 CHAPTER XIV of SHE CHAPTER XIV A SOUL IN HELL It was nearly ten o'clock at night when I cast myself down upon my bed and began to gather my scattered wits and reflect upon what I had seen and heard. But the more I reflected, the less I could make of it. Was I mad, or drunk, or dreaming, or was I merely the victim of a gigantic and most elaborate hoax? How was it possible that I, a rational man, not unacquainted with the leading scientific facts of our history, and hitherto an absolute and utter disbeliever in all the hocus-pocus, which in Europe goes by the name of the supernatural, could believe that I had, within the last few minutes, been engaged in conversation with a woman two thousand and odd years old? The thing was contrary to the experience of human nature, and absolutely and utterly impossible. It must be a hoax, and yet, if it were a hoax, what was I to make of it? What, too, was to be said of the figures on the water, of the woman's extraordinary acquaintance with the remote past, and her ignorance, or apparent ignorance, of any subsequent history? What, too, of her wonderful and awful loveliness? This, at any rate, was a patent fact, and beyond the experience of the world. No merely mortal woman could shine with such a supernatural radiance. About that she had, at any rate, been in the right. It was not safe for any man to look upon such beauty. I was a hardened vessel in such matters, having with the exception of one painful experience of my Green Nintendo youth, put this off to sex, I sometimes think that this is a misnomer, almost entirely out of my thoughts. But now, to my intense horror, I knew that I could never put away the vision of those glorious eyes, and alas, the very diablary of the woman, whilst it horrified and repelled, attracted in even a greater degree. A person with the experience of two thousand years at her back, with the command of such tremendous powers, and the knowledge of a mystery that could hold off death, was certainly worth falling in love with, if ever woman was. But alas, it was not a question of whether or no she was worth it, for so far as I could judge, not being versed in such matters, I, a fellow of my college, noted for what my acquaintances are pleased to call my misogyny, and a respectable man now well on in middle life, had fallen absolutely and hopelessly in love with this white sorceress. Nonsense. It must be nonsense. She had warned me fairly, and I had refused to take the warning. Curses on the fatal curiosity that is ever prompting man to draw the veil from woman, and curses on the natural impulse that begets it. It is the cause of half, a high and more than half, of our misfortunes. Why cannot man be content to live alone and be happy, and let the women live alone and be happy too? But perhaps they would not be happy, and I am not sure that we should either. Here is a nice state of affairs. I admired my age to fall a victim to this modern Cersei. But then she was not modern, at least she said not. She was almost as ancient as the original Cersei. I tore my hair, and jumped up from my couch, feeling that if I did not do something I should go off my head. What did she mean about the scarabias too? It was Leo's scarabias, and had come out of the old coffer that Vinci had left in my rooms nearly one and twenty years before. Could it be, after all, that the whole story was true, and the writing on the shirt was not a forgery, or the invention of some crack-brained, long-forgotten individual? And if so, could it be that Leo was the man that she was waiting for, the dead man who was to be born again? Impossible. The whole thing was gibberish. Who ever heard of a man being born again? But if it were possible that a woman could exist for two thousand years, this might be possible also. Anything might be possible. I myself might, for what I knew, be a reincarnation of some other forgotten self, or perhaps the last of a long line of ancestral selves. Well, vive la guerre, why not? Only, unfortunately, I had no recollection of these previous conditions. The idea was so absurd to me that I burst out laughing, and addressing the sculpted picture of a grim-looking warrior on the cave wall, called out to him aloud. Who knows, old fellow? Perhaps I was your contemporary. By Jove, perhaps I was you, and you are I. And then I laughed again at my own folly, and the sound of my laughter rang dismally along the vaulted roof, as though the ghost of the warrior had echoed the ghost of a laugh. Next I be-thought me that I had not been to see how Leo was, so taking up one of the lamps which was burning at my bedside, I slipped off my shoes, and crept down the passage to the entrance of his sleeping cave. The draught of the night air was lifting his curtain to and fro gently, as though spirit hands were drawing and redrawing it. I slid into the vault-like apartment, and looked round. There was a light by which I could see that Leo was lying on the couch, tossing restlessly in his fever, but asleep. At his side, half lying on the floor, half leaning against the stone couch, was Ustain. She held his hand in one of hers, but she too was dozing, and too made a pretty, or rather a pathetic, picture. Poor Leo. His cheek was burning red, though dark shadows beneath his eyes, and his breath came heavily. He was very, very ill, and again the horrible fear seized me that he might die, and I be left alone in the world. And yet, if he lived, he would perhaps be my rival with Asher. Even if he were not the man, what chance should I, middle-aged and hideous, have against his bright youth and beauty? Well, thank heaven my sense of right was not dead. She had not killed that yet, and as I stood there, I prayed to heaven in my heart that my boy, my modern son, might live. I, even if he proved to be the man. Then I went back as softly as I had come, but still I could not sleep. The sight and thought of dear Leo, lying there so ill, had a field to the fire of my unrest. My wearied body and overstrained mind awakened all my imagination into preternatural activity. Ideas, visions, almost inspirations floated before it with startling vividness. Most of them were grotesque enough, some were ghastly, some recalled thoughts and sensations that had for years been buried in the debris of my past life. But behind and above them all hovered the shape of that awful woman and through them gleamed the memory of her entrancing loveliness. Up and down the cave I strode. Up and down. Suddenly I observed, what I had not noticed before, that there was a narrow aperture in the rocky wall. I took up the lamp and examined it. The aperture led to a passage. Now I was still sufficiently sensible to remember that it is not pleasant, in such a situation as ours was, to have passages running into one's bedchamber from no one knows where. There are passages, people can come up them. They can come up when one is asleep. Partly to see where it went to, and partly from a restless desire to be doing something, I followed the passage. It led to a stone stair, which I descended. The stair ended in another passage, a rather tunnel, also hewn out of the bedrock, and running, so far as I could judge, exactly beneath the gallery that led to the entrance of our rooms and across the great central cave. I went on down it. It was as silent as the grave, but still, drawn by some sensation or attraction that I cannot define, I followed on, my stocking feet falling without noise on the smooth and rocky floor. When I had traversed some fifty yards of space, I came to another passage running at right angles, and here an awful thing happened to me. The sharp draft caught my lamp, and extinguished it, leaving me in utter darkness, in the bowels of that mysterious place. I took a couple of strides forward so as to clear the bisecting tunnel, being terribly afraid lest I should turn up it in the dark, if once I got confused as to the direction, and then pause to think. What was I to do? I had no match. It seemed awful to attempt that long journey back through the utter gloom, and yet I could not stand there all night, and if I did, probably it would not help me much, for in the bowels of the rock it would be as dark at midday as at midnight. I looked back over my shoulder, not a sight or a sound. I peered forward into the darkness. Surely far away I saw something like the faint glow of fire. Perhaps it was a cave where I could get alight. At any rate it was worth investigating. Slowly and painfully I crept along the tunnel, keeping my hand against its wall, and feeling at every step with my foot before I put it down, fearing lest I should fall into some pit. Thirty paces. There was a light, a broad light that came and went, shining through curtains. Fifty paces. It was close at hand. Sixty. Oh, great heaven! I was at the curtains, and they did not hang close, so I could see clearly into the little cavern beyond them. It had all the appearance of being a tomb, and was lit up by a fire that burnt in its centre with a whitish flame and without smoke. Indeed, there to the left was a stone shelf with a little ledge to it, three inches or so high, and on the shelf lay what I took to be a corpse. At any rate it looked like one, with something white thrown over it. To the right was a similar shelf, on which lay some broided coverings. Over the fire bent the figure of a woman. She was sideways to me and facing the corpse, wrapped in a dark mantle that hid her like a nun's cloak. She seemed to be staring at the flickering flame. Suddenly, as I was trying to make up my mind what to do, with a convulsive movement that somehow gave an impression of despairing energy, the woman rose to her feet and cast a dark cloak from her. It was she herself. She was clothed, as I had seen her when she unveiled, in the curtain of clinging white, cut low upon her bosom, and bound in at the waist with a barbaric double-headed snake, and, as before, her rippling black hair fell in heavy masses down her back. But her face was what caught my eye, and held me as in a vice, not this time by the force of its beauty, but by the power of fascinated terror. The beauty was still there, indeed, but the agony, the blind passion, and the awful vindictiveness displayed upon those quivering features and in the tortured look of the upturned eyes were such as surpassed my powers of description. For a moment she stood still, her hands raised high above her head, and as she did so, the white robe slipped from her down to her golden girdle, bearing the blinding loveliness of her form. She stood there, her fingers clenched, and the awful look of malevolence gathered and deepened on her face. Suddenly I thought of what would happen if she discovered me, and the reflection made me turn sick and faint. But even if I had known that I must die if I stopped, I would not believe that I could have moved, for I was absolutely fascinated. But still I knew my danger. Supposing she should hear me, or see me through the curtain, supposing I even sneezed, or that her magic told her that she was being watched, swift indeed would be my doom. Down came the clenched hands to her sides, then up again above her head, and as I am a living and honorable man, the white flame of the fire leapt up after them, almost to the roof, throwing a fierce and ghastly glare upon she herself, upon the white figure beneath the covering, and every scroll and detail of the rockwork. Down came the ivory arms again, and as they did so she spoke, or rather hissed in Arabic, in a note that curdled my blood, and for a second stopped my heart. Curse her. May she be everlastingly accursed. The arms fell, and the flame sank. Up they went again, and the broad tongue of fire shot up after them, and then again they fell. Curse her memory. A cursed be the memory of the Egyptian. Up again, and again down. Curse her, the daughter of the Nile, because of her beauty. Curse her, because her magic hath prevailed against me. Curse her, because she held my beloved from me. And again the flame dwindled and shrank. She put her hands before her eyes, and abandoning the hissing tone cried aloud, What is the use of cursing? She prevailed, and she is gone. Then she recommends with an even more frightful energy. Curse her where she is. Let my curses reach her where she is and disturb her rest. Curse her through the starry spaces. Let her shadow be accursed. Let my power find her even there. Let her hear me even there. Let her hide herself in the blackness. Let her go down into the pit of despair, because I shall one day find her. Again the flame fell, and again she covered her eyes with her hands. It is of no use, no use, she wailed. Who can reach those who sleep? Not even I can reach them. Then once more she began her unholy rites. Curse her when she shall be born again. Let her be born accursed. Let her be utterly accursed from the hour of her birth, until sleep finds her. Yea then let her be accursed, for then shall