For several years, at various philosophical gatherings and brotherhoods, Paula, invariably stimulated by the unusual, had encountered this remarkable woman. Having very little to say as a rule, Madame Nestor was a figure for comment and one not readily forgotten because of occasional memorable utterances. In all the cults of New York, there was likely no individual quite so out of alignment with ordinary life. Indefinitely, she would be called fifty. Her forehead was broad, her mouth soft. The face as a whole was heavy and flour-white. There was a distention of eyeballs and a pulpy shapelessness to her body which gave the impression of advanced physical deterioration--that peculiar kind of breaking down, often noticeable among psychics of long practice. Her absolute incapacity to keep anything of value was only one characteristic of interest. Madame Nestor's record of apparently thoughtless generosity was truly inspiriting. "I had to see you to-day," she said, sinking down with a sigh of relief. "I sat behind you last night in Prismatic Hall." The younger woman recalled with a start--the whisper she had heard. She leaned forward and inquired quickly: "So it was you, Madame Nestor, who knew--this Bellingham"--she cleared her throat as she uttered the name--"as he is now--a quarter of a century ago?" "Yes. How very strange that you should have heard what I said.... You will join one of his classes, I presume?" "I can imagine doing no such thing." "Dear Paula, do you think it will really turn out--that you are to have no relation with Bellingham?" Paula repressed the instant impulse to answer sharply. The fact that she had already felt Bellingham's power made the other's words a harsh irritation. "What relation could I have? He is odious to me." "I suppose I should have been a cinder long since, dear, if these were days for burning witches," Madame Nestor said. "When I saw Bellingham's eyes settle upon you last night--it appeared to me that you are to know him well. I came here to give you what strength I could--because he is the chief of devils." "I'm only one of the working neuters of the human hive," Paula managed to declare. The elder woman said a strange thing: "Ah, no. The everlasting feminine is alive in your every movement. A man like Bellingham would cross the world for you. Some strong-souled woman sooner or later must encompass his undoing, and last night it came to me in a way to force my conviction--that you are the woman." Paula bent toward her. Darkness covered the centres of her mind and she was afraid. She could not laugh, for she had already met the magician's will. "But I loathe him," she whispered. "About the very name when I first heard it yesterday was an atmosphere which aroused all my antagonism." "Even that--he has overcome, but it may help you to endure." "What does the man want?"