As Curtis spoke they all three became conscious of living things around them--things that moved about, silently and surrept.i.tiously and conveyed the impression of mockery. The hills, the valley, the trees were full of it--the whole place teemed with it--teemed with silent, subtle, stealthy mockery. The senses of the three men were now keenly alive, but a dead weight hung upon their limbs and rendered them useless. And as they stared into the gloom, in sickly fear, the firelight flickered and they saw shadows, such as the moon, when low in the heaven, might fashion from the figure of a man; but yet they were shadows neither of man, nor G.o.d, nor of any familiar thing. They were dark, vague, formless and indefinite, and they quivered--quivered with a quivering that suggested mockery.

Suddenly the shadows disappeared; the flickering of the flames ceased; and in the place of the fire appeared a seething, writhing ma.s.s of what looked like white luminous snakes. And in the midst of this ma.s.s sprang up a cylindrical form, which grew and grew until it attained a height of ten or twelve feet, when it remained stationary and threw out branches. And the three men now saw it was a tree--a tree with a sleek, pulpy, semi-transparent, perspiring trunk full of a thick, white, vibrating, luminous fluid; and that it was laden with a fruit, in shape resembling an apple, but of the same hue and material as the trunk. Spread out on the ground around it, were its roots, twitching and palpitating with repulsive life, and bare with a bareness that shocked the senses. It was so utterly and inconceivably unlike what Hamar, Curtis and Kelson had imagined the Unknown--and yet, withal, so monstrous (not merely in its shape but in its suggestions), and so vividly real and livid, that they were not merely terrified--they were stricken with a terror that rendered them dumb and helpless. And as they looked at it, from out the trunk, shot an enormous thing--white and glistening, and fashioned like a human tongue. And after pointing derisively at them, it withdrew; whereupon all the fruit shook, as if convulsed with unseemly laughter. They then saw between the foremost branches of the tree a big eye. The white of it was thick and pasty, the iris spongy in texture, and the pupil bulging with a lurid light.

It stared at them with a steady stare--insolent and quizzical. Hamar and his friends stared back at it in fascinated horror, and would have continued staring at it indefinitely, had not Hamar's mercenary instincts come to their rescue. He recollected that time was pressing, and that unless he got into communication with the strange thing at once, according to the book, it would vanish--and he might never be able to get in touch with it again. Thus egged on, he made a great effort to regain his courage, and at length succeeded in forcing himself to speak. Though his voice was weak and shaking he managed to p.r.o.nounce the prescribed mode of address, viz.:--"Bara phonen etek mo," which being interpreted is, "Spirit from the Unknown, give ear to me." He then explained their earnest desire to pay homage to the Supernatural, and to be initiated into the mysteries of the Black Art.

When Hamar had concluded his address, the antic.i.p.ations of the three as to how it would be answered, or whether it would be answered at all--were such that they were forced to hold their breath almost to the point of suffocation. If the Thing _could_ speak what would its voice be like? The seconds pa.s.sed, and they were beginning to prepare themselves for disappointment, when suddenly across the intervening s.p.a.ce separating them from the Unknown, the reply came--came in soft, silky, lisping tones--human and yet not human, novel and yet in some way--a way that defied a.n.a.lysis--familiar. Strange to say, they all three felt that this familiarity belonged to a far back period of their existence, no less than to a more modern one--to a period, in fact, to which they could affix no date. And, although a perfect unity of expression suggested that the utterance of the Thing was the utterance of one being only, a certain variation in its tones, a rising and falling from syllable to syllable, led them to infer that the voice was not the voice of one but of many.

"You are anxious to acquire knowledge of the Secrets a.s.sociated with the Great Atlantean Magic?" the voice lisped.

"We are!" Hamar stammered, "and we are willing to give our souls in exchange for them."

"Souls!" the voice lisped, whilst trunk and branches swayed lightly, and the air was full of silent merriment. "Souls! you speak in terms you do not understand. To acquire the secrets of Black Magic, all you have to do is to agree that during a brief period--a period of a few months, you will live together in harmony; that you will make use of the powers you acquire to the detriment of all save yourselves; that you will never allow your minds to revert to anything spiritual; and--that you will abstain from--marrying."

"And if we succeed in carrying out the conditions?" Hamar asked.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE INITIATION]

"Then," the voice replied, "you will retain free, untrammelled possession of your knowledge."

"For how long?" Curtis queried.

"For the natural term of your lives--that is to say, for as long as you would have lived had you never been initiated into the secrets of magic."

"And if we fail?"

"You will pa.s.s into the permanent possession of the Unknown."

"Does that mean we shall die the moment we fail?" Kelson inquired timidly.

"Die!" the voice lisped. "Again you speak in terms you do not understand. You may be sent for."

"You say--in perfect harmony." Hamar put in. "Does that mean without a quarrel, however slight?"

"It means without a quarrel that would lead to separation. The moment you disunite the compact is broken."

