tically none of which ever has been fathomed by white
men. The Master realized that all his powers might be tried to the
utmost to match and overcome the demonstration of the Jannati Shahr
folk.

While Bara Miyan stood talking to the three _Sufis_, the Master was in
a low voice instructing his own men.

"Everything now depends on the outcome of the approaching contest,"
said he. "These people, irrespective of what we show them, will
probably evince no surprise. If we allow any sign or word of
astonishment to escape us, no matter what they do, they will consider
us beaten and we shall lose all. There must be no indication of
surprise, among you. Remain impassive, at all costs!" He turned to
Brodeur, and in French warned him:

"Remember the signals, now. One mistake on your part may cost my
life--more than that, the lives of all the Legion. Remember!"

"Count on me, my Captain!" affirmed Brodeur. The masked woman, coming
to the Master's side, said also in French:

"I have one favor to ask of you!"

"Well, what?"

"Your life is worth everything, now. Mine, nothing. Let me subject
myself--"

He waved her away, and making no answer, turned to the Olema.

"Hast thou, O Bara Miyan," he asked in a steady voice, "a swordsman
who can with one blow split a man from crown to jaw?"

"Thou speakest to such a one, White Sheik!"

"Take, then, a simitar of the keenest, and cut me down!"

The old man turned, took from the hand of a horseman a long, curved
blade of razor-keenness and with a heavy back. The Master glanced
significantly at Brodeur, who knelt by the switchboard with one
steady hand on a brass lever, the other on the control of a complex
ray-focussing device.

Toward Bara Miyan the Master advanced across the turf. He came close.
For a moment the two men eyed each other silently.

"Strike, son of the Prophet!" cried the Master.

Up whirled the Olema's blade, flickering in the sun. The metallic
_click_ of the brass switch synchronized with that sweep; Brodeur
shifted the reflector by the fraction of a degree.

Bara Miyan's arm grew rigid, quivered a second, then dropped inert.
From his paralyzed hand the simitar fell to the grass. Brodeur threw
off the ray; and the Master, unsmiling, stooped, picked up the blade
and with a salaam handed it back, hilt-first, to the old man.

Only with his left hand could Bara Miyan accept it. He spoke no word,
neither did any murmur run through the massed horsemen. But the