Maskull’s second day on Tormance dawned. Branchspell was already above
the when he awoke. He was aware that his organs had
changed the night. His was into an eyelike
sorb; his had and into a third arm, springing
from the breast. The arm gave him at once a of physical
security, but with the he was to experiment, he
could its function.
As he there in the white sunlight, opening and each of his
three in turn, he that the two ones his
understanding, the upper one his will. That is to say, with the lower
eyes he saw in clear detail, but without personal interest; with
the he saw nothing as self-existent—everything appeared as an
object of or non-importance to his own needs.
Rather puzzled as to how this would turn out, he got up and looked about
him. He had slept out of of Oceaxe. He was to learn if she
were still on the spot, but going to he up his
mind to in the river.
It was a morning. The white sun already to glare, but
its was by a wind, which through the
trees. A of clouds the sky. They looked like
animals, and were always shape. The ground, as well as the
leaves and of the trees, still of dew
or rain the night. A poignantly sweet of nature entered his
nostrils. His pain was quiescent, and his were high.
Before he bathed, he viewed the of the Ifdawn Marest. In the
morning they out pictorially. He that they were
from five to six thousand high. The lofty, irregular, castellated
line like the of a magic city. The him were
composed of rocks—vermilion, emerald, yellow, ulfire, and black.
As he at them, his to like a slow, drum,
and he all over—indescribable hopes, aspirations, and emotions
came over him. It was more than the of a new world which he
felt—it was something different....
He and drank, and as he was himself, Oceaxe strolled
indolently up.
He now the colour of her skin—it was a vivid, yet
delicate mixture of carmine, white, and jale. The was startlingly
unearthly. With these new colors she looked like a genuine
representative of a planet. Her also had something curious
about it. The were womanly, the were characteristically
female—yet all somehow to a daring, underlying
will. The on her set the same puzzle in plainer
language. Its bold, was with of sex
and softness.
She came to the river’s and him from top to toe. “Now you
are more like a man,” she said, in her lovely, voice.
“You see, the was successful,” he answered, gaily.
Oceaxe looking him over. “Did some woman give you that
ridiculous robe?”
“A woman did give it to me”—dropping his smile—“but I saw nothing
ridiculous in the gift at the time, and I don’t now.”
“I think I’d look in it.”
As she the words, she off the skin, which suited
her so well, and to him to garments. He obeyed,
rather shamefacedly, for he that the was in
fact more to his sex. He the skin a dress.
Oceaxe in her appeared more to him.
“I don’t want you to gifts at all from other women,” she
remarked slowly.
“Why not? What can I be to you?”
“I have been about you the night.” Her voice was
retarded, scornful, viola-like. She sat on the of a fallen
tree, and looked away.
“In what way?”
She returned no answer to his question, but to off pieces of
the bark.
“Last night you were so contemptuous.”
“Last night is not today. Do you always walk through the world with your
head over your shoulder?”
It was now Maskull’s turn to be silent.
“Still, if you have male instincts, as I you have, you can’t go
on me forever.”
“But this is preposterous,” said Maskull, opening his wide.
“Granted that you are a woman—we can’t be so primeval.”
Oceaxe sighed, and rose to her feet. “It doesn’t matter. I can wait.”
“From that I that you to make the in my society. I
have no objection—in I shall be glad—but only on condition that you
drop this language.”
“Yet you do think me beautiful?”
“Why shouldn’t I think so, if it is the fact? I fail to see what that
has to do with my feelings. Bring it to an end, Oceaxe. You will find
plenty of men to admire—and love you.”
At that she up. “Does love and choose, you fool? Do you
imagine I am so hard put to it that I have to for lovers? Is not
Crimtyphon waiting for me at this very moment?”
“Very well. I am sorry to have your feelings. Now the
temptation no farther—for it is a temptation, where a woman is
concerned. I am not my own master.”
“I’m not anything so very hateful, am I? Why do you humiliate
me so?”
Maskull put his hands his back. “I repeat, I am not my own
master.”
“Then who is your master?”
“Yesterday I saw Surtur, and from today I am him.”
