remarkable powers, as you saw, holds the Doctrine, as you call
it, and he has been trying for months to convert me to it; but, as I
said going to Elsinore, I'm afraid I am too hopelessly materialistic for
any conversion to be possible in my case, at least as far as my present
experiences have gone."

"As the belief so must be the faith," she said with a grave smile. "It
is no more possible to have true faith when you do not really believe
than it is to be hungry when you have not got an appetite. That is quite
a material simile; but I think it is true."

"Absolutely true!" he replied, looking at her again with a note of
interrogation in each eye. "But, really, these things are too deep for
me, a mere human animal. And now, talking about appetite, here comes the
soup."

The dinner _a deux_ was just what he had intended it to be, simple and
yet perfect in every detail. The subject of Franklin Marmion's departure
from the world was, as if by mutual consent, dropped. Oscarovitch
comforted such conscience as he had by trying to believe that what
Nitocris had said about her belief in the Doctrine was to her really
true. He also honestly believed that she had faced her great sorrow in
solitude, and overcome it in the strength of that belief. Their
conversation turned easily away to other topics, and by the time that
coffee was brought in and he had obtained her permission to light a
cigarette, his beautiful guest appeared to have left the recent past
behind her, for the time being at least, and was almost as she had been
during the run up to Elsinore.

Her manner was that of complete composure, and it is hardly necessary to
say that this mastery of her emotion forced him to a degree of
admiration, almost of worship, which the physical charm that appealed
only to his animal senses could never have inspired. Here, truly, was
the ideal Empress of the Russias and the East sitting almost beside him.
And now the psychological moment had come!

"Will you excuse me for a couple of minutes, Miss Marmion?" he asked, as
he finished his coffee and rose from his chair. "Going back to what you
were saying about re-incarnation: I have something in my room which I
hope may interest you. I got it from my friend, the miracle-worker. He
told me a long story about it that I don't want to trouble you with: but
the thing in itself is quite worth seeing. At least, I never saw
anything like it before."

"Then please let me see it," she replied