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 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
 
 THE SLAYER 
 OF SOULS 
 
 BY 
 
 ROBERT W. CHAMBERS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "IN SECRET," "THE COMMON LAW," "THE 
 RECKONING," "LORRAINE," ETC. 
 
 NEW XBIr YORK 
 GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
 
 Copyright, 1920, 
 By Robert W. Chambers 
 
 Copyright, 1919, 1920, by International Magazine Company 
 Printed in the United States of America
 
 5(2 
 
 TO 
 
 MY FRIEND 
 GEORGE ARMSBY 
 
 564430 
 
 LISKAEU
 
 TO 
 
 GEORGE 
 
 I 
 
 Mirror of Fashion, 
 
 Admiral of Finance, 
 
 Don't, in a passion, 
 
 Denounce this poor Romance; 
 
 For, while I dare not hope it might 
 
 Enthuse you, 
 
 Perhaps it will, some rainy night, 
 
 Amuse you. 
 
 II 
 
 So, your attention, 
 
 In poetry polite, 
 
 To my invention 
 
 I bashfully invite. 
 
 Don't hurl the book at Eddie's head 
 
 Deep laden, 
 
 Or Messmore's; you might hit instead 
 
 Will Braden. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Kahn among Canners, 
 
 And Grand Vizier of style, 
 
 Emir of Manners, 
 
 Accept and place on file 
 
 This tribute, which I proffer while 
 
 I grovel, 
 
 And honor with thy matchless Smile 
 
 My novel. 
 
 R. W. C.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I THE YEZIDEE 13 
 
 II THE YELLOW SNAKE 21 
 
 III GREY MAGIC 38 
 
 IV BODY AND SOUL 54 
 
 V THE ASSASSINS 76 
 
 VI IN BATTLE 95 
 
 VII THE BRIDAL 113 
 
 VIII THE MAN IN WHITE 135 
 
 IX THE WEST WIND 147 
 
 . X AT THE RITZ l6l 
 
 XI YULUN THE BELOVED 183 
 
 XII HIS EXCELLENCY 197 
 
 xin SA-N'SA 207 
 
 XIV A DEATH-TRAIL 238 
 
 XV IN THE FIRELIGHT 249 
 
 XVI THE PLACE OF PRAYER 26l 
 
 XVII THE SLAYER OF SOULS 277 
 
 vil
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE YEZIDEE 
 
 ONLY when the Nan-yang Maru sailed from 
 Yuen-San did her terrible sense of forebod- 
 ing begin to subside. 
 
 For four years, waking or sleeping, the awful sub- 
 consciousness of supreme evil had never left her. 
 
 But now, as the Korean shore, receding into dark- 
 ness, grew dimmer and dimmer, fear subsided and 
 grew vague as the half-forgotten memory of horror 
 in a dream. 
 
 She stood near the steamer's stern apart from 
 other passengers, a slender, lonely figure in her 
 silver-fox furs, her ulster and smart little hat, watch- 
 ing the lights of Yuen-San grow paler and smaller 
 along the horizon until they looked like a level row 
 of stars. 
 
 Under her haunted eyes Asia was slowly dis- 
 solving to a streak of vapour in the misty lustre of 
 the moon. 
 
 Suddenly the ancient continent disappeared, 
 washed out by a wave against the sky; and with it 
 13
 
 14 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 vanished the last shreds of that accursed nightmare 
 which had possessed her for four endless years. But 
 whether during those unreal years her soul had only 
 been held in bondage, or whether, as she had been 
 taught, it had been irrevocably destroyed, she still 
 remained uncertain, knowing nothing about the death 
 of souls or how it was accomplished. 
 
 As she stood there, her sad eyes fixed on the misty 
 East, a passenger passing an Englishwoman 
 paused to say something kind to the young American ; 
 and added, "if there is anything my husband and I 
 can do it would give us much pleasure." The girl 
 ha.d turned her head as though not comprehending. 
 The other woman hesitated. 
 
 "This is Doctor Nome's daughter, is it not?" she 
 inquired in a pleasant voice. 
 
 "Yes, I am Tressa Nome. ... I ask your par- 
 don. . . . Thank you, madam: I am I seem to 
 be a trifle dazed " 
 
 "What wonder, you poor child! Come to us if 
 you feel need of companionship." 
 
 "You are very kind. ... I seem to wish to be 
 alone, somehow." 
 
 "I understand. . . . Good-night, my dear." 
 
 Late the next morning Tressa Nome awoke, con- 
 scious for the first time in four years that it was at 
 last her own familiar self stretched out there on the 
 pillows where sunshine streamed through the port- 
 hole. All that day she lay in her bamboo steamer 
 chair on deck. Sun and wind conspired to dry every 
 tear that wet her closed lashes. Her dark, glossy
 
 THE YEZIDEE 15 
 
 hair blew about her face ; scarlet tinted her full lips 
 again ; the tense hands relaxed. Peace came at sun- 
 down. 
 
 That evening she took her Yu-kin from her cabin 
 and found a chair on the deserted hurricane deck. 
 
 And here, in the brilliant moonlight of the China 
 Sea, she curled up cross-legged on the deck, all alone, 
 and sounded the four futile strings of her moon-lute, 
 and hummed to herself, in a still voice, old songs 
 she had sung in Yian before the tragedy. She sang 
 the tent-song called Tchinguiz. She sang Camel 
 Bells and The Blue Bazaar, children's songs of the 
 Yiort. She sang the ancient Khiounnou song called 
 u The Saghalien": 
 
 In the month of Saffar 
 Among the river-reeds 
 I saw two horsemen 
 Sitting on their steeds. 
 Tulugum ! 
 Heitulum! 
 By the river-reeds 
 
 II 
 
 In the month of Saffar 
 A demon guards the ford. 
 
 Tokhta, my Lover! 
 Draw your shining sword! 
 Tulugum! 
 Heitulum! 
 Slay him with your sword!
 
 16 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 In the month of Saffar 
 ] Among the water-weeds 
 
 I saw two horsemen 
 Fighting on their steeds. 
 Tulugum! 
 Heitulum! 
 l How my lover bleeds/ 
 
 IV 
 
 In the month of Saffar, 
 The Year I should have wed 
 The Year of The Panther 
 My lover lay dead, 
 Tulugum ! 
 Heitulum! 
 Dead without a head. 
 
 And songs like these the one called "Keuke 
 Mongol," and an ancient air of the Tchortchas called 
 "The Thirty Thousand Calamities," and some Chi- 
 nese boatmen's songs which she had heard in Yian 
 before the tragedy; these she hummed to herself 
 there in the moonlight playing on her round-faced, 
 short-necked lute of four strings. 
 
 Terror indeed seemed ended for her, and in her 
 heart a great overwhelming joy was welling up 
 which seemed to overflow across the entire moonlit 
 world. 
 
 She had no longer any fear; no premonition of 
 further evil. Among the few Americans and English 
 aboard, something of her story was already known.
 
 THE YEZIDEE 17 
 
 People were kind; and they were also considerate 
 enough to subdue their sympathetic curiosity when 
 they discovered that this young American girl shrank 
 from any mention of what had happened to her 
 during the last four years of the Great World War. 
 
 It was evident, also, that she preferred to remain 
 aloof; and this inclination, when finally understood, 
 was respected by her fellow passengers. The clever, 
 efficient and polite Japanese officers and crew of the 
 Nan-yang Maru were invariably considerate and 
 courteous to her, and they remained nicely reticent, 
 although they also knew the main outline of her story 
 and very much desired to know more. And so, sur- 
 rounded now by the friendly security of civilised 
 humanity, Tressa Nome, reborn to light out of hell's 
 own shadows, awoke from four years of nightmare 
 which, after all, perhaps, never had seemed entirely 
 actual. 
 
 And now God's real sun warmed her by day; His 
 real moon bathed her in creamy coolness by night; 
 sky and wind and wave thrilled her with their blessed 
 assurance that this was once more the real world 
 which stretched illimitably on every side from 
 horizon to horizon; and the fair faces and pleasant 
 voices of her own countrymen made the past seem 
 only a ghastly dream that never again could enmesh 
 her soul with its web of sorcery. 
 
 And now the days at sea fled very swiftly; and 
 when at last the Golden Gate was not far away she 
 had finally managed to persuade herself that nothing
 
 18 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 really can harm the human soul ; that the monstrous 
 devil-years were ended, never again to return; that 
 in this vast, clean Western Continent there could 
 be no occult threat to dread, no gigantic menace to 
 destroy her body, no secret power that could consign 
 her soul to the dreadful abysm of spiritual annihila- 
 tion. 
 
 Very early that morning she came on deck. The 
 November day was delightfully warm, the air clear 
 save for a belt of mist low on the water to the south- 
 ward. 
 
 She had been told that land would not be sighted 
 for twenty-four hours, but she went forward and 
 stood beside the starboard rail, searching the hori- 
 zon with the enchanted eyes of hope. 
 
 As she stood there a Japanese ship's officer cross- 
 ing the deck, forward, halted abruptly and stood 
 staring at something to the southward. 
 
 At the same moment, above the belt of mist on 
 the water, and perfectly clear against the blue sky 
 above, the girl saw a fountain of gold fire rise from 
 the fog, drift upward in the daylight, slowly assume 
 the incandescent outline of a serpentine creature 
 which leisurely uncoiled and hung there floating, its 
 lizard-tail undulating, its feet with their five stumpy 
 claws closing, relaxing, like those of a living reptile. 
 For a full minute this amazing shape of fire floated 
 there in the sky, brilliant in the morning light, then 
 the reptilian form faded, died out, and the last spark 
 vanished in the sunshine.
 
 THE YEZIDEE 19 
 
 When the Japanese officer at last turned to re- 
 sume his promenade, he noticed a white-faced girl 
 gripping a stanchion behind him as though she were 
 on the point of swooning. He crossed the deck 
 quickly. Tressa Nome's eyes opened. 
 
 "Are you ill, Miss Nome?" he asked. 
 
 "The the Dragon," she whispered. 
 
 The officer laughed. "Why, that was nothing but 
 Chinese day-fireworks," he explained. "The crew 
 of some fishing boat yonder in the fog is amusing 
 Itself." He looked at her narrowly, then with a 
 nice little bow and smile he offered his arm : "If you 
 are indisposed, perhaps you might wish to go below 
 to your stateroom, Miss Nome?" 
 
 She thanked him, managed to pull herself together 
 and force a ghost of a smile. 
 
 He lingered a moment, said something cheerful 
 about being nearly home, then made her a punc- 
 tilious salute and went his way. 
 
 Tressa Nome leaned back against the stanchion 
 and closed her eyes. Her pallor became deathly. She 
 bent over and laid her white face in her folded arms. 
 
 After a while she lifted her head, and, turning 
 very slowly, stared at the fog-belt out of frightened 
 eyes. 
 
 And saw, rising out of the fog, a pearl-tinted 
 sphere which gradually mounted into the clear day- 
 light above like the full moon's phantom in the sky. 
 
 Higher, higher rose the spectral moon until at 
 last it swam in the very zenith. Then it slowly evap- 
 orated in the blue vault above.
 
 20 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 A great wave of despair swept her; she clung to 
 the stanchion, staring with half-blinded eyes at the 
 flat fog-bank in the south. 
 
 But no more "Chinese day-fireworks" rose out of 
 it. And at length she summoned sufficient strength 
 to go below to her cabin and lie there, half sense- 
 less, huddled on her bed. 
 
 When land was sighted, the following morning, 
 Tressa Nome had lived a century in twenty-four 
 hours. And in that space of time her agonised soul 
 had touched all depths. 
 
 But now as the Golden Gate loomed up in the 
 morning light, rage, terror, despair had burned 
 themselves out. From their ashes within her mind 
 arose the cool wrath of desperation armed for any- 
 thing, wary, alert, passionately determined to sur- 
 vive at whatever cost, recklessly ready to fight for 
 bodily existence. 
 
 That was her sole instinct now, to go on living, to 
 survive, no matter at what price. And if it were 
 indeed true that her soul had been slain, she defied 
 its murderers to slay her body also. 
 
 That night, at her hotel in San Francisco, she 
 double-locked her door and lay down without un- 
 dressing, leaving all lights burning and an automatic 
 pistol underneath her pillow. 
 
 Toward morning she fell asleep, slept for an 
 hour, started up in awful fear. And saw the double-
 
 THE YEZIDEE 21 
 
 locked door opposite the foot of her bed slowly 
 opening of its own accord. 
 
 Into the brightly illuminated room stepped a 
 graceful young man in full evening dress carrying 
 over his left arm an overcoat, and in his other hand 
 a top hat and silver tipped walking-stick. 
 
 With one bound the girl swung herself from the 
 bed to the carpet and clutched at the pistol under 
 her pillow. 
 
 "Sanang!" she cried in a terrible voice. 
 
 "Keuke Mongol!" he said, smilingly. 
 
 For a moment they confronted each other in the 
 brightly lighted bedroom, then, partly turning, he 
 cast a calm glance at the open door behind him ; and, 
 as though moved by a wind, the door slowly closed. 
 And she heard the key turn of itself in the lock, and 
 saw the bolt slide smoothly into place again. 
 
 Her power of speech came back to her presently 
 only a broken whisper at first : "Do you think I 
 am afraid of your accursed magic?" she managed 
 to gasp. "Do you think I am afraid of you, 
 Sanang?" 
 
 "You are afraid," he said serenely. 
 
 "You lie!" 
 
 "No, I do not lie. To one another the Yezidees 
 never lie." 
 
 "You lie again, assassin! I am no Yezidee!" 
 
 He smiled gently. His features were pleasing, 
 smooth, and regular; his cheek-bones high, his skin 
 fine and of a pale and delicate ivory colour. Once 
 his black, beautifully shaped eyes wandered to the
 
 22 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 levelled pistol which she now held clutched desper- 
 ately close to her right hip, and a slightly ironical 
 expression veiled his gaze for an instant. 
 
 "Bullets?" he murmured. "But you and I are of 
 the Hassanis." 
 
 "The third lie, Sanang!" Her voice had regained 
 its strength. Tense, alert, blue eyes ablaze, every 
 faculty concentrated on the terrible business before 
 her, the girl now seemed like some supple leopardess 
 poised on the swift verge of murder. 
 
 "Tokhta!"* She spat the word. "Any move- 
 ment toward a hidden weapon, any gesture suggest- 
 ing recourse to magic and I kill you, Sanang, ex- 
 actly where you stand!" 
 
 "With a pistol?" He laughed. Then his smooth 
 features altered subtly. He said: "Keuke Mongol, 
 who call yourself Tressa Nome, Keuke heavenly 
 azure-blue, named so in the temple because of the 
 colour of your eyes listen attentively, for this is the 
 Yarlig which I bring to you by word of mouth from 
 Yian, as from Yezidee to Yezidee : 
 
 "Here, in this land called the United States of 
 America, the Temple girl, Keuke Mongol, who has 
 witnessed the mysteries of Erlik and who under- 
 stands the magic of the Sheiks-el-Djebel, and who 
 has seen Mount Alamout and the eight castles and 
 the fifty thousand Hassanis in white turbans and in 
 robes of white; you Azure-blue eyes heed the 
 Yarlig! or may thirty thousand calamities over- 
 take you !" 
 
 *"Look out!" Nomad-Mongol dialect.
 
 THE YEZIDEE 23 
 
 There was a dead silence; then he went on seri- 
 ously: "It is decreed: You shall cease to remember 
 that you are a Yezidee, that you are of the Has- 
 sanis, that you ever have laid eyes on Yian the Beau- 
 tiful, that you ever set naked foot upon Mount Ala- 
 mout. It is decreed that you remember nothing of 
 what you have seen and heard, of what has been 
 told and taught during the last four years reckoned 
 as the Christians reckon from our Year of the Bull. 
 Otherwise my Master sends you this for your 
 convenience." 
 
 Leisurely, from under his folded overcoat, the 
 young man produced a roll of white cloth and 
 dropped it at her feet and the girl shrank aside, 
 shuddering, knowing that the roll of white cloth 
 was meant for her winding-sheet. 
 
 Then the colour came back to lip and cheek; and, 
 glancing up from the soft white shroud, she smiled 
 at the young man: "Have you ended your Oriental 
 mummery?" she asked calmly. "Listen very seri- 
 ously in your turn, Sanang, Sheik-el-Djebel, Prince 
 of the Hassanis who, God knows when and how, 
 have come out into the sunshine of this clean and 
 decent country, out of a filthy darkness where devils 
 and sorcerers make earth a hell. 
 
 "If you, or yours, threaten me, annoy me, inter- 
 fere with me, I shall go to our civilised police and 
 tell all I know concerning the Yezidees. I mean to 
 live. Do you understand? You know what you 
 have done to me and mine. I come back to my own 
 country alone, without any living kin, poor, home-
 
 24 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 less, friendless, and, perhaps, damned. I intend, 
 nevertheless, to survive. I shall not relax my clutch 
 on bodily existence whatever the Yezidees may pre- 
 tend to have done to my soul. I am determined to 
 live in the body, anyway." 
 
 He nodded gravely. 
 
 She said: "Out at sea, over the fog, I saw the sign 
 of Yu-lao in fire floating in the day-sky. I saw his 
 spectral moon rise and vanish in mid-heaven. I un- 
 derstood. But " And here she suddenly showed 
 
 an edge of teeth under the full scarlet upper lip : 
 "Keep your signs and your shrouds to yourself, dog 
 of a Yezidee! toad! tortoise-egg! he-goat with 
 three legs ! Keep your threats and your messages to 
 yourself! Keep your accursed magic to yourself! 
 Do you think to frighten me with your sorcery by 
 showing me the Moons of Yu-lao? by opening a 
 bolted door? I know more of such magic than do 
 you, Sanang Death Adder of Alamout!" 
 
 Suddenly she laughed aloud at him laughed in- 
 sultingly in his expressionless face : 
 
 "I saw you and Gutchlug Khan and your cowardly 
 Tchortchas in red-lacquered jackets slink out of the 
 Temple of Erlik where the bronze gong thundered 
 and a cloud settled down raining little yellow snakes 
 all over the marble steps all over you, Prince 
 Sanang ! You were afraid, my Tougtchi ! you and 
 Gutchlug and your red Tchortchas with their hal- 
 berds all dripping with human entrails ! And I saw 
 you mount and gallop off into the woods while in 
 the depths of the magic cloud which rained little
 
 THE YEZIDEE 25 
 
 yellow snakes all around you, we temple girls laughed 
 and mocked at you at you and your cowardly 
 Tchortcha horsemen." 
 
 A slight tinge of pink came into the young man's 
 pale face. Tressa Nome stepped nearer, her levelled 
 pistol resting on her hip. 
 
 "Why did you not complain of us to your Master, 
 the Old Man of the Mountain?" she asked jeeringly. 
 "And where, also, was your Yezidee magic when it 
 rained little snakes ? What frightened you away 
 who had boldly come to seize a temple girl you 
 who had screwed up your courage sufficiently to defy 
 Erlik in his very shrine and snatch from his temple 
 a young thing whose naked body wrapped in gold 
 was worth the chance of death to you?" 
 
 The young man's top-hat dropped to the floor. 
 He bent over to pick it up. His face was quite ex- 
 pressionless, quite colourless, now. 
 
 "I went on no such errand," he said with an effort. 
 "I went with a thousand prayers on scarlet paper 
 made in " 
 
 "A lie, Yezidee ! You came to seize me!" 
 
 He turned still paler. "By Abu, Omar, Otman, 
 and Ali, it is not true !" 
 
 "You lie ! by the Lion of God, Hassini !" 
 
 She stepped closer. "And I'll tell you another 
 thing you fear you Yezidee of Alamout you rob- 
 ber of Yian you sorcerer of Sabbah Khan, and chief 
 of his sect of Assassins ! You fear this native land 
 of mine, America ; and its laws and customs, and its 
 clear, clean sunshine; and its cities and people; and
 
 26 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 its police ! Take that message back. We Americans 
 fear nobody save the true God! nobody neither 
 Yezidee nor Hassani nor Russ nor German nor that 
 sexless monster born of hell and called the Bol- 
 shevik!" 
 
 "Tokhta !" he cried sharply. 
 
 "Damn you!" retorted the girl; "get out of 
 my room! Get out of my sight! Get out of my 
 path ! Get out of my life ! Take that to your Mas- 
 ter of Mount Alamout ! I do what I please ; I go 
 where I please ; I live as I please. And if I please, / 
 turn against htm!" 
 
 "In that event," he said hoarsely, "there Ties your 
 winding-sheet on the floor at your feet! Take up 
 your shroud; and make Erlik seize you !" 
 
 "Sanang," she said very seriously. 
 
 "I hear you, Keuke-Mongol." 
 
 "Listen attentively. I wish to live. I have had 
 enough of death in life. I desire to remain a living, 
 breathing thing even if it be true as you Yezidees 
 tell me, that you have caught my soul in a net and 
 that your sorcerers really control its destiny. 
 
 "But damned or not, I passionately desire to live. 
 And I am coward enough to hold my peace for the 
 sake of living. So I remain silent. I have no 
 stomach to defy the Yezidees; because, if I do, 
 sooner or later I shall be killed. I know it. I have 
 no desire to die for others to perish for the sake 
 of the common good. I am young. I have suffered 
 too much; I am determined to live and let my soul 
 take its chances between God and Erlik."
 
 THE YEZIDEE 27 
 
 She came close to him, looked curiously into his 
 pale face. 
 
 "I laughed at you out of the temple cloud," she 
 said. "I know how to open bolted doors as well 
 as you do. And I know other things. And if you 
 ever again come to me in this life I shall first torture 
 you, then slay you. Then I shall tell all ! ... and 
 unroll my shroud." 
 
 "I keep your word of promise until you break it," 
 he interrupted hastily. "Yarlig! It is decreed!" 
 And then he slowly turned as though to glance over 
 his shoulder at the locked and bolted door. 
 
 "Permit me to open it for you, Prince Sanang," 
 said the girl scornfully. And she gazed steadily at 
 the door. 
 
 Presently, all by itself, the key turned in the lock, 
 the bolt slid back, the door gently opened. 
 
 Toward it, white as a corpse, his overcoat on his 
 left arm, his stick and top-hat in the other hand, crept 
 the young man in his faultless evening garb. 
 
 Then, as he reached the threshold, he suddenly 
 sprang aside. A small yellow snake lay coiled there 
 on the door sill. For a full throbbing minute the 
 young man stared at the yellow reptile in unfeigned 
 horror. Then, very cautiously, he moved his fas- 
 cinated eyes sideways and gazed in silence at Tressa 
 Nome. 
 
 The girl laughed. 
 
 "Sorceress!" he burst out hoarsely. "Take that 
 accurseo! thing from my path!" 
 
 "What thing, Sanang?" At that his dark, fright-
 
 28 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 ened eyes stole toward the threshold again, seeking 
 the little snake. But there was no snake there. And 
 when he was certain of this he went, twitching and 
 trembling all over. 
 
 Behind him the door closed softly, locking and 
 bolting itself. 
 
 And behind the bolted door in the brightly lighted 
 bedroom Tressa Nome fell on both knees, her pistol 
 still clutched in her right hand, calling passionately 
 upon Christ to forgive her for the dreadful ability 
 she had dared to use, and begging Him to save her 
 body from death and her soul from the snare of the 
 Yezidee.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE YELLOW SNAKE 
 
 WHEN the young man named Sanang left the 
 bed-chamber of Tressa Nome he turned to 
 the right in the carpeted corridor outside 
 and hurried toward the hotel elevator. But he did 
 not ring for the lift; instead he took the spiral iron 
 stairway which circled it, and mounted hastily to the 
 floor above. 
 
 Here was his own apartment and he entered it 
 with a key bearing the hotel tag. A dusky-skinned 
 powerful old man wearing a grizzled beard and a 
 greasy broadcloth coat of old-fashioned cut known 
 to provincials as a "Prince Albert" looked up from 
 where he was seated cross-legged upon the sofa, 
 sharpening a curved knife on a whetstone. 
 
 "Gutchlug," stammered Sanang, "I am afraid 
 of her I What happened two years ago at the temple 
 happened again a moment since, there in her very 
 bedroom! She made a yellow death-adder out of 
 nothing and placed it upon the threshold, and mocked 
 me with laughter. May Thirty Thousand Calami- 
 ties overtake her! May Erlik seize her! May her 
 29
 
 30 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 eyes rot out and her limbs fester! May the seven 
 score and three principal devils " 
 
 "You chatter like a temple ape," said Gutchlug 
 tranquilly. "Does Keuke Mongol die or live? That 
 alone interests me." 
 
 "Gutchlug," faltered the young man, "thou know- 
 est that m-my heart is inclined to mercy toward this 
 young Yezidee " 
 
 "I know that it is inclined to lust," said the other 
 bluntly. 
 
 Sanang's pale face flamed. 
 
 "Listen," he said. "If I had not loved her better 
 than life had I dared go that day to the temple to 
 take her for my own?" 
 
 "You loved life better," said Gutchlug. "You fled 
 when it rained snakes on the temple steps you and 
 your Tchortcha horsemen ! Kai ! I also ran. But 
 I gave every soldier thirty blows with a stick before 
 I slept that night. And you should have had your 
 thirty, also, conforming to the Yarlig, my Tougtchi." 
 
 Sanang, still holding his hat and cane and carrying 
 his overcoat over his left arm, looked down at the 
 heavy, brutal features of Gutchlug Khan at the 
 cruel mouth with its crooked smile under the grizzled 
 beard; at the huge hands the powerful hands of 
 a murderer now deftly honing to a razor-edge the 
 Kalmuck knife held so firmly yet lightly in his great 
 blunt fingers. 
 
 "Listen attentively, Prince Sanang," growled 
 Gutchlug, pausing in his monotonous task to test the
 
 THE YELLOW SNAKE 31 
 
 blade's edge on his thumb "Does the Yezidee 
 Keuke Mongol live? Yes or no?" 
 
 Sanang hesitated, moistened his pallid lips. "She 
 dares not betray us." 
 
 "By what pledge?" 
 
 "Fear." 
 
 "That is no pledge. You also were afraid, yet you 
 went to the temple !" 
 
 "She has listened to the Yarlig. She has looked 
 upon her shroud. She has admitted that she desires 
 to live. Therein lies her pledge to us." 
 
 "And she placed a yellow snake at your feet!" 
 sneered Gutchlug. "Prince Sanang, tell me, what 
 man or what devil in all the chronicles of the past has 
 ever tamed a Snow-Leopard?" And he continued to 
 hone his yataghan. 
 
 "Gutchlug " 
 
 "No, she dies," said the other tranquilly. 
 
 "Not yet!" 
 
 "When, then?" 
 
 "Gutchlug, thou knowest me. Hear my pledge ! 
 At her first gesture toward treachery her first 
 thought of betrayal I myself will end it all." 
 
 "You promise to slay this young snow-leop- 
 ardess?" 
 
 "By the four companions, I swear to kill her with 
 my own hands !" 
 
 Gutchlug sneered. "Kill her yes with the kiss 
 that has burned thy lips to ashes for all these months.
 
 32 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 I know thee, Sanang. Leave her to me. Dead she 
 will no longer trouble thee." 
 
 "Gutchlug!" 
 
 "I hear, Prince Sanang." 
 
 "Strike when I nod. Not until then." 
 
 "I hear, Tougtchi. I understand thee, my Ban- 
 neret. I whet my knife. Kai!" 
 
 Sanang looked at him, put on his top-hat and over- 
 coat, pulled on a pair of white evening gloves. 
 
 "I go forth," he said more pleasantly. 
 
 "I remain here to talk to my seven ancestors and 
 sharpen my knife," remarked Gutchlug. 
 
 "When the white world and the yellow world and 
 the brown world and the black world finally fall be- 
 fore the Hassanis," said Sanang with a quick smile, 
 "I shall bring thee to her. Gutchlug once before 
 she is veiled, thou shalt behold what is lovelier than 
 Eve." 
 
 The other stolidly whetted his knife. 
 
 Sanang pulled out a gold cigarette case, lighted 
 a cigarette with an air. 
 
 "I go among Germans," he volunteered amiably. 
 "The huns swam across two oceans, but, like the 
 unclean swine, it is their own throats they cut when 
 they swim ! Well, there is only one God. And not 
 very many angels. Erlik is greater. And there are 
 many million devils to do his bidding. Adieu. 
 There is rice and there is koumiss in the frozen 
 closet. When I return you shall have been asleep for 
 hours."
 
 THE YELLOW SNAKE 33 
 
 When Sanang left the hotel one of two young men 
 seated in the hotel lobby got up and strolled out 
 after him. 
 
 A few minutes later the other man went to the 
 elevator, ascended to the fourth floor, and entered 
 an apartment next to the one occupied by Sanang. 
 
 There was another man there, lying on the lounge 
 and smoking a cigar. Without a word, they both 
 went leisurely about the matter of disrobing for the 
 night. 
 
 When the shorter man who had been in the apart- 
 ment when the other entered, and who was dark 
 and curly-headed, had attired himself in pyjamas, 
 he sat down on one of the twin beds to enjoy his 
 cigar to the bitter end. 
 
 "Has Sanang gone out?" he inquired in a low 
 voice. 
 
 "Yes. Benton went after him." 
 
 The other man nodded. "Cleves," he said, "I 
 guess it looks as though this Nome girl is in it, too." 
 
 "What happened?" 
 
 "As soon as she arrived, Sanang made straight 
 for her apartment. He remained inside for half 
 an hour. Then he came out in a hurry and went 
 to his own rooms, where that surly servant of his. 
 squats all day, shining up his arsenal, and drinking 
 koumiss." 
 
 "Did you get their conversation?" 
 
 "I've got a record of the gibberish. It requires, 
 an interpreter, of course."
 
 34 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I suppose so. I'll take the records east with 
 me to-morrow, and by the same token I'd better 
 notify New York that I'm leaving." 
 
 He went, half-undressed, to the telephone, got the 
 telegraph office, and sent the following message : 
 
 "RECKLOW, New York: 
 
 "Leaving to-morrow for N. Y. with samples. Re- 
 tain expert in Oriental fabrics. 
 
 "VICTOR CLEVES." 
 
 "Report for me, too," said the dark young man, 
 who was still enjoying his cigar on his pillows. 
 
 So Cleves sent another telegram, directed also to 
 
 "RECKLOW, New York: 
 
 "Benton and I are watching the market. Chinese 
 importations fluctuate. Recent consignment per Nan- 
 yang Maru will be carefully inspected and details 
 forwarded. 
 
 "ALEK SELDEN." 
 
 In the next room Gutchlug could hear the voice 
 of Cleves at the telephone, but he merely shrugged 
 his heavy shoulders in contempt. For he had other 
 things to do beside eavesdropping. 
 
 Also, for the last hour in fact, ever since 
 Sanang's departure something had been happening 
 to him something that happens to a Hassani only 
 once in a lifetime. And now this unique thing had 
 happened to him to him, Gutchlug Khan to him
 
 THE YELLOW SNAKE 35 
 
 before whose Khiounnou ancestors eighty-one thou- 
 sand nations had bowed the knee. 
 
 It had come to him at last, this dread thing, un- 
 heralded, totally unexpected, a few minutes after 
 Sanang had departed. 
 
 And he suddenly knew he was going to die. 
 
 And, when, presently, he comprehended it, he bent 
 his grizzled head and listened seriously. And, after 
 a little silence, he heard his soul bidding him fare- 
 well. 
 
 So the chatter of white men at a telephone in the 
 next apartment had no longer any significance for 
 him. Whether or not they had been spying on him ; 
 whether they were plotting, made no difference to 
 him now. 
 
 He tested his knife's edge with his thumb and 
 listened gravely to his soul bidding him farewell. 
 
 But, for a Yezidee, there was still a little detail 
 to attend to before his soul departed; two matters 
 to regulate. One was to select his shroud. The 
 other was to cut the white throat of this young snow- 
 leopardess called Keuke Mongol, the Yezidee temple 
 girl. 
 
 And he could steal down to her bedroom and finish 
 that matter in five minutes. 
 
 But first he must choose his shroud, as is the 
 custom of the Yezidee. 
 
 That office, however, was quickly accomplished in 
 a country where fine white sheets of linen are to be 
 found on every hotel bed.
 
 36 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 So, on his way to the door, his naked knife in 
 his right hand, he paused to fumble under the bed- 
 covers and draw out a white linen sheet. 
 
 Something hurt his hand like a needle. He moved 
 it, felt the thing squirm under his fingers and pierce 
 his palm again and again. With a shriek, he tore the 
 bedclothes from the bed. 
 
 A little yellow snake lay coiled there. 
 
 He got as far as the telephone, but could not use 
 it. And there he fell heavily, shaking the room and 
 dragging the instrument down with him. 
 
 There was some excitement. Cleves and Selden 
 in their bathrobes went in to look at the body. The 
 hotel physician diagnosed it as heart-trouble. Or, 
 possibly, poison. Some gazed significantly at the 
 naked knife still clutched in the dead man's hands. 
 
 Around the wrist of the other hand was twisted 
 a pliable gold bracelet representing a little snake. It 
 had real emeralds for eyes. 
 
 It had not been there when Gutchlug died. 
 
 But nobody except Sanang could know that. And 
 later when Sanang came back and found Gutchlug 
 very dead on the bed and a policeman sitting outside, 
 he offered no information concerning the new brace- 
 let shaped like a snake with real emeralds for eyes, 
 which adorned the dead man's left wrist. 
 
 Toward evening, however, after an autopsy had 
 confirmed the house physician's diagnosis that heart- 
 disease had finished Gutchlug, Sanang mustered
 
 THE YELLOW SNAKE 37 
 
 enough courage to go to the desk in the lobby and 
 send up his card to Miss Nome. 
 
 It appeared, however, that Miss Nome had left 
 for Chicago about noon.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 GREY MAGIC 
 
 ) Victor Cleves came the following telegram 
 in code: 
 
 "Washington, 
 
 "April 1 4th. iQig. 
 
 "Investigation ordered by the State Department 
 as the result of frequent mention in despatches of 
 Chinese troops operating with the Russian Bolshe- 
 viki forces ha\s disclosed that the Bolsheviki are actu- 
 ally raising a Chinese division of 30,000 men re- 
 cruited in Central Asia. This division has been 
 guilty of the greatest cruelties. A strange rumour 
 prevails among the Allied forces at Archangel that 
 this Chinese division is led by Yezidee and Hassani 
 officers belonging to the sect of devil-worshipers and 
 that they employ black arts and magic in battle. 
 
 "From information so far gathered by the sev- 
 eral branches of the United States Secret Service 
 operating throughout the world, it appears possible 
 that the various revolutionary forces of disorder, in 
 Europe and Asia, which now are violently threaten- 
 ing the peace and security, of all established civilisa- 
 tion on earth, may have had a common origin. This 
 origin, it is now suspected, may date back to a very 
 remote epoch; the wide-spread forces of violence 
 and merciless destruction may have had their begin- 
 38
 
 GREY MAGIC 39 
 
 ning among some ancient and predatory race whose 
 existence was maintained solely by robbery and mur- 
 der. 
 
 t( Anarchists, terrorists, Bolshevists, Reds of all 
 shades and degrees, are now believed to represent in 
 modern times what perhaps once was a tribe of 
 Assassins a sect whose religion was founded upon 
 a common predilection for crimes of violence. 
 
 "On this theory then, for the present, the United 
 States Government will proceed with this investiga- 
 tion of Bolshevism; and the Secret Service will con- 
 tinue to pay particular attention to all Orientals in 
 the United States and other countries. You person- 
 ally are formally instructed to keep in touch with 
 XLY-37I (Alek Selden) and ZB-jos (James Ben- 
 ton), and to employ every possible means to become 
 friendly with the girl Tressa Nome, win her confi- 
 dence, mid, if possible, enlist her actively in the Gov- 
 ernment Service as your particular aid and comrade. 
 
 "It is equally important that the movements of the 
 Oriental, called Sanang, be carefully observed in or- 
 der to discover the identity and whereabouts of his 
 companions. However, until further instructions he 
 is not to be taken into custody. M. H. 2479. 
 
 "(Signed) 
 
 "(JOHN RECKLOW.)" 
 
 The long despatch from John Recklow made 
 Cleves's duty plain enough. 
 
 For months, now, Selden and Benton had been 
 watching Tressa Nome. And they had learned 
 practically nothing about her. 
 
 And now the girl had come within Cleves's sphere 
 of operation. She had been in New York for two 
 weeks. Telegrams from Benton in Chicago, and
 
 40 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 from Selden in Buffalo, had prepared him for her 
 arrival. 
 
 He had his men watching her boarding-house on 
 West Twenty-eighth Street, men to follow her, men 
 to keep their eyes on her at the theatre, where every 
 evening, at 10 145, her entr'acte was staged. He knew 
 where to get her. But he, himself, had been on the 
 watch for the man Sanang; and had failed to find 
 the slightest trace of him in New York, although 
 warned that he had arrived. 
 
 So, for that evening, he left the hunt for Sanang 
 to others, put on his evening clothes, and dined with 
 fashionable friends at the Patroons' Club, who never 
 for an instant suspected that young Victor Cleves 
 was in the Service of the United States Government. 
 About half-past nine he strolled around to the 
 theatre, desiring to miss as much as possible of the 
 popular show without being too late to see the curious 
 little entr'acte in which this girl, Tressa Nome, ap- 
 peared alone. 
 
 He had secured an aisle seat near the stage at an 
 outrageous price; the main show was still thunder- 
 ing and fizzing and glittering as he entered the 
 theatre; so he stood in the rear behind the orchestra 
 until the descending curtain extinguished the out- 
 rageous glare and din. 
 
 Then he went down the aisle, and as he seated 
 himself Tressa Nome stepped from the wings and 
 stood before the lowered curtain facing an expectant 
 but oddly undemonstrative audience.
 
 GREY MAGIC 41 
 
 The girl worked rapidly, seriously, and in silence. 
 She seemed a mere child there behind the footlights, 
 not more than sixteen anyway her winsome eyes 
 and wistful lips unspoiled by the world's wisdom. 
 
 Yet once or twice the mouth drooped for a second 
 and the winning eyes darkened to a remoter blue 
 the brooding iris hue of far horizons. 
 
 She wore the characteristic tabard of stiff golden 
 tissue and the gold pagoda-shaped headpiece of a 
 Yezidee temple girl. Her flat, slipper-shaped foot- 
 gear was of stiff gold, too, and curled upward at the 
 toes. 
 
 All this accentuated her apparent youth. For in 
 face and throat no firmer contours had as yet modi- 
 fied the soft fullness of immaturity; her limbs were 
 boyish and frail, and her bosom more undecided still, 
 so that the embroidered breadth of gold fell flat and 
 straight from her chest to a few inches above the 
 ankles. 
 
 She seemed to have no stock of paraphernalia with 
 which to aid the performance; no assistant, no or- 
 chestral diversion, nor did she serve herself with 
 any magician's patter. She did her work close to 
 the footlights. 
 
 Behind her loomed a black curtain; the strip of 
 stage in front was bare even of carpet; the orches- 
 tra remained mute. 
 
 But when she needed anything a little table, for 
 example well, it was suddenly there where she re- 
 quired it a tripod, for instance, evidently fitted
 
 42 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 to hold the big iridescent bubble of glass in 
 which swarmed little tropical fishes and which 
 arrived neatly from nowhere. She merely placed 
 her hands before her as though ready to support 
 something weighty which she expected and sud- 
 denly, the huge crystal bubble was visible, resting 
 between her hands. And when she tired of holding 
 it, she set it upon the empty air and let go of it; 
 and instead of crashing to the stage with its finny 
 rainbow swarm of swimmers, out of thin air ap- 
 peared a tripod to support it. 
 
 Applause followed, not very enthusiastic, for the 
 sort of audience which sustains the shows of which 
 her performance was merely an entr'acte is an au- 
 dience responsive only to the obvious. 
 
 Nobody ever before had seen that sort of magic 
 in America. People scarcely knew whether or not 
 they quite liked it. The lightning of innovation stu- 
 pefies the dull; ignorance is always suspicious of in- 
 novation always afraid to put itself on record until 
 its mind is made up by somebody else. 
 
 So in this typical New York audience approbation 
 was cautious, but every fascinated eye remained 
 focused on this young girl who continued to do in- 
 credible things, which seemed to resemble "putting 
 something over" on them; a thing which no unedu- 
 cated American conglomeration ever quite forgives. 
 
 The girl's silence, too, perplexed them ; they were 
 accustomed to gabble, to noise, to jazz, vocal and 
 instrumental, to that incessant metropolitan clamour
 
 GREY MAGIC 43 
 
 which fills every second with sound in a city whose 
 only distinction is its din. Stage, press, art, letters, 
 social existence unless noisy mean nothing in Goth- 
 am; reticence, leisure, repose are the three lost arts. 
 The megaphone is the city's symbol; its chief est 
 crime, silence. 
 
 The girl having finished with the big glass bubble 
 full of tiny fish, picked it up and tossed it aside. For 
 a moment it apparently floated there in space like 
 a soap-bubble. Changing rainbow tints waxed and 
 waned on the surface, growing deeper and more gor- 
 geous until the floating globe glowed scarlet, then 
 suddenly burst into flame and vanished. And only a 
 strange, sweet perfume lingered in the air. 
 
 But she gave her perplexed audience no time to 
 wonder; she had seated herself on the stage and was 
 already swiftly busy unfolding a white veil with 
 which she presently covered herself, draping it over 
 her like a tent. 
 
 The veil seemed to be translucent; she was appar- 
 ently visible seated beneath it. But the veil turned 
 into smoke, rising into the air in a thin white cloud; 
 and there, where she had been seated, was a statue 
 of white stone the image of herself ! in all the frail 
 springtide of early adolescence a white statue, cold, 
 opaque, exquisite in its sculptured immobility. 
 
 There came, the next moment, a sound of distant 
 thunder; flashes lighted the blank curtain; and sud- 
 denly a vein of lightning and a sharper peal shattered 
 the statue to fragments.
 
 44. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 There they lay, broken bits of her own sculptured 
 body, glistening in a heap behind the footlights. 
 Then each fragment began to shimmer with a rosy 
 internal light of its own, until the pile of broken 
 marble glowed like living coals under thickening and 
 reddening vapours. And, presently, dimly percep- 
 tible, there she was in the flesh again, seated in the 
 fiery centre of the conflagration, stretching her arms 
 luxuriously, yawning, seemingly awakening from re- 
 freshing slumber, her eyes unclosing to rest with a 
 sort of confused apology upon her astounded au- 
 dience. 
 
 As she rose to her feet nothing except herself re- 
 mained on the stage no debris, not a shred of 
 smoke, not a spark. 
 
 She came down, then, across an inclined plank into 
 the orchestra among the audience. 
 
 In the aisle seat nearest her sat Victor Cleves. 
 His business was to be there that evening. But she 
 didn't know that, knew nothing about him had 
 never before set eyes on him. 
 
 At her gesture of invitation he made a cup of both 
 his hands. Into these she poured a double handful 
 of unset diamonds or what appeared to be dia- 
 monds pressed her own hands above his for a 
 second and the diamonds in his palms had become 
 pearls. 
 
 These were passed around to people in the vicinity, 
 and finally returned to Mr. Cleves, who, at her re- 
 quest, covered the heap of pearls with both his hands, 
 hiding them entirely from view.
 
 GREY MAGIC 45 
 
 At her nod he uncovered them. The pearls had 
 become emeralds. Again, while he held them, and 
 without even touching him, she changed them into 
 rubies. Then she turned away from him, apparently 
 forgetting that he still held the gems, and he sat 
 very still, one cupped hand over the other, while she 
 poured silver coins into a woman's gloved hands, 
 turned them into gold coins, then flung each coin into 
 the air, where it changed to a living, fragrant rose 
 and fell among the audience. 
 
 Presently she seemed to remember Cleves, came 
 back down the aisle, and under his close and intent 
 gaze drew from his cupped hands, one by one, a 
 score of brilliant little living birds, which continually 
 flew about her and finally perched, twittering, on her 
 golden headdress a rainbow-crest of living jewels. 
 
 As she drew the last warm, breathing little feath- 
 ered miracle from Cleves's hands and released it, he 
 said rapidly under his breath: "I want a word with 
 you later. Where?" 
 
 She let her clear eyes rest on him for a moment, 
 then with a shrug so slight that it was perceptible, 
 perhaps, only to him, she moved on along the in- 
 clined way, stepped daintily over the footlights, 
 caught fire, apparently, nodded to a badly rattled 
 audience, and sauntered off, burning from head to 
 foot. 
 
 What applause there was became merged in a 
 dissonant instrumental outburst from the orchestra; 
 the great god Jazz resumed direction, the mindless
 
 46 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 audience breathed freely again as the curtain rose 
 upon a familiar, yelling turbulence, including all that 
 Gotham really understands and cares for legs and 
 noise. 
 
 Victor Cleves glanced up at the stage, then con- 
 tinued to study the name of the girl on the pro- 
 gramme. It was featured in rather pathetic solitude 
 under "Entr'acte." And he read further: "During 
 the entr'acte Miss Tressa Nome will entertain you 
 with several phases of Black Magic. This 
 strange knowledge was acquired by Miss Nome 
 from the Yezidees, among which almost unknown 
 people still remain descendants of that notorious and 
 formidable historic personage known in the twelfth 
 century as The Old Man of the Mountain or The 
 Old Man of Mount Alamout. 
 
 "The pleasant profession of this historic indi- 
 vidual was assassination; and some historians now 
 believe that genuine occult power played a part in 
 his dreadful record a record which terminated only 
 when the infantry of Genghis Khan took Mount Ala- 
 mout by storm and hanged the Old Man of the 
 Mountain and burned his body under a boulder of 
 You-Stone. 
 
 "For Miss Nome's performance there appears to 
 be no plausible, practical or scientific explanation. 
 
 "During her performance the curtain will remain 
 lowered for fifteen minutes and will then rise on the 
 last act of 'You Betcha Life.' " 
 
 The noisy show continued while Cleves, paying it
 
 GREY MAGIC 47 
 
 scant attention, brooded over the programme. And 
 ever his keen, grey eyes reverted to her name, Tressa 
 Nome. 
 
 Then, for a little while, he settled back and let 
 his absent gaze wander over the galloping battalions 
 of painted girls and the slapstick principals whose 
 perpetual motion evoked screams of approbation 
 from the audience amid the din of the great god 
 Jazz. 
 
 He had an aisle seat; he disturbed nobody when 
 he went out and around to the stage door. 
 
 The aged man on duty took his card, called a boy 
 and sent it off. The boy returned with the card, 
 saying that Miss Nome had already dressed and de- 
 parted. 
 
 Cleves tipped him and then tipped the doorman 
 heavily. 
 
 "Where does she live?" he asked. 
 
