ated
me, the child, in the smoke of the burning. But I awoke again and when
I awoke the past was gone and the soul of the Asika filled me, bringing
with it its awful memories, its gathered wisdom, its passion of love and
hate, and its power to look backward and before."
"Do you ever do these things?" asked Alan.
"Backward, yes, before very little; since you came, not at all, because
my heart is a coward and I fear what I might see. Oh! Vernoon, Vernoon,
I know you and your thoughts. You think me a beautiful beast who loves
like a beast, who loves you because you are white and different from our
men. Well, what there is of the beast in me the gods of my people gave,
for they are devils and I am their servant. But there is more than that,
there is good also which I have won for myself. I knew you would come
even before I had seen your face, I knew you would come," she went
on passionately, "and that is why I was yours already. But what would
befall after you came, that I neither knew, nor know, because I will not
seek, who could learn it all."
He looked at her and she saw the doubt in his eyes.
"You do not believe me, Vernoon. Very well, this night you shall see,
you and that black dog of yours, that you may know I do not trick you,
and he shall tell me what you see, for he being but a low-born pig will
speak the truth, not minding if it hurts me, whereas you are gentle and
might spare, and myself I have sworn not to search the future by an oath
that I may not break."
"What of the past?" asked Alan.
"We will not waste time on it, for I know it all. Vernoon, have you no
memories of Asiki-land? Do you think you never visited it before?"
"Never," said Alan; "it was my uncle who came and ran away with Little
Bonsa on his head."
"That is news indeed," she replied mockingly. "Did you then think that I
believed it to be you, though it is true that she who went before, or
my spirit that was in her, fell into error for an hour, and thought that
fool-uncle of yours was _the Man_. When she found her mistake she
let him go, and bade the god go with him that it might bring back the
appointed Man, as it has done; yes, that Little Bonsa, who knew him of
old, might search him out from among all the millions of men, born or
unborn, and bring him back to me. Therefore also she chose a young black
dog who would live for many years, and bade the god to take him with
her, and told him of the wealth of our people that it might
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