"What advantages will the secrets bring us?" Hamar inquired. "Can we gain unlimited wealth?"

"Yes!" the voice replied. "Unlimited wealth and influence."

"And health?"

"So long as you fulfil the conditions of the compact you will enjoy perfect health. Will you, or will you not, pledge yourselves?"

"I am ready if you fellows are," Hamar whispered.

"I am!" Curtis cried. "Anything is better than the life we are living at present."

"And I, too," Kelson said. "I agree with Ed."

"Very well then," the voice once more lisped. "Each of you take a fruit and eat it, and the compact is irrevocably struck. You cannot back out of it without incurring the consequences already named. Don't be afraid, step up here and help yourselves--one apiece--mind, no more." And again it seemed to Hamar, Curtis and Kelson as if the tree and everything around it was convulsed with silent laughter.

"Come on!" Hamar cried, somewhat imperatively. "Don't waste time.

You've decided, and besides, remember this affair may turn out trumps.

I'll go first," and walking up to the tree he plucked a fruit and began to eat it. Curtis and Kelson slowly followed suit.

"I believe I'm eating a live slug, or a toad," Curtis muttered, with a retch.

"And I, too," Kelson whispered. "It's filthy. I shall be sick. If I am, will it make any difference to the compact, I wonder?"

What the fruit really tasted like they could never decide. It reminded them of many things and of nothing. It was sweet yet bitter; it repelled but at the same time pleased them; it was as perplexing as the voice--as enigmatical. When they had eaten it they resumed their former positions on the ground, and the voice once again addressed them.

"The fruit you have consumed has created in you a fitness to make use of the powers about to be conferred. You have acquired the faculty of sorcery--you will be initiated by stages, into the knowledge and practice of it. These stages, seven in number, will cover the period of your compact, _i.e._ twenty-one months, and at the end of every three months--when a fresh stage is reached--you will receive fresh powers.

"In the first stage, the stage you are now entering upon, you will receive the power of divination. You will be told how to detect the presence of water and all kinds of metals, and how to read people's thoughts.

"In the second stage--exactly three months from to-day--you will receive the gift of second-sight; the power of separating your immaterial from your material body and projecting it, anywhere you will, on the physical plane; and, to a large extent, you will be enabled to circ.u.mvent gravity. Thus you will be able to perform all manner of jugglery tricks--tricks that will set the whole world gaping. Profit by them.

"In the third stage you will possess the secrets of invisibility; of walking on the water; of breathing under the water; of taming wild beasts; and of understanding their language.

"In the fourth stage you will understand how to inflict all manner of diseases, and work all sorts of spells; such, for instance, as bewitching milk, causing people to have fits, bad dreams, etc. You will also know how to create plagues--plagues of insects, or of any other noxious thing.

"In the fifth stage you will possess absolute knowledge of the art of medicine and be able to cure every ailment.

"In the sixth stage you will acquire the power of producing vampires and werwolves from the human being, and of transforming people from the human to any animal guise.

"In the seventh and final stage you will be given the complete mastery of every art and science--including astrology, astronomy, necromancy, etc.; and for this stage is reserved the greatest power of all--namely, the complete dominion over woman's will and affections.

The powers of creating life, and of extending life beyond the now natural limit, and of avoiding accidents, will never be conferred on you. Neither shall you learn, not at least during your physical existence--who or what we are, or the secrets of creation.

"Each successive stage will cancel the preceding one--that is to say, the powers you have acquired in the first stage will be annulled on your arriving at the second stage, and so on. But if you carry out your compact faithfully--that is to say, if at the end of the twenty-one months you are still united--all the powers you have held hitherto, in the different stages, temporarily, will return to you and remain in your possession permanently. Have you anything to say?"

"Yes!" Hamar answered; "I fully understand all you have explained to us and I like the idea of it immensely. The fear of our coming to any serious loggerheads and of dissolving partnership doesn't worry me much--but I must say, it seems very remote--the prospect of gaining such tremendous powers--powers that will give us practically everything we want--save youth--"

"Youth you will never regain," lisped the voice. "And elixirs of life, surely you must know, are no longer sought after, by beings of the planet Earth. They are quite out of date. You will, of course, learn the most efficacious means of making yourselves and other people youthful in appearance."

"Yes, but how shall we learn these secrets?" Kelson nerved himself to ask.

"They will be revealed to you in various ways--sometimes when asleep.

You will receive preliminary instructions as to divination before this time to-morrow."

"And meanwhile, we shall be in want of money," Curtis remarked.

"No!" the voice replied, "you will not be in want of money. Have you anything more to ask?"

No one spoke, and the silence that followed was interrupted by a loud rustling of the wind. The darkness then lifted; but nothing was to be seen--nothing save the trees and bushes, moon and stars.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 16: This is a very sinister sign in astrology, denoting the presence of evil influences of all kinds.--(_Author's note._)]