 "Say," said the old man, "I dunno, and that's 
 straight. But them ladies mostly goes up to the 
 roof for a look in at the 'Moonlight Masnue' and 
 a dance afterward. Was you ever up there?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Seen the new show?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, g'wan up while you can get a table. And 
 I bet the little girl will be somewheres around." 
 
 "The little girl" was "somewheres around." He 
 secured a table, turned and looked about at the vast 
 cabaret into which only a few people had yet filtered,
 
 48 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 and saw her at a distance in the carpeted corridor 
 buying violets from one of the flower-girls. 
 
 A waiter placed a reserve card on his table ; he con- 
 tinued on around the outer edge of the auditorium. 
 
 Miss Nome had already seated herself at a small 
 table in the rear, and a waiter was serving her with 
 iced orange juice and little French cakes. 
 
 When the waiter returned Cleves went up and 
 took off his hat. 
 
 "May I talk with you for a moment, Miss 
 Nome?" he said. 
 
 The girl looked up, the wheat-straw still between 
 her scarlet lips. Then, apparently recognising in him 
 the young man in the audience who had spoken to 
 her, she resumed her business of imbibing orange 
 juice. 
 
 The girl seemed even frailer and younger in her 
 hat and street gown. A silver-fox stole hung from 
 her shoulders ; a gold bag lay on the table under the 
 bunch of violets. 
 
 She paid no attention whatever to him. Presently 
 her wheat-straw buckled, and she selected a better 
 one. 
 
 He said: "There's something rather serious I'd 
 like to speak to you about if you'll let me. I'm not 
 the sort you evidently suppose. I'm not trying to 
 annoy you." 
 
 At that she looked around and upward once more. 
 
 Very, very young, but already spoiled, he thought, 
 for the dark-blue eyes were coolly appraising him,
 
 GREY MAGIC 49 
 
 and the droop of the mouth had become almost sul- 
 len. Besides, traces of paint still remained to incar- 
 nadine lip and cheek and there was a hint of hard- 
 ness in the youthful plumpness of the features. 
 
 "Are you a professional?" she asked without curi- 
 osity. 
 
 "A theatrical man? No." 
 
 "Then if you haven't anything to offer me, what is 
 it you wish?" 
 
 "I have a job to offer if you care for it and if 
 you are up to it," he said. 
 
 Her eyes became slightly hostile : 
 
 "What kind of job do you mean?" 
 
 "I want to learn something about you first. Will 
 you come over to my table and talk it over?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "What sort do you suppose me to be?" he in- 
 quired, amused. 
 
 "The usual sort, I suppose." 
 
 "You mean a Johnny?" 
 
 "Yes of sorts." 
 
 She let her insolent eyes sweep him once more v 
 from head to foot. 
 
 He was a well-built young man and in his evening 
 dress he had that something about him which placed 
 him very definitely where he really belonged. 
 
 "Would you mind looking at my card?" he asked. 
 
 He drew it out and laid it beside her, and without 
 stirring she scanned it sideways. 
 
 "That's my name and address," he continued. "I'm
 
 50 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 not contemplating mischief. I've enough excitement 
 in life without seeking adventure. Besides, I'm not 
 the sort who goes about annoying women." 
 
 She glanced up at him again : 
 
 "You are annoying me !" 
 
 "I'm sorry. I was quite honest. Good-night." 
 
 He took his conge with unhurried amiability; had 
 already turned away when she said: 
 
 "Please . . . what do you desire to say to me?" 
 He came back to her table : 
 
 "I couldn't tell you until I know a little more about 
 you." 
 
 "What do you wish to know?" 
 
 "Several things. I could scarcely ask you go 
 over such matters with you standing here." 
 
 There was a pause ; the girl juggled with the straw 
 on the table for a few moments, then, partly turn- 
 ing, she summoned a waiter, paid him, adjusted her 
 stole, picked up her gold bag and her violets and 
 stood up. Then she turned to Cleves and gave him 
 a direct look, which had in it the impersonal and 
 searching gaze of a child. 
 
 When they were seated at the table reserved for 
 him the place already was filling rapidly backwash 
 from the theatres slopped through every aisle 
 people not yet surfeited with noise, not yet suffi- 
 ciently sodden by their worship of the great god 
 Jazz. 
 
 "Jazz," said Cleves, glancing across his dinner- 
 card at Tressa Nome "what's the meaning of the 
 word? Do you happen to know?"
 
 GREY MAGIC 51 
 
 "Doesn't it come from the French ^aser'f" 
 
 He smiled. "Possibly. I'm rather hungry. Are 
 you?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Will you indicate your preferences?" 
 
 She studied her card, and presently he gave the 
 order. 
 
 "I'd like some champagne," she said, "unless you 
 think it's too expensive." 
 
 He smiled at that, too, and gave the order. 
 
 "I didn't suggest any wine because you seem so 
 young," he said. 
 
 "How old do I seem?" 
 
 "Sixteen perhaps." 
 
 "I am twenty-one." 
 
 "Then you've had no troubles. 5 ' 
 
 "I don't know what you call i ">uble," she re- 
 marked, indifferently, watching the a* 'ving throngs. 
 
 The orchestra, too, had taken its pla . , 
 
 "Well," she said, "now that you've picked me up, 
 what do you really want of me?" There was no 
 mitigating smile to soften what she said. She 
 dropped her elbows on the table, rested her chin 
 between her palms and looked at him with the same 
 searching, undisturbed expression that is so discon- 
 certing in children. As he made no reply: "May I 
 have a cocktail?" she inquired. 
 
 He gave the order. And his mind registered pes- 
 simism. "There is nothing doing with this girl," 
 he thought. "She's already on the toboggan." But
 
 52 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 he said aloud: "That was beautiful work you did 
 down in the theatre, Miss Nome." 
 
 "Did you think so?" 
 
 "Of course. It was astounding work." 
 
 "Thank you. But managers and audiences differ 
 with you." 
 
 "Then they are very stupid," he said. 
 
 "Possibly. But that does not help me pay my 
 board." 
 
 "Do you mean you have trouble in securing the- 
 atrical engagements?" 
 
 "Yes, I am through here to-night, and there's 
 nothing else in view, so far." 
 
 "That's incredible I" he exclaimed. 
 
 She lifted her glass, slowly drained it. 
 
 For a few moments she caressed the stem of the 
 empty glass, her gaze remote. 
 
 "Yes, it's that way," she said. "From the begin- 
 ning I felt that my audiences were not in sympathy 
 with me. Sometimes it even amounts to hostility. 
 Americans do not like what I do, even if it holds 
 their attention. I don't quite understand why they 
 don't like it, but I'm always conscious they don't. 
 And of course that settles it to-night has settled the 
 whole thing, once and for all." 
 
 "What are you going to do?" 
 
 "What others do, I presume." 
 
 "What do others do?" he inquired, watching the 
 lovely sullen eyes. 
 
 "Oh, they do what I'm doing now, don't they? '
 
 GREY MAGIC 53 
 
 let some man pick them up and feed them." She 
 lifted her indifferent eyes. "I'm not criticising you. 
 I meant to do it some day when I had courage. 
 That's why I just asked you if I might have some 
 champagne finding myself a little scared at my first 
 step. . . . But you did say you might have a job 
 for me. Didn't you?" 
 
 "Suppose I haven't. What are you going to do?" 
 
 The curtain was rising. She nodded toward the 
 bespangled chorus. "Probably that sort of thing. 
 They've asked me." 
 
 Supper was served. They both were hungry and 
 thirsty; the music made conversation difficult, so 
 they supped in silence and watched the imbecile show 
 conceived by vulgarians, produced by vulgarians and 
 served up to mental degenerates of the same species 
 the average metropolitan audience. 
 
 For ten minutes a pair of comedians fell up and 
 down a flight of steps, and the audience shrieked ap- 
 proval. 
 
 "Miss Nome?" 
 
 The girl who had been watching the show turned 
 in her chair and looked back at him. 
 
 "Your magic is by far the most wonderful I have 
 ever seen or heard of. Even in India such things 
 are not done." 
 
 "No, not in India," she said, indifferently. 
 
 "Where then?" 
 
 "In China." 
 
 "You learned to do such things there?"
 
 54 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Where, in China, did you learn such amazing 
 magic?" 
 
 "In Yian." 
 
 "I never heard of it. Is it a province?" 
 
 "A city." 
 
 "And you lived there?" 
 
 "Fourteen years." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "From 1904 to 1918." 
 
 "During the great war," he remarked, "you were 
 in China?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Then you arrived here very recently." 
 
 "In^November, from the Coast." 
 
 "I see. You played the theatres from the Coast 
 eastward." 
 
 "And went to pieces in New York," she added 
 calmly, finishing her glass of champagne. 
 
 "Have you any family?" he asked. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Do you care to say anything further?" he in- 
 quired, pleasantly. 
 
 "About my family? Yes, if you wish. My father 
 was in the spice trade in Yian. The Yezidees took 
 Yian in 1910, threw him into a well in his own com- 
 pound and filled it up with dead imperial troops. I 
 was thirteen years old. . . . The Hassani did that. 
 They held Yian nearly eight years, and I lived with 
 my mother, in a garden pagoda, until 1914. In
 
 GREY MAGIC 55 
 
 January of that year Germans got through from 
 Kiaou-Chou. They had been six months on the way. 
 I think they were Hassanis. Anyway, they persuaded 
 the Hassanis to massacre every English-speaking 
 prisoner. And so my mother died in the garden 
 pagoda of Yian. ... I was not told for four 
 years." 
 
 "Why did they spare you?" he asked, astonished 
 at her story so quietly told, so utterly destitute of 
 emotion. 
 
 "I was seventeen. A certain person had placed 
 me among the temple girls in the temple of Erlik. 
 It pleased this person to make of me a Mongol 
 temple girl as a mockery at Christ. They gave me 
 the name Keuke Mongol. I asked to serve the shrine 
 of Kwann-an she being like to our Madonna. But 
 this person gave me the choice between the halberds 
 of the Tchortchas and the sorcery of Erlik." 
 
 She lifted her sombre eyes. "So I learned how to 
 do the things you saw. But what I did there on the 
 stage is not respectable." 
 
 An odd shiver passed over him. For a second he 
 took her literally, suddenly convinced that her magic 
 was not white but black as the demon at whose shrine 
 she had learned it. Then he smiled and asked her 
 pleasantly, whether indeed she employed hypnosis in 
 her miraculous exhibitions. 
 
 But her eyes became more sombre still, and, "I 
 don't care to talk about it," she said. "I have al- 
 ready said too much."
 
 56 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry into profes- 
 sional secrets " 
 
 "I can't talk about it," she repeated. ". . . Please 
 my glass is quite empty." 
 
 When he had refilled it: 
 
 "How did you get away from Yian?" he asked. 
 
 "The Japanese." 
 
 "What luck!" 
 
 "Yes. One battle was fought at Buldak. The 
 Hassanis and Blue Flags were terribly cut up. Then, 
 outside the walls of Yian, Prince Sanang's Tchortcha 
 infantry made a stand. He was there with his Yezi- 
 dee horsemen, all in leather and silk armour with 
 casques and corselets of black Indian steel. 
 
 "I could see them from the temple saw the Jap- 
 anese gunners open fire. The Tchortchas were 
 blown to shreds in the blast of the Japanese guns. 
 . . . Sanang got away with some of his Yezidee 
 horsemen." 
 
 "Where was that battle?" 
 
 "I told you, outside the walls of Yian." 
 
 "The newspapers never mentioned any such trou- 
 ble in China," he said, suspiciously. 
 
 "Nobody knows about it except the Germans and 
 the Japanese." 
 
 "Who is this Sanang?" he demanded. 
 
 "A Yezidee-Mongol. He is one of the Sheiks-el- 
 Djebel a servant of The Old Man of Mount Ala- 
 mout." 
 
 "What is he?"
 
 GREY MAGIC 57 
 
 "A sorcerer assassin." 
 
 "What!" exclaimed Cleves incredulously. 
 
 "Why, yes," she said, calmly. "Have you never 
 heard of The Old Man of Mount Alamout?" 
 
 "Well, yes " 
 
 "The succession has been unbroken since 1090 B.C. 
 A Hassan Sabbah is still the present Old Man of the 
 Mountain. His Yezidees worship Erlik. They are 
 sorcerers. But you would not believe that." 
 
 Cleves said with a smile, "Who is Erlik?" 
 
 "The Mongols' Satan." 
 
 "Oh! So these Yezidees are devil-worshipers!" 
 
 "They are more. They are actually devils." 
 
 "You don't really believe that even in unexplored 
 China there exists such a creature as a real sorcerer, 
 do you?" he inquired, smilingly. 
 
 "I don't wish to talk of it." 
 
 To his surprise her face had flushed, and he 
 thought her sensitive mouth quivered a little. 
 
 He watched her in silence for a moment; then, 
 leaning a little way across the table: 
 
 "Where are you going when the show here 
 closes?" 
 
 "To my boarding-house." 
 
 "And then?" 
 
 "To bed," she said, sullenly. 
 
 "And to-morrow what do you mean to do?" 
 
 "Go out to the agencies and ask for work." 
 
 "And if there is none?" 
 
 "The chorus," she said, indifferently.
 
 58 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "What salary have you been getting?" 
 She told him. 
 
 "Will you take three times that amount and work 
 with me?"
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 BODY AND SOUL 
 
 THE girl's direct gaze met his with that merci- 
 less searching intentness he already knew. 
 "What do you wish me to do?" 
 
 "Enter the service of the United States." 
 
 "Wh-what?" 
 
 "Work for the Government." 
 
 She was too taken aback to answer. 
 
 "Where were you born?" he demanded abruptly. 
 
 "In Albany, New York," she replied in a dazed 
 way. 
 
 "You are loyal to your country?" 
 
 "Ye* certainly." 
 
 "You would not betray her?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "I don't mean for money; I mean from fear." 
 
 After a moment, and, avoiding his gaze: "I am 
 afraid of death," she said very simply. 
 
 He waited. 
 
 "I I don't know w'hat I might do being 
 afraid," she added in a troubled voice. "I desire to 
 live." 
 
 He still waited. 
 
 59
 
 60 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 She lifted her eyes: "I'd try not to betray my 
 country," she murmured. 
 
 "Try to face death for your country's honour?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "And for your own?" 
 
 "Yes; and for my own." 
 
 He leaned nearer: "Yet you're taking a chance on 
 your own honour to-night." 
 
 She blushed brightly: "I didn't think I was taking 
 a very great chance with you." 
 
 He said: "You have found life too hard. And 
 when you faced failure in New York you began to 
 let go of life real life, I mean. And you came up 
 here to-night wondering whether you had courage 
 to let yourself go. When I spoke to you it scared 
 you. You found you hadn't the courage. But per- 
 haps to-morrow you might find it or next week 
 if sufficiently scared by hunger you might venture 
 to take the first step along the path that you say 
 others usually take sooner or later." 
 
 The girl flushed scarlet, sat looking at him out of 
 eyes grown dark with anger. 
 
 He said: "You told me an untruth. You have 
 been tempted to betray your country. You have re- 
 sisted. You have been threatened with death. You 
 have had courage to defy threats and temptations 
 where your country's honour was concerned !" 
 
 "How do you know?" she demanded. 
 
 He continued, ignoring the question: "From the 
 time you landed in San Francisco you have been 
 threatened. You tried to earn a living by your ma-
 
 BODY AND SOUL 61 
 
 gician's tricks, but in city after city, as you came 
 East, your uneasiness grew into fear, and your fear 
 into terror, because every day more terribly con- 
 firmed your belief that people were following you de- 
 termined either to use you to their own purposes or 
 to murder you " 
 
 The girl turned quite white and half rose in her 
 chair, then sank back, staring at him out of dilated 
 eyes. Then Cleves smiled: "So you've got the nerve 
 to do Government work," he said, "and you've got 
 the intelligence, and the knowledge, and something 
 else I don't know exactly what to call it Skill? 
 Dexterity? Sorcery?" he smiled "I mean your 
 professional ability. That's what I want that be- 
 wildering dexterity of yours, to help your own coun- 
 try in the fight of its life. Will you enlist for ser- 
 vice?" 
 
 "W-what fight?" she asked faintly. 
 
 "The fight with the Red Spectre." 
 
 "Anarchy?" 
 
 "Yes . . . Are you ready to leave this place? I 
 want to talk to you." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "In my own rooms." 
 
 After a moment she rose. 
 
 "I'll go to yaur rooms with you," she said. She 
 added very calmly that she was glad it was to be his 
 rooms and not some other man's. 
 
 Out of countenance, he demanded what she meant, 
 and she said quite candidly that she'd made up her
 
 62 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 mind to live at any cost, and that if she couldn't 
 make an honest living she'd make a living anyway. 
 
 He offered no reply to this until they had reached 
 the street and he had called a taxi. 
 
 On their way to his apartment he re-opened the 
 subject rather bluntly, remarking that life was not 
 worth living at the price she had mentioned. 
 
 "That is the accepted Christian theory," she re- 
 plied coolly, "but circumstances alter things." 
 
 "Not such things." 
 
 "Oh, yes, they do. If one is already damned, what 
 difference does anything else make?" 
 
 He asked, sarcastically, whether she considered 
 herself already damned. 
 
 She did not reply for a few moments, then she 
 said, in a quick, breathless way, that souls have been 
 entrapped through ignorance of evil. And asked 
 him if he did not believe it. 
 
 "No," he said, "I don't." 
 
 She shook her head. "You couldn't understand," 
 she said. "But I've made up my mind to one thing; 
 even if my soul has perished, my body shall not die 
 for a long, long time. I mean to live," she added. 
 "I shall not let my body be slain ! They shall not 
 steal life from me, whatever they have done to my 
 soul " 
 
 "What in heaven's name are you talking about?" 
 he exclaimed. "Do you actually believe in .soul- 
 snatchers and life-stealers?" 
 
 She seemed sullen, her profile turned to him, her 
 eyes on the brilliantly lighted avenue up which they
 
 BODY AND SOUL 63 
 
 were speeding. After a while : "I'd rather live de- 
 cently and respectably if I can," she said. "That is 
 the natural desire of any girl, I suppose. But if I 
 can't, nevertheless I shall beat off death at any cost. 
 And whatever the price of life is, I shall pay it. 
 Because I am absolutely determined to go on living. 
 And if I can't provide the means I'll have to let 
 some man do it, I suppose." 
 
 "It's a good thing it was I who found you when 
 you were out of a job," he remarked coldly. 
 
 "I hope so," she said. "Even in the beginning I 
 didn't really believe you meant to be impertinent" 
 a tragic smile touched her lips "and I was almost 
 sorry " 
 
 "Are you quite crazy?" he demanded. 
 
 "No, my mind is untouched. It's my soul that's 
 gone. . . . Do you know I was very hungry when 
 you spoke to me? The management wouldn't ad- 
 vance anything, and my last money went for my 
 room. . . . Last Monday I had three dollars to 
 face the future and no job. I spent the last of it 
 to-night on violets, orange juice and cakes. My furs 
 and my gold bag remain. I can go two months 
 
 more on them. Then it's a job or " She 
 
 shrugged and buried her nose in her violets. 
 
 "Suppose I advance you a month's salary?" he 
 said. 
 
 "What am I to do for it?" 
 
 The taxi stopped at a florist's on the corner of 
 Madison Avenue and 58th Street. Overhead were 
 apartments. There was no elevator merely the
 
 64 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 street door to unlock and four dim nights of stairs 
 rising steeply to the top. 
 
 He lived on the top floor. As they paused before 
 his door in the dim corridor: 
 
 "Are you afraid?" he asked. 
 
 She came nearer, laid a hand on his arm: 
 
 "Are you afraid?" 
 
 He stood silent, the latch-key in his hand. 
 
 "I'm not afraid of myself if that is what you 
 mean," he said. 
 
 "That is partly what I mean . . . you'll have to 
 mount guard over your soul." 
 
 "I'll look out for my soul," he retorted dryly. 
 
 "Do so. I lost mine. I I would not wish any 
 harm to yours through our companionship." 
 
 "Don't you worry about my soul," he remarked, 
 fitting the key to the lock. But again her hand fell 
 on his wrist: 
 
 "Wait. I can't can't help warning you. Neither 
 your soul nor your body are safe if if you ever 
 do make of me a companion. I've got to tell you 
 this!" 
 
 "What are you talking about?" he demanded 
 bluntly. 
 
 "Because you have been courteous considerate 
 and you don't know oh, you don't realise what 
 spiritual peril is! What your soul and body have 
 to fear if you if you win me over if you ever 
 manage to make of me a friend!" 
 
 He said: "People follow and threaten you. We 
 know that. I understand also that association with
 
 BODY AND SOUL 65 
 
 you involves me, and that I shall no doubt be 
 menaced with bodily harm." 
 
 He laid his hand on hers where it still rested on 
 his sleeves: 
 
 "But that's my business, Miss Nome," he added 
 with a smile. "So, otherwise, it being merely a plain 
 business affair between you and me, I think I may 
 also venture my immortal soul alone with you in my 
 room." 
 
 The girl flushed darkly. 
 
 "You have misunderstood," she said. 
 
 He looked at her coolly, intently; and arrived at 
 no conclusion. Young, very lovely, confessedly with- 
 out moral principle, he still could not believe her ac- 
 tually depraved. "What did you mean?" he said 
 bluntly. 
 
 "In companionship with the lost, one might lose 
 one's way unawares. . . . Do you know that there 
 is an Evil loose in the world which is bent upon con- 
 quest by obtaining control of men's minds?" 
 
 "No," he replied, amused. 
 
 "And that, through the capture of men's minds 
 and souls the destruction of civilisation is being 
 planned?" 
 
 "Is that what you learned in your captivity, Miss 
 Nome?" 
 
 "You do not believe me." 
 
 "I believe your terrible experiences in China have 
 shaken you to your tragic little soul Horror and 
 grief and loneliness have left scars on tender, impres- 
 sionable youth. They would have slain maturity
 
 66 THE SLAYER OF 9OLS 
 
 broken it, crushed it. But youth is flexible, pliable, 
 and bends gives way under pressure. Scars be- 
 come slowly effaced. It shall be so with you. You 
 will learn to understand that nothing really can harm 
 the soul." 
 
 For a few moments' silence they stood facing each 
 other on the dim landing outside his locked door. 
 
 "Nothing can slay our souls," he repeated in a 
 grave voice. "I do not believe you really ever have 
 done anything to wound even your self-respect. I do 
 not believe you are capable of it, or ever have been, 
 or ever will be. But somebody has deeply wounded 
 you, spiritually, and has wounded your mind to per- 
 suade you that your soul is no longer in God's keep- 
 ing. For that is a lie!" 
 
 He saw her features working with poignant emo- 
 tions as though struggling to believe him. 
 
 "Souls are never lost," he said. "Ungoverned 
 passions of every sort merely cripple them for a 
 space. God always heals them in the end." 
 
 He laid his hand on the door-knob once more 
 and lifted the latch-key. 
 
 "Don't!" she whispered, catching his hand again, 
 "if there should be somebody in there waiting for 
 us!" 
 
 "There is not a soul in my rooms. My servant 
 sleeps out." 
 
 "There is somebody there !" she said, trembling. 
 
 "Nobody, Miss Nome. Will you come in with 
 me?" 
 
 "I don't dare ,"
 
 BODY AND SOUL 67 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "You and I alone together no! oh, please 
 please ! I am afraid !" 
 
 "Of what?" 
 
 "Of giving you my c-confidence and trust- 
 and and f-friendship." 
 
 "I want you to." 
 
 "I must not! It would destroy us both, soul and 
 body!" 
 
 "I tell you," he said, impatiently, "that there is 
 no destruction of the soul and it's a clean comrade- 
 ship anyway a fighting friendship I ask of you all 
 I ask; all I offer! Wherein, then, lies this peril in 
 being alone together?" 
 
 "Because I am finding it in my heart "to believe in 
 you, trust you, hold fast to your strength and pro- 
 tection. And if I give way yield and if I make 
 you a promise and if there is anybody in that room 
 to see us and hear us then we shall be destroyed, 
 both of us, soul and body " 
 
 He took her hands, held them until their trembling 
 ceased. 
 
 "I'll answer for our bodies. Let God look after 
 the rest. Will you trust Him?" 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "And me?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 But her face blanched as he turned the latch-key, 
 switched on the electric light, and preceded her into 
 the room beyond. 
 
 The place was one of those accentless, typical
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 bachelor apartments made comfortable for anything 
 masculine, but quite unlivable otherwise. 
 
 Live coals still glowed in the hob grate ; he placed 
 a lump of cannel coal on the embers, used a bellows 
 vigorously and the flame caught with a greasy 
 crackle. 
 
 The girl stood motionless until he pulled up an 
 easy chair for her, then he found another for him- 
 self. She let slip her furs, folded her hands around 
 the bunch of violets and waited. 
 
 "Now," he said, "I'll come to the point. In 1916 
 I was at Plattsburg, expecting a commission. The 
 Department of Justice sent for me. I went to Wash- 
 ington where I was made to understand that I had 
 been selected to serve my country in what is vaguely 
 known as the Secret Service and which includes 
 government agents attached to several departments. 
 
 "The great war is over; but I am still retained in 
 the service. Because something more sinister than 
 a hun victory over civilisation threatens this Repub- 
 lic. And threatens the civilised world." 
 
 "Anarchy," she said. 
 
 "Bolshevism." 
 
 She did not stir in her chair. 
 
 She had become very white. She said nothing. He 
 looked at her with his quiet, reassuring smile. 
 
 "That's what I want of you," he repeated. 
 
 "I want your help," he went on, "I want your 
 valuable knowledge of the Orient. I want whatever 
 secret information you possess. I want your rather 
 amazing gifts, your unprecedented experience
 
 BODY AND SOUL 69 
 
 almost unknown people, your familiarity with occult 
 things, your astounding powers whatever they are 
 hypnotic, psychic, material. 
 
 "Because, to-day, civilisation is engaged in a se- 
 cret battle for existence against gathering powers of 
 violence, the force and limit of which are still un- 
 guessed. 
 
 "It is a battle between righteousness and evil, be- 
 tween sanity and insanity, light and darkness, God 
 and Satan! And if civilisation does not win, then 
 the world perishes." 
 
 She raised her still eyes to his, but made no other 
 movement. 
 
 "Miss Nome," he said, "we in the International 
 Service know enough about you to desire to know 
 more. 
 
 "We already knew the story you have told to me. 
 Agents in the International Secret Service kept in 
 touch with you from the time that the Japanese es- 
 corted you out of China. 
 
 "From the day you landed, and all across the 
 Continent to New York, you have been kept in view 
 by agents of this government. 
 
 "Here, in New York, my men have kept in touch 
 with you. And now, to-night, the moment has come 
 for a personal understanding between you and me." 
 
 The girl's pale lips moved became stiffly articu- 
 late: "I I wish to live," she stammered, "I fear 
 death." 
 
 "I know it. I know what I ask when I ask your 
 help."
 
 70 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 She said in the ghost of a voice : "If I turn against 
 them they will kill me." 
 
 "They'll try," he said quietly. 
 
 "They will not fail, Mr. Cleves." 
 
 "That is in God's hands." 
 
 She became deathly white at that. 
 
 "No," she burst out in an agonised voice, "it is 
 not in God's hands! If it were, I should not be 
 afraid! It is in the hands of those who stole my 
 soul!" 
 
 She covered her face with both arms, fairly writh- 
 ing on her chair. 
 
 "If the Yezidees have actually made you believe 
 any such nonsense" he began; but she dropped her 
 arms and stared at him out of terrible blue eyes : 
 
 "I don't want to die, I tell you! I am afraid! 
 afraid/ If I reveal to you what I know they'll kill 
 me. If I turn against them and aid you, they'll slay 
 my body, and send it after my soul!" 
 
 She was trembling so violently that he sprang up 
 and went to her. After a moment he passed one 
 arm around her shoulders and held her firmly, close 
 to him. 
 
 "Come," he said, "do your duty. Those who en- 
 list under the banner of Christ have nothing to dread 
 in this world or the next." 
 
 "If if I could believe I were safe there." 
 
 "I tell you that you are. So is every human soul ! 
 What mad nonsense have the Yezidees made you 
 believe? Is there any surer salvation for the soul 
 than to die in Christ's service?"
 
 BODY AND SOUL 71 
 
 He slipped his arm from her quivering shoulders 
 and grasped both her hands, crushing them as though 
 to steady every fibre in her tortured body. 
 
 "I want you to live. I want to live, too. But I 
 tell you it's in God's hands, and we soldiers of civili- 
 sation have nothing to fear except failure to do our 
 duty. Now, then, are we comrades under the United 
 States Government?" 
 
 "OGod I dare not!" 
 
 "Are we?" 
 
 Perhaps she felt the physical pain of his crushing 
 grip for she turned and looked him in the eyes. 
 
 "I don't want to die," she whispered. "Don't 
 make me!" 
 
 "Will you help your country?" 
 
 The terrible directness of her child's gaze became 
 almost unendurable to him. 
 
 "Will you offer your country your soul and body?" 
 he insisted in a low, tense voice. 
 
 Her stiff lips formed a word. 
 
 "Yes!" he exclaimed. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 For a moment she rested against his shoulder, 
 deathly white, then in a flash she had straightened, 
 was on her feet in one bound and so swiftly that he 
 scarcely followed her movement was unaware that 
 she had risen until he saw her standing there with 
 a pistol glittering in her hand, her eyes fixed on the 
 portieres that hung across the corridor leading to his 
 bedroom. 
 
 "What on earth," he began, but she interrupted
 
 72 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 him, keeping her gaze focused on the curtains, and 
 the pistol resting level on her hip. 
 
 "I'll answer you if I die for it!" she cried. "I'll 
 tell you everything I know ! You wish to learn what 
 is this monstrous evil that threatens the world with 
 destruction what you call anarchy and Bolshevism? 
 It is an Evil that was born before Christ came!^ It 
 is an Evil which not only destroys cities and empires 
 and men but which is more terrible still for it obtains 
 control of the human mind, and uses it at will; and 
 it obtains sovereignty over the soul, and makes it 
 prisoner. Its aim is to dominate first, then to de- 
 stroy. It was conceived in the beginning by Erlik 
 and by Sorcerers and devils. . . . Always, from the 
 first, there have been sorcerers and living devils. 
 
 "And when human history began to be remem- 
 bered and chronicled, devils were living who wor- 
 shiped Erlik and practised sorcery. 
 
 "They have been called by many names. A thou- 
 sand years before Christ Hassan Sabbah founded his 
 sect called Hassanis or Assassins. The Yezidees are 
 of them. Their Chief is still called Sabbah; their 
 creed is the annihilation of civilisation!" 
 
 Cleves had risen. The girl spoke in a clear, ac- 
 centless monotone, not looking at him, her eyes and 
 pistol centred on the motionless curtains. 
 
 "Look out!" she cried sharply. 
 
 "What is the matter?" he demanded. "Do you 
 suppose anybody is hidden behind that curtain in 
 the passageway?"
 
 BODY AND SOUL 73 
 
 "If there is," she replied in her excited but dis- 
 tinct voice, "here is a tale to entertain him : 
 
 "The Hassanis are a sect of assassins which has 
 spread out of Asia all over the world, and they are 
 determined upon the annihilation of everything and 
 everybody in it except themselves! 
 
 "In Germany is a branch of the sect. The hun is 
 the lineal descendant of the ancient Yezidee; the 
 gods of the hun are the old demons under other 
 names; the desire and object of the hun is the same 
 desire to rule the minds and bodies and souls of 
 men and use them to their own purposes!" 
 
 She lifted her pistol a little, came a pace forward: 
 
 "Anarchist, Yezidee, Hassani, Boche, Bolshevik 
 all are the same all are secretly swarming in the 
 hidden places for the same purpose!" 
 
 The girl's blue eyes were aflame, now, and the 
 pistol was lifting slowly in her hand to a deadly level. 
 
 "Sanang!" she cried in a terrible voice. 
 
 "Sanang!" she cried again in her terrifying young 
 voice "Toad! Tortoise egg! Spittle of Erlik! 
 May the Thirty Thousand Calamities overtake you ! 
 Sheik-el-Djebel ! cowardly Khan whom I laughed 
 at from the temple when it rained yellow snakes 
 on the marble steps when all the gongs in Yian 
 sounded in your frightened ears!" 
 
 She waited. 
 
 "What! You won't step out? Tokhtaf" she ex- 
 claimed in a ringing tone, and made a swift motion 
 with her left hand. Apparently out of her empty 
 open palm, like a missile hurled, a thin, blinding
 
 74 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 beam of light struck the curtains, making them sud- 
 denly transparent. 
 
 A man stood there. 
 
 He came out, moving very slowly as though partly 
 stupefied. He wore evening dress under his over- 
 coat, and had a long knife in his right hand. 
 
 Nobody spoke. 
 
 "So I really was to die then, if I came here," 
 said the girl in a wondering way. 
 
 Sanang's stealthy gaze rested on her, stole toward 
 Cleves. He moistened his lips with his tongue. "You 
 deliver me to this government agent?" he asked 
 hoarsely. 
 
 "I deliver nobody by treachery. You may go, 
 Sanang." 
 
 He hesitated, a graceful, faultless, metropolitan 
 figure in top-hat and evening attire. Then, as he 
 started to move, Cleves covered him with his weapon. 
 
 "I can't let that man go free!" cried Cleves 
 angrily. 
 
 "Very well!" she retorted in a passionate voice 
 "then take him if you are able ! Tokhta! Look out 
 for yourself!" 
 
 Something swift as lightning struck the pistol from 
 his grasp, blinded him, half stunned him, set him 
 reeling in a drenching blaze of light that blotted out 
 all else, 
 
 He heard the door slam; he stumbled, caught at 
 the back of a chair while his senses and sight were 
 clearing. 
 
 "By heavens!" he whispered with ashen lips, "you
 
 BODY AND SOUL 75 
 
 you are a sorceressr or something. What what 
 are you doing to me ?'* 
 
 There was no answer. And when his vision 
 cleared a little more he saw her crouched on the floor, 
 her head against the locked door, listening, perhaps 
 or sobbing he scarcely understood which until 
 the quiver of her shoulders made it plainer. 
 
 When at last Cleves went to her and bent over and 
 touched her she looked up at him out of wet eyes, 
 and her grief-drawn mouth quivered. 
 
 "I I don't know," she sobbed, "if he truly stole 
 away my soul there there in the temple dusk of 
 Yian. But he he stole my heart for all his wick- 
 edness Sanang, Prince of the Yezidees and I have 
 been fighting him for it all these years all these 
 long years fighting for what he stole in the temple 
 dusk! . . . And now now I have it back my 
 heart all broken to pieces here on the ioor be- 
 hind your your bolted door."
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE ASSASSINS 
 
 ON the wall hung a map of Mongolia, that 
 indefinite region a million and a half square 
 miles in area, vast sections of which have 
 never been explored. 
 
 Turkestan and China border it on the south, and 
 Tibet almost touches it, not quite. 
 
 Even in the twelfth century, when the wild Mon- 
 gols broke loose and nearly overran the world, the 
 Tibet infantry under Genghis, the Tchortcha horse- 
 men drafted out of Black China, and a great cloud 
 of Mongol cavalry under the Prince of the Van- 
 guard commanding half a hundred Hezars, never 
 penetrated that grisly and unknown waste. The 
 "Eight Towers of the Assassins" guarded it still 
 guard it, possibly. 
 
 The vice-regent of Erlik, Prince of Darkness, 
 dwelt within this unknown land. And dwells there 
 still, perhaps. 
 
 In front of this wall-map stood Tressa Nome. 
 
 Behind her, facing the map, four men were seated 
 three of them under thirty. 
 
 These three were volunteers in the service of the 
 United States Government men of independent 
 76
 
 THE ASSASSINS 77 
 
 means, of position, who had volunteered for military 
 duty at the outbreak of the great war. However, 
 they had been assigned by the Government to a very 
 different sort of duty no less exciting than service 
 on the fighting line, but far less conspicuous, for 
 they had been drafted into the United States De- 
 partment of Justice. 
 
 The names of these three were Victor Cleves, a 
 professor of ornithology at Harvard University be- 
 fore the war ; Alexander Selden, junior partner in the 
 hanking firm of Milwyn, Selden, and Co., and James 
 Benton, a~NewYork architect. 
 
 The fourth man's name was John Recklow. He 
 might have been over fifty, or under. He was well- 
 built, in a square, athletic way, clear-skinned and 
 ruddy, grey-eyed, quiet in voice and manner. His 
 hair and moustache had turned silvery. He had been 
 employed by the Government for many years. He 
 seemed to be enormously interested in what Miss 
 Nome was saying. 
 
 Also he was the only man who interrupted her 
 narrative to ask questions. And his questions re- 
 vealed a knowledge which was making the girl more 
 sensitive and uneasv every moment. 
 
 Finally, when she spoke of the Scarlet Desert, he 
 asked if the Scarlet Lake were there and if the Xin 
 was still supposed to inhabit its vermilion depths. 
 And at that she turned and looked at him, her fore- 
 finger still resting on the map. 
 
 "Where have you ever heard of the Scarlet Lake 
 and the Xin?" she asked as though frightened.
 
 78 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Recklow said quietly that as a boy he had served 
 under Gordon and Sir Robert. 
 
 "If, as a boy, you served under Chinese Gordon, 
 you already know much of what I have told you, 
 Mr. Recklow. Is it not true?" she demanded ner- 
 vously. 
 
 "That makes no difference," he replied with a 
 smile. "It is all very new to these three young gen- 
 tlemen. And as for myself, I am checking up what 
 you say and comparing it with what I heard many, 
 many years ago when my comrade Barres and I 
 were in Yian." 
 
 "Did you really know Sir Robert Hart?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Then why do you not explain to these gentle- 
 men?" 
 
 "Dear child," he interrupted gently, "what did 
 Chinese Gordon or Sir Robert Hart, or even my 
 comrade Barres, or I myself know about occult Asia 
 in comparison to what you know? a girl who has 
 actually served the mysteries of Erlik for four 
 amazing years I" 
 
 She paled a trifle, came slowly across the room 
 to where Recklow was seated, laid a timid hand on 
 his sleeve. 
 
 "Do you believe there are sorcerers in Asia?" 
 she asked with that child-like directness which her 
 wonderful blue eyes corroborated. 
 
 Recklow remained silent. 
 
 "Because," she went on, "if, in your heart, you do
 
 THE ASSASSINS 79 
 
 not believe this to be an accursed fact, then what I 
 have to say will mean nothing to any of you." 
 
 Recklow touched his short, silvery moustache, 
 hesitating. Then : 
 
 "The worship of Erlik is devil worship," he said. 
 "Also I am entirely prepared to believe that there 
 are, among the Yezidees, adepts who employ scien- 
 tific weapons against civilisation who have proba- 
 bly obtained a rather terrifying knowledge of psychic 
 laws which they use scientifically, and which to or- 
 dinary, God-fearing folk appear to be the black 
 magic of sorcerers." 
 
 Cleves said: "The employment by the huns of 
 poison gases and long-range cannon is a parallel case. 
 Before the war we could not believe in the possi- 
 bility of a cannon that threw shells a distance of 
 seventy miles." 
 
 The girl still addressed herself to Recklow: 
 "Then you do not believe there are real sorcerers in 
 Asia, Mr. Recklow?" 
 
 "Not sorcerers with supernatural powers for evil. 
 Only degenerate human beings who, somehow, have 
 managed to tap invisible psychic currents, and have 
 learned how to use terrific forces about which, so 
 far, we know practically nothing." 
 
 She spoke again in the same uneasy voice: "Then 
 you do not believe that either God or Satan is in- 
 volved?" 
 
 "No," he replied smilingly, "and you must not so 
 believe." 
 
 "Nor the the destruction of human souls," she
 
 80 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 persisted; "you do not believe it is being accom- 
 plished to-day?" 
 
 "Not in the slightest, dear young lady," he said 
 cheerfully. 
 
 "Do you not believe that to have been instructed 
 in such unlawful knowledge is damning? Do you 
 not believe that ability to employ unknown forces 
 is forbidden of God, and that to disobey His law 
 means death to the soul?" 
 
 "No!" 
 
 "That it is the price one pays to Satan for occult 
 power over people's minds?" she insisted. 
 
 "Hypnotic suggestion is not one of the cardinal 
 sins," explained Recklow, still smiling "unless wick- 
 edly employed. The Yezidee priesthood is a band 
 of so-called sorcerers only because of their wicked 
 employment of whatever hypnotic and psychic knowl- 
 edge they may have obtained. 
 
 "There was nothing intrinsically wicked in the 
 huns' discovery of phosgene. But the use they 
 made of it made devils out of them. My ability 
 to manufacture phosgene gas is no crime. But if 
 I manufacture it and use it to poison innocent hu- 
 man beings, then, in that sense, I am, perhaps, a sort 
 of modern sorcerer." 
 
 Tressa Nome turned paler: 
 
 "I had better tell you that I have used forbidden 
 knowledge which the Yezidees taught me in the 
 temple of Erlik." 
 
 "Used it how?" demanded Cleves.
 
 THE ASSASSINS 81 
 
 "To to earn a living. . . . And once or twice 
 to defend myself." 
 
 There was the slightest scepticism in Recklow's 
 bland smile. "You did quite right, Miss Nome." 
 
 She had become very white now. She stood be- 
 side Recklow, her back toward the suspended map, 
 and looked in a scared sort of way from one to the 
 other of the men seated before her, turning finally to 
 Cleves, and coming toward him. 
 
 "I I once killed a man," she said with a catch in 
 her breath. 
 
 Cleves reddened with astonishment. "Why did 
 you do that?" he asked. 
 
 "He was already on his way to kill me in bed." 
 
 "You were perfectly right," remarked Recklow 
 coolly. 
 
 "I don't know ... I was in bed. . . . And then, 
 on the edge of sleep, I felt his mind groping to get 
 hold of mine feeling about in the darkness to get 
 hold of my brain and seize it and paralyse it." 
 
 All colour had left her face. Cleves gripped the 
 arm of his chair and watched her intently. 
 
 "I I had only a moment's mental freedom," she 
 went on in a ghost of a voice. "I was just able to 
 rouse myself, fight off those murderous brain-fingers 
 let loose a clear mental ray. . . . And then, O 
 God! I saw him in his room with his Kalmuck 
 knife saw him already on his way to murder me 
 Gutchlug Khan, the Yezidee looking about in his 
 bedroom for a shroud. . . . And when when he 
 reached for the bed to draw forth a fine, white sheet
 
 82 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 for the shroud without which no Yezidee dares jour- 
 ney deathward then then I became frightened. 
 . . . And I killed him I slew him there in his 
 hotel bedroom on the floor above mine!" 
 
 Selden moistened his lips : "That Oriental, Gutch- 
 lug, died from heart-failure in a San Francisco ho- 
 tel," he said. "I was there at the time." 
 
 "He died by the fangs of a little yellow snake," 
 whispered the girl. 
 
 "There was no snake in his room," retorted 
 Cleves. 
 
 "And no wound on his body," added Selden. "I 
 attended the autopsy." 
 
 She said, faintly: "There was no snake, and no 
 wound, as you say. . . . Yet Gutchlug died of both 
 there in his bedroom. . . . And before he died he 
 heard his soul bidding him farewell; and he saw the 
 death-adder coiled in the sheet he clutched saw the 
 thing strike him again and again saw and felt the 
 tiny wounds on his left hand; felt the fangs pricking 
 deep, deep into the veins ; died of it there within the 
 minute died of the swiftest poison known. And 
 yet " 
 
 She turned her dead-white face to Cleves "And 
 yet there was no snake there! . . . And never had 
 been. . . . And so I I ask you, gentlemen, if souls 
 do not die when minds learn to fight death with 
 death and deal it so swiftly, so silently, while one's 
 body lies, unstirring on a bed in a locked room on 
 the floor below "
 
 THE ASSASSINS 83 
 
 She swayed a little, put out one hand rather 
 blindly. 
 
 Recklow rose and passed a muscular arm around 
 her; Cleves, beside her, held her left hand, crushing 
 it, without intention, until she opened her eyes with a 
 cry of pain. 
 
 "Are you all right?" asked Recklow bluntly. 
 
 "Yes." She turned and looked at Cleves and he 
 caressed her bruised hand as though dazed. 
 
 "Tell me," she said to Cleves "you who know 
 
 know more about my mind than anybody living " 
 
 a painful colour surged into her face but she went 
 on steadily, forcing herself to meet his gaze: "tell 
 me, Mr. Cleves do you still believe that nothing 
 can really destroy my soul? And that it shall yet 
 win through to safety?" 
 
 He said: "Your soul is in God's keeping, and al- 
 ways shall be. ... And if the Yezidees have made 
 you believe otherwise, they lie." 
 
 Recklow added in a slow, perplexed way: "I have 
 no personal knowledge of psychic power. I am not 
 psychic, not susceptible. But if you actually possess 
 such ability, Miss Nome, and if you have employed 
 such knowledge to defend your life, then you have 
 done absolutely right." 
 
 "No guilt touches you," added Selden with an 
 involuntary shiver, "if by hypnosis or psychic ability 
 you really did put an end to that would-be murderer, 
 Gutchlug." 
 
 Selden said: "If Gutchlug died by the fangs of a 
 yellow death-adder which existed only in his own
 
 84. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 mind, and if you actually had anything to do with it 
 you acted purely in self-defence." 
 
 "You did your full duty," added Benton "but 
 good God! it seems incredible to me, that such 
 power can actually be available in the world!" 
 
 Recklow spoke again in his pleasant, undisturbed 
 voice: "Go back to the map, Miss Nome, and tell 
 us a little more about this rather terrifying thing 
 which you believe menaces the civilised world with 
 destruction." 
 
 Tressa Nome laid a slim finger on the map. Her 
 voice had become steady. She said: 
 
 "The devil-worship, of which one of the modern 
 developments is Bolshevism, and another the terror- 
 ism of the hun, began in Asia long before Christ's 
 advent: At least so it was taught us in the temple 
 of Erlik. 
 
 "It has always existed, its aim always has been 
 the annihilation of good and the elevation of evil; 
 the subjection of right by might, and the worldwide 
 triumph of wrong. 
 
 "Perhaps it is as old as the first battle between 
 God and Satan. I have wondered about it, some' 
 times. There in the dusk of the temple when the 
 Eight Assassins came the eight Sheiks-el-Djebel, 
 all in white chanting the Yakase of Sabbah al 
 ways that dirge when they came and spread their 
 eight white shrouds on the temple steps " 
 
 Her voice caught; she waited to recover her com- 
 posure. Then went on :
 
 THE ASSASSINS 85 
 
 "The ambition of Genghis was to conquer the 
 world by force of arms. It was merely of physical 
 subjection that he dreamed. But the Slayer of 
 Souls " 
 
 "Who?" asked Recklow sharply. 
 
