, I go," said Leo angrily, his face flushing to the
roots of his hair with shame.

"I pray thee not, I pray thee not," she answered, yet without venturing
to forbid him. "We will talk of it hereafter. Oros, away! Send round the
Fire of Hes to every chief. Three nights hence at the moonrise bid
the Tribes gather--nay, not all, twenty thousand of their best will be
enough, the rest shall stay to guard the Mountain and this Sanctuary.
Let them bring food with them for fifteen days. I join them at the
following dawn. Go."

He bowed and went, whereon, dismissing the matter from her mind, Ayesha
began to question me again about the Chinese and their customs.

It was in course of a somewhat similar conversation on the following
night, of which, however, I forget the exact details, that a remark of
Leo's led to another exhibition of Ayesha's marvellous powers.

Leo--who had been considering her plans for conquest, and again
combating them as best he could, for they were entirely repugnant to his
religious, social and political views--said suddenly that after all they
must break down, since they would involve the expenditure of sums of
money so vast that even Ayesha herself would be unable to provide
them by any known methods of taxation. She looked at him and laughed a
little.

"Verily, Leo," she said, "to thee, yes; and to Holly here I must seem as
some madcap girl blown to and fro by every wind of fancy, and building
me a palace wherein to dwell out of dew and vapours, or from the
substance of the sunset fires. Thinkest thou then that I would enter on
this war--one woman against all the world"--and as she spoke her shape
grew royal and in her awful eyes there came a look that chilled my
blood--"and make no preparation for its necessities? Why, since last we
spoke upon this matter, foreseeing all, I have considered in my mind,
and now thou shalt learn how, without cost to those we rule--and for
that reason alone shall they love us dearly--I will glut the treasuries
of the Empress of the Earth.

"Dost remember, Leo, how in Kor I found but a single pleasure during all
those weary ages--that of forcing my mother Nature one by one to yield
me up her choicest secrets; I, who am a student of all things which are
and of the forces that cause them to be born. Now follow me, both of
you, and ye shall look on what mortal eyes have not yet beheld."

"What are we to see?" I asked doubtfully, having a lively recollection
of Ayesha'