similarity."
+
+"At any rate it did not fall upon you," answered Bickley with something
+like a sob, in a voice of mingled awe and exasperation. "For goodness'
+sake! Bastin, stop your Biblical parallels and let us adore, yes, let us
+adore the divinest creature that the earth has borne!"
+
+Never have I loved Bickley more than when I heard him utter those words.
+
+"'Divinest' is a large term, Bickley, and one to which I hesitate to
+subscribe, remembering as I do certain of the prophets and the Early
+Fathers with all their faults, not of course to mention the Apostles.
+But--" here he paused, for suddenly all three of us became aware of Oro.
+
+He also has been thrown to the ground by the strength of the prisoned
+forces which he gathered and loosed upon their unholy errand, but, as
+I rejoiced to observe, had suffered from them much more than ourselves.
+Doubtless this was owing to the fact that he had sprung forward in
+a last wild effort to save his daughter, or to prevent her from
+interfering with his experiment, I know not which. As a result his right
+cheek was much scorched, his right arm was withered and helpless, and
+his magnificent beard was half burnt off him. Further, very evidently he
+was suffering from severe shock, for he rocked upon his feet and shook
+like an aspen leaf. All this, however, did not interfere with the
+liveliness of his grief and rage.
+
+There he stood, a towering shape, like a lightning-smitten statue, and
+cursed us, especially Bastin.
+
+"My daughter has gone!" he cried, "burned up by the fiery power that is
+my servant. Nothing remains of her but dust, and, Priest, this is your
+doing. You poisoned her heart with your childish doctrines of mercy and
+sacrifice, and the rest, so that she threw herself into the path of the
+flash to save some miserable races that she had never even known."
+
+He paused exhausted, whereon Bastin answered him with spirit:
+
+"Yes, Oro, she being a holy woman, has gone where you will never follow
+her. Also it is your own fault since you should have listened to her
+entreaties instead of boxing her ears like the brute you are."
+
+"My daughter is gone," went on Oro, recovering his strength, "and my
+great designs are ruined. Yet only for a while," he added, "for the
+world-balance will return again, if not till long after your life-spans
+are done."
+
+"If you don't doctor yourself, Lord Oro," said Bickley, also rising,
+"I may tell you as one who understands such things, that most likely it
+will be after your life-span is done also. Although their effect may be
+delayed, severe shocks from burns and over-excitement are apt to prove
+fatal to the aged."
+
+Oro snarled at him; no other word describes it.
+
+"And there are other things, Physician," he said, "which are apt to
+prove fatal to the young. At least now you will no longer deny my
+power."
+
+"I am not so sure," answered Bickley, "since it seems that there is a
+greater Power, namely that of a woman's love and sacrifice."
+
+"And a greater still," interrupted Bastin, "Which put those ideas into
+her head."
+
+"As for you, Humphrey," went on Oro, "I rejoice to think that you at
+least have lost two things that man desires above all other things--the
+woman you sought and the future kingship of the world."
+
+I stood up and faced him.
+
+"The first I have gained, although how, you do not understand, Oro,"
+I answered. "And of the second, seeing that it would have come through
+you, on your conditions, I am indeed glad to be rid. I wish no power
+that springs from murder, and no gifts from one who answered his
+daughter's prayer with blows."
+
+For a moment he seemed remorseful.
+
+"She vexed me with her foolishness," he said. Then his rage blazed up
+again:
+
+"And it was you who taught it to her," he went on. "You are guilty, all
+three of you, and therefore I am left with none to serve me in my age;
+therefore also my mighty schemes are overthrown."
+
+"Also, Oro, if you speak truth, therefore half the world is saved," I
+added quietly, "and one has left it of whom it was unworthy."
+
+"You think that these civilisations of yours, as you are pleased to call
+them, are saved, do you?" he sneered. "Yet, even if Bickley were right
+and I should die and become powerless, I tell you that they are already
+damned. I have studied them in your books and seen them with my eyes,
+and I say that they are rotten before ever they are ripe, and that their
+end shall be the end of the Sons of Wisdom, to die for lack of increase.
+That is why I would have saved the East, because in it alone there is
+increase, and thence alone can rise the great last race of man which I
+would have given to your children for an heritage. Moreover, think not
+that you Westerners have done with wars. I tell you that they are but
+begun and that the sword shall eat you up, and what the sword spares
+class shall snatch from class in the struggle for supremacy and ease."
+
+Thus he spoke with extraordinary and concentrated bitterness that I
+confess would have frightened me, had I been capable of fear, which at
+the moment I was not. Who is afraid when he has lost all?
+
+Nor was Bastin alarmed, if for other reasons.
+
+"I think it right to tell you, Oro," he said, "that the only future you
+need trouble about is your own. God Almighty will look after the western
+civilisations in whatever way He may think best, as you may remember He
+did just now. Only I am sure you won't be here to see how it is done."
+
+Again fury blazed in Oro's eyes.
+
+"At least I will look after you, you half-bred dogs, who yap out
+ill-omened prophecies of death into my face. Since the three of you
+loved my daughter whom you brought to her doom, and were by her beloved,
+if differently, I think it best that you should follow on her road.
+How? That is the question? Shall I leave you to starve in these great
+caves?--Nay, look not towards the road of escape which doubtless she
+pointed out to you, for, as Humphrey knows, I can travel swiftly and I
+will make sure that you find it blocked. Or shall I--" and he glanced
+upwards at the great globes of wandering fire, as though he purposed to
+summon them to be our death, as doubtless he could have done.
+
+"I do not care what you do," I answered wearily. "Only I would beg you
+to strike quickly. Yet for my friends I am sorry, since it was I who led
+them on this quest, and for you, too, Tommy," I added, looking at the
+poor little hound. "You were foolish, Tommy," I went on, "when you
+scented out that old tyrant in his coffin, at least for our own sake."
+
+Indeed the dog was terribly scared. He whined continually and from time
+to time ran a little way and then returned to us, suggesting that we
+should go from this horror-haunted spot. Lastly, as though he understood
+that it was Oro who kept us there, he went to him and jumping up, licked
+his hand in a beseeching fashion.
+
+The super-man looked at the dog and as he looked the rage went out of
+his face and was replaced by something resembling pity.
+
+"I do not wish the beast to die," he muttered to himself in low
+reflective tones, as though he thought aloud, "for of them all it alone
+liked and did not fear me. I might take it with me but still it would
+perish of grief in the loneliness of the caves. Moreover, she loved it
+whom I shall see no more; yes, Yva--" as he spoke the name his voice
+broke a little. "Yet if I suffer them to escape they will tell my story
+to the world and make me a laughingstock. Well, if they do, what does it
+matter? None of those Western fools would believe it; thinking that they
+knew all; like Bickley they would mock and say that they were mad, or
+liars."
+
+Again Tommy licked his hand, but more confidently, as though instinct
+told him something of what was passing in Oro's mind. I watched with
+an idle wonder, marvelling whether it were possible that this merciless
+being would after all spare us for the sake of the dog.
+
+So, strange to say, it came about, for suddenly Oro looked up and said:
+
+"Get you gone, and quickly, before my mood changes. The hound has saved
+you. For its sake I give you your lives, who otherwise should certainly
+have died. She who has gone pointed out to you, I doubt not, a road that
+runs to the upper air. I think that it is still open. Indeed," he added,
+closing his eyes for a moment, "I see that it is still open, if long
+and difficult. Follow it, and should you win through, take your boat and
+sail away as swiftly as you can. Whether you die or live I care nothing,
+but my hands will be clean of your blood, although yours are stained
+with Yva's. Begone! and my curse go with you."
+
+Without waiting for further words we went to fetch our lanterns,
+water-bottles and bag of food which we had laid down at a little
+distance. As we approached them I looked up and saw Oro standing some
+way off. The light from one of the blue globes of fire which passed
+close above his head, shone upon him and made him ghastly. Moreover, it
+seemed to me as though approaching death had written its name upon his
+malevolent countenance.
+
+I turned my head away, for about his aspect in those sinister
+surroundings there was something horrible, something menacing and
+repellent to man and of him I wished to see no more. Nor indeed did I,
+for when I glanced in that direction again Oro was gone. I suppose that
+he had retreated into the shadows where no light played.
+
+
+We gathered up our gear, and while the others were relighting the
+lanterns, I walked a few paces forward to the spot where Yva had been
+dissolved in the devouring fire. Something caught my eye upon the rocky
+floor. I picked it up. It was the ring, or rather the remains of the
+ring that I had given her on that night when we declared our love amidst
+the ruins by the crater lake. She had never worn it on her hand but for
+her own reasons, as she told me, suspended it upon her breast beneath
+her robe. It was an ancient ring that I had bought in Egypt, fashioned
+of gold in which was set a very hard basalt or other black stone. On
+this was engraved the ank or looped cross, which was the Egyptian symbol
+of Life, and round it a snake, the symbol of Eternity. The gold was for
+the most part melted, but the stone, being so hard and protected by the
+shield and asbestos cloak, for such I suppose it was, had resisted the
+fury of the flash. Only now it was white instead of black, like a burnt
+onyx that had known the funeral pyre. Indeed, perhaps it was an onyx. I
+kissed it and hid it away, for it seemed to me to convey a greeting and
+with it a promise.
+
+Then we started, a very sad and dejected trio. Leaving with a shudder
+that vast place where the blue lights played eternally, we came to the
+shaft up and down which the travelling stone pursued its endless path,
+and saw it arrive and depart again.
+
+"I wonder he did not send us that way," said Bickley, pointing to it.
+
+"I am sure I am very glad it never occurred to him," answered Bastin,
+"for I am certain that we could not have made the journey again without
+our guide, Yva."
+
+I looked at him and he ceased. Somehow I could not bear, as yet, to hear
+her beloved name spoken by other lips.
+
+Then we entered the passage that she pointed out to us, and began a most
+terrible journey which, so far as we could judge, for we lost any exact
+count of time, took us about sixty hours. The road, it is true, was
+smooth and unblocked, but the ascent was fearfully steep and slippery;
+so much so that often we were obliged to pull each other up it and lie
+down to rest.
+
+Had it not been for those large, felt-covered bottles of Life-water,
+I am sure we should never have won through. But this marvelous elixir,
+drunk a little at a time, always re-invigorated us and gave us strength
+to push on. Also we had some food, and fortunately our spare oil held
+out, for the darkness in that tunnel was complete. Tommy became so
+exhausted that at length we must carry him by turns. He would have died
+had it not been for the water; indeed I thought that he was going to
+die.
+
+After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to begin to
+recover, and generally there was something in his manner which suggested
+to us that he knew himself to be not far from the surface of the earth
+towards which we had crawled upwards for thousands upon thousands of
+feet, fortunately without meeting with any zone of heat which was not
+bearable.
+
+We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little further,
+suddenly Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished. Then we heard him barking
+but where we could not see, since the tunnel appeared to take a turn
+and continue, but this time on a downward course, while the sound of the
+barks came from our right. We searched with the lanterns which were
+now beginning to die and found a little hole almost filled with fallen
+pieces of rock. We scooped these away with our hands, making an aperture
+large enough to creep through. A few more yards and we saw light, the
+blessed light of the moon, and in it stood Tommy barking hoarsely. Next
+we heard the sound of the sea. We struggled on desperately and presently
+pushed our way through bushes and vegetation on to a steep declivity.
+Down this we rolled and scrambled, to find ourselves at last lying upon
+a sandy beach, whilst above us the full moon shone in the heavens.
+
+Here, with a prayer of thankfulness, we flung ourselves down and slept.
+
+If it had not been for Tommy and we had gone further along the tunnel,
+which I have little doubt stretched on beneath the sea, where, I wonder,
+should we have slept that night?
+
+When we woke the sun was shining high in the heavens. Evidently there
+had been rain towards the dawn, though as we were lying beneath the
+shelter of some broad-leaved tree, from it we had suffered little
+inconvenience. Oh! how beautiful, after our sojourn in those unholy
+caves, were the sun and the sea and the sweet air and the raindrops
+hanging on the leaves.
+
+We did not wake of ourselves; indeed if we had been left alone I am
+sure that we should have slept the clock round, for we were terribly
+exhausted. What woke us was the chatter of a crowd of Orofenans who were
+gathered at a distance from the tree and engaged in staring at us in a
+frightened way, also the barks of Tommy who objected to their intrusion.
+Among the people I recognised our old friend the chief Marama by his
+feather cloak, and sitting up, beckoned to him to approach. After a good
+deal of hesitation he came, walking delicately like Agag, and stopping
+from time to time to study us, as though he were not sure that we were
+real.
+
+"What frightens you, Marama?" I asked him.
+
+"You frighten us, O Friend-from-the-Sea. Whence did you and the Healer
+and the Bellower come and why do your faces look like those of ghosts
+and why is the little black beast so large-eyed and so thin? Over
+the lake we know you did not come, for we have watched day and night;
+moreover there is no canoe upon the shore. Also it would not have been
+possible."
+
+"Why not?" I asked idly.
+
+"Come and see," he answered.
+
+Rising stiffly we emerged from beneath the tree and perceived that we
+were at the foot of the cliff against which the remains of the yacht had
+been borne by the great tempest. Indeed there it was within a couple of
+hundred yards of us.
+
+Following Marama we climbed the sloping path which ran up the cliff
+and ascended a knoll whence we could see the lake and the cone of the
+volcano in its centre. At least we used to be able to see this cone, but
+now, at any rate with the naked eye, we could make out nothing, except a
+small brown spot in the midst of the waters of the lake.
+
+"The mountain which rose up many feet in that storm which brought you to
+Orofena, Friend-from-the-Sea, has now sunk till only the very top of it
+is to be seen," said Marama solemnly. "Even the Rock of Offerings has
+vanished beneath the water, and with it the house that we built for
+you."
+
+"Yes," I said, affecting no surprise. "But when did that happen?"
+
+"Five nights ago the world shook, Friend-from-the-Sea, and when the sun
+rose we saw that the mouth of the cave which appeared on the day of your
+coming, had vanished, and that the holy mountain itself had sunk deep,
+so that now only the crest of it is left above the water."
+
+"Such things happen," I replied carelessly.
+
+"Yes, Friend-from-the-Sea. Like many other marvels they happen where you
+and your companions are. Therefore we beg you who can arise out of the
+earth like spirits, to leave us at once before our island and all of us
+who dwell thereon are drowned beneath the ocean. Leave us before we kill
+you, if indeed you be men, or die at your hands if, as we think, you be
+evil spirits who can throw up mountains and drag them down, and create
+gods that slay, and move about in the bowels of the world."
+
+"That is our intention, for our business here is done," I answered
+calmly. "Come now and help us to depart. But first bring us food. Bring
+it in plenty, for we must victual our boat."
+
+Marama bowed and issued the necessary orders. Indeed food sufficient for
+our immediate needs was already there as an offering, and of it we ate
+with thankfulness.
+
+Then we boarded the ship and examined the lifeboat. Thanks to our
+precautions it was still in very fair order and only needed some little
+caulking which we did with grass fibre and pitch from the stores. After
+this with the help of the Orofenans who worked hard in their desperate
+desire to be rid of us, we drew the boat into the sea, and provisioned
+her with stores from the ship, and with an ample supply of water.
+Everything being ready at last, we waited for the evening wind which
+always blew off shore, to start. As it was not due for half an hour or
+more, I walked back to the tree under which we had slept and tried to
+find the hole whence we had emerged from the tunnel on to the face of
+the cliff.
+
+My hurried search proved useless. The declivity of the cliff was covered
+with tropical growth, and the heavy rain had washed away every trace of
+our descent, and very likely filled the hole itself with earth. At any
+rate, of it I could discover nothing. Then as the breeze began to blow
+I returned to the boat and here bade adieu to Marama, who gave me his
+feather cloak as a farewell gift.
+
+"Good-bye, Friend-from-the-Sea," he said to me. "We are glad to have
+seen you and thank you for many things. But we do not wish to see you
+any more."
+
+"Good-bye, Marama," I answered. "What you say, we echo. At least you
+have now no great lump upon your neck and we have rid you of your
+wizards. But beware of the god Oro who dwells in the mountain, for if
+you anger him he will sink your island beneath the sea."
+
+"And remember all that I have taught you," shouted Bastin.
+
+Marama shivered, though whether at the mention of the god Oro, of whose
+powers the Orofenans had so painful a recollection, or at the result of
+Bastin's teachings, I do not know. And that was the last we shall ever
+see of each other in this world.
+
+The island faded behind us and, sore at heart because of all that we had
+found and lost again, for three days we sailed northward with a fair
+and steady wind. On the fourth evening by an extraordinary stroke of
+fortune, we fell in with an American tramp steamer, trading from the
+South Sea Islands to San Francisco. To the captain, who treated us very
+kindly, we said simply that we were a party of Englishmen whose yacht
+had been wrecked on a small island several hundreds of miles away, of
+which we knew neither the name, if it had one, nor the position.
+
+This story was accepted without question, for such things often happen
+in those latitudes, and in due course we were landed at San Francisco,
+where we made certain depositions before the British Consul as to the
+loss of the yacht Star of the South. Then we crossed America, having
+obtained funds by cable, and sailed for England in a steamer flying the
+flag of the United States.
+
+Of the great war which made this desirable I do not speak since it
+has nothing, or rather little, to do with this history. In the end
+we arrived safely at Liverpool, and thence travelled to our homes in
+Devonshire.
+
+
+Thus ended the history of our dealings with Oro, the super-man who began
+his life more than two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and with
+his daughter, Yva, whom Bastin still often calls the Glittering Lady.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVII. Bastin Discovers a Resemblance
+
+
+There is little more to tell.
+
+Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman,
+volunteered for service at the front and departed in the uniform of the
+R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin
+how much better it was in such a national emergency as existed, to
+belong to a profession in which a man could do something to help the
+bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the common cause, than
+to one like his in which it was only possible to pelt them with vain
+words.
+
+"You think that, do you, Bickley?" answered Bastin. "Well, I hold that
+it is better to heal souls than bodies, because, as even you will have
+learned out there in Orofena, they last so much longer."
+
+"I am not certain that I learned anything of the sort," said Bickley,
+"or even that Oro was more than an ordinary old man. He said that he
+had lived a thousand years, but what was there to prove this except his
+word, which is worth nothing?"
+
+"There was the Lady Yva's word also, which is worth a great deal,
+Bickley."
+
+"Yes, but she may have meant a thousand moons. Further, as according
+to her own showing she was still quite young, how could she know her
+father's age?"
+
+"Quite so, Bickley. But all she actually said was that she was of the
+same age as one of our women of twenty-seven, which may have meant two
+hundred and seventy for all I know. However, putting that aside you
+will admit that they had both slept for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years."
+
+"I admit that they slept, Bastin, because I helped to awaken them, but
+for how long there is nothing to show, except those star maps which are
+probably quite inaccurate."
+
+"They are not inaccurate," I broke in, "for I have had them checked by
+leading astronomers who say that they show a marvelous knowledge of the
+heavens as these were two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and are
+today."
+
+Here I should state that those two metal maps and the ring which I gave
+to Yva and found again after the catastrophe, were absolutely the only
+things connected with her or with Oro that we brought away with us.
+The former I would never part with, feeling their value as evidence.
+Therefore, when we descended to the city Nyo and the depths beneath,
+I took them with me wrapped in cloth in my pocket. Thus they were
+preserved. Everything else went when the Rock of Offerings and the cave
+mouth sank beneath the waters of the lake.
+
+This may have happened either in the earth tremor, which no doubt
+was caused by the advance of the terrific world-balance, or when the
+electric power, though diffused and turned by Yva's insulated body,
+struck the great gyroscope's travelling foot with sufficient strength,
+not to shift it indeed on to the right-hand path as Oro had designed,
+but still to cause it to stagger and even perhaps to halt for the
+fraction of a second. Even this pause may have been enough to cause
+convulsions of the earth above; indeed, I gathered from Marama and other
+Orofenans that such convulsions had occurred on and around the island
+at what must have corresponded with that moment of the loosing of the
+force.
+
+This loss of our belongings in the house of the Rock of Offerings was
+the more grievous because among them were some Kodak photographs which
+I had taken, including portraits of Oro and one of Yva that was really
+excellent, to say nothing of pictures of the mouth of the cave and of
+the ruins and crater lake above. How bitterly I regret that I did not
+keep these photographs in my pocket with the map-plates.
+
+"Even if the star-maps are correct, still it proves nothing," said
+Bickley, "since possibly Oro's astronomical skill might have enabled
+him to draw that of the sky at any period, though I allow this is
+impossible."
+
+"I doubt his taking so much trouble merely to deceive three wanderers
+who lacked the knowledge even to check them," I said. "But all this
+misses the point, Bickley. However long they had slept, that man and
+woman did arise from seeming death. They did dwell in those marvelous
+caves with their evidences of departed civilisations, and they did show
+us that fearful, world-wandering gyroscope. These things we saw."
+
+"I admit that we saw them, Arbuthnot, and I admit that they are one and
+all beyond human comprehension. To that extent I am converted, and, I
+may add, humbled," said Bickley.
+
+"So you ought to be," exclaimed Bastin, "seeing that you always swore
+that there was nothing in the world that is not capable of a perfectly
+natural explanation."
+
+"Of which all these things may be capable, Bastin, if only we held the
+key."
+
+"Very well, Bickley, but how do you explain what the Lady Yva did? I may
+tell you now what she commanded me to conceal at the time, namely, that
+she became a Christian; so much so that by her own will, I baptised and
+confirmed her on the very morning of her sacrifice. Doubtless it was
+this that changed her heart so much that she became willing, of course
+without my knowledge, to leave everything she cared for," here he looked
+hard at me, "and lay down her life to save the world, half of which she
+believed was about to be drowned by Oro. Now, considering her history
+and upbringing, I call this a spiritual marvel, much greater than any
+you now admit, and one you can't explain, Bickley."
+
+"No, I cannot explain, or, at any rate, I will not try," he answered,
+also staring hard at me. "Whatever she believed, or did not believe, and
+whatever would or would not have happened, she was a great and wonderful
+woman whose memory I worship."
+
+"Quite so, Bickley, and now perhaps you see my point, that what you
+describe as mere vain words may also be helpful to mankind; more so,
+indeed, than your surgical instruments and pills."
+
+"You couldn't convert Oro, anyway," exclaimed Bickley, with irritation.
+
+"No, Bickley; but then I have always understood that the devil is beyond
+conversion because he is beyond repentance. You see, I think that if
+that old scoundrel was not the devil himself, at any rate he was a
+bit of him, and, if I am right, I am not ashamed to have failed in his
+case."
+
+"Even Oro was not utterly bad, Bastin," I said, reflecting on certain
+traits of mercy that he had shown, or that I dreamed him to have shown
+in the course of our mysterious midnight journeys to various parts of
+the earth. Also I remembered that he had loved Tommy and for his sake
+had spared our lives. Lastly, I do not altogether wonder that he came to
+certain hasty conclusions as to the value of our modern civilisations.
+
+"I am very glad to hear it, Humphrey, since while there is a spark left
+the whole fire may burn up again, and I believe that to the Divine mercy
+there are no limits, though Oro will have a long road to travel before
+he finds it. And now I have something to say. It has troubled me very
+much that I was obliged to leave those Orofenans wandering in a kind of
+religious twilight."
+
+"You couldn't help that," said Bickley, "seeing that if you had stopped,
+by now you would have been wandering in religious light."
+
+"Still, I am not sure that I ought not to have stopped. I seem to have
+deserted a field that was open to me. However, it can't be helped, since
+it is certain that we could never find that island again, even if Oro
+has not sunk it beneath the sea, as he is quite capable of doing, to
+cover his tracks, so to speak. So I mean to do my best in another field
+by way of atonement."
+
+"You are not going to become a missionary?" I said.
+
+"No, but with the consent of the Bishop, who, I think, believes that my
+locum got on better in the parish than I do, as no doubt was the case,
+I, too, have volunteered for the Front, and been accepted as a chaplain
+of the 201st Division."
+
+"Why, that's mine!" said Bickley.
+
+"Is it? I am very glad, since now we shall be able to pursue our
+pleasant arguments and to do our best to open each other's minds."
+
+"You fellows are more fortunate than I am," I remarked. "I also
+volunteered, but they wouldn't take me, even as a Tommy, although I
+misstated my age. They told me, or at least a specialist whom I saw did
+afterwards, that the blow I got on the head from that sorcerer's boy--"
+
+"I know, I know!" broke in Bickley almost roughly. "Of course, things
+might go wrong at any time. But with care you may live to old age."
+
+"I am sorry to hear it," I said with a sigh, "at least I think I am.
+Meanwhile, fortunately there is much that I can do at home; indeed a
+course of action has been suggested to me by an old friend who is now in
+authority."
+
+
+Once more Bickley and Bastin in their war-stained uniforms were dining
+at my table and on the very night of their return from the Front, which
+was unexpected. Indeed Tommy nearly died of joy on hearing their voices
+in the hall. They, who played a worthy part in the great struggle,
+had much to tell me, and naturally their more recent experiences had
+overlaid to some extent those which we shared in the mysterious island
+of Orofena. Indeed we did not speak of these until, just as they were
+going away, Bastin paused beneath a very beautiful portrait of my late
+wife, the work of an artist famous for his power of bringing out the
+inner character, or what some might call the soul, of the sitter. He
+stared at it for a while in his short-sighted way, then said: "Do you
+know, Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more than
+at this moment, that although they were different in height and so on,
+there was a really curious physical resemblance between your late wife
+and the Lady Yva."
+
+"Yes," I answered. "I think so too."
+
+Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he did so I
+saw him start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
+
+Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life. It is, I
+admit, an odd story and one which suggests problems that I cannot solve.
+Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance which is the privilege
+and hall-mark of faith; Bickley disposes, or used to dispose, of them by
+a blank denial which carries no conviction, and least of all to himself.
+
+What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves learned?
+A round, short but still with time and to spare wherein to be dull and
+lonesome; a fateful treadmill to which we were condemned we know not
+how, but apparently through the casual passions of those who went before
+us and are now forgotten, causing us, as the Bible says, to be born in
+sin; up which we walk wearily we know not why, seeming never to make
+progress; off which we fall outworn we know not when or whither.
+
+Such upon the surface it appears to be, nor in fact does our ascertained
+knowledge, as Bickley would sum it up, take us much further. No prophet
+has yet arisen who attempted to define either the origin or the reasons
+of life. Even the very Greatest of them Himself is quite silent on this
+matter. We are tempted to wonder why. Is it because life as expressed in
+the higher of human beings, is, or will be too vast, too multiform and
+too glorious for any definition which we could understand? Is it
+because in the end it will involve for some, if not for all, majesty on
+unfathomed majesty, and glory upon unimaginable glory such as at present
+far outpass the limits of our thought?
+
+The experiences which I have recorded in these pages awake in my heart a
+hope that this may be so. Bastin is wont, like many others, to talk in
+a light fashion of Eternity without in the least comprehending what he
+means by that gigantic term. It is not too much to say that Eternity,
+something without beginning and without end, and involving, it
+would appear, an everlasting changelessness, is a state beyond
+human comprehension. As a matter of fact we mortals do not think in
+constellations, so to speak, or in aeons, but by the measures of our own
+small earth and of our few days thereon. We cannot really conceive of
+an existence stretching over even one thousand years, such as that
+which Oro claimed and the Bible accords to a certain early race of men,
+omitting of course his two thousand five hundred centuries of sleep. And
+yet what is this but one grain in the hourglass of time, one day in the
+lost record of our earth, of its sisters the planets and its father the
+sun, to say nothing of the universes beyond?
+
+It is because I have come in touch with a prolonged though perfectly
+finite existence of the sort, that I try to pass on the reflections
+which the fact of it awoke in me. There are other reflections connected
+with Yva and the marvel of her love and its various manifestations
+which arise also. But these I keep to myself. They concern the wonder of
+woman's heart, which is a microcosm of the hopes and fears and desires
+and despairs of this humanity of ours whereof from age to age she is the
+mother.
+
+HUMPHREY ARBUTHNOT.
+
+
+
+
+NOTE By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+Within about six months of the date on which he wrote the last words
+of this history of our joint adventures, my dear friend, Humphrey
+Arbuthnot, died suddenly, as I had foreseen that probably he would do,
+from the results of the injury he received in the island of Orofena.
+
+He left me the sole executor to his will, under which he divided his
+property into three parts. One third he bequeathed to me, one third
+(which is strictly tied up) to Bastin, and one third to be devoted,
+under my direction, to the advancement of Science.
+
+His end appears to have been instantaneous, resulting from an effusion
+of blood upon the brain. When I was summoned I found him lying dead by
+the writing desk in his library at Fulcombe Priory. He had been writing
+at the desk, for on it was a piece of paper on which appear these words:
+"I have seen her. I--" There the writing ends, not stating whom he
+thought he had seen in the moments of mental disturbance or delusion
+which preceded his decease.
+
+Save for certain verbal corrections, I publish this manuscript without
+comment as the will directs, only adding that it sets out our mutual
+experiences very faithfully, though Arbuthnot's deductions from them are
+not always my own.
+
+I would say also that I am contemplating another visit to the South Sea
+Islands, where I wish to make some further investigations. I dare
+say, however, that these will be barren of results, as the fountain of
+Life-water is buried for ever, nor, as I think, will any human being
+stand again in the Hades-like halls of Nyo. It is probable also that it
+would prove impossible to rediscover the island of Orofena, if indeed
+that volcanic land still remains above the waters of the deep.
+
+Now that he is a very wealthy man, Bastin talks of accompanying me for
+purposes quite different from my own, but on the whole I hope he will
+abandon this idea. I may add that when he learned of his unexpected
+inheritance he talked much of the "deceitfulness of riches," but that he
+has not as yet taken any steps to escape their golden snare. Indeed he
+now converses of his added "opportunities of usefulness," I gather in
+connection with missionary enterprise.
+
+
+J. R. BICKLEY.
+
+
+P.S.--I forgot to state that the spaniel Tommy died within three days of
+his owner. The poor little beast was present in the room at the time
+of Arbuthnot's passing away, and when found seemed to be suffering from
+shock. From that moment Tommy refused food and finally was discovered
+quite dead and lying by the body on Marama's feather cloak, which
+Arbuthnot often used as a dressing-gown. As Bastin raised some religious
+objections, I arranged without his knowledge that the dog's ashes should
+rest not far from those of the master and mistress whom it loved so
+well.
+
+J.R.B.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHEN THE WORLD SHOOK ***
+
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diff --git a/old/old/wtwsh10.txt b/old/old/wtwsh10.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..22c8881
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/old/wtwsh10.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,14256 @@
+*The Project Gutenberg Etext of When the World Shook by Haggard*
+#3 in our series by H. Rider Haggard
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+When the World Shook
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+Being an Account of the Great Adventure
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+by H. Rider Haggard
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+*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
+
+
+
+
+
+Created by Anthony Matonak, amatonak@flash.net
+
+
+
+
+
+When the World Shook
+
+Being an Account of the Great Adventure
+of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
+
+by H. Rider Haggard
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+Ditchingham, 1918.
+MY DEAR CURZON,
+
+More than thirty years ago you tried to protect me, then a
+stranger to you, from one of the falsest and most malignant
+accusations ever made against a writer.
+
+So complete was your exposure of the methods of those at work
+to blacken a person whom they knew to be innocent, that, as you
+will remember, they refused to publish your analysis which
+destroyed their charges and, incidentally, revealed their
+motives.
+
+Although for this reason vindication came otherwise, your
+kindness is one that I have never forgotten, since, whatever the
+immediate issue of any effort, in the end it is the intention
+that avails.
+
+Therefore in gratitude and memory I ask you to accept this
+romance, as I know that you do not disdain the study of romance
+in the intervals of your Imperial work.
+
+The application of its parable to our state and possibilities--
+beneath or beyond these glimpses of the moon--I leave to your
+discernment.
+
+
+Believe me,
+Ever sincerely yours,
+H. RIDER HAGGARD.
+
+
+
+
+To
+The Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G.
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+ 1.  ARBUTHNOT DESCRIBES HIMSELF
+
+ 2.  BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+ 3.  NATALIE
+
+ 4.  DEATH AND DEPARTURE
+
+ 5.  THE CYCLONE
+
+ 6.  LAND
+
+ 7.  THE OROFENANS
+
+ 8.  BASTIN ATTEMPTS THE MARTYR'S CROWN
+
+ 9.  THE ISLAND IN THE LAKE
+
+10.  THE DWELLERS IN THE TOMB
+
+11.  RESURRECTION
+
+12.  TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND YEARS!
+
+13.  ORO SPEAKS AND BASTIN ARGUES
+
+14.  THE UNDER-WORLD
+
+15.  ORO IN HIS HOUSE
+
+16.  VISIONS OF THE PAST
+
+17.  YVA EXPLAINS
+
+18.  THE ACCIDENT
+
+19.  THE PROPOSALS OF BASTIN AND BICKLEY
+
+20.  ORO AND ARBUTHNOT TRAVEL BY NIGHT
+
+21.  LOVE'S ETERNAL ALTAR
+
+22.  THE COMMAND
+
+23.  IN THE TEMPLE OF FATE
+
+24.  THE CHARIOT OF THE PIT
+
+25.  SACRIFICE
+
+26.  TOMMY
+
+27.  BASTIN DISCOVERS A RESEMBLANCE
+
+28.  NOTE BY J. R. BICKLEY, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+When the World Shook
+
+
+
+Chapter I
+
+Arbuthnot Describes Himself
+
+
+I suppose that I, Humphrey Arbuthnot, should begin this history
+in which Destiny has caused me to play so prominent a part, with
+some short account of myself and of my circumstances.
+
+I was born forty years ago in this very Devonshire village in
+which I write, but not in the same house. Now I live in the
+Priory, an ancient place and a fine one in its way, with its
+panelled rooms, its beautiful gardens where, in this mild
+climate, in addition to our own, flourish so many plants which
+one would only expect to find in countries that lie nearer to the
+sun, and its green, undulating park studded with great timber
+trees. The view, too, is perfect; behind and around the rich
+Devonshire landscape with its hills and valleys and its scarped
+faces of red sandstone, and at a distance in front, the sea.
+There are little towns quite near too, that live for the most
+part on visitors, but these are so hidden away by the contours of
+the ground that from the Priory one cannot see them. Such is
+Fulcombe where I live, though for obvious reasons I do not give
+it its real name.
+
+Many years ago my father, the Rev. Humphrey Arbuthnot, whose
+only child I am, after whom also I am named Humphrey, was the
+vicar of this place with which our family is said to have some
+rather vague hereditary connection. If so, it was severed in the
+Carolian times because my ancestors fought on the side of
+Parliament.
+
+My father was a recluse, and a widower, for my mother, a
+Scotswoman, died at or shortly after my birth. Being very High
+Church for those days he was not popular with the family that
+owned the Priory before me. Indeed its head, a somewhat vulgar
+person of the name of Enfield who had made money in trade, almost
+persecuted him, as he was in a position to do, being the local
+magnate and the owner of the rectorial tithes.
+
+I mention this fact because owing to it as a boy I made up my
+mind that one day I would buy that place and sit in his seat, a
+wild enough idea at the time. Yet it became engrained in me, as
+do such aspirations of our youth, and when the opportunity arose
+in after years I carried it out. Poor old Enfield! He fell on
+evil fortunes, for in trying to bolster up a favourite son who
+was a gambler, a spendthrift, and an ungrateful scamp, in the end
+he was practically ruined and when the bad times came, was forced
+to sell the Fulcombe estate. I think of him kindly now, for after
+all he was good to me and gave me many a day's shooting and leave
+to fish for trout in the river.
+
+By the poor people, however, of all the district round, for the
+parish itself is very small, my father was much beloved, although
+he did practise confession, wear vestments and set lighted
+candles on the altar, and was even said to have openly expressed
+the wish, to which however he never attained, that he could see a
+censer swinging in the chancel. Indeed the church which, as monks
+built it, is very large and fine, was always full on Sundays,
+though many of the worshippers came from far away, some of them
+doubtless out of curiosity because of its papistical repute, also
+because, in a learned fashion, my father's preaching was very
+good indeed.
+
+For my part I feel that I owe much to these High-Church views.
+They opened certain doors to me and taught me something of the
+mysteries which lie at the back of all religions and therefore
+have their home in the inspired soul of man whence religions are
+born. Only the pity is that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred
+he never discovers, never even guesses at that entombed
+aspiration, never sinks a shaft down on to this secret but most
+precious vein of ore.
+
+I have said that my father was learned; but this is a mild
+description, for never did I know anyone quite so learned. He was
+one of those men who is so good all round that he became
+pre-eminent in nothing. A classic of the first water, a very
+respectable mathematician, an expert in theology, a student of
+sundry foreign languages and literature in his lighter moments,
+an inquirer into sociology, a theoretical musician though his
+playing of the organ excruciated most people because it was too
+correct, a really first-class authority upon flint instruments
+and the best grower of garden vegetables in the county, also of
+apples--such were some of his attainments. That was what made his
+sermons so popular, since at times one or the other of these
+subjects would break out into them, his theory being that God
+spoke to us through all of these things.
+
+But if I began to drift into an analysis of my father's
+abilities, I should never stop. It would take a book to describe
+them. And yet mark this, with them all his name is as dead to the
+world to-day as though he had never been. Light reflected from a
+hundred facets dissipates itself in space and is lost; that
+concentrated in one tremendous ray pierces to the stars.
+
+Now I am going to be frank about myself, for without frankness
+what is the value of such a record as this? Then it becomes
+simply another convention, or rather conventional method of
+expressing the octoroon kind of truths with which the highly
+civilised races feed themselves, as fastidious ladies eat cakes
+and bread from which all but the smallest particle of nourishment
+has been extracted.
+
+The fact is, therefore, that I inherited most of my father's
+abilities, except his love for flint instruments which always
+bored me to distraction, because although they are by association
+really the most human of things, somehow to me they never convey
+any idea of humanity. In addition I have a practical side which
+he lacked; had he possessed it surely he must have become an
+archbishop instead of dying the vicar of an unknown parish. Also
+I have a spiritual sense, mayhap mystical would be a better term,
+which with all this religion was missing from my father's nature.
+
+For I think that notwithstanding his charity and devotion he
+never quite got away from the shell of things, never cracked it
+and set his teeth in the kernel which alone can feed our souls.
+His keen intellect, to take an example, recognised every one of
+the difficulties of our faith and flashed hither and thither in
+the darkness, seeking explanation, seeking light, trying to
+reconcile, to explain. He was not great enough to put all this
+aside and go straight to the informing Soul beneath that strives
+to express itself everywhere, even through those husks which are
+called the World, the Flesh and the Devil, and as yet does not
+always quite succeed.
+
+It is this boggling over exteriors, this peering into pitfalls,
+this desire to prove that what such senses as we have tell us is
+impossible, is in fact possible, which causes the overthrow of
+many an earnest, seeking heart and renders its work, conducted on
+false lines, quite nugatory. These will trust to themselves and
+their own intelligence and not be content to spring from the
+cliffs of human experience into the everlasting arms of that
+Infinite which are stretched out to receive them and to give them
+rest and the keys of knowledge. When will man learn what was
+taught to him of old, that faith is the only plank wherewith he
+can float upon this sea and that his miserable works avail him
+nothing; also that it is a plank made of many sorts of wood,
+perhaps to suit our different weights?
+
+So to be honest, in a sense I believe myself to be my father's
+superior, and I know that he agreed with me. Perhaps this is
+owing to the blood of my Scotch mother which mixed well with his
+own; perhaps because the essential spirit given to me, though
+cast in his mould, was in fact quite different--or of another
+alloy. Do we, I wonder, really understand that there are millions
+and billions of these alloys, so many indeed that Nature, or
+whatever is behind Nature, never uses the same twice over? That
+is why no two human beings are or ever will be quite identical.
+Their flesh, the body of their humiliation, is identical in all,
+any chemist will prove it to you, but that which animates the
+flesh is distinct and different because it comes from the home of
+that infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate
+evolution of the good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and
+hell.
+
+Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another
+advantage over my father, which certainly came to me from my
+mother, who was, as I judge from all descriptions and such
+likenesses as remain of her, an extremely handsome woman. I was
+born much better looking. He was small and dark, a little man
+with deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also dark, but tall
+above the average, and well made. I do not know that I need say
+more about my personal appearance, to me not a very attractive
+subject, but the fact remains that they called me "handsome
+Humphrey" at the University, and I was the captain of my college
+boat and won many prizes at athletic sports when I had time to
+train for them.
+
+Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because
+he knew that he could do it better than anyone else, and partly
+to save school expenses. The experiment was very successful, as my
+love of all outdoor sports and of any small hazardous adventure
+that came to my hand, also of associating with fisherfolk whom
+the dangers of the deep make men among men, saved me from
+becoming a milksop. For the rest I learned more from my father,
+whom I always desired to please because I loved him, than I
+should have done at the best and most costly of schools. This was
+shown when at last I went to college with a scholarship, for
+there I did very well indeed, as search would still reveal.
+
+Here I had better set out some of my shortcomings, which in
+their sum have made a failure of me. Yes, a failure in the
+highest sense, though I trust what Stevenson calls "a faithful
+failure." These have their root in fastidiousness and that lack
+of perseverance, which really means a lack of faith, again using
+the word in its higher and wider sense. For if one had real faith
+one would always persevere, knowing that in every work undertaken
+with high aim, there is an element of nobility, however humble
+and unrecognised that work may seem to be. God after all is the
+God of Work, it is written large upon the face of the Universe. I
+will not expand upon the thought; it would lead me too far
+afield, but those who have understanding will know what I mean.
+
+As regards what I interpret as fastidiousness, this is not very
+easy to express. Perhaps a definition will help. I am like a man
+with an over-developed sense of smell, who when walking through a
+foreign city, however clean and well kept, can always catch the
+evil savours that are inseparable from such cities. More, his
+keen perception of them interferes with all other perceptions and
+spoils his walks. The result is that in after years, whenever he
+thinks of that beautiful city, he remembers, not its historic
+buildings or its wide boulevards, or whatever it has to boast,
+but rather its ancient, fish-like smell. At least he remembers
+that first owing to this defect in his temperament.
+
+So it is with everything. A lovely woman is spoiled for such a
+one because she eats too much or has too high a voice; he does
+not care for his shooting because the scenery is flat, or for his
+fishing because the gnats bite as well as the trout. In short he
+is out of tune with the world as it is. Moreover, this is a
+quality which, where it exists, cannot be overcome; it affects
+day-labourers as well as gentlemen at large. It is bred in the
+bone.
+
+Probably the second failure-breeding fault, lack of
+perseverance, has its roots in the first, at any rate in my case.
+At least on leaving college with some reputation, I was called to
+the Bar where, owing to certain solicitor and other connections,
+I had a good opening. Also, owing to the excellence of my memory
+and powers of work, I began very well, making money even during
+my first year. Then, as it happened, a certain case came my way
+and, my leader falling ill suddenly after it was opened, was left
+in my hands. The man whose cause I was pleading was, I think, one
+of the biggest scoundrels it is possible to conceive. It was a
+will case and if he won, the effect would be to beggar two most
+estimable middle-aged women who were justly entitled to the
+property, to which end personally I am convinced he had committed
+forgery; the perjury that accompanied it I do not even mention.
+
+Well, he did win, thanks to me, and the estimable middle-aged
+ladies were beggared, and as I heard afterwards, driven to such
+extremities that one of them died of her misery and the other
+became a lodging-house keeper. The details do not matter, but I
+may explain that these ladies were unattractive in appearance and
+manner and broke down beneath my cross-examination which made
+them appear to be telling falsehoods, whereas they were only
+completely confused. Further, I invented an ingenious theory of
+the facts which, although the judge regarded it with suspicion,
+convinced an unusually stupid jury who gave me their verdict.
+
+Everybody congratulated me and at the time I was triumphant,
+especially as my leader had declared that our case was
+impossible. Afterwards, however, my conscience smote me sorely,
+so much so that arguing from the false premise of this business,
+I came to the conclusion that the practice of the Law was not
+suited to an honest man. I did not take the large view that such
+matters average themselves up and that if I had done harm in this
+instance, I might live to do good in many others, and perhaps
+become a just judge, even a great judge. Here I may mention that
+in after years, when I grew rich, I rescued that surviving old
+lady from her lodging-house, although to this day she does not
+know the name of her anonymous friend. So by degrees, without
+saying anything, for I kept on my chambers, I slipped out of
+practice, to the great disappointment of everybody connected with
+me, and took to authorship.
+
+A marvel came to pass, my first book was an enormous success.
+The whole world talked of it. A leading journal, delighted to
+have discovered someone, wrote it up; other journals followed
+suit to be in the movement. One of them, I remember, which had
+already dismissed it with three or four sneering lines, came out
+with a second and two-column notice. It sold like wildfire and I
+suppose had some merits, for it is still read, though few know
+that I wrote it, since fortunately it was published under a
+pseudonym.
+
+Again I was much elated and set to work to write another and,
+as I believe, a much better book. But jealousies had been excited
+by this leaping into fame of a totally unknown person, which
+were, moreover, accentuated through a foolish article that I
+published in answer to some criticisms, wherein I spoke my mind
+with an insane freedom and biting sarcasm. Indeed I was even mad
+enough to quote names and to give the example of the very
+powerful journal which at first carped at my work and then gushed
+over it when it became the fashion. All of this made me many
+bitter enemies, as I found out when my next book appeared.
+
+It was torn to shreds, it was reviled as subversive of morality
+and religion, good arrows in those days. It was called puerile,
+half-educated stuff--I half-educated! More, an utterly false
+charge of plagiarism was cooked up against me and so well and
+venomously run that vast numbers of people concluded that I was a
+thief of the lowest order. Lastly, my father, from whom the
+secret could no longer be kept, sternly disapproved of both these
+books which I admit were written from a very radical and somewhat
+anti-church point of view. The result was our first quarrel and
+before it was made up, he died suddenly.
+
+
+Now again fastidiousness and my lack of perseverance did their
+work, and solemnly I swore that I would never write another book,
+an oath which I have kept till this moment, at least so far as
+publication is concerned, and now break only because I consider
+it my duty so to do and am not animated by any pecuniary object.
+
+Thus came to an end my second attempt at carving out a career.
+By now I had grown savage and cynical, rather revengeful also, I
+fear. Knowing myself to possess considerable abilities in sundry
+directions, I sat down, as it were, to think things over and
+digest my past experiences. Then it was that the truth of a very
+ancient adage struck upon my mind, namely, that money is power.
+Had I sufficient money I could laugh at unjust critics for
+example; indeed they or their papers would scarcely dare to
+criticise me for fear lest it should be in my power to do them a
+bad turn. Again I could follow my own ideas in life and perhaps
+work good in the world, and live in such surroundings as
+commended themselves to me. It was as clear as daylight, but--how
+to make the money?
+
+I had some capital as the result of my father's death, about
+�8,000 in all, plus a little more that my two books had brought
+in. In what way could I employ it to the best advantage? I
+remembered that a cousin of my father and therefore my own, was a
+successful stock-broker, also that there had been some affection
+between them. I went to him, he was a good, easy-natured man who
+was frankly glad to see me, and offered to put �5,000 into his
+business, for I was not minded to risk every thing I had, if he
+would give me a share in the profits. He laughed heartily at my
+audacity.
+
+"Why, my boy," he said, "being totally inexperienced at this
+game, you might lose us more than that in a month. But I like
+your courage, I like your courage, and the truth is that I do
+want help. I will think it over and write to you."
+
+He thought it over and in the end offered to try me for a year
+at a fixed salary with a promise of some kind of a partnership if
+I suited him. Meanwhile my �5,000 remained in my pocket.
+
+I accepted, not without reluctance since with the impatience of
+youth I wanted everything at once. I worked hard in that office
+and soon mastered the business, for my knowledge of figures--I
+had taken a first-class mathematical degree at college--came to
+my aid, as in a way did my acquaintance with Law and Literature.
+Moreover I had a certain aptitude for what is called high
+finance. Further, Fortune, as usual, showed me a favourable face.
+
+In one year I got the partnership with a small share in the
+large profits of the business. In two the partner above me
+retired, and I took his place with a third share of the firm. In
+three my cousin, satisfied that it was in able hands, began to
+cease his attendance at the office and betook himself to
+gardening which was his hobby. In four I paid him out altogether,
+although to do this I had to borrow money on our credit, for by
+agreement the title of the firm was continued. Then came that
+extraordinary time of boom which many will remember to their
+cost. I made a bold stroke and won. On a certain Saturday when
+the books were made up, I found that after discharging all
+liabilities, I should not be worth more than �20,000. On the
+following Saturday but two when the books were made up, I was
+worth �153,000! L'appetit vient en mangeant. It seemed nothing
+to me when so many were worth millions.
+
+For the next year I worked as few have done, and when I struck
+a balance at the end of it, I found that on the most conservative
+estimate I was the owner of a million and a half in hard cash, or
+its equivalent. I was so tired out that I remember this discovery
+did not excite me at all. I felt utterly weary of all wealth-
+hunting and of the City and its ways. Moreover my old
+fastidiousness and lack of perseverance re-asserted themselves. I
+reflected, rather late in the day perhaps, on the ruin that this
+speculation was bringing to thousands, of which some lamentable
+instances had recently come to my notice, and once more
+considered whether it were a suitable career for an upright man.
+I had wealth; why should I not take it and enjoy life?
+
+Also--and here my business acumen came in, I was sure that
+these times could not last. It is easy to make money on a rising
+market, but when it is falling the matter is very different. In
+five minutes I made up my mind. I sent for my junior partners,
+for I had taken in two, and told them that I intended to retire
+at once. They were dismayed both at my loss, for really I was the
+firm, and because, as they pointed out, if I withdrew all my
+capital, there would not be sufficient left to enable them to
+carry on.
+
+One of them, a blunt and honest man, said to my face that it
+would be dishonourable of me to do so. I was inclined to answer
+him sharply, then remembered that his words were true.
+
+"Very well," I said, "I will leave you �600,000 on which you
+shall pay me five per cent interest, but no share of the
+profits."
+
+On these terms we dissolved the partnership and in a year they
+had lost the �600,000, for the slump came with a vengeance. It
+saved them, however, and to-day they are earning a reasonable
+income. But I have never asked them for that �600,000.
+
+
+
+Chapter II
+
+Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+Behold me once more a man without an occupation, but now the
+possessor of about �900,000. It was a very considerable fortune,
+if not a large one in England; nothing like the millions of which
+I had dreamed, but still enough. To make the most of it and to
+be sure that it remained, I invested it very well, mostly in
+large mortgages at four per cent which, if the security is good,
+do not depreciate in capital value. Never again did I touch a
+single speculative stock, who desired to think no more about
+money. It was at this time that I bought the Fulcombe property.
+It cost me about �120,000 of my capital, or with alterations,
+repairs, etc., say �150,000, on which sum it may pay a net two
+and a half per cent, not more.
+
+This �3,700 odd I have always devoted to the upkeep of the
+place, which is therefore in first-rate order. The rest I live
+on, or save.
+
+These arrangements, with the beautifying and furnishing of the
+house and the restoration of the church in memory of my father,
+occupied and amused me for a year or so, but when they were
+finished time began to hang heavy on my hands. What was the use
+of possessing about �20,000 a year when there was nothing upon
+which it could be spent? For after all my own wants were few and
+simple and the acquisition of valuable pictures and costly
+furniture is limited by space. Oh! in my small way I was like
+the weary King Ecclesiast. For I too made me great works and had
+possessions of great and small cattle (I tried farming and lost
+money over it!) and gathered me silver and gold and the peculiar
+treasure of kings, which I presume means whatever a man in
+authority chiefly desires, and so forth. But "behold all was
+vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the
+sun."
+
+So, notwithstanding my wealth and health and the deference
+which is the rich man's portion, especially when the limit of his
+riches is not known, it came about that I too "hated life," and
+this when I was not much over thirty. I did not know what to do;
+for Society as the word is generally understood, I had no taste;
+it bored me; horse-racing and cards I loathed, who had already
+gambled too much on a big scale. The killing of creatures under
+the name of sport palled upon me, indeed I began to doubt if it
+were right, while the office of a junior county magistrate in a
+place where there was no crime, only occupied me an hour or two a
+month.
+
+Lastly my neighbours were few and with all due deference to
+them, extremely dull. At least I could not understand them
+because in them there did not seem to be anything to understand,
+and I am quite certain that they did not understand me. More,
+when they came to learn that I was radical in my views and had
+written certain "dreadful" and somewhat socialistic books in the
+form of fiction, they both feared and mistrusted me as an enemy
+to their particular section of the race. As I had not married and
+showed no inclination to do so, their womenkind also, out of
+their intimate knowledge, proclaimed that I led an immoral life,
+though a little reflection would have shown them that there was
+no one in the neighbourhood which for a time I seldom left, who
+could possibly have tempted an educated creature to such courses.
+
+Terrible is the lot of a man who, while still young and
+possessing the intellect necessary to achievement, is deprived of
+all ambition. And I had none at all. I did not even wish to
+purchase a peerage or a baronetcy in this fashion or in that,
+and, as in my father's case, my tastes were so many and so
+catholic that I could not lose myself in any one of them. They
+never became more than diversions to me. A hobby is only really
+amusing when it becomes an obsession.
+
+At length my lonesome friendlessness oppressed me so much that
+I took steps to mitigate it. In my college life I had two
+particular friends whom I think I must have selected because
+they were so absolutely different from myself.
+
+They were named Bastin and Bickley. Bastin--Basil was his
+Christian name--was an uncouth, shock-headed, flat-footed person
+of large, rugged frame and equally rugged honesty, with a mind
+almost incredibly simple. Nothing surprised him because he lacked
+the faculty of surprise. He was like that kind of fish which lies
+at the bottom of the sea and takes every kind of food into its
+great maw without distinguishing its flavour. Metaphorically
+speaking, heavenly manna and decayed cabbage were just the same
+to Bastin. He was not fastidious and both were mental pabulum--of
+a sort--together with whatever lay between these extremes. Yet he
+was good, so painfully good that one felt that without exertion
+to himself he had booked a first-class ticket straight to Heaven;
+indeed that his guardian angel had tied it round his neck at
+birth lest he should lose it, already numbered and dated like an
+identification disc.
+
+I am bound to add that Bastin never went wrong because he never
+felt the slightest temptation to do so. This I suppose
+constitutes real virtue, since, in view of certain Bible sayings,
+the person who is tempted and would like to yield to the
+temptation, is equally a sinner with the person who does yield.
+To be truly good one should be too good to be tempted, or too
+weak to make the effort worth the tempter's while--in short not
+deserving of his powder and shot.
+
+I need hardly add that Bastin went into the Church; indeed, he
+could not have gone anywhere else; it absorbed him naturally, as
+doubtless Heaven will do in due course. Only I think it likely
+that until they get to know him he will bore the angels so much
+that they will continually move him up higher. Also if they have
+any susceptibilities left, probably he will tread upon their
+toes--an art in which I never knew his equal. However, I always
+loved Bastin, perhaps because no one else did, a fact of which he
+remained totally unconscious, or perhaps because of his brutal
+way of telling one what he conceived to be the truth, which, as
+he had less imagination than a dormouse, generally it was not.
+For if the truth is a jewel, it is one coloured and veiled by
+many different lights and atmospheres.
+
+It only remains to add that he was learned in his theological
+fashion and that among his further peculiarities were the slow,
+monotonous voice in which he uttered his views in long sentences,
+and his total indifference to adverse argument however sound and
+convincing.
+
+My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different
+character. Like Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced
+another way. If Bastin's omnivorous throat could swallow a camel,
+especially a theological camel, Bickley's would strain at the
+smallest gnat, especially a theological gnat. The very best and
+most upright of men, yet he believed in nothing that he could not
+taste, see or handle. He was convinced, for instance, that man is
+a brute-descended accident and no more, that what we call the
+soul or the mind is produced by a certain action of the grey
+matter of the brain; that everything apparently inexplicable has
+a perfectly mundane explanation, if only one could find it; that
+miracles certainly never did happen, and never will; that all
+religions are the fruit of human hopes and fears and the most
+convincing proof of human weakness; that notwithstanding our
+infinite variations we are the subjects of Nature's single law
+and the victims of blind, black and brutal chance.
+
+Such was Bickley with his clever, well-cut face that always
+reminded me of a cameo, and thoughtful brow; his strong, capable
+hands and his rather steely mouth, the mere set of which
+suggested controversy of an uncompromising kind. Naturally as the
+Church had claimed Bastin, so medicine claimed Bickley.
+
+Now as it happened the man who succeeded my father as vicar of
+Fulcombe was given a better living and went away shortly after I
+had purchased the place and with it the advowson. Just at this
+time also I received a letter written in the large, sprawling
+hand of Bastin from whom I had not heard for years. It went
+straight to the point, saying that he, Bastin, had seen in a
+Church paper that the last incumbent had resigned the living of
+Fulcombe which was in my gift. He would therefore be obliged if I
+would give it to him as the place he was at in Yorkshire did not
+suit his wife's health.
+
+Here I may state that afterwards I learned that what did not
+suit Mrs. Bastin was the organist, who was pretty. She was by
+nature a woman with a temperament so insanely jealous that
+actually she managed to be suspicious of Bastin, whom she had
+captured in an unguarded moment when he was thinking of something
+else and who would as soon have thought of even looking at any
+woman as he would of worshipping Baal. As a matter of fact it
+took him months to know one female from another. Except as
+possible providers of subscriptions and props of Mothers'
+Meetings, women had no interest for him.
+
+To return--with that engaging honesty which I have mentioned--
+Bastin's letter went on to set out all his own disabilities,
+which, he added, would probably render him unsuitable for the
+place he desired to fill. He was a High Churchman, a fact which
+would certainly offend many; he had no claims to being a preacher
+although he was extraordinarily well acquainted with the writings
+of the Early Fathers. (What on earth had that to do with the
+question, I wondered.) On the other hand he had generally been
+considered a good visitor and was fond of walking (he meant to
+call on distant parishioners, but did not say so).
+
+Then followed a page and a half on the evils of the existing
+system of the presentation to livings by private persons, ending
+with the suggestion that I had probably committed a sin in buying
+this particular advowson in order to increase my local authority,
+that is, if I had bought it, a point on which he was ignorant.
+Finally he informed me that as he had to christen a sick baby
+five miles away on a certain moor and it was too wet for him to
+ride his bicycle, he must stop. And he stopped.
+
+There was, however, a P.S. to the letter, which ran as follows:
+
+"Someone told me that you were dead a few years ago, and of
+course it may be another man of the same name who owns Fulcombe.
+If so, no doubt the Post Office will send back this letter."
+
+That was his only allusion to my humble self in all those
+diffuse pages. It was a long while since I had received an
+epistle which made me laugh so much, and of course I gave him the
+living by return of post, and even informed him that I would
+increase its stipend to a sum which I considered suitable to the
+position.
+
+About ten days later I received another letter from Bastin
+which, as a scrawl on the flap of the envelope informed me, he
+had carried for a week in his pocket and forgotten to post.
+Except by inference it returned no thanks for my intended
+benefits. What it did say, however, was that he thought it wrong
+of me to have settled a matter of such spiritual importance in so
+great a hurry, though he had observed that rich men were nearly
+always selfish where their time was concerned. Moreover, he
+considered that I ought first to have made inquiries as to his
+present character and attainments, etc., etc.
+
+To this epistle I replied by telegraph to the effect that I
+should as soon think of making inquiries about the character of
+an archangel, or that of one of his High Church saints. This
+telegram, he told me afterwards, he considered unseemly and even
+ribald, especially as it had given great offence to the
+postmaster, who was one of the sidesmen in his church.
+
+Thus it came about that I appointed the Rev. Basil Bastin to
+the living of Fulcombe, feeling sure that he would provide me
+with endless amusement and act as a moral tonic and discipline.
+Also I appreciated the man's blunt candour. In due course he
+arrived, and I confess that after a few Sundays of experience I
+began to have doubts as to the wisdom of my choice, glad as I was
+to see him personally. His sermons at once bored me, and, when
+they did not send me to sleep, excited in me a desire for debate.
+How could he be so profoundly acquainted with mysteries before
+which the world had stood amazed for ages? Was there nothing too
+hot or too heavy in the spiritual way for him to dismiss in a few
+blundering and casual words, as he might any ordinary incident of
+every-day life, I wondered? Also his idea of High Church
+observances was not mine, or, I imagine, that of anybody else.
+But I will not attempt to set it out.
+
+His peculiarities, however, were easy to excuse and entirely
+swallowed up by the innate goodness of his nature which soon made
+him beloved of everyone in the place, for although he thought
+that probably most things were sins, I never knew him to discover
+a sin which he considered to be beyond the reach of forgiveness.
+Bastin was indeed a most charitable man and in his way
+wide-minded.
+
+The person whom I could not tolerate, however, was his wife,
+who, to my fancy, more resembled a vessel, a very unattractive
+vessel, full of vinegar than a woman. Her name was Sarah and she
+was small, plain, flat, sandy-haired and odious, quite obsessed,
+moreover, with her jealousies of the Rev. Basil, at whom it
+pleased her to suppose that every woman in the countryside under
+fifty was throwing herself.
+
+Here I will confess that to the best of my ability I took care
+that they did in outward seeming, that is, whenever she was
+present, instructing them to sit aside with him in darkened
+corners, to present him with flowers, and so forth. Several of
+them easily fell into the humour of the thing, and I have seen
+him depart from a dinner-party followed by that glowering Sarah,
+with a handful of rosebuds and violets, to say nothing of the
+traditional offerings of slippers, embroidered markers and the
+like. Well, it was my only way of coming even with her, which I
+think she knew, for she hated me poisonously.
+
+So much for Basil Bastin. Now for Bickley. Him I had met on
+several occasions since our college days, and after I was settled
+at the Priory from time to time I asked him to stay with me. At
+length he came, and I found out that he was not at all
+comfortable in his London practice which was of a nature
+uncongenial to him; further, that he did not get on with his
+partners. Then, after reflection, I made a suggestion to him. I
+pointed out that, owing to its popularity amongst seaside
+visitors, the neighbourhood of Fulcombe was a rising one, and
+that although there were doctors in it, there was no really
+first-class surgeon for miles.
+
+Now Bickley was a first-class surgeon, having held very high
+hospital appointments, and indeed still holding them. Why, I
+asked, should he not come and set up here on his own? I would
+appoint him doctor to the estate and also give him charge of a
+cottage hospital which I was endowing, with liberty to build and
+arrange it as he liked. Further, as I considered that it would be
+of great advantage to me to have a man of real ability within
+reach, I would guarantee for three years whatever income he was
+earning in London.
+
+He thanked me warmly and in the end acted on the idea, with
+startling results so far as his prospects were concerned. Very
+soon his really remarkable skill became known and he was earning
+more money than as an unmarried man he could possibly want.
+Indeed, scarcely a big operation took place at any town within
+twenty miles, and even much farther away, at which he was not
+called in to assist.
+
+Needless to say his advent was a great boon to me, for as he
+lived in a house I let him quite near by, whenever he had a spare
+evening he would drop in to dinner, and from our absolutely
+opposite standpoints we discussed all things human and divine.
+Thus I was enabled to sharpen my wits upon the hard steel of his
+clear intellect which was yet, in a sense, so limited.
+
+I must add that I never converted him to my way of thinking and
+he never converted me to his, any more than he converted Bastin,
+for whom, queerly enough, he had a liking. They pounded away at
+each other, Bickley frequently getting the best of it in the
+argument, and when at last Bastin rose to go, he generally made
+the same remark. It was:
+
+"It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your
+intellect so utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted
+you of error at least half a dozen times, and not to confess it
+is mere pigheadedness. Good night. I am sure that Sarah will be
+sitting up for me."
+
+"Silly old idiot!" Bickley would say, shaking his fist after
+him. "The only way to get him to see the truth would be to saw
+his head open and pour it in."
+
+Then we would both laugh.
+
+Such were my two most intimate friends, although I admit it was
+rather like the equator cultivating close relationships with the
+north and south poles. Certainly Bastin was as far from Bickley
+as those points of the earth are apart, while I. as it were, sat
+equally distant between the two. However, we were all very happy
+together, since in certain characters, there are few things that
+bind men more closely than profound differences of opinion.
+
+
+Now I must turn to my more personal affairs. After all, it is
+impossible for a man to satisfy his soul, if he has anything of
+the sort about him which in the remotest degree answers to that
+description, with the husks of wealth, luxury and indolence,
+supplemented by occasional theological and other arguments
+between his friends; Becoming profoundly convinced of this truth,
+I searched round for something to do and, like Noah's dove on the
+waste of waters, found nothing. Then I asked Bickley and Bastin
+for their opinions as to my best future course. Bickley proved a
+barren draw. He rubbed his nose and feebly suggested that I might
+go in for "research work," which, of course, only represented his
+own ambitions. I asked him indignantly how I could do such a
+thing without any scientific qualifications whatever. He admitted
+the difficulty, but replied that I might endow others who had the
+qualifications.
+
+"In short, become a mulch cow for sucking scientists," I
+replied, and broke off the conversation.
+
+Bastin's idea was, first, that I should teach in a Sunday
+School; secondly, that if this career did not satisfy all my
+aspirations, I might be ordained and become a missionary.
+
+On my rejection of this brilliant advice, he remarked that the
+only other thing he could think of was that I should get married
+and have a large family, which might possibly advantage the
+nation and ultimately enrich the Kingdom of Heaven, though of
+such things no one could be quite sure. At any rate, he was
+certain that at present I was in practice neglecting my duty,
+whatever it might be, and in fact one of those cumberers of the
+earth who, he observed in the newspaper he took in and read when
+he had time, were "very happily named--the idle rich."
+
+"Which reminds me," he added, "that the clothing-club finances
+are in a perfectly scandalous condition; in fact, it is �25 in
+debt, an amount that as the squire of the parish I consider it
+incumbent on you to make good, not as a charity but as an
+obligation."
+
+"Look here, my friend," I said, ignoring all the rest, "will
+you answer me a plain question? Have you found marriage such a
+success that you consider it your duty to recommend it to others?
+And if you have, why have you not got the large family of which
+you speak?"
+
+"Of course not," he replied with his usual frankness. "Indeed,
+it is in many ways so disagreeable that I am convinced it must be
+right and for the good of all concerned. As regards the family I
+am sure I do not know, but Sarah never liked babies, which
+perhaps has something to do with it."
+
+Then he sighed, adding, "You see, Arbuthnot, we have to take
+things as we find them in this world and hope for a better."
+
+"Which is just what I am trying to do, you unilluminating old
+donkey!" I exclaimed, and left him there shaking his head over
+matters in general, but I think principally over Sarah.
+
+By the way, I think that the villagers recognised this good
+lady's vinegary nature. At least, they used to call her "Sour
+Sal."
+
+
+
+Chapter III
+
+Natalie
+
+
+Now what Bastin had said about marriage stuck in my mind as his
+blundering remarks had a way of doing, perhaps because of the
+grain of honest truth with which they were often permeated.
+Probably in my position it was more or less my duty to marry. But
+here came the rub; I had never experienced any leanings that way.
+I was as much a man as others, more so than many are, perhaps,
+and I liked women, but at the same time they repelled me.
+
+My old fastidiousness came in; to my taste there was always
+something wrong about them. While they attracted one part of my
+nature they revolted another part, and on the whole I preferred
+to do without their intimate society, rather than work violence
+to this second and higher part of me. Moreover, quite at the
+beginning of my career I had concluded from observation that a
+man gets on better in life alone, rather than with another to
+drag at his side, or by whom perhaps he must be dragged. Still
+true marriage, such as most men and some women have dreamed of in
+their youth, had always been one of my ideals; indeed it was on
+and around this vision that I wrote that first book of mine which
+was so successful. Since I knew this to be unattainable in our
+imperfect conditions, however, notwithstanding Bastin's
+strictures, again I dismissed the whole matter from my mind as a
+vain imagination.
+
+As an alternative I reflected upon a parliamentary career which
+I was not too old to begin, and even toyed with one or two
+opportunities that offered themselves, as these do to men of
+wealth and advanced views. They never came to anything, for in
+the end I decided that Party politics were so hateful and so
+dishonest, that I could not bring myself to put my neck beneath
+their yoke. I was sure that if I tried to do so, I should fail
+more completely than I had done at the Bar and in Literature.
+Here, too, I am quite certain that I was right.
+
+The upshot of it all was that I sought refuge in that last
+expedient of weary Englishmen, travel, not as a globe-trotter,
+but leisurely and with an inquiring mind, learning much but again
+finding, like the ancient writer whom I have quoted already, that
+there is no new thing under the sun; that with certain variations
+it is the same thing over and over again.
+
+No, I will make an exception, the East did interest me
+enormously. There it was, at Benares, that I came into touch with
+certain thinkers who opened my eyes to a great deal. They
+released some hidden spring in my nature which hitherto had
+always been striving to break through the crust of our
+conventions and inherited ideas. I know now that what I was
+seeking was nothing less than the Infinite; that I had "immortal
+longings in me." I listened to all their solemn talk of epochs
+and years measureless to man, and reflected with a thrill that
+after all man might have his part in every one of them. Yes, that
+bird of passage as he seemed to be, flying out of darkness into
+darkness, still he might have spread his wings in the light of
+other suns millions upon millions of years ago, and might still
+spread them, grown radiant and glorious, millions upon millions
+of years hence in a time unborn.
+
+If only I could know the truth. Was Life (according to Bickley)
+merely a short activity bounded by nothingness before and behind;
+or (according to Bastin) a conventional golden-harped and haloed
+immortality, a word of which he did not in the least understand
+the meaning?
+
+Or was it something quite different from either of these,
+something vast and splendid beyond the reach of vision,
+something God-sent, beginning and ending in the Eternal Absolute
+and at last partaking of His attributes and nature and from aeon
+to aeon shot through with His light? And how was the truth to be
+learned? I asked my Eastern friends, and they talked vaguely of
+long ascetic preparation, of years upon years of learning, from
+whom I could not quite discover. I was sure it could not be from
+them, because clearly they did not know; they only passed on what
+they had heard elsewhere, when or how they either could not or
+would not explain. So at length I gave it up, having satisfied
+myself that all this was but an effort of Oriental imagination
+called into life by the sweet influences of the Eastern stars.
+
+I gave it up and went away, thinking that I should forget. But
+I did not forget. I was quick with a new hope, or at any rate
+with a new aspiration, and that secret child of holy desire grew
+and grew within my soul, till at length it flashed upon me that
+this soul of mine was itself the hidden Master from which I must
+learn my lesson. No wonder that those Eastern friends could not
+give his name, seeing that whatever they really knew, as
+distinguished from what they had heard, and it was little enough,
+each of them had learned from the teaching of his own soul.
+
+Thus, then, I too became a dreamer with only one longing, the
+longing for wisdom, for that spirit touch which should open my
+eyes and enable me to see.
+
+Yet now it happened strangely enough that when I seemed within
+myself to have little further interest in the things of the
+world, and least of all in women, I, who had taken another guest
+to dwell with me, those things of the world came back to me and
+in the shape of Woman the Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed
+since is it not written that no man can live to himself alone, or
+lose himself in watching and nurturing the growth of his own
+soul?
+
+
+It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and
+stayed there a while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name
+in the book of our Minister to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred
+Upton, not because I wished him to ask me to dinner, but for the
+reason that I had heard of him as a man of archeological tastes
+and thought that he might enable me to see things which otherwise
+I should not see.
+
+As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire
+neighbours who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on
+the following night. I accepted and found myself one of a
+considerable party, some of them distinguished English people who
+wore Orders, as is customary when one dines with the
+representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and this shows
+that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first time
+in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
+Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in
+to dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even
+a lady as there was not one to spare.
+
+Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself
+seated between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither
+of whom could talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign
+language, not even French in which they addressed me, seeming
+surprised that I did not understand them. I was humiliated at my
+own ignorance, although in fact I was not ignorant, only my
+education had been classical. Indeed I was a good classic and had
+kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I became an
+idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
+countess might know Latin from which her own language was
+derived, and addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir
+Alfred, who was not far off and overheard me (he also knew
+Latin), burst into laughter and proceeded to explain the joke in
+a loud voice, first in French and then in English, to the
+assembled company, who all became infected with merriment and
+also stared at me as a curiosity.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to
+a mistake of my driver I had arrived rather late and had not been
+introduced to her. As her father's only daughter, her mother
+being dead, she was seated at the end of the table behind a
+fan-like arrangement of white Madonna lilies, and she had bent
+forward and, like the others, was looking at me, but in such a
+fashion that her head from that distance seemed as though it were
+surrounded and crowned with lilies. Indeed the greatest art could
+not have produced a more beautiful effect which was, however,
+really one of naked accident.
