Page:Doughty--Mirrikh or A woman from Mars.djvu/206

 She vanished like meadow mist before the rays of the rising sun, and I was alone.

Yet I felt her near me. I knew the sense of her presence now—nor has that knowledge ever left me—I knew that she  was near me then, that her thoughts were impressing themselves upon my soul.

“Think of Maurice,” she seemed to say; and immediately I thought of Maurice.

Had my planetary journey been prolonged for a purpose?

I do not know, but this much is certain, on the instant, when obeying that inward voice, I fixed my mind on Maurice, I stood at his side!

For me space had been obliterated. If it was all true and Maurice was on Mars, then was I also on Mars. I could see Maurice, but I instantly perceived that he was powerless to  see me.

It was Maurice and it was not Maurice.

The person I stood beside was dressed in a long gown of blue satin, belted in at the waist and beautifully embroidered  with flowers in their natural colors, but the face, though it  bore some resemblance to my friend, was as the face of my  mysterious acquaintance at Panompin. Like Mr. Mirrikh’s face, half yellow, half black; yet inside of that body—and  I seemed able to look inside without the slightest difficulty,  I could see another man, perfect in every particular. This was Maurice De Veber as I knew him—there was no  change.

When I first saw him I shouted his name aloud, but now finding that I could not make my presence known, I contented myself with simply looking at him and surveying his  surroundings which were, of course, of the highest interest,  for then I had not the slightest doubt that I was actually  on the planet Mars.

Maurice was sitting upon a chair made of reeds plaited together, in a room of considerable size where there was  a couch, also of plaited reeds, but no other furniture save  an extra chair or two. He was smoking an odd-looking cigar; its shape was a perfect crescent, and instead of the  odor of tobacco, it sent up with the smoke a most delicious  perfume.

Now it seemed to me that it was morning and that Maurice had just arisen from the couch, where he had been sleeping all night with his present clothes on. With the