“Did you speak with him?” she asked curiously.
“I did.”
“Tell me what he said.”
“No, I can’t—I won’t. But he said, his was more
tormenting than yours, Oceaxe, and that’s why I can look at you in cold
blood.”
“Did Surtur you to be a man?”
Maskull frowned. “Is love such a sport, then? I should have
thought it effeminate.”
“It doesn’t matter. You won’t always be so boyish. But don’t try my
patience too far.”
“Let us talk about something else—and, above all, let us on our
road.”
She into a laugh, so rich, sweet, and enchanting, that he
grew inflamed, and to catch her in his arms. “Oh,
Maskull, Maskull—what a you are!”
“In what way am I a fool?” he demanded, scowling—not at her words, but
at his own weakness.
“Isn’t the whole world the of of lovers? And
yet you think above all that. You try to away from nature,
but where will you a to in?”
“Besides beauty, I now you with a second quality: persistence.”
“Read me well, and then it is natural law that you’ll think twice and
three times me away.... And now, we go, we had
better eat.”
“Eat?” said Maskull thoughtfully.
“Don’t you eat? Is food in the same category as love?”
“What food is it?”
“Fish from the river.”
Maskull his promise to Joiwind. At the same time, he felt
hungry.
“Is there nothing milder?”
She her mouth scornfully. “You came through Poolingdred, didn’t
you? All the people there are the same. They think life is to be looked
at, and not lived. Now that you are visiting Ifdawn, you will have to
change your notions.”
“Go catch your fish,” he returned, his brows.
The broad, clear past them with undulations, from
the direction of the mountains. Oceaxe on the bank, and
peered into the depths. Presently her look and
concentrated; she her hand in and out some of little
monster. It was more like a than a fish, with its plates
and teeth. She it on the ground, and it started about.
Suddenly she all her will into her sorb. The into
the air, and dead.
She up a sharp-edged slate, and with it the and
entrails. During this operation, her hands and stained
with the light blood.
“Find the drude, Maskull,” she said, with a lazy smile. “You had it last
night.”
He for it. It was hard to locate, for its had dull
and in the sunlight, but at last he it. Oceaxe it in
the of the monster, and left the on the ground.
“While it’s cooking, I’ll wash some of this blood away, which frightens
you so much. Have you blood before?”
Maskull at her in perplexity. The old came back—the
contrasting sexual in her person. Her bold, masterful,
masculine of manner with the
fascinating and of her voice. A idea
flashed into his mind.
“In your country I’m told there is an act of will called ‘absorbing.’
What is that?”
She her red, hands away from her draperies, and a
delicious, laugh. “You think I am a man?”
“Answer my question.”
“I’m a woman through and through, Maskull—to the marrowbone. But that’s
not to say I have males.”
“And that means...”
“New for my harp, Maskull. A range of passions, a stormier
heart...”
“For you, yes—But for them?...”
“I don’t know. The don’t their experiences. Probably
unhappiness of some sort—if they still know anything.”
“This is a business!” he exclaimed, her gloomily. “One
would think Ifdawn a land of devils.”
Oceaxe gave a as she took a step toward the river.
“Better men than you—better in every of the word—are walking about
with them. You may be as as you like,
Maskull, but the remains, animals were to be eaten, and simple
natures were to be absorbed.”
“And count for nothing!”
She had over the river’s edge, to wash her arms and hands, but
glanced up over her to answer his remark. “They do count. But
we only a man as for just as long as he’s able to his
own with others.”
The was soon cooked, and they in silence. Maskull cast
heavy, from time to time toward his companion. Whether
it was to the quality of the food, or to his long
abstention, he did not know, but the nauseous, and even
cannibalistic. He ate little, and the moment he got up he defiled.
“Let me this drude, where I can it some other time,” said
Oceaxe. “On the next occasion, though, I shall have no Maskull with me,
to shock.... Now we have to take to the river.”
