“Your wishes are my law, O Aradna.” Then, turning to Watson: “I am over-eager, stranger. You are the best-built man I have seen for many a circle. But I shall best you.” He paced to his throne and resumed his seat. “Let him tell us his tale. I repeat, Geos, that for all his beauty this one is an impostor. When he has spoken I shall confute him. I ask only that in the end he be turned over to me.” It was plain that the Thomahlia was blest with odd rulers. If the Bar Senestro was a priest, he was clearly still more of a soldier. The fiery challenge of the man struck an answering chord in Watson; he knew the time must come when he should weigh himself up against this Alexander, and it was anything but displeasing to him. “What must I say and do?” he asked the Rhamda Geos. “What do they want me to tell them?” “Just what you have told me: tell them of the Nervina, and of the Rhamda Avec. The prince is a man of the world, but from the Rhamdas you will have justice.” Whereat Chick addressed the Intellectuals. They seemed accustomed to the outbursts of the handsome Bar, and were now waiting complacently. In a few words Watson described the Nervina and Avec; their appearance, manners--everything. Fortunately he did not have to dissemble. When he had finished there was a faint murmur of approval. “It is proven,” declared the girl queen. “It is truly my cousin, the Nervina. I knew not the Rhamda, but from your faces it must have been he, Senestro, what say you to this?” But the Bar was totally unconvinced. “All this is childish. Did I not say he is of our world--D'Hartian or Kospian, or some other? Does not all Thomahlia know of the Nervina? Few have seen the Rhamda Avec, but what of it? Some have. What this stranger says proves nothing at all. I say, give him a test.” “The test?” from Geos, in a hushed tone. “Just that. There is none who knows the likeness of the Jarados; none but the absent Avec. None among us has ever seen his image. It is a secret to all save the High Rