how nothing ever so engrossing, so
thrilling, as that ghostly figure in flowing robes stealing across the
piazza in starlight and silence--the princess of a broken kingdom, the
priestess of a forgotten faith coming to her station to perform a
jugglery of which she knew not even the meaning. It was my versatile
friend Heru, and with quick, incisive steps, her whole frame ambent for
the time with the fervour of her mission, she came swiftly down to
within a dozen yards of where I stood. Heru, indeed, but not the same
princess as in the morning; an inspired priestess rather, her slim body
wrapped in blue and quivering with emotion, her face ashine with
Delphic fire, her hair loose, her feet bare, until at last when, as she
stood within the limit of the magic circle, her white hands upon her
breast, her eyes flashing like planets themselves in the starshine she
looked so ghostly and unreal I felt for a minute I was dreaming.

Then began a strange, weird dance amongst the imagery of the rings,
over which my earth planet was beginning to throw a haze of light. At
first it was hardly more than a walk, a slow procession round the twin
circumferences of the centred tripod. But soon it increased to an
extraordinary graceful measure, a cadenced step without music or sound
that riveted my eyes to the dancer. Presently I saw those mystic,
twinkling feet of hers--as the dance became swifter--were performing a
measured round amongst the planet signs--spelling out something, I knew
not what, with quick, light touch amongst the zodiac figures, dancing
out a soundless invocation of some kind as a dumb man might spell a
message by touching letters. Quicker and quicker, for minute after
minute, grew the dance, swifter and swifter the swing of the light blue
drapery as the priestess, with eager face and staring eyes, swung
panting round upon her orbit, and redder and redder over the city tops
rose the circumference of the earth. It seemed to me all the silent
multitude were breathing heavily as we watched that giddy dance, and
whatever THEY felt, all my own senses seemed to be winding up upon that
revolving figure as thread winds on a spindle.

"When will she stop?" I whispered to my friend under my breath.

"When the earth-star rests in the roof-niche of the temple it is
climbing," she answered back.

"And then?"

"On the tripod is a globe of water. In it she will see the destiny of
the year, and will tell us. The whiter the w