I overtake her with my vengeance, and utterly destroy her. And so on. The flame rose and fell, reflecting itself in her agonized eyes. The hissing sound of her terrible maledictions, and no words of mine can convey how terrible they were, ran through the walls and died away in little echoes, and the fierce light and deep gloom alternated themselves on the white and dreadful form stretched upon that buyer of stone. But at length she seemed to wear herself out and cease. She sat herself down upon the rocky floor, shook the dense cloud of her beautiful hair over her face and breast, and began to sob terribly in the torture of her heart-rending despair. Two thousand years, she moaned. Two thousand years have I wanted and endured, but though century doth still creep onto century, and time give place to time, the sting of memory hath not lessened, the light of hope doth not shine more bright. O, to have lived two thousand years with all my passion eating out my heart, and with my sin ever before me. O, that for me life cannot bring forgetfulness. O, for the weary years that have been, and are yet to come, and ever more to come, endless and without end. My love, my love, my love, why did that stranger bring thee back to me after this sort? For five hundred years I have not suffered thus. O, if I sinned against thee, have I not wiped away the sin? When will thou come back to me who have all, and yet without thee have not? What is there that I can do? What? What? What? And Pachan she, Pachan's thy Egyptian, doth abide with thee where thou art, and mock my memory. O, why could I not die with thee, I who slew thee? Alas that I cannot die! Alas, alas! And she flung herself prone upon the ground, and sobbed and wept, till I thought her heart must burst. Suddenly she ceased, raised herself to her feet, rearranged her robe, and, tossing back her long locks impatiently, swept across to where the figure lay upon the stone. O, callicrity she cried, and I trembled at the name. I must look upon thy face again, though it be agony. It is a generation since I looked upon thee whom I slew, slew with mine own hand, and with trembling fingers she seized the corn of the sheet-like wrapping that covered the form upon the storm-buyer, and then paused. When she spoke again it was in a kind of odd whisper, as though her idea were terrible even to herself. Shall I raise thee, she said, apparently addressing the corpse, so that thou standest there before me as of old? I can do it. And she held out her hands over the sheeted dead, while her whole frame became rigid and terrible to see, and her eyes grew fixed and dull. I shrank in horror behind the curtain, my hair stood upon my head, and whether it was my imagination or a fact, I am unable to say, but I thought that the quiet form beneath the covering began to quiver, and the winding sheet to lift as though it lay on the breast of one who slept. Suddenly she withdrew her hands, and the motion of the corpse seemed to me to cease. To what purpose, she said gloomily, of what good is it to recall the semblance of life when I cannot recall the spirit? Even if thou stoodest before me, thou wouldst not know me, and couldst but do what I bid thee. The life in thee would be my life, and not thy life, collocrities. For a moment she stood there brooding, and then cast herself down on her knees beside the form, and began to press her lips against the sheet and weep. There was something so horrible about the sight of this awe-inspiring woman letting loose her passion on the dead. So much more horrible even than anything that had gone before, that I could no longer bear to look at it, and turning began to creep, shaking as I was in every limb, slowly along the pitch-dark passage, feeling in my trembling heart that I had seen a vision of a soul in hell. On I stumbled, I scarcely know how. Twice I fell. Once I turned up the bisecting passage, but fortunately found out my mistake in time. For twenty minutes or more I crept along, till at last it occurred to me that I must have passed the little stair by which I descended. So, utterly exhausted, and nearly frightened to death, I sank down at length there on the stone flooring, and sank into oblivion. When I came to, I noticed a faint ray of light in the passage just behind me. I crept to it, and found it was the little stair down which the weak dawn was stealing. Passing up it, I gained my chamber in safety, and flinging myself on the couch was soon lost in slumber, or rather stupor. End of Chapter 14 Chapter 15 of She This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Nick Gisburn She by H. Ryder Haggard Chapter 15 Asher Gives Judgment The next thing that I remember was opening my eyes and perceiving the form of Job, who had now practically recovered from his attack of fever. He was standing in the ray of light that pierced into the cave from the outer air, shaking out my clothes as a makeshift for brushing them, which he could not do because there was no brush, and then folding them up neatly and laying them on the foot of the stone couch. This done, he got my travelling dressing case out of the Gladstone bag and opened it ready for my use. First he stood it on the foot of the couch also, then, being afraid I suppose that I should kick it off, he placed it on a leopard skin on the floor and stood back a step or two to observe the effect. It was not satisfactory, so he shut up the bag, turned it on end, and having rested it against the foot of the couch, put the dressing case on it. Next he looked at the pots full of water, which constituted our washing apparatus. Ah, I heard in murmur, no hot water in this beastly place. I suppose these poor creatures only use it to boil each other in, and he sighed deeply. What is the matter Job, I said. Big pardon sir, he said, touching his hair. I thought you were asleep sir, and I am sure you seem as though you wanted. One might think from the look of you that you had been having a night of it. I only groaned by a way of answer. I had indeed been having a night of it, such as I hope never to have again. How is Mr. Leo Job? Much the same sir. If you don't so mend, he'll end sir, and that's all about it. Though I must say that that there savage, Ustain, do do her best for him, almost like a baptised Christian. She is always hanging round and looking after him, and if I ventures to interfere, it's awful to see her. Her hair seems to stand on end, and she curses and swears away in her heathen talk. At least I fancy she must be cursing from the look of her. And what do you do then? I make her a polite bow, and I say, young woman, your position is one that I don't quite understand, and can't recognise. Let me tell you that I has a duty to perform to my master, as is incapacitated by illness, and that I am going to perform it until I am incapacitated too. But she don't take no heed, not she. Only curses and swears away worse than ever. Last night she put her hand under that sort of night shirt she wears, and whips out a knife with a kind of curl in the blade, so I whips out my revolver, and we walks round and round each other, till at last she bursts out laughing. It isn't nice treatment for a Christian man to have to put up with from a savage, however handsome she may be, but it is what people must expect as his fools enough, Job laid great emphasis on the fools, to come to such place to look for things no man is meant to find. It's a judgement on us, sir, that's my view, and I for one, is of opinion that the judgement isn't half done yet, and when it is done, we should be done too, and just stop in these beastly caves with the ghosts and the corpses for once and all. And now sir, I must be seeing about Mr Leo's broth, if that wildcat will let me, and perhaps you would like to get up sir, because it's past nine o'clock. Job's remarks were not of an exactly cheering order to a man who had passed such a night as I had, and what is more, they had the weight of truth. Taking one thing with another, it appeared to me to be an utter impossibility that we should escape from the place we were. Supposing that Leo recovered, and supposing that she would let us go, which was exceedingly doubtful, and that she did not blast us in some moment of vexation, and that we were not hot-potted by the Amahagga, it would be quite impossible for us to find our way across the network of marshes which, stretching for scores and scores of miles, formed a stronger and more impossible fortification around the various Amahagga households than any that could be built or designed by a man. No, there was but one thing to do, face it out. And speaking for my own part, I was so intensely interested in the whole weird story that, so far as I was concerned, in the shattered state of my nose, I asked nothing better, even if my life paid forfeit to my curiosity. What man for whom physiology as charms could forbear to study such a character as that of this Asha when the opportunity of doing so presented itself. The very terror of the pursuit added to its fascination, and besides, as I was forced to own to myself, even now in this sober light of day, she herself had attractions that I could not forget. Not even the dreadful sight which I had witnessed during the night could drive that folly from my mind, and alas, that I should have to admit it, it has not been driven thence to this hour. After I had dressed myself, I passed into the eating, or rather in barming chamber, and had some food, which was as before brought to me by the girl Mutes. When I had finished, I went and saw poor Leo, who was quite off his head, and did not even know me. I asked Usdain how she thought he was, and only shook her head, and began to cry a little. Evidently, her hopes were small, and I then and there made up my mind that if it were in any way possible, I would get she to come and see him. Surely she would cure him if she chose. At any rate, she said she could. While I was in the room, Bilali entered, and also shook his head. He will die at night, he said. God forbid my father, I answered, and turned away with a heavy heart. She who must be obeyed commands thy presence, my baboon, said the old man as soon as we got to the curtain. But, oh my dear son, be more careful. Yesterday I made sure in my heart that she would blast thee, when that did not crawl upon thy stomach before her. She is sitting in the great hall even now to do justice upon those who would have smitten thee and the lion. Come on, my son, come swiftly. I turned and followed him down the passage, and when we reached the great central cave saw that many Amahaga, some robed, and some merely clad in the sweet simplicity of a leopard skin, were hurrying along it. We mingled with the throng and walked up the enormous and indeed almost interminable cave. All the way its walls were elaborately sculptured and every twenty paces or so passages opened out of it at right angles. Leading, Bilali told me, to tombs, hollowed in the rock by the people who were before. Nobody visited those tombs now, he said, and I must say that my heart rejoiced when I thought of the opportunities of antiquarian research which opened out before me. At last we came to the head of the cave where there was a rock dais almost exactly similar to the one on which we had been so furiously attacked, a fact that proved to me that these dais must have been used as altars, probably for the celebration of religious ceremonies and more especially of rites connected with the interment of the dead. By the side of this dais were passages leading, Bilali informed me, to other caves full of dead bodies. Indeed he added, the whole mountain is full of dead and nearly all of them are perfect. In front of the dais were gathered a great number of people of both sexes who stood staring about in their peculiar, gloomy fashion which would have reduced Mark Tapley himself to misery in about five minutes. On the dais was a rude chair of black wood inlaid with ivory having a seat made of grass fiber and a footstool formed of a wooden slab attached to the framework of the chair. Suddenly there was a great cry of Haya! Haya! She! She! and there upon the entire crowd of spectators instantly precipitated itself upon the ground and lay still as though it were individually and collectively stricken dead leaving me standing there like some solitary survivor of a massacre. As it did so a long string of guards began to defile from a passage to the left and range themselves on either side of the dais. Then followed about a score of male mutes then as many women mutes bearing lamps and then a tall white figure swathed from head to foot in whom I recognized she herself. She mounted the dais and sat down upon the chair and smoked me in Greek I suppose because she did not wish those present to understand what she said. Come hither, oh holly! she said sit thou at my feet and see me do justice on those who would have slain thee Forgive me if my Greek