 "The Slayer of Souls Erlik's vice-regent on earth 
 Hassan Sabbah. The Old Man of the Mountain. 
 It is of him I am speaking," exclaimed Tressa Nome 
 with quiet resolution. "Genghis sought only physi- 
 cal conquest of man ; the Yezidee's ambition is more 
 awful, for he is attempting to surprise and seize the 
 very minds of men!" 
 
 There was a dead silence. Tressa looked palely 
 upon the four. 
 
 "The Yezidees who you tell me are not sorcerers 
 are using power which you tell me is not magic 
 accursed by God to waylay, capture, enslave, and 
 destroy the minds and souls of mankind. 
 
 "It may be that what they employ is hypnotic abil- 
 ity and psychic power and can be, some day, ex- 
 plained on a scientific basis when we learn more 
 about the occult laws which govern these phenomena. 
 
 "But could anything render the threat less awful? 
 For there have existed for centuries perhaps al- 
 ways a sect of Satanists determined upon the de- 
 struction of everything that is pure and holy and 
 good on earth; and they are resolved to substitute 
 for righteousness the dreadful reign of hell. 
 
 "In the beginning there were comparatively few 
 of these human demons. Gradually, through the
 
 86 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 eras, they have increased. In the twelfth century 
 there were fifty thousand of the Sect of Assassins. 
 
 "Beside the castle of the Slayer of Souls on Mount 
 
 Alamout " she laid her finger on the map 
 
 "eight other towers were erected for the Eight Chief 
 Assassins, called Sheiks-el-Djebel. 
 
 "In the temple we were taught where these eight 
 towers stood." She picked up a pencil, and on eight 
 blank spaces of unexplored and unmapped Mon- 
 golia she made eight crosses. Then she turned to 
 the men behind her. 
 
 "It was taught to us in the temple that from these 
 eight foci of infection the disease of evil has been 
 spreading throughout the world; from these eight 
 towers have gone forth every year the emissaries of 
 evil perverted missionaries to spread the poison- 
 ous propaganda, to teach it, to tamper stealthily with 
 the minds of men, dominate them, pervert them, in- 
 struct them in the creed of the Assassin of Souls. 
 
 "All over the world are people, already contami- 
 nated, whose minds are already enslaved and poi- 
 soned, and who are infecting the still healthy brains 
 of others stealthily possessing themselves of the 
 minds of mankind teaching them evil, inviting them 
 to mock the precepts of Christ. 
 
 "Of such lost minds are the degraded brains of 
 the Germans the pastors and philosophers who 
 teach that might is right. 
 
 "Of such crippled minds are the Bolsheviki, poi- 
 soned long, long ago by close contact with Asia
 
 THE ASSASSINS 87 
 
 which, before that, had infected and enslaved the 
 minds of the ruling classes with ferocious philosophy. 
 
 "Of such minds are all anarchists of every shade 
 and stripe all terrorists, all disciples of violence, 
 the murderously envious, the slothful slinking 
 brotherhood which prowls through the world tak- 
 ing every opportunity to set it afire ; those mentally 
 dulled by reason of excesses; those weak intellects 
 become unsound through futile gabble, parlour so- 
 cialists, amateur revolutionists, theoretical incapa- 
 bles excited by discussion fit only for healthy minds." 
 
 She left the map and came over to where the four 
 men were seated terribly intent upon her every word. 
 
 "In the temple of Erlik, where my girlhood was 
 passed after the murder of my parents, I learned 
 what I am repeating to you," she said. 
 
 "I learned this, also, that the Eight Towers still 
 exist still stand to-day, at least theoretically 
 and that from the Eight Towers pours forth across 
 the world a stream of poison. 
 
 "I was told that, to every country, eight Yezidees 
 were allotted eight sorcerers or adepts in scien- 
 tific psychology if you prefer it whose mission is to 
 teach the gospel of hell and gradually but surely to 
 win the minds of men to the service of the Slayer 
 of Souls. 
 
 "That is what was taught us in the temple. We 
 were educated in the development of occult powers 
 for it seems all human beings possess this psychic 
 power latent within them only few, even when in-
 
 88 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 structed, acquire any ability to control and use this 
 force. . . . 
 
 "I I learned rapidly, I even thought, some- 
 times, that the Yezidees were beginning to be a little 
 afraid of me, even the Hassani priests. . . . And 
 the Sheiks-el-Djebel, spreading their shrouds on the 
 temple steps, looked at me with unquiet eyes, where I 
 stood like a corpse amid the incense clouds " 
 
 She passed, her fingers over her eyelids, then 
 framed her face between both hands for a moment's 
 thought lost in tragic retrospection. 
 
 "Kai !" she whispered dreamily as though to her- 
 self "what Erlik awoke within my body that was 
 asleep, God knows, but it was as though a twin com- 
 rade arose within me and looked out through my 
 eyes upon a world which never before had been 
 visible." 
 
 Utter silence reigned in the room : Cleves's breath- 
 ing seemed almost painful to him so intently was he 
 listening and watching this girl; Benton's hands 
 whitened with his grip on the chair-arms; Selden, 
 tense, absorbed, kept his keen gaze of a business man 
 fastened on her face. Recklow slowly caressed the 
 cold bowl of his pipe with both thumbs. 
 
 Tressa Nome's strange and remote eyes subtly 
 altered, and she lifted her head and looked calmly at 
 the men before her. 
 
 "I think that there is nothing more for me to 
 add," she said. "The Red Spectre of Anarchy, called 
 Bolshevism at present, threatens our country. Our
 
 THE ASSASSINS 89 
 
 Government is now awake to this menace and the 
 Secret Service is moving everywhere. 
 
 "Great damage already has been done to the 
 minds of many people in this Republic; poison has 
 spread; is spreading. The Eight Towers still stand. 
 The Eight Assassins are in America. 
 
 "But these eight Assassins know me to be their 
 enemy. . . . They will surely attempt to kill me. 
 ... I don't believe I can avoid death very long. 
 . . . But I want to serve my country and and 
 mankind." 
 
 "They'll have to get me first," said Cleves, blunt- 
 ly. "I shall not permit you out of my sight." 
 
 Recklow said in a musing voice: "And these 
 eight gentlemen, who are very likely to hurt us, also, 
 are the first people we ought to hunt." 
 
 "To get them," added Selden, "we ought to choke 
 the stream at its source." 
 
 "To find out who they are is what is going to 
 worry us," added Benton. Cleves had stood holding 
 a chair for Tressa Nome. Finally she noticed it and 
 seated herself as though tired. 
 
 "Is Sanang one of these eight?" he asked her. 
 The girl turned and looked up at him, and he saw 
 the flush mounting in her face. 
 
 "Sometimes," she said steadily, "I have almost 
 believed he was Erlik's own vice-regent on earth 
 the Slayer of Souls himself." 
 
 Benton and Selden had gone. Recklow left a little 
 later. Cleves accompanied him out to the landing.
 
 90 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Are you going to keep Miss Nome here with 
 you for the present?" inquired the older man. 
 
 "Yes. I dare not let her out of my sight, Reck- 
 low. What else can I do?" 
 
 "I don't know. Is she prepared for the conse- 
 quences?" 
 
 "Gossip? Slander?" 
 
 "Of course." 
 
 "I can get a housekeeper." 
 
 "That only makes it look worse." 
 
 Cleves reddened. "Well, do you want to find her 
 in some hotel or apartment with her throat cut?" 
 
 "No," replied Recklow, gently, "I do not." 
 
 "Then what else is there to do but keep her here in 
 my own apartment and never let her out of my 
 sight until we can find and lock up the eight gen- 
 tlemen who are undoubtedly bent on murdering 
 her?" 
 
 "Isn't there some woman in the Service who 
 could help out? I could mention several." 
 
 "I tell you I can't trust Tressa Nome to any- 
 body except myself," insisted Cleves. "I got her into 
 this; I am responsible if she is murdered; I dare not 
 entrust her safety to anybody else. And, Recklow, 
 it's a ghastly responsibility for a man to induce a 
 young girl to face death, even in the service of her 
 country." 
 
 "If she remains here alone with you she'll face 
 social destruction," remarked Recklow.
 
 THE ASSASSINS 91 
 
 Cleves was silent for a moment, then he burst 
 out: "Well, what am I to do? What is there left 
 for me to do except to watch over her and see her 
 through this devilish business? What other way 
 have I to protect her, Recklow?" 
 
 "You could offer her the protection of your name," 
 suggested the other, carelessly. 
 
 "What? You mean marry her?" 
 
 "Well, nobody else would be inclined to, Cleves, 
 if it ever becomes known she has lived here quite 
 alone with you." 
 
 Cleves stared at the elder man. 
 
 "This is nonsense," he said in a harsh voice. 
 "That young girl doesn't want to marry anybody. 
 Neither do I. She doesn't wish to have her throat 
 cut, that's all. And I'm determined she shan't." 
 
 "There are stealthier assassins, Cleves, the slay- 
 ers of reputations. It goes badly with their victim. 
 It does indeed." 
 
 "Well, hang it, what do you think I ought to 
 do?" 
 
 "I think you ought to marry her if you're going 
 to keep her here." 
 
 "Suppose she doesn't mind the unconventionality 
 of it?" 
 
 "All women mind. No woman, at heart, is un- 
 conventional, Cleves." 
 
 "She she seems to agree with me that she ought 
 to stay here. . . . Besides, she has no money, no 
 relatives, no friends in America "
 
 92 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "All the more tragic. If you really believe it to 
 be your duty to keep her here where you can look 
 after her bodily safety, then the other obligation is 
 still heavier. And there may come a day when Miss 
 Nome will wish that you had been less conscientious 
 concerning the safety of her pretty throat. . . . For 
 the knife of the Yezidee is swifter and less cruel than 
 the tongue that slays with a smile. . . . And this 
 young girl has many years to live, after this business 
 of Bolshevism is dead and forgotten in our Repub- 
 lic." 
 
 "Recklow!" 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "You think I might dare try to find a room some- 
 where else for her and let her take her chances? 
 Do you?" 
 
 "It's your affair." 
 
 "I know hang it! I know it's my affair. I've 
 unintentionally made it so. But can't you tell me 
 what I ought to do?" 
 
 "I can't." 
 
 "What would you do?" 
 
 "Don't ask me," returned Recklow, sharply. "If 
 you're not man enough to come to a decision you 
 may turn her over to me." 
 
 Cleves flushed brightly. "Do you think you are 
 old enough to take my job and avoid scandal?" 
 
 Recklow's cold eyes rested on him : "If you like," 
 he said, "I'll assume your various kinds of personal 
 responsibility toward Miss Nome."
 
 THE ASSASSINS 93 
 
 Cleve's visage burned. "I'll shoulder my own 
 burdens," he retorted. 
 
 "Sure. I knew you would." And Recklow smiled 
 and held out his hand. Cleves took it without cor- 
 diality. Standing so, Recklow, still smiling, said: 
 "What a rotten deal that child has had is hav- 
 ing. Her father and mother were fine people. Did 
 you ever hear of Dr. Nome?" 
 
 "She mentioned him once." 
 
 "They were up-State people of most excellent an- 
 tecedents and no money. 
 
 "Dr. Nome was our Vice-Consul at Yarkand in 
 the province of Sin Kiang. All he had was his sal- 
 ary, and he lost that and his post when the adminis- 
 tration changed. Then he went into the spice trade. 
 
 "Some Jew syndicate here sent him up the Yar- 
 kand River to see what could be done about jade 
 and gold concessions. He was on that business when 
 the tragedy happened. The Kalmuks and Khirghiz 
 were responsible, under Yezidee instigation. And 
 there you are : and here is his child, Cleves back, 
 by some miracle, from that flowering hell called 
 Yian, believing in her heart that she really lost her 
 soul there in the temple. And now, here in her own 
 native land, she is exposed to actual and hourly dan- 
 ger of assassination. . . . Poor kid ! . . . Did you 
 ever hear of a rottener deal, Cleves?" 
 
 Their hands had remained clasped while Recklow 
 was speaking. He spoke again, clearly, amiably: 
 
 "To lay down one's life for a friend is fine. I'm
 
 94 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 not sure that it's finer to offer one's honour in behalf 
 of a girl whose honour is at stake." 
 
 After a moment Cleves's grip tightened 
 
 "All right," he said. 
 
 Recklow went downstair
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 IN BATTLE 
 
 CLEVES went back into the apartment; he no- 
 ticed that Miss Nome's door was ajar. 
 
 To get to his own room he had to pass 
 that way; and he saw her, seated before the mirror, 
 partly undressed, her dark, lustrous hair being 
 combed out and twisted up for the night. 
 
 Whether this carelessness was born of innocence 
 or of indifference mattered little; he suddenly real- 
 ised that these conditions wouldn't do. And his 
 first feeling was of anger. 
 
 "If you'll put on your robe and slippers," he 
 said in an unpleasant voice, "I'd like to talk to you 
 for a few moments." 
 
 She turned her head on its charming neck and 
 looked around and up at him over one naked shoul- 
 der. 
 
 "Shall I come into your room?" she inquired. 
 
 "No! . . . when you've got some clothes on, 
 call me." 
 
 "I'm quite ready now," she said calmly, and drew 
 
 the Chinese slippers over her bare feet and passed 
 
 a silken loop over the silver bell buttons on her 
 
 right shoulder. Then, undisturbed, she continued 
 
 95
 
 96 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 to twist up her hair, following his movements in the 
 mirror with unconcerned blue eyes. 
 
 He entered and seated himself, the impatient ex- 
 pression still creasing his forehead and altering his 
 rather agreeable features, 
 
 "Miss Nome," he said, "you're absolutely con- 
 vinced that these people mean to do you harm. Isn't 
 that true?" 
 
 "Of course," she said simply. 
 
 "Then, until we get them, you're running a seri- 
 ous risk. In fact, you live in hourly peril. That is 
 your belief, isn't it?" 
 
 She put the last peg into her thick, curly hair, 
 lowered her arms, turned, dropped one knee over 
 the other, and let her candid gaze rest on him in 
 silence. 
 
 "What I mean to explain," he said coldly, "is 
 that as long as I induced you to go into this affair 
 I'm responsible for you. If I let you out of my 
 sight here in New York and if anything happens to 
 you, I'll be as guilty as the dirty beast who takes 
 your life. What is your opinion? It's up to me to 
 stand by you now, isn't it?" 
 
 "I had rather be near you for a while," she said 
 timidly. 
 
 "Certainly. But, Miss Nome, our living here to- 
 gether, in my apartment or living together any- 
 where else is never going to be understood by 
 other people. You know that, don't you?" 
 
 After a silence, still looking at him out of clear, 
 unembarrassed eyes:
 
 IN BATTLE 97 
 
 "I know. ... But ... I don't want to die." 
 
 "I told you," he said sharply, "they'll have to 
 kill me first. So that's all right. But how about 
 what I am doing to your reputation?" 
 
 "I understand." 
 
 "I suppose you do. You're very young. Once 
 out of this blooming mess, you will have all your 
 life before you. But if I kill your reputation for you 
 while saving your body from death, you'll find no 
 happiness in living. Do you realise that?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, then? Have you any solution for this 
 problem that confronts you?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Haven't you any idea to suggest?" 
 
 "I don't don't want to die," she repeated in an 
 unsteady voice. 
 
 He bit his lip; and after a moment's scowling 
 silence under the merciless scrutiny of her eyes: 
 "Then you had better marry me," he said. 
 
 It was some time before she spoke. For a sec- 
 ond or two he sustained the searching quality of 
 her gaze, but it became unendurable. 
 
 Presently she said: "I don't ask it of you. I can 
 shoulder my own burdens." And he remembered 
 what he had just said to Recklow. 
 
 "You've shouldered more than your share," he 
 blurted out. "You are deliberately risking death 
 to serve your country. I enlisted you. The least I 
 can do is to say my affections are not engaged; so
 
 '98 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 naturally the idea of of marrying anybody never 
 entered my head." 
 
 "Then you do not care for anybody else?" 
 
 Her candour amazed and disconcerted him. 
 
 "No." He looked at her, curiously. "Do you care 
 for anybody in that way?" 
 
 A light blush tinted her face. She said gravely: 
 "If we really are going to marry each other I had 
 better tell you that I did care for Prince Sanang." 
 
 "What!" he cried, astounded. 
 
 "It seems incredible, doesn't it? Yet it is quite 
 true. I fought him; I fought myself; I stood guard 
 over my mind and senses there in the temple ; I knew 
 what he was and I detested him and I mocked him 
 there in the temple. . . . And I loved him." 
 
 "Sanang!" he repeated, not only amazed but also 
 oddly incensed at the naive confession. 
 
 "Yes, Sanang. ... If we are to marry, I thought 
 I ought to tell you. Don't you think so?" 
 
 "Certainly," he replied in an absent-minded way, 
 his mind still grasping at the thing. Then, looking 
 up: "Do you still care for this fellow?" 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 "Are you perfectly sure, Miss Nome?" 
 
 "As sure as that I am alive when I awake from a 
 nightmare. My hatred for Sanang is very bitter," 
 she added frankly, "and yet somehow it is not my 
 wish to see him harmed." 
 
 "You still care for him a little?" 
 1 "Oh, no. But can't you understand that it is 
 not in me to wish him harm? . . . No girlfeels that
 
 IN BATTLE 99 
 
 way once having cared. To become indifferent to 
 a familiar thing is perhaps natural; but to desire to 
 harm it is not in my character." 
 
 "You have plenty of character," he said, staring 
 at her. 
 
 "You don't think so. Do you?" 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Because of what I said to you on the roof-garden 
 that night. It was shameful, wasn't it?" 
 
 "You behaved like many a thoroughbred," he re- 
 turned bluntly; "you were scared, bewildered, ready 
 to bolt to any shelter offered." 
 
 "It's quite true I didn't know what to do to keep 
 alive. And that was all that interested me to keep 
 on living having lost my soul and being afraid to 
 die and find myself in hell with Erlik." 
 
 He said: "Isn't that absurd notion out of your 
 head yet?" 
 
 "I don't know. ... I can't suddenly believe my- 
 self safe after all those years. It is not easy to root 
 out what was planted in childhood and what grew to 
 be part of one during the tender and formative pe- 
 riod. . . . You can't understand, Mr. Cleves you 
 can't ever feel or visualise what became my daily 
 life in a region which was half paradise and half 
 hell " 
 
 She bent her head and took her face between her 
 fingers, and sat so, brooding. 
 
 After a little while: "Well," he said, "there's 
 only one way to manage this affair if you are will- 
 ing, Miss Nome."
 
 100 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 She merely lifted her eyes. 
 
 "I think," he said, "there's only that one way out 
 of it. But you understand" he turned pink "it 
 will be quite all right your liberty privacy I 
 shan't bother you annoy " 
 
 She merely looked at him. 
 
 "After this Bolshevistic flurry is settled in a year 
 or two or three then you can very easily get your 
 freedom; and you'll have all life before you" . . . 
 he rose: " and a jolly good friend in me a good 
 comrade, Miss Nome. And that means you can 
 count on me when you go into business or whatever 
 you decide to do." 
 
 She also had risen, standing slim and calm in her 
 exquisite Chinese robe, the sleeves of which covered 
 her finger tips. 
 
 "Are you going to marry me?" she asked. 
 
 "If you'll let me." 
 
 "Yes I will . . . it's so generous and consid- 
 erate of you. I I don't ask it; I really don't " 
 
 "But / do." 
 
 " And I never dreamed of such a thing." 
 
 He forced a smile. "Nor I. It's rather a crazy 
 jthing to do. But I know of no saner alternative. 
 ... So we had better get our license to-morrow. 
 . . . And that settles it." 
 
 He turned to go; and, on her threshold, his feet 
 caught in something on the floor and he stumbled, 
 trying to free his feet from a roll of soft white cloth 
 lying there on the carpet. And when he picked it up,
 
 IN BATTLE 101 
 
 it unrolled, and a knife fell out of the folds of cloth 
 and struck his foot. 
 
 Still perplexed, not comprehending, he stooped to 
 recover the knife. Then, straightening up, he found 
 himself looking into the colourless face of Tressa 
 Nome. 
 
 "What's all this?" he asked "this sheet and 
 knife here on the floor outside your door?" 
 
 She answered with difficulty: "They have sent 
 you your shroud, I think." 
 
 "Are not those things yours? Were they not al- 
 ready here in your baggage?" he demanded incredu- 
 lously. Then, realising that they had not been 
 there on the door-sill when he entered her room a 
 few moments since, a rough chill passed over him 
 the icy caress of fear. 
 
 "Where did that thing come from?" he said 
 hoarsely. "How could it get here when my door is 
 locked and bolted? Unless there's somebody hidden 
 here!" 
 
 Hot anger suddenly flooded him ; he drew his pis- 
 tol and sprang into the passageway. 
 
 "What the devil is all this!" he repeated furi- 
 ously, flinging open his bedroom door and switching 
 on the light. 
 
 He searched his room in a rage, went on 
 and searched the dining-room, smoking-room, and 
 kitchen, and every clothes-press and closet, always 
 aware of Tressa's presence close behind him. And 
 when there remained no tiniest nook or cranny in
 
 102 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 the place unsearched, he stood in the centre of the 
 carpet glaring at the locked and bolted door. 
 
 He heard her say under her breath: "This is 
 going to be a sleepless night. And a dangerous 
 one." And, turning to stare at her, saw no fear in 
 her face, only excitement. 
 
 He still held clutched in his left hand the sheet and 
 the knife. Now he thrust these toward her. 
 
 "What's this damned foolery, anyway?" he de- 
 manded harshly. She took the knife with a slight 
 shudder. "There is something engraved on the 
 silver hilt," she said. 
 
 He bent over her shoulder. 
 
 "Eighur," she added calmly, "not Arabic. The 
 Mongols had no written characters of their own." 
 
 She bent closer, studying the inscription. After 
 a moment, still studying the Eighur characters, she 
 rested her left hand on his shoulder an impulsive, 
 unstudied movement that might have meant either 
 confidence or protection. 
 
 "Look," she said, "it is not addressed to you after 
 all, but to a symbol a series of numbers, 53-6-26." 
 
 "That is my designation in the Federal Service," 
 he said, sharply. 
 
 "Oh!" she nodded slowly. "Then this is what is 
 written in the Mongol-Yezidee dialect, traced out in 
 Eighur characters: 'To 53-6-26! By one of the 
 Eight Assassins the Slayer of Souls sends this shroud 
 and this knife from Mount Alamout. Such a blade 
 shall divide your heart. This sheet is for your 
 corpse.' "
 
 IN BATTLE 103 
 
 After a grim silence he flung the soft white cloth 
 on the floor. 
 
 "There's no use my pretending I'm not surprised 
 and worried," he said; "I don't know how that cloth 
 got here. Do you?" 
 
 "It was sent." 
 
 "How?" 
 
 She shook her head and gave him a grave, con- 
 fused look. 
 
 "There are ways. You could not understand. 
 . . . This is going to be a sleepless night for us." 
 
 "You can go to bed, Tressa. I'll sit up and read 
 and keep an eye on that door." 
 
 "I can't let you remain alone here. I'm afraid 
 to do that." 
 
 He gave a laugh, not quite pleasant, as he sud- 
 denly comprehended that the girl now considered 
 their roles to be reversed. 
 
 "Are you planning to sit up in order to protect 
 me?" he asked, grimly amused. 
 
 "Do you mind?" 
 
 "Why, you blessed little thing, I can take care of 
 myself. How funny of you, when I am trying to 
 plan how best to look out for you!" 
 
 But her face remained pale and concerned, and 
 she rested her left hand more firmly on his shoul- 
 der. 
 
 "I wish to remain awake with you," she said. 
 "Because I myself don't fully understand this" 
 she looked at the knife in her palm, then down at
 
 104 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 the shroud. "It is going to be a strange night for 
 us," she sighed. "Let us sit together here on the 
 lounge where I can face that bolted door. And 
 if you are willing, I am going to turn out the 
 
 lights " She suddenly bent forward and 
 
 switched them off "because I must keep my mind 
 on guard." 
 
 "Why do you do that?" he asked, "you can't see 
 the door, now." 
 
 "Let me help you in my own way," she whispered. 
 "I I am very deeply disturbed, and very, very 
 angry. I do not understand this new menace. Yezi- 
 dee that I am, I do not understand what kind of 
 danger threatens you through your loyalty to me." 
 
 She drew him forward, and he opened his mouth 
 to remonstrate, to laugh; but as he turned, his foot 
 touched the shroud, and an uncontrollable shiver 
 passed over him. 
 
 They went close together, across the dim room to 
 the lounge, and seated themselves. Enough light 
 from Madison Avenue made objects in the room 
 barely discernible. 
 
 Sounds from the street below became rarer as the 
 hours wore away. The iron jar of trams, the rattle 
 of vehicles, the harsh warning of taxicabs broke the 
 stillness at longer and longer intervals, until, save 
 only for that immense and ceaseless vibration of the 
 monstrous iron city under the foggy stars, scarcely a 
 sound stirred the silence.
 
 IN BATTLE 105 
 
 The half-hour had struck long ago on the bell of 
 the little clock. Now the clear bell sotmded three 
 times. 
 
 Cleves stirred on the lounge beside Tressa. Again 
 and again he had thought that she was asleep for 
 her head had fallen back against the cushions, and 
 she lay very still. But always, when he leaned nearer 
 to peer down at her, he saw her eyes open, and fixed 
 intently upon the bolted door. 
 
 His pistol, which still rested on his knee, was 
 pointed across the room, toward the door. Once 
 he reminded her in a whisper that she was unarmed 
 and that it might be as well for her to go and get 
 her pistol. But she murmured that she was suffi- 
 ciently equipped; and, in spite of himself, he shiv- 
 ered as he glanced down at her frail and empty 
 hands. 
 
 It was some time between three and half-past, 
 he judged, when a sudden movement of the girl 
 brought him upright on his seat, quivering with ex- 
 citement. 
 
 "Mr. Cleves!" 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "The Sorcerers!" 
 
 "Where ? Outside the door ?" 
 
 "Oh, my God," she murmured, "they are after 
 my mind again! Their fingers are groping to seize 
 my brain and get possession of it!" 
 
 "What!" he stammered, horrified. 
 
 "Here in the dark," she whispered "and I feel
 
 106 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 their fingers caressing me searching moving 
 stealthily to surprise and grasp my thoughts. ... I 
 know what they are doing ... I am resisting . . . 
 I am fighting fighting!" 
 
 She sat bolt upright with clenched hands at her 
 breast, her face palely aglow in the dimness as 
 though illumined by some vivid inward light or, 
 as he thought from the azure blaze in her wide- 
 open eyes. 
 
 "Is is this what you call what you believe to be 
 magic?" he asked unsteadily. "Is there some hostile 
 psychic influence threatening you?" 
 
 "Yes. I'm resisting. I'm fighting fighting. 
 They shall not trap me. They shall not harm you 1 
 . . . I know how to defend myself and you! . . . 
 And you!" 
 
 Suddenly she flung her left arm around his neck 
 and the delicate clenched hand brushed his cheek. 
 
 "They shall not have you," she breathed. "I am 
 fighting. I am holding my own. There are eight 
 of them eight Assassins! My mind is in battle 
 with theirs fiercely in battle. ... I hold my own ! 
 I am armed and waiting!" 
 
 With a convulsive movement she drew his head 
 closer to her shoulder. "Eight of them !" she whis- 
 pered, "trying to entrap and seize my brain. But 
 my thoughts are free I My mind is defending you 
 you, here in my arms!" 
 
 After a breathless silence: "Look out!" she 
 whispered with terrible energy; "they are after your
 
 IN BATTLE 107 
 
 mind at last. Fix your thoughts on me ! Keep your 
 mind clear of their net! Don't let their ghostly fin- 
 gers touch it. Look at me I" She drew him closer. 
 "Look at me! Believe in me! I can resist. I can 
 defend you. Does your head feel confused?" 
 
 "Yes numb." 
 
 "Don't sleep! Don't close your eyes! Keep them 
 open and look at me!" 
 
 "I can scarcely see you " 
 
 "You must see me!" 
 
 "My eyes are heavy," he said drowsily. "I can't 
 see you, Tressa " 
 
 "Wake! Look at me! Keep your mind clear. 
 Oh, I beg you I beg you ! They're after our minds 
 and souls, I tell you ! Oh, believe in me," she be- 
 seeched him in an agonised whisper "Can't you 
 believe in me for a moment, as if you loved me!" 
 
 His heavy lids lifted and he tried to look at her. 
 
 "Can you see me? Can you?" 
 
 He muttered something in a confused voice. 
 
 "Victor!" 
 
 At the sound of his own name, he opened his eyes 
 again and tried to straighten up, but his pistol fell 
 to the carpet. 
 
 "Victor!" she gasped, "clear your mind in the 
 name of God!" 
 
 "I can not " 
 
 "I tell you hell is opening beyond that door! out- 
 side your bolted door, there I Can't you believe me ! 
 Can't you hear me ! Oh, what will hold you if the
 
 108 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 love of God can not!" she burst out. "I'd crucify 
 myself for you if you'd look at me if you'd only 
 fight hard enough to believe in me as though you 
 loved me I" 
 
 His eyes unclosed but he sank back against her 
 Moulder. 
 
 "Victor I" she cried in a terrible voice. 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 "If the love of God could only hold you for a 
 moment more!" she stammered with her mouth 
 against his ear, "just for a moment, Victor! Can't 
 you hear me?" 
 
 "Yes very far away." 
 
 "Fight for me ! Try to care for me ! Don't let 
 Sanang have me !" 
 
 He shuddered in her arms, reached out and rest- 
 ing heavily on her shoulder, staggered to his feet and 
 stood swaying like a drunken man. 
 
 "No, by God," he said thickly, "Sanang shall not 
 touch you." 
 
 The girl was on her feet now, holding him upright 
 with an arm around his shoulders. 
 
 "They can't can't harm us together," she stam- 
 mered. "Hark! Listen! Can you hear? Oh, can 
 you hear?" 
 
 "Give me my pistol," he tried to say, but his tongue 
 seemed twisted. "No by God Sanang shall not 
 touch you." 
 
 She stooped lithely and recovered the weapon. 
 "Hush," she said close to his burning face. "Lis-
 
 IN BATTLE 109 
 
 ten. Our minds are safe ! I can hear somebody's 
 soul bidding its body farewell!" 
 
 White-lipped she burst out laughing, kicked the 
 shroud out of the way, thrust the pistol into his right 
 hand, went forward, forcing him along beside her, 
 and drew the bolts from the door. 
 
 Suddenly he spoke distinctly: 
 
 "Is there anything outside that door on the land- 
 ing?" 
 
 "Yes ... I don't know what. Are you ready?" 
 She laid her hand on lock and knob. 
 
 He nodded. At the same instant she jerked open 
 the door; and a hunchback who had been picking 
 at the lock fell headlong into the room, his pistol 
 exploding on the carpet in a streak of fire. 
 
 It was a horrible struggle to secure the powerful 
 misshapen creature, for he clawed and squealed and 
 bounced about on the floor, striking blindly with ape- 
 like arms. But at last Cleves held him down, throt- 
 tled and twitching, and Tressa ripped strips from the 
 shroud to truss up the writhing thing. 
 
 Then Cleves switched on the light. 
 
 "Why why you rat!" he exclaimed in hysteri- 
 cal relief at seeing a living man whom he recognised 
 there at his feet. "What are you doing here?" 
 
 The hunchback's red eyes blazed up at him from 
 the floor. 
 
 "Who who is he?" faltered the girl. 
 
 "He's a German tailor named Albert Feke one 
 of the Chicago Bolsheviki the most dangerous sort 
 we harbour one of their vile leaders who preaches
 
 110 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 that might is right and tells his disciples to go ahead 
 and take what they want." 
 
 He looked down at the malignant cripple. 
 
 "You're wanted for the I. W. W. bomb murder, 
 Albert. Did you know it?" 
 
 The hunchback licked his bloody lips. Then he 
 kicked himself to a sitting position, squatted there 
 like a toad and looked steadily at Tressa Nome out 
 of small red-rimmed eyes. Blood dripped on his 
 beard; his huge hairy fists, tied and crossed behind 
 his back, made odd, spasmodic movements. 
 
 Cleves went to the telephone. Presently Tressa 
 heard his voice, calm and distinct as usual: 
 
 "We've caught Albert Feke. He's here at my 
 rooms. I'd like to have you come over, Recklow. 
 . . . Oh, yes, he kicked and scuffled and scratched 
 like a cat. . . . What? ... No, I hadn't heard 
 that he'd been in China. . . . Who? . . . Albert 
 Feke? You say he was one of the Germans who 
 escaped from Shantung four years ago? . . . You 
 think he's a Yezidee ! You mean one of the Eight 
 Assassins?" 
 
 The hunchback, staring at Tressa out of red- 
 rimmed eyes, suddenly snarled and lurched his mis- 
 shapen body at her. 
 
 "Teufelstuck!" he screamed, "ain't I tell effery- 
 body in Yian already it iss safer if we cut your 
 throat ! Devil-slut of Erlik snow-leopardess ! cat 
 of the Yezidees who has made of Sanang a fool! 
 it iss I who haf said always, always, that you know
 
 IN BATTLE 111 
 
 too damn much! . . . Kai! ... I hear my soul 
 bidding me farewell. Gif me my shroud!" 
 
 Cleves came back from the telephone. With the 
 toe of his left foot he lifted the shroud and kicked it 
 across the hunchback's knees. 
 
 "So you were one of the huns who instigated the 
 massacre in Yian," he said, curiously. At that Tressa 
 turned very white and a cry escaped her. 
 
 But the hunchback's features were all twisted into 
 ferocious laughter, and he beat on the carpet with 
 the heels of his great splay feet. 
 
 "Ja! Ja!" he shrieked, "in Yian it vas a goot 
 hunting! English and Yankee men und vimmens ve 
 haff dropped into dose deep wells down. Py Gott 
 in Himmel, how dey schream up out of dose deep 
 wells in Yian!" He began to cackle and shriek in 
 his frenzy. "Ach Gott ja I It iss not you either 
 you there, Keuke Mongol, who shall escape from the 
 Sheiks-el-Djebel! It iss dot Old Man of the Moun- 
 tain who shall tell your soul it iss time to say fare- 
 well! Ja! Ja! Ach Gott! it iss my only regret 
 that I shall not see the world when it is all afire! 
 Ja ! Ja ! all on fire like hell ! But you shall see it, 
 slut-leopard of the snows ! You shall see it und you 
 shall burn ! Kai ! Kai ! My soul it iss bidding my 
 body farewell. Kai ! May Erlik curse you, Keuke 
 Mongol Heavenly Azure Sorceress of the tem- 
 ple ! " 
 
 He spat at her and rolled over in his shroud. 
 
 The girl looking down on him closed her eyes for 
 a moment, and Cleves saw her bloodless lips move,
 
 112 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 and bent nearer, listening. And he heard her whis- 
 pering to herself: 
 
 "Preserve us all, O God, from the wrath of Satan 
 who was stoned."
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE BRIDAL 
 
 OVER the United States stretched an unseen 
 network of secret intrigue woven tirelessly 
 night and day by the busy enemies of civilisa- 
 tion Reds, parlour-socialists, enemy-aliens, terror- 
 ists, Bolsheviki, pseudo-intellectuals, I. W. W.'s, so- 
 cial faddists, and amateur meddlers of every nuance 
 all the various varieties of the vicious, witless, and 
 mentally unhinged brought together through the 
 "cohesive power of plunder" and the degeneration 
 of cranial tissue. 
 
 All over the United States the various depart- 
 mental divisions of the Secret Service were busily 
 following up these threads of intrigue leading every- 
 where through the obscurity of this vast and secret 
 maze. 
 
 To meet the constantly increasing danger of physi- 
 cal violence and to uncover secret plots threatening 
 sabotage and revolution, there were capable agents 
 in * .very branch of the Secret Service, both Federal 
 ar 1 State. 
 
 But in the first months of 1919 something more 
 terrifying than physical violence suddenly threat- 
 ened civilised America, a wild, grotesque, incred- 
 ible threat of a war on human minds! 
 "3
 
 114 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 And, little by little, the United States Govern- 
 ment became convinced that this ghastly menace was 
 no dream of a disordered imagination, but that it 
 was real: that among the enemies of civilisation 
 there actually existed a few powerful but perverted 
 minds capable of wielding psychic forces as terrific 
 weapons: that by the sinister use of psychic knowl- 
 edge controlling these mighty forces the very minds 
 of mankind could be stealthily approached, seized, 
 controlled and turned upon civilisation to aid in the 
 world's destruction. 
 
 In terrible alarm the Government turned to Eng- 
 land for advice. But Sir William Crookes was 
 dead. 
 
 However, in England, Sir Conan Doyle immedi- 
 ately took up the matter, and in America Professor 
 Hyslop was called into consultation. 
 
 And then, when the Government was beginning 
 to realise what this awful menace meant, and that 
 there were actually in the United States possibly half 
 a dozen people who already had begun to carry on 
 a diabolical warfare by means of psychic power, for 
 the purpose of enslaving and controlling the very 
 minds of men, then, in the terrible moment of dis- 
 covery, a young girl landed in America after four- 
 teen years' absence in Asia. 
 
 And this was the amazing girl that Victor Cleves 
 had just married, at Recklow's suggestion, and in 
 the line of professional duty, and moral duty, per- 
 haps. 
 
 It had been a brief, matter-of-fact ceremony. John
 
 THE BRIDAL 115 
 
 Recklow, of the Secret Service, was there; also Ben- 
 ton and Selden of the same service. 
 
 The bride's lips were unresponsive; cold as the 
 touch of the groom's unsteady hand. 
 
 She looked down at her new ring in a blank sort 
 of way, gave her hand listlessly to Recklow and to 
 the others in turn, whispered a timidly comprehen- 
 sive "Thank you," and walked away beside Cleves as 
 though dazed. 
 
 There was a taxicab waiting. Tressa entered. 
 Recklow came out and spoke to Cleves in a low 
 voice. 
 
 "Don't worry," replied Cleves dryly. "That's 
 why I married her." 
 
 "Where are you going now?" inquired Recklow. 
 
 "Back to my apartment." 
 
 "Why don't you take her away for a month?" 
 
 Cleves flushed with annoyance: "This is no oc- 
 casion for a wedding trip. You understand that, 
 Recklow." 
 
 "I understand. But we ought to give her a breath- 
 ing space. She's had nothing but trouble. She's 
 worn out." 
 
 Cleves hesitated: "I can guard her better in the 
 apartment. Isn't it safer to go back there, where 
 your people are always watching the street and house 
 day and night?" 
 
 "In a way it might be safer, perhaps. But that 
 girl is nearly exhausted. And her value to us is un- 
 limited. She may be the vital factor in this fight
 
 116 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 with anarchy. Her weapon is. her mind. And it's 
 got to have a chance to rest." 
 
 Cleves, with one hand on the cab door, looked 
 around impatiently. 
 
 "Do you, also, conclude that the psychic factor is 
 actually part of this damned problem of Bolshe- 
 vism?" 
 
 Recklow's ccrol eyes measured him: "Do you?" 
 
 "My God, Recklow, I don't know after what my 
 own eyes have seen." 
 
 "I don't know either," said the other calmly, "but 
 I am taking no chances. I don't attempt to explain 
 certain things that have occurred. But if it be true 
 that a misuse of psychic ability by foreigners Asi- 
 atics among the anarchists is responsible for some 
 of the devilish things being done in the United States, 
 then your wife's unparalleled knowledge of the oc- 
 cult East is absolutely vital to us. And so I say, bet- 
 ter take her away somewhere and give her mind a 
 chance to recover from the incessant strain of these 
 tragic years." 
 
 The two men stood silent for a moment, then 
 Recklow went to the window of the taxicab. 
 
 "I have been suggesting a trip into the country, 
 Mrs. Cleves," he said pleasantly, " into the real 
 country, somewhere, a month's quiet in the woods, 
 perhaps. Wouldn't it appeal to you?" 
 
 Cleves turned to catch her low-voiced answer. 
 
 "I should like it very much," she said in that odd, 
 hushed way of speaking, which seemed to have al-
 
 THE BRIDAL 117 
 
 tered her own voice and manner since the ceremony 
 a little while before. 
 
 Driving back to his apartment beside her, he 
 strove to realise that this girl was his wife. 
 
 One of her gloves lay across her lap, and on it 
 rested a slender hand. And on one finger was his 
 ring. 
 
 But Victor Cleves could not bring himself to be- 
 lieve that this brand-new ring really signified any- 
 thing to him, that it had altered his own life in 
 any way. But always his incredulous eyes returned 
 to that slim finger resting there, unstirring, banded 
 with a narrow circlet of virgin gold. 
 
 In the apartment they did not seem to know ex- 
 actly what to do or say what attitude to assume 
 what effort to make. 
 
 Tressa went into her own room, removed her hat 
 and furs, and came slowly back into the living- 
 room, where Cleves still stood gazing absently out 
 of the window. 
 
 A fine rain was falling. 
 
 They seated themselves. There seemed nothing 
 better to do. 
 
 He said, politely: "In regard to going away for 
 a rest, you wouldn't care for the North Woods, I 
 fancy, unless you like winter sports. Do you?" 
 
 "I like sunlight and green leaves," she said in that 
 odd, still voice. 
 
 "Then, if it would please you to go South for a 
 few weeks' rest " 
 
 "Would it inconvenience you?"
 
 118 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Her manner touched him. 
 
 "My dear Miss Nome," he began, and checked 
 himself, flushing painfully. The girl blushed, too; 
 then, when he began to laugh, her lovely, bashful 
 smile glimmered for the first time. 
 
 "I really can't bring myself to realise that you 
 and I are married," he explained, still embarrassed, 
 though smiling. 
 
 Her smile became an endeavour. "I can't believe 
 it either, Mr. Cleves," she said. "I feel rather 
 stunned." 
 
 "Hadn't you better call me Victor under the cir- 
 cumstances?" he suggested, striving to speak lightly. 
 
 "Yes. ... It will not be very easy to say it not 
 for some time, I think." 
 
 "Tressa?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Yes what?" 
 
 "Yes Victor." 
 
 "That's the idea," he insisted with forced gaiety. 
 
 "The thing to do is to face this rather funny situ- 
 ation and take it amiably and with good humour. 
 You'll have your freedom some day, you know." 
 
 "Yes I know." 
 
 "And we're already on very good terms. We find 
 each other interesting, don't we?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "It even seems to me," he ventured, "it certainly 
 seems to me, at times, as though we are approach- 
 ing a common basis of of mutual er esteem." 
 
 "Yes. I I do esteem you, Mr. Cleves."
 
 THE BRIDAL 119 
 
 "In point of fact," he concluded, surprised, "we 
 are friends in a way. Wouldn't you call it 
 friendship?" 
 
 "I think so, I think I'd call it that," she ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 "I think so, too. And that is lucky for us. That 
 makes this crazy situation more comfortable less 
 well, perhaps less ponderous." 
 
 The girl assented with a vague smile, but her eyes 
 remained lowered. 
 
 "You see," he went on, "when two people are as 
 oddly situated as we are, they're likely to be afraid 
 of being in each other's way. But they ought to 
 get on without being unhappy as long as they are 
 quite confident of each other's friendly considera- 
 tion. Don't you think so, Tressa?" 
 
 Her lowered eyes rested steadily on her ring-fin-, 
 ger. "Yes," she said. "And I am not unhappy, 
 or afraid." 
 
 She lifted her blue gaze to his; and, somehow, he 
 thought of her barbaric name, Keuke, and its Yezi- 
 dee significance, "heavenly azure." 
 
 "Are we really going away together?" she asked 
 timidly. 
 
 "Certainly, if you wish." 
 
 "If you, also, wish it, Mr. Cleves." 
 
 He found himself saying with emphasis that he 
 always wished to do what she desired. And he 
 added, more gently: 
 
 "You are tired, Tressa tired and lonely and un- 
 happy."
 
 120 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Tired, but not the others." 
 
 "Not unhappy?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Aren't you lonely?" 
 
 "Not with you." 
 
 The answer came so naturally, so calmly, that 
 the slight sensation of pleasure it gave him arrived 
 only as an agreeable afterglow. 
 
 "We'll go South," he said. . . . "I'm so glad that 
 you don't feel lonely with me." 
 
 "Will it be warmer where we are going, Mr. 
 Cleves?" 
 
 "Yes you poor child! You need warmth and 
 sunshine, don't you? Was it warm in Yian, where 
 you lived so many years?" 
 
 "It was always June in Yian," she said under her 
 breath. 
 
 She seemed to have fallen into a revery; he 
 watched the sensitive face. Almost imperceptibly 
 it changed; became altered, younger, strangely lovely. 
 
 Presently she looked up and it seemed to him 
 that it was not Tressa Nome at all he saw, but little 
 Keuke Heavenly Azure of the Yezidee temple, 
 as she dropped one slim knee over the other and 
 crossed her hands above it. 
 
 "It was very beautiful in Yian," she said, " Yian 
 of the thousand bridges and scented gardens so full 
 of lilies. Even after they took me to the temple, 
 and I thought the world was ending, God's skies still 
 remained soft overhead, and His weather fair and 
 golden. . . . And when, in the month of the Snake,
 
 THE BRIDAL 121 
 
 the Eight Sheiks-el-Djebel came to the temple to 
 spread their shrouds on the rose-marble steps, then, 
 after they had departed, chanting the Prayers for 
 the Dead, each to his Tower of Silence, we temple 
 girls were free for a week. . . . And once I went 
 with Tchagane a girl and with Yulun another 
 girl and we took our keutch, which is our luggage, 
 and we went to the yai'lak, or summer pavilion on the 
 Lake of the Ghost. Oh, wonderful, a silvery world 
 of pale-gilt suns and of moons so frail that the 
 cloud-fleece at high-noon has more substance!" 
 
 Her voice died out; she sat gazing down at her 
 spread fingers, on one of which gleamed her wed- 
 ding-ring. 
 
 After a little, she went on dreamily: 
 
 "On that week, each three months, we were free. 
 . . . If a young man should please us. . . ." 
 
 "Free?" he repeated. 
 
 "To love," she explained coolly. 
 
 "Oh." He nodded, but his face became rather 
 grim. 
 
 "There came to me at the yai'lak," she went on 
 carelessly, "one Khassar NoTane NoTane means 
 Prince all in a surcoat of gold tissue with green 
 vines embroidered, and wearing a green cap trimmed 
 with dormouse, and green boots inlaid with stiff 
 gold. . . . 
 
 "He was so young ... a boy. I laughed. I 
 said: 'Is this a Yagaoul? An Urdu-envoy of Prince 
 Erlik?' mocking him as young and thoughtless girls
 
 182 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 mock not in unfriendly manner though I would 
 not endure the touch of any man at all. 
 
 "And when I laughed at him, this Eighur boy flew 
 into such a rage ! Kai ! I was amazed. 
 
 "'Sou-sou! Squirrel!' he cried angrily at me. 
 'Learn the Yacaz, little chatterer ! Little mocker of 
 men, it is ten blows with a stick you require, not 
 kisses!' 
 
