THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 y
 
 OSRU 
 
 A Tale of Many Incarnations 
 
 The History of a Soul 
 
 By 
 JUSTIN STERNS 
 
 New York 
 
 Lenox Publishing Company 
 244 Lenox Avenue
 
 Copyright. 1910 
 
 By Lenox Publishing Company. 
 
 Entered at Stationers' Hall 
 
 London
 
 PS 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Introduction 9 
 
 Foreword 13 
 
 Sherau the Paraschites . . . . 25 
 Nero the Emperor . . . .49 
 Dravid of the Galleys . . . .67 
 Chunda, wife of Ram Ruoy . . .81 
 Lovis, Sieur le Brent . . . -99 
 Don Jose de Roderiguez . . . in 
 
 Ha fid, the Dwarf 127 
 
 Jeanie Campbell 137 
 
 Jackson's Millie 151 
 
 fared Willson . . . .< . . 171 
 Afterword 191
 
 Have caution, O Soul, lest you soar on the 
 
 wings of Desire 
 
 To that Height you aspired to reach and 
 beyond, to the Fire.
 
 OSRU, A TALE OF MANY INCARNA 
 TIONS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 It is not at all necessary to believe the doc 
 trines of Karma and Reincarnation, on which 
 it is based, in order to follow this history of 
 the soul OSRU known to man as Nero in his 
 most conspicuous incarnation a history 
 wherein through various lives he reaps as he 
 has sown and slowly rises to a height of char 
 acter where right at last seems greater to him 
 than might. But it is, of course, very essen 
 tial to understand these beliefs. 
 
 Briefly, then, Karma is the doctrine (held 
 by something like three-fourths of the inhabi- 
 
 9
 
 OSRU 
 
 tants of the world) that each one reaps the 
 fruits of his own deeds, good or bad, at the 
 same time learning through his suffering to 
 be unwilling to inflict similar pain on another. 
 The drift being ever upward, each learns by 
 doing what he desires to do and taking the 
 consequences to discriminate between good 
 and evil and to desire the good. 
 
 Reincarnation, which is always believed in 
 where Karma is accepted, provides the oppor 
 tunity for reaping the fruits of one's deeds and 
 desires. The main tenet of Reincarnation is 
 known to every one, namely: That we live 
 repeatedly, taking up the business of growing 
 better each time at that point where we left off. 
 
 In brief, Karma is the Christian doctrine, 
 "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also 
 reap." And Reincarnation is merely the 
 means to that end. 
 
 There is only one more point which may not 
 10
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 be generally understood. The reincarnating 
 ego is sexless; taking form in whatever en 
 vironment, and with whichever sex provides 
 the best opportunity for its next lesson. 
 
 ii
 
 FOREWORD. 
 
 I leaned from the low-hung crescent moon 
 and grasping the west-pointing horn of it 
 looked down. Against the other horn reclined, 
 motionless, a Shining One and looked at me, 
 but I was unafraid. Below me the hills and 
 valleys were thick with humans, and the moon 
 swung low that I might see what they did. 
 
 "Who are they?" I asked of the Shining 
 One. For I was unafraid. 
 
 And the Shining One made answer: 
 
 "They are the Sons of God and the Daugh 
 ters of God." 
 
 13
 
 OSRU 
 
 I looked again, and saw that they beat and 
 trampled each other. Sometimes they seemed 
 not to know that the fellow-creature they 
 pushed from their path fell under their feet. 
 But sometimes they looked as he fell and 
 kicked him brutally. 
 
 And I said to the Shining One : 
 
 "Are they all the Sons and Daughters of 
 God?" 
 
 And the Shining One said: "All." 
 
 As I leaned and watched them, it grew clear 
 to me that each was frantically seeking some 
 thing, and that it was because they sought 
 what they sought with such singleness of pur 
 pose that they were so inhuman to all who 
 hindered them. And I said to the Shining 
 One: 
 
 "What do they seek?" 
 
 And the Shining One made answer : "Hap 
 piness." 
 
 14
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 "Are they all seeking Happiness?" 
 
 "All." 
 
 "Have any of them found it?" 
 
 "None of those have found it." 
 
 "Do they ever think they have found it?" 
 
 "Sometimes they think they have found it." 
 
 My eyes filled, for at that moment I caught 
 a glimpse of a woman with a babe at her 
 breast, and I saw the babe torn from her and 
 the woman cast into a deep pit by a man with 
 his eyes fixed on a shining yellow lump that 
 he believed to be (or perchance to contain, I 
 know not) Happiness. 
 
 And I turned to the Shining One, my eyes 
 blinded. 
 
 "Will they ever find it?" 
 
 And he said: "They will find it." 
 
 "All of them?" 
 
 "All of them." ;| 
 
 "Those who are trampled?" 
 
 15
 
 OSRU 
 
 "Those who are trampled." 
 
 "And those who trample ?" 
 
 "And those who trample." 
 
 I looked again, a long time, at what they 
 were doing on the hills and in the valleys, and 
 again my eyes went blind with tears, and I 
 sobbed out to the Shining One: 
 
 "Is it God's will, or the work of the Devil, 
 that men seek Happiness?" 
 
 "It is God's will." 
 
 "And it looks so like the work of the 
 Devil!" 
 
 The Shining One smiled inscrutably. 
 
 "It does look like the work of the Devil." 
 
 When I had looked a little longer, I cried 
 out, protesting: 
 
 "Why has He put them down there, to seek 
 Happiness and to cause each other such un- 
 measurable misery?" 
 
 Again the Shining One smiled inscrutably. 
 16
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 i 
 "They are learning." 
 
 "What are they learning?" 
 
 "They are learning Life. And they are 
 learning Love." 
 
 I said nothing. One man in the herd below 
 held me breathless, fascinated. He walked 
 proudly, and others ran and laid the bound, 
 struggling bodies of living men before him, 
 that he might tread upon them and never 
 touch foot to earth. But suddenly a whirl 
 wind seized him and tore his purple from him 
 and set him down, naked among strangers. 
 And they fell upon him and maltreated him 
 sorely. 
 
 I clapped my hands. 
 
 "Good! Good!" I cried, exultantly. "He got 
 what he deserved!" 
 
 Then I looked up suddenly, and saw again 
 the inscrutable smile of the Shining One. 
 
 And the Shining One spake: 
 
 17
 
 OSRU 
 
 "They all get what they deserve." 
 
 "And no worse?" 
 
 "And no worse." 
 
 "And no better?" 
 
 "How can there be any better? They each 
 deserve whatever shall teach them the true 
 way to Happiness." 
 
 I was silenced. 
 
 And still the people went on seeking, and 
 trampling each other in their eagerness to find. 
 And I perceived, what I had not fully grasped 
 before, that the Whirlwind caught them up 
 from time to time and set them down else 
 where to continue the Search. 
 
 And I said to the Shining One : 
 
 "Does the Whirlwind always set them down 
 again on these hills or in these valleys?" 
 
 And the Shining One made answer: 
 
 "Not always on these hills or in these val 
 leys." 
 
 18
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 "Where then?" 
 
 "Look above you." 
 
 And I looked up. Above me stretched the 
 Milky Way and gleamed the stars. 
 
 And I breathed "Oh" and fell silent, awed 
 by what it was given to me to comprehend. 
 
 Below me, they still trampled each other. 
 
 And I asked the Shining One: 
 
 "But no matter where the Whirlwind sets 
 them down, they go on seeking Happiness?" 
 
 "They go on seeking Happiness." 
 
 "And the Whirlwind makes no mistakes?" 
 
 "It makes no mistakes." 
 
 "It puts them, sooner or later, where they 
 will get what they deserve?" 
 
 "Sooner or later, where they will get what 
 they deserve." 
 
 Then the load crushing my heart lightened, 
 and I found I could look at the brutal cruel 
 ties that went on below me with pity for the 
 
 19
 
 OSRU 
 
 cruel. And the longer I looked the stronger 
 the pity grew. 
 
 And I said to the Shining One : 
 
 "They act like men goaded." 
 
 "They are goaded." 
 
 "What goads them?" 
 
 "The name of the goad is Desire." 
 
 Then, when I had looked a little longer, I 
 cried out passionately: 
 
 "Desire is an evil thing!" 
 
 But the face of the Shining One grew stern 
 and his voice rang out, dismaying me: 
 
 "Desire is not an evil thing." 
 
 I trembled, and Thought withdrew herself 
 into the innermost chamber of my heart. Till 
 at last I said : 
 
 "It is Desire that nerves men on to learn 
 the lessons God has set?" 
 
 "It is Desire that nerves them." 
 20
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 ! 
 
 "The Lessons of Life and Love?" 
 
 "Of Life and Love." 
 
 Then I looked again into the valley, and the 
 load was gone from my heart. And I could 
 no longer see that they were cruel. I could 
 only see that they were learning. 
 
 I watched them, one by one, but the Whirl 
 wind always carried them out of sight. 
 
 Then I turned to the Shining One beseech 
 ingly: 
 
 "If I could only follow one when the Whirl 
 wind takes him, and follow him and follow 
 him " 
 
 I looked into the unfathomable, smiling eyes 
 of the Shining One, and my eyes plead with 
 him. 
 
 And the Shining One said: 
 
 "You shall follow and follow. Choose." 
 
 And my eyes fell again upon the earth. 
 21
 
 OSRU 
 
 There lay the banks of the Nile. I saw a man 
 with the terror of death in his face who ran 
 like the wind of the desert. 
 
 And I said to the Shining One: 
 
 "I choose him." 
 
 And the Shining One said : "So be it," and 
 was gone. 
 
 And I found myself on the earth beside that 
 man, and I saw all things whatsoever he did, 
 and the things that befell him, and whenever 
 the Whirlwind took him, it took me also. 
 
 22
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. But linger; the Path 
 
 that you choose 
 Leads, perchance, where the Sun hides his 
 
 face, and the Hell-waters ooze.
 
 SHERAU THE PARASCHITES. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - FIRST OF THE 
 SOUL OSRU 
 
 Sherau, the paraschites, having made the 
 eight incisions required by law in the body of 
 the most noble Rameses I. fled for his life from 
 the shower of well-directed stones that were 
 his immediate portion. 
 
 For his life in very truth, since this was one 
 of those happily rare occasions when the body 
 desecrated by the abhorred knife of the em- 
 balmer's most vile but necessary assistant, the 
 paraschites, was that of a Pharaoh. The 
 stones hurled at him were twice the size used 
 by the onlookers to express their rage at the 
 
 25
 
 OSRU 
 
 mutilation of the dead body of a slave, or 
 even a citizen. Moreover, the throng in the 
 City of the Dead, that lay across the sacred 
 Nile on the hither bank from Thebes, was 
 many times greater today than on days of less 
 notable embalmings. In fact, if no chance- 
 directed stone of the many that rained about 
 him found its mark and made him even as the 
 great Rameses now was, then indeed had the 
 sheltering arm of the god of the outcast para- 
 schites been over him during his mad race. 
 
 Sherau stumbled on into the shelter of the 
 nearest thicket, cursing the fate that had 
 caused him to be born a paraschites, bruised 
 and stinging from the stones that had found 
 him but freer than on some former occasions 
 from downright hurt. He threw himself face 
 downward among the papyrus reeds and laid 
 his forehead on his crossed arms, breathed 
 and shaken by his wild run and trembling with 
 
 26
 
 SHERAU 
 
 relief. For Fear of Death and Lust of Life 
 had stalked at the right shoulder and at the 
 left of Sherau the paraschites since the hour 
 he knew that the king was dead, and that the 
 doubtful honor of assisting to prepare the 
 royal mummy was to be his. 
 
 "Now by the great God Seth," gasped 
 Sherau, under his breath lest any pious Egyp 
 tian should hear him call on the name of the 
 god of all evil, "if I had but the power of 
 Rameses, son of Rameses, over the thrower of 
 every stone flung at me this day for just one 
 little hour ; one little, little hour ! Ah-e ! but I 
 would wring their necks ! With my two hands 
 I would wring them." And his two hands 
 could have made short work of the necks of 
 most men. 
 
 "If I were but Rameses the Living! Ah-e! 
 Ah-e ! Ah-e ! They should make me sport for 
 a thousand years, those throwers of stones and 
 
 27
 
 OSRU 
 
 shouters of evil names. Ah-e!" Sherau was 
 reviving. 
 
 He drew himself up furtively, into the most 
 reverential attitude of the praying Egyptian, 
 and sucked in a long breath. 
 
 "O Mighty Seth! Give me the power of 
 Rameses the power of Rameses the power 
 of Rameses!" 
 
 The veins stood out swollen and blue on his 
 neck and forehead, and on his clenched hands, 
 and he prayed without ceasing till he fell over 
 on his side, exhausted. 
 
 He roused up when the tumult of the peo 
 ple who followed the chariot of Rameses II. 
 as he returned across the river to Thebes, 
 reached him. 
 
 Sherau crept to the edge of the thicket, and 
 lay concealed where the whole sweep of the 
 road for half a mile spread out below him. 
 
 His eyes were set wide open, and blazed like 
 28
 
 SHERAU 
 
 the unwinking, jewel eyes of an idol. As he 
 sprawled full length among the reeds he dug 
 his naked toes into the soft, black earth and 
 his hands reached out and clutched all they 
 could hold of the slender papyri and crushed 
 them together savagely. While he watched 
 the passing pageant his lips writhed over his 
 strong, white teeth, making of his face a most 
 wonderful series of gargoyle masks. At any 
 moment, as he beheld the approach and de 
 parture of the Pharaoh and his attendants, his 
 head was a fitting model for a heathen idol of 
 the sort they appease with the sacrifice of lit 
 tle children. 
 
 Presently Sherau betook himself to his 
 hovel, in the mean quarter where the Thebans 
 allowed such outcasts as paraschites to live, 
 and there ate, drank and made merry with 
 others of his calling because, having mutilated 
 the body of a Pharaoh that day, he was neither 
 
 29
 
 OSRU 
 
 a corpse nor a cripple at nightfall, an escape 
 unparalleled since men first became mummies. 
 
 But in the middle of the hot and windless 
 night that followed, sleepless in spite of the 
 wine, Sherau left his hut and sought a place he 
 knew on the Nile bank a little beyond the City 
 of the Dead. 
 
 Directly he reached the spot he set about 
 what he had come to do, for it was not the 
 aimless restlessness of insomnia that had sent 
 him night-wandering, and it was not the first 
 time, nor the second, nor the tenth, that he 
 had spent the hours before dawn in his pres 
 ent occupation. 
 
 He stalked the bushes skillfully until he suc 
 ceeded in laying hands of violence on a small 
 she-bird with her three young ones. Long 
 practice had made him deft at this. To-night, 
 the male bird escaped. Had the best of luck 
 been his he would have had that also. 
 
 30
 
 SHERAU 
 
 Sherau drew from the bushes a small wicker 
 cage in which he put his captives. The young 
 birds presently gave over squawking and the 
 mother bird, worried and wakeful over her 
 changed surroundings, settled again on her 
 nest to make the best of it. 
 
 Sherau's eyes sought the moon. It was still 
 an hour too high for safety in his main enter 
 prise. But fair sport could be had in the in 
 terval. He threw himself down and tore up 
 the thick vegetation leaving a level, cleared 
 space under his eyes, as he supported himself 
 on his elbow. A luckless dragon fly lit in the 
 little arena. Immediately, Sherau's great hand 
 covered it. Through his fingers he watched 
 its agitated fluttering. 
 
 "I am a mightier than Rameses," he mut 
 tered. "I am Sherau the Great, king of land 
 and sea. King of the whole world. Every 
 nation is mine or pays me tribute. A thou- 
 
 31
 
 OSRU 
 
 sand slaves in my palace sweat daily in my 
 service. An hundred thousand are building 
 my tomb, that shall be the wonder of the ages. 
 My name shall never be forgotten. I am 
 Sherau the King. 
 
 "This slave here," he mumbled on, "hath 
 crossed my path in somewhat. I have cast 
 him in chains. How shall I serve him, that 
 he may feel the displeasure of the King of the 
 World and all my subjects tremble at his fate? 
 Hold! 'Tis a woman slave. See! she flaunts 
 in gauze. I have but wearied of her. There 
 fore I will graciously spare her life. I will 
 merely strip her of these costly garments of 
 gold embroidered gauze and cast her out to 
 be the dancing girl of the paraschites. Ah-e! 
 from the palace of Sherau the Great to the 
 dens of the paraschites! That were worse 
 than death !" He caught the dragon fly care- 
 
 3 2
 
 SHERAU 
 
 fully and held it down firmly by its outspread 
 wings, reveling in its struggles. 
 
 "So! my fair one! Thou dost not wish to 
 be shorn of thy finery and leave the palace of 
 Sherau the Emperor? 'Tis thine own fault. 
 With thy great beauty thou shouldst so have 
 charmed me that I would never have parted 
 with thee. Nay, thou mightest have sat on an 
 Empress's throne. 'Tis without use that thou 
 strugglest. By thy mighty master's com 
 mands thou art stripped of thy gauds one by 
 one!" 
 
 With the deliberation of an executioner 
 Sherau robbed the creature of its delicate 
 wings and let it go. 
 
 "There! Get thee hence and queen it over 
 the paraschites. Ah-e ! 'Tis almost too much 
 favor to those dogs that they should have 
 thee ! Mayhap some day when other pleasures 
 
 33
 
 OSRU 
 
 pall, I will seek thee out in thy den and thou 
 shalt thank thy king that he spared thy life 
 to-night." 
 