+
+An angel looking down upon earth through the lilies of
+Heaven--that was the rather absurd thought which flashed into my
+mind. I did not quite realise her face at first except that it
+seemed to be both dark and fair; as a fact her waving hair which
+grew rather low upon her forehead, was dark, and her large, soft
+eyes were grey. I did not know, and to this moment I do not know
+if she was really beautiful, but certainly the light that shone
+through those eyes of hers and seemed to be reflected upon her
+delicate features, was beauty itself. It was like that glowing
+through a thin vase of the purest alabaster within which a lamp
+is placed, and I felt this effect to arise from no chance, like
+that of the lily-setting, but, as it were, from the lamp of the
+spirit within.
+
+Our eyes met, and I suppose that she saw the wonder and
+admiration in mine. At any rate her amused smile faded, leaving
+the face rather serious, though still sweetly serious, and a
+tinge of colour crept over it as the first hue of dawn creeps
+into a pearly sky. Then she withdrew herself behind the screen of
+lilies and for the rest of that dinner which I thought was never
+coming to an end, practically I saw her no more. Only I noted as
+she passed out that although not tall, she was rounded and
+graceful in shape and that her hands were peculiarly delicate.
+
+Afterwards in the drawing-room her father, with whom I had
+talked at the table, introduced me to her, saying:
+
+"My daughter is the real archaeologist, Mr. Arbuthnot, and I
+think if you ask her, she may be able to help you."
+
+Then he bustled away to speak to some of his important guests,
+from whom I think he was seeking political information.
+
+"My father exaggerates," she said in a soft and very
+sympathetic voice, "but perhaps"--and she motioned me to a seat
+at her side.
+
+Then we talked of the places and things that I more
+particularly desired to see and, well, the end of it was that I
+went back to my hotel in love with Natalie; and as she afterwards
+confessed, she went to bed in love with me.
+
+It was a curious business, more like meeting a very old friend
+from whom one had been separated by circumstances for a score of
+years or so than anything else. We were, so to speak, intimate
+from the first; we knew all about each other, although here and
+there was something new, something different which we could not
+remember, lines of thought, veins of memory which we did not
+possess in common. On one point I am absolutely clear: it was not
+solely the everyday and ancient appeal of woman to man and man to
+woman which drew us together, though doubtless this had its part
+in our attachment as under our human conditions it must do,
+seeing that it is Nature's bait to ensure the continuance of the
+race. It was something more, something quite beyond that
+elementary impulse.
+
+At any rate we loved, and one evening in the shelter of the
+solemn walls of the great Coliseum at Rome, which at that hour
+were shut to all except ourselves, we confessed our love. I
+really think we must have chosen the spot by tacit but mutual
+consent because we felt it to be fitting. It was so old, so
+impregnated with every human experience, from the direst crime of
+the tyrant who thought himself a god, to the sublimest sacrifice
+of the martyr who already was half a god; with every vice and
+virtue also which lies between these extremes, that it seemed to
+be the most fitting altar whereon to offer our hearts and all
+that caused them to beat, each to the other.
+
+So Natalie and I were betrothed within a month of our first
+meeting. Within three we were married, for what was there to
+prevent or delay? Naturally Sir Alfred was delighted, seeing that
+he possessed but small private resources and I was able to make
+ample provision for his daughter who had hitherto shown herself
+somewhat difficult in this business of matrimony and now was
+bordering on her twenty-seventh year. Everybody was delighted,
+everything went smoothly as a sledge sliding down a slope of
+frozen snow and the mists of time hid whatever might be at the
+end of that slope. Probably a plain; at the worst the upward rise
+of ordinary life.
+
+That is what we thought, if we thought at all. Certainly we
+never dreamed of a precipice. Why should we, who were young, by
+comparison, quite healthy and very rich? Who thinks of precipices
+under such circumstances, when disaster seems to be eliminated
+and death is yet a long way off?
+
+And yet we ought to have done so, because we should have known
+that smooth surfaces without impediment to the runners often end
+in something of the kind.
+
+I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where
+of course we met with a great reception, including the ringing
+(out of tune) of the new peal of bells that I had given to the
+church, Bastin made haste to point this out.
+
+"Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot," he
+reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as
+usual, though what at I do not know, had been escorted from the
+room by Natalie, "and really, when I come to think of it, you are
+an unusually fortunate person. You possess a great deal of money,
+much more than you have any right to; which you seem to have done
+very little to earn and do not spend quite as I should like you
+to do, and this nice property, that ought to be owned by a great
+number of people, as, according to the views you express, I
+should have thought you would acknowledge, and everything else
+that a man can want. It is very strange that you should be so
+favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
+which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even
+in the end and you will get your share of troubles, like others.
+Perhaps Mrs. Arbuthnot will have no children as there is so much
+for them to take. Or perhaps you will lose all your money and
+have to work for your living, which might be good for you. Or,"
+he added, still thinking aloud after his fashion, "perhaps she
+will die young--she has that kind of face, although, of course, I
+hope she won't," he added, waking up.
+
+I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the
+proverbial funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to
+them. I suppose it was because in a flash of intuition I knew
+that they would come true and that he was an appointed Cassandra.
+Perhaps this uncanny knowledge overcame my natural indignation at
+such super-gaucherie of which no one but Bastin could have been
+capable, and even prevented me from replying at all, so that I
+merely sat still and looked at him.
+
+But Bickley did reply with some vigour.
+
+"Forgive me for saying so, Bastin," he said, bristling all over
+as it were, "but your remarks, which may or may not be in
+accordance with the principles of your religion, seem to me to be
+in singularly bad taste. They would have turned the stomachs of a
+gathering of early Christians, who appear to have been the worst
+mannered people in the world, and at any decent heathen feast
+your neck would have been wrung as that of a bird of ill omen."
+
+"Why?" asked Bastin blankly. "I only said what I thought to be
+the truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste."
+
+"Then I will say what I think also to be the truth," replied
+Bickley, growing furious. "It is that you use your Christianity
+as a cloak for bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy
+for others of which you seem to have none. Moreover, since you
+talk of the death of people's wives, I will tell you something
+about your own, as a doctor, which I can do as I never attended
+her. It is highly probable, in my opinion, that she will die
+before Mrs. Arbuthnot, who is quite a healthy person with a good
+prospect of life."
+
+"Perhaps," said Bastin. "If so, it will be God's will and I
+shall not complain" (here Bickley snorted), "though I do not see
+what you can know about it. But why should you cast reflections
+on the early Christians who were people of strong principle
+living in rough times, and had to wage war against an established
+devil-worship? I know you are angry because they smashed up the
+statues of Venus and so forth, but had I been in their place I
+should have done the same."
+
+"Of course you would, who doubts it? But as for the early
+Christians and their iconoclastic performances--well, curse them,
+that's all!" and he sprang up and left the room.
+
+I followed him.
+
+Let it not be supposed from the above scene that there was any
+ill-feeling between Bastin and Bickley. On the contrary they were
+much attached to each other, and this kind of quarrel meant no
+more than the strong expression of their individual views to
+which they were accustomed from their college days. For instance
+Bastin was always talking about the early Christians and
+missionaries, while Bickley loathed both, the early Christians
+because of the destruction which they had wrought in Egypt,
+Italy, Greece and elsewhere, of all that was beautiful; and the
+missionaries because, as he said, they were degrading and
+spoiling the native races and by inducing them to wear clothes,
+rendering them liable to disease. Bastin would answer that their
+souls were more important than their bodies, to which Bickley
+replied that as there was no such thing as a soul except in the
+stupid imagination of priests, he differed entirely on the point.
+As it was quite impossible for either to convince the other,
+there the conversation would end, or drift into something in
+which they were mutually interested, such as natural history and
+the hygiene of the neighbourhood.
+
+Here I may state that Bickley's keen professional eye was not
+mistaken when he diagnosed Mrs. Bastin's state of health as
+dangerous. As a matter of fact she was suffering from heart
+disease that a doctor can often recognise by the colour of the
+lips, etc., which brought about her death under the following
+circumstances:
+
+Her husband attended some ecclesiastical function at a town
+over twenty miles away and was to have returned by a train which
+would have brought him home about five o'clock. As he did not
+arrive she waited at the station for him until the last train
+came in about seven o'clock--without the beloved Basil. Then, on
+a winter's night she tore up to the Priory and begged me to lend
+her a dog-cart in which to drive to the said town to look for
+him. I expostulated against the folly of such a proceeding,
+saying that no doubt Basil was safe enough but had forgotten to
+telegraph, or thought that he would save the sixpence which the
+wire cost.
+
+Then it came out, to Natalie's and my intense amusement, that
+all this was the result of her jealous nature of which I have
+spoken. She said she had never slept a night away from her
+husband since they were married and with so many "designing
+persons" about she could not say what might happen if she did so,
+especially as he was "such a favourite and so handsome." (Bastin
+was a fine looking man in his rugged way.)
+
+I suggested that she might have a little confidence in him, to
+which she replied darkly that she had no confidence in anybody.
+
+The end of it was that I lent her the cart with a fast horse
+and a good driver, and off she went. Reaching the town in
+question some two and a half hours later, she searched high and
+low through wind and sleet, but found no Basil. He, it appeared,
+had gone on to Exeter, to look at the cathedral where some
+building was being done, and missing the last train had there
+slept the night.
+
+About one in the morning, after being nearly locked up as a mad
+woman, she drove back to the Vicarage, again to find no Basil.
+Even then she did not go to bed but raged about the house in her
+wet clothes, until she fell down utterly exhausted. When her
+husband did return on the following morning, full of information
+about the cathedral, she was dangerously ill, and actually passed
+away while uttering a violent tirade against him for his supposed
+suspicious proceedings.
+
+That was the end of this truly odious British matron.
+
+In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process,
+canonised her in his imagination as a kind of saint. "So loving,"
+he would say, "such a devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can
+assure you that even in the midst of her death-struggle her last
+thoughts were of me," words that caused Bickley to snort with
+more than usual vigour, until I kicked him to silence beneath the
+table.
+
+
+
+Chapter IV
+
+Death and Departure
+
+
+Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life
+to bitterness and my hopes to ashes.
+
+Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and
+Natalie. Mentally, physically, spiritually we were perfectly
+mated, and we loved each other dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet
+there was something about her which filled me with vague fears,
+especially after she found that she was to become a mother. I
+would talk to her of the child, but she would sigh and shake her
+head, her eyes filling with tears, and say that we must not count
+on the continuance of such happiness as ours, for it was too
+great.
+
+I tried to laugh away her doubts, though whenever I did so I
+seemed to hear Bastin's slow voice remarking casually that she
+might die, as he might have commented on the quality of the
+claret. At last, however, I grew terrified and asked her bluntly
+what she meant.
+
+"I don't quite know, dearest," she replied, "especially as I am
+wonderfully well. But--but--"
+
+"But what?" I asked.
+
+"But I think that our companionship is going to be broken for a
+little while."
+
+"For a little while!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey. I think that I shall be taken away from you--
+you know what I mean," and she nodded towards the churchyard.
+
+"Oh, my God!" I groaned.
+
+"I want to say this," she added quickly, "that if such a thing
+should happen, as it happens every day, I implore you, dearest
+Humphrey, not to be too much distressed, since I am sure that you
+will find me again. No, I can't explain how or when or where,
+because I do not know. I have prayed for light, but it has not
+come to me. All I know is that I am not talking of reunion in Mr.
+Bastin's kind of conventional heaven, which he speaks about as
+though to reach it one stumbled through darkness for a minute
+into a fine new house next door, where excellent servants had
+made everything ready for your arrival and all the lights were
+turned up. It is something quite different from that and very
+much more real."
+
+Then she bent down ostensibly to pat the head of a little black
+cocker spaniel called Tommy which had been given to her as a
+puppy, a highly intelligent and affectionate animal that we both
+adored and that loved her as only a dog can love. Really, I knew,
+it was to hide her tears, and fled from the room lest she should
+see mine.
+
+As I went I heard the dog whimpering in a peculiar way, as
+though some sympathetic knowledge had been communicated to its
+wonderful animal intelligence.
+
+That night I spoke to Bickley about the matter, repeating
+exactly what had passed. As I expected, he smiled in his grave,
+rather sarcastic way, and made light of it.
+
+"My dear Humphrey," he said, "don't torment yourself about such
+fancies. They are of everyday occurrence among women in your
+wife's condition. Sometimes they take one form, sometimes
+another. When she has got her baby you will hear no more of
+them."
+
+I tried to be comforted but in vain.
+
+The days and weeks went by like a long nightmare and in due
+course the event happened. Bickley was not attending the case; it
+was not in his line, he said, and he preferred that where a
+friend's wife was concerned, somebody else should be called in.
+So it was put in charge of a very good local man with a large
+experience in such domestic matters.
+
+How am I to tell of it? Everything went wrong; as for the
+details, let them be. Ultimately Bickley did operate, and if
+surpassing skill could have saved her, it would have been done.
+But the other man had misjudged the conditions; it was too late,
+nothing could help either mother or child, a little girl who died
+shortly after she was born but not before she had been
+christened, also by the name of Natalie.
+
+I was called in to say farewell to my wife and found her
+radiant, triumphant even in her weakness.
+
+"I know now," she whispered in a faint voice. "I understood as
+the chloroform passed away, but I cannot tell you. Everything is
+quite well, my darling. Go where you seem called to go, far away.
+Oh! the wonderful place in which you will find me, not knowing
+that you have found me. Good-bye for a little while; only for a
+little while, my own, my own!"
+
+Then she died. And for a time I too seemed to die, but could
+not. I buried her and the child here at Fulcombe; or rather I
+buried their ashes since I could not endure that her beloved body
+should see corruption.
+
+
+Afterwards, when all was over, I spoke of these last words of
+Natalie's with both Bickley and Bastin, for somehow I seemed to
+wish to learn their separate views.
+
+The latter I may explain, had been present at the end in his
+spiritual capacity, but I do not think that he in the least
+understood the nature of the drama which was passing before his
+eyes. His prayers and the christening absorbed all his attention,
+and he never was a man who could think of more than one thing at
+a time.
+
+When I told him exactly what had happened and repeated the
+words that Natalie spoke, he was much interested in his own
+nebulous way, and said that it was delightful to meet with an
+example of a good Christian, such as my wife had been, who
+actually saw something of Heaven before she had gone there. His
+own faith was, he thanked God, fairly robust, but still an
+undoubted occurrence of the sort acted as a refreshment, "like
+rain on a pasture when it is rather dry, you know," he added,
+breaking into simile.
+
+I remarked that she had not seemed to speak in the sense he
+indicated, but appeared to allude to something quite near at hand
+and more or less immediate.
+
+"I don't know that there is anything nearer at hand than the
+Hereafter," he answered. "I expect she meant that you will
+probably soon die and join her in Paradise, if you are worthy to
+do so. But of course it is not wise to put too much reliance upon
+words spoken by people at the last, because often they don't
+quite know what they are saying. Indeed sometimes I think this
+was so in the case of my own wife, who really seemed to me to
+talk a good deal of rubbish. Good-bye, I promised to see Widow
+Jenkins this afternoon about having her varicose veins cut out,
+and I mustn't stop here wasting time in pleasant conversation.
+She thinks just as much of her varicose veins as we do of the
+loss of our wives."
+
+I wonder what Bastin's ideas of unpleasant conversation may be,
+thought I to myself, as I watched him depart already
+wool-gathering on some other subject, probably the heresy of one
+of those "early fathers" who occupied most of his thoughts.
+
+Bickley listened to my tale in sympathetic silence, as a doctor
+does to a patient. When he was obliged to speak, he said that it
+was interesting as an example of a tendency of certain minds
+towards romantic vision which sometimes asserts itself, even in
+the throes of death.
+
+"You know," he added, "that I put faith in none of these
+things. I wish that I could, but reason and science both show me
+that they lack foundation. The world on the whole is a sad place,
+where we arrive through the passions of others implanted in them
+by Nature, which, although it cares nothing for individual death,
+is tender towards the impulse of races of every sort to preserve
+their collective life. Indeed the impulse is Nature, or at least
+its chief manifestation. Consequently, whether we be gnats or
+elephants, or anything between and beyond, even stars for aught I
+know, we must make the best of things as they are, taking the
+good and the evil as they come and getting all we can out of life
+until it leaves us, after which we need not trouble. You had a
+good time for a little while and were happy in it; now you are
+having a bad time and are wretched. Perhaps in the future, when
+your mental balance has re-asserted itself, you will have other
+good times in the afternoon of your days, and then follow
+twilight and the dark. That is all there is to hope for, and we
+may as well look the thing in the face. Only I confess, my dear
+fellow, that your experience convinces me that marriage should be
+avoided at whatever inconvenience. Indeed I have long wondered
+that anyone can take the responsibility of bringing a child into
+the world. But probably nobody does in cold blood, except
+misguided idiots like Bastin," he added. "He would have twenty,
+had not his luck intervened."
+
+"Then you believe in nothing, Friend," I said.
+
+"Nothing, I am sorry to say, except what I see and my five
+senses appreciate."
+
+"You reject all possibility of miracle, for instance?"
+
+"That depends on what you mean by miracle. Science shows us all
+kinds of wonders which our great grandfathers would have called
+miracles, but these are nothing but laws that we are beginning to
+understand. Give me an instance."
+
+"Well," I replied at hazard, "if you were assured by someone
+that a man could live for a thousand years?"
+
+"I should tell him that he was a fool or a liar, that is all.
+It is impossible."
+
+"Or that the same identity, spirit, animating principle--call
+it what you will--can flit from body to body, say in successive
+ages? Or that the dead can communicate with the living?"
+
+"Convince me of any of these things, Arbuthnot, and mind you I
+desire to be convinced, and I will take back every word I have
+said and walk through Fulcombe in a white sheet proclaiming
+myself the fool. Now, I must get off to the Cottage Hospital to
+cut out Widow Jenkins's varicose veins. They are tangible and
+real at any rate; about the largest I ever saw, indeed. Give up
+dreams, old boy, and take to something useful. You might go back
+to your fiction writing; you seem to have leanings that way, and
+you know you need not publish the stories, except privately for
+the edification of your friends."
+
+With this Parthian shaft Bickley took his departure to make a
+job of Widow Jenkins's legs.
+
+I took his advice. During the next few months I did write
+something which occupied my thoughts for a while, more or less.
+It lies in my safe to this minute, for somehow I have never been
+able to make up my mind to burn what cost me so much physical and
+mental toil.
+
+When it was finished my melancholy returned to me with added
+force. Everything in the house took a tongue and cried to me of
+past days. Its walls echoed a voice that I could never hear
+again; in the very looking-glasses I saw the reflection of a lost
+presence. Although I had moved myself for the purposes of sleep
+to a little room at the further end of the building, footsteps
+seemed to creep about my bed at night and I heard the rustle of a
+remembered dress without the door. The place grew hateful to me.
+I felt that I must get away from it or I should go mad.
+
+
+One afternoon Bastin arrived carrying a book and in a state of
+high indignation. This work, written, as he said, by some ribald
+traveller, grossly traduced the character of missionaries to the
+South Sea Islands, especially of those of the Society to which he
+subscribed, and he threw it on the table in his righteous wrath.
+Bickley picked it up and opened it at a photograph of a very
+pretty South Sea Island girl clad in a few flowers and nothing
+else, which he held towards Bastin, saying:
+
+"Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her
+distinctly attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus
+blooms with a difference to our women--a little lower down."
+
+"The devil is always attractive," replied Bastin gloomily.
+"Child of Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph
+is enough to make my poor Sarah turn in her grave."
+
+"Why?" asked Bickley; "seeing that wide seas roll between you
+and this dusky Venus. Also I thought that according to your
+Hebrew legend sin came in with bark garments."
+
+"You should search the Scriptures, Bickley," I broke in, "and
+cultivate accuracy. It was fig-leaves that symbolised its
+arrival. The garments, which I think were of skin, developed
+later."
+
+"Perhaps," went on Bickley, who had turned the page, "she" (he
+referred to the late Mrs. Bastin) "would have preferred her
+thus," and he held up another illustration of the same woman.
+
+In this the native belle appeared after conversion, clad in
+broken-down stays--I suppose they were stays--out of which she
+seemed to bulge and flow in every direction, a dirty white dress
+several sizes too small, a kind of Salvation Army bonnet without
+a crown and a prayer-book which she held pressed to her middle;
+the general effect being hideous, and in some curious way,
+improper.
+
+"Certainly," said Bastin, "though I admit her clothes do not
+seem to fit and she has not buttoned them up as she ought. But it
+is not of the pictures so much as of the letterpress with its
+false and scandalous accusations, that I complain."
+
+"Why do you complain?" asked Bickley. "Probably it is quite
+true, though that we could never ascertain without visiting the
+lady's home."
+
+"If I could afford it," exclaimed Bastin with rising anger, "I
+should like to go there and expose this vile traducer of my
+cloth."
+
+"So should I," answered Bickley, "and expose these introducers
+of consumption, measles and other European diseases, to say
+nothing of gin, among an innocent and Arcadian people."
+
+"How can you call them innocent, Bickley, when they murder and
+eat missionaries?"
+
+"I dare say we should all eat a missionary, Bastin, if we were
+hungry enough," was the answer, after which something occurred to
+change the conversation.
+
+But I kept the book and read it as a neutral observer, and came
+to the conclusion that these South Sea Islands, a land where it
+was always afternoon, must be a charming place, in which perhaps
+the stars of the Tropics and the scent of the flowers might
+enable one to forget a little, or at least take the edge off
+memory. Why should I not visit them and escape another long and
+dreary English winter? No, I could not do so alone. If Bastin and
+Bickley were there, their eternal arguments might amuse me. Well,
+why should they not come also? When one has money things can
+always be arranged.
+
+The idea, which had its root in this absurd conversation, took
+a curious hold on me. I thought of it all the evening, being
+alone, and that night it re-arose in my dreams. I dreamed that my
+lost Natalie appeared to me and showed me a picture. It was of a
+long, low land, a curving shore of which the ends were out of the
+picture, whereon grew tall palms, and where great combers broke
+upon gleaming sand.
+
+Then the picture seemed to become a reality and I saw Natalie
+herself, strangely changeful in her aspect, strangely varying in
+face and figure, strangely bright, standing in the mouth of a
+pass whereof the little bordering cliffs were covered with bushes
+and low trees, whose green was almost hid in lovely flowers.
+There in my dream she stood, smiling mysteriously, and stretched
+out her arms towards me.
+
+As I awoke I seemed to hear her voice, repeating her dying
+words: "Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the
+wonderful place in which you will find me, not knowing that you
+have found me."
+
+With some variations this dream visited me twice that night. In
+the morning I woke up quite determined that I would go to the
+South Sea Islands, even if I must do so alone. On that same
+evening Bastin and Bickley dined with me. I said nothing to them
+about my dream, for Bastin never dreamed and Bickley would have
+set it down to indigestion. But when the cloth had been cleared
+away and we were drinking our glass of port--both Bastin and
+Bickley only took one, the former because he considered port a
+sinful indulgence of the flesh, the latter because he feared it
+would give him gout--I remarked casually that they both looked
+very run down and as though they wanted a rest. They agreed, at
+least each of them said he had noticed it in the other. Indeed
+Bastin added that the damp and the cold in the church, in which
+he held daily services to no congregation except the old woman
+who cleaned it, had given him rheumatism, which prevented him
+from sleeping.
+
+"Do call things by their proper names," interrupted Bickley. "I
+told you yesterday that what you are suffering from is neuritis
+in your right arm, which will become chronic if you neglect it
+much longer. I have the same thing myself, so I ought to know,
+and unless I can stop operating for a while I believe my fingers
+will become useless. Also something is affecting my sight,
+overstrain, I suppose, so that I am obliged to wear stronger and
+stronger glasses. I think I shall have to leave Ogden" (his
+partner) "in charge for a while, and get away into the sun. There
+is none here before June."
+
+"I would if I could pay a locum tenens and were quite sure it
+isn't wrong," said Bastin.
+
+"I am glad you both think like that," I remarked, "as I have a
+suggestion to make to you. I want to go to the South Seas about
+which we were talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that
+Bickley has been advising for me, and I should be very grateful
+if you would both come as my guests. You, Bickley, make so much
+money out of cutting people about, that you can arrange your own
+affairs during your absence. But as for you, Bastin, I will see
+to the wherewithal for the locum tenens, and everything else."
+
+"You are very kind," said Bastin, "and certainly I should like
+to expose that misguided author, who probably published his
+offensive work without thinking that what he wrote might affect
+the subscriptions to the missionary societies, also to show
+Bickley that he is not always right, as he seems to think. But I
+could never dream of accepting without the full approval of the
+Bishop."
+
+"You might get that of your nurse also, if she happens to be
+still alive," mocked Bickley. "As for his Lordship, I don't think
+he will raise any objection when he sees the certificate I will
+give you about the state of your health. He is a great believer
+in me ever since I took that carbuncle out of his neck which he
+got because he will not eat enough. As for me, I mean to come if
+only to show you how continually and persistently you are wrong.
+But, Arbuthnot, how do you mean to go?"
+
+"I don't know. In a mail steamer, I suppose."
+
+"If you can run to it, a yacht would be much better."
+
+"That's a good idea, for one could get out of the beaten tracks
+and see the places that are never, or seldom, visited. I will
+make some inquiries. And now, to celebrate the occasion, let us
+all have another glass of port and drink a toast."
+
+They hesitated and were lost, Bastin murmuring something about
+doing without his stout next day as a penance. Then they both
+asked what was the toast, each of them, after thought, suggesting
+that it should be the utter confusion of the other.
+
+I shook my head, whereon as a result of further cogitation,
+Bastin submitted that the Unknown would be suitable. Bickley said
+that he thought this a foolish idea as everything worth knowing
+was already known, and what was the good of drinking to the rest?
+A toast to the Truth would be better.
+
+A notion came to me.
+
+"Let us combine them," I said, "and drink to the Unknown
+Truth."
+
+So we did, though Bastin grumbled that the performance made him
+feel like Pilate.
+
+"We are all Pilates in our way," I replied with a sigh.
+
+"That is what I think every time I diagnose a case," exclaimed
+Bickley.
+
+As for me I laughed and for some unknown reason felt happier
+than I had done for months. Oh! if only the writer of that
+tourist tale of the South Sea Islands could have guessed what
+fruit his light-thrown seed would yield to us and to the world!
+
+
+I made my inquiries through a London agency which hired out
+yachts or sold them to the idle rich. As I expected, there were
+plenty to be had, at a price, but wealthy as I was, the figure
+asked of the buyer of any suitable craft, staggered me. In the
+end, however, I chartered one for six months certain and at so
+much per month for as long as I liked afterwards. The owners paid
+insurance and everything else on condition that they appointed
+the captain and first mate, also the engineer, for this yacht,
+which was named Star of the South, could steam at about ten knots
+as well as sail.
+
+I know nothing about yachts, and therefore shall not attempt to
+describe her, further than to say that she was of five hundred
+and fifty tons burden, very well constructed, and smart to look
+at, as well she might be, seeing that a deceased millionaire from
+whose executors I hired her had spent a fortune in building and
+equipping her in the best possible style. In all, her crew
+consisted of thirty-two hands. A peculiarity of the vessel was
+that owing to some fancy of the late owner, the passenger
+accommodation, which was splendid, lay forward of the bridge,
+this with the ship's store-rooms, refrigerating chamber, etc.,
+being almost in the bows. It was owing to these arrangements,
+which were unusual, that the executors found it impossible to
+sell, and were therefore glad to accept such an offer as mine in
+order to save expenses. Perhaps they hoped that she might go to
+the bottom, being heavily insured. If so, the Fates did not
+disappoint them.
+
+The captain, named Astley, was a jovial person who held every
+kind of certificate. He seemed so extraordinarily able at his
+business that personally I suspected him of having made mistakes
+in the course of his career, not unconnected with the worship of
+Bacchus. In this I believe I was right; otherwise a man of such
+attainments would have been commanding something bigger than a
+private yacht. The first mate, Jacobsen, was a melancholy Dane, a
+spiritualist who played the concertina, and seemed to be able to
+do without sleep. The crew were a mixed lot, good men for the
+most part and quite unobjectionable, more than half of them being
+Scandinavian. I think that is all I need say about the Star of
+the South.
+
+The arrangement was that the Star of the South should proceed
+through the Straits of Gibraltar to Marseilles, where we would
+join her, and thence travel via the Suez Canal, to Australia and
+on to the South Seas, returning home as our fancy or convenience
+might dictate.
+
+All the first part of the plan we carried out to the letter. Of
+the remainder I say nothing at present.
+
+The Star of the South was amply provided with every kind of
+store. Among them were medicines and surgical instruments,
+selected by Bickley, and a case of Bibles and other religious
+works in sundry languages of the South Seas, selected by Bastin,
+whose bishop, when he understood the pious objects of his
+journey, had rather encouraged than hindered his departure on
+sick leave, and a large number of novels, books of reference,
+etc., laid in by myself. She duly sailed from the Thames and
+reached Marseilles after a safe and easy passage, where all three
+of us boarded her.
+
+I forgot to add that she had another passenger, the little
+spaniel, Tommy. I had intended to leave him behind, but while I
+was packing up he followed me about with such evident
+understanding of my purpose that my heart was touched. When I
+entered the motor to drive to the station he escaped from the
+hands of the servant, whimpering, and took refuge on my knee.
+After this I felt that Destiny intended him to be our companion.
+Moreover, was he not linked with my dead past, and, had I but
+known it, with my living future also?
+
+
+
+Chapter V
+
+The Cyclone
+
+
+We enjoyed our voyage exceedingly. In Egypt, a land I was glad
+to revisit, we only stopped a week while the Star of the South,
+which we rejoined at Suez, coaled and went through the Canal.
+This, however, gave us time to spend a few days in Cairo, visit
+the Pyramids and Sakkara which Bastin and Bickley had never seen
+before, and inspect the great Museum. The journey up the Nile was
+postponed until our return. It was a pleasant break and gave
+Bickley, a most omnivorous reader who was well acquainted with
+Egyptian history and theology, the opportunity of trying to prove
+to Bastin that Christianity was a mere development of the ancient
+Egyptian faith. The arguments that ensued may be imagined. It
+never seemed to occur to either of them that all faiths may be
+and indeed probably are progressive; in short, different rays of
+light thrown from the various facets of the same crystal, as in
+turn these are shone upon by the sun of Truth.
+
+Our passage down the Red Sea was cool and agreeable. Thence we
+shaped our course for Ceylon. Here again we stopped a little
+while to run up to Kandy and to visit the ruined city of
+Anarajapura with its great Buddhist topes that once again gave
+rise to religious argument between my two friends. Leaving Ceylon
+we struck across the Indian Ocean for Perth in Western Australia.
+
+It was a long voyage, since to save our coal we made most of it
+under canvas. However, we were not dull as Captain Astley was a
+good companion, and even out of the melancholy Dane, Jacobsen, we
+had entertainment. He insisted on holding seances in the cabin,
+at which the usual phenomena occurred. The table twisted about,
+voices were heard and Jacobsen's accordion wailed out tunes above
+our heads. These happenings drove Bickley to a kind of madness,
+for here were events which he could not explain. He was convinced
+that someone was playing tricks upon him, and devised the most
+elaborate snares to detect the rogue, entirely without result.
+
+First he accused Jacobsen, who was very indignant, and then me,
+who laughed. In the end Jacobsen and I left the "circle" and the
+cabin, which was locked behind us; only Bastin and Bickley
+remaining there in the dark. Presently we heard sounds of
+altercation, and Bickley emerged looking very red in the face,
+followed by Bastin, who was saying:
+
+"Can I help it if something pulled your nose and snatched off
+your eyeglasses, which anyhow are quite useless to you when there
+is no light? Again, is it possible for me, sitting on the other
+side of that table, to have placed the concertina on your head
+and made it play the National Anthem, a thing that I have not the
+slightest idea how to do?"
+
+"Please do not try to explain," snapped Bickley. "I am
+perfectly aware that you deceived me somehow, which no doubt you
+think a good joke."
+
+"My dear fellow," I interrupted, "is it possible to imagine old
+Basil deceiving anyone?"
+
+"Why not," snorted Bickley, "seeing that he deceives himself
+from one year's end to the other?"
+
+"I think," said Bastin, "that this is an unholy business and
+that we are both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do
+with it," and he departed to his cabin, probably to say some
+appropriate prayers.
+
+After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an
+instrument called a planchette and with difficulty persuaded
+Bickley to try it, which he did after many precautions. The
+thing, a heart-shaped piece of wood mounted on wheels and with a
+pencil stuck at its narrow end, cantered about the sheet of paper
+on which it was placed, Bickley, whose hands rested upon it,
+staring at the roof of the cabin. Then it began to scribble and
+after a while stopped still.
+
+"Will the Doctor look?" said Jacobsen. "Perhaps the spirits
+have told him something."
+
+"Oh! curse all this silly talk about spirits," exclaimed
+Bickley, as he arranged his eyeglasses and held up the paper to
+the light, for it was after dinner.
+
+He stared, then with an exclamation which I will not repeat,
+and a glance of savage suspicion at the poor Dane and the rest of
+us, threw it down and left the cabin. I picked it up and next
+moment was screaming with laughter. There on the top of the sheet
+was a rough but entirely recognizable portrait of Bickley with
+the accordion on his head, and underneath, written in a delicate,
+Italian female hand, absolutely different from his own, were
+these words taken from one of St. Paul's Epistles--"Oppositions
+of science falsely so called." Underneath them again in a
+scrawling, schoolboy fist, very like Bastin's, was inscribed,
+"Tell us how this is done, you silly doctor, who think yourself
+so clever."
+
+"It seems that the devil really can quote Scripture," was
+Bastin's only comment, while Jacobsen stared before him and
+smiled.
+
+Bickley never alluded to the matter, but for days afterwards I
+saw him experimenting with paper and chemicals, evidently trying
+to discover a form of invisible ink which would appear upon the
+application of the hand. As he never said anything about it, I
+fear that he failed.
+
+This planchette business had a somewhat curious ending. A few
+nights later Jacobsen was working it and asked me to put a
+question. To oblige him I inquired on what day we should reach
+Fremantle, the port of Perth. It wrote an answer which, I may
+remark, subsequently proved to be quite correct.
+
+"That is not a good question," said Jacobsen, "since as a
+sailor I might guess the reply. Try again, Mr. Arbuthnot."
+
+"Will anything remarkable happen on our voyage to the South
+Seas?" I inquired casually.
+
+The planchette hesitated a while then wrote rapidly and
+stopped. Jacobsen took up the paper and began to read the answer
+aloud--"To A, B the D, and B the C, the most remarkable things
+will happen that have happened to men living in the world."
+
+"That must mean me, Bickley the doctor and Bastin the
+clergyman," I said, laughing.
+
+Jacobsen paid no attention, for he was reading what followed.
+As he did so I saw his face turn white and his eyes begin to
+start from his head. Then suddenly he tore the paper in pieces
+which he thrust into his pocket. Lifting his great fist he
+uttered some Danish oath and with a single blow smashed the
+planchette to fragments, after which he strode away, leaving me
+astonished and somewhat disturbed. When I met him the next
+morning I asked him what was on the paper.
+
+"Oh!" he said quietly, "something I should not like you too-
+proper English gentlemens to see. Something not nice. You
+understand. Those spirits not always good; they do that kind of
+thing sometimes. That's why I broke up this planchette."
+
+Then he began to talk of something else and there the matter
+ended.
+
+I should have said that, principally with a view to putting
+themselves in a position to confute each other, ever since we had
+started from Marseilles both Bastin and Bickley spent a number of
+hours each day in assiduous study of the language of the South
+Sea Islands. It became a kind of competition between them as to
+which could learn the most. Now Bastin, although simple and even
+stupid in some ways, was a good scholar, and as I knew at
+college, had quite a faculty for acquiring languages in which he
+had taken high marks at examinations. Bickley, too, was an
+extraordinarily able person with an excellent memory, especially
+when he was on his mettle. The result was that before we ever
+reached a South Sea island they had a good working knowledge of
+the local tongues.
+
+As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife
+who, under some of the "white Australia" regulations, were not
+allowed to remain in the country and offered to work as servants
+in return for a passage to Apia where we proposed to call some
+time or other. With these people Bastin and Bickley talked all
+day long till really they became fairly proficient in their soft
+and beautiful dialect. They wished me to learn also, but I said
+that with two such excellent interpreters and the natives while
+they remained with us, it seemed quite unnecessary. Still, I
+picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as much as they did
+perhaps.
+
+At length, travelling on and on as a voyager to the planet Mars
+might do, we sighted the low shores of Australia and that same
+evening were towed, for our coal was quite exhausted, to the
+wharf at Fremantle. Here we spent a few days exploring the
+beautiful town of Perth and its neighbourhood where it was very
+hot just then, and eating peaches and grapes till we made
+ourselves ill, as a visitor often does who is unaware that fruit
+should not be taken in quantity in Australia while the sun is
+high. Then we departed for Melbourne almost before our arrival
+was generally known, since I did not wish to advertise our
+presence or the object of our journey.
+
+We crossed the Great Australian Bight, of evil reputation, in
+the most perfect weather; indeed it might have been a mill pond,
+and after a short stay at Melbourne, went on to Sydney, where we
+coaled again and laid in supplies.
+
+Then our real journey began. The plan we laid out was to sail
+to Suva in Fiji, about 1,700 miles away, and after a stay there,
+on to Hawaii or the Sandwich Islands, stopping perhaps at the
+Phoenix Islands and the Central Polynesian Sporades, such as
+Christmas and Fanning Isles. Then we proposed to turn south again
+through the Marshall Archipelago and the Caroline Islands, and so
+on to New Guinea and the Coral Sea. Particularly did we wish to
+visit Easter Island on account of its marvelous sculptures that
+are supposed to be the relics of a pre-historic race. In truth,
+however, we had no fixed plan except to go wherever circumstance
+and chance might take us. Chance, I may add, or something else,
+took full advantage of its opportunities.
+
+We came to Suva in safety and spent a while in exploring the
+beautiful Fiji Isles where both Bastin and Bickley made full
+inquiries about the work of the missionaries, each of them
+drawing exactly opposite conclusions from the same set of
+admitted facts. Thence we steamed to Samoa and put our two
+natives ashore at Apia, where we procured some coal. We did not
+stay long enough in these islands to investigate them, however,
+because persons of experience there assured us from certain
+familiar signs that one of the terrible hurricanes with which
+they are afflicted, was due to arrive shortly and that we should
+do well to put ourselves beyond its reach. So having coaled and
+watered we departed in a hurry.
+
+Up to this time I should state we had met with the most
+wonderful good fortune in the matter of weather, so good indeed
+that never on one occasion since we left Marseilles, had we been
+obliged to put the fiddles on the tables. With the superstition
+of a sailor Captain Astley, when I alluded to the matter, shook
+his head saying that doubtless we should pay for it later on,
+since "luck never goes all the way" and cyclones were reported to
+be about.
+
+Here I must tell that after we were clear of Apia, it was
+discovered that the Danish mate who was believed to be in his
+cabin unwell from something he had eaten, was missing. The
+question arose whether we should put back to find him, as we
+supposed that he had made a trip inland and met with an accident,
+or been otherwise delayed. I was in favour of doing so though the
+captain, thinking of the threatened hurricane, shook his head and
+said that Jacobsen was a queer fellow who might just as well have
+gone overboard as anywhere else, if he thought he heard "the
+spirits, of whom he was so fond," calling him. While the matter
+was still in suspense I happened to go into my own stateroom and
+there, stuck in the looking-glass, saw an envelope in the Dane's
+handwriting addressed to myself. On opening it I found another
+sealed letter, unaddressed, also a note that ran as follows:
+
+"Honoured Sir,
+
+"You will think very badly of me for leaving you, but the
+enclosed which I implore you not to open until you have seen the
+last of the Star of the South, will explain my reason and I hope
+clear my reputation. I thank you again and again for all your
+kindness and pray that the Spirits who rule the world may bless
+and preserve you, also the Doctor and Mr. Bastin."
+
+
+This letter, which left the fate of Jacobsen quite unsolved,
+for it might mean either that he had deserted or drowned himself,
+I put away with the enclosure in my pocket. Of course there was
+no obligation on me to refrain from opening the letter, but I
+shrank from doing so both from some kind of sense of honour and,
+to tell the truth, for fear of what it might contain. I felt that
+this would be disagreeable; also, although there was nothing to
+connect them together, I bethought me of the scene when Jacobsen
+had smashed the planchette.
+
+On my return to the deck I said nothing whatsoever about the
+discovery of the letter, but only remarked that on reflection I
+had changed my mind and agreed with the captain that it would be
+unwise to attempt to return in order to look for Jacobsen. So the
+boatswain, a capable individual who had seen better days, was
+promoted to take his watches and we went on as before. How
+curiously things come about in the world! For nautical reasons
+that were explained to me, but which I will not trouble to set
+down, if indeed I could remember them, I believe that if we had
+returned to Apia we should have missed the great gale and
+subsequent cyclone, and with these much else. But it was not so
+fated.
+
+It was on the fourth day, when we were roughly seven hundred
+miles or more north of Samoa, that we met the edge of this gale
+about sundown. The captain put on steam in the hope of pushing
+through it, but that night we dined for the first time with the
+fiddles on, and by eleven o'clock it was as much as one could do
+to stand in the cabin, while the water was washing freely over
+the deck. Fortunately, however, the wind veered more aft of us,
+so that by putting about her head a little (seamen must forgive
+me if I talk of these matters as a landlubber) we ran almost
+before the wind, though not quite in the direction that we wished
+to go.
+
+When the light came it was blowing very hard indeed, and the
+sky was utterly overcast, so that we got no glimpse of the sun,
+or of the stars on the following night. Unfortunately, there was
+no moon visible; indeed, if there had been I do not suppose that
+it would have helped us because of the thick pall of clouds. For
+quite seventy-two hours we ran on beneath bare poles before that
+gale. The little vessel behaved splendidly, riding the seas like
+a duck, but I could see that Captain Astley was growing alarmed.
+When I said something complimentary to him about the conduct of
+the Star of the South, he replied that she was forging ahead all
+right, but the question was--where to? He had been unable to take
+an observation of any sort since we left Samoa; both his patent
+logs had been carried away, so that now only the compass
+remained, and he had not the slightest idea where we were in that
+great ocean studded with atolls and islands.
+
+I asked him whether we could not steam back to our proper
+course, but he answered that to do so he would have to travel
+dead in the eye of the gale, and he doubted whether the engines
+would stand it. Also there was the question of coal to be
+considered. However, he had kept the fires going and would do
+what he could if the weather moderated.
+
+That night during dinner which now consisted of tinned foods
+and whisky and water, for the seas had got to the galley fire,
+suddenly the gale dropped, whereat we rejoiced exceedingly. The
+captain came down into the saloon very white and shaken, I
+thought, and I asked him to have a nip of whisky to warm him up,
+and to celebrate our good fortune in having run out of the wind.
+He took the bottle and, to my alarm, poured out a full half
+tumbler of spirit, which he swallowed undiluted in two or three
+gulps.
+
+"That's better!" he said with a hoarse laugh. "But man, what is
+it you are saying about having run out of the wind? Look at the
+glass!"
+
+"We have," said Bastin, "and it is wonderfully steady. About 29
+degrees or a little over, which it has been for the last three
+days."
+
+Again Astley laughed in a mirthless fashion, as he answered:
+
+"Oh, that thing! That's the passengers' glass. I told the
+steward to put it out of gear so that you might not be
+frightened; it is an old trick. Look at this," and he produced
+one of the portable variety out of his pocket.
+
+We looked, and it stood somewhere between 27 degrees and 28
+degrees.
+
+"That's the lowest glass I ever saw in the Polynesian or any
+other seas during thirty years. It's right, too, for I have
+tested it by three others," he said.
+
+"What does it mean?" I asked rather anxiously.
+
+"South Sea cyclone of the worst breed," he replied. "That
+cursed Dane knew it was coming and that's why he left the ship.
+Pray as you never prayed before," and again he stretched out his
+hand towards the whisky bottle. But I stepped between him and it,
+shaking my head. Thereon he laughed for the third time and left
+the cabin. Though I saw him once or twice afterwards, these were
+really the last words of intelligible conversation that I ever
+had with Captain Astley.
+
+"It seems that we are in some danger," said Bastin, in an
+unmoved kind of way. "I think that was a good idea of the
+captain's, to put up a petition, I mean, but as Bickley will
+scarcely care to join in it I will go into the cabin and do so
+myself."
+
+Bickley snorted, then said:
+
+"Confound that captain! Why did he play such a trick upon us
+about the barometer? Humphrey, I believe he had been drinking."
+
+"So do I," I said, looking at the whisky bottle. "Otherwise,
+after taking those precautions to keep us in the dark, he would
+not have let on like that."
+
+"Well," said Bickley, "he can't get to the liquor, except
+through this saloon, as it is locked up forward with the other
+stores."
+
+"That's nothing," I replied, "as doubtless he has a supply of
+his own; rum, I expect. We must take our chance."
+
+Bickley nodded, and suggested that we should go on deck to see
+what was happening. So we went. Not a breath of wind was
+stirring, and even the sea seemed to be settling down a little.
+At least, so we judged from the motion, for we could not see
+either it or the sky; everything was as black as pitch. We heard
+the sailors, however, engaged in rigging guide ropes fore and
+aft, and battening down the hatches with extra tarpaulins by the
+light of lanterns. Also they were putting ropes round the boats
+and doing something to the spars and topmasts.
+
+Presently Bastin joined us, having, I suppose, finished his
+devotions.
+
+"Really, it is quite pleasant here," he said. "One never knows
+how disagreeable so much wind is until it stops."
+
+I lit my pipe, making no answer, and the match burned quite
+steadily there in the open air.
+
+"What is that?" exclaimed Bickley, staring at something which
+now I saw for the first time. It looked like a line of white
+approaching through the gloom. With it came a hissing sound, and
+although there was still no wind, the rigging began to moan
+mysteriously like a thing in pain. A big drop of water also fell
+from the sides into my pipe and put it out. Then one of the
+sailors cried in a hoarse voice:
+
+"Get down below, governors, unless you want to go out to sea!"
+
+"Why?" inquired Bastin.
+
+"Why? Becos the 'urricane is coming, that's all. Coming as
+though the devil had kicked it out of 'ell."
+
+Bastin seemed inclined to remonstrate at this sort of language,
+but we pushed him down the companion and followed, propelling the
+spaniel Tommy in front of us. Next moment I heard the sailors
+battening the hatch with hurried blows, and when this was done to
+their satisfaction, heard their feet also as they ran into
+shelter.
+
+Another instant and we were all lying in a heap on the cabin
+floor with poor Tommy on top of us. The cyclone had struck the
+ship! Above the wash of water and the screaming of the gale we
+heard other mysterious sounds, which doubtless were caused by the
+yards hitting the seas, for the yacht was lying on her side. I
+thought that all was over, but presently there came a rending,
+crashing noise. The masts, or one of them, had gone, and by
+degrees we righted.
+
+"Near thing!" said Bickley. "Good heavens, what's that?"
+
+I listened, for the electric light had temporarily gone out,
+owing, I suppose, to the dynamo having stopped for a moment. A
+most unholy and hollow sound was rising from the cabin floor. It
+might have been caused by a bullock with its windpipe cut, trying
+to get its breath and groaning. Then the light came on again and
+we saw Bastin lying at full length on the carpet.
+
+"He's broken his neck or something," I said.
+
+Bickley crept to him and having looked, sang out:
+
+"It's all right! He's only sea-sick. I thought it would come to
+that if he drank so much tea."
+
+"Sea-sick," I said faintly--"sea-sick?"
+
+"That's all," said Bickley. "The nerves of the stomach acting
+on the brain or vice-versa--that is, if Bastin has a brain," he
+added sotto voce.
+
+"Oh!" groaned the prostrate clergyman. "I wish that I were
+dead!"
+
+"Don't trouble about that," answered Bickley. "I expect you
+soon will be. Here, drink some whisky, you donkey."
+
+Bastin sat up and obeyed, out of the bottle, for it was
+impossible to pour anything into a glass, with results too
+dreadful to narrate.
+
+"I call that a dirty trick," he said presently, in a feeble
+voice, glowering at Bickley.
+
+"I expect I shall have to play you a dirtier before long, for
+you are a pretty bad case, old fellow."
+
+As a matter of fact he had, for once Bastin had begun really we
+thought that he was going to die. Somehow we got him into his
+cabin, which opened off the saloon, and as he could drink nothing
+more, Bickley managed to inject morphia or some other compound
+into him, which made him insensible for a long while.
+
+"He must be in a poor way," he said, "for the needle went more
+than a quarter of an inch into him, and he never cried out or
+stirred. Couldn't help it in that rolling."
+
+But now I could hear the engines working, and I think that the
+bow of the vessel was got head on to the seas, for instead of
+rolling we pitched, or rather the ship stood first upon one end
+and then upon the other. This continued for a while until the
+first burst of the cyclone had gone by. Then suddenly the engines
+stopped; I suppose that they had broken down, but I never
+learned, and we seemed to veer about, nearly sinking in the
+process, and to run before the hurricane at terrific speed.
+
+"I wonder where we are going to?" I said to Bickley. "To the
+land of sleep, Humphrey, I imagine," he replied in a more gentle
+voice than I had often heard him use, adding: "Good-bye, old boy,
+we have been real friends, haven't we, notwithstanding my
+peculiarities? I only wish that I could think that there was
+anything in Bastin's views. But I can't, I can't. It's good night
+for us poor creatures!"
+
+
+
+Chapter VI
+
+Land
+
+
+At last the electric light really went out. I had looked at my
+watch just before this happened and wound it up, which, Bickley
+remarked, was superfluous and a waste of energy. It then marked
+3.20 in the morning. We had wedged Bastin, who was now snoring
+comfortably, into his berth, with pillows, and managed to tie a
+cord over him--no, it was a large bath towel, fixing one end of
+it to the little rack over his bed and the other to its
+framework. As for ourselves, we lay down on the floor between the
+table legs, which, of course, were screwed, and the settee,
+protecting ourselves as best we were able by help of the
+cushions, etc., between two of which we thrust the terrified
+Tommy who had been sliding up and down the cabin floor. Thus we
+remained, expecting death every moment till the light of day, a
+very dim light, struggling through a port-hole of which the iron
+cover had somehow been wrenched off. Or perhaps it was never
+shut, I do not remember.
+
+About this time there came a lull in the hellish, howling
+hurricane; the fact being, I suppose, that we had reached the
+centre of the cyclone. I suggested that we should try to go on
+deck and see what was happening. So we started, only to find the
+entrance to the companion so faithfully secured that we could not
+by any means get out. We knocked and shouted, but no one
+answered. My belief is that at this time everyone on the yacht
+except ourselves had been washed away and drowned.
+
+Then we returned to the saloon, which, except for a little
+water trickling about the floor, was marvelously dry, and, being
+hungry, retrieved some bits of food and biscuit from its corners
+and ate. At this moment the cyclone began to blow again worse
+than ever, but it seemed to us, from another direction, and
+before it sped our poor derelict barque. It blew all day till for
+my part I grew utterly weary and even longed for the inevitable
+end. If my views were not quite those of Bastin, certainly they
+were not those of Bickley. I had believed from my youth up that
+the individuality of man, the ego, so to speak, does not die when
+life goes out of his poor body, and this faith did not desert me
+then. Therefore, I wished to have it over and learn what there
+might be upon the other side.
+
+We could not speak much because of the howling of the wind, but
+Bickley did manage to shout to me something to the effect that
+his partners would, in his opinion, make an end of their great
+practice within two years, which, he added, was a pity. I nodded
+my head, not caring twopence what happened to Bickley's partners
+or their business, or to my own property, or to anything else.
+When death is at hand most of us do not think much of such things
+because then we realise how small they are. Indeed I was
+wondering whether within a few minutes or hours I should or
+should not see Natalie again, and if this were the end to which
+she had seemed to beckon me in that dream.
+
+On we sped, and on. About four in the afternoon we heard sounds
+from Bastin's cabin which faintly reminded me of some tune. I
+crept to the door and listened. Evidently he had awakened and was
+singing or trying to sing, for music was not one of his strong
+points, "For those in peril on the sea." Devoutly did I wish that
+it might be heard. Presently it ceased, so I suppose he went to
+sleep again.
+
+The darkness gathered once more. Then of a sudden something
+fearful happened. There were stupendous noises of a kind I had
+never heard; there were convulsions. It seemed to us that the
+ship was flung right up into the air a hundred feet or more.
+
+"Tidal wave, I expect," shouted Bickley.
+
+Almost as he spoke she came down with the most appalling crash
+on to something hard and nearly jarred the senses out of us. Next
+the saloon was whirling round and round and yet being carried
+forward, and we felt air blowing upon us. Then our senses left
+us. As I clasped Tommy to my side, whimpering and licking my
+face, my last thought was that all was over, and that presently I
+should learn everything or nothing.
+
+
+I woke up feeling very bruised and sore and perceived that
+light was flowing into the saloon. The door was still shut, but
+it had been wrenched off its hinges, and that was where the light
+came in; also some of the teak planks of the decking, jagged and
+splintered, were sticking up through the carpet. The table had
+broken from its fastenings and lay upon its side. Everything else
+was one confusion. I looked at Bickley. Apparently he had not
+awakened. He was stretched out still wedged in with his cushions
+and bleeding from a wound in his head. I crept to him in terror
+and listened. He was not dead, for his breathing was regular and
+natural. The whisky bottle which had been corked was upon the
+floor unbroken and about a third full. I took a good pull at the
+spirit; to me it tasted like nectar from the gods. Then I tried
+to force some down Bickley's throat but could not, so I poured a
+little upon the cut on his head. The smart of it woke him in a
+hurry.
+
+"Where are we now?" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to tell me
+that Bastin is right after all and that we live again somewhere
+else? Oh! I could never bear that ignominy."
+
+"I don't know about living somewhere else," I said, "although
+my opinions on that matter differ from yours. But I do know that
+you and I are still on earth in what remains of the saloon of the
+Star of the South."
+
+"Thank God for that! Let's go and look for old Bastin," said
+Bickley. "I do pray that he is all right also."
+
+"It is most illogical of you, Bickley, and indeed wrong,"
+groaned a deep voice from the other side of the cabin door, "to
+thank a God in Whom you do not believe, and to talk of praying
+for one of the worst and most inefficient of His servants when
+you have no faith in prayer."
+
+"Got you there, my friend," I said.
+
+Bickley murmured something about force of habit, and looked
+smaller than I had ever seen him do before.
+
+Somehow we forced that door open; it was not easy because it
+had jammed. Within the cabin, hanging on either side of the bath
+towel which had stood the strain nobly, something like a damp
+garment over a linen line, was Bastin most of whose bunk seemed
+to have disappeared. Yes--Bastin, pale and dishevelled and
+looking shrunk, with his hair touzled and his beard apparently
+growing all ways, but still Bastin alive, if very weak.
+
+Bickley ran at him and made a cursory examination with his
+fingers.
+
+"Nothing broken," he said triumphantly. "He's all right."
+
+"If you had hung over a towel for many hours in most violent
+weather you would not say that," groaned Bastin. "My inside is a
+pulp. But perhaps you would be kind enough to untie me."
+
+"Bosh!" said Bickley as he obeyed. "All you want is something
+to eat. Meanwhile, drink this," and he handed him the remains of
+the whisky.
+
+Bastin swallowed it every drop, murmuring something about
+taking a little wine for his stomach's sake, "one of the Pauline
+injunctions, you know," after which he was much more cheerful.
+Then we hunted about and found some more of the biscuits and
+other food with which we filled ourselves after a fashion.
+
+"I wonder what has happened," said Bastin. "I suppose that,
+thanks to the skill of the captain, we have after all reached the
+haven where we would be."
+
+Here he stopped, rubbed his eyes and looked towards the saloon
+door which, as I have said, had been wrenched off its hinges, but
+appeared to have opened wider than when I observed it last. Also
+Tommy, who was recovering his spirits, uttered a series of low
+growls.
+
+"It is a most curious thing," he went on, "and I suppose I must
+be suffering from hallucinations, but I could swear that just now
+I saw looking through that door the same improper young woman
+clothed in a few flowers and nothing else, whose photograph in
+that abominable and libellous book was indirectly the cause of
+our tempestuous voyage."
+
+"Indeed!" replied Bickley. "Well, so long as she has not got on
+the broken-down stays and the Salvation Army bonnet without a
+crown, which you may remember she wore after she had fallen into
+the hands of your fraternity, I am sure I do not mind. In fact I
+should be delighted to see anything so pleasant."
+
+At this moment a distinct sound of female tittering arose from
+beyond the door. Tommy barked and Bickley stepped towards it, but
+I called to him.
+
+"Look out! Where there are women there are sure to be men. Let
+us be ready against accidents."
+
+So we armed ourselves with pistols, that is Bickley and I did,
+Bastin being fortified solely with a Bible.
+
+Then we advanced, a remarkable and dilapidated trio, and
+dragged the door wide. Instantly there was a scurry and we caught
+sight of women's forms wearing only flowers, and but few of
+these, running over white sand towards groups of men armed with
+odd-looking clubs, some of which were fashioned to the shapes of
+swords and spears. To make an impression I fired two shots with
+my revolver into the air, whereupon both men and women fled into
+groves of trees and vanished.
+
+"They don't seem to be accustomed to white people," said
+Bickley. "Is it possible that we have found a shore upon which no
+missionary has set a foot?"
+
+"I hope so," said Bastin, "seeing that unworthy as I am, then
+the opportunities for me would be very great."
+
+We stood still and looked about us. This was what we saw. All
+the after part of the ship from forward of the bridge had
+vanished utterly; there was not a trace of it; she had as it were
+been cut in two. More, we were some considerable distance from
+the sea which was still raging over a quarter of a mile away
+where great white combers struck upon a reef and spouted into the
+air. Behind us was a cliff, apparently of rock but covered with
+earth and vegetation, and against this cliff, in which the prow
+of the ship was buried, she, or what remained of her, had come to
+anchor for the last time.
+
+"You see what has happened," I said. "A great tidal wave has
+carried us up here and retreated."
+
+"That's it," exclaimed Bickley. "Look at the debris," and he
+pointed to torn-up palms, bushes and seaweed piled into heaps
+which still ran salt water; also to a number of dead fish that
+lay about among them, adding, "Well, we are saved anyhow."
+
+"And yet there are people like you who say that there is no
+Providence!" ejaculated Bastin.
+
+"I wonder what the views of Captain Astley and the crew are, or
+rather were, upon that matter," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, looking about him vaguely. "It
+is true that I can't see any of them, but if they are drowned no
+doubt it is because their period of usefulness in this world had
+ended."
+
+"Let's get down and look about us," I remarked, being anxious
+to avoid further argument.
+
+So we scrambled from the remnant of the ship, like Noah
+descending out of the ark, as Bastin said, on to the beach
+beneath, where Tommy rushed to and fro, gambolling for joy. Here
+we discovered a path which ran diagonally up the side of a cliff
+which was nowhere more than fifty or sixty feet in height, and
+possibly had once formed the shore of this land, or perhaps that
+of a lake. Up this path we went, following the tracks of many
+human feet, and reaching the crest of the cliff, looked about us,
+basking as we did so in the beautiful morning sun, for the sky
+was now clear of clouds and with that last awful effort, which
+destroyed our ship, the cyclone had passed away.
+
+We were standing on a plain down which ran a little stream of
+good water whereof Tommy drank greedily, we following his
+example. To the right and left of this plain, further than we
+could see, stretched bushland over which towered many palms,
+rather ragged now because of the lashing of the gale. Looking
+inland we perceived that the ground sloped gently downwards,
+ending at a distance of some miles in a large lake. Far out in
+this lake something like the top of a mountain of a brown colour
+rose above the water, and on the edge of it was what from that
+distance appeared to be a tumbled ruin.
+
+"This is all very interesting," I said to Bickley. "What do you
+make of it?"
+
+"I don't quite know. At first sight I should say that we are
+standing on the lip of a crater of some vast extinct volcano.
+Look how it curves to north and south and at the slope running
+down to the lake."
+
+I nodded.
+
+"Lucky that the tidal wave did not get over the cliff," I said.
+"If it had the people here would have all been drowned out. I
+wonder where they have gone?"
+
+As I spoke Bastin pointed to the edge of the bush some hundreds
+of yards away, where we perceived brown figures slipping about
+among the trees. I suggested that we should go back to the mouth
+of our path, so as to have a line of retreat open in case of
+necessity, and await events. So we did and there stood still. By
+degrees the brown figures emerged on to the plain to the number
+of some hundreds, and we saw that they were both male and female.
+The women were clothed in nothing except flowers and a little
+girdle; the men were all armed with wooden weapons and also wore
+a girdle but no flowers. The children, of whom there were many,
+were quite naked.
+
+Among these people we observed a tall person clothed in what
+seemed to be a magnificent feather cloak, and, walking around and
+about him, a number of grotesque forms adorned with hideous masks
+and basket-like head-dresses that were surmounted by plumes.
+
+"The king or chief and his priests or medicine-men! This is
+splendid," said Bickley triumphantly.
+
+Bastin also contemplated them with enthusiasm as raw material
+upon which he hoped to get to work.
+
+By degrees and very cautiously they approached us. To our joy,
+we perceived that behind them walked several young women who bore
+wooden trays of food or fruit.
+
+"That looks well," I said. "They would not make offerings
+unless they were friendly."
+
+"The food may be poisoned," remarked Bickley suspiciously.
+
+The crowd advanced, we standing quite still looking as
+dignified as we could, I as the tallest in the middle, with Tommy
+sitting at my feet. When they were about five and twenty yards
+away, however, that wretched little dog caught sight of the
+masked priests. He growled and then rushed at them barking, his
+long black ears flapping as he went.
+
+The effect was instantaneous. One and all they turned and fled
+precipitately, who evidently had never before seen a dog and
+looked upon it as a deadly creature. Yes, even the tall chief and
+his masked medicine-men fled like hares pursued by Tommy, who bit
+one of them in the leg, evoking a terrific howl. I called him
+back and took him into my arms. Seeing that he was safe for a
+while the crowd reformed and once again advanced.
+
+As they came we noted that they were a wonderfully handsome
+people, tall and straight with regularly shaped features and
+nothing of the negro about them. Some of the young women might
+even be called beautiful, though those who were elderly had
+become corpulent. The feather-clothed chief, however, was much
+disfigured by a huge growth with a narrow stalk to it that hung
+from his neck and rested on his shoulder.
+
+"I'll have that off him before he is a week older," said
+Bickley, surveying this deformity with great professional
+interest.
+
+On they came, the girls with the platters walking ahead. On one
+of these were what looked like joints of baked pork, on another
+some plantains and pear-shaped fruits. They knelt down and
+offered these to us. We contemplated them for a while. Then
+Bickley shook his head and began to rub his stomach with
+appropriate contortions. Clearly they were quick-minded enough for
+they saw the point. At some words the girls brought the platters
+to the chief and others, who took from them portions of the food
+at hazard and ate them to show that it was not poisoned, we
+watching their throats the while to make sure that it was
+swallowed. Then they returned again and we took some of the food
+though only Bickley ate, because, as I pointed out to him, being
+a doctor who understood the use of antidotes; clearly he should
+make the experiment. However, nothing happened; indeed he said
+that it was very good.
+
+After this there came a pause. Then suddenly Bastin took up his
+parable in the Polynesian tongue which--to a certain extent--he
+had acquired with so much pains.
+
+"What is this place called?" he asked slowly and distinctly,
+pausing between each word.
+
+His audience shook their heads and he tried again, putting the
+accents on different syllables. Behold! some bright spirit
+understood him and answered:
+
+"Orofena."
+
+"That means a hill, or an island, or a hill in an island,"
+whispered Bickley to me.
+
+"Who is your God?" asked Bastin again.
+
+The point seemed one upon which they were a little doubtful,
+but at last the chief answered, "Oro. He who fights."
+
+"In other words, Mars," said Bickley.
+
+"I will give you a better one," said Bastin in the same slow
+fashion.
+
+Thinking that he referred to himself these children of Nature
+contemplated his angular form doubtfully and shook their heads.
+Then for the first time one of the men who was wearing a mask and
+a wicker crate on his head, spoke in a hollow voice, saying:
+
+"If you try Oro will eat you up."
+
+"Head priest!" said Bickley, nudging me. "Old Bastin had better
+be careful or he will get his teeth into him and call them
+Oro's."
+
+Another pause, after which the man in a feather cloak with the
+growth on his neck that a servant was supporting, said:
+
+"I am Marama, the chief of Orofena. We have never seen men like
+you before, if you are men. What brought you here and with you
+that fierce and terrible animal, or evil spirit which makes a
+noise and bites?"
+
+Now Bickley pretended to consult me who stood brooding and
+majestic, that is if I can be majestic. I whispered something and
+he answered:
+
+"The gods of the wind and the sea."
+
+"What nonsense," ejaculated Bastin, "there are no such things."
+
+"Shut up," I said, "we must use similes here," to which he
+replied:
+
+"I don't like similes that tamper with the truth."
+
+"Remember Neptune and Aeolus," I suggested, and he lapsed into
+consideration of the point.
+
+"We knew that you were coming," said Marama. "Our doctors told
+us all about you a moon ago. But we wish that you would come more
+gently, as you nearly washed away our country."
+
+After looking at me Bickley replied:
+
+"How thankful should you be that in our kindness we have spared
+you."
+
+"What do you come to do?" inquired Marama again. After the
+usual formula of consulting me Bickley answered:
+
+"We come to take that mountain (he meant lump) off your neck
+and make you beautiful; also to cure all the sickness among your
+people."
+
+"And I come," broke in Bastin, "to give you new hearts."
+
+These announcements evidently caused great excitement. After
+consultation Marama answered:
+
+"We do not want new hearts as the old ones are good, but we
+wish to be rid of lumps and sicknesses. If you can do this we
+will make you gods and worship you and give you many wives."
+(Here Bastin held up his hands in horror.) "When will you begin
+to take away the lumps?"
+
+"To-morrow," said Bickley. "But learn that if you try to harm
+us we will bring another wave which will drown all your country."
+
+Nobody seemed to doubt our capacities in this direction, but
+one inquiring spirit in a wicker crate did ask how it came about
+that if we controlled the ocean we had arrived in half a canoe
+instead of a whole one.
+
+Bickley replied to the effect that it was because the gods
+always travelled in half-canoes to show their higher nature,
+which seemed to satisfy everyone. Then we announced that we had
+seen enough of them for that day and would retire to think.
+Meanwhile we should be obliged if they would build us a house and
+keep us supplied with whatever food they had.
+
+"Do the gods eat?" asked the sceptic again.
+
+"That fellow is a confounded radical," I whispered to Bickley.
+"Tell him that they do when they come to Orofena."
+
+He did so, whereon the chief said:
+
+"Would the gods like a nice young girl cooked?"
+
+At this point Bastin retired down the path, realising that he
+had to do with cannibals. We said that we preferred to look at
+the girls alive and would meet them again to-morrow morning, when
+we hoped that the house would be ready.
+
+So our first interview with the inhabitants of Orofena came to
+an end, on which we congratulated ourselves.
+
+
+On reaching the remains of the Star of the South we set to work
+to take stock of what was left to us. Fortunately it proved to be
+a very great deal. As I think I mentioned, all the passenger part
+of the yacht lay forward of the bridge, just in front of which
+the vessel had been broken in two, almost as cleanly as though
+she were severed by a gigantic knife. Further our stores were
+forward and practically everything else that belonged to us, even
+down to Bickley's instruments and medicines and Bastin's
+religious works, to say nothing of a great quantity of tinned
+food and groceries. Lastly on the deck above the saloon had stood
+two large lifeboats. Although these were amply secured at the
+commencement of the gale one of them, that on the port side, was
+smashed to smithers; probably some spar had fallen upon it. The
+starboard boat, however, remained intact and so far as we could
+judge, seaworthy, although the bulwarks were broken by the waves.
+
+"There's something we can get away in if necessary," I said.
+
+"Where to?" remarked Bastin. "We don't know where we are or if
+there is any other land within a thousand miles. I think we had
+better stop here as Providence seems to have intended, especially
+when there is so much work to my hand."
+
+"Be careful," answered Bickley, "that the work to your hand
+does not end in the cutting of all our throats. It is an awkward
+thing interfering with the religion of savages, and I believe
+that these untutored children of Nature sometimes eat
+missionaries."
+
+"Yes, I have heard that," said Bastin; "they bake them first as
+they do pigs. But I don't know that they would care to eat me,"
+and he glanced at his bony limbs, "especially when you are much
+plumper. Anyhow one can't stop for a risk of that sort."
+
+Deigning no reply, Bickley walked away to fetch some fine fish
+which had been washed up by the tidal wave and were still
+flapping about in a little pool of salt water. Then we took
+counsel as to how to make the best of our circumstances, and as a
+result set to work to tidy up the saloon and cabins, which was
+not difficult as what remained of the ship lay on an even keel.
+Also we got out some necessary stores, including paraffin for the
+swinging lamps with which the ship was fitted in case of accident
+to the electric light, candles, and the guns we had brought with
+us so that they might be handy in the event of attack. This done,
+by the aid of the tools that were in the storerooms, Bickley, who
+was an excellent carpenter, repaired the saloon door, all that
+was necessary to keep us private, as the bulkhead still remained.
+
+"Now," he said triumphantly when he had finished and got the
+lock and bolts to work to his satisfaction, "we can stand a siege
+if needed, for as the ship is iron built they can't even burn us
+out and that teak door would take some forcing. Also we can shore
+it up."
+
+"How about something to eat? I want my tea," said Bastin.
+
+"Then, my reverend friend," replied Bickley, "take a couple of
+the fire buckets and fetch some water from the stream. Also
+collect driftwood of which there is plenty about, clean those
+fish and grill them over the saloon stove."
+
+"I'll try," said Bastin, "but I never did any cooking before."
+
+"No," replied Bickley, "on second thoughts I will see to that
+myself, but you can get the fish ready."
+
+So, with due precautions, Bastin and I fetched water from the
+stream which we found flowed over the edge of the cliff quite
+close at hand into a beautiful coral basin that might have been
+designed for a bath of the nymphs. Indeed one at a time, while
+the other watched, we undressed and plunged into it, and never
+was a tub more welcome than after our long days of tempest. Then
+we returned to find that Bickley had already set the table and
+was engaged in frying the fish very skilfully on the saloon
+stove, which proved to be well adapted to the purpose. He was
+cross, however, when he found that we had bathed and that it was
+now too late for him to do likewise.
+
+While he was cleaning himself as well as he could in his cabin
+basin and Bastin was boiling water for tea, suddenly I remembered
+the letter from the Danish mate Jacobsen. Concluding that it
+might now be opened as we had certainly parted with most of the
+Star of the South for the last time, I read it. It was as
+follows:
+
+
+"The reason, honoured Sir, that I am leaving the ship is that
+on the night I tore up the paper, the spirit controlling the
+planchette wrote these words: 'After leaving Samoa the Star of
+the South will be wrecked in a hurricane and everybody on board
+drowned except A. B. and B. Get out of her! Get out of her! Don't
+be a fool, Jacob, unless you want to come over here at once. Take
+our advice and get out of her and you will live to be old.--
+SKOLL."
+
+
+"Sir, I am not a coward but I know that this will happen, for
+that spirit which signs itself Skoll never tells a lie. I did try
+to give the captain a hint to stop at Apia, but he had been
+drinking and openly cursed me and called me a sneaking cheat. So
+I am going to run away, of which I am very much ashamed. But I do
+not wish to be drowned yet as there is a girl whom I want to
+marry, and my mother I support. You will be safe and I hope you
+will not think too badly of me.--JACOB JACOBSEN.
+
+"P.S.--It is an awful thing to know the future. Never try to
+learn that."
+
+
+I gave this letter to Bastin and Bickley to read and asked them
+what they thought of it.
