The professor smiled. He was holding the light up to the snow-stone, at a spot that would have been the point of intersection had lines been drawn from the three missing gems, and the resulting triangle centred.

He held his hand up to the substance. It was slightly rough at that point, as though it had been frozen.

Then he ran his fingers across the surrounding surface.

"Ah!" he exclaimed. "I thought so! That helps considerably. Chick--put your hand up here. What do you feel?"

"Rough," said Chick, feeling the intersection point. "Slightly so, but cold and--and magnetic."

"Now feel here."

"Cool and magnetic, doctor; but smooth. What does it prove?"

"Let's see; do you understand the term 'electrolysis'? Good. Well, there should be another clue--not similar, but supplementary, or rather, complementary--on the earth side. Perhaps one of you found it while you lived in that house." The professor eyed both men anxiously. "Did either of you find a stain, or anything of that sort, on the walls, ceiling, or floor of any room there?"

Both shook their heads.

"Well, there ought to be," frowned the doctor. "I am positive that, should we return now, we could locate some such phenomenon. From this side it is very easy to account for; it's simply the disintegrating effect of the current, constantly impinging at the point of contact or the intersection. Having acted on this side, it must have left some mark on the other."

Watson was still running his hand over the snow-stone. Once before, when he had stood barefooted in the contest with the Senestro, he had noted its cold magnetism.

"What is this substance, professor?"

"That, I have not been able to discover. I would call it neutral element, for want of a more exact term; something that touches both aspects of the spectrum."

"Both aspects of the spectrum?"

"Yes; as nearly as the limitations of my vocabulary will permit. If you recall, I showed you a simple experiment the other day in the palace.

By means of an inductor I drew out the iron principle from the ether and built up the metal. Only it was not precisely iron but its Thomahlian equivalent. Had you been on the earth side you would have seen nothing at all, not even myself. I was on the wrong aspect of the spectrum.

"Also, you see here the Jaradic colours--the crimson, green and blue--the shades between, the iridescence and the shadows. Had you been on the other side you wouldn't have seen one of them; they are not precisely our own colours, but their equivalents on this side of the Spot.

"In the final analysis, as I said before, it gets down to ether, to speed and vibration--and still at last to the perceptive limitations of our own earthly five senses. Just stop and consider how limited we are!

Only five senses--why, even insects have six. Then consider that all matter, when we get to the bottom of it, is differentiated and condensed ether, focused into various mathematical arrangements, as numberless as the particles of the universe. Of these our five senses pick out a very small proportion indeed.

"This is one way to account for the Blind Spot. It may be merely another phase of the spectrum--not simply the unexplored regions of the infra-red or the ultra-violet, but a region co-existent with what we normally apprehend, and making itself manifest through apertures in what we, with our extremely limited sense-grasp, think to be a continuous spectrum. I throw out the idea mainly as a suggestion. It is not necessarily the true explanation.

"Let us go a bit farther. Remember, we are still upon the earth. And that we are still in San Francisco, although all the while we are also in the Mahovisal. This is 288 Chatterton Place, and at the same time it is the Temple of the Bell. It might be a hundred or a thousand other places just as well, too, if my hypothesis is correct; which we shall see.

"Now, what does this mean? Simply this, gentlemen, that we five-sensed people have failed to grasp the true meaning of the word 'Infinity.' We look out toward the stars, fancying that only in unlimited space can we find the infinite. We little suspect we ourselves are infinity! It is only our five senses that make us finite.

"As soon as we grasp this the so-called spiritual realm becomes a very substantial fact. We begin to apprehend the occult. Our five-sensed world is merely a highly specialized phase of infinity. Material or spiritual--it is all the same. That's why we look on the Thomahlians as occult, and why they consider us in the same light.

"It is strictly a question of sense perception and limitations, which can be covered by the word, 'viewpoint.' Viewpoint--that is all it amounts to.

"There is no such thing as unreality; but there is most certainly such a thing as relativity, and all life is real.

"Of course I knew nothing of this until the discovery of the Blind Spot.

It will, I think, prove to be one of the greatest events in history. It will silence the sceptics, and form a bulwark for all religion. And it will make us all appreciate our Creator the more."

The professor stopped. For some moments there was silence.

"What are we to do now?" asked Harry.

But the professor chose not to answer. With his tape he began taking a fresh series of measurements, with reference to the empty sockets and one particularly brilliant red gem, which seemed to be "number one" in the circle. From time to time the doctor jotted down the results and made short calculations. Presently he said: "That ought to be enough.

Now suppose we--"

At that instant something happened. Harry Wendel caught him by the shoulder. He pointed to the suspended stone.

It was moving!

It was revolving, almost imperceptibly, like some vast wheel turning on its axis. So slowly did it rotate, the motion would have escaped attention were it not for the gems and their brilliance.

Suddenly it came to a stop, short and quick, as though it had dropped into a notch. And from above they heard the deep, solemn clang of the temple bell.

"What is that?" asked Harry, startled. "Who moved the stone?"

"Can it be," flashed Chick, "that Hobart Fenton has found the keys?"

"That remains to be seen!" from the doctor. "Come--we must find out what has happened!"

Within a minute they knew. As they came out of the private door on the now emptied floor of the great temple, they saw the senior queen, the Nervina, coming down the great stairway from the Spot of Life.

"What is it?" called Harry, apprehensively.

"The Aradna!" she replied. Her voice was curiously strained. "Something happened, and--she has fallen through the Spot!"

XLVI

OUT OF THE OCCULT

"HOW DID IT HAPPEN?"

"I scarcely know. We went up to play with the dog. It was unwilling to leave the place, and Aradna teasingly tried to push her off on to the steps. She succeeded, but--well, it was all over that quick. The Aradna was gone!"

But the Spot had by this time lost a good deal of its terror. Knowing what was on the other side, and who, made a great difference. As the doctor said later in a private consultation with Chick and Harry:

"It's not so bad. That is, if Hobart Fenton is at work there. I think he is. Really, I only regret that we didn't know of this beforehand; we could have sent a message through to him."

And the professor went on to explain what he meant. At the time he spoke, it was twenty-four hours after the Aradna's going; another twenty-four hours would see the evening of the Last Day--the sixteenth of the sacred Days of Life--what the Rhamdas alluded to as "the Day of Judgment." And the Mahovisal was a seething mass of humanity, all bent upon seeing the fulfillment of their highest hopes.

"Bear in mind that if the Spot should not open at the last moment, you and I are done for. We will be self-condemned 'False Ones'; our lives will not last one minute after midnight tomorrow night if we fail to get through!

"That Prophecy means EVERYTHING to the Thomahlians. There was a time when they accepted it on faith; now it is an intellectual conviction with every last one of them. And one and all look forward to a new and glorious life beyond the Spot--in the occult world--our world!

"Now, the ticklish part of the job will be to open the Spot just long enough to permit us to get through, yet prevent the whole Prophecy from coming to pass. We've got to get through, together with that black case of mine, and then shut the door in the face of all Thomahlia!"