doth halt like a lame man. It is so long since I have heard the sound of it that my tongue is stiff and will not bend rightly to the words. I bowed and, mounting the dais, sat down at her feet. How hast thou slept, my holly, she asked? I slept not well, oh Asha. I answered with perfect truth and with an inward fear that perhaps she knew how I had passed the heart of the night. So she said with a little laugh I too have not slept well. Last night I had dreams and me thinks that thou didst call them to me, oh holly. Of what didst thou dream, Asha? I asked indifferently. I dreamed, she answered quickly of one I hate and one I love and then, as though to turn the conversation she addressed the captain of her guard in Arabic. Let the men be brought before me. The captain bowed low for the guard and her attendants did not prostrate themselves but had remained standing and departed with his underlings down a passage to the right. Then came a silence. She leaned her swayed head upon her hand and appeared to be lost in thought while the multitude before her continued to grovel upon their stomachs only screwing their heads round a little so as to get a view of us with one eye. It seemed that their queen so rarely appeared in public that they were willing to undergo this inconvenience and even grave her risks to have the opportunity of looking on her or rather on her garments for no living man there except myself had ever seen her face. At last we caught sight of the waving of lights and heard the tramp of men coming along the passage and infiled the guard and with them the survivors of our would-be murderers to the number of twenty or more on whose countenances a natural expression of sullenness struggled with the terror that evidently filled their savage hearts. They were ranged in front of the dais and would have cast themselves down on the floor of the cave like the spectators but she stopped them. Nay, she said in her softest voice stand, I pray you stand. Perchance the time will soon be when ye shall grow weary of being stretched out and she laughed melodiously. I saw a cringe of terror run along the rank of the doomed wretches and, wicked villains as they were, I felt sorry for them. Some minutes, perhaps two or three passed before anything fresh occurred during which she appeared from the movement of her head for, of course, we could not see her eyes to be slowly and carefully examining each delinquent. At last she spoke addressing herself to me in a quiet and deliberate tone. Does thou, O my guest, recognize these men? I, O queen, nearly all of them, I said, and I saw them glower at me as I said it. Then tell to me, and this great company, the tale whereof I have heard. Thus addued, I, in as few words as I could, related the history of the cannibal feast and of the attempted torture of our poor servant. The narrative was received in perfect silence both by the accused and by the audience and also by she herself. When I had done, I came upon Bilali by name and lifting his head from the ground, but without rising, the old man confirmed my story. No further evidence was taken. Ye have heard, said she at length, in a cold, clear voice, very different from her usual tones. Indeed, it was one of the most remarkable things about this extraordinary creature that her voice had the power of suiting itself in a wonderful manner to the mood of the moment. Let us say, ye rebellious children, why vengeance should not be done upon you. For some time there was no answer, but at last one of the men, a fine broad-chested fellow, well on in middle life, with deep-graven features and an eye like a hawks, spoke and said that the orders that they had received were not to harm the white men. Nothing was said of their black servant, so egged on there too by a woman who is now dead, and put him, after the ancient and honorable custom of their country, with a view of eating him in due course. As for their sudden attack upon ourselves, it was made in an axis of sudden fury, and they deeply regretted it. He ended by humbly praying that they might be banished into the swamps to live and die as it might chance, but I saw it ridden on his face that he had but little hope of mercy. Then came a pause, and the most intense silence reigned the whole scene, which, illuminated as it was by the flicker of the lamp striking out broad patterns of light and shadow upon the rocky walls, was as strange as any I ever saw, even in that unholy land. Upon the ground before the dais were stretched scores of the corpse-like forms of the spectators, till at last the long lines of them were lost in the gloomy background. Before this outstretched audience were the knots of evil-doers trying to cover up their natural terrors with a brave appearance of unconcern. On the right and left stood the silent guards, robed in white and armed with great spears and daggers, and men and women mutes watching with hard curious eyes. Then, seated in her barbaric chair above them all, with myself at her feet, was the veiled white woman, whose loveliness and awesome power seemed to visibly shine about her like a halo, or rather, like the glow from some unseen light. Never have I seen her veil-shape look more terrible than it did in that space, while she gathered herself up for vengeance. At last it came Dogs and Serpents She began in a low voice that gradually gathered power as she went on, till the place rang with it. Eaters of human flesh, two things have ye done. First, ye have attacked these strangers, being white men, and would have slain their servants and for that alone death is your reward. But that is not all. Ye have dared to disobey me. Did I not send my word unto you by Bilali, my servant, and the father of your household? Did I not bid you to hospitably entertain these strangers, whom now ye have striven to slay, and whom, had not they been brave and strong beyond the strength of men, ye would cruelly have murdered? Hath it not been taught to you from childhood, that the law of she is an ever-fixed law, and that he who breaketh it by so much as one jot or tittle shall perish? And is not my lightest word a law? Have not your fathers taught you this, I say, whilst as yet ye were but children? Do ye not know that as well might ye bid these great caves to fall upon you, or the sun to cease its journeying, as to hope to turn me from my courses or make my word light or heavy, according to your minds? Well do ye know it, ye wicked ones? But ye are all evil, evil to the core, the wickedness bubbles up in you like a fountain in the springtime. Were it not for me, generations since had ye ceased to be, for of your own evil way had ye destroyed each other. And now, because ye have done this thing, because ye have striven to put these men, my guests, to death, and yet more because ye have dared to disobey my word, this is the doom that I doom you to, that ye be taken to the cave of torture and given over to the tormentors and that on the going down of tomorrow's sun, those of you who yet remain alive be slain, even as ye would have slain the servant of this, my guest. She ceased, and a faint murmur of horror ran round the cave. As for the victims, as soon as they realized the full hideousness of their doom, their stoicism sucked them, and they flung themselves down upon the ground, and wept and implored for mercy in a way that was dreadful to behold. I too turned to Asher, and begged her to spare them, or at least to meet out their fate in some less awful way. But she was hard as adamant about it. My holly, she said, again speaking in Greek, which to tell the truth, although I have always been considered a better scholar of the language than most men, I found it rather difficult to follow, briefly because of the change in the fall of the accent. Asher, of course, talked with the accent of her contemporaries, whereas we have only tradition and the modern accent to guide us as to the exact pronunciation. My holly, it cannot be. Were I to show mercy to these wolves, your lives would not be safe among these people for a day. Thou knowest them not. They are tigers to lap blood, and even now they hunger for your lives. How thinkest thou that I rule these people? I have but a regiment of guards to do my bidding, therefore it is not by force. It is by terror. My empire is of the imagination. Once in a generation may have I do as I have done but now, and slay a score by torture. Believe not that I would be cruel, or take vengeance on anything so low. What can it profit me to be avenged on such as these? Those who live long, my holly, have no passions, live where they have interests. Though I may seem to slay in wrath, or because my mood is crossed, it is not so. Thou hast seen how in the heavens the little clouds blow this way and that without a cause, yet behind them is the great wind sweeping on its path wither it listeth. So it is with me, oh holly. My moods and changers are the little clouds, and fitfully these seem to turn, but behind them ever blows the great wind of my purpose. Nay, the men must die, and die as I have said. Then, suddenly turning to the captain of the guard, as my word is, so be it. Footnote. The Cave of Torture. I afterward saw this dreadful place, also a legacy from the prehistoric people who lived in core. The only objects in the cave itself were slabs of rock arranged in various positions to facilitate the operations of the torturers. Many of these slabs, which were of a porous stone, were stained quite dark with the blood of ancient victims that had soaked into them. Also in the centre of the room was a place for a furnace, with a cavity wherein to heat the historic pot. But the most dreadful thing about the cave was that over each slab was a sculptured illustration of the appropriate torture being applied. These sculptures were so awful that I will not harrow the reader attempting a description of them. L-H-H End of Footnote End of Chapter 15 Chapter 16 of She This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Nick Gisburn She by H. Rider Haggard Chapter 16 The Tombs of Cor After the prisoners had been removed Arsha waved her hand and the spectators turned round and began to crawl off down the cave like a scattered flock of sheep. When they were a fair distance from the days, however, they rose and walked away, leaving the queen and myself alone with the exception of the mutes and guards, most of whom had departed with the doomed men. Thinking this a good opportunity, I asked she to come and see Leo telling her of his serious condition but she would not, saying that he certainly would not die before the night as people never died of that sort of fever except at nightfall or dawn. Also, she said that it would be better to let the sickness spend its course as much as possible before she cured it. Accordingly, I was rising to leave and follow her as she would talk with me and show me the wonders of the caves. I was too much involved in the web of her fatal fascinations to say her no even if I had wished which I did not. She rose from her chair and making some signs to the mutes descended from the dais. Thereon four of the girls took lamps and ranged themselves too in front and too behind us but the others went away as also did the guards. Now she said, wouldst thou see some of the wonders of this place, O Holly? Look upon this great cave. So is thou ever the like. Yet was it and many more like it hollowed by the hands of the dead race that once lived here in the city on the plain. A great and wonderful people must they have been these men of core but like the Egyptians they thought more of the dead than of the living. How many men thinkest thou working for how many years did it need to the hollowing out this cave and all the galleries thereof? Tens of thousands, I answered. So, O Holly, this people was an old people before the Egyptians were. A little can I read of their inscriptions having found the key there too and see thou here this was one of the last of the caves that they hollowed and turning to the rock behind her she motioned the mutes to hold up the lamps. Carven over the dais a figure of an old man seated in a chair with an ivory rod in his hand. It struck me at once that his feet were exceedingly like those of the man who was represented as being embalmed in the chamber where we took our meals. Beneath the chair, which by the way was shaped exactly like the one in which Asher had sat to give judgment was a short inscription in the extraordinary characters of which I have already spoke but which I do not remember sufficient of to illustrate. It looked more like Chinese writing than the time acquainted with. This inscription Asher proceeded with some difficulty and hesitation to read aloud and translate. It ran as follows In the year 4259 from the founding of the city of Imperial Core was this cave or burial place completed by Tysno King of Core the people thereof and their slaves having laboured thereat for