“The angels do not mate with such men as that. The Tsarina must have been misled by appearances, perhaps, indeed, carried away by her hereditary hatred of your people. It is impossible that any but a true man could have won the love of such a woman. You tell me that you come as friends and not as enemies, so, for the hour, let there be peace, not war, between us. While you are my guests my city is yours, and all that it contains. I pledge my honour for your safety, so let the Daughter of the Air descend that I may hear from her lips the music of her voice.” Turning aside, half to hide a smile at the Oriental metaphor of the Sultan’s speech, Alan went to the foot of the steps and held out his hand to Alma. As she alighted on the terrace he led her towards him, saying-- “This is my wife. Yesterday morning she was Alma Tremayne, a daughter in the fifth generation of the first President of the Federation. Her ancestor and yours made terms of peace after the War of the Terror. It is, therefore, more fitting that you should hear from her lips than from mine the message that we bring.” “My ears are waiting,” said Khalid, bending low over the hand that Alma held out to him as Alan spoke. “It would be a strange message that would not be welcome from such lips.” From one whom she could have looked upon as an equal such language as this would have jarred sorely upon Alma, accustomed as she was to the frank directness of her own people’s speech. But from Khalid she tolerated it as she would have tolerated the extravagance of a child, and as he raised his head again she looked at him with eyes that dazzled him afresh, intoxicated as he already was with her, to him, strange and almost unearthly beauty, and said in a voice such as he had never heard before-- “Thank you, Sultan, for your welcome, but surely there is little need for me to tell you what message we bring. Last night you saw it written in letters of fire across the heavens. Has not the voice of God spoken bidding you and your people to cease the cruel warfare that you are waging upon the world and to prepare for the end of which that is a sign?” As she spoke she raised her hand and pointed to where the shape of the Fire-Cloud now hung in the sky like a white mist paling before the light of the rising sun. “You rejected our first warning, as perhaps was natural, but now that you have seen the confirmation of it shining among the stars, surely you will no longer reject it.” The last words were spoken in a gentle, pleading tone, which no man could have heard without being moved by them.