+
+"Coincidence," said Bickley. "The man is a weak-minded idiot
+and heard in Samoa that they expected a hurricane."
+
+"I think," chimed in Bastin, "that the devil knows how to look
+after his own at any rate for a little while. I dare say it would
+have been much better for him to be drowned."
+
+"At least he is a deserter and failed in his duty. I never wish
+to hear of him again," I said.
+
+As a matter of fact I never have. But the incident remains
+quite unexplained either by Bickley or Bastin.
+
+
+
+Chapter VII
+
+The Orofenans
+
+
+To our shame we had a very pleasant supper that night off the
+grilled fish, which was excellent, and some tinned meat. I say to
+our shame, in a sense, for on our companions the sharks were
+supping and by rights we should have been sunk in woe. I suppose
+that the sense of our own escape intoxicated us. Also,
+notwithstanding his joviality, none of us had cared much for the
+captain, and his policy had been to keep us somewhat apart from
+the crew, of whom therefore we knew but little. It is true that
+Bastin held services on Sundays, for such as would attend, and
+Bickley had doctored a few of them for minor ailments, but there,
+except for a little casual conversation, our intercourse began
+and ended.
+
+Now the sad fact is that it is hard to be overwhelmed with
+grief for those with whom we are not intimate. We were very sorry
+and that is all that can be said, except that Bastin, being High
+Church, announced in a matter-of-fact way that he meant to put up
+some petitions for the welfare of their souls. To this Bickley
+retorted that from what he had seen of their bodies he was sure
+they needed them.
+
+Yes, it was a pleasant supper, not made less so by a bottle of
+champagne which Bickley and I shared. Bastin stuck to his tea,
+not because he did not like champagne, but because, as he
+explained, having now come in contact with the heathen it would
+never do for him to set them an example in the use of spirituous
+liquors.
+
+"However much we may differ, Bastin, I respect you for that
+sentiment," commented Bickley.
+
+"I don't know why you should," answered Bastin; "but if so, you
+might follow my example."
+
+That night we slept like logs, trusting to our teak door which
+we barricaded, and to Tommy, who was a most excellent watch-dog,
+to guard us against surprise. At any rate we took the risk. As a
+matter of fact, nothing happened, though before dawn Tommy did
+growl a good deal, for I heard him, but as he sank into slumber
+again on my bed, I did not get up. In the morning I found from
+fresh footprints that two or three men had been prowling about
+the ship, though at a little distance.
+
+We rose early, and taking the necessary precautions, bathed in
+the pool. Then we breakfasted, and having filled every available
+receptacle with water, which took us a long time as these
+included a large tank that supplied the bath, so that we might
+have at least a week's supply in case of siege, we went on deck
+and debated what we should do. In the end we determined to stop
+where we were and await events, because, as I pointed out, it was
+necessary that we should discover whether these natives were
+hostile or friendly. In the former event we could hold our own on
+the ship, whereas away from it we must be overwhelmed; in the
+latter there was always time to move inland.
+
+About ten o'clock when we were seated on stools smoking, with
+our guns by our side--for here, owing to the overhanging cliff in
+which it will be remembered the prow of the ship was buried, we
+could not be reached by missiles thrown from above--we saw
+numbers of the islanders advancing upon us along the beach on
+either side. They were preceded as before by women who bore food
+on platters and in baskets. These people, all talking excitedly
+and laughing after their fashion, stopped at a distance, so we
+took no notice of them. Presently Marama, clad in his feather
+cloak, and again accompanied by priests or medicine-men, appeared
+walking down the path on the cliff face, and, standing below,
+made salutations and entered into a conversation with us of which
+I give the substance--that is, so far as we could understand it.
+
+He reproached us for not having come to him as he expected we
+would do. We replied that we preferred to remain where we were
+until we were sure of our greeting and asked him what was the
+position. He explained that only once before, in the time of his
+grandfather, had any people reached their shores, also during a
+great storm as we had done. They were dark-skinned men like
+themselves, three of them, but whence they came was never known,
+since they were at once seized and sacrificed to the god Oro,
+which was the right thing to do in such a case.
+
+We asked whether he would consider it right to sacrifice us. He
+replied:
+
+Certainly, unless we were too strong, being gods ourselves, or
+unless an arrangement could be concluded. We asked--what
+arrangement? He replied that we must make them gifts; also that
+we must do what we had promised and cure him--the chief--of the
+disease which had tormented him for years. In that event
+everything would be at our disposal and we, with all our
+belongings, should become taboo, holy, not to be touched. None
+would attempt to harm us, nothing should be stolen under penalty
+of death.
+
+We asked him to come up on the deck with only one companion
+that his sickness might be ascertained, and after much hesitation
+he consented to do so. Bickley made an examination of the growth
+and announced that he believed it could be removed with perfect
+safety as the attachment to the neck was very slight, but of
+course there was always a risk. This was explained to him with
+difficulty, and much talk followed between him and his followers
+who gathered on the beach beneath the ship. They seemed adverse
+to the experiment, till Marama grew furious with them and at last
+burst into tears saying that he could no longer drag this
+terrible burden about with him, and he touched the growth. He
+would rather die. Then they gave way.
+
+I will tell the rest as shortly as I can.
+
+A hideous wooden idol was brought on board, wrapped in leaves
+and feathers, and upon it the chief and his head people swore
+safety to us whether he lived or died, making us the guests of
+their land. There were, however, two provisos made, or as such we
+understood them. These seemed to be that we should offer no
+insult or injury to their god, and secondly, that we should not
+set foot on the island in the lake. It was not till afterwards
+that it occurred to me that this must refer to the mountain top
+which appeared in the inland sheet of water. To those
+stipulations we made no answer. Indeed, the Orofenans did all the
+talking. Finally, they ratified their oaths by a man who, I
+suppose, was a head priest, cutting his arm and rubbing the blood
+from it on the lips of the idol; also upon those of the chief. I
+should add that Bastin had retired as soon as he saw that false
+god appear, of which I was glad, since I felt sure that he would
+make a scene.
+
+The operation took place that afternoon and on the ship, for
+when once Marama had made up his mind to trust us he did so very
+thoroughly. It was performed on deck in the presence of an awed
+multitude who watched from the shore, and when they saw Bickley
+appear in a clean nightshirt and wash his hands, uttered a groan
+of wonder. Evidently they considered it a magical and religious
+ceremony; indeed ever afterwards they called Bickley the Great
+Priest, or sometimes the Great Healer in later days. This was a
+grievance to Bastin who considered that he had been robbed of his
+proper title, especially when he learned that among themselves he
+was only known as "the Bellower," because of the loud voice in
+which he addressed them. Nor did Bickley particularly appreciate
+the compliment.
+
+With my help he administered the chloroform, which was done
+under shelter of a sail for fear lest the people should think
+that we were smothering their chief. Then the operation went on
+to a satisfactory conclusion. I omit the details, but an electric
+battery and a red-hot wire came into play.
+
+"There," said Bickley triumphantly when he had finished tying
+the vessels and made everything neat and tidy with bandages, "I
+was afraid he might bleed to death, but I don't think there is
+any fear of that now, for I have made a real job of it." Then
+advancing with the horrid tumour in his hands he showed it in
+triumph to the crowd beneath, who groaned again and threw
+themselves on to their faces. Doubtless now it is the most sacred
+relic of Orofena.
+
+When Marama came out of the anesthetic, Bickley gave him
+something which sent him to sleep for twelve hours, during all
+which time his people waited beneath. This was our dangerous
+period, for our difficulty was to persuade them that he was not
+dead, although Bickley had assured them that he would sleep for a
+time while the magic worked. Still, I was very glad when he woke
+up on the following morning, and two or three of his leading men
+could see that he was alive. The rest was lengthy but simple,
+consisting merely in keeping him quiet and on a suitable diet
+until there was no fear of the wound opening. We achieved it
+somehow with the help of an intelligent native woman who, I
+suppose, was one of his wives, and five days later were enabled
+to present him healed, though rather tottery, to his affectionate
+subjects.
+
+It was a great scene, which may be imagined. They bore him away
+in a litter with the native woman to watch him and another to
+carry the relic preserved in a basket, and us they acclaimed as
+gods. Thenceforward we had nothing to fear in Orofena--except
+Bastin, though this we did not know at the time.
+
+All this while we had been living on our ship and growing very
+bored there, although we employed the empty hours in conversation
+with selected natives, thereby improving our knowledge of the
+language. Bickley had the best of it, since already patients
+began to arrive which occupied him. One of the first was that man
+whom Tommy had bitten. He was carried to us in an almost comatose
+state, suffering apparently from the symptoms of snake poisoning.
+
+Afterward it turned out that he conceived Tommy to be a divine
+but most venomous lizard that could make a very horrible noise,
+and began to suffer as one might do from the bite of such a
+creature. Nothing that Bickley could do was enough to save him
+and ultimately he died in convulsions, a circumstance that
+enormously enhanced Tommy's reputation. To tell the truth, we
+took advantage of it to explain that Tommy was in fact a
+supernatural animal, a sort of tame demon which only harmed
+people who had malevolent intentions towards those he served or
+who tried to steal any of their possessions or to intrude upon
+them at inconvenient hours, especially in the dark. So terrible
+was he, indeed, that even the skill of the Great Priest, i.e.,
+Bickley, could not avail to save any whom once he had bitten in
+his rage. Even to be barked at by him was dangerous and conveyed
+a curse that might last for generations.
+
+All this we set out when Bastin was not there. He had wandered
+off, as he said, to look for shells, but as we knew, to practise
+religious orations in the Polynesian tongue with the waves for
+audience, as Demosthenes is said to have done to perfect himself
+as a political orator. Personally I admit that I relied more on
+the terrors of Tommy to safeguard us from theft and other
+troubles than I did upon those of the native taboo and the
+priestly oaths.
+
+The end of it all was that we left our ship, having padlocked
+up the door (the padlock, we explained, was a magical instrument
+that bit worse than Tommy), and moved inland in a kind of
+triumphal procession, priests and singers going before (the
+Orofenans sang extremely well) and minstrels following after
+playing upon instruments like flutes, while behind came the
+bearers carrying such goods as we needed. They took us to a
+beautiful place in a grove of palms on a ridge where grew many
+breadfruit trees, that commanded a view of the ocean upon one
+side and of the lake with the strange brown mountain top on the
+other. Here in the midst of the native gardens we found that a
+fine house had been built for us of a kind of mud brick and
+thatched with palm leaves, surrounded by a fenced courtyard of
+beaten earth and having wide overhanging verandahs; a very
+comfortable place indeed in that delicious climate. In it we took
+up our abode, visiting the ship occasionally to see that all was
+well there, and awaiting events.
+
+For Bickley these soon began to happen in the shape of an
+ever-increasing stream of patients. The population of the island
+was considerable, anything between five and ten thousand, so far
+as we could judge, and among these of course there were a number
+of sick. Ophthalmia, for instance, was a prevalent disease, as
+were the growths such as Marama had suffered from, to say nothing
+of surgical cases and those resulting from accident or from
+nervous ailments. With all of these Bickley was called upon to
+deal, which he did with remarkable success by help of his books
+on Tropical Diseases and his ample supplies of medical
+necessaries.
+
+At first he enjoyed it very much, but when we had been
+established in the house for about three weeks he remarked, after
+putting in a solid ten hours of work, that for all the holiday he
+was getting he might as well be back at his old practice, with
+the difference that there he was earning several thousands a
+year. Just then a poor woman arrived with a baby in convulsions
+to whose necessities he was obliged to sacrifice his supper,
+after which came a man who had fallen from a palm tree and broken
+his leg.
+
+Nor did I escape, since having somehow or other established a
+reputation for wisdom, as soon as I had mastered sufficient of
+the language, every kind of knotty case was laid before me for
+decision. In short, I became a sort of Chief Justice--not an easy
+office as it involved the acquirement of the native law which was
+intricate and peculiar, especially in matrimonial cases.
+
+At these oppressive activities Bastin looked on with a gloomy
+eye.
+
+"You fellows seem very busy," he said one evening; "but I can
+find nothing to do. They don't seem to want me, and merely to set
+a good example by drinking water or tea while you swallow whisky
+and their palm wine, or whatever it is, is very negative kind of
+work, especially as I am getting tired of planting things in the
+garden and playing policeman round the wreck which nobody goes
+near. Even Tommy is better off, for at least he can bark and hunt
+rats."
+
+"You see," said Bickley, "we are following our trades.
+Arbuthnot is a lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I
+may add a general--a very general--practitioner and work at
+medicine in an enormous and much-neglected practice. Therefore,
+you, being a clergyman, should go and do likewise. There are some
+ten thousand people here, but I do not observe that as yet you
+have converted a single one."
+
+Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his
+usual object of what is known as "getting a rise" out of Bastin.
+Little did he guess what he was doing.
+
+Bastin thought a while ponderously, then said:
+
+"It is very strange from what peculiar sources Providence
+sometimes sends inspirations. If wisdom flows from babes and
+sucklings, why should it not do so from the well of agnostics and
+mockers?"
+
+"There is no reason which I can see," scoffed Bickley, "except
+that as a rule wells do not flow."
+
+"Your jest is ill-timed and I may add foolish," continued
+Bastin. "What I was about to add was that you have given me an
+idea, as it was no doubt intended that you should do. I will,
+metaphorically speaking, gird up my loins and try to bear the
+light into all this heathen blackness."
+
+"Then it is one of the first you ever had, old fellow. But
+what's the need of girding up your loins in this hot climate?"
+inquired Bickley with innocence. "Pyjamas and that white and
+green umbrella of yours would do just as well."
+
+Bastin vouchsafed no reply and sat for the rest of that evening
+plunged in deep thought.
+
+On the following morning he approached Marama and asked his
+leave to teach the people about the gods. The chief readily
+granted this, thinking, I believe, that he alluded to ourselves,
+and orders were issued accordingly. They were to the effect that
+Bastin was to be allowed to go everywhere unmolested and to talk
+to whom he would about what he would, to which all must listen
+with respect.
+
+Thus he began his missionary career in Orofena, working at it,
+good and earnest man that he was, in a way that excited even the
+admiration of Bickley. He started a school for children, which
+was held under a fine, spreading tree. These listened well, and
+being of exceedingly quick intellect soon began to pick up the
+elements of knowledge. But when he tried to persuade them to
+clothe their little naked bodies his failure was complete,
+although after much supplication some of the bigger girls did
+arrive with a chaplet of flowers--round their necks!
+
+Also he preached to the adults, and here again was very
+successful in a way, especially after he became more familiar
+with the language. They listened; to a certain extent they
+understood; they argued and put to poor Bastin the most awful
+questions such as the whole Bench of Bishops could not have
+answered. Still he did answer them somehow, and they politely
+accepted his interpretation of their theological riddles. I
+observed that he got on best when he was telling them stories out
+of the Old Testament, such as the account of the creation of the
+world and of human beings, also of the Deluge, etc. Indeed one of
+their elders said--Yes, this was quite true. They had heard it
+all before from their fathers, and that once the Deluge had taken
+place round Orofena, swallowing up great countries, but sparing
+them because they were so good.
+
+Bastin, surprised, asked them who had caused the deluge. They
+replied, Oro which was the name of their god, Oro who dwelt
+yonder on the mountain in the lake, and whose representation they
+worshipped in idols. He said that God dwelt in Heaven, to which
+they replied with calm certainty:
+
+"No, no, he dwells on the mountain in the lake," which was why
+they never dared to approach that mountain.
+
+Indeed it was only by giving the name Oro to the Divinity and
+admitting that He might dwell in the mountain as well as
+everywhere else, that Bastin was able to make progress. Having
+conceded this, not without scruples, however, he did make
+considerable progress, so much, in fact, that I perceived that
+the priests of Oro were beginning to grow very jealous of him and
+of his increasing authority with the people. Bastin was naturally
+triumphant, and even exclaimed exultingly that within a year he
+would have half of the population baptised.
+
+"Within a year, my dear fellow," said Bickley, "you will have
+your throat cut as a sacrifice, and probably ours also. It is a
+pity, too, as within that time I should have stamped out
+ophthalmia and some other diseases in the island."
+
+Here, leaving Bastin and his good work aside for a while, I
+will say a little about the country. From information which I
+gathered on some journeys that I made and by inquiries from the
+chief Marama, who had become devoted to us, I found that Orofena
+was quite a large place. In shape the island was circular, a
+broad band of territory surrounding the great lake of which I
+have spoken, that in its turn surrounded a smaller island from
+which rose the mountain top. No other land was known to be near
+the shores of Orofena, which had never been visited by anyone
+except the strangers a hundred years ago or so, who were
+sacrificed and eaten. Most of the island was covered with forest
+which the inhabitants lacked the energy, and indeed had no tools,
+to fell. They were an extremely lazy people and would only
+cultivate enough bananas and other food to satisfy their
+immediate needs. In truth they lived mostly upon breadfruit and
+other products of the wild trees.
+
+Thus it came about that in years of scarcity through drought or
+climatic causes, which prevented the forest trees from bearing,
+they suffered very much from hunger. In such years hundreds of
+them would perish and the remainder resorted to the dreadful
+expedient of cannibalism. Sometimes, too, the shoals of fish
+avoided their shores, reducing them to great misery. Their only
+domestic animal was the pig which roamed about half wild and in
+no great numbers, for they had never taken the trouble to breed
+it in captivity. Their resources, therefore, were limited, which
+accounted for the comparative smallness of the population,
+further reduced as it was by a wicked habit of infanticide
+practised in order to lighten the burden of bringing up children.
+
+They had no traditions as to how they reached this land, their
+belief being that they had always been there but that their
+forefathers were much greater than they. They were poetical, and
+sang songs in a language which themselves they could not
+understand; they said that it was the tongue their forefathers
+had spoken. Also they had several strange customs of which they
+did not know the origin. My own opinion, which Bickley shared,
+was that they were in fact a shrunken and deteriorated remnant of
+some high race now coming to its end through age and
+inter-breeding. About them indeed, notwithstanding their
+primitive savagery which in its qualities much resembled that of
+other Polynesians, there was a very curious air of antiquity. One
+felt that they had known the older world and its mysteries,
+though now both were forgotten. Also their language, which in
+time we came to speak perfectly, was copious, musical, and
+expressive in its idioms.
+
+One circumstance I must mention. In walking about the country I
+observed all over it enormous holes, some of them measuring as
+much as a hundred yards across, with a depth of fifty feet or
+more, and this not on alluvial lands although there traces of
+them existed also, but in solid rock. What this rock was I do not
+know as none of us were geologists, but it seemed to me to
+partake of the nature of granite. Certainly it was not coral like
+that on and about the coast, but of a primeval formation.
+
+When I asked Marama what caused these holes, he only shrugged
+his shoulders and said he did not know, but their fathers had
+declared that they were made by stones falling from heaven. This,
+of course, suggested meteorites to my mind. I submitted the idea
+to Bickley, who, in one of his rare intervals of leisure, came
+with me to make an examination.
+
+"If they were meteorites," he said, "of which a shower struck
+the earth in some past geological age, all life must have been
+destroyed by them and their remains ought to exist at the bottom
+of the holes. To me they look more like the effect of high
+explosives, but that, of course, is impossible, though I don't
+know what else could have caused such craters."
+
+Then he went back to his work, for nothing that had to do with
+antiquity interested Bickley very much. The present and its
+problems were enough for him, he would say, who neither had lived
+in the past nor expected to have any share in the future.
+
+As I remained curious I made an opportunity to scramble to the
+bottom of one of these craters, taking with me some of the
+natives with their wooden tools. Here I found a good deal of soil
+either washed down from the surface or resulting from the
+decomposition of the rock, though oddly enough in it nothing
+grew. I directed them to dig. After a while to my astonishment
+there appeared a corner of a great worked stone quite unlike that
+of the crater, indeed it seemed to me to be a marble. Further
+examination showed that this block was most beautifully carved in
+bas-relief, apparently with a design of leaves and flowers. In
+the disturbed soil also I picked up a life-sized marble hand of a
+woman exquisitely finished and apparently broken from a statue
+that might have been the work of one of the great Greek
+sculptors. Moreover, on the third finger of this hand was a
+representation of a ring whereof, unfortunately, the bezel had
+been destroyed.
+
+I put the hand in my pocket, but as darkness was coming on, I
+could not pursue the research and disinter the block. When I
+wished to return the next day, I was informed politely by Marama
+that it would not be safe for me to do so as the priests of Oro
+declared that if I sought to meddle with the "buried things the
+god would grow angry and bring disaster on me."
+
+When I persisted he said that at least I must go alone since no
+native would accompany me, and added earnestly that he prayed me
+not to go. So to my great regret and disappointment I was obliged
+to give up the idea.
+
+
+
+Chapter VIII
+
+Bastin Attempts the Martyr's Crown
+
+
+That carved stone and the marble hand took a great hold of my
+imagination. What did they mean? How could they have come to the
+bottom of that hole, unless indeed they were part of some
+building and its ornaments which had been destroyed in the
+neighbourhood? The stone of which we had only uncovered a corner
+seemed far too big to have been carried there from any ship; it
+must have weighed several tons. Besides, ships do not carry such
+things about the world, and none had visited this island during
+the last two centuries at any rate, or local tradition would have
+recorded so wonderful a fact. Were there, then, once edifices
+covered with elegant carving standing on this place, and were
+they adorned with lovely statues that would not have disgraced
+the best period of Greek art? The thing was incredible except on
+the supposition that these were relics of an utterly lost
+civilisation.
+
+Bickley was as much puzzled as myself. All he could say was
+that the world was infinitely old and many things might have
+happened in it whereof we had no record. Even Bastin was excited
+for a little while, but as his imagination was represented by
+zero, all he could say was:
+
+"I suppose someone left them there, and anyhow it doesn't
+matter much, does it?"
+
+But I, who have certain leanings towards the ancient and
+mysterious, could not be put off in this fashion. I remembered
+that unapproachable mountain in the midst of the lake and that on
+it appeared to be something which looked like ruins as seen from
+the top of the cliff through glasses. At any rate this was a
+point, that I might clear up.
+
+Saying nothing to anybody, one morning I slipped away and
+walked to the edge of the lake, a distance of five or six miles
+over rough country. Having arrived there I perceived that the
+cone-shaped mountain in the centre, which was about a mile from
+the lake shore, was much larger than I had thought, quite three
+hundred feet high indeed, and with a very large circumference.
+Further, its sides evidently once had been terraced, and it was
+on one of these broad terraces, half-way up and facing towards
+the rising sun, that the ruin-like remains were heaped. I
+examined them through my glasses. Undoubtedly it was a cyclopean
+ruin built of great blocks of coloured stone which seemed to have
+been shattered by earthquake or explosion. There were the pillars
+of a mighty gateway and the remains of walls.
+
+I trembled with excitement as I stared and stared. Could I not
+get to the place and see for myself? I observed that from the
+flat bush-clad land at the foot of the mountain, ran out what
+seemed to be the residue of a stone pier which ended in a large
+table-topped rock between two and three hundred feet across. But
+even this was too far to reach by swimming, besides for aught I
+knew there might be alligators in that lake. I walked up and down
+its borders, till presently I came to a path which led into a
+patch of some variety of cotton palm.
+
+Following this path I discovered a boat-house thatched over
+with palm leaves. Inside it were two good canoes with their
+paddles, floating and tied to the stumps of trees by fibre ropes.
+Instantly I made up my mind that I would paddle to the island and
+investigate. Just as I was about to step into one of the canoes
+the light was cut off. Looking up I saw that a man was crouching
+in the door-place of the boat-house in order to enter, and paused
+guiltily.
+
+"Friend-from-the-Sea" (that was the name that these islanders
+had given to me), said the voice of Marama, "say--what are you
+doing here?"
+
+"I am about to take a row on the lake, Chief," I answered
+carelessly.
+
+"Indeed, Friend. Have we then treated you so badly that you are
+tired of life?"
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked.
+
+"Come out into the sunlight, Friend, and I will explain to
+you."
+
+I hesitated till I saw Marama lifting the heavy wooden spear he
+carried and remembered that I was unarmed. Then I came out.
+
+"What does all this mean, Chief?" I asked angrily when we were
+clear of the patch of cotton palm.
+
+"I mean, Friend, that you have been very near to making a
+longer journey than you thought. Have patience now and listen to
+me. I saw you leaving the village this morning and followed,
+suspecting your purpose. Yes, I followed alone, saying nothing to
+the priests of Oro who fortunately were away watching the
+Bellower for their own reasons. I saw you searching out the
+secrets of the mountain with those magic tubes that make things
+big that are small, and things that are far off come near, and I
+followed you to the canoes."
+
+"All that is plain enough, Marama. But why?"
+
+"Have I not told you, Friend-from-the-Sea, that yonder hill
+which is called Orofena, whence this island takes its name, is
+sacred?"
+
+"You said so, but what of it?"
+
+"This: to set foot thereon is to die and, I suppose, great as
+you are, you, too, can die like others. At least, although I love
+you, had you not come away from that canoe I was about to
+discover whether this is so."
+
+"Then for what are the canoes used?" I asked with irritation.
+
+"You see that flat rock, Friend, with the hole beyond, which is
+the mouth of a cave that appeared only in the great storm that
+brought you to our land? They are used to convey offerings which
+are laid upon the rock. Beyond it no man may go, and since the
+beginning no man has ever gone."
+
+"Offerings to whom?"
+
+"To the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead who live
+there."
+
+"Oromatuas? Oro! It is always something to do with Oro. Who and
+what is Oro?"
+
+"Oro is a god, Friend, though it is true that the priests say
+that above him there is a greater god called Degai, the Creator,
+the Fate who made all things and directs all things."
+
+"Very well, but why do you suppose that Oro, the servant of
+Degai, lives in that mountain? I thought that he lived in a grove
+yonder where your priests, as I am told, have an image of him."
+
+"I do not know, Friend-from-the-Sea, but so it has been held
+from the beginning. The image in the grove is only visited by his
+spirit from time to time. Now, I pray you, come back and before
+the priests discover that you have been here, and forget that
+there are any canoes upon this lake."
+
+So, thinking it wisest, I turned the matter with a laugh and
+walked away with him to the village. On our road I tried to
+extract some more information but without success. He did not
+know who built the ruin upon the mountain, or who destroyed it.
+He did not know how the terraces came there. All he knew was that
+during the convulsion of Nature which resulted in the tidal wave
+that had thrown our ship upon the island, the mountain had been
+seen to quiver like a tree in the wind as though within it great
+forces were at work. Then it was observed to have risen a good
+many more feet above the surface of the lake, as might be noted
+by the water mark upon the shore, and then also the mouth of the
+cave had appeared. The priests said that all this was because the
+Oromatuas who dwelt there were stirring, which portended great
+things. Indeed great things had happened--for had we not arrived
+in their land?
+
+I thanked him for what he had told me, and, as there was
+nothing more to be learned, dropped the subject which was never
+mentioned between us again, at least not for a long while. But in
+my heart I determined that I would reach that mountain even
+though to do so I must risk my life. Something seemed to call me
+to the place; it was as though I were being drawn by a magnet.
+
+As it happened, before so very long I did go to the mountain,
+not of my own will but because I was obliged. It came about thus.
+One night I asked Bastin how he was getting on with his
+missionary work. He replied: Very well indeed, but there was one
+great obstacle in his path, the idol in the Grove. Were it not
+for this accursed image he believed that the whole island would
+become Christian. I asked him to be more plain. He explained that
+all his work was thwarted by this idol, since his converts
+declared that they did not dare to be baptised while it sat there
+in the Grove. If they did, the spirit that was in it would
+bewitch them and perhaps steal out at night and murder them.
+
+"The spirit being our friends the sorcerers," I suggested.
+
+"That's it, Arbuthnot. Do you know, I believe those devilish
+men sometimes offer human sacrifices to this satanic fetish, when
+there is a drought or anything of that sort."
+
+"I can quite believe it," I answered, "but as they will
+scarcely remove their god and with it their own livelihood and
+authority, I am afraid that as we don't want to be sacrificed,
+there is nothing to be done."
+
+At this moment I was called away. As I went I heard Bastin
+muttering something about martyrs, but paid no attention. Little
+did I guess what was going on in his pious but obstinate mind. In
+effect it was this--that if no one else would remove that idol he
+was quite ready to do it himself.
+
+However, he was very cunning over that business, almost
+Jesuitical indeed. Not one word did he breathe of his dark plans
+to me, and still less to Bickley. He just went on with his
+teaching, lamenting from time to time the stumbling-block of the
+idol and expressing wonder as to how it might be circumvented by
+a change in the hearts of the islanders, or otherwise. Sad as it
+is to record, in fact, dear old Bastin went as near to telling a
+fib in connection with this matter as I suppose he had ever done
+in his life. It happened thus. One day Bickley's sharp eye caught
+sight of Bastin walking about with what looked like a bottle of
+whisky in his pocket.
+
+"Hallo, old fellow," he said, "has the self-denying ordinance
+broken down? I didn't know that you took pegs on the sly," and he
+pointed to the bottle.
+
+"If you are insinuating, Bickley, that I absorb spirits
+surreptitiously, you are more mistaken than usual, which is
+saying a good deal. This bottle contains, not Scotch whisky but
+paraffin, although I admit that its label may have misled you,
+unintentionally, so far as I am concerned."
+
+"What are you going to do with the paraffin?" asked Bickley.
+
+Bastin coloured through his tan and replied awkwardly:
+
+"Paraffin is very good to keep away mosquitoes if one can stand
+the smell of it upon one's skin. Not that I have brought it here
+with that sole object. The truth is that I am anxious to
+experiment with a lamp of my own design made--um--of native
+wood," and he departed in a hurry.
+
+"When next old Bastin wants to tell a lie," commented Bickley,
+"he should make up his mind as to what it is to be, and stick to
+it. I wonder what he is after with that paraffin? Not going to
+dose any of my patients with it, I hope. He was arguing the other
+day that it is a great remedy taken internally, being quite
+unaware that the lamp variety is not used for that purpose."
+
+"Perhaps he means to swallow some himself, just to show that he
+is right," I suggested.
+
+"The stomach-pump is at hand," said Bickley, and the matter
+dropped.
+
+Next morning I got up before it was light. Having some
+elementary knowledge of the main facts of astronomy, which
+remained with me from boyhood when I had attended lectures on the
+subject, which I had tried to refresh by help of an encyclopedia
+I had brought from the ship, I wished to attempt to obtain an
+idea of our position by help of the stars. In this endeavour, I
+may say, I failed absolutely, as I did not know how to take a
+stellar or any other observation.
+
+On my way out of our native house I observed, by the lantern I
+carried, that the compartment of it occupied by Bastin was empty,
+and wondered whither he had gone at that hour. On arriving at my
+observation-post, a rocky eminence on open ground, where, with
+Tommy at my side, I took my seat with a telescope, I was
+astonished to see or rather to hear a great number of the natives
+walking past the base of the mound towards the bush. Then I
+remembered that some one, Marama, I think, had informed me that
+there was to be a great sacrifice to Oro at dawn on that day.
+After this I thought no more of the matter but occupied myself in
+a futile study of the heavenly bodies. At length the dawn broke
+and put a period to my labours.
+
+Glancing round me before I descended from the little hill, I
+saw a flame of light appear suddenly about half a mile or more
+away among those trees which I knew concealed the image of Oro.
+On this personally I had never had the curiosity to look, as I
+knew that it was only a hideous idol stuck over with feathers and
+other bedizenments. The flame shot suddenly straight into the
+still air and was followed a few seconds later by the sound of a
+dull explosion, after which it went out. Also it was followed by
+something else--a scream of rage from an infuriated mob.
+
+At the foot of the hill I stopped to wonder what these sounds
+might mean. Then of a sudden appeared Bickley, who had been
+attending some urgent case, and asked me who was exploding
+gunpowder. I told him that I had no idea.
+
+"Then I have," he answered. "It is that ass Bastin up to some
+game. Now I guess why he wanted that paraffin. Listen to the row.
+What are they after?"
+
+"Sacrificing Bastin, perhaps," I replied, half in jest. "Have
+you your revolver?"
+
+He nodded. We always wore our pistols if we went out during the
+dark hours.
+
+"Then perhaps we had better go to see."
+
+We started, and had not covered a hundred yards before a girl,
+whom I recognised as one of Bastin's converts, came flying
+towards us and screaming out, "Help! Help! They kill the Bellower
+with fire! They cook him like a pig!"
+
+"Just what I expected," said Bickley.
+
+Then we ran hard, as evidently there was no time to lose. While
+we went I extracted from the terrified girl, whom we forced to
+show us the way, that as the sacrifice was about to be offered
+Bastin had appeared, and, "making fire," applied it to the god
+Oro, who instantly burst into flame. Then he ran back, calling
+out that the devil was dead. As he did so there was a loud
+explosion and Oro flew into pieces. His burning head went a long
+way into the air and, falling on to one of the priests, killed
+him. Thereon the other priests and the people seized the Bellower
+and made him fast. Now they were engaged in heating an oven in
+which to put him to cook. When it was ready they would eat him in
+honour of Oro.
+
+"And serve him right too!" gasped Bickley, who, being stout,
+was not a good runner. "Why can't he leave other people's gods
+alone instead of blowing them up with gunpowder?"
+
+"Don't know," I answered. "Hope we shall get there in time!"
+
+"To be cooked and eaten with Bastin!" wheezed Bickley, after
+which his breath gave out.
+
+As it chanced we did, for these stone ovens take a long time to
+heat. There by the edge of his fiery grave with his hands and
+legs bound in palm-fibre shackles, stood Bastin, quite unmoved,
+smiling indeed, in a sort of seraphic way which irritated us both
+extremely. Round him danced the infuriated priests of Oro, and
+round them, shrieking and howling with rage, was most of the
+population of Orofena. We rushed up so suddenly that none tried
+to stop us, and took our stand on either side of him, producing
+our pistols as we did so.
+
+"Thank you for coming," said Bastin in the silence which
+followed; "though I don't think it is the least use. I cannot
+recall that any of the early martyrs were ever roasted and eaten,
+though, of course, throwing them into boiling oil or water was
+fairly common. I take it that the rite is sacrificial and even in
+a low sense, sacramental, not merely one of common cannibalism."
+
+I stared at him, and Bickley gasped out:
+
+"If you are to be eaten, what does it matter why you are
+eaten?"
+
+"Oh!" replied Bastin; "there is all the difference in the
+world, though it is one that I cannot expect you to appreciate.
+And now please be quiet as I wish to say my prayers. I imagine
+that those stones will be hot enough to do their office within
+twenty minutes or so, which is not very long."
+
+At that moment Marama appeared, evidently in a state of great
+perturbation. With him were some of the priests or sorcerers who
+were dancing about as I imagine the priests of Baal must have
+done, and filled with fury. They rolled their eyes, they stuck
+out their tongues, they uttered weird cries and shook their
+wooden knives at the placid Bastin.
+
+"What is the matter?" I asked sternly of the chief.
+
+"This, Friend-from-the-Sea. The Bellower there, when the
+sacrifice was about to be offered to Oro at the dawn, rushed
+forward, and having thrust something between the legs of the
+image of the god, poured yellow water over it, and with fire
+caused it to burst into fierce flame. Then he ran away and mocked
+the god who presently, with a loud report, flew into pieces and
+killed that man. Therefore the Bellower must be sacrificed."
+
+"What to?" I asked. "The image has gone and the piece of it
+that ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened
+if the god had been angry with him, but on one of its own
+priests, whom it killed. Therefore, having been sacrificed by the
+god itself, he it is that should be eaten, not the Bellower, who
+merely did what his Spirit bade him."
+
+This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon
+Marama, but to the priests it did not at all appeal.
+
+"Eat them all!" these cried. "They are the enemies of Oro and
+have worked sacrilege!"
+
+Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people
+seemed to agree with them. Things began to look very ugly. The
+priests rushed forward, threatening us with their wooden weapons,
+and one of them even aimed a blow at Bickley, which only missed
+him by an inch or two.
+
+"Look here, my friend," called the doctor whose temper was
+rising, "you name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you
+not? Well, be careful, lest I should show you that I can kill as
+well as heal!"
+
+Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great
+bedizened fellow who literally was foaming at the mouth with
+rage, rushed forward again, his club raised, apparently with the
+object of dashing out Bickley's brains.
+
+Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot
+through the heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face--
+stone dead. There was consternation, for these people had never
+seen us shoot anything before, and were quite unacquainted with
+the properties of firearms, which they supposed to be merely
+instruments for making a noise. They stared, they gasped in fear
+and astonishment, and then they fled, pursued by Tommy, barking,
+leaving us alone with the two dead men.
+
+"It was time to teach them a lesson," said Bickley as he
+replaced the empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled
+him into the burning pit.
+
+"Yes," I answered; "but presently, when they have got over
+their fright, they will come back to teach us one."
+
+Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had
+taken.
+
+"What do you suggest?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Flight," I answered.
+
+"Where to--the ship? We might hold that."
+
+"No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our
+road there. To the island in the lake where they dare not follow
+us, for it is holy ground."
+
+"How are we going to live on the island?" asked Bickley.
+
+"I don't know," I replied; "but I am quite certain that if we
+stay here we shall die."
+
+"Very well," he said; "let us try it."
+
+While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin's bonds. "Thank
+you," he said. "It is a great relief to stretch one's arms after
+they have been compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do
+not know that I am really grateful. The martyr's crown was
+hanging above me, so to speak, and now it has vanished into the
+pit, like that man whom Bickley murdered."
+
+"Look here," exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, "if you say
+much more, Bastin, I'll chuck you into the pit too, to look for
+your martyr's crown, for I think you have done enough mischief
+for one morning."
+
+"If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that
+unfortunate man's destruction on to me--"
+
+"Oh! shut it and trot," broke in Bickley. "Those infernal
+savages are coming with your blessed converts leading the van."
+
+So we "trotted" at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin
+stooped down and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as
+Atalanta in Academy pictures is represented as doing to the
+apples, and bore it away in triumph.
+
+"I know it is scorched," he ejaculated at intervals, "but they
+might trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original
+false god. Now they can't, for there's nothing left."
+
+As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our
+pursuit was very half-hearted indeed. To begin with, now that
+their first rage was over, the Orofenans who were fond of us had
+no particular wish to do us to death, while the ardour of their
+sorcerers, who wished this very much, had been greatly cooled by
+the mysterious annihilation of their idol and the violent deaths
+of two of their companions, which they thought might be
+reduplicated in their own persons. So it came about that the
+chase, if noisy, was neither close nor eager.
+
+We reached the edge of the lake where was the boat-house of
+which I have spoken already, travelling at little more than a
+walk. Here we made Bastin unfasten the better of the two canoes
+that by good luck was almost filled with offerings, which
+doubtless, according to custom, must be made upon the day of this
+feast to Oro, while we watched against surprise at the boat-house
+door. When he was ready we slipped in and took our seats, Tommy
+jumping in after us, and pushed the canoe, now very heavily
+laden, out into the lake.
+
+Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be
+beyond wooden spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what
+would happen. All the crowd of islanders had rushed to the lake
+edge where they stood staring at us stupidly. Bastin, thinking
+the occasion opportune, lifted the hideous head of the idol which
+he had carefully washed, and began to preach on the downfall of
+"the god of the Grove."
+
+This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in
+the minds of his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was
+concerned--I do not know. At any rate, one of the priests shouted
+something, whereon everybody began to talk at once. Then,
+stooping down, they threw water from the lake over themselves and
+rubbed its sand and mud into their hair, all the while making
+genuflexions toward the mountain in the middle, after which they
+turned and departed.
+
+"Don't you think we had better go back?" asked Bastin.
+"Evidently my words have touched them and their minds are melting
+beneath the light of Truth."
+
+"Oh! by all means," replied Bickley with sarcasm; "for then
+their spears will touch us, and our bodies will soon be melting
+above the fires of that pit."
+
+"Perhaps you are right," said Bastin; "at least, I admit that
+you have made matters very difficult by your unjustifiable
+homicide of that priest who I do not think meant to injure you
+seriously, and really was not at all a bad fellow, though
+opinionated in some ways. Also, I do not suppose that anybody is
+expected, as it were, to run his head into the martyr's crown.
+When it settles there of itself it is another matter."
+
+"Like a butterfly!" exclaimed the enraged Bickley.
+
+"Yes, if you like to put it that way, though the simile seems a
+very poor one; like a sunbeam would be better."
+
+Here Bickley gave way with his paddle so vigorously that the
+canoe was as nearly as possible upset into the lake.
+
+In due course we reached the flat Rock of Offerings, which
+proved to be quite as wide as a double croquet lawn and much
+longer.
+
+"What are those?" I asked, pointing to certain knobs on the
+edge of the rock at a spot where a curved projecting point made a
+little harbour.
+
+Bickley examined them, and answered:
+
+"I should say that they are the remains of stone mooring-posts
+worn down by many thousands of years of weather. Yes, look, there
+is the cut of the cables upon the base of that one, and very big
+cables they must have been."
+
+We stared at one another--that is, Bickley and I did, for
+Bastin was still engaged in contemplating the blackened head of
+the god which he had overthrown.
+
+
+
+Chapter IX
+
+The Island in the Lake
+
+
+We made the canoe fast and landed on the great rock, to
+perceive that it was really a peninsula. That is to say, it was
+joined to the main land of the lake island by a broad roadway
+quite fifty yards across, which appeared to end in the mouth of
+the cave. On this causeway we noted a very remarkable thing,
+namely, two grooves separated by an exact distance of nine feet
+which ran into the mouth of the cave and vanished there.
+
+"Explain!" said Bickley.
+
+"Paths," I said, "worn by countless feet walking on them for
+thousands of years."
+
+"You should cultivate the art of observation, Arbuthnot. What
+do you say, Bastin?"
+
+He stared at the grooves through his spectacles, and replied:
+
+"I don't say anything, except that I can't see anybody to make
+paths here. Indeed, the place seems quite unpopulated, and all
+the Orofenans told me that they never landed on it because if
+they did they would die. It is a part of their superstitious
+nonsense. If you have any idea in your head you had better tell
+us quickly before we breakfast. I am very hungry."
+
+"You always are," remarked Bickley; "even when most people's
+appetites might have been affected. Well, I think that this great
+plateau was once a landing-place for flying machines, and that
+there is the air-shed or garage."
+
+Bastin stared at him.
+
+"Don't you think we had better breakfast?" he said. "There are
+two roast pigs in that canoe, and lots of other food, enough to
+last us a week, I should say. Of course, I understand that the
+blood you have shed has thrown you off your balance. I believe it
+has that effect, except on the most hardened. Flying machines
+were only invented a few years ago by the brothers Wright in
+America."
+
+"Bastin," said Bickley, "I begin to regret that I did not leave
+you to take part in another breakfast yonder--I mean as the
+principal dish."
+
+"It was Providence, not you, who prevented it, Bickley,
+doubtless because I am unworthy of such a glorious end."
+
+"Then it is lucky that Providence is a good shot with a pistol.
+Stop talking nonsense and listen. If those were paths worn by
+feet they would run to the edge of the rock. They do not. They
+begin there in that gentle depression and slope upwards somewhat
+steeply. The air machines, which were evidently large, lit in the
+depression, possibly as a bird does, and then ran on wheels or
+sledge skids along the grooves to the air-shed in the mountain.
+Come to the cave and you will see."
+
+"Not till we have breakfast," said Bastin. "I will get out a
+pig. As a matter of fact, I had no supper last night, as I was
+taking a class of native boys and making some arrangements of my
+own."
+
+As for me, I only whistled. It all seemed very feasible. And
+yet how could such things be?
+
+We unloaded the canoe and ate. Bastin's appetite was splendid.
+Indeed, I had to ask him to remember that when this supply was
+done I did not know where we should find any more.
+
+"Take no thought for the morrow," he replied. "I have no doubt
+it will come from somewhere," and he helped himself to another
+chop.
+
+Never had I admired him so much. Not a couple of hours before
+he was about to be cruelly murdered and eaten. But this did not
+seem to affect him in the least. Bastin was the only man I have
+ever known with a really perfect faith. It is a quality worth
+having and one that makes for happiness. What a great thing not
+to care whether you are breakfasted on, or breakfast!
+
+"I see that there is lots of driftwood about here," he
+remarked, "but unfortunately we have no tea, so in this climate
+it is of little use, unless indeed we can catch some fish and
+cook them."
+
+"Stop talking about eating and help us to haul up the canoe,"
+said Bickley.
+
+Between the three of us we dragged and carried the canoe a long
+way from the lake, fearing lest the natives should come and bear
+it off with our provisions. Then, having given Tommy his
+breakfast off the scraps, we walked to the cave. I glanced at my
+companions. Bickley's face was alight with scientific eagerness.
+Here are not dreams or speculations, but facts to be learned, it
+seemed to say, and I will learn them. The past is going to show
+me some of its secrets, to tell me how men of long ago lived and
+died and how far they had advanced to that point on the road of
+civilisation at which I stand in my little hour of existence.
+
+That of Bastin was mildly interested, no more. Obviously, with
+half his mind he was thinking of something else, probably of his
+converts on the main island and of the school class fixed for
+this hour which circumstances prevented him from attending.
+Indeed, like Lot's wife he was casting glances behind him towards
+the wicked place from which he had been forced to flee.
+
+Neither the past nor the future had much real interest for
+Bastin; any more than they had for Bickley, though for different
+reasons. The former was done with; the latter he was quite
+content to leave in other hands. If he had any clear idea
+thereof, probably that undiscovered land appeared to him as a
+big, pleasant place where are no unbelievers or erroneous
+doctrines, and all sinners will be sternly repressed, in which,
+clad in a white surplice with all proper ecclesiastical
+trappings, he would argue eternally with the Early Fathers and in
+due course utterly annihilate Bickley, that is in a moral sense.
+Personally and as a man he was extremely attached to Bickley as a
+necessary and wrong-headed nuisance to which he had become
+accustomed.
+
+And I! What did I feel? I do not know; I cannot describe. An
+extraordinary attraction, a semi-spiritual exaltation, I think.
+That cave mouth might have been a magnet drawing my soul. With my
+body I should have been afraid, as I daresay I was, for our
+circumstances were sufficiently desperate. Here we were,
+castaways upon an island, probably uncharted, one of thousands in
+the recesses of a vast ocean, from which we had little chance of
+escape. More, having offended the religious instincts of the
+primeval inhabitants of that island, we had been forced to flee
+to a rocky mountain in the centre of a lake, where, after the
+food we had brought with us by accident was consumed, we should
+no doubt be forced to choose between death by starvation, or, if
+we attempted to retreat, at the hands of justly infuriated
+savages. Yet these facts did not oppress me, for I was being
+drawn, drawn to I knew not what, and if it were to doom--well, no
+matter.
+
+Therefore, none of us cared: Bastin because his faith was equal
+to any emergency and there was always that white-robed heaven
+waiting for him beyond which his imagination did not go (I often
+wondered whether he pictured Mrs. Bastin as also waiting; if so,
+he never said anything about her); Bickley because as a child of
+the Present and a servant of knowledge he feared no future,
+believing it to be for him non-existent, and was careless as to
+when his strenuous hour of life should end; and I because I felt
+that yonder lay my true future; yes, and my true past, even
+though to discover them I must pass through that portal which we
+know as Death.
+
+We reached the mouth of the cave. It was a vast place; perhaps
+the arch of it was a hundred feet high, and I could see that once
+all this arch had been adorned with sculptures. Protected as
+these were by the overhanging rock, for the sculptured mouth of
+the cave was cut deep into the mountain face, they were still so
+worn that it was impossible to discern their details. Time had
+eaten them away like an acid. But what length of time? I could
+not guess, but it must have been stupendous to have worked thus
+upon that hard and sheltered rock.
+
+This came home to me with added force when, from subsequent
+examination, we learned that the entire mouth of this cave had
+been sealed up for unnumbered ages. It will be remembered that
+Marama told me the mountain in the lake had risen much during the
+frightful cyclone in which we were wrecked and with it the cave
+mouth which previously had been invisible. From the markings on
+the mountain side it was obvious that something of the sort had
+happened very recently, at any rate on this eastern face. That
+is, either the flat rock had sunk or the volcano had been thrown
+upwards.
+
+Once in the far past the cave had been as it was when we found
+it. Then it had gone down in such a way that the table-rock
+entirely sealed the entrance. Now this entrance was once more
+open, and although of course there was a break in them, the
+grooves of which I have spoken ran on into the cave at only a
+slightly different level from that at which they lay upon the
+flat rock. And yet, although they had been thus sheltered by a
+great stone curtain in front of them, still these sculptures were
+worn away by the tooth of Time. Of course, however, this may have
+happened to them before they were buried in some ancient
+cataclysm, to be thus resurrected at the hour of our arrival upon
+the island.
+
+Without pausing to make any closer examination of these
+crumbled carvings, we entered the yawning mouth of that great
+place, following and indeed walking in the deep grooves that I
+have mentioned. Presently it seemed to open out as a courtyard
+might at the end of a passage; yes, to open on to some vast place
+whereof in that gloom we could not see the roof or the limits.
+All we knew was that it must be enormous--the echoes of our
+voices and footsteps told us as much, for these seemed to come
+back to us from high, high above and from far, far away. Bickley
+and I said nothing; we were too overcome. But Bastin remarked:
+
+
+"Did you ever go to Olympia? I did once to see a kind of play
+where the people said nothing, only ran about dressed up. They
+told me it was religious, the sort of thing a clergyman should
+study. I didn't think it religious at all. It was all about a nun
+who had a baby."
+
+"Well, what of it?" snapped Bickley.
+
+"Nothing particular, except that nuns don't have babies, or if
+they do the fact should not be advertised. But I wasn't thinking
+of that. I was thinking that this place is like an underground
+Olympia."
+
+"Oh, be quiet!" I said, for though Bastin's description was not
+bad, his monotonous, drawling voice jarred on me in that
+solemnity.
+
+"Be careful where you walk," whispered Bickley, for even he
+seemed awed, "there may be pits in this floor."
+
+"I wish we had a light," I said, halting.
+
+"If candles are of any use," broke in Bastin, "as it happens I
+have a packet in my pocket. I took them with me this morning for
+a certain purpose."
+
+"Not unconnected with the paraffin and the burning of the idol,
+I suppose?" said Bickley. "Hand them over."
+
+"Yes; if I had been allowed a little more time I intended--"
+
+"Never mind what you intended; we know what you did and that's
+enough," said Bickley as he snatched the packet from Bastin's
+hand and proceeded to undo it, adding, "By heaven! I have no
+matches, nor have you, Arbuthnot!"
+
+"I have a dozen boxes of wax vestas in my other pocket," said
+Bastin. "You see, they burn so well when you want to get up a
+fire on a damp idol. As you may have noticed, the dew is very
+heavy here."
+
+In due course these too were produced. I took possession of
+them as they were too valuable to be left in the charge of
+Bastin, and, extracting a box from the packet, lit two of the
+candles which were of the short thick variety, like those used in
+carriage-lamps.
+
+Presently they burned up, making two faint stars of light
+which, however, were not strong enough to show us either the roof
+or the sides of that vast place. By their aid we pursued our
+path, still following the grooves till suddenly these came to an
+end. Now all around us was a flat floor of rock which, as we
+perceived clearly when we pushed aside the dust that had gathered
+thickly on it in the course of ages, doubtless from the gradual
+disintegration of the stony walls, had once been polished till it
+resembled black marble. Indeed, certain cracks in the floor
+appeared to have been filled in with some dark-coloured cement. I
+stood looking at them while Bickley wandered off to the right and
+a little forward, and presently called to me. I walked to him,
+Bastin sticking close to me as I had the other candle, as did the
+little dog, Tommy, who did not like these new surroundings and
+would not leave my heels.
+
+"Look," said Bickley, holding up his candle, "and tell me--
+what's that?"
+
+Before me, faintly shown, was some curious structure of
+gleaming rods made of yellowish metal, which rods appeared to be
+connected by wires. The structure might have been forty feet high
+and perhaps a hundred long. Its bottom part was buried in dust.
+
+"What is that?" asked Bickley again.
+
+I made no answer, for I was thinking. Bastin, however, replied:
+
+"It's difficult to be sure in this light, but I should think
+that it may be the remains of a cage in which some people who
+lived here kept monkeys, or perhaps it was an aviary. Look at
+those little ladders for the monkeys to climb by, or possibly for
+the birds to sit on."
+
+"Are you sure it wasn't tame angels?" asked Bickley.
+
+"What a ridiculous remark! How can you keep an angel in a cage?
+I--"
+
+"Aeroplane!" I almost whispered to Bickley.
+
+"You've got it!" he answered. "The framework of an aeroplane
+and a jolly large one, too. Only why hasn't it oxidised?"
+
+"Some indestructible metal," I suggested. "Gold, for instance,
+does not oxidise."
+
+He nodded and said:
+
+"We shall have to dig it out. The dust is feet thick about it;
+we can do nothing without spades. Come on."
+
+We went round to the end of the structure, whatever it might
+be, and presently came to another. Again we went on and came to
+another, all of them being berthed exactly in line.
+
+"What did I tell you?" said Bickley in a voice of triumph. "A
+whole garage full, a regular fleet of aeroplanes!"
+
+"That must be nonsense," said Bastin, "for I am quite sure that
+these Orofenans cannot make such things. Indeed they have no
+metal, and even cut the throats of pigs with wooden knives."
+
+Now I began to walk forward, bearing to the left so as to
+regain our former line. We could do nothing with these metal
+skeletons, and I felt that there must be more to find beyond.
+Presently I saw something looming ahead of me and quickened my
+pace, only to recoil. For there, not thirty feet away and perhaps
+three hundred yards from the mouth of the cave, suddenly appeared
+what looked like a gigantic man. Tommy saw it also and barked as
+dogs do when they are frightened, and the sound of his yaps
+echoed endlessly from every quarter, which scared him to silence.
+Recovering myself I went forward, for now I guessed the truth. It
+was not a man but a statue.
+
+The thing stood upon a huge base which lessened by successive
+steps, eight of them, I think, to its summit. The foot of this
+base may have been a square of fifty feet or rather more; the
+real support or pedestal of the statue, however, was only a
+square of about six feet. The figure itself was little above
+life-size, or at any rate above our life-size, say seven feet in
+height. It was very peculiar in sundry ways.
+
+To begin with, nothing of the body was visible, for it was
+swathed like a corpse. From these wrappings projected one arm,
+the right, in the hand of which was the likeness of a lighted
+torch. The head was not veiled. It was that of a man, long-nosed,
+thin-lipped, stern-visaged; the countenance pervaded by an awful
+and unutterable calm, as deep as that of Buddha only less benign.
+On the brow was a wreathed head-dress, not unlike an Eastern
+turban, from which sprang two little wings resembling in some
+degree those on the famous Greek head of Hypnos, lord of Sleep.
+Between the folds of the wrappings on the back sprang two other
+wings, enormous wings bent like those of a bird about to take
+flight. Indeed the whole attitude of the figure suggested that it
+was springing from earth to air. It was executed in black basalt
+or some stone of the sort, and very highly finished. For
+instance, on the bare feet and the arm which held the torch could
+be felt every muscle and even some of the veins. In the same way
+the details of the skull were perfectly perceptible to the touch,
+although at first sight not visible on the marble surface. This
+was ascertained by climbing on the pedestal and feeling the face
+with our hands.
+
+Here I may say that its modelling as well as that of the feet
+and the arm filled Bickley, who, of course, was a highly trained
+anatomist, with absolute amazement. He said that he would never
+have thought it possible that such accuracy could have been
+reached by an artist working in so hard a material.
+
+When the others had arrived we studied this relic as closely as
+our two candles would allow, and in turn expressed our opinions
+of its significance. Bastin thought that if those things down
+there were really the remains of aeroplanes, which he did not
+believe, the statue had something to do with flying, as was shown
+by the fact that it had wings on its head and shoulders. Also, he
+added, after examining the face, the head was uncommonly like
+that of the idol that he had blown up. It had the same long nose
+and severe shut mouth. If he was right, this was probably another
+effigy of Oro which we should do well to destroy at once before
+the islanders came to worship it.
+
+Bickley ground his teeth as he listened to him.
+
+"Destroy that!" he gasped. "Destroy! Oh! you, you--early
+Christian."
+
+Here I may state that Bastin was quite right, as we proved
+subsequently when we compared the head of the fetish, which, as
+it will be remembered, he had brought away with him, with that of
+the statue. Allowing for an enormous debasement of art, they were
+essentially identical in the facial characteristics. This would
+suggest the descent of a tradition through countless generations.
+Or of course it may have been accidental. I am sure I do not
+know, but I think it possible that for unknown centuries other
+old statues may have existed in Orofena from which the idol was
+copied. Or some daring and impious spirit may have found his way
+to the cave in past ages and fashioned the local god upon this
+ancient model.
+
+Bickley was struck at once, as I had been, with the resemblance
+of the figure to that of the Egyptian Osiris. Of course there
+were differences. For instance, instead of the crook and the
+scourge, this divinity held a torch. Again, in place of the crown
+of Egypt it wore a winged head-dress, though it is true this was
+not very far removed from the winged disc of that country. The
+wings that sprang from its shoulders, however, suggested
+Babylonia rather than Egypt, or the Assyrian bulls that are
+similarly adorned. All of these symbolical ideas might have been
+taken from that figure. But what was it? What was it?
+
+In a flash the answer came to me. A representation of the
+spirit of Death! Neither more nor less. There was the shroud;
+there the cold, inscrutable countenance suggesting mysteries that
+it hid. But the torch and the wings? Well, the torch was that
+which lighted souls to the other world, and on the wings they
+flew thither. Whoever fashioned that statue hoped for another
+life, or so I was convinced.
+
+I explained my ideas. Bastin thought them fanciful and
+preferred his notion of a flying man, since by constitution he
+was unable to discover anything spiritual in any religion except
+his own. Bickley agreed that it was probably an allegorical
+representation of death but sniffed at my interpretation of the
+wings and the torch, since by constitution he could not believe
+that the folly of a belief in immortality could have developed so
+early in the world, that is, among a highly civilised people such
+as must have produced this statue.
+
+What we could none of us understand was why this ominous image
+with its dead, cold face should have been placed in an aerodrome,
+nor in fact did we ever discover. Possibly it was there long
+before the cave was put to this use. At first the place may have
+been a temple and have so remained until circumstances forced the
+worshippers to change their habits, or even their Faith.
+
+We examined this wondrous work and the pedestal on which it
+stood as closely as we were able by the dim light of our candles.
+I was anxious to go further and see what lay beyond it; indeed we
+did walk a few paces, twenty perhaps, onward into the recesses of
+the cave.
+
+Then Bickley discovered something that looked like the mouth of
+a well down which he nearly tumbled, and Bastin began to complain
+that he was hot and very thirsty; also to point out that he
+wished for no more caves and idols at present.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," said Bickley, "these candles are
+burning low and we don't want to use up more if we can prevent
+it, for we may need what we have got very badly later on. Now,
+according to my pocket compass the mouth of this cave points due
+east; probably at the beginning it was orientated to the rising
+sun for purposes of astronomical observation or of worship at
+certain periods of the year. From the position of the sun when we
+landed on the rock this morning I imagine that just now it rises
+almost exactly opposite to the mouth of the cave. If this is so,
+to-morrow at dawn, for a time at least, the light should
+penetrate as far as the statue, and perhaps further. What I
+suggest is that we should wait till then to explore."
+
+I agreed with him, especially as I was feeling tired, being
+exhausted by wonder, and wanted time to think. So we turned back.
+As we did so I missed Tommy and inquired anxiously where he was,
+being afraid lest he might have tumbled down the well-like hole.
+
+"He's all right," said Bastin. "I saw him sniffing at the base
+of that statue. I expect there is a rat in there, or perhaps a
+snake."
+
+Sure enough when we reached it there was Tommy with his black
+nose pressed against the lowest of the tiers that formed the base
+of the statue, and sniffing loudly. Also he was scratching in the
+dust as a dog does when he has winded a rabbit in a hole. So
+engrossed was he in this occupation that it was with difficulty
+that I coaxed him to leave the place.
+
+I did not think much of the incident at that time, but
+afterwards it came back to me, and I determined to investigate
+those stones at the first opportunity.
+
+Passing the wrecks of the machines, we emerged on to the
+causeway without accident. After we had rested and washed we set
+to work to draw our canoe with its precious burden of food right
+into the mouth of the cave, where we hid it as well as we could.
+
+This done we went for a walk round the base of the peak. This
+proved to be a great deal larger than we had imagined, over two
+miles in circumference indeed. All about it was a belt of fertile
+land, as I suppose deposited there by the waters of the great
+lake and resulting from the decay of vegetation. Much of this
+belt was covered with ancient forest ending in mud flats that
+appeared to have been thrown up recently, perhaps at the time of
+the tidal wave which bore us to Orofena. On the higher part of
+the belt were many of the extraordinary crater-like holes that I
+have mentioned as being prevalent on the main island; indeed the
+place had all the appearance of having been subjected to a
+terrific and continuous bombardment.
+
+When we had completed its circuit we set to work to climb the
+peak in order to explore the terraces of which I have spoken and
+the ruins which I had seen through my field-glasses. It was quite
+true; they were terraces cut with infinite labour out of the
+solid rock, and on them had once stood a city, now pounded into
+dust and fragments. We struggled over the broken blocks of stone
+to what we had taken for a temple, which stood near the lip of
+the crater, for without doubt this mound was an extinct volcano,
+or rather its crest. All we could make out when we arrived was
+that here had once stood some great building, for its courts
+could still be traced; also there lay about fragments of steps
+and pillars.
+
+Apparently the latter had once been carved, but the passage of
+innumerable ages had obliterated the work and we could not turn
+these great blocks over to discover if any remained beneath. It
+was as though the god Thor had broken up the edifice with his
+hammer, or Jove had shattered it with his thunderbolts; nothing
+else would account for that utter wreck, except, as Bickley
+remarked significantly, the scientific use of high explosives.
+
+Following the line of what seemed to have been a road, we came
+to the edge of the volcano and found, as we expected, the usual
+depression out of which fire and lava had once been cast, as from
+Hecla or Vesuvius. It was now a lake more than a quarter of a
+mile across. Indeed it had been thus in the ancient days when the
+buildings stood upon the terraces, for we saw the remains of
+steps leading down to the water. Perhaps it had served as the
+sacred lake of the temple.
+
+We gazed with wonderment and then, wearied out, scrambled back
+through the ruins, which, by the way, were of a different stone
+from the lava of the mountain, to the mouth of the great cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter X
+
+The Dwellers in the Tomb
+
+
+By now it was drawing towards sunset, so we made such
+preparations as we could for the night. One of these was to
+collect dry driftwood, of which an abundance lay upon the shore,
+to serve us for firing, though unfortunately we had nothing that
+we could cook for our meal.
+
+While we were thus engaged we saw a canoe approaching the
+table-rock and perceived that in it were the chief Marama and a
+priest. After hovering about for a while they paddled the canoe
+near enough to allow of conversation which, taking no notice of
+their presence, we left it to them to begin.
+
+"O, Friend-from-the-Sea," called Marama, addressing myself, "we
+come to pray you and the Great Healer to return to us to be our
+guests as before. The people are covered with darkness because of
+the loss of your wisdom, and the sick cry aloud for the Healer;
+indeed two of those whom he has cut with knives are dying."
+
+"And what of the Bellower?" I asked, indicating Bastin.
+
+"We should like to see him back also, Friend-from-the-Sea, that
+we may sacrifice and eat him, who destroyed our god with fire and
+caused the Healer to kill his priest."
+
+"That is most unjust," exclaimed Bastin. "I deeply regret the
+blood that was shed on the occasion, unnecessarily as I think."
+
+"Then go and atone for it with your own," said Bickley, "and
+everybody will be pleased."
+
+Waving to them to be silent, I said:
+
+"Are you mad, Marama, that you should ask us to return to
+sojourn among people who tried to kill us, merely because the
+Bellower caused fire to burn an image of wood and its head to fly
+from its shoulders, just to show you that it had no power to hold
+itself together, although you call it a god? Not so, we wash our
+hands of you; we leave you to go your own way while we go ours,
+till perchance in a day to come, after many misfortunes have
+overtaken you, you creep about our feet and with prayers and
+offerings beg us to return."
+
+I paused to observe the effect of my words. It was excellent,
+for both Marama and the priest wrung their hands and groaned.
+Then I went on:
+
+"Meanwhile we have something to tell you. We have entered the
+cave where you said no man might set a foot, and have seen him
+who sits within, the true god." (Here Bastin tried to interrupt,
+but was suppressed by Bickley.)
+
+They looked at each other in a frightened way and groaned more
+loudly than before.
+
+"He sends you a message, which, as he told us of your approach,
+we came to the shore to deliver to you."
+
+"How can you say that?" began Bastin, but was again violently
+suppressed by Bickley.
+
+"It is that he, the real Oro, rejoices that the false Oro,
+whose face is copied from his face, has been destroyed. It is
+that he commands you day by day to bring food in plenty and lay
+it upon the Rock of Offerings, not forgetting a supply of fresh
+fish from the sea, and with it all those things that are stored
+in the house wherein we, the strangers from the sea, deigned to
+dwell awhile until we left you because in your wickedness you
+wished to murder us."
+
+"And if we refuse--what then?" asked the priest, speaking for
+the first time.
+
+"Then Oro will send death and destruction upon you. Then your
+food shall fail and you shall perish of sickness and want, and
+the Oromatuas, the spirits of the great dead, shall haunt you in
+your sleep, and Oro shall eat up your souls."
+
+At these horrible threats both of them uttered a kind of wail,
+after which, Marama asked:
+
+"And if we consent, what then, Friend-from-the-Sea?"
+
+"Then, perchance," I answered, "in some day to come we may
+return to you, that I may give you of my wisdom and the Great
+Healer may cure your sick and the Bellower may lead you through
+his gate, and in his kindness make you to see with his eyes."
+
+This last clause of my ultimatum did not seem to appeal to the
+priest, who argued a while with Marama, though what he said we
+could not hear. In the end he appeared to give way. At any rate
+Marama called out that all should be done as we wished, and that
+meanwhile they prayed us to intercede with Oro in the cave, and
+to keep back the ghosts from haunting them, and to protect them
+from misfortune. I replied that we would do our best, but could
+guarantee nothing since their offence was very great.
+
+Then, to show that the conversation was at an end, we walked
+away with dignity, pushing Bastin in front of us, lest he should
+spoil the effect by some of his ill-timed and often over-true
+remarks.
+
+"That's capital," said Bickley, when we were out of hearing.
+"The enemy has capitulated. We can stop here as long as we like,
+provisioned from the mainland, and if for any reason we wish to
+leave, be sure of our line of retreat."
+
+"I don't know what you call capital," exclaimed Bastin. "It
+seems to me that all the lies which Arbuthnot has just told are
+sufficient to bring a judgment upon us. Indeed, I think that I
+will go back with Marama and explain the truth."
+
+"I never before knew anybody who was so anxious to be cooked
+and eaten," remarked Bickley. "Moreover, you are too late, for
+the canoe is a hundred yards away by now, and you shan't have
+ours. Remember the Pauline maxims, old fellow, which you are so
+fond of quoting, and be all things to all men, and another that
+is more modern, that when you are at Rome, you must do as the
+Romans do; also a third, that necessity has no law, and for the
+matter of that, a fourth, that all is fair in love and war."
+
+"I am sure, Bickley, that Paul never meant his words to bear
+the debased sense which you attribute to them--" began Bastin,
+but at this point I hustled him off to light a fire--a process at
+which I pointed out he had shown himself an expert.
+
+We slept that night under the overhanging rock just to one side
+of the cave, not in the mouth, because of the draught which drew
+in and out of the great place. In that soft and balmy clime this
+was no hardship, although we lacked blankets. And yet, tired
+though I was, I could not rest as I should have done. Bastin
+snored away contentedly, quite unaffected by his escape which to
+him was merely an incident in the day's work; and so, too,
+slumbered Bickley, except that he did not snore. But the
+amazement and the mystery of all that we had discovered and of
+all that might be left for us to discover, held me back from
+sleep.
+
+What did it mean? What could it mean? My nerves were taut as
+harp strings and seemed to vibrate to the touch of invisible
+fingers, although I could not interpret the music that they made.
+Once or twice also I thought I heard actual music with my
+physical ears, and that of a strange quality. Soft and low and
+dreamful, it appeared to well from the recesses of the vast cave,
+a wailing song in an unknown tongue from the lips of women, or of
+a woman, multiplied mysteriously by echoes. This, however, must
+have been pure fancy, since there was no singer there.
+
+Presently I dozed off, to be awakened by the sudden sound of a
+great fish leaping in the lake. I sat up and stared, fearing lest
+it might be the splash of a paddle, for I could not put from my
+mind the possibility of attack. All I saw, however, was the low
+line of the distant shore, and above it the bright and setting
+stars that heralded the coming of the sun. Then I woke the
+others, and we washed and ate, since once the sun rose time would
+be precious.
+
+At length it appeared, splendid in a cloudless sky, and, as I
+had hoped, directly opposite to the mouth of the cave. Taking our
+candles and some stout pieces of driftwood which, with our
+knives, we had shaped on the previous evening to serve us as
+levers and rough shovels, we entered the cave. Bickley and I were
+filled with excitement and hope of what we knew not, but Bastin
+showed little enthusiasm for our quest. His heart was with his
+half-converted savages beyond the lake, and of them, quite
+rightly I have no doubt, he thought more than he did of all the
+archaeological treasures in the whole earth. Still, he came,
+bearing the blackened head of Oro with him which, with
+unconscious humour, he had used as a pillow through the night
+because, as he said, "it was after all softer than stone." Also,
+I believe that in his heart he hoped that he might find an
+opportunity of destroying the bigger and earlier edition of Oro
+in the cave, before it was discovered by the natives who might
+wish to make it an object of worship. Tommy came also, with
+greater alacrity than I expected, since dogs do not as a rule
+like dark places. When we reached the statue I learned the
+reason; he remembered the smell he had detected at its base on
+the previous day, which Bastin supposed to proceed from a rat,
+and was anxious to continue his investigations.
+
+We went straight to the statue, although Bickley passed the
+half-buried machines with evident regret. As we had hoped, the
+strong light of the rising sun fell upon it in a vivid ray,
+revealing all its wondrous workmanship and the majesty--for no
+other word describes it--of the somewhat terrifying countenance
+that appeared above the wrappings of the shroud. Indeed, I was
+convinced that originally this monument had been placed here in
+order that on certain days of the year the sun might fall upon it
+thus, when probably worshippers assembled to adore their hallowed
+symbol. After all, this was common in ancient days: witness the
+instance of the awful Three who sit in the deepest recesses of
+the temple of Abu Simbel, on the Nile.
+
+We gazed and gazed our fill, at least Bickley and I did, for
+Bastin was occupied in making a careful comparison between the
+head of his wooden Oro and that of the statue.
+
+"There is no doubt that they are very much alike," he said.
+"Why, whatever is that dog doing? I think it is going mad," and
+he pointed to Tommy who was digging furiously at the base of the
+lowest step, as at home I have seen him do at roots that
+sheltered a rabbit.
+
+Tommy's energy was so remarkable that at length it seriously
+attracted our attention. Evidently he meant that it should do so,
+for occasionally he sprang back to me barking, then returned and
+sniffed and scratched. Bickley knelt down and smelt at the stone.
+
+"It is an odd thing, Humphrey," he said, "but there is a
+strange odour here, a very pleasant odour like that of
+sandal-wood or attar of roses."
+
+"I never heard of a rat that smelt like sandal-wood or attar of
+roses," said Bastin. "Look out that it isn't a snake."
+
+I knelt down beside Bickley, and in clearing away the deep dust
+from what seemed to be the bottom of the step, which was perhaps
+four feet in height, by accident thrust my amateur spade somewhat
+strongly against its base where it rested upon the rocky floor.
+
+Next moment a wonder came to pass. The whole massive rock
+began to turn outwards as though upon a pivot! I saw it coming
+and grabbed Bickley by the collar, dragging him back so that we
+just rolled clear before the great block, which must have weighed
+several tons, fell down and crushed us. Tommy saw it too, and
+fled, though a little late, for the edge of the block caught the
+tip of his tail and caused him to emit a most piercing howl. But
+we did not think of Tommy and his woes; we did not think of our
+own escape or of anything else because of the marvel that
+appeared to us. Seated there upon the ground, after our backward
+tumble, we could see into the space which lay behind the fallen
+step, for there the light of the sun penetrated.