 He lolled back on his elbow and waited, for 
 Sherau played the game scrupulously by the 
 rules he had made for it. Only those creatures 
 that ventured into the little arena represented 
 the unfortunate objects of the mighty She- 
 rau's displeasure. 
 
 Suddenly he leaned forward with stopped 
 breath. A sacred beetle! lo! a sacred beetle! 
 Never before had the power that ruled pro 
 vided a scarab to become the object of the royal 
 anger. 
 
 Sherau the paraschites threw himself flat 
 on his chest in an ecstasy, and reaching for 
 ward with both hands caged the new prisoner 
 where it stood. There was not a spark of awe 
 for the holy things of Egypt in him. Instead 
 a tremulous delight and a huge sense of power 
 
 34
 
 SHERAU 
 
 at being able to torture and finally to slay that 
 which it meant death to an Egyptian to kill, 
 even by accident, if the fact became known. 
 
 "An high priest!" whispered Sherau, with 
 sparkling eyes. "An high priest! Now, in 
 deed, hath Sherau the King fit sport !" 
 
 Carefully prisoning the beetle with one 
 hand, with the other he stripped from a reed 
 a fibre of the strength and flexibility of thread. 
 He looped it about his quarry, between the 
 first and second segments, and holding an end 
 in either hand he settled down to gloat over 
 its struggles and to weave great dreams of 
 absolute power out of them, that should trick 
 him into forgetting that he was a dog of a 
 paraschites. 
 
 " Tis Ami," he muttered, "who bade me 
 prepare the body of that dead dog of a Rame- 
 ses to-day. Now shall he get his deserts !" 
 
 With dilating nostrils he tormented the in- 
 
 35
 
 OSRU 
 
 sect a while, letting it seem to escape and 
 dragging it rudely back. 
 
 "So ! Didst thou think to flee the vengeance 
 of thy king, unhappy priest? Nay, now, the 
 hour of thy death is set and written. I do 
 but play with thee a little space, ere I deliver 
 thee over to the executioner. Fit sport for 
 kings ! Fit sport for kings !" he muttered. 
 
 "Now, now, thou wretched one," impa 
 tiently, "if thou wilt not be quiet we must see 
 what can be done to quiet thee. My hands 
 weary of keeping such constant hold on thy 
 rope/' 
 
 One by one, he removed the legs of the in 
 sect, thrilling at each desecration of the sacred 
 creature as though it were in fact the living 
 body of his enemy, the high priest, that he 
 mutilated. 
 
 "Now, at last, thou art content to be quiet, 
 
 36
 
 SHERAU 
 
 art them ? But thy submission cometh too late 
 to avail thee aught. Thou shouldst have bent 
 the knee to Sherau, and ceased to cross his 
 mighty will, ere, by his orders, thou wert shorn 
 of thy sacred office. His word is given. Thou 
 must die." 
 
 He put the beetle through the bars of the 
 wicker cage, and roughly prodded the bird 
 awake. But she refused to touch it. Perhaps 
 the impulse to eat lay dormant in her during 
 the hours belonging to sleep. 
 
 "Then will I be thy executioner," snarled 
 Sherau. With a quick jerk he tightened the 
 loop of reed fibre, and directly the body of the 
 sacred scarabaeus of the Nile lay dismem 
 bered before him. 
 
 "Carrion," he muttered, poking it out of 
 sight among the reeds. 
 
 He looked at the moon. 
 
 37
 
 OSRU 
 
 "One more! There is time for one more!" 
 he whispered, gluttonously, and settled himself 
 to watch. 
 
 "The next shall be Setos, the wine-seller," 
 he mused. "He hath done me an ill turn this 
 day concerning the price of that fourth bottle 
 of wine. 'Twas half water ah-e! Setos! 
 welcome!" Sherau's long arm shot out in 
 greeting. He grasped by the gorgeous wings 
 the moth that had come unwittingly to play 
 the sorry role of Setos. 
 
 "Thou goest finely clad, O Setos, charger 
 of three prices for thy diluted wine ! 'Tis sim 
 ple justice that I should take from thee this 
 gaudy cloak thou gottest by such thievery. 
 There ! Henceforth go afoot, and clad in rags. 
 'Tis properer so. And harken, Setos! Hadst 
 thou not spat upon me for an 'outcast dog of 
 a paraschites' when I told thee of the water 
 in thy wine, then would I have soared thee this 
 
 38
 
 SHERAU 
 
 further punishment. Seest thou this house of 
 twigs I build thee with mine own hands? 
 Therein shalt thou stay till thou diest of hun 
 ger and thirst. For thy sins, O Setos. Ah-e ! 
 Setos! Sherau the Mighty is long of arm and 
 strong of hand. Thou wilt never sell poor 
 wine again." 
 
 He looked for the third time at the moon, 
 and getting up stretched lustily. His night of 
 pleasure was not half over. If that which was 
 to follow did but equal what was just com 
 pleted, then would the days of terror he had 
 endured since the death of Rameses be alto 
 gether wiped out. He took up the cage of 
 nesting birds and plunged deeper into the 
 thicket. 
 
 Presently he reached a small pit covered 
 with a lattice of twigs, and cunningly con 
 trived to escape notice. Many an anxious hour 
 had Sherau spent on the construction of this 
 
 39
 
 OSRU 
 
 dungeon, knowing perfectly that discovery 
 would cost him his life. Now, after a thor 
 ough reconnoitre, he put in his hand and drew 
 forth his royal prisoner a starveling kitten 
 some six months old. Of a truth, this Egyp 
 tian holdeth nought holy ! In his mad lust for 
 power he layeth violent hands on all that is 
 most sacred to his race. Nothing could save 
 an Egyptian who was known to have killed a 
 cat. It is a tremulous joy to Sherau, when life 
 is hardest and he is made most keenly to feel a 
 miserable outcast, to remember that thrice 
 already he has done what not one of his per- 
 secuters would dare do and yet he lives! 
 
 There was water at all times in the den of 
 the half-starved kitten, which Sherau had 
 risked his life five months before to steal. 
 Food he brought as he had brought it now, 
 not too often, lest his coming be observed. 
 Moreover, there was vivider delight to be had 
 
 40 '
 
 SHERAU 
 
 from the antics of his prisoner when its hun 
 ger was keen. Sherau laughed aloud now, 
 as the kitten glared at the birds and began to 
 lash its tail. 
 
 He threw himself down again on his belly, 
 with his puppets within sweep of his long 
 arms. And first, disregarding the agony of 
 the awakened mother bird, he took the cat in 
 his brutal hands and looked it over sharply. 
 The creature bore the scars on its thin body 
 of previous torture. Not hunger only did 
 Sherau the Great mete out to his royal pris 
 oner. 
 
 "Ah-e ! Rameses the Little ! Thy namesake 
 is dead. This day have I thrust my knife into 
 him. Shall I therefore do likewise unto thee? 
 or save thee a while that thou mayest make 
 sport for me? Art hungered, little king? em 
 peror that was ? dethroned one ? So ! then thou 
 shalt kill but not eat ! kill but not eat ! kill but
 
 OSRU 
 
 not eat! Thou that wert king, thou shalt be 
 executioner, despised of the people and profit 
 ing not by the deaths of thy victims." 
 
 He put the cat back in its hole and turned 
 his attention to the birds. 
 
 "Thou first!" to the mother bird, "that thy 
 squawking may cease." 
 
 He looped a cord about her neck and under 
 her wings and then, with evil ingenuity, wound 
 another one around her bill so that her fear 
 was no longer audible. Returning her to the 
 cage he bound her offspring in the same way. 
 
 "The anger of the mighty Sherau is great," 
 he muttered to them. "Ye slept, and danger 
 threatened the life of the king your master, 
 whom ye were appointed to guard. Treason! 
 Quick death were a thousand times too mer 
 ciful. Sherau will show the world a king's 
 displeasure. Ye shall die a death not known 
 to man until this day. Ye shall be thrown to 
 
 42
 
 SHERAU 
 
 the lions. Ah-e! Never again will a soldier 
 of Sherau the King fall asleep at his post." 
 
 He took out the starveling cat, and slipping 
 the loop at the loose end of the rope tied round 
 its neck over his wrist, he watched his frantic 
 assaults on the cage, chuckling at the mad 
 nesses of terror and hunger being enacted for 
 his pleasure. At length he drew back the cat, 
 and taking out one of the birds held it by its 
 tether, cleverly playing one against the other 
 until, satiated, he permitted the kill. 
 
 He threw the bird into the hole and beat the 
 cat off cruelly when he tried to follow, at 
 length taking another bird from the cage and 
 thrusting it almost against his muzzle to dis 
 tract his attention. So the game went on. But 
 at the third kill, as Sherau beat him off when 
 he tried to follow and eat, the half-crazed kit 
 ten turned on him and did quick havoc with 
 his claws. Sherau caught him round the neck, 
 
 43
 
 OSRU 
 
 cursing savagely, and almost strangled him. 
 Presently he muttered, loosening his clutch: 
 
 "Thou shalt die to-night for this that thou 
 hast done." The blood was streaming from 
 his right hand. "But first complete thy work. 
 There is yet one other needs thy claws. Then 
 will I strangle thee, O Rameses, with this 
 same hand that thou hast torn as I would I 
 could strangle thy namesake, who sleeps to 
 night in the bed of his father." 
 
 The moon was close on an hour lower when 
 they broke in upon him, the lifeless kitten still 
 hanging limp in his bloodstained hand. 
 
 Sherau sprang to his feet at their storm of 
 hostile cries, swinging the kitten defiantly 
 about his head with a loud scream of laugh 
 ter. Death had come to him, death so certain 
 that the idea of seeking to escape it did not 
 enter his mind. Instead, Fear of Death and 
 Lust of Life stood again at his right shoulder 
 
 44
 
 SHERAU 
 
 and at his left, and they rent his brain between 
 them so that he went altogether mad. 
 
 "I go to the Halls of Osiris," he shouted. 
 "Yea, I go ! but come thou with me ! I go not 
 alone! not alone! I am Sherau the Mighty, 
 king of the earth and of men. If I go this 
 night to the Halls of the Dead, I go fitly 
 attended. Come with me, thou ! and thou ! and 
 thou!" He felled them like oxen. 
 
 The moon dropped lower and hid behind the 
 thicket, leaving the Nile in starry darkness and 
 Sherau, with four others, lying stark beside 
 the stark kitten. 
 
 45
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. Behold! What you 
 
 crave shall be yours, 
 To your uttermost dream and beyond it. But 
 
 Justice endures.
 
 NERO THE EMPEROR. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - SECOND OF THE 
 Sour, OSRU 
 
 The Imperial One awoke refreshed. He 
 had slept like an infant from sunrise to sun 
 rise and now, stretching deliciously like a child 
 and with a child's keen satisfaction in the mere 
 feel of the morning air, he returned to con 
 sciousness. 
 
 "Of a truth I am indeed as the gods," he 
 murmured languorously, "since not even such 
 a magnificent orgy as that" his mind swept 
 rapidly over the ten hours that immediately 
 preceded his just-finished slumber "requires 
 of me the price of aching body and splitting 
 
 49
 
 OSRU 
 
 head that mortals commonly pay for their in- 
 tenser pleasures." 
 
 It was god-like. He yawned lazily, lost in 
 admiration of himself. 
 
 'Twas indeed marvellous that a man could 
 so drain the cup, leave but the dregs, and set 
 it down with a steady hand. Would the day 
 ever come when this iron body of his would 
 fail him Nay! He was the special care of 
 the Olympians; more, a god himself! 'Twas 
 their ichor in his veins made him thus strong. 
 And his mind, dismissing the subject care 
 lessly dwelt happily, instead, on his last wak 
 ing hours, re-living them with zest. 
 
 At length he raised himself on his elbow and 
 looked around. The slave who alone remained 
 in his chamber while he slept, crouched cross- 
 legged in his corner, dozing. 
 
 Seeing that he slept, Nero chuckled like a 
 mischievous boy about to tickle an unconscious 
 
 50
 
 NERO 
 
 comrade witfi a straw. Slipping from his bed, 
 his delicious languor dispelled for a moment, 
 he looked about for a fitting instrument of 
 torture. 
 
 "By Mercury! the very thing!" 
 
 He tore down certain long cords that 
 adorned the costly hangings of his couch, and 
 making a slip-noose he dropped it stealthily 
 over the head of the sleeping man. With the 
 other end in his hand he returned to his bed 
 and stretched himself out luxuriously. 
 
 "Now would a few choice spirits were with 
 me to see me give this fellow the lesson he 
 needs," quoth Nero to himself, right merrily. 
 "But no matter. The jest will bear telling." 
 Perhaps it occurred to him, casually, that be 
 ing alone had its compensations, since it left 
 him a free hand if he chose to embellish the 
 jest in the telling. 
 
 He forbore to follow up the joke immedi- 
 51
 
 OSRU 
 
 ately. It prolonged the pleasure to be got from 
 it, to speculate idly on what the knave would 
 do when he woke him. He cursed softly to 
 himself that there was not so much as one 
 boon companion beside him with whom he 
 could lay a wager about it, nor any way to 
 summon one without waking the sleeping 
 slave. 
 
 Presently he tightened the cord cautiously. 
 The man woke and sprang up, clutching at his 
 throat and gasping, mad with terror but not 
 in the least understanding his predicament. 
 Nero threw himself back, shaken by violent 
 spasms of laughter. The creature's antics 
 were excruciating before he saw how things 
 were with him, and if that were possible, twice 
 as funny after. Nero's sides ached. 
 
 After a time he made an end of laughing, 
 and the tigerish love of power in him woke up. 
 
 52
 
 NERO 
 
 As a jest the thing was stale, but there was 
 still much sport much sport. 
 
 The laughter died out of his eyes, and a 
 glitter like that in the lidless eyes of a snake 
 about to strike replaced it. 
 
 He dragged the slave toward him. 
 
 "On thy knees, O Gyges," he thundered, 
 and Gyges, clutching with both hands at the 
 rope that threatened his wind-pipe, dropped to 
 his knees and struggled toward him. 
 
 "Nay, on thy belly, by Jupiter!" stormed 
 Nero, and with a sudden jerk he sent him 
 sprawling on his face. "I'll teach thee to sleep 
 at thy post! Not another word, on thy life, 
 till I bid thee speak," as the man attempted to 
 gasp excuses. Half dragged, half crawling, 
 he got near enough to clasp the Caesar's naked 
 feet and cover them with beseeching kisses. 
 
 Nero stayed his hand. The black fire in his 
 53
 
 OSRU 
 
 eyes burned low. The situation was develop 
 ing beyond its early promise. The Imperial 
 One was smitten, suddenly, with a most bril 
 liant fancy. 
 
 "Perchance," he said, carelessly, watching 
 his man through slitted eyes, "perchance I may 
 yet spare thy worthless life. Me-seems thou 
 dost realize the greatness of thy sin. I do 
 bethink me of a fitting deed whereby thou 
 mayest blot it out. Dost desire thy life?" 
 
 The man made inarticulate moan, and redou 
 bled his efforts to bathe the imperial feet with 
 his tears and dry them with his kisses. 
 
 "Thou shalt worship me as I were Jupiter 
 himself," proclaimed the august Emperor, unc 
 tuously, enraptured with his plan as the details 
 of it developed. "Thou shalt worship with 
 whatsoever ardor thou wilt, desiring of me the 
 gift of thy life. And belike, if thou dost wor 
 ship with enough true fervor to merit such a 
 
 54
 
 NERO 
 
 boon, mayhap, I say, if thou dost please the 
 god that abideth in me with thy worship, it 
 may be I shall grant thy trifling request." 
 
 The trembling Gyges prostrated himself, 
 and never was Jupiter Ammon in propria per 
 sona more fervently worshipped. Whenever 
 his ardor slacked for a moment Nero turned 
 away his head with a gesture of impatience, 
 and the quivering wretch, prone on the tessel 
 lated marble, quivered yet more, redoubling 
 his efforts to move this stony and indifferent 
 god to pity. Once Nero prompted, "Dost 
 know that prayer, 'O Jupiter, Invincible' ?" and 
 Gyges stammered through it, and then through 
 every prayer he could remember that in any 
 wise fitted his case, whoever the god or god 
 dess, changing the name to Jupiter, glibly. 
 
 At length, satiated, his Master said, indif 
 ferently : "Enough ! I give thee thy life," and 
 the spent Gyges fell motionless on his face. 
 
 55
 
 OSRU 
 
 But an anger-sharpened : "Hast no thanks to 
 offer?" recalled him to his task, and Nero 
 tasted yet another keen and glorious sensation. 
 Truly, the day began richly! To be a god, 
 and to receive the prayers and thanks of man, 
 was indeed divine. 
 
 "Have done!" he murmured at last, with 
 feigned languor. "Thy frenzy irks me. Me- 
 thinks I begin to understand how the gods are 
 sometimes too worn out by the never ending 
 protestations of the people to grant their pray 
 ers. Now bathe me, Gyges, and use that new 
 Persian perfume of roses." 
 
 Gyges, with his eyes on Nero's face, es 
 sayed tentatively to remove the cord from his 
 neck. 
 
 "That thou didst not pray for," said Nero, 
 with childish petulance. "Nay, 'tis too late. I 
 am wearied with thy prayers. Thou shalt go 
 about to bathe and clothe me even as thou art. 
 