three generations to be a tomb for their citizens of rank who shall come after. May the blessings of the heaven above the heaven rest upon their work and may the sleep of Tysno the mighty monarch, the likeness of whose features is graven above a sound and happy sleep till the day of awakening and also the sleep of his servants and of those of his race who, rising up after him shall yet lay their heads as low. Footnote The Day of Awakening This phrase is remarkable as seeming to indicate a belief in a future state. Editor End of Footnote Thou seest, O Holly, she said this people found of the city of which the ruins yet cumber the plain yonder four thousand years before this cave was finished yet when first mine eyes beheld it two thousand years ago was it even as it is now. Judge therefore how old must that city have been and now follow thou me and I will show thee after what fashion this great people fell when the time was cum for it to fall and she led the way down to the centre of the cave stopping at a spot where a round rock had been let into a kind of large manhole in the flooring, accurately filling it just as the iron plates fill the spaces in the London pavements down which the coals are thrown. Thou seest, she said Tell me, what is it? Nay, I know not, I answered whereon she crossed to the left-hand side of the cave looking towards the entrance and signed to the mutes to hold up the lamps. On the wall was something painted with a red pigment in similar characters to those hewn beneath the sculpture of Tysno king of core this inscription she proceeded to translate to me the pigment still being fresh enough to show the form of the letters it ran thus I, Junis a priest of the great temple of core write this upon the rock of the burying place in the year four thousand eight hundred and three in the year four thousand eight hundred and three from the founding of core core is fallen no more shall the mighty feast in her halls no more shall she rule the world and her navies go out to commerce with the world core is fallen and her mighty works and all the cities of core and all the harbors that she built and the canals that she made are for the wolf and the owl and the wild swan and the barbarian who comes after twenty and five moons ago did a cloud settle upon core and the hundred cities of core and out of the cloud came a pestilence that slew her people old and young one with another and spared not one with another they turned black and died the young and the old the rich and the poor the man and the woman the prince and the slave the pestilence slew and slew and ceased not by day or by night those who escaped from the pestilence were slain of the famine no longer could the bodies of the children of core be preserved according to the ancient rites because of the number of the dead therefore were they hurled into the great pit beneath the cave through the hole in the floor of the cave then at last a remnant of this the great people the light of the whole world went down to the coast and took ship and sailed northwards and now am I the last man left alive of this great city of men but whether there be any yet left in the other cities I know not this do I write in misery of heart before I die because core the imperial is no more and because there are none to worship in her temple and all her palaces are empty and her printers and her captains and her traders and her fair women have passed off the face of the earth I gave a sigh of astonishment the utter desolation depicted in this rude scroll was so overpowering it was terrible to think of this solitary survivor of a mighty people recording its fate before he too went down into darkness what must the old man have felt as in ghastly terrifying solitude by the light of one lamp feebly illuminating a little space of gloom he in a few brief lines dubbed the history of his nation's death upon the cavern wall what a subject for the moralist or the painter or indeed for anyone who can think does it not occur to the oholly said Asher laying her hand upon my shoulder that those men who sailed north may have been the fathers of the first Egyptians nay I know not it seems that the world is very old old yes it is old indeed time after time have nations I enrich and strong nations learned in the arts been and passed away and been forgotten so that no memory of them remains this is but one of several for time eats up the works of man unless indeed he digs in caves like the people of core and then may have the sea swallows them or the earthquake shakes them in who knows what has been on the earth or what shall be there is no new thing under the sun as the wise Hebrew wrote long ago yet were not these people utterly destroyed as I think some few remained in the other cities for their cities were many but the barbarians from the south or Pachans my people the Arabs came down upon them and took their women to wife and the race of the Amahaga that is now is a bastard brood of the mighty sons of core and behold it dwelleth in the tombs with its fathers bones footnote the name of the race Amahaga would seem to indicate a curious mingling of races such as might easily have occurred in the neighborhood of the Zambezi the prefix Amah is common to the Zulu and kindred races and signifies people while Hagar is an Arabic word meaning a stone editor end of footnote but I know not who can know my arts cannot pierce so far into the blackness of times night a great people were they were left to conquer and then they dwelt at ease within their rocky mountain walls with their manservants and their maidservants their minstrels, their sculptors and their concubines and traded and quarrelled and ate and hunted and slept and main merry till their time came but come I will show thee the great pit beneath the cave where of the writing speaks never shall thine eyes witness such another sight accordingly I followed her to a side passage opening out of the main cave then down a great number of steps and along an underground shaft which cannot have been less than 60 feet beneath the surface of the rock and was ventilated by curious borings that ran upward I know not where suddenly the passage ended and she halted and bade the mutes hold up the lamps and as she had prophesied I saw a scene such as I was not likely to see again we were standing in an enormous pit or rather on the brink of it for it went down deeper I do not know how much than the level on which we stood and was edged in with a low wall of rock so far as I could judge this pit was about the size of the space beneath the dome of St. Paul's in London and when the lamps were held up I saw that it was nothing but one vast charnel house being literally full of thousands of human skeletons which lay piled up in an enormous gleaming pyramid formed by the slipping down of the bodies at the apex as fresh ones were dropped in from above anything more appalling than this jumbled mass of the remains of a departed race I cannot imagine and what made it even more dreadful was that in this dry air a considerable number of the bodies had simply become desiccated with the skin still on them and now fixed in every conceivable position stared at us out of the mountain of white bones grotesquely horrible caricatures of humanity in my astonishment I uttered an ejaculation and the echoes of my voice ringing in the vaulted space disturbed a skull that had been accurately balanced for many thousands of years near the apex of the pile down it came with a run bounding along merrily towards us and of course bringing an avalanche of other bones after it till at last the whole pit rattled with their movement even as though the skeletons were getting up to greeters come I said I have seen enough these are the bodies of those who died of the great sickness is it not so I added as we turned away yea the people of core ever embalmed their dead as did the egyptians but their art was greater than the art of the egyptians for whereas the egyptians disemboweled and drew the brain the people of core injected fluid into the veins and thus reached every part but stay thou shalt see and she halted at hab hazard at one of the little doorways opening out of the passage along which we were walking and motioned to the mutes to light us in we entered into a small chamber similar to the one in which I had slept at our first stopping place only instead of one there were two stone benches or beds in it on the benches lay figures covered with yellow linen on which a fine and impalpable dust are gathered in the course of ages but nothing like to the extent that one would have anticipated for in these deep hewn caves there is no material to turn to dust about the bodies on the stone shelves and floor of the tomb were many painted vases but I saw very few ornaments or weapons in any of the vaults footnote all the linen that the amahagawa was taken from the tombs which accounted for its yellow hue it was well washed however and properly re-bleached it acquired its former snowy whiteness and was the softest and best linen I ever saw L-H-H end of footnote Uplift the cloth so holly said Asha but when I put out my hand to do so I drew it back again it seemed like sacrilege and to speak the truth I was awed by the dread solemnity of the place and of the presences before us then with a little laugh at my fears she drew them herself only to discover other and yet finer cloths lying over the forms upon the stone bench these also she withdrew and then for the first time for thousands upon thousands of years did living eyes look upon the face of that chilly dead it was a woman she might have been 35 years of age or perhaps a little less and had certainly been beautiful even now her calm clear-cut features marked out with delicate eyebrows and long eyelashes which threw little lines of the shadow of the lamp light upon the ivory face were wonderfully beautiful there robed in white the blue black hair was streaming she slept her last long sleep and on her arm its face pressed against her breast there lay a little babe so sweet was the sight although so awful that I confess it without shame I could scarcely withhold my tears it took me back across the dim gulf of ages to some happy home in dead imperial core where this winsome lady girt about with beauty had lived and died making her last born with her to the tomb there they were before us mother and babe the white memories of a forgotten human history speaking more eloquently to the heart than could any written record of their lives reverently I replaced the grave cloths and with a sigh that flowers so fair should in the purpose of the everlasting have only bloomed to be gathered to the grave I turned to the body on the opposite shelf and gently unveiled it it was that of a man in advanced life with a long grizzled beard and also robed in white probably the husband of the lady who after surviving her many years came at last to sleep once more for good and all beside her we left the place and entered others it would be too long to describe the many things I saw in them each one had its occupants for the 500 and odd years that it elapsed between the completion of the cave and the destruction of the race had evidently sufficed to fill these catacombs numberless as they were and all appeared to have been undisturbed since the day when they were placed there I could fill a book with the description of them but to do so would only be to repeat what I have said with variations nearly all the bodies so masterfully was the art with which they had been treated were as perfect as on the day of death thousands of years before nothing came to injure them in the deep silence of the living rock they were beyond the reach of heat and cold and damp and the aromatic drugs with which they had been saturated were evidently practically everlasting in their effect here and there however we saw an exception and in these cases although the flesh looked sound enough externally if one touched it it fell in and revealed the fact that the figure was but a pile of dust this arose Asher told me from these particular bodies having either owing to haste in the burial or other causes being soaked in the preservative instead of it being injected into the substance of the flesh footnote Asher afterwards showed me the tree from the leaves of which this ancient preservative was manufactured it is a low bush like tree that to this day grows in wonderful plenty upon the sides of the mountains or rather upon the slopes leading up to the rocky walls the leaves are long and narrow a vivid green in colour but turning a bright red in the autumn and not unlike those of a laurel in general appearance they have little smell when green but if boiled the aromatic odour from them is so strong that one can hardly bear it the best mixture however was made from the roots and among the people of core there was a lore which Asher showed me alluded to on some of the