Page:The Master of Mysteries (1912).djvu/156



ARDLY had Astro's office hours begun, one morning, when Valeska threw back the black velvet portières of the great studio, and motioned her visitors to enter. They came in anxiously—a dignified but careworn haggard man of fifty and his hysterical sobbing wife. Apparently they expected immediately to meet the Master of Mysteries face to face; for they looked curiously about the richly decorated apartment with a hesitating air.

"You'll have to wait a few moments," said the girl in a friendly voice. "The Master is at present rapt in a psychic trance, and can not be disturbed. Excuse me while I prepare for his awakening. It is dangerous to call him too suddenly; but I know your business is urgent, and I'll do what I can."

With that, she took from a small antique reliquary a handful of green powder and scattered it on a censer. Almost immediately it flared up and sent forth an aromatic smoke. It flickered eerily as she left them. Once alone, she entered a small chamber off the reception-room, and turned on the studio lights from an electric switch.

In the place where she stood now, looking into a large mirror, she could see the visitors, vividly illum- Rh