They off the land onto the water. It against them with a
sluggish current, but the opposition, of them, had the
contrary effect—it them to themselves, and they moved
faster. They the river in this way for miles. The
exercise the of Maskull’s blood, and he
began to look at in a more way. The sunshine,
the wind, the cloud scenery, the quiet, crystal
forests—all was and delightful. They approached nearer and
nearer to the painted of Ifdawn.
There was something to him in those walls. He was
attracted by them, yet a of awe. They looked real, but at the
same time very supernatural. If one see the portrait of a ghost,
painted with a hard, outline, in colors, the feelings
produced by such a would be to Maskull’s
impressions as he the Ifdawn precipices.
He the long silence. “Those have most extraordinary
shapes. All the lines are and perpendicular—no or
curves.”
She walked on the water, in order to him. “That’s typical
of Ifdawn. Nature is all with us. Nothing soft and
gradual.”
“I you, but I don’t you.”
“All over the Marest you’ll of ground or
rushing up. Trees fast. Women and men don’t think twice before
acting. One may call Ifdawn a place of quick decisions.”
Maskull was impressed. “A fresh, wild, land.”
“How is it where you come from?” asked Oceaxe.
“Oh, mine is a world, where nature takes a hundred years to
move a of solid land. Men and animals go about in flocks.
Originality is a habit.”
“Are there there?”
“As with you, and not very formed.”
“Do they love?”
He laughed. “So much so that it has the dress, speech, and
thoughts of the whole sex.”
“Probably they are more than I?”
“No, I think not,” said Maskull.
There was another long silence, as they unsteadily
onward.
“What is your in Ifdawn?” Oceaxe suddenly.
He over his answer. “Can you that it’s possible to have
an right in of one, so big that one can’t see it as a whole?”
She a long, look at him, “What of aim?”
“A aim.”
“Are you to set the world right?”
“I nothing—I am waiting.”
“Don’t wait too long, for time doesn’t wait—especially in Ifdawn.”
“Something will happen,” said Maskull.
Oceaxe a smile. “So you have no special in the
Marest?”
“No, and if you’ll permit me, I will come home with you.”
“Singular man!” she said, with a short, laugh. “That’s what I
have been all the time. Of you will come home with me.
As for Crimtyphon...”
“You mentioned that name before. Who is he?”
“Oh! My lover, or, as you would say, my husband.”
“This doesn’t matters,” said Maskull.
“It them where they were. We have to remove him.”
“We are each other,” said Maskull, quite
startled. “Do you by any that I am making a with
you?”
“You will do nothing against your will. But you have promised to come
home with me.”
“Tell me, how do you remove husbands in Ifdawn?”
“Either you or I must kill him.”
He her for a full minute. “Now we are from to
insanity.”
“Not at all,” Oceaxe. “It is the too-sad truth. And when you
have Crimtyphon, you will it.”
“I’m aware I am on a planet,” said Maskull slowly, “where all
sorts of of may happen, and where the very laws of
morality may be different. Still as as I am concerned, is
murder, and I’ll have no more to do with a woman who wants to make use
of me, to of her husband.”
“You think me wicked?” Oceaxe steadily.
“Or mad.”
“Then you had me, Maskull—only—”
“Only what?”
“You wish to be consistent, don’t you? Leave all other and wicked
people as well. Then you’ll it to the rest.”
Maskull frowned, but said nothing.
“Well?” Oceaxe, with a smile.
“I’ll come with you, and I’ll see Crimtyphon—if only to him.”
Oceaxe into a of rich, laughter, but at
the image up by Maskull’s last words, or from some other cause,
he did not know. The dropped.
At a of a of miles from the now cliffs, the
river a sharp, right-angled turn to the west, and was no longer of
use to them on their journey. Maskull up doubtfully.
“It’s a climb for a morning.”
“Let’s here a little,” said she, a of
black rock, up just out of the water in the middle of the
river.
They to it, and Maskull sat down. Oceaxe, however,
standing and erect, her toward the opposite,
and a and call.
“What is that for?” She did not answer. After waiting a minute, she
repeated the call. Maskull now saw a large bird itself from the
top of one of the precipices, and sail slowly toward them. It was
followed by two others. The of these was slow
and clumsy.
