t,
and, behold! there was only one--the perfect and ultimate Charm.

'And THAT'S all right,' said the Psammead, breaking a breathless
silence.

'Yes,' said Anthea, 'and we've got our hearts' desire. Father and Mother
and The Lamb are coming home today.'

'But what about me?' said Rekh-mara.

'What IS your heart's desire?' Anthea asked.

'Great and deep learning,' said the Priest, without a moment's
hesitation. 'A learning greater and deeper than that of any man of my
land and my time. But learning too great is useless. If I go back to my
own land and my own age, who will believe my tales of what I have seen
in the future? Let me stay here, be the great knower of all that has
been, in that our time, so living to me, so old to you, about which your
learned men speculate unceasingly, and often, HE tells me, vainly.'

'If I were you,' said the Psammead, 'I should ask the Amulet about that.
It's a dangerous thing, trying to live in a time that's not your own.
You can't breathe an air that's thousands of centuries ahead of your
lungs without feeling the effects of it, sooner or later. Prepare the
mystic circle and consult the Amulet.'

'Oh, WHAT a dream!' cried the learned gentleman. 'Dear children, if
you love me--and I think you do, in dreams and out of them--prepare the
mystic circle and consult the Amulet!'

They did. As once before, when the sun had shone in August splendour,
they crouched in a circle on the floor. Now the air outside was thick
and yellow with the fog that by some strange decree always attends the
Cattle Show week. And in the street costers were shouting. 'Ur Hekau
Setcheh,' Jane said the Name of Power. And instantly the light went
out, and all the sounds went out too, so that there was a silence and
a darkness, both deeper than any darkness or silence that you have ever
even dreamed of imagining. It was like being deaf or blind, only darker
and quieter even than that.

Then out of that vast darkness and silence came a light and a voice. The
light was too faint to see anything by, and the voice was too small
for you to hear what it said. But the light and the voice grew. And the
light was the light that no man may look on and live, and the voice was
the sweetest and most terrible voice in the world. The children cast
down their eyes. And so did everyone.

'I speak,' said the voice. 'What is it that you would hear?'

There was a pause. Everyone was afraid to speak.

'What are we to do about