of this plant, containing obscure alkaloids of the
katinacetate class, constituted his only vice--if you can call a habit
such as this vice, that works great well-being and that leaves no
appreciable aftermaths of evil such as are produced by alcohol or
drugs.

For a few minutes the Master sat quite motionless, pondering. Then
suddenly he got up again, and strode to one of the westward-looking
windows. The light was almost wholly gone, now. The man's figure,
big-shouldered, compact, well-knit, appeared only as a dim silhouette
against the faded blur in the west; a blur smoky and streaked with
dull smudges as of old, dried blood.

Far below, stretching away, away, shimmered the city's million
inconsequential lights. Above, stars were peeping out--were spying
down at all this feverish mystery of human life. Some of the low-hung
stars seemed to blend with the far lights along the Palisades. The
Master's lips tightened with impatience, with longing.

"There's where it is," he muttered. "Not five miles from here! It's
there, and I've got to have it. There--a thing that can't be bought!
There--a thing that must be mine!"

Among the stars, cutting down diagonally from the north-west, crept a
tiny, red gleam. The Master looked very grim, as his eyes followed its
swift flight.

"The Chicago mail-plane, just getting in," he commented. "In half an
hour, the Paris plane starts from the Cortlandt Street aero-tower. And
beyond Paris lies Constantinople; and beyond that, Arabia--the East!
Men are going out that way, tonight! And I--stick here like an old,
done relic, cooped in _Niss'rosh_--imprisoned in this steel and glass
cage of my own making!"

Suddenly he wheeled, flung himself into the big chair by the table and
dragged the faun's head over to him. He pressed a button at the base
of it, waited a moment and as the question came, "Number, please?"
spoke the desired number into the cupped hand and ear of the bronze.
Then, as he waited again, with the singular telephone in hand, he
growled savagely:

"By Allah! This sort of thing's not going to go on any longer! Not if
I die stopping it!"

A familiar voice, issuing from the lips of the faun--a voice made
natural and audible as the living human tones, by means of a delicate
microphone attachment inside the bronze head--tautened his nerves.

"Hello, hello!" called he. "That you, Bohannan?"

"Yes," sounded the answer. "Of course I know who _you_ are. There's
only one voi