 "At that I whistled my two dogs, Bars and Alaga, 
 for I did not think what he said was funny. 
 
 "I said to him: 'You had better go home, Khas- 
 sar Noi'ane, for if no man has ever pleased me where 
 I am at liberty to please myself, here on the Lake 
 of the Ghost, then be very certain that no boy can 
 please Keuke-Mongol here or anywhere!' 
 
 "And at that kai ! What did he say that mon- 
 key?" She looked at her husband, her splendid 
 eyes ablaze with wrathful laughter, and made a ges- 
 ture full of angry grace : 
 
 " 'Squirrel !' he cries 'little malignant sorceress 
 of Yian ! May everything high about you become a 
 sandstorm, and everything long a serpent, and every- 
 thing broad a toad, and everything ' 
 
 "But I had had enough, Victor," she added ex- 
 citedly, "and I made a wild bee bite him on the 
 lip! What do you think of such a courtship?" she 
 cried, laughing. But Cleves's face was a study in 
 emotions. 
 
 And then, suddenly, the laughing mask seemed to 
 slip from the bewitching features of Keuke Mon- 
 gol; and there was Tressa Nome Tressa Cleves
 
 THE BRIDAL 123 
 
 disconcerted, paling a little as the memory of her 
 impulsive confidence in this man beside her began to 
 dawn on her more clearly. 
 
 "I I'm sorry " she faltered. . . . "You'll 
 
 think me silly think evil of me, perhaps " 
 
 She looked into his troubled eyes, then suddenly 
 she took her face into both hands and covered it, 
 sitting very still. 
 
 "We'll go South together," he said in. an uncer- 
 tain voice. ... "I hope you will try to think of me 
 as a friend. . . . I'm just troubled because I am so 
 anxious to understand you. That is all. . . . I'm 
 I'm troubled, too, because I am anxious that you 
 should think well of me. Will you try, always?" 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "I want to be your friend, always," he said. 
 
 "Thank you, Mr. Cleves." 
 
 It was a strange spot he chose for Tressa 
 strange but lovely in its own unreal and rather spec- 
 tral fashion where a pearl-tinted mist veiled the 
 St. Johns, and made exquisite ghosts of the pal- 
 mettos, and softened the sun to a silver-gilt wafer 
 pasted on a nacre sky. 
 
 It was a still country, where giant water-oaks tow- 
 ered, fantastic under their misty camouflage of moss, 
 and swarming with small birds. 
 
 Among the trees the wood-ibis stole ; without on 
 the placid glass of the stream the eared grebe floated. 
 There was no wind, no stirring of leaves, no sound 
 save the muffled splash of silver mullet, the breath-
 
 124 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 less whirr of a humming-bird, or the hushed rustle of 
 lizards in the woods. 
 
 For Tressa this was the blessed balm that heals, 
 the balm of silence. And, for the first week, she 
 slept most of the time, or lay in her hammock watch- 
 ing the swarms of small birds creeping and flitting 
 amid the moss-draped labyrinths of the live-oaks at 
 her very door. 
 
 It had been a little club house before the war, this 
 bungalow on the St. Johns at Orchid Hammock. Its 
 members had been few and wealthy; but some were 
 dead in France and Flanders, and some still re- 
 mained overseas, and others continued busy in the 
 North. 
 
 And these two young people were quite alone 
 there, save for a negro cook and a maid, and an 
 aged negro kennel-master who wore a scarlet waist- 
 coat and cords too large for his shrunken body, 
 and who pottered, pottered through the fields all 
 day, with his whip clasped behind his bent back and 
 the pointers ranging wide, or plodding in at heel with 
 red tongues lolling. 
 
 Twice Cleves went a little way for quail, using 
 Benton's dogs ; but even here in this remote spot he 
 dared not move out of view of the little house where 
 Tressa lay asleep. 
 
 So he picked up only a few brace of birds, and con- 
 fined his sport to impaling too-familiar scorpions 
 on the blade of his knife. 
 
 And all the while life remained unreal for him; 
 his marriage seemed utterly unbelievable; he could
 
 THE BRIDAL 125 
 
 not realise it, could not reconcile himself to condi- 
 tions so incomprehensible. 
 
 Also, ever latent in his mind, was knowledge that 
 made him restless the knowledge that the young 
 girl he had married had been in love with another 
 man: Sanang. 
 
 And there were other thoughts thoughts which 
 had scarcely even taken the shape of questions. 
 
 One morning he came from his room and found 
 Tressa on the veranda in her hammock. She had 
 her moon-lute in her lap. 
 
 "You feel better much better!" he said gaily, 
 saluting her extended hand. 
 
 "Yes. Isn't this heavenly? I begin to believe it 
 is life to me, this pearl-tinted world, and the scent 
 of orange bloom and the stillness of paradise itself." 
 
 She gazed out over the ghostly river. Not a 
 wing stirred its glassy surface. 
 
 "Is this dull for you?" she asked in a low voice. 
 
 "Not if you are contented, Tressa." 
 
 "You're so nice about it. Don't you think you 
 might venture a day's real shooting?" 
 
 "No, I think I won't," he replied. 
 
 "On my account?" 
 
 "Well yes." 
 
 "I'm so sorry." 
 
 "It's all right as long as you're getting rested. 
 What is that instrument?" 
 
 "My moon-lute." 
 
 "Oh, is that what it's called?"
 
 126 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 She nodded, touched the strings. He watched her 
 exquisite hands. 
 
 "Shall I?" she inquired a little shyly. 
 
 "Go ahead. I'd like to hear it!" 
 
 "I haven't touched it in months not since I was 
 on the steamer." She sat up in her hammock and 
 began to swing there; and played and sang while 
 swinging in the flecked shadow of the orange bloom: 
 
 <f L,ittle Isle of Cispangou, 
 Isle of iris, isle of cherry, 
 Tell your tiny maidens merry 
 Clouds are looming over you! 
 
 La-e-la! 
 
 La-e-la! 
 
 All your ocean's but a ferry; 
 Ships are bringing death to you! 
 
 La-e-lou! 
 
 La-e-lou! 
 
 "Little Isle of Cispangou, 
 Half a thousand ships are sailing; 
 Captain Death commands each crew; 
 Lo! the ruddy moon is paling! 
 
 La-e-la^! 
 
 La-e-la\f 
 
 Clouds the dying moon are veiling, 
 Every cloud a shroud for you! 
 
 La-e-lou! 
 
 La-e-lou!" 
 
 "Cispangou," she explained, "is the very, very an- 
 cient name, among the Mongols, for Japan." 
 
 "It's not exactly a gay song," he said. "What's 
 it about?"
 
 THE BRIDAL 127 
 
 "Oh, it's a very ancient song about the Mongol 
 invasion of Japan. I know scores and scores of such 
 songs." 
 
 She sang some other songs. Afterward she de- 
 scended from the hammock and came and sat down 
 beside him on the veranda steps. 
 
 "I wish I could amuse you," she said wistfully. 
 
 "Why do you think I'm bored, Tressa? I'm not 
 at all." 
 
 But she only sighed, lightly, and gathered her 
 knees in both arms. 
 
 "I don't know how young men in the Western 
 world are entertained," she remarked presently. 
 
 "You don't have to entertain me," he said, smil- 
 ing. 
 
 "I should be happy to, if I knew how." 
 
 "How are young men entertained in the Orient?" 
 
 "Oh, they like songs and stories. But I don't 
 think you do." 
 
 He laughed in spite of himself. 
 
 "Do you really wish to entertain me?" 
 
 "I do," she said seriously. 
 
 "Then please perform some of those tricks of 
 magic which you can do so amazingly well." 
 
 Her dawning smile faded a trifle. "I don't I 
 haven't " She hesitated. 
 
 "You haven't your professional paraphernalia 
 with you," he suggested. 
 
 "Oh as for that " 
 
 "Don't you need it?"
 
 128 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "For some things some kinds of things. ... I 
 could do other things " 
 
 He waited. She seemed disconcerted. "Don't do 
 anything you don't wish to do, Tressa," he said. 
 
 "I was only only afraid that if I should do 
 some little things to amuse you, I might stir stir 
 up interfere encounter some sinister current 
 and betray myself betray my whereabouts " 
 
 "Well, for heaven's sake don't venture then !" he 
 said with emphasis. "Don't do anything to stir up 
 any other wireless any Yezidee " 
 
 "I am wondering," she reflected, "just what I dare 
 venture to do to amuse you." 
 
 "Don't bother about me. I wouldn't have you 
 try any psychic stunt down here, and run the chance 
 of stirring up some Asiatic devil somewhere !" 
 
 She nodded absently, occupied with her own 
 thoughts, sitting there, chin on hand, her musing 
 eyes intensely blue. 
 
 "I think I can amuse you," she concluded, "with- 
 out bringing any harm to myself." 
 
 "Don't try it, Tressa! " 
 
 "I'll be very careful. Now, sit quite still closer 
 to me, please." 
 
 He edged closer; and became conscious of an in- 
 definable freshness in the air that enveloped him, 
 like the scent of something young and growing. But 
 it was no magic odour, merely the virginal scent of 
 her hair and skin that even clung to her summer 
 gown.
 
 THE BRIDAL 1<1 
 
 He heard her singing under her breath to her- 
 self: 
 
 "La-e-laf 
 "La-e-la!" 
 
 and murmuring caressingly in an unknown tongue. 
 
 Then, suddenly in the pale sunshine, scores of lit- 
 tle birds came hovering around them, alighting all 
 over them. And he saw them swarming out of the 
 mossy festoons of the water-oaks scores and scores 
 of tiny birds Parula warblers, mostly all flitting 
 fearlessly down to alight upon his shoulders and 
 knees, all keeping up their sweet, dreamy little twit- 
 tering sound. 
 
 "This is wonderful," he whispered. 
 
 The girl laughed, took several birds on her fore- 
 finger. 
 
 "This is nothing," she said. "If I only dared 
 
 wait a moment ! " And, to the Parula warblers : 
 
 "Go home, little friends of God!" 
 
 The air was filled with the musical whisper of 
 wings. She passed her right arm around her hus- 
 band's neck. 
 
 "Look at the river," she said. 
 
 "Good God!" he blurted out. And sat dumb. 
 
 For, over the St. John's misty surface, there was 
 the span of a bridge a strange, marble bridge 
 humped up high in the centre. 
 
 And over it were passing thousands of people 
 he could make them out vaguely see them passing
 
 A 30 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 in two never-ending streams tinted shapes on the 
 marble bridge. 
 
 And now, on the farther shore of the river, he 
 was aware of a city a vast one, with spectral pa- 
 goda shapes against the sky 
 
 Her arm tightened around his neck. 
 
 He saw boats on the river like the grotesque 
 shapes that decorate ancient lacquer. 
 
 She rested her face lightly against his cheek. 
 
 In his ears was a far confusion of voices the stir 
 and movement of multitudes noises on ships, boat- 
 men's cries, the creak of oars. 
 
 Then, far and sonorous, quavering across the wa- 
 ter from the city, the din of a temple gong. 
 
 There were bells, too very sweet and silvery 
 camel bells, bells from the Buddhist temples. 
 
 He strained his eyes, and thought, amid the pa- 
 godas, that there were minarets, also. 
 
 Suddenly, clear and ringing came the distant muez- 
 zin's cry: "There is no other god but God! . . . 
 It is noon. Mussulmans, pray 1" 
 
 The girl's arm slipped from his neck and she shud- 
 dered and pushed him from her. 
 
 There was nothing, now, on the river or beyond it 
 but the curtain of hanging mist; no sound except the 
 cry of a gull, sharp and querulous in the vapours 
 overhead. 
 
 "Have have you been amused?" she asked. 
 
 "What did you do to me I" he demanded harshly. 
 
 She smiled and drew a light breath like a sigh. 
 
 "God knows what we living do to one another,
 
 THE BRIDAL 131 
 
 or to ourselves," she said. "I only tried to amuse 
 you after taking counsel with the birds." 
 
 "What was that bridge I saw!" 
 
 "The Bridge of Ten Thousand Felicities." 
 
 "And the city?" 
 
 "Yian." 
 
 "You lived there?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 He moistened his dry lips and stole another glance 
 at this very commonplace Florida river. Sky and 
 water were blank and still, and the ghostly trees 
 stood tall, reflected palely in the translucent tide. 
 
 "You merely made me visualise what you were 
 thinking about," he concluded in a voice which still 
 remained unsteady. 
 
 "Did you hear nothing?" 
 
 He was silent, remembering the bells and the 
 enormous murmur of a living multitude. 
 
 "And there were the birds, too." She added, 
 with an uncertain smile: "I do not mean to worry 
 you. . . . And you did ask me to amuse you." 
 
 "I don't know how you did it," he said harshly. 
 "And the details those thousands and thousands 
 of people on the bridge ! . . . And there was one, 
 quite near this end of the bridge, who looked back. 
 . . . A young girl who turned and laughed at 
 us " 
 
 "That was Yulun." 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "Yulun. I taught her English." 
 
 "A temple girl?"
 
 132 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Yes. From Black China." 
 
 "How could you make me see her!" he demanded. 
 
 "Why do you ask such things? I do not know 
 how to tell you how I do it." 
 
 "It's a dangerous, uncanny knowledge!" he 
 blurted out; and suddenly checked himself, for the 
 girl's face went white. 
 
 "I don't mean uncanny," he hastened to add. "Be- 
 ause it seems to me that what you did by juggling 
 with invisible currents to which, when attuned, our 
 five senses respond, is on the same lines as the wire- 
 less telegraph and telephone." 
 
 She said nothing, but her colour slowly returned. 
 
 "You mustn't be so sensitive," he added. "I've 
 no doubt that it's all quite normal quite explicable 
 on a perfectly scientific basis. Probably it's no more 
 mysterious than a man in an airplane over midocean 
 conversing with people ashore on two continents." 
 
 For the remainder of the day and evening Tressa 
 seemed subdued not restless, not nervous, but so 
 quiet that, sometimes, glancing at her askance, Cleves 
 involuntarily was reminded of some lithe young crea- 
 ture of the wilds, intensely alert and still, immersed 
 in fixed and dangerous meditation. 
 
 About five in the afternoon they took their golf 
 sticks, went down to the river, and embarked in the 
 canoe. 
 
 The water was glassy and still. There was not 
 a ripple ahead, save when a sleeping gull awoke and 
 leisurely steered out of their way.
 
 THE BRIDAL 133 
 
 Tressa's arms and throat were bare and she wore 
 no hat. She sat forward, wielding the bow paddle 
 and singing to herself in a low voice. 
 
 "You feel all right, don't you?" he asked. 
 
 "Oh, I am so well, physically, now! It's really 
 wonderful, Victor like being a child again," she re- 
 plied happily. 
 
 "You're not much more," he muttered. 
 
 She heard him : "Not very much more in 
 years," she said. . . . "Does Scripture tell us how 
 old Our Lord was when He descended into Hell?" 
 
 "I don't know," he replied, startled. 
 
 After a little while Tressa tranquilly resumed her 
 paddling and singing: 
 
 " And eight tall towers 
 Guard the route 
 Of human life, 
 Where at all hours 
 Death looks out, 
 Holding a knife 
 Rolled in a shroud. 
 
 For every man, 
 
 Humble or proud, 
 
 Mighty or bowed, 
 
 Death has a shroud; for every man, 
 Even for Tchingniz Khan! 
 
 Behold them pass! lancer, 
 
 Baroulass, 
 
 Temple dancer 
 
 In tissue gold, 
 
 Khiounnou, 
 
 Karlik bold,
 
 134. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Christian, Jew, 
 Nations swarm to the great Urdu. 
 
 Yagaoul, with your kettledrum, 
 Warn your Khan that his hour is come! 
 
 Shroud and knife at his spurred feet throw, 
 And bid him stretch his neck for the blow! " 
 
 "You know," remarked Cleves, "that some of 
 those songs you sing are devilish creepy." 
 
 Tressa looked around at him over her shoulder, 
 saw he was smiling, smiled faintly in return. 
 
 They were off Orchid Cove now. The hotel and 
 cottages loomed dimly in the silver mist. Voices 
 came distinctly across the water. There were peo- 
 ple on the golf course paralleling the river; laughter 
 sounded from the clubhouse veranda. 
 
 They went ashore.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 
 
 IT was at the sixth hole that they passed the man 
 ahead who was playing all alone a courteous 
 young fellow in white flannels, who smiled and 
 bowed them "through" in silence. 
 
 They thanked him, drove from the tee, and left 
 the polite and reticent young man still apparently 
 hunting for a lost ball. 
 
 Like other things which depended upon dexterity 
 and precision, Tressa had taken most naturally to 
 golf. Her supple muscles helped. 
 
 At the ninth hole they looked back but did not see 
 the young man in white flannels. 
 
 Hammock, set with pine and palmetto, and inter- 
 vals of evil-looking swamp, flanked the course. Rank 
 wire-grass, bayberry and scrub palmetto bounded the 
 fairgreen. 
 
 On every blossoming bush hung butterflies Palo- 
 medes swallowtails drugged with sparkle-berry 
 honey, their gold and black velvet wings conspicuous 
 in the sunny mist. 
 
 "Like the ceremonial vestments of a Yezidee exe- 
 cutioner," murmured the girl. "The Tchortchas 
 135
 
 136 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 wear red when they robe to do a man to death. " 
 
 "I wish you could forget those things," said 
 Cleves. 
 
 "I am trying. ... I wonder where that young 
 man in white went." 
 
 Cleves searched the links. "I don't see him. Per- 
 haps he had to go back for another ball." 
 
 "I wonder who he was," she mused. 
 
 "I don't remember seeing him before," said 
 Cleves. . . . "Shall we start back?" 
 
 They walked slowly across the course toward the 
 tenth hole. 
 
 Tressa teed up, drove low and straight. Cleves 
 sliced, and they walked together into the scrub and 
 towards the woods, where his ball had bounded into 
 a bunch of palm trees. 
 
 Far in among the trees something white moved 
 and vanished. 
 
 "Probably a white egret," he remarked, knocking 
 about in the scrub with his midiron. 
 
 "It was that young man in white flannels," said 
 Tressa in a low voice. 
 
 "What would he be doing in there?" he asked in- 
 credulously. "That's merely a jungle, Tressa 
 swamp and cypress, thorn and creeper, and no man 
 would go into that mess if he could. There is no 
 bottom to those swamps." 
 
 "But I saw him in there," she said in a troubled 
 voice. 
 
 "But when I tell you that only a wild animal or a
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 137 
 
 snake or a bird could move in that jungle ! The bog 
 is one vast black quicksand. There's death in those 
 depths." 
 
 ''Victor." 
 
 "Yes?" He looked around at her. She was 
 pale. He came up and took her hand inquiringly. 
 
 "I don't feel well," she murmured. "I'm not ill, 
 you understand " 
 
 "What's the matter, Tressa?" 
 
 She shook her head drearily: "I don't know. 
 ... I wonder whether I should have tried to amuse 
 you this morning " 
 
 "You don't think you've stirred up any of those 
 Yezidee beasts, do you?" he asked sharply. 
 
 And as she did not answer, he asked again whether 
 she was afraid that what she had done that morning 
 might have had any occult consequences. And he 
 reminded her that she had hesitated to venture any- 
 thing on that account. 
 
 His voice, in spite of him, betrayed great ner- 
 vousness now, and he saw apprehension in her eyes, 
 also. 
 
 "Why should that man in white have followed us, 
 keeping out of sight in the woods?" he went on. 
 "Did you notice about him anything to disturb you, 
 Tressa?" 
 
 "Not at the time. But it's odd I can't put him 
 out of my mind. Since we passed him and left him 
 apparently hunting a lost ball, I have not been able 
 to put him out of my mind."
 
 138 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "He seemed civil and well bred. He was per- 
 fectly good-humoured all courtesy and smiles." 
 
 "I think perhaps it was the way he smiled at 
 us," murmured the girl. "Everybody in the East 
 smiles when they draw a knife. . . ." 
 
 He placed his arm through hers. "Aren't you a 
 trifle morbid?" he said pleasantly. 
 
 She stooped for her golf ball, retaining a hold on 
 his arm. He picked up his ball, too, put away her 
 clubs and his, and they started back together in 
 silence, evidently with no desire to make it eighteen 
 holes. 
 
 "It's a confounded shame," he muttered, "just as 
 you were becoming so rested and so delightfully well, 
 to have anything any unpleasant flash of memory 
 cut in to upset you " 
 
 "I brought it on myself. I should not have risked 
 stirring up the sinister minds that were asleep." 
 
 "Hang it alll and I asked you to amuse me." 
 
 "It was not wise in me," she said under her breath. 
 "It is easy to disturb the unknown currents which en- 
 mesh the globe. I ought not to have shown you Yian. 
 I ought not to have shown you Yulun. It was my 
 fault for doing that. I was a little lonely, and I 
 wanted to see Yulun." 
 
 i They came down the river back to the canoe, 
 threw in their golf bags, and embarked on the 
 glassy stream. 
 
 Over the calm flood, stained deep with crimson, 
 the canoe glided in the sanguine evening light. But
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 139 
 
 Tressa sang no more and her head was bent side- 
 ways as though listening always listening to 
 something inaudible to Cleves something very, 
 very far away which she seemed to hear through 
 the still drip of the paddles. 
 
 They were not yet in sight of their landing when 
 she spoke to him, partly turning: 
 
 "I think some of your men have arrived." 
 
 "Where?" he asked, astonished. 
 
 "At the house." 
 
 "Why do you think so?" 
 
 "I think so." 
 
 They paddled a little faster. In a few minutes 
 their dock came into view. 
 
 "It's funny," he said, "that you should think some 
 of our men have arrived from the North. I don't 
 see anybody on the dock." 
 
 "It's Mr. Recklow," she said in a low voice. "He 
 is seated on our veranda." 
 
 As it was impossible to see the house, let alone 
 the veranda, Cleves made no reply. He beached 
 the canoe; Tressa stepped out; he followed, carry- 
 ing the golf bags. 
 
 A mousy light lingered in the shrubbery; bats were 
 flying against a salmon-tinted sky as they took the 
 path homeward. 
 
 With an impulse quite involuntary, Cleves en* 
 circled his young wife's shoulders with his left arm. 
 
 "Girl-comrade," he said lightly, "I'd kill any 
 man who even looked as though he'd harm you."
 
 140 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 He smiled, but she had not missed the ugly under- 
 tone in his words. 
 
 They walked slowly, his arm around her shoul- 
 ders. Suddenly he felt her start. They halted. 
 
 "What was it?" he whispered. 
 
 "I thought there was something white in the 
 woods." 
 
 "Where, dear?" he asked coolly. 
 
 "Over there beyond the lawn." 
 
 What she called the "lawn" was only a vast sheet 
 of pink and white phlox, now all misty with the 
 whirring wings of sphinx-moths and Noctuidae. 
 
 The oak grove beyond was dusky. Cleves could 
 see nothing among the trees. 
 
 After a moment they went forward. His arm 
 had fallen away from her shoulders. 
 
 There were no lights except in the kitchen when 
 they came in sight of the house. At first nobody 
 was visible on the screened veranda under the orange 
 trees. But when he opened the swing door for her 
 a shadowy figure arose from a chair. 
 
 It was John Recklow. He came forward, bent his 
 strong white head, and kissed Tressa's hand. 
 
 "Is all well with you, Mrs. Cleves?" 
 
 "Yes. I am glad you came." 
 
 Cleves clasped the elder man's firm hand. 
 
 "I'm glad too, Recklow. You'll stop with us, of 
 course." 
 
 "Do you really want me?" 
 
 "Of course," said Cleves.
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 141 
 
 "All right. I've a coon and a surrey behind your 
 house." 
 
 So Cleves went around in the dusk and sent the 
 outfit back to the hotel, and he himself carried in 
 Recklow's suitcase. 
 
 Then Tressa went away to give instructions, and 
 the two men were left together on the dusky veranda. 
 
 "Well?" said Recklow quietly. 
 
 Cleves went to him and rested both hands on his 
 shoulders : 
 
 "I'm playing absolutely square. She's a perfectly 
 fine girl and she'll have her chance some day, God 
 willing." 
 
 "Her chance?" repeated Recklow. 
 
 "To marry whatever man she will some day care 
 for." 
 
 "I see," said Recklow drily. 
 
 There was a silence, then: 
 
 "She's simply a splendid specimen of woman- 
 hood," said Cleves earnestly. "And intensely inter- 
 esting to me. Why, Recklow, I haven't known a 
 dull moment though I fear she has known 
 many " 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Why? Well, being married to a a sort of 
 temporary figurehead shut up here all day alone 
 with a man of no particular interest to her " 
 
 "Don't you interest her?" 
 
 "Well, how could I? She didn't choose me be- 
 cause she liked me particularly."
 
 142 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Didn't she?" asked Recklow, still more drily. 
 "Well, that does make it a trifle dull for you both." 
 
 "Not for me," said the younger man naively. 
 "She is one of the most interesting women I ever 
 met. And good heavens ! what psychic knowledge 
 that child possesses! She did a thing to-day 
 
 merely to amuse me " He checked himself and 
 
 looked at Recklow out of sombre eyes. 
 
 "What did she do?" inquired the older man. 
 
 "I think I'll let her tell you if she wishes. . . . 
 And that reminds me. Why did you come down 
 here, Recklow?" 
 
 "I want to show you something, Cleves. May we 
 step into the house?" 
 
 They went into a little lamplit living-room. Reck- 
 low handed a newspaper clipping to Cleves : the lat- 
 ter read it, standing: 
 
 < "HAD DEADLIEST GAS READY FOR GERMANS , 
 " 'Lewisite' Might Have Killed Millions 
 
 "WASHINGTON, APRIL 24. Guarded night and 
 day and far out of human reach on a pedestal at 
 the Interior Department Exposition here is a tiny 
 vial. It contains a specimen of the deadliest poison 
 ever known, 'Lewisite,' the product of an American 
 scientist. 
 
 "Germany escaped this poison by signing the 
 armistice before all the resources of the United 
 States were turned upon her. 
 
 "Ten airplanes carrying 'Lewisite' would have
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 143 
 
 wiped out, it is said, every vestige of life animal 
 and vegetable in Berlin. A single day's output 
 would snuff out the millions of lives on Manhattan 
 Island. A drop poured in the palm of the hand 
 would penetrate to the blood, reach the heart and 
 kill the victim in agony. 
 
 "What was coming to Germany may be imagined 
 by the fact that when the armistice was signed 'Lew- 
 isite' was being manufactured at the rate of ten tons 
 a day. Three thousand tons of this most terrible 
 instrument ever conceived for killing would have 
 been ready for business on the American front in 
 France on November i. 
 
 ' 'Lewisite' is another of the big secrets of the 
 war just leaking out. It was developed in the Bu- 
 reau of Mines by Professor W. Lee Lewis, of 
 Northwestern University, Evanston, 111., who took a 
 commission as a captain in the army. 
 
 "The poison was manufactured in a specially 
 built plant near Cleveland, called the 'Mouse Trap/ 
 because every workman who entered the stockade 
 went under an agreement not to leave the eleven- 
 acre space until the war was won. The object of 
 this, of course, was to protect the secret. 
 
 "Work on the plant was started eighteen days 
 after the Bureau of Mines had completed its experi- 
 ments. 
 
 "Experts are certain that no one will want to 
 steal the sample. Everybody at the Exposition, 
 which shows what Secretary Lane's department is 
 doing, keeps as far away from it as possible." 
 
 When Cleves had finished reading, he raised his 
 eyes in silence. 
 
 "That vial was stolen a week ago," said Recklow
 
 144. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 gravely, "by a young man who killed one guard and 
 fatally wounded the other." 
 
 "Was there any ante-mortem statement?" 
 
 "Yes. I've followed the man. I lost all trace of 
 him at Palm Beach, but I picked it up again at Or- 
 mond. And now I'm here, Cleves." 
 
 "You don't mean you've traced him here!" ex- 
 claimed Cleves under his breath. 
 
 "He's here on the St. Johns River, somewhere. 
 He came up in a motor-boat, but left it east of 
 Orchard Cove. Benton knows this country. He's 
 covering the motor-boat. And I came here to see 
 how you are getting on." 
 
 "And to warn us," added Cleves quietly. 
 
 "\\r e }i y es< He's got that stuff. It's deadlier 
 than the newspaper suspects. And I guess I guess, 
 Cleves, he's one of those damned Yezidee witch- 
 doctors or sorcerers, as they call them; one of 
 that sect of Assassins sent over here to work havoc 
 on feeble minds and do murder on the side." 
 
 "Why do you think so?" 
 
 "Because the dirty beast lugs his shroud around 
 with him a bed-sheet stolen from the New Willard 
 in Washington. 
 
 "We were so close to him in Jacksonville that we 
 got it, and his luggage. But we didn't get him, the 
 rat! God knows how he knew we were waiting for 
 him in his room. He never came back to get his 
 luggage. 
 
 "But he stole a bed-sheet from his hotel in St.
 
 THE MAN IN WHITE 145 
 
 Augustine, and that is how we picked him up again. 
 Then, at Palm Beach, we lost the beggar, but some- 
 how or other I felt it in my bones that he was after 
 you you and your wife. So I sent Benton to Or- 
 mond and I went to Palatka. Benton picked up his 
 trail. It led toward you toward the St. Johns. 
 And the reptile has been here forty-eight hours, try- 
 ing to nose you out, I suppose " 
 
 Tressa came into the room. Both men looked at 
 her. 
 
 Cleves said in a guarded voice : 
 
 "To-day, on the golf links at Orchard Cove, there 
 was a young man in white flannels very polite and 
 courteous to us but Tressa thought she saw him 
 slinking through the woods as though following and 
 watching us." 
 
 "My man, probably," said Recklow. He turned 
 quietly to Tressa and sketched for her the substance 
 of what he had just told Cleves. 
 
 "The man in white flannels on the golf links," said 
 Cleves, "was well built and rather handsome, and 
 not more than twenty-five. I thought he was a 
 Jew." 
 
 "I thought so too," said Tressa, calmly, "until I 
 saw him in "the woods. And then and then sud- 
 denly it came to me that his smile was the smile of 
 a treacherous Shaman sorcerer. 
 
 ". . . And the idea haunts me the memory of 
 those smooth-faced, smiling men in white men who 
 smile only when they slay when they slay body
 
 146 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 and soul under the iris skies of Yian! O God, mer- 
 ciful, long suffering," she whispered, staring into the 
 East, "deliver our souls from Satan who was stoned, 
 and our bodies from the snare of the Yezideel"
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE WEST WIND 
 
 THE night grew sweet with the scent of orange 
 bloom, and all the perfumed darkness was 
 vibrant with the feathery whirr of hawk- 
 moths' wings. 
 
 Tressa had taken her moon-lute to the hammock, 
 but her fingers rested motionless on the strings. 
 
 Cleves and Recklow, shoulder to shoulder, paced 
 the moonlit path along the hedges of oleander and 
 hibiscus which divided garden from jungle. 
 
 And they moved cautiously on the white-shell 
 road, not too near the shadow line. For in the 
 cypress swamp the bloated grey death was awake 
 and watching under the moon ; and in the scrub pal- 
 metto the diamond-dotted death moved lithely. 
 
 And somewhere within the dark evil of the jungle 
 a man in white might be watching. 
 
 So Recklow's pistol swung lightly in his right 
 hand and Cleves' weapon lay in his side-pocket, and 
 they strolled leisurely around the drive and up and 
 down the white-shell walks, passing Tressa at regu- 
 lar intervals, where she sat in her hammock with 
 the moon-lute across her knees. 
 
 Once Cleves paused to place two pink hibiscus 
 147
 
 148 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 blossoms in her hair above her ears; and the girl 
 smiled gravely at him in the light. 
 
 Again, pausing beside her hammock on one of 
 their tours of the garden, Recklow said in a low 
 voice : "If the beast would only show himself, Mrs. 
 Cleves, we'd not miss him. Have you caught a 
 glimpse of anything white in the woods?" 
 
 "Only the night mist rising from the branch and 
 a white ibis stealing through it." 
 
 Cleves came nearer: "Do you think the Yezidee is 
 in the woods watching us, Tressa?" 
 
 "Yes, he is there," she said calmly. 
 
 "You know it?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Recklow stared at the woods. "We can't go in 
 to hunt for him," he said. "That fellow would get 
 us with his Lewisite gas before we could discover and 
 destroy him." 
 
 "Suppose he waits for a west wind and squirts 
 his gas in this direction?" whispered Cleves. 
 
 "There is no wind," said Tressa tranquilly. "He 
 has been waiting for it, I think. The Yezidee is 
 very patient. And he is a Shaman sorcerer." 
 
 "My God!" breathed Recklow. "What sort of 
 hellish things has the Old World been dumping into 
 America for the last fifty years? An ordinary anar- 
 chist is bad enough, but this new breed of devil 
 these Yezidees this sect of Assassins " 
 
 "Hush!" whispered Tressa. 
 
 All three listened to the great cat-owl howling 
 from the jungle. But Tressa had heard another
 
 THE WEST WIND 149 
 
 sound the vague stir of leaves in the live-oaks. Was 
 it a passing breeze? Was a night wind rising? She 
 listened. But heard no brittle clatter from the 
 palm-fronds. 
 
 "Victor," she said. 
 
 "Yes, Tressa." 
 
 "If a wind comes, we must hunt him. That will 
 be necessary." 
 
 "Either we hunt him and get him, or he kills us 
 here with his gas," said Recklow quietly. 
 
 "If the night wind comes," said Tressa, "we must 
 hunt the darkness for the Yezidee." She spoke 
 coolly. 
 
 "If he'd only show himself," muttered Recklow, 
 staring into the darkness. 
 
 The girl picked up her lute, caught Cleves' worried 
 eyes fixed on her, suddenly comprehended that his 
 anxiety was on her account, and blushed brightly 
 in the moonlight. And he saw her teeth catch at 
 her underlip; saw her look up again at him, con- 
 fused. 
 
 "If I dared leave you," he said, "I'd go into the 
 hammock and start that reptile. This won't do 
 this standing pat while he comes to some deadly de- 
 cision in the woods there." 
 
 "What else is there to do?" growled Recklow. 
 
 "Watch," said the girl. "Out-watch the Yezidee. 
 If there is no night-wind he may tire of waiting. 
 Then you must shoot fast very, very fast and 
 straight. But if the night-wind comes, then we must 
 hunt him in darkness."
 
 150 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Recklow, pistol in hand, stood straight and sturdy 
 in the moonlight, gazing fixedly at the forest. Cleves 
 sat down at his wife's feet. 
 
 She touched her moon-lute tranquilly and sang 
 in her childish voice : 
 
 "Ring, ring, Buddha bells, 
 Gilded gods are listening. 
 Swing, swing, lily bells, 
 In my garden glistening. 
 Now I hear the Shaman drum; 
 Now the scarlet horsemen come; 
 
 Ding-dong! 
 
 Ding-dong! 
 
 Through the chanting of the throng 
 Thunders now the temple gong. 
 
 Boom-boom! 
 
 Ding-dong! 
 
 "Let the gold gods listen! 
 In my garden; what care I 
 Where my lily bells hang mute! 
 
 Snowy-sweet they glisten 
 Where I'm singing to my lute. 
 In my garden; what care I 
 
 Who is dead and who shall die? 
 'Let the gold gods save or slay 
 Scented lilies bloom in May. 
 
 Boom, boom, temple gong! 
 Ding-dong! 
 Ding-dong!" 
 
 "What are you singing?" whispered Cleves. 
 " The Bells of Yian.' " 
 "Is it old?"
 
 THE WEST WIND 151 
 
 "Of the 1 3th century. There were few Buddhist 
 bells in Yian then. It is Lamaism that has destroyed 
 the Mongols and that has permitted the creed of the 
 Assassins to spread the devil worhip of Erlik." 
 
 He looked at her, not understanding. And she, 
 pale, slim prophetess, in the moonlight, gazed at him 
 out of lost eyes eyes which saw, perhaps, the 
 bloody age of men when mankind took the devil by 
 the throat and all Mount Alamout went up in smok- 
 ing ruin ; and the Eight Towers were dark as death 
 and as silent before the blast of the silver clarions of 
 Ghenghis Khan. 
 
 "Something is stirring in the forest," whispered 
 Tressa, her fingers on her lips. 
 
 "Damnation," muttered Recklow, "it's the 
 wind!" 
 
 They listened. Far in the forest they heard the 
 clatter of palm-fronds. They waited. The ominous 
 warning grew faint, then rose again, a long, low 
 rattle of palm-fronds which became a steady mono- 
 tone. 
 
 "We hunt," said Recklow bluntly. "Come on!" 
 
 But the girl sprang from the hammock and caught 
 her husband's arm and drew Recklow back from the 
 hibiscus hedge. 
 
 "Use me," she said. "You could never find the 
 Yezidee. Let me do the hunting; and then shoot 
 very, very fast." 
 
 "We've got to take her," said Recklow. "We 
 dare not leave her."
 
 152 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I can't let her lead the way into those black 
 woods," muttered Cleves. 
 
 "The wind is blowing in my face," insisted Reck- 
 low. "We'd better hurry." 
 
 Tressa laid one hand on her husband's arm. 
 
 "I can find the Yezidee, I think. You never could 
 find him before he finds you ! Victor, let me use my 
 own knowledge! Let me find the way. Please let 
 me lead ! Please, Victor. Because, if you don't, I'm 
 afraid we'll all die here in the garden where we 
 stand." 
 
 Cleves cast a haggard glance at Recklow, then 
 looked at his wife. 
 
 "All right," he said. 
 
 The girl opened the hedge gate. Both men fol- 
 lowed with pistols lifted. 
 
 The moon silvered the forest. There was no 
 mist, but a night-wind blew mournfully through palm 
 and cypress, carrying with it the strange, disturbing 
 pungency of the jungle wild, unfamiliar perfumes, 
 the acrid aroma of swamp and rotting mould. 
 
 "What about snakes?" muttered Recklow, knee 
 deep in wild phlox. 
 
 But there was a deadlier snake to find and destroy, 
 somewhere in the blotched shadows of the forest. 
 
 The first sentinel trees were very near, now; and 
 Tressa was running across a ghostly tangle, where 
 once had been an orange grove, and where aged and 
 dying citrus stumps rose stark amid the riot of en- 
 croaching jungle. 
 
 "She's circling to get the wind at our backs,"
 
 THE WEST WIND 153 
 
 breathed Recklow, running forward beside Cleves. 
 "That's our only chance to kill the dirty rat catch 
 him with the wind at our backs I" 
 
 Once, traversing a dry hammock where streaks 
 of moonlight alternated with velvet-black shadow a 
 rattlesnake sprang his goblin alarm. 
 
 They could not locate the reptile. They shrank 
 together and moved warily, chilled with fear. 
 
 Once, too, clear in the moonlight, the Grey Death 
 reared up from bloated folds and stood swaying 
 rhythmically in a horrible shadow dance before them. 
 And Cleves threw one arm around his wife and 
 crept past, giving death a wide berth there in the 
 checkered moonlight. 
 
 Now, under foot, the dry hammock lay every- 
 where and the night wind blew on their backs. 
 
 Then Tressa turned and halted the two men with 
 a gesture. And went to her husband where he stood 
 in the palm forest, and laid her hands on his shoul- 
 ders, looking him very wistfully in the eyes. 
 
 Under her searching gaze he seemed oddly to 
 comprehend her appeal. 
 
 "You are going to use to use your knowledge," 
 he said mechanically. "You are going to find the 
 man in white." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You are going to find him in a way we don't un- 
 derstand," he continued, dully. 
 
 "Yes. . . . You will not hold me in in horror 
 will you?"
 
 154 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Recklow came up, making no sound on the spongy 
 palm litter underfoot. 
 
 "Can you find this devil?" he whispered. 
 
 "I think so." 
 
 "Does your super-instinct finer sense knowl- 
 edge whatever it is give you any inkling as to his 
 whereabouts, Mrs. Cleves?" 
 
 "I think he is here in this hammock. Only " 
 
 she turned again, with swift impulse, to her husband, 
 " only if you if you do not hold me in in horror 
 because of what I do " 
 
 There was a silence ; then : 
 
 "What are you about to do?" he asked hoarsely. 
 
 "Slay this man." 
 
 "We'll do that," said Cleves with a shudder. 
 "Only show him to us and we'll shoot the dirty 
 reptile to slivers " 
 
 "Suppose we hit the jar of gas," said Recklow. 
 
 After a silence, Tressa said: 
 
 "I have got to give him back to Satan. There is 
 no other way. I understood that from the first. He 
 can not die by your pistols, though you shoot very 
 fast and straight. No!" 
 
 After another silence, Recklow said: 
 
 "You had better find him before the wind changes. 
 We hunt down wind or we die here together." 
 
 She looked at her husband. 
 
 "Show him to us in your own way," he said, "and 
 deal with him as he must be dealt with." 
 
 A gleam passed across her pale face and she tried 
 to smile at her husband.
 
 THE WEST WIND 155 
 
 Then, turning down the hammock to the east, she 
 walked noiselessly forward over the fibrous litter, 
 the men on either side of her, their pistols poised. 
 
 They had halted on the edge of an open glade, 
 ringed with young pines in fullest plumage. 
 
 Tressa was standing very straight and still in a 
 strange, supple, agonised attitude, her left forearm 
 across her eyes, her right hand clenched, her slender 
 body slightly twisted to the left. 
 
 The men gazed pallidly at her with tense, set 
 faces, knowing that the girl was in terrible mental 
 conflict against another mind a powerful, sinister 
 mind which was seeking to grasp her thoughts and 
 control them. 
 
 Minute after minute sped : the girl never moved, 
 locked in her psychic duel with this other brutal 
 mind, beating back its terrible thought-waves which 
 were attacking her, fighting for mental supremacy, 
 struggling in silence with an unseen adversary whose 
 mental dominance meant death. 
 
 Suddenly her cry rang out sharply in the moon- 
 light, and then, all at once, a man in white stood 
 there in the lustre of the moon a young, graceful 
 man dressed in white flannels and carrying on his 
 right arm what seemed to be a long white cloak. 
 
 Instantly the girl was transformed from a living 
 statue into a lithe, supple, lightly moving thing that 
 passed swiftly to the west of the glade, keeping the 
 young man in white facing the wind, which was blow- 
 ing and tossing the plumy young pines. 
 
 "So it is you, young man, with whom I have
 
 156 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 been wrestling here under the moon of the only 
 God!" she said in a strange little voice, all vibrant 
 and metallic with menacing laughter. 
 
 "It is I, Keuke Mongol," replied the young man 
 in white, tranquilly; yet his words came as though 
 he were tired and out of breath, and the hand he 
 raised to touch his small black moustache trembled 
 as if from physical exhaustion. 
 
 "Yarghouz!" she exclaimed. "Why did I not 
 know you there on the golf links, Assassin of the 
 Seventh Tower? And why do you come here with 
 your shroud over your arm and hidden under it, in 
 your right hand, a flask full of death?" 
 
 He said, smiling: 
 
 "I come because you are to die, Heavenly-Azure 
 Eyes. I bring you your shroud." And he moved 
 warily westward around the open circle of young 
 pines. 
 
 Instantly the girl flung her right arm straight up- 
 ward. 
 
 "Yarghouz!" 
 
 "I hear thee, Heavenly Azure." 
 
 "Another step to the west and I shatter thy flask 
 of gas." 
 
 "With what?" he demanded; but stood discreetly 
 motionless. 
 
 "With what I grasp in an empty palm. Thou 
 knowest, Yarghouz." 
 
 "I have heard," he said with smiling uncertainty, 
 "but to hear of force that can be hurled out of an
 
 THE WEST WIND 157 
 
 empty palm is one thing, and to see it and feel it is 
 another. I think you lie, Heavenly Azure." 
 
 "So thought Gutchlug. And died of a yellow 
 snake." 
 
 The young man seemed to reflect. Then he looked 
 up at her in his frank, smiling way. 
 
 "Wilt thou listen, Heavenly Eyes?" 
 
 "I hear thee, Yarghouz." 
 
 "Listen then, Keuke Mongol. Take life from us 
 as we offer it. Life is sweet. Erlik, like a spider, 
 waits in darkness for lost souls that flutter to his 
 net." 
 
 "You think my soul was lost there in the temple, 
 Yarghouz?" 
 
 "Unutterably lost, little temple girl of Yian. 
 Therefore, live. Take life as a gift!" 
 
 "Whose gift?" 
 
 "Sanang's." 
 
 "It is written," she said gravely, "that we belong 
 to God and we return to him. Now then, Yezidee, 
 do your duty as I do mine ! Kai !" 
 
 At the sound of the formula always uttered by the 
 sect of Assassins when about to do murder, the 
 young man started and shrank back. The west wind 
 blew fresh in his startled eyes. 
 
 "Sorceress," he said less firmly, "you leave your 
 Yiort to come all alone into this forest and seek me. 
 Why then have you come, if not to submit ! if not 
 to take the gift of life if not to turn away from 
 your seducers who are hunting me, and who have 
 corrupted you?"
 
 158 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Yarghouz, I come to slay you," she said quietly. 
 
 Suddenly the man snarled at her, flung the shroud 
 at her feet, and crept deliberately to the left. 
 
 "Be careful !" she cried sharply; "look what you're 
 about ! Stand still, son of a dog ! May your mother 
 bewail your death!" 
 
 Yarghouz edged toward tlie west, clasping in his 
 right hand the flask of gas. 
 
 "Sorceress," he laughed, "a witch of Thibet 
 prophesied with a drum that the three purities, the 
 nine perfections, and the nine times nine felicities 
 shall be lodged in him who slays the treacherous 
 temple girl, Keuke Mongol! There is more magic 
 in this bottle which I grasp than in thy mind and 
 body. Heavenly Eyes ! I pray God to be merciful 
 to this soul I send to Erlik!" 
 
 All the time he was advancing, edging cautiously 
 around the circle of little plumy pines ; and already 
 the wind struck his left cheek. 
 
 "Yarghouz Khan!" cried the girl in her clear 
 voice. "Take up your shroud and repeat the fatha !" 
 
 "Backward!" laughed the young man, " as do 
 you, Keuke Mongol!" 
 
 "Heretic!" she retorted. "Do you also refuse to 
 name the ten Imaums in your prayers? Dog! Toad! 
 Spittle of Erlik! May all your cattle die and all 
 your horses take the glanders and all your dogs the 
 mange!" 
 
 "Silence, sorceress!" he shouted, pale with fear 
 and fury. "Witch ! Mud worm ! May Erlik seize 
 you! May your skin be covered with putrefying
 
 THE WEST WIND 159 
 
 sores ! May all the demons torment you ! May God 
 remember you in hell!" 
 
 "Yarghouz! Stand still 1" 
 
 "Is your word then the Rampart of Gog and 
 Magog, you young witch of Yian, that a Khan of the 
 Seventh Tower need fear you!" he sneered, stealing 
 stealthily westward through the feathery pines. 
 