inscriptions to the effect that on pain of heavy penalties no one under a certain rank was to be embalmed with the drugs prepared from the roots the object in effect of this was of course to preserve the trees from extermination the sale of the leaves and roots was a government monopoly and from it the kings of core derived a large proportion of their private revenue L-H-H end of footnote about the last tomb we visited I must however say one word for its content spoke even more eloquently to the human sympathies than those of the first it had but two occupants and they lay together on a single shelf I withdrew the grave cloths and there clasped heart to heart were a young man and a blooming girl her head rested on his arm and his lips were pressed against her brow I opened the mandolin in robe and there over his heart was a dagger wound and beneath the woman's fair breast was a like cruel stab through which her life had ebbed away on the rock above was an inscription in three words Asher translated it it was it was wedded in death what was the life story of these two who over truth were beautiful in their lives and in their death were not divided I closed my eyelids and imagination taking up the thread of thought shot its swift shuttle back across the ages weaving a picture on their blackness so real and vivid in its details that I could almost for a moment think that I had triumphed all the past and that my spirit's eyes had pierced the mystery of time I seem to see this fair girl form the yellow hair streaming down her glittering against her garments snowy white and the bosom that was whiter than the robes even dimming with its lustre her ornaments of burnished gold I seem to see the great cave filled with warriors bearded and clad in mail and on the lighted days where Asher had given judgment a man standing robed and surrounded by the symbols of his priestly office and up the cave there came one clad in purple and before him and behind him came minstrels and fair maidens chanting a wedding song white stood the maid against the altar fairer than the fairest there purer than a lily and more cold than the dew that glistens in its heart but as the man drew near she shouldered then out of the press and throng there sprang a dark haired youth and put his arms about this long forgotten maid and kissed her pale face in which the blood shot up like lights of the red dawn across the silent sky and next there was turmoil and uproar and a flashing of swords and they tore the youth from her arms and stabbed him but with a cry she snatched a dagger from his belt and drove it into her snowy breast home to the heart and down she fell and then with cries and wailing and every sound of lamentation the pageant rolled away from the arena of my vision and once more the past shut too its book let him who reads forgive the intrusion of a dream into a history of fact but it came so home to me I saw it all so clear in a moment as it were and besides who shall say what proportion of fact past, present or to come may lie in the imagination what is imagination perhaps it is the shadow of the intangible truth perhaps it is the soul's thought in an instant the whole thing had passed through my brain and she was addressing me behold the lot of man said the veiled Asher as she drew the winding sheets back over the dead lovers speaking in a solemn, thrilling voice which accorded well with a dream that I had dreamed to the tomb and to the forgetfulness that hides the tomb must we all come at last I even I who live so long even for me oh holly thousands upon thousands of years hence thousands of years after you has gone through the gate and been lost in the mists a day will dawn whereon I shall die and be even as thou art and these are and then what will it avail that I have lived a little longer holding off death by the knowledge that I have wrung from nature since at last I too must die what is a span of ten thousand years or ten times ten thousand years in the history of time it is as naught it is as the mist that roll up in the sunlight it fleeth away like an hour of sun it fleeth away like an hour of sleep or a breath of the eternal spirit behold the lot of man certainly it shall overtake us and we shall sleep certainly too we shall awake and live again and again shall sleep and so on and on through periods, spaces and times from eon unto eon till the world is dead and the worlds beyond the world are dead and naught liveth but the spirit that is life but for us twain and for these dead ones shall the end of ends be life or shall it be death as yet death is but life's night but out of the night is the morrow born again and doth again beget the night only when day and night and life and death are ended and swallowed up in that from which they came what shall be our fate oh holly who can see so far not even I and then, with a sudden change of tone and manner is thou seen enough my stranger guest or shall I show thee more of the wonders of these tombs that are my palace halls if thou wilt I can lead thee to where Tisno the mightiest and most valorous king of Co in whose day these caves were ended lies in a pomp that seems to mock at nothingness and bid the empty shadows of the past do homage to his sculptured vanity I have seen enough oh queen I answered my heart is overwhelmed by the power of the present death mortality is weak and easily broken down by a sense of the companionship that awaits upon its end take me hence oh Asha End of Chapter 16 Chapter 17 of She this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Nick Gisburn She by H. Ryder Haggard Chapter 17 The Balanced Turns In a few minutes following the lamps of the mutes which held out from the body as a bearer holds water in a vessel had the appearance of floating down the darkness by themselves we came to a stair which led us to She's anti-room the same that Bilali had crept up upon on all fours on the previous day here I would have bid the queen adieu but she would not nay she said enter with me oh Holly for of a truth thy conversation pleaseth me think oh Holly for two thousand years have I had none to converse with save slaves and my own thoughts and though of all this thinking hath much wisdom come and many secrets been made plain yet am I weary of my thoughts and have come to loathe my own society for surely the food that memory gives to eat is bitter to the taste and it is only with the teeth of hope that we can bear to bite it now though thy thoughts are green and tender as becomeeth once so young yet are they those of a thinking brain and in truth thou dost bring back to my mind certain of those old philosophers with whom in days bygone I have disputed at Athens and at Bekah in Arabia for thou hast the same crabbed air and dusty look as though thou hadst past thy days in reading ill-rit Greek and been stained dark with the grime of manuscripts so draw the curtain and sit here by my side and we will eat fruit and talk of pleasant things see I will again unveil to thee thou hast brought it on thyself oh Holly fairly have I warned thee and thou shalt call me beautiful as even those old philosophers will want to do fire upon them for getting their philosophy and without more ado she stood up and shook the white wrappings from her and came forth shining and splendid like some glittering snake when she has cast her slough I and fixed her wonderful eyes upon me more deadly than any basilisks and pierced me through and through with their beauty and sent her light laugh ringing through the air like chimes of silver bells a new mood was on her and the very colour of her mind seemed to change beneath it it was no longer torture-tone and hateful as I had seen it when she was cursing her dead rival by the leaping flames no longer icily terrible as in the judgment-hole no longer rich and somber and splendid like a Tyrian cloth as in the dwellings of the dead no her mood now was that of Aphrodite triumphing life radiant ecstatic wonderful seemed to flow from her and around her softly she laughed and sighed and swift her glances flew she shook her heavy tresses and their perfume filled the place she struck her little sandal foot upon the floor and hummed a snatch of some old Greek epithelamium all the majesty was gone or did but lurk and faintly flicker through her laughing eyes like lightning seen through sunlight she had cast off the terror of the leaping flame the cold power of judgment that was even now being done and the wise sadness of the tombs cast them off and put them behind her like the white shroud she wore and now stood out the incarnation of lovely tempting womanhood made more perfect and in a way more spiritual than ever woman was before so my Holly sit there where thou can see me by thine own wish remember again I say blame me not if thou dost wear away thy little span with such a sick pain at the heart that thou wouldst feign have died before ever thy curious eyes were set upon me there sit so and tell me for in truth I am inclined for praises tell me am I not beautiful nay speak not so hastily consider well the point take me feature by feature forgetting not my form and my hands and feet and my hair and the whiteness of my skin and then tell me truly hast thou ever known a woman who in aught I in one little portion of her beauty in the curve of an eyelash even or the modelling of a shell like ear is justified to hold a light before my loveliness now my waist perchance thou thinkest it too large but of a truth it is not so it is this golden snake that is too large and doth not bind it as it should it is a wide snake and knoweth that it is ill to tie in the waist but see give me thy hands so now press them round me and there with but a little force thy fingers touch oh holly I could bear it no longer I am but a man and she was more than a woman heaven knows what she was I do not but then and there I fell upon my knees before her and told her in a sad mixture of languages for such moments confused the thoughts that I worshipped her as never woman was worshipped and that I would give my immortal soul to marry her which at that time I certainly would have done and so indeed would any other man or all the race of men rolled into one for a moment she looked surprised and then she began to laugh and clap her hands in glee oh so soon oh holly she said I wondered how many minutes it would need to bring thee to thy knees I have not seen a man kneel before me for so many days and believe me to a woman's heart the sight is sweet I wisdom and length of days take not from that dear pleasure which is our sexes only right what woods thou what woods thou that does not know what thou doest have I not told thee that I am not for thee I love but one and thou art not the man ah holly for all thy wisdom and in a way thou art wise thou art but a fool running after folly thou would's look into mine eyes thou would's kiss me well if it pleaseth thee look and she bent herself towards me and fixed her dark and thrilling orbs upon my own I and kiss too if thou wilt for thanks be given to the scheme of things kissers leave no marks except upon the heart but if thou dost kiss I tell the other surety will thou eat out thy breast with love of me and die and she bent yet further towards me till her soft hair brush my brow and her fragrant breath played upon my face and made me faint and weak then of a sudden even as I stretched out my hands to clasp she straightened herself and a quick change passed over her reaching out her hand she held it over my head and it seemed to me that something flowed from it that chilled me back to common sense and a knowledge of propriety and the domestic virtues enough of this wanton folly she said with a touch of sternness listen holly thou art a good and honest man and I feign would spare thee but oh it is so hard for woman to be merciful I have said I am not for thee my thoughts pass by me like an idle wind and the dust of thy imagination sink again into the depths well of despair of thou wilt thou dost not know me holly hath thou seen me but ten hours past when my passion seized me thou had shrunk from me in fear and trembling I am of many moods and like the water in that vessel I reflect many things but they pass my holly they pass and are forgotten only the water is the water still and I still am I and that which maketh the water maketh it and that which maketh me, maketh me nor can my quality be altered therefore pay no heed to what I seem seeing that thou canst not know what I am if thou troublest me again I will veil myself and thou shalt behold my face no more I rose and sank on the cushioned couch beside her yet quivering with emotion though for a moment my mad passion had left me as the leaves of a tree quiver still although the gust be gone that stirred them I did not dare to tell her that I had seen her in that deep and hellish mood muttering incantations to the fire in the tomb so she went on now it's some fruit