quite right, Tydomin," he said, in a bold, cheerful voice. "We
have been fools. So near the light all the time, and we never guessed
it. Always buried in the past or future--systematically ignoring the
present--and now it turns out that apart from the present we have no
life at all."

"Thank Spadevil for it," she answered, more loudly than usual.

Maskull looked at the man's dark, concrete form. "Spadevil, now I mean
to follow you to the end. I can do nothing less."

The severe face showed no sign of gratification--not a muscle relaxed.

"Watch that you don't lose your gift," he said gruffly.

Tydomin spoke. "You promised that I should enter Sant with you."

"Attach yourself to the truth, not to me. For I may die before you, but
the truth will accompany you to your death. However, now let us journey
together, all three of us."

The words had not left his mouth before he put his face against the
fine, driving snow, and pressed onward toward his destination. He walked
with a long stride; Tydomin was obliged to half run in order to keep up
with him. The three travelled abreast; Spadevil in the middle. The fog
was so dense that it was impossible to see a hundred yards ahead. The
ground was covered by the green snow. The wind blew in gusts from the
Sant highlands and was piercingly cold.

"Spadevil, are you a man, or more than a man?" asked Maskull.

"He that is not more than a man is nothing."

"Where have you now come from?"

"From brooding, Maskull. Out of no other mother can truth be born. I
have brooded, and rejected; and I have brooded again. Now, after many
months' absence from Sant, the truth at last shines forth for me in its
simple splendour, like an upturned diamond."

"I see its shining," said Maskull. "But how much does it owe to ancient
Hator?"

"Knowledge has its seasons. The blossom was to Hator, the fruit is to
me. Hator also was a brooder--but now his followers do not brood. In
Sant all is icy selfishness, a living death. They hate pleasure, and
this hatred is the greatest pleasure to them."

"But in what way have they fallen off from Hator's doctrines?"

"For him, in his sullen purity of nature, all the world was a snare,
a limed twig. Knowing that pleasure was everywhere, a fierce, mocking
enemy, crouching and waiting at every corner of the road of life, in
order to kill with its sweet sting the naked grandeur of the soul, he
shielded himself behind pain. This also his followers do, but