"He's human enough," said Croft. "Murray, I actually feel as though I were facing some positive action at last. It's a relief. Ever since this thing happened I've been in an even worse state than I was after I'd seen Naia first--and before I'd managed to acquire a physical life on Palos. There was a barrier between us then that seemed insurmountable, as you know, and yet I knew her, the one woman, in all the teeming multitudes of feminine spirits I had ever longed to know. I--I knew her--mine. And now there's another barrier between us, scarcely less fatal, though of a different kind." "But--you overcame the first, and--" "I'll overcome the second," he interrupted in a flash. "I get your meaning, and I'll do it. Zitu, what did I not overcome to reach her in the first place! But I reached her, and I'll reach her again." I didn't doubt it. Again I felt to its full the driving power in the will of Jason Croft. And at last the man was aroused--at last he had become less man, torn and harried by the loss of his dearest possessions, than an intelligent fighting force. Or so he impressed me as he sat there in the astral body, while his physical form lay billions of miles beyond us both, in Himyra, at Robur's house. "Aye, you'll reach her," I said, and looked him in the eyes. "You'll reach her, Croft, and Naia and Jason, Son of Jason, will come back to Aphur and to Jason's house." "Aye, by Zitu! Murray, your words fire me. I go to make them true, and Zitu guard you!" He vanished, leaving me to open my bodily eyes. Darkness met them. There was naught but the night in the room. Yet I had seen Jason's figure plainly while we conversed, and I did not doubt he had been able to equally perceive mine. What, then, was the answer? Was there no darkness to the spirit, even as between Palos and earth outside of the atmospheric envelope there was no time? Was the riddle held in that? Was there no such thing as darkness, concealment to the understanding mind? Was it only the objective eye for which light was a necessity toward making the truths of creation plain? Was it only the physical ear that required the vibration of sound? Were time, light, sound, touch, but material things? Was rhythm the basic principle of soul existence as expressed in mind? Certainly Croft and I conversed as easily by thought transference, a variant of astral vibration, as in the body we would have used spoken words. What, then? Were life, consciousness, rhythm, all, but expressions of a universal force--existing already bridgelike between God's far-flung worlds? CHAPTER VI PREPARING THE PEOPLE Croft went not to Himyra, however, as I fancied, but to Zitra, after he left me, and the sleeping apartment of Zud, taking his stand close to where the high priest lay wrapped in slumber on a copper couch.