ala, taking up
the challenge. "I'm not going to have my aerial throne blown to blazes
at all. Why it's a curiosity--one of the sights. I bring everybody up
here to see it."

"And to sit on it?" rejoined Elvesdon, mischievously.

"Only that no one ever has, except you. Tell me. What did it feel
like, for the first time?"

Her straight, clear glance was full upon his face. He was thinking that
`the first time' felt uncommonly like being the last. But he answered:

"Well, I don't know. It was a queer experience--for the first time. To
be absolutely candid I won't pretend that I completely enjoyed it."

"I know you didn't. I could see that your hand on the bough was not
quite steady. That makes it all the more a big thing to have done."

"What did you yourself feel like the first time, Miss Thornhill, and--
what on earth put the idea into your head?"

"I felt just as I do now, how glorious it was being suspended in
mid-air,"--the listener felt creepy in the calves of the legs, as the
words brought back his own feelings. "What put it into my head? I was
up here one day with another girl and it occurred to me it would be good
fun to go and sit there, overhanging space. She didn't believe I meant
it, but I just climbed out on to the tree and sat there. She nearly
fainted."

"Well, nerve isn't a monopoly of our sex. Look at the wonderful things
women do--diving from a ghastly height into a narrow tank--or looping
the loop on a bicycle, and so on. By George! it's enough to make your
hair stand on end to watch them."

"We've missed the sunset," cried Edala. "Never mind. You can see
plenty of sunsets, but you can't sit on my aerial throne every day.
Why, where's father?" looking around. "Oh, there; over by that flat
rock."

Thornhill had strolled away while the two were talking and was standing,
shading a match to light his pipe, when--

"_Inkose_!"

He started slightly. The mountain top was flat and he had seen no one
on it but themselves. The salute, however, had proceeded from a tall
native, who had risen from behind the flat boulder before mentioned.

This man now advanced, and in the limp of his gait, the other recognised
him as the Zulu. Then--Heavens and earth! He had wondered where he had
seen him before. Now he knew.

But it was ghastly. No, the thing could not be. It was only a striking
likeness. Moonlight is untrustworthy--and now, this light up here in
the afterglow of the