Si whispered in the ear of that good woman the nature of my errand, with doubtless some blandishment of her own; and my errand being one so much above the vulgar and so nearly touching the sovereign, I was at once accorded a separate room in the gate-house, whence I could look down in comparative peace on the common herd of suitors, and listen to the buzz of their invective as they practised speeches which I calculated it would take Ar-hap all the rest of his reign to listen to, without allowing him any time for pronouncing verdicts on them. Here I made myself comfortable, and awaited the return of the sovereign as placidly as might be. Meanwhile fate was playing into my feeble hands. I have said it was hot weather. At first this seemed but an outcome of the Martian climate, but as the hours went by the heat developed to an incredible extent. Also that red glare previously noted in the west grew in intensity, till, as the hours slipped by, all the town was staring at it in panting horror. I have seen a prairie on fire, luckily from the far side of a comfortably broad river, and have ridden through a pine-forest when every tree for miles was an uplifted torch, and pungent yellow smoke rolled down each corrie side in grey rivers crested with dancing flame. But that Martian glare was more sombre and terrible than either. "What is it?" I asked of poor Si, who came out gasping to speak to me by the gate-house. "None of us know, and unless the gods these Thither folk believe in are angry, and intend to destroy the world with yonder red sword in the sky, I cannot guess. Perhaps," she added, with a sudden flash of inspiration, "it comes by your machinations for Heru's help." "No!" "If not by your wish, then, in the name of all you love, set your wish against it. If you know any incantations suitable for the occasion, oh, practise them now at once, for look, even the very grass is withering; birds are dropping from trees; fishes, horribly bloated, are beginning to float down the steaming rills; and I, with all others, have a nameless dread upon me." Hotter and hotter it grew, until about sunset the red blaze upon the sky slowly opened, and showed us for about half an hour, through the opening a lurid, flame-coloured meteor far out in space beyond; then the cleft closed again, and through that abominable red curtain came the very breath of Hades.