answered, and, taking each of us by the
hand, he led us forward across the great emptiness of the apse to the
altar at its head.

As we drew near the distant chant of the priests gathered in volume,
assuming a glad, triumphant note, and it seemed to me--though this,
perhaps was fancy--that the light from the twisted columns of flame grew
even brighter.

At length we were there, and, Oros, loosing our hands, prostrated
himself thrice before the altar. Then he rose again, and, falling behind
us, stood in silence with bent head and folded fingers. We stood silent
also, our hearts filled with mingled hope and fear like a cup with wine.

Were our labours ended? Had we found her whom we sought, or were we,
perchance, but enmeshed in the web of some marvellous mummery and
about to make acquaintance with the secret of another new and mystical
worship? For years and years we had searched, enduring every hardness of
flesh and spirit that man can suffer, and now we were to learn whether
we had endured in vain. Yes, and Leo would learn if the promise was
to be fulfilled to him, or whether she whom he adored had become but a
departed dream to be sought for only beyond the gate of Death. Little
wonder that he trembled and turned white in the agony of that great
suspense.

Long, long was the time. Hours, years, ages, aeons, seemed to flow over
us as we stood there before glittering silver curtains that hid the
front of the black altar beneath the mystery of the sphinx-like face
of the glorious image which was its guardian, clothed with that frozen
smile of eternal love and pity. All the past went before us as we
struggled in those dark waters of our doubt. Item by item, event by
event, we rehearsed the story which began in the Caves of Kor, for our
thoughts, so long attuned, were open to each other and flashed from soul
to soul.

Oh! now we knew, they were open also to _another_ soul. We could see
nothing save the Altar and the Effigy, we could only hear the slow chant
of the priests and priestesses and the snake-like hiss of the rushing
fires. Yet we knew that our hearts were as an open book to One who
watched beneath the Mother's shadowing wings.

CHAPTER XIV

THE COURT OF DEATH

Now the curtains were open. Before us appeared a chamber hollowed from
the thickness of the altar, and in its centre a throne, and on the
throne a figure clad in waves of billowy white flowing from the head
over the arms of the throne down to