+
+The first idea it gave me was that of the jewelled shrine of
+some mediaeval saint which, by good fortune, had escaped the
+plunderers; there are still such existing in the world. It shone
+and glittered, apparently with gold and diamonds, although, as a
+matter of fact, there were no diamonds, nor was it gold which
+gleamed, but some ancient metal, or rather amalgam, which is now
+lost to the world, the same that was used in the tubes of the
+air-machines. I think that it contained gold, but I do not know.
+At any rate, it was equally lasting and even more beautiful,
+though lighter in colour.
+
+For the rest this adorned recess which resembled that of a
+large funeral vault, occupying the whole space beneath the base
+of the statue that was supported on its arch, was empty save for
+two flashing objects that lay side by side but with nearly the
+whole width of the vault between them.
+
+I pointed at them to Bickley with my finger, for really I could
+not speak.
+
+"Coffins, by Jove!" he whispered. "Glass or crystal coffins and
+people in them. Come on!"
+
+A few seconds later we were crawling into that vault while
+Bastin, still nursing the head of Oro as though it were a baby,
+stood confused outside muttering something about desecrating
+hallowed graves.
+
+Just as we reached the interior, owing to the heightening of
+the sun, the light passed away, leaving us in a kind of twilight.
+Bickley produced carriage candles from his pocket and fumbled for
+matches. While he was doing so I noticed two things--firstly,
+that the place really did smell like a scent-shop, and, secondly,
+that the coffins seemed to glow with a kind of phosphorescent
+light of their own, not very strong, but sufficient to reveal
+their outlines in the gloom. Then the candles burnt up and we
+saw.
+
+Within the coffin that stood on our left hand as we entered,
+for this crystal was as transparent as plate glass, lay a most
+wonderful old man, clad in a gleaming, embroidered robe. His long
+hair, which was parted in the middle, as we could see beneath the
+edge of the pearl-sewn and broidered cap he wore, also his beard
+were snowy white. The man was tall, at least six feet four inches
+in height, and rather spare. His hands were long and thin, very
+delicately made, as were his sandalled feet.
+
+But it was his face that fixed our gaze, for it was marvelous,
+like the face of a god, and, as we noticed at once, with some
+resemblance to that of the statue above. Thus the brow was broad
+and massive, the nose straight and long, the mouth stern and
+clear-cut, while the cheekbones were rather high, and the
+eyebrows arched. Such are the characteristics of many handsome
+old men of good blood, and as the mummies of Seti and others show
+us, such they have been for thousands of years. Only this man
+differed from all others because of the fearful dignity stamped
+upon his features. Looking at him I began to think at once of the
+prophet Elijah as he must have appeared rising to heaven,
+enhanced by the more earthly glory of Solomon, for although the
+appearance of these patriarchs is unknown, of them one conceives
+ideas. Only it seemed probable that Elijah may have looked more
+benign. Here there was no benignity, only terrible force and
+infinite wisdom.
+
+Contemplating him I shivered a little and felt thankful that he
+was dead. For to tell the truth I was afraid of that awesome
+countenance which, I should add, was of the whiteness of paper,
+although the cheeks still showed tinges of colour, so perfect was
+the preservation of the corpse.
+
+I was still gazing at it when Bickley said in a voice of
+amazement:
+
+"I say, look here, in the other coffin."
+
+I turned, looked, and nearly collapsed on the floor of the
+vault, since beauty can sometimes strike us like a blow. Oh!
+there before me lay all loveliness, such loveliness that there
+burst from my lips an involuntary cry:
+
+"Alas! that she should be dead!"
+
+A young woman, I supposed, at least she looked young, perhaps
+five or six and twenty years of age, or so I judged. There she
+lay, her tall and delicate shape half hidden in masses of
+rich-hued hair in colour of a ruddy blackness. I know not how
+else to describe it, since never have I seen any of the same
+tint. Moreover, it shone with a life of its own as though it had
+been dusted with gold. From between the masses of this hair
+appeared a face which I can only call divine. There was every
+beauty that woman can boast, from the curving eyelashes of
+extraordinary length to the sweet and human mouth. To these
+charms also were added a wondrous smile and an air of kind
+dignity, very different from the fierce pride stamped upon the
+countenance of the old man who was her companion in death.
+
+She was clothed in some close-fitting robe of white broidered
+with gold; pearls were about her neck, lying far down upon the
+perfect bosom, a girdle of gold and shining gems encircled her
+slender waist, and on her little feet were sandals fastened with
+red stones like rubies. In truth, she was a splendid creature,
+and yet, I know not how, her beauty suggested more of the spirit
+than of the flesh. Indeed, in a way, it was unearthly. My senses
+were smitten, it pulled at my heart-strings, and yet its
+unutterable strangeness seemed to awake memories within me,
+though of what I could not tell. A wild fancy came to me that I
+must have known this heavenly creature in some past life.
+
+By now Bastin had joined us, and, attracted by my exclamation
+and by the attitude of Bickley, who was staring down at the
+coffin with a fixed look upon his face, not unlike that of a
+pointer when he scents game, he began to contemplate the wonder
+within it in his slow way.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said. "Do you think the Glittering Lady in
+there is human?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady is dead, but I suppose that she was human
+in her life," I answered in an awed whisper.
+
+"Of course she is dead, otherwise she would not be in that
+glass coffin. I think I should like to read the Burial Service
+over her, which I daresay was never done when she was put in
+there."
+
+"How do you know she is dead?" asked Bickley in a sharp voice
+and speaking for the first time. "I have seen hundreds of
+corpses, and mummies too, but never any that looked like these."
+
+I stared at him. It was strange to hear Bickley, the scoffer at
+miracles, suggesting that this greatest of all miracles might be
+possible.
+
+"They must have been here a long time," I said, "for although
+human, they are not, I think, of any people known to the world
+to-day; their dress, everything, shows it, though perhaps
+thousands of years ago--" and I stopped.
+
+"Quite so," answered Bickley; "I agree. That is why I suggest
+that they may have belonged to a race who knew what we do not,
+namely, how to suspend animation for great periods of time."
+
+I said no more, nor did Bastin, who was now engaged in studying
+the old man, and for once, wonderstruck and overcome. Bickley,
+however, took one of the candles and began to make a close
+examination of the coffins. So did Tommy, who sniffed along the
+join of that of the Glittering Lady until his nose reached a
+certain spot, where it remained, while his black tail began to
+wag in a delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away and
+investigated.
+
+"As I thought," he said--"air-holes. See!"
+
+I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in
+a line with the face of its occupant, were a number of little
+holes that either by accident or design outlined the shape of a
+human mouth.
+
+"They are not airtight," murmured Bickley; "and if air can
+enter, how can dead flesh remain like that for ages?"
+
+Then he continued his search upon the other side.
+
+"The lid of this coffin works on hinges," he said. "Here they
+are, fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within
+could have pulled it down before the senses departed."
+
+"No," I answered; "for look, here is a crystal bolt at the end
+and it is shot from without."
+
+This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to
+examine the other coffin.
+
+"I've got it!" he exclaimed presently. "The old god in here"
+(somehow we all thought of this old man as not quite normal)
+"shut down the Glittering Lady's coffin and bolted it. His own is
+not bolted, although the bolt exists in the same place. He just
+got in and pulled down the lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking--
+for how can such things be? Let us get out and think."
+
+So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had
+begun to oppress us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the
+cave, where for a while we remained silent.
+
+"I am very thirsty," said Bastin presently. "Those smells seem
+to have dried me up. I am going to get some tea--I mean water, as
+unfortunately there is no tea," and he set off towards the mouth
+of the cave.
+
+We followed him, I don't quite know why, except that we wished
+to breathe freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and
+its contents would be as safe as they had been for--well, how
+long?
+
+It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and
+down enjoying it sub-consciously, for really our--that is
+Bickley's and my own--intelligences were concentrated on that
+sepulchre and its contents. Where Bastin's may have been I do not
+know, perhaps in a visionary teapot, since I was sure that it
+would take him a day or two to appreciate the significance of our
+discoveries. At any rate, he wandered off, making no remarks
+about them, to drink water, I suppose.
+
+Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the
+table-rock and we went to see the reason of his noise. It proved
+to be very satisfactory, for while we were in the cave the
+Orofenans had brought absolutely everything belonging to us,
+together with a large supply of food from the main island. Not a
+single article was missing; even our books, a can with the bottom
+out, and the broken pieces of a little pocket mirror had been
+religiously transported, and with these a few articles that had
+been stolen from us, notably my pocket-knife. Evidently a great
+taboo had been laid upon all our possessions. They were now
+carefully arranged in one of the grooves of the rock that Bickley
+supposed had been made by the wheels of aeroplanes, which was why
+we had not seen them at once.
+
+Each of us rushed for what we desired most--Bastin for one of
+the canisters of tea, I for my diaries, and Bickley for his chest
+of instruments and medicines. These were removed to the mouth of
+the cave, and after them the other things and the food; also a
+bell tent and some camp furniture that we had brought from the
+ship. Then Bastin made some tea of which he drank four large
+pannikins, having first said grace over it with unwonted fervour.
+Nor did we disdain our share of the beverage, although Bickley
+preferred cocoa and I coffee. Cocoa and coffee we had no time to
+make then, and in view of that sepulchre in the cave, what had we
+to do with cocoa and coffee?
+
+So Bickley and I said to each other, and yet presently he
+changed his mind and in a special metal machine carefully made
+some extremely strong black coffee which he poured into a thermos
+flask, previously warmed with hot water, adding thereto about a
+claret glass of brandy. Also he extracted certain drugs from his
+medicine-chest, and with them, as I noted, a hypodermic syringe,
+which he first boiled in a kettle and then shut up in a little
+tube with a glass stopper.
+
+These preparations finished, he called to Tommy to give him the
+scraps of our meal. But there was no Tommy. The dog was missing,
+and though we hunted everywhere we could not find him. Finally we
+concluded that he had wandered off down the beach on business of
+his own and would return in due course. We could not bother about
+Tommy just then.
+
+After making some further preparations and fidgeting about a
+little, Bickley announced that as we had now some proper paraffin
+lamps of the powerful sort which are known as "hurricane," he
+proposed by their aid to carry out further examinations in the
+cave.
+
+"I think I shall stop where I am," said Bastin, helping himself
+from the kettle to a fifth pannikin of tea. "Those corpses are
+very interesting, but I don't see any use in staring at them
+again at present. One can always do that at any time. I have
+missed Marama once already by being away in that cave, and I have
+a lot to say to him about my people; I don't want to be absent in
+case he should return."
+
+"To wash up the things, I suppose," said Bickley with a sniff;
+"or perhaps to eat the tea-leaves."
+
+"Well, as a matter of fact, I have noticed that these natives
+have a peculiar taste for tea-leaves. I think they believe them
+to be a medicine, but I don't suppose they would come so far for
+them, though perhaps they might in the hope of getting the head
+of Oro. Anyhow, I am going to stop here."
+
+"Pray do," said Bickley. "Are you ready, Humphrey?"
+
+I nodded, and he handed to me a felt-covered flask of the non-
+conducting kind, filled with boiling water, a tin of preserved
+milk, and a little bottle of meat extract of a most concentrated
+sort. Then, having lit two of the hurricane lamps and seen that
+they were full of oil, we started back up the cave.
+
+
+
+Chapter XI
+
+Resurrection
+
+
+We reached the sepulchre without stopping to look at the parked
+machines or even the marvelous statue that stood above it, for
+what did we care about machines or statues now? As we approached
+we were astonished to hear low and cavernous growlings.
+
+"There is some wild beast in there," said Bickley, halting.
+"No, by George! it's Tommy. What can the dog be after?"
+
+We peeped in, and there sure enough was Tommy lying on the top
+of the Glittering Lady's coffin and growling his very best with
+the hair standing up upon his back. When he saw who it was,
+however, he jumped off and frisked round, licking my hand.
+
+"That's very strange," I exclaimed.
+
+"Not stranger than everything else," said Bickley.
+
+"What are you going to do?" I asked.
+
+"Open these coffins," he answered, "beginning with that of the
+old god, since I would rather experiment on him. I expect he will
+crumble into dust. But if by chance he doesn't I'll jam a little
+strychnine, mixed with some other drugs, of which you don't know
+the names, into one of his veins and see if anything happens. If
+it doesn't, it won't hurt him, and if it does--well, who knows?
+Now give me a hand."
+
+We went to the left-hand coffin and by inserting the hook on
+the back of my knife, of which the real use is to pick stones out
+of horses' hoofs, into one of the little air-holes I have
+described, managed to raise the heavy crystal lid sufficiently to
+enable us to force a piece of wood between it and the top. The
+rest was easy, for the hinges being of crystal had not corroded.
+In two minutes it was open.
+
+From the chest came an overpowering spicy odour, and with it a
+veritable breath of warm air before which we recoiled a little.
+Bickley took a pocket thermometer which he had at hand and
+glanced at it. It marked a temperature of 82 degrees in the
+sepulchre. Having noted this, he thrust it into the coffin
+between the crystal wall and its occupant. Then we went out and
+waited a little while to give the odours time to dissipate, for
+they made the head reel.
+
+After five minutes or so we returned and examined the
+thermometer. It had risen to 98 degrees, the natural temperature
+of the human body.
+
+"What do you make of that if the man is dead?" he whispered.
+
+I shook my head, and as we had agreed, set to helping him to
+lift the body from the coffin. It was a good weight, quite eleven
+stone I should say; moreover, it was not stiff, for the hip
+joints bent. We got it out and laid it on a blanket we had spread
+on the floor of the sepulchre. Whilst I was thus engaged I saw
+something that nearly caused me to loose my hold from
+astonishment. Beneath the head, the centre of the back and the
+feet were crystal boxes about eight inches square, or rather
+crystal blocks, for in them I could see no opening, and these
+boxes emitted a faint phosphorescent light. I touched one of them
+and found that it was quite warm.
+
+"Great heavens!" I exclaimed, "here's magic."
+
+"There's no such thing," answered Bickley in his usual formula.
+Then an explanation seemed to strike him and he added, "Not magic
+but radium or something of the sort. That's how the temperature
+was kept up. In sufficient quantity it is practically
+indestructible, you see. My word! this old gentleman knew a thing
+or two."
+
+Again we waited a little while to see if the body begun to
+crumble on exposure to the air, I taking the opportunity to make
+a rough sketch of it in my pocket-book in anticipation of that
+event. But it did not; it remained quite sound.
+
+"Here goes," said Bickley. "If he should be alive, he will
+catch cold in his lungs after lying for ages in that baby
+incubator, as I suppose he has done. So it is now or never."
+
+Then bidding me hold the man's right arm, he took the
+sterilized syringe which he had prepared, and thrusting the
+needle into a vein he selected just above the wrist, injected the
+contents.
+
+"It would have been better over the heart," he whispered, "but
+I thought I would try the arm first. I don't like risking chills
+by uncovering him."
+
+I made no answer and again we waited and watched.
+
+"Great heavens, he's stirring!" I gasped presently.
+
+Stirring he was, for his fingers began to move.
+
+Bickley bent down and placed his ear to the heart--I forgot to
+say that he had tested this before with a stethoscope, but had
+been unable to detect any movement.
+
+"I believe it is beginning to beat," he said in an awed voice.
+
+Then he applied the stethoscope, and added, "It is, it is!"
+
+Next he took a filament of cotton wool and laid it on the man's
+lips. Presently it moved; he was breathing, though very faintly.
+Bickley took more cotton wool and having poured something from
+his medicine-chest on to it, placed it over the mouth beneath the
+man's nostrils--I believe it was sal volatile.
+
+Nothing further happened for a little while, and to relieve the
+strain on my mind I stared absently into the empty coffin. Here I
+saw what had escaped our notice, two small plates of white metal
+and cut upon them what I took to be star maps. Beyond these and
+the glowing boxes which I have mentioned, there was nothing else
+in the coffin. I had no time to examine them, for at that moment
+the old man opened his mouth and began to breathe, evidently with
+some discomfort and effort, as his empty lungs filled themselves
+with air. Then his eyelids lifted, revealing a wonderful pair of
+dark glowing eyes beneath. Next he tried to sit up but would have
+fallen, had not Bickley supported him with his arm.
+
+I do not think he saw Bickley, indeed he shut his eyes again as
+though the light hurt them, and went into a kind of faint. Then
+it was that Tommy, who all this while had been watching the
+proceedings with grave interest, came forward, wagging his tail,
+and licked the man's face. At the touch of the dog's red tongue,
+he opened his eyes for the second time. Now he saw--not us but
+Tommy, for after contemplating him for a few seconds, something
+like a smile appeared upon his fierce but noble face. More, he
+lifted his hand and laid it on the dog's head, as though to pat
+it kindly. Half a minute or so later his awakening senses
+appreciated our presence. The incipient smile vanished and was
+replaced by a somewhat terrible frown.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley had poured out some of the hot coffee laced
+with brandy into the cup that was screwed on the top of the
+thermos flask. Advancing to the man whom I supported, he put it
+to his lips. He tasted and made a wry face, but presently he
+began to sip, and ultimately swallowed it all. The effect of the
+stimulant was wonderful, for in a few minutes he came to life
+completely and was even able to sit up without support.
+
+For quite a long while he gazed at us gravely, talking us in and
+everything connected with us. For instance, Bickley's medicine-
+case which lay open showing the little vulcanite tubes, a few
+instruments and other outfit, engaged his particular attention,
+and I saw at once that he understood what it was. Thus his arm
+still smarted where the needle had been driven in and on the
+blanket lay the syringe. He looked at his arm, then looked at the
+syringe, and nodded. The paraffin hurricane lamps also seemed to
+interest and win his approval. We two men, as I thought,
+attracted him least of all; he just summed us up and our
+garments, more especially the garments, with a few shrewd
+glances, and then seemed to turn his thoughts to Tommy, who had
+seated himself quite contentedly at his side, evidently accepting
+him as a new addition to our party.
+
+I confess that this behaviour on Tommy's part reassured me not
+a little. I am a great believer in the instincts of animals,
+especially of dogs, and I felt certain that if this man had not
+been in all essentials human like ourselves, Tommy would not have
+tolerated him. In the same way the sleeper's clear liking for
+Tommy, at whom he looked much oftener and with greater kindness
+than he did at us, suggested that there was goodness in him
+somewhere, since although a dog in its wonderful tolerance may
+love a bad person in whom it smells out hidden virtue, no really
+bad person ever loved a dog, or, I may add, a child or a flower.
+
+As a matter of fact, the "old god," as we had christened him
+while he was in his coffin, during all our association with him,
+cared infinitely more for Tommy than he did for any of us, a
+circumstance that ultimately was not without its influence upon
+our fortunes. But for this there was a reason as we learned
+afterwards, also he was not really so amiable as I hoped.
+
+When we had looked at each other for a long while the sleeper
+began to arrange his beard, of which the length seemed to
+surprise him, especially as Tommy was seated on one end of it.
+Finding this out and apparently not wishing to disturb Tommy, he
+gave up the occupation, and after one or two attempts, for his
+tongue and lips still seemed to be stiff, addressed us in some
+sonorous and musical language, unlike any that we had ever heard.
+We shook our heads. Then by an afterthought I said "Good day" to
+him in the language of the Orofenans. He puzzled over the word as
+though it were more or less familiar to him, and when I repeated
+it, gave it back to me with a difference indeed, but in a way
+which convinced us that he quite understood what I meant. The
+conversation went no further at the moment because just then some
+memory seemed to strike him.
+
+He was sitting with his back against the coffin of the
+Glittering Lady, whom therefore he had not seen. Now he began to
+turn round, and being too weak to do so, motioned me to help him.
+I obeyed, while Bickley, guessing his purpose, held up one of the
+hurricane lamps that he might see better. With a kind of fierce
+eagerness he surveyed her who lay within the coffin, and after he
+had done so, uttered a sigh as of intense relief.
+
+Next he pointed to the metal cup out of which he had drunk.
+Bickley filled it again from the thermos flask, which I observed
+excited his keen interest, for, having touched the flask with his
+hand and found that it was cool, he appeared to marvel that the
+fluid coming from it should be hot and steaming. Presently he
+smiled as though he had got the clue to the mystery, and
+swallowed his second drink of coffee and spirit. This done, he
+motioned to us to lift the lid of the lady's coffin, pointing out
+a certain catch in the bolts which at first we could not master,
+for it will be remembered that on this coffin these were shot.
+
+In the end, by pursuing the same methods that we had used in
+the instance of his own, we raised the coffin lid and once more
+were driven to retreat from the sepulchre for a while by the
+overpowering odour like to that of a whole greenhouse full of
+tuberoses, that flowed out of it, inducing a kind of stupefaction
+from which even Tommy fled.
+
+When we returned it was to find the man kneeling by the side of
+the coffin, for as yet he could not stand, with his glowing eyes
+fixed upon the face of her who slept therein and waving his long
+arms above her.
+
+"Hypnotic business! Wonder if it will work," whispered Bickley.
+Then he lifted the syringe and looked inquiringly at the man, who
+shook his head, and went on with his mesmeric passes.
+
+I crept round him and took my stand by the sleeper's head, that
+I might watch her face, which was well worth watching, while
+Bickley, with his medicine at hand, remained near her feet, I
+think engaged in disinfecting the syringe in some spirit or acid.
+I believe he was about to make an attempt to use it when
+suddenly, as though beneath the influence of the hypnotic passes,
+a change appeared on the Glittering Lady's face. Hitherto,
+beautiful as it was, it had been a dead face though one of a
+person who had suddenly been cut off while in full health and
+vigour a few hours, or at the most a day or so before. Now it
+began to live again; it was as though the spirit were returning
+from afar, and not without toil and tribulation.
+
+Expression after expression flitted across the features; indeed
+these seemed to change so much from moment to moment that they
+might have belonged to several different individuals, though each
+was beautiful. The fact of these remarkable changes with the
+suggestion of multiform personalities which they conveyed
+impressed both Bickley and myself very much indeed. Then the
+breast heaved tumultuously; it even appeared to struggle. Next
+the eyes opened. They were full of wonder, even of fear, but oh!
+what marvelous eyes. I do not know how to describe them, I
+cannot even state their exact colour, except that it was dark,
+something like the blue of sapphires of the deepest tint, and yet
+not black; large, too, and soft as a deer's. They shut again as
+though the light hurt them, then once more opened and wandered
+about, apparently without seeing.
+
+At length they found my face, for I was still bending over her,
+and, resting there, appeared to take it in by degrees. More, it
+seemed to touch and stir some human spring in the still-sleeping
+heart. At least the fear passed from her features and was
+replaced by a faint smile, such as a patient sometimes gives to
+one known and well loved, as the effects of chloroform pass away.
+For a while she looked at me with an earnest, searching gaze,
+then suddenly, for the first time moving her arms, lifted them
+and threw them round my neck.
+
+The old man stared, bending his imperial brows into a little
+frown, but did nothing. Bickley stared also through his glasses
+and sniffed as though in disapproval, while I remained quite
+still, fighting with a wild impulse to kiss her on the lips as
+one would an awakening and beloved child. I doubt if I could have
+done so, however, for really I was immovable; my heart seemed to
+stop and all my muscles to be paralysed.
+
+I do not know for how long this endured, but I do know how it
+ended. Presently in the intense silence I heard Bastin's heavy
+voice and looking round, saw his big head projecting into the
+sepulchre.
+
+"Well, I never!" he said, "you seem to have woke them up with a
+vengeance. If you begin like that with the lady, there will be
+complications before you have done, Arbuthnot."
+
+Talk of being brought back to earth with a rush! I could have
+killed Bastin, and Bickley, turning on him like a tiger, told him
+to be off, find wood and light a large fire in front of the
+statue. I think he was about to argue when the Ancient gave him a
+glance of his fierce eyes, which alarmed him, and he departed,
+bewildered, to return presently with the wood.
+
+But the sound of his voice had broken the spell. The Lady let
+her arms fall with a start, and shut her eyes again, seeming to
+faint. Bickley sprang forward with his sal volatile and applied
+it to her nostrils, the Ancient not interfering, for he seemed to
+recognise that he had to deal with a man of skill and one who
+meant well by them.
+
+In the end we brought her round again and, to omit details,
+Bickley gave her, not coffee and brandy, but a mixture he
+compounded of hot water, preserved milk and meat essence. The
+effect of it on her was wonderful, since a few minutes after
+swallowing it she sat up in the coffin. Then we lifted her from
+that narrow bed in which she had slept for--ah! how long? and
+perceived that beneath her also were crystal boxes of the
+radiant, heat-giving substance. We sat her on the floor of the
+sepulchre, wrapping her also in a blanket.
+
+Now it was that Tommy, after frisking round her as though in
+welcome of an old friend, calmly established himself beside her
+and laid his black head upon her knee. She noted it and smiled
+for the first time, a marvelously sweet and gentle smile. More,
+she placed her slender hand upon the dog and stroked him feebly.
+
+Bickley tried to make her drink some more of his mixture, but
+she refused, motioning him to give it to Tommy. This, however, he
+would not do because there was but one cup. Presently both of the
+sleepers began to shiver, which caused Bickley anxiety. Abusing
+Bastin beneath his breath for being so long with the fire, he
+drew the blankets closer about them.
+
+Then an idea came to him and he examined the glowing boxes in
+the coffin. They were loose, being merely set in prepared
+cavities in the crystal. Wrapping our handkerchiefs about his
+hand, he took them out and placed them around the wakened
+patients, a proceeding of which the Ancient nodded approval. Just
+then, too, Bastin returned with his first load of firewood, and
+soon we had a merry blaze going just outside the sepulchre. I saw
+that they observed the lighting of this fire by means of a match
+with much interest.
+
+Now they grew warm again, as indeed we did also--too warm. Then
+in my turn I had an idea. I knew that by now the sun would be
+beating hotly against the rock of the mount, and suggested to
+Bickley, that, if possible, the best thing we could do would be
+to get them into its life-giving rays. He agreed, if we could
+make them understand and they were able to walk. So I tried.
+First I directed the Ancient's attention to the mouth of the cave
+which at this distance showed as a white circle of light. He
+looked at it and then at me with grave inquiry. I made motions to
+suggest that he should proceed there, repeating the word "Sun" in
+the Orofenan tongue. He understood at once, though whether he
+read my mind rather than what I said I am not sure. Apparently
+the Glittering Lady understood also and seemed to be most anxious
+to go. Only she looked rather pitifully at her feet and shook her
+head. This decided me.
+
+I do not know if I have mentioned anywhere that I am a tall man
+and very muscular. She was tall, also, but as I judged not so
+very heavy after her long fast. At any rate I felt quite certain
+that I could carry her for that distance. Stooping down, I lifted
+her up, signing to her to put her arms round my neck, which she
+did. Then calling to Bickley and Bastin to bring along the
+Ancient between them, with some difficulty I struggled out of the
+sepulchre, and started down the cave. She was more heavy than I
+thought, and yet I could have wished the journey longer. To begin
+with she seemed quite trustful and happy in my arms, where she
+lay with her head against my shoulder, smiling a little as a
+child might do, especially when I had to stop and throw her long
+hair round my neck like a muffler, to prevent it from trailing in
+the dust.
+
+A bundle of lavender, or a truss of new-mown hay, could not
+have been more sweet to carry and there was something electric
+about the touch of her, which went through and through me. Very
+soon it was over, and we were out of the cave into the full glory
+of the tropical sun. At first, that her eyes might become
+accustomed to its light and her awakened body to its heat, I set
+her down where shadow fell from the overhanging rock, in a canvas
+deck chair that had been brought by Marama with the other things,
+throwing the rug about her to protect her from such wind as there
+was. She nestled gratefully into the soft seat and shut her eyes,
+for the motion had tired her. I noted, however, that she drew in
+the sweet air with long breaths.
+
+Then I turned to observe the arrival of the Ancient, who was
+being borne between Bickley and Bastin in what children know as a
+dandy-chair, which is formed by two people crossing their hands
+in a peculiar fashion. It says much for the tremendous dignity of
+his presence that even thus, with one arm round the neck of
+Bickley and the other round that of Bastin, and his long white
+beard falling almost to the ground, he still looked most
+imposing.
+
+Unfortunately, however, just as they were emerging from the
+cave, Bastin, always the most awkward of creatures, managed to
+leave hold with one hand, so that his passenger nearly came to
+the ground. Never shall I forget the look that he gave him.
+Indeed, I think that from this moment he hated Bastin. Bickley he
+respected as a man of intelligence and learning, although in
+comparison with his own, the latter was infantile and crude; me
+he tolerated and even liked; but Bastin he detested. The only one
+of our party for whom he felt anything approaching real affection
+was the spaniel Tommy.
+
+We set him down, fortunately uninjured, on some rugs, and also
+in the shadow. Then, after a little while, we moved both of them
+into the sun. It was quite curious to see them expand there. As
+Bickley said, what happened to them might well be compared to the
+development of a butterfly which has just broken from the living
+grave of its chrysalis and crept into the full, hot radiance of
+the light. Its crinkled wings unfold, their brilliant tints
+develop; in an hour or two it is perfect, glorious, prepared for
+life and flight, a new creature.
+
+So it was with this pair, from moment to moment they gathered
+strength and vigour. Near-by to them, as it happened, stood a
+large basket of the luscious native fruits brought that morning
+by the Orofenans, and at these the Lady looked with longing. With
+Bickley's permission, I offered them to her and to the Ancient,
+first peeling them with my fingers. They ate of them greedily, a
+full meal, and would have gone on had not the stern Bickley,
+fearing untoward consequences, removed the basket. Again the
+results were wonderful, for half an hour afterwards they seemed
+to be quite strong. With my assistance the Glittering Lady, as I
+still call her, for at that time I did not know her name, rose
+from the chair, and, leaning on me, tottered a few steps forward.
+Then she stood looking at the sky and all the lovely panorama of
+nature beneath, and stretching out her arms as though in worship.
+Oh! how beautiful she seemed with the sunlight shining on her
+heavenly face!
+
+Now for the first time I heard her voice. It was soft and deep,
+yet in it was a curious bell-like tone that seemed to vibrate
+like the sound of chimes heard from far away. Never have I
+listened to such another voice. She pointed to the sun whereof
+the light turned her radiant hair and garments to a kind of
+golden glory, and called it by some name that I could not
+understand. I shook my head, whereon she gave it a different name
+taken, I suppose, from another language. Again I shook my head
+and she tried a third time. To my delight this word was
+practically the same that the Orofenans used for "sun."
+
+"Yes," I said, speaking very slowly, "so it is called by the
+people of this land."
+
+She understood, for she answered in much the same language:
+
+"What, then, do you call it?"
+
+"Sun in the English tongue," I replied.
+
+"Sun. English," she repeated after me, then added, "How are you
+named, Wanderer?"
+
+"Humphrey," I answered.
+
+"Hum-fe-ry!" she said as though she were learning the word,
+"and those?"
+
+"Bastin and Bickley," I replied.
+
+Over these patronymics she shook her head; as yet they were too
+much for her.
+
+"How are you named, Sleeper?" I asked.
+
+"Yva," she answered.
+
+"A beautiful name for one who is beautiful," I declared with
+enthusiasm, of course always in the rich Orofenan dialect which
+by now I could talk well enough.
+
+She repeated the words once or twice, then of a sudden caught
+their meaning, for she smiled and even coloured, saying hastily
+with a wave of her hand towards the Ancient who stood at a
+distance between Bastin and Bickley, "My father, Oro; great man;
+great king; great god!"
+
+At this information I started, for it was startling to learn
+that here was the original Oro, who was still worshipped by the
+Orofenans, although of his actual existence they had known
+nothing for uncounted time. Also I was glad to learn that he was
+her father and not her old husband, for to me that would have
+been horrible, a desecration too deep for words.
+
+"How long did you sleep, Yva?" I asked, pointing towards the
+sepulchre in the cave.
+
+After a little thought she understood and shook her head
+hopelessly, then by an afterthought, she said,
+
+"Stars tell Oro to-night."
+
+So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had
+guessed as much from those plates in the coffin which seemed to
+have stars engraved on them.
+
+At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient
+himself approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged
+in an animated argument with Bastin.
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" said Bickley, "keep your theology to
+yourself at present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a
+temper he may die."
+
+"If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him
+that he is a liar," replied Bastin obstinately.
+
+"Which you did, Bastin, only fortunately he did not understand
+you. But for your own sake I advise you not to take liberties. He
+is not one, I think, with whom it is wise to trifle. I think he
+seems thirsty. Go and get some water from the rain pool, not from
+the lake."
+
+Bastin departed and presently returned with an aluminum jug
+full of pure water and a glass. Bickley poured some of it into a
+glass and handed it to Yva who bent her head in thanks. Then she
+did a curious thing. Having first lifted the glass with both
+hands to the sky and held it so for a few seconds, she turned and
+with an obeisance poured a little of it on the ground before her
+father's feet.
+
+A libation, thought I to myself, and evidently Bastin agreed
+with me, for I heard him mutter,
+
+"I believe she is making a heathen offering."
+
+Doubtless we were right, for Oro accepted the homage by a
+little motion of the head. After this, at a sign from him she
+drank the water. Then the glass was refilled and handed to Oro
+who also held it towards the sky. He, however, made no libation
+but drank at once, two tumblers of it in rapid succession.
+
+By now the direct sunlight was passing from the mouth of the
+cave, and though it was hot enough, both of them shivered a
+little. They spoke together in some language of which we could
+not understand a word, as though they were debating what their
+course of action should be. The dispute was long and earnest. Had
+we known what was passing, which I learned afterwards, it would
+have made us sufficiently anxious, for the point at issue was
+nothing less than whether we should or should not be forthwith
+destroyed--an end, it appears, that Oro was quite capable of
+bringing about if he so pleased. Yva, however, had very clear
+views of her own on the matter and, as I gather, even dared to
+threaten that she would protect us by the use of certain powers
+at her command, though what these were I do not know.
+
+While the event hung doubtful Tommy, who was growing bored with
+these long proceedings, picked up a bough still covered with
+flowers which, after their pretty fashion, the Orofenans had
+placed on the top of one of the baskets of food. This small bough
+he brought and laid at the feet of Oro, no doubt in the hope that
+he would throw it for him to fetch, a game in which the dog
+delighted. For some reason Oro saw an omen in this simple canine
+performance, or he may have thought that the dog was making an
+offering to him, for he put his thin hand to his brow and thought
+a while, then motioned to Bastin to pick up the bough and give it
+to him.
+
+Next he spoke to his daughter as though assenting to something,
+for I saw her sigh in relief. No wonder, for he was conveying his
+decision to spare our lives and admit us to their fellowship.
+
+After this again they talked, but in quite a different tone and
+manner. Then the Glittering Lady said to me in her slow and
+archaic Orofenan:
+
+"We go to rest. You must not follow. We come back perhaps
+tonight, perhaps next night. We are quite safe. You are quite
+safe under the beard of Oro. Spirit of Oro watch you. You
+understand?"
+
+I said I understood, whereon she answered:
+
+"Good-bye, O Humfe-ry."
+
+"Good-bye, O Yva," I replied, bowing.
+
+Thereon they turned and refusing all assistance from us,
+vanished into the darkness of the cave leaning upon each other
+and walking slowly.
+
+
+
+Chapter XII
+
+Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Years!
+
+
+"You seem to have made the best of your time, old fellow," said
+Bickley in rather a sour voice.
+
+"I never knew people begin to call each other by their
+Christian names so soon," added Bastin, looking at me with a
+suspicious eye.
+
+"I know no other," I said.
+
+"Perhaps not, but at any rate you have another, though you
+don't seem to have told it to her. Anyway, I am glad they are
+gone, for I was getting tired of being ordered by everybody to
+carry about wood and water for them. Also I am terribly hungry as
+I can't eat before it is light. They have taken most of the best
+fruit to which I was looking forward, but thank goodness they do
+not seem to care for pork."
+
+"So am I," said Bickley, who really looked exhausted. "Get the
+food, there's a good fellow. We'll talk afterwards."
+
+When we had eaten, somewhat silently, I asked Bickley what he
+made of the business; also whither he thought the sleepers had
+gone.
+
+"I think I can answer the last question," interrupted Bastin.
+"I expect it is to a place well known to students of the Bible
+which even Bickley mentions sometimes when he is angry. At any
+rate, they seem to be very fond of heat, for they wouldn't part
+from it even in their coffins, and you will admit that they are
+not quite natural, although that Glittering Lady is so attractive
+as regards her exterior."
+
+Bickley waved these remarks aside and addressed himself to me.
+
+"I don't know what to think of it," he said; "but as the
+experience is not natural and everything in the Universe, so far
+as we know it, has a natural explanation, I am inclined to the
+belief that we are suffering from hallucinations, which in their
+way are also quite natural. It does not seem possible that two
+people can really have been asleep for an unknown length of time
+enclosed in vessels of glass or crystal, kept warm by radium or
+some such substance, and then emerge from them comparatively
+strong and well. It is contrary to natural law."
+
+"How about microbes?" I asked. "They are said to last
+practically for ever, and they are living things. So in their
+case your natural law breaks down."
+
+"That is true," he answered. "Some microbes in a sealed tube
+and under certain conditions do appear to possess indefinite
+powers of life. Also radium has an indefinite life, but that is a
+mineral. Only these people are not microbes nor are they
+minerals. Also, experience tells us that they could not have
+lived for more than a few months at the outside in such
+circumstances as we seemed to find them."
+
+"Then what do you suggest?"
+
+"I suggest that we did not really find them at all; that we
+have all been dreaming. You know that there are certain gases
+which produce illusions, laughing gas is one of them, and that
+these gases are sometimes met with in caves. Now there were very
+peculiar odours in that place under the statue, which may have
+worked upon our imaginations in some such way. Otherwise we are
+up against a miracle, and, as you know, I do not believe in
+miracles."
+
+"I do," said Bastin calmly. "You'll find all about it in the
+Bible if you will only take the trouble to read. Why do you talk
+such rubbish about gases?"
+
+"Because only gas, or something of the sort, could have made us
+imagine them."
+
+"Nonsense, Bickley! Those people were here right enough. Didn't
+they eat our fruit and drink the water I brought them without
+ever saying thank you? Only, they are not human. They are evil
+spirits, and for my part I don't want to see any more of them,
+though I have no doubt Arbuthnot does, as that Glittering Lady
+threw her arms round his neck when she woke up, and already he is
+calling her by her Christian name, if the word Christian can be
+used in connection with her. The old fellow had the impudence to
+tell us that he was a god, and it is remarkable that he should
+have called himself Oro, seeing that the devil they worship on
+the island is also called Oro and the place itself is named
+Orofena."
+
+"As to where they have gone," continued Bickley, taking no
+notice of Bastin, "I really don't know. My expectation is,
+however, that when we go to look tomorrow morning--and I suggest
+that we should not do so before then in order that we may give
+our minds time to clear--we shall find that sepulchre place quite
+empty, even perhaps without the crystal coffins we have imagined
+to stand there."
+
+"Perhaps we shall find that there isn't a cave at all and that
+we are not sitting on a flat rock outside of it," suggested
+Bastin with heavy sarcasm, adding, "You are clever in your way,
+Bickley, but you can talk more rubbish than any man I ever knew."
+
+"They told us they would come back tonight or tomorrow," I
+said. "If they do, what will you say then, Bickley?"
+
+"I will wait till they come to answer that question. Now let us
+go for a walk and try to change our thoughts. We are all
+over-strained and scarcely know what we are saying."
+
+"One more question," I said as we rose to start. "Did Tommy
+suffer from hallucinations as well as ourselves?"
+
+"Why not?" answered Bickley. "He is an animal just as we are,
+or perhaps we thought we saw Tommy do the things he did."
+
+"When you found that basket of fruit, Bastin, which the natives
+brought over in the canoe, was there a bough covered with red
+flowers lying on the top of it?"
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot, one bough only; I threw it down on the rock as
+it got in the way when I was carrying the basket."
+
+"Which flowering bough we all thought we saw the Sleeper Oro
+carry away after Tommy had brought it to him."
+
+"Yes; he made me pick it up and give it to him," said Bastin.
+
+"Well, if we did not see this it should still be lying on the
+rock, as there has been no wind and there are no animals here to
+carry it away. You will admit that, Bickley?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Then if it has gone you will admit also that the presumption
+is that we saw what we thought we did see?"
+
+"I do not know how that conclusion can be avoided, at any rate
+so far as the incident of the bough is concerned," replied
+Bickley with caution.
+
+Then, without more words, we started to look. At the spot where
+the bough should have been, there was no bough, but on the rock
+lay several of the red flowers, bitten off, I suppose, by Tommy
+while he was carrying it. Nor was this all. I think I have
+mentioned that the Glittering Lady wore sandals which were
+fastened with red studs that looked like rubies or carbuncles. On
+the rock lay one of these studs. I picked it up and we examined
+it. It had been sewn to the sandal-strap with golden thread or
+silk. Some of this substance hung from the hole drilled in the
+stone which served for an eye. It was as rotten as tinder,
+apparently with extreme age. Moreover, the hard gem itself was
+pitted as though the passage of time had taken effect upon it,
+though this may have been caused by other agencies, such as the
+action of the radium rays. I smiled at Bickley who looked
+disconcerted and even sad. In a way it is painful to see the
+effect upon an able and earnest man of the upsetting of his
+lifelong theories.
+
+We went for our walk, keeping to the flat lands at the foot of
+the volcano cone, for we seemed to have had enough of wonders and
+to desire to reassure ourselves, as it were, by the study of
+natural and familiar things. As it chanced, too, we were rewarded
+by sundry useful discoveries. Thus we found a place where the
+bread-tree and other fruits, most of them now ripe, grew in
+abundance, as did the yam. Also, we came to an inlet that we
+noticed was crowded with large and beautiful fish from the lake,
+which seemed to find it a favourite spot. Perhaps this was
+because a little stream of excellent water ran in here,
+overflowing from the great pool or mere which filled the crater
+above.
+
+At these finds we rejoiced greatly, for now we knew that we
+need not fear starvation even should our supply of food from the
+main island be cut off. Indeed, by help of some palm-leaf stalks
+which we wove together roughly, Bastin, who was rather clever at
+this kind of thing, managed to trap four fish weighing two or
+three pounds apiece, wading into the water to do so. It was
+curious to observe with what ease he adapted himself to the
+manners and customs of primeval man, so much so, indeed, that
+Bickley remarked that if he could believe in re-incarnation, he
+would be absolutely certain that Bastin was a troglodyte in his
+last sojourn on the earth.
+
+However this might be, Bastin's primeval instincts and
+abilities were of the utmost service to us. Before we had been
+many days on that island he had built us a kind of native hut or
+house roofed with palm leaves in which, until provided with a
+better, as happened afterwards, we ate and he and Bickley slept,
+leaving the tent to me. Moreover, he wove a net of palm fibre
+with which he caught abundance of fish, and made fishing-lines of
+the same material (fortunately we had some hooks) which he baited
+with freshwater mussels and the insides of fish. By means of
+these he secured some veritable monsters of the carp species that
+proved most excellent eating. His greatest triumph, however, was
+a decoy which he constructed of boughs, wherein he trapped a
+number of waterfowl. So that soon we kept a very good table of a
+sort, especially after he had learned how to cook our food upon
+the native plan by means of hot stones. This suited us admirably,
+as it enabled Bickley and myself to devote all our time to
+archaeological and other studies which did not greatly interest
+Bastin.
+
+By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards
+evening, so we cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly
+exhausted, made ourselves as comfortable as we could and went to
+sleep. Even our marvelous experiences could not keep Bickley and
+myself from sleeping, and on Bastin such things had no effect. He
+accepted them and that was all, much more readily than we did,
+indeed. Triple-armed as he was in the mail of a child-like faith,
+he snapped his fingers at evil spirits which he supposed the
+Sleepers to be, and at everything else that other men might
+dread.
+
+Now, as I have mentioned, after our talk with Marama, although
+we did not think it wise to adventure ourselves among them again
+at present, we had lost all fear of the Orofenans. In this
+attitude, so far as Marama himself and the majority of his people
+were concerned, we were quite justified, for they were our warm
+friends. But in the case of the sorcerers, the priests and all
+their rascally and superstitious brotherhood, we were by no means
+justified. They had not forgiven Bastin his sacrilege or for his
+undermining of their authority by the preaching of new doctrines
+which, if adopted, would destroy them as a hierarchy. Nor had
+they forgiven Bickley for shooting one of their number, or any of
+us for our escape from the vengeance of their god.
+
+So it came about that they made a plot to seize us all and hale
+us off to be sacrificed to a substituted image of Oro, which by
+now they had set up. They knew exactly where we slept upon the
+rock; indeed, our fire showed it to them and so far they were not
+afraid to venture, since here they had been accustomed for
+generations to lay their offerings to the god of the Mountain.
+Secretly on the previous night, without the knowledge of Marama,
+they had carried two more canoes to the borders of the lake. Now
+on this night, just as the moon was setting about three in the
+morning, they made their attack, twenty-one men in all, for the
+three canoes were large, relying on the following darkness to get
+us away and convey us to the place of sacrifice to be offered up
+at dawn and before Marama could interfere.
+
+The first we knew of the matter, for most foolishly we had
+neglected to keep a watch, was the unpleasant sensation of brawny
+savages kneeling on us and trussing us up with palm-fibre ropes.
+Also they thrust handfuls of dry grass into our mouths to prevent
+us from calling out, although as air came through the interstices
+of the grass, we did not suffocate. The thing was so well done
+that we never struck a blow in self-defence, and although we had
+our pistols at hand, much less could we fire a shot. Of course,
+we struggled as well as we were able, but it was quite useless;
+in three minutes we were as helpless as calves in a net and like
+calves were being conveyed to the butcher. Bastin managed to get
+the gag out of his mouth for a few seconds, and I heard him say
+in his slow, heavy voice:
+
+"This, Bickley, is what comes of trafficking with evil spirits
+in museum cases--" There his speech stopped, for the grass wad
+was jammed down his throat again, but distinctly I heard the
+inarticulate Bickley snort as he conceived the repartee he was
+unable to utter. As for myself, I reflected that the business
+served us right for not keeping a watch, and abandoned the issue
+to fate.
+
+Still, to confess the truth, I was infinitely more sorry to die
+than I should have been forty-eight hours earlier. This is a dull
+and in most ways a dreadful world, one, if we could only summon
+the courage, that some of us would be glad to leave in search of
+new adventures. But here a great and unprecedented adventure had
+begun to befall me, and before its mystery was solved, before
+even I could formulate a theory concerning it, my body must be
+destroyed, and my intelligence that was caged therein, sent far
+afield; or, if Bickley were right, eclipsed. It seemed so sad
+just when the impossible, like an unguessed wandering moon, had
+risen over the grey flats of the ascertained and made them shine
+with hope and wonder.
+
+They carried us off to the canoes, not too gently; indeed, I
+heard the bony frame of Bastin bump into the bottom of one of
+them and reflected, not without venom, that it served him right
+as he was the fount and origin of our woes. Two stinking
+magicians, wearing on their heads undress editions of their court
+cages, since these were too cumbersome for active work of the
+sort, and painted all over with various pigments, were just about
+to swing me after him into the same, or another canoe, when
+something happened. I did not know what it was, but as a result,
+my captors left hold of me so that I fell to the rock, lying upon
+my back.
+
+Then, within my line of vision, which, it must be remembered,
+was limited because I could not lift my head, appeared the upper
+part of the tall person of the Ancient who said that he was named
+Oro. I could only see him down to his middle, but I noted vaguely
+that he seemed to be much changed. For instance, he wore a
+different coloured dress, or rather robe; this time it was dark
+blue, which caused me to wonder where on earth it came from.
+Also, his tremendous beard had been trimmed and dressed, and on
+his head there was a simple black cap, strangely quilted, which
+looked as though it were made of velvet. Moreover, his face had
+plumped out. He still looked ancient, it is true, and unutterably
+wise, but now he resembled an antique youth, so great were his
+energy and vigour. Also, his dark and glowing eyes shone with a
+fearful intensity. In short, he seemed impressive and terrible
+almost beyond imagining.
+
+He looked about him slowly, then asked in a deep, cold voice,
+speaking in the Orofenan tongue:
+
+"What do you, slaves?"
+
+No one seemed able to answer, they were too horror-stricken at
+this sudden vision of their fabled god, whose fierce features of
+wood had become flesh; they only turned to fly. He waved his thin
+hand and they came to a standstill, like animals which have
+reached the end of their tether and are checked by the chains
+that bind them. There they stood in all sorts of postures,
+immovable and looking extremely ridiculous in their paint and
+feathers, with dread unutterable stamped upon their evil faces.
+
+The Sleeper spoke again:
+
+"You would murder as did your forefathers, O children of snakes
+and hogs fashioned in the shape of men. You would sacrifice those
+who dwell in my shadow to satisfy your hate because they are
+wiser than you. Come hither thou," and he beckoned with a bony
+finger to the chief magician.
+
+The man advanced towards him in short jumps, as a mechanical
+toy might do, and stood before him, his miniature crate and
+feathers all awry and the sweat of terror melting the paint in
+streaks upon his face.
+
+"Look into the eyes of Oro, O worshipper of Oro," said the
+Sleeper, and he obeyed, his own eyes starting out of his head.
+
+"Receive the curse of Oro," said the Ancient again. Then
+followed a terrible spectacle. The man went raving mad. He
+bounded into the air to a height inconceivable. He threw himself
+upon the ground and rolled upon the rock. He rose again and
+staggered round and round, tearing pieces out of his arms with
+his teeth. He yelled hideously like one possessed. He grovelled,
+beating his forehead against the rock. Then he sat up, slowly
+choked and--died.
+
+His companions seemed to catch the infection of death as
+terrified savages often do. They too performed dreadful antics,
+all except three of them who stood paralysed. They rushed about
+battering each other with their fists and wooden weapons, looking
+like devils from hell in their hideous painted attire. They
+grappled and fought furiously. They separated and plunged into
+the lake, where with a last grimace they sank like stones.
+
+It seemed to last a long while, but I think that as a matter of
+fact within five minutes it was over; they were all dead. Only
+the three paralysed ones remained standing and rolling their
+eyes.
+
+The Sleeper beckoned to them with his thin finger, and they
+walked forward in step like soldiers.
+
+"Lift that man from the boat," he said, pointing to Bastin,
+"cut his bonds and those of the others."
+
+They obeyed with a wonderful alacrity. In a minute we stood at
+liberty and were pulling the grass gags from our mouths. The
+Ancient pointed to the head magician who lay dead upon the rock,
+his hideous, contorted countenance staring open-eyed at heaven.
+
+"Take that sorcerer and show him to the other sorcerers yonder,"
+he said, "and tell them where your fellows are if they would find
+them. Know by these signs that the Oro, god of the Mountain, who
+has slept a while, is awake, and ill will it go with them who
+question his power or dare to try to harm those who dwell in his
+house. Bring food day by day and await commands. Begone!"
+
+The dreadful-looking body was bundled into one of the canoes,
+that out of which Bastin had emerged. A rower sprang into each of
+them and presently was paddling as he had never done before. As
+the setting moon vanished, they vanished with it, and once more
+there was a great silence.
+
+"I am going to find my boots," said Bastin. "This rock is hard
+and I hurt my feet kicking at those poor fellows who appear to
+have come to a bad end, how, I do not exactly understand.
+Personally, I think that more allowances should have been made
+for them, as I hope will be the case elsewhere, since after all
+they only acted according to their lights."
+
+"Curse their lights!" ejaculated Bickley, feeling his throat
+which was bruised. "I'm glad they are out."
+
+Bastin limped away in search of his boots, but Bickley and I
+stood where we were contemplating the awakened Sleeper. All
+recollection of the recent tumultuous scene seemed to have passed
+from his mind, for he was engaged in a study of the heavens. They
+were wonderfully brilliant now that the moon was down, brilliant
+as they only can be in the tropics when the sky is clear.
+
+Something caused me to look round, and there, coming towards
+us, was she who said her name was Yva. Evidently all her weakness
+had departed also, for now she needed no support, but walked with
+a peculiar gliding motion that reminded me of a swan floating
+forward on the water. Well had we named her the Glittering Lady,
+for in the starlight literally she seemed to glitter. I suppose
+the effect came from her golden raiment, which, however, I
+noticed, as in her father's case, was not the same that she had
+worn in the coffin; also from her hair that seemed to give out a
+light of its own. At least, she shimmered as she came, her tall
+shape swaying at every step like a willow in the wind. She drew
+near, and I saw that her face, too, had filled out and now was
+that of one in perfect health and vigour, while her eyes shone
+softly and seemed wondrous large.
+
+In her hands she carried those two plates of metal which I had
+seen lying in the coffin of the Sleeper Oro. These she gave to
+him, then fell back out of his hearing--if it were ever possible
+to do this, a point on which I am not sure--and began to talk to
+me. I noted at once that in the few hours during which she was
+absent, her knowledge of the Orofenan tongue seemed to have
+improved greatly as though she had drunk deeply from some hidden
+fount of memory. Now she spoke it with readiness, as Oro had done
+when he addressed the sorcerers, although many of the words she
+used were not known to me, and the general form of her language
+appeared archaic, as for instance that of Spenser is compared
+with modern English. When she saw I did not comprehend her,
+however, she would stop and cast her sentences in a different
+shape, till at length I caught her meaning. Now I give the
+substance of what she said.
+
+"You are safe," she began, glancing first at the palm ropes
+that lay upon the rock and then at my wrists, one of which was
+cut.
+
+"Yes, Lady Yva, thanks to your father."
+
+"You should say thanks to me. My father was thinking of other
+things, but I was thinking of you strangers, and from where I was
+I saw those wicked ones coming to kill you."
+
+"Oh! from the top of the mountain, I suppose."
+
+She shook her head and smiled but vouchsafed no further
+explanation, unless her following words can be so called. These
+were:
+
+"I can see otherwise than with my eyes, if I choose." A
+statement that caused Bickley, who was listening, to mutter:
+
+"Impossible! What the deuce can she mean? Telepathy, perhaps."
+
+"I saw," she continued, "and told the Lord, my father. He came
+forth. Did he kill them? I did not look to learn."
+
+"Yes. They lie in the lake, all except three whom he
+sent away as messengers."
+
+"I thought so. Death is terrible, O Humphrey, but it is a sword
+which those who rule must use to smite the wicked and the
+savage."
+
+Not wishing to pursue this subject, I asked her what her father
+was doing with the metal plates.
+
+"He reads the stars," she answered, "to learn how long we have
+been asleep. Before we went to sleep he made two pictures of
+them, as they were then and as they should be at the time he had
+set for our awakening."
+
+"We set that time," interrupted Bickley.
+
+"Not so, O Bickley," she answered, smiling again. "In the
+divine Oro's head was the time set. You were the hand that
+executed his decree."
+
+When Bickley heard this I really thought he would have burst.
+However, he controlled himself nobly, being anxious to hear the
+end of this mysterious fib.
+
+"How long was the time that the lord Oro set apart for sleep?"
+I asked.
+
+She paused as though puzzled to find words to express her
+meaning, then held up her hands and said:
+
+"Ten," nodding at her fingers. By second thoughts she took
+Bickley's hands, not mine, and counted his ten fingers.
+
+"Ten years," said Bickley. "Well, of course, it is impossible,
+but perhaps--" and he paused.
+
+"Ten tens," she went on with a deepening smile, "one hundred."
+
+"O!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten hundreds, one thousand."
+
+"I say!" said Bickley.
+
+"Ten times ten thousand, one hundred thousand."
+
+Bickley became silent.
+
+"Twice one hundred thousand and half a hundred thousand, two
+hundred and fifty thousand years. That was the space of time
+which the lord Oro, my father, set for our sleep. Whether it has
+been fulfilled he will know presently when he has read the book
+of the stars and made comparison of it with what he wrote before
+we laid us down to rest," and she pointed to the metal plates
+which the Ancient was studying.
+
+Bickley walked away, making sounds as though he were going to
+be ill and looking so absurd in his indignation that I nearly
+laughed. The Lady Yva actually did laugh, and very musical was
+that laugh.
+
+"He does not believe," she said. "He is so clever he knows
+everything. But two hundred and fifty thousand years ago we
+should have thought him quite stupid. Then we could read the
+stars and calculate their movements for ever."
+
+"So can we," I answered, rather nettled.
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, since you will be able to show my
+father if in one of them he is wrong."
+
+Secretly I hoped that this task would not be laid on me.
+Indeed, I thought it well to change the subject for the
+edification of Bickley who had recovered and was drawn back by
+his eager curiosity. Just then, too, Bastin joined us, happy in
+his regained boots.
+
+"You tell us, Lady Yva," I said, "that you slept, or should
+have slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years." Here Bastin
+opened his eyes. "If that was so, where was your mind all this
+time?"
+
+"If by my mind you mean spirit, O Humphrey, I have to answer
+that at present I do not know for certain. I think, however, that
+it dwelt elsewhere, perhaps in other bodies on the earth, or some
+different earth. At least, I know that my heart is very full of
+memories which as yet I cannot unroll and read."
+
+"Great heavens, this is madness!" said Bickley.
+
+"In the great heavens," she answered slowly, "there are many
+things which you, poor man, would think to be madness, but yet
+are truth and perfect wisdom. These things, or some of them, soon
+I shall hope to show you."
+
+"Do if you can," said Bickley.
+
+"Why not?" interrupted Bastin. "I think the lady's remarks
+quite reasonable. It seems to me highly improbable if really she
+has slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years, which, of
+course, I can't decide, that an immortal spirit would be allowed
+to remain idle for so long. That would be wallowing in a bed of
+idleness and shirking its duty which is to do its work. Also, as
+she tells you, Bickley, you are not half so clever as you think
+you are in your silly scepticism, and I have no doubt that there
+are many things in other worlds which would expose your
+ignorance, if only you could see them."
+
+At this moment Oro turned and called his daughter. She went at
+once, saying:
+
+"Come, strangers, and you shall learn."
+
+So we followed her.
+
+"Daughter," he said, speaking in Orofenan, I think that we
+might understand, "ask these strangers to bring one of those
+lamps of theirs that by the light of it I may study these
+writings."
+
+"Perhaps this may serve," said Bickley, suddenly producing an
+electric torch from his pocket and flashing it into his face. It
+was his form of repartee for all he had suffered at the hands of
+this incomprehensible pair. Let me say at once that it was
+singularly successful. Perhaps the wisdom of the ages in which
+Oro flourished had overlooked so small a matter as electric
+torches, or perhaps he did not expect to meet with them in these
+degenerate days. At any rate for the first and last time in my
+intercourse with him I saw the god, or lord--the native word
+bears either meaning--Oro genuinely astonished. He started and
+stepped back, and for a moment or two seemed a little frightened.
+Then muttering something as to the cleverness of this
+light-producing instrument, he motioned to his daughter to take
+it from Bickley and hold it in a certain position. She obeyed,
+and in its illumination he began to study the engraved plates,
+holding one of them in either hand.
+
+After a while he gave me one of the plates to hold, and with
+his disengaged hand pointed successively to the constellation of
+Orion, to the stars Castor, Pollux, Aldebaran, Rigel, the
+Pleiades, Sirius and others which with my very limited knowledge
+I could not recognise offhand. Then on the plate which I held, he
+showed us those same stars and constellations, checking them one
+by one.
+
+Then he remarked very quietly that all was in order, and
+handing the plate he held to Yva, said:
+
+"The calculations made so long ago are correct, nor have the
+stars varied in their proper motions during what is after all but
+an hour of time. If you, Stranger, who, I understand, are named
+Humphrey, should be, as I gather, a heaven-master, naturally you
+will ask me how I could fix an exact date by the stars without an
+error of, let us say, from five to ten thousand years. I answer
+you that by the proper motion of the stars alone it would have
+been difficult. Therefore I remember that in order to be exact, I
+calculated the future conjunctions of those two planets," and he
+pointed to Saturn and Jupiter. "Finding that one of these
+occurred near yonder star," and he indicated the bright orb,
+Spica, "at a certain time, I determined that then I would awake.
+Behold! There are the stars as I engraved them from my
+foreknowledge, upon this chart, and there those two great planets
+hang in conjunction. Daughter Yva, my wisdom has not failed me.
+This world of ours has travelled round the sun neither less nor
+more than two hundred and fifty thousand times since we laid
+ourselves down to sleep. It is written here, and yonder," and he
+pointed, first to the engraved plates and then to the vast
+expanse of the starlit heavens.
+
+Awe fell on me; I think that even Bickley and Bastin were awed,
+at any rate for the moment. It was a terrible thing to look on a
+being, to all appearance more or less human, who alleged that he
+had been asleep for two hundred and fifty thousand years, and
+proceeded to prove it by certain ancient star charts. Of course
+at the time I could not check those charts, lacking the necessary
+knowledge, but I have done so since and found that they are quite
+accurate. However this made no difference, since the
+circumstances and something in his manner convinced me that he
+spoke the absolute truth.
+
+He and his daughter had been asleep for two hundred and fifty
+thousand years. Oh! Heavens, for two hundred and fifty thousand
+years!
+
+
+
+Chapter XIII
+
+Oro Speaks and Bastin Argues
+
+
+The reader of what I have written, should there ever be such a
+person, may find the record marvelous, and therefore rashly
+conclude that because it is beyond experience, it could not be.
+It is not a wise deduction, as I think Bickley would admit today,
+because without doubt many things are which surpass our extremely
+limited experience. However, those who draw the veil from the
+Unknown and reveal the New, must expect incredulity, and accept
+it without grumbling. Was that not the fate, for instance, of
+those who in the Middle Ages, a few hundred years ago,
+discovered, or rather rediscovered the mighty movements of those
+constellations which served Oro for an almanac?
+
+But the point I want to make is that if the sceptic plays a
+Bickleyan part as regards what has been written, it seems
+probable that his attitude will be accentuated as regards that
+which it still remains for me to write. If so, I cannot help it,
+and must decline entirely to water down or doctor facts and thus
+pander to his prejudice and ignorance. For my part I cannot
+attempt to explain these occurrences; I only know that they
+happened and that I set down what I saw, heard and felt, neither
+more nor less.
+
+Immediately after Oro had triumphantly vindicated his stellar
+calculations he turned and departed into the cave, followed by
+his daughter, waving to us to remain where we were. As she passed
+us, however, the Glittering Lady whispered--this time to Bastin--
+that he would see them again in a few hours, adding:
+
+"We have much to learn and I hope that then you who, I
+understand, are a priest, will begin to teach us of your religion
+and other matters."
+
+Bastin was so astonished that he could make no reply, but when
+they had gone he said:
+
+"Which of you told her that I was a priest?"
+
+We shook our heads for neither of us could remember having done
+so.
+
+"Well, I did not," continued Bastin, "since at present I have
+found no opportunity of saying a word in season. So I suppose she
+must have gathered it from my attire, though as a matter of fact
+I haven't been wearing a collar, and those men who wanted to cook
+me, pulled off my white tie and I didn't think it worth while
+dirtying a clean one."
+
+"If," said Bickley, "you imagine that you look like the
+minister of any religion ancient or modern in a grubby flannel
+shirt, a battered sun-helmet, a torn green and white umbrella and
+a pair of ragged duck trousers, you are mistaken, Bastin, that is
+all."
+
+"I admit that the costume is not appropriate, Bickley, but how
+otherwise could she have learned the truth?"
+
+"These people seem to have ways of learning a good many things.
+But in your case, Bastin, the cause is clear enough. You have
+been walking about with the head of that idol and always keep it
+close to you. No doubt they believe that you are a priest of the
+worship of the god of the Grove--Baal, you know, or something of
+that sort."
+
+When he heard this Bastin's face became a perfect picture.
+Never before did I see it so full of horror struggling with
+indignation.
+
+"I must undeceive them without a moment's delay," he said, and
+was starting for the cave when we caught his arms and held him.
+
+"Better wait till they come back, old fellow," I said,
+laughing. "If you disobey that Lord Oro you may meet with another
+experience in the sacrifice line."
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Arbuthnot. I will occupy the interval
+in preparing a suitable address."
+
+"Much better occupy it in preparing breakfast," said Bickley.
+"I have always noticed that you are at your best extempore."
+
+In the end he did prepare breakfast though in a distrait
+fashion; indeed I found him beginning to make tea in the
+frying-pan. Bastin felt that his opportunity had arrived, and was
+making ready to rise to the occasion.
+
+Also we felt, all three of us, that we were extremely shabby-
+looking objects, and though none of us said so, each did his best
+to improve his personal appearance. First of all Bickley cut
+Bastin's and my hair, after which I did him the same service.
+Then Bickley who was normally clean shaven, set to work to remove
+a beard of about a week's growth, and I who wore one of the
+pointed variety, trimmed up mine as best I could with the help of
+a hand-glass. Bastin, too, performed on his which was of the
+square and rather ragged type, wisely rejecting Bickley's advice
+to shave it off altogether, offered, I felt convinced, because he
+felt that the result on Bastin would be too hideous for words.
+After this we cut our nails, cleaned our teeth and bathed; I even
+caught Bickley applying hair tonic from his dressing case in
+secret, behind a projecting rock, and borrowed some myself. He
+gave it me on condition that I did not mention its existence to
+Bastin who, he remarked, would certainly use the lot and make
+himself smell horrible.
+
+Next we found clean ducks among our store of spare clothes, for
+the Orofenans had brought these with our other possessions, and
+put them on, even adding silk cumberbunds and neckties. My tie I
+fastened with a pin that I had obtained in Egypt. It was a tiny
+gold statuette of very fine and early workmanship, of the god
+Osiris, wearing the crown of the Upper Land with the uraeus
+crest, and holding in his hands, which projected from the mummy
+wrappings, the emblems of the crook, the scourge and the crux
+ansata, or Sign of Life.
+
+Bastin, for his part, arrayed himself in full clerical costume,
+black coat and trousers, white tie and stick-up clergyman's
+collar which, as he remarked, made him feel extremely hot in that
+climate, and were unsuitable to domestic duties, such as
+washing-up. I offered to hold his coat while he did this office
+and told him he looked very nice indeed.
+
+"Beautiful!" remarked Bickley, "but why don't you put on your
+surplice and biretta?" (Being very High-Church Bastin did wear a
+biretta on festival Sundays at home.) "There would be no mistake
+about you then."
+
+"I do not think it would be suitable," replied Bastin whose
+sense of humour was undeveloped. "There is no service to be
+performed at present and no church, though perhaps that cave--"
+and he stopped.
+
+When we had finished these vain adornments and Bastin had put
+away the things and tidied up, we sat down, rather at a loose
+end. We should have liked to walk but refrained from doing so for
+fear lest we might dirty our clean clothes. So we just sat and
+thought. At least Bickley thought, and so did I for a while until
+I gave it up. What was the use of thinking, seeing that we were
+face to face with circumstances which baffled reason and beggared
+all recorded human experience? What Bastin did I am sure I do not
+know, but I think from the expression of his countenance that he
+was engaged in composing sermons for the benefit of Oro and the
+Glittering Lady.
+
+One diversion we did have. About eleven o'clock a canoe came
+from the main island laden with provisions and paddled by Marama
+and two of his people. We seized our weapons, remembering our
+experiences of the night, but Marama waved a bough in token of
+peace. So, carrying our revolvers, we went to the rock edge to
+meet him. He crept ashore and, chief though he was, prostrated
+himself upon his face before us, which told me that he had heard
+of the fate of the sorcerers. His apologies were abject. He
+explained that he had no part in the outrage of the attack, and
+besought us to intercede on behalf of him and his people with the
+awakened god of the Mountain whom he looked for with a terrified
+air.
+
+We consoled him as well as we could, and told him that he had
+best be gone before the god of the Mountain appeared, and perhaps
+treated him as he had done the sorcerers. In his name, however,
+we commanded Marama to bring materials and build us a proper
+house upon the rock, also to be sure to keep up a regular and
+ample supply of provisions. If he did these things, and anything
+else we might from time to time command, we said that perhaps his
+life and those of his people would be spared. This, however,
+after the evil behaviour of some of them of course we could not
+guarantee.
+
+Marama departed so thoroughly frightened that he even forgot to
+make any inquiries as to who this god of the Mountain might be,
+or where he came from, or whither he was going. Of course, the
+place had been sacred among his people from the beginning,
+whenever that may have been, but that its sacredness should
+materialise into an active god who brought sorcerers of the
+highest reputation to a most unpleasant end, just because they
+wished to translate their preaching into practice, was another
+matter. It was not to be explained even by the fact of which he
+himself had informed me, that during the dreadful storm of some
+months before, the cave mouth which previously was not visible on
+the volcano, had suddenly been lifted up above the level of the
+Rock of Offerings, although, of course, all religious and
+instructed persons would have expected something peculiar to
+happen after this event.
+
+Such I knew were his thoughts, but, as I have said, he was too
+frightened and too hurried to express them in questions that I
+should have found it extremely difficult to answer. As it was he
+departed quite uncertain as to whether one of us was not the real
+"god of the Mountain," who had power to bring hideous death upon
+his molesters. After all, what had he to go on to the contrary,
+except the word of three priests who were so terrified that they
+could give no coherent account of what had happened? Of these
+events, it was true, there was evidence in the twisted carcass of
+their lamented high sorcerer, and, for the matter of that, of
+certain corpses which he had seen, that lay in shallow water at
+the bottom of the lake. Beyond all was vague, and in his heart I
+am sure that Marama believed that Bastin was the real "god of the
+Mountain." Naturally, he would desire to work vengeance on those
+who tried to sacrifice and eat him. Moreover, had he not
+destroyed the image of the god of the Grove and borne away its
+head whence he had sucked magic and power?
+
+Thus argued Marama, disbelieving the tale of the frightened
+sorcerers, for he admitted as much to me in after days.
+
+Marama departed in a great hurry, fearing lest the "god of the
+Mountain," or Bastin, whose new and splendid garb he regarded
+with much suspicion, might develop some evil energy against him.
+Then we went back to our camp, leaving the industrious Bastin,
+animated by a suggestion from Bickley that the fruit and food
+might spoil if left in the sun, to carry it into the shade of the
+cave. Owing to the terrors of the Orofenans the supply was so
+large that to do this he must make no fewer than seven journeys,
+which he did with great good will since Bastin loved physical
+exercise. The result on his clerical garments, however, was
+disastrous. His white tie went awry, squashed fruit and roast pig
+gravy ran down his waistcoat and trousers, and his high collar
+melted into limp crinkles in the moisture engendered by the
+tropical heat. Only his long coat escaped, since that Bickley
+kindly carried for him.
+
+It was just as he arrived with the seventh load in this
+extremely dishevelled condition that Oro and his daughter emerged
+from the cave. Indeed Bastin, who, being shortsighted, always
+wore spectacles that, owing to his heated state were covered with
+mist, not seeing that dignitary, dumped down the last basket on
+to his toes, exclaiming:
+
+"There, you lazy beggar, I told you I would bring it all, and I
+have."
+
+In fact he thought he was addressing Bickley and playing off on
+him a troglodytic practical joke.
+
+Oro, however, who at his age did not appreciate jokes, resented
+it and was about to do something unpleasant when with
+extraordinary tact his daughter remarked:
+
+"Bastin the priest makes you offerings. Thank him, O Lord my
+father."
+
+So Oro thanked him, not too cordially for evidently he still
+had feeling in his toes, and once more Bastin escaped. Becoming
+aware of his error, he began to apologise profusely in English,
+while the lady Yva studied him carefully.
+
+"Is that the costume of the priests of your religion, O
+Bastin?" she asked, surveying his dishevelled form. "If so, you
+were better without it."
+
+Then Bastin retired to straighten his tie, and grabbing his
+coat from Bickley, who handed it to him with a malicious smile,
+forced his perspiring arms into it in a peculiarly awkward and
+elephantine fashion.
+
+Meanwhile Bickley and I produced two camp chairs which we had
+made ready, and on these the wondrous pair seated themselves side
+by side.
+
+"We have come to learn," said Oro. "Teach!"
+
+"Not so, Father," interrupted Yva, who, I noted, was clothed in
+yet a third costume, though whence these came I could not
+imagine. "First I would ask a question. Whence are you,
+Strangers, and how came you here?"
+
+"We are from the country called England and a great storm
+shipwrecked us here; that, I think, which raised the mouth of the
+cave above the level of this rock," I answered.