 56
 
 NERO 
 
 I have spared thy life. Be content." He gave 
 the cord a playful pull and Gyges a meaning 
 glance. "To-day, at least, I shall be well 
 served. If thou dost thy duties carelessly, O 
 Gyges!" He laughed loudly. "By Momus! 
 thy face would make a skeleton shake with 
 mirth. Why doth this visible cord so fret thee, 
 fool? Thou knowest" the words slid juicily 
 between his teeth, and it seemed as though he 
 must have rolled them as a savory tidbit 
 against his palate "the life of every man in 
 Rome is in my hands equally with thine. A 
 noose, invisible but strong, lieth about the neck 
 of every one of them, and the end of it lieth 
 here lieth here" he opened and closed his 
 hand, suggestively, in the very face of Gyges. 
 "As easily as I could tighten this rope thou 
 wearest necklace fashion shall I show thee 
 how easily? just so easily I could have the 
 life of any slave or senator in Rome. An I 
 
 57
 
 OSRU 
 
 would I could choose at random say the hun 
 dredth man who spoke to me from this hour 
 and by Jupiter whom I represent on earth, 
 ere the sun set twice, I could find the pretext 
 to slay. Yea! though he were the greatest in 
 the Empire after me. Now by all the gods! 
 I will yet do that very thing ! 'Twere a timely 
 jest wherewith to entertain some favored 
 legate." 
 
 Gyges, almost forgetting to tremble now 
 that the imperial attention was diverted from 
 him, laved his body with the costly perfume. 
 
 "Ah-h !" breathed Nero ecstatically, inhaling 
 the delicious odor with closed eyes, "see thou 
 command to be bought a goodly store of this 
 fragrance of the Olympians. I, also, am one 
 of them." 
 
 He opened his eyes sharply, as he realized 
 that for a full minute he had forgotten his god- 
 ship, and shot a scrutinizing glance at Gyges, 
 
 58
 
 NERO 
 
 to see if he had dared to forget it also. He 
 scowled as he noted that Gyges had ceased to 
 tremble. 
 
 Thereafter, the Imperial One fell silent for 
 the space of time it took to bathe his right arm. 
 Then he began smoothly: 
 
 "How long hast thou served me, Gyges?" 
 
 The man looked up. 
 
 "Since eighty days, Imperial One," he an 
 swered, after a rapid calculation. 
 
 "Ah !" The Imperial One narrowed his eyes 
 to twain wicked slits. As Gyges met their 
 glance his trembling returned to an extent that 
 wholly satisfied the great Caesar. But at the 
 same time it whetted his appetite. 
 
 "Thy predecessor pleased me but for some 
 forty-three. I sent him to the galleys." Which 
 was true as to the galleys, but a lie as to the 
 time. 
 
 "And the slave who bathed me before him 
 
 59
 
 NERO 
 
 let me think I believe 'twas but a paltry 
 twenty I endured him. One morning he spilled 
 perfume in my eyes. 'Twas a double sin, for 
 the stuff was costly. He still lies in prison. 
 I had not remembered the vermin again but 
 for thee. Let him rot ! But he was a clumsy 
 beast, while thy hands, O Gyges, are like 
 down ! Of a truth, thou art a wonder, Gyges ! 
 Eighty days ! Some god protects thee, Gyges !" 
 
 The evil little eyes of the august Emperor 
 opened wide in mocking surprise. They 
 feasted on the shaken wretch who was trying 
 to steady the hands that were like down lest 
 they lose their cunning. 
 
 Really sated at last by the sight of the mis 
 erable creature's deadly fear, the mood of the 
 Emperor changed. 
 
 "The gods give joy when they will," he rea 
 soned. "Not often to such as he, but yet they 
 give it. I will cause him to rejoice also. Then 
 
 60
 
 OSRU 
 
 shall I have played the god to the full this 
 day." And pleased with this new conceit of 
 his fertile brain, he promptly carried it out. 
 
 "Thou pleasest me well, O Gyges!" he said 
 aloud, in a voice of honey. "I would not take 
 a king's ransom for thee!" 
 
 The startled slave, mindful of what had 
 pleased before, broke out into fulsome adula 
 tion addressing him as Jupiter till Nero simu 
 lating ennui stopped him. 
 
 "Enough! Thou delightest to serve me? 
 Thou shalt serve me better than by declaiming 
 idle words, or even than by rubbing perfumes 
 on my chest with thy hands of down. Dost 
 remember that Christian maiden thou didst get 
 for me some time agone? By that god of all 
 thieving, Mercury, I never did suitably reward 
 thy theft of her! What sayest thou? So? 
 Her father hath not ceased to strive to put on 
 thee the blame of it? Let him have care! 
 
 61
 
 OSRU 
 
 Nero hath torture chambers for such as babble 
 against his pleasures! But as for thee, thou 
 shalt procure me just such another delectable 
 maiden. Just so lovely and just so unwilling. 
 By Cupid ! I tell thee I grieved for three days 
 thereafter, that I had given her that same 
 night to the guard! 'Twas such a blunder as 
 Nero never made before nor will again, I 
 promise thee. But thou shalt find me another, 
 and if she doth make me forget the first one, 
 why, as certainly as Venus hears me say the 
 word I will set thee free. Stay now, I have 
 a merry thought, O Gyges! Thou shalt shut 
 her in the locked garden, that she may think 
 to flee me when I come !" The imperial laugh 
 rang out, pealing through the chamber. 
 "Yea! thou wilt deserve thy freedom, an thou 
 procurest me another such morsel. See thou 
 do it." 
 
 The Mighty One's toilet proceeded in silence. 
 62
 
 NERO 
 
 "Methinks," he mused aloud, as Gyges 
 bound the fillet on his hair, "methinks the 
 populace shouted less joyfully than their duty 
 was, when I deigned to show myself to them 
 in procession robed as Jupiter, two days since, 
 or is it three? Insects!" he raged, remember 
 ing the occasional insulting silences that had 
 fallen on the throngs. "I would see my chariot 
 wheels pass over any of them, as willingly as 
 I would bid thee smite a buzzing fly. Let them 
 wait ! Let them wait ! I will yet devise some 
 way to teach them proper reverence for their 
 Emperor ! It shall yet be felt by every man in 
 Rome, I am his Master ! 
 
 "Haste thee, Gyges. I am anhungered."
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. A Flood swiftly bearing 
 
 you Thither. 
 But, passing your Goal without pause, it will 
 
 carry you Whither?
 
 DRAVID OF THE GALLEYS. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - THIRD OF THE 
 Soui, OSRU 
 
 "Come hither, Caius ! See this fellow here. 
 By Bacchus, 'tis a pity he is not with the 
 gladiators! Why doth thy Festus waste him 
 on a galley? By all the gods, 'twould make 
 my blood tingle to see him meet that black lion 
 of Abyssinia that slew six at the last games! 
 With a spike, say, or the short broadsword. 
 He is from Gaul, is it not so? I have seen his 
 like in Rome. But never never his equal. 
 "Tis thy trireme, this ? Then have him out and 
 let us look at him. What! chained at the 
 waist?" 
 
 67
 
 OSRU 
 
 "Yea, and for good reason! Thou sayest 
 well, he is a marvel. But 'tis plain, O Marcus, 
 thou hast not full measure of thy father's war 
 rior blood, or thou wouldst not make lion-meat 
 of such as he ! He is the glory of my trireme. 
 Because of him and the stroke he sets, there 
 is neither trireme nor bireme in all the fleets 
 of Rome can make shift to pass us. His mus 
 cles are ductile adamant, lightning for speed 
 and one with the everlasting hills for endur 
 ance. And yet he is an old man. Look at his 
 hair, my Marcus. Fifty years he hath seen, 
 at the least, and for thirty of these he hath 
 been an ornament to the galleys. 'Tis with 
 out doubt he was peerless in his prime. But 
 his strength waneth not, methinks. Of a truth, 
 to bend mightily at the oars doth exercise the 
 whole body to increasing vigor/' 
 
 "But why hast thou chained him with the 
 chain I had thought was worn by the galleys 
 
 68
 
 DRAVID 
 
 but when in battle, lest they think to spring 
 overboard and join the enemy, O Caius?" 
 
 "Because he hath a devil. Many devils. See 
 him eye the knife in thy belt ! He hath a mad 
 ness for liberty. Three men hath he killed 
 and yet, because he is such an oarsman as the 
 galleys hold but once in an hundred years, his 
 life hath been spared. 
 
 "Once he eyed the knife that Miletus the 
 centurion wore, as he eyed thine but now. 
 And then he sprang on him and seized it and 
 ran swiftly, and he had wounded three men to 
 their death ere they secured him. I know not 
 whither he thought to flee. 'Twas impossible 
 that he escape. He hath, as I said to thee 
 before, O Marcus, a madness for liberty that 
 stirreth him to wild deeds. For what he did 
 that day he should have been given to the 
 lions, and there were many who were urgent, 
 even as thou wouldst have been, that he should 
 
 69
 
 OSRU 
 
 crown the next games with his mighty death- 
 struggles. But Festus is a soldier before all 
 else. He decreed that the life of Dravid 
 should be spared, because of his usefulness to 
 the State, but that he should wear the battle 
 cestus from that hour. In truth, no man's life 
 would be safe in my trireme if he did not. He 
 hath an ugly temper, and that madness for lib 
 erty which possesseth him at all times maketh 
 him fearless of death. He would do, only Jupi 
 ter knoweth what of violence, if he had such 
 freedom to move as these others." 
 
 "Now by the great god Pan! What thou 
 sayest exciteth me, Caius. I would give a 
 thousand sesterces to see him fight." 
 
 "Thou wert born a matter of twenty years 
 too late, my Marcus. Dravid hath fought in 
 the arena, and the sight was worth thy thou 
 sand sesterces and more. It happened in this 
 wise. He himself got wind of the fierce desire 
 
 70
 
 DRAVID 
 
 of many to see him act the gladiator, and after 
 a time he besought Festus without ceasing to 
 suffer him to meet any beast they should choose 
 in single combat, and to give him his liberty 
 if he slew it. The youth of the city heard of 
 his petition, and went wild, even as thou 
 wouldst have done, O Marcus, for a sight of 
 his prowess. So both Dravid and the young 
 men who longed to wager their money on him 
 continually besought Festus with such impor 
 tunity that he was fain to satisfy them all. So 
 he devised a clever trick, whereby the games 
 were graced by the feats of this wonderful 
 Gaul and yet the pride of the galleys was not 
 taken from us. He granted the petition of 
 Dravid. If he slew the beast single-handed 
 he was to be free. But Festus cunningly sta 
 tioned another where he could rush out and 
 give, or feign to give, the final thrust. So that 
 Dravid not having won single-handed, Festus
 
 OSRU 
 
 would be guiltless in sending him back to the 
 galleys ! Also, if Dravid was too hard pressed 
 the other gladiator was to come to his assist 
 ance. So in any case our mighty Gaul, our 
 treasure, was to be saved to us." 
 
 "By Bacchus ! I could weep, Caius, to think 
 I was not here!" 
 
 "Thou wert not long done sucking pap, my 
 Marcus. The games were not for such as thou 
 wert then. And yet, I think we err in that the 
 children are no longer brought so young to the 
 arena." 
 
 "Torment me not, Caius. Tell me quickly 
 what befell this Dravid." 
 
 "Oh, a splendid beast of Bengal 'twas said, 
 a man-eater that had slain his hundreds in his 
 own jungles was the choice of Festus. The 
 people when they heard it went wild with joy, 
 to think of the magnificent Dravid pitted 
 against that more than magnificent beast who 
 
 72
 
 DRAVID 
 
 had already slain many since he was brought 
 hither. But Festus had the Gaul well weap- 
 oned. He greatly desired that whether he 
 should kill the tiger or not, he should come 
 through without a scratch and return that 
 same day to the trireme." 
 
 "Hasten, Caius! Tell me of the struggle. 
 Didst see it?" 
 
 "Thou art an unreasoning youth ! How can 
 I tell thee faster? Did I see it? Yea, that I 
 did ! It all fell as Festus had devised. Dravid 
 and that Bengalese brute made the most glor 
 ious picture mine eye hath ever beheld in the 
 arena. And he slew the beast, Marcus! He 
 slew him without help. There was not a soul 
 in the whole ampitheatre who did not know it 
 was Dravid's thrust that finished him, and not 
 the blow of the suborned gladiator who rushed 
 up just in time to stick his knife to the hilt 
 into the brute before he fell. 
 
 73
 
 OSRU 
 
 "So Dravid came back to the galleys. The 
 very spirit of the tiger seemed to have gone 
 into him. He knew well enough that Festus 
 had duped him, and he looked like a crouching 
 lion as he sat in a heap when the oars were 
 silent brooding over it. Then he suddenly 
 made the same petition to Festus again canst 
 believe?" 
 
 "I groan to think he doth not make it again, 
 this very hour!" 
 
 "Festus knew not what to think, but at the 
 mere whisper of seeing Dravid again there 
 was such enthusiasm among the citizens that 
 he consented. 
 
 "This time they chose a lion, every whit the 
 equal of that black beast thou didst so admire 
 and Dravid performed the impossible with 
 him. 'Twas a goodly sight. I would thou 
 hadst seen it, Marcus." 
 
 74
 
 DRAVID 
 
 "Remind me not of my loss! But tell me 
 more fully of the fight." 
 
 "Nay, I cannot. 'Tis twenty years since. 
 
 "As before, the man Festus had appointed 
 rushed out and thrust his sword into the stag 
 gering beast. But what think you? Dravid 
 turned on him and made the man do battle for 
 his life. Oh, then the people rose to him! 
 For 'twas known to all what Festus had in 
 tended. Now by the beneficence of Jupiter, 
 the gladiator who had been appointed to feign 
 help to Dravid was of a noble build, and never 
 has my blood so tingled in my veins as when 
 they clenched. For Festus sent men quickly 
 who seized them from behind, and two men 
 drawing back the arms of each of them, two 
 others took the weapons from them. Which 
 was marvellous clever of Festus, for he desired 
 not to stop the fight and yet he would not risk 
 
 75
 
 OSRU 
 
 that Dravid should be wounded. So the two 
 fought in the Gaulish manner, with naked 
 hands. And Dravid strangled his man!" 
 
 "Ah, Jupiter!" sighed Marcus, softly. 
 
 "Then he turned in a flash to the people, and 
 stretched out his hands ; and all took his mean 
 ing. Oh, the tumult that rose! Some were 
 for keeping him I think they were secretly 
 reckoning that if he returned to the galleys 
 they might see him yet again but most were 
 for letting him go. My trireme all but lost its 
 crowning star. But Festus stood firm. He 
 sent men to lead him away without seeming 
 violence, and caused to be circulated the report 
 that Dravid was but kept to show his skill once 
 more in the arena, and that quieted the people. 
 
 "But this time they reckoned without Dra 
 vid. He could never be persuaded to fight 
 again. He sitteth ever as thou seest him now, 
 with the look in his eyes of one who bideth his 
 
 76
 
 DRAVID 
 
 time. He looketh in vain. The liberty he 
 craveth will be his only from the hand of 
 Death." 
 
 "By Pluto! Thou dost touch my pity con 
 cerning this Gaul, Caius. Festus should have - 
 freed him at the demand of the people." 
 
 "Festus is too good a soldier. Look at his 
 massive arms!" 
 
 "Whence came he?" 
 
 "I know not. From some wild tribe where 
 he was bred up in the freedom he dreameth 
 of night and day. It may be, a chiefs son. 
 He was taken in battle." 
 
 "Bethink you, Caius! What memories of 
 his youth of wild freedom must be his as he 
 sitteth in his chains!" 
 
 "I have ere now conceived that the pent-up, 
 savage longing in his heart for the mountains 
 of his birth doth breed the mighty strokes that 
 are my joy. But come, thou shalt see for thy- 
 
 77
 
 OSRU 
 
 self. There is time, ere we seek the feast 
 Glaucus spreadeth to-night in honor of thine 
 illustrious father's son, to take thee to yon 
 headland and return. Thou shalt see the swift 
 est oars Rome boasteth, my Marcus. Sit here, 
 where thou canst mark the muscles of his 
 mighty back."
 
 Lo ! Desire is potent. But pray that it prove 
 
 not a Fire 
 That shall turn, in the end, and enshroud you, 
 
 and fashion your Pyre.
 
 CHUNDA, WIFE OF RAM RUOY. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - FOURTH OF THE 
 SOUL OSRU 
 
 Ram Ruoy was old, very old. Also he was 
 rich, very rich. By an unfortunate combina 
 tion of circumstances notably the plague 
 Ram Ruoy's wives were all dead. But a rich 
 old Brahmin could not cold-bloodedly be left 
 without a wife to perform suttee for him when 
 his time came to depart, thereby acquiring for 
 him much salvation and a happy reincarnation 
 when he should next be reborn. There is noth 
 ing new to the Hindoo in the idea of vicarious 
 atonement. 
 