 "I give thee thy last chance, Yarghouz Khan," she 
 said in an excited voice that trembled. "Recite thy 
 prayer naming the ten, because with their holy names 
 upon thy lips thou mayest escape damnation. For I 
 am here to slay thee, Yarghouz! Take up thy 
 shroud and pray!" 
 
 The young man felt the west wind at the back of 
 his left ear. Then he began to laugh. 
 
 "Heavenly Eyes," he said, "thy end is come to- 
 gether with the two police who hide in the pines yon- 
 der behind thee ! Behold the bottle magic of Yarg- 
 houz Khan!" 
 
 And he lifted the glass flask in the moonlight as 
 though he were about to smash it at her feet. 
 
 Then a terrible thing occurred. The entire flask 
 glowed red hot in his grasp ; and the man screamed 
 and strove convulsively to fling the bottle; but it 
 stuck to his hand, melted into the smoking flesh. 
 
 Then he screamed again- or tried to but his 
 entire lower jaw came off and he stood there with 
 the awful orifice gaping in the moonlight stood, 
 reeled a moment and then and then his whole 
 face slid off, leaving nothing but a bony mask out of 
 which burst shriek after shriek
 
 160 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Keuke Mongol had fainted dead away. Cleves 
 took her into his arms. 
 
 Recklow, trembling and deathly white, went over 
 to the thing that lay among the young pines and 
 forced himself to bend over it. 
 
 The glass flask still stuck to one charred hand, but 
 it was no longer hot. And Recklow rolled the un- 
 speakable thing into the white shroud and pushed it 
 into the swamp. 
 
 An evil ooze took it, slowly sucked it under and 
 engulfed it. A few stinking bubbles broke. 
 
 Recklow went back to the little glade among the 
 pines. 
 
 A young girl lay sobbing convulsively in her hus- 
 band's arms, asking God's pardon and his for the 
 justice she had done upon an enemy of all man- 
 kind.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 AT THE RITZ 
 
 TTTHEN Victor Cleves telegraphed from St. 
 
 Vl/ Augustine to Washington that he and his 
 
 wife were on their way North, and that 
 
 they desired to see John Recklow as soon as they 
 
 arrived, John Recklow remarked that he knew of no 
 
 place as private as a public one. And he came on to 
 
 New York and established himself at the Ritz, rather 
 
 regally. 
 
 To dine with him that evening were two volun- 
 teer agents of the United States Secret Service, 
 ZB-303, otherwise James Benton, a fashionable ar- 
 chitect; and XYL-3?i, Alexander Selden, sometime 
 junior partner in the house of Milwin, Selden & Co. 
 
 A single lamp was burning in the white-and-rose 
 rococo room. Under its veiled glow these three men 
 sat conversing in guarded voices over coffee and 
 cigars, awaiting the advent of 53-6-26, otherwise 
 Victor Cleves, recently Professor of Ornithology at 
 Cambridge; and his young wife, Tressa, known offi- 
 cially as V-6g. 
 
 "Did the trip South do Mrs. Cleves any good?" 
 inquired Benton. 
 
 "Some," said Recklow. "When Selden and I saw 
 her she was getting better." 
 161
 
 162 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I suppose that affair of Yarghouz upset her 
 pretty thoroughly." 
 
 "Yes." Recklow tossed his cigar into the fireplace 
 and produced a pipe. "Victor Cleves upsets her 
 more," he remarked. 
 
 "Why?" asked Benton, astonished. 
 
 "She's beginning to fall in love with him and 
 doesn't know what's the matter with her," replied the 
 elder man drily. "Selden noticed it, too." 
 
 Benton looked immensely surprised. "I sup- 
 posed," he said, "that she and Cleves considered the 
 marriage to be merely a temporary necessity. I 
 didn't imagine that they cared for each other." 
 
 "I don't suppose they did at first," said Selden. 
 "But I think she's interested in Victor. And I don't 
 see how he can help falling in love with her, because 
 she's a very beautiful thing to gaze on, and a most 
 engaging one to talk to." 
 
 "She's about the prettiest girl I ever saw," ad- 
 mitted Benton, "and about the cleverest. All the 
 same " 
 
 "All the same what?" 
 
 "Well, Mrs. Cleves has her drawbacks, you know 
 as a real wife, I mean." 
 
 Recklow said: "There is a fixed idea in Cleves's 
 head that Tressa Nome married him as a last resort, 
 which is true. But he'll never believe she's changed 
 her ideas in regard to him unless she herself en- 
 lightens him. And the girl is too shy to do that. 
 Besides, she believes the same thing of him. There's 
 a mess for you!"
 
 AT THE RITZ 163 
 
 Recklow filled his pipe carefully. 
 
 "In addition," he went on, "Mrs. Cleves has 
 another and very terrible fixed idea in her charming 
 head, and that is that she really did lose her soul 
 among those damned Yezidees. She believes that 
 Cleves, though kind to her, considers her merely 
 as something uncanny something to endure until 
 this Yezidee campaign is ended and she is safe from 
 assassination." 
 
 Benton said: "After all, and in spite of all her 
 loveliness, I myself should not feel entirely comfort- 
 able with such a girl for a real wife." 
 
 "Why?" demanded Recklow. 
 
 "Well good heavens, John! those uncanny 
 things she does her rather terrifying psychic 
 knowledge and ability make a man more or less un- 
 easy." He laughed without mirth. 
 
 "For example," he added, "I never was nervous 
 in any physical crisis; but since I've met Tressa 
 Nome to be frank I'm not any too comfortable in 
 my mind when I remember Gutchlug and Sanang 
 and Albert Feke and that dirty reptile Yarghouz 
 and when I recollect how that girl dealt with them! 
 Good God, John, I'm not a coward, I hope, but that 
 sort of thing worries me!" 
 
 Recklow lighted his pipe. He said: "In the Gov- 
 ernment's campaign against these eight foreigners 
 who have begun a psychic campaign against the un- 
 suspicious people of this decent Republic, with the 
 purpose of surprising, overpowering and enslaving 
 the minds of mankind by a misuse of psychic power,
 
 164. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 we agents of the Secret Service are slowly gaining 
 the upper hand. 
 
 "In this battle of minds we are gaining a victory. 
 But we are winning solely and alone through the 
 psychic ability and the loyalty and courage of a 
 young girl who, through tragedy of circumstances, 
 spent the years of her girlhood in the infamous 
 Yezidee temple at Yian, and who learned from the 
 devil-worshipers themselves not only this so-called 
 magic of the Mongol sorcerers, but also how to meet 
 its psychic menace and defeat it." 
 
 He looked at Benton, shrugged: 
 
 "If you and if Cleves really feel the slightest re- 
 pugnance toward the strange psychic ability of this 
 brave and generous girl, I for one do not share it." 
 
 Benton reddened: "It isn't exactly repug- 
 nance " But Recklow interrupted sharply: 
 
 "Do you realise, Benton, what she's already ac- 
 complished for us in our secret battle against Bol- 
 shevism? against the very powers of hell itself, led 
 by these Mongol sorcerers? 
 
 "Of the Eight Assassins or Sheiks-el-Djebel 
 who came to the United States to wield the dreadful 
 weapon of psychic power against the minds of our 
 people, and to pervert them and destroy all civilisa- 
 tion, of the Eight Chief Assassins of the Eight 
 Towers, this girl already has discovered and identi- 
 fied four, Sanang, Gutchlug, Albert Feke, and 
 Yarghouz; and she has destroyed the last three." 
 
 He sat calmly enjoying his pipe for a few mo- 
 ments' silence, then:
 
 AT THE RITZ 165 
 
 "Five of this sect of Assassins remain five sly, 
 murderous, psychic adepts who call themselves sor- 
 cerers. Except for Prince Sanang, I do not know 
 who these other four men may be. I haven't a no- 
 tion. Nor have you. Nor do I believe that with all 
 the resources of the United States Secret Service we 
 ever should be able to discover these four Sheiks- 
 el-Djebel except for the astounding spiritual courage 
 and psychic experience of the young wife of Victor 
 Cleves." 
 
 After a moment Selden nodded. "That is quite 
 true," he said simply. "We are utterly helpless 
 against unknown psychic forces. And I, for one, feel 
 no repugnance toward what Mrs. Cleves has done 
 for all mankind and in the name of God." 
 
 "She's a brave girl," muttered Benton, "but it's 
 terrible to possess such knowledge and horrible to 
 use it." 
 
 Recklow said : "The horror of it nearly killed the 
 girl herself. Have you any idea how she must suffer 
 by being forced to employ such terrific knowledge? 
 by being driven to use it to combat this menace of 
 hell? Can you imagine what this charming, sensitive, 
 tragic young creature must feel when, with powers 
 natural to her but unfamiliar to us, she destroys 
 with her own mind and will-power demons in human 
 shape who are about to destroy her? 
 
 "Talk of nerve! Talk of abnegation! Talk of 
 perfect loyalty and courage! There is more than 
 these in Tressa Cleves. There is that dauntless 
 bravery which faces worse than physical death. Be-
 
 166 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 cause the child still believes that her soul is damned 
 for whatever happened to her in the Yezidee temple ; 
 and that when these Yezidees succeed in killing her 
 body, Erlik will surely seize the soul that leaves it." 
 There was a knocking at the door. Benton got up 
 and opened it. Victor Cleves came in with his young 
 wife. 
 
 Tressa Cleves seemed to have grown since she 
 had been away. Taller, a trifle paler, yet without 
 even the subtlest hint of that charming maturity 
 which the young and happily married woman invari- 
 ably wears, her virginal allure now verged vaguely 
 on the delicate edges of austerity. 
 
 Cleves, sunburnt and vigorous, looked older, 
 somehow far less boyish and he seemed more 
 silent than when, nearly seven months before, he had 
 been assigned to the case of Tressa Nome. 
 
 Recklow, Selden and Benton greeted them 
 warmly; to each in turn Tressa gave her narrow, 
 sun-tanned hand. Recklow led her to a seat. A 
 servant came with iced fruit juice and little cakes 
 and cigarettes. 
 
 Conversation, aimless and general, fulfilling for- 
 malities, gradually ceased. 
 
 A full June moon stared through the open win- 
 dows searching for the traditional bride, perhaps 
 and its light silvered a pale and lovely figure that 
 might possibly have passed for the pretty ghost of 
 a bride, but not for any girl who had married be- 
 cause she was loved.
 
 AT THE RITZ 167 
 
 Recklow broke the momentary silence, bluntly: 
 
 "Have you anything to report, Cleves?" 
 
 The young fellow hesitated: 
 
 "My wife has, I believe." 
 
 The others turned to her. She seemed, for a 
 moment, to shrink back in her chair, and, as her eyes 
 involuntarily sought her husband, there was in them 
 a vague and troubled appeal. 
 
 Cleves said in a sombre voice: "I need scarcely 
 remind you how deeply distasteful this entire and 
 accursed business is to my wife. But she is going to 
 see it through, whatever the cost. And we four men 
 understand something of what it has cost her is 
 costing her in violence to her every instinct." 
 
 "We honour her the more," said Recklow quietly. 
 
 "We couldn't honour her too much," said Cleves. 
 
 A slight colour came into Tressa's face ; she bent 
 her head, but Recklow saw her eyes steal sideways 
 toward her husband. 
 
 Still bowed a little in her chair, she seemed to re- 
 flect for a while concerning what she had to say; 
 then, looking up at John Recklow: 
 
 "I saw Sanang." 
 
 "Good heavens! Where?" he demanded. 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 Cleves, flushing with embarrassment, explained: 
 "She saw him clairvoyantly. She was lying in the 
 hammock. You remember I had a trained nurse for 
 her after what happened in Orchid Lodge." 
 
 Tressa looked miserably at Recklow, dumbly, 
 for a moment. Then her lips unclosed.
 
 168 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I saw Prince Sanang," she repeated. "He was 
 near the sea. There were rocks cottages on cliffs 
 and very brilliant flowers in tiny, pocket-like gar- 
 dens. 
 
 "Sanang was walking on the cliffs with another 
 man. There were forests, inland." 
 
 "Do you know who the other man was?" asked 
 Recklow gently. 
 
 "Yes. He was one of the Eight. I recognised 
 him. When I was a girl he came once to the Temple 
 of Yian, all alone, and spread his shroud on the pink 
 marble steps. And we temple girls mocked him and 
 threw stemless roses on the shroud, telling him they 
 were human heads with which to grease his toug." 
 
 She became excited and sat up straighter in her 
 chair, and her strange little laughter rippled like a 
 rill among pebbles. 
 
 "I threw a big rose without a stem upon the 
 shroud," she exclaimed, "and I cried out, 'Niaz!' 
 which means, 'Courage,' and I mocked him, saying, 
 'Djamouk Khagan,' when he was only a Khan, of 
 course ; and I laughed and rubbed one finger against 
 the other, crying out, 'Toug ia glachakho!' which 
 means, 'The toug is anointed.' And which was 
 very impudent of me, because Djamouk was a Sheik- 
 el-Djebel and Khan of the Fifth Tower, and entitled 
 to a toug and to eight men and a Toughtchi. And it 
 is a grave offence to mock at the anointing of a 
 toug." 
 
 She paused, breathless, her splendid azure eyes 
 sparkling with the memory of that girlish mischief.
 
 AT THE RITZ 169 
 
 Then their brilliancy faded; she bit her lip and stole 
 an uncertain glance at her husband. 
 
 And after a pause she explained in a very sub- 
 dued voice that the "lagla michi," or action of 
 "greasing the toug," or standard, was done when a 
 severed human head taken in battle was cast at the 
 foot of the lance shaft stuck upright in the ground. 
 
 "You see," she said sadly, "we temple girls, being 
 already damned, cared little what we said, even to 
 such a terrible man as Djamouk Khan. And even 
 had the ghost of old Tchinguiz Khagan himself 
 comedo the temple and looked at us out of his tawny 
 eyes, I think we might have done something saucy." 
 
 Tressa's pretty face was spiritless, now; she 
 leaned back in her armchair and they heard an un- 
 conscious sigh escape her. 
 
 "Ai-ya ! Ai-ya I" she murmured to herself, "what 
 crazy things we did on the rose-marble steps, Yulun 
 and I, so long so long ago." 
 
 Cleves got up and went over to stand beside his 
 wife's chair. 
 
 "What happened is this," he said heavily. "Dur- 
 ing my wife's convalescence after that Yarghouz af- 
 fair, she found herself, at a certain moment, clair- 
 voyant. And she thought she saw she did see 
 Sanang, and an Asiatic she recognised as being one 
 of the chiefs of the Assassins sect, whose name is 
 Djamouk. 
 
 "But, except that it was somewhere near the sea 
 some summer colony probably on the Atlantic 
 coast she does not know where this pair of jail-
 
 170 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 birds roost. And this is what we have come here to 
 report." 
 
 Benton, politely appalled, tried not to look in- 
 credulous. But it was evident that Selden and Reck- 
 low had no doubts. 
 
 "Of course," said Recklow calmly, "the thing to 
 do is for you and your wife to try to find this place 
 she saw." 
 
 "Make a tour of all such ocean-side resorts until 
 Mrs. Cleves recognises the place she saw," added 
 Selden. And to Recklow he added: "I believe there 
 are several perfectly genuine cases on record where 
 clairvoyants have aided the police." 
 
 "Several authentic cases," said Recklow quietly. 
 But Benton' s face was a study. 
 
 Tressa looked up at her husband. He dropped 
 his hand reassuringly on her shoulder and nodded 
 with a slight smile. 
 
 "There there was something else," she said with 
 considerable hesitation "something not quite in 
 line of duty perhaps " 
 
 "It seems to concern Benton," added Cleves, 
 smiling. 
 
 "What is it?" inquired Selden, smiling also as 
 Benton's features froze to a mask. 
 
 "Let me tell you, first," interrupted Cleves, "that 
 my wife's psychic ability and skill can make me 
 visualise and actually see scenes and people which, 
 God knows, I never before laid eyes upon, but which 
 she has both seen and known. 
 
 "And one morning, in Florida, I asked her to do
 
 AT THE RITZ 171 
 
 something strange something of that sort to amuse 
 me and we were sitting on the steps of our cottage 
 you know, the old club-house at Orchid I and the 
 first I knew I saw, in the mist on the St. Johns, a 
 Chinese bridge humped up over that very common- 
 place stream, and thousands of people passing over* 
 it, and a city beyond the town of Yian, Tressa 
 tells me, and I heard the Buddhist bells and the big 
 temple gong and the noises in streets and on the 
 water " 
 
 He was becoming considerably excited at the mem- 
 ory, and his lean face reddened and he gesticulated 
 as he spoke : 
 
 "It was astounding, Recklow! There was that 
 bridge, and all those people moving over it; and the 
 city beyond, and the boats and shipping, and the 
 vast murmur of multitudes. . . . And then, there 
 on the bridge crossing toward Yian, I saw a young 
 girl, who turned and looked back at my wife and 
 laughed." 
 
 "And I told him it was Yulun," said Tressa, 
 simply. 
 
 "A playfellow of my wife's in Yian," explained 
 Cleves. "But if she were really Chinese she didn't 
 look like what are my own notions of a Chinese 
 girl." 
 
 "Yulun came from Black China," said Mrs. 
 Cleves. "I taught her English. I loved her dearly. 
 I was her most intimate friend in Yian." 
 
 There ensued a silence, broken presently by Ben- 
 ton; and:
 
 172 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Where do I appear in this?" he asked stiffly. 
 
 Tressa's smile was odd; she looked at Selden and 
 said: 
 
 "When I was convalescent I was lonely. ... I 
 made the effort one evening. And I found Yulun. 
 And again she was on a bridge. But she was dressed 
 as I am. And the bridge was one of 'those great, 
 horrible steel monsters that sprawl across the East 
 River. And I was astonished, and I said, 'Yulun, 
 darling, are you really here in America and in New 
 York, or has a demon tangled the threads of thought 
 to mock my mind in illness?' 
 
 "Then Yulun looked very sorrowfully at me and 
 wrote in Arabic characters, in the air, the name of 
 our enemy who once came to the Lake of Ghosts for 
 love of her Yaddin-ed-Din, Tougtchi to Djamouk 
 the Fox. . . . And who went his way again amid 
 our scornful laughter. . . . He is a demon. And 
 he was tangling my thread of thought!" 
 
 Tressa btecame exceedingly animated once more. 
 She rose and came swiftly to where Benton was 
 standing. 
 
 "And what do you think!" she said eagerly. "I 
 said to her, 'Yulun! Yulun! Will you make the 
 effort and come to me if I make the effort? Will 
 you come to me, beloved?' And Yulun made 'Yes,' 
 with her lips." 
 
 After a silence: "But where do I come in?" in- 
 quired Benton, stiffly fearful of such matters. 
 
 "You came in." 
 
 "I don't understand."
 
 AT THE RITZ 173 
 
 "You came in the door while Yulun and I were 
 talking." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "When you came to see me after I was better, 
 and you and Mr. Selden were going North with 
 Mr. Recklow. Don't you remember; I was lying in 
 the hammock in the moonlight, and Victor told you 
 I was asleep?" 
 
 "Yes, of course " 
 
 "I was not asleep. I had made the effort and I 
 was with Yulun. ... I did not know you were 
 standing beside my hammock in the moonlight until 
 Yulun told me. . . . And that is what I am to tell 
 you; Yulun saw you. . . . And Yulun has written 
 it in Chinese, in Eighur characters and in Arabic, 
 tracing them with her forefinger in the air that 
 Yulun, loveliest in Yian, flame-slender and very 
 white, has seen her heart, like a pink pearl afire, 
 burning between your august hands." 
 
 "My hands !" exclaimed Benton, very red. 
 
 There fell an odd silence. Nobody laughed. 
 
 Tressa came nearer to Benton, wistful, uncertain, 
 shy. 
 
 "Would you care to see Yulun?" she asked. 
 
 "Well no," he said, startled. "I I shall not 
 deny that such things worry me a lot, Mrs. Cleves. 
 I'm a an Episcopalian." 
 
 The tension released, Selden was the first to laugh. 
 
 "There's no use blinking the truth," he said; 
 "we're up against something absolutely new. Of 
 course, it isn't magic. It can, of course, be ex-
 
 174. THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 plained by natural laws about which we happen to 
 know nothing at present." 
 
 Recklow nodded. "What do we know about the 
 human mind? It has been proven that no thought 
 can originate within that mass of convoluted physical 
 matter called the brain. It has been proven that 
 something outside the brain originates thought and 
 uses the brain as a vehicle to incubate it. What do 
 we know about thought?" 
 
 Selden, much interested, sat cogitating and looking 
 at Mrs. Cleves. But Benton, still flushed and evi- 
 dently nervous, sat staring out of the window at the 
 full moon, and twisting an unlighted cigarette to 
 shreds. 
 
 "Why didn't you tell Benton when the thing oc- 
 curred down there at Orchid Lodge, the night we 
 called to say good-bye?" asked Selden, curiously. 
 
 Tressa gave him a distressed smile : C 1 was afraid 
 he wouldn't believe me. And I was afraid that you 
 and Mr. Recklow, even if you believed it, might 
 not like like me any the better for for being 
 clairvoyant." 
 
 Recklow came over, bent his handsome grey head, 
 and kissed her hand. 
 
 "I never liked any woman better, nor respected 
 any woman as deeply," he said. And, lifting his 
 head, he saw tears sparkling in her eyes. 
 
 "My dear," he said in a low voice, and his firm 
 hand closed over the slim fingers he had kissed. 
 
 Benton got up from his chair, went to the window, 
 turned shortly and came over to Tressa.
 
 AT THE RITZ 175 
 
 'Tou're braver than I ever could learn to be," he 
 said shortly., "I ask your pardon if I seem sceptical. 
 I'm more worried than incredulous. There's some- 
 thing born in me part of me that shrinks from 
 anything that upsets my orthodox belief in the future 
 life. But if you wish me to see this this girl 
 Yulun it's quite all right." 
 
 She said softly, and with gentle wonder: "I know 
 of nothing that could upset your belief, Mr. Benton. 
 There is only one God. And if Mahomet be His 
 prophet, or if he be Lord Buddha, or if your Lord 
 Christ be vice-regent to the Most High, I do not 
 know. All I know is that God is God, and that He 
 prevailed over Satan who was stoned. And that in 
 Paradise is eternal life, and in hell demons hide 
 where dwells Erlik, Prince of Darkness." 
 
 Benton, silent and secretly aghast at her theology, 
 said nothing. Recklow pleasantly but seriously de- 
 nied that Satan and his demons were actual and con- 
 crete creatures. 
 
 Again Cleves's hand fell lightly on his wife's 
 shoulder, in a careless gesture of reassurance. And, 
 to Benton, "No soul is ever lost," he said, calmly. 
 "I don't exactly know how that agrees with your or- 
 thodoxy, Benton. But it is surely so." 
 
 "I don't know myself," said Benton. "I hope it's 
 so." He looked at Tressa a moment and then blurted 
 out: "Anyway, if ever there was a soul in God's 
 keeping and guarded by His angels, it's your wife's 1" 
 
 "That also is true," said Cleves quietly. 
 
 "By the way," remarked Recklow carelessly,
 
 176 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I've arranged to have you stop at the Ritz while 
 you're in town, Mrs. Cleves. You and your IniS- 
 band are to occupy the apartment adjoining this. 
 Where is your luggage, Victor?" 
 
 "In our apartment." 
 
 "That won't do," said Recklow decisively. "Tel- 
 ephone for it." 
 
 Cleves went to the telephone, but Recklow took 
 the instrument out of his hand and called the number. 
 The voice of one of his own agents answered. 
 
 Cleves was standing alone by the open window 
 when Recklow hung up the telephone. Tressa, on 
 the sofa, had been whispering with Benton. Selden, 
 looking over the evening paper by the rose-shaded 
 lamp, glanced up as Recklow went over to Cleves. 
 
 "Victor," he said, "your man has been murdered. 
 His throat was cut; his head was severed completely. 
 Your luggage has been ransacked and so has your 
 apartment. Three of my men are in possession, and 
 the local police seem to comprehend the necessity of 
 keeping the matter out of the newspapers. What 
 was in your baggage?" 
 
 "Nothing," said Cleves, ghastly pale. 
 
 "All right. We'll have your effects packed up 
 again and brought over here. Are you going to tell 
 your wife?" 
 
 Cleves, still deathly pale, cast a swift glance to- 
 ward her. She sat on the sofa in animated conver- 
 sation with Benton. She laughed once, and Benton 
 smiled at what she was saying. 
 
 "Is there any need to tell her, Recklow?"
 
 AT THE RITZ 177 
 
 "Not for a while, anyway." 
 
 "All right. I suppose the Yezidees are respon- 
 sible for this horrible business." 
 
 "Certainly. Your poor servant's head lay at the 
 foot of a curtain-pole which had been placed upright 
 between two chairs. On the pole were tied three 
 tufts of hair from the dead man's head. The pole 
 had been rubbed with blood." 
 
 "That's Mongol custom," muttered Cleves. "They 
 made a toug and 'greased' it! the murderous 
 devils !" 
 
 "They did more. They left at the foot of your 
 bed and at the foot of your wife's bed two white 
 sheets. And a knife lay in the centre of each sheet. 
 That, of course, is the symbol of the Sect of Assas- 
 sins." 
 
 Cleves nodded. His body, as he leaned there on 
 the window sill in the moonlight, trembled. But his 
 face had grown dark with rage. 
 
 "If I could could only get my hands on one of 
 them," he whispered hoarsely. 
 
 "Be careful. Don't wear a face like that. Your 
 wife is looking at us," murmured Recklow. 
 
 With an effort Cleves raised his head and smiled 
 across the room at his wife. 
 
 "Our luggage will be sent over shortly," he said. 
 "If you're tired, we'll say good-night." 
 
 So she rose and the three men came to make their 
 adieux and pay their compliments and devoirs. Then, 
 with a smile that seemed almost happy, she went 
 into her own apartment on her husband's arm.
 
 178 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Cleves and his wife had connecting bedrooms and 
 a sitting-room between. Here they paused for a mo- 
 ment before the always formal ceremony of leave- 
 taking at night. There were roses on the centre 
 table. Tressa dropped one hand on the table and 
 bent over the flowers. 
 
 "They seem so friendly," she said under her 
 breath. 
 
 He thought she meant that she found even in 
 flowers a refuge from the solitude of a loveless mar- 
 riage. 
 
 He said quietly: "I think you will find the world 
 very friendly, if you wish. n But she shook her head, 
 looking at the roses. 
 
 Finally he said good-night and she extended her 
 hand, and he took it formally. 
 
 Then their hands fell away. Tressa turned and 
 went toward her bedroom. At the door she stopped, 
 turned slowly. 
 
 "What shall I do about Yulun?" she asked. 
 
 "What is there to do ? Yulun is in China." 
 
 "Yes, her body is." 
 
 "Do you mean that the rest of her whatever it 
 is could come here?" 
 
 "Why, of course." 
 
 "So that Benton could see her?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Could he see her just as she is? Her face and 
 figure clothes and everything?" 
 
 "Yes."
 
 AT THE RITZ 179 
 
 "Would she seem real or like a ghost spirit 
 whatever you choose to call such things?" 
 
 Tressa smiled. "She'd be exactly as real as you 
 or I, Victor. She'd seem like anybody else." 
 
 "That's astonishing," he muttered. "Could Ben- 
 ton hear her speak?" 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 "Talk to her?" 
 
 Tressa laughed: "Of course. If Yulun should 
 make the effort she could leave her body as easily 
 as she undresses herself. It is no more difficult to 
 divest one's self of one's body than it is to put off 
 one garment and put on another. . . . And, some- 
 how, I think Yulun will do it to-night." 
 
 "Come hercT' 
 
 "It would be like her." Tressa laughed. "Isn't 
 it odd that she should have become ro enamoured of 
 Mr. Benton just seeing him there in the moonlight 
 that night at Orchid Lodge?" 
 
 For a moment the smile curved her lips, then the 
 shadow fell again across her eyes, veiling them in 
 that strange and lovely way which Cleves knew so 
 well; and he looked into her impenetrable eyes in 
 troubled silence. 
 
 "Victor," she said in a low voice, "were you afraid 
 to tell me that your man had been murdered?" 
 
 After a moment: "You always know everything," 
 he said unsteadily. "When did you learn it?" 
 
 "Just before Mr. Recklow told you." 
 
 "How did you learn it, Tressa?" 
 
 "I looked into our apartment."
 
 180 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "While you were telephoning." 
 
 "You mean you looked into our rooms from 
 here?' 
 
 "Yes, clairvoyantly." 
 
 "What did you see?" 
 
 "The laglamichi!" she said with a shudder. "Kail 
 The Toug of Djamouk is anointed at last!" 
 
 "Is that the beast of a Mongol who did this 
 murder ?" 
 
 "Djamouk and Prince Sanang planned it," she 
 said, trembling a little. "But that butchery was 
 Yaddin's work, I think. Kai ! The work of Yaddin- 
 ed-Din, Tougtchi to Djamouk the Fox!" 
 
 They stood confronting each other, the length of 
 the sitting-room between them. And after the silence 
 had lasted a full minute Cleves reddened and said: 
 "I am going to sleep on the couch at the foot of 
 your bed, Tressa." 
 
 His young wife reddened too. 
 
 He said: "This affair has thoroughly scared me. 
 I can't let you sleep out of my sight." 
 
 "I am quite safe. And you would have an un- 
 comfortable night," she murmured. 
 
 "Do you mind if I sleep on the couch, Tressa?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Will you call me when you are ready?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 She went into her bedroom and closed the door. 
 
 When he was ready he slipped a pistol into the 
 pocket of his dressing-gown, belted it over his py-
 
 AT THE RITZ 181 
 
 jamas, and walked into the sitting-room. His wife 
 called him presently, and he went in. Her night- 
 lamp was burning and she extended her hand to ex- 
 tinguish it. 
 
 "Could you sleep if it burns?" he asked bluntly. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Then let it burn. This business has got on my 
 nerves," he muttered. 
 
 They looked at each other in an expressionless 
 way. Both really understood how useless was this 
 symbol of protection this man the girl called hus- 
 band; how utterly useless his physical strength, 
 and the pistol sagging in the pocket of his dressing- 
 gown. Both understood that the only real projection 
 to be looked for must come from her from the 
 gifted and guardian mind of this young girl who lay 
 there looking at him from the pillows. 
 
 "Good-night," he said, flushing; "I'll do my best. 
 But only one of God's envoys, like you, knows how 
 to do battle with things that come out of hell." 
 
 After a moment's silence she said in a colourless 
 voice : "I wish you'd lie down on the bed." 
 
 "Had you rather I did?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 So he went slowly to the bed, placed his pistol 
 under the pillow, drew his dressing-gown around 
 him, and lay down. 
 
 After he had lain unstirring for half an hour: 
 "Try to sleep, Tressa," he said, without turning his 
 head.
 
 182 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Can't you seem to sleep, Victor?" she asked. 
 And he heard her turn her head. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Shall I help you?" 
 
 "Do you mean use hypnosis the power of sug- 
 gestion on me?" 
 
 "No. I can help you to sleep very gently. I 
 can make you very drowsy. . . . You are drowsy 
 now. . . . You are very close to the edge of sleep. 
 . . . Sleep, dear. . . . Sleep, easily, naturally, con- 
 fidently as a tired boy. . . . You are sleeping, . . . 
 deeply . . . sweetly . . . my dear . . . my dear, 
 dear husband."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 
 
 CLEVES opened his eyes. He was lying on his 
 left side. In the pink glow of the night-lamp 
 he saw his wife in her night-dress, seated side- 
 ways on the farther edge of the bed, talking to a 
 young girl. 
 
 The strange girl wore what appeared to be a 
 chamber-robe of frail gold tissue that clung to her 
 body and glittered as she moved. He had never 
 before seen such a dress; but he had seen the girl; 
 he recognised her instantly as the girl he had seen 
 turn to look back at Tressa as she crossed the phan- 
 tom bridge over that misty Florida river. And 
 Clever Comprehended that he was looking at Yulun. 
 
 But this charming young thing was no ghost, no 
 astral projection. This girl was warm, living, breath- 
 ing flesh. The delicate scent of her strange gar- 
 ments and of her hair, her very breath, was in the 
 air of the room. Her half-hushed but laughing voice 
 was deliciously human; her delicate little hands, ca- 
 ressing Tressa's, were too eagerly real to doubt. 
 
 Both talked at the same time, their animated 
 voices mingling in the breathless delight of the re- 
 union. Their exclamations, enchanting laughter, 
 183
 
 184 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 bubbling chatter, filled his ears. But not one word 
 of what they were saying to each other could he 
 understand. 
 
 Suddenly Tressa looked over her shoulder and 
 met his astonished eyes. 
 
 "Tokhta!" she exclaimed. "Yulun! My lord 
 is awake I" 
 
 Yulun swung around swiftly on the edge of the 
 bed and looked laughingly at Cleves. But when 
 her red lips unclosed she spoke to Tressa: and, 
 "Darling," she said in English, "I think your dear 
 lord remembers that he saw me on the Bridge of 
 Dreams. And heard the bells of Yian across the 
 mist." 
 
 Tressa said, laughing at her husband: "This is 
 Yulun, flame-slender, very white, loveliest in Yian. 
 On the rose-marble steps of the Yezidee Temple she 
 flung a stemless rose upon Djamouk's shroud, where 
 he had spread it like a patch of snow in the sun. 
 
 "And at the Lake of the Ghosts, where there is 
 freedom to love, for those who desire love,, came 
 Yaddin, Tougtchi to Djamouk the Fox, in search of 
 love and Yulun, flame-slim, and flower-white. . . . 
 Tell my dear lord, Yulun I" 
 
 Yulun laughed at Cleves out of her dark eyes that 
 slanted charmingly at the corners. 
 
 "Kail" she cried softly, clapping her palms. "I 
 took his roses and tore them with my hands till their 
 petals rained on him and their golden hearts were 
 a powdery cloud floating across the water. 
 
 "I said: 'Even the damned do not mate with
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 185 
 
 demons, my Tougtchi ! So go to the devil, my Ban- 
 neret, and may Erlik seize you!' " 
 
 Cleves, his ears ringing with the sweet confusion 
 of their girlish laughter, rose from his pillow, sup- 
 porting himself on one arm. 
 
 "You are Yulun. You are alive and real " 
 
 He looked at Tressa : "She is real, isn't she?" And, 
 to Yulun: "Where do you come from?" 
 
 The girl replied seriously: "I come from Yian." 
 She turned to Tressa with a dazzling smile : "Thou 
 knowest, my heart's gold, how it was I came. Tell 
 thy dear lord in thine own way, so that it shall be 
 simple for his understanding. . . . And now be- 
 cause my visit is ending I think thy dear lord should 
 sleep. Bid him sleep, my heart's goldl" 
 
 At that calm suggestion Cleves sat upright on the 
 bed, or attempted to. But sank back gently on his 
 pillow and met there a dark, delicious rush of drow- 
 siness. 
 
 He made an effort or tried to : the smooth, sweet 
 tide of sleep swept over him to the eyelids, leaving 
 him still and breathing evenly on his pillow. 
 
 The two girls leaned over and looked down at 
 him. 
 
 "Thy dear lord," murmured Yulun. "Does he 
 love thee, rosebud of Yian?" 
 
 "No," said Tressa, under her breath. 
 
 "Does he know thou art damned, heart of gold?" 
 
 "He says no soul is ever really harmed," whis- 
 pered Tressa.
 
 186 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Kail Has he never heard of the Slayer of 
 Souls?" exclaimed Yulun incredulously. 
 
 "My lord maintains that neither the Assassin of 
 Khorassan nor the Sheiks-el-Djebel of the Eight 
 Towers, nor their dark prince Erlik, can have power 
 over God to slay the human soul." 
 
 "Tokhta, Rose of Yianl Our souls were slain 
 there in the Yezfdee temple." 
 
 Tressa looked down at Cleves: 
 
 "My dear lord says no," she said under her 
 breath. 
 
 "And Sanang?" 
 
 Tressa paled: "His mind and mine did battle. I 
 tore my heart from his grasp. I have laid it, bleed- 
 ing, at my dear lord's feet. Let God judge between 
 us, Yulun." 
 
 "There was a day," whispered Yulun, "when 
 Prince Sanang went to the Lake of the Ghosts." 
 
 Tressa, very pallid, looked down at her sleeping 
 husband. She said: 
 
 "Prince Sanang came to the Lake of the Ghosts. 
 The snow of the cherry-trees covered the young 
 world. 
 
 "The water was clear as sunlight; and the lake 
 was afire with scarlet carp . . . Yulun beloved 
 the nightingale sang all night long all night long 
 . . . Then I saw Sanang shining, all gold, in the 
 moonlight . . . May God remember him in hell!" 
 
 "May God remember him." 
 
 "Sanang Noi'ane. May he be accursed in the 
 Namaz Gal"
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 187 
 
 "May he be tormented in Jehaunum! Sanang, 
 Slayer of Souls." 
 
 Tressa leaned forward on the bed, stretched her- 
 self out, and laid her face gently across her hus- 
 band's feet, touching them with her lips. 
 
 Then she straightened herself and sat up, sup- 
 ported by one hand, and looking silently down at the 
 sleeping man. 
 
 "No soul shall die," she said. "Niaz!" 
 
 "Is it written?" asked Yulun, surprised. 
 
 "My lord has said it." 
 
 "Allahou Ekber," murmured Yulun; "thy lord 
 is only a man." 
 
 Tressa said: "Neither the Tekbir nor the fatha, 
 nor the warning of Khidr, nor the Yacaz of the 
 Khagan, nor even the prayers of the Ten Imaums 
 are of any value to me unless my dear lord confirms 
 the truth of them with his own lips." 
 
 "AndErlik? Is he nothing, then?" 
 
 "Erlik!" repeated Tressa insolently. "Who is 
 Erlik but the servant of Satan who was stoned?" 
 
 Her beautiful, angry lips were suddenly distorted; 
 her blue eyes blazed. Then she spat, her mouth still 
 tremulous with hatred. She said in a voice shaking 
 with rage: 
 
 "Yulun, beloved! Listen attentively. I have slain 
 two of the Slayers of the Eight Towers. With God's 
 help I shall slay them all all! Djamouk, Yaddin, 
 Arrak Sou-Sou all! every one! Tiyang Khan, 
 Togrul, all shall I slay, even to the last one among 
 them!"
 
 188 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Sanang, also?" 
 
 "I leave him to God. It is a fearful thing to fall 
 into the hands of the living God!" 
 
 Yulun calmly paraphrased the cant phrase of the 
 Assassins: "For it is written that we belong to God 
 and we return to Him. Heart of gold, I shall exe- 
 cute my dutyl" 
 
 Then Yulun slipped from the edge of the bed to 
 the floor, and stood there looking oddly at Tressa, 
 her eyes rain-bright as though choking back tears 
 or laughter. 
 
 "Heart of a rose," she said in a suppressed voice, 
 "my time is nearly ended. ... So. ... I go to the 
 chamber of this strange young man who holds my 
 soul like a pearl afire between his hapds. ... I 
 think it it written that I shall love him." 
 
 Tressa rose also and placed her lips close to 
 Yulun's ear: "His name, beloved, is Benton. His 
 room is on this floor. Shall we make the effort to- 
 gether?" 
 
 "Yes," said Yulun. "Lay your body down upon 
 the bed beside your lord who sleeps so deeply. . . . 
 And now stretch out. . . . And fold both hands. 
 . . . And now put off thy body like a silken garment. 
 . . . So! And leave it there beside thy lord, 
 asleep." 
 
 They stood together for a moment, shining like 
 dewy shapes of tall flowers, whispering and laughing 
 together in the soft glow of the night lamp. 
 
 Cleves slept on, unstirring. There was the white
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 189 
 
 and sleeping figure of his wife lying on the bed be- 
 side him. 
 
 But Tressa and Yulun were already melting away 
 between the wall and the confused rosy radiance of 
 the lamp. 
 
 Benton, in night attire and chamber-robe belted in, 
 fresh from his bath and still drying his curly hair 
 on a rough towel, wandered back into his bedroom. 
 
 When his short, bright hair was dry, he lighted a 
 cigarette, took the automatic from his dresser, exam- 
 ined the clip, and shoved it under his pillow. 
 
 Then he picked up the little leather-bound Testa- 
 ment, seated himself, and opened it. And read 
 tranquilly while his cigarette burned. 
 
 When he was ready he turned out the ceiling light, 
 leaving only the night lamp lighted. Then he knelt 
 beside his bed, a custom surviving the nursery 
 period, and rested his forehead against his folded 
 hands. 
 
 Then, as he prayed, something snapped the thread 
 of prayer as though somebody had spoken aloud in 
 the still room; and, like one who has been suddenly 
 interrupted, he opened his eyes and looked around 
 and upward. 
 
 The silent shock of her presence passed presently. 
 He got up from his knees, looking at her all the 
 while. 
 
 "You are Yulun," he said very calmly. 
 
 The girl flushed brightly and rested one hand on 
 the foot of the bed. 
 
 "Do you remember in the moonlight where you
 
 190 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 walked along the hedge of white hibiscus and olean- 
 der that night you said good-bye to Tressa in the 
 South?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Twice," she said, laughing, "you stopped to peer 
 at the blossoms in the moonlight." 
 
 "I thought I saw a face among them." 
 
 "You were not sure whether it was flowers or a 
 girl's face looking at you from the blossoming hedge 
 of white hibiscus," said Yulun. 
 
 "I know now," he said in an odd, still voice, unlike 
 his own. 
 
 "Yes, it was I," she murmured. And of a sudden 
 the girl dropped to her knees without a sound and 
 laid her head on the velvet carpet at his feet. 
 
 So swiftly, noiselessly was it done that he had 
 not comprehended had not moved when she sat 
 upright, resting on her knees, and grasped the collar 
 of her tunic with both gemmed hands. 
 
 "Have pity on me, lord of my lost soul !" she cried 
 softly. 
 
 Benton stooped in a dazed way to lift the girl; but 
 found himself knee deep in a snowy drift of white 
 hibiscus blossoms touched nothing but silken petals 
 waded in them as he stepped forward. And saw 
 her standing before him still grasping the collar of 
 her golden tunic. 
 
 A great white drift of bloom lay almost waist 
 deep between them ; the fragrance of oleander, too, 
 was heavy in the room. 
 
 "There are years of life before the flaming gates
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 191 
 
 of Jehaunum open. And I am very young," said 
 Yulun wistfully. 
 
 Somebody else laughed in the room. Turning his 
 head, he saw Tressa standing by the empty fireplace. 
 
 "What you see and hear need not disturb you," 
 she said, looking at Benton out of brilliant eyes. 
 "There is no god but God; and His prophet has 
 been called by many names." And to Yulun : "Have 
 I not told you that nothing can harm our souls?" 
 
 Yulun's expression altered and she turned to Ben- 
 ton: "Say it to me !" she pleaded. 
 
 As in a dream he heard his own words : "Nothing 
 can ever really harm the soul." 
 
 Yulun's hands fell from her tunic collar. Very 
 slowly she lifted her head, looking at him out of 
 lovely, proud young eyes. 
 
 She said, evenly, her still gaze on him: "I am 
 Yulun of the Temple. My heart is like a blazing 
 pearl which you hold between your hands. May 
 the four Blessed Companions witness the truth of 
 what I say." 
 
 Then a delicate veil of colour wrapped her white 
 skin from throat to temple; she looked at Benton 
 with sudden and exquisite distress, frightened and 
 ashamed at his silence. 
 
 In the intense stillness Benton moved toward her. 
 Into his outstretched hands her two hands fell; but, 
 bending above them, his lips touched only two white 
 hibiscus flowers that lay fresh and dewy in his 
 palms. 
 
 Bewildered, be straightened up; and saw the girl
 
 192 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 standing by the mantel beside Tressa, who had 
 caught her by the left hand. 
 
 "Tokhta! Look out!" she said distinctly. 
 
 Suddenly he saw two men in the room, close to 
 him their broad faces, slanting eyes, and sparse 
 beards thrust almost against his shoulder. 
 
 "Djamouk! Yaddin-ed-Din!" cried Tressa in a 
 terrible voice. But quick as a flash Yulun tore a 
 white sheet from the bed, flung it on the floor, and, 
 whipping a tiny, jewelled knife from her sleeve, 
 threw it glittering upon the sheet at the feet of the 
 two men. 
 
 "One shroud for two souls I" she said breathlessly. 
 " and a knife like that to sever them from their 
 bodies!" 
 
 The two men sprang backward as the sheet 
 touched their feet, and now they stood there as 
 though confounded. 
 
 "Djamouk, Kahn of the Fifth Tower!" cried 
 Tressa in a clear voice, "you have put off your body 
 like a threadbare cloak, and your form that stands 
 there Is only your mind ! And it fs only the evil will 
 of Yaddin in the shape of his body that confronts 
 us in this room of a man you have doomed!" 
 
 Yulun, intent as a young leopardess on her prey, 
 moved soundlessly toward Yaddin. 
 
 "Tougtchi!" she said coldly, "you did murder this 
 day, my Banneret, and the Toug of Djamouk has 
 been greased. Now look out for yourself !" 
 
 "Don't stirl" came Tressa's warning voice, as 
 Benton snatched his pistol from the pillow. "Don't
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 193 
 
 fire ! Those men have no real substance ! For God's 
 sake don't fire ! I tell you they have no bodies !" 
 
 Suddenly something some force flung Benton 
 on the bed. The two men did not seem to touch him 
 at all, but he lay there struggling, crushed, held by 
 something that was strangling him. 
 
 Through his swimming eyes he saw Yaddin trying 
 to drive a long nail into his skull with a hammer, 
 felt the piercing agony of the first crashing blow, 
 struggled upright, drenched in blood, his ears ring- 
 ing with the screaming of Yaddin. 
 
 Then, there in the little rococo bedroom of the 
 Ritz-Carlton, began a strange and horrible strug- 
 gle the more dreadful because the struggle was not 
 physical and the combatants never touched each 
 other scarcely moved at all. 
 
 Yaddin, still screaming, confronted Yulun. The 
 girl's eyes were ablaze, her lips parted with the vio- 
 lence of her breathing. And Yaddin writhed and 
 screamed under the terrible concentration of her 
 gaze, his inferior but ferocious mind locked with 
 her mind in deadly battle. 
 
 The girl said slowly, showing a glimmer of white 
 teeth: "Your will to do evil to my young lord is 
 breaking, Yaddin-ed-Din. . ... I am breaking it. 
 The nail and hammer were but symbols. It was 
 your brain that brooded murder that willed he 
 should die as though shattered by lightning when that 
 blood-vessel burst in his brain!" 
 
 "Sorceress!" shrieked Yaddin, "what are you do-
 
 194 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 ing to my heart, where my body lies asleep in a berth 
 on the Montreal Express!" 
 