“What are they?” he asked.
She still returned no answer, but and sat down
beside him. Before many minutes he was able to the shapes
and colors of the monsters. They were not birds, but creatures
with long, bodies, and ten apiece, terminating
in which as wings. The were of blue, the legs
and were yellow. They were flying, without haste, but in a somewhat
ominous fashion, toward them. He make out a long, thin
spike from each of the heads.
“They are shrowks,” Oceaxe at last. “If you want to know their
intention, I’ll tell you. To make a of us. First of all their
spikes will us, and then their mouths, which are suckers,
will us of blood—pretty too; there are no half
measures with shrowks. They are beasts, so don’t eat flesh.”
“As you such sangfroid,” said Maskull dryly, “I take it
there’s no particular danger.”
Nevertheless he to on to his and failed. A
new of was him to the ground.
“Are you trying to up?” asked Oceaxe smoothly.
“Well, yes, but those to be me to the
rock with their wills. May I ask if you had any special object in view
in them up?”
“I you the is real, Maskull. Instead of talking and
asking questions, you had much see what you can do with your
will.”
“I to have no will, unfortunately.”
Oceaxe was with a of laughter, but it was still rich and
beautiful. “It’s you aren’t a very protector, Maskull. It
seems I must play the man, and you the woman. I things
of your big body. Why, my husband would send those dancing all
around the sky, by way of a joke, of them. Now watch
me. Two of the three I’ll kill; the third we will home on. Which
one shall we keep?”
The their slow, toward them. Their
bodies were of size. They produced in Maskull the same of
loathing as did. He that as they hunted
with their wills, there was no for them to a swift
motion.
“Choose which you please,” he said shortly. “They are equally
objectionable to me.”
“Then I’ll choose the leader, as it is the most energetic
animal. Watch now.”
She upright, and her with fire. Maskull felt
something his brain. His were free once more. The two
monsters in the and toward the
earth, one after the other. He them crash on the ground, and
then motionless. The leader still came toward them, but he fancied
that its was in character; it was no longer menacing, but
tame and unwilling.
Oceaxe it with her will to the opposite their
island rock. Its there extended, her pleasure.
They the water.
Maskull viewed the at close quarters. It was about thirty feet
long. Its bright-coloured skin was shining, slippery, and leathery; a
mane of black its long neck. Its was and
unnatural, with its eyes, stiletto, and blood-
sucking cavity. There were true on its and tail.
“Have you a good seat?” asked Oceaxe, the creature’s flank. “As
I have to steer, let me jump on first.”
She up her gown, then up and sat the animal’s
back, just the mane, which she clutched. Between her and the fin
there was just room for Maskull. He the two with his
outer hands; his third, new arm pressed against Oceaxe’s back, and for
additional security he was to her with it.
Directly he did so, he that he had been tricked, and that this
ride had been planned for one purpose only—to his desires.
The third arm a of its own, of which he had
been ignorant. It was a magn. But the of love which was
communicated to it was no longer pure and noble—it was boiling,
passionate, and torturing. He his teeth, and quiet, but
Oceaxe had not plotted the to of his
feelings. She looked around, with a golden, smile. “The ride
will last some time, so on well!” Her voice was soft like a flute,
but malicious.
Maskull grinned, and said nothing. He not remove his arm.
The on to its legs. It itself forward, and rose
slowly and in the air. They to toward the
painted cliffs. The motion was swaying, rocking, and sickening; the
contact of the brute’s skin was disgusting. All this, however, was
merely to Maskull, as he sat there with closed eyes, holding
on to Oceaxe. In the and centre of his was the
knowledge that he was a woman, and that her was
responding to his touch like a harp.
They up and up. He opened his eyes, and to look around
him. By this time they were already level with the top of the outer
rampart of precipices. There now came in a wild of
islands, with outlines, from a sea of air. The islands
were summits; or, more speaking, the country was a
high tableland, by narrow and bottomless
cracks. These were in some cases like canals, in others like
lakes, in others in the ground, closed in all round. The
perpendicular of the islands—that is, the upper, visible parts of
the faces—were of rock, coloured; but the
level were a of wild plant life. The trees alone
were from the shrowk’s back. They were of different
shapes, and did not look ancient; they were and but did
not appear very graceful; they looked tough, wiry, and savage.
