ound
the lion, like a timid hound, and tell me what you mean. Of whom do you
speak?"

"That is the trouble, Macumazahn. I do not know. This lion, or rather
lioness, lies hid in the caves of a very distant mountain and I have
never seen her--in the flesh."

"Then how can you talk of what you have never seen?"

"In the same way, Macumazahn, that your priests talk of what they have
never seen, because they, or a few of them, have knowledge of it. I
will tell you a secret. All seers who live at the same time, if they are
great, commune with each other because they are akin and their spirits
meet in sleep or dreams. Therefore I know of a mistress of our craft, a
very lioness among jackals, who for thousands of years has lain sleeping
in the northern caves and, humble though I am, she knows of me."

"Quite so," I said, yawning, "but perhaps, Zikali, you will come to the
point of the spear. What of her? How is she named, and if she exists
will she help me?"

"I will answer your question backwards, Macumazahn. I think that she
will help you if you help her, in what way I do not know, because
although witch-doctors sometimes work without pay, as I am doing now,
Macumazahn, witch-doctoresses never do. As for her name, the only one
that she has among our company is 'Queen,' because she is the first of
all of them and the most beauteous among women. For the rest I can tell
you nothing, except that she has always been and I suppose, in this
shape or in that, will always be while the world lasts, because she has
found the secret of life unending."

"You mean that she is immortal, Zikali," I answered with a smile.

"I do not say that, Macumazahn, because my little mind cannot shape the
thought of immortality. But when I was a babe, which is far ago, she had
lived so long that scarce would she knew the difference between then
and now, and already in her breast was all wisdom gathered. I know it,
because although, as I have said, we have never seen each other, at
times we walk together in our sleep, for thus she shares her loneliness,
and I think, though this may be but a dream, that last night she told me
to send you on to her to seek an answer to certain questions which you
would put to me to-day. Also to me she seemed to desire that you should
do her a service; I know not what service."

Now I grew angry and asked,

"Why does it please you to fool me, Zikali, with such talk as this? If
there is any truth in it, show me whe