 "Your heart is weak, Yaddin. Soon the valves 
 shall fail. A negro porter shall discover you dead 
 in your berth, my Banneret!" 
 
 The man's swarthy face became livid with the ter- 
 rific mental battle. 
 
 "Let me go back to my body !" he panted. "What 
 are you doing to me that I can not go back? I will 
 go back ! I wish it ! I " 
 
 "Let us go back and rejoin our bodies!" cried 
 Djamouk in an agonised voice. "There are teeth 
 in my throat, deep in my throat, biting and tearing 
 out the cords." 
 
 "Cancer," said Tressa calmly. "Your body shall 
 die of it while your soul stumbles on through dark- 
 ness." 
 
 "My Tougtchi!" shouted Djamouk, "I hear my 
 soul bidding my body farewell! I must go before 
 my mind expires in the terrible gaze of this young 
 sorceress!" 
 
 He turned, drifted like something misty to the 
 solid wall. 
 
 "My soul be ransom for yours!" cried Yulun to 
 Tressa. "Bar that man's path to life !" 
 
 Tressa flung out her right hand and, with her fore- 
 finger, drew a barrier through space, bar above bar. 
 
 And Benton, half swooning on his bed, saw a cage 
 of terrible and living light penning in Djamouk, who 
 beat upon the incandescent bars and grasped them
 
 YULUN THE BELOVED 195 
 
 and clawed his way about, squealing like a tortured 
 rat in a red-hot cage. 
 
 Through the deafening tumult Yulun's voice cut 
 like a sword: 
 
 "Their bodies are dying, Heart of a Rose! . . . 
 Listen ! I hear their souls bidding their minds fare- 
 well!" 
 
 And, after a dreadful silence: "The train speed- 
 ing north carries two dead men! God is God. 
 Niaz!" 
 
 The bars of living fire faded. Two cinder-like and 
 shapeless shadows floated and eddied like whitened 
 ashes stirred by a wind on the hearth; then drifted 
 through the lamp-light, fading, dissolving, lost grad- 
 ually in thin air. 
 
 Tressa, leaning back against the mantel, covered 
 her face with both hands. 
 
 Yulun crept to the bed where Benton lay, breath- 
 ing evenly in deepest sleep. 
 
 With the sheer sleeve of her tunic she wiped the 
 blood from his face. And, at her touch, the wound 
 in the temple closed and the short, bright hair dried 
 and curled over a forehead as clean and fresh as a 
 boy's. 
 
 Then Yulun laid her lips against his, rested so a 
 moment. 
 
 "Seek me, dear lord," she whispered. "Or send 
 me a sign and I shall come." 
 
 And, after a pause, she said, her lips scarcely 
 stirring: "Love me. My heart is a flaming pearl 
 burning between your hands."
 
 196 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Then she lifted her head. 
 
 But Tressa had rejoined her body, where it lay 
 asleep beside her deeply sleeping husband. 
 
 So Yulun stood a moment, her eyes remote. Then, 
 after a while, the little rococo bedroom in the Ritz- 
 Carlton was empty save for a young man asleep on 
 the bed, holding in his clenched hand a white hibiscus 
 blossom.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY 
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY PRESIDENT TIN- 
 TINTO, Chief Executive of one of the 
 newer and cruder republics, visiting New 
 York incognito with his Secretaries of War and of 
 the Navy, had sent for John Recklow. And now 
 the reception was in full operation. 
 
 Recklow was explaining. "In the beginning," he 
 said, "the Bolsheviks' aim was to destroy everything 
 and everybody except themselves, and then to re- 
 organise for their own benefit what was left of a 
 wrecked world. That was their programme " 
 
 "Quite a programme," interrupted the Secretary 
 of War, with something that almost resembled a 
 giggle. But his prominent eyes continued to stare 
 at Recklow untouched by the mirth which stretched 
 his large, silly mouth. 
 
 The face of the Secretary of the Navy resembled 
 the countenance of a benevolent manatee. The vis- 
 age of the President was a study in tinted chalks. 
 
 Recklow said: "To combat that sort of Bol- 
 shevism was a business that we of the United States 
 Secret Service understood or supposed we under- 
 stood. 
 
 197
 
 138 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Then, suddenly, out of unknown Mongolia and 
 into the civilised world stepped eight men." 
 
 "Yezidees," said the President mechanically. 
 "Your Government has sent me a very full re- 
 port." 
 
 "Yezidees of the Sect of the Assassins," con- 
 tinued Recklow; " the most ancient sect in the 
 world surviving from ancient times the Sorcerers 
 of Asia. And, as it was in ancient times, so it is 
 now: the Yezidees are devil worshipers; their god 
 is Satan; his prophet is Erlik, Prince of Darkness; 
 his regent on earth is the old man of Mount Ala- 
 mout; and to this ancient and sinister title a Yezi- 
 dee sorcerer called Prince Sanang, or Sanang No'i- 
 ane, has succeeded. 
 
 "His murderous deputies were the Eight Khans 
 of the Eight Towers. Four of these assassins are 
 dead Gutchlug, Yarghouz, Djamouk the Fox, and 
 Yaddin-ed-Din. One is in prison charged with mur- 
 der, Albert Feke. 
 
 "Four of the sorcerers remain alive: Tiyang 
 Khan, Togrul, Arrak, Sou-Sou, called The Squirrel, 
 and the Old Man of the Mountain himself, Sai- 
 Sanang, Prince of the Yezidees." 
 
 Recklow paused; the pop-eyes of the War Secre- 
 tary were upon him ; the benevolent manatee gazed 
 mildly at him; the countenance of the President 
 seemed more like a Rocky Mountain goat than ever 
 chiselled out of a block of tinted chalk. 
 
 Recklow said: "To the menace of Bolshevism, 
 which endangers this Republic and yours, has been
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY 199 
 
 added a more terrible threat the threat of pow- 
 erful and evil minds made formidable by psychic 
 knowledge. 
 
 "For these Yezidee Sorcerers are determined to 
 conquer, seize, and subdue the minds of mankind. 
 They are here for that frightful purpose. Power- 
 fully, terrifically equipped to surprise and capture 
 the unarmed minds of our people, enslave their very 
 thoughts and use them to their own purposes, these 
 Sorcerers of the Yezidees assumed control of the 
 Bolsheviki, who were merely envious and ferocious 
 bandits, but whose crippled minds are now utterly 
 enslaved by these Assassins from Asia. 
 
 "And this is what the United States Secret Serv- 
 ice has to combat. And its weapons are not war- 
 rants, not pistols. For in this awful battle between 
 decency and evil, it is mind against mind in an occult 
 death grapple. And our only weapon against these 
 minds made powerful by psychic knowledge and 
 made terrible by an esoteric ability akin to what is 
 called black magic, our only weapon is the mind of 
 a young girl." 
 
 "I understand," said the President, "that she be- 
 came an adept in occult practices while imprisoned 
 in the Yezidee Temple of Erlik at Yian." 
 
 Recklow looked into the President's face, which 
 had grown very pale. 
 
 "Yes, sir," he said. "God alone knows what this 
 child learned in the Yezidee Temple. All I know 
 is that with this knowledge she has met the Yezidees 
 in a battle of minds, has halted them, confounded
 
 200 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 them, fought them with their own occult knowledge, 
 and has slain four of them." 
 
 The intense silence was broken by the frivolous 
 titter of the Secretary of War: 
 
 "Of course I don't believe any of this supernatu- 
 ral stuff," he said with the split grin which did not 
 modify his protruding stare. "This girl is merely a 
 clever detective, that is the gist of the matter. And 
 I don't believe anything else." 
 
 "Perhaps, sir, you will believe this, then," said 
 John Recklow quietly. "I cut it from the Times 
 this morning." And he handed the clipping to the 
 Secretary of War. 
 
 NEW PLOT IN EAST 
 
 Moslem and Hindu Conspirators 
 
 Have Formed Secret 
 
 Organisation 
 
 Have World Revolution in View 
 
 Think to Rouse Asia, America, and Africa 
 
 to Outbreaks by Their 
 
 Propaganda. 
 
 Copyright, I9i9,by The New York Times Company. 
 Special Cable to The New York Times. 
 
 'July i. A significant event has recently taken 
 place. Under the name of the Oriental League has 
 recently been established a central organisation unit-
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY 201 
 
 ing all the various secret societies of Moslem and 
 Hindu nationalists. The aim of the new association 
 is to prepare for joint revolutionary action in Asia, 
 America, and Africa. 
 
 The effects of this vast conspiracy may already be 
 traced in recent events in Egypt, India, and Afghan- 
 istan. For the first time, through the creation of 
 this league, the racial and religious differences which 
 have divided Eastern conspirators have been over- 
 come. The Ottoman League, founded by Mahmud 
 Muktar Pasha, Munir Pasha, and Ahmed Rechid 
 Bey, has adhered to the new organisation. So have 
 the extreme Egyptian nationalists and the Hindu rev- 
 olutionary group, "Pro India," emissaries of which 
 were recently sentenced for bringing bombs into 
 Switzerland during the war at the instigation of the 
 German General Staff. 
 
 At a "Constituent Assembly" of the league, which 
 took place in Yian, there were present, besides Young 
 Turks, Egyptians and Hindus, delegates represent- 
 ing Persia, Afghanistan, Algeria, Morocco, and 
 Mongolia. 
 
 The league is of Mongolian origin. Its leading 
 spirit is a certain Prince Sanang, of whom little is 
 known. 
 
 Associated with this mischievous and rather mys- 
 terious Mongolian personage are three better known 
 criminals, now fugitives from justice Talaat, En- 
 ver, and Djemal. It is to Enver Pasha's talent for 
 intrigue that the union between Moslems and Hin- 
 dus, the most striking and dangerous feature of the 
 movement, is chiefly due. 
 
 Considerable funds are at the disposal of the 
 league. These are partly supplied from Germany. 
 Besides enjoying the support of the Germans, the
 
 202 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 league is also in close touch with Lenine, who very 
 soon after his advent to power organised an Orien- 
 tal Department in Moscow. 
 
 The alliance between the league and the Russian 
 Bolsheviki was brought about by the notorious Ger- 
 man Socialist agent, "Parvus," who is now in Swit- 
 zerland. Many weeks ago he conferred with the 
 Soviet rulers in Moscow, whence he went to Afghan- 
 istan, hoping to reorganise the new Amir's army and 
 establish lines of communication for propaganda in 
 India. 
 
 Evidence exists that the recent insurrection in 
 Egypt, the sudden attack of the Afghans, and the 
 rising in India, remarkable for co-operation between 
 Moslems and Hindus, were connected with the ac- 
 tivities of the league. 
 
 The Secretary looked up after he finished the 
 reading. 
 
 "I don't see anything about Black Magic in this?" 
 he remarked flippantly. 
 
 Recklow's features became very grave. 
 
 "I think," he said, "that everybody myself in- 
 cluded and, with all respect, even yourself, sir, 
 and your honourable colleague, and perhaps even 
 his Excellency your President, should be on per- 
 petual guard over their minds, and the thoughts that 
 range there, lest, surreptitiously, stealthily, some 
 taint of Yezidee infection lodge there and take root 
 and spread perhaps throughout your new Re- 
 public."
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY $03 
 
 The Secretary of War grinned. "They say I'm 
 something of a socialist already," he chuckled. "Do 
 you think your magic Yezidees are responsible ?" 
 
 The President, troubled and pallid, gazed stead- 
 ily at Recklow. 
 
 "Mine is a single-track mind," he remarked as 
 though to himself. 
 
 Recklow said nothing. It is one kind of mind, 
 after all. However, single-track roads are now ob- 
 solete. 
 
 "A single-track mind," repeated the President. 
 "And I should not like anything to happen to the 
 switch. It would mean ditching or a rusty siding 
 at best. . . . Please do all that is possible to get 
 those four Yezidees, Mr. Recklow." 
 
 Recklow said calmly: "Our only hope is in this 
 young girl, Tressa Nome, who is now Mrs. Cleves." 
 
 "My conscience!" piped the Secretary of the 
 Navy. "What would happen to us if these Yezi- 
 dees should murder her?" 
 
 "God knows," replied John Recklow, unsmiling. 
 
 "Why not put her aboard our new dreadnought?" 
 suggested the Secretary, "and keep her cruising un- 
 til you United States Secret Service fellows get the 
 rest of these infernal Yezidees and clap 'em into 
 jail?" 
 
 "We can do nothing without her," said Recklow 
 sombrely. 
 
 There was a painful silence. The President joined 
 his finger tips and stared palely into space.
 
 204 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "May I not say," he suggested, "that I think it a 
 vital necessity that these Yezidees be caught and de- 
 stroyed before 'they do any damage to the minds 
 of myself and my cabinet?" 
 
 "God grant it, sir," said Recklow grimly. 
 
 "Mine," murmured the President, "is a single- 
 track mind. I should be very much annoyed if any- 
 body tampered with the rails very much annoyed 
 indeed, Mr. Recklow." 
 
 "They mustn't murder that girl," said the Secre- 
 tary of the Navy. "Do you need any Marines, Mr. 
 Recklow? Why not ask your Government for a 
 few?" 
 
 Recklow rose : "Mr. President," he said, "I shall 
 not deny that my Government is very deeply dis- 
 turbed by this situation. In the beginning, these 
 eight Assassins, and Sanang, came here for the pur- 
 pose of attacking, overpowering, and enslaving the 
 minds of the people of the United States and of 
 the South American Republics. 
 
 "But now, after four of their infamous colleagues 
 have been destroyed, the ferocious survivors, thor- 
 oughly alarmed, have turned their every energy to- 
 ward accomplishing the death of Mrs. Cleves ! Why, 
 sir, scarcely a day passes but that some attempt upon 
 her life is made by these Yezidees. 
 
 "Scarcely a day passes that this young girl is not 
 suddenly summoned to defend her mind as well as 
 her body against the occult attacks of these Mongol 
 Sorcerers. Yes, sir, Sorcerers!" repeated Recklow,
 
 HIS EXCELLENCY 205 
 
 his calm voice deep with controlled passion, " what- 
 ever your honourable Secretary of War may think 
 about it I" 
 
 His cold, grey eyes measured the President as he 
 stood there. 
 
 "Mr. President, I am at my wits' end to protect 
 her from assassination ! Her husband is always with 
 her Victor Cleves, sir, of our Secret Service. But 
 wherever he takes her these devils follow and send 
 their emissaries to watch her, to follow, to attempt 
 her mental destruction or her physical death. 
 
 "There is no end to their stealthy cunning, to 
 their devilish devices, to their hellish ingenuity! 
 
 "And all we can do is to guard her person from 
 the approach of strangers, and stand ready, physi- 
 cally, to aid her. 
 
 "She is our only barrier your only defence be- 
 tween civilisation and horrors worse than Bolshe- 
 vism. 
 
 "] believe, Mr. President, that civilisation in 
 North and South America in your own Republic as 
 well as in ours depends, literally, upon the safety 
 of Tressa Cleves. For, if the Yezidees kill her, 
 then I do not see what is to save civilisation from 
 utter disintegration and total destruction." 
 
 There was a silence. Recklow was not certain, 
 that the President had been listening. 
 
 His Excellency sat with finger tips joined, gazing 
 pallidly into space; and Recklow heard him mur- 
 muring under his breath and all to himself, as
 
 206 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 though to fix the deathless thought forever in his 
 brain: 
 
 "May I not say that mine is a single-track mind? 
 May I not say it? May I not, may I not, not, 
 not, not "
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 SA-N'SA 
 
 "TUNE sunshine poured through the window of his 
 bedroom in the Ritz; and Cleves had just fin- 
 ished dressing when he heard his wife's voice in 
 the adjoining sitting-room. 
 
 He had not supposed that Tressa was awake. He 
 hastened to tie his tie and pull on a smoking jacket, 
 listening all the while to his wife's modulated but 
 gay young voice. 
 
 Then he opened the sitting-room door and went 
 in. And found his wife entirely alone. 
 
 She looked up at him, her lips still parted as 
 though checked in what she had been saying, the 
 smile still visible in her blue eyes. 
 
 "Who on earth are you talking to?" he asked, his 
 bewildered glance sweeping the sunny room again. 
 
 She did not reply; her smile faded as a spot of 
 sunlight wanes, veiled by a cloud yet a glimmer of 
 it remained in her gaze as he came over to her. 
 
 "I thought they'd brought our breakfast," he said, 
 " hearing your voice. . . . Did you sleep well?" 
 
 "Yes, Victor." 
 
 He seated himself, and his perplexed scrutiny in- 
 cluded her frail morning robe of China silk, her 
 207
 
 208 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 lovely bare arms, and her splendid hair twisted up 
 and pegged down with a jade dagger. Around her 
 bare throat and shoulders, too, was a magnificent 
 necklace of imperial jade which he had never be- 
 fore seen; and on one slim, white finger a superb 
 jade ring. 
 
 "By Jove 1" he said, "you're very exotic this morn- 
 ing, Tressa. I never before saw that negligee ef- 
 fect." 
 
 The girl laughed, glanced at her ring, lifted a frail 
 silken fold and examined the amazing embroidery. 
 
 "I wore it at the Lake of the Ghosts," she said. 
 
 The name of that place always chilled him. He 
 had begun to hate it, perhaps because of all that he 
 did not know about it about his wife's strange girl- 
 hood about Yian and the devil's Temple there 
 and about Sanang. 
 
 He said coldly but politely that the robe was 
 unusual and the jade very wonderful. 
 
 The alteration in his voice and expression did not 
 escape her. It meant merely masculine jealousy, but 
 Tressa never dreamed he cared in that way. 
 
 Breakfast was brought, served; and presently 
 these two young people were busy with their melons, 
 coffee, and toast in the sunny room high above the 
 softened racket of traffic echoing through avenue 
 and street below. 
 
 "Recklow telephoned me this morning," he re- 
 marked. 
 
 She looked up, her face serious. 
 
 ".Recklow says that Yezidee mischief is taking vis-
 
 SA-N'SA 209 
 
 ible shape. The Socialist Party is going to be split 
 into bits and a new party, impudently and publicly 
 announcing itself as the Communist Party of Amer- 
 ica, is being organised. Did you ever hear of any- 
 thing as shameless as outrageous in this Repub- 
 lic?" 
 
 She said very quietly: "Sanang has taken pris- 
 oner the minds of these wretched people. He and 
 his remaining Yezidees are giving battle to the un- 
 armed minds of our American people." 
 
 "Gutchlug is dead," said Cleves, " and Yarg- 
 houz and Djamouk, and Yaddin." 
 
 "But Tiyang Khan is alive, and Togrul, and that 
 cunning demon Arrak Sou-Sou, called The Squir- 
 rel," she said. She bent her head, considering the 
 jade ring on her finger. " And Prince Sanang," 
 she added in a low voice. 
 
 "Why didn't you let me shoot him when I had 
 the chance?" said Cleves harshly. 
 
 So abrupt was his question, so rough his sudden 
 manner, that the girl looked up in dismayed sur- 
 prise. Then a deep colour stained her face. 
 
 "Once," she said, "Prince Sanang held my heart 
 prisoner as Erlik held my soul. ... I told you 
 that." 
 
 "Is that the reason you gave the fellow a chance?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Oh. . . . And possibly you gave Sanang a 
 chance because he still holds your affections !" 
 
 She said, crimson with the pain of the accusation : 
 "I tore my heart out of his keeping. ... I told you
 
 210 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 that. . . . And, believing trying to believe what 
 you say to me, I have tried to tear my soul out of 
 the claws of Erlik. . . . Why are you angry?" 
 
 "I don't know. . . . I'm not angry. . . . The 
 whole horrible situation is breaking my nerve, I 
 guess. . . . With whom were you talking before I 
 came in?" 
 
 After a silence the girl's smile glimmered. 
 
 "I'm afraid you won't like it if I tell you." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "You such things perplex and worry you. . . . 
 I am afraid you won't like me any the better if I 
 tell you who it was I had been talking with." 
 
 His intent gaze never left her. "I want you to 
 tell me," he repeated. 
 
 "I I was talking with Sa-n'sa," she faltered. 
 
 "With whom?" 
 
 "With Sa-n'sa. ... We called her Sansa." 
 
 "Who the dickens is Sansa?" 
 
 "We were three comrades at the Temple," she 
 said timidly, " Yulun, Sansa, and myself. We 
 loved each other. We always went to the Lake of 
 the Ghosts together for protection " 
 
 "Go on!" 
 
 "Sansa was a girl of the Aroulads, born at Buldak 
 as was Temujin. The night she was born three 
 moon-rainbows made circles around her Ya'ilak. 
 The Baroulass horsemen saw this and prayed loudly 
 in their saddles. Then they galloped to Yian and 
 came crawling on their bellies to Sanang Noiane with 
 the news of the miracle. And Sanang came with a
 
 SA-N'SA 211 
 
 thousand riders in leather armour. And, 'What is this 
 child's name?' he shouted, riding into the Ya'ilak with 
 his black banners flapping around him like devil's 
 wings. 
 
 "A poor Manggoud came out of the tent of skins, 
 carrying the new born infant, and touched his head 
 to Sanang's stirrup. 'This babe is called Tchagane,' 
 he said, trembling all over. 'No !' cries Sanang, 'she 
 is called Sansa. Give her to me and may Erlik seize 
 you!' 
 
 "And he took the baby on his saddle in front of 
 him and struck his spurs deep; and so came Sansa to 
 Yian under a roaring rustle of black silk banners. 
 . . . It is so written in the Book of Iron. . . . Alla- 
 hou Ekber." 
 
 Cleves had leaned his elbow on the table, his fore- 
 head rested in his palm. 
 
 Perhaps he was striving in a bewildered way to 
 reconcile such occult and amazing things with the 
 year 1920 with the commonplace and noisy city of 
 New York with this pretty, modern, sunlit sitting- 
 room in the Ritz-Carlton on Madison Avenue with 
 this girl in her morning negligee opposite, her coffee 
 and melon fragrant at her elbow, her wonderful blue 
 eyes resting on him. 
 
 "Sansa," he repeated slowly, as though striving to 
 grasp even a single word from the confusion of 
 names and phrases that were sounding still in his 
 ears like the vibration of distant and unfamiliar seas. 
 
 "Is this the girl you were talking with just now?
 
 212 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 In in this room?" he added, striving to under- 
 stand. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "She wasn't here, of course." 
 
 "Her body was not." 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 Tressa said in her sweet, humorous way: "You 
 must try to accustom yourself to such things, Victor. 
 You know that Yulun talks to me. ... I wanted to 
 talk to Sansa. The longing awakened me. So / 
 made the effort." 
 
 "And she came I mean the part of her which is 
 not her body." 
 
 "Yes, she came. We talked very happily while 
 I was bathing and dressing. Then we came in here. 
 She is such a darling!" 
 
 "Where is she?" 
 
 "In Yian, feeding her silk-worms and making a 
 garden. You see, Sansa is quite wealthy now, be- 
 cause when the Japanese came she filled a bullock 
 cart with great lumps of spongy gold from the Tem- 
 ple and filled another cart with Yu-stone, and took 
 the Hezar of Baroulass horsemen on guard at the 
 Lake of the Ghosts. And with this Keutch, riding 
 a Soubz horse, and dressed like an Urieng lancer, my 
 pretty little comrade Tchagane, who is called Sansa, 
 marched north preceded by two kettle-drums and a 
 toug with two tails " 
 
 Tressa's clear laughter checked her; she clapped 
 her hands, breathless with mirth at the picture she 
 evoked.
 
 SA-N'SA 213 
 
 "Kai!" she laughed; "what adorable impudence 
 has Sansa! Neither Tchortcha nor Khiounnou 
 dared ask her who were her seven ancestors ! No ! 
 And when her caravan came to the lovely Yliang 
 river, my darling Sansa rode out and grasped the 
 lance from her Tougtchi and drove the point deep 
 into the fertile soil, crying in a clear voice : 'A place 
 for Tchagane and her people ! Make room for the 
 toug!' 
 
 "Then her Manggoud, who carried the spare steel 
 tip for her lance, got out of his saddle and, gather- 
 ing a handful of mulberry leaves, rubbed the shaft 
 of the lance till it was all pale green. 
 
 ' 'Toug iaglachakho !' cries my adorable Sansa ! 
 'Build me here my Urdu ! * my Mocalla ! ** And 
 upon it pitch my tent of skins I" 
 
 Again Tressa's laughter checked her, and she 
 strove to control it with the jade ring pressed to her 
 lips. 
 
 "Oh, Victor," she added in a stifled voice, looking 
 at him out of eyes full of mischief, "you don't real- 
 ise how funny it was Sansa and her toug and her 
 Urdu Oh, Allah! the bones of Tchinguiz must 
 have rattled in his tomb I" 
 
 Her infectious laughter evoked a responsive but 
 perplexed smile from Cleves; but it was the smile of 
 a bewildered man who has comprehended very little 
 of an involved jest; and he looked around at the 
 modern room as though to find his bearings. 
 
 * Urdu = An imperial encampment. 
 
 * Mocalla = A platform used as a Moslem pulpit.
 
 214 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Suddenly Tressa leaned forward swiftly and laid 
 one hand on his. 
 
 "You don't think all this is very funny. You don't 
 like it," she said in soft concern. 
 
 "It isn't that, Tressa. But this is New York City 
 in the year 1920. And I can't I absolutely can not 
 get into touch hook up, mentally, with such things 
 with the unreal Oriental life that is so familiar 
 to you." 
 
 She nodded sympathetically: "I know. You feel 
 like a Mergued Pagan from Lake Baikal when all 
 the lamps are lighted in the Mosque ; like a camel 
 driver with his jade and gold when he enters Yar- 
 kand at sunrise." 
 
 "Probably I feel like that," said Cleves, laughing 
 outright. "I take your word, dear, anyway." 
 
 But he took more; he picked up her soft hand 
 where it still rested on his, pressed it, and instantly 
 reddened because he had done it. And Tressa's 
 bright flush responded so quickly that neither of 
 them understood, and both misunderstood. 
 
 The girl rose with heightened colour, not knowing 
 why she stood up or what she meant to do. And 
 Cleves, misinterpreting her emotion as a silent re- 
 buke to the invasion of that convention tacitly ac- 
 cepted between them, stood up, too, and began to 
 speak carelessly of commonplace things. 
 
 She made the effort to reply, scarcely knowing 
 what she was saying, so violently had his caress dis- 
 turbed her heart, and she was still speaking when 
 their telephone rang.
 
 SA-N'SA 215 
 
 Cleves went; listened, then, still listening, sum- 
 moned Tressa to his side with a gesture. 
 
 "It's Selden," he said in a low voice. "He says 
 he has the Yezidee Arrak Sou-Sou under observa- 
 tion, and that he needs you desperately. Will you 
 help us?" 
 
 "I'll go, of course," she replied, turning quite 
 pale. 
 
 Cleves nodded, still listening. After a while: 
 "All right. We'll be there. Good-bye," he said 
 sharply; and hung up. 
 
 Then he turned and looked at his wife. 
 
 "I wish to God," he muttered, "that this business 
 were ended. I I can't bear to have you go." 
 
 "I am not afraid. . . . Where is it?" 
 
 "I never heard of the place before. We're to 
 meet Selden at Tool's Acre.' " 
 
 "Where is it, Victor?" 
 
 "I don't know. Selden says there are no roads, 
 not even a spotted trail. It's a wilderness left 
 practically blank by the Geological Survey. Only 
 the contours are marked, and Selden tells me that 
 the altitudes are erroneous and the unnamed lakes 
 and water courses are all wrong. He says it is his 
 absolute conviction that the Geological Survey never 
 penetrated this wilderness at all, but merely skirted 
 it and guessed at what lay inside, because the map 
 he has from Washington is utterly misleading, and 
 the entire region is left blank except for a few 
 vague blue lines and spots indicating water, and a 
 few heights marked '1800.' "
 
 216 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 He turned and began to pace the sitting-room, 
 frowning, perplexed, undecided. 
 
 "Selden tells me," he said, "that the Yezidee, 
 Arrak Sou-Sou, is in there and very busy doing 
 something or other. He says that he can do noth- 
 ing without you, and will explain why when we meet 
 him." 
 
 "Yes, Victor." 
 
 Cleves turned on his heel and came over to where 
 his wife stood beside the sunny window. 
 
 "I hate to ask you to go. I know that was the 
 understanding. But this incessant danger your 
 constant peril " 
 
 "That does not count when I think of my coun- 
 try's peril," she said in a quiet voice. "When are 
 we to start? And what shall I pack in my trunk?" 
 
 "Dear child," he said with a brusque laugh, "it's 
 a wilderness and we carry what we need on our 
 backs. Selden meets us at a place called Glenwild, 
 on the edge of this wilderness, and we follow him 
 in on our two legs." 
 
 He glanced across at the mantel clock. 
 
 "If you'll dress," he said nervously, "we'll go to 
 some shop that outfits sportsmen for the North. Be- 
 cause, if we can, we ought to leave on the one o'clock 
 train." 
 
 She smiled; came up to him. "Don't worry about 
 me," she said. "Because I also am nervous and 
 tired ; and I mean to make an end of every Yezidee 
 remaining in America." 
 
 "Sanang, too?"
 
 SA-N'SA 217 
 
 They both flushed deeply. 
 
 She said in a steady voice: "Between God and 
 Erlik there is a black gulf where a million million 
 stars hang, lighting a million million other worlds. 
 
 "Prince Sanang's star glimmers there. It is a sun, 
 called Yramid. And it lights the planet, Yu-tsung. 
 Let him reign there between God and Erlik." 
 
 "You will slay this man?" 
 
 "God forbid I" she said, shuddering. "But I shall 
 send him to his own star. Let my soul be ransom for 
 his! And may Allah judge between us between 
 this man and me." 
 
 Then, in the still, sunny room, the girl turned to 
 face the East. And her husband saw her lips move 
 as though speaking, but heard no sound. 
 
 "What on earth are you saying there, all to your- 
 self?" he demanded at last. 
 
 She turned her head and looked at him across her 
 left shoulder. 
 
 ""I asked Sansa to help me. . . . And she says 
 she will." 
 
 Cleves nodded in a dazed way. Then he opened 
 a window and leaned there in the sunshine, looking 
 down into Madison Avenue. And the roar of traffic 
 seemed to soothe his nerves. 
 
 But "Good heavens!" he thought; "do such things 
 really go on in New York in 1920! Is the entire 
 world becoming a little crazy? Am I really in my 
 right mind when I believe that the girl I married is 
 talking, without wireless, to another girl in China 1"
 
 218 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 He leaned there heavily, gazing down into the 
 street with sombre eyes. 
 
 "What a ghastly thing these Yezidees are trying 
 to do to the world these Assassins of men's 
 minds'!" he thought, turning away toward the door 
 of his bedroom. 
 
 As he crossed the threshold he stumbled, and look- 
 ing down saw that he had tripped over a white sheet 
 lying there. For a moment he thought it was a 
 sheet from his own bed, and he started to pick it 
 up. Then he saw the naked blade of a knife at his 
 feet. 
 
 With an uncontrollable shudder he stepped out of 
 the shroud and stood staring at the knife as though 
 it were a snake. It had a curved blade and a bone 
 hilt coarsely inlaid with Arabic characters in brass. 
 
 The shroud was a threadbare affair perhaps a 
 bed-sheet from some cheap lodging house. But its 
 significance was so repulsive that he hesitated to 
 touch it. 
 
 However, he was ashamed to have it discovered 
 in his room. He picked up the brutal-looking knife 
 and kicked the shroud out into the corridor, where 
 they could guess if they liked how such a rag got 
 into the Ritz-Carlton. 
 
 Then he searched his bedroom, and, of course, 
 discovered nobody hiding. But chills crawled on his 
 spine while he was about it, and he shivered still as 
 he stood in the centre of the room examining the 
 knife and testing edge and point. 
 
 Then, close to his ear, a low voice whispered:
 
 SA-N'SA 219 
 
 "Be careful, my lord; the Yezidee knife is poisoned. 
 But it is written that a poisoned heart is more dan- 
 gerous still." 
 
 He had turned like a flash; and he saw, between 
 him and the sitting-room door, a very young girl 
 with slightly slanting eyes, and rose and ivory fea- 
 tures as perfect as though moulded out of tinted 
 bisque. 
 
 She wore a loose blue linen robe, belted in, short 
 at the elbows and skirt, showing two creamy-skinned 
 arms and two bare feet in straw sandals. In one 
 hand she had a spray of purple mulberries, and she 
 looked coolly at Cleves and ate a berry or two. 
 
 "Give me the knife," she said calmly. 
 
 He handed it to her; she wiped it with a mulberry 
 leaf and slipped it through her girdle. 
 
 "I am Sansa," she said with a friendly glance at 
 him, busy with her fruit. 
 
 Cleves strove to speak naturally, but his voice 
 trembled. 
 
 "Is it you I mean your real self your own 
 body?" 
 
 "It's my real self. Yes. But my body is asleep 
 in my mulberry grove." 
 
 "In in China?" 
 
 "Yes," she said calmly, detaching another mul- 
 berry and eating it. A few fresh leaves fell on the 
 centre table. 
 
 Sansa chose another berry. "You know," she 
 said, "that I came to Tressa this morning, to my 
 little Heart of Fire I came when she called me. And
 
 220 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 I was quite sleepy, too. But I heard her, though 
 there was a night wind in the mulberry trees, and 
 the river made a silvery roaring noise in the dark. 
 . . . And now I must go. But I shall come again 
 very soon." 
 
 She smiled shyly and held out her lovely little 
 hand, " As Tressa tells me is your custom in Amer- 
 ica," she said, "I offer you a good-bye." 
 
 He took her hand and found it a warm, smooth 
 thing of life and pulse. 
 
 "Why," he stammered in his astonishment, "you 
 are real! You are not a ghost!" 
 
 "Yes, I am real," she answered, surprised, "but 
 I'm not in my body, if you mean that." Then she 
 laughed and withdrew her hand, and, going, made 
 him a friendly gesture. 
 
 "Cherish, my lord, my darling Heart of Fire. 
 Serpents twist and twine. So do rose vines. May 
 their petals make your path of velvet and sweet 
 scented. May everything that is round be a pome- 
 granate for you two to share ; may everything that 
 sways be lilies bordering a path wide enough for two. 
 In the name of the Most Merciful God, may the 
 only cry you hear be the first sweet wail of your first- 
 born. And when the tenth shall be born, may you 
 and Heart of Fire bewail your fate because both of 
 you desire more children I" 
 
 She was laughing when she disappeared. Cleves 
 thought she was still there, so radiant the sunshine, 
 so sweet the scent in the room. 
 
 But the golden shadow by the door was empty of
 
 SA-N'SA 221 
 
 her. If she had slipped through the doorway he 
 had not noticed her departure. Yet she was no 
 longer there. And, when he understood, he turned 
 back into the empty room, quivering all over. Sud- 
 denly a terrible need of Tressa assailed him an im- 
 perative necessity to speak to her hear her voice. 
 
 "Tressa !" he called, and rested his hand on the 
 centre table, feeling weak and shaken to the knees. 
 Then he looked down and saw the mulberry leaves 
 lying scattered there, tender and green and still 
 dewy with the dew of China. 
 
 "Oh, my God!" he whispered, "such things are! 
 It isn't my mind that has gone wrong. There are 
 such things!" 
 
 The conviction swept him like a tide till his 
 senses swam. As though peering through a mist of 
 gold he saw his wife enter and come to him; felt 
 her arm about him, sustaining him where he swayed 
 slightly with one hand on the table among the mul- 
 berry leaves. 
 
 "Ah," murmured Tressa, noticing the green 
 leaves, "she oughtn't to have done that. That was 
 thoughtless of her, to show herself to you." 
 
 Cleves looked at her in a dazed way. "The body 
 is nothing," he muttered. "The rest only is real. 
 That is the truth, isn't it?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I seem to be beginning to believe it. ... Sansa 
 said things I shall try to tell you some day 
 dear. . . . I'm so glad to hear your voice." 
 
 "Are you?" she murmured.
 
 222 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "And so glad to feel your touch. ... I found a 
 shroud on my threshold. And a knife." 
 
 "The Yezidees are becoming mountebanks. . . . 
 Where is the knife?" she asked scornfully. 
 
 "Sansa said it was poisoned. She took it. She 
 she said that a poisoned heart is more dangerous 
 still." 
 
 Then Tressa threw up her head and called softly 
 into space : "Sansa ! Little Silk-Moth ! What are 
 these mischievous things you have told to my lord?" 
 
 She stood silent, listening. And, in the answer 
 which he could not hear, there seemed to be some- 
 thing that set his young wife's cheeks aflame. 
 
 "Sansa! Little devil!" she cried, exasperated. 
 "May Erlik send his imps to pinch you if you have 
 said to my lord these shameful things. It was im- 
 pudent! It was mischievous! You cover me with 
 shame and confusion, and I am humbled in the dust 
 of my lord's feet!" 
 
 Cleves looked at her, but she could not sustain 
 his gaze. 
 
 "Did Sansa say to you what she said to me?" he 
 demanded unsteadily. 
 
 "Yes. ... I ask your pardon. . . . And I had 
 already told her you did not did not were not in 
 in love with me. ... I ask your pardon." 
 
 "Ask more. . . . Ask your heart whether it 
 would care to hear that I am in love. And with 
 whom. Ask your heart if it could ever care to listen 
 to what my heart could say to it." 
 
 "Y-yes I'll ask my heart," she faltered. . . .
 
 SA-N'SA 223 
 
 "I think I had better finish dressing " She 
 
 lifted her eyes, gave him a breathless smile as he 
 caught her hand and kissed it. 
 
 "It it would be very wonderful," she stammered, 
 " if our necessity should be-become our choice." 
 
 But that speech seemed to scare her and she fled, 
 leaving her husband standing tense and upright in 
 the middle of the room. 
 
 Their train on the New York Central Railroad 
 left the Grand Central Terminal at one in the after- 
 noon. 
 
 Cleves had made his arrangements by wire. They 
 travelled lightly, carrying, except for the clothing 
 they wore, only camping equipment for two. 
 
 It was raining in the Hudson valley; they rushed 
 through the outlying towns and Po'keepsie in a sum- 
 mer downpour. 
 
 At Hudson the rain slackened. A golden mist en- 
 veloped Albany, through which the beautiful tower 
 and facades along the river loomed, masking the 
 huge and clumsy Capitol and the spires beyond. 
 
 At Schenectady, rifts overhead revealed glimpses 
 of blue. At Amsterdam, where they descended from 
 the train, the flag on the arsenal across the Mohawk 
 flickered brilliantly in the sunny wind. 
 
 By telegraphic arrangement, behind the station 
 waited a touring car driven by a trooper of State 
 Constabulary, who, with his comrade, saluted smart- 
 ly as Cleves and Tressa came up. 
 
 There was a brief, low-voiced conversation. Their
 
 224 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 camping outfit was stowed aboard, Tressa sprang 
 into the tonneau followed by Cleves, and the car 
 started swiftly up the inclined roadway, turned to 
 the right across the railroad bridge, across the trol- 
 ley tracks, and straight on up the steep hill paved 
 with blocks of granite. 
 
 On the level road which traversed the ridge at 
 last they speeded up, whizzed past the great hedged 
 farm where racing horses are bred, rushing through 
 the afternoon sunshine through the old-time Scotch 
 settlements which once were outposts of the old New 
 York frontier. 
 
 Nine miles out the macadam road ended. They 
 veered to the left over a dirt road, through two 
 hamlets ; then turned to the right. 
 
 The landscape became rougher. To their left lay 
 the long, low Maxon hills; behind them the May* 
 field range stretched northward into the open jaws 
 of the Adirondacks. 
 
 All around them were woods, now. Once a Gate 
 House appeared ahead; and beyond it they crossed 
 four bridges over a foaming, tumbling creek whers. 
 Cleves caught glimpses of shadowy forms in amber- 
 tinted pools big yellow trout that sank unhurriedly 
 out of sight among huge submerged boulders wet 
 with spray. 
 
 The State trooper beside the chauffeur turned to 
 Cleves, his purple tie whipping in the wind. 
 
 "Yonder is Glenwild, sir," he said. 
 
 It was a single house on the flank of a heavily 
 forested hill. Deep below to the left the creek leaped
 
 SA-N'SA 225 
 
 two cataracts and went flashing out through a belt 
 of cleared territory ablaze with late sunshine. 
 
 The car swung into the farm-yard, past the barn 
 on the right, and continued on up a very rough trail. 
 
 "This is the road to the Ireland Vlaie," said the 
 trooper. "It is possible for cars for another mile 
 only." 
 
 Splendid spruce, pine, oak, maple, and hemlock 
 fringed the swampy, uneven trail which was no more 
 than a wide, rough vista cut through the forest. 
 
 And, as the trooper had said, a little more than a 
 mile farther the trail became a tangle of bushes and 
 swale; the car slowed down and stopped; and a man 
 rose from where he was seated on a mossy log and 
 came forward, his rifle balanced across the hollow 
 of his left arm. 
 
 The man was Alek Selden. 
 
 It was long after dark and they were still travel* 
 ling through pathless woods by the aid of their elec- 
 tric torches. 
 
 There was little underbrush; the forest of spruce 
 and hemlock was first growth. 
 
 Cleves shined the trees but could discover no 
 blazing, no trodden path. 
 
 In explanation, Selden said briefly that he had 
 hunted the territory for years. 
 
 "But I don't begin to know it," he added. "There 
 are vast and ugly regions of bog and swale where a 
 sea of alders stretches to the horizon. There are 
 desolate wastes of cat-briers and witch-hopple un-
 
 226 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 der leprous tangles of grey birches, where stealthy 
 little brooks darkle deep under matted debris. Only 
 wild things can travel such country. 
 
 "Then there are strange, slow-flowing creeks in 
 the perpetual shadows of tamarack woods, where 
 many a man has gone in never to come out." 
 
 "Why?" asked Tressa. 
 
 "Under the tender carpet of green cresses are 
 shining black bogs set with tussock; and under the 
 bog stretches quicksand, and death." 
 
 "Do you know these places?" asked Cleves. 
 
 "No." 
 
 Cleves stepped forward to Tressa's side. 
 
 "Keep flashing the ground," he said harshly. "I 
 don't want you to step into some hell-hole. I'm sorry 
 I brought you, anyway." 
 
 "But I had to come," she said in a low voice. 
 
 Like the two men, she wore a grey flannel shirt, 
 knickers, and spiral puttees. 
 
 They, however, carried rifles as well as packs; 
 and the girl's pack was lighter. 
 
 They had halted by a swift, icy rivulet to eat, with- 
 out building a fire. After that they crossed the 
 Ireland Vlaie and the main creek, where remains 
 of a shanty stood on the bluff above the right bank 
 the last sign of man. 
 
 Beyond lay the uncharted land, skimped and 
 shirked entirely in certain regions by map-makers; 
 an unknown wilderness on the edges of which Sel- 
 den had often camped when deer shooting. 
 
 It was along this edge he was leading them, now,
 
 SA-N'SA 227 
 
 to a lean-to which he had erected, and from which 
 he had travelled in to Glenwild to use the superin- 
 tendent's telephone to New York. 
 
 There seemed to be no animal life stirring in this 
 forest; their torches illuminated no fiery orbs of 
 dazed wild things surprised at gaze in the wilder- 
 ness; no leaping furry form crossed their flashlights' 
 fan-shaped radiance. 
 
 There were no nocturnal birds to be seen or heard, 
 either: no bittern squawked from hidden sloughs; no 
 herons howled; not an owl-note, not a whispering 
 cry of a whippoorwill, not the sudden uncanny twit- 
 ter of those little birds that become abruptly vocal 
 after dark, interrupted the dense stillness of the 
 forest. 
 
 And it was not until his electric torch glimmered 
 repeatedly upon reaches of dusk-hidden bog that 
 Cleves understood how Selden took his bearings 
 for the night was thick and there were no stars. 
 
 "Yes," said Selden tersely, "I'm trying to skirt 
 the bog until I shine a peeled stick." 
 
 An hour later the peeled alder-stem glittered in 
 the beam of the torches. In ten minutes something 
 white caught the electric rays. 
 
 It was Selden's spare undershirt drying on a bush 
 behind the lean-to. 
 
 "Can we have a fire?" asked Cleves, relieving his 
 wife of her pack and striding into the open-faced 
 camp.
 
 228 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Yes, I'll fix it," replied Selden. "Are you all 
 right, Mrs. Cleves?" 
 
 Tressa said: "Delightfully tired, thank you." And 
 smiled faintly at her husband as he let go his own 
 pack, knelt, and spread a blanket for his wife. 
 
 He remained there, kneeling, as she seated herself. 
 
 "Are you quite fit?" he asked bluntly. Yet, 
 through his brusqueness her ear caught a vague 
 undertone of something else anxiety perhaps per- 
 haps tenderness. And her heart stirred deliciously 
 in her breast. 
 
 He inflated a pillow for her ; the firelight glim* 
 mered, brightened, spread glowing across her feet. 
 She lay back with a slight sigh, relaxed. 
 
 Then, suddenly, the thrill of her husband's touch 
 flooded her face with colour; but she lay motionless, 
 one arm flung across her eyes, while he unrolled her 
 puttees and unlaced her muddy shoes. 
 
 A heavenly warmth from the fire dried her stock- 
 inged feet. Later, on the edge of sleep, she opened 
 her eyes and found herself propped upright on her 
 husband's shoulder. 
 
 Drowsily, obediently she swallowed spoonfuls of 
 the hot broth which he administered. 
 
 "Are you really quite comfortable, dear?" he 
 whispered. 
 
 "Wonderfully. . . . And so very happy. . . . 
 Thank you dear." 
 
 She lay back, suffering him to bathe her face and 
 hands with warm water. 
 
 When the fire was only a heap of dying coals, she
 
 SA-N'SA 229 
 
 turned over on her right side and extended her hand 
 a little way into the darkness. Searching, half asleep, 
 she touched her husband, and her hand relaxed in 
 his nervous clasp. And she fell into the most perfect 
 sleep which she had known in years. 
 
 She dreamed that somebody whispered to her, 
 "Darling, darling, wake up. It is morning, be- 
 loved." 
 
 Suddenly she opened her eyes; and saw her hus- 
 band set a tray, freshly plaited out of Indian willow, 
 beside her blanket. 
 
 "Here's your breakfast, pretty lady," he said, 
 smilingly. "And over there is an exceedingly frigid 
 pool of water. You're to have the camp to yourself 
 for the next hour or two." 
 
 "You dear fellow," she murmured, still confused 
 by sleep, and reached out to touch his hand. He 
 caught hers and kissed it, back and palm, and got 
 up hastily as though scared. 
 
 "Selden and I will stand sentry," he muttered. 
 "There is no hurry, you know." 
 