As Maskull to the landscape, he Oceaxe and his
passion. Other came to the front. The was gay
and bright. The sun down, quickly-changing clouds across
the sky, the earth was vivid, wild, and lonely. Yet he no
aesthetic sensations—he nothing but an for action
and possession. When he looked at anything, he wanted to
deal with it. The of the land not free, but sticky;
attraction and were its constituents. Apart from this wish to
play a personal part in what was going on around and him, the
scenery had no for him.
So was he, that his arm its clasp. Oceaxe
turned around to at him. Whether or not she was satisfied with what
she saw, she a low laugh, like a chord.
“Cold again so quickly, Maskull?”
“What do you want?” he asked absently, still looking over the side.
“It’s how I to all this.”
“You wish to take a hand?”
“I wish to down.”
“Oh, we have a good way to go yet.... So you different?”
“Different from what? What are you talking about?” said Maskull, still
lost in abstraction.
Oceaxe laughed again. “It would be if we couldn’t make a man of
you, for the material is excellent.”
After that, she her once more.
The air from water in another way. They were
not on a plane surface, but upward, like a of broken
terraces, as the progressed. The had been flying
well above the ground; but now, when a new line of cliffs
confronted them, Oceaxe did not the upward, but it to
enter a narrow canyon, which the like a channel.
They were into shade. The was not above
thirty wide; the on for many
hundred feet. It was as as an ice chamber. When Maskull attempted
to the with his eyes, he saw nothing but black obscurity.
“What is at the bottom?” he asked.
“Death for you, if you go to look for it.”
“We know that. I mean, is there any of life there?”
“Not that I have of,” said Oceaxe, “but of all things
are possible.”
“I think very likely there is life,” he returned thoughtfully.
Her laugh out of the gloom. “Shall we go and see?”
“You that amusing?”
“No, not that. What I do is the big with the
beard, who is so in himself.”
Maskull then laughed too. “I to be the only thing in Tormance
which is not a for me.”
“Yes, but I am a for you.”
The its way through the of the mountain,
and all the time they were rising.
“At least I have nothing like your voice before,” said Maskull,
who, since he had no longer anything to look at, was at last for
conversation.
“What’s the with my voice?”
“It’s all that I can of you now; that’s why I mentioned it.”
“Isn’t it clear—don’t I speak distinctly?”
“Oh, it’s clear enough, but—it’s inappropriate.”
“Inappropriate?”
“I won’t further,” said Maskull, “but you are speaking
or laughing, your voice is by the and instrument
I have to. And yet I repeat, it is inappropriate.”
“You that my nature doesn’t correspond?”
He was just his reply, when their talk was broken
off by a and terrifying, but not very loud up from the
gulf directly them. It was a low, grinding, thunder.
“The ground is under us!” Oceaxe.
“Shall we escape?”
She no answer, but the shrowk’s upward, at such a
steep that they their seats with difficulty. The floor
of the canyon, by some force, be
heard, and almost felt, up after them, like a landslip
in the direction. The cracked, and to fall.
A hundred the air, louder and louder each
second—splitting, hissing, cracking, grinding, booming, exploding,
roaring. When they had still fifty or so to go, to the top, a
sort of dark, sea of and appeared under
their feet, rapidly, with might, by
the most noises. The was up for two hundred yards,
before and them. Millions of of solid to be
raised. The in its was by the debris.
Beast and in that moment all the of an
earthquake—they were rolled over, and among the rocks
and dirt. All was thunder, instability, motion, confusion.
Before they had time to their position, they were in the
sunlight. The still continued. In another minute or two the
valley had a new mountain, a hundred or more higher
than the old. Then its movement suddenly. Every noise stopped, as
if by magic; not a moved. Oceaxe and Maskull themselves up
and themselves for and bruises. The on its
side, violently, and with fright.