 So they made haste and sold to him Chunda, 
 81
 
 OSRU 
 
 daughter of Dasura Mitra. There was much 
 pomp and ceremony of marriage connected 
 with the bargain, and large presents passed 
 from Ram Ruoy to Mitra; wherefore the lat 
 ter rejoiced greatly that his final decision 
 eleven years before on the day of Chunda's 
 birth had been to allow her to live. His dis 
 appointment then that she had not been a boy 
 was bitter, and he was more than half decided 
 during some hours to throw her into the Sacred 
 River, with suitable prayers that the proper 
 deity might feel duly propitiated and send a 
 son. However the final decision had been to 
 keep her, and now, behold! Five hundred 
 rupees was the reward of his self-sacrifice. 
 Truly Mitra had no cause to repent of the trou 
 ble he had put himself to, to raise her. 
 
 Chunda was well grown and pretty, and her 
 husband was rich, very rich, and indulgent. 
 Almost, the women who saw her jewels and 
 
 82
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 silks felt envy. But not quite, for Ram Ruoy 
 would lie on his funeral pyre before long ; next 
 moon, perhaps, or three moons hence, or ten; 
 and Chunda would lie beside him. No, no one 
 quite envied Chunda. 
 
 Perhaps instead, they spitefully rejoiced that 
 her day to queen it would be short, and that 
 they would be wearing their less costly neck 
 laces and anklets after the smoke had risen 
 that would make her forever indifferent to 
 such gauds. 
 
 For there could be no glamour of doubt 
 about Chunda's future. It was that certainty 
 which had made necessary the costly gifts of 
 Ram Ruoy to Dasura Mitra, who would have 
 had to part with a goodly marriage portion to 
 have wedded Chunda to a boy of eighteen. 
 Dasura Mitra had taken advantage to the full 
 of the dire necessity of Ram Ruoy, and had 
 driven a hard bargain. It is one thing to 
 
 83
 
 OSRU 
 
 marry off a daughter knowing that it may, 
 perchance, become her duty to perform suttee, 
 for there were, even at that period, widows in 
 India. The custom of burning them all had 
 already passed in that section. But it was 
 quite another matter, argued Mitra, to marry 
 her to do certain suttee for an old and other 
 wise wifeless man. And the price should be 
 high. Only the malignity of the Gods, claimed 
 Mitra, could have brought a man of Ram 
 Ruoy's rank to such a pass that he had not a 
 single wife left to comfort his soul on the Per 
 ilous Passage. What were five hundred rupees 
 to a man like Ram Ruoy, when they went to 
 purchase the boon of a wife to survive him? 
 And indeed Ram Ruoy, when the plague had 
 done its work and yet providentially spared 
 him, did not haggle long over the price before 
 he took to himself this young thing, Chunda, 
 and breathed freely again when he thought of
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 the future beyond the grave. Also, from a 
 merely carnal point of view, this fresh, young, 
 new wife pleased him. For he was old, very 
 old, and jaded. 
 
 But there was nothing to please Chunda, ex 
 cept the anklets. She sometimes forgot the 
 other things, when there were plenty of women 
 about wondering at and desiring them. They 
 were marvellously inlaid with gold, and at a 
 little distance looked the all gold anklets that 
 only a princess may wear. Some, not many, 
 could match her other jewels, but as to anklets 
 she stood alone. 
 
 In this other matter, alas, she stood alone 
 also. To any wife in all Hindoostan the lot 
 might fall to do suttee, just as any soldier may 
 die in battle. That was bearable. But the cer 
 tainty, the speedy certainty, who could look it 
 in the face and not quail? Chunda trembled 
 daily, nay, hourly. And the health and com- 
 
 85
 
 OSRU 
 
 fort of Ram Ruoy possessed her thoughts in 
 the silent night watches. To keep the breath 
 in that senile bunch of bones, ah, only to keep 
 it there! She pushed Death from him with 
 her strong young hands and made of herself 
 a willing mat, lest the damp of the earth should 
 reach his feet and work him harm. 
 
 "Delight of my eyes," said Ram Ruoy, after 
 some six months of wedded bliss with the wife 
 of his second childhood, "the Gods meant me 
 no ill, as I thought in my first grief, when they 
 took the six wives they had left me in the space 
 of four suns. They did but plan to give me 
 thee, that thou mightest cheer and delight my 
 failing strength. Yea, and even hold Death 
 from me, thou treasure ! Blessed be the Gods !" 
 
 Chunda trembled. 
 
 Sometimes, in anger, Ram Ruoy reminded 
 her of the fate stored up for her. 
 
 86
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 "Wouldst ruin me with thine itch for jew 
 els? It is well the Gods have taken my other 
 wives. A rajah could not buy trinkets enough 
 to satisfy two such as thou. Thou wast an 
 evil-liver when last on earth, without a doubt. 
 Perchance thou didst ruin thy husband with 
 thine extravagance, as thou dost all but ruin 
 me, and 'tis in penance for that that thou art 
 now set apart to burn!" 
 
 And Chunda trembled, and forgot the arm 
 let she had been cajoling him to buy. 
 
 Others beside her husband reminded her 
 freely of the future. There was Agra, the 
 ugly-tempered wife of Ram Ruoy's oldest son, 
 who ruled the women and the household. 
 
 "Thou little devil !" she would say, when no 
 one else could hear. "Glad will I be to see 
 thee burn! Pray Kali it be not long that I 
 wait that much-to-be-desired sight !" 
 
 87
 
 OSRU 
 
 And then she would laugh and chuckle a 
 long time, as she saw how sorely Chunda trem 
 bled. 
 
 There was much that made life a doubtful 
 blessing to Chunda, but still she clung to it. 
 During her hone)Tnoon, which had been a 
 moon of myrrh and bitterness, she had, indeed, 
 wished herself dead, but even while she longed 
 for death, every fibre of her healthy body 
 shrank from the death that waited for her, 
 like a karait in the grass. 
 
 It availed nothing to outshine the wives of 
 poorer and younger men, because they, spite 
 ful and devoid of compunction, were quick at 
 reminding her to tremble. 
 
 "Thou'rt right to go in broidered silks, and 
 deck thine ears with rubies," said Satartha, 
 wife of Paryanya, with oily tongue. "Poor 
 child ! Thou hast every right to make thy life 
 a merry one !"
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 And Chunda trembled. 
 
 "Beseech Krishna for a son," counseled 
 Arthvan, her mother. "If thou dost bear him 
 a son, then while he is yet little, thou canst 
 implore Ram Ruoy, and he will take another 
 wife, lest, perchance, the manling suffer from 
 thy loss. Of a surety, when thou wert last 
 earth-born thou didst some grievous wrong, 
 that the angry Gods should have marked thee 
 out for this long torment of fear." 
 
 But Chunda was a barren woman. Not even 
 a useless woman-babe came to mock her. Ram 
 Ruoy was old, very old, and she invoked the 
 intervention of Krishna in vain. One by one 
 she went to every shrine she could persuade 
 her husband to let her visit. 
 
 After these pilgrimages there was always 
 the sick fear, as she drew near home, lest they 
 sat within and waited her coming that they 
 might shave her head. Many nights she woke
 
 OSRU 
 
 and felt of her hair with terrified haste. Some 
 times she dreamed that she put up her hand 
 and her beautiful silky hair was not sign of 
 the near approach of her ordeal. 
 
 The very worst of all was to watch the 
 funeral pyres of other men, men invariably 
 younger than her husband. They could not, in 
 fact, well be older. Sometimes the widows 
 who burned with them were younger than she, 
 but that counted for little. They had been 
 happy wives until she counted the days that 
 each had known that the death of her lord was 
 certain. 
 
 They had not been bought for this. Some 
 times she knew they loved their husbands and 
 gladly paid the price that secured to them fu 
 ture happiness. There was Misra, now. Her 
 beloved had been young and strong and beau 
 tiful, until the night he had drowsily sought to 
 free himself from the weight of the cobra that 
 
 90
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 had coiled on his smooth, bare breast. Never 
 had the thought come to Misra that she was to 
 burn beside him in her one and twentieth year. 
 Chunda felt that she could have borne to be 
 Misra. 
 
 "Desire of my heart," said Ram Ruoy with 
 clumsy playfulness, as they returned from wit 
 nessing her suttee, "see thou tend me softly 
 that the day when thou shalt follow Misra, and 
 climb the steps to me, be kept far from us." 
 
 And Chunda trembled. 
 
 That night she woke, screaming. She had 
 climbed the steps ; she had lain down beside the 
 corpse of Ram Ruoy; she had felt the fire. 
 The pain of the burning woke her, and she lay 
 and trembled till daybreak. After that the 
 dream came often. Twice, thrice in a moon, 
 she climbed the steps and the flames lapped her 
 flesh. 
 
 Still Ram Ruoy did not die. The breath was
 
 OSRU 
 
 yet in him and he doddered about, calling 
 Chunda his little Gift of Life and chuckling 
 that he was the Beloved of the Gods, since 
 when he had thought to die they had given him 
 a beautiful bride and ten more years than he 
 had hoped to enjoy. 
 
 Chunda was three and twenty when they 
 did at last cut off her beautiful hair. For 
 twelve full years Ram Ruoy kept the breath in 
 his shrunken frame though two score sun 
 sets seemed more than he was like to see, on 
 the day he made little Chunda his wife lest he 
 fail of a widow. 
 
 That night she half woke and her hand crept 
 drowsily up to her head that she might take 
 comfort in the feel of her soft hair. Then the 
 air was torn with screams, for the horrible 
 prickliness of a shorn scalp was under her 
 shaking fingers, and the truth she had been too 
 dazed to realize before came home. 
 
 92
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 The chief priests counseled her. A widow 
 must mount beside her husband of her own 
 free will, yet it was an unheard of thing for an 
 only wife to refuse. They labored with her, 
 pointing out that there was but one path ap 
 pointed for her by the gods. They made her 
 drunk with soma and wrought upon her over 
 strung nerves till they wrung from her a loath 
 consent. Then they sent her home. 
 
 That night the dream came again and she 
 woke, raving. But no one, though she threw 
 herself on her face before each, turned a lis 
 tening ear to her refusal to lie beside Ram 
 Ruoy. To the high priest she had given con 
 sent. Therefore she could be bound and 
 dragged there. They told her so. 
 
 They drugged her at last, because she con 
 tinued to fill the house with her shrieks and 
 disturb their slumbers. But they could not 
 risk killing her that would not acquire merit 
 
 93
 
 OSRU 
 
 for Ram Ruoy and the biggest dose they 
 dared give only partly quieted her. Sometimes 
 she lay in a waking dream, living over the 
 coming hour. Sometimes she shrieked without 
 ceasing and sometimes she raved that she 
 cared nought for the future happiness of Ram 
 Ruoy and would not go. 
 
 She struck at Chitiji, the high priest; but 
 what punishment is commanded for a widow 
 about to immolate herself for the repose of her 
 husband's soul? 
 
 To Agra she screamed: 
 
 "Thou shalt return to earth and burn a 
 widow, because thou art glad I go to the bier of 
 Ram Ruoy. All all of you " the sweep of 
 her arm included the priests, "shall suffer be 
 cause of this. It may be that for the sins of a 
 former birth this thing has come upon me, but 
 in your future lives it shall be counted to you 
 as sin that ye force me against my will to climb 
 
 94
 
 CHUNDA 
 
 the steps to Ram Ruoy. Yea, it shall be 
 counted to you as sin !" She threw herself back 
 in a convulsion. A very little more and Ram 
 Ruoy might have been cheated of his rights. 
 
 Freshly stupefied with drugs she climbed the 
 steps, supported and held close prisoner by two 
 of her husband's sons. But at sight of Ram 
 Ruoy's sheeted figure she broke from them and 
 fled, and fought them with the strength of 
 madness as they dragged her back. 
 
 The women looked on with horror at the 
 shame she put upon their sex and called out to 
 the sons of Ram Ruoy to bind her with cords, 
 lest the worthless one rob Ram Ruoy of his 
 sacred dues. 
 
 The flames lapped her flesh, as they had in 
 her dreams, but she could not wake. 
 
 95
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. But Justice abides, over 
 ruling. 
 
 And Desire, being spent, bends the neck to 
 her rod and her schooling.
 
 LOVIS, SIEUR LE BRENT. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - FIFTH OF THE 
 Soui, OSRU 
 
 To be thrust into a dungeon was no figure 
 of speech in the days when the Norman barons 
 were building up their power, cementing it 
 securely with violence. They took you by the 
 shoulders in those times and thrust you bru 
 tally into the darkness, so that you stumbled 
 forward drunkenly, and except the cell was 
 narrow and you brought up against the oppo 
 site wall suddenly, you lost your balance and 
 came to earth sprawling on your face. And 
 as you lay there partly stunned, you heard the 
 great key creak and the receding footsteps of 
 
 99
 
 OSRU 
 
 the gaoler as he went back to the light of 
 heaven and the sight of the blue sky. 
 
 'Twas a fearsome thing to offend one of 
 those lawless autocrats of Normandy, with 
 none to question his decrees or bring him to 
 book for injustice. Men went into his ample 
 prisons striplings and came out, feet foremost, 
 cadaverous gray-beards; having been forgot 
 ten while my lord pursued his enemies and 
 equally forgotten while he pursued his pleas 
 ures. 
 
 Lovis, Sieur le Brent, picked himself up and 
 strode around close to the walls of the foul, 
 damp place into which he had just been thrust, 
 like one demented. He made the circuit some 
 hundred times perhaps, before thought came 
 back to him. For the mixture of daze and fear 
 and mad desire to take some one by the throat 
 that filled him when he first found himself in 
 the dungeon of the man he served with his 
 
 TOO
 
 LOVIS SIEUR LE BRENT 
 
 sword, was a far cry from thinking. But in 
 time his brain cleared, and while his body con 
 tinued to sweep on with the tireless strides of 
 a coursing hound his brain began to race still 
 more swiftly, seeking out the chances of speedy 
 release. 
 
 "Now God be thanked that I have no store 
 of land or gold. When did I think to be glad 
 that I had nought in the world beyond my 
 sword ? 'Twould be with me even as with poor 
 Gibert de Rohan, God rest him in Heaven, 
 and 'twas for less than mine offense that he 
 was first thrust perchance into this very 
 hole." 
 
 Lovis le Brent's blood chilled at the fancy 
 that the luckless Sieur de Rohan might have 
 spent his brief imprisonment restlessly meas 
 uring these very walls, even as he was now 
 measuring them. It weighed on him heavily 
 as an evil omen that almost his first coherent 
 
 101
 
 OSRU 
 
 thought in this place had been of de Rohan. 
 
 "But de Rohan had estates which would 
 tempt a king's anger to wax instead of waning 
 with time, as is nature. He had never a chance, 
 once he gave de Breouille cause to seize him." 
 
 This same de Breouille, who had been 
 tempted beyond his power to resist by de Ro 
 han's wealth, (albeit he imprisoned him in 
 anger and without any ulterior idea of con 
 fiscating his worldly goods), was now the ac 
 tive and at present triumphing enemy of le 
 Brent. 
 
 "My chances are good, so help me God," said 
 le Brent. He put away from him resolutely 
 the thought of the life-long prisoners in that 
 very set of dungeons. Prisoners whose his 
 tories he had known, whose histories every one 
 knew, but in whose behalf no one lifted a fin 
 ger lest they should suddenly depart from the 
 haunts of their fellows and join them. Instead 
 
 IO2
 
 LOVIS SIEUR LE BRENT 
 
 he thought over the stories of every prisoner 
 of de Breouille's who had been released or had 
 escaped. The list was long enough to be en 
 couraging. 
 
 "If all else fail, there are ofttimes gaolers 
 I must study these varlets here " Prison 
 had not yet changed the Sieur's attitude to 
 ward the common herd. 
 
 "But after all's said, my best chance is that 
 de Breouille's whim against me will die out, 
 mayhap in a few days. If the damsel for 
 whose sweet sake I am here would but bestir 
 herself in my behalf yea, if she should grant 
 de Breouille his uttermost desire, and but de 
 mand in return banishment for me, I ask no 
 more than banishment, how gladly would I 
 give her up! For I must give her up, in all 
 case, if so be he keep me here. 
 
 "There is much to be tried. By God's help, 
 I shall not miss the sight of many suns " 
 
 103
 
 OSRU 
 
 ******* 
 
 Ten years. 
 
 Lovis le Brent beat his head against the 
 wall. Another will-o-the-wisp hope had that 
 day gone. But there was still a chance. Lovis 
 le Brent's pluck would not altogether down. 
 There was always the chance that the Baron's 
 whim would change. He had lain down and 
 risen up by the light of that hope for near four 
 thousand days. But to-day it shone very 
 dimly. Lovis tore his hair. Despair all but 
 possessed him. He beat his fists against the 
 wall. It was not possible, at that moment, to 
 feel that the Baron's whim would change. 
 
 The fact was, his whim was gone. He had 
 merely forgotten. There were men, prisoners 
 for fifty years in that same castle gaol, put 
 there by the Baron's grandfather for trifling 
 offences and simply left there by his successors. 
 Le Brent knew this. Every one knew it. But 
 
 104
 
 LOVIS SIEUR LE BRENT 
 
 no one cared. And every one knew that he, 
 Lovis le Brent, was unjustly detained, deprived 
 of his liberty, but no one cared. He beat with 
 his two hands upon his breast until he fell 
 
 exhausted. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 Twenty years. 
 
 There was still one chance. 
 
 The Baron would without doubt die first, 
 and then he would raise heaven and earth to 
 reach the ear of his successor. De Breouille 
 had to his credit fifty ill-spent years, le Brent 
 was ten years younger. Also, de Breouille was 
 always fighting with his neighbors. He might 
 at any time be killed. A just God grant it soon. 
 And it sometimes happened, too, that a new 
 Baron set free the men who cumbered the dun 
 geons he would presently fill himself. 
 
