was the Missie Marie herself as last we saw
her alive many, many years ago, only grown a hundred times more
beautiful."[*]

[*] See the book called _Marie_ by H. Rider Haggard.

Now I groaned, and Hans went on:

"The two White Ones came up to me, and stood looking at me with eyes
that were more soft than those of bucks. Then the Missie Marie said to
the other: 'This is Hans of whom I have so often told you, O Star.'"

Here I groaned again, for how did this Hottentot know that name, or
rather its sweet rendering?

"Then she who was called Star asked, 'How goes it with one who is the
heart of all three of us, O Hans?' Yes, Baas, those Shining Ones joined
_me_, the dirty little Hottentot in my old clothes and smelling of
tobacco, with themselves when they spoke of you, for I knew they were
speaking of you, Baas, which made me think I must be drunk, even there
in the quiet place. So I told them all that I had told your reverend
father, and a very great deal more, for they seemed never to be tired of
listening. And once, when I mentioned that sometimes, while pretending
to be asleep, I had heard you praying aloud at night for the Missie
Marie who died for you, and for another who had been your wife whose
name I did not remember but who had also died, they both cried a little,
Baas. Their tears shone like crystals and smelt like that stuff in a
little glass tube which Harut said that he brought from some far land
when he put a drop or two on your handkerchief, after you were faint
from the pain in your leg at the house yonder. Or perhaps it was the
flowers that smelt, for where the tears fell there sprang up white
lilies shaped like two babes' hands held together in prayer."

Hearing this, I hid my face in my hands lest Hans should see human tears
unscented with attar of roses, and bade him continue.

"Baas, the White One who was called Star, asked me of your son, the
young Baas Harry, and I told her that when last I had seen him he was
strong and well and would make a bigger man than you were, whereat she
sighed and shook her head. Then the Missie Marie said: 'Tell the Baas,
Hans, that I also have a child which he will see one day, but it is not
a son.'

"After this they, too, said something about Love, but what it was
I cannot remember, since even as I repeat this dream to you it is
beginning to slip away from me fast as a swallow skimming the water.
Their last words, however, I do remember. They were: 'Say t