grief--when I feel none?"

"Don't pretend, woman!"

Oceaxe smiled. "From your manner one would think you were accusing me of
some crime."

Maskull literally snorted at her words. "What, you live with filth--you
live in the arms of a morbid monstrosity and then--"

"Oh, now I grasp it," she said, in a tone of perfect detachment.

"I'm glad."

"Well, Maskull," she proceeded, after a pause, "and who gave you the
right to rule my conduct? Am I not mistress of my own person?"

He looked at her with disgust, but said nothing. There was another long
interval of silence.

"I never loved him," said Oceaxe at last, looking at the ground.

"That makes it all the worse."

"What does all this mean--what do you want?"

"Nothing from you--absolutely nothing--thank heaven!"

She gave a hard laugh. "You come here with your foreign preconceptions
and expect us all to bow down to them."

"What preconceptions?"

"Just because Crimtyphon's sports are strange to you, you murder
him--and you would like to murder me."

"Sports! That diabolical cruelty."

"Oh, you're sentimental!" said Oceaxe contemptuously. "Why do you need
to make such a fuss over that man? Life is life, all the world over, and
one form is as good as another. He was only to be made a tree, like a
million other trees. If they can endure the life, why can't he?"

"And this is Ifdawn morality!"

Oceaxe began to grow angry. "It's you who have peculiar ideas. You rave
about the beauty of flowers and trees--you think them divine. But
when it's a question of taking on this divine, fresh, pure, enchanting
loveliness yourself, in your own person, it immediately becomes a cruel
and wicked degradation. Here we have a strange riddle, in my opinion."

"Oceaxe, you're a beautiful, heartless wild beast--nothing more. If you
weren't a woman--"

"Well"--curling her lip--"let us hear what would happen if I weren't a
woman?"

Maskull bit his nails.

"It doesn't matter. I can't touch you--though there's certainly not the
difference of a hair between you and your boy-husband. For this you may
thank my 'foreign preconceptions.'... Farewell!"

He turned to go. Oceaxe's eyes slanted at him through their long lashes.

"Where are you off to, Maskull?"

"That's a matter of no importance, for wherever I go it must be a change
for the better. You walking whirlpools of crime!"

"Wait a minute. I only want to say this. Blodsombre is just starting,
and you had better stay h