 Lovis threw himself on the filthy straw and 
 lay there a while in a semi-stupor. Hope de- 
 
 105
 
 OSRU 
 
 ferred maketh the heart sick and the brain 
 sick, too. 
 
 Presently a frenzy took him and he leaped 
 up, his eyes gleaming. Swinging his arms like 
 mad he tore around the dark place and jumped 
 and leaped and shrieked aloud. No gaoler 
 came to quiet him for no one heard. 
 
 When he was tired out he threw himself on 
 the straw again and slept. 
 
 * H= * * * * * 
 
 Thirty years. 
 
 His hair is white, but his body is still rugged. 
 His mad orgies of violent rage have served as 
 exercise and kept him strong. 
 
 There is a new hope. 
 
 The Baron is at war with a mightier Baron. 
 If he loses God send he may he loses all, 
 and the new Baron will very surely set his pris 
 oners free. Out of scorn for his conquered 
 enemy, he will certainly do it. 
 
 106
 
 LOVIS SIEUR LE BRENT 
 
 Gaolers are fear-smitten creatures not easy 
 to bribe to a righteous deed, lest their hides 
 pay the price, or lest they find themselves be 
 hind the key they have so often turned. Be 
 like, also, the bribes at le Brent's command are 
 not ample enough to tempt most of the brother 
 hood. But every new gaoler is always a new 
 chance. It may be that, some day, one braver 
 than the rest will wink at the escape of a pris 
 oner who has not been inquired after for fif 
 teen years. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 Forty years. 
 
 The Baron is not dead. Not he, but the 
 Baron he fought some ten years since went 
 to the wall. 
 
 But it must come soon now, it must come. 
 He cannot live forever, with the devil waiting 
 hungrily for his wicked soul. 
 
 Lovis le Brent sits much with his head on 
 107
 
 OSRU 
 
 his hands. His strength is going for the old 
 rages take hold of him less often. But his 
 head is clear and strong. He has never ceased 
 
 to calculate the chances left him. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 Fifty years. 
 
 De Breouille is just dead. But le Brent's 
 dungeon has another occupant. 
 
 It fell empty these two years since, when 
 Lovis le Brent almost beat his brains out 
 against the floor at last. Although he did 
 not quite beat them out yet he addled them 
 finally, and shortly thereafter he left the dun 
 geon. 
 
 For dungeons are places for the living, not 
 the dead. 
 
 108
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. She twists you a rope 
 
 for your using. 
 But mayhap they will hang you, ere night, with 
 
 that rope of your choosing.
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - SIXTH OF THE 
 Soui, OSRU 
 
 Don Jose de Roderiguez was in the clutches 
 of The Three. The torments of the Inquisi 
 tion were closing in around him. How and 
 why it had come to pass he had but a dazed 
 notion. He fed and housed two merchants 
 from Cadiz, who sought his hospitality on a 
 certain eve of Ascension. That was all. And 
 because of that simple act of kindness all this 
 trouble and terror had come upon him. Was 
 there no justice in Heaven ? Was God Himself 
 dead, that He had not heard his hourly cries 
 for help these two years past? 
 
 in
 
 OSRU 
 
 Don Jose de Roderiguez was already more 
 than half crazed. Only a lumpishly unimag 
 inative creature, with almost undifferentiated 
 brains, could lie long in the dungeons of The 
 Three and keep those brains unclouded. 
 
 "Christ witnesseth ! It might as easily have 
 been any other man in the market place as my 
 thrice-wretched self, my father!" 
 
 He beat his breast and raised to his lips the 
 hempen rope that bound the robe of the padre, 
 stammering out to his patient ears for the hun 
 dredth time the story of his misfortunes. 
 
 "They offered me excellent golden doubloons 
 for a night's lodging. A curse on their money ! 
 And then it comes to light they are heretics 
 God knoweth ,1 wotted not nor dreamed it, 
 else had I delivered them up with my own 
 hands and shortly thereafter I am haled be 
 fore The Three for the heinous crime of har 
 boring heretics; the rest thou knowest. By 
 
 112
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 the Holy Virgin Mary, the Blessed Mother of 
 Our Sacred Lord, I am no heretic. Why will 
 not The Three believe? I have bared my 
 thoughts to them from the hour of my birth." 
 
 He had indeed. Don Jose de Roderiguez 
 groaned and smote his forehead as he remem 
 bered the ordeal. Once only, shortly after his 
 arrest, he had faced The Three. For five mad 
 dening hours he stood in an ague of fear and 
 answered their entrapping questions from 
 whose entangling meshes but four in Seville 
 had ever escaped. This cell of his had seemed 
 a place of peace and refuge ever since. But 
 at any moment Their summons might come. 
 
 Don Jose wept weakly. He was no longer 
 the brawling, dare-devil braggart who had 
 looked up boldly at the sun that beat on Seville 
 for some thirty odd years. It was many 
 months since that gruesome interview, but he 
 dreaded the next so much that he would have 
 
 "3
 
 OSRU 
 
 instantly chosen life-long imprisonment, in 
 the peace and comparative plenty and freedom 
 from physical pain that were now his, rather 
 than face The Three again. 
 
 "Holy father, no man in Seville hath lived 
 farther from heresy than wretched Jose de 
 Roderiguez. I call all the saints in Heaven to 
 witness how terrible is the injustice under 
 which I suffer. Since my pious mother took 
 me to mass at five years old, till now, in my 
 forty-first year, I have not wavered in obe 
 dience to the Church. However great my sins, 
 God knoweth I have always confessed them 
 and patiently performed the penances, howso 
 ever severe. Never have I complained. 'Tis 
 true that in the matter of the girl Manuela, 
 whereof I told thee something formerly, the 
 holy father certainly did fleece me somewhat, 
 but God is my witness, it never entered into 
 the heart of de Roderiguez to complain. I 
 
 114
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 was but too glad to appease God for my 
 sins " 
 
 The friar's countenance changed. 
 
 "Thou sayest a priest of the Most Blessed 
 Jesus robbed thee?" 
 
 The words rang coldly and loudly. There 
 were those listening behind the innocent grat 
 ing high in the wall on the inner side of the 
 room. The holy father feared lest they had 
 missed this point of his mumbling penitent's 
 confession. 
 
 A priest may not repeat outside the secrets 
 of the confessional, but if, by chance, they are 
 overheard 
 
 De Roderiguez clutched his throat. 
 
 "Shrive me ! shrive me, father ! I am as one 
 drunken with anguish. I say what I do not 
 mean. Thou wilt not tell The Three?" 
 
 "Fear not, my son. My lips are sealed. 
 Thou knowest full well a priest tells nothing
 
 OSRU 
 
 nothing. He stands between thee and thy 
 God, not between thee and man. But this is 
 a grievous thing, son, a very grievous thing. 
 In the eyes of God thou art sorely guilty. Then 
 what matters it how it appeareth in the eyes 
 of men? Thou saidst thy confessor robbed 
 thee, and I trow he did but set thee a fitting 
 penance for a deadly sin. If The Three heard 
 thee, nay, nay, / will not tell them but if 
 The Three did hear thee utter such blasphemy 
 against the Holy Mother Church, methinks 
 thou wouldst have short shrift !" 
 
 "I meant it not," moaned de Roderiguez. "I 
 knew not what I said. I am stupid from sleep 
 less nights and wretched days. It is now near- 
 ing two years that no one hath come nigh me, 
 saving thee." 'Twas the habit of The Three 
 to wear out the stubborn ones, whose stories 
 could in no wise be shaken, by means of these 
 long, terrifying silences. "The august Three 
 
 116
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 have forgotten the miserable de Roderiguez." 
 "Not so," said the friar, significantly. 
 "Thou shalt shortly find The Three have had 
 thee in remembrance these past two years. 
 And as for this damning thing that thou hast 
 said, the evil in men's hearts will out. Drunken 
 men speak truth, and thou wast indeed as one 
 drunk and unguarded in thy speech by reason 
 of thy sleepless vigils. But I will shrive thee, 
 my son. Thou shalt lie all night face down 
 ward on this stone floor, fasting and without 
 drink, from the hour the gaoler visits thee till 
 he come again with to-morrow's sun. And 
 thou shalt tell thy beads without ceasing. And 
 further, because thou hast said a priest robbed 
 thee perchance thou hadst best make volun 
 tary offering to the Church in fitting restitu 
 tion, seest thou, for that thou hast slandered 
 the Lord thy God through his earthly vicar. I 
 leave to thee what portion of thy worldly 
 
 117
 
 OSRU 
 
 goods thou wilt bestow. The Church is ever 
 needy, and thy sin is great. And the Lord 
 loveth the cheerful gift." 
 
 "I will, father," whispered the now deeply 
 terrified cavalier. 
 
 The priest withdrew, his task at last accom 
 plished. Weekly for two and twenty months 
 he had been confessing de Roderiguez and 
 seeking to gain his confidence, in the service 
 of The Three. To-day, for the first time, de 
 Roderiguez had let fall a word that could be 
 used against him. The evil in the heart will 
 out. 
 
 The friar sighed. There could now be no 
 doubt that the unhappy man was a heretic and 
 a harborer of heretics. The Blessed Lord had 
 graciously decreed that he should have a 
 goodly heritage of land and gold, which would 
 henceforth be held in trust for the poor by the 
 Holy Church. 'Twas indeed needless that Don 
 
 118
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 Jose should present it, or any portion thereof, 
 of his own free will as a sin offering. His con 
 viction as a heretic would now follow without 
 possibility of failure, and both his life and his 
 estates would be forfeit. 
 
 The friar paused to sigh again over the de 
 pravity of human hearts. Then his thoughts 
 reverted to Don Jose's fortune and the peni 
 tential gift he meant he should make to Holy 
 Mother Church. He studied long and ear 
 nestly on how he should move him to give up 
 all. The friar was an artistic man in his pro 
 fessional capacity. The Church could rise in 
 her might and take, but 'twere far more seemly 
 that the don himself should give in grief and 
 penitence, than that the Church, however 
 justly, should seize. Moreover, 'twere better 
 for the poor wretch's soul that he, ignorant 
 that these worldly possessions were in fact no 
 longer his, should yield them up in submissive 
 
 119
 
 OSRU 
 
 penitence and accept the cross of poverty for 
 his terrible sin. Also, was it not a covetous 
 desire for the doubloons of the heretics that 
 had first led him astray? 
 
 The friar pondered long and earnestly, tell 
 ing his beads the while. Finally he drew a 
 breath of relief and satisfaction and went to 
 vespers. Don Jose would, without doubt, be 
 moved ere long to make a princely gift to the 
 Church, a full and free surrender of his earthly 
 all. 
 
 But de Roderiguez, though sleepless, did not 
 lie in penance on the floor of his cell saying his 
 prayers that night. Before the hour the holy 
 father had set all thought of prayers and pen 
 ance was wiped from his mind as fire wipes 
 the impression of the signet ring from wax. 
 
 Toward nightfall de Roderiguez had an 
 other guest, who muffled his face from the 
 gaoler, but showed it when they were alone 
 
 1 20
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 to the prisoner. He spoke briefly, and his stay 
 was short. But that brief stay was sufficient to 
 complete the work of The Three in remodel 
 ing to madness the brain of Jose. 
 
 " 'Tis twenty years, Jose de Roderiguez. 
 Dost remember ?'* 
 
 De Roderiguez remembered. So well that 
 he instinctively stood at bay. Some of the 
 brute courage natural to the man, that The 
 Three had all but sweated out of him with the 
 sweat of fear, returned. 
 
 "Thou hast had thy day. Now mine ! Thy 
 greater wealth did get thee the wife of my de 
 sire. For fifteen years I suffered in mind and 
 body because of that. Thy kinsmen were many, 
 else had I slain thee ere now. But all ends 
 well. Thou art singled out by The Three. 
 Know, 'twas I that caused the report that the 
 strangers from Cadiz who sojourned at thy 
 house were heretics. Ah! Dios! Long did I 
 
 121
 
 OSRU 
 
 wait to draw thee into the net of The Three! 
 But Mary the Blessed Virgin at length heard 
 my prayers. This day thou hast signed the 
 warrant of thy death. Spies of The Three 
 lurked behind yon grating and heard what thou 
 didst tell thy priest." 
 
 The knees of Jose de Roderiguez bent. He 
 caught at the grating of the little window to 
 straighten them and clung there. But he still 
 faced his guest defiantly. 
 
 "I have gained the ear of one of The Three, 
 at great cost, and asked for thee a boon. I 
 have asked for thee, that ere thou diest thou 
 shouldst know the embraces of the Iron 
 Maiden. He hath said it. He will not fail. 
 'Tis my estate in Granada assures to me this 
 boon I have asked for thee. Think of me, de 
 Roderiguez, thou base-born whelp of a devil, 
 when the Iron Maiden folds thee softly, 
 softly." 
 
 122
 
 DON JOSE DE RODERIGUEZ 
 
 De Roderiguez drew himself up a little 
 straighter with the remnant of his strength, 
 still clinging to the grating. 
 
 His guest continued. 
 
 "This one thing more I asked for thee. Rest 
 easy in thy heart. Thou shalt be spared the 
 death of a heretic. Thou shalt not burn. He 
 hath promised it. And I have such a palace in 
 Granada as would move a prince to keep his 
 promises. Nay, verily, thou shalt not burn. 
 Thou shalt not come alive from the arms of 
 the Maiden. The day is even now set for thy 
 bridal. I will tell thee no more than that 'tis 
 that same Saint's Day whereon thou madest 
 thine the bride I burned for twenty years ago. 
 Had Death not snatched her from thee, that 
 would I now do. Whether thy nuptials with 
 the Iron Maid shall come to pass within this 
 year, thou shalt not know. The Three move 
 slowly. How long already hast thou lain here ? 
 
 123
 
 OSRU 
 
 But surely, surely, she awaits thee to be thy 
 bride. I would thou hadst had no other ! Dost 
 feel her soft kisses on thine eyes, de Rod- 
 eriguez ? I see thou dost ! Not once, but many 
 times she shall embrace thee, and thou shalt die 
 in agony. 
 
 "Adios, Jose de Roderiguez !" 
 
 124
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. Mayhap you "mil find 
 
 it has knotted 
 A scourge for your quivering flesh. Whereof 
 
 only God wotted.
 
 HAFID THE DWARF. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - SEVENTH OF THE 
 Soui, OSRU 
 
 Baron von Altenberg, crusader, came home 
 to his castle on the Rhine and his little daugh 
 ter Berta from dealings with the Saracens. 
 He had given the infidel dogs many goodly 
 blows and, by the grace of God, brought home 
 a whole skin. Also, he had fetched with him 
 among the spoils of his right arm a certain 
 manikin of a kind seldom seen in Teuton lands. 
 This manikin was a present for the little Berta. 
 
 "Hi ! little maid," quoth the Baron, "I have 
 brought thee a goodly toy. Behold!" and he 
 pulled forward the little man who came barely 
 
 127
 
 OSRU 
 
 to the elbow of the fourteen-year-old Berta. 
 
 "So. Thou shalt have some one to keep thee 
 merry, when next I go to wrest the tomb of our 
 Blessed Lord from the accursed hands of the 
 Turks. He hath frolicsome antics shall make 
 thee laugh till thy sides are sore. And he hath 
 a clever wit. Already he knoweth our tongue 
 as his own. He is thine, Bertlein. And thou 
 shalt teach him to love the Savior and hate 
 the Saracen. Belike, thou wilt find thou hast 
 little to teach him concerning that last. Me- 
 thinks he hath good reason to hate the Sara 
 cen. Look thou here." 
 
 He laid hold of the dwarf and pulled him 
 toward him, not roughly but without taking ac 
 count of his manhood or even his humanity; 
 rather, treating him as something between a 
 child and a doll. He stripped off the short 
 Turkish jacket he wore and jerked open the 
 blouse shirt underneath. 
 
 128
 
 HAFID 
 
 Across his chest, laid evenly with an awful 
 precision that suggested a devilish skill in 
 wielding the whip, were the scars of great 
 welts that had once gone deep. 
 
 The sensitive Berta's impressions of her new 
 toy and playmate were scarcely as roseate as 
 her father had expected. Later Northern Eu 
 rope learned the dreadful art of making 
 dwarfs, but at this period they were unknown. 
 Hand's squat, barrel-shaped trunk and hands 
 that touched the floor like an ape's moved her 
 to something like nausea, but the scars on his 
 breast and a certain wistfulness in his smile 
 stirred the depths of her gentle heart. She put 
 out a timid hand and the dwarf, skilled beyond 
 more fortunate men in reading faces, sank 
 thankfully to his knees and kissed the fingers 
 of his new mistress, aware that a happier era 
 had begun for him. 
 
 As for Berta, she found her father had by 
 129
 
 OSRU 
 
 no means overstated Hafid' s power to amuse. 
 But none of his tricks and antics so absorbed 
 and fascinated her as the tales he told of the 
 people among whom he had lived. Weird 
 tales, as though the Arabian Nights folk (of 
 whom she had never heard) had come to life 
 and frolicked anew. 
 
 "But tell me thine own tale, Hand!" 
 
 "Nay, mistress!" 
 
 "Then will I have thee beaten !" 
 
