music that gave rise to one of the few truly
humorous incidents of our caverned life. Larry came to me--it was just
after our fourth sleep, I remember.

"Come on to a concert," he said.

We skimmed off to one of the bridge garrisons. Rador called the
two-score guards to attention; and then, to my utter stupefaction, the
whole company, O'Keefe leading them, roared out the anthem, "God Save
the King." They sang--in a closer approach to the English than might
have been expected scores of miles below England's level. "Send him
victorious! Happy and glorious!" they bellowed.

He quivered with suppressed mirth at my paralysis of surprise.

"Taught 'em that for Marakinoff's benefit!" he gasped. "Wait till that
Red hears it. He'll blow up.

"Just wait until you hear Yolara lisp a pretty little thing I taught
her," said Larry as we set back for what we now called home. There was
an impish twinkle in his eyes.

And I did hear. For it was not many minutes later that the priestess
condescended to command me to come to her with O'Keefe.

"Show Goodwin how much you have learned of our speech, O lady of the
lips of honeyed flame!" murmured Larry.

She hesitated; smiled at him, and then from that perfect mouth, out of
the exquisite throat, in the voice that was like the chiming of little
silver bells, she trilled a melody familiar to me indeed:

"She's only a bird in a gilded cage,
A bee-yu-tiful sight to see--"

And so on to the bitter end.

"She thinks it's a love-song," said Larry when we had left. "It's only
part of a repertoire I'm teaching her. Honestly, Doc, it's the only
way I can keep my mind clear when I'm with her," he went on earnestly.
"She's a devil-ess from hell--but a wonder. Whenever I find myself
going I get her to sing that, or Take Back Your Gold! or some other
ancient lay, and I'm back again--pronto--with the right perspective!
POP goes all the mystery! 'Hell!' I say, 'she's only a woman!'"

CHAPTER XVIII

The Amphitheatre of Jet

For hours the black-haired folk had been streaming across the bridges,
flowing along the promenade by scores and by hundreds, drifting down
toward the gigantic seven-terraced temple whose interior I had never
as yet seen, and from whose towering exterior, indeed, I had always
been kept far enough away--unobtrusively, but none the less decisively--to
prevent any real observation. The structure, I had estimated,
nevertheless, could not reach less than a th