Or against
the science of whatever devils that made it--or made the way for it to
enter this world of ours?"

With an effort he regained control.

"Goodwin," he said, "do you know at all of the ruins on the Carolines;
the cyclopean, megalithic cities and harbours of Ponape and Lele, of
Kusaie, of Ruk and Hogolu, and a score of other islets there?
Particularly, do you know of the Nan-Matal and the Metalanim?"

"Of the Metalanim I have heard and seen photographs," I said. "They
call it, don't they, the Lost Venice of the Pacific?"

"Look at this map," said Throckmartin. "That," he went on, "is
Christian's chart of Metalanim harbour and the Nan-Matal. Do you see
the rectangles marked Nan-Tauach?"

"Yes," I said.

"There," he said, "under those walls is the Moon Pool and the seven
gleaming lights that raise the Dweller in the Pool, and the altar and
shrine of the Dweller. And there in the Moon Pool with it lie Edith
and Stanton and Thora."

"The Dweller in the Moon Pool?" I repeated half-incredulously.

"The Thing you saw," said Throckmartin solemnly.

A solid sheet of rain swept the ports, and the Southern Queen began to
roll on the rising swells. Throckmartin drew another deep breath of
relief, and drawing aside a curtain peered out into the night. Its
blackness seemed to reassure him. At any rate, when he sat again he
was entirely calm.

"There are no more wonderful ruins in the world," he began almost
casually. "They take in some fifty islets and cover with their
intersecting canals and lagoons about twelve square miles. Who built
them? None knows. When were they built? Ages before the memory of
present man, that is sure. Ten thousand, twenty thousand, a hundred
thousand years ago--the last more likely.

"All these islets, Walter, are squared, and their shores are frowning
seawalls of gigantic basalt blocks hewn and put in place by the hands
of ancient man. Each inner water-front is faced with a terrace of
those basalt blocks which stand out six feet above the shallow canals
that meander between them. On the islets behind these walls are
time-shattered fortresses, palaces, terraces, pyramids; immense
courtyards strewn with ruins--and all so old that they seem to wither
the eyes of those who look on them.

"There has been a great subsidence. You can stand out of Metalanim
harbour for three miles and look down upon the tops of similar
monolithic structures and walls twenty feet below you in the water.