 "Nay, mistress! But tell me rather of the 
 blessed Savior. Thou'rt over young to hear 
 the tale of Hafid the dwarf, fair mistress !" 
 
 "Hafid! Then I shall assuredly have thee 
 beaten if thou dost continue to disobey me !" 
 
 But Hafid only smiled wistfully and renewed 
 his request to be told of the Holy Jesus. He 
 knew well 'twas not through such lips as the 
 tender-hearted Berta's that commands for 
 beatings came. 
 
 130
 
 HAFID 
 
 Because Berta asked him very often to tell 
 what had befallen himself, it happened that he 
 heard very often the story of Christ. So good 
 came ot it. For presently the wondrous gen 
 tleness of the Holy One of Nazareth crept into 
 his heart and drove out the bitterness that 
 man's inhumanity had put there, and at last he 
 could speak to Berta quietly and without ran 
 cor of those things that had been his lot. 
 
 "I am a Greek. The Turks stole me, little 
 maid. This, our blessed Lord permitted. May 
 hap had I known Him then He had not suf 
 fered it. While my bones were still soft and 
 young they misshaped me thus. Nay, the good 
 Lord gave me not this body. 'Tis the work of 
 human hands. I am thy plaything, little lady, 
 but to be thy plaything is to be free and to be 
 a man. Yea, a man! To be the plaything of 
 Ahmed the sheikh ah, blessed Jesus, let me 
 forget !
 
 OSRU 
 
 "The pirates who stole me kept me eight 
 years and taught me many things. For a 
 dwarf must be skilled to amuse if he thinks 
 to keep his skin on his bones. 
 
 "At what, methinks, must have been sixteen 
 years, though I know not for certain mine age 
 when they snatched me from Greece, they sold 
 me to Ahmed and that black devil of a Saracen 
 owned my body and soul till thy father took 
 me from him. Of a truth, the dear Lord Jesus 
 looked with pity on me then. 
 
 " 'Twas not that sometimes he beat me till 
 all went dark and I fell. Men are beaten. 
 Stripes I can take like a man, for I am strong. 
 If I had nought to remember save those times 
 when I was beaten to unconsciousness 'twere a 
 light matter. That I could forgive, even as 
 our blessed Lord commandeth. But the cursed 
 Ahmed had a cruel wit and tormented me 
 sorely. 'Twas his whim to have me led about 
 
 132
 
 HAFID 
 
 like a bear by a collar and chain, and with me 
 a brown bear, smallish and of a rough coat. 
 What the beast did I must do, and all a bear's 
 tricks I learned. Did it dance, I danced too. 
 Like a bear, cumbrously. When it went on all 
 fours, I also must go on all fours. 'Twas bit 
 ter! To be mishandled thus and treated as a 
 beast to make men sport ! 
 
 "Ahmed held us his choicest entertainment 
 and had us out to liven all his guests. Each of 
 us had a keeper, a huge black-a-moor, the twain 
 dressed in the self-same fashion. For the bear, 
 'twas nought. He had not a man's feelings 
 wherewith to suffer at the indignities put 
 upon us. 
 
 "In an evil hour Ahmed, wearying of using 
 me as a dancing bear, bethought him to get a 
 monkey and train me to monkey capers. So I 
 must needs learn to swing on bars and hang 
 head downward and such like tricks. 'Twas 
 
 133
 
 OSRU 
 
 worse than death. What the ape did I must 
 copy when 'twas Ahmed's caprice thus to make 
 sport of me, to while the time. And when the 
 animal swung by the tail they would grow un 
 seemly with laughter. I could not follow. 
 Forsooth, he was the cleverer. 
 
 "These be but the worst of the ways Ahmed 
 hath devised from time to time to torment me. 
 May the blessed Lord put out his eyes and 
 wither his arms ! 
 
 "I will confess the truth to thee now, sweet 
 mistress! Hand hath hitherto feared to tell 
 thee this, lest thou shouldst desire to do like 
 wise! 
 
 "Nay, nay! I know it well! Thou wouldst 
 not! If the Blessed Lord is gentle, even as 
 thou, then will I, too, love Him forever." 
 
 134
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. Behold in the Sheaves 
 
 you are reaping 
 The Harvest of Former Desire. So a truce to 
 
 your weeping.
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - EIGHTH OF THE 
 SOUL OSRU 
 
 The London alleys were dark and far from 
 safe in the days of Bess the Queen. This one, 
 however, held nothing worse than a bedraggled 
 girl. She crept out of a doorway and clasped 
 the arms of the men who passed. But they 
 shook her off. She was not of those who create 
 desire. Consumption was wasting her to the 
 
 bone. 
 
 Close on to midnight came another pedes 
 trian, the first for half an hour. 
 
 "Come wi' me, man dear. Come awa' wi' 
 me," she wheedled, with strained coquetry. 
 
 137
 
 OSRU 
 
 The man essayed to free himself from her 
 clinging but less roughly than the others had. 
 She was not to be so lightly shaken off. She 
 plead with him eagerly. 
 
 "Not I, lass. Gang hame alang and let be 
 thy de'il's trade for this one night, i' the name 
 o' God." 
 
 He thrust his hand into his pocket for the 
 coin which should free her from the necessity 
 of keeping longer vigil on the doorstep. 
 
 He found the girl's hand there. 
 
 "Sae, sae, lass?" said Duncan McDonald. 
 He drew out the interloping hand and looked 
 at it. The frail, damp fingers still held the 
 half crown they had closed over. 
 
 The girl began to laugh hysterically. 
 
 "At last! at last!" she said, over and over, 
 mixing the words with the laughter. "At last ! 
 at last ! at last !" 
 
 The laugh twisted itself into a cough that 
 
 138
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL 
 
 shook her till she would have fallen if McDon 
 ald had not caught her. He drew her down on 
 the steps of the nearest house and put his 
 brandy flask to her lips. 
 
 "Now, lass," he said sternly, when it became 
 possible to speak to her again, "tell me a'. I 
 canna leave thee here to pick the gowd frae 
 the pockets o' the night wanderers. The Lord 
 kens weel 'tis nae waur than thy trade, but the 
 law suffers the tane, an' punishes the tither. 
 Come, lassie, come." The girl was sobbing 
 convulsively. 
 
 "I dinna care what ye do wi' me," was all 
 she would say. "I kent it maun come tae this." 
 The forlorn droop of her shoulders smote Dun 
 can. He drew her into the bar of moonlight 
 that was the sole lamp of that hole of darkness. 
 
 "Tut, tut," he muttered. "Bitter business! 
 unco bitter business ! Here, lass." He pressed 
 into her hand the piece of money he had taken 
 
 139
 
 OSRU 
 
 from her inert fingers and another with it. 
 "Tak' them. The gowd is naught. Now gie 
 o'er greetin' an' tell me a'." 
 
 The girl bent forward and strained to see 
 his face. 
 
 "Art a 'man o' God, guidman?" she whis 
 pered. She had noted the clerical cut of his 
 garments when he drew her to the light. 
 
 "Aye, by the grace o' Christ, wha' bade the 
 Magdalen gang free an' sin nae mair. Tell me 
 thy tale. Thou'rt sick unto death, an' yet 
 thou'rt fain to sell thy body to the de'il. Aye, 
 an' this ither matter o' the gowd. Ye ken weel 
 the penalty o' the law for sic as ye caught steal 
 ing. Nae, be na fearfu' o' me, but tell me a'. 
 An' see," the sternness crept into his voice 
 again, "see thou tell't me true." 
 
 The girl sobbed quietly. 
 
 "I sell mysel whiles I am beaten an' driven 
 forth tae get gowd. Look!" She pulled the 
 
 140
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL 
 
 dress off her shoulder, indifferently, turning 
 slightly to show her bruised back. 
 
 Duncan let slip a groan at what he saw. 
 
 "For twal nights I hae taen the siller, whiles 
 nae man wad tak up wi' me, an I daurna gang 
 back wi' out gowd I daurna ! Jock is cruel ! 
 The river is the place for me, syne men winna 
 look at me nae mair. Lang syne the river's 
 waited for me. For a' my kind it waits. I 
 hae tried an' tried, but I canna do it. Some 
 what aye hauds me back wi' a strang arm. The 
 water is sae black an' cauld it frights me. 'Tis 
 like throwing yoursel' into the mou' o' the pit 
 o' hell. 'Tis strange, but I fear death waur 
 than I fear Jock. An' I kenna why. I kenna 
 why! For Jock is the very de'il himsel. I 
 maun get the courage to seek out the river 
 some day gin Jock doesna beat me dead first. 
 Or I dinna hang for stealing. Gae ye tae hae 
 me hang, man o' God ?" 
 
 141
 
 OSRU 
 
 "Nae, nae, lass," said McDonald, hastily, 
 fearing another paroxysm of hysteria. "Didna 
 I gie thee the gowd? Hae peace. Ye shanna 
 hang. Nor throw thysel into the river. God 
 forgie all men! An' the brute ye ca' Jock 
 shanna beat ye mair. Ye maun die, puir lass. 
 The seal o' death is e'en now upo' thee. Canna 
 ye see it yoursel? But ye shall hae peace an' 
 a saft bed, an' lo'eing care, and ye shall learn 
 o' thy lo'eing Savior, wha has bled an' died for 
 sic as thee. Wilt come wi' me, lass ? I'll hide 
 thee sae thou'lt nae mair see this Jock, wham 
 God will punish in his ain guid time. Ah!" 
 For the girl had quietly lost consciousness. 
 Until he felt her heart McDonald feared she 
 was dead. 
 
 * # s|c $ s|c * * 
 
 "Hae ye heard?" said old Margaret Morri 
 son to Peg Nicholson, her crony. "Campbell's 
 Jeanie cam hame last night. Lord God! Ye 
 
 142
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL 
 
 maun see her ! Her that waur syne sic a bonnie 
 lassie, she's nae mair than skin stretched o'er 
 banes. The puir, white face o' her ! 
 
 "Aye, ye kent? 'Twas Meester McDonald, 
 o' Alexander's kirk on the ither side o' Ayr, 
 that found the puir lass at the de'il's wark i' 
 the Lunnon streets. 
 
 "Wi' Lady Mary Beaton she maun gang tae 
 Lunnon town seven years syne. I kent her 
 weel, the sonsie lass. 'Twas by some English 
 de'il o' ae sarving man she was undone. Nae, 
 na sae as ye think. Her heart didna stray. She 
 lo'ed him not, then or ever. He kidnappit her. 
 She was snatched frae the end o' the garden 
 o' my Lady Mary's, an' keepit close prisoner, 
 wi'in lockit rooms. This cursed English lackey 
 kent a great laird had cast eyes o' luve on 
 Jeanie, but Jeanie wadna hae him. Sae this 
 Jock, this black-hearted spawn o' the midden, 
 thought tae get her, an' bargain wi' the great 
 
 143
 
 OSRU 
 
 man for her. An' sae he did. God maun set 
 him i' the middle o' the Pit, for what he has 
 done tae her. Hey, tutti taiti ! He made her 
 suffer ! 
 
 "Syne cam ither lairds an' gentles, an' Jock 
 bade them come in. But he wadna let Jeanie 
 gang out, till the great lairds wanted her nae 
 mair, an' the cough had grippit her. Then he 
 sent her into the street. Puir pretty Jeanie! 
 Puir sonsie lassie ! An' guid as she waur bon- 
 nie. Why has the Lord dealt sae heavily wi' 
 sic an ane?" 
 
 "An' we hae thought lang syne 'twas by her 
 ain evil wish that nane kent what had come tae 
 her. An' her mither wi' breakin' heart! I 
 dinna ken why the Lord has done it a' !" 
 
 "Meester McDonald bides i' the village tae 
 labor for her soul. A guid man. God hae him 
 
 i' his keeping !" 
 
 ******* 
 
 144
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL 
 
 Jeanie shook her head. 
 
 "I winna believe there's a God or in Christ, 
 His Son," she said. 
 
 "My lass, my lass, dinna blaspheme!" cried 
 Duncan, the sweat of anguish starting out on 
 his forehead. "Dinna tempt the Lord thy God, 
 wha is able an' willin' tae save thy soul alive 
 by th' bluid o' His dear Son." - 
 
 But Jeanie still shook her head. Her eyes 
 burned. 
 
 "I hae thought o' it night an' day. There 
 canna be a God. Ye, wha are but a man, wad 
 ye hae delivered me into the hands o' Jock? 
 Gin God were God, an' nae a de'il, wad He do 
 waur than ye wad do? What hae I e'er done, 
 that wicked men suld harm me ? There wasna 
 ane I didna shrink frae. Nae ane. 'Twas al 
 ways violence. Ilka day an' ilka, ilka night. 
 An' ye tauld me God is Luve ! Whar was He, 
 in His might, when I had need o' Him ?" 
 
 145
 
 OSRU 
 
 "His ways are na sic as our ways," said 
 Duncan, helplessly. "Wha are we, tae judge 
 Him ? Ye dinna ken what secret sin maun be 
 in your heart, lass. Man canna ken the ways 
 o' the Lord. They are righteous." 
 
 "Nae. Man canna ken sic ways," said 
 Jeanie, scornfully. 
 
 "Repent," pleaded Duncan. "Ye daurna die 
 in your sins, an' gang tae Hell." 
 
 "My sins?" cried Jeanie, her voice shrilling 
 suddenly. "Wha sinned, me or Jock? He beat 
 me syne I maun gang out an' fetch him gowd. 
 Was that the justice o' God or His mighty 
 luve? Tell me that, man o' God!" 
 
 "Wae's me! Ye'll gang tae Hell. I canna 
 save ye !" groaned McDonald, burying his face 
 in his hands. 
 
 Jeanie put out a frail hand and touched his 
 shoulder. 
 
 "I hae been in Hell," she said. "When I was 
 146
 
 JEANIE CAMPBELL 
 
 young an' innocent He pit me there. He maun 
 do as He chooses wi' me now. I canna believe 
 that He is guid." 
 
 She turned her face wearily to the wall. 
 McDonald knelt suddenly. 
 
 "Oh, thou great an' just God, save the soul 
 o' this puir bairn o' Thine." In his agony, he 
 said the same words over and over blindly. 
 His power to pray coherently deserted him but 
 an aching desire burned in every fibre of him 
 that this so wronged child should reach 
 Heaven. 
 
 Afterward he never could remember how 
 long he stammered out his heart-broken peti 
 tion, or say whether Jeanie waked or slept. He 
 could not even tell them whether he continued 
 to utter aloud the prayer that filled his heart. 
 But presently Jeanie clutched his arm and cried 
 out so sharply that he looked up startled. 
 
 Jeanie sat straight up Jeanie, who had not
 
 OSRU 
 
 lifted her head for days staring not at but 
 beside him. 
 
 Her eyes were raised to about the height of 
 a man's head but McDonald could not see what 
 she saw. Yet he knew. Yes, he knew ! As he 
 watched her face change from wonder to awe, 
 and from awe to peace, and from peace to love, 
 he knew wnose face she saw with the inner 
 vision and whose voice she listened to. It was 
 no surprise to him when she whispered, "Aye, 
 Lord !" The smile that came to her mouth at 
 that moment did not fade when she presently 
 dropped back limply. It was still there when 
 she lay in her shroud and witnessed silently for 
 him as he told his unbelievable story of the 
 goodness and compassion of Christ. 
 
 148
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. So weaponed, you will 
 
 not be beaten. 
 But the Fruits of Desire, whether Honey or 
 
 Gall, must be eaten.
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE - - NINTH OF THE 
 SOUL OSRU 
 
 Another julep? You'll find nothing like 
 that, sir, in the length and breadth of New 
 England. Yes, sir. I'm a yankee. Connecti 
 cut yankee. I don't have this here southern 
 accent because I wa'n't brought up by a nigger 
 mammy. That's how they get it. I reckon you 
 know that. The southerners ought to be 
 ashamed of themselves, talking like niggers. 
 I've hung onto my r's for forty years and I 
 don't expect ever to lose them. And I've got 
 a yankee nurse for the youngster to keep his 
 English pure. He gets lammed every time he
 
 OSRU 
 
 says "heah." I won't have it. I had the best 
 schooling the north has to give, and he's going 
 to have the same. Harvard '77, sir. No, I 
 wasn't with Washington. It didn't matter to 
 me what the government was just so it got 
 stable again, so I took it quietly and got an edu 
 cation and let those that wanted to, fight it out. 
 The best way when you have nothing at stake 
 yourself. 
 
 It's altogether a matter of business with me, 
 living in Mississippi. I'm not here because I 
 like their damn climate, but to breed niggers. 
 Oh, I raise cotton, too, but that isn't the main 
 crop. Got to have something to keep their 
 dirty black hands busy on. My real business 
 since I turned twenty-five has been to breed 
 slaves for the market. I saw the future of cot 
 ton way back in 1780. Yes, sir; predicted then 
 that blacks would drop out of use naturally in 
 the north. There wa'n't anything they could 
 
 152
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 do better, or half as well, as whites. But I saw 
 the south would need 'em, need 'em bad. I 
 said to myself that the kind bred on the soil 
 would be like gold among brass, beside the 
 trash picked up at random by the slavers off 
 the African coast and packed so thick in the 
 hold they were more dead than alive when they 
 got them on the block. And I wa'n't far 
 wrong. I underestimated it a little. 
 