believe me it is the only true food for man oh tell me of the philosophy of that Hebrew messiah who came after me and who thou sayest now rule Rome and Greece and Egypt and the barbarians beyond it must have been a strange philosophy that he taught for in my day the peoples would have not of our philosophies revel and lust and drink blood and cold steel and the shock of men gathered in the battle these were the cannons of their creeds I had recovered myself a little by now and feeling bitterly ashamed of the weakness into which I had been betrayed I did my best to expound to her the doctrines of Christianity to which however with a single exception of our conception of heaven and hell I found that she paid but scant attention her interest being all directed towards the man who taught them also I told her that among her own people the Arabs another prophet, Juan Mohammed had arisen and preached a new faith to which many millions of mankind now adhered ah she said I see two new religions I have known so many and doubtless there have been many more since I knew ought beyond these caves of core mankind asks ever of the skies to vision out what lies behind them it is terror for the end and but a subtler form of selfishness this it is that breeds religions mark my holly each religion claims the future for its followers or at least the good thereof the evil is for those benighted ones who will have none of it seeing the light the true believers worship as the fishes see the stars but dimly the religions come and the religions pass and the civilizations come and pass and not endures but the world and human nature ah if man would but see that hope is from within and not from without that he himself must work out his own salvation he is there and within him is the breath of life and the knowledge of good and evil as good and evil is to him let him build and stand erect and not cast himself before the image of some unknown god modelled like his poor self but with a bigger brain to think the evil thing and a longer arm to do it I thought to myself which shows how old such reasoning is being indeed one of the recurring qualities of theological discussion that her argument sounded very like some that I have heard in the 19th century and in other places than the caves of core and with which by the way I totally disagree but I did not care to try and discuss the question with her to begin with my mind was too weary with all the emotions through which I had passed and in the second place I knew that I should get the worst of it it is weary work enough to argue with an ordinary materialist who hurls statistics and holds strata of geological facts at your head whilst you can only buffet him with deductions and instincts and the snowflakes of faith that are alas so apt to melt in the hot embers of our troubles how little chance then should I have against one whose brain was supernaturally sharpened and who had 2,000 years of experience besides all manner of knowledge of the secrets of nature at her command feeling that you would be more likely to convert me than I should to convert her I thought it best to leave the matter alone and so sat silent many a time since then have I bitterly regretted that I did so for thereby I lost the only opportunity I can remember having had of ascertaining what Asher really believed and what her philosophy was well my holy she continued and so those people of mine have found a prophet a false prophet thou sayest for he is not thine own and indeed I doubt it not yet in my day was it otherwise for then we Arabs had many gods Alat there was and Saba the host of heaven Al-Utsa and Manah the stony one for whom the blood of victims flowed and Wad and Sawa and Yaghuth the lion of the dwellers in Yaman and Yaouk the horse of Morad and Nasser the eagle of Hamayah I and many more oh the folly of it all the shame and the pitiful folly yet when I rose in wisdom and spoke thereof surely they would have slain me in the name of their outraged gods well so hath it ever been but my holly art thou weary of me already that thou dost sit so silent or dost thou feelest I should teach thee my philosophy for no I have a philosophy what would a teacher be without her own philosophy and if thou dost vex me over much beware for I will have thee learn it and thou shalt be my disciple and we twain will found a faith that shall swallow up all others faithless man and but half an hour since thou wasst upon thy knees the posture does not suit thee holly swearing that thou didst love me what shall we do nay I have it I will come and see this youth the lion as the old man Bilali calls him who came with thee and who is so sick the fever must have run its course by now and if he is about to die fear not my holly I shall use no magic have I not told thee that there is no such thing as magic though there is such a thing as understanding and applying the forces which are in nature go now and presently, when I have made the drug ready I will follow thee footnote Asha was a great chemist indeed chemistry appears to have been her only amusement and occupation she had one of the caves fitted up as a laboratory although her appliances were necessarily rude the results that she attained were as will become clear in the course of this narrative sufficiently surprising L H H end of footnote accordingly I went only to find Job and Ostain in a great state of grief declaring that Leo was in the throes of death and that they had been searching for me everywhere I rushed to the couch and glanced at him clearly he was dying he was senseless and breathing heavily but his lips were quivering and every now and again a little shudder ran down his frame I knew enough of doctoring to see that in another hour he would be beyond the reach of earthly help perhaps in another five minutes how I cursed my selfishness and the folly that had kept me lingering by Asha's side while my dear boy lay dying alas and alas easily the best of us are lighted down to evil by the gleam of a woman's eyes what a wicked wretch was I actually for the last half hour I had scarcely thought of Leo and this be it remembered of the man who for twenty years had been my dearest companion and the chief interest of my existence and now perhaps it was too late I rung my hands and glanced round Ostain was sitting by the couch and in her eyes burnt the dull light of despair Job was blubbering I am sorry I cannot name his distress by any more delicate word audibly in the corner seeing my eye fixed upon him he went outside to give way to his grief in the passage obviously the only hope lay in Asha she and she alone unless indeed she was an imposter which I could not believe could save him I would go and implore her to come as I started to do so however Job came flying into the room his hair literally standing on end with terror oh god help us sir he ejaculated in a frightened whisper his corpse are coming sliding down the passage for a moment I was puzzled but presently of course it struck me that he must have seen Asha wrapped in her grave like garment and been deceived by the extraordinary undulating smoothness of her walk into a belief that she was a white ghost gliding towards him indeed at that very moment the question was settled for Asha herself was in the apartment or rather cave Job turned and saw her sheeted form and then with a convulsive howl of here it comes sprang into a corner and jammed his face against the wall and Ustain, guessing who's the dread presence must be prostrated herself upon her face thou comest in good time Asha I said for my boy lies at the point of death so she said softly provided he be not dead it is no matter for I can bring him back to life my holly is that man there thy servant and is that the method wherewith thy servants greet strangers in thy country he is frightened of thy gob it hath a death like air I answered she laughed and the girl, ah I see now it is she of whom thou did speak to me well bid them both to leave us and we will see to this sick lion of thine I love not that underlings should perceive my wisdom thereon I told Ustain in Arabic and Job in English both to leave the room an order which the latter obeyed readily enough and was glad to obey for he could not in any way subdue his fear but it was otherwise with Ustain what does she want she whispered guided between her fear of the terrible queen and her anxiety to remain near Leo it is surely the right of a wife to be near her husband when he dyeth nay I will not go my lord the baboon why doth not that woman leave is my holly asked Arsha from the other end of the cave where she was engaged in carelessly examining some of the sculptures on the wall she is not willing to leave Leo I answered not knowing what to say Arsha wheeled round and pointing to the girl Ustain said one word and one only but it was quite enough for the tone in which it was said meant volumes go and then Ustain crept past her on her hands and knees and went thou seest my holly said Arsha with a little laugh it was needful that I should give these people a lesson in obedience that girl went nigh to disobeying me and learned this morn how I treat the disobedient well she has gone and now let me see the youth and she glided towards the couch on which Leo lay with his face in the shadow and turned towards the wall he hath a noble shape she said as she bent over him to look upon his face next second her tall and willowy form was staggering back across the room as though she had been shot or stabbed staggering back till at last she struck the cavern wall and then there burst from her lips the most awful and unearthly scream that I ever heard in all my life what is it Arsha I cried is he dead she turned and sprang towards me like a Tigris thou dog she said in a terrible whisper which sounded like the hiss of a snake why dis thou hide this from me and she stretched out her arm and I thought that she was about to slay me what I ejaculated the most lively terror what ah she said learn my holly learn their lies their lies my lost collocrities collocrities who has come back to me at last as I knew he would as I knew he would and she began to sob and to laugh and generally to conduct herself like any other lady who is a little upset murmuring nonsense thought I to myself but I did not like to say it and indeed at that moment I was thinking of Leo's life having forgotten everything else in that terrible anxiety what I feared now was that he should die while she was carrying on unless thou art able to help him Arsha I put in by way of a reminder thy collocrities will soon be far beyond thy calling surely he dyeth even now true she said with a start oh why did I not come before I am unnerved my hand trembles even mine and yet it is very easy hear thou holly take this file and she produced a tiny jar of pottery from the folds of her garment and pour the liquid in it down his throat it will cure him if he be not dead swift now swift the man dies I glanced towards him it was true enough Leo was in his death struggle I saw his poor face turning ashen and heard the breath begin to rattle in his throat the file was stopped with a little piece of wood I drew it with my teeth and a drop of the fluid within flew out upon my tongue it had a sweet flavour and for a second been my head swim and a mist gather before my eyes but happily the effect passed away as swiftly as it had arisen when I reached Leo's side he was plainly expiring his golden head was slowly turning from side to side and his mouth was slightly open I called to Asher to hold his head and this she managed to do though the woman was quivering from head to foot like an aspen leaf or a startled horse then forcing the jar a little more open I poured the contents of the file into his mouth instantly a little vapour arose from it as happens when one disturbs nitric acid and this side did not increase my hopes already faint enough of the efficacy of the treatment one thing however was certain the death throw ceased at first I thought because he had got beyond them and crossed the awful river his face turned to a livid pallor and his heart beats which had been feeble enough before seemed to die away altogether only the eyelid still twitched a little in my doubt I looked up at Asher whose head wrapping had slipped back in her excitement when she went reeling across the room she was still holding Leo's head and with a face as pale as his own watching his countenance was such an expression of agonised anxiety as I had never seen before clearly she did not know if he would live or die five minutes slowly passed and I saw that she was abandoning hope her lovely oval face seemed to fall in and grow visibly thinner beneath the pressure of a mental agony whose pencil drew black lines about the hollows of her eyes the coral faded even from her lips till they were as white as Leo's face and quivered pitifully it was shocking to see her even in my own grief I felt