Then Bastin went, carrying under his arm a large Bible printed in the language of the South Sea Islands.
A little while later Yva appeared, arrayed in her wondrous robes which, being a man, it is quite impossible for me to describe. She saw us looking at these, and, after greeting us both, also Tommy, who was enraptured at her coming, asked us how the ladies of our country attired themselves.
We tried to explain, with no striking success.
“You are as stupid about such matters as were the men of the Old World,” she said, shaking her head and laughing. “I thought that you had with you pictures of ladies you have known which would show me.”
Now, in fact, I had in a pocketbook a photograph of my wife in evening-dress, also a miniature of her head and bust painted on ivory, a beautiful piece of work done by a master hand, which I always wore. These, after a moment’s hesitation, I produced and showed to her, Bickley having gone away for a little while to see about something connected with his attempted analysis of the Life-water. She examined them with great eagerness, and as she did so I noted that her face grew tender and troubled.
“This was your wife,” she said as one who states what she knows to be a fact. I nodded, and she went on:
“She was sweet and beautiful as a flower, but not so tall as I am, I think.”
“No,” I answered, “she lacked height; given that she would have been a lovely woman.”
“I am glad you think that women should be tall,” she said, glancing at her shadow. “The eyes were such as mine, were they not—in colour, I mean?”
“Yes, very like yours, only yours are larger.”
“That is a beautiful way of wearing the hair. Would you be angry if I tried it? I weary of this old fashion.”
“Why should I be angry?” I asked.
At this moment Bickley reappeared and she began to talk of the details of the dress, saying that it showed more of the neck than had been the custom among the women of her people, but was very pretty.
“That is because we are still barbarians,” said Bickley; “at least, our women are, and therefore rely upon primitive methods of attraction, like the savages yonder.”
She smiled, and, after a last, long glance, gave me back the photograph and the miniature, saying as she delivered the latter:
“I rejoice to see that you are faithful, Humphrey, and wear this picture on your heart, as well as in it.”
“Then you must be a very remarkable woman,” said Bickley. “Never before did I hear one of your sex rejoice because a man was faithful to somebody else.”
“Has Bickley been disappointed in his love-heart, that he is so angry to us women?” asked Yva innocently of me. Then, without waiting for an answer, she inquired of him whether he had been successful in his analysis of the Life-water.
“How do you know what I was doing with the Life-water? Did Bastin tell you?” exclaimed Bickley.
“Bastin told me nothing, except that he was afraid of the descent to Nyo; that he hated Nyo when he reached it, as indeed I do, and that he thought that my father, the Lord Oro, was a devil or evil spirit from some Underworld which he called hell.”
“Bastin has an open heart and an open mouth,” said Bickley, “for which I respect him. Follow his example if you will, Lady Yva, and tell us who and what is the Lord Oro, and who and what are you.”
“Have we not done so already? If not, I will repeat. The Lord Oro and I are two who have lived on from the old time when the world was different, and yet, I think, the same. He is a man and not a god, and I am a woman. His powers are great because of his knowledge, which he has gathered from his forefathers and in a life of a thousand years before he went to sleep. He can do things you cannot do. Thus, he can pass through space and take others with him, and return again. He can learn what is happening in far-off parts of the world, as he did when he told you of the war in which your country is concerned. He has terrible powers; for instance, he can kill, as he killed those savages. Also, he knows the secrets of the earth, and, if it pleases him, can change its turning so that earthquakes happen and sea becomes land, and land sea, and the places that were hot grow cold, and those that were cold grow hot.”
“All of which things have happened many times in the history of the globe,” said Bickley, “without the help of the Lord Oro.”
“Others had knowledge before my father, and others doubtless will have knowledge after him. Even I, Yva, have some knowledge, and knowledge is strength.”
“Yes,” I interposed, “but such powers as you attribute to your father are not given to man.”
“You mean to man as you know him, man like Bickley, who thinks that he has learned everything that was ever learned. But it is not so. Hundreds of thousands of years ago men knew more than it seems they do today, ten times more, as they lived ten times longer, or so you tell me.”
“Men?” I said.
“Yes, men, not gods or spirits, as the uninstructed nations supposed them to be. My father is a man subject to the hopes and terrors of man. He desires power which is ambition, and when the world refused his rule, he destroyed that part of it which rebelled, which is revenge. Moreover, above all things he dreads death, which is fear. That is why he suspended life in himself and me for two hundred and fifty thousand years, as his knowledge gave him strength to do, because death