 I don't know any one else who's had the 
 sense to go about it systematically and scien 
 tifically, as I have. I breed 'em, I tell you, 
 breed 'em like cattle. That's what they are, a 
 high grade domestic animal. I count on a brat 
 a year from the gals. Oh, no, that's not un 
 reasonable. Why, they come mighty near that 
 left to themselves. You don't understand nig 
 gers. You northerners never do. 
 
 You see that's pretty much all the work I 
 expect of them. I won't allow the women to 
 
 153
 
 OSRU 
 
 pull cotton. They're all house niggers, and the 
 Lord Almighty knows they have a pretty easy 
 time of it. No, of course there'd be nothing 
 in it if everybody bred for the market, but as 
 it is, my stock is known all over the south and 
 I'm offered higher prices every year. You see 
 I won't keep a man on the place that isn't fancy 
 breed, so to speak. Sound of wind and limb 
 and strong as an ox. 
 
 No, sir, I am not troubled with sentimental 
 feelings when it comes to separating mothers 
 and children ! That's all bosh. You northern 
 ers don't understand niggers and you never 
 will. You picture them to yourselves with 
 "white" feelings, but that's not so. Any way 
 the Lord separates parents and children every 
 day and no one expects Him to stop. When I 
 sell a likely youngster down the river all his 
 dam has to do is to imagine that he died and be 
 resigned. And that's what I tell her if she 
 
 154
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 goes to make a fuss. He has died, as far as 
 she's concerned. "The Lord gave, and the 
 Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name 
 of the Lord." That's her cue. 
 
 Oh, I've eliminated the question of fathers 
 from the problem altogether. Couldn't be both 
 ered. I simply will not let the wenches marry. 
 If the men want to marry on other plantations 
 I don't object, but they're satisfied on the whole 
 with my way. I tell you again, as I told you 
 before, they don't know anything about the 
 "white" point of view. 
 
 I've got my neighbors down on me, because 
 I won't let the gals marry. But what's the 
 odds ? It's the same thing in Dutch, their way 
 and mine. Take my neighbor on the next plan 
 tation now, Godfrey Carter, Col. Godfrey Car 
 ter. Half his pickaninnies are a damn sight 
 lighter than the color of the wenches and their 
 lawful wedded husbands justifies. When you 
 
 155
 
 OSRU 
 
 breed for the market, as I do, some few rules 
 are necessary. And I notice that they buy my 
 niggers just the same, even if they do slander 
 my methods. 
 
 But it doesn't fall very hard on the women, 
 to part with their offspring, as a general thing. 
 Usually the brats are at least half grown be 
 fore I have an offer I'll look at and then, as I 
 tell the wenches when they offer to take it nasty 
 once in a while they've always plenty more 
 and plenty to come. 
 
 I've never had any real trouble, except with 
 Millie. Millie was the wench who brought out 
 those last juleps. Did you notice her? I 
 thought so. Millie's noticeable, as niggers go. 
 But she ain't what she was in her young days. 
 Millie's turned forty-eight. Did you ever see 
 the beat of that sassy carriage? And those 
 eyes ! She hates me as she wouldn't the devil 
 
 156
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 himself, and she takes delight in showing it. 
 That proves how easy I am with them. Of 
 course I could break her will, but up to about 
 now I've had to keep her in good condition for 
 business reasons. And she knows it, so there 
 you are. But my time's coming. 
 
 I don't usually sell under fifteen can't get 
 the price. But some kind of fate was after 
 Millie's children. Again and again I'd have 
 offers for hers when they wa'n't over five or 
 six offers it would be a sin and against na 
 ture to refuse. Why I've had the price I'd 
 expect to get for the full-grown nigger, offered 
 me for her brats when they couldn't do a thing 
 beyond picking up a handkerchief! I don't 
 wonder, in a way. Millie's a Creole nigger, and 
 three- fourths white herself. Most of her brats 
 have been lighter yet, and that pert and pretty 
 they'd be singled out from the whole litter of 
 
 157
 
 OSRU 
 
 pickaninnies by every man who came here. So 
 whenever a pickaninny was wanted, it gen 
 erally came from Millie's brood. 
 
 It went along and went along, and some fate 
 kept singling out her brats and carrying them 
 off at anywhere from five to eight years. She 
 actually hasn't kept a child over eight years, 
 except the lame one. First off, it was purely 
 a matter that fate attended to. I sold them be 
 cause no man in his right mind would have re 
 fused the offers I had for them. But latterly 
 I've played fate some myself. She roused my 
 dander after a time, you see. I think I would 
 sell a brat of Millie's at a sacrifice if it got over 
 eight, but I've not needed to, so far. She's the 
 most profitable nigger I ever had even if she 
 did cheat me out of four years' returns. That 
 happened this way. Millie had her first brat 
 at fifteen. Well along about thirty-five or so, 
 she got the very devil in her and no mistake. 
 
 158
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 She'd had eighteen children in those twenty 
 years, and the iron had entered her soul, it 
 seems. What d'you say ? Well, she is an ex 
 ception. But any way, she's three-fourths 
 white. She ought to have some notion of 
 "white" feelings. As I was saying the iron 
 had entered her soul, for she only had the three 
 youngest left. You'd have thought three'd 
 have kept her contented, but there's no reason 
 in these niggers. I swear before God that up 
 to that time I had never sold a brat of Millie's 
 to tantalize her, but she insisted I had and she 
 wouldn't get out of the notion. 
 
 Well for three years if you please, that 
 wench was barren. Time went on and on but 
 no sign of any more of Millie's. The doctor 
 couldn't make it out. I always keep a doctor 
 on the place. When you breed niggers, it pays 
 his salary a dozen times over to keep them 
 looked after and right up in prime condition. 
 
 159
 
 OSRU 
 
 Now you know it's unheard of for a nigger 
 wench to go barren at thirty-five. But at last 
 she lost her head and got to boasting that she'd 
 bear no more children for me to sell down the 
 river. So then I knew how to bring her round. 
 The youngest of her brats was three, so I 
 looked out for a chance and sold the three at 
 one lick. This time I did do it a-purpose, and 
 what's more I told her so. I thought after 
 wards that the easiest way to have brought her 
 to terms would have been to have threatened 
 to sell them, but I'm quick-tempered. I didn't 
 stop to think it all out, just paid her back in 
 her own coin. The impulse took me by the 
 throat, so to speak, and right on top of that the 
 opportunity came and I seized it. Then I had 
 Millie on my hands for a while I can tell you. 
 She was like a wild devil. I had to have her 
 watched for days for fear she'd kill herself 
 or me. When we finally came to terms I had 
 
 1 60
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 to promise her, that if she ever had a child that 
 was imperfect in any way she might keep it. 
 I thought I was safe to promise that, but by 
 God, sir, the next brat she had had a twisted 
 foot. I don't know how it happened. The 
 niggers claimed she used voodoo charms. At 
 any rate there's the fact. So that made four 
 years she didn't do her duty by me. Never, 
 since I bought my first nigger forty-one years 
 ago, have I been so riled toward one of them as 
 I am toward her. I've held my hand for busi 
 ness reasons, but I needn't do that much longer. 
 My turn's coming. I'll make a field nigger of 
 her pretty soon and keep her there till she's 
 ready to go down on her knees and beg my 
 pardon for what she's done, and own up that 
 she's lived like a queen all her life and never 
 knew it. I'll see to it that she gets the airs 
 and sassiness welted out of her. Oh, I'll break 
 her yet! But meantime fate has had another 
 
 161
 
 OSRU 
 
 fling at her. By God, sir, it's preposterous, the 
 way that wench has caught it from all sides, 
 after all. She's got exactly one child now. A 
 brat about seven months old. 
 
 Yes, that's what I'm going to tell you, what 
 happened to Jim. I kept my word and didn't 
 sell him. He was worth more to keep Millie 
 good-natured and up to her duty, any way. 
 Besides, I never had an offer for her club- 
 footed cub. But mind you, about a year ago 
 Jim came back from an errand to another 
 plantation and brought the measles. Now this 
 is where fate comes in again, flat-footed. Jim 
 died, and the two Millie had left died. She 
 only had two, fortunately, for I've kept hers 
 sold down pretty close the last ten years. But 
 not another pickaninny on the place, though 
 most of them had it, took any harm from it. 
 
 Talk about fate ! I tried to make Millie see 
 that the Lord was punishing her for not having 
 
 162
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 done her duty in that state of life in which it 
 had pleased Him to place her. Millie got re 
 ligion four or five years ago, and I thought 
 that ought to be just the argument to touch her 
 heart, but she only spit at me. I mean exactly 
 that, spit at me. It makes them mighty sassy, 
 these wenches, when they think they're so valu 
 able for breeding purposes that you won't beat 
 them. I've made it a rule to keep business con 
 siderations first, but Lord, I don't quite know 
 how I've happened to stick it out in her case. 
 
 Oh, yes, Millie realizes that her breeding 
 days are about over. But she thinks I'm going 
 to sell her. I always sell 'em with their last 
 brat you see, while they're still useful, and she 
 knows that. There isn't an old negress on 
 the place. And Millie thinks, d'you see, be 
 cause I have put up with her impudence for 
 business reasons, that I shall go right on and 
 sell her, just the same as any other wench, at 
 
 163
 
 OSRU 
 
 a certain age. But no; I sha'n't sell Millie. 
 I've got a few scores against her, and I guess 
 I can afford to settle them. No, she isn't a 
 field hand yet. This last brat of hers needs her 
 for a while still. 
 
 Well, as I was saying, that's the way fate 
 looked after Jim and the two others. I lost two 
 likely niggers that time. I don't count Jim 
 among my losses, but it's always been a sort of 
 consolation to me that Millie lost him too. She 
 took on like mad at the time, and if she hadn't 
 found religion good and strong, I don't know 
 what methods we could have used to calm her 
 down. But after a time, sir, she had the im 
 pudence to tell me that she was glad the Lord 
 took them before I had a chance to sell them 
 down the river. I've chalked that up against 
 her, too. She spends her time between pray 
 ing the Lord for deliverance and for venge 
 ance on me. As if the Lord interfered in the 
 
 164
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 affairs of niggers. I can't notice that he con 
 cerns himself particularly with the affairs of 
 white folks. It's all chance and business 
 ability. 
 
 Yes, yes, perhaps the Lord did interfere 
 when he sent you along to get my little shaver 
 out of the danger his fool of a nurse had let 
 him into. My God ! If I lost him ! He's the only 
 one I ever had. I didn't marry till fifty-five, 
 and I shouldn't have then if I hadn't wanted 
 an heir. 
 
 Eh ! Oh, they don't count. Do you suppose 
 any southern gentleman takes account of them, 
 when he makes his will? 
 
 Sell Millie? Zounds, man ! Haven't I made 
 it plain that she's had my dander riz these fif 
 teen year, so's it's made it hard for me to keep 
 a cool business head where she's been con 
 cerned? She's going to the cotton field just 
 as soon as the cotton's ready to pull. That 
 
 165
 
 OSRU 
 
 nigger's got to knuckle down to me on her 
 bended knees, if I have to half kill her to get 
 her there. I'll break her as I'd break a wild 
 horse. Do you suppose I've bided my time, 
 and stood her impudence for business reasons, 
 to be done out of my turn at the last moment ? 
 
 I know, I know, I understand my debt to 
 you, sir. If you hadn't got to the little chap 
 just when you did my God, I'd have let my 
 whole bunch of niggers go, when I saw the 
 slim chance he had. But ask me anything else. 
 Anything in reason, sir, and it's yours. 
 
 Zounds! I knew you were a preacher, a 
 preacher and a northerner. Why did I have to 
 babble to you about the wench Millie? Our 
 southern clergymen, sir, preach the Bible, sir 
 that a slave should be subject to his master 
 in all things! 
 
 Well, you've got me down, sir, I won't deny 
 it. But I won't sell Millie. If that's the only 
 
 166
 
 JACKSON'S MILLIE 
 
 way I can square my big account with you, I'll 
 give her to you, sir. Yes, and the brat. Lord ! 
 This comes near being more than I can stand ! 
 What'll you do with her ? 
 
 Well, by the great horn spoon ! 
 
 If anybody had told me last week, that I'd 
 give Millie away to a preacher from New York 
 who was going to set her free I'd have killed 
 myself laughing at him! By God! I would, 
 sir! 
 
 I've a notion the Lord has took notice of 
 Millie's prayers at last. I'd never have be 
 lieved it. Here's her "deliverance." But there 
 ain't any vengeance on me in sight, I'm re 
 lieved to notice. 
 
 It's a remarkable coincidence, sir! If you 
 hadn't had the nerve and grit to do what you 
 did for the little lad, when it might have meant 
 death for both of you sir oh, I appreciate your 
 courage, sir, b'Gad, I do! And if, on the top 
 
 167
 
 OSRU 
 
 of that, I hadn't let my tongue wag like an old 
 fool's about Millie 
 
 Well, I'm sorry. I'll make no bones of that. 
 But I pay my debts of honor on demand. On 
 demand, sir. Millie's yours. Yes, and the brat. 
 
 I'll make out the papers in the morning. 
 
 168
 
 Lo! Desire is potent. But endless its wax 
 ing and waning 
 
 Till with Justice (called Love) it be blent, the 
 True Path attaining.
 
 JARED WILLSON. 
 
 BEING INCARNATION THE; - - TENTH OF THE 
 SOUL OSRU 
 
 Jared Willson, staunch union man, took ad 
 vantage of the prolonged applause to slake his 
 thirst from the contents of the white stone- 
 china pitcher at his elbow. He drew the back 
 of his hand across his mouth, brushed the hand 
 absently against his right trouser leg, and 
 faced his audience again. 
 
 His eyes blazed with strong personal feel 
 ing. Somehow his subject was a little out of 
 hand to-night; had the bit in its teeth and was 
 dragging him along. For one thing, the day 
 was an anniversary of great sadness to him 
 
 171
 
 OSRU 
 
 and memory had been torturing him cruelly. 
 
 " 'Taint fer no milk-and-water, mushy- 
 wushy sentimental reasons, nor yet fer fear 
 you know me, all of you, and you know it aint 
 fer fear, that I'm telling you to leave venge 
 ance out of the matter and go in fer justice, 
 jest plain, unadulterated justice. You kin 
 safely leave the vengeance to Gawd He's 
 looking out fer that and don't you fergit it! 
 But look out fer yerselves, that there aint no 
 vengeance owin' t'you, fer you'll surely git it, 
 here or hereafter, here or hereafter. 
 
 "So what I say is this. If it'll improve the 
 conditions of you and yer mates in any way 
 really improve them to smash a damned mil 
 lionaire, why smash him. Blow him up with 
 dynamite if you want ; only be damn sure that 
 getting him out of the way is a reel step toward 
 justice." (Applause.) 
 
 "As sure as there's a Gawd in heaven, and 
 172
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 there is, they'll all pay up for their sins, now 
 or by and by. I've been a Christian fer four 
 teen years but I don't want none of this here 
 'only believe on the Lord and your sins shall 
 be washed whiter than snow' religion. No, 
 comrades, the Gawd I believe in is a just Gawd. 
 Let the mercy go, I say. Or else, make it 
 mercy fer the sinned against and justice fer 
 the sinner." (Applause.) 
 
 "If you git very free with yer mercy to the 
 sinner, the sinned against is tolerable likely not 
 to git even justice done him. Justice is all I 
 want, and justice is what I'm willing to take 
 fer whatever I've done, and justice I'll work 
 for, night and day, till I drop dead." (Ap 
 plause.) 
 
 "So don't you waste no valyble time, like our 
 esteemed friend the last speaker, growling 
 about the good times the men who rob you of 
 your earnings are having with their ill-gotten
 
 OSRU 
 
 gains. They'll pay. As sure as there's a Gawd 
 they'll pay, measure f er measure, an eye f er an 
 eye, and a tooth f er a tooth. The old Jews was 
 right about it. The Gospel is true too, but it 
 don't really give the lie to the plain, sound jus 
 tice of an eye fer an eye and a tooth f er a tooth, 
 as some of these here mushy preachers says 
 it does. 
 
 "You won't find nothing in the words spoken 
 by our blessed Lord himself to interfere with 
 every feller getting his just deserts. You just 
 look again ef you think so. 
 
 "But I didn't set out to preach no sermon, 
 lads. Excuse me all. What I wanted to say 
 is this. Do you think that skinny old devil 
 of a kerosene thief, fer instance, is going to 
 pray himself out of any of the sufferin' that is 
 his due fer the way he's made the victims of 
 his rascally business methods suffer ? Not one 
 jot, not one tittle. Till all be fulfilled. Eternity
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 is plenty long. He'll have time to suffer pang 
 fer pang, fer every pang he's ever caused any 
 one. And he can't plead, 'Oh, Lord! I didn't 
 know I was doin' it !' neither, fer he knows well 
 enough when he's doin' as he wouldn't like to 
 be done by and that's plenty to fix the blame 
 on him. 
 
 "I don't believe in no eternal hell, because 
 there wouldn't be no justice in letting a man go 
 on sufferin' after he'd felt as much pain as he'd 
 caused, but I guess it'll take most of eternity 
 to square the accounts of some men. His sort, 
 f'instance. Why, take jest one case, that hap 
 pened to come beneath my notice. This devil 
 forced a man to shut down. This man wouldn't 
 sell when he wanted him to you know the 
 trick so when he had him hipped he refused 
 to buy. Teach the other chaps a lesson, you 
 know. 
 
