which he had addressed himself with all the
force of his mighty nature for twenty years, was now at length
approaching completion. The mine that he had so patiently laid, year
after year, beneath the foundations of Society, was complete in every
detail, the first spark had been applied, and the first rumbling of
the explosion was already sounding in the ears of men, though they
little knew how much it imported. The work of the master-intellect
was almost done. The long days and nights of plotting and planning
were over, and the hour for action had arrived at last.

For him there was little more to do, and the time was very near when
he could retire from the strife, and watch in peace and confidence
the reaping of the harvest of ruin and desolation that his hands had
sown. Henceforth, the central figure in the world-revolution must be
the young English engineer, whose genius had brought him forth out of
his obscurity to take command of the subjugated powers of the air,
and to arbitrate the destinies of the world.

This was why he was sitting here, in the long twilight of the June
evening, talking so earnestly with the man who, under the spell of
his mysterious power and master-will, had been his second self in
completing the work that he had designed, and had thought and spoken
and acted as he had inspired him against all the traditions of his
race and station, in that strange double life that he had lived, in
each portion of which he had been unconscious of all that he had been
and had done in the other. The time had now come to draw aside the
veil which had so far divided these two lives from each other, to
show him each as it was in very truth, and to leave him free to
deliberately choose between them.

Natas had been speaking without any interruption from Tremayne for
nearly an hour, drawing the parallel of the two lives before him with
absolute fidelity, neither omitting nor justifying anything, and his
wondering hearer had listened to him in silence, unable to speak for
the crowding emotions which were swarming through his brain. At
length Natas concluded by saying--

"And now, Alan Tremayne, I have shown you faithfully the two paths
which you have trodden since first I had need of you. So far you have
been as clay in the hands of the potter. Now the spell is removed,
and you are free to choose which of them you will follow to the
end,--that of the English gentleman of fortune and high position,
whose country