“That was a affair,” said Maskull, the off his
person.
Oceaxe a cut on her with a of her robe.
“It might have been worse.... I mean, it’s to come up,
but it’s death to go down, and that just as often.”
“Whatever you to live in such a country?”
“I don’t know, Maskull. Habit, I suppose. I have often of moving
out of it.”
“A good must be you for having to your life in a
place like this, where one is safe from one minute to
another.”
“You will learn by degrees,” she answered, smiling.
She looked hard at the monster, and it got to its feet.
“Get on again, Maskull!” she directed, to her perch. “We
haven’t too much time to waste.”
He obeyed. They their flight, this time over the
mountains, and in full sunlight. Maskull settled again to his
thoughts. The of the country to into
his brain. His will so and that to sit
there in was a torture. He not to be
doing something.
“How you are, Maskull!” said Oceaxe quietly, without turning
her head.
“What secrets—what do you mean?”
“Oh, I know perfectly well what’s you. Now I think it
wouldn’t be to ask you—is still enough?”
“Oh, don’t ask me anything,” Maskull. “I’ve too many
problems in my already. I only wish I answer some of them.”
He at the landscape. The was its way toward
a mountain, of shape. It was an natural
quadrilateral pyramid, in great and in a
broad, top, on which what looked like green still lingered.
“What is that?” he asked.
“Disscourn. The point in Ifdawn.”
“Are we going there?”
“Why should we go there? But if you were going on farther, it might be
worth your while to pay a visit to the top. It the whole land
as as the Sinking Sea and Swaylone’s Island—and beyond. You can also
see Alppain from it.”
“That’s a I to see I have finished.”
“Do you, Maskull?” She around and put her hand on his wrist.
“Stay with me, and one day we’ll go to Disscourn together.”
He unintelligibly.
There were no of in the country under their feet.
While Maskull was still it, a large of not
far ahead, many trees and rocks, with an awful
roar and into an gulf. What was solid land one
minute a clean-cut the next. He jumped up with
the shock. “This is frightful.”
Oceaxe unmoved.
“Why, life here must be impossible,” he on, when he had
somewhat himself. “A man would need nerves of steel.... Is
there no means at all of a like this?”
“Oh, I we wouldn’t be alive if there weren’t,” Oceaxe,
with composure. “We are more or less at it—but that doesn’t
prevent our often caught.”
“You had teach me the signs.”
“We’ll have many to go over together. And among them, I expect,
will be we are to in the land at all.... But let us
get home.”
“How is it now?”
“It is right in of you,” said Oceaxe, pointing with her
forefinger. “You can see it.”
He the direction of the and, after a questions, made
out the spot she was indicating. It was a peninsula, about two
miles distant. Three of its rose out of a of air, the
bottom of which was invisible; its fourth was a bottleneck, joining it
to the mainland. It was with vegetation, in
the atmosphere. A single tall tree, up in the middle
of the peninsula, else; it was wide and with
sea-green leaves.
“I wonder if Crimtyphon is there,” Oceaxe. “Can I see two
figures, or am I mistaken?”
“I also see something,” said Maskull.
In twenty minutes they were directly above the peninsula, at a of
about fifty feet. The speed, and came to earth on the
mainland, at the of the isthmus. They both
descended—Maskull with thighs.
“What shall we do with the monster?” asked Oceaxe. Without waiting for a
suggestion, she its with her hand. “Fly away home! I
may want you some other time.”
It gave a grunt, itself on its again, and, after
half running, for a yards, rose into the air,
and away in the same direction from which they had come. They
watched it out of sight, and then Oceaxe started to the of
land, by Maskull.
Branchspell’s white on them with force. The sky
had by cloudless, and the wind had entirely. The
ground was a rich of ferns, shrubs, and grasses.
Through these be here and there the soil—and
occasionally a glittering, white boulder. Everything looked
extraordinary and barbaric. Maskull was at last walking in the weird
Ifdawn Marest which had such in him when seen
from a distance.... And now he no wonder or at all, but
only to meet beings—so had his will. He
longed to test his powers on his creatures, and nothing else
seemed of the least to him.