 She heard him and his comrade walking away 
 over dried leaves; their steps receded; a dry stick 
 cracked distantly; then silence stealthily invaded the 
 place like a cautious living thing, creeping unseen 
 through the golden twilight of the woods. 
 
 Seated in her blanket, she drank the coffee; ate a 
 little; then lay down again in the early sun, feeling 
 the warmth of the heap of whitening coals at her 
 feet, also.
 
 230 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 For an hour she dozed awake, drowsily opening 
 her eyes now and then to look across the glade at 
 the pool over which a single dragon-fly glittered on 
 guard. 
 
 Finally she rose resolutely, grasped a bit of soap, 
 and went down to the edge of the pool. 
 
 Tressa was in flannel shirt and knickers when her 
 husband and Selden hailed the camp and presently 
 appeared walking slowly toward the dead fire. 
 
 Their grave faces checked her smile of greeting; 
 her husband came up and laid one hand on her arm, 
 looking at her out of thoughtful, preoccupied eyes. 
 
 "What is the Tchordagh?" he said in a low voice. 
 
 The girl's quiet face went white. 
 
 "The the Tchordagh!" she stammered. 
 
 "Yes, dear. What is it?" 
 
 "I don't don't know where you heard that 
 term," she whispered. "The Tchordagh is the 
 the power of Erlik. It is a term. ... In it is 
 comprehended all the evil, all the cunning, all the 
 perverted spiritual intelligence of Evil, its sinister 
 might, its menace. It is an Alouad-Yezidee term, 
 and it is written in brass in Eighur characters on the 
 Eight Towers, and on the Rampart of Gog and 
 Magog; nowhere else in the world!" 
 
 "It is written on a pine tree a few paces from this 
 camp," said Cleves absently. 
 
 Selden said: "It has not been there more than an 
 hour or two, Mrs. Cleves. A square of bark was
 
 SA-N'SA 231 
 
 cut out and on the white surface of the wood this 
 word is written in English." 
 
 "Can you tell us what it signifies?" asked Cleves, 
 quietly. 
 
 Tressa's studied effort at self-control was apparent 
 to both men. 
 
 She said: "When that word is written, then it is 
 a death struggle between all the powers of Darkness 
 and those who have read the written letters of that 
 word. . . . For it is written in The Iron Book that 
 no one but the Assassin of Khorassan excepting 
 the Eight Sheiks shall read that written word and 
 live to boast of having read it." 
 
 "Let us sit here and talk it over," said Selden 
 soberly. 
 
 And when Tressa was seated on a fallen log, and 
 Cleves settled down cross-legged at her feet, Selden 
 spoke again, very soberly: 
 
 "On the edges of these woods, to the northwest, 
 lies a sea of briers, close growing, interwoven and 
 matted, strong and murderous as barbed wire. 
 
 "Miles out in this almost impenetrable region lies 
 a patch of trees called Fool's Acre. 
 
 "At Wells I heard that the only man who had 
 ever managed to reach Fool's Acre was a trapper, 
 and that he was still living. 
 
 "I found him at Rainbow Lake a very old man, 
 who had a fairly clear recollection of Fool's Acre 
 and his exhausting journey there. 
 
 "And he told me that man had been there before 
 he had. For there was a roofless stone house there,
 
 232 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 and the remains of a walled garden. And a skull 
 deep in the wild grasses." 
 
 Selden paused and looked down at the recently 
 healed scars on his wrists and hands. 
 
 "It was a rotten trip," he said bluntly. "It took 
 me three days to cut a tunnel through that accursed 
 tangle of matted brier and grey birch. . . . Fool's 
 Acre is a grove of giant trees first growth pine, 
 oak, and maple. Great outcrops of limestone ledges 
 bound it on the east. A brook runs through the 
 woods. 
 
 "There is a house there, no longer roofless, and 
 built of slabs of fossil-pitted limestone. The glass in 
 the windows is so old that it is iridescent. 
 
 "A seven-foot wall encloses the house, built also 
 of slabs blasted out of the rock outcrop, and all 
 pitted with fossil shells. 
 
 "Inside is a garden not the remains of one a 
 beautiful garden full of unfamiliar flowers. And 
 in this garden I saw the Yezidee on his knees making 
 living things out of lumps of dead earth!" 
 
 "The Tchordagh!" whispered the girl. 
 
 "What was the Yezidee doing?" demanded 
 Cleves nervously. 
 
 Involuntarily all three drew nearer each other 
 there in the sunshine. 
 
 "It was difficult for me to see," said Selden in his 
 quiet, serious voice. "It was nearly twilight: I lay 
 flat on top of the wall under the curving branches of 
 a huge syringa bush in full bloom. The Yezi- 
 dees "
 
 SA-N'SA 3S3 
 
 "Were there two!" exclaimed Clever 
 
 "Two. They were squatting on the old stone patK 
 bordering one of the flower-beds." He turned to 
 Tressa: "They both wore white cloths twisted 
 around their heads, and long soft garments of white. 
 Under these their bare, brown legs showed, but 
 they wore things on their naked feet which were 
 shaped like what we call Turkish slippers only dif- 
 ferent." 
 
 "Black and green," nodded Tressa with the vagiUt 
 horror growing in her face. 
 
 "Yes. The soles of their shoes were bright 
 green." 
 
 "Green is the colour sacred to Islam," saidTressa. 
 "The priests of Satan defile it by staining with green 
 the soles of their footwear." 
 
 After an interval: "Go on," said Cleves ner- 
 vously. 
 
 Selden drew closer, and they bent their heads to 
 listen : 
 
 "I don't, even now, know what the Yezidees were 
 actually doing. In the twilight it was hard to see 
 clearly. But I'll tell you what it looked like to me. 
 One of these squatting creatures would scoop out a 
 handful of soil from the flower-bed, and mould it 
 for a few moments between his lean, sinewy fingers, 
 and then he'd open his hands and and something 
 alive something small like a rat or a toad, or God 
 knows what, would escape from between his palms 
 and run out into the grass "
 
 234 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Selden's voice failed and he looked at Cleves with 
 sickened eyes. 
 
 "I can't can't make you understand how repul- 
 sive to me it was to see a wriggling live thing creep 
 out between their fingers and and go running or 
 scrambling away little loathsome things with 
 humpy backs that hopped or scurried through the 
 grass " 
 
 "What on earth were these Yezidees doing, 
 Tressa?" asked Cleves almost roughly. 
 
 The girl's white face was marred by the imprints 
 of deepening horror. 
 
 "It is the Tchor-Dagh," she said mechanically. 
 "They are using every resource of hell to destroy 
 me testing the gigantic power of Evil as though 
 it were some vast engine charged with thunderous 
 destruction ! and they were testing it to discover its 
 terrific capacity to annihilate " 
 
 Her voice died in her dry throat; she dropped her 
 bloodless visage into both hands and remained 
 seated so. 
 
 Both men looked at her in silence, not daring to 
 interfere. Finally the girl lifted her pallid face from 
 her hands. 
 
 A That is what they were doing," she said in a 
 dull voice. "Out of inanimate earth they were 
 making things animate living creatures to to 
 test the hellish power which they are storing con- 
 centrating for my destruction." 
 
 "What is their purpose?" asked Cleves harshly. 
 "What do these Mongol Sorcerers expect to gain
 
 SA-N'SA 235 
 
 by making little live things out of lumps of garden 
 dirt?" 
 
 "They are testing their power," whispered the 
 girl. 
 
 "Like tuning up a huge machine?" muttered 
 Selden. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "For what purpose?" 
 
 "To make larger living creatures out of of 
 clay." 
 
 "They can't they can't create!" exclaimed 
 Cleves. "I don't know how by what filthy tricks 
 they make rats out of dirt. But they can't make 
 a anything like a like a man!" 
 
 Tressa's body trembled slightly. 
 
 "Once," she said, "in the temple, Prince Sanang 
 took dust which was brought in sacks of goat-skin, 
 and fashioned the heap of dirt with his hands, so 
 that it resembled the body of a man lying there on 
 the marble floor under the shrine of Erlik. . . . And 
 and then, there in the shadows where only the 
 Dark Star burned that black lamp which is called 
 the Dark Star the long heap of dust lying there on 
 the marble pavement began to to breathe! " 
 
 She pressed both hands over her breast as though 
 to control her trembling body: "I saw it; I saw the 
 long shape of dust begin to breathe, to stir, move, 
 and slowly lift itself " ^ 
 
 "A Yezidee trick!" gasped Cleves; but he also was 
 trembling now. 
 
 "God!" whispered the girl. "Allah alone knows
 
 236 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 the Merciful, the Long Suffering He knows 
 what it was that we temple girls saw there that 
 Yulun saw that Sa-n'sa and I beheld there rising 
 up like a man from the marble floor and standing 
 erect in the shadowy twilight of the Dark 
 Star. . . ." 
 
 Her hands gripped at her breast; her face was 
 deathly. 
 
 "Then," she said, "I saw Prince Sanang draw his 
 sabre of Indian steel, and he struck . . . once only. 
 . . . And a dead man fell down where the thing had 
 stood. And all the marble was flooded with scarlet 
 blood." 
 
 "A trick," repeated Cleves, in the ghost of his own 
 voice. But his gaze grew vacant. 
 
 Presently Selden spoke in tones that sounded 
 weakly querulous from emotional reaction: 
 
 "There is a path a tunnel under the matted 
 briers. It took me more than a week to cut it out. 
 It is possible to reach Fool's Acre. We can try 
 with our rifles if you say so, Mrs. Cleves." 
 
 The girl looked up. A little colour came into her 
 cheeks. She shook her head. 
 
 "Their bodies may not be there in the garden," 
 she said absently. "What you saw may not have 
 been that part of them the material which dies by 
 knife or bullet. . . . And it is necessary that these 
 Yezidees should die." 
 
 "Can you do anything?" asked Cleves, hoarsely. 
 
 She looked at her husband; tried to smile:
 
 SA-N'SA 237 
 
 "I must try. ... I think we had better not lose 
 any time if Mr. Selden will lead us." 
 
 "Now?" 
 
 "Yes, we had better go, I think," said the girl. 
 Her smile still remained stamped on her lips, but 
 her eyes seemed preoccupied as though following 
 the movements of something remote that was passing 
 across the far horizon.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 
 
 THE way to Fool's Acre was under a tangled 
 canopy of thorns, under rotting windfalls of 
 grey mirch, through tunnel after tunnel of 
 fallen debris woven solidly by millions of strands of 
 tough cat-briers which cut the flesh like barbed wire. 
 
 There was blood on Tressa, where her flannel 
 shirt had been pierced in a score of places. Cleves 
 and Selden had been painfully slashed. 
 
 Silent, thread-like streams flowed darkling under 
 the tangled mass that roofed them. Sometimes they 
 could move upright; more often they were bent 
 double; and there were long stretches where they 
 had to creep forward on hands and knees through 
 sparse wild grasses, soft, rotten soil, or paths of 
 sphagnum which cooled their feverish skin in vel- 
 vety, icy depths. 
 
 At noon they rested and ate, lying prone under 
 the matted roof of their tunnel. 
 
 Cleves and Selden had their rifles. Tressa lay like 
 a slender boy, her brier-torn hands empty. 
 
 And, as she lay there, her husband made a sponge 
 of a handful of sphagnum moss, and bathed her 
 face and her arms, cleansing the dried blood from 
 238
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 239 
 
 the skin, while the girl looked up at him out of 
 grave, inscrutable eyes. 
 
 The sun hung low over the wilderness when they 
 came to the woods of Fool's Acre. They crept cau- 
 tiously out of the briers, among ferns and open spots 
 carpeted with pine needles and dead leaves which 
 were beginning to burn ruddy gold under the level 
 rays of the sun. 
 
 Lying flat behind an enormous oak, they remained 
 listening for a while. Selden pointed through the 
 woods, eastward, whispering that the house stood 
 there not far away. 
 
 "Don't you think we might risk the chance and 
 use our rifles?" asked Cleves in a low voice. 
 
 "No. It is the Tchor-Dagh that confronts us. 
 I wish to talk to Sansa," she murmured. 
 
 A moment later Selden touched her arm. 
 
 "My God," he breathed, "who is that!" 
 
 "It is Sansa," said Tressa calmly, and sat up 
 among the ferns. And the next instant Sansa stepped 
 daintily out of the red sunlight and seated herself 
 among them without a sound. 
 
 Nobody spoke. The newcomer glanced at Selden, 
 smiled slightly, blushed, then caught a glimpse of 
 Cleves where he lay in the brake, and a mischievous 
 glimmer came into her slanting eyes. 
 
 "Did I not tell my lord truths?" she inquired in a 
 demure whisper. "As surely as the sun is a dragon, 
 and the flaming pearl burns between his claws, so 
 surely burns the soul of Heart of Flame between thy
 
 240 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 guarding hands. There are as many words as there 
 are demons, my lord, but it is written that Niaz is 
 the greatest of all words save only the name of 
 God." 
 
 She laughed without any sound, sweetly malicious 
 where she sat among the ferns. 
 
 "Heart of Flame," she said to Tressa, "you called 
 me and I made the effort.'' 
 
 "Darling," said Tressa in her thrilling voice, "the 
 Yezidees are making living things out of dust, as 
 Sanang No'iane made that thing in the Temple. . . . 
 And slew it before our eyes." 
 
 "The Tchor-Dagh," said Sansa calmly. 
 
 "The Tchor-Dagh," whispered Tressa. 
 
 Sansa's smooth little hands crept up to the collar 
 of her odd, blue tunic; grasped it. 
 
 "In the name of God the Merciful," she said 
 without a tremor, "listen to me, Heart of Flame, and 
 may my soul be ransom for yours!" 
 
 "I hear you, Sansa." 
 
 Sansa said, her fingers still grasping the em- 
 broidered collar of her tunic: 
 
 "Yonder, behind walls, two Tower Chiefs meddle 
 with the Tchor-Dagh, making living things out of 
 the senseless .dust they scrape from the garden." 
 
 Selden moistened his dry lips. Sansa said: 
 
 "The Yezidees who have come into this wilder- 
 ness are Arrak Sou-Sou, the Squirrel; and Tiyang 
 Khan. . . . May God remember them in Hell!" 
 
 "May God remember them," said Tressa me- 
 chanically.
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 241 
 
 "And these two Yezidee Sorcerers," continued 
 Sansa coolly, "have advanced thus far in the Tchor- 
 Dagh ; for they now roam these woods, digging like 
 demons for the roots of Ginseng; and thou knowest, 
 
 Heart of Flame, what that indicates." 
 
 "Does Ginseng grow in these woods!" exclaimed 
 Tressa with a new terror in her widening eyes. 
 
 "Ginseng grows here, little Rose-Heart, and the 
 roots are as perfect as human bodies. And Tiyang 
 Khan squats in the walled garden moulding the Gin- 
 seng roots in his unclean hands, while Sou-Sou the 
 Squirrel scratches among the dead leaves of the 
 woods for roots as perfect as a naked human body. 
 
 "All day long the Sou-Sou rummages among the 
 trees; all day longTiyang pats and rubs and moulds 
 the Ginseng roots in his skinny fingers. It is the 
 Tchor-Dagh, Heart of Flame. And these Sorcerers 
 must be destroyed." 
 
 "Are their bodies here?" 
 
 "Arrak is in the body. And thus it shall be ac- 
 complished: listen attentively, Rose Heart Afire! 
 
 1 shall remain here with " she looked at Selden 
 
 and flushed a trifle, " with you, my lord. And 
 when the Squirrel comes a-digging, so shall my lord 
 slay him with a bullet. . . . And when I hear his 
 soul bidding his body farewell, then I shall make 
 prisoner his soul. . . . And send it to the Dark Star. 
 . . . And the rest shall be in the hands of Allah." 
 
 She turned to Tressa and caught her hands in 
 both of her own: 
 
 "It is written on the Iron Pages," she whispered,
 
 242 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "that we belong to Erlik and we return to him. But 
 in the Book of Gold it is written otherwise: 'God 
 preserve us from Satan who was stoned!' . . . 
 Therefore, in the name of Allah ! Now then, Heart 
 of Flame, do your duty!" 
 
 A burning flush leaped over Tressa's features. 
 
 "Is my soul, then, my own!" 
 
 "It belongs to God," said Sansa gravely. 
 
 "And Sanang?" 
 
 "God is greatest." 
 
 "But was God there at the Lake of the 
 Ghosts?" 
 
 "God is everywhere. It is so written in the Book 
 of Gold," replied Sansa, pressing her hands ten- 
 derly. 
 
 "Recite the Fatha, Heart of Flame. Thy lips 
 shall not stiffen; God listens." 
 
 Tressa rose in the sunset glory and stood as 
 though dazed, and all crimsoned in the last fiery 
 bars of the declining sun. 
 
 Cleves also rose. 
 
 Sansa laughed noiselessly: "My lord would go 
 whither thou goest, Heart of Fire I" she whispered. 
 "And thy ways shall be his ways!" 
 
 Tressa's cheeks flamed and she turned and looked 
 at Cleves. 
 
 Then Sansa rose and laid a hand on Tressa's arm 
 and on her husband's: 
 
 "Listen attentively. Tiyang Khan must be 
 destroyed. The signal sounds when my lord's rifle- 
 shot makes a loud noise here among these trees."
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 243 
 
 "Can I prevail against the Tchor-Dagh?" asked 
 Tressa, steadily. 
 
 "Is not that event already in God's hands, dar- 
 ling?" said Sansa softly. She smiled and resumed 
 her seat beside Selden, amid the drooping fern 
 fronds. 
 
 "Bid thy dear lord leave his rifle here," she added 
 quietly. 
 
 Cleves laid down his weapon. Selden pointed 
 eastward in silence. 
 
 So they went together into the darkening woods. 
 
 In the dusk of heavy foliage overhanging the 
 garden, Tressa lay flat as a lizard on the top of the 
 wall. Beside her lay her husband. 
 
 In the garden below them flowers bloomed in 
 scented thickets, bordered by walks of flat stone 
 slabs split from boulders. A little lawn, very green, 
 centred the garden. 
 
 And on this lawn, in the clear twilight still tinged 
 with the sombre fires of sundown, squatted a man 
 dressed in a loose white garment. 
 
 Save for a twisted breadth of white cloth, his 
 shaven head was bare. His sinewy feet were naked, 
 too, the lean, brown toes buried in the grass. 
 
 Tressa's lips touched her husband's ear. 
 
 "Tiyang Khan," she breathed. "Watch what he 
 does I" 
 
 Shoulder to shoulder they lay there, scarcely 
 daring to breathe. Their eyes were fastened on the 
 Mongol Sorcerer, who, squatted below on his
 
 244 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 haunches, grave and deliberate as a great grey ape, 
 continued busy with the obscure business which so 
 intently preoccupied him. 
 
 In a short semi-circle on the grass in front of him 
 he had placed a dozen wild Ginseng roots. The 
 roots were enormous, astoundingly shaped like the 
 human body, almost repulsive in their weird sym- 
 metry. 
 
 The Yezidee had taken one of these roots into his 
 hands. Squatting there in the semi-dusk, he began 
 to massage it between his long, muscular fingers, 
 rubbing, moulding, pressing the root with caressing 
 deliberation. 
 
 His unhurried manipulation, for a few moments, 
 seemed to produce no result. But presently the Gin- 
 seng root became lighter in colour and more supple, 
 yielding to his fingers, growing ivory pale, sinuously 
 limber in a newer and more delicate symmetry. 
 
 "Look!" gasped Cleves, grasping his wife's arm. 
 'What is that man doing!" 
 
 'The Tchor-Dagh I" whispered Tressa. "Do you 
 see what lies twisting there in his hands !" 
 
 The Ginseng root had become the tiny naked 
 body of a woman a little ivory-white creature, 
 struggling to escape between the hands that had 
 created it dark, powerful, masterly hands, open- 
 ing leisurely now, and releasing the living being they 
 had fashioned. 
 
 The thing scrambled between the fingers of the 
 Sorcerer, leaped into the grass, ran a little way and
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 245 
 
 hid, crouched down, panting, almost hidden by the 
 long grass. The shocked watchers on the wall could 
 still see the creature. Tressa felt Cleves' body trem- 
 bling beside her. She rested a cool, steady hand 
 on his. 
 
 "It is the Tchor-Dagh," she breathed close to his 
 face. "The Mongol Sorcerer is becoming for- 
 midable." 
 
 "Oh, God!" murmured Cleves, "that thing he 
 made is alive! I saw it. I can see it hiding there in 
 the grass. It's frightened breathing! It's alive!" 
 
 His pistol, clutched in his right hand, quivered. 
 His wife laid her hand on it and cautiously shook 
 her head. 
 
 "No," she said, "that is of no use." 
 
 "But what that Yezidee is doing is is blas- 
 phemous " 
 
 "Watch him! His mind is stealthily feeling its 
 way among the laws and secrets of the Tchor-Dagh. 
 He has found a thread. He is following it through 
 the maze into hell's own labyrinth ! He has created 
 a tiny thing in the image of the Creator. He will 
 try to create a larger being now. Watch him with 
 his Ginseng roots!" 
 
 Tiyang, looming ape-like on his haunches in the 
 deepening dusk, moulded and massaged che Gin- 
 seng roots, one after another. And one after 
 another, tiny naked creatures wriggled out of his 
 palms between his fingers and scuttled away into the 
 herbage.
 
 24,6 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Already the dim lawn was alive with them, crawl- 
 ing, scurrying through the grass, creeping in among 
 the flower-beds, little, ghostly-white things that glim- 
 mered from shade into shadow like moonbeams. 
 
 Tressa's mouth touched her husband's ear: 
 
 "It is for the secret of Destruction that the Yezi- 
 dee seeks. But first he must learn the secret of 
 creation. He is learning. . . . And he must learn 
 no more than he has already learned." 
 
 "That Yezidee is a living man. Shall I fire?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "I can kill him with the first shot." 
 
 "Hark!" she whispered excitedly, her hand clos- 
 ing convulsively on her husband's arm. 
 
 The whip-crack of a rifle-shot still crackled in 
 their ears. 
 
 Tiyang had leaped to his feet in the dusk, a Gin- 
 seng root, half-alive, hanging from one hand and 
 beginning to squirm. 
 
 Suddenly the first moonbeam fell across the wall. 
 And in its lustre Tressa rose to her knees and flung 
 up her right hand. 
 
 Then it was as though her palm caught and re- 
 flected the moon's ray, and hurled it in one blinding 
 shaft straight into the dark visage of Tiyang-Khan. 
 
 The Yezidee fell as though he had been pierced 
 by a shaft of steel, and lay sprawling there on the 
 grass in the ghastly glare. 
 
 And where his features had been there gaped 
 only a hole into the head.
 
 A DEATH TRAIL 247 
 
 Then a dreadful thing occurred; for everywhere 
 the grass swarmed with the little naked creatures he 
 had made, running, scrambling, scuttling, darting 
 into the black hole which had been the face of Ti- 
 yang-Khan. 
 
 They poured into the awful orifice, crowding, jost- 
 ling one another so violently that the head jerked 
 from side to side on the grass, a wabbling, inert, 
 soggy mass in the moonlight. 
 
 And presently the body of Tiyang-Khan, Warden 
 of the Rampart of Gog and Magog, and Lord of 
 the Seventh Tower, began to burn with white fire 
 a low, glimmering combustion that seemed to clothe 
 the limbs like an incandescent mist. 
 
 On the wall knelt Tressa, the glare from her lifted 
 hand streaming over the burning form below. 
 
 Cleves stood tall and shadowy beside his wife, the 
 useless pistol hanging in his grasp. 
 
 Then, in the silence of the woods, and very near, 
 they heard Sansa laughing. And Selden's anxious 
 voice : 
 
 "Arrak is dead. The Sou-Sou hangs across a 
 rock, head down, like a shot squirrel. Is all well 
 with you?" 
 
 "Tiyang is on his way to his star," said Tressa 
 calmly. "Somewhere in the world his body has bid 
 its mind farewell. . . . And so his body may live 
 for a little, blind, in mental darkness, fed by others, 
 and locked in all day, all night, until the end." 
 
 Sansa, at the base of the wall, turned to Selden.
 
 248 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Shall I bring my body with me, one day, my 
 lord?" she asked demurely. 
 
 "Oh, Sansa " he whispered, but she placed 
 
 a fragrant hand across his lips and laughed at him 
 in the moonlight. 

 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 
 
 IN 1920 the whole spiritual world was trembling 
 under the thundering shock of the Red Surf 
 pounding the frontiers of civilisation from pole 
 to pole. 
 
 Up out of the hell-pit of Asia had boiled the 
 molten flood, submerging Russia, dashing in giant 
 waves over Germany and Austria, drenching Italy, 
 France, England with its bloody spindrift. 
 
 And now the Red Rain was sprinkling the United 
 States from coast to coast, and the mindless ad- 
 ministration, scared out of its stupidity at last, began 
 a frantic attempt to drain the country of the filthy 
 flood and throw up barriers against the threatened 
 deluge. 
 
 In every state and city Federal agents made whole- 
 sale arrests too late! 
 
 A million minds had already been perverted and 
 dominated by the terrible Sect of the Assassins. 
 A million more were sickening under the awful 
 psychic power of the Yezidee. 
 
 Thousands of the disciples of the Yezidee devil- 
 worshipers had already been arrested and held for 
 deportation, poor, wretched creatures whose minds 
 249
 
 250 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 were no longer their own, but had been stealthily 
 surprised, seized and mastered by Mongol adepts 
 and filled with ferocious hatred against their fellow 
 men. 
 
 Yet, of the Eight Yezidee Assassins only two now 
 remained alive in America, Togrul, and Sanang, 
 the Slayer of Souls. 
 
 Yarghouz was dead; Djamouk the Fox, Kahn of 
 the Fifth Tower was dead; Yaddin-ed-Din, Arrak 
 the Sou-Sou, Gutchlug, Tiyang Khan, all were dead. 
 Six Towers had become dark and silent. From them 
 the last evil thought, the last evil shape had sped; 
 the last wicked prayer had been said to Erlik, 
 Khagan of all Darkness. 
 
 But his emissary on earth, Prince Sanang, still 
 lived. And at Sanang' s heels stole Togrul, Tougtchi 
 to Sanang Noiane, the Slayer of Souls. 
 
 In the United States there had been a cessation 
 of the active campaign of violence toward those in 
 authority. Such unhappy dupes of the Yezidees as 
 the I. W. W. and other radicals were, for the time, 
 physically quiescent. Crude terrorism with its more 
 brutal outrages against life and law ceased. But 
 two million sullen eyes, in which all independent 
 human thought had been extinguished, watched un- 
 blinking the wholesale arrests by the government 
 watched panic-stricken officials rushing hither and 
 thither to execute the mandate of a miserable ad- 
 ministration watched and waited in dreadful 
 silence.
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 251 
 
 In that period of ominous quiet which possessed 
 the land, the little group of Secret Service men that 
 surrounded the young girl who alone stood between 
 a trembling civilisation and the threat of hell's own 
 chaos, became convinced that Sanang was preparing 
 a final and terrible effort to utterly overwhelm the 
 last vestige of civilisation in the United States. 
 
 What shape that plan would develop they could 
 not guess. 
 
 John Recklow sent Benton to Chicago to watch 
 that centre of infection for the appearance there of 
 the Yezidee Togrul. 
 
 Selden went to Boston where a half-witted group 
 of parlour-socialists at Cambridge were talking too 
 loudly and loosely to please even the most tolerant 
 at Harvard. 
 
 But neither Togrul nor Sanang had, so far, ma- 
 terialised in either city; and John Recklow prowled 
 the purlieus of New York, haunting strange 
 byways and obscure quarters where the dull embers 
 of revolution always smouldered, watching for the 
 Yezidee who was the deep-bedded, vital root of this 
 psychic evil which menaced the minds of all man- 
 kind, Sanang, the Slayer of Souls. 
 
 Recklow's lodgings were tucked away in Westover 
 Court three bedrooms, a parlour and a kitchenette. 
 Tressa Cleves occupied one bedroom; her husband 
 another; Recklow the third. 
 
 And in this tiny apartment, hidden away among a 
 group of old buildings, the very existence of which 
 was unknown to the millions who swarmed the
 
 252 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 streets of the greatest city in the world, here in 
 Westover Court, a dozen paces from the roar of 
 Broadway, was now living a young girl upon whose 
 psychic power the only hope of the world now 
 rested. 
 
 The afternoon had turned grey and bitter; ragged 
 flakes still fell; a pallid twilight possessed the snowy 
 city, through which lighted trains and taxis moved 
 in the foggy gloom. 
 
 By three o'clock in the afternoon all shops were 
 illuminated; the south windows of the Hotel Astor 
 across the street spread a sickly light over the old 
 buildings of Westover Court as John Recklow en- 
 tered the tiled hallway, took the stairs to the left, 
 and went directly to his apartment. 
 
 He unlocked the door and let himself in and stood 
 a moment in the entry shaking the snow from his 
 hat and overcoat. 
 
 The sitting-room lamp was unlighted but he could 
 see a fire in the grate, and Tressa Cleves seated near, 
 her eyes fixed on the glowing coals. 
 
 He bade her good evening in a low voice; she 
 turned her charming head and nodded, and he drew 
 a chair to the fender and stretched out his wet shoes 
 to the warmth. 
 
 "Is Victor still out?" he inquired. 
 
 She said that her husband had not yet returned. 
 Her eyes were on the fire, Recklow's rested on her 
 shadowy face.
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 253 
 
 "Benton got his man in Chicago," he said. "It 
 was not Togrul Kahn." 
 
 "Who was it?" 
 
 "Only a Swami fakir who'd been preaching sedi- 
 tion to a little group of greasy Bengalese from 
 Seattle. . . . I've heard from Selden, too." 
 
 She nodded listlessly and lifted her eyes. 
 
 "Neither Sanang nor Togrul have appeared in 
 Boston," he said. "I think they're here in New 
 York." 
 
 The girl said nothing. 
 
 After a silence : 
 
 "Are you worried about your husband?" he asked 
 abruptly. 
 
 "I am always uneasy when he is absent," she 
 said quietly. 
 
 "Of course. . . . But I don't suppose he knows 
 that." 
 
 "I suppose not." 
 
 Recklow leaned over, took a coal in the tongs and 
 lighted a cigar. Leaning back in his armchair, he 
 said in a musing voice : 
 
 "No, I suppose your husband does not realise 
 that you are so deeply concerned over his welfare." 
 
 The girl remained silent. 
 
 "I suppose," said Recklow softly, "he doesn't 
 dream you are in love with him." 
 
 Tressa Cleves did not stir a muscle. After a long 
 silence she said in her even voice: 
 
 "Do you think I am in love with my husband, Mr. 
 Recklow?"
 
 254 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "I think you fell in love with him the first evening 
 you met him." 
 
 "I did." 
 
 Neither of them spoke again for some minutes. 
 Recklow's cigar went wrong; he rose and found 
 another and returned to the fire, but did not light it. 
 
 "It's a rotten day, isn't it?" he said with a 
 shiver, and dumped a scuttle of coal on the fire. 
 
 They watched the blue flames playing over the 
 grate. 
 
 Tressa said: "I could no more help falling in 
 love with him than I could stop my heart beating. 
 . . . But I did not dream that anybody knew." 
 
 "Don't you think he ought to know?" 
 
 "Why? He is not in love with me." 
 
 "Are you sure, Mrs. Cleves?" 
 
 "Yes. He is wonderfully sweet and kind. But 
 he could not fall in love with a girl who has been 
 what I have been." 
 
 Recklow smiled. "What have you bees, Tressa 
 Nome?" 
 
 "You know." 
 
 "A temple-girl at Yian?" 
 
 "And at the Lake of the Ghosts," she said in a 
 low voice. 
 
 "What of it?" 
 
 "I can not tell you, Mr. Recklow. . . . Only that 
 I lost my soul in the Yezidee Temple " 
 
 "That is untrue !" 
 
 "I wish it were untrue. . . . My husband tells me 
 that nothing can really harm the soul. I try to be-
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 255 
 
 fieve him. . . . But Erlik lives. And when my soul 
 at last shall escape my body, it shall not escape the 
 Slayer of Souls." 
 
 "That is monstrously untrue " 
 
 "No. I tell you that Prince Sanang slew my soul. 
 And my soul's ghost belongs to Erlik. How can 
 any man fall in love with such a girl?" 
 
 "Why do you say that Sanang slew your soul?" 
 asked Recklow, peering at her averted face through 
 the reddening firelight. 
 
 She lay still in her chair for a moment, then turned 
 suddenly on him : 
 
 "He did slay it! He came to the Lake of the 
 Ghosts as my lover; he meant to have done it there; 
 but I would not have him would not listen, nor 
 suffer his touch ! I mocked at him and his passion. 
 I laughed at his Tchortchas. They were afraid of 
 me!" 
 
 She half rose from her chair, grasped the arms, 
 then seated herself again, her eyes ablaze with the 
 memory of wrongs. 
 
 "How dare I show my dear lord that I am in love 
 with him when Sanang's soul caught my soul out of 
 my body one day surprised my soul while my body 
 lay asleep in the Yezidee Temple! and bore it 
 in his arms to the very gates of hell!" 
 
 "Good God," whispered Recklow, "what do you 
 mean? Such things can't happen." 
 
 "Why not? They do happen. I was caught un- 
 awares. ... It was one golden afternoon, and 
 Yulan and Sansa and I were eating oranges by the
 
 256 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 fountain in the inner shrine. And I lay down by the 
 pool and made the effort you understand?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Very well. My soul left my body asleep and I 
 went out over the tops of the flowers idly, without 
 aim or intent as the winds blow in summer. ... It 
 was in the Wood of the White Moth that I saw 
 Sanang's soul flash downward like a streak of fire 
 and wrap my soul in flame! . . . And, in a flash, 
 we were at the gates of hell before I could free my- 
 self from his embrace. . . . Then, by the Temple 
 pool, among the oranges, I cried out asleep; and my 
 terrified body sat up sobbing and trembling in 
 Yulun's arms. But the Slayer of Souls had slain 
 mine in the Wood of the White Moth slain it as 
 he caught me in his flaming arms. . . . And now you 
 know why such a woman as I dare not bend to kiss 
 the dust from my dear Lord's feet Aie-a ! Aie-a I 
 I who have lost my girl's soul to him who slew it in 
 the Wood of the White Moth!" 
 
 She sat rocking in her chair in the red firelight, 
 her hands framing her lovely face, her eyes staring 
 straight ahead as though they saw opening before 
 them through the sombre shadows of that room all 
 the dread magic of the East where the dancing flame 
 of Sanang's blazing soul lighted their path to hell 
 through the enchanted forest. 
 
 Recklow had grown pale, but his voice was steady. 
 
 "I see no reason," he said, "why your husband 
 should not love you."
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 257 
 
 "I tell you my girl's soul belonged to Sanang 
 was part of his, for an instant." 
 
 "It is burned pure of dross." 
 
 "It is burned." 
 
 Recklow remained silent. Tressa lay deep in her 
 armchair, twisting her white fingers. 
 
 "What makes him so late?" she said ... "I sent 
 my soul out twice to look for him, and could not find 
 him." 
 
 "Send it again," said Recklow, fearfully. 
 
 For ten minutes the girl lay as though asleep, 
 then her eyes unclosed and she said drowsily: "I can 
 not find him." 
 
 "Did did you learn anything while while you 
 were away?" asked Recklow cautiously. 
 
 "Nothing. There is a thick darkness out there 
 I mean a darkness gathering over the whole land. 
 It is like a black fog. When the damned pray to 
 Erlik there is a darkness that gathers like a brown 
 mist " 
 
 Her voice ceased; her hands tightened on the arms 
 of her chair. 
 
 "That is what Sanang is doing I" she said in a 
 breathless voice. 
 
 "What?" demanded Recklow. 
 
 "Praying! That is what he is doing! A million 
 perverted minds which he has seized and obsessed 
 are being concentrated on blasphemous prayers to 
 Erlik! Sanang is directing them. Do you under- 
 stand the terrible power of a million minds all 
 willing, in unison, the destruction of good and the
 
 258 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 triumph of evil? A million human minds! More! 
 For that is what he is doing. That is the thick dark- 
 ness that is gathering over the entire Western world. 
 It is the terrific materialisation of evil power from 
 evil minds, all focussed upon the single thought that 
 evil must triumph and good die !" 
 
 She sat, gripping the arms of her chair, pale, rigid, 
 terribly alert, dreadfully enlightened, now, concern- 
 ing the awful and new menace threatening the sanity 
 of mankind. 
 
 She said in her steady, emotionless voice : "When 
 the Yezidee Sorcerers desire to overwhelm a nomad 
 people some yort perhaps that has resisted the 
 Sheiks of the Eight Towers, then the Slayer of Souls 
 rides with his Black Banners to the Namaz-Ga or 
 Place of Prayer. 
 
 "Two marble bridges lead to it. There are four- 
 teen hundred mosques there. Then come the Eight, 
 each with his shroud, chanting the prayers for those 
 dead in hell. And there the Yezidees pray blas- 
 phemously, all their minds in ferocious unison. . . . 
 And I have seen a little yort full of Broad Faces with 
 their slanting eyes and sparse beards, sicken and die, 
 and turn black in the sun as though the plague had 
 breathed on them. And I have seen the Long Noses 
 and bushy beards of walled towns wither and perish 
 in the blast and blight from the Namaz-Ga where 
 the Slayer of Souls sat his saddle and prayed to 
 Erlik, and half a million Yezidees prayed in blas- 
 phemous unison." 
 
 Recklow's head rested on his left hand. The
 
 IN THE FIRELIGHT 259 
 
 other, unconsciously, had crept toward his pistol 
 the weapon which had become so useless in this 
 awful struggle between this girl and the loosened 
 forces of hell. 
 
 "Is that what you think Sanang is about?" he 
 asked heavily. 
 
 "Yes. I know it. He has seized the minds of a 
 million men in America. Every anarchist is to-day 
 concentrating in one evil and supreme mental effort, 
 under Sanang's direction, to will the triumph of evil 
 and the doom of civilisation. ... I wish my hus- 
 band would come home." 
 
 "Tressa?" 
 
 She turned her pallid face in the firelight: "If 
 Sanang has appointed a Place of Prayer," she said, 
 "he himself will pray on that spot. That will be the 
 Namaz-Ga for the last two Yezidee Sorcerers still 
 alive in the Western World." 
 
 "That's what I wished to ask you," said Recklow 
 softly. "Will you try once more, Tressa?" 
 
 "Yes. I will send out my soul again to look for 
 the Namaz-Ga." 
 
 She lay back in her armchair and closed her eyes. 
 
 "Only," she added, as though to herself, "I wish 
 my dear lord were safe in this room beside me. . . . 
 May God's warriors be his escort. And surely they 
 are well armed, and can prevail over demons. Aie-a ! 
 I wish my lord would come home out of the dark- 
 ness. ... Mr. Recklow?" 
 
 "Yes, Tressa." 
 
 "I thought I heard him on the stairs."
 
 260 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Not yet." 
 
 "Aie-a!" she sighed and closed her eyes again. 
 
 She lay like one dead. There was no sound in 
 the room save the soft purr of the fire. 
 
 Suddenly from the sleeping girl a frightened voice 
 burst : "Yulun ! Yulun ! Where is that yellow maid 
 of the Baroulass? . . . What is she doing? That 
 sleek young thing belongs to Togrul Kahn? Yulun ! 
 I am afraid of her! Tell Sansa to watch that she 
 does not stir from the Lake of the Ghosts! . . . 
 Warn that young Baroulass Sorceress that if she 
 stirs I slay her. And know how to do it in spite of 
 Sanang and all the prayers from the Namaz-Gal 
 Yulun! Sansa! Watch her, follow her, hearts of 
 flame! My soul be ransom for yours! Tokhta!" 
 
 The girl's eyes unclosed. Presently she stirred 
 slightly, passed one hand across her forehead, turned 
 her head toward Recklow. 
 
 "I could not discover the Namaz-Ga," she said 
 wearily. "I wish my husband would return."
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 
 
 HER husband called her on the telephone a 
 few minutes later: 
 
 "Fifty-three, Six-twenty-six speaking! 
 Who is this?" 
 
 "V-sixty-nine," replied his young wife happily. 
 "Are you all right?" 
 
 "Yes. IsM.H. 2479 there?" 
 
 "He is here." 
 
 "Very well. An hour ago I saw Togrul Khan in 
 a limousine and chased him in a taxi. His car got 
 away in the fog but it was possible to make out the 
 number. An empty Cadillac limousine bearing that 
 number is now waiting outside the 44th Street en- 
 trance to the Hotel Astor. The doorman will hold 
 it until I finish telephoning. Tell M. H. 2479 to 
 send men to cover this matter " 
 
 "Victor!" 
 
 "Be careful! Yes, what is it?" 
 
 "I beg you not to stir in this affair until I can 
 join you " 
 
 "Hurry then. It's just across the street from 
 
 Westover Court " His voice ceased ; she heard 
 
 another voice, faintly, and an exclamation from her 
 261
 
 262 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 husband; then his hurried voice over the wire: "The 
 doorman just sent word to hurry. The car number 
 is N. Y. 0/5 F 0379! I've got to run ! Good-b " 
 
 He left the booth at the end of Peacock Alley, ran 
 down the marble steps to the left and out to the 
 snowy sidewalk, passing on his way a young girl 
 swathed to the eyes in chinchilla who was hurrying 
 into the hotel. As he came to where the limousine 
 was standing, he saw that it was still empty although 
 the door stood open and the engine was running. 
 Around the chauffeur stood the gold laced doorman, 
 the gorgeously uniformed carriage porter and a 
 mounted policeman. 
 
 "Hey!" said the latter when he saw Cleves, 
 "what's the matter here? What are you holding up 
 this car for?" 
 
 Cleves beckoned him, whispered, then turned to 
 the doorman. 
 
 "Why did you send for me? Was the chauffeur 
 trying to pull out?" 
 
 "Yes, sir. A lady come hurrying out an' she 
 jumps in, and the shawfur he starts her hum- 
 ming " 
 
 "A lady! Where did she go?" 
 
 "It was that young lady in chinchilla fur. The 
 one you just met when you run out. Yessir ! Why, 
 as soon as I held up the car and called this here cop, 
 she opens the door and out she jumps and beats it 
 into the hotel again " 
 
 "Hold that car, Officer!" interrupted Cleves.
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 263 
 
 "Keep it standing here and arrest anybody who gets 
 into it! I'll be back again " 
 
 He turned and hurried into the hotel, traversed 
 Peacock Alley scanning every woman he passed, 
 searching for a slim shape swathed in chinchilla. 
 There were no chinchilla wraps in Peacock Alley; 
 none in the dining-room where people already were 
 beginning to gather and the orchestra was now play- 
 ing; no young girl in chinchilla in the waiting room, 
 or in the north dining-room. 
 
 Then, suddenly, far across the crowded lobby, he 
 saw a slender, bare-headed girl in a chinchilla cloak 
 turn hurriedly away from the room-clerk's desk, 
 holding a key in her white gloved hand. 
 
 Before he could take two steps in her direction 
 she had disappeared in the crowd. 
 
 He made his way through the packed lobby as best 
 he could amid throngs of people dressed for dinner, 
 theatre, or other gaiety awaiting them somewhere 
 out there in the light-smeared winter fog; but when 
 he arrived at the room clerk's desk he looked for a 
 chinchilla wrap in vain. 
 
 Then he leaned over the desk and said to the clerk 
 in a low voice: "I am a Federal agent from the 
 Department of Justice. Here are my credentials. 
 Now, who was that young woman in chinchilla furs 
 to whom you gave her door key a moment ago?" 
 
 The clerk leaned over his counter and, dropping 
 his voice, answered that the lady in question had ar- 
 rived only that morning from San Francisco; had 
 registered as Madame Aoula Baroulass; and had
 
 264 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 been given a suite on the fourth floor numbered from 
 408 to 414. 
 
 "Do you mean to arrest her?" added the clerk in 
 a weird whisper. 
 
 "I don't know. Possibly. Have you the master- 
 key?" 
 
 The clerk handed it to him without a word; and 
 Cleves hurried to the elevator. 
 
 On the fourth floor the matron on duty halted 
 him, but when he murmured an explanation she 
 nodded and laid a finger on her lips. 
 
 "Madame has gone to her apartment," she whis- 
 pered. 
 
 "Has she a servant? Or friends with her?" 
 
 "No, sir. ... I did see her speak to two foreign 
 looking gentlemen in the elevator when she arrived 
 this morning." 
 
 Cleves nodded; the matron pointed out the direc- 
 tion in silence, and he went rapidly down the car- 
 peted corridor, until he came to a door num- 
 bered 408. 
 
 For a second only he hesitated, then swiftly fitted 
 the master-key and opened the door. 
 
 The room a bedroom was brightly lighted ; but 
 there was nobody there. The other rooms dress- 
 ing closet, bath-room and parlour, all were brilliantly 
 lighted by ceiling fixtures and wall brackets ; but there 
 was not a person to be seen in any of the rooms 
 nor, save for the illumination, was there any visible 
 sign that anybody inhabited the apartment. 
 
 Swiftly he searched the apartment from end to
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 265 
 
 end. There was no baggage to be seen, no gar- 
 ments, no toilet articles, no flowers in the vases, no 
 magazines or books, not one article of feminine ap- 
 parel or of personal bric-a-brac visible in the entire 
 place. 
 
 Nor had the bed even been turned down nor any 
 preparation for the night's comfort been attempted. 
 And, except for the blazing lights, it was as though 
 the apartment had not been entered by anybody for a 
 month. 
 
 All the windows were closed, all shades lowered 
 and curtains drawn. The air, though apparently 
 pure enough, had that vague flatness which one asso- 
 ciates with an unused guest-chamber when opened 
 for an airing. 
 
 Now, deliberately, Cleves began a more thorough 
 search of the apartment, looking behind curtains, 
 under beds, into clothes presses, behind sofas. 
 
 Then he searched the bureau drawers, dressers, 
 desks for any sign or clew of the girl in the chin- 
 chillas. There was no dust anywhere, the hotel 
 management evidently was particular but there was 
 not even a pin to be found. 
 
 Presently he went out into the corridor and looked 
 again at the number on the door. He had made no 
 mistake. 
 
 Then he turned and sped down the long corridor 
 to where the matron was standing beside her desk 
 preparing to go off duty as soon as the other matron 
 arrived to relieve her. 
 
 To his impatient question she replied positively
 
 266 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 that she had seen the girl in chinchillas unlock 408 
 and enter the apartment less than five minutes be- 
 fore he had arrived in pursuit. 
 
 "And I saw her lights go on as soon as she went 
 in," added the matron, pointing to the distant illu- 
 minated transom. 
 
 "Then she went out through into the next apart- 
 ment," insisted Cleves. 
 
 "The fire-tower is on one side of her; the scullery 
 closet on the other," said the matron. "She could 
 not have left that apartment without coming out into 
 the corridor. And if she had come out I should 
 have seen her." 
 