+
+"The time appointed having come when it should be raised," said
+Oro as though to himself.
+
+"Where is England?" asked Yva.
+
+Now among the books we had with us was a pocket atlas, quite a
+good one of its sort. By way of answer I opened it at the map of
+the world and showed her England. Also I showed, to within a
+thousand miles or so, that spot on the earth's surface where we
+spoke together.
+
+The sight of this atlas excited the pair greatly. They had not
+the slightest difficulty in understanding everything about it and
+the shape of the world with its division into hemispheres seemed
+to be quite familiar to them. What appeared chiefly to interest
+them, and especially Oro, were the relative areas and positions
+of land and sea.
+
+"Of this, Strangers," he said, pointing to the map, "I shall
+have much to say to you when I have studied the pictures of your
+book and compared them with others of my own."
+
+"So he has got maps," said Bickley in English, "as well as star
+charts. I wonder where he keeps them."
+
+"With his clothes, I expect," suggested Bastin.
+
+Meanwhile Oro had hidden the atlas in his ample robe and
+motioned to his daughter to proceed.
+
+"Why do you come here from England so far away?" the Lady Yva
+asked, a question to which each of us had an answer.
+
+"To see new countries," I said.
+
+"Because the cyclone brought us," said Bickley.
+
+"To convert the heathen to my own Christian religion," said
+Bastin, which was not strictly true.
+
+It was on this last reply that she fixed.
+
+"What does your religion teach?" she asked.
+
+"It teaches that those who accept it and obey its commands will
+live again after death for ever in a better world where is
+neither sorrow nor sin," he answered.
+
+When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a
+new thought and look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
+
+"Who are the heathen?" Yva asked again after a pause, for she
+also seemed to be impressed.
+
+"All who do not agree with Bastin's spiritual views," answered
+Bickley.
+
+"Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness
+of heart, do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose
+that your father and you are heathen," replied Bastin stoutly.
+
+This seemed to astonish them, but presently Yva caught his
+meaning and smiled, while Oro said:
+
+"Of this great matter of faith we will talk later. It is an old
+question in the world."
+
+"Why," went on Yva, "if you wished to travel so far did you
+come in a ship that so easily is wrecked? Why did you not journey
+through the air, or better still, pass through space, leaving
+your bodies asleep, as, being instructed, doubtless you can do?"
+
+"As regards your first question," I answered, "there are no
+aircraft known that can make so long a journey."
+
+"And as regards the second," broke in Bickley, "we did not do
+so because it is impossible for men to transfer themselves to
+other places through space either with or without their bodies."
+
+At this information the Glittering Lady lifted her arched
+eyebrows and smiled a little, while Oro said:
+
+"I perceive that the new world has advanced but a little way on
+the road of knowledge."
+
+Fearing that Bastin was about to commence an argument, I began
+to ask questions in my turn.
+
+"Lord Oro and Lady Yva," I said, "we have told you something of
+ourselves and will tell you more when you desire it. But pardon
+us if first we pray you to tell us what we burn to know. Who are
+you? Of what race and country? And how came it that we found you
+sleeping yonder?"
+
+"If it be your pleasure, answer, my Father," said Yva.
+
+Oro thought a moment, then replied in a calm voice:
+
+"I am a king who once ruled most of the world as it was in my
+day, though it is true that much of it rebelled against me, my
+councillors and servants. Therefore I destroyed the world as it
+was then, save only certain portions whence life might spread to
+the new countries that I raised up. Having done this I put myself
+and my daughter to sleep for a space of two hundred and fifty
+thousand years, that there might be time for fresh civilisations
+to arise. Now I begin to think that I did not allot a sufficiency
+of ages, since I perceive from what you tell me, that the
+learning of the new races is as yet but small."
+
+Bickley and I looked at each other and were silent. Mentally we
+had collapsed. Who could begin to discuss statements built upon
+such a foundation of gigantic and paralysing falsehoods?
+
+Well, Bastin could for one. With no more surprise in his voice
+than if he were talking about last night's dinner, he said:
+
+"There must be a mistake somewhere, or perhaps I misunderstand
+you. It is obvious that you, being a man, could not have
+destroyed the world. That could only be done by the Power which
+made it and you."
+
+I trembled for the results of Bastin's methods of setting out
+the truth. To my astonishment, however, Oro replied:
+
+"You speak wisely, Priest, but the Power you name may use
+instruments to accomplish its decrees. I am such an instrument."
+
+"Quite so," said Bastin, "just like anybody else. You have more
+knowledge of the truth than I thought. But pray, how did you
+destroy the world?"
+
+"Using my wisdom to direct the forces that are at work in the
+heart of this great globe, I drowned it with a deluge, causing
+one part to sink and another to rise, also changes of climate
+which completed the work."
+
+"That's quite right," exclaimed Bastin delightedly. "We know
+all about the Deluge, only you are not mentioned in connection
+with the matter. A man, Noah, had to do with it when he was six
+hundred years old."
+
+"Six hundred?" said Oro. "That is not very old. I myself had
+seen more than a thousand years when I lay down to sleep."
+
+"A thousand!" remarked Bastin, mildly interested. "That is
+unusual, though some of these mighty men of renown we know lived
+over nine hundred."
+
+Here Bickley snorted and exclaimed:
+
+"Nine hundred moons, he means."
+
+"I did not know Noah," went on Oro. "Perhaps he lived after my
+time and caused some other local deluge. Is there anything else
+you wish to ask me before I leave you that I may study this map
+writing?"
+
+"Yes," said Bastin. "Why were you allowed to drown your world?"
+
+"Because it was evil, Priest, and disobeyed me and the Power I
+serve."
+
+"Oh! thank you," said Bastin, "that fits in exactly. It was
+just the same in Noah's time."
+
+"I pray that it is not just the same now," said Oro, rising.
+"To-morrow we will return, or if I do not who have much that I
+must do, the lady my daughter will return and speak with you
+further."
+
+He departed into the cave, Yva following at a little distance.
+
+I accompanied her as far as the mouth of the cave, as did
+Tommy, who all this time had been sitting contentedly upon the
+hem of her gorgeous robe, quite careless of its immemorial age,
+if it was immemorial and not woven yesterday, a point on which I
+had no information.
+
+"Lady Yva," I said, "did I rightly understand the Lord Oro to
+say that he was a thousand years old?"
+
+"Yes, O Humphrey, and really he is more, or so I think."
+
+"Then are you a thousand years old also?" I asked, aghast.
+
+"No, no," she replied, shaking her head, "I am young, quite
+young, for I do not count my time of sleep."
+
+"Certainly you look it," I said. "But what, Lady Yva, do you
+mean by young?"
+
+She answered my question by another.
+
+"What age are your women when they are as I am?"
+
+"None of our women were ever quite like you, Lady Yva. Yet, say
+from twenty-five to thirty years of age."
+
+"Ah! I have been counting and now I remember. When my father
+sent me to sleep I was twenty-seven years old. No, I will not
+deceive you, I was twenty-seven years and three moons." Then,
+saying something to the effect that she would return, she
+departed, laughing a little in a mischievous way, and, although I
+did not observe this till afterwards, Tommy departed with her.
+
+When I repeated what she had said to Bastin and Bickley, who
+were standing at a distance straining their ears and somewhat
+aggrieved, the former remarked:
+
+"If she is twenty-seven her father must have married late in
+life, though of course it may have been a long while before he
+had children."
+
+Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while,
+went off like a bomb.
+
+"Do you tell us, Bastin," he asked, "that you believe one word
+of all this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan
+being a thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the
+rest?"
+
+"If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it
+at present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept
+warm by a pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of
+the constellations at the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do
+most things."
+
+"Even cause the Deluge," jeered Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about the Deluge, but perhaps he may have been
+permitted to cause a deluge. Why not? You can't look at things
+from far enough off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you,
+you conclude that therefore it is impossible. The same Power
+which gives you skill to succeed in an operation, that hitherto
+was held impracticable, as I know you have done once or twice,
+may have given that old fellow power to cause a deluge. You
+should measure the universe and its possibilities by worlds and
+not by acres, Bickley."
+
+"And believe, I suppose, that a man can live a thousand years,
+whereas we know well that he cannot live more than about a
+hundred."
+
+"You don't know anything of the sort, Bickley. All you know is
+that over the brief period of history with which we are
+acquainted, say ten thousand years at most, men have only lived
+to about a hundred. But the very rocks which you are so fond of
+talking about, tell us that even this planet is millions upon
+millions of years of age. Who knows then but that at some time in
+its history, men did not live for a thousand years, and that lost
+civilisations did not exist of which this Oro and his daughter
+may be two survivors?"
+
+"There is no proof of anything of the sort," said Bickley.
+
+"I don't know about proof, as you understand it, though I have
+read in Plato of a continent called Atlantis that was submerged,
+according to the story of old Egyptian priests. But personally I
+have every proof, for it is all written down in the Bible at
+which you turn tip your nose, and I am very glad that I have been
+lucky enough to come across this unexpected confirmation of the
+story. Not that it matters much, since I should have learned all
+about it when it pleases Providence to remove me to a better
+world, which in our circumstances may happen any day. Now I must
+change my clothes before I see to the cooking and other things."
+
+"I am bound to admit," said Bickley, looking after him, "that
+old Bastin is not so stupid as he seems. From his point of view
+the arguments he advances are quite logical. Moreover I think he
+is right when he says that we look at things through the wrong
+end of the telescope. After all the universe is very big and who
+knows what may happen there? Who knows even what may have
+happened on this little earth during the aeons of its existence,
+whenever its balance chanced to shift, as the Ice Ages show us it
+has often done? Still I believe that old Oro to be a Prince of
+Liars."
+
+"That remains to be proved," I answered cautiously. "All I know
+is that he is a wonderfully learned person of most remarkable
+appearance, and that his daughter is the loveliest creature I
+ever saw."
+
+"There I agree," said Bickley decidedly, "and as brilliant as
+she is lovely. If she belongs to a past civilisation, it is a
+pity that it ever became extinct. Now let's go and have a nap.
+Bastin will call us when supper is ready."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIV
+
+The Under-world
+
+
+That night we slept well and without fear, being quite certain
+that after their previous experience the Orofenans would make no
+further attempts upon us. Indeed our only anxiety was for Tommy,
+whom we could not find when the time came to give him his supper.
+Bastin, however, seemed to remember having seen him following the
+Glittering Lady into the cave. This, of course, was possible, as
+certainly he had taken an enormous fancy to her and sat himself
+down as close to her as he could on every occasion. He even
+seemed to like the ancient Oro, and was not afraid to jump up and
+plant his dirty paws upon that terrific person's gorgeous robe.
+Moreover Oro liked him, for several times I observed him pat the
+dog upon the head; as I think I have said, the only human touch
+that I had perceived about him. So we gave up searching and
+calling in the hope that he was safe with our supernatural
+friends.
+
+The next morning quite early the Lady Yva appeared alone; no,
+not alone, for with her came our lost Tommy looking extremely
+spry and well at ease. The faithless little wretch just greeted
+us in a casual fashion and then went and sat by Yva. In fact when
+the awkward Bastin managed to stumble over the end of her dress
+Tommy growled at him and showed his teeth. Moreover the dog was
+changed. He was blessed with a shiny black coat, but now this
+coat sparkled in the sunlight, like the Lady Yva's hair.
+
+"The Glittering Lady is all very well, but I'm not sure that I
+care for a glittering dog. It doesn't look quite natural," said
+Bastin, contemplating him.
+
+"Why does Tommy shine, Lady?" I asked.
+
+"Because I washed him in certain waters that we have, so that
+now he looks beautiful and smells sweet," she answered, laughing.
+
+It was true, the dog did smell sweet, which I may add had not
+always been the case with him, especially when there were dead
+fish about. Also he appeared to have been fed, for he turned up
+his nose at the bits we had saved for his breakfast.
+
+"He has drunk of the Life-water," explained Yva, "and will want
+no food for two days."
+
+Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked
+incredulous.
+
+"You do not believe, O Bickley," she said, studying him
+gravely. "Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I
+tell you many lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He
+is not sure; he thinks to himself, I will wait and find out
+whether or no these funny people cheat me."
+
+Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were
+contrary to experience, also that Tommy in a general way was
+rather a greedy little dog.
+
+"You, too, like to eat, Bickley" (this was true, he had an
+excellent appetite), "but when you have drunk the Life-water you
+will care much less."
+
+"I am glad to hear it," interrupted Bastin, "for Bickley wants
+a lot of cooking done, and I find it tedious."
+
+"You eat also, Lady," said Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I eat sometimes because I like it, but I can go weeks and
+not eat, when I have the Life-water. Just now, after so long a
+sleep, I am hungry. Please give me some of that fruit. No, not
+the flesh, flesh I hate."
+
+We handed it to her. She took two plantains, peeled and ate
+them with extraordinary grace. Indeed she reminded me, I do not
+know why, of some lovely butterfly drawing its food from a
+flower.
+
+While she ate she observed us closely; nothing seemed to escape
+the quick glances of those beautiful eyes. Presently she said:
+
+"What, O Humphrey, is that with which you fasten your
+neckdress?" and she pointed to the little gold statue of Osiris
+that I used as a pin.
+
+I told her that it was a statuette of a god named Osiris and
+very, very ancient, probably quite five thousand years old, a
+statement at which she smiled a little; also that it came from
+Egypt.
+
+"Ah!" she answered, "is it so? I asked because we have figures
+that are very like to that one, and they also hold in their hands
+a staff surmounted by a loop. They are figures of Sleep's
+brother--Death."
+
+"So is this," I said. "Among the Egyptians Osiris was the god
+of Death."
+
+She nodded and replied that doubtless the symbol had come down
+to them.
+
+"One day you shall take me to see this land which you call so
+very old. Or I will take you, which would be quicker," she added.
+
+We all bowed and said we should be delighted. Even Bastin
+appeared anxious to revisit Egypt in such company, though when he
+was there it seemed to bore him. But what she meant about taking
+us I could not guess. Nor had we time to ask her, for she went
+on, watching our faces as she spoke.
+
+"The Lord Oro sends you a message, Strangers. He asks whether
+it is your wish to see where we dwell. He adds that you are not
+to come if you do not desire, or if you fear danger."
+
+We all answered that there was nothing we should like better,
+but Bastin added that he had already seen the tomb.
+
+"Do you think, Bastin, that we live in a tomb because we slept
+there for a while, awaiting the advent of you wanderers at the
+appointed hour?"
+
+"I don't see where else it could be, unless it is further down
+that cave," said Bastin. "The top of the mountain would not be
+convenient as a residence."
+
+"It has not been convenient for many an age, for reasons that I
+will show you. Think now, before you come. You have naught to
+fear from us, and I believe that no harm will happen to you. But
+you will see many strange things that will anger Bickley because
+he cannot understand them, and perhaps will weary Bastin because
+his heart turns from what is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey
+will rejoice in them because the doors of his soul are open and
+he longs--what do you long for, Humphrey?"
+
+"That which I have lost and fear I shall never find again," I
+answered boldly.
+
+"I know that you have lost many things--last night, for
+instance, you lost Tommy, and when he slept with me he told me
+much about you and--others."
+
+"This is ridiculous," broke in Bastin. "Can a dog talk?"
+
+"Everything can talk, if you understand its language, Bastin.
+But keep a good heart, Humphrey, for the bold seeker finds in the
+end. Oh! foolish man, do you not understand that all is yours if
+you have but the soul to conceive and the will to grasp? All,
+all, below, between, above! Even I know that, I who have so much
+to learn."
+
+So she spoke and became suddenly magnificent. Her face which
+had been but that of a super-lovely woman, took on grandeur. Her
+bosom swelled; her presence radiated some subtle power, much as
+her hair radiated light.
+
+In a moment it was gone and she was smiling and jesting.
+
+"Will you come, Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go,
+down to the Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun?
+Perhaps you will do better to stay here in the sun, for the
+Under-world has terrors for weak hearts that were born but
+yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble in the dark."
+
+"I shall take my electric torch," said Bastin with decision,
+"and I advise you fellows to do the same. I always hated cellars,
+and the catacombs at Rome are worse, though full of sacred
+interest."
+
+Then we started, Tommy frisking on ahead in a most provoking
+way as though he were bored by a visit to a strange house and
+going home, and Yva gliding forward with a smile upon her face
+that was half mystic and half mischievous. We passed the remains
+of the machines, and Bickley asked her what they were.
+
+"Carriages in which once we travelled through the skies, until
+we found a better way, and that the uninstructed used till the
+end," she answered carelessly, leaving me wondering what on earth
+she meant.
+
+We came to the statue and the sepulchre beneath without
+trouble, for the glint of her hair, and I may add of Tommy's
+back, were quite sufficient to guide us through the gloom. The
+crystal coffins were still there, for Bastin flashed his torch
+and we saw them, but the boxes of radium had gone.
+
+"Let that light die," she said to Bastin. "Humphrey, give me
+your right hand and give your left to Bickley. Let Bastin cling
+to him and fear nothing."
+
+We passed to the end of the tomb and stood against what
+appeared to be a rock wall, all close together, as she directed.
+
+"Fear nothing," she said again, but next second I was never
+more full of fear in my life, for we were whirling downwards at a
+speed that would have made an American elevator attendant turn
+pale.
+
+"Don't choke me," I heard Bickley say to Bastin, and the
+latter's murmured reply of:
+
+"I never could bear these moving staircases and tubelifts. They
+always make me feel sick."
+
+I admit that for my part I also felt rather sick and clung
+tightly to the hand of the Glittering Lady. She, however, placed
+her other hand upon my shoulder, saying in a low voice:
+
+"Did I not tell you to have no fear?"
+
+Then I felt comforted, for somehow I knew that it was not her
+desire to harm and much less to destroy me. Also Tommy was seated
+quite at his ease with his head resting against my leg, and his
+absence of alarm was reassuring. The only stoic of the party was
+Bickley. I have no doubt that he was quite as frightened as we
+were, but rather than show it he would have died.
+
+"I presume this machinery is pneumatic," he began when suddenly
+and without shock, we arrived at the end of our journey. How far
+we had fallen I am sure I do not know, but I should judge from
+the awful speed at which we travelled, that it must have been
+several thousand feet, probably four or five.
+
+"Everything seems steady now," remarked Bastin, "so I suppose
+this luggage lift has stopped. The odd thing is that I can't see
+anything of it. There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be
+standing on a level floor."
+
+"The odd thing is," said Bickley, "that we can see at all.
+Where the devil does the light come from thousands of feet
+underground?"
+
+"I don't know," answered Bastin, "unless there is natural gas
+here, as I am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in
+Canada."
+
+"Natural gas be blowed," said Bickley. "It is more like
+moonlight magnified ten times."
+
+So it was. The whole place was filled with a soft radiance,
+equal to that of the sun at noon, but gentler and without heat.
+
+"Where does it come from?" I whispered to Yva.
+
+"Oh!" she replied, as I thought evasively. "It is the light of
+the Under-world which we know how to use. The earth is full of
+light, which is not wonderful, is it, seeing that its heart is
+fire? Now look about you."
+
+I looked and leant on her harder than ever, since amazement
+made me weak. We were in some vast place whereof the roof seemed
+almost as far off as the sky at night. At least all that I could
+make out was a dim and distant arch which might have been one of
+cloud. For the rest, in every direction stretched vastness,
+illuminated far as the eye could reach by the soft light of which
+I have spoken, that is, probably for several miles. But this
+vastness was not empty. On the contrary it was occupied by a
+great city. There were streets much wider than Piccadilly, all
+bordered by houses, though these, I observed, were roofless, very
+fine houses, some of them, built of white stone or marble. There
+were roadways and pavements worn by the passage of feet. There,
+farther on, were market-places or public squares, and there,
+lastly, was a huge central enclosure one or two hundred acres in
+extent, which was filled with majestic buildings that looked like
+palaces, or town-halls; and, in the midst of them all, a vast
+temple with courts and a central dome. For here, notwithstanding
+the lack of necessity, its builders seemed to have adhered to the
+Over-world tradition, and had roofed their fane.
+
+And now came the terror. All of this enormous city was dead.
+Had it stood upon the moon it could not have been more dead. None
+paced its streets; none looked from its window-places. None
+trafficked in its markets, none worshipped in its temple. Swept,
+garnished, lighted, practically untouched by the hand of Time,
+here where no rains fell and no winds blew, it was yet a howling
+wilderness. For what wilderness is there to equal that which once
+has been the busy haunt of men? Let those who have stood among
+the buried cities of Central Asia, or of Anarajapura in Ceylon,
+or even amid the ruins of Salamis on the coast of Cyprus, answer
+the question. But here was something infinitely more awful. A
+huge human haunt in the bowels of the earth utterly devoid of
+human beings, and yet as perfect as on the day when these ceased
+to be.
+
+"I do not care for underground localities," remarked Bastin,
+his gruff voice echoing strangely in that terrible silence, "but
+it does seem a pity that all these fine buildings should be
+wasted. I suppose their inhabitants left them in search of fresh
+air."
+
+"Why did they leave them?" I asked of Yva.
+
+"Because death took them," she answered solemnly. "Even those
+who live a thousand years die at last, and if they have no
+children, with them dies the race."
+
+"Then were you the last of your people?" I asked.
+
+"Inquire of my father," she replied, and led the way through
+the massive arch of a great building.
+
+It led into a walled courtyard in the centre of which was a
+plain cupola of marble with a gate of some pale metal that
+looked like platinum mixed with gold. This gate stood open.
+Within it was the statue of a woman beautifully executed in white
+marble and set in a niche of some black stone. The figure was
+draped as though to conceal the shape, and the face was stern and
+majestic rather than beautiful. The eyes of the statue were
+cunningly made of some enamel which gave them a strange and
+lifelike appearance. They stared upwards as though looking away
+from the earth and its concerns. The arms were outstretched. In
+the right hand was a cup of black marble, in the left a similar
+cup of white marble. From each of these cups trickled a thin
+stream of sparkling water, which two streams met and mingled at a
+distance of about three feet beneath the cups. Then they fell
+into a metal basin which, although it must have been quite a foot
+thick, was cut right through by their constant impact, and
+apparently vanished down some pipe beneath. Out of this metal
+basin Tommy, who gambolled into the place ahead of us, began to
+drink in a greedy and demonstrative fashion.
+
+"The Life-water?" I said, looking at our guide.
+
+She nodded and asked in her turn:
+
+"What is the statue and what does it signify, Humphrey?"
+
+I hesitated, but Bastin answered:
+
+"Just a rather ugly woman who hid up her figure because it was
+bad. Probably she was a relation of the artist who wished to have
+her likeness done and sat for nothing."
+
+"The goddess of Health," suggested Bickley. "Her proportions
+are perfect; a robust, a thoroughly normal woman."
+
+"Now, Humphrey," said Yva.
+
+I stared at the work and had not an idea. Then it flashed on me
+with such suddenness and certainity that I am convinced the
+answer to the riddle was passed to me from her and did not
+originate in my own mind.
+
+"It seems quite easy," I said in a superior tone. "The figure
+symbolises Life and is draped because we only see the face of
+Life, the rest is hidden. The arms are bare because Life is real
+and active. One cup is black and one is white because Life brings
+both good and evil gifts; that is why the streams mingle, to be
+lost beneath in the darkness of death. The features are stern and
+even terrifying rather than lovely, because such is the aspect of
+Life. The eyes look upward and far away from present things,
+because the real life is not here."
+
+"Of course one may say anything," said Bastin, "but I don't
+understand all that."
+
+"Imagination goes a long way," broke in Bickley, who was vexed
+that he had not thought of this interpretation himself. But Yva
+said:
+
+"I begin to think that you are quite clever, Humphrey. I wonder
+whence the truth came to you, for such is the meaning of the
+figure and the cups. Had I told it to you myself, it could not
+have been better said," and she glanced at me out of the corners
+of her eyes. "Now, Strangers, will you drink? Once that gate was
+guarded, and only at a great price or as a great reward were
+certain of the Highest Blood given the freedom of this fountain
+which might touch no common lips. Indeed it was one of the causes
+of our last war, for all the world which was, desired this water
+which now is lapped by a stranger's hound."
+
+"I suppose there is nothing medicinal in it?" said Bastin.
+"Once when I was very thirsty, I made a mistake and drank three
+tumblers of something of the sort in the dark, thinking that it
+was Apollinaris, and I don't want to do it again."
+
+"Just the sort of thing you would do," said Bickley. "But, Lady
+Yva, what are the properties of this water?"
+
+"It is very health-giving," she answered, "and if drunk
+continually, not less than once each thirty days, it wards off
+sickness, lessens hunger and postpones death for many, many
+years. That is why those of the High Blood endured so long and
+became the rulers of the world, and that, as I have said, is the
+greatest of the reasons why the peoples who dwelt in the ancient
+outer countries and never wished to die, made war upon them, to
+win this secret fountain. Have no fear, O Bastin, for see, I will
+pledge you in this water."
+
+Then she lifted a strange-looking, shallow, metal cup whereof
+the handles were formed of twisted serpents, that lay in the
+basin, filled it from the trickling stream, bowed to us and
+drank. But as she drank I noted with a thrill of joy that her
+eyes were fixed on mine as though it were me she pledged and me
+alone. Again she filled the cup with the sparkling water, for it
+did sparkle, like that French liqueur in which are mingled little
+flakes of gold, and handed it to me.
+
+I bowed to her and drank. I suppose the fluid was water, but to
+me it tasted more like strong champagne, dashed with Chateau
+Yquem. It was delicious. More, its effects were distinctly
+peculiar. Something quick and subtle ran through my veins;
+something that for a few moments seemed to burn away the
+obscureness which blurs our thought. I began to understand
+several problems that had puzzled me, and then lost their
+explanations in the midst of light, inner light, I mean.
+Moreover, of a sudden it seemed to me as though a window had been
+opened in the heart of that Glittering Lady who stood beside me.
+At least I knew that it was full of wonderful knowledge,
+wonderful memories and wonderful hopes, and that in the latter
+two of these I had some part; what part I could not tell. Also I
+knew that my heart was open to her and that she saw in it
+something which caused her to marvel and to sigh.
+
+In a few seconds, thirty perhaps, all this was gone. Nothing
+remained except that I felt extremely strong and well, happier,
+too, than I had been for years. Mutely I asked her for more of
+the water, but she shook her head and, taking the cup from me,
+filled it again and gave it to Bickley, who drank. He flushed,
+seemed to lose the self-control which was his very strong
+characteristic, and said in a rather thick voice:
+
+"Curious! but I do not think at this moment there is any
+operation that has ever been attempted which I could not tackle
+single-handed and with success."
+
+Then he was silent, and Bastin's turn came. He drank rather
+noisily, after his fashion, and began:
+
+"My dear young lady, I think the time has come when I should
+expound to you--" Here he broke off and commenced singing very
+badly, for his voice was somewhat raucous:
+
+
+From Greenland's icy mountains,
+
+  From India's coral strand,
+
+Where Afric's sunny fountains
+
+  Roll down their golden sand.
+
+
+Ceasing from melody, he added:
+
+"I determined that I would drink nothing intoxicating while I
+was on this island that I might be a shining light in a dark
+place, and now I fear that quite unwittingly I have broken what I
+look upon as a promise."
+
+Then he, too, grew silent.
+
+"Come," said Yva, "my father, the Lord Oro, awaits you."
+
+We crossed the court of the Water of Life and mounted steps
+that led to a wide and impressive portico, Tommy frisking ahead
+of us in a most excited way for a dog of his experience.
+Evidently the water had produced its effect upon him as well as
+upon his masters. This portico was in a solemn style of
+architecture which I cannot describe, because it differed from
+any other that I know. It was not Egyptian and not Greek,
+although its solidity reminded me of the former, and the beauty
+and grace of some of the columns, of the latter. The profuseness
+and rather grotesque character of the carvings suggested the
+ruins of Mexico and Yucatan, and the enormous size of the blocks
+of stone, those of Peru and Baalbec. In short, all the known
+forms of ancient architecture might have found their inspiration
+here, and the general effect was tremendous.
+
+"The palace of the King," said Yva, "whereof we approach the
+great hall."
+
+We entered through mighty metal doors, one of which stood ajar,
+into a vestibule which from certain indications I gathered had
+once been a guard, or perhaps an assembly-room. It was about
+forty feet deep by a hundred wide. Thence she led us through a
+smaller door into the hall itself. It was a vast place without
+columns, for there was no roof to support. The walls of marble or
+limestone were sculptured like those of Egyptian temples,
+apparently with battle scenes, though of this I am not sure for I
+did not go near to them. Except for a broad avenue along the
+middle, up which we walked, the area was filled with marble
+benches that would, I presume, have accommodated several thousand
+people. But they were empty--empty, and oh! the loneliness of it
+all.
+
+Far away at the head of the hall was a dais enclosed, and, as
+it were, roofed in by a towering structure that mingled grace and
+majesty to a wonderful degree. It was modelled on the pattern of
+a huge shell. The base of the shell was the platform; behind were
+the ribs, and above, the overhanging lip of the shell. On this
+platform was a throne of silvery metal. It was supported on the
+arched coils of snakes, whereof the tails formed the back and the
+heads the arms of the throne.
+
+On this throne, arrayed in gorgeous robes, sat the Lord Oro,
+his white beard flowing over them, and a jewelled cap upon his
+head. In front of him was a low table on which lay graven sheets
+of metal, and among them a large ball of crystal.
+
+There he sat, solemn and silent in the midst of this awful
+solitude, looking in very truth like a god, as we conceive such a
+being to appear. Small as he was in that huge expanse of
+buildings, he seemed yet to dominate it, in a sense to fill the
+emptiness which was accentuated by his presence. I know that the
+sight of him filled me with true fear which it had never done in
+the light of day, not even when he arose from his crystal coffin.
+Now for the first time I felt as though I were really in the
+presence of a Being Supernatural. Doubtless the surroundings
+heightened this impression. What were these mighty edifices in
+the bowels of the world? Whence came this wondrous, all-pervading
+and translucent light, whereof we could see no origin? Whither
+had vanished those who had reared and inhabited them? How did it
+happen that of them all, this man, if he were a man; and this
+lovely woman at my side, who, if I might trust my senses and
+instincts, was certainly a woman, alone survived of their
+departed multitudes?
+
+The thing was crushing. I looked at Bickley for encouragement,
+but got none, for he only shook his head. Even Bastin, now that
+the first effects of the Life-water had departed, seemed
+overwhelmed, and muttered something about the halls of Hades.
+
+Only the little dog Tommy remained quite cheerful. He trotted
+down the hall, jumped on to the dais and sat himself comfortably
+at the feet of its occupant.
+
+"I greet you," Oro said in his slow, resonant voice. "Daughter,
+lead these strangers to me; I would speak with them."
+
+
+
+Chapter XV
+
+Oro in His House
+
+
+We climbed on to the dais by some marble steps, and sat
+ourselves down in four curious chairs of metal that were more or
+less copied from that which served Oro as a throne; at least the
+arms ended in graven heads of snakes. These chairs were so
+comfortable that I concluded the seats were fixed on springs,
+also we noticed that they were beautifully polished.
+
+"I wonder how they keep everything so clean," said Bastin as we
+mounted the dais. "In this big place it must take a lot of
+housemaids, though I don't see any. But perhaps there is no dust
+here."
+
+I shrugged my shoulders while we seated ourselves, the Lady Yva
+and I on Oro's right, Bickley and Bastin on his left, as he
+indicated by pointing with his finger.
+
+"What say you of this city?" Oro asked after a while of me.
+
+"We do not know what to say," I replied. "It amazes us. In our
+world there is nothing like to it."
+
+"Perchance there will be in the future when the nations grow
+more skilled in the arts of war," said Oro darkly.
+
+"Be pleased, Lord Oro," I went on, "if it is your will, to tell
+us why the people who built this place chose to live in the
+bowels of the earth instead of upon its surface."
+
+"They did not choose; it was forced upon them," was the answer.
+"This is a city of refuge that they occupied in time of war, not
+because they hated the sun. In time of peace and before the
+Barbarians dared to attack them, they dwelt in the city Pani
+which signifies Above. You may have noted some of its remaining
+ruins on the mount and throughout the island. The rest of them
+are now beneath the sea. But when trouble came and the foe rained
+fire on them from the air, they retreated to this town, Nyo,
+which signifies Beneath."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"And then they died. The Water of Life may prolong life, but it
+cannot make women bear children. That they will only do beneath
+the blue of heaven, not deep in the belly of the world where
+Nature never designed that they should dwell. How would the
+voices of children sound in such halls as these? Tell me, you,
+Bickley, who are a physician."
+
+"I cannot. I cannot imagine children in such a place, and if
+born here they would die," said Bickley.
+
+Oro nodded.
+
+"They did die, and if they went above to Pani they were
+murdered. So soon the habit of birth was lost and the Sons of
+Wisdom perished one by one. Yes, they who ruled the world and by
+tens of thousands of years of toil had gathered into their bosoms
+all the secrets of the world, perished, till only a few, and
+among them I and this daughter of mine, were left."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then, Humphrey, having power so to do, I did what long I had
+threatened, and unchained the forces that work at the world's
+heart, and destroyed them who were my enemies and evil, so that
+they perished by millions, and with them all their works.
+Afterwards we slept, leaving the others, our subjects who had not
+the secret of this Sleep, to die, as doubtless they did in the
+course of Nature or by the hand of the foe. The rest you know."
+
+"Can such a thing happen again?" asked Bickley in a voice that
+did not hide his disbelief.
+
+"Why do you question me, Bickley, you who believe nothing of
+what I tell you, and therefore make wrath? Still I will say this,
+that what I caused to happen I can cause once more--only once, I
+think--as perchance you shall learn before all is done. Now,
+since you do not believe, I will tell you no more of our
+mysteries, no, not whence this light comes nor what are the
+properties of the Water of Life, both of which you long to know,
+nor how to preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave of
+dreamless sleep, like a live jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor
+aught else. As to these matters, Daughter, I bid you also to be
+silent, since Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this around him,
+he who saw us rise from the coffins, still mocks at us in his
+heart. Therefore let him, this little man of a little day, when
+his few years are done go to the tomb in ignorance, and his
+companions with him, they who might have been as wise as I am."
+
+Thus Oro spoke in a voice of icy rage, his deep eyes glowing
+like coals. Hearing him I cursed Bickley in my heart for I was
+sure that once spoken, his decree was like to that of the Medes
+and Persians and could not be altered. Bickley, however, was not
+in the least dismayed. Indeed he argued the point. He told Oro
+straight out that he would not believe in the impossible until it
+had been shown to him to be possible, and that the law of Nature
+never had been and never could be violated. It was no answer, he
+said, to show him wonders without explaining their cause, since
+all that he seemed to see might be but mental illusions produced
+he knew not how.
+
+Oro listened patiently, then answered:
+
+"Good. So be it, they are illusions. I am an illusion; those
+savages who died upon the rock will tell you so. This fair woman
+before you is an illusion; Humphrey, I am sure, knows it as you
+will also before you have done with her. These halls are
+illusions. Live on in your illusions, O little man of science,
+who because you see the face of things, think that you know the
+body and the heart, and can read the soul at work within. You are
+a worthy child of tens of thousands of your breed who were before
+you and are now forgotten."
+
+Bickley looked up to answer, then changed his mind and was
+silent, thinking further argument dangerous, and Oro went on:
+
+"Now I differ from you, Bickley, in this way. I who have more
+wisdom in my finger-point than you with all the physicians of
+your world added to you, have in your brains and bodies, yet
+desire to learn from those who can give me knowledge. I
+understand from your words to my daughter that you, Bastin, teach
+a faith that is new to me, and that this faith tells of life
+eternal for the children of earth. Is it so?"
+
+"It is," said Bastin eagerly. "I will set out--"
+
+Oro cut him short with a wave of the hand.
+
+"Not now in the presence of Bickley who doubtless disbelieves
+your faith, as he does all else, holding it with justice or
+without, to be but another illusion. Yet you shall teach me and
+on it I will form my own judgment."
+
+"I shall be delighted," said Bastin. Then a doubt struck him,
+and he added: "But why do you wish to learn? Not that you may
+make a mock of my religion, is it?"
+
+"I mock at no man's belief, because I think that what men
+believe is true--for them. I will tell you why I wish to hear of
+yours, since I never hide the truth. I who am so wise and old,
+yet must die; though that time may be far away, still I must die,
+for such is the lot of man born of woman. And I do not desire to
+die. Therefore I shall rejoice to learn of any faith that
+promises to the children of earth a life eternal beyond the
+earth. Tomorrow you shall begin to teach me. Now leave me,
+Strangers, for I have much to do," and he waved his hand towards
+the table.
+
+We rose and bowed, wondering what he could have to do down in
+this luminous hole, he who had been for so many thousands of
+years out of touch with the world. It occurred to me, however,
+that during this long period he might have got in touch with
+other worlds, indeed he looked like it.
+
+"Wait," he said, "I have something to tell you. I have been
+studying this book of writings, or world pictures," and he
+pointed to my atlas which, as I now observed for the first time,
+was also lying upon the table. "It interests me much. Your
+country is small, very small. When I caused it to be raised up I
+think that it was larger, but since then that seas have flowed
+in."
+
+Here Bickley groaned aloud.
+
+"This one is much greater," went on Oro, casting a glance at
+Bickley that must have penetrated him like a searchlight. Then he
+opened the map of Europe and with his finger indicated Germany
+and Austria-Hungary. "I know nothing of the peoples of these
+lands," he added, "but as you belong to one of them and are my
+guests, I trust that yours may succeed in the war."
+
+"What war?" we asked with one voice.
+
+"Since Bickley is so clever, surely he should know better than
+an illusion such as I. All I can tell you is that I have learned
+that there is war between this country and that," and he pointed
+to Great Britain and to Germany upon the map; "also between
+others."
+
+"It is quite possible," I said, remembering many things. "But
+how do you know?"
+
+"If I told you, Humphrey, Bickley would not believe, so I will
+not tell. Perhaps I saw it in that crystal, as did the
+necromancers of the early world. Or perhaps the crystal serves
+some different purpose and I saw it otherwise--with my soul. At
+least what I say is true."
+
+"Then who will win?" asked Bastin.
+
+"I cannot read the future, Preacher. If I could, should I ask
+you to expound to me your religion which probably is of no more
+worth than a score of others I have studied, just because it
+tells of the future? If I could read the future I should be a god
+instead of only an earth-lord."
+
+"Your daughter called you a god and you said that you knew we
+were coming to wake you up, which is reading the future,"
+answered Bastin.
+
+"Every father is a god to his daughter, or should be; also in
+my day millions named me a god because I saw further and struck
+harder than they could. As for the rest, it came to me in a
+vision. Oh! Bickley, if you were wiser than you think you are,
+you would know that all things to come are born elsewhere and
+travel hither like the light from stars. Sometimes they come
+faster before their day into a single mind, and that is what men
+call prophecy. But this is a gift which cannot be commanded, even
+by me. Also I did not know that you would come. I knew only that
+we should awaken and by the help of men, for if none had been
+present at that destined hour we must have died for lack of
+warmth and sustenance."
+
+"I deny your hypothesis in toto," exclaimed Bickley, but nobody
+paid any attention to him.
+
+"My father," said Yva, rising and bowing before him with her
+swan-like grace, "I have noted your commands. But do you permit
+that I show the temple to these strangers, also something of our
+past?"
+
+"Yes, yes," he said. "It will save much talk in a savage tongue
+that is difficult to me. But bring them here no more without my
+command, save Bastin only. When the sun is four hours high in the
+upper world, let him come tomorrow to teach me, and afterwards if
+so I desire. Or if he wills, he can sleep here."
+
+"I think I would rather not," said Bastin hurriedly. "I make no
+pretense to being particular, but this place does not appeal to
+me as a bedroom. There are degrees in the pleasures of solitude
+and, in short, I will not disturb your privacy at night."
+
+Oro waved his hand and we departed down that awful and most
+dreary hall.
+
+"I hope you will spend a pleasant time here, Bastin," I said,
+looking back from the doorway at its cold, illuminated vastness.
+
+"I don't expect to," he answered, "but duty is duty, and if I
+can drag that old sinner back from the pit that awaits him, it
+will be worth doing. Only I have my doubts about him. To me he
+seems to bear a strong family resemblance to Beelzebub, and he's
+a bad companion week in and week out."
+
+We went through the portico, Yva leading us, and passed the
+fountain of Life-water, of which she cautioned us to drink no
+more at present, and to prevent him from doing so, dragged Tommy
+past it by his collar. Bickley, however, lingered under the
+pretence of making a further examination of the statue. As I had
+seen him emptying into his pocket the contents of a corked bottle
+of quinine tabloids which he always carried with him, I guessed
+very well that his object was to procure a sample of this water
+for future analysis. Of course I said nothing, and Yva and Bastin
+took no note of what he was doing.
+
+When we were clear of the palace, of which we had only seen one
+hall, we walked across an open space made unutterably dreary by
+the absence of any vegetation or other sign of life, towards a
+huge building of glorious proportions that was constructed of
+black stone or marble. It is impossible for me to give any idea
+of the frightful solemnity of this doomed edifice, for as I think
+I have said, it alone had a roof, standing there in the midst of
+that brilliant, unvarying and most unnatural illumination which
+came from nowhere and yet was everywhere. Thus, when one lifted a
+foot, there it was between the sole of the boot and the floor, or
+to express it better, the boot threw no shadow. I think this
+absence of shadows was perhaps the most terrifying circumstance
+connected with that universal and pervading light. Through it we
+walked on to the temple. We passed three courts, pillared all of
+them, and came to the building which was larger than St. Paul's
+in London. We entered through huge doors which still stood open,
+and presently found ourselves beneath the towering dome. There
+were no windows, why should there be in a place that was full of
+light? There was no ornamentation, there was nothing except black
+walls. And yet the general effect was magnificent in its majestic
+grace.
+
+"In this place," said Yva, and her sweet voice went whispering
+round the walls and the arching dome, "were buried the Kings of
+the Sons of Wisdom. They lie beneath, each in his sepulchre. Its
+entrance is yonder," and she pointed to what seemed to be a
+chapel on the right. "Would you wish to see them?"
+
+"Somehow I don't care to," said Bastin. "The place is dreary
+enough as it is without the company of a lot of dead kings."
+
+"I should like to dissect one of them, but I suppose that would
+not be allowed," said Bickley.
+
+"No," she answered. "I think that the Lord Oro would not wish
+you to cut up his forefathers."
+
+"When you and he went to sleep, why did you not choose the
+family vault?" asked Bastin.
+
+"Would you have found us there?" she queried by way of answer.
+Then, understanding that the invitation was refused by general
+consent, though personally I should have liked to accept it, and
+have never ceased regretting that I did not, she moved towards a
+colossal object which stood beneath the centre of the dome.
+
+On a stepped base, not very different from that in the cave but
+much larger, sat a figure, draped in a cloak on which was graved
+a number of stars, doubtless to symbolise the heavens. The
+fastening of the cloak was shaped like the crescent moon, and the
+foot-stool on which rested the figure's feet was fashioned to
+suggest the orb of the sun. This was of gold or some such metal,
+the only spot of brightness in all that temple. It was impossible
+to say whether the figure were male or female, for the cloak
+falling in long, straight folds hid its outlines. Nor did the
+head tell us, for the hair also was hidden beneath the mantle and
+the face might have been that of either man or woman. It was
+terrible in its solemnity and calm, and its expression was as
+remote and mystic as that of Buddha, only more stern. Also
+without doubt it was blind; it was impossible to mistake the
+sightlessness of those staring orbs. Across the knees lay a naked
+sword and beneath the cloak the arms were hidden. In its complete
+simplicity the thing was marvelous.
+
+On either side upon the pedestal knelt a figure of the size of
+life. One was an old and withered man with death stamped upon his
+face; the other was a beautiful, naked woman, her hands clasped
+in the attitude of prayer and with vague terror written on her
+vivid features.
+
+Such was this glorious group of which the meaning could not be
+mistaken. It was Fate throned upon the sun, wearing the
+constellations as his garment, armed with the sword of Destiny
+and worshipped by Life and Death. This interpretation I set out
+to the others.
+
+Yva knelt before the statue for a little while, bowing her head
+in prayer, and really I felt inclined to follow her example,
+though in the end I compromised, as did Bickley, by taking off my
+hat, which, like the others, I still wore from force of habit,
+though in this place none were needed. Only Bastin remained
+covered.
+
+"Behold the god of my people," said Yva. "Have you no reverence
+for it, O Bastin?"
+
+"Not much," he answered, "except as a work of art. You see I
+worship Fate's Master. I might add that your god doesn't seem to
+have done much for you, Lady Yva, as out of all your greatness
+there's nothing left but two people and a lot of old walls and
+caves."
+
+At first she was inclined to be angry, for I saw her start.
+Then her mood changed, and she said with a sigh:
+
+"Fate's Master! Where does He dwell?"
+
+"Here amongst other places," said Bastin. "I'll soon explain
+that to you."
+
+"I thank you," she replied gravely. "But why have you not
+explained it to Bickley?" Then waving her hand to show that she
+wished for no answer, she went on:
+
+"Friends, would you wish to learn something of the history of
+my people?"
+
+"Very much," said the irrepressible Bastin, "but I would rather
+the lecture took place in the open air."
+
+"That is not possible," she answered. "It must be here and now,
+or not at all. Come, stand by me. Be silent and do not move. I am
+about to set loose forces that are dangerous if disturbed."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVI
+
+Visions of the Past
+
+
+She led us to the back of the statue and pointed to each of us
+where we should remain. Then she took her place at right angles
+to us, as a showman might do, and for a while stood immovable.
+Watching her face, once more I saw it, and indeed all her body,
+informed with that strange air of power, and noted that her eyes
+flashed and that her hair grew even more brilliant than was
+common, as though some abnormal strength were flowing through it
+and her. Presently she spoke, saying:
+
+"I shall show you first our people in the day of their glory.
+Look in front of you."
+
+We looked and by degrees the vast space of the apse before us
+became alive with forms. At first these were vague and shadowy,
+not to be separated or distinguished. Then they became so real
+that until he was reproved by a kick, Tommy growled at them and
+threatened to break out into one of his peals of barking.
+
+A wonderful scene appeared. There was a palace of white marble
+and in front of it a great courtyard upon which the sun beat
+vividly. At the foot of the steps of the palace, beneath a silken
+awning, sat a king enthroned, a crown upon his head and wearing
+glorious robes. In his hand was a jewelled sceptre. He was a
+noble-looking man of middle age and about him were gathered the
+glittering officers of his court. Fair women fanned him and to
+right and left, but a little behind, sat other fair and jewelled
+women who, I suppose, were his wives or daughters.
+
+"One of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom new-crowned,
+receives the homage of the world," said Yva.
+
+As she spoke there appeared, walking in front of the throne one
+by one, other kings, for all were crowned and bore sceptres. At
+the foot of the throne each of them kneeled and kissed the foot
+of him who sat thereon, as he did so laying down his sceptre
+which at a sign he lifted again and passed away. Of these kings
+there must have been quite fifty, men of all colours and of
+various types, white men, black men, yellow men, red men.
+
+Then came their ministers bearing gifts, apparently of gold and
+jewels, which were piled on trays in front of the throne. I
+remember noting an incident. An old fellow with a lame leg
+stumbled and upset his tray, so that the contents rolled hither
+and thither. His attempts to recover them were ludicrous and
+caused the monarch on the throne to relax from his dignity and
+smile. I mention this to show that what we witnessed was no set
+scene but apparently a living piece of the past. Had it been so
+the absurdity of the bedizened old man tumbling down in the midst
+of the gorgeous pageant would certainly have been omitted.
+
+No, it must be life, real life, something that had happened,
+and the same may be said of what followed. For instance, there
+was what we call a review. Infantry marched, some of them armed
+with swords and spears, though these I took to be an ornamental
+bodyguard, and others with tubes like savage blowpipes of which I
+could not guess the use. There were no cannon, but carriages came
+by loaded with bags that had spouts to them. Probably these were
+charged with poisonous gases. There were some cavalry also,
+mounted on a different stamp of horse from ours, thicker set and
+nearer the ground, but with arched necks and fiery eyes and, I
+should say, very strong. These again, I take it, were ornamental.
+Then came other men upon a long machine, slung in pairs in
+armoured sacks, out of which only their heads and arms projected.
+This machine, which resembled an elongated bicycle, went by at a
+tremendous rate, though whence its motive power came did not
+appear. It carried twenty pairs of men, each of whom held in his
+hand some small but doubtless deadly weapon, that in appearance
+resembled an orange. Other similar machines which followed
+carried from forty to a hundred pairs of men.
+
+The marvel of the piece, however, were the aircraft. These came
+by in great numbers. Sometimes they flew in flocks like wild
+geese, sometimes singly, sometimes in line and sometimes in
+ordered squadrons, with outpost and officer ships and an exact
+distance kept between craft and craft. None of them seemed to be
+very large or to carry more than four or five men, but they were
+extraordinarily swift and as agile as swallows. Moreover they
+flew as birds do by beating their wings, but again we could not
+guess whence came their motive power.
+
+The review vanished, and next appeared a scene of festivity in
+a huge, illuminated hall. The Great King sat upon a dais and
+behind him was that statue of Fate, or one very similar to it,
+beneath which we stood. Below him in the hall were the feasters
+seated at long tables, clad in the various costumes of their
+countries. He rose and, turning, knelt before the statue of Fate.
+Indeed he prostrated himself thrice in prayer. Then taking his
+seat again, he lifted a cup of wine and pledged that vast
+company. They drank back to him and prostrated themselves before
+him as he had done before the image of Fate. Only I noted that
+certain men clad in sacerdotal garments not at all unlike those
+which are worn in the Greek Church to-day, remained standing.
+
+Now all this exhibition of terrestrial pomp faded. The next
+scene was simple, that of the death-bed of this same king--we
+knew him by his wizened features. There he lay, terribly old and
+dying. Physicians, women, courtiers, all were there watching the
+end. The tableau vanished and in place of it appeared that of the
+youthful successor amidst cheering crowds, with joy breaking
+through the clouds of simulated grief upon his face. It vanished
+also.
+
+"Thus did great king succeed great king for ages upon ages,"
+said Yva. "There were eighty of them and the average of their
+reigns was 700 years. They ruled the earth as it was in those
+days. They gathered up learning, they wielded power, their wealth
+was boundless. They nurtured the arts, they discovered secrets.
+They had intercourse with the stars; they were as gods. But like
+the gods they grew jealous. They and their councillors became a
+race apart who alone had the secret of long life. The rest of the
+world and the commonplace people about them suffered and died.
+They of the Household of Wisdom lived on in pomp for generations
+till the earth was mad with envy of them.
+
+"Fewer and fewer grew the divine race of the Sons of Wisdom
+since children are not given to the aged and to those of an
+ancient, outworn blood. Then the World said:
+
+"'They are great but they are not many; let us make an end of
+them by numbers and take their place and power and drink of their
+Life-water, that they will not give to us. If myriads of us
+perish by their arts, what does it matter, since we are
+countless?' So the World made war upon the Sons of Wisdom. See!"
+
+Again a picture formed. The sky was full of aircraft which
+rained down fire like flashes of lightning upon cities beneath.
+From these cities leapt up other fires that destroyed the swift-
+travelling things above, so that they fell in numbers like gnats
+burned by a lamp. Still more and more of them came till the
+cities crumbled away and the flashes that darted from them ceased
+to rush upwards. The Sons of Wisdom were driven from the face of
+the earth.
+
+Again the scene changed. Now it showed this subterranean hall
+in which we stood. There was pomp here, yet it was but a shadow
+of that which had been in the earlier days upon the face of the
+earth. Courtiers moved about the palace and there were people in
+the radiant streets and the houses, for most of them were
+occupied, but rarely did the vision show children coming through
+their gates.
+
+Of a sudden this scene shifted. Now we saw that same hall in
+which we had visited Oro not an hour before. There he sat, yes,
+Oro himself, upon the dais beneath the overhanging marble shell.
+Round him were some ancient councillors. In the body of the hall
+on either side of the dais were men in military array, guards
+without doubt though their only weapon was a black rod not unlike
+a ruler, if indeed it were a weapon and not a badge of office.
+
+
+Yva, whose face had suddenly grown strange and fixed, began to
+detail to us what was passing in this scene, in a curious
+monotone such as a person might use who was repeating something
+learned by heart. This was the substance of what she said:
+
+"The case of the Sons of Wisdom is desperate. But few of them
+are left. Like other men they need food which is hard to come by,
+since the foe holds the upper earth and that which their doctors
+can make here in the Shades does not satisfy them, even though
+they drink the Life-water. They die and die. There comes an
+embassy from the High King of the confederated Nations to talk of
+terms of peace. See, it enters."
+
+As she spoke, up the hall advanced the embassy. At the head of
+it walked a young man, tall, dark, handsome and commanding, whose
+aspect seemed in some way to be familiar to me. He was richly
+clothed in a purple cloak and wore upon his head a golden circlet
+that suggested royal rank. Those who followed him were mostly old
+men who had the astute faces of diplomatists, but a few seemed to
+be generals. Yva continued in her monotonous voice:
+
+"Comes the son of the King of the confederated Nations, the
+Prince who will be king. He bows before the Lord Oro. He says
+'Great and Ancient Monarch of the divine blood, Heaven-born One,
+your strait, and that of those who remain to you, is sore. Yet on
+behalf of the Nations I am sent to offer terms of peace, but this
+I may only do in the presence of your child who is your heiress
+and the Queen-to-be of the Sons of Wisdom.'"
+
+Here, in the picture, Oro waved his hand and from behind the
+marble shell appeared Yva herself, gloriously apparelled, wearing
+royal ornaments and with her train held by waiting ladies. She
+bowed to the Prince and his company and they bowed back to her.
+More, we saw a glance of recognition pass between her and the
+Prince.
+
+Now the real Yva by our side pointed to the shadow Yva of the
+vision or the picture, whichever it might be called, a strange
+thing to see her do, and went on:
+
+"The daughter of the Lord Oro comes. The Prince of the Nations
+salutes her. He says that the great war has endured for hundreds
+of years between the Children of Wisdom fighting for absolute
+rule and the common people of the earth fighting for liberty. In
+that war many millions of the Sons of the Nations had perished,
+brought to their death by fearful arts, by wizardries and by
+plagues sown among them by the Sons of Wisdom. Yet they were
+winning, for the glorious cities of the Sons of Wisdom were
+destroyed and those who remained of them were driven to dwell in
+the caves of the earth where with all their strength and magic
+they could not increase, but faded like flowers in the dark.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks what are the terms of peace proposed by the
+Nations. The Prince answers that they are these: That the Sons of
+Wisdom shall teach all their wisdom to the wise men among the
+Nations. That they shall give them to drink of the Life-water, so
+that their length of days also may be increased. That they shall
+cease to destroy them by sickness and their mastery of the forces
+which are hid in the womb of the world. If they will do these
+things, then the Nations on their part will cease from war, will
+rebuild the cities they have destroyed by means of their flying
+ships that rain down death, and will agree that the Lord Oro and
+his seed shall rule them for ever as the King of kings.
+
+"The Lord Oro asks if that be all. The Prince answers that it
+is not all. He says that when he dwelt a hostage at the court of
+the Sons of Wisdom he and the divine Lady, the daughter of the
+Lord Oro, and his only living child, learned to love each other.
+He demands, and the Nations demand, that she shall be given to
+him to wife, that in a day to come he may rule with her and their
+children after them.
+
+"See!" went on Yva in her chanting, dreamy voice, "the Lord Oro
+asks his daughter if this be true. She says," here the real Yva
+at my side turned and looked me straight in the eyes, "that it is
+true; that she loves the Prince of the Nations and that if she
+lives a million years she will wed no other man, since she who is
+her father's slave in all else is still the mistress of herself,
+as has ever been the right of her royal mothers.
+
+"See again! The Lord Oro, the divine King, the Ancient, grows
+wroth. He says that it is enough and more than enough that the
+Barbarians should ask to eat of the bread of hidden learning and
+to drink of the Life-water of the Sons of Wisdom, gifts that were
+given to them of old by Heaven whence they sprang in the
+beginning. But that one of them, however highly placed, should
+dare to ask to mix his blood with that of the divine Lady, the
+Heiress, the Queen of the Earth to be, and claim to share her
+imperial throne that had been held by her pure race from age to
+age, was an insult that could only be purged by death. Sooner
+would he give his daughter in marriage to an ape than to a child
+of the Barbarians who had worked on them so many woes and striven
+to break the golden fetters of their rule.
+
+"Look again!" continued Yva. "The Lord Oro, the divine, grows
+angrier still" (which in truth he did, for never did I see such
+dreadful rage as that which the picture revealed in him). "He
+warns, he threatens. He says that hitherto out of gentle love and
+pity he has held his hand; that he has strength at his command
+which will slay them, not by millions in slow war, but by tens
+of millions at one blow; that will blot them and their peoples
+from the face of earth and that will cause the deep seas to roll
+where now their pleasant lands are fruitful in the sun. They
+shrink before his fury; behold, their knees tremble because they
+know that he has this power. He mocks them, does the Lord Oro. He
+asks for their submission here and now, and that in the name of
+the Nations they should take the great oath which may not be
+broken, swearing to cease from war upon the Sons of Wisdom and to
+obey them in all things to the ends of the earth. Some of the
+ambassadors would yield. They look about them like wild things
+that are trapped. But madness takes the Prince. He cries that the
+oath of an ape is of no account, but that he will tear up the
+Children of Wisdom as an ape tears leaves, and afterwards take
+the divine Lady to be his wife.
+
+"Look on the Lord Oro!" continued the living Yva, "his wrath
+leaves him. He grows cold and smiles. His daughter throws herself
+upon her knees and pleads with him. He thrusts her away. She
+would spring to the side of the Prince; he commands his
+councillors to hold her. She cries to the Prince that she loves
+him and him only, and that in a day to come him she will wed and
+no other. He thanks her, saying that as it is with her, so it is
+with him, and that because of his love he fears nothing. She
+swoons. The Lord Oro motions with his hand to the guard. They
+lift their death-rods. Fire leaps from them. The Prince and his
+companions, all save those who were afraid and would have sworn
+the oath, twist and writhe. They turn black; they die. The Lord
+Oro commands those who are left to enter their flying ships and
+bear to the Nations of the Earth tidings of what befalls those
+who dare to defy and insult him; to warn them also to eat and
+drink and be merry while they may, since for their wickedness
+they are about to perish."
+
+
+The scene faded and there followed another which really I
+cannot describe. It represented some vast underground place and
+what appeared to be a huge mountain of iron clothed in light,
+literally a thing like an alp, rocking and spinning down a
+declivity, which farther on separated into two branches because
+of a huge razor-edge precipice that rose between. There in the
+middle of this vast space with the dazzling mountain whirling
+towards him, stood Oro encased in some transparent armour, as
+though to keep off heat, and with him his daughter who under his
+direction was handling something in the rock behind her. Then
+there was a blinding flash and everything vanished. All of this
+picture passed so swiftly that we could not grasp its details;
+only a general impression remained.
+
+"The Lord Oro, using the strength that is in the world whereof
+he alone has the secret, changes the world's balance causing that
+which was land to become sea and that which was sea to become
+land," said Yva in her chanting, unnatural voice.
+
+Another scene of stupendous and changing awfulness. Countries
+were sinking, cities crashing down, volcanoes were spouting fire;
+the end of the earth seemed to be at hand. We could see human
+beings running to and fro in thousands like ants. Then in huge
+waves hundreds and hundreds of feet high, the ocean flowed in and
+all was troubled, yeasty sea.
+
+"Oro carries out his threat to destroy the Nations who had
+rebelled against him," said Yva. "Much of the world sinks beneath
+the waves, but in place of it other lands arise above the waves,
+to be inhabited by the seed of those who remain living in those
+portions of the Earth that the deluge spared."
+
+This horrible vision passed and was succeeded by one more, that
+of Oro standing in the sepulchre of the cave by the side of the
+crystal coffin which contained what appeared to be the body of
+his daughter. He gazed at her, then drank some potion and laid
+himself down in the companion coffin, that in which we had found
+him.
+
+
+All vanished away and Yva, appearing to wake from some kind of
+trance, smiled, and in her natural voice asked if we had seen
+enough.
+
+"Quite," I answered in a tone that caused her to say:
+
+"I wonder what you have seen, Humphrey. Myself I do not know,
+since it is through me that you see at all and when you see I am
+in you who see."
+
+"Indeed," I replied. "Well, I will tell you about it later."
+
+"Thank you so much," exclaimed Bastin, recovering suddenly from
+his amazement. "I have heard a great deal of these moving-picture
+shows which are becoming so popular, but have always avoided
+attending them because their influence on the young is supposed
+to be doubtful, and a priest must set a good example to his
+congregation. Now I see that they can have a distinct educational
+value, even if it is presented in the form of romance."
+
+"How is it done?" asked Bickley, almost fiercely.
+
+"I do not altogether know," she answered. "This I do know,
+however, that everything which has happened on this world can be
+seen from moment to moment at some point in the depths of space,
+for thither the sun's light takes it. There, too, it can be
+caught and thence in an instant returned to earth again, to be
+reflected in the mirror of the present by those who know how that
+mirror should be held. Ask me no more; one so wise as you, O
+Bickley, can solve such problems for himself."
+
+"If you don't mind, Lady Yva," said Bastin, "I think I should
+like to get out of this place, interesting as it is. I have food
+to cook up above and lots of things to attend to, especially as I
+understand I am to come back here tomorrow. Would you mind
+showing me the way to that lift or moving staircase?"
+
+"Come," she said, smiling.
+
+So we went past the image of Fate, out of the temple, down the
+vast and lonely streets so unnaturally illuminated, to the place
+where we had first found ourselves on arrival in the depths.
+There we stood.
+
+A moment later and we were whirling up as we had whirled down.
+I suppose that Yva came with us though I never saw her do so, and
+the odd thing was that when we arrived in the sepulchre, she
+seemed already to be standing there waiting to direct us.
+
+"Really," remarked Bastin, "this is exactly like Maskelyne and
+Cook. Did you ever see their performance, Bickley? If so, it must
+have given you lots to explain for quite a long while."
+
+"Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in
+Orofena," replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from
+his pocket an end of candle to which he set light.
+
+"What is jugglery?" asked Bastin, and they departed arguing,
+leaving me alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
+
+"What have I seen?" I asked her.
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but
+perhaps something of the truth."
+
+"I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you
+swear yourself to a man for ever."
+
+"Yes, and this I did. What of it?"
+
+"Only that it might be hard for another man."
+
+"Yes, for another man it might be hard. You were once married,
+were you not, Humphrey, to a wife who died?"
+
+"Yes, I was married."
+
+"And did you not swear to that wife that you would never look
+in love upon another woman?"
+
+"I did," I answered in a shamed voice. "But how do you know? I
+never told you so."
+
+"Oh! I know you and therefore guessed."
+
+"Well, what of it, Yva?"
+
+"Nothing, except that you must find your wife before you love
+again, and before I love again I must find him whom I wish to be
+my husband."
+
+"How can that happen," I asked, "when both are dead?"
+
+"How did all that you have seen to-day in Nyo happen?" she
+replied, laughing softly. "Perhaps you are very blind, Humphrey,
+or perhaps we both are blind. If so, mayhap light will come to
+us. Meanwhile do not be sad. Tomorrow I will meet you and you
+shall teach me--your English tongue, Humphrey, and other things."
+
+"Then let it be in the sunlight, Yva. I do not love those
+darksome halls of Nyo that glow like something dead."
+
+"It is fitting, for are they not dead?" she answered, with a
+little laugh. "So be it. Bastin shall teach my father down below,
+since sun and shade are the same to him who only thinks of his
+religion, and you shall teach me up above."
+
+"I am not so certain about Bastin and of what he thinks," I
+said doubtfully. "Also will the Lord Oro permit you to come?"
+
+"Yes, for in such matters I rule myself. Also," she added
+meaningly, "he remembers my oath that I will wed no man--save one
+who is dead. Now farewell a while and bid Bastin be here when the
+sun is three hours high, not before or after."
+
+Then I left her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XVII
+
+Yva Explains
+
+
+When I reached the rock I was pleased to find Marama and about
+twenty of his people engaged in erecting the house that we had
+ordered them to build for our accommodation. Indeed, it was
+nearly finished, since house-building in Orofena is a simple
+business. The framework of poles let into palm trunks, since they
+could not be driven into the rock, had been put together on the
+further shore and towed over bodily by canoes. The overhanging
+rock formed one side of the house; the ends were of palm leaves
+tied to the poles, and the roof was of the same material. The
+other side was left open for the present, which in that equable
+and balmy clime was no disadvantage. The whole edifice was about
+thirty feet long by fifteen deep and divided into two portions,
+one for sleeping and one for living, by a palm leaf partition.
+Really, it was quite a comfortable abode, cool and rainproof,
+especially after Bastin had built his hut in which to cook.
+
+Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and
+implored us to visit them on the main island. I answered that
+perhaps we would later on, as we wished to procure certain things
+from the wreck. Also, he requested Bastin to continue his
+ministrations as the latter greatly desired to do. But to this
+proposal I would not allow him to give any direct answer at the
+moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure of Oro's
+approval.
+
+Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind
+them the usual ample store of provisions.
+
+We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had
+said about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little
+appetite for solid food, though this returned upon the following
+day. The same thing happened upon every occasion after drinking
+of that water which certainly was a most invigorating fluid.
+Never for years had any of us felt so well as it caused us to do.
+
+So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of
+these, indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them
+as something out of the common, of course, but as facts which
+admitted of no discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament
+told much the same story of people called the Sons of God who
+lived very long lives and ran after the daughters of men whom
+they should have left alone, and thus became the progenitors of a
+remarkable race. Of this race, he presumed that Oro and his
+daughter were survivors, especially as they spoke of their family
+as "Heaven born." How they came to survive was more than he could
+understand and really scarcely worth bothering over, since there
+they were.
+
+It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although
+naturally Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly
+exaggerated, when he declared that he had caused this
+catastrophe, unless indeed he was talking about a totally
+different deluge, though even then he could not have brought it
+about. It was curious, however, that the people drowned were said
+to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion about those
+whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of that,
+he could not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his
+own showing he was a most revengeful person and one who declined
+to agree to a quite suitable alliance, apparently desired by both
+parties, merely because it offended his family pride. No, on
+reflection he might be unjust to Oro in this particular, since he
+never told that story; it was only shown in some pictures which
+very likely were just made up to astonish us. Meanwhile, it was
+his business to preach to this old sinner down in that hole, and
+he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
+must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek
+inspiration, which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
+
+Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
+
+"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause
+another just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after
+him.
+
+"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not
+hide the truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he
+revenges himself upon us in any way, we must just put up with it
+like other martyrs."
+
+"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said
+Bickley.
+
+"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware
+of that, as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you
+become one, I am sorry to say that I do not see how you can
+expect any benefit. You would only be like a man who puts a
+sovereign into the offertory bag in mistake for a shilling. The
+extra nineteen shillings will do him no good at all, since in his
+heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could have them
+back."
+
+Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not
+laugh.
+
+"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I
+have gone quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of
+homicidal mania, which I feel developing in me where Bastin is
+concerned, or of other abnormal violence, that you will take
+whatever steps you consider necessary, even to putting me out of
+the way if that is imperative."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."
+
+"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great
+number of things which I know it to be quite impossible that I
+should have seen or experienced. The only explanation is that I
+am suffering from delusions."
+
+"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"
+
+"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."
+
+"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by
+no means certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He
+has a faith and he sticks to it, as millions have done before
+him, and that is better than making spiritual experiments, as I
+am sorry to say I do, or rejecting things because one cannot
+understand them, as you do, which is only a form of intellectual
+vanity."
+
+"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat
+that I am mad, and Bastin is mad."
+
+"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I
+mad, too?"
+
+"You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn't enough to drive a man
+mad when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly
+impossible moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible
+young woman in an utterly impossible underground city, then I
+don't know what is."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, starting.
+
+"Mean? Well, if you didn't notice it, there's hope for you."
+
+"Notice what?"
+
+"All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do
+you admit that?"
+
+"Of course; there could be no mistake on that point."
+
+"Very well. Then according to my version there came a man,
+still young, dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions
+of peace and wanted to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is
+that right?"
+
+"Absolutely."
+
+"Well, and didn't you recognise the man?"
+
+"No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose
+appearance reminded me of someone."
+
+"I suppose it must be true," mused Bickley, "that we do not
+know ourselves."
+
+"So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be
+our special study. 'Know thyself,' you remember."
+
+"I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean
+to tell me that you did not recognise your own double in that
+man? Shave off your beard and put on his clothes and no one could
+distinguish you apart."
+
+I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
+
+"Now you mention it," I said slowly, "I suppose there was a
+resemblance. I didn't look at him very much; I was studying the
+simulacrum of Yva. Also, you know it is some time since--I mean,
+there are no pier-glasses in Orofena."
+
+"The man was you," went on Bickley with conviction. "If I were
+superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am
+not, I know that I must be mad."
+
+"Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble
+each other."
+
+"There are degrees in resemblance," said Bickley with one of
+his contemptuous snorts. "It won't do, Humphrey, my boy," he
+added. "I can only think of one possible explanation--outside of
+the obvious one of madness."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that
+cinematograph show in some way or other, did she not? She said
+that in order to do this she loosed some hidden forces. I suggest
+that she did nothing of the sort."
+
+"Then whence did the pictures come and why?"
+
+"From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-
+bull, fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally
+fill the role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had
+happened to impress her. Hence the resemblance."
+
+"You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural
+cunning and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don't know, first,
+why she should be so anxious to add another impression to the
+many we have received in this place; and, secondly, if she was,
+how she managed to mesmerise three average but totally different
+men into seeing the same things. My explanation is that you were
+deceived as to the likeness, which, mind you, I did not
+recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin."
+
+"Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask
+Yva herself. She ought to know. Now I'm off to try to analyse
+that confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary
+spring variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and
+possibly not uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I
+can only apply some very elementary tests."
+
+So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was
+left alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting
+continually to wander off into the cave, whence I must recall
+him. I suppose that my experiences of the day, reviewed beneath
+the sweet influences of the wonderful tropical night, affected
+me. At any rate, that mystical side of my nature, to which I
+think I alluded at the beginning of this record, sprang into
+active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal vanished, the
+abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of us
+creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British.
+I lost my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in
+strange places; of course, always supposing that we have a
+spirit, which Bickley would deny.
+
+I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
+unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see
+and accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps
+only a refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and
+again, and that our animating principle, whatever it might be,
+does inhabit various bodies, which, naturally enough, it would
+shape to its own taste and likeness? Would that taste and
+likeness vary so very much over, let us say, a million years or
+so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a minute, in the aeons
+of Eternity?
+
+On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect
+that it may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered
+man of the far past were in fact identical? If the woman were the
+same, preserved across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why
+should not her lover be the same? What did I say--her lover? Was
+I her lover? No, I was the lover of one who had died--my lost
+wife. Well, if I had died and lived again, why should not--why
+should not that Sleeper--have lived again during her long sleep?
+Through all those years the spirit must have had some home, and,
+if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points,
+similarities, which rushed in upon me--oh! it was ridiculous.
+Bickley was right. We were all mad!
+
+There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war
+with Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such
+knowledge would presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond
+those given to man. I could not believe that he possessed these;
+as Bickley said, it would be past experience. Yet it was most
+strange that he who was uninformed as to our national history and
+dangers, should have hit upon a country with which we might well
+have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here again I was
+bewildered and overcome. My brain rocked. I would seek sleep, and
+in it escape, or at any rate rest from all these mysteries.
+
+
+On the following morning we despatched Bastin to keep his
+rendezvous in the sepulchre at the proper time. Had we not done
+so I felt sure that he would have forgotten it, for on this
+occasion he was for once an unwilling missioner. He tried to
+persuade one of us to come with him--even Bickley would have been
+welcome; but we both declared that we could not dream of
+interfering in such a professional matter; also that our presence
+was forbidden, and would certainly distract the attention of his
+pupil.
+
+"What you mean," said the gloomy Bastin, "is that you intend to
+enjoy yourselves up here in the female companionship of the
+Glittering Lady whilst I sit thousands of feet underground
+attempting to lighten the darkness of a violent old sinner whom I
+suspect of being in league with Satan."