for hers is it too late? I gasped she hid her face in her hands and made no answer and I too turned away but as I did so I heard a deep drawn breath and I received a line of colour creeping up Leo's face then another and another and then wonder of wonders the man we had thought dead turned over on his side thou seest I said in a whisper I see she answered hoarsely he is saved I thought we were too late another moment one little moment more and he had been gone sobbing as though her heart would break and yet looking lovelier than ever as she did it at last she ceased forgive me my holly forgive me for my weakness thou seest after all I am a very woman think, now think of it this morning didst thou speak of the place of torment appointed by this new religion of thine hell or hades doudes call it a place where the vital essence lives in the spiritual memory and where all the errors and faults of judgment and unsatisfied passions and the unsubstantial terrors of the mind wherewith it hath at any time had to do come to mock and haunt and jibe and ring the heart forever and forever with the vision of its own hopelessness thus even thus have I lived for full two thousand years for some six and sixty generations as you reckon time in a hell as thou callest it with the memory of a crime tortured day and night with an unfulfilled desire without companionship without comfort without death and led on only down my dreary road by the marsh lights of hope which though they flickered here and there and now glowed strong and now were not yet as my skill told me would one day lead unto my deliverer and then think of it still oh holly for never shall thou hear such another tale or see such another scene nay not even if I give thee ten thousand years of life and thou shalt have it in payment if thou wilt think at last my deliverer came he for whom I had watched and waited through the generations at the appointed time he came to seek me as I knew that he must come for my wisdom could not err though I knew not when or how yet see how ignorant I was see how small my knowledge and how faint my strength for hours he lay there sick unto death and I felt it not I who had waited for him for two thousand years I knew it not and then at last I see him and behold my chances gone but by a hair's breadth even before I have it for he is in the very jaws of death whence no power of mine can draw him and if he die surely must the hell be lived through once more once more must I face the weary centuries and wait and wait till the time in its fullness shall bring my beloved back to me and then thou gave us him the medicine and that five minutes dragged long before I knew if he would live or die and I tell thee that all the sixty generations that are gone were not so long as that five minutes but they passed at length and still he showed no sign and I knew that if the drug works not then as far as I have had knowledge it works not at all then thought I that he was once more dead and all the torches of all the years gathered themselves into a single venomed spear and paced me through and through because again I had lost calicoities and then when all was done behold he sighed behold he lived and I knew that he would live for none die on whom the drug takes hold think of it now my holly think of the wonder of it he will sleep for twelve hours and then the fever will have left him she stopped and laid her hand upon his golden head and then bent down and kissed his brow with a chastened abandonment of tenderness that would have been beautiful to behold had not the sight cut me to the heart for I was jealous Chapter 18 of SHE this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org SHE by A. Trider Haggard Chapter 18 Go Woman then followed a silence of a minute or so during which SHE appeared of one might judge from the almost angelic rapture of her face for she looked angelic sometimes to be plunged into a happy ecstasy suddenly however a new thought struck her and her expression became the very reverse of angelic almost had I forgotten she said that woman you stand what is she to callicreties his servant or and she paused and her voice trembled I shrugged my shoulders I understand that she's wed to him according to the custom of the Amahagger I answered but I know not her face grew dark as a thunder cloud older she was Asia had not outlived jealousy then there is an end she said she must die even now for what crime I asked horrified she's guilty of naught but they are not guilty of their self o Asia she loves the man and he has been pleased to accept her love where then is her sin truly oh holly thou art foolish she answered almost patently where is her sin her sin is that she stands between me and my desire well I know that I can take him from her for dwells are a man upon this earth oh holly who could resist me if I put out my strength men of faithful for so long only his temptations pass them by if the temptation be but strong enough then will the man yield for every man like every rope hath his breaking strain and passion is to men what goal and power are to women the weight upon their weakness believe me ill will it go with mortal woman in that heaven of which those speakers have only the spirits be more fair for their lords will never turn to look upon them and their heaven will become their hell a man can be bought to the woman's beauty if it be but beautiful enough and woman's beauty can ever be bought with gold if only there be gold enough so was it in my day and so it will be to the end of time the world is a great mark my holly where all things are for sale to whom who bids the highest in the currency of our desires these are marks which are as cynical as might have been expected from a woman of Asia's age and experience jarred upon me and I answered testily that in our heaven there was no marriage or giving in marriage else would it not be heaven does that mean she put in fire on the holly to think so ill of us poor women is it then marriage that marks the line between the heaven and the hell but enough of this this is no time for disputing in the challenge of our wits why does thou always dispute are thou also a philosopher of these latter days as of this woman she must die for though I can take her lover from her yet while she lived he might think tenderly of her that I cannot away with no other woman shall dwell in my lord's thoughts my empire shall be all my own she hath had her day let her be content for better as an hour with love than a century of loneliness now the night shall swallow her nay nay I cried it will be a wicked crime and from a crime not comes but what is evil for thine own sake do not this deed is it then a crime of foolish men to put away that which stands between us and our ends then is our life one long crime my holly since day by day we destroy that we may live since in this world none said the strongest can endure those who are weak must perish the earth is to the strong when the fruits thereof for every tree that grows a scorchal wither that the strong one may take their share we run to place and power over the dead bodies of those who fail and fall for starving babes it is the scheme of things that says too that a crime breeds evil but therein thou dost lack experience for out of crimes come many good things and out of good grows much evil the cruel rage of the tyrant may prove a blessing to the thousands who come after him and the sweet-heartedness of a holy man may make a nation slaves man doeth this and doeth that from the good or evil of his heart but he knows not to what end his moral sense may prompt him for when he striketh he is blind to where the blotel fall nor can he count the airy threads that weave the web of circumstance good and evil, love and hate night and day, sweet and bitter man and woman, heaven above and earth beneath all these things are necessary one to the other and who knows the end of each I tell thee that there is a hand of faith that winds them up to bear the burden of its purpose and all things are gathered in that great rope to which all things are needful doeth it not become us to say this thing is evil and this good or the dark is hateful and the light lovely for to other eyes than ours the evil may be the good and the darkness more beautiful in the day or all alike be fair hearest thou my holly I felt it was hopeless to argue against causes of this nature which if it were carried to its logical conclusion would absolutely destroy all morality as we understand it but her talk gave me a fresh thrill of fear for what may not be possible to a being who unconstrained by human law is also absolutely unshackled by a moral sense of right and wrong which however partial and conventional it may be is yet based as our conscience tells us upon the great wall of individual responsibility that marks off mankind from the beasts but I was deeply anxious to say this then whom I liked and respected from the dire fate that overshadowed her at the hands of her mighty rival so I made one more appeal Asia I said thou art too subtle for me but thou thyself has told me that each man should be a law unto himself and follow the teaching of his heart hath thy heart no mercy towards her whose place thou wouldst take bethink thee as thou sayest though to me the thing is incredible he whom thou desirest has returned to thee after many ages and but now thou hast as thou sayest also wrung him from the jaws of death will thou celebrate his coming by the murder of one who loved him and whom Pachans he loved one at the least who saved his life for thee when the spears of thy slaves would have made an end thereof thou sayest also that in past days that it's grievously wrong this man though with thine own hand that it slay him because of the Egyptian amenitas whom he loved thou knoweth that oh stranger thou knoweth that that name I spoke it not to thee she broke in with a cry catching at my arm Pachans I dreamed it as strange dreams do hover about these caves of core it seems that the dream was indeed a shadow of the truth what came to thee of thy mad crime two thousand years of waiting was it not and now as thou repeat the history say what thou wilt I tell thee that evil will come of it for to him who doeth at the least good breeds good and evil evil even though in after days out of evil cometh good offenses must needs come but woe to him by whom the offends cometh I also said that messiah of whom I spoke to thee and it was truly sad if thou slayest this innocent woman I say unto thee that thou shalt be accursed and pluck no fruit from thy ancient tree of love also what thinkest thou how will this man take thee red-handed from the slaughter of her who loved intended him as to that she answered I have already answered thee had I slain thee as well as her yet should he love me holly because he could not save himself though from and thou could save thyself from dying if by chance I slew thee oh holly and yet maybe there is truth in what thou dost say for in some way it presseth on my mind if it may be I will spare this woman have I not told thee that I am not cruel for the sake of cruelty I love not to see suffering or to cause it let her come before me quick now before my mood changes and she hastily covered her face with its gauzy wrappings for these to have succeeded him to this extent I pass out into the passage and called to you Stain whose white garment I cut sight of some yards away huddled up against one of the earthenware lamps or placid intervals along the tunnel she rose and ran towards me is my lord dead oh say not that he is dead she cried lifting on her noble looking face all stained as it was with tears up to me with an air of infinite beseeching went straight to my heart nay he lives answered she has saved him enter she sighed deeply entered and fell upon her hands and knees after the custom of the Amahagga people in the presence of the dread she stand said Asha in her callous voice and come hither Stain obeyed standing before her with bowed head then came a pause which Asha broke pointing to the sleeping form of Leah the man is my husband she answered in a low voice who gave him to thee for a husband I took him according to the custom of our country or she thou hast done evil woman in taking this man who is a stranger he is not of thine own race and the custom fails listen for chance I did this thing through ignorance therefore woman do I spare thee otherwise hath thou died listen again go from hence back to thine own place and never dare to speak to or set thine eyes upon this man again he is not for thee listen a third time if thou breakest this my lord that moment thou diest go but his stand did not move go woman then she looked up and I saw that her face was torn with passion nay oh she I will not go she answered in a choked voice the man is my husband and I love him I love him and I will not leave him what right hath thou to command me to leave my