hrobbed agonizingly, that my eyes smarted so as to render
it almost impossible to keep them open, that a ceaseless humming
was in my ears.

For some time I lay endeavouring to regain command of myself, to
prepare to face again that scene which had something horrifying
in its yellowness, touched with the green and gold.

And when finally I reopened my eyes, I sat up with a suppressed cry.
For a tall figure in a yellow robe from beneath which peeped yellow
slippers, a figure crowned with a green turban, stood in the centre
of the apartment!

It was that of a majestic old man, white bearded, with aquiline
nose, and the fierce eagle eyes of a fanatic set upon me sternly,
reprovingly.

With folded arms he stood watching me, and I drew a sharp breath and
rose slowly to my feet.

There amid the yellow and green and gold, amid the abominable reek
of burning hashish I stood and faced Hassan of Aleppo!

No words came to me; I was confounded.

Hassan spoke in that gentle voice which I had heard only once before.

"Mr. Cavanagh," he said, "I have brought you here that I might warn
you. Your police are seeking me night and day, and I am fully alive
to my danger whilst I stay in your midst. But for close upon a
thousand years the Sheikh-al-jebal, Lord of the Hashishin, has
guarded the traditions and the relics of the Prophet, Salla-'llahu
'ale yhi wasellem! I, Hassan of Aleppo, am Sheikh of the Order
to-day, and my sacred duty has brought me here."

The piercing gaze never left my face. I was not yet by any means
my own man and still I made no reply.

"You have been wise," continued Hassan, "in that you have never
touched the sacred slipper. Had you lain hands upon it, no secrecy
could have availed you. The eye of the Hashishin sees all. There
is a shaft of light which the true Believer perceives at night as
he travels toward El-Medineh. It is the light which uprises, a
spiritual fire, from the tomb of the Prophet (Salla-'llahu 'aleyhi
wasellem!). The relics also are radiant, though in a lesser degree."

He took a step toward me, spreading out his lean brown hands, palms
downward.

"A shaft of light," he said impressively, "shines upward now from
London. It is the light of the holy slipper." He gazed intently
at the yellow drapery at the left of the divan, but as though he
were looking not at the wall but through it. His features worked
convulsively; he was a man inspired. "I see it now!" he almost
whis