 "I tell you she isn't in those rooms!" protested 
 Cleves. 
 
 "She must be there, sir. I saw her go in a few 
 seconds before you came up." 
 
 At that moment the other matron arrived. There 
 was no use arguing. He left the explanation of the 
 situation to the woman who was going off duty, and, 
 hastening his steps, he returned to apartment 408. 
 
 The door, which he had left open, had swung 
 shut. Again he fitted the master-key, entered, 
 paused on the threshold, looked around nervously, 
 his nostrils suddenly filled with a puff of perfume. 
 
 And there on the table by the bed he saw a glass 
 bowl filled with a mass of Chinese orchids great 
 odorous clusters of orange and snow-white bloom 
 that saturated all the room with their freshening 
 scent. 
 
 So astounded was he that he stood stock still, one
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 267 
 
 hand still on the door-knob; then in a trice he had 
 closed and locked the door from inside. 
 
 Somebody was in that apartment. There could 
 be no doubt about it. He dropped his right hand 
 into his overcoat pocket and took hold of his auto- 
 matic pistol. 
 
 For ten minutes he stood so, listening, peering 
 about the room from bed to curtains, and out into 
 the parlour. There was not a sound in the place. 
 Nothing stirred. 
 
 Now, grasping his pistol but not drawing it, he 
 began another stealthy tour of the apartment, ex- 
 ploring every nook and cranny. And, at the end, 
 had discovered nothing new. 
 
 When at length he realised that, as far as he 
 could discover, there was not a living thing in the 
 place excepting himself, a very faint chill grew along 
 his neck and shoulders, and he caught his breath 
 suddenly, deeply. 
 
 He had come back to the bedroom, now. The 
 perfume of #ie orchids saturated the still air. 
 
 And, as he stood staring at them, all of a sudden 
 he saw, where their twisted stalks rested in the 
 transparent bowl of water, something moving 
 something brilliant as a live ember gliding out from 
 among the mass of submerged stems a living fish 
 glowing in scarlet hues and winnowing the water with 
 grotesquely trailing fins as delicate as filaments of 
 scarlet lace. 
 
 To and fro swam the fish among the maze of 
 orchid stalks. Even its eyes were hot and red as
 
 268 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 molten rubies; and as its crimson gills swelled and 
 relaxed and swelled, tints of cherry-fire waxed and 
 waned over its fat and glowing body. 
 
 And vaguely, now, in the perfume saturated air, 
 Cleves seemed to sense a subtle taint of evil, some- 
 thing sinister in the intense stillness of the place in 
 the jewelled fish gliding so silently in and out among 
 the pallid convolutions of the drowned stems. 
 
 As he stood staring at the fish, the drugged odour 
 of the orchids heavy in his throat and lungs, some- 
 thing stirred very lightly in the room. 
 
 Chills crawling over every limb, he looked around 
 across his shoulder. 
 
 There was a figure seated cross-legged in the 
 middle of the bed! 
 
 Then, in the perfumed silence, the girl laughed. 
 
 For a full minute neither of them moved. No 
 sound had echoed her low laughter save the dead- 
 ened pulsations of his own heart. But now there 
 grew a faint ripple of water in the bowl where the 
 scarlet fish, suddenly restless, was swimming hither 
 and thither as though pursued by an invisible hand. 
 
 With the slight noise of splashing water in his 
 ears, Cleves stood staring at the figure on the bed. 
 Under her chinchilla cloak the girl seemed to be all a 
 pale golden tint hair, skin, eyes. The scant shred 
 of an evening gown she wore, the jewels at her 
 throat and breast, all were yellow and amber and 
 saffron-gold. 
 
 And now, looking him in the eyes, she leisurely 
 disengaged the robe of silver fur from her naked
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 269 
 
 shoulders and let it fall around her on the bed. For 
 a second the lithe, willowy golden thing gathered 
 there as gracefully as a coiled snake filled him with 
 swift loathing. Then, almost instantly, the beauty of 
 the lissome creature fascinated him. 
 
 She leaned forward and set her elbows on her 
 two knees, and rested her face between her hands 
 like a gold rose-bud between two ivory petals, he 
 thought, dismayed by this young thing's beauty, 
 shaken by the dull confusion of his own heart bat- 
 tering his breast like the blows of a rising tide. 
 
 "What do you wish?" she inquired in her soft 
 young voice. "Why have you come secretly into my 
 rooms to search and clasping in your hand a loaded 
 pistol deep within your pocket?" 
 
 "Why have you hidden yourself until now?" he 
 retorted in a dull and laboured voice. 
 
 "I have been here." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "Here! . . . Looking at you. . . . And watch- 
 ing my scarlet fish. His name is Dzelim. He is near- 
 ly a thousand years old and as wise as a magician. 
 Look upon him, my lord! See how rapidly he 
 darts around his tiny crystal world! like a comet 
 through outer star-dust, running the eternal race with 
 Time. . .' . And yonder is a chair. Will my lord 
 be seated at his new servant's feet?" 
 
 A strange, physical weariness seemed to weight 
 his limbs and shoulders. He seated himself near the 
 bed, never taking his heavy gaze from the smiling,
 
 270 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 golden thing which squatted there watching him so 
 intently. 
 
 "Whose limousine was that which you entered and 
 then left so abruptly?" he asked. 
 
 "My own." 
 
 "What was the Yezidee Togrul Kahn doing in 
 it?" 
 
 "Did you see anybody in my car?" she asked, 
 veiling her eyes a little with their tawny lashes. 
 
 "I saw a man with a thick beard dyed red with 
 henna, and the bony face and slant eyes of Togrul 
 the Yezidee." 
 
 "May my soul be ransom for yours, my lord, but 
 you lie!" she said softly. Her lips parted in a 
 smile ; but her half-veiled eyes were brilliant as two 
 topazes. 
 
 "Is that your answer?" 
 
 She lifted one hand and with her forefinger made 
 signs from right to left and then downward as 
 though writing in Turkish and in Chinese characters. 
 
 "It is written," she said in a low voice, "that we 
 belong to God and we return to him. Look out 
 what you are about, my lord!" 
 
 He drew his pistol from his overcoat and, hold- 
 ing it, rested his hand on his knee. 
 
 "Now," he said hoarsely, "while we await the 
 coming of Togrul Kahn, you shall remain exactly 
 where you are, and you shall tell me exactly who 
 you are in order that I may decide whether to arrest 
 you as an alien enemy inciting my countrymen to
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 271 
 
 murder, or to let you go as a foreigner who is able 
 to prove her honesty and innocence." 
 
 The girl laughed: 
 
 "Be careful," she said. "My danger lies in your 
 youth and mine somewhere between your lips and 
 mine lies my only danger from you, my lord." 
 
 A dull flush mounted to his temples and burned 
 there. 
 
 "I am the golden comrade to Heavenly-Azure," 
 she said, still smiling. "I am the Third Immaum in 
 the necklace Keuke wears where Yulun hangs as a 
 rose-pearl, and Sansa as a pearl on fire. 
 
 "Look upon me, my lordl" 
 
 There was a golden light in his eyes which seemed 
 to stiffen the muscles and confuse his vision. He 
 heard her voice again as though very far away : 
 
 "It is written that we shall love, my lord thou 
 and I this night this night. Listen attentively. I 
 am thy slave. My lips shall touch thy feet. Look 
 upon me, my lord!" 
 
 There was a dazzling blindness in his eyes and in 
 his brain. He swayed a little still striving to fix her 
 with his failing gaze. t His pistol hand slipped side- 
 ways from his knee, fell limply, and the weapon 
 dropped to the thick carpet. He could still see the 
 glimmering golden shape of her, still hear her dis- 
 tant voice: 
 
 "It is written that we belong to God . . . 
 Tokhta! . . ." 
 
 Over his knees was settling a snow-white sheet; 
 on it, in his lap, lay a naked knife. There was not
 
 272 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 a sound in the room save the rushing and splashing 
 of the scarlet fish in its crystal bowl. 
 
 Bending nearer, the girl fixed her yellow eyes 
 on the man who looked back at her with dying 
 gaze, sitting upright and knee deep in his shroud. 
 
 Then, noiselessly she uncoiled her supple golden 
 body, extending her right arm toward the knife. 
 
 "Throw back thy head, my lord, and stretch thy 
 throat to the knife's sweet edge," she whispered 
 caressingly. "No! do not close your eyes. Look 
 upon me. Look into my eyes. I am Aoula, temple 
 girl of the Baroulass! I am mistress to the Slayer 
 of Souls! I am a golden plaything to Sanang 
 Noiane, Prince of the Yezidees. Look upon me at- 
 tentively, my lord!" 
 
 Her smooth little hand closed on the hilt; the 
 scarlet fish splashed furiously in the bowl, dislodg- 
 ing a blossom or two which fell to the carpet and 
 slowly faded into mist. 
 
 Now she grasped the knife, and she slipped from 
 the bed to the floor and stood before the dazed man. 
 
 "This is the Namaz-Ga," she said in her silky 
 voice. "Behold, this is the appointed Place of 
 Prayer. Gaze around you, my lord. These are the 
 shadows of mighty men who come here to see you 
 die in the Place of Prayer." 
 
 Cleves's head had fallen back, but his eyes were 
 open. The Baroulass girl took his head in both 
 hands and turned it hither and thither. And his 
 glazing eyes seemed to sweep a throng of shadowy
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 273 
 
 white-robed men crowding the room. And he saw 
 the bloodless, symmetrical visage of Sanang among 
 them, and the great red beard of Togrul; and his 
 stiffening lips parted in an uttered cry, and sagged 
 open, flaccid and soundless. 
 
 The Baroulass sorceress lifted the shroud 
 from his knees and spread it on the carpet, moving 
 with leisurely grace about her business and softly 
 intoning the Prayers for the Dead. 
 
 Then, having made her arrangements, she took 
 her knife into her right hand again and came back 
 to the half-conscious man, and stood close in front 
 of him, bending near and looking curiously into his 
 dimmed eyes. 
 
 "Ayah!" she said smilingly. "This is the Place 
 of Prayer. And you shall add your prayer to ours 
 before I use my knife. So ! I give you back your 
 power of speech. Pronounce the name of Erlik!" 
 
 Very slowly his dry lips moved and his dry tongue 
 trembled. The word they formed was, 
 
 "Tressa!" 
 
 Instantly the girl's yellow eyes grew incandescent 
 and her lovely mouth became distorted. With her 
 left hand she caught his chin, forced his head back, 
 exposing his throat, and using all her strength drew 
 the knife's edge across it. 
 
 But it was only her clenched fingers that swept 
 the taut throat clenched and empty fingers in 
 which the knife had vanished. 
 
 And when the Baroulass girl saw that her clenched
 
 274 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 hand was empty, felt her own pointed nails cutting 
 into the tender flesh of her own palm, she stared at 
 her blood-stained fingers in sudden terror stared, 
 spread them, shrieked where she stood, and writhed 
 there trembling and screaming as though gripped in 
 an invisible trap. 
 
 But she fell silent when the door of the room 
 opened noiselessly behind her ; and it was as though 
 she dared not turn her head to face the end of all 
 things which had entered the room and was drawing 
 nearer in utter silence. 
 
 Suddenly she saw its shadow on the wall; and her 
 voice burst from her lips in a last shuddering scream. 
 
 Then the end came slowly, without a sound, and 
 she sank at the knees, gently, to a kneeling posture, 
 then backward, extending her supple golden shape 
 across the shroud; and lay there limp as a dead 
 snake. 
 
 Tressa went to the bowl of water and drew 
 from it every blossom. The scarlet fish was now 
 thrashing the water to an iridescent spume; and 
 Tressa plunged in her hands and seized it and flung 
 it out squirming and wheezing crimson foam on 
 the shroud beside the golden girl of the Baroulass. 
 Then, very slowly, she drew the shroud over the dy- 
 ing things ; stepped back to the chair where her hus- 
 band lay unconscious; knelt down beside him and 
 took his head on her shoulder, gazing, all the while, 
 at the outline of the dead girl under the snowy 
 shroud.
 
 THE PLACE OF PRAYER 275 
 
 After a long while Cleves stirred and opened his 
 eyes. Presently he turned his head sideways on her 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Tressa," he whispered. 
 
 "Hush," she whispered, "all is well now." But 
 she did not move her eyes from the shroud, which 
 now outlined the still shapes of two human figures. 
 
 "John Recklow !" she called in a low voice. 
 
 Recklow entered noiselessly with drawn pistol. 
 She motioned to him ; he bent and lifted the edge of 
 the shroud, cautiously. A bushy red beard pro- 
 truded. 
 
 "Togrul!" he exclaimed. . . . "But who is this 
 young creature lying dead beside him?" 
 
 Then Tressa caught the collar of her tunic in her 
 left hand and flung back her lovely face looking up- 
 ward out of eyes like sapphires wet with rain : 
 
 "In the name of the one and only God," she 
 sobbed "if there be no resurrection for dead souls, 
 then I have slain this night in vain ! 
 
 "For what does it profit a girl if her soul be lost 
 to a lover and her body be saved for her husband?" 
 
 She rose from her knees, the tears still falling, 
 and went and looked down at the outlined shapes 
 beneath the shroud. 
 
 Recklow had gone to the telephone to summon his 
 own men and an ambulance. Now, turning toward 
 Tressa from his chair: 
 
 "God knows what we'd do without you, Mrs. 
 Cleves. I believe this accounts for all the Yezidees 
 except Sanang."
 
 276 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "Excepting Prince Sanang," she said drearily. 
 Then she went slowly to where her husband lay in 
 his armchair, and sank down on the floor, and laid 
 her cheek across his feet.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 IN that great blizzard which, on the 4th of Feb- 
 ruary, struck the eastern coast of the United 
 States from Georgia to Maine, John Recklow 
 and his men hunted Sanang, the last of the Yezidees. 
 
 And Sanang clung like a demon to the country 
 which he had doomed to destruction, imbedding each 
 claw again as it was torn loose, battling for the su- 
 premacy of evil with all his dreadful psychic power, 
 striving still to seize, cripple, and slay the bodies 
 and souls of a hundred million Americans. 
 
 Again he scattered the uncounted myriads of 
 germs of the Black Plague which he and his Yezidees 
 had brought out of Mongolia a year before; and 
 once more the plague swept over the country, and 
 thousands on thousands died. 
 
 But now the National, State and City governments 
 were fighting, with physicians, nurses, and police, 
 this gruesome epidemic which had come into the 
 world from they knew not where. And National, 
 State and City governments, aroused at last, were 
 fighting the more terrible plague of anarchy. 
 
 Nation-wide raids were made from the Atlantic 
 to the Pacific, and from the Gulf to the Lakes. 
 277
 
 278 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Thousands of terrorists of all shades and stripes 
 whose minds had been seized and poisoned by the 
 Yezidees were being arrested. Deportations had 
 begun; government agents were everywhere swarm- 
 ing to clean out the foulness that had struck deeper 
 into the body of the Republic than any one had sup- 
 posed. 
 
 And it seemed, at last, as though the Red Plague, 
 too, was about to be stamped out along with the 
 Black Death called Influenza. 
 
 But only a small group of Secret Service men 
 knew that a resurgence of these horrors was inevit- 
 able unless Sanang, the Slayer of Souls, was de- 
 stroyed. And they knew, too, that only one person 
 in America could hope to destroy Sanang, the last 
 of the Yezidees, and that was Tressa Cleves. 
 
 Only by the sudden onset of the plague in various 
 cities of the land had Recklow any clew concerning 
 the whereabouts of Sanang. 
 
 In Boston, then Washington, then Kansas City, 
 and then New York the epidemic suddenly blazed 
 up. And in these places of death the Secret Service 
 men always found a clew, and there they hunted 
 Sanang, the Yezidee, to kill him without mercy 
 where they might find him. 
 
 But they never found Sanang NoTane; only the 
 ghastly marks of his poisoned claws on the body of 
 the sickened nation only minds diseased by the Red 
 Plague and bodies dying of the Black Death civil 
 and social centres disorganized, disrupted, depraved, 
 dying.
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 279 
 
 When the blizzard burst upon New York, strug- 
 gling in the throes of the plague, and paralysed the 
 metropolis for a week, John Recklow sent out a 
 special alarm, and New York swarmed with Secret 
 Service men searching the snow-buried city for a 
 graceful, slender, dark young man whose eyes slanted 
 a trifle in his amber-tinted face; who dressed fash- 
 ionably, lived fastidiously, and spoke English per- 
 fectly in a delightfully modulated voice. 
 
 And to New York, thrice stricken by anarchy, by 
 plague, and now by God, hurried, from all parts 
 of the nation, thousands of secret agents who had 
 been hunting Sanang in distant cities or who had 
 been raiding the traitorous and secret gatherings of 
 his mental dupes. 
 
 Agent ZB-3O3, who was volunteer agent James 
 Benton, came from Boston with his new bride who 
 had just arrived by way of England a young girl 
 named Yulun who landed swathed in sables, and 
 stretched out both lovely little hands to Benton the 
 instant she caught sight of him on the pier. Where- 
 upon he took the slim figure in furs into his arms, 
 which was interesting because they had never before 
 met in the flesh. 
 
 So, their honeymoon scarce begun, Benton and 
 Yulun came from Boston in answer to Recklow's 
 emergency call. 
 
 And all the way across from San Francisco came 
 volunteer agent XLY-37I, otherwise Alek Selden, 
 bringing with him a girl named Sansa whom he had 
 gone to the coast to meet, and whom he had imrne-
 
 280 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 diately married after she had landed from the Jap- 
 anese steamer Nan-y&mg Maru. Which, also, was 
 remarkable, because, although they recognised each 
 other instantly, and their hands and lips clung as 
 they met, neither had ever before beheld the living 
 body of tBe other. 
 
 The third man who came to New York at Reek- 
 low's summons was volunteer agent 53-6-26, other- 
 wise Victor Cleyes. 
 
 His young wife, suffering from nervous shock 
 after the deaths of Togrul Khan and of the Barou- 
 lass girl, Aoula, had been convalescing in a private 
 sanitarium in Westchester. 
 
 Until the summons came to her husband from 
 Recklow, she had seen him only for a few moments 
 every day. But the call to duty seemed to have ef- 
 fected a miraculous cure in the slender, blue-eyed 
 girl who had lain all day long, day after day, in her 
 still, sunny room scarcely unclosing her eyes at all 
 save only when her husband was permitted to enter 
 for the few minutes allowed them every day. 
 
 The physician had just left, after admitting that 
 Mrs. Cleves seemed to be well enough to travel if 
 she insisted; and she and her maid had already begun 
 to pack when her husband came into her room. 
 
 She looked around over her shoulder, then rose 
 from her knees, flung an armful of clothing into the 
 trunk before which she had been kneeling, and came 
 across the room to him. Then she dismissed her 
 maid from the room. And when the girl had gone :
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 281 
 
 "I am well, Victor," she said in a low voice. "Why 
 are you troubled?" 
 
 "I can't bear to have you drawn into this horrible 
 affair once more." 
 
 "Who else is there to discover and overcome 
 Sanang?" she asked calmly. 
 
 He remained silent. 
 
 So, for a few moments they stood confronting 
 each other there in the still, sunny chamber hus- 
 band and wife who had never even exchanged the 
 first kiss two young creatures more vitally and in- 
 timately bound together than any two on earth yet 
 utterly separated body and soul from each other 
 two solitary spirits which had never merged; two 
 bodies virginal and inviolate. 
 
 Tressa spoke first: "I must go. That was our 
 bargain." 
 
 The word made him wince as though it had been a 
 sudden blow. Then his face flushed red. 
 
 "Bargain or no bargain," he said, "I don't want 
 you to go because I'm afraid you can not endure 
 another shock like the last one. . . . And every time 
 you have thrown your own mind and body between 
 this Nation and destruction you have nearly died 
 of it" 
 
 "And if I die?" she said in a low voice. 
 
 What answer she awaited perhaps hoped for 
 was not the one he made. He said : "If you die in 
 what you believe to be your line of duty, then it will 
 be I who have killed you."
 
 282 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "That would not be true. It is you who have 
 saved me." 
 
 "I have not. I have done nothing except to lead 
 you Into danger of death since I first met you. If 
 you mean spiritually, that also is untrue. You have 
 saved yourself if that indeed were necessary. You 
 have redeemed yourself if it is true you needed re- 
 demption which I never believed " 
 
 "Oh," she sighed swiftly, "Sanang surprised my 
 soul when it was free of my body followed my soul 
 into the Wood of the White Moth caught it there 
 all alone and slew it!" 
 
 His lips and throat had gone dry as he watched 
 the pallid terror grow in her face. 
 
 Presently he recovered his voice: "You call that 
 Yezidee the Slayer of Souls," he said, "but I tell 
 you there is no such creature, no such power ! 
 
 "I suppose I I know what you mean having 
 seen what we call souls dissociated from their phys- 
 ical bodies but that this Yezidee could do you any 
 spiritual damage I do not for one instant believe. 
 The idea is monstrous, I tell you " 
 
 "I I fought him soul battling against 
 soul " she stammered, breathing faster and ir- 
 regularly. "I struggled with Sanang there in the 
 Wood of the White Moth. I called on God ! I called 
 on my two great dogs, Bars and Alaga ! I recited the 
 Fatha with all my strength fighting convulsively 
 whenever his soul seized mine; I cried out the name 
 of Khidr, begging for wisdom ! I called on the Ten 
 Imaums, on Ali the Lion, on the Blessed Compan-
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 283 
 
 ions. Then I tore my spirit out of the grasp of his 
 soul but there was no escape"! no escape," she 
 wailed. "For on every side I saw the cloud-topped 
 rampart of Gog and Magog, and the woods rang 
 with Erlik's laughter the dissonant mirth of 
 hell " 
 
 She began to shudder and sway a little, then with 
 an effort she controlled herself in a measure. 
 
 "There never has been," she began again with lips 
 that quivered in spite of her "there never has been 
 one moment in our married lives when my soul dared 
 forget the Wood of the White Moth dared seek 
 yours. . . . God lives. But so does Erlik. There 
 are angels; but there are as many demons. . . . My 
 soul is ashamed. . . . And very lonely . . . very 
 lonely . . . but no fit companion for yours " 
 
 Her hands dropped listlessly beside her and her 
 chin sank. 
 
 "So you believe that Yezidee devil caught your 
 soul when it was wandering somewhere out of your 
 body, and destroyed it," he said. 
 
 She did not answer, did not even lift her eyes until 
 he had stepped close to her closer than he had ever 
 come. Then she looked up at him, but closed her 
 eyes as he swept her into his arms and crushed her 
 face and body against his own. 
 
 Now her red lips were on his ; now her face and 
 heart and limbs and breast melted into his her 
 breath, her pulse, her strength flowed into his and 
 became part of their single being and single pulse 
 and breath. And she felt their two souls flame and
 
 284 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 fuse together, and burn together in one heavenly 
 blaze felt the swift conflagration mount, over- 
 whelm, and sweep her clean of the last lingering 
 taint; felt her soul, unafraid, clasp her husband's 
 spirit in its white embrace clung to him, uplifted 
 out of hell, rising into the blinding light of Paradise. 
 
 Far far away she heard her own voice in singing 
 whispers heard her lips pronounce The Name 
 "Ata Ata ! Allahou " 
 
 Her blue eyes unclosed; through a mist, in which 
 she saw her husband's face, grew a vast metallic 
 clamour in her ears. 
 
 Her husband kissed her, long, silently; then, re- 
 taining her hand, he turned and lifted the receiver 
 from the clamouring telephone. 
 
 "Yes! Yes, this is 53-6-26. Yes, -69 is with 
 me. . . . When? . . . To-day? . . . Very well. 
 . . . Yes, we'll come at once. . . . Yes, we can get 
 a train in a few minutes. . . . All right. Good-bye." 
 
 He took his wife into his arms again. 
 
 "Dearest of all in the world," he said, "Sanang is 
 cornered in a row of houses near the East River, and 
 Recklow has flung a cordon around the entire block. 
 Good God ! I can't take you there !" 
 
 Then Tressa smiled, drew his head down, looked 
 into his face till the clear blue splendour of her gaze 
 stilled the tumult in his brain. 
 
 "I alone know how to deal with Prince Sanang," 
 she said quietly. "And if John Recklow, or you, or 
 Mr. Benton or Mr. Selden should kill him with your 
 pistols, it would be only his body you slay, not the
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 285 
 
 evil thing that would escape you and return to Erlik." 
 
 "Must you do this thing, Tressa?" 
 
 "Yes, I must do it." 
 
 "But if our pistols cannot kill this sorcerer, how 
 are you going to deal with him?" 
 
 "I know how." 
 
 "Have you the strength?" 
 
 "Yes the bodily and the spiritual. Don't you 
 know that I am already part of you?" 
 
 "We shall be nearer still," he murmured. 
 
 She flushed but met his gaze. 
 
 "Yes. . . . We shall be but one being. . . . Ut- 
 terly. . . . For already our hearts and souls are 
 one. And we shall become of one mind and one 
 body. 
 
 "I am no longer afraid of Sanang Noiane !" 
 
 "No longer afraid to slay him?" he asked quietly. 
 
 A blue light flashed in her eyes and her face grew 
 still and white and terrible. 
 
 "Death to the body? That is nothing, my lord!" 
 she said, in a hard, sweet voice. "It is written that 
 we belong to God and that we return to Him. All 
 living things must die, Heart of the World! It is 
 only the death of souls that matters. And it has 
 arrived at a time in the history of mankind, I think, 
 when the Slayer of Souls shall slay no more." 
 
 She looked at him, flushed, withdrew her hand and 
 went slowly across the room to the big bay window 
 where potted flowers were in bloom. 
 
 From a window-box she took a pinch of dry soil 
 and dropped it into the bosom of her gown.
 
 286 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Then, facing the East, with lowered arms and 
 palms turned outward: 
 
 "There is no god but God," she whispered "the 
 merciful, the long-suffering, the compassionate, the 
 just. 
 
 "For it is written that when the heavens are rolled 
 together like a scroll, every soul shall know what 
 it hath wrought. 
 
 "And those souls that are dead in Jehannum shall 
 arise from the dead, and shall have their day in 
 court. Nor shall Erlik stay them till all has been 
 said. 
 
 "And on that day the soul of a girl that hath been 
 put to death shall ask for what reason it was slain. 
 
 "Thus it has been written." 
 
 Then Tressa dropped to her Knees, touched the 
 carpet with her forehead, straightened her lithe body 
 and, looking over her shoulder, clapped her hands 
 together sharply. 
 
 Her maid opened the door. "Hasten with my 
 lord's luggage!" she cried happily; and, still kneel- 
 ing, lifted her head to her husband and laughed up 
 into his eyes. 
 
 "You should call the porter for we are nearly 
 ready. Shall we go to the station in a sleigh ? Oh, 
 wonderful!" 
 
 She leaped to her feet, extended her hand and 
 caught his. 
 
 "Horses for the lord of the Yiort!" she cried, 
 laughingly. "Kosh! Take me out into this new 
 white world that has been born to-day of the ten
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 287 
 
 purities and the ten thousand felicities ! It has been 
 made anew for you and me who also have been born 
 this day!" 
 
 He scarcely knew this sparkling, laughing girl 
 with her quick grace and her thousand swift little 
 moods and gaieties. 
 
 Porters came to take his luggage from his own 
 room ; and then her trunk and bags were ready, and 
 were taken away. 
 
 The baggage sleigh drove off. Their own jing- 
 ling sleigh followed; and Tressa, buried in furs, 
 looked out upon a dazzling, unblemished world, 
 lying silvery white under a sky as azure as her eyes. 
 
 "Keuke Mongol Heavenly Azure," he whis- 
 pered close to her crimsoned cheek, "do you know 
 how I have loved you always always?" 
 
 "No, I did not know that," she said. 
 
 "Nor I, in the beginning. Yet it happened, also, 
 from the beginning when I first saw you." 
 
 "That is a delicious thing to be told. Within 
 me a most heavenly glow is spreading. . . . Un- 
 glove your hand." 
 
 She slipped the glove from her own white fingers 
 and felt for his under the furs. 
 
 "Aie," she sighed, "you are more beautiful than 
 Ali ; more wonderful than the Flaming Pearl. Out 
 of ice and fire a new world has been made for us." 
 
 "Heavenly Azure my darling!" 
 
 "Oh-h," she sighed, "your words are sweeter than 
 the breeze in Yian I I shall be a bride to you such 
 as there never has been since the days of the Blessed
 
 288 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 Companions may their names be perfumed and 
 sweet-scented! . . . Shall I truly be one with you, 
 my lord?" 
 
 "Mind, soul, and body, one being, you and I, little 
 Heavenly Azure." 
 
 "Between your two hands you hold me like a 
 burning rose, my lord." 
 
 "Your sweetness and fire penetrate my soul." 
 
 "We shall burn together then till the sky-carpet 
 be rolled up. Kosh ! We shall be one, and on that 
 day I shall not be afraid." 
 
 The sleigh came to a clashing, jingling halt; the 
 train plowed into the depot buried in vast clouds 
 of snowy steam. 
 
 But when they had taken the places reserved for 
 them, and the train was moving swifter and more 
 swiftly toward New York, fear suddenly over- 
 whelmed Victor Cleves, and his face grew grey with 
 the menacing tumult of his thoughts. 
 
 The girl seemed to comprehend him, too, and her 
 own features became still and serious as she leaned 
 forward in her chair. 
 
 "It is in God's hands, Heart of the World," she 
 said in a low voice. "We are one, thou and I, or 
 nearly so. Nothing can harm my soul." 
 
 "No. ... But the danger to your life " 
 
 "I fear no Yezidee." 
 
 "The beast will surely try to kill you. And what 
 can I do? You say my pistol is useless." 
 
 "Yes. . . . But I want you near me." 
 
 "Do you imagine I'd leave you for a second?
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 289 
 
 Good God," he added in a strangled voice, "isn't 
 there any way I can kill this wild beast? With my 
 naked hands ?" 
 
 "You must leave him to me, Victor." 
 
 "And you believe you can slay him? Do you?" 
 
 She remained silent for a long while, bent for- 
 ward in her armchair, and her hands clasped tightly 
 on her knees. 
 
 "My husband," she said at last, "what your as- 
 tronomers have but just begun to suspect is true, and 
 has long, long been known to the Sheiks-el-Djebel. 
 
 "For, near to this world we live in, are other 
 worlds planets that do not reflect light. And there 
 is a dark world called Yrimid, close to the earth 
 a planet wrapped in darkness a black star. . . . 
 And upon it Erlik dwells. . . . And it is peopled 
 by demons. . . . And from it comes sickness and 
 evil " 
 
 She moistened her lips; sat for a while gazing 
 vaguely straight before her. 
 
 "From this black planet comes all evil upon 
 earth," she resumed in a hushed voice. "For it is 
 very near to the earth. It is not a hundred miles 
 away. All strange phenomena for which our scien- 
 tists can not account are due to this invisible planet, 
 all new and sudden pestilences; all convulsions of 
 nature; the newly noticed radio disturbances; the 
 new, so-called inter-planetary signals all all have 
 their hidden causes within that black and demon- 
 haunted planet long known to the Yezidees, and by 
 them called Yrimid, or Erlik's World.
 
 290 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 "And it is to this black planet that I shall send 
 Sanang, Slayer of Souls. I shall tear him from this 
 earth, though he cling to it with every claw; and 
 I shall fling his soul into darkness out across the 
 gulf drive his soul forth hurl it toward Erlik 
 like a swift rocket charred and falling from the 
 sky into endless night. 
 
 "So shall I strive to deal with Prince Sanang, Sor- 
 cerer of Mount Alamout, the last of the Assassins, 
 Sheik-el-Djebel, and Slayer of Souls. . . . May 
 God remember him in hell." 
 
 Already their train was rolling into the great ter- 
 minal. 
 
 Recklow was awaiting them. He took Tressa's 
 hands in his and gazed earnestly into her face. 
 
 "Have you come to show us how to conclude this 
 murderous business?" he asked grimly. 
 
 "I shall try," she said calmly. "Where have you 
 cornered Sanang?" 
 
 "Could you and Victor come at once?" 
 
 "Yes." She turned and looked at her husband, 
 who had become quite pale. 
 
 Recklow saw the look they exchanged. There 
 could be no misunderstanding what had happened 
 to these two. Their tragedy had ended. They 
 were united at last. He understood it instantly, 
 realised how terrible was this new and tragic situ- 
 ation for them both. 
 
 Yet, h - knew also that the salvation of civilisa-
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 291 
 
 tion itself now depended upon this girl. She must 
 face Sanang. There was nothing else possible. 
 
 "The streets are choked with snow," he said, 
 "but I have a coupe and two strong horses waiting." 
 
 He nodded to one of his men standing near. 
 Cleves gave him the hand luggage and checks. 
 
 "All right," he said in a low voice to Recklow; 
 and passed one arm through Tressa's. 
 
 The coupe was waiting on Forty-second Street, 
 guarded by a policeman. When they had entered 
 and were seated, two mounted policemen rode ahead 
 of the lurching vehicle, picking a way amid the 
 monstrous snow-drifts, and headed for the East 
 River. 
 
 "We've got him somewhere in a wretched row of 
 empty houses not far from East River Park. I'm 
 taking you there. I've drawn a cordon of my men 
 around the entire block. He can't get away. But 
 I dared take no chances with this Yezidee sorcerer 
 dared not let one of my men go in to look for him 
 go anywhere near him, until I could lay the 
 situation before you, Mrs. Cleves." 
 
 "Yes," she said calmly, "it was the only way, Mr. 
 Recklow. There would have been no use shooting 
 him no use taking him prisoner. A prisoner, he 
 remains as deadly as ever; dead, his mind still lives 
 and breeds evil. You are quite right; it is for me 
 to deal with Sanang." 
 
 Recklow shuddered in spite of himself. "Can 
 you tear his claws from the vitals of the world, and
 
 292 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 free the sick brains of a million people from the 
 slavery of this monster's mind?" 
 
 The girl said seriously: 
 
 "Even Satan was stoned. It is so written. And 
 was cast out. And dwells forever and ever in Abad- 
 don. No star lights that Pit. None lights the 
 Black Planet, Yrimid. It is where evil dwells. And 
 there Sanang NoTane belongs." 
 
 And now, beyond the dirty edges of the snow- 
 smothered city, under an icy mist they caught sight 
 of the river where ships lay blockaded by frozen 
 floes. 
 
 Gulls circled over it; ghostly factory chimneys on 
 the further shore loomed up gigantic, ranged like 
 minarettes. 
 
 The coupe, jolting along behind the mounted po- 
 licemen, struggled up toward the sidewalk and 
 stopped. The two horses stood steaming, knee deep 
 in snow. Recklow sprang out; Tressa gave him one 
 hand and stepped lithely to the sidewalk. Then 
 Cleves got out and came and took hold of his 
 wife's arm again. 
 
 "Well," he said harshly to Recklow, "where is 
 this damned Yezidee hidden?" 
 
 Recklow pointed in silence, but he and Tressa 
 had already lifted their gaze to the stark, shabby row 
 of abandoned three-story houses where every dirty 
 blind was closed. 
 
 "They're to be demolished and model tenements 
 built," he said briefly.
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 293 
 
 A man muffled in a fur overcoat came up and took 
 Tressa's hand and kissed it. 
 
 She smiled palely at Benton, spoke of Yulun, 
 wished him happiness. While she was yet speaking 
 Selden approached and bent over her gloved hand. 
 She spoke to him very sweetly of Sansa, expressing 
 pleasure at the prospect of seeing her again in the 
 body. 
 
 "The Seldens and ourselves have adjoining apart- 
 ments at the Ritz," said Benton. "We have re- 
 served a third suite for you and Victor." 
 
 She inclined her lovely head, gravely, then turned 
 to Recklow, saying that she was ready. 
 
 "It makes no difference which front door I un- 
 lock," he said. "All these tenements are connected 
 by human rat-holes and hidden runways leading from 
 one house to another. . . . How many men do you 
 want?" 
 
 "I want you four men, nobody else." 
 
 Recklow led the way up a snow-covered stoop, 
 drew a key from his pocket, fitted it, and pulled open 
 the door. 
 
 A musty chill struck their faces as they entered 
 the darkened and empty hallway. Involuntarily 
 every man drew his pistol. 
 
 "I must ask you to do exactly what I tell you to 
 do," she said calmly. 
 
 "Certainly," said Recklow, caressing his white 
 moustache and striving to pierce the gloom with his 
 keen eyes. 
 
 Then Tressa took her husband's hand. "Come,"
 
 294 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 she said. They mounted the stairway together ; and 
 the three others followed with pistols lifted. 
 
 There was a vague grey light on the second floor; 
 the broken rear shutters let it in. 
 
 As though she seemed to know her way, the girl 
 led them forward, opened a door in the wall, and 
 disclosed a bare, dusty room in the next house. 
 
 Through this she stepped; the others crept after 
 her with weapons ready. She opened a second door, 
 turned to the four men. 
 
 "Wait here for me. Come only when I call," she 
 whispered. 
 
 "For God's sake take me with you," burst out 
 Cleves. 
 
 "In God's name stay where you are till you hear 
 me call your name !" she said almost breathlessly. 
 
 Then, suddenly she turned, swiftly retracing her 
 steps; and they saw her pass through the first door 
 and disappear into the first house they had entered. 
 
 A terrible silence fell among them. The sound of 
 her steps on the bare boards had died away. There 
 was not a sound in the chilly dusk. 
 
 Minute after minute dragged by. One by one 
 the men peered fearfully at Cleves. His visage 
 was ghastly and they could see his pistol-hand trem- 
 bling. 
 
 Twice Recklow looked at his wrist watch. The 
 third time he said, unsteadily: "She has been gone 
 three-quarters of an hour." 
 
 Then, far away, they heard a heavy tread on the 
 stairs. Nearer and nearer came the footsteps.
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 295 
 
 Every pistol was levelled at the first door as a man's 
 bulky form darkened it. 
 
 "It's one of my men," said Recklow in a voice 
 like a low groan. "Where on earth is Mrs. Cleves?" 
 
 "I came to tell you," said the agent, "Mrs. Cleves 
 came out of the first house nearly an hour ago. She 
 got into the coupe and told the driver to go to the 
 Rite." 
 
 "What!" gasped Recklow. 
 
 "She's gone to the Ritz," repeated the agent. "No 
 one else has come out. And I began to worry 
 hearing nothing of you, Mr. Recklow. So I stepped 
 in to see " 
 
 "You say that Mrs. Cleves went out of fhe house 
 we entered, got into the coupe, and told the driver 
 to go to the Ritz?" demanded Cleves, astounded. 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Where is that coupe? Did it return?" 
 
 "It had not returned when I came in here." 
 
 "Go back and look for it. Look in the other 
 street," said Recklow sharply. 
 
 The agent hurried away over the creaking boards. 
 The four men gazed at one another. 
 
 "The thing to do is to obey her and stay where 
 we are," said Recklow grimly. "Who knows what 
 peril we may cause her if we move from " 
 
 His words froze on his lips as Tressa's voice rang 
 out from the darkness beyond the door they were 
 guarding: 
 
 "Victor! I I need youl Come to me, my hus- 
 band!"
 
 296 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 As Cleves sprang through the door into the dark- 
 ness beyond, Benton smashed a window sash with 
 all the force of his shoulder, and, reaching out 
 through the shattered glass, tore the rotting blinds 
 from their hinges, letting in a flood of sickly light. 
 
 Against the bare wall stood Tressa, both arms ex- 
 tended, her hands flat against the plaster, and each 
 hand transfixed and pinned to the wall by a knife. 
 
 A white sheet lay at her feet. On it rested a third 
 knife. And, bending on one knee to pick it up, they 
 caught a glimpse of a slender young man in fashion- 
 able afternoon attire, who, as they entered with the 
 crash of the shattered window in their ears, sprang 
 to his nimble feet and stood confronting them, knife 
 in hand. 
 
 Instantly every man fired at him and the bullets 
 whipped the plaster to a smoke behind him, but the 
 slender, dark skinned young man stood motionless, 
 loofcmg at them out of brilliant eyes that slanted a 
 trifle. 
 
 Again the racket of the fusillade swept him and 
 filled the room with plaster dust. 
 
 Cleves, frantic with horror, laid hold of the knives 
 that pinned his wife's hands to the wall, and dragged 
 them out. 
 
 But there was no blood, no wound to be seen on 
 her soft palms,. She took the murderous looking 
 blades from him, threw one terrible look at Sanang, 
 kicked the shroud across the floor toward him, and 
 flung both knives upon it. 
 
 The place was still dim with plaster dust and pistol
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 297 
 
 fumes as she stepped forward through the acrid mist, 
 motioning the four men aside. 
 
 "Sanang!" she cried in a clear voice, "may God 
 remember you in hell, for my feet have spurned your 
 shroud, and your knives, which could not scar my 
 palms, shall never pierce my heart I Look out for 
 yourself, Prince Sanang!" 
 
 "Tokhta !" he said, calmly. "My soul be ransom 
 for yours!" 
 
 "That is a lie! My soul is already ransomed! 
 My mind is the more powerful. It has already 
 halted yours. It is conquering yours. It is seizing 
 your mind and enslaving it. It is mastering your 
 will, Sanang! Your mind bends before mine. You 
 know it! You know it is bending. You feel it is 
 breaking down!" 
 
 Sanang's eyes began to glitter but his pale brown 
 face had grown almost white. 
 
 "I slew you once in the Wood of the White 
 Moth," he said huskily. "There is no resurrection 
 from such a death, little Heavenly Azure. Look 
 upon me ! My soul and yours are one !" 
 
 "You are looking upon my soul," she said. 
 
 "A lie ! You are in your body !" 
 
 The girl laughed. "My body lies asleep in the 
 Ritz upon my husband's bed," she said. "My body 
 is his, my mind belongs to him, my soul is already one 
 with his. Do you not know it, dog of a Yezidee? 
 Look upon me, Sanang Noiane ! Look upon my un- 
 wounded hands ! My shroud lies at your feet. And 
 there lie the knives that could not pierce my heart I
 
 298 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 I am thrice clean! Listen to my words, Sanang! 
 There is no other god but God!" 
 
 The young man's visage grew pasty and loose and 
 horrible; his lips became flaccid like dewlaps; but 
 out of these sagging folds of livid skin his voice 
 burst whistling, screaming, as though wrenched from 
 his very belly: 
 
 "May Erlik strangle you! May you rot where 
 you stand ! May your face become a writhing mass 
 of maggots and your body a corruption of living 
 worms ! 
 
 "For what you are doing to me this day may 
 every demon in hell torment you ! 
 
 "Have~a care what you are about!" he screeched. 
 "You are slaying my mind, you sorceress! You 
 have seized my mind and are crushing it! You are 
 putting out its light, you Yezidee witch! you are 
 quenching the last spark of reason in me " 
 
 "Sanang!" 
 
 His knife fell clattering to the floor. But he 
 stood stock still, his hands clutching his head stood 
 motionless, while scream on scream tore through the 
 loose and gaping lips, blowing them into ghastly, 
 distorted folds. 
 
 "Sanang Noiane!" she cried in her clear voice, 
 "the Eight Towers are darkened! The Rampart 
 of Gog and Magog is fallen ! On Mount Alamoul 
 nothing is living. The minds of mankind are free 
 again!" 
 
 She stepped forward, slowly, and stood near him ; 
 chanting in a low voice the Prayers for the Dead
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 299 
 
 She bent down and unrolled the shroud, laid it on 
 his shoulders and drew it up and across his face, 
 covering his dying eyes, and swathed him' so, slowly, 
 from head to foot. 
 
 Then she gathered up the three knives, cast them 
 upward into the air. They did not fall again. They 
 disappeared. And all the while, under her breath, 
 the girl was chanting the Prayers for the Dead as 
 she moved silently about her business. 
 
 Shrouded to the forehead in its white cerements, 
 the muffled figure of Sanang stood upright, motion- 
 less as a swathed and frozen corpse. 
 
 Outside, the daylight had become greyer. It had 
 begun to snow again, and a few flakes blew in 
 through the shattered windows and clung to the 
 winding sheet of Sanang. 
 
 And now Tressa drew close to the shrouded shape 
 and stood before it, gazing intently upon the out- 
 lined features of the last of the Yezidees. 
 
 "Sanang," she said very softly, "I hear your soul 
 bidding your body farewell. Tokhta !" 
 
 Then, under the strained gaze of the four men 
 gathered there, the shroud fell to the floor in a loose 
 heap of white folds. There was nobody under it; 
 no trace of Sanang. The human shape of the Yezi- 
 dee had disappeared; but a greyish mist had filled 
 the room, wavering up like smoke from the shroud, 
 and, like smoke, blowing in a long streamer toward 
 the window where the draught drew it out through 
 the falling snow and scattered the last shred of it 
 against the greying sky.
 
 300 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 
 
 In the room the mist thinned swiftly; the four 
 men could now see one another. But Tressa was no 
 longer in the room. And in place of the white shroud 
 a piece of filthy tattered carpet lay on the floor. 
 And a dead rat, flattened out, dry and dusty, lay 
 upon it. 
 
 "For God's sake," whispered Recklow hoarsely, 
 "let us get out of this!" 
 
 Cleves, his pistol clutched convulsively, stared at 
 him in terror. But Recklow took him by the arm 
 and drew him away, muttering that Tressa was 
 waiting for him, and might be ill, and that there was 
 nothing further to expect in this ghastly spot. 
 
 They went with Cleves to the Ritz. At the desk 
 the clerk said that Mrs. Cleves had the keys and 
 was in her apartment. 
 
 The three men entered the corridor with him; 
 watched him try the door; saw him open it; lin- 
 gered a moment after it had closed; heard the key 
 turn. 
 
 At the sound of the door closing the maid came. 
 
 "Madame is asleep in her room," she whispered. 
 
 "When did she come in?" 
 
 "More than two hours ago, sir. I have drawn 
 her bath, but when I opened the door a few moments 
 ago, Madame was still asleep." 
 
 He nodded; he was trembling when he put off his 
 overcoat and dropped hat and gloves on the carpet. 
 
 From the little rose and ivory reception room he
 
 THE SLAYER OF SOULS 301 
 
 could see the closed door of his wife's chamber. 
 And for a while he stood staring at it. 
 
 Then, slowly, he crossed this room, opened the 
 door; entered. 
 
 In her bedroom the tinted twilight was like ashes 
 of roses. He went to the bed and looked down at 
 her shadowy face; gazed intently; listened; then, in 
 sudden terror, bent and laid his hand on her heart. 
 It was beating as tranquilly as a child's; but as she 
 stirred, turned her head, and unclosed her eyes, un- 
 der his hand her heart leaped like a wild thing 
 caught unawares and the snowy skin glowed with an 
 exquisite and deepening tint as she lifted her arms 
 and clasped them around her husband's neck, draw- 
 ing his quivering face against her own. 
 
 THE END
 
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