til his nose reached a certain spot, where it remained, while his
black tail began to wag in a delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away
and investigated.

"As I thought," he said--"air-holes. See!"

I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in a line
with the face of its occupant, were a number of little holes that either
by accident or design outlined the shape of a human mouth.

"They are not airtight," murmured Bickley; "and if air can enter, how
can dead flesh remain like that for ages?"

Then he continued his search upon the other side.

"The lid of this coffin works on hinges," he said. "Here they are,
fashioned of the crystal itself. A living person within could have
pulled it down before the senses departed."

"No," I answered; "for look, here is a crystal bolt at the end and it is
shot from without."

This puzzled him; then as though struck by an idea, he began to examine
the other coffin.

"I've got it!" he exclaimed presently. "The old god in here" (somehow
we all thought of this old man as not quite normal) "shut down the
Glittering Lady's coffin and bolted it. His own is not bolted, although
the bolt exists in the same place. He just got in and pulled down the
lid. Oh! what nonsense I am talking--for how can such things be? Let us
get out and think."

So we crept from the sepulchre in which the perfumed air had begun to
oppress us and sat ourselves down upon the floor of the cave, where for
a while we remained silent.

"I am very thirsty," said Bastin presently. "Those smells seem to have
dried me up. I am going to get some tea--I mean water, as unfortunately
there is no tea," and he set off towards the mouth of the cave.

We followed him, I don't quite know why, except that we wished to
breathe freely outside, also we knew that the sepulchre and its contents
would be as safe as they had been for--well, how long?

It proved to be a beautiful morning outside. We walked up and down
enjoying it sub-consciously, for really our--that is Bickley's and my
own--intelligences were concentrated on that sepulchre and its contents.
Where Bastin's may have been I do not know, perhaps in a visionary
teapot, since I was sure that it would take him a day or two to
appreciate the significance of our discoveries. At any rate, he wandered
off, making no remarks about them, to drink water, I suppose.

Presently he began to shout to us from the end of the table-rock and we
went to see the re