+
+"With whom you should be proud to break a lance," said Bickley.
+
+"So I am, in the daylight. For instance, when he uses your
+mouth to advance his arguments. Bickley, but this is another
+matter. However, if I do not appear again you will know that I
+died in a good cause, and, I hope, try to recover my remains and
+give them decent burial. Also, you might inform the Bishop of how
+I came to my end, that is, if you ever get an opportunity, which
+is more than doubtful."
+
+"Hurry up, Bastin, hurry up!" said the unfeeling Bickley, "or
+you will be late for your appointment and put your would-be
+neophyte into a bad temper."
+
+Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed
+in the language of the South Sea Islands.
+
+A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous
+robes which, being a man, it is quite impossible for me to
+describe. She saw us looking at these, and, after greeting us
+both, also Tommy, who was enraptured at her coming, asked us how
+the ladies of our country attired themselves.
+
+We tried to explain, with no striking success.
+
+"You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the
+Old World," she said, shaking her head and laughing. "I thought
+that you had with you pictures of ladies you have known which
+would show me."
+
+Now, in fact, I had in a pocket-book a photograph of my wife in
+evening-dress, also a miniature of her head and bust painted on
+ivory, a beautiful piece of work done by a master hand, which I
+always wore. These, after a moment's hesitation, I produced and
+showed to her, Bickley having gone away for a little while to see
+about something connected with his attempted analysis of the
+Life-water. She examined them with great eagerness, and as she
+did so I noted that her face grew tender and troubled.
+
+"This was your wife," she said as one who states what she knows
+to be a fact. I nodded, and she went on:
+
+"She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I
+am, I think."
+
+"No," I answered, "she lacked height; given that she would have
+been a lovely woman."
+
+"I am glad you think that women should be tall," she said,
+glancing at her shadow. "The eyes were such as mine, were they
+not--in colour, I mean?"
+
+"Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger."
+
+"That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be
+angry if I tried it? I weary of this old fashion."
+
+"Why should I be angry?" I asked.
+
+At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the
+details of the dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than
+had been the custom among the women of her people, but was very
+pretty.
+
+"That is because we are still barbarians," said Bickley; "at
+least, our women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods
+of attraction, like the savages yonder."
+
+She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the
+photograph and the miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
+
+"I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear
+this picture on your heart, as well as in it."
+
+"Then you must be a very remarkable woman," said Bickley.
+"Never before did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man
+was faithful to somebody else."
+
+"Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so
+angry to us women?" asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without
+waiting for an answer, she inquired of him whether he had been
+successful in his analysis of the Life-water.
+
+"How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did
+Bastin tell you?" exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the
+descent to Nyo; that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I
+do, and that he thought that my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil
+or evil spirit from some Under-world which he called hell."
+
+"Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth," said Bickley,
+"for which I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady
+Yva, and tell us who and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what
+are you."
+
+"Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord
+Oro and I are two who have lived on from the old time when the
+world was different, and yet, I think, the same. He is a man and
+not a god, and I am a woman. His powers are great because of his
+knowledge, which he has gathered from his forefathers and in a
+life of a thousand years before he went to sleep. He can do
+things you cannot do. Thus, he can pass through space and take
+others with him, and return again. He can learn what is happening
+in far-off parts of the world, as he did when he told you of the
+war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible powers;
+for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he
+knows the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can
+change its turning so that earthquakes happen and sea becomes
+land, and land sea, and the places that were hot grow cold, and
+those that were cold grow hot."
+
+"All of which things have happened many times in the history of
+the globe," said Bickley, "without the help of the Lord Oro."
+
+"Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless
+will have knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge,
+and knowledge is strength."
+
+"Yes," I interposed, "but such powers as you attribute to your
+father are not given to man."
+
+"You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks
+that he has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is
+not so. Hundreds of thousands of years ago men knew more than it
+seems they do today, ten times more, as they lived ten times
+longer, or so you tell me."
+
+"Men?" I said.
+
+"Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations
+supposed them to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and
+terrors of man. He desires power which is ambition, and when the
+world refused his rule, he destroyed that part of it which
+rebelled, which is revenge. Moreover, above all things he dreads
+death, which is fear. That is why he suspended life in himself
+and me for two hundred and fifty thousand years, as his knowledge
+gave him strength to do, because death was near and he thought
+that sleep was better than death."
+
+"Why should he dread to die," asked Bickley, "seeing that sleep
+and death are the same?"
+
+"Because his knowledge tells him that Sleep and Death are not
+the same, as you, in your foolishness, believe, for there Bastin
+is wiser than you. Because for all his wisdom he remains ignorant
+of what happens to man when the Light of Life is blown out by the
+breath of Fate. That is why he fears to die and why he talks with
+Bastin the Preacher, who says he has the secret of the future."
+
+"And do you fear to die?" I asked.
+
+"No, Humphrey," she answered gently. "Because I think that
+there is no death, and, having done no wrong, I dread no evil. I
+had dreams while I was asleep, O Humphrey, and it seemed to me
+that--"
+
+Here she ceased and glanced at where she knew the miniature was
+hanging upon my breast.
+
+"Now," she continued, after a little pause, "tell me of your
+world, of its history, of its languages, of what happens there,
+for I long to know."
+
+So then and there, assisted by Bickley, I began the education
+of the Lady Yva. I do not suppose that there was ever a more apt
+pupil in the whole earth. To begin with, she was better
+acquainted with every subject on which I touched than I was
+myself; all she lacked was information as to its modern aspect.
+Her knowledge ended two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, at
+which date, however, it would seem that civilisation had already
+touched a higher water-mark than it has ever since attained.
+Thus, this vanished people understood astronomy, natural
+magnetism, the force of gravity, steam, also electricity to some
+subtle use of which, I gathered, the lighting of their
+underground city was to be attributed. They had mastered
+architecture and the arts, as their buildings and statues showed;
+they could fly through the air better than we have learned to do
+within the last few years.
+
+More, they, or some of them, had learned the use of the Fourth
+Dimension, that is their most instructed individuals, could move
+through opposing things, as well as over them, up into them and
+across them. This power these possessed in a two-fold form. I
+mean, that they could either disintegrate their bodies at one
+spot and cause them to integrate again at another, or they could
+project what the old Egyptians called the Ka or Double, and
+modern Theosophists name the Astral Shape, to any distance.
+Moreover, this Double, or Astral Shape, while itself invisible,
+still, so to speak, had the use of its senses. It could see, it
+could hear, and it could remember, and, on returning to the body,
+it could avail itself of the experience thus acquired.
+
+Thus, at least, said Yva, while Bickley contemplated her with a
+cold and unbelieving eye. She even went further and alleged that
+in certain instances, individuals of her extinct race had been
+able to pass through the ether and to visit other worlds in the
+depths of space.
+
+"Have you ever done that?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Once or twice I dreamed that I did," she replied quietly.
+
+"We can all dream," he answered.
+
+As it was my lot to make acquaintance with this strange and
+uncanny power at a later date, I will say no more of it now.
+
+Telepathy, she declared, was also a developed gift among the
+Sons of Wisdom; indeed, they seem to have used it as we use
+wireless messages. Only, in their case, the sending and receiving
+stations were skilled and susceptible human beings who went on
+duty for so many hours at a time. Thus intelligence was
+transmitted with accuracy and despatch. Those who had this
+faculty were, she said, also very apt at reading the minds of
+others and therefore not easy to deceive.
+
+"Is that how you know that I had been trying to analyse your
+Life-water?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Yes," she answered, with her unvarying smile. "At the moment I
+spoke thereof you were wondering whether my father would be angry
+if he knew that you had taken the water in a little flask." She
+studied him for a moment, then added: "Now you are wondering,
+first, whether I did not see you take the water from the fountain
+and guess the purpose, and, secondly, whether perhaps Bastin did
+not tell me what you were doing with it when we met in the
+sepulchre."
+
+"Look here," said the exasperated Bickley, "I admit that
+telepathy and thought-reading are possible to a certain limited
+extent. But supposing that you possess those powers, as I think
+in English, and you do not know English, how can you interpret
+what is passing in my mind?"
+
+"Perhaps you have been teaching me English all this while
+without knowing it, Bickley. In any case, it matters little,
+seeing that what I read is the thought, not the language with
+which it is clothed. The thought comes from your mind to mine--
+that is, if I wish it, which is not often--and I interpret it in
+my own or other tongues."
+
+"I am glad to hear it is not often, Lady Yva, since thoughts
+are generally considered private."
+
+"Yes, and therefore I will read yours no more. Why should I,
+when they are so full of disbelief of all I tell you, and
+sometimes of other things about myself which I do not seek to
+know?"
+
+"No wonder that, according to the story in the pictures, those
+Nations, whom you named Barbarians, made an end of your people,
+Lady Yva."
+
+"You are mistaken, Bickley; the Lord Oro made an end of the
+Nations, though against my prayer," she added with a sigh.
+
+Then Bickley departed in a rage, and did not appear again for
+an hour.
+
+"He is angry," she said, looking after him; "nor do I wonder.
+It is hard for the very clever like Bickley, who think that they
+have mastered all things, to find that after all they are quite
+ignorant. I am sorry for him, and I like him very much."
+
+"Then you would be sorry for me also, Lady Yva?"
+
+"Why?" she asked with a dazzling smile, "when your heart is
+athirst for knowledge, gaping for it like a fledgling's mouth for
+food, and, as it chances, though I am not very wise, I can
+satisfy something of your soul-hunger."
+
+"Not very wise!" I repeated.
+
+"No, Humphrey. I think that Bastin, who in many ways is so
+stupid, has more true wisdom than I have, because he can believe
+and accept without question. After all, the wisdom of my people
+is all of the universe and its wonders. What you think magic is
+not magic; it is only gathered knowledge and the finding out of
+secrets. Bickley will tell you the same, although as yet he does
+not believe that the mind of man can stretch so far."
+
+"You mean that your wisdom has in it nothing of the spirit?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, that is what I mean. I do not even know if
+there is such a thing as spirit. Our god was Fate; Bastin's god
+is a spirit, and I think yours also."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Therefore, I wish you and Bastin to teach me of your god, as
+does Oro, my father. I want--oh! so much, Humphrey, to learn
+whether we live after death."
+
+"You!" I exclaimed. "You who, according to the story, have
+slept for two hundred and fifty thousand years! You, who have,
+unless I mistake, hinted that during that sleep you may have
+lived in other shapes! Do you doubt whether we can live after
+death?"
+
+"Yes. Sleep induced by secret arts is not death, and during
+that sleep the I within might wander and inhabit other shapes,
+because it is forbidden to be idle. Moreover, what seems to be
+death may not be death, only another form of sleep from which the
+I awakes again upon the world. But at last comes the real death,
+when the I is extinguished to the world. That much I know,
+because my people learned it."
+
+"You mean, you know that men and women may live again and again
+upon the world?"
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, I do. For in the world there is only a certain
+store of life which in many forms travels on and on, till the lot
+of each I is fulfilled. Then comes the real death, and after
+that--what, oh!--what?"
+
+"You must ask Bastin," I said humbly. "I cannot dare to teach
+of such matters."
+
+"No, but you can and do believe, and that helps me, Humphrey,
+who am in tune with you. Yes, it helps me much more than do
+Bastin and his new religion, because such is woman's way. Now, I
+think Bickley will soon return, so let us talk of other matters.
+Tell me of the history of your people, Humphrey, that my father
+says are now at war."
+
+
+
+Chapter XVIII
+
+The Accident
+
+
+Bickley did return, having recovered his temper, since after
+all it was impossible for anyone to remain angry with the Lady
+Yva for long, and we spent a very happy time together. We
+instructed and she was the humble pupil.
+
+How swift and nimble was her intelligence! In that one morning
+she learned all our alphabet and how to write our letters. It
+appeared that among her people, at any rate in their later
+periods, the only form of writing that was used was a highly
+concentrated shorthand which saved labour. They had no journals,
+since news which arrived telepathically or by some form of
+wireless was proclaimed to those who cared to listen, and on it
+all formed their own judgments. In the same way poems and even
+romances were repeated, as in Homer's day or in the time of the
+Norse sagas, by word of mouth. None of their secret knowledge was
+written down. Like the ritual of Freemasonry it was considered
+too sacred.
+
+Moreover, when men lived for hundreds of years this was not so
+necessary, especially as their great fear was lest it should fall
+into the hands of the outside nations, whom they called
+Barbarians. For, be it remembered, these Sons of Wisdom were
+always a very small people who ruled by the weight of their
+intelligence and the strength of their accumulated lore. Indeed,
+they could scarcely be called a people; rather were they a few
+families, all of them more or less connected with the original
+ruling Dynasty which considered itself half divine. These
+families were waited upon by a multitude of servants or slaves
+drawn from the subject nations, for the most part skilled in one
+art or another, or perhaps, remarkable for their personal beauty.
+Still they remained outside the pale.
+
+The Sons of Wisdom did not intermarry with them or teach them
+their learning, or even allow them to drink of their Life-water.
+They ruled them as men rule dogs, treating them with kindness,
+but no more, and as many dogs run their course and die in the
+lifetime of one master, so did many of these slaves in that of
+one of the Sons of Wisdom. Therefore, the slaves came to regard
+their lords not as men, but gods. They lived but three score
+years and ten like the rest of us, and went their way, they,
+whose great-great-grandfathers had served the same master and
+whose great-great-great-grandchildren would still serve him. What
+should we think of a lord who we knew was already adult in the
+time of William the Conqueror, and who remained still vigorous
+and all-powerful in that of George V? One, moreover, who
+commanded almost infinite knowledge to which we were denied the
+key? We might tremble before him and look upon him as half-
+divine, but should we not long to kill him and possess his
+knowledge and thereby prolong our own existence to his wondrous
+measure?
+
+Such, said Yva, was the case with their slaves and the peoples
+from whence these sprang. They grew mad with jealous hate, till
+at length came the end we knew.
+
+Thus we talked on for hours till the time came for us to eat.
+As before Yva partook of fruit and we of such meats as we had at
+hand. These, we noticed, disgusted her, because, as she
+explained, the Children of Wisdom, unless driven thereto by
+necessity, touched no flesh, but lived on the fruits of the earth
+and wine alone. Only the slaves and the Barbarians ate flesh. In
+these views Bickley for once agreed with her, that is, except as
+regards the wine, for in theory, if not in practice--he was a
+vegetarian.
+
+"I will bring you more of the Life-water," she said, "and then
+you will grow to hate these dead things, as I do. And now
+farewell. My father calls me. I hear him though you do not. To-
+morrow I cannot come, but the day after I will come and bring you
+the Life-water. Nay, accompany me not, but as I see he wishes it,
+let Tommy go with me. I will care for him, and he is a friend in
+all that lonely place."
+
+So she went, and with her Tommy, rejoicing.
+
+"Ungrateful little devil!" said Bickley. "Here we've fed and
+petted him from puppyhood, or at least you have, and yet he skips
+off with the first stranger. I never saw him behave like that to
+any woman, except your poor wife."
+
+"I know," I answered. "I cannot understand it. Hullo! here
+comes Bastin."
+
+Bastin it was, dishevelled and looking much the worse for wear,
+also minus his Bible in the native tongue.
+
+"Well, how have you been getting on?" said Bickley.
+
+"I should like some tea, also anything there is to eat."
+
+We supplied him with these necessaries, and after a while he
+said slowly and solemnly:
+
+"I cannot help thinking of a childish story which Bickley told
+or invented one night at your house at home. I remember he had an
+argument with my wife, which he said put him in mind of it, I am
+sure I don't know why. It was about a monkey and a parrot that
+were left together under a sofa for a long while, where they were
+so quiet that everybody forgot them. Then the parrot came out
+with only one feather left in its tail and none at all on its
+body, saying, 'I've had no end of a time!' after which it dropped
+down and died. Do you know, I feel just like that parrot, only I
+don't mean to die, and I think I gave the monkey quite as good as
+he gave me!"
+
+"What happened?" I asked, intensely interested.
+
+"Oh! the Glittering Lady took me into that palace hall where
+Oro was sitting like a spider in a web, and left me there. I got
+to work at once. He was much interested in the Old Testament
+stories and said there were points of truth about them, although
+they had evidently come down to the modern writer--he called him
+a modern writer--in a legendary form. I thought his remarks
+impertinent and with difficulty refrained from saying so. Leaving
+the story of the Deluge and all that, I spoke of other matters,
+telling him of eternal life and Heaven and Hell, of which the
+poor benighted man had never heard. I pointed out especially that
+unless he repented, his life, by all accounts, had been so
+wicked, that he was certainly destined to the latter place."
+
+"What did he say to that?" I asked.
+
+"Do you know, I think it frightened him, if one could imagine
+Oro being frightened. At any rate he remarked that the truth or
+falsity of what I said was an urgent matter for him, as he could
+not expect to live more than a few hundred years longer, though
+perhaps he might prolong the period by another spell of sleep.
+Then he asked me why I thought him so wicked. I replied because
+he himself said that he had drowned millions of people, which
+showed an evil heart and intention even if it were not a fact. He
+thought a long while and asked what could be done in the
+circumstances. I replied that repentance and reparation were the
+only courses open to him."
+
+"Reparation!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, reparation was what I said, though I think I made a
+mistake there, as you will see. As nearly as I can remember, he
+answered that he was beginning to repent, as from all he had
+learned from us, he gathered that the races which had arisen as a
+consequence of his action, were worse than those which he had
+destroyed. As regards reparation, what he had done once he could
+do again. He would think the matter over seriously, and see if it
+were possible and advisable to raise those parts of the world
+which had been sunk, and sink those which had been raised. If so,
+he thought that would make very handsome amends to the departed
+nations and set him quite right with any superior Power, if such
+a thing existed. What are you laughing at, Bickley? I don't think
+it a laughing matter, since such remarks do not seem to me to
+indicate any real change in Oro's heart, which is what I was
+trying to effect."
+
+Bickley, who was convulsed with merriment, wiped his eyes and
+said:
+
+"You dear old donkey, don't you see what you have done, or
+rather would have done if there were a word of truth in all this
+ridiculous story about a deluge? You would be in the way of
+making your precious pupil, who certainly is the most masterly
+old liar in the world, repeat his offence and send Europe to the
+bottom of the sea."
+
+"That did occur to me, but it doesn't much matter as I am quite
+certain that such a thing would never be allowed. Of course there
+was a real deluge once, but Oro had no more to do with it than I
+had. Don't you agree, Arbuthnot?"
+
+"I think so," I answered cautiously, "but really in this place
+I am beginning to lose count of what is or is not possible. Also,
+of course, there may have been many deluges; indeed the history
+of the world shows that this was so; it is written in its
+geological strata. What was the end of it?"
+
+"The end was that he took the South Sea Bible and, after I had
+explained a little about our letters, seemed to be able to read
+it at once. I suppose he was acquainted with the art of printing
+in his youth. At any rate he said that he would study it, I don't
+know how, unless he can read, and that in two days' time he would
+let me know what he thought about the matter of my religion. Then
+he told me to go. I said that I did not know the way and was
+afraid of losing myself. Thereupon he waved his hand, and I
+really can't say what happened."
+
+"Did you levitate up here," asked Bickley, "like the late
+lamented Mr. Home at the spiritualistic seances?"
+
+"No, I did not exactly levitate, but something or someone
+seemed to get a hold of me, and I was just rushed along in a most
+tumultuous fashion. The next thing I knew was that I was standing
+at the door of that sepulchre, though I have no recollection of
+going up in the lift, or whatever it is. I believe those beastly
+caves are full of ghosts, or devils, and the worst of it is that
+they have kept my solar-tope, which I put on this morning
+forgetting that it would be useless there."
+
+"The Lady Yva's Fourth Dimension in action," I suggested, "only
+it wouldn't work on solar-topes."
+
+"I don't know what you are talking about," said Bastin, "but if
+my hat had to be left, why not my boots and other garments?
+Please stop your nonsense and pass the tea. Thank goodness I
+haven't got to go down there tomorrow, as he seems to have had
+enough of me for the present, so I vote we all pay a visit to the
+ship. It will be a very pleasant change. I couldn't stand two
+days running with that old fiend, and his ghosts or devils in the
+cave."
+
+
+Next morning accordingly, fearing no harm from the Orofenans,
+we took the canoe and rowed to the main island. Marama had
+evidently seen us coming, for he and a number of his people met
+us with every demonstration of delight, and escorted us to the
+ship. Here we found things just as we had left them, for there
+had been no attempt at theft or other mischief.
+
+While we were in the cabin a fit of moral weakness seemed to
+overcome Bickley, the first and I may add the last from which I
+ever saw him suffer.
+
+"Do you know," he said, addressing us, "I think that we should
+do well to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal
+of the marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here,
+it is still obvious that we find ourselves in very peculiar and
+unhealthy surroundings. I mean mentally unhealthy, indeed I think
+that if we stay here much longer we shall probably go off our
+heads. Now that boat on the deck remains sound and seaworthy. Why
+should not we provision her and take our chance? We know more or
+less which way to steer."
+
+Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.
+
+"Wouldn't it be rather a risky job in an open boat?" he asked.
+"However, that doesn't matter much because I don't take any
+account of risks, knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow
+and that the hairs of my head are all numbered."
+
+"They might be numbered under water as well as above it,"
+muttered Bickley, "and I feel sure that on your own showing, you
+would be as valuable dead as alive."
+
+"What I seem to feel," went on Bastin, "is that I have work to
+my hand here. Also, the locum tenens at Fulcombe no doubt runs
+the parish as well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man
+for the place than I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but
+I do not despair of him yet, and besides him there is the
+Glittering Lady, a most open-minded person, whom I have not yet
+had any real opportunity of approaching in a spiritual sense.
+Then there are all these natives who cannot learn without a
+teacher. So on the whole I think I would rather stay where I am
+until Providence points out some other path."
+
+"I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons,"
+I said. "I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of
+men to come in touch with such things as we have found upon this
+island. They may be illusions, but at least they are very
+interesting illusions. One might live ten lifetimes and find
+nothing else of the sort. Therefore I should like to see the end
+of the dream."
+
+Bickley reflected a little, then said:
+
+"On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am
+terribly afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear
+and see, and that way madness lies. It is better to die than to
+go mad."
+
+"You'll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean
+decease, of course," interrupted Bastin. "And who knows, perhaps
+all this is an opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes,
+which, I must say, are singularly blind. You think you know
+everything there is to learn, but the fact is that like the rest
+of us, you know nothing at all, and good man though you are,
+obstinately refuse to admit the truth and to seek support
+elsewhere. For my part I believe that you are afraid of falling
+in love with that Glittering Lady and of being convinced by her
+that you are wrong in your most unsatisfactory conclusions."
+
+"I am out-voted anyway," said Bickley, "and for the rest,
+Bastin, look after yourself and leave me alone. I will add that
+on the whole I think you are both right, and that it is wisest
+for us to stop where we are, for after all we can only die once."
+
+"I am not so sure, Bickley. There is a thing called the second
+death, which is what is troubling that old scoundrel, Oro. Now I
+will go and look for those books."
+
+So the idea of flight was abandoned, although I admit that even
+to myself it had attractions. For I felt that I was being wrapped
+in a net of mysteries from which I saw no escape. Yes, and of
+more than mysteries; I who had sworn that I would never look upon
+another woman, was learning to love this sweet and wondrous Yva,
+and of that what could be the end?
+
+
+We collected all we had come to seek, and started homewards
+escorted by Marama and his people, including a number of young
+women who danced before us in a light array of flowers.
+
+Passing our old house, we came to the grove where the idol Oro
+had stood and Bastin was so nearly sacrificed. There was another
+idol there now which he wished to examine, but in the end did not
+as the natives so obviously objected. Indeed Marama told me that
+notwithstanding the mysterious death of the sorcerers on the Rock
+of Offerings, there was still a strong party in the island who
+would be glad to do us a mischief if any further affront were
+offered to their hereditary god.
+
+He questioned us also tentatively about the apparition, for
+such he conceived it to be, which had appeared upon the rock and
+killed the sorcerers, and I answered him as I thought wisest,
+telling him that a terrible Power was afoot in the land, which he
+would do well to obey.
+
+"Yes," he said; "the God of the Mountain of whom the tradition
+has come down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he
+sees, he hears and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O
+Friend-from-the-Sea."
+
+As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick
+bush. Suddenly from out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore
+a mask upon his face, but from his shape could not have been more
+than thirteen or fourteen years of age. In his hand was a wooden
+club. He ran forward, stopped, and with a yell of hate hurled it,
+I think at Bastin, but it hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and
+remembered no more.
+
+Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do
+not know. It seemed to me that through them continually I saw the
+stately figure of old Oro contemplating me gravely, as though he
+were making up his mind about something in which I must play a
+part. Then there was another figure, that of the gracious but
+imperial Yva, who from time to time, as I thought, leant over me
+and whispered in my ear words of rest and comfort. Nor was this
+all, since her shape had a way of changing suddenly into that of
+my lost wife who would speak with her voice. Or perhaps my wife
+would speak with Yva's voice. To my disordered sense it was as
+though they were one personality, having two shapes, either of
+which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me
+most blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the
+dead, and in the dead the living. More, I took journeys, or
+rather some unknown part of me seemed to do so. One of these I
+remember, for its majestic character stamped itself upon my mind
+in such a fashion that all the waters of delirium could not wash
+it out nor all its winds blow away that memory.
+
+I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster
+than light can flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near,
+they grew into enormous, flaming Glories round which circled
+world upon world. They became small, dwindled to points of light
+and disappeared.
+
+We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous
+white city wherein were buildings with domes of crystal and
+alabaster, in the latter of which were set windows made of great
+jewels; sapphires or rubies they seemed to me. We went on up a
+lovely valley. To the left were hills, down which tumbled
+waterfalls; to the right was a river broad and deep that seemed
+to overflow its banks as does the Nile. Behind were high
+mountains on the slopes of which grew forests of glorious trees,
+some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up their crests
+stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
+guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was
+lit with a light such as that of the moon, only intensified and
+of many colours. Indeed looking up, I saw that above us floated
+three moons, each of them bigger than our own at the full, and
+gathered that here it was night.
+
+We came to a house set amid scented gardens and having in front
+of it terraces of flowers. It seemed not unlike my own house at
+home, but I took little note of it, because of a woman who sat
+upon the verandah, if I may call it so. She was clad in garments
+of white silk fastened about her middle with a jewelled girdle.
+On her neck also was a collar of jewels. I forget the colour;
+indeed this seemed to change continually as the light from the
+different moons struck when she moved, but I think its prevailing
+tinge was blue. In her arms this woman nursed a beauteous,
+sleeping child, singing happily as she rocked it to and fro. Yva
+went towards the woman who looked up at her step and uttered a
+little cry. Then for the first time I saw the woman's face. It
+was that of my dead wife!
+
+As I followed in my dream, a little cloud of mist seemed to
+cover both my wife and Yva, and when I reached the place Yva was
+gone. Only my wife remained, she and the child. There she stood,
+solemn and sweet. While I drew near she laid down the child upon
+the cushioned seat from which she had risen. She stretched out
+her arms and flung them about me. She embraced me and I embraced
+her in a rapture of reunion. Then turning she lifted up the
+child, it was a girl, for me to kiss.
+
+"See your daughter," she said, "and behold all that I am making
+ready for you where we shall dwell in a day to come."
+
+I grew confused.
+
+"Yva," I said. "Where is Yva who brought me here? Did she go
+into the house?"
+
+"Yes," she answered happily. "Yva went into the house. Look
+again!"
+
+I looked and it was Yva's face that was pressed against my own,
+and Yva's eyes that gazed into mine. Only she was garbed as my
+wife had been, and on her bosom hung the changeful necklace.
+
+"You may not stay," she whispered, and lo! it was my wife that
+spoke, not Yva.
+
+"Tell me what it means?" I implored.
+
+"I cannot," she answered. "There are mysteries that you may not
+know as yet. Love Yva if you will and I shall not be jealous, for
+in loving Yva you love me. You cannot understand? Then know this,
+that the spirit has many shapes, and yet is the same spirit--
+sometimes. Now I who am far, yet near, bid you farewell a while."
+
+Then all passed in a flash and the dream ended.
+
+Such was the only one of those visions which I can recall.
+
+
+I seemed to wake up as from a long and tumultuous sleep. The
+first thing I saw was the palm roof of our house upon the rock. I
+knew it was our house, for just above me was a palm leaf of which
+I had myself tied the stalk to the framework with a bit of
+coloured ribbon that I had chanced to find in my pocket. It came
+originally from the programme card of a dance that I had attended
+at Honolulu and I had kept it because I thought it might be
+useful. Finally I used it to secure that loose leaf. I stared at
+the ribbon which brought back a flood of memories, and as I was
+thus engaged I heard voices talking, and listened--Bickley's
+voice, and the Lady Yva's.
+
+"Yes," Bickley was saying, "he will do well now, but he went
+near, very near."
+
+"I knew he would not die," she answered, "because my father
+said so."
+
+"There are two sorts of deaths," replied Bickley, "that of the
+body and that of the mind. I was afraid that even if he lived,
+his reason would go, but from certain indications I do not think
+that will happen now. He will get quite well again--though--" and
+he stopped.
+
+"I am very glad to hear you say so," chimed in Bastin. "For
+weeks I thought that I should have to read the Burial Service
+over poor Arbuthnot. Indeed I was much puzzled as to the best
+place to bury him. Finally I found a very suitable spot round the
+corner there, where it isn't rock, in which one can't dig and the
+soil is not liable to be flooded. In fact I went so far as to
+clear away the bush and to mark out the grave with its foot to
+the east. In this climate one can't delay, you know."
+
+Weak as I was, I smiled. This practical proceeding was so
+exactly like Bastin.
+
+"Well, you wasted your labour," exclaimed Bickley.
+
+"Yes, I am glad to say I did. But I don't think it was your
+operations and the rest that cured him, Bickley, although you
+take all the credit. I believe it was the Life-water that the
+Lady Yva made him drink and the stuff that Oro sent which we gave
+him when you weren't looking."
+
+"Then I hope that in the future you will not interfere with my
+cases," said the indignant Bickley, and either the voices passed
+away or I went to sleep.
+
+When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my
+side watching me.
+
+"Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out
+walking," she said slowly in English.
+
+"Who taught you my language?" I asked, astonished. "Bastin and
+Bickley, while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man just
+same now as he was hundred thousand years ago," she added
+enigmatically. "All think one woman beautiful when no other woman
+there."
+
+"Indeed," I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part
+of Bastin and Bickley she alluded. Could that self-centred pair--
+oh! it was impossible.
+
+"How long have I been ill?" I asked to escape the subject which
+I felt to be uncomfortable.
+
+She lifted her beautiful eyes in search of words and began to
+count upon her fingers.
+
+"Two moon, one half moon, yes, ten week, counting Sabbath," she
+answered triumphantly.
+
+"Ten weeks!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, Humphrey, ten whole weeks and three days you first bad,
+then mad. Oh!" she went on, breaking into the Orofenan tongue
+which she spoke so perfectly, although it was not her own. That
+language of hers I never learned, but I know she thought in it
+and only translated into Orofenan, because of the great
+difficulty which she had in rendering her high and refined ideas
+into its simpler metaphor, and the strange words which often she
+introduced. "Oh! you have been very ill, friend of my heart. At
+times I thought that you were going to die, and wept and wept.
+Bickley thinks that he saved you and he is very clever. But he
+could not have saved you; that wanted more knowledge than any of
+your people have; only I pray you, do not tell him so because it
+would hurt his pride."
+
+"What was the matter with me then, Yva?"
+
+"All was the matter. First, the weapon which that youth threw--
+he was the son of the sorcerer whom my father destroyed--crushed
+in the bone of your head. He is dead for his crime and may he be
+accursed for ever," she added in the only outbreak of rage and
+vindictiveness in which I ever saw her indulge.
+
+"One must make excuses for him; his father had been killed," I
+said.
+
+"Yes, that is what Bastin tells me, and it is true. Still, for
+that young man I can make no excuse; it was cowardly and wicked.
+Well, Bickley performed what he calls operation, and the Lord
+Oro, he came up from his house and helped him, because Bastin is
+no good in such things. Then he can only turn away his head and
+pray. I, too, helped, holding hot water and linen and jar of the
+stuff that made you feel like nothing, although the sight made me
+feel more sick than anything since I saw one I loved killed, oh,
+long, long ago."
+
+"Was the operation successful?" I asked, for I did not dare to
+begin to thank her.
+
+"Yes, that clever man, Bickley, lifted the bone which had been
+crushed in. Only then something broke in your head and you began
+to bleed here," and she touched what I believe is called the
+temporal artery. "The vein had been crushed by the blow, and gave
+way. Bickley worked and worked, and just in time he tied it up
+before you died. Oh! then I felt as though I loved Bickley,
+though afterwards Bastin said that I ought to have loved him,
+since it was not Bickley who stopped the bleeding, but his
+prayer."
+
+"Perhaps it was both," I suggested.
+
+"Perhaps, Humphrey, at least you were saved. Then came another
+trouble. You took fever. Bickley said that it was because a
+certain gnat had bitten you when you went down to the ship, and
+my father, the Lord Oro, told me that this was right. At the
+least you grew very weak and lost your mind, and it seemed as
+though you must die. Then, Humphrey, I went to the Lord Oro and
+kneeled before him and prayed for your life, for I knew that he
+could cure you if he would, though Bickley's skill was at an end.
+
+"'Daughter,' he said to me, 'not once but again and again you
+have set up your will against mine in the past. Why then should I
+trouble myself to grant this desire of yours in the present, and
+save a man who is nothing to me?'
+
+"I rose to my feet and answered, 'I do not know, my Father, yet
+I am certain that for your own sake it will be well to do so. I
+am sure that of everything even you must give an account at last,
+great though you be, and who knows, perhaps one life which you
+have saved may turn the balance in your favour.'
+
+"'Surely the priest Bastin has been talking to you,' he said.
+
+"'He has,' I answered, 'and not he alone. Many voices have been
+talking to me.'"
+
+"What did you mean by that?" I asked.
+
+"It matters nothing what I meant, Humphrey. Be still and listen
+to my story. My father thought a while and answered:
+
+"'I am jealous of this stranger. What is he but a short-lived
+half-barbarian such as we knew in the old days? And yet already
+you think more of him than you do of me, your father, the divine
+Oro who has lived a thousand years. At first I helped that
+physician to save him, but now I think I wish him dead.'
+
+"'If you let this man die, my Father,' I answered, 'then we
+part. Remember that I also have of the wisdom of our people,
+and can use it if I will.'
+
+"'Then save him yourself,' he said.
+
+"'Perhaps I shall, my Father,' I answered, 'but if so it will
+not be here. I say that if so we part and you shall be left to
+rule in your majesty alone.'
+
+"Now this frightened the Lord Oro, for he has the weakness that
+he hates to be alone.
+
+"'If I do what you will, do you swear never to leave me, Yva?'
+he asked. 'Know that if you will not swear, the man dies.'
+
+"'I swear,' I answered--for your sake, Humphrey--though I did
+not love the oath.
+
+"Then he gave me a certain medicine to mix with the Life-water,
+and when you were almost gone that medicine cured you, though
+Bickley does not know it, as nothing else could have done. Now I
+have told you the truth, for your own ear only, Humphrey."
+
+"Yva," I asked, "why did you do all this for me?"
+
+"Humphrey, I do not know," she answered, "but I think because I
+must. Now sleep a while."
+
+
+
+Chapter XIX
+
+The Proposals of Bastin and Bickley
+
+
+So far as my body was concerned I grew well with great
+rapidity, though it was long before I got back my strength. Thus
+I could not walk far or endure any sustained exertion. With my
+mind it was otherwise. I can not explain what had happened to it;
+indeed I do not know, but in a sense it seemed to have become
+detached and to have assumed a kind of personality of its own. At
+times it felt as though it were no longer an inhabitant of the
+body, but rather its more or less independent partner. I was
+perfectly clear-headed and of insanity I experienced no symptoms.
+Yet my mind, I use that term from lack of a better, was not
+entirely under my control. For one thing, at night it appeared to
+wander far away, though whither it went and what it saw there I
+could never remember.
+
+I record this because possibly it explains certain mysterious
+events, if they were events and not dreams, which shortly I must
+set out. I spoke to Bickley about the matter. He put it by
+lightly, saying that it was only a result of my long and most
+severe illness and that I should steady down in time, especially
+if we could escape from that island and its unnatural atmosphere.
+Yet as he spoke he glanced at me shrewdly with his quick eyes,
+and when he turned to go away I heard him mutter something to
+himself about "unholy influences" and "that confounded old Oro."
+
+The words were spoken to himself and quite beneath his breath,
+and of course not meant to reach me. But one of the curious
+concomitants of my state was that all my senses, and especially
+my hearing, had become most abnormally acute. A whisper far away
+was now to me like a loud remark made in a room.
+
+Bickley's reflection, for I can scarcely call it more, set me
+thinking. Yva had said that Oro sent me medicine which was
+administered to me without Bickley's knowledge, and as she
+believed, saved my life, or certainly my reason. What was in it?
+I wondered. Then there was that Life-water which Yva brought and
+insisted upon my drinking every day. Undoubtedly it was a
+marvelous tonic and did me good. But it had other effects also.
+Thus, as she said would be the case, after a course of it I
+conceived the greatest dislike, which I may add has never
+entirely left me, of any form of meat, also of alcohol. All I
+seemed to want was this water with fruit, or such native
+vegetables as there were. Bickley disapproved and made me eat
+fish occasionally, but even this revolted me, and since I gained
+steadily in weight, as we found out by a simple contrivance, and
+remained healthy in every other way, soon he allowed me to choose
+my own diet.
+
+About this time Oro began to pay me frequent visits. He always
+came at night, and what is more I knew when he was coming,
+although he never gave me warning. Here I should explain that
+during my illness Bastin, who was so ingenious in such matters,
+had built another hut in which he and Bickley slept, of course
+when they were not watching me, leaving our old bed-chamber to
+myself.
+
+Well, I would wake up and be aware that Oro was coming. Then he
+appeared in a silent and mysterious way, as though he had
+materialised in the room, for I never saw him pass the doorway.
+In the moonlight, or the starlight, which flowed through the
+entrance and the side of the hut that was only enclosed with
+latticework, I perceived him seat himself upon a certain stool,
+looking like a most majestic ghost with his flowing robes, long
+white beard, hooked nose and hawk eyes. In the day-time he much
+resembled the late General Booth whom I had often seen, except
+for certain added qualities of height and classic beauty of
+countenance. At night, however, he resembled no one but himself,
+indeed there was something mighty and godlike in his appearance,
+something that made one feel that he was not as are other men.
+
+For a while he would sit and look at me. Then he began to speak
+in a low, vibrant voice. What did he speak of? Well, many
+matters. It was as though he were unburdening that hoary soul of
+his because it could no longer endure the grandeur of its own
+loneliness. Amongst sundry secret things, he told me of the past
+history of this world of ours, and of the mighty civilisations
+which for uncounted ages he and his forefathers had ruled by the
+strength of their will and knowledge, of the dwindling of their
+race and of the final destruction of its enemies, although I
+noticed that now he no longer said that this was his work alone.
+One night I asked him if he did not miss all such pomp and power.
+
+Then suddenly he broke out, and for the first time I really
+learned what ambition can be when it utterly possesses the soul
+of man.
+
+"Are you mad," he asked, "that you suppose that I, Oro, the
+King of kings, can be content to dwell solitary in a great cave
+with none but the shadows of the dead to serve me? Nay, I must
+rule again and be even greater than before, or else I too will
+die. Better to face the future, even if it means oblivion, than
+to remain thus a relic of a glorious past, still living and yet
+dead, like that statue of the great god Fate which you saw in the
+temple of my worship."
+
+"Bastin does not think that the future means oblivion," I
+remarked.
+
+"I know it. I have studied his faith and find it too humble for
+my taste, also too new. Shall I, Oro, creep a suppliant before
+any Power, and confess what Bastin is pleased to call my sins?
+Nay, I who am great will be the equal of all greatness, or
+nothing."
+
+He paused a while, then went on:
+
+"Bastin speaks of 'eternity.' Where and what then is this
+eternity which if it has no end can have had no beginning? I know
+the secret of the suns and their attendant worlds, and they are
+no more eternal than the insect which glitters for an hour. Out
+of shapeless, rushing gases they gathered to live their day, and
+into gases at last they dissolve again with all they bore."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "but they reform into new worlds."
+
+"That have no part with the old. This world, too, will melt,
+departing to whence it came, as your sacred writings say, and
+what then of those who dwelt and dwell thereon? No, Man of
+today, give me Time in which I rule and keep your dreams of an
+Eternity that is not, and in which you must still crawl and
+serve, even if it were. Yet, if I might, I confess it, I would
+live on for ever, but as Master not as Slave."
+
+
+On another night he began to tempt me, very subtly. "I see a
+spark of greatness in you, Humphrey," he said, "and it comes into
+my heart that you, too, might learn to rule. With Yva, the last
+of my blood, it is otherwise. She is the child of my age and of a
+race outworn; too gentle, too much all womanly. The soul that
+triumphs must shine like steel in the sun, and cut if need be;
+not merely be beauteous and shed perfume like a lily in the
+shade. Yet she is very wise and fair," here he looked at me,
+"perchance of her might come children such as were their
+forefathers, who again would wield the sceptre of the dominion of
+the earth."
+
+I made no answer, wondering what he meant exactly and thinking
+it wisest to be silent.
+
+"You are of the short-lived races," he went on, "yet very much
+a man, not without intelligence, and by the arts I have I can so
+strengthen your frame that it will endure the shocks of time for
+three such lives as yours, or perchance for more, and then--"
+
+Again he paused and went on:
+
+"The Daughter of kings likes you also, perhaps because you
+resemble--" here he fixed me with his piercing eyes, "a certain
+kinglet of base blood whom once she also liked, but whom it was
+my duty to destroy. Well, I must think. I must study this world
+of yours also and therein you may help me. Perhaps afterwards I
+will tell you how. Now sleep."
+
+In another moment he was gone, but notwithstanding his powerful
+command, for a while I could not sleep. I understood that he was
+offering Yva to me, but upon what terms? That was the question.
+With her was to go great dominion over the kingdoms of the earth.
+I could not help remembering that always this has been and still
+is Satan's favourite bait. To me it did not particularly appeal.
+I had been ambitious in my time--who is not that is worth his
+salt? I could have wished to excel in something, literature or
+art, or whatever it might be, and thus to ensure the memory of my
+name in the world.
+
+Of course this is a most futile desire, seeing that soon or
+late every name must fade out of the world like an unfixed
+photograph which is exposed to the sun. Even if it could endure,
+as the old demigod, or demidevil, Oro, had pointed out, very
+shortly, by comparison with Time's unmeasured vastness, the whole
+solar system will also fade. So of what use is this feeble love
+of fame and this vain attempt to be remembered that animates us
+so strongly? Moreover, the idea of enjoying mere temporal as
+opposed to intellectual power, appealed to me not at all. I am a
+student of history and I know what has been the lot of kings and
+the evil that, often enough, they work in their little day.
+
+Also if I needed any further example, there was that of Oro
+himself. He had outlived the greatness of his House, as a royal
+family is called, and after some gigantic murder, if his own
+story was to be believed, indulged in a prolonged sleep. Now he
+awoke to find himself quite alone in the world, save for a
+daughter with whom he did not agree or sympathise. In short, he
+was but a kind of animated mummy inspired by one idea which I
+felt quite sure would be disappointed, namely, to renew his
+former greatness. To me he seemed as miserable a figure as one
+could imagine, brooding and plotting in his illuminated cave, at
+the end of an extended but misspent life.
+
+Also I wondered what he, or rather his ego, had been doing
+during all those two hundred and fifty thousand years of sleep.
+Possibly if Yva's theory, as I understood it, were correct, he
+had reincarnated as Attila, or Tamerlane, or Napoleon, or even as
+Chaka the terrible Zulu king. At any rate there he was still in
+the world, filled with the dread of death, but consumed now as
+ever by his insatiable and most useless finite ambitions.
+
+Yva, also! Her case was his, but yet how different. In all this
+long night of Time she had but ripened into one of the sweetest
+and most gentle women that ever the world bore. She, too, was
+great in her way, it appeared in her every word and gesture, but
+where was the ferocity of her father? Where his desire to reach
+to splendour by treading on a blood-stained road paved with
+broken human hearts? It did not exist. Her nature was different
+although her body came of a long line of these power-loving
+kings. Why this profound difference of the spirit? Like
+everything else it was a mystery. The two were as far apart as
+the Poles. Everyone must have hated Oro, from the beginning,
+however much he feared him, but everyone who came in touch with
+her must have loved Yva.
+
+
+Here I may break into my personal narrative to say that this,
+by their own confession, proved to be true of two such various
+persons as Bastin and Bickley.
+
+"The truth, which I am sure it would be wrong to hide from you,
+Arbuthnot," said the former to me one day, "is that during your
+long illness I fell in love, I suppose that is the right word,
+with the Glittering Lady. After thinking the matter over also, I
+conceived that it would be proper to tell her so if only to clear
+the air and prevent future misunderstandings. As I remarked to
+her on that occasion, I had hesitated long, as I was not certain
+how she would fill the place of the wife of the incumbent of an
+English parish."
+
+"Mothers' Meetings, and the rest," I suggested.
+
+"Exactly so, Arbuthnot. Also there were the views of the Bishop
+to be considered, who might have objected to the introduction
+into the diocese of a striking person who so recently had been a
+heathen, and to one in such strong contrast to my late beloved
+wife."
+
+"I suppose you didn't consider the late Mrs. Bastin's views on
+the subject of re-marriage. I remember that they were strong," I
+remarked rather maliciously.
+
+"No, I did not think it necessary, since the Scriptural
+instructions on the matter are very clear, and in another world
+no doubt all jealousies, even Sarah's, will be obliterated. Upon
+that point my conscience was quite easy. So when I found that,
+unlike her parent, the Lady Yva was much inclined to accept the
+principles of the faith in which it is my privilege to instruct
+her, I thought it proper to say to her that if ultimately she
+made up her mind to do so--of course this was a sine qua non--I
+should be much honoured, and as a man, not as a priest, it would
+make me most happy if she would take me as a husband. Of course I
+explained to her that I considered, under the circumstances, I
+could quite lawfully perform the marriage ceremony myself with
+you and Bickley as witnesses, even should Oro refuse to give her
+away. Also I told her that although after her varied experiences
+in the past, life at Fulcombe, if we could ever get there, might
+be a little monotonous, still it would not be entirely devoid of
+interest."
+
+"You mean Christmas decorations and that sort of thing?"
+
+"Yes, and choir treats and entertaining Deputations and
+attending other Church activities."
+
+"Well, and what did she say, Bastin?"
+
+"Oh! she was most kind and flattering. Indeed that hour will
+always remain the pleasantest of my life. I don't know how it
+happened, but when it was over I felt quite delighted that she
+had refused me. Indeed on second thoughts, I am not certain but
+that I shall be much happier in the capacities of a brother and
+teacher which she asked me to fill, than I should have been as
+her husband. To tell you the truth, Arbuthnot, there are moments
+when I am not sure whether I entirely understand the Lady Yva. It
+was rather like proposing to one's guardian angel."
+
+"Yes," I said, "that's about it, old fellow. 'Guardian Angel'
+is not a bad name for her."
+
+Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
+
+"Look here, Arbuthnot," he said. "I want to own up to
+something. I think I ought to, because of certain things I have
+observed, in order to prevent possible future misunderstandings."
+
+"What's that?" I asked innocently.
+
+"Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed
+bachelor on principle. Women introduce too many complications
+into life, and although it involves some sacrifice, on the whole,
+I have thought it best to do without them and leave the carrying
+on of the world to others."
+
+"Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley."
+
+"Only this. While you were ill the sweetness of that Lady Yva
+and her wonderful qualities as a nurse overcame me. I went to
+pieces all of a sudden. I saw in her a realisation of every ideal
+I had ever entertained of perfect womanhood. So to speak, my
+resolves of a lifetime melted like wax in the sun.
+Notwithstanding her queer history and the marvels with which she
+is mixed up, I wished to marry her. No doubt her physical
+loveliness was at the bottom of it, but, however that may be,
+there it was."
+
+"She is beautiful," I commented; "though I daresay older than
+she looks."
+
+"That is a point on which I made no inquiries, and I should
+advise you, when your turn comes, as no doubt it will, to follow
+my example. You know, Arbuthnot," he mused, "however lovely a
+woman may be, it would put one off if suddenly she announced that
+she was--let us say--a hundred and fifty years old."
+
+"Yes," I admitted, "for nobody wants to marry the contemporary
+of his great-grandmother. However, she gave her age as twenty-
+seven years and three moons."
+
+"And doubtless for once did not tell the truth. But, as she
+does not look more than twenty-five, I think that we may all
+agree to let it stand at that, namely, twenty-seven, plus an
+indefinite period of sleep. At any rate, she is a sweet and most
+gracious woman, apparently in the bloom of youth, and, to cut it
+short, I fell in love with her."
+
+"Like Bastin," I said.
+
+"Bastin!" exclaimed Bickley indignantly. "You don't mean to say
+that clerical oaf presumed--well, well, after all, I suppose that
+he is a man, so one mustn't be hard on him. But who could have
+thought that he would run so cunning, even when he knew my
+sentiments towards the lady? I hope she told him her mind."
+
+"The point is, what did she tell you, Bickley?"
+
+"Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure
+to be refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one's ease."
+(Here, remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to
+hide a smile.) "She said--what did she say exactly? Such a lot
+that it is difficult to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking
+of marriage. Also, that she had not yet recovered from some
+recent love affair which left her heart sore, since the time of
+her sleep did not count. Also, that her father would never
+consent, and that the mere idea of such a thing would excite his
+animosity against all of us."
+
+"Is that all?" I asked.
+
+"Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and
+extremely honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her.
+She hoped, however, that I should never repeat it or even allude
+to the matter again, as her dearest wish was to be able to look
+upon me as her most intimate friend to whom she could always come
+for sympathy and counsel."
+
+"What happened then?"
+
+"Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she
+wished, and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore
+and upset, but I am getting over it, having always practised
+self-control."
+
+"I am sorry for you, old fellow."
+
+"Are you?" he asked suspiciously. "Then perhaps you have tried
+your luck, too?"
+
+"No, Bickley."
+
+His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
+
+"Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing
+how lately you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin.
+Perhaps you will get over it--recent marriage, I mean--as he
+has." He hesitated a while, then went on: "Of course you will,
+old fellow; I know it, and, what is more, I seem to know that
+when your turn comes you will get a different answer. If so, it
+will keep her in the family as it were--and good luck to you.
+Only--"
+
+"Only what?" I asked anxiously.
+
+"To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don't think that there will be real
+good luck for any one of us over this woman--not in the ordinary
+sense, I mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman.
+Is she quite a woman, and could she really marry a man as others
+do?"
+
+"It is curious that you should talk like that," I said
+uneasily. "I thought that you had made up your mind that the
+whole business was either illusion or trickery--I mean, the odd
+side of it."
+
+"If it is illusion, Arbuthnot, then a man cannot marry an
+illusion. And if it is trickery, then he will certainly be
+tricked. But, supposing that I am wrong, what then?"
+
+"You mean, supposing things are as they seem to be?"
+
+"Yes. In that event, Arbuthnot, I am sure that something will
+occur to prevent your being united to a woman who lived thousands
+of years ago. I am sorry to say it, but Fate will intervene.
+Remember, it is the god of her people that I suppose she
+worships, and, I may add, to which the whole world bows."
+
+At his words a kind of chill fell upon me. I think he saw or
+divined it, for after a few remarks upon some indifferent matter,
+he turned and went away.
+
+Shortly after this Yva came to sit with me. She studied me for
+a while and I studied her. I had reason to do so, for I observed
+that of late her dress had become much more modern, and on the
+present occasion this struck me forcibly. I do not know exactly
+in what the change, or changes, consisted, because I am not
+skilled in such matters and can only judge of a woman's garments
+by their general effect. At any rate, the gorgeous sweeping robes
+were gone, and though her attire still looked foreign and
+somewhat oriental, with a touch of barbaric splendour about it--
+it was simpler than it had been and showed more of her figure,
+which was delicate, yet gracious.
+
+"You have changed your robes, Lady," I said. "Yes, Humphrey.
+Bastin gave me pictures of those your women wear." (On further
+investigation I found that this referred to an old copy of the
+Queen newspaper, which, somehow or other, had been brought with
+the books from the ship.) "I have tried to copy them a little,"
+she added doubtfully.
+
+"How do you do it? Where do you get the material?" I asked.
+
+"Oh!" she answered with an airy wave of her hand, "I make it--
+it is there."
+
+"I don't understand," I said, but she only smiled radiantly,
+offering no further explanation. Then, before I could pursue the
+subject, she asked me suddenly:
+
+"What has Bickley been saying to you about me?" I fenced,
+answering: "I don't know. Bastin and Bickley talk of little else.
+You seem to have been a great deal with them while I was ill."
+
+"Yes, a great deal. They are the nearest to you who were so
+sick. Is it not so?"
+
+"I don't know," I answered again. "In my illness it seemed to
+me that you were the nearest."
+
+"About Bastin's words I can guess," she went on. "But I ask
+again--what has Bickley been saying to you about me? Of the first
+part, let it be; tell me the rest."
+
+I intended to evade her question, but she fixed those violet,
+compelling eyes upon me and I was obliged to answer.
+
+"I believe you know as well as I do," I said; "but if you will
+have it, it was that you are not as other human women are, and
+that he who would treat you as such, must suffer; that was the
+gist of it."
+
+"Some might be content to suffer for such as I," she answered
+with quiet sweetness. "Even Bastin and Bickley may be content to
+suffer in their own little ways."
+
+"You know that is not what I meant," I interrupted angrily, for
+I felt that she was throwing reflections on me.
+
+"No; you meant that you agreed with Bickley that I am not quite
+a woman, as you know women."
+
+I was silent, for her words were true.
+
+Then she blazed out into one of her flashes of splendour, like
+something that takes fire on an instant; like the faint and
+distant star which flames into sudden glory before the watcher's
+telescope.
+
+"It is true that I am not as your women are--your poor, pale
+women, the shadows of an hour with night behind them and before.
+Because I am humble and patient, do you therefore suppose that I
+am not great? Man from the little country across the sea, I lived
+when the world was young, and gathered up the ancient wisdom of a
+greater race than yours, and when the world is old I think that I
+still shall live, though not in this shape or here, with all that
+wisdom's essence burning in my breast, and with all beauty in my
+eyes. Bickley does not believe although he worships. You only
+half believe and do not worship, because memory holds you back,
+and I myself do not understand. I only know though knowing so
+much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble road called
+Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an immortal
+city."
+
+"Nor do I understand how all this can be, Yva," I said feebly,
+for she dazzled and overwhelmed me with her blaze of power.
+
+"No, you do not understand. How can you, when even I cannot?
+Thus for two hundred and fifty thousand years I slept, and they
+went by as a lightning flash. One moment my father gave me the
+draught and I laid me down, the next I awoke with you bending
+over me, or so it seemed. Yet where was I through all those
+centuries when for me time had ceased? Tell me, Humphrey, did you
+dream at all while you were ill? I ask because down in that
+lonely cavern where I sleep a strange dream came to me one night.
+It was of a journey which, as I thought, you and I seemed to make
+together, past suns and universes to a very distant earth. It
+meant nothing, Humphrey. If you and I chanced to have dreamed the
+same thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is
+most common, or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I
+am not altogether as your women are, and I can bring no happiness
+to any man, or at the least, to one who cannot wait. Therefore,
+perhaps you would do well to think less of me, as I have
+counselled Bastin and Bickley."
+
+Then again she gazed at me with her wonderful, great eyes, and,
+shaking her glittering head a little, smiled and went.
+
+But oh! that smile drew my heart after her.
+
+
+
+Chapter XX
+
+Oro and Arbuthnot Travel by Night
+
+
+As time went on, Oro began to visit me more and more
+frequently, till at last scarcely a night went by that he did not
+appear mysteriously in my sleeping-place. The odd thing was that
+neither Bickley nor Bastin seemed to be aware of these nocturnal
+calls. Indeed, when I mentioned them on one or two occasions,
+they stared at me and said it was strange that he should have
+come and gone as they saw nothing of him.
+
+On my speaking again of the matter, Bickley at once turned the
+conversation, from which I gathered that he believed me to be
+suffering from delusions consequent on my illness, or perhaps to
+have taken to dreaming. This was not wonderful since, as I
+learned afterwards, Bickley, after he was sure that I was asleep,
+made a practice of tying a thread across my doorway and of
+ascertaining at the dawn that it remained unbroken. But Oro was
+not to be caught in that way. I suppose, as it was impossible for
+him to pass through the latticework of the open side of the
+house, that he undid the thread and fastened it again when he
+left; at least, that was Bastin's explanation, or, rather, one of
+them. Another was that he crawled beneath it, but this I could
+not believe. I am quite certain that during all his prolonged
+existence Oro never crawled.
+
+At any rate, he came, or seemed to come, and pumped me--I can
+use no other word--most energetically as to existing conditions
+in the world, especially those of the civilised countries, their
+methods of government, their social state, the physical
+characteristics of the various races, their religions, the exact
+degrees of civilisation that they had developed, their
+attainments in art, science and literature, their martial
+capacities, their laws, and I know not what besides.
+
+I told him all I could, but did not in the least seem to
+satisfy his perennial thirst for information.
+
+"I should prefer to judge for myself," he said at last. "Why
+are you so anxious to learn about all these nations, Oro?" I
+asked, exhausted.
+
+"Because the knowledge I gather may affect my plans for the
+future," he replied darkly.
+
+"I am told, Oro, that your people acquired the power of
+transporting themselves from place to place."
+
+"It is true that the lords of the Sons of Wisdom had such
+power, and that I have it still, O Humphrey."
+
+"Then why do you not go to look with your own eyes?" I
+suggested.
+
+"Because I should need a guide; one who could explain much in a
+short time," he said, contemplating me with his burning glance
+until I began to feel uncomfortable.
+
+To change the subject I asked him whether he had any further
+information about the war, which he had told me was raging in
+Europe.
+
+He answered: "Not much; only that it was going on with varying
+success, and would continue to do so until the nations involved
+therein were exhausted," or so he believed. The war did not seem
+greatly to interest Oro. It was, he remarked, but a small affair
+compared to those which he had known in the old days. Then he
+departed, and I went to sleep.
+
+Next night he appeared again, and, after talking a little on
+different subjects, remarked quietly that he had been thinking
+over what I had said as to his visiting the modern world, and
+intended to act upon the suggestion.
+
+"When?" I asked.
+
+"Now," he said. "I am going to visit this England of yours and
+the town you call London, and you will accompany me."
+
+"It is not possible!" I exclaimed. "We have no ship."
+
+"We can travel without a ship," said Oro.
+
+I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a
+much better companion than I should in my present weak state.
+
+"An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues,
+would be useless," he replied sharply. "You shall come and you
+only."
+
+I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly--which, indeed, I did
+do, in another sense.
+
+But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand
+to and fro above my head.
+
+My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
+
+
+They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog,
+which I knew could belong to one place only--London, in December,
+and at my side was Oro.
+
+"Is this the climate of your wonderful city?" he asked, or
+seemed to ask, in an aggrieved tone.
+
+I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and
+began to look about me.
+
+Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of
+buildings, looking dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I
+recognised the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, for
+both could be seen from where we stood in front of the
+Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their identity to Oro.
+
+"Good," he said. "Let us enter your Place of Talk."
+
+"But I am not a member, and we have no passes for the
+Strangers' Gallery," I expostulated.
+
+"We shall not need any," he replied contemptuously. "Lead on."
+
+Thus adjured, I crossed the road, Oro following me. Looking
+round, to my horror I saw him right in the path of a motor-bus
+which seemed to go over him.
+
+"There's an end to Oro," thought I to myself. "Well, at any
+rate, I have got home."
+
+Next instant he was at my side quite undisturbed by the
+incident of the bus. We came to a policeman at the door and I
+hesitated, expecting to be challenged. But the policeman seemed
+absolutely indifferent to our presence, even when Oro marched
+past him in his flowing robes. So I followed with a like success.
+Then I understood that we must be invisible.
+
+We passed to the lobby, where members were hurrying to and fro,
+and constituents and pressmen were gathered, and so on into the
+House. Oro walked up its floor and took his stand by the table,
+in front of the Speaker. I followed him, none saying us No.
+
+As it chanced there was what is called a scene in progress--I
+think it was over Irish matters; the details are of no account.
+Members shouted, Ministers prevaricated and grew angry, the
+Speaker intervened. On the whole, it was rather a degrading
+spectacle. I stood, or seemed to stand, and watched it all. Oro,
+in his sweeping robes, which looked so incongruous in that place,
+stepped, or seemed to step, up to the principal personages of the
+Government and Opposition, whom I indicated to him, and inspected
+them one by one, as a naturalist might examine strange insects.
+Then, returning to me, he said:
+
+"Come away; I have seen and heard enough. Who would have
+thought that this nation of yours was struggling for its life in
+war?"
+
+We passed out of the House and somehow came to Trafalgar
+Square. A meeting was in progress there, convened, apparently, to
+advocate the rights of Labour, also those of women, also to
+protest against things in general, especially the threat of
+Conscription in the service of the country.
+
+Here the noise was tremendous, and, the fog having lifted
+somewhat, we could see everything. Speakers bawled from the base
+of Nelson's column. Their supporters cheered, their adversaries
+rushed at them, and in one or two instances succeeded in pulling
+them down. A woman climbed up and began to scream out something
+which could only be heard by a few reporters gathered round her.
+I thought her an unpleasant-looking person, and evidently her
+remarks were not palatable to the majority of her auditors. There
+was a rush, and she was dragged from the base of one of
+Landseer's lions on which she stood. Her skirt was half rent off
+her and her bodice split down the back. Finally, she was conveyed
+away, kicking, biting, and scratching, by a number of police. It
+was a disgusting sight, and tumult ensued.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "Your officers of order are good; the
+rest is not good."
+
+Later we found ourselves opposite to the doors of a famous
+restaurant where a magnificent and gigantic commissionaire helped
+ladies from motor-cars, receiving in return money from the men
+who attended on them. We entered; it was the hour of dinner. The
+place sparkled with gems, and the naked backs of the women
+gleamed in the electric light. Course followed upon course;
+champagne flowed, a fine band played, everything was costly;
+everything was, in a sense, repellent.
+
+"These are the wealthy citizens of a nation engaged in fighting
+for its life," remarked Oro to me, stroking his long beard. "It
+is interesting, very interesting. Let us go."
+
+We went out and on, passing a public-house crowded with women
+who had left their babies in charge of children in the icy
+street. It was a day of Intercession for the success of England
+in the war. This was placarded everywhere. We entered, or,
+rather, Oro did, I following him, one of the churches in the
+Strand where an evening service was in progress. The preacher in
+the pulpit, a very able man, was holding forth upon the necessity
+for national repentance and self-denial; also of prayer. In the
+body of the church exactly thirty-two people, most of them
+elderly women, were listening to him with an air of placid
+acceptance.
+
+"The priest talks well, but his hearers are not many," said Oro.
+"Let us go."
+
+We came to the flaunting doors of a great music-hall and passed
+through them, though to others this would have been impossible,
+for the place was filled from floor to roof. In its promenades
+men were drinking and smoking, while gaudy women, painted and
+low-robed, leered at them. On the stage girls danced, throwing
+their legs above their heads. Then they vanished amidst applause,
+and a woman in a yellow robe, who pretended to be tipsy, sang a
+horrible and vulgar song full of topical allusions, which was
+received with screams of delight by the enormous audience.
+
+"Here the hearers are very many, but those to whom they listen
+do not talk well. Let us go," said Oro, and we went.
+
+At a recruiting station we paused a moment to consider posters
+supposed to be attractive, the very sight of which sent a thrill
+of shame through me. I remember that the inscription under one of
+them was: "What will your best girl say?"
+
+"Is that how you gather your soldiers? Later it will be
+otherwise," said Oro, and passed on.
+
+We reached Blackfriars and entered a hall at the doors of which
+stood women in poke-bonnets, very sweet-faced, earnest-looking
+women. Their countenances seemed to strike Oro, and he motioned
+me to follow him into the hall. It was quite full of a miserable-
+looking congregation of perhaps a thousand people. A man in the
+blue and red uniform of the Salvation Army was preaching of duty
+to God and country, of self-denial, hope and forgiveness. He
+seemed a humble person, but his words were earnest, and love
+flowed from him. Some of his miserable congregation wept, others
+stared at him open-mouthed, a few, who were very weary, slept. He
+called them up to receive pardon, and a number, led by the sweet-
+faced women, came and knelt before him. He and others whispered
+to them, then seemed to bless them, and they rose with their
+faces changed.
+
+"Let us go," said Oro. "I do not understand these rites, but at
+last in your great and wonderful city I have seen something that
+is pure and noble."
+
+We went out. In the streets there was great excitement. People
+ran to and fro pointing upwards. Searchlights, like huge fingers
+of flame, stole across the sky; guns boomed. At last, in the
+glare of a searchlight, we saw a long and sinister object
+floating high above us and gleaming as though it were made of
+silver. Flashes came from it followed by terrible booming reports
+that grew nearer and nearer. A house collapsed with a crash just
+behind us.
+
+"Ah!" said Oro, with a smile. "I know this--it is war, war as
+it was when the world was different and yet the same."
+
+As he spoke, a motor-bus rumbled past. Another flash and
+explosion. A man, walking with his arms round the waist of a girl
+just ahead of us; seemed to be tossed up and to melt. The girl
+fell in a heap on the pavement; somehow her head and her feet had
+come quite close together and yet she appeared to be sitting
+down. The motor-bus burst into fragments and its passengers
+hurtled through the air, mere hideous lumps that had been men and
+women. The head of one of them came dancing down the pavement
+towards us, a cigar still stuck in the corner of its mouth.
+
+"Yes, this is war," said Oro. "It makes me young again to see
+it. But does this city of yours understand?"
+
+We watched a while. A crowd gathered. Policemen ran up,
+ambulances came. The place was cleared, and all that was left
+they carried away. A few minutes later another man passed by with
+his arm round the waist of another girl. Another motor-bus
+rumbled up, and, avoiding the hole in the roadway, travelled on,
+its conductor keeping a keen look-out for fares.
+
+The street was cleared by the police; the airship continued its
+course, spawning bombs in the distance, and vanished. The
+incident was closed.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I have seen enough of your great
+and wonderful city. I would rest in the quiet of Nyo and think."
+
+The next thing that I remember was the voice of Bastin, saying:
+
+"If you don't mind, Arbuthnot, I wish that you would get up.
+The Glittering Lady (he still called her that) is coming here to
+have a talk with me which I should prefer to be private. Excuse
+me for disturbing you, but you have overslept yourself; indeed, I
+think it must be nine o'clock, so far as I can judge by the sun,
+for my watch is very erratic now, ever since Bickley tried to
+clean it."
+
+"I am sorry, my dear fellow," I said sleepily, "but do you know
+I thought I was in London--in fact, I could swear that I have
+been there."
+
+"Then," interrupted Bickley, who had followed Bastin into the
+hut, giving me that doubtful glance with which I was now
+familiar, "I wish to goodness that you had brought back an
+evening paper with you."
+
+A night or two later I was again suddenly awakened to feel that
+Oro was approaching. He appeared like a ghost in the bright
+moonlight, greeted me, and said:
+
+"Tonight, Humphrey, we must make another journey. I would visit
+the seat of the war."
+
+"I do not wish to go," I said feebly.
+
+"What you wish does not matter," he replied. "I wish that you
+should go, and therefore you must."
+
+"Listen, Oro," I exclaimed. "I do not like this business; it
+seems dangerous to me."
+
+"There is no danger if you are obedient, Humphrey."
+
+"I think there is. I do not understand what happens. Do you
+make use of what the Lady Yva called the Fourth Dimension, so
+that our bodies pass over the seas and through mountains, like
+the vibrations of our Wireless, of which I was speaking to you?"
+
+"No, Humphrey. That method is good and easy, but I do not use
+it because if I did we should be visible in the places which we
+visit, since there all the atoms that make a man would collect
+together again and be a man."
+
+"What, then, do you do?" I asked, exasperated.
+
+"Man, Humphrey, is not one; he is many. Thus, amongst other
+things he has a Double, which can see and hear, as he can in the
+flesh, if it is separated from the flesh."
+
+"The old Egyptians believed that," I said.
+
+"Did they? Doubtless they inherited the knowledge from us, the
+Sons of Wisdom. The cup of our learning was so full that, keep it
+secret as we would, from time to time some of it overflowed among
+the vulgar, and doubtless thus the light of our knowledge still
+burns feebly in the world."
+
+I reflected to myself that whatever might be their other
+characteristics, the Sons of Wisdom had lost that of modesty, but
+I only asked how he used his Double, supposing that it existed.
+
+"Very easily," he answered. "In sleep it can be drawn from the
+body and sent upon its mission by one that is its master."
+
+"Then while you were asleep for all those thousands of years
+your Double must have made many journeys."
+
+"Perhaps," he replied quietly, "and my spirit also, which is
+another part of me that may have dwelt in the bodies of other
+men. But unhappily, if so I forget, and that is why I have so
+much to learn and must even make use of such poor instruments as
+you, Humphrey."
+
+"Then if I sleep and you distil my Double out of me, I suppose
+that you sleep too. In that case who distils your Double out of
+you, Lord Oro?"
+
+He grew angry and answered:
+
+"Ask no more questions, blind and ignorant as you are. It is
+your part not to examine, but to obey. Sleep now," and again he
+waved his hand over me.
+
+
+In an instant, as it seemed, we were standing in a grey old
+town that I judged from its appearance must be either in northern
+France or Belgium. It was much shattered by bombardment; the
+church, for instance, was a ruin; also many of the houses had
+been burnt. Now, however, no firing was going on for the town had
+been taken. The streets were full of armed men wearing the German
+uniform and helmet. We passed down them and were able to see into
+the houses. In some of these were German soldiers engaged in
+looting and in other things so horrible that even the unmoved Oro
+turned away his head.
+
+We came to the market-place. It was crowded with German troops,
+also with a great number of the inhabitants of the town, most of
+them elderly men and women with children, who had fallen into
+their power. The Germans, under the command of officers, were
+dragging the men from the arms of their wives and children to one
+side, and with rifle-butts beating back the screaming women. Among
+the men I noticed two or three priests who were doing their best
+to soothe their companions and even giving them absolution in
+hurried whispers.
+
+At length the separation was effected, whereon at a hoarse word
+of command, a company of soldiers began to fire at the men and
+continued doing so until all had fallen. Then petty officers went
+among the slaughtered and with pistols blew out the brains of any
+who still moved.
+
+"These butchers, you say, are Germans?" asked Oro of me.
+
+"Yes," I answered, sick with horror, for though I was in the
+mind and not in the body, I could feel as the mind does. Had I
+been in the body also, I should have fainted.
+
+"Then we need not waste time in visiting their country. It is
+enough; let us go on."
+
+We passed out into the open land and came to a village. It was
+in the occupation of German cavalry. Two of them held a little
+girl of nine or ten, one by her body, the other by her right
+hand. An officer stood between them with a drawn sword fronting
+the terrified child. He was a horrible, coarse-faced man who
+looked to me as though he had been drinking.
+
+"I'll teach the young devil to show us the wrong road and let
+those French swine escape," he shouted, and struck with the
+sword. The girl's right hand fell to the ground.
+
+"War as practised by the Germans!" remarked Oro. Then he
+stepped, or seemed to step up to the man and whispered, or seemed
+to whisper, in his ear.
+
+I do not know what tongue or what spirit speech he used, or
+what he said, but the bloated-faced brute turned pale. Yes, he
+drew sick with fear.
+
+"I think there are spirits in this place," he said with a
+German oath. "I could have sworn that something told me that I
+was going to die. Mount!"
+
+The Uhlans mounted and began to ride away.
+
+"Watch," said Oro.
+
+As he spoke out of a dark cloud appeared an aeroplane. Its
+pilot saw the band of Germans beneath and dropped a bomb. The aim
+was good, for the missile exploded in the midst of them, causing
+a great cloud of dust from which arose the screams of men and
+horses.