 "There was one man who had worked for 
 
 175
 
 OSRU 
 
 the man he had busted up, who couldn't get 
 no other job. Too old, you know. This man 
 had a wife and a granddaughter. They starved 
 for a while, and then the girl got tired of that 
 and drifted onto the street and broke their 
 hearts. Years of shame and sufferin' fer three 
 people and only Gawd Almighty knows how 
 many more suffered, one way or another, from 
 that one foxy business trick and a few more 
 thousands a year more than he can spend fer 
 the old cheat that planned it and put it 
 through. Now ther' aint no just Gawd that'll 
 let him off fer one second of the sufferin' he 
 caused them three. If 'twas twenty years 
 apiece, that makes sixty fer him. Measure fer 
 measure, a tooth fer a tooth. 
 
 "No, there aint no Gawd that washes away 
 yer sins till they're paid fer don't you bank 
 on it a minute. There may be heaven, there 
 probably is, though I aint no good on figurin' 
 
 176
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 out what it's like. But I'm sure about hell. It's 
 needed fer his kind and bunches of others as 
 bad in various ways. But I'm preachin' again. 
 I aint myself tonight !" 
 
 (Cries of "Goon!") 
 
 "When I got religion I got conviction of sin, 
 but I didn't want nothin' but justice even fer 
 myself. I'm willin' to suffer for every bit of 
 pain I ever caused. I don't want no fergive- 
 ness' fer my sins justice is plenty good 
 enough fer me. I tell you what, there's nothin' 
 like knowin' you've got to square your own 
 account some time or other to make you care 
 ful what you do. There's nothin' equal to it in 
 the namby-pamby 'only believe and your sins 
 shall be blotted out forever' religion. I tell 
 you, no believing will blot out a single sin. 
 They'll be blotted out as fast as you've paid fer 
 them in kind; paid fer them in kind!" (Ap 
 plause. ) 
 
 177
 
 OSRU 
 
 Jared Willson wiped the sweat from his 
 forehead with his palm, and shook the drops 
 from his hand. 
 
 "Some of you young chaps have been talking 
 up this strike in the wrong sperit. You'd think, 
 to listen to some of you, that the only reason 
 for a strike was to cripple the capitalists and 
 give them less money to spend on their pleas 
 ures. Fool's logic ! But after all, it's just your 
 unsatisfied sense of justice that's putting you 
 wrong. Your heads is queered but your hearts 
 is right. Don't get the notion in your minds 
 that it's your business to spoil the fun of the 
 men who are spending your rightful money. 
 You've got bigger business than that I hope. 
 'Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the 
 Lord.' And He don't need no help of yours, 
 neither. If a man deserves death He can drop 
 a flower-pot on his head as he passes along the 
 street. Or tip him over a cliff in the auto that
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 he bought with your money. He don't need 
 none o' your bombs, He don't. If a man de 
 serves torment, and he's to get some of his Hell 
 right here, the Lord kin let loose on him with 
 some horrible disease that will burn like hell 
 fire. 
 
 "I won't say no more about it. You kin work 
 it out fer yerselves. But keep it clear in your 
 heads that what you're workin' fer is justice 
 fer yourselves and yer fellows, and leave jus 
 tice fer yer oppressors to work itself out. 
 There's a hereafter and they'll get their dues. 
 Oh, they'll get what is coming to them, don't 
 you fret. I should go clean mad, when I re 
 member what I've suffered through no fault 
 of mine, if I didn't have that blessed faith in a 
 just Gawd to tie to. His strong right arm will 
 overtake every one of the devils who have made 
 my life a hell for nigh onto thirty years." 
 
 He choked up and fell silent a moment. He 
 179
 
 OSRU 
 
 was thinking of his petted Janet, just turned 
 sixteen who, nine years ago that night, had 
 died the victim of some ruthless, unknown 
 tramp. 
 
 " 'The Lord do so to me, and more also/ if 
 I've ever done a hundredth part of the mean 
 ness and evil that's been done to me. I don't 
 want nothin' better fer myself than that same 
 justice I want to see visited on the heads of 
 my enemies. 
 
 " 'With whatsoever measure ye mete' re 
 member that 'with whatsoever measure ye 
 mete.' " 
 
 "Tell me a story, Jack!" 
 
 "You know them all, Sis." 
 
 "You fibber ! Three years in Cuba and home 
 a week not a week yet and you've told me 
 all your stories already! Oh, Jack! Begin!" 
 
 She perched on the arm of his chair and 
 180
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 forcibly conveyed his pipe from his languid 
 fingers. 
 
 Jack laughed. 
 
 "All right, Kitten. I'd forgotten what a dic 
 tatorial infant you were. Give it here. I can't 
 talk without it. Now stop whisking the flies 
 off my chin with the end of your pigtail, that's 
 an angel child. Better make me comfortable 
 when you want a story, there's a straight tip 
 for you. What sort of story?" 
 
 "About some man who was brave. About 
 the bravest man you saw in the whole three 
 years." 
 
 Jack smoked with irritating deliberation. 
 
 "Isn't there one who was braver than the 
 rest?" 
 
 "There's one I think was braver than the 
 rest. I don't know whether you'll see it, Kate." 
 
 "Goon, Jack. What did he do ?" 
 
 "He hardly comes up to specifications; not 
 181
 
 OSRU 
 
 the conventional ones, the ones you judge 
 heroes by. He didn't make any spectacular 
 grandstand play, you know. I believe he had 
 about six lines in the paper handed him after 
 wards. That's all I ever saw. He didn't look 
 like a hero, either. He looked like the sort of 
 man that works in gangs on buildings. A 
 mason, perhaps ; certainly no higher." 
 
 "Oh, Jack!" 
 
 "I'm not treating you very well, am I, Kate ? 
 Well, this is a story from life, and life isn't so 
 very picturesque." He picked up her "Morte 
 d' Arthur" that lay on the veranda railing. "If 
 you don't like my hero go back to Mallory, with 
 his dinky Sir Percivales and Sir Launcelotes. 
 We can't compete with him now-a-days." 
 
 Kate laughed and pinched his cheek till he 
 screwed up his face in protest. "If he's a hero 
 I shan't mind his being a workman." 
 
 "How good of you ! You wouldn't have ap- 
 182
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 proved of his manners. He was a rough old 
 fellow who swore about as often as you say, 
 'How perfectly dreadful.' ' * 
 
 "How perfectly dreadful !" 
 
 "Exactly. And he swallowed some whiskey 
 straight about as often as you drink water." 
 
 "Hm!" sniffed fastidious Kitty, who was 
 just old enough to begin to have views on the 
 liquor habit. 
 
 "You don't like the sort my hero is? Too 
 bad. And what's more, he was by no means 
 cleanly in his habits. I never saw him when he 
 didn't have dirty finger nails " 
 
 Katherine put a firm hand over his mouth. 
 
 "Now that's enough, Jack Ryder. If he's a 
 hero, tell me about it and quit fooling." 
 
 "Fooling, young lady! I'm merely giving 
 you a faithful pen picture ! But all right. We'll 
 skip the rest of the personal description if you 
 want to. You're too young to appreciate it, 
 
 183
 
 OSRU 
 
 that's the matter." He caught her chastising 
 hand and held it. 
 
 "You know we had the deuce of a time clean 
 ing Cuba up. And especially we had to wipe 
 out the yellow fever before they would let us 
 come home. You knew about that, or at least 
 you thought you did. You know that after a 
 while we found that the regular Egyptian 
 plague of mosquitoes they have down there 
 carried it." 
 
 "I read all about that," quoth Katherine, 
 feeling very well informed. 
 
 "You haven't the least idea what fools the 
 Cubans were. Every year when the season 
 came round they used to lie down and die, as 
 thick as flies and as meek as good old Moses. 
 They never thought for a second there was 
 anything to be done about it." 
 
 "Were you sorry you were a doctor then?" 
 questioned Kitty. 
 
 184
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 "No," said Jack shortly, his face darkening. 
 He remembered how he had had to set his teeth 
 when he started for the quarantined pavilions, 
 until habit came to his aid and he could go 
 there without thinking what he was doing. 
 
 "Some of the experiments we had to try got 
 into the papers. Not all of them, though. Some 
 of them weren't very dangerous and some of 
 them were. This one was." 
 
 "What one?" 
 
 "The one," said Ryder, "that we tried on the 
 old mason who didn't clean his finger nails." 
 
 "Oh !" said Katherine. And then, "Did he 
 die?" 
 
 Jack looked carefully enigmatic. 
 
 "I suppose you've picked up the habit of 
 turning over to read the last page. Don't you 
 know that spoils the story? 
 
 "West he was still the Surgeon-General 
 then posted that he wanted a volunteer, and 
 
 185
 
 OSRU 
 
 what for. Generally when he asked for volun 
 teers he got 'em right off the bat. But this 
 time there were just about nine chances out of 
 ten that the volunteer would have a soldier's 
 funeral, d'you see, Kitten? How do you like 
 my hero now ?" 
 
 "Did he die?" 
 
 "Do you have to die to be a hero ?" evasively. 
 "Well there weren't any takers for two or 
 three days, and that's a long time for one of 
 Uncle Sam's calls for volunteers to go begging. 
 Then this old chap came around to headquar 
 ters and asked for Dr. West. West was out 
 and they handed him over to me. He hadn't 
 come to volunteer exactly, he had a lot of ques 
 tions to ask first. But it wasn't long before I 
 saw he was really going to do it. I was sorry 
 for the old boy, it looked to me so like a dead 
 sure miss for him, and much as we needed his 
 
 186
 
 1 
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 help I talked against it. Do you remember 
 Mettus Curtius?" 
 
 "Of course. I adored him," said Kate, wink 
 ing away the unwelcomed tears. 
 
 "Don't cry, Kitten. I'm just telling you a 
 hero story, that's all. 
 
 "Every time he was off duty he'd hunt me 
 up with more questions to ask. He knew ex 
 actly what he was doing, you know. There 
 wasn't any hot-headed, impulsive, 'hurrah boys' 
 physical courage about it. It was just cold 
 blooded walking up and shaking hands with 
 death. That's a lot harder, Kate. 
 
 "I used to ask him why he was going to do 
 it and what do you think he said? 'I don't 
 know. I've never done nothin' fer nobody/ 
 Doesn't sound much like Sir Percivale-Launce- 
 lot, eh, Kittie?" 
 
 "Stop about Sir Percivale-Launcelot !"
 
 OSRU 
 
 "All right. And then he would go on quiz 
 zing me about what would come of it if we 
 found out what we wanted to find out, and 
 what it would do in the long run towards clean 
 ing up Cuba. He was a wise old bird. Always 
 every five minutes or so, I'd remind him that 
 it was quite on the cards that he wouldn't pull 
 through and he would shrug his shoulders and 
 go on asking the keenest questions, till he knew 
 just about as much about it as I did." 
 
 "Was he very unhappy? Had he gone to 
 war because he wanted to get killed?" asked 
 Kate, remembering the heroes of some score 
 of novels. 
 
 "No. He liked living well enough. He just 
 kept saying that he never had done nothing 
 for nobody. The courage bug had bitten him I 
 guess, Kitten," pinching her cheek as he saw 
 the tears start again. "Too bad about his 
 double negatives, isn't it, Toots?" 
 
 1 88
 
 JARED WILLSON 
 
 "A truly hero can use any kind of grammar 
 he likes," declared Kate stoutly. 
 
 "Right ! They'll never make a snob of you, 
 Sis!" 
 
 "Well?" prompted Katherine. 
 
 "He was a psychological problem," mused 
 Jack aloud, forgetting her. "He wasn't the 
 sort heroes are made of at all not that kind. 
 Brute courage, maybe. Sticking to his engine 
 till it was ditched that, yes. Not the Mettus 
 Curtius type." 
 
 "Did he die?" asked Kittie, her eyes widen 
 ing. 
 
 Jack took out a clipping and showed it to her. 
 
 "The papers didn't get at all of it. If they 
 had, he'd have had the whole of their first 
 pages at least once." 
 
 Jared Willson, one of the soldiers who volun 
 teered to be inoculated by the bite of a mosquito 
 that had previously bitten a yellow fever patient, 
 is dead. He was one of six who answered the re- 
 
 189
 
 OSRU 
 
 cent call of Surgeon-General West to submit to 
 inoculation, and experimental curative treatment 
 in case yellow fever developed. The incident has 
 proved beyond question that Yellow Jack has 
 been repeatedly transmitted by mosquitoes. It is 
 thought certain that the other five will recover. 
 Willson is a martyr to science. 
 
 "There, there, Kitten!" sopping her eyes 
 with his handkerchief. "Don't you suppose 
 they take good care of heroes when they get 
 them over on the other side ?" 
 
 190
 
 AFTERWORD. 
 
 And suddenly the Shining One was with me. 
 
 Far, dizzily far below us reeled the world. 
 I put my hand out timidly and grasped a flut 
 tering end of his garment. For I saw that I 
 had no wings and I was very sore afraid. The 
 earth swung past below us and we trod lightly 
 upon what ? 
 
 He looked into my eyes, smiling serenely, 
 and withdrew his raiment gently. And 
 straightway I was ashamed that I had known 
 fear. 
 
 He said: "Is not God ?" 
 191
 
 OSRU 
 
 Then I smiled also, and floated gladly beside 
 him. (Shoulder to shoulder, the angel and I, 
 even as two brothers.) 
 
 And he said : " You have seen what you de 
 sired to see." 
 
 "I have seen." 
 
 "And you have understood?" 
 
 I answered : "I could not have believed that 
 out of so much evil good would come !" 
 
 Said the Shining One: "What is Evil?" 
 And I was dumb before him. 
 
 Then he said : "What is Good ?" 
 
 And still I was dumb. 
 
 He looked at me with searching eyes that 
 probed to the roots of my being. And suddenly 
 a light stole in upon my soul and I made ex 
 ultant answer. 
 
 "All is as God would have it !" 
 
 Said the Shining One : "Even so !" 
 192
 
 AFTERWORD 
 
 We swept through space together, two sons 
 of God, gloriously exulting, thrilling to the 
 dominant chord of the universe. 
 
 All is even as God would have it! 
 
 I looked below me again. The earth was no 
 longer there, so far had we fled through space. 
 Neither were there stars, nor any other planet. 
 And there was nor darkness nor light, yet I 
 saw the Shining One. 
 
 And I said: "It is well with that man 
 but" 
 
 "But?" 
 
 I plead for him. 
 
 "But he does not know it is well with him !" 
 
 The inscrutable, smiling eyes of the Shining 
 One answered somewhat, but I could not 
 fathom their meaning. 
 
 "If he might but know what I know!" I 
 pleaded. And again. 
 
 193
 
 OSRU 
 
 "Even if he must straightway forget it, and 
 go back to the bitterness of earth blind, deaf, 
 to all we twain understand !" 
 
 The tears rained from my eyes. 
 
 "I see well that he must not remember, else 
 no pain could ever again hurt him ! Yet will it 
 strengthen him a little to know for a moment, 
 and the strength will remain." 
 
 I cried aloud. 
 
 "He has great need of strength. The path 
 he has chosen has little light and his feet will 
 be bruised often." 
 
 I found courage to stoop and kiss the hand 
 of the Shining One, humbly supplicating. 
 
 Then the Shining One answered me. 
 
 "Those lives you re-lived but now were 
 yours." 
 
 I hid my eyes with my hands and fell 
 through space, for an eternity. The seraph 
 swept down beside me. 
 
 194
 
 AFTERWORD 
 
 Afterwards, I uncovered my face and looked 
 up. The smile of the Radiant One was even as 
 before, inscrutable, all-comprehending, ineffa 
 bly gentle. He said: 
 
 "It is given to all, on the eve of returning to 
 embodiment, thus wholly to understand." 
 
 And I said to him then : 
 
 "All is well, for all is as God wills it ! I will 
 go back there now, to endure whatever it is just 
 that I should endure. But I am fain, if this be 
 possible, to suffer all it remains for me to suffer 
 in one life and so bring it to an end." 
 
 The Radiant One grew of a sudden more 
 dazzling, as though joy streamed from him, 
 and he said : 
 
 "Even so you chose, the last time you drew 
 near the earth seeking rebirth. Behold, that 
 former desire and the fruits thereof are ac 
 complished. It is now given you to desire 
 
 anew." 
 
 195
 
 OSRU 
 
 Marvelling, I thought aloud : "I do not un 
 derstand !" 
 
 He smiled. 
 
 "What would you fain do when you return 
 to the flesh?" 
 
 I trembled. 
 
 "That which I choose will come to pass?" 
 
 "Desire is potent." 
 
 I found no words. 
 
 "And also the fruits of desire are ever to be 
 well thought upon." 
 
 Then I answered with passion : 
 
 "I would that I might harm no one ! Though 
 it slay me ; though I must walk through fire for 
 untold ages to avoid offense; yet I choose it 
 rather ; yea, a thousand times rather !" 
 
 Then for the last time the Resplendent One 
 smiled down upon me. 
 
 "You have chosen well. But does it suffice, 
 to harm no one? Yet is it a step on the Path. 
 
 196
 
 AFTERWORD 
 
 Rest here in peace, for the moment of your re 
 turn to earth is not fully come." 
 
 He is gone ******! can 
 the singing of the worlds hurling themselves 
 through space ****** it is granted 
 me to perceive how their orbits interlace ever 
 lastingly ****** 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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