s abandoned, somewhat a bit musty, but weathertight
and seemed comfortable to me.

The first thing to be done was to despatch a messenger to the Old One,
begging the favor of an audience with him. That done, (by one of my
foster-brothers), we settled down to a meal of buds, honey, insects and
birds eggs! It tasted good to me, with the familiarity of food eaten in
childhood, but among the others, only Kyla ate with appetite and Regis
Hastur with interested curiosity.

* * * * *

After the demands of hospitality had been satisfied, my foster-parents
asked the names of my party, and I introduced them one by one. When I
named Regis Hastur, it reduced them to brief silence, and then to an
outcry; gently but firmly, they insisted that their home was unworthy to
shelter the son of a Hastur, and that he must be fittingly entertained
at the Royal Nest of the Old One.

There was no gracious way for Regis to protest, and when the messenger
returned, he prepared to accompany him. But before leaving, he drew me
aside:

"I don't much like leaving the rest of you--"

"You'll be safe enough."

"It's not that I'm worried about, Dr. Allison."

"Call me Jason," I corrected angrily. Regis said, with a little
tightening of his mouth, "That's it. You'll have to be Dr. Allison
tomorrow when you tell the Old One about your mission. But you have to
be the Jason he knows, too."

"So--?"

"I wish I needn't leave here. I wish you were--going to stay with the
men who know you only as Jason, instead of being alone--or only with
Kyla."

There was something odd in his face, and I wondered at it. Could he--a
Hastur--be jealous of Kyla? Jealous of _me_? It had never occurred to me
that he might be somehow attracted to Kyla. I tried to pass it off
lightly:

"Kyla might divert me."

Regis said without emphasis, "Yet she brought Dr. Allison back once
before." Then, surprisingly, he laughed. "Or maybe you're right. Maybe
Kyla will--scare away Dr. Allison if he shows up."

* * * * *

The coals of the dying fire laid strange tints of color on Kyla's face
and shoulders and the wispy waves of her dark hair. Now that we were
alone, I felt constrained.

"Can't you sleep, Jason?"

I shook my head. "Better sleep while you can." I felt that this night
of all nights I dared not close my eyes or when I woke I would have
vanished into the Jay Allison I hated. For a moment I saw the ro