ed the scene of the terrific devastation
wrought by the earthquake did they begin to think they had submitted
their wills and lives to the caprice of a madwoman. However, there was
no drawing back,--nothing for it but still to obey,--for even in the
stress and terror naturally excited by their amazing position, they did
not fail to see that the great air-ship was steadily controlled, and
that whatever was the force controlling it, it maintained its level,
its mysterious vibrating discs still throbbing with vital and incessant
regularity. Apparently nothing could disturb its equilibrium or shatter
its mechanism. And, according to its woman-designer's command, they
lowered it gently till it was, so to say, almost immersed in the
torrent and covered with spray--indeed Morgana's light figure itself at
the prow looked like a fair spirit risen from the waters rather than
any form of flesh and blood, so wreathed and transfigured it was by the
dust of the ceaseless foam. She stood erect, bent on a quest that
seemed hopeless, watching every eddying curve of water,--every
flickering ripple,--her eyes, luminous as stars, searched the black and
riven rocks with an eager passion of discovery,--when all suddenly as
she gazed, a thin ray of light,--pure gold in colour,--struck sharply
like a finger-point on a shallow pool immediately below her. She looked
and uttered a cry, beckoning to Rivardi.

"Come! Come!"

He hurried to her side, Gaspard following. The pool on which her eyes
were fixed was shallow enough to show the pebbly bed beneath the
water--and there lay apparently two corpses--one of a man, the other of
a woman whose body was half flung across that of the man.

Morgana pointed to them.

"They must be brought up here!" she said, insistently--"You must lift
them! We have emergency ropes and pulleys--it is easily done! Why do
you hesitate?"

"Because you demand the impossible!" said Rivardi--"You send us to
death to rescue the already dead!"

She turned upon him with wrath in her eyes.

"You refuse to obey me?"

What a face confronted him! White as marble, and as terrible in
expression as that of a Medusa, it had a paralysing effect on his
nerves, and he shrank and trembled at her glance.

"You refuse to obey me?" she repeated--"Then--if you do--I destroy this
air-ship and ourselves in less than two minutes! Choose! Obey, and
live!--disobey and die!"

He staggered back from her in terror at her looks, which gave h