husband I saw little quiver pass down Asia's frame and shuddered myself fearing the worst be pitiful I said in Latin it is but nature working I am pitiful she answered coldly in the same language had I not been pitiful she had been dead even now then addressing his stand woman I say to thee go before I destroy thee where thou art I will not go here's mine mine she cried in anguish I took him and I saved his life destroy me then if thou hast the power I will not give thee my husband never never Asia made a movement so swift that I could scarcely follow it but it seemed to me that she likely struck the poor girl upon the head with her hand I looked at you stand and then staggered back in horror there upon her hair right across her bronze-like tresses were three finger marks white as snow as for the girl herself she had put her hands to her head and was looking dazed great heavens I said perfectly aghast is a dreadful man of her station of human power but she did but laugh a little thou thinkest poor ignorant fool she said to the bewildered woman that I have not the power to slay stay there lies a mirror and she pointed to Leo's round shaving glass that had been arranged by Job with other things upon his portment her give it to this woman my holly and let her see that which lies across her hair and whether or no I have power to slay I picked up the glass and held it before you stand's eyes she gazed then felled at her hair then gazed again and then sank upon the ground with a sort of sob now wilt thou go or must I strike a second time as day shone mockery look I have set my seal upon these at the time I know thee till thy hair is all as white as it if I see thy face again be sure too that thy bones shall soon be whiter than my mark upon the hair utterly awed and broken down the poor creature rose and marked with that awful mark crept from the room sobbing bitterly look not so frightened my holly said Asia when she had gone I tell thee that I deal not in magic there is no such thing there's only a force that thou dost not understand I marked her to strike terror to her heart else must I have slain her and now I will bid my servants to bear my lord callicrities to a chamber near my own that I may watch over him and be ready to greet him when he wakes under the two shall thou come my holly and the white man thy servant but one thing remember at thy peril nor shall thou say to callicrities as to how this woman went and as little as maybe of me now I have warned thee and she slid away to give her orders leaving me more absolutely confounded than ever indeed sober-wildered was I and wracked and torn with such a succession of various emotions I had to think that I must be going mad however perhaps fortunately I had but little time to reflect for presently the mutes arrived to carry the sleeping Leo and our possessions across the central cave so for a while all was bustle our new rooms were situated immediately behind what we used to call Asia's Boudoir the curtained space where I had first seen her where she herself slept I did not then know but it was somewhere quite close that night I passed in Leo's room but he slept through it like the dead never once stirring I also slept fairly well as indeed I needed to do but my sleep was full of dreams of all the horrors and wonders I had undergone chiefly however I was haunted by that frightful piece of Diablory by which Asia left her finger marks upon her rival's hair there was something so terrible about her swift snake-like movement and the instantaneous blanching of that threefold line the stern had been much more tremendous I doubt if they would have impressed me so deeply to this day I often dream of that awful scene and see the weeping woman bereaved and marked like cane cast a last look at her lover and creep from the presence of her dread queen another dream that troubled me originated in the huge pyramid of bones I dreamt they all stood up and marched past me in thousands and tens of thousands in squadrons companies and armies with the sunlight shining through their hollow ribs on they rushed across the plain to core their imperial home I saw the drawbridges fall before them and heard their bones clank through the brazen gates on they went up the splendid streets on pest fountains palaces and temples such as the eye of man never saw but there was no man to greet them in the marketplace and no woman's face appeared at the windows only a bodiless voice went before them calling this imperial core fallen fallen fallen on right through the city marched those gleaming phalanxes and the rattle of their bony tread echoed through the silent air as they pressed grimly on they passed through the city and clung the wall and marched along the great roadway that was made upon the wall to that length they once more reached the drawbridge then as the sun was sinking they returned again towards the sepulchre and luredly his light shone in the sockets of their empty eyes throwing gigantic shadows of their bones stretched away and crept and crept like huge spider's legs as their armies wound across the plain then they came to the cave and once more one by one flung themselves in unending files through the hole into the pit of bones and I awoke shuddering to see she who had evidently been standing between my couch and Leo's glide like a shadow from the room after this I slept again soundly this time till morning when I awoke much refreshed and got up at last the hour drew near at which, according to Asia Leo was to awake and with it came she herself as usual veiled now she'll see you Holly she said presently shall he awake in his right mind the fever having left him hardly were the words out of her mouth when Leo turned round and stretched out his arms yawned open his eyes and perceiving a female form bending over him through his arms round her and kissed her mistaking her perhaps for you Sten at any rate he said in Arabic hello you Sten why have you tied your head up like that have you got the toothache and then in English I say I'm awfully hungry like Job your son of a gun why the dues have we got to now eh I am sure I wish I knew Mr. Leo said Job edging suspiciously past Asia whom he still regarded with the utmost disgust and horror being by no means sure that she was not an animated corpse but you mustn't talk Mr. Leo you've been very ill and given us a great deal of anxiety and this lady looking at Asia would be so kind as to move I'll bring you your soup this turned Leo's attention to the lady who was standing by in perfect silence hello he said that's not you Sten then for the first time Asia spoke to him and her first words were a lie she has gone from hence upon a visit she said and behold in her place am I here as that handmade Asia's silver notes seem to puzzle Leo's half awakened intellect as also did her corpse like wrappings however he said nothing at the time but drank off his soup greedily enough then turned over and slept again till the evening when he woke for the second time he saw me and began to question me as to what had happened but I had to put him off his best I could till the morrow when he awoke almost miraculously better then I told him something of his illness and of my doings but as Asia was present I could not tell him much except that she was queen of the country and well-exposed towards us and that it was her pleasure to go veiled for though of course I spoke in English I was afraid that she might understand what we were saying in the expression of our faces and besides I remembered her warning on the following day Leo got almost entirely recovered the flesh wound in his side was healed and his constitution naturally a vigorous one had shaken off the exhaustion consequent on his terrible fever with a rapidity that I can only attribute to the effects of the wonderful drug which Asia had given to him and also to the fact that his illness had been too short to reduce him very much with his returning health came back a recollection of all his adventures up to the time when he had lost consciousness in the marsh and of course if you stand also to whom I had discovered he had grown considerably attached indeed he overwhelmed with questions about the poor girl which I did not dare to answer for after Leo's first awakening she had sent for me and again warned me solemnly that I was to reveal nothing of the story to him delicately hinting that if I did it would be the worst for me so for the second time cautioned me not to tell Leo anything more than I was obliged about herself saying that she would reveal herself to him in her own time indeed her whole man had changed after all that I had seen I had expected that she would take the earliest opportunity of claiming the man she believed to be her old world lover but this for some reason of her own which was at the time quite inscrutable to me she did not do all that she did was to attend to his once quietly and with a humility which was striking contrast with her former imperious bearing addressing him always in a tone of something very like respect and keeping him with her as much as possible of course his curiosity was as much excited about this mysterious woman as my own had been and he was particularly anxious to see her face which I had without entering into particulars told him was as lovely as her form and voice this in itself was enough to raise the expectations of any young man to a dangerous and had it not been that he had not as yet completely shaken off the effects of illness and was much trouble in his mind about to stand of whose affection and brave devotion he spoke in touching terms I have no doubt that he would have entered into her plans and fallen in love with her by anticipation as it was however he was simply wildly curious and also like myself considerably awed for though no hint had been given to him by Asia of her extraordinary age he not naturally came to identify her with the woman spoken of on the pot shirt at last quite driven into a corner by his continual questions which he showered on me while he was dressing on the third morning I referred him to Asia saying with perfect truth that I did not know where you stand was accordingly after Leo'd eaten a hearty breakfast we adjourned into she's presence for her mutes had orders to admit as at all ours she was as usual seated in what for want of a better term we called her Boudoir and on the curtains being drawn she rose from her couch and stretching out both hands came forward to greet us or rather Leo for I as may be imagined was now quite left in the cold it was a pretty sight to see her veiled form gliding towards a sturdy young Englishman dressed in his grey flannel suit although he is half a Greek in blood Leo is with the exception of his hair one of the most English looking man I ever saw he has nothing of the subtle form a slippery manner of the modern Greek about him though I presume that he got his remarkable personal beauty from his foreign mother whose portrait he resembles not a little he is very tall and big-chested and yet not awkward as so many big men are and his head is set upon him in such a fashion as to give him a proud and figure a set which is well translated as a mahogany name of the lion greeting to thee my young stranger lord she said in her softest voice right glad am I to see thee upon their feet believe me had I not saved thee at the last never would I have stood upon those feet again but the danger is done and it shall be my care and she flung a world of meaning into the words that it does return no more Leo bowed her and then in his best Arabic thanked her for all her kindness and courtesy and caring for one unknown to nay she answered softly it'll cut the world's passage and then beauty is too rare upon it give me no thanks who are made happy by their coming hmmph old fellow said Leo aside to me in English the lady is very civil we seem to have tumbled into clover I hope that you've made the most of your opportunities I chove what a pair of arms she has got I nudged him in the ribs to make him keep quiet for I caught sight of a gleam from Asia's veiled eyes which were regarding me curiously I trust went on Asia that my servants have attended well upon thee if there can be comfort in this poor place be sure it waits on thee is there what that I can do for thee more yes oh she answered Leo hastily I would faint know whether the young lady who was looking after me has gone to ah said Asia the girl yes I saw her nay I know not she said that she would go I know not with her for chance she will return for chance not it is weird as in waiting upon the sick and these savage women a fickle Leo looked both sulky and distressed by this intelligence it's very odd he said to me in English and then addressing she I cannot understand he said the young lady and I well in short we had a regard for each other Asia laughed a little very musically and then turned the subject end of chapter 18