+
+"Come and see," said Oro.
+
+We were there. Out of the cloud of dust appeared one man
+galloping furiously. He was a young fellow who, as I noted, had
+turned his head away and hidden his eyes with his hand when the
+horror was done yonder. All the others were dead except the
+officer who had worked the deed. He was still living, but both
+his hands and one of his feet had been blown away. Presently he
+died, screaming to God for mercy.
+
+We passed on and came to a barn with wide doors that swung a
+little in the wind, causing the rusted hinges to scream like a
+creature in pain. On each of these doors hung a dead man
+crucified. The hat of one of them lay upon the ground, and I knew
+from the shape of it that he was a Colonial soldier.
+
+"Did you not tell me," said Oro after surveying them, "that
+these Germans are of your Christian faith?"
+
+"Yes; and the Name of God is always on their ruler's lips."
+
+"Ah!" he said, "I am glad that I worship Fate. Bastin the
+priest need trouble me no more."
+
+"There is something behind Fate," I said, quoting Bastin
+himself.
+
+"Perhaps. So indeed I have always held, but after much study I
+cannot understand the manner of its working. Fate is enough for
+me."
+
+We went on and came to a flat country that was lined with
+ditches, all of them full of men, Germans on one side, English
+and French upon the other. A terrible bombardment shook the
+earth, the shells raining upon the ditches. Presently that from
+the English guns ceased and out of the trenches in front of them
+thousands of men were vomited, who ran forward through a hail of
+fire in which scores and hundreds fell, across an open piece of
+ground that was pitted with shell craters. They came to barbed
+wire defenses, or what remained of them, cut the wire with
+nippers and pulled up the posts. Then through the gaps they
+surged in, shouting and hurling hand grenades. They reached the
+German trenches, they leapt into them and from those holes arose
+a hellish din. Pistols were fired and everywhere bayonets
+flashed.
+
+Behind them rushed a horde of little, dark-skinned men, Indians
+who carried great knives in their hands. Those leapt over the
+first trench and running on with wild yells, dived into the
+second, those who were left of them, and there began hacking with
+their knives at the defenders and the soldiers who worked the
+spitting maxim guns. In twenty minutes it was over; those lines
+of trenches were taken, and once more from either side the guns
+began to boom.
+
+"War again," said Oro, "clean, honest war, such as the god I
+call Fate decrees for man. I have seen enough. Now I would visit
+those whom you call Turks. I understand they have another worship
+and perhaps they are nobler than these Christians."
+
+We came to a hilly country which I recognised as Armenia, for
+once I travelled there, and stopped on an seashore. Here were the
+Turks in thousands. They were engaged in driving before them mobs
+of men, women and children in countless numbers. On and on they
+drove them till they reached the shore. There they massacred them
+with bayonets, with bullets, or by drowning. I remember a
+dreadful scene of a poor woman standing up to her waist in the
+water. Three children were clinging to her--but I cannot go on,
+really I cannot go on. In the end a Turk waded out and bayoneted
+her while she strove to protect the last living child with her
+poor body whence it sprang.
+
+"These, I understand," said Oro, pointing to the Turkish
+soldiers, "worship a prophet who they say is the voice of God."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "and therefore they massacre these who are
+Christians because they worship God without a prophet."
+
+"And what do the Christians massacre each other for?"
+
+"Power and the wealth and territories that are power. That is,
+the King of the Germans wishes to rule the world, but the other
+Nations do not desire his dominion. Therefore they fight for
+Liberty and Justice."
+
+"As it was, so it is and shall be," remarked Oro, "only with
+this difference. In the old world some were wise, but here--" and
+he stopped, his eyes fixed upon the Armenian woman struggling in
+her death agony while the murderer drowned her child, then added:
+"Let us go."
+
+Our road ran across the sea. On it we saw a ship so large that
+it attracted Oro's attention, and for once he expressed
+astonishment.
+
+"In my day," he said, "we had no vessels of this greatness in
+the world. I wish to look upon it."
+
+We landed on the deck of the ship, or rather the floating
+palace, and examined her. She carried many passengers, some
+English, some American, and I pointed out to Oro the differences
+between the two peoples. These were not, he remarked, very wide
+except that the American women wore more jewels, also that some
+of the American men, to whom we listened as they conversed, spoke
+of the greatness of their country, whereas the Englishmen, if
+they said anything concerning it, belittled their country.
+
+Presently, on the surface of the sea at a little distance
+appeared something strange, a small and ominous object like a can
+on the top of a pole. A voice cried out "Submarine!" and everyone
+near rushed to look.
+
+"If those Germans try any of their monkey tricks on us, I guess
+the United States will give them hell," said another voice near
+by.
+
+Then from the direction of the pole with the tin can on the top
+of it, came something which caused a disturbance in the smooth
+water and bubbles to rise in its wake.
+
+"A torpedo!" cried some.
+
+"Shut your mouth," said the voice. "Who dare torpedo a vessel
+full of the citizens of the United States?"
+
+Next came a booming crash and a flood of upthrown water, in the
+wash of which that speaker was carried away into the deep. Then
+horror! horror! horror! indescribable, as the mighty vessel went
+wallowing to her doom. Boats launched; boats overset; boats
+dragged under by her rush through the water which could not be
+stayed. Maddened men and women running to and fro, their eyes
+starting from their heads, clasping children, fastening lifebelts
+over their costly gowns, or appearing from their cabins, their
+hands filled with jewels that they sought to save. Orders cried
+from high places by stern-faced officers doing their duty to the
+last. And a little way off that thin pole with a tin can on the
+top of it watching its work.
+
+Then the plunge of the enormous ship into the deep, its huge
+screws still whirling in the air and the boom of the bursting
+boilers. Lastly everything gone save a few boats floating on the
+quiet sea and around them dots that were the heads of struggling
+human beings.
+
+"Let us go home," said Oro. "I grow tired of this war of your
+Christian peoples. It is no better than that of the barbarian
+nations of the early world. Indeed it is worse, since then we
+worshipped Fate and but a few of us had wisdom. Now you all claim
+wisdom and declare that you worship a God of Mercy."
+
+
+With these words still ringing in my ears I woke up upon the
+Island of Orofena, filled with terror at the horrible
+possibilities of nightmare.
+
+What else could it be? There was the brown and ancient cone of
+the extinct volcano. There were the tall palms of the main island
+and the lake glittering in the sunlight between. There was Bastin
+conducting a kind of Sunday school of Orofenans upon the point of
+the Rock of Offerings, as now he had obtained the leave of Oro to
+do. There was the mouth of the cave, and issuing from it Bickley,
+who by help of one of the hurricane lamps had been making an
+examination of the buried remains of what he supposed to be
+flying machines. Without doubt it was nightmare, and I would say
+nothing to them about it for fear of mockery.
+
+Yet two nights later Oro came again and after the usual
+preliminaries, said:
+
+"Humphrey, this night we will visit that mighty American
+nation, of which you have told me so much, and the other Neutral
+Countries."
+
+
+[At this point there is a gap in Mr. Arbuthnot's M.S., so Oro's
+reflections on the Neutral Nations, if any, remain unrecorded. It
+continues:]
+
+
+On our homeward way we passed over Australia, making a detour
+to do so. Of the cities Oro took no account. He said that they
+were too large and too many, but the country interested him so
+much that I gathered he must have given great attention to
+agriculture at some time in the past. He pointed out to me that
+the climate was fine, and the land so fertile that with a proper
+system of irrigation and water-storage it could support tens of
+millions and feed not only itself but a great part of the
+outlying world.
+
+"But where are the people?" he asked. "Outside of those huge
+hives," and he indicated the great cities, "I see few of them,
+though doubtless some of the men are fighting in this war. Well,
+in the days to come this must be remedied."
+
+Over New Zealand, which he found beautiful, he shook his head
+for the same reason.
+
+On another night we visited the East. China with its teeming
+millions interested him extremely, partly because he declared
+these to be the descendants of one of the barbarian nations of
+his own day. He made a remark to the effect that this race had
+always possessed points and capacities, and that he thought that
+with proper government and instruction their Chinese offspring
+would be of use in a regenerated world.
+
+For the Japanese and all that they had done in two short
+generations, he went so far as to express real admiration, a very
+rare thing with Oro, who was by nature critical. I could see that
+mentally he put a white mark against their name.
+
+India, too, really moved him. He admired the ancient buildings
+at Delhi and Agra, especially the Taj Mahal. This, he declared,
+was reminiscent of some of the palaces that stood at Pani, the
+capital city of the Sons of Wisdom, before it was destroyed by
+the Barbarians.
+
+The English administration of the country also attracted a word
+of praise from him, I think because of its rather autocratic
+character. Indeed he went so far as to declare that, with certain
+modifications, it should be continued in the future, and even to
+intimate that he would bear the matter in mind. Democratic forms
+of government had no charms for Oro.
+
+Amongst other places, we stopped at Benares and watched the
+funeral rites in progress upon the banks of the holy Ganges. The
+bearers of the dead brought the body of a woman wrapped in a red
+shroud that glittered with tinsel ornaments. Coming forward at a
+run and chanting as they ran, they placed it upon the stones for
+a little while, then lifted it up again and carried it down the
+steps to the edge of the river. Here they took water and poured
+it over the corpse, thus performing the rite of the baptism of
+death. This done, they placed its feet in the water and left it
+looking very small and lonely. Presently appeared a tall,
+white-draped woman who took her stand by the body and wailed. It
+was the dead one's mother. Again the bearers approached and laid
+the corpse upon the flaming pyre.
+
+"These rites are ancient," said Oro. "When I ruled as King of
+the World they were practised in this very place. It is pleasant
+to me to find something that has survived the changefulness of
+Time. Let it continue till the end."
+
+
+Here I will cease. These experiences that I have recorded are
+but samples, for also we visited Russia and other countries.
+Perhaps, too, they were not experiences at all, but only dreams
+consequent on my state of health. I cannot say for certain,
+though much of what I seemed to see fitted in very well indeed
+with what I learned in after days, and certainly at the time they
+appeared as real as though Oro and I had stood together upon
+those various shores.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXI
+
+Love's Eternal Altar
+
+
+Now of all these happenings I said very little to Bastin and
+Bickley. The former would not have understood them, and the
+latter attributed what I did tell him to mental delusions
+following on my illness. To Yva I did speak about them, however,
+imploring her to explain their origin and to tell me whether or
+not they were but visions of the night.
+
+She listened to me, as I thought not without anxiety, from
+which I gathered that she too feared for my mind. It was not so,
+however, for she said:
+
+"I am glad, O Humphrey, that your journeyings are done, since
+such things are not without danger. He who travels far out of the
+body may chance to return there no more."
+
+"But were they journeyings, or dreams?" I asked.
+
+She evaded a direct answer.
+
+"I cannot say. My father has great powers. I do not know them
+all. It is possible that they were neither journeyings nor
+dreams. Mayhap he used you as the sorcerers in the old days used
+the magic glass, and after he had put his spell upon you, read in
+your mind that which passes elsewhere."
+
+I understood her to refer to what we call clairvoyance, when
+the person entranced reveals secret or distant things to the
+entrancer. This is a more or less established phenomenon and much
+less marvelous than the actual transportation of the spiritual
+self through space. Only I never knew of an instance in which the
+seer, on awaking, remembered the things that he had seen, as in
+my case. There, however, the matter rested, or rests, for I could
+extract nothing more from Yva, who appeared to me to have her
+orders on the point.
+
+Nor did Oro ever talk of what I had seemed to see in his
+company, although he continued from time to time to visit me at
+night. But now our conversation was of other matters. As Bastin
+had discovered, by some extraordinary gift he had soon learned
+how to read the English language, although he never spoke a
+single word in that tongue. Among our reference books that we
+brought from the yacht, was a thin paper edition of the
+Encyclopedia Britannica, which he borrowed when he discovered
+that it contained compressed information about the various
+countries of the world, also concerning almost every other
+matter. My belief is that within a month or so that marvelous
+old man not only read this stupendous work from end to end, but
+that he remembered everything of interest which it contained. At
+least, he would appear and show the fullest acquaintance with
+certain subjects or places, seeking further light from me
+concerning them, which very often I was quite unable to give him.
+
+An accident, as it chanced, whereof I need not set out the
+details, caused me to discover that his remarkable knowledge was
+limited. Thus, at one period, he knew little about any modern
+topic which began with a letter later in the alphabet than, let
+us say, C. A few days afterwards he was acquainted with those up
+to F, or G; and so on till he reached Z, when he appeared to me
+to know everything, and returned the book. Now, indeed, he was a
+monument of learning, very ancient and very new, and with some
+Encyclopedia-garnered facts or deductions of what had happened
+between.
+
+Moreover, he took to astronomical research, for more than once
+we saw him standing on the rock at night studying the heavens. On
+one of these occasions, when he had the two metal plates, of
+which I have spoken, in his hands, I ventured to approach and ask
+what he did. He replied that he was checking his calculations
+that he found to be quite correct, an exact period of two hundred
+and fifty thousand years having gone by since he laid himself
+down to sleep. Then, by aid of the plates, he pointed out to me
+certain alterations that had happened during that period in the
+positions of some of the stars.
+
+For instance, he showed me one which, by help of my glasses, I
+recognised as Sirius, and remarked that two hundred and fifty
+thousand years ago it was further away and much smaller. Now it
+was precisely in the place and of the size which he had
+predicted, and he pointed to it on his prophetic map. Again he
+indicated a star that the night-glass told me was Capella, which,
+I suppose, is one of the most brilliant stars in the sky, and
+showed me that on the map he had made two hundred and fifty
+thousand years ago, it did not exist, as then it was too far
+north to appear thereon. Still, he observed, the passage of this
+vast period of time had produced but little effect upon the face
+of the heavens. To the human eye the majority of the stars had
+not moved so very far.
+
+"And yet they travel fast, O Humphrey," he said. "Consider then
+how great is their journey between the time they gather and that
+day when, worn-out, once more they melt to vaporous gas. You
+think me long-lived who compared to them exist but a tiny
+fraction of a second, nearly all of which I have been doomed to
+pass in sleep. And, Humphrey, I desire to live--I, who have great
+plans and would shake the world. But my day draws in; a few brief
+centuries and I shall be gone, and--whither, whither?"
+
+"If you lived as long as those stars, the end would be the
+same, Oro."
+
+"Yes, but the life of the stars is very long, millions of
+millions of years; also, after death, they reform, as other
+stars. But shall I reform as another Oro? With all my wisdom, I
+do not know. It is known to Fate only--Fate-the master of worlds
+and men and the gods they worship--Fate, whom it may please to
+spill my gathered knowledge, to be lost in the sands of Time."
+
+"It seems that you are great," I said, "and have lived long and
+learned much. Yet the end of it is that your lot is neither worse
+nor better than that of us creatures of an hour."
+
+"It is so, Humphrey. Presently you will die, and within a few
+centuries I shall die also and be as you are. You believe that
+you will live again eternally. It may be so because you do
+believe, since Fate allows Faith to shape the future, if only for
+a little while. But in me Wisdom has destroyed Faith and
+therefore I must die. Even if I sleep again for tens of thousands
+of years, what will it help me, seeing that sleep is
+unconsciousness and that I shall only wake again to die, since
+sleep does not restore to us our youth?"
+
+He ceased, and walked up and down the rock with a troubled
+mien. Then he stood in front of me and said in a triumphant
+voice:
+
+"At least, while I live I will rule, and then let come what may
+come. I know that you do not believe, and the first victory of
+this new day of mine shall be to make you believe. I have great
+powers and you shall see them at work, and afterwards, if things
+go right, rule with me for a little while, perhaps, as the first
+of my subjects. Hearken now; in one small matter my calculations,
+made so long ago, have gone wrong. They showed me that at this
+time a day of earthquakes, such as those that again and again
+have rocked and split the world, would recur. But now it seems
+that there is an error, a tiny error of eleven hundred years,
+which must go by before those earthquakes come."
+
+"Are you sure," I suggested humbly, "that there is not also an
+error in those star-maps you hold?"
+
+"I am sure, Humphrey. Some day, who knows? You may return to
+your world of modern men who, I gather, have knowledge of the
+great science of astronomy. Take now these maps with which I have
+done, and submit them to the most learned of those men, and let
+them tell you whether I was right or wrong in what I wrote upon
+this metal two hundred and fifty thousand years ago. Whatever
+else is false, at least the stars in their motions can never
+die."
+
+Then he handed me the maps and was gone. I have them today, and
+if ever this book is published, they will appear with it, that
+those who are qualified may judge of them and of the truth or
+otherwise of Oro's words.
+
+From that night forward for quite a long time I saw Oro no
+more. Nor indeed did any of us, since for some reason of his own
+he forbade us to visit the under ground city of Nyo. Oddly
+enough, however, he commanded Yva to bring down the spaniel,
+Tommy, to be with him from time to time. When I asked her why,
+she said it was because he was lonely and desired the dog's
+companionship. It seemed to us very strange that this super-man,
+who had the wisdom of ten Solomons gathered in one within his
+breast, should yet desire the company of a little dog. What then
+was the worth of learning and long life, or, indeed, of anything?
+Well, Solomon himself asked the question ages since, and could
+give no answer save that all is vanity.
+
+I noted about this time that Yva began to grow very sad and
+troubled; indeed, looking at her suddenly on two or three
+occasions, I saw that her beautiful eyes were aswim with tears.
+Also, I noted that always as she grew sadder she became, in a
+sense, more human. In the beginning she was, as it were, far
+away. One could never forget that she was the child of some alien
+race whose eyes had looked upon the world when, by comparison,
+humanity was young; at times, indeed, she might have been the
+denizen of another planet, strayed to earth. Although she never
+flaunted it, one felt that her simplest word hid secret wisdom;
+that to her books were open in which we could not read. Moreover,
+as I have said, occasionally power flamed out of her, power that
+was beyond our ken and understanding.
+
+Yet with all this there was nothing elfish about her, nothing
+uncanny. She was always kind, and, as we could feel, innately
+good and gentle-hearted, just a woman made half-divine by gifts
+and experience that others lack. She did not even make use of
+her wondrous beauty to madden men, as she might well have done
+had she been so minded. It is true that both Bastin and Bickley
+fell in love with her, but that was only because all with whom
+she had to do must love her, and then, when she told them that it
+might not be, it was in such a fashion that no soreness was left
+behind. They went on loving her, that was all, but as men love
+their sisters or their daughters; as we conceive that they may
+love in that land where there is no marrying or giving in
+marriage.
+
+But now, in her sadness, she drew ever nearer to us, and
+especially to myself, more in tune with our age and thought. In
+truth, save for her royal and glittering loveliness in which
+there was some quality which proclaimed her of another blood, and
+for that reserve of hidden power which at times would look out of
+her eyes or break through her words, she might in most ways have
+been some singularly gifted and beautiful modern woman.
+
+The time has come when I must speak of my relations with Yva
+and of their climax. As may have been guessed, from the first I
+began to love her. While the weeks went on that love grew and
+grew, until it utterly possessed me, although for a certain
+reason connected with one dead, at first I fought against it. Yet
+it did not develop quite in the fashion that might have been
+expected. There was no blazing up of passion's fire; rather was
+there an ever-increasing glow of the holiest affection, till at
+last it became a lamp by which I must guide my feet through life
+and death. This love of mine seemed not of earth but from the
+stars. As yet I had said nothing to her of it because in some way
+I felt that she did not wish me to do so, felt also that she was
+well aware of all that passed within my heart, and desired, as it
+were, to give it time to ripen there. Then one day there came a
+change, and though no glance or touch of Yva's told me so, I knew
+that the bars were taken down and that I might speak.
+
+
+It was a night of full moon. All that afternoon she had been
+talking to Bastin apart, I suppose about religion, for I saw that
+he had some books in his hand from which he was expounding
+something to her in his slow, earnest way. Then she came and sat
+with us while we took our evening meal. I remember that mine
+consisted of some of the Life-water which she had brought with her
+and fruit, for, as I think I have said, I had acquired her
+dislike to meat, also that she ate some plantains, throwing the
+skins for Tommy to fetch and laughing at his play. When it was
+over, Bastin and Bickley went away together, whether by chance or
+design I do not know, and she said to me suddenly:
+
+"Humphrey, you have often asked me about the city Pani, of
+which a little portion of the ruins remains upon this island, the
+rest being buried beneath the waters. If you wish I will show you
+where our royal palace was before the barbarians destroyed it
+with their airships. The moon is very bright, and by it we can
+see."
+
+I nodded, for, knowing what she meant, somehow I could not
+answer her, and we began the ascent of the hill. She explained to
+me the plan of the palace when we reached the ruins, showing me
+where her own apartments had been, and the rest. It was very
+strange to hear her quietly telling of buildings which had stood
+and of things that had happened over two hundred and fifty
+thousand years before, much as any modern lady might do of a
+house that had been destroyed a month ago by an earthquake or a
+Zeppelin bomb, while she described the details of a disaster
+which now frightened her no more. I think it was then that for
+the first time I really began to believe that in fact Yva had
+lived all those aeons since and been as she still appeared.
+
+We passed from the palace to the ruins of the temple, through
+what, as she said, had been a pleasure-garden, pointing out where
+a certain avenue of rare palms had grown, down which once it was
+her habit to walk in the cool of the day. Or, rather, there were
+two terraced temples, one dedicated to Fate like that in the
+underground city of Nyo, and the other to Love. Of the temple to
+Fate she told me her father had been the High Priest, and of the
+temple to Love she was the High Priestess.
+
+Then it was that I understood why she had brought me here.
+
+She led the way to a marble block covered with worn-out carvings
+and almost buried in the debris. This, she said, was the altar of
+offerings. I asked her what offerings, and she replied with a
+smile:
+
+"Only wine, to signify the spirit of life, and flowers to
+symbolise its fragrance," and she laid her finger on a cup-like
+depression, still apparent in the marble, into which the wine was
+poured.
+
+Indeed, I gathered that there was nothing coarse or
+bacchanalian about this worship of a prototype of Aphrodite; on
+the contrary, that it was more or less spiritual and ethereal. We
+sat down on the altar stone. I wondered a little that she should
+have done so, but she read my thought, and answered:
+
+"Sometimes we change our faiths, Humphrey, or perhaps they
+grow. Also, have I not told you that sacrifices were offered on
+this altar?" and she sighed and smiled.
+
+I do not know which was the sweeter, the smile or the sigh.
+
+We looked at the water glimmering in the crater beneath us on
+the edge of which we sat. We looked at heaven above in which the
+great moon sailed royally. Then we looked into each other's eyes.
+
+"I love you," I said.
+
+"I know it," she answered gently. "You have loved me from the
+first, have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you
+began to love me, but until you dreamed a certain dream you would
+not admit it."
+
+"Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?"
+
+"I cannot say, Humphrey. But I tell you this. As you will learn
+in time, one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the
+flesh."
+
+I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words
+brought to my mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and I
+answered:
+
+"Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere,
+for certainly I should find her. Doubtless she meant beyond the
+shores of death--or perhaps she also dreamed."
+
+She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
+
+"Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey. As
+you dream and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed. Of dreams, then,
+let us say no more, since I think that they have served their
+purpose, and all three of us understand."
+
+Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon
+her perfumed breast. She lifted it and kissed me on the lips,
+saying:
+
+"With this kiss again I give myself to you. But oh! Humphrey,
+do not ask too much of the god of my people, Fate," and she
+looked me in the eyes and sighed.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, trembling.
+
+"Many, many things. Among them, that happiness is not for
+mortals, and remember that though my life began long ago, I am
+mortal as you are, and that in eternity time makes no
+difference."
+
+"And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?"
+
+"Who said it? Not I. Humphrey, I tell you this. Nor earth, nor
+heaven, nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst
+its way towards reunion and completeness. Only there must be
+love, manifested in many shapes and at many times, but ever
+striving to its end, which is not of the flesh. Aye, love that
+has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated, love that seems
+false, love betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering through
+the worlds, love asleep and living in its sleep, love awake and
+yet sleeping; all love that has in it the germ of life. It
+matters not what form love takes. If it be true I tell you that
+it will win its way, and in the many that it has seemed to
+worship, still find the one, though perchance not here."
+
+At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
+
+"Not here? Then where?" I said.
+
+"Ask your dead wife, Humphrey. Ask the dumb stars. Ask the God
+you worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word--Somewhere!
+Man, be not afraid. Do you think that such as you and I can be
+lost in the aching abysms of space? I know but little, yet I tell
+you that we are its rulers. I tell you that we, too, are gods, if
+only we can aspire and believe. For the doubting and timid there
+is naught. For those who see with the eyes of the soul and
+stretch out their hands to grasp there is all. Even Bastin will
+tell you this."
+
+"But," I said, "life is short. Those worlds are far away, and
+you are near."
+
+She became wonderful, mysterious.
+
+"Near I am far," she said; "and far I am near, if only this
+love of yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp. And,
+Humphrey, it needs strength, for here I am afraid that it will
+bear little of such fruit as men desire to pluck."
+
+Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for
+I did not know what to say or ask.
+
+"Listen," she went on. "Already my father has offered me to you
+in marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not
+understand? Believe me, it is one that you should never pay,
+since the rule of the world can be too dearly bought by the
+slaughter of half the world. And if you would pay it, I cannot."
+
+"But this is madness!" I exclaimed. "Your father has no powers
+over our earth."
+
+"I would that I could think so, Humphrey. I tell you that he
+has powers and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done
+before. You, too, he would use, and me."
+
+"And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves. Let us take each
+other while we may. Bastin is a priest."
+
+"Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment
+Oro watches us in his thought and laughs. Only in death,
+Humphrey, shall we pass beyond his reach and become lords of
+ourselves."
+
+"It is monstrous!" I cried. "There is the boat, let us fly
+away."
+
+"What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god
+of my people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we
+must wait our doom."
+
+"Doom," I said--"doom? What then is about to happen?"
+
+"A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey. Or, rather, it will
+not happen."
+
+"Why not, if it must?"
+
+"Beloved," she whispered, "Bastin has expounded to me a new
+faith whereof the master-word is Sacrifice. The terrible thing
+will not happen because of sacrifice! Ask me no more."
+
+She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the
+ancient altar of sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her
+face and making her mysterious. Then she threw it back, showing
+her lovely eyes and glittering hair, and laughed.
+
+"We have still an earthly hour," she said; "therefore let us
+forget the far, dead past and the eternities to come and be
+joyful in that hour. Now throw your arms about me and I will tell
+you strange stories of lost days, and you shall look into my eyes
+and learn wisdom, and you shall kiss my lips and taste of bliss--
+you, who were and are and shall be--you, the beloved of Yva from
+the beginning to the end of Time."
+
+
+
+Chapter XXII
+
+The Command
+
+
+I think that both Bastin and Bickley, by instinct as it were,
+knew what had passed between Yva and myself and that she had
+promised herself to me. They showed this by the way in which they
+avoided any mention of her name. Also they began to talk of their
+own plans for the future as matters in which I had no part. Thus
+I heard them discussing the possibility of escape from the island
+whereof suddenly they seemed to have grown weary, and whether by
+any means two men (two, not three) could manage to sail and steer
+the lifeboat that remained upon the wreck. In short, as in all
+such cases, the woman had come between; also the pressure of a
+common loss caused them to forget their differences and to draw
+closer together. I who had succeeded where they both had failed,
+was, they seemed to think, out of their lives, so much that our
+ancient intimacy had ended.
+
+This attitude hurt me, perhaps because in many respects the
+situation was awkward. They had, it is true, taken their failures
+extremely well, still the fact remained that both of them had
+fallen in love with the wonderful creature, woman and yet more
+than woman, who had bound herself to me. How then could we go on
+living together, I in prospective possession of the object that
+all had desired, and they without the pale?
+
+Moreover, they were jealous in another and quite a different
+fashion because they both loved me in their own ways and were
+convinced that I who had hitherto loved them, henceforward should
+have no affection left to spare, since surely this Glittering
+Lady, this marvel of wisdom and physical perfections would take
+it all. Of course they were in error, since even if I could have
+been so base and selfish, this was no conduct that Yva would have
+wished or even suffered. Still that was their thought.
+
+Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then
+spoke straight out to them.
+
+"My friends," I said, "as I see that you have guessed, Yva and
+I are affianced to each other and love each other perfectly."
+
+"Yes, Arbuthnot," said Bastin, "we saw that in your face, and
+in hers as she bade us good night before she went into the cave,
+and we congratulate you and wish you every happiness."
+
+"We wish you every happiness, old fellow," chimed in Bickley.
+He paused a while, then added, "But to be honest, I am not sure
+that I congratulate you."
+
+"Why not, Bickley?"
+
+"Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not
+because you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be
+expected that you would do, but on account of something totally
+different. I told you a while ago and repetition is useless and
+painful. I need only add therefore that since then my conviction
+has strengthened and I am sure, sorry as I am to say it, that in
+this matter you must prepare for disappointment and calamity.
+That woman, if woman she really is, will never be the wife of
+mortal man. Now be angry with me if you like, or laugh as you
+have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and yourself, I
+also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak what I
+believe to be the truth."
+
+"Like Cassandra," I suggested.
+
+"Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person." At first I
+was inclined to resent Bickley's words--who would not have been
+in the circumstances? Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my
+mind the conviction that he spoke the truth. In this world Yva
+was not for me or any man. Moreover she knew it, the knowledge
+peeped out of every word she spoke in our passionate love scene
+by the lake. She was aware, and subconsciously I was aware, that
+we were plighting our troth, not for time but for eternity. With
+time we had little left to do; not for long would she wear the
+ring I gave her on that holy night.
+
+Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt
+that the situation was strained and awkward and broke in with a
+curious air of forced satisfaction:
+
+"It's uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to
+have a clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you
+in a respectable fashion. Of course I can't say that the
+Glittering Lady is as yet absolutely converted to our faith, but
+I am certain that she has absorbed enough of its principles to
+justify me in uniting her in Christian wedlock."
+
+"Yes," I answered, "she has absorbed its principles;
+she told me as much herself. Sacrifice, for instance,"
+and as I spoke the word my eyes filled with tears.
+
+"Sacrifice!" broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he
+needed a vent to his mental disturbance. "Rubbish. Why should
+every religion demand sacrifice as savages do? By it alone they
+stand condemned."
+
+"Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of
+all life that is worth the living," I answered sadly enough.
+"Anyhow I believe you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will
+not be troubled to marry us."
+
+"You don't mean," broke in Bastin with a horrified air, "that
+you propose to dispense--"
+
+"No, Bastin, I don't mean that. What I mean is that it comes
+upon me that something will prevent this marriage. Sacrifice,
+perhaps, though in what shape I do not know. And now good night.
+I am tired."
+
+
+That night in the chill dead hour before the dawn Oro came
+again. I woke up to see him seated by my bed, majestic, and, as
+it seemed to me, lambent, though this may have been my
+imagination.
+
+"You take strange liberties with my daughter, Barbarian, or she
+takes strange liberties with you, it does not matter which," he
+said, regarding me with his calm and terrible eyes.
+
+"Why do you presume to call me Barbarian?" I asked, avoiding
+the main issue.
+
+"For this reason, Humphrey. All men are the same. They have the
+same organs, the same instincts, the same desires, which in
+essence are but two, food and rebirth that Nature commands;
+though it is true that millions of years before I was born, as I
+have learned from the records of the Sons of Wisdom, it was said
+that they were half ape. Yet being the same there is between them
+a whole sea of difference, since some have knowledge and others
+none, or little. Those who have none or little, among whom you
+must be numbered, are Barbarians. Those who have much, among whom
+my daughter and I are the sole survivors, are the Instructed."
+
+"There are nearly two thousand millions of living people in
+this world," I said, "and you name all of them Barbarians?"
+
+"All, Humphrey, excepting, of course, myself and my daughter
+who are not known to be alive. You think that you have learned
+much, whereas in truth you are most ignorant. The commonest of
+the outer nations, when I destroyed them, knew more than your
+wisest know today."
+
+"You are mistaken, Oro; since then we have learned something of
+the soul."
+
+"Ah!" he exclaimed, "that interests me and perhaps it is true.
+Also, if true it is very important, as I have told you before--or
+was it Bastin? If a man has a soul, he lives, whereas even we
+Sons of Wisdom die, and in Death what is the use of Wisdom?
+Because you can believe, you have souls and are therefore,
+perhaps, heirs to life, foolish and ignorant as you are today.
+Therefore I admit you and Bastin to be my equals, though Bickley,
+who like myself believes nothing, is but a common chemist and
+doctor of disease."
+
+"Then you bow to Faith, Oro?"
+
+"Yes, and I think that my god Fate also bows to Faith. Perhaps,
+indeed, Faith shapes Fate, not Fate, Faith. But whence comes that
+faith which even I with all my learning cannot command? Why is it
+denied to me and given to you and Bastin?"
+
+"Because as Bastin would tell you, it is a gift, though one
+that is never granted to the proud and self-sufficient. Become
+humble as a child, Oro, and perchance you too may acquire faith."
+
+"And how shall I become humble?"
+
+"By putting away all dreams of power and its exercise, if such
+you have, and in repentance walking quietly to the Gates of
+Death," I replied.
+
+"For you, Humphrey, who have little or none of these things,
+that may be easy. But for me who have much, if not all, it is
+otherwise. You ask me to abandon the certain for the uncertain,
+the known for the unknown, and from a half-god communing with the
+stars, to become an earthworm crawling in mud and lifting blind
+eyes towards the darkness of everlasting night."
+
+"A god who must die is no god, half or whole, Oro; the
+earthworm that lives on is greater than he."
+
+"Mayhap. Yet while I endure I will be as a god, so that when
+night comes, if come it must, I shall have played my part and
+left my mark upon this little world of ours. Have done!" he added
+with a burst of impatience. "What will you of my daughter?"
+
+"What man has always willed of woman--herself, body and soul."
+
+"Her soul perchance is yours, if she has one, but her body is
+mine to give or withhold. Yet it can be bought at a price," he
+added slowly.
+
+"So she told me, Oro."
+
+"I can guess what she told you. Did I not watch you yonder by
+the lake when you gave her a ring graved with the signs of Life
+and Everlastingness? The question is, will you pay the price?"
+
+"Not so; the question is--what is the price?"
+
+"This; to enter my service and henceforth do my will--without
+debate or cavil."
+
+"For what reward, Oro?"
+
+"Yva and the dominion of the earth while you shall live,
+neither more nor less."
+
+"And what is your will?"
+
+"That you shall learn in due course. On the second night from
+this I command the three of you to wait upon me at sundown in the
+buried halls of Nyo. Till then you see no more of Yva, for I do
+not trust her. She, too, has powers, though as yet she does not
+use them, and perchance she would forget her oaths, and following
+some new star of love, for a little while vanish with you out of
+my reach. Be in the sepulchre at the hour of sundown on the
+second day from this, all three of you, if you would continue to
+live upon the earth. Afterwards you shall learn my will and make
+your choice between Yva with majesty and her loss with death."
+
+Then suddenly he was gone.
+
+
+Next morning I told the others what had passed, and we talked
+the matter over. The trouble was, of course, that Bickley did not
+believe me. He had no faith in my alleged interviews with Oro,
+which he set down to delusions of a semi-mesmeric character. This
+was not strange, since it appeared that on the previous night he
+had watched the door of my sleeping-place until dawn broke, which
+it did long after Oro had departed, and he had not seen him
+either come or go, although the moon was shining brightly.
+
+When he told me this I could only answer that all the same he
+had been there as, if he could speak, Tommy would have been able
+to certify. As it chanced the dog was sleeping with me and at the
+first sound of the approach of someone, woke up and growled. Then
+recognising Oro, he went to him, wagged his tail and curled
+himself up at his feet.
+
+Bastin believed my story readily enough, saying that Oro was a
+peculiar person who no doubt had ways of coming and going which
+we did not understand. His point was, however, that he did not in
+the least wish to visit Nyo any more. The wonders of its
+underground palaces and temples had no charms for him. Also he
+did not think he could do any good by going, since after "sucking
+him as dry as an orange" with reference to religious matters
+"that old vampire-bat Oro had just thrown him away like the
+rind," and, he might add, "seemed no better for the juice he had
+absorbed."
+
+"I doubt," continued Bastin, "whether St. Paul himself could
+have converted Oro, even if he performed miracles before him.
+What is the use of showing miracles to a man who could always
+work a bigger one himself?"
+
+In short, Bastin's one idea, and Bickley's also for the matter
+of that, was to get away to the main island and thence escape by
+means of the boat, or in some other fashion.
+
+I pointed out that Oro had said we must obey at the peril of
+our lives; indeed that he had put it even more strongly, using
+words to the effect that if we did not he would kill us.
+
+"I'd take the risk," said Bickley, "since I believe that
+you dreamt it all, Arbuthnot. However, putting that
+aside, there is a natural reason why you should wish to
+go, and for my own part, so do I in a way. I want to see
+what that old fellow has up his extremely long sleeve, if
+there is anything there at all."
+
+"Well, if you ask me, Bickley," I answered, "I believe it is
+the destruction of half the earth, or some little matter of that
+sort."
+
+At this suggestion Bickley only snorted, but Bastin said
+cheerfully:
+
+"I dare say. He is bad enough even for that. But as I am quite
+convinced that it will never be allowed, his intentions do not
+trouble me."
+
+I remarked that he seemed to have carried them out once before.
+
+"Oh! you mean the Deluge. Well, no doubt there was a deluge,
+but I am sure that Oro had no more to do with it than you or I,
+as I think I have said already. Anyhow it is impossible to leave
+you to descend into that hole alone. I suggest, therefore, that
+we should go into the sepulchre at the time which you believe Oro
+appointed, and see what happens. If you are not mistaken, the
+Glittering Lady will come there to fetch us, since it is quite
+certain that we cannot work the lift or whatever it is, alone. If
+you are mistaken we can just go back to bed as usual."
+
+"Yes, that's the best plan," said Bickley, shortly, after which
+the conversation came to an end.
+
+All that day and the next I watched and waited in vain for the
+coming of Yva, but no Yva appeared. I even went as far as the
+sepulchre, but it was as empty as were the two crystal coffins,
+and after waiting a while I returned. Although I did not say so
+to Bickley, to me it was evident that Oro, as he had said, was
+determined to cut off all communication between us.
+
+The second day drew to its close. Our simple preparations were
+complete. They consisted mainly in making ready our hurricane
+lamps and packing up a little food, enough to keep us for three
+or four days if necessary, together with some matches and a good
+supply of oil, since, as Bastin put it, he was determined not to
+be caught like the foolish virgins in the parable.
+
+"You see," he added, "one never knows when it might please that
+old wretch to turn off the incandescent gas or electric light, or
+whatever it is he uses to illumine his family catacombs, and then
+it would be awkward if we had no oil."
+
+"For the matter of that he might steal our lamps,"
+suggested Bickley, "in which case we should be where
+Moses was when the light went out."
+
+"I have considered that possibility," answered Bastin, "and
+therefore, although it is a dangerous weapon to carry loaded, I
+am determined to take my revolver. If necessary I shall consider
+myself quite justified in shooting him to save our lives and
+those of thousands of others."
+
+At this we both laughed; somehow the idea of Bastin trying to
+shoot Oro struck us as intensely ludicrous. Yet that very thing
+was to happen.
+
+
+It was a peculiarly beautiful sunset over the southern seas. To
+the west the great flaming orb sank into the ocean, to the east
+appeared the silver circle of the full moon. To my excited fancy
+they were like scales hanging from the hand of a materialised
+spirit of calm. Over the volcano and the lake, over the island
+with its palm trees, over the seas beyond, this calm brooded.
+Save for a few travelling birds the sky was empty; no cloud
+disturbed its peace; the world seemed steeped in innocence and
+quiet.
+
+All these things struck me, as I think they did the others,
+because by the action of some simultaneous thought it came to our
+minds that very probably we were looking on them for the last
+time. It is all very well to talk of the Unknown and the Infinite
+whereof we are assured we are the heirs, but that does not make
+it any easier for us to part with the Known and the Finite. The
+contemplation of the wonders of Eternity does not conceal the
+advantages of actual and existent Time. In short there is no one
+of us, from a sainted archbishop down to a sinful suicide, who
+does not regret the necessity of farewell to the pleasant light
+and the kindly race of men wherewith we are acquainted.
+
+For after all, who can be quite certain of the Beyond? It may
+be splendid, but it will probably be strange, and from
+strangeness, after a certain age, we shrink. We know that all
+things will be different there; that our human relationships will
+be utterly changed, that perhaps sex which shapes so many of
+them, will vanish to be replaced by something unknown, that
+ambitions will lose their hold of us, and that, at the best, the
+mere loss of hopes and fears will leave us empty. So at least we
+think, who seek not variation but continuance, since the spirit
+must differ from the body and that thought alarms our
+intelligence.
+
+At least some of us think so; others, like Bickley, write down
+the future as a black and endless night, which after all has its
+consolations since, as has been wisely suggested, perhaps
+oblivion is better than any memories. Others again, like Bastin,
+would say of it with the Frenchman, plus ca change, plus c'est la
+meme chose. Yet others, like Oro, consider it as a realm of
+possibilities, probably unpleasant and perhaps non-existent; just
+this and nothing more. Only one thing is certain, that no
+creature which has life desires to leap into the fire and from
+the dross of doubts, to resolve the gold--or the lead--of
+certainty.
+
+"It is time to be going," said Bastin. "In these skies the sun
+seems to tumble down, not to set decently as it does in England,
+and if we wait any longer we shall be late for our appointment in
+the sepulchre. I am sorry because although I don't often notice
+scenery, everything looks rather beautiful this evening. That
+star, for instance, I think it is called Venus."
+
+"And therefore one that Arbuthnot should admire," broke in
+Bickley, attempting to lighten matters with a joke. "But come on
+and let us be rid of this fool's errand. Certainly the world is a
+lovely place after all, and for my part I hope that we haven't
+seen the last of it," he added with a sigh.
+
+"So do I," said Bastin, "though of course, Faith teaches us
+that there are much better ones beyond. It is no use bothering
+about what they are like, but I hope that the road to them
+doesn't run through the hole that the old reprobate, Oro, calls
+Nyo."
+
+A few minutes later we started, each of us carrying his share
+of the impedimenta. I think that Tommy was the only really
+cheerful member of the party, for he skipped about and barked,
+running backwards and forwards into the mouth of the cave, as
+though to hurry our movements.
+
+"Really," said Bastin, "it is quite unholy to see an animal
+going on in that way when it knows that it is about to descend
+into the bowels of the earth. I suppose it must like them."
+
+"Oh! no," commented Bickley, "it only likes what is in them--
+like Arbuthnot. Since that little beast came in contact with the
+Lady Yva, it has never been happy out of her company."
+
+"I think that is so," said Bastin. "At any rate I have noticed
+that it has been moping for the last two days, as it always does
+when she is not present. It even seems to like Oro who gives me
+the creeps, perhaps because he is her father. Dogs must be very
+charitable animals."
+
+By now we were in the cave marching past the wrecks of the
+half-buried flying-machines, which Bickley, as he remarked
+regretfully, had never found time thoroughly to examine. Indeed,
+to do so would have needed more digging than we could do without
+proper instruments, since the machines were big and deeply
+entombed in dust.
+
+We came to the sepulchre and entered.
+
+"Well," said Bickley, seating himself on the edge of one of the
+coffins and holding up his lamp to look about him, "this place
+seems fairly empty. No one is keeping the assignation, Arbuthnot,
+although the sun is well down."
+
+As he spoke the words Yva stood before us. Whence she came we
+did not see, for all our backs were turned at the moment of her
+arrival. But there she was, calm, beautiful, radiating light.
+
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIII
+
+In the Temple of Fate
+
+
+Yva glanced at me, and in her eyes I read tenderness and
+solicitude, also something of inquiry. It seemed to me as though
+she were wondering what I should do under circumstances that
+might, or would, arise, and in some secret fashion of which I was
+but half conscious, drawing an answer from my soul. Then she
+turned, and, smiling in her dazzling way, said:
+
+"So, Bickley, as usual, you did not believe? Because you did
+not see him, therefore the Lord Oro, my father, never spoke with
+Humphrey. As though the Lord Oro could not pass you without your
+knowledge, or, perchance, send thoughts clothed in his own shape
+to work his errand."
+
+"How do you know that I did not believe Arbuthnot's story?"
+Bickley asked in a rather cross voice and avoiding the direct
+issue. "Do you also send thoughts to work your errands clothed in
+your own shape, Lady Yva?"
+
+"Alas! not so, though perhaps I could if I might. It is very
+simple, Bickley. Standing here, I heard you say that although the
+sun was well down there was no one to meet you as Humphrey had
+expected, and from those words and your voice I guessed the
+rest."
+
+"Your knowledge of the English language is improving fast, Lady
+Yva. Also, when I spoke, you were not here."
+
+"At least I was very near, Bickley, and these walls are thinner
+than you think," she answered, contemplating what seemed to be
+solid rock with eyes that were full of innocence. "Oh! friend,"
+she went on suddenly, "I wonder what there is which will cause
+you to believe that you do not know all; that there exist many
+things beyond the reach of your learning and imagination? Well,
+in a day or two, perhaps, even you will admit as much, and
+confess it to me--elsewhere," and she sighed.
+
+"I am ready to confess now that much happens which I do not
+understand at present, because I have not the key to the trick,"
+he replied.
+
+Yva shook her head at him and smiled again. Then she motioned
+to all of us to stand close to her, and, stooping, lifted Tommy
+in her arms. Next moment that marvel happened which I have
+described already, and we were whirling downwards through space,
+to find ourselves in a very little time standing safe in the
+caves of Nyo, breathless with the swiftness of our descent. How
+and on what we descended neither I nor the others ever learned.
+It was and must remain one of the unexplained mysteries of our
+great experience.
+
+"Whither now, Yva?" I asked, staring about me at the radiant
+vastness.
+
+"The Lord Oro would speak with you, Humphrey. Follow. And I
+pray you all do not make him wrath, for his mood is not gentle."
+
+So once more we proceeded down the empty streets of that
+underground abode which, except that it was better illuminated,
+reminded me of the Greek conception of Hades. We came to the
+sacred fountain over which stood the guardian statue of Life,
+pouring from the cups she held the waters of Good and Ill that
+mingled into one health-giving wine.
+
+"Drink, all of you," she said; "for I think before the sun sets
+again upon the earth we shall need strength, every one of us."
+
+So we drank, and she drank herself, and once more felt the
+blood go dancing through our veins as though the draught had been
+some nectar of the gods. Then, having extinguished the lanterns
+which we still carried, for here they were needless, and we
+wished to save our oil, we followed her through the great doors
+into the vast hall of audience and advanced up it between the
+endless, empty seats. At its head, on the dais beneath the
+arching shell, sat Oro on his throne. As before, he wore the
+jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes, while the table in
+front of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which he
+wrote with a pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his
+own fierce eyes. Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to
+ascend the dais.
+
+"You are here. It is well," he said, which was all his
+greeting. Only when Tommy ran up to him he bent down and patted
+the dog's head with his long, thin hand, and, as he did so, his
+face softened. It was evident to me that Tommy was more welcome
+to him than were the rest of us.
+
+There was a long silence while, one by one, he searched us with
+his piercing glance. It rested on me, the last of the three of
+us, and from me travelled to Yva.
+
+"I wonder why I have sent for you?" he said at length, with a
+mirthless laugh. "I think it must be that I may convince Bickley,
+the sceptic, that there are powers which he does not understand,
+but that I have the strength to move. Also, perhaps, that your
+lives may be spared for my own purposes in that which is about to
+happen. Hearken! My labours are finished; my calculations are
+complete," and he pointed to the sheets of metal before him that
+were covered with cabalistic signs. "Tomorrow I am about to do
+what once before I did and to plunge half the world in the deeps
+of ocean and lift again from the depths that which has been
+buried for a quarter of a million years."
+
+"Which half?" asked Bickley.
+
+"That is my secret, Physician, and the answer to it lies
+written here in signs you cannot read. Certain countries will
+vanish, others will be spared. I say that it is my secret."
+
+"Then, Oro, if you could do what you threaten, you would drown
+hundreds of millions of people."
+
+"If I could do! If I could do!" he exclaimed, glaring at
+Bickley. "Well, tomorrow you shall see what I can do. Oh! why do
+I grow angry with this fool? For the rest, yes, they must drown.
+What does it matter? Their end will be swift; some few minutes of
+terror, that is all, and in one short century every one of them
+would have been dead."
+
+An expression of horror gathered on Bastin's face.
+
+"Do you really mean to murder hundreds of millions of people?"
+he asked, in a thick, slow voice.
+
+"I have said that I intend to send them to that heaven or that
+hell of which you are so fond of talking, Preacher, somewhat more
+quickly than otherwise they would have found their way thither.
+They have disappointed me, they have failed; therefore, let them
+go and make room for others who will succeed."
+
+"Then you are a greater assassin than any that the world has
+bred, or than all of them put together. There is nobody as bad,
+even in the Book of Revelation!" shouted Bastin, in a kind of
+fury. "Moreover, I am not like Bickley. I know enough of you and
+your hellish powers to believe that what you plan, that you can
+do."
+
+"I believe it also," sneered Oro. "But how comes it that the
+Great One whom you worship does not prevent the deed, if He
+exists, and it be evil?"
+
+"He will prevent it!" raved Bastin. "Even now He commands me to
+prevent it, and I obey!" Then, drawing the revolver from his
+pocket, he pointed it at Oro's breast, adding: "Swear not to
+commit this crime, or I will kill you!"
+
+"So the man of peace would become a man of blood," mused Oro,
+"and kill that I may not kill for the good of the world? Why,
+what is the matter with that toy of yours, Preacher?" and he
+pointed to the pistol.
+
+Well might he ask, for as he spoke the revolver flew out of
+Bastin's hand. High into the air it flew, and as it went
+discharged itself, all the six chambers of it, in rapid
+succession, while Bastin stood staring at his arm and hand which
+he seemed unable to withdraw.
+
+"Do you still threaten me with that outstretched hand,
+Preacher?" mocked Oro.
+
+"I can't move it," said Bastin; "it seems turned to stone."
+
+"Be thankful that you also are not turned to stone. But,
+because your courage pleases me, I will spare you, yes, and will
+advance you in my New Kingdom. What shall you be? Controller of
+Religions, I think, since all the qualities that a high priest
+should have are yours--faith, fanaticism and folly."
+
+"It is very strange," said Bastin, "but all of a sudden my arm
+and hand are quite well again. I suppose it must have been 'pins
+and needles' or something of that sort which made me throw away
+the pistol and pull the trigger when I didn't mean to do so."
+
+Then he went to fetch that article which had fallen beyond the
+dais, and quite forgot his intention of executing Oro in the
+interest of testing its mechanism, which proved to be destroyed.
+To his proposed appointment he made no illusion. If he
+comprehended what was meant, which I doubt, he took it as a joke.
+
+"Hearken all of you," said Oro, lifting his head suddenly, for
+while Bastin recovered the revolver he had been brooding. "The
+great thing which I shall do tomorrow must be witnessed by you
+because thereby only can you come to understand my powers. Also
+yonder where I bring it about in the bowels of the earth, you
+will be safer than elsewhere, since when and perhaps before it
+happens, the whole world will heave and shake and tremble, and I
+know not what may chance, even in these caves. For this reason
+also, do not forget to bring the little hound with you, since him
+least of all of you would I see come to harm, perhaps because
+once, hundreds of generations ago as you reckon time, I had a dog
+very like to him. Your mother loved him much, Yva, and when she
+died, this dog died also. He lies embalmed with her on her coffin
+yonder in the temple, and yesterday I went to look at both of
+them. The beasts are wonderfully alike, which shows the
+everlastingness of blood."
+
+He paused a while, lost in thought, then continued: "After the
+deed is done I'll speak with you and you shall choose, Strangers,
+whether you will die your own masters, or live on to serve me.
+Now there is one problem that is left to me to solve--whether I
+can save a certain land--do not ask which it is, Humphrey, though
+I see the question in your eyes--or must let it go with the rest.
+I only answer you that I will do my best because you love it. So
+farewell for a while, and, Preacher, be advised by me and do not
+aim too high again."
+
+"It doesn't matter where I aim," answered Bastin sturdily, "or
+whether I hit or miss, since there is something much bigger than
+me waiting to deal with you. The countries that you think you are
+going to destroy will sleep quite as well tomorrow as they do
+tonight, Oro."
+
+"Much better, I think, Preacher, since by then they will have
+left sorrow and pain and wickedness and war far behind them."
+
+"Where are we to go?" I asked.
+
+"The Lady Yva will show you," he answered, waving his hand, and
+once more bent over his endless calculations.
+
+Yva beckoned to us and we turned and followed her down the
+hall. She led us to a street near the gateway of the temple and
+thence into one of the houses. There was a portico to it leading
+to a court out of which opened rooms somewhat in the Pompeian
+fashion. We did not enter the rooms, for at the end of the court
+were a metal table and three couches also of metal, on which were
+spread rich-looking rugs. Whence these came I do not know and
+never asked, but I remember that they were very beautiful and
+soft as velvet.
+
+"Here you may sleep," she said, "if sleep you can, and eat of
+the food that you have brought with you. Tomorrow early I will
+call you when it is time for us to start upon our journey into
+the bowels of the earth."
+
+"I don't want to go any deeper than we are," said Bastin
+doubtfully.
+
+"I think that none of us want to go, Bastin," she answered with
+a sigh. "Yet go we must. I pray of you, anger the Lord Oro no
+more on this or any other matter. In your folly you tried to kill
+him, and as it chanced he bore it well because he loves courage.
+But another time he may strike back, and then, Bastin--"
+
+"I am not afraid of him," he answered, "but I do not like
+tunnels. Still, perhaps it would be better to accompany you than
+to be left in this place alone. Now I will unpack the food."
+
+Yva turned to go.
+
+"I must leave you," she said, "since my father needs my help.
+The matter has to do with the Force that he would let loose
+tomorrow, and its measurements; also with the preparation of the
+robes that we must wear lest it should harm us in its leap."
+
+Something in her eyes told me that she wished me to follow her,
+and I did so. Outside the portico where we stood in the desolate,
+lighted street, she halted.
+
+"If you are not afraid," she said, "meet me at midnight by the
+statue of Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you,
+Humphrey, where, if anywhere, we may be alone."
+
+"I will come, Yva."
+
+"You know the road, and the gates are open, Humphrey."
+
+Then she gave me her hand to kiss and glided away. I returned
+to the others and we ate, somewhat sparingly, for we wished to
+save our food in case of need, and having drunk of the Life-
+water, were not hungry. Also we talked a little, but by common
+consent avoided the subject of the morrow and what it might bring
+forth.
+
+We knew that terrible things were afoot, but lacking any
+knowledge of what these might be, thought it useless to discuss
+them. Indeed we were too depressed, so much so that even Bastin
+and Bickley ceased from arguing. The latter was so overcome by
+the exhibition of Oro's powers when he caused the pistol to leap
+into the air and discharge itself, that he could not even pluck
+up courage to laugh at the failure of Bastin's efforts to do
+justice on the old Super-man, or rather to prevent him from
+attempting a colossal crime.
+
+At length we lay down on the couches to rest, Bastin remarking
+that he wished he could turn off the light, also that he did not
+in the least regret having tried to kill Oro. Sleep seemed to
+come to the others quickly, but I could only doze, to wake up
+from time to time. Of this I was not sorry, since whenever I
+dropped off dreams seemed to pursue me. For the most part they
+were of my dead wife. She appeared to be trying to console me for
+some loss, but the strange thing was that sometimes she spoke
+with her own voice and sometimes with Yva's, and sometimes looked
+at me with her own eyes and sometimes with those of Yva. I
+remember nothing else about these dreams, which were very
+confused.
+
+After one of them, the most vivid of all, I awoke and looked at
+my watch. It was half-past eleven, almost time for me to be
+starting. The other two seemed to be fast asleep. Presently I
+rose and crept down the court without waking them. Outside the
+portico, which by the way was a curious example of the survival
+of custom in architecture, since none was needed in that
+weatherless place, I turned to the right and followed the wide
+street to the temple enclosure. Through the pillared courts I
+went, my footsteps, although I walked as softly as I could,
+echoing loudly in that intense silence, through the great doors
+into the utter solitude of the vast and perfect fane.
+
+Words can not tell the loneliness of that place. It flowed over
+me like a sea and seemed to swallow up my being, so that even the
+wildest and most dangerous beast would have been welcome as a
+companion. I was as terrified as a child that wakes to find
+itself deserted in the dark. Also an uncanny sense of terrors to
+come oppressed me, till I could have cried aloud if only to hear
+the sound of a mortal voice. Yonder was the grim statue of Fate,
+the Oracle of the Kings of the Sons of Wisdom, which was believed
+to bow its stony head in answer to their prayers. I ran to it,
+eager for its terrible shelter, for on either side of it were
+figures of human beings. Even their cold marble was company of a
+sort, though alas! over all frowned Fate.
+
+Let anyone imagine himself standing alone beneath the dome of
+St. Paul's; in the centre of that cathedral brilliant with
+mysterious light, and stretched all about it a London that had
+been dead and absolutely unpeopled for tens of thousands of
+years. If he can do this he will gather some idea of my physical
+state. Let him add to his mind-picture a knowledge that on the
+following day something was to happen not unlike the end of the
+world, as prognosticated by the Book of Revelation and by most
+astronomers, and he will have some idea of my mental
+perturbations. Add to the mixture a most mystic yet very real
+love affair and an assignation before that symbol of the cold
+fate which seems to sway the universes down to the tiniest detail
+of individual lives, and he may begin to understand what I,
+Humphrey Arbuthnot, experienced during my vigil in this sanctuary
+of a vanished race.
+
+It seemed long before Yva came, but at last she did come. I
+caught sight of her far away beyond the temple gate, flitting
+through the unholy brightness of the pillared courts like a white
+moth at night and seeming quite as small. She approached; now she
+was as a ghost, and then drawing near, changed into a living,
+breathing, lovely woman. I opened my arms, and with something
+like a sob she sank into them and we kissed as mortals do.
+
+"I could not come more quickly," she said. "The Lord Oro needed
+me, and those calculations were long and difficult. Also twice he
+must visit the place whither we shall go tomorrow, and that took
+time."
+
+"Then it is close at hand?" I said.
+
+"Humphrey, be not foolish. Do you not remember, who have
+travelled with him, that Oro can throw his soul afar and bring it
+back again laden with knowledge, as the feet of a bee are laden
+with golden dust? Well, he went and went again, and I must wait.
+And then the robes and shields; they must be prepared by his arts
+and mine. Oh! ask not what they are, there is no time to tell,
+and it matters nothing. Some folk are wise and some are foolish,
+but all which matters is that within them flows the blood of life
+and that life breeds love, and that love, as I believe, although
+Oro does not, breeds immortality. And if so, what is Time but as
+a grain of sand upon the shore?"
+
+"This, Yva; it is ours, who can count on nothing else."
+
+"Oh! Humphrey, if I thought that, no more wretched creature
+would breathe tonight upon this great world."
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked, growing fearful, more at her
+manner and her look than at her words.
+
+"Nothing, nothing, except that Time is so very short. A kiss, a
+touch, a little light and a little darkness, and it is gone. Ask
+my father Oro who has lived a thousand years and slept for tens
+of thousands, as I have, and he will say the same. It is against
+Time that he fights; he who, believing in nothing beyond, will
+inherit nothing, as Bastin says; he to whom Time has brought
+nothing save a passing, blood-stained greatness, and triumph
+ending in darkness and disaster, and hope that will surely suffer
+hope's eclipse, and power that must lay down its coronet in
+dust."
+
+"And what has it brought to you, Yva, beyond a fair body and a
+soul of strength?"
+
+"It has brought a spirit, Humphrey. Between them the body and
+the soul have bred a spirit, and in the fires of tribulation from
+that spirit has been distilled the essence of eternal love. That
+is Time's gift to me, and therefore, although still he rules me
+here, I mock at Fate," and she waved her hand with a gesture of
+defiance at the stern-faced, sexless effigy which sat above us,
+the sword across its knees.
+
+"Look! Look!" she went on in a swelling voice of music,
+pointing to the statues of the dotard and the beauteous woman.
+"They implore Fate, they worship Fate. I do not implore, I do not
+worship or ask a sign as even Oro does and as did his
+forefathers. I rise above and triumph. As Fate, the god of my
+people, sets his foot upon the sun, so I set my foot upon Fate,
+and thence, like a swimmer from a rock, leap into the waters of
+Immortality."
+
+I looked at her whose presence, as happened from time to time,
+had grown majestic beyond that of woman; I studied her deep eyes
+which were full of lights, not of this world, and I grew afraid.
+
+"What do you mean?" I asked. "Yva, you talk like one who has
+finished with life."
+
+"It passes," she answered quickly. "Life passes like breath
+fading from a mirror. So should all talk who breathe beneath the
+sun."
+
+"Yes, Yva, but if you went and left me still breathing on that
+mocking glass--"
+
+"If so, what of it? Will not your breath fade also and join
+mine where all vapours go? Or if it were yours that faded and
+mine that remained for some few hours, is it not the same? I
+think, Humphrey, that already you have seen a beloved breath melt
+from the glass of life," she added, looking at me earnestly.
+
+I bowed my head and answered:
+
+"Yes, and therefore I am ashamed."
+
+"Oh! why should you be ashamed, Humphrey, who are not sure but
+that two breaths may yet be one breath? How do you know that
+there is a difference between them?"
+
+"You drive me mad, Yva. I cannot understand."
+
+"Nor can I altogether, Humphrey. Why should I, seeing that I am
+no more than woman, as you are no more than man? I would always
+have you remember, Humphrey, that I am no spirit or sorceress,
+but just a woman--like her you lost."
+
+I looked at her doubtfully and answered:
+
+"Women do not sleep for two hundred thousand years. Women do
+not take dream journeys to the stars. Women do not make the dead
+past live again before the watcher's eyes. Their hair does not
+glimmer in the dusk nor do their bodies gleam, nor have they such
+strength of soul or eyes so wonderful, or loveliness so great."
+
+These words appeared to distress her who, as it seemed to me,
+was above all things anxious to prove herself woman and no more.
+
+"All these qualities are nothing, Humphrey," she cried. "As for
+the beauty, such as it is, it comes to me with my blood, and with
+it the glitter of my hair which is the heritage of those who for
+generations have drunk of the Life-water. My mother was lovelier
+than I, as was her mother, or so I have heard, since only the
+fairest were the wives of the Kings of the Children of Wisdom.
+For the rest, such arts as I have spring not from magic, but from
+knowledge which your people will acquire in days to come, that
+is, if Oro spares them. Surely you above all should know that I
+am only woman," she added very slowly and searching my face with
+her eyes.
+
+"Why, Yva? During the little while that we have been together I
+have seen much which makes me doubt. Even Bickley the sceptic
+doubts also."
+
+"I will tell you, though I am not sure that you will believe
+me." She glanced about her as though she were frightened lest
+someone should overhear her words or read her thoughts. Then she
+stretched out her hands and drawing my head towards her, put her
+lips to my ear and whispered:
+
+"Because once you saw me die, as women often die--giving life
+for life."
+
+"I saw you die?" I gasped.
+
+She nodded, then continued to whisper in my ear, not in her own
+voice, but another's:
+
+"Go where you seem called to go, far away. Oh! the wonderful
+place in which you will find me, not knowing that you have found
+me. Good-bye for a little while; only for a little while, my own,
+my own!"
+
+I knew the voice as I knew the words, and knowing, I think that
+I should have fallen to the ground, had she not supported me with
+her strong arms.
+
+"Who told you?" I stammered. "Was it Bickley or Bastin? They
+knew, though neither of them heard those holy words."
+
+"Not Bickley nor Bastin," she answered, shaking her head, "no,
+nor you yourself, awake or sleeping, though once, by the lake
+yonder, you said to me that when a certain one lay dying, she
+bade you seek her elsewhere, for certainly you would find her.
+Humphrey, I cannot say who told me those words because I do not
+know. I think they are a memory, Humphrey!"
+
+"That would mean that you, Yva, are the same as one who was--
+not called Yva."
+
+"The same as one who was called Natalie, Humphrey," she replied
+in solemn accents. "One whom you loved and whom you lost."
+
+"Then you think that we live again upon this earth?"
+
+"Again and yet again, until the time comes for us to leave the
+earth for ever. Of this, indeed, I am sure, for that knowledge
+was part of the secret wisdom of my people."
+
+"But you were not dead. You only slept."
+
+"The sleep was a death-sleep which went by like a flash, yes,
+in an instant, or so it seemed. Only the shell of the body
+remained preserved by mortal arts, and when the returning spirit
+and the light of life were poured into it again, it awoke. But
+during this long death-sleep, that spirit may have spoken through
+other lips and that light may have shone through other eyes,
+though of these I remember nothing."
+
+"Then that dream of our visit to a certain star may be no
+dream?"
+
+"I think no dream, and you, too, have thought as much."
+
+"In a way, yes, Yva. But I could not believe and turned from
+what I held to be a phantasy."
+
+"It was natural, Humphrey, that you should not believe.
+Hearken! In this temple a while ago I showed you a picture of
+myself and of a man who loved me and whom I loved, and of his
+death at Oro's hands. Did you note anything about that man?"
+
+"Bickley did," I answered. "Was he right?"
+
+"I think that he was right, since otherwise I should not have
+loved you, Humphrey."
+
+"I remember nothing of that man, Yva."
+
+"It is probable that you would not, since you and he are very
+far apart, while between you and him flow wide seas of death,
+wherein are set islands of life; perhaps many of them. But I
+remember much who seem to have left him but a very little while
+ago."
+
+"When you awoke in your coffin and threw your arms about me,
+what did you think, Yva?"
+
+"I thought you were that man, Humphrey."
+
+There was silence between us and in that silence the truth came
+home to me. Then there before the effigy of Fate and in the
+desolate, glowing temple we plighted anew our troth made holy by
+a past that thus so wonderfully lived again.
+
+Of this consecrated hour I say no more. Let each picture it as
+he will. A glory as of heaven fell upon us and in it we dwelt a
+space.
+
+
+"Beloved," she whispered at length in a voice that was choked
+as though with tears, "if it chances that we should be separated
+again for a little while, you will not grieve over much?"
+
+"Knowing all I should try not to grieve, Yva, seeing that in
+truth we never can be parted. But do you mean that I shall die?"
+
+"Being mortal either of us might seem to die, Humphrey," and
+she bent her head as though to hide her face. "You know we go
+into dangers this day."
+
+"Does Oro really purpose to destroy much of the world and has
+he in truth the power, Yva?"
+
+"He does so purpose and most certainly he has the power,
+unless--unless some other Power should stay his hand."
+
+"What other power, Yva?"
+
+"Oh! perhaps that which you worship, that which is called Love.
+The love of man may avert the massacre of men. I hope so with all
+my heart. Hist! Oro comes. I feel, I know that he comes, though
+not in search of us who are very far from his thought tonight.
+Follow me. Swiftly."
+
+She sped across the temple to where a chapel opened out of it,
+which was full of the statues of dead kings, for here was the
+entrance to their burial vault. We reached it and hid behind the
+base of one of these statues. By standing to our full height,
+without being seen we still could see between the feet of the
+statue that stood upon a pedestal.
+
+Then Oro came.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXIV
+
+The Chariot of the Pit
+
+
+Oro came and of necessity alone. Yet there was that in his air
+as he advanced into the temple, which suggested a monarch
+surrounded by the pomp and panoply of a great court. He marched,
+his head held high, as though heralds and pursuivants went in
+front of him, as though nobles surrounded him and guards or
+regiments followed after him. Let it be admitted that he was a
+great figure in his gorgeous robes, with his long white beard,
+his hawk-like features, his tall shape and his glittering eyes,
+which even at that distance I could see. Indeed once or twice I
+thought that he glanced out of the corners of them towards the
+chapel where we were hid. But this I think was fancy. For as Yva
+said, his thoughts were set elsewhere.
+
+He reached the statue of Fate and stood for a while
+contemplating it and the suppliant figures on either side, as
+though he were waiting for his invisible court to arrange itself.
+Then he doffed his jewelled cap to the effigy, and knelt before
+it. Yes, Oro the Ancient, the Super-man, the God, as the early
+peoples of the earth fancied such a being, namely, one full of
+wrath, revenge, jealousy, caprice and power, knelt in
+supplication to this image of stone which he believed to be the
+home of a spirit, thereby showing himself to be after all not so
+far removed from the savages whose idol Bastin had destroyed.
+More, in a clear and resonant voice which reached us even across
+that great space, he put up his prayer. It ran something as
+follows, for although I did not understand the language in which
+he spoke Yva translated it to me in a whisper:
+
+"God of the Sons of Wisdom, God of the whole earth, only God to
+whom must bow every other Power and Dominion, to thee I, Oro the
+Great King, make prayer and offer sacrifice. Twenty times ten
+thousand years and more have gone by since I, Oro, visited this,
+thy temple and knelt before this, thy living effigy, yet thou,
+ruler of the world, dost remember the prayer I made and the
+sacrifice I offered. The prayer was for triumph over my enemies
+and the sacrifice a promise of the lives of half of those who in
+that day dwelt upon the earth. Thou heardest the prayer, thou
+didst bow thy head and accept the sacrifice. Yea, the prayer was
+granted and the sacrifice was made, and in it were counted the
+number of my foes.
+
+"Then I slept. Through countless generations I slept on and at
+my side was the one child of my body that was left to me. What
+chanced to my spirit and to hers during that sleep, thou knowest
+alone, but doubtless they went forth to work thy ends.
+
+"At the appointed time which thou didst decree, I awoke again
+and found in my house strangers from another land. In the company
+of one of those whose spirit I drew forth, I visited the peoples
+of the new earth, and found them even baser and more evil than
+those whom I had known. Therefore, since they cannot be bettered.
+I purpose to destroy them also, and on their wreck to rebuild a
+glorious empire, such as was that of the Sons of Wisdom at its
+prime.
+
+"A sign! O Fate, ruler of the world, give me a sign that my
+desire shall be fulfilled."
+
+He paused, stretching out his arms and staring upwards. While
+he waited I felt the solid rock on which I stood quiver and sway
+beneath my feet so that Yva and I clung to each other lest we
+should fall. This chanced also. The shock of the earth tremor,
+for such without doubt it was, threw down the figures of the
+ancient man and the lovely woman which knelt as though making
+prayers to Fate, and shook the marble sword from off its knees.
+As it fell Oro caught it by the hilt, and, rising, waved it in
+triumph.
+
+"I thank thee, God of my people from the beginning," he cried.
+"Thou hast given to me, thy last servant, thine own sword and I
+will use it well. For these worshippers of thine who have fallen,
+thou shalt have others, yes, all those who dwell in the new world
+that is to be. My daughter and the man whom she has chosen to be
+the father of the kings of the earth, and with him his
+companions, shall be the first of the hundreds of millions that
+are to follow, for they shall kiss thy feet or perish. Thou shalt
+set thy foot upon the necks of all other gods; thou shalt rule
+and thou alone, and, as of old, Oro be thy minister."
+
+Still holding the sword, he flung himself down as though in an
+ecstasy, and was silent.
+
+"I read the omen otherwise," whispered Yva. "The worshippers of
+Fate are overthrown. His sword of power is fallen, but not into
+the hands that clasped it, and he totters on his throne. A
+greater God asserts dominion of the world and this Fate is but
+his instrument."
+
+Oro rose again.
+
+"One prayer more," he cried. "Give me life, long life, that I
+may execute thy decrees. By word or gesture show me a sign that I
+shall be satisfied with life, a year for every year that I have
+lived, or twain!"
+
+He waited, staring about him, but no token came; the idol did
+not speak or bow its head, as Yva had told me it was wont to do
+in sign of accepted prayer, how, she knew not. Only I thought I
+heard the echo of Oro's cries run in a whisper of mockery round
+the soaring dome.
+
+Once more Oro flung himself upon his knees and began to pray in
+a veritable agony.
+
+"God of my forefathers, God of my lost people, I will hide
+naught from thee," he said. "I who fear nothing else, fear death.