On the peninsula all was and shade. It a
large copse, about two in extent. In the of the of
small trees and was a space—perhaps the
roots of the tree in the centre had killed off the smaller
fry all around it. By the of the tree a little, bubbling
fountain, water was iron-red. The on all sides,
overhung with thorns, flowers, and creepers, the with
an air of wild and seclusion—a god might
have here.
Maskull’s left everything, to on the two men who
formed the centre of the picture.
One was reclining, in the Grecian fashion of on a
tall of mosses, with flowers; he rested on one arm, and
was a of plum, with enjoyment. A of these plums
lay on the him. The over-spreading of the tree
completely him from the sun. His small, was clad
in a skin, his naked. Maskull not tell from
his he were a boy or a man. The were
smooth, soft, and childish, their was tranquil;
but his upper was and adult. His skin was of the
colour of yellow ivory. His long, matched his sorb—it was
violet. The second man was the other, a feet
away from him. He was and muscular, his was broad, bearded,
and commonplace, but there was something terrible about his
appearance. The were by a deep-seated look of pain,
despair, and horror.
Oceaxe, without pausing, and up to the outermost
shadows of the tree, some from the couch.
“We have met with an uplift,” she carelessly, looking toward
the youth.
He her, but said nothing.
“How is your plant man on?” Her was but
extremely beautiful. While waiting for an answer, she sat on the
ground, her under her body, and the
skirt of her robe. Maskull just her, with
crossed arms.
There was for a minute.
“Why don’t you answer your mistress, Sature?” said the boy on the couch,
in a calm, voice.
The man did not his expression, but in a
strangled tone, “I am on very well, Oceaxe. There are already
buds on my feet. Tomorrow I to take root.”
Maskull a him. He was perfectly aware that
although these were by Sature, they were being by
the boy.
“What he says is true,” the latter. “Tomorrow will
reach the ground, and in a days they ought to be well established.
Then I shall set to work to his arms into branches, and his
fingers into leaves. It will take longer to his into a
crown, but still I hope—in I can almost promise that a month
you and I, Oceaxe, will be and fruit from this new and
remarkable tree.”
“I love these natural experiments,” he concluded, out his hand
for another plum. “They me.”
“This must be a joke,” said Maskull, taking a step forward.
The looked at him serenely. He no reply, but Maskull as
if he were being by an iron hand on his throat.
“The morning’s work is now concluded, Sature. Come here again after
Blodsombre. After tonight you will here permanently, I expect, so
you had set to work to clear a of ground for your roots.
Never forget—however fresh and these plants appear to you now,
in the they will be your and enemies. Now you
may go.”
The man away, across the isthmus, out of sight. Oceaxe
yawned.
Maskull pushed his way forward, as if against a wall. “Are you joking,
or are you a devil?”
“I am Crimtyphon. I joke. For that of yours, I will devise
a new for you.”
The of without ceremony. Oceaxe got up, stretched
her limbs, smiled, and prepared herself to the
struggle her old lover and her new. Crimtyphon too; he
reached out his hand for more fruit, but did not eat it. Maskull’s self-
control and he at the boy, with red fury—his
beard and his was crimson. When he with he had
to deal, Crimtyphon left off smiling, off the couch, and a
terrible and into his sorb. Maskull staggered. He
gathered together all the of his will, and by weight
continued his advance. The boy and ran the couch, trying
to away.... His opposition collapsed. Maskull stumbled
forward, himself, and then clear over the high of
mosses, to at his antagonist. He on top of him with all his
bulk. Grasping his throat, he his little around,
so that the was broken. Crimtyphon died.
The the tree with its upturned. Maskull
viewed it attentively, and as he did so an of and wonder
came into his own countenance. In the moment of death Crimtyphon’s face
had a and alteration. Its personal
character had vanished, place to a vulgar, mask
which nothing.
He did not have to search his mind long, to where he had seen
the of that expression. It was with that on the face
of the at the siance, after Krag had with it.