+The priest-fool yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering
+words of judgment and damnation which, though I do not believe
+them, yet stick in my heart like arrows. I will stamp out his
+faith, and with this ancient sword of thine drive back the new
+gods into the darkness whence they came. Yet what if some water
+of Truth flows through the channel of his leaden lips, and what
+if because I have ruled and will rule as thou didst decree,
+therefore, in some dim place of souls, I must bear these burdens
+of terror and of doom which I have bound upon the backs of
+others! Nay, it cannot be, for what power is there in all the
+universe that dares to make a slave of Oro and to afflict him
+with stripes?
+
+"Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my
+path in the ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless
+and forgotten as are those who went before me, while my crown of
+Power shines on younger brows. Alas! I grow old, since aeons of
+sleep have not renewed my strength. My time is short and yet I
+would not die as mortals must. Oh! God of my people, whom I have
+served so well, save me from the death I dread. For I would not
+die. Give me a sign; give me the ancient, sacred sign!"
+
+So he spoke, lifting his proud and splendid head and watching
+the statue with wide, expectant eyes.
+
+"Thou dost not answer," he cried again. "Wouldst thou desert
+me, Fate? Then beware lest I set up some new god against thee and
+hurl thee from thine immemorial throne. While I live I still have
+powers, I who am the last of thy worshippers, since it seems that
+my daughter turns her back on thee. I will get me to the
+sepulchre of the kings and take counsel with the dust of that
+wizard who first taught me wisdom. Even from the depths of death
+he must come to my call clad in a mockery of life, and comfort
+me. A little while yet I will wait, and if thou answer not, then
+Fate, soon I'll tear the sceptre from thy hand, and thou shalt
+join the company of dead gods." And throwing aside the sword,
+again Oro laid down his head upon the ground and stretched out
+his arms in the last abasement of supplication.
+
+"Come," whispered Yva, "while there is yet time. Presently he
+will seek this place to descend to the sepulchre, and if he
+learns that we have read his heart and know him for a coward
+deserted of his outworn god, surely he will blot us out. Come,
+and be swift and silent."
+
+We crept out of the chapel, Yva leading, and along the circle
+of the great dome till we reached the gates. Here I glanced back
+and perceived that Oro, looking unutterably small in that
+vastness, looking like a dead man, still lay outstretched before
+the stern-faced, unanswering Effigy which, with all his wisdom, he
+believed to be living and divine. Perhaps once it was, but if
+so its star had set for ever, like those of Amon, Jupiter and
+Baal, and he was its last worshipper.
+
+Now we were safe, but still we sped on till we reached the
+portico of our sleeping place. Then Yva turned and spoke.
+
+"It is horrible," she said, "and my soul sickens. Oh, I thank
+the Strength which made it that I have no desire to rule the
+earth, and, being innocent of death, do not fear to die and cross
+his threshold."
+
+"Yes, it is horrible," I answered. "Yet all men fear death."
+
+"Not when they have found love, Humphrey, for that I think is
+his true name, and, with it written on his brow, he stands upon
+the neck of Fate who is still my father's god."
+
+"Then he is not yours, Yva?"
+
+"Nay. Once it was so, but now I reject him; he is no longer
+mine. As Oro threatens, and perchance dare do in his rage, I have
+broken his chain, though in another fashion. Ask me no more;
+perhaps one day you will learn the path I trod to freedom."
+
+Then before I could speak, she went off:
+
+"Rest now, for within a few hours I must come to lead you and
+your companions to a terrible place. Yet whatever you may see or
+hear, be not afraid, Humphrey, for I think that Oro's god has no
+power over you, strong though he was, and that Oro's plans will
+fail, while I, who too have knowledge, shall find strength to
+save the world."
+
+Then of a sudden, once again she grew splendid, almost divine;
+no more a woman but as it were an angel. Some fire of pure
+purpose seemed to burn up in her and to shine out of her eyes.
+Yet she said little. Only this indeed:
+
+"To everyone, I think, there comes the moment of opportunity
+when choice must be made between what is great and what is small,
+between self and its desires and the good of other wanderers in
+the way. This day that moment may draw near to you or me, and if
+so, surely we shall greet it well. Such is Bastin's lesson, which
+I have striven to learn."
+
+Then she flung her arms about me and kissed me on the brow as a
+mother might, and was gone.
+
+
+Strangely enough, perhaps because of my mental exhaustion, for
+what I had passed through seemed to overwhelm me so that I could
+no longer so much as think with clearness, even after all that I
+have described I slept like a child and awoke refreshed and well.
+
+I looked at my watch to find that it was now eight o'clock in
+the morning in this horrible place where there was neither morn,
+nor noon, nor night, but only an eternal brightness that came I
+knew not whence, and never learned.
+
+I found that I was alone, since Bickley and Bastin had gone to
+fill our bottles with the Life-water. Presently they returned and
+we ate a little; with that water to drink one did not need much
+food. It was a somewhat silent meal, for our circumstances were a
+check on talk; moreover, I thought that the others looked at me
+rather oddly. Perhaps they guessed something of my midnight visit
+to the temple, but if so they thought it wisest to say nothing.
+Nor did I enlighten them.
+
+Shortly after we had finished Yva appeared. She was wonderfully
+quiet and gentle in her manner, calm also, and greeted all of us
+with much sweetness. Of our experiences during the night she said
+no word to me, even when we were alone. One difference I noticed
+about her, however; that she was clothed in garments such as I
+had never seen her wear before. They were close fitting, save for
+a flowing cape, and made of some grey material, not unlike a
+coarse homespun or even asbestos cloth. Still they became her
+very well, and when I remarked upon them, all she answered was
+that part of our road would be rough. Even her feet were shod
+with high buskins of this grey stuff.
+
+Presently she touched Bastin on the shoulder and said that she
+would speak with him apart. They went together into one of the
+chambers of that dwelling and there remained for perhaps the half
+of an hour. It was towards the end of this time that in the
+intense silence I heard a crash from the direction of the temple,
+as though something heavy had fallen to the rocky floor. Bickley
+also heard this sound. When the two reappeared I noticed that
+though still quite calm, Yva looked radiant, and, if I may say
+so, even more human and womanly than I had ever seen her, while
+Bastin also seemed very happy.
+
+"One has strange experiences in life, yes, very strange," he
+remarked, apparently addressing the air, which left me wondering
+to what particular experience he might refer. Well, I thought
+that I could guess.
+
+"Friends," said Yva, "it is time for us to be going and I am
+your guide. You will meet the Lord Oro at the end of your
+journey. I pray you to bring those lamps of yours with you, since
+all the road is not lightened like this place."
+
+"I should like to ask," said Bickley, "whither we go and for
+what object, points on which up to the present we have had no
+definite information."
+
+"We go, friend Bickley, deep into the bowels of the world, far
+deeper, I think, than any mortal men have gone hitherto, that is,
+of your race."
+
+"Then we shall perish of heat," said Bickley, "for with every
+thousand feet the temperature rises many degrees."
+
+"Not so. You will pass through a zone of heat, but so swiftly
+that if you hold your breath you will not suffer overmuch. Then
+you will come to a place where a great draught blows which will
+keep you cool, and thence travel on to the end."
+
+"Yes, but to what end, Lady Yva?"
+
+"That you will see for yourselves, and with it other wondrous
+things."
+
+Here some new idea seemed to strike her, and after a little
+hesitation she added:
+
+"Yet why should you go? Oro has commanded it, it is true, but I
+think that at the last he will forget. It must be decided
+swiftly. There is yet time. I can place you in safety in the
+sepulchre of Sleep where you found us. Thence cross to the main
+island and sail away quickly in your boat out into the great sea,
+where I believe you will find succour. Know that after disobeying
+him, you must meet Oro no more lest it should be the worse for
+you. If that be your will, let us start. What say you?"
+
+She looked at me.
+
+"I say, Yva, that I am willing to go if you come with us. Not
+otherwise."
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "that I want to see all this
+supernatural rubbish thoroughly exploded, and that therefore I
+should prefer to go on with the business."
+
+"And I say," said Bastin, "that my most earnest desire is to be
+clear of the whole thing, which wearies and perplexes me more
+than I can tell. Only I am not going to run away, unless you
+think it desirable to do so too, Lady Yva. I want you to
+understand that I am not in the least afraid of the Lord Oro, and
+do not for one moment believe that he will be allowed to bring
+about disaster to the world, as I understand is his wicked
+object. Therefore on the whole I am indifferent and quite
+prepared to accept any decision at which the rest of you may
+arrive."
+
+"Be it understood," said Yva with a little smile when Bastin
+had finished his sermonette, "that I must join my father in the
+bowels of the earth for a reason which will be made plain
+afterwards. Therefore, if you go we part, as I think to meet no
+more. Still my advice is that you should go." *
+
+( * It is fortunate that we did not accept Yva's offer. Had we
+done so we should have found ourselves shut in, and perished, as
+shall be told.--H. A. )
+
+
+To this our only answer was to attend to the lighting of our
+lamps and the disposal of our small impedimenta, such as our tins
+of oil and water bottles. Yva noted this and laughed outright.
+
+"Courage did not die with the Sons of Wisdom," she said.
+
+Then we set out, Yva walking ahead of us and Tommy frisking at
+her side.
+
+Our road led us through the temple. As we passed the great
+gates I started, for there, in the centre of that glorious
+building, I perceived a change. The statue of Fate was no more!
+It lay broken upon the pavement among those fragments of its two
+worshippers which I had seen shaken down some hours before.
+
+"What does this mean?" I whispered to Yva. "I have felt no
+other earthquake."
+
+"I do not know," she answered, "or if I know I may not say. Yet
+learn that no god can live on without a single worshipper, and,
+in a fashion, that idol was alive, though this you will not
+believe."
+
+"How very remarkable," said Bastin, contemplating the ruin. "If
+I were superstitious, which I am not, I should say that this
+occurrence was an omen indicating the final fall of a false god.
+At any rate it is dead now, and I wonder what caused it?"
+
+"I felt an earth tremor last night," said Bickley, "though it
+is odd that it should only have affected this particular statue.
+A thousand pities, for it was a wonderful work of art."
+
+Then I remembered and reminded Bickley of the crash which we
+had heard while Yva and Bastin were absent on some secret
+business in the chamber.
+
+Walking the length of the great church, if so it could be
+called, we came to an apse at the head of it where, had it been
+Christian, the altar would have stood. In this apse was a little
+open door through which we passed. Beyond it lay a space of rough
+rock that looked as though it had been partially prepared for the
+erection of buildings and then abandoned. All this space was
+lighted, however, like the rest of the City of Nyo, and in the
+same mysterious way. Led by Yva, we threaded our path between the
+rough stones, following a steep downward slope. Thus we walked
+for perhaps half a mile, till at length we came to the mouth of a
+huge pit that must, I imagine, have lain quite a thousand feet
+below the level of the temple.
+
+I looked over the edge of this pit and shrank back terrified.
+It seemed to be bottomless. Moreover, a great wind rushed up it
+with a roaring sound like to that of an angry sea. Or rather
+there were two winds, perhaps draughts would be a better term, if
+I may apply it to an air movement of so fierce and terrible a
+nature. One of these rushed up the pit, and one rushed down. Or
+it may have been that the up rush alternated with the down rush.
+Really it is impossible to say.
+
+"What is this place?" I asked, clinging to the others and
+shrinking back in alarm from its sheer edge and bottomless depth,
+for that this was enormous we could see by the shaft of light
+which flowed downwards farther than the eye could follow.
+
+"It is a vent up and down which air passes from and to the
+central hollows of the earth," Yva answered. "Doubtless in the
+beginning through it travelled that mighty force which blew out
+these caves in the heated rocks, as the craftsman blows out
+glass."
+
+"I understand," said Bastin. "Just like one blows out a bubble
+on a pipe, only on a larger scale. Well, it is very interesting,
+but I have seen enough of it. Also I am afraid of being blown
+away."
+
+"I fear that you must see more," answered Yva with a smile,
+"since we are about to descend this pit."
+
+"Do you mean that we are to go down that hole, and if so, how?
+I don't see any lift, or moving staircase, or anything of that
+sort."
+
+"Easily and safely enough, Bastin. See."
+
+As she spoke a great flat rock of the size of a small room
+appeared, borne upwards, as I suppose, by the terrific draught
+which roared past us on its upward course. When it reached the
+lip of the shaft, it hung a little while, then moved across and
+began to descend with such incredible swiftness that in a few
+seconds it had vanished from view.
+
+"Oh!" said Bastin, with his eyes almost starting out of his
+head, "that's the lift, is it? Well, I tell you at once I don't
+like the look of the thing. It gives me the creeps. Suppose it
+tilted."
+
+"It does not tilt," answered Yva, still smiling. "I tell you,
+Bastin, that there is naught to fear. Only yesterday, I rode this
+rock and returned unharmed."
+
+"That is all very well, Lady Yva, but you may know how to
+balance it; also when to get on and off."
+
+"If you are afraid, Bastin, remain here until your companions
+return. They, I think, will make the journey."
+
+Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the
+truth, if less frank we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
+
+"No, I'll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as
+any other, and if anything were to happen to them and I were left
+alone, it would be worse still."
+
+"Then be prepared," said Yva, "for presently this air-chariot
+of ours will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge,
+step on to it and throw yourselves upon your faces and all will
+be well. At the foot of the shaft the motion lessens till it
+almost stops, and it is easy to spring, or even crawl to the firm
+earth."
+
+Then she stooped down and lifted Tommy who was sniffing
+suspiciously at the edge of the pit, his long ears blown straight
+above his head, holding him beneath her left arm and under her
+cloak, that he might not see and be frightened.
+
+We waited a while in silence, perhaps for five or six minutes,
+among the most disagreeable, I think, that I ever passed. Then
+far down in the brightness below appeared a black speck that
+seemed to grow in size as it rushed upwards.
+
+"It comes," said Yva. "Prepare and do as I do. Do not spring,
+or run, lest you should go too far. Step gently on to the rock
+and to its centre, and there lie down. Trust in me, all of you."
+
+"There's nothing else to do," groaned Bastin.
+
+The great stone appeared and, as before, hung at the edge of
+the pit. Yva stepped on to it quietly, as she did so, catching
+hold of my wrist with her disengaged hand. I followed her feeling
+very sick, and promptly sat down. Then came Bickley with the air
+of the virtuous hero of a romance walking a pirate's plank, and
+also sat down. Only Bastin hesitated until the stone began to
+move away. Then with an ejaculation of "Here goes!" he jumped
+over the intervening crack of space and landed in the middle of
+us like a sack of coal. Had I not been seated really I think he
+would have knocked me off the rock. As it was, with one hand he
+gripped me by the beard and with the other grasped Yva's robe, of
+neither of which would he leave go for quite a long time,
+although we forced him on to his face. The lantern which he held
+flew from his grasp and descended the shaft on its own account.
+
+"You silly fool!" exclaimed Bickley whose perturbation showed
+itself in anger. "There goes one of our lamps."
+
+"Hang the lamp!" muttered the prostrate Bastin. "We shan't want
+it in Heaven, or the other place either."
+
+Now the stone which had quivered a little beneath the impact of
+Bastin, steadied itself again and with a slow and majestic
+movement sailed to the other side of the gulf. There it felt the
+force of gravity, or perhaps the weight of the returning air
+pressed on it, which I do not know. At any rate it began to fall,
+slowly at first, then more swiftly, and afterwards at an
+incredible pace, so that in a few seconds the mouth of the pit
+above us grew small and presently vanished quite away. I looked
+up at Yva who was standing composedly in the midst of our
+prostrate shapes. She bent down and called in my ear:
+
+"All is well. The heat begins, but it will not endure for
+long."
+
+I nodded and glanced over the edge of the stone at Bastin's
+lantern which was sailing alongside of us, till presently we
+passed it. Bastin had lit it before we started, I think in a
+moment of aberration, and it burned for quite a long while,
+showing like a star when the shaft grew darker as it did by
+degrees, a circumstance that testifies to the excellence of the
+make, which is one advertised not to go out in any wind. Not that
+we felt wind, or even draught, perhaps because we were travelling
+with it.
+
+Then we entered the heat zone. About this there was no doubt,
+for the perspiration burst out all over me and the burning air
+scorched my lungs. Also Tommy thrust his head from beneath the
+cloak with his tongue hanging out and his mouth wide open.
+
+"Hold your breaths!" cried Yva, and we obeyed until we nearly
+burst. At least I did, but what happened to the others I do not
+know.
+
+Fortunately it was soon over and the air began to grow cool
+again. By now we had travelled an enormous distance, it seemed to
+be miles on miles, and I noticed that our terrific speed was
+slackening, also that the shaft grew more narrow, till at length
+there were only a few feet between the edge of the stone and its
+walls. The result of this, or so I supposed, was that the
+compressed air acted as a buffer, lessening our momentum, till at
+length the huge stone moved but very slowly.
+
+"Be ready to follow me," cried Yva again, and we rose to our
+feet, that is, Bickley and I did, but poor Bastin was semi-
+comatose. The stone stopped and Yva sprang from it to a rock
+platform level with which it lay. We followed, dragging Bastin
+between us. As we did so something hit me gently on the head. It
+was Bastin's lamp, which I seized.
+
+"We are safe. Sit down and rest," said Yva, leading us a few
+paces away.
+
+We obeyed and presently by the dim light saw the stone begin to
+stir again, this time upwards. In another twenty seconds it was
+away on its never-ending journey.
+
+"Does it always go on like that?" said Bastin, sitting up and
+staring after it.
+
+"Tens of thousands of years ago it was journeying thus, and
+tens of thousands of years hence it will still be journeying, or
+so I think," she replied. "Why not, since the strength of the
+draught never changes and there is nothing to wear it except the
+air?"
+
+Somehow the vision of this huge stone, first loosed and set in
+motion by heaven knows what agency, travelling from aeon to aeon
+up and down that shaft in obedience to some law I did not
+understand, impressed my imagination like a nightmare. Indeed I
+often dream of it to this day.
+
+I looked about me. We were in some cavernous place that could
+be but dimly seen, for here the light that flowed down the shaft
+from the upper caves where it was mysteriously created, scarcely
+shone, and often indeed was entirely cut off, when the ever-
+journeying stone was in the narrowest parts of the passage. I
+could see, however, that this cavern stretched away both to right
+and left of us, while I felt that from the left, as we sat facing
+the shaft, there drew down a strong blast of fresh air which
+suggested that somewhere, however far away, it must open on to
+the upper world. For the rest its bottom and walls seemed to be
+smooth as though they had been planed in the past ages by the
+action of cosmic forces. Bickley noticed this the first and
+pointed it out to me. We had little time to observe, however, for
+presently Yva said:
+
+"If you are rested, friends, I pray you light those lamps of
+yours, since we must walk a while in darkness."
+
+We did and started, still travelling downhill. Yva walked ahead
+with me and Tommy who seemed somewhat depressed and clung close
+to our heels. The other two followed, arguing strenuously about I
+know not what. It was their way of working off irritation and
+alarms.
+
+I asked Yva what was about to happen, for a great fear
+oppressed me.
+
+"I am not sure, Beloved," she answered in a sweet and gentle
+voice, "who do not know all Oro's secrets, but as I think, great
+things. We are now deep in the bowels of the world, and
+presently, perhaps, you will see some of its mighty forces
+whereof your ignorant races have no knowledge, doing their
+everlasting work."
+
+"Then how is it that we can breathe here?" I asked. "Because
+this road that we are following connects with the upper air or
+used to do so, since once I followed it. It is a long road and
+the climb is steep, but at last it leads to the light of the
+blessed sun, nor are there any pitfalls in the path. Would that
+we might tread it together, Humphrey," she added with passion,
+"and be rid of mysteries and the gloom, or that light which is
+worse than gloom."
+
+"Why not?" I asked eagerly. "Why should we not turn and flee?"
+
+"Who can flee from my father, the Lord Oro?" she replied. "He
+would snare us before we had gone a mile. Moreover, if we fled,
+by tomorrow half the world must perish."
+
+"And how can we save it by not flying, Yva?"
+
+"I do not know, Humphrey, yet I think it will be saved,
+perchance by sacrifice. That is the keystone of your faith, is it
+not? Therefore if it is asked of you to save the world, you will
+not shrink from it, will you, Humphrey?"
+
+"I hope not," I replied, without enthusiasm, I admit. Indeed it
+struck me that a business of this sort was better fitted to
+Bastin than to myself, or at any rate to his profession. I think
+she guessed my thoughts, for by the light of the lamp I saw her
+smile in her dazzling way. Then after a swift glance behind her,
+she turned and suddenly kissed me, as she did so calling down
+everlasting blessings on my head and on my spirit. There was
+something very wonderful about this benediction of Yva's and it
+thrilled me through and through, so that to it I could make no
+answer.
+
+Next moment it was too late to retreat, for our narrowing
+passage turned and we found ourselves in a wondrous place. I call
+it wondrous because of it we could see neither the beginning nor
+the end, nor the roof, nor aught else save the rock on which we
+walked, and the side or wall that our hands touched. Nor was this
+because of darkness, since although it was not illuminated like
+the upper caverns, light of a sort was present. It was a very
+strange light, consisting of brilliant and intermittent flashes,
+or globes of blue and lambent flame which seemed to leap from
+nowhere into nowhere, or sometimes to hang poised in mid air.
+
+"How odd they are," said the voice of Bastin behind me. "They
+remind me of those blue sparks which jump up from the wires of
+the tramways in London on a dark night. You know, don't you,
+Bickley? I mean when the conductor pulls round that long stick
+with an iron wheel on the top of it."
+
+"Nobody but you could have thought of such a comparison,
+Bastin," answered Bickley. "Still, multiplied a thousandfold they
+are not unlike."
+
+Nor indeed were they, except that each blue flash was as big as
+the full moon and in one place or another they were so continuous
+that one could have read a letter by their light. Also the effect
+of them was ghastly and most unnatural, terrifying, too, since
+even their brilliance could not reveal the extent of that
+gigantic hollow in the bowels of the world wherein they leapt to
+and fro like lightnings, or hung like huge, uncanny lanterns.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXV
+
+Sacrifice
+
+
+"The air in this place must be charged with some form of
+electricity, but the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm
+us," said Bickley in a matter-of-fact fashion as though he were
+determined not to be astonished.
+
+"To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights,
+though how these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know,"
+I answered.
+
+As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above.
+It resembled a shooting star or a meteor more than anything else
+that I had ever seen, and made me wonder whether we were not
+perhaps standing beneath some inky, unseen sky.
+
+Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light,
+which made him terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in
+front of us clad in a long cloak.
+
+"Dear me!" said Bastin, "he looks just like the devil, doesn't
+he, and now I come to think of it, this isn't at all a bad
+imitation of hell."
+
+"How do you know it is an imitation?" asked Bickley.
+
+"Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it
+were, the Lady Yva and I should not be here."
+
+Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the
+argument went no further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent
+the knee in greeting to him.
+
+"So you have come, all of you," he said. "I thought that
+perhaps there were one or two who would not find courage to ride
+the flying stone. I am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he
+who had shown himself a coward should have had no share in the
+rule of that new world which is to be. Therefore I chose yonder
+road that it might test you."
+
+"Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to
+return by, I shall be much obliged to you, Oro," said Bastin.
+
+"How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible,
+Preacher? How do you know indeed that this is not your last
+journey from which there is no return?"
+
+"Of course I can't be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the
+question is one which you might more appropriately put to
+yourself. According to your own showing you are now extremely old
+and therefore your end is likely to come at any moment. Of
+course, however, if it did you would have one more journey to
+make, but it wouldn't be polite for me to say in what direction."
+
+Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden
+rage. Remembering the scene in the temple where he had grovelled
+before his god, uttering agonised, unanswered prayers for added
+days, I understood the reason of his wrath. It was so great that
+I feared lest he should kill Bastin (who only a few hours before,
+be it remembered, had tried to kill him) then and there, as
+doubtless he could have done if he wished. Fortunately, if he
+felt it; the impulse passed.
+
+"Miserable fool!" he said. "I warn you to keep a watch upon
+your words. Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy.
+Today you stab me with your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I
+silence it for ever."
+
+"I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that you
+can't hurt me at all any more than I could hurt you last night
+because, you see, it wasn't permitted. When the time comes for me
+to die, I shall go, but you will have nothing to do with that. To
+tell the truth, I am very sorry for you, as with all your
+greatness, your soul is of the earth, earthy, also sensual and
+devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I am afraid, very malignant,
+and you will have a great deal to answer for shortly. Yours won't
+be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you glory in your
+sins and don't know what repentance means."
+
+I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the
+most unbounded admiration for Bastin's fearless courage which
+enabled him thus to beard this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed
+were we all, for I read it in Yva's face and heard Bickley
+mutter:
+
+"Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!"
+
+Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his
+heart, for he stared at the man and made no answer. In the
+language of the ring, he was quite "knocked out" and, almost
+humbly, changed the subject.
+
+"We have yet a little while," he said, "before that happens
+which I have decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of
+the marvels of this bubble blown in the bowels of the world," and
+he motioned to us to pick up the lanterns.
+
+Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it
+was, for a distance of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here
+suddenly we came to a great groove in the rocky floor, as broad
+as a very wide roadway, and mayhap four feet in depth. The bottom
+of this groove was polished and glittered; indeed it gave us the
+impression of being iron, or other ore which had been welded
+together beneath the grinding of some immeasurable weight. Just
+at the spot where we struck the groove, it divided into two, for
+this reason.
+
+In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been,
+rose, the fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more
+sharply, and this at a spot where the groove had a somewhat steep
+downward dip which appeared to extend onwards I know not how far.
+
+Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a
+mile, I should think, we observed that it became ever more
+pronounced, till at length it ended in a razor-edge cliff which
+stretched up higher than we could see, even by the light of the
+electrical discharges. Standing against the edge of this cliff,
+we perceived that at a distance from it there were now two
+grooves of about equal width. One of these ran away into the
+darkness on our right as we faced the sharp edge, and at an ever-
+widening angle, while the other, at a similar angle, ran into the
+darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
+
+No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves
+now lay within hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter
+of a mile, for be it remembered we had followed the rising rock
+between them. To put it quite clearly, it was exactly as though
+one line of rails had separated into two lines of rails, as often
+enough they do, and an observer standing on high ground between
+could see them both vanishing into tunnels to the right and left,
+but far apart.
+
+The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where
+first we saw it at the point of separation, was not polished like
+the left-hand groove, although at some time or other it seemed to
+have been subjected to the pressure of the same terrific weight
+which cut its fellow out of the bed of rock or iron, as the sharp
+wheels of a heavily laden wagon sink ruts into a roadway.
+
+"What does it all mean, Lord Oro?" I asked when he had led us
+back to the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves,
+that is, a mile or so away from the razor-edged cliff.
+
+"This, Humphrey," he answered. "That which travels along yonder
+road, when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the
+left-hand path which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could
+a giant at that moment of its touching this exact spot on which I
+lay my hand, thrust it with sufficient strength, it would leave
+the left-hand road and take the right-hand road."
+
+"And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?"
+
+"Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough
+upon its way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and
+great things would happen in the world above, as once they
+happened in bygone days. Now do you understand, Humphrey?"
+
+"Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now," I answered. "But
+fortunately there is no such giant."
+
+Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up
+with a fiendish exultation, as he cried:
+
+"Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned
+the balance of the world from the right-hand road which now is
+dull with disuse, to the left-hand road which glitters so
+brightly to your eyes, and the face of the earth was changed. Now
+again I will turn it from the left-hand road to the right-hand
+road in which for millions of years it was wont to run, and once
+more the face of the earth shall change, and those who are left
+living upon the earth, or who in the course of ages shall come to
+live upon the new earth, must bow down to Oro and take him and
+his seed to be their gods and kings."
+
+When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also
+I remembered a certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us
+in the Temple of Nyo. But supported by his disbelief, Bickley
+asked:
+
+"And how often does the balance of which you speak come this
+way, Lord Oro?"
+
+"Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley," he
+replied.
+
+"Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble
+us," remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
+
+"Do you think so, you learned Bickley?" asked Oro. "If so, I do
+not. Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone
+awry, that Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us.
+Hearken now! What is that sound we hear?"
+
+As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs
+of a dreadful music. I cannot describe it in words because that
+is impossible, but it was something like to the buzz of a
+thousand humming-tops such as are loved by children because of
+their weird song.
+
+"Back to the wall!" cried Oro triumphantly. "The time is
+short!"
+
+So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us
+with long, determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side
+and, as I thought, now and again glanced at my face with a look
+that was half anxious and half pitiful. Also twice she stooped
+and patted Tommy.
+
+We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had
+started to examine the grooved roads. At least I think this was
+so, since now for the first time I observed a kind of little window
+in its rocky face. It stood about five feet from its floor level,
+and was perhaps ten inches square, not more. In short, except for
+its shape it resembled a ship's porthole rather than a window.
+Its substance appeared to be talc, or some such material, and
+inches thick, yet through it, after Oro had cast aside some sort
+of covering, came a glare like that of a search-light. In fact it
+was a search-light so far as concerned one of its purposes.
+
+By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four
+objects which looked like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown
+metal or material. Very deftly, very quietly, Yva lifted these
+cloaks and wrapped one of them about each of us, and while she
+was thus employed I noticed that they were of a substance very
+similar to that of the gown she wore, which I have described, but
+harder. Next she gave one of the metal-like shields to each of
+us, bidding us hold them in front of our bodies and heads, and
+only to look through certain slits in them in which were
+eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the
+searchlight window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row
+with our backs against the rock wall, at certain spots which she
+indicated with great precision, and whatever we saw or heard on
+no account to move.
+
+So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin.
+Then Yva took the fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one
+than ours, and placed herself between me and the search-light or
+porthole. On the other side of this was Oro who had no shield.
+
+These arrangements took some minutes and during that time
+occupied all our attention. When they were completed, however,
+our curiosity and fear began to reassert themselves. I looked
+about me and perceived that Oro had his right hand upon what
+seemed to be a rough stone rod, in shape not unlike that with
+which railway points are moved. He shouted to us to stand still
+and keep the shields over our faces. Then very gently he pressed
+upon the lever. The porthole sank the fraction of an inch, and
+instantly there leapt from it a most terrific blaze of lightning,
+which shot across the blackness in front and, as lightning does,
+revealed far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that
+against which we leant.
+
+"All works well," exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting
+his hand from the rod, "and the strength which I have stored will
+be more than enough."
+
+Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
+
+"I say," said Bickley, "as you know, I have been sceptical, but
+I don't like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?"
+
+"Sink half the world beneath the seas," said Oro, "and raise up
+that which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as
+you do not believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you
+ask such questions?"
+
+"I believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
+yesterday," said Bastin. "For your soul's sake I beg you to
+desist from an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but
+which will certainly involve your eternal damnation, since the
+failure will be no fault of yours."
+
+Then I spoke also, saying:
+
+"I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not
+know exactly how much or how little you can do, but I understand
+that your object is to slay men by millions in order to raise up
+another world of which you will be the absolute king, as you were
+of some past empire that has been destroyed, either through your
+agency or otherwise. No good can come of such ambitions. Like
+Bastin, for your soul's sake I pray you to let them be."
+
+"What Humphrey says I repeat," said Yva. "My Father, although
+you know it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you
+sow you will harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not
+dream. Moreover, your plans will fail. Now I who am, like
+yourself, of the Children of Wisdom, have spoken, for the first
+and last time, and my words are true. I pray you give them
+weight, my Father."
+
+Oro heard, and grew furious.
+
+"What!" he said. "Are you against me, every one, and my own
+daughter also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a
+new world; I would destroy your vile civilisations which I have
+studied with my eyes, that I may build better! To you, Humphrey,
+I would give my only child in marriage that from you may spring a
+divine race of kings! And yet you are against me and set up your
+puny scruples as a barrier across my path of wisdom. Well, I
+tread them down, I go on my appointed way. But beware how you try
+to hold me back. If any one of you should attempt to come between
+me and my ends, know that I will destroy you all. Obey or die."
+
+"Well, he has had his chance and he won't take it," said Bastin
+in the silence that followed. "The man must go to the devil his
+own way and there is nothing more to be said."
+
+I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant
+humming grew to a roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound
+which presently drowned all attempts at ordinary speech.
+
+Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away
+there appeared something terrible. I can only describe its
+appearance as that of an attenuated mountain on fire. When it
+drew nearer I perceived that it was more like a ballet-dancer
+whirling round and round upon her toes, or rather all the
+ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and then multiplied a
+million times in size. No, it was like a mushroom with two
+stalks, one above and one below, or a huge top with a point on
+which it spun, a swelling belly and another point above. But what
+a top! It must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an
+inch, and its circumference who could measure?
+
+On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate
+inconceivable, so that it looked like a gigantic wheel of fire.
+Yet it was not fire that clothed it but rather some
+phosphorescence, since from it came no heat. Yes, a
+phosphorescence arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red,
+with streaks of other colours running up between, and a kind of
+waving fringe of purple.
+
+The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of
+avalanches or of icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to
+the sea. Its terrific aspect was appalling, and its weight caused
+the solid rock to quiver like a leaf. Watching it, we felt as
+ants might feel at the advent of the crack of doom, for its mere
+height and girth and size overwhelmed us. We could not even
+speak. The last words I heard were from the mouth of Oro who
+screamed out:
+
+"Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men,
+and behold me change its path--turning it as the steersman turns
+a ship!"
+
+Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them
+approached the porthole or search-light to which she did
+something that I could not distinguish. The effect was to make
+the beam of light much stronger and sharper, also to shift it on
+to the point or foot of the spinning mountain and, by an aiming
+of the lens from time to time, to keep it there.
+
+This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not
+travel fast notwithstanding the frightful speed of its
+revolutions. I should doubt indeed if it advanced more quickly
+than a man could walk; at any rate so it seemed to us. But we had
+no means of judging its real rate of progress whereof we knew as
+little as we did of the course it followed in the bowels of the
+earth. Perhaps that was spiral, from the world's deep heart
+upwards, and this was the highest point it reached. Or perhaps it
+remained stationary, but still spinning, for scores or hundreds
+of years in some central powerhouse of its own, whence, in
+obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these
+terrific journeys.
+
+No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the
+information to himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate
+there it was, travelling towards us on its giant butt, the peg of
+the top as it were, which, hidden in a cloud of friction-born
+sparks that enveloped it like the cup of a curving flower of
+fire, whirled round and round at an infinite speed. It was on
+this flaming flower that the search-light played steadily,
+doubtless that Oro might mark and measure its monstrous progress.
+
+"He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand
+path," I shouted into Bickley's ear.
+
+"Can't be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens
+of millions of tons one inch," Bickley roared back, trying to
+look confident.
+
+Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a
+sudden she cast down her shield and, throwing herself upon her
+knees, stretched out her hands in supplication to her father. I
+understood, as did we all, that she was imploring him to abandon
+his hellish purpose. He glared at her and shook his head. Then,
+as she still went on praying, he struck her across the face with
+his hand and pushed her to her feet again. My blood boiled as I
+saw it and I think I should have sprung at him, had not Bickley
+caught hold of me, shouting, "Don't, or he will kill her and us
+too."
+
+Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the
+blue discharges which now flashed almost continuously, and the
+phosphorescent glare of the advancing mountain, I saw that though
+her beautiful face worked beneath the pain of the blow, her eyes
+remained serene and purposeful. Even then I wondered--what was
+the purpose shining through them. Also I wondered if I was about
+to be called upon to make that sacrifice of which she had spoken,
+and if so, how. Of one thing I was determined--that if the call
+came it should not find me deaf. Yet all the while I was horribly
+afraid.
+
+At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens--
+again, being alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The
+beam of light shifted and wandered till, far away, it fell
+exactly upon that spot where the rock began to rise into the
+ridge which separated the two grooves or roads and ended in the
+razor-edged cliff. Moreover I observed that Oro, who left it the
+last of us, had either placed something white to mark this first
+infinitesimal bulging of the floor of the groove, or had smeared
+it with chalk or shining pigment. I observed also what I had not
+been able to see before, that a thin white line ran across the
+floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of this painted
+rise of rock, and that the glare of the search-light now lay
+exactly over that line.
+
+The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature's
+workshop, for such without doubt it was, was drawing near,
+emitting as it came a tumult of sounds which, with the echoes
+that they caused, almost over-whelmed our senses. Poor little
+Tommy, already cowed, although he was a bold-natured beast, broke
+down entirely, and I could see from his open mouth that he was
+howling with terror. He stared about him, then ran to Yva and
+pawed at her, evidently asking to be taken into her arms. She
+thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me to lift
+him up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting
+sadly that if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I
+even thought of passing him on to Bickley, but had no time.
+Indeed I could not attract his attention, for Bickley was staring
+with all his eyes at the nightmare-like spectacle which was in
+progress about us. Indeed no nightmare, no wild imagination of
+which the mind of man is capable, could rival the aspect of its
+stupendous facts.
+
+Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by
+those globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and
+now shot upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or
+end, like a stream of meteors that had gone mad. Then the
+travelling mountain, two thousand feet in height, or more, with
+its enormous saucer-like rim painted round with bands of lurid
+red and blue, and about its grinding foot the tulip bloom of
+emitted flame. Then the fierce-faced Oro at his post, his hand
+upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to drown half of this great
+world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a saint in
+hell and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a
+saint might bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And
+lastly we three men flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
+
+Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which
+it was given to our human eyes to witness.
+
+And all the while, bending, bowing towards us--away from us--
+making obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to
+the path behind as though in farewell; instinct with a horrible
+life, with a hideous and gigantic grace, that titanic Terror
+whirled onwards to the mark of fate.
+
+At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive
+and did not know its awful mission. Visions flashed across my
+mind. I thought of the peoples of the world sleeping in their
+beds, or going about their business, or engaged even in the work
+of war. I thought of the ships upon the seas steaming steadily
+towards their far-off ports. Then I thought of what presently
+might happen to them, of the tremors followed by convulsions, of
+the sudden crashing down of cities, such as we had seen in the
+picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the inflow of the waters
+of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and desolation
+as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following death. So
+I thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect of
+the Universe to stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin
+of His handiwork.
+
+Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod,
+his hair and long beard seemed to bristle with furious and
+delighted excitement. The purple-fringed rim of the Monster had
+long overshadowed the whited patch of rock; its grinding foot was
+scarce ten yards away. Oro made more signs to Yva who, beneath
+the shelter of her shield, again bent down and did something that
+I could not see. Then, as though her part were played, she rose,
+drew the grey hood of her cloak all about her face so that her
+eyes alone remained visible, took one step towards me and in the
+broken English we had taught her, called into my ear.
+
+"Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not
+me!"
+
+She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and
+next instant with a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending
+himself double, thrust upon the rod, as I could see from his open
+mouth, shouting while he thrust.
+
+At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately
+in front of the lens or window, so that the metallic shield with
+which she covered herself pressed against its substance.
+
+Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
+
+Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out
+a rush of living flame. It struck on Yva's shield and expanded to
+right and left. The insulated shield and garments that she wore
+seemed to resist it. For a fraction of time she stood there like
+a glowing angel, wrapped in fire.
+
+Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little
+distance dissolved like a ghost and vanished from our sight.
+
+Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
+
+
+And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had
+received the full blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet
+whilst destroying, it turned away from her, seeking the free
+paths of the air. So it came about that its obstructed strength
+struck the foot of the travelling gyroscope, diffused and did not
+suffice to thrust it that one necessary inch on which depended
+the fate of half the world, or missing it altogether, passed away
+on either side. Even so the huge, gleaming mountain rocked and
+trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it bowed itself towards us as
+though in majestic homage to greatness passed away. For a second,
+too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
+and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of
+fire went out, while I was thrown to the ground.
+
+When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more
+sailing majestically upon its way and down the accustomed
+left-hand path!
+
+
+Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook--but Yva
+had saved the world!
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVI
+
+Tommy
+
+
+I lay still a while, on my back as I had fallen, and beneath
+the shield-like defence which Yva had given to me.
+Notwithstanding the fire-resisting, metalised stuff of which it
+was made, I noted that it was twisted and almost burnt through.
+Doubtless the stored-up electricity or earth magnetism, or
+whatever it may have been that had leapt out of that hole, being
+diffused by the resistance with which it was met, had grazed me
+with its outer edge, and had it not been for the shield and
+cloak, I also should have been burned up. I wished, oh! how I
+wished that it had been so. Then, by now all must have finished
+and I should have known the truth as to what awaits us beyond the
+change: sleep, or dreams, or perchance the fullest life. Also I
+should not have learned alone.
+
+Lying there thus, idly, as though in a half-sleep, I felt Tommy
+licking my face, and throwing my arm about the poor little
+frightened beast, I watched the great world-balance as it
+retreated on its eternal journey. At one time its vast projecting
+rim had overshadowed us and almost seemed to touch the cliff of
+rock against which we leant. I remember that the effect of that
+shining arch a thousand feet or so above our heads was wonderful.
+It reminded me of a canopy of blackest thunder clouds supported
+upon a framework of wheeling rainbows, while beneath it all the
+children of the devil shouted together in joy. I noted this
+effect only a few seconds before Yva spoke to me and leapt into
+the path of the flash.
+
+Now, however, it was far away, a mere flaming wheel that became
+gradually smaller, and its Satanic voices were growing faint. As
+I have said, I watched its disappearance idly, reflecting that I
+should never look upon its like again; also that it was something
+well worth going forth to see. Then I became aware that the
+humming, howling din had decreased sufficiently to enable me to
+hear human voices without effort. Bastin was addressing Bickley--
+like myself they were both upon the ground.
+
+"Her translation, as you may have noticed, Bickley, if you were
+not too frightened, was really very remarkable. No doubt it will
+have reminded you, as it did me, of that of Elijah. She had
+exactly the appearance of a person going up to Heaven in a
+vehicle of fire. The destination was certainly the same, and even
+the cloak she wore added a familiar touch and increased the
+similarity."
+
+"At any rate it did not fall upon you," answered Bickley with
+something like a sob, in a voice of mingled awe and exasperation.
+"For goodness' sake! Bastin, stop your Biblical parallels and let
+us adore, yes, let us adore the divinest creature that the earth
+has borne!"
+
+Never have I loved Bickley more than when I heard him utter
+those words.
+
+"'Divinest' is a large term, Bickley, and one to which I
+hesitate to subscribe, remembering as I do certain of the
+prophets and the Early Fathers with all their faults, not of
+course to mention the Apostles. But--" here he paused, for
+suddenly all three of us became aware of Oro.
+
+He also has been thrown to the ground by the strength of the
+prisoned forces which he gathered and loosed upon their unholy
+errand, but, as I rejoiced to observe, had suffered from them
+much more than ourselves. Doubtless this was owing to the fact
+that he had sprung forward in a last wild effort to save his
+daughter, or to prevent her from interfering with his experiment,
+I know not which. As a result his right cheek was much scorched,
+his right arm was withered and helpless, and his magnificent
+beard was half burnt off him. Further, very evidently he was
+suffering from severe shock, for he rocked upon his feet and
+shook like an aspen leaf. All this, however, did not interfere
+with the liveliness of his grief and rage.
+
+There he stood, a towering shape, like a lightning-smitten
+statue, and cursed us, especially Bastin.
+
+"My daughter has gone!" he cried, "burned up by the fiery power
+that is my servant. Nothing remains of her but dust, and, Priest,
+this is your doing. You poisoned her heart with your childish
+doctrines of mercy and sacrifice, and the rest, so that she threw
+herself into the path of the flash to save some miserable races
+that she had never even known."
+
+He paused exhausted, whereon Bastin answered him with spirit:
+
+"Yes, Oro, she being a holy woman, has gone where you will
+never follow her. Also it is your own fault since you should have
+listened to her entreaties instead of boxing her ears like the
+brute you are."
+
+"My daughter is gone," went on Oro, recovering his strength,
+"and my great designs are ruined. Yet only for a while," he
+added, "for the world-balance will return again, if not till long
+after your life-spans are done."
+
+ "If you don't doctor yourself, Lord Oro," said Bickley, also
+rising, "I may tell you as one who understands such things, that
+most likely it will be after your life-span is done also. Although
+their effect may be delayed, severe shocks from burns and over-
+excitement are apt to prove fatal to the aged."
+
+Oro snarled at him; no other word describes it.
+
+"And there are other things, Physician," he said, "which are
+apt to prove fatal to the young. At least now you will no longer
+deny my power."
+
+"I am not so sure," answered Bickley, "since it seems that
+there is a greater Power, namely that of a woman's love and
+sacrifice."
+
+"And a greater still," interrupted Bastin, "Which put those
+ideas into her head."
+
+"As for you, Humphrey," went on Oro, "I rejoice to think that
+you at least have lost two things that man desires above all
+other things--the woman you sought and the future kingship of the
+world."
+
+I stood up and faced him.
+
+"The first I have gained, although how, you do not understand,
+Oro," I answered. "And of the second, seeing that it would have
+come through you, on your conditions, I am indeed glad to be rid.
+I wish no power that springs from murder, and no gifts from one
+who answered his daughter's prayer with blows."
+
+For a moment he seemed remorseful.
+
+"She vexed me with her foolishness," he said. Then his rage
+blazed up again:
+
+"And it was you who taught it to her," he went on. "You are
+guilty, all three of you, and therefore I am left with none to
+serve me in my age; therefore also my mighty schemes are
+overthrown."
+
+"Also, Oro, if you speak truth, therefore half the world is
+saved," I added quietly, "and one has left it of whom it was
+unworthy."
+
+"You think that these civilisations of yours, as you are
+pleased to call them, are saved, do you?" he sneered. "Yet, even
+if Bickley were right and I should die and become powerless, I
+tell you that they are already damned. I have studied them in
+your books and seen them with my eyes, and I say that they are
+rotten before ever they are ripe, and that their end shall be the
+end of the Sons of Wisdom, to die for lack of increase. That is
+why I would have saved the East, because in it alone there is
+increase, and thence alone can rise the great last race of man
+which I would have given to your children for an heritage.
+Moreover, think not that you Westerners have done with wars. I
+tell you that they are but begun and that the sword shall eat you
+up, and what the sword spares class shall snatch from class in
+the struggle for supremacy and ease."
+
+Thus he spoke with extraordinary and concentrated bitterness
+that I confess would have frightened me, had I been capable of
+fear, which at the moment I was not. Who is afraid when he has
+lost all?
+
+Nor was Bastin alarmed, if for other reasons.
+
+"I think it right to tell you, Oro," he said, "that the only
+future you need trouble about is your own. God Almighty will look
+after the western civilisations in whatever way He may think
+best, as you may remember He did just now. Only I am sure you
+won't be here to see how it is done."
+
+Again fury blazed in Oro's eyes.
+
+"At least I will look after you, you half-bred dogs, who yap
+out ill-omened prophecies of death into my face. Since the three
+of you loved my daughter whom you brought to her doom, and were
+by her beloved, if differently, I think it best that you should
+follow on her road. How? That is the question? Shall I leave you
+to starve in these great caves?--Nay, look not towards the road
+of escape which doubtless she pointed out to you, for, as
+Humphrey knows, I can travel swiftly and I will make sure that
+you find it blocked. Or shall I--" and he glanced upwards at the
+great globes of wandering fire, as though he purposed to summon
+them to be our death, as doubtless he could have done.
+
+"I do not care what you do," I answered wearily. "Only I would
+beg you to strike quickly. Yet for my friends I am sorry, since
+it was I who led them on this quest, and for you, too, Tommy," I
+added, looking at the poor little hound. "You were foolish,
+Tommy," I went on, "when you scented out that old tyrant in his
+coffin, at least for our own sake."
+
+Indeed the dog was terribly scared. He whined continually and
+from time to time ran a little way and then returned to us,
+suggesting that we should go from this horror-haunted spot.
+Lastly, as though he understood that it was Oro who kept us
+there, he went to him and jumping up, licked his hand in a
+beseeching fashion.
+
+The super-man looked at the dog and as he looked the rage went
+out of his face and was replaced by something resembling pity.
+
+"I do not wish the beast to die," he muttered to himself in
+low reflective tones, as though he thought aloud, "for of them
+all it alone liked and did not fear me. I might take it with me
+but still it would perish of grief in the loneliness of the
+caves. Moreover, she loved it whom I shall see no more; yes,
+Yva--" as he spoke the name his voice broke a little. "Yet if I
+suffer them to escape they will tell my story to the world and
+make me a laughingstock. Well, if they do, what does it matter?
+None of those Western fools would believe it; thinking that they
+knew all; like Bickley they would mock and say that they were
+mad, or liars."
+
+Again Tommy licked his hand, but more confidently, as though
+instinct told him something of what was passing in Oro's mind. I
+watched with an idle wonder, marvelling whether it were possible
+that this merciless being would after all spare us for the sake
+of the dog.
+
+So, strange to say, it came about, for suddenly Oro looked up
+and said:
+
+"Get you gone, and quickly, before my mood changes. The hound
+has saved you. For its sake I give you your lives, who otherwise
+should certainly have died. She who has gone pointed out to you,
+I doubt not, a road that runs to the upper air. I think that it
+is still open. Indeed," he added, closing his eyes for a moment,
+"I see that it is still open, if long and difficult. Follow it,
+and should you win through, take your boat and sail away as
+swiftly as you can. Whether you die or live I care nothing, but
+my hands will be clean of your blood, although yours are stained
+with Yva's. Begone! and my curse go with you."
+
+Without waiting for further words we went to fetch our
+lanterns, water-bottles and bag of food which we had laid down at
+a little distance. As we approached them I looked up and saw Oro
+standing some way off. The light from one of the blue globes of
+fire which passed close above his head, shone upon him and made
+him ghastly. Moreover, it seemed to me as though approaching
+death had written its name upon his malevolent countenance.
+
+I turned my head away, for about his aspect in those sinister
+surroundings there was something horrible, something menacing and
+repellent to man and of him I wished to see no more. Nor indeed
+did I, for when I glanced in that direction again Oro was gone. I
+suppose that he had retreated into the shadows where no light
+played.
+
+
+We gathered up our gear, and while the others were relighting
+the lanterns, I walked a few paces forward to the spot where Yva
+had been dissolved in the devouring fire. Something caught my eye
+upon the rocky floor. I picked it up. It was the ring, or rather
+the remains of the ring that I had given her on that night when
+we declared our love amidst the ruins by the crater lake. She had
+never worn it on her hand but for her own reasons, as she told
+me, suspended it upon her breast beneath her robe. It was an
+ancient ring that I had bought in Egypt, fashioned of gold in
+which was set a very hard basalt or other black stone. On this
+was engraved the ank or looped cross, which was the Egyptian
+symbol of Life, and round it a snake, the symbol of Eternity. The
+gold was for the most part melted, but the stone, being so hard
+and protected by the shield and asbestos cloak, for such I
+suppose it was, had resisted the fury of the flash. Only now it
+was white instead of black, like a burnt onyx that had known the
+funeral pyre. Indeed, perhaps it was an onyx. I kissed it and hid
+it away, for it seemed to me to convey a greeting and with it a
+promise.
+
+Then we started, a very sad and dejected trio. Leaving with a
+shudder that vast place where the blue lights played eternally,
+we came to the shaft up and down which the travelling stone
+pursued its endless path, and saw it arrive and depart again.
+
+"I wonder he did not send us that way," said Bickley, pointing
+to it.
+
+"I am sure I am very glad it never occurred to him," answered
+Bastin, "for I am certain that we could not have made the journey
+again without our guide, Yva."
+
+I looked at him and he ceased. Somehow I could not bear, as
+yet, to hear her beloved name spoken by other lips.
+
+Then we entered the passage that she pointed out to us, and
+began a most terrible journey which, so far as we could judge,
+for we lost any exact count of time, took us about sixty hours.
+The road, it is true, was smooth and unblocked, but the ascent
+was fearfully steep and slippery; so much so that often we were
+obliged to pull each other up it and lie down to rest.
+
+Had it not been for those large, felt-covered bottles of Life-
+water, I am sure we should never have won through. But this
+marvelous elixir, drunk a little at a time, always re-
+invigorated us and gave us strength to push on. Also we had some
+food, and fortunately our spare oil held out, for the darkness in
+that tunnel was complete. Tommy became so exhausted that at
+length we must carry him by turns. He would have died had it not
+been for the water; indeed I thought that he was going to die.
+
+After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to
+begin to recover, and generally there was something in his manner
+which suggested to us that he knew himself to be not far from the
+surface of the earth towards which we had crawled upwards for
+thousands upon thousands of feet, fortunately without meeting
+with any zone of heat which was not bearable.
+
+We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little
+further, suddenly Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished. Then we
+heard him barking but where we could not see, since the tunnel
+appeared to take a turn and continue, but this time on a downward
+course, while the sound of the barks came from our right. We
+searched with the lanterns which were now beginning to die and
+found a little hole almost filled with fallen pieces of rock. We
+scooped these away with our hands, making an aperture large
+enough to creep through. A few more yards and we saw light, the
+blessed light of the moon, and in it stood Tommy barking
+hoarsely. Next we heard the sound of the sea. We struggled on
+desperately and presently pushed our way through bushes and
+vegetation on to a steep declivity. Down this we rolled and
+scrambled, to find ourselves at last lying upon a sandy beach,
+whilst above us the full moon shone in the heavens.
+
+Here, with a prayer of thankfulness, we flung ourselves down
+and slept.
+
+If it had not been for Tommy and we had gone further along the
+tunnel, which I have little doubt stretched on beneath the sea,
+where, I wonder, should we have slept that night?
+
+When we woke the sun was shining high in the heavens. Evidently
+there had been rain towards the dawn, though as we were lying
+beneath the shelter of some broad-leaved tree, from it we had
+suffered little inconvenience. Oh! how beautiful, after our
+sojourn in those unholy caves, were the sun and the sea and the
+sweet air and the raindrops hanging on the leaves.
+
+We did not wake of ourselves; indeed if we had been left alone
+I am sure that we should have slept the clock round, for we were
+terribly exhausted. What woke us was the chatter of a crowd of
+Orofenans who were gathered at a distance from the tree and
+engaged in staring at us in a frightened way, also the barks of
+Tommy who objected to their intrusion. Among the people I
+recognised our old friend the chief Marama by his feather cloak,
+and sitting up, beckoned to him to approach. After a good deal of
+hesitation he came, walking delicately like Agag, and stopping
+from time to time to study us, as though he were not sure that we
+were real.
+
+"What frightens you, Marama?" I asked him.
+
+"You frighten us, O Friend-from-the-Sea. Whence did you and the
+Healer and the Bellower come and why do your faces look like
+those of ghosts and why is the little black beast so large-eyed
+and so thin? Over the lake we know you did not come, for we have
+watched day and night; moreover there is no canoe upon the shore.
+Also it would not have been possible."
+
+"Why not?" I asked idly.
+
+"Come and see," he answered.
+
+Rising stiffly we emerged from beneath the tree and perceived
+that we were at the foot of the cliff against which the remains
+of the yacht had been borne by the great tempest. Indeed there it
+was within a couple of hundred yards of us.
+
+Following Marama we climbed the sloping path which ran up the
+cliff and ascended a knoll whence we could see the lake and the
+cone of the volcano in its centre. At least we used to be able to
+see this cone, but now, at any rate with the naked eye, we could
+make out nothing, except a small brown spot in the midst of the
+waters of the lake.
+
+"The mountain which rose up many feet in that storm which
+brought you to Orofena, Friend-from-the-Sea, has now sunk till
+only the very top of it is to be seen," said Marama solemnly.
+"Even the Rock of Offerings has vanished beneath the water, and
+with it the house that we built for you."
+
+"Yes," I said, affecting no surprise. "But when did that
+happen?"
+
+"Five nights ago the world shook, Friend-from-the-Sea, and when
+the sun rose we saw that the mouth of the cave which appeared on
+the day of your coming, had vanished, and that the holy mountain
+itself had sunk deep, so that now only the crest of it is left
+above the water."
+
+"Such things happen," I replied carelessly.
+
+"Yes, Friend-from-the-Sea. Like many other marvels they happen
+where you and your companions are. Therefore we beg you who can
+arise out of the earth like spirits, to leave us at once before
+our island and all of us who dwell thereon are drowned beneath
+the ocean. Leave us before we kill you, if indeed you be men, or
+die at your hands if, as we think, you be evil spirits who can
+throw up mountains and drag them down, and create gods that slay,
+and move about in the bowels of the world."
+
+"That is our intention, for our business here is done," I
+answered calmly. "Come now and help us to depart. But first bring
+us food. Bring it in plenty, for we must victual our boat."
+
+Marama bowed and issued the necessary orders. Indeed food
+sufficient for our immediate needs was already there as an
+offering, and of it we ate with thankfulness.
+
+Then we boarded the ship and examined the lifeboat. Thanks to
+our precautions it was still in very fair order and only needed
+some little caulking which we did with grass fibre and pitch from
+the stores. After this with the help of the Orofenans who worked
+hard in their desperate desire to be rid of us, we drew the boat
+into the sea, and provisioned her with stores from the ship, and
+with an ample supply of water. Everything being ready at last, we
+waited for the evening wind which always blew off shore, to
+start. As it was not due for half an hour or more, I walked back
+to the tree under which we had slept and tried to find the hole
+whence we had emerged from the tunnel on to the face of the
+cliff.
+
+My hurried search proved useless. The declivity of the cliff
+was covered with tropical growth, and the heavy rain had washed
+away every trace of our descent, and very likely filled the hole
+itself with earth. At any rate, of it I could discover nothing.
+Then as the breeze began to blow I returned to the boat and here
+bade adieu to Marama, who gave me his feather cloak as a farewell
+gift.
+
+"Good-bye, Friend-from-the-Sea," he said to me. "We are glad to
+have seen you and thank you for many things. But we do not wish
+to see you any more."
+
+"Good-bye, Marama," I answered. "What you say, we echo. At
+least you have now no great lump upon your neck and we have rid
+you of your wizards. But beware of the god Oro who dwells in the
+mountain, for if you anger him he will sink your island beneath
+the sea."
+
+"And remember all that I have taught you," shouted Bastin.
+
+Marama shivered, though whether at the mention of the god Oro,
+of whose powers the Orofenans had so painful a recollection, or
+at the result of Bastin's teachings, I do not know. And that was
+the last we shall ever see of each other in this world.
+
+The island faded behind us and, sore at heart because of all
+that we had found and lost again, for three days we sailed
+northward with a fair and steady wind. On the fourth evening by
+an extraordinary stroke of fortune, we fell in with an American
+tramp steamer, trading from the South Sea Islands to San
+Francisco. To the captain, who treated us very kindly, we said
+simply that we were a party of Englishmen whose yacht had been
+wrecked on a small island several hundreds of miles away, of
+which we knew neither the name, if it had one, nor the position.
+
+This story was accepted without question, for such things often
+happen in those latitudes, and in due course we were landed at
+San Francisco, where we made certain depositions before the
+British Consul as to the loss of the yacht Star of the South.
+Then we crossed America, having obtained funds by cable, and
+sailed for England in a steamer flying the flag of the United
+States.
+
+Of the great war which made this desirable I do not speak since
+it has nothing, or rather little, to do with this history. In the
+end we arrived safely at Liverpool, and thence travelled to our
+homes in Devonshire.
+
+
+Thus ended the history of our dealings with Oro, the super-man
+who began his life more than two hundred and fifty thousand years
+ago, and with his daughter, Yva, whom Bastin still often calls
+the Glittering Lady.
+
+
+
+Chapter XXVII
+
+Bastin Discovers a Resemblance
+
+
+There is little more to tell.
+
+Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman,
+volunteered for service at the front and departed in the uniform
+of the R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of
+explaining to Bastin how much better it was in such a national
+emergency as existed, to belong to a profession in which a man
+could do something to help the bodies of his countrymen that had
+been broken in the common cause, than to one like his in which it
+was only possible to pelt them with vain words.
+
+"You think that, do you, Bickley?" answered Bastin. "Well, I
+hold that it is better to heal souls than bodies, because, as
+even you will have learned out there in Orofena, they last so
+much longer."
+
+"I am not certain that I learned anything of the sort," said
+Bickley, "or even that Oro was more than an ordinary old man. He
+said that he had lived a thousand years, but what was there to
+prove this except his word, which is worth nothing?"
+
+"There was the Lady Yva's word also, which is worth a great
+deal, Bickley."
+
+"Yes, but she may have meant a thousand moons. Further, as
+according to her own showing she was still quite young, how could
+she know her father's age?"
+
+"Quite so, Bickley. But all she actually said was that she was
+of the same age as one of our women of twenty-seven, which may
+have meant two hundred and seventy for all I know. However,
+putting that aside you will admit that they had both slept for
+two hundred and fifty thousand years."
+
+"I admit that they slept, Bastin, because I helped to awaken
+them, but for how long there is nothing to show, except those
+star maps which are probably quite inaccurate."
+
+"They are not inaccurate," I broke in, "for I have had them
+checked by leading astronomers who say that they show a
+marvelous knowledge of the heavens as these were two hundred and
+fifty thousand years ago, and are today."
+
+Here I should state that those two metal maps and the ring
+which I gave to Yva and found again after the catastrophe, were
+absolutely the only things connected with her or with Oro that we
+brought away with us. The former I would never part with, feeling
+their value as evidence. Therefore, when we descended to the city
+Nyo and the depths beneath, I took them with me wrapped in cloth
+in my pocket. Thus they were preserved. Everything else went when
+the Rock of Offerings and the cave mouth sank beneath the waters
+of the lake.
+
+This may have happened either in the earth tremor, which no
+doubt was caused by the advance of the terrific world-balance, or
+when the electric power, though diffused and turned by Yva's
+insulated body, struck the great gyroscope's travelling foot with
+sufficient strength, not to shift it indeed on to the right-hand
+path as Oro had designed, but still to cause it to stagger and
+even perhaps to halt for the fraction of a second. Even this
+pause may have been enough to cause convulsions of the earth
+above; indeed, I gathered from Marama and other Orofenans that
+such convulsions had occurred on and around the island at what
+must have corresponded with that moment of the loosing of the
+force.
+
+This loss of our belongings in the house of the Rock of
+Offerings was the more grievous because among them were some
+Kodak photographs which I had taken, including portraits of Oro
+and one of Yva that was really excellent, to say nothing of
+pictures of the mouth of the cave and of the ruins and crater
+lake above. How bitterly I regret that I did not keep these
+photographs in my pocket with the map-plates.
+
+"Even if the star-maps are correct, still it proves nothing,"
+said Bickley, "since possibly Oro's astronomical skill might have
+enabled him to draw that of the sky at any period, though I allow
+this is impossible."
+
+"I doubt his taking so much trouble merely to deceive three
+wanderers who lacked the knowledge even to check them," I said.
+"But all this misses the point, Bickley. However long they had
+slept, that man and woman did arise from seeming death. They did
+dwell in those marvelous caves with their evidences of departed
+civilisations, and they did show us that fearful, world-wandering
+gyroscope. These things we saw."
+
+"I admit that we saw them, Arbuthnot, and I admit that they are
+one and all beyond human comprehension. To that extent I am
+converted, and, I may add, humbled," said Bickley.
+
+"So you ought to be," exclaimed Bastin, "seeing that you always
+swore that there was nothing in the world that is not capable of
+a perfectly natural explanation."
+
+"Of which all these things may be capable, Bastin, if only we
+held the key."
+
+"Very well, Bickley, but how do you explain what the Lady Yva
+did? I may tell you now what she commanded me to conceal at the
+time, namely, that she became a Christian; so much so that by her
+own will, I baptised and confirmed her on the very morning of her
+sacrifice. Doubtless it was this that changed her heart so much
+that she became willing, of course without my knowledge, to leave
+everything she cared for," here he looked hard at me, "and lay
+down her life to save the world, half of which she believed was
+about to be drowned by Oro. Now, considering her history and
+upbringing, I call this a spiritual marvel, much greater than any
+you now admit, and one you can't explain, Bickley."
+
+"No, I cannot explain, or, at any rate, I will not try," he
+answered, also staring hard at me. "Whatever she believed, or did
+not believe, and whatever would or would not have happened, she
+was a great and wonderful woman whose memory I worship."
+
+"Quite so, Bickley, and now perhaps you see my point, that what
+you describe as mere vain words may also be helpful to mankind;
+more so, indeed, than your surgical instruments and pills."
+
+"You couldn't convert Oro, anyway," exclaimed Bickley, with
+irritation.
+
+"No, Bickley; but then I have always understood that the devil
+is beyond conversion because he is beyond repentance. You see, I
+think that if that old scoundrel was not the devil himself, at
+any rate he was a bit of him, and, if I am right, I am not
+ashamed to have failed in his case."
+
+"Even Oro was not utterly bad, Bastin," I said, reflecting on
+certain traits of mercy that he had shown, or that I dreamed him
+to have shown in the course of our mysterious midnight journeys
+to various parts of the earth. Also I remembered that he had
+loved Tommy and for his sake had spared our lives. Lastly, I do
+not altogether wonder that he came to certain hasty conclusions
+as to the value of our modern civilisations.
+
+"I am very glad to hear it, Humphrey, since while there is a
+spark left the whole fire may burn up again, and I believe that
+to the Divine mercy there are no limits, though Oro will have a
+long road to travel before he finds it. And now I have something
+to say. It has troubled me very much that I was obliged to leave
+those Orofenans wandering in a kind of religious twilight."
+
+"You couldn't help that," said Bickley, "seeing that if you had
+stopped, by now you would have been wandering in religious
+light."
+
+"Still, I am not sure that I ought not to have stopped. I seem
+to have deserted a field that was open to me. However, it can't
+be helped, since it is certain that we could never find that
+island again, even if Oro has not sunk it beneath the sea, as he
+is quite capable of doing, to cover his tracks, so to speak. So I
+mean to do my best in another field by way of atonement."
+
+"You are not going to become a missionary?" I said.
+
+"No, but with the consent of the Bishop, who, I think, believes
+that my locum got on better in the parish than I do, as no doubt
+was the case, I, too, have volunteered for the Front, and been
+accepted as a chaplain of the 201st Division."
+
+"Why, that's mine!" said Bickley.
+
+"Is it? I am very glad, since now we shall be able to pursue
+our pleasant arguments and to do our best to open each other's
+minds."
+
+"You fellows are more fortunate than I am," I remarked. "I also
+volunteered, but they wouldn't take me, even as a Tommy, although
+I misstated my age. They told me, or at least a specialist whom I
+saw did afterwards, that the blow I got on the head from that
+sorcerer's boy--"
+
+"I know, I know!" broke in Bickley almost roughly. "Of course,
+things might go wrong at any time. But with care you may live to
+old age."
+
+"I am sorry to hear it," I said with a sigh, "at least I think
+I am. Meanwhile, fortunately there is much that I can do at home;
+indeed a course of action has been suggested to me by an old
+friend who is now in authority."
+
+
+Once more Bickley and Bastin in their war-stained uniforms were
+dining at my table and on the very night of their return from the
+Front, which was unexpected. Indeed Tommy nearly died of joy on
+hearing their voices in the hall. They, who played a worthy part
+in the great struggle, had much to tell me, and naturally their
+more recent experiences had overlaid to some extent those which
+we shared in the mysterious island of Orofena. Indeed we did not
+speak of these until, just as they were going away, Bastin paused
+beneath a very beautiful portrait of my late wife, the work of an
+artist famous for his power of bringing out the inner character,
+or what some might call the soul, of the sitter. He stared at it
+for a while in his short-sighted way, then said: "Do you know,
+Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more than
+at this moment, that although they were different in height and
+so on, there was a really curious physical resemblance between
+your late wife and the Lady Yva."
+
+"Yes," I answered. "I think so too."
+
+Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he
+did so I saw him start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
+
+Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life.
+It is, I admit, an odd story and one which suggests problems that
+I cannot solve. Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance
+which is the privilege and hall-mark of faith; Bickley disposes,
+or used to dispose, of them by a blank denial which carries no
+conviction, and least of all to himself.
+
+What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves
+learned? A round, short but still with time and to spare wherein
+to be dull and lonesome; a fateful treadmill to which we were
+condemned we know not how, but apparently through the casual
+passions of those who went before us and are now forgotten,
+causing us, as the Bible says, to be born in sin; up which we
+walk wearily we know not why, seeming never to make progress; off
+which we fall outworn we know not when or whither.
+
+Such upon the surface it appears to be, nor in fact does our
+ascertained knowledge, as Bickley would sum it up, take us much
+further. No prophet has yet arisen who attempted to define either
+the origin or the reasons of life. Even the very Greatest of them
+Himself is quite silent on this matter. We are tempted to wonder
+why. Is it because life as expressed in the higher of human
+beings, is, or will be too vast, too multiform and too glorious
+for any definition which we could understand? Is it because in
+the end it will involve for some, if not for all, majesty on
+unfathomed majesty, and glory upon unimaginable glory such as at
+present far outpass the limits of our thought?
+
+The experiences which I have recorded in these pages awake in
+my heart a hope that this may be so. Bastin is wont, like many
+others, to talk in a light fashion of Eternity without in the
+least comprehending what he means by that gigantic term. It is
+not too much to say that Eternity, something without beginning
+and without end, and involving, it would appear, an everlasting
+changelessness, is a state beyond human comprehension. As a
+matter of fact we mortals do not think in constellations, so to
+speak, or in aeons, but by the measures of our own small earth and
+of our few days thereon. We cannot really conceive of an
+existence stretching over even one thousand years, such as that
+which Oro claimed and the Bible accords to a certain early race
+of men, omitting of course his two thousand five hundred
+centuries of sleep. And yet what is this but one grain in the
+hourglass of time, one day in the lost record of our earth, of
+its sisters the planets and its father the sun, to say nothing of
+the universes beyond?
+
+It is because I have come in touch with a prolonged though
+perfectly finite existence of the sort, that I try to pass on the
+reflections which the fact of it awoke in me. There are other
+reflections connected with Yva and the marvel of her love and its
+various manifestations which arise also. But these I keep to
+myself. They concern the wonder of woman's heart, which is a
+microcosm of the hopes and fears and desires and despairs of this
+humanity of ours whereof from age to age she is the mother.
+
+HUMPHREY ARBUTHNOT.
+
+
+
+NOTE
+By J. R. Bickley, M.R.C.S.
+
+
+Within about six months of the date on which he wrote the last
+words of this history of our joint adventures, my dear friend,
+Humphrey Arbuthnot, died suddenly, as I had foreseen that
+probably he would do, from the results of the injury he received
+in the island of Orofena.
+
+He left me the sole executor to his will, under which he
+divided his property into three parts. One third he bequeathed to
+me, one third (which is strictly tied up) to Bastin, and one
+third to be devoted, under my direction, to the advancement of
+Science.
+
+His end appears to have been instantaneous, resulting from an
+effusion of blood upon the brain. When I was summoned I found him
+lying dead by the writing desk in his library at Fulcombe Priory.
+He had been writing at the desk, for on it was a piece of paper
+on which appear these words: "I have seen her. I--" There the
+writing ends, not stating whom he thought he had seen in the
+moments of mental disturbance or delusion which preceded his
+decease.
+
+Save for certain verbal corrections, I publish this manuscript
+without comment as the will directs, only adding that it sets out
+our mutual experiences very faithfully, though Arbuthnot's
+deductions from them are not always my own.
+
+I would say also that I am contemplating another visit to the
+South Sea Islands, where I wish to make some further
+investigations. I dare say, however, that these will be barren of
+results, as the fountain of Life-water is buried for ever, nor,
+as I think, will any human being stand again in the Hades-like
+halls of Nyo. It is probable also that it would prove impossible
+to rediscover the island of Orofena, if indeed that volcanic land
+still remains above the waters of the deep.
+
+Now that he is a very wealthy man, Bastin talks of accompanying
+me for purposes quite different from my own, but on the whole I
+hope he will abandon this idea. I may add that when he learned of
+his unexpected inheritance he talked much of the "deceitfulness
+of riches," but that he has not as yet taken any steps to escape
+their golden snare. Indeed he now converses of his added
+"opportunities of usefulness," I gather in connection with
+missionary enterprise.
+
+
+J. R. BICKLEY.
+
+
+P.S.--I forgot to state that the spaniel Tommy died within
+three days of his owner. The poor little beast was present in the
+room at the time of Arbuthnot's passing away, and when found
+seemed to be suffering from shock. From that moment Tommy refused
+food and finally was discovered quite dead and lying by the body
+on Marama's feather cloak, which Arbuthnot often used as a
+dressing-gown. As Bastin raised some religious objections, I
+arranged without his knowledge that the dog's ashes should rest
+not far from those of the master and mistress whom it loved so
+well.
+
+J.R.B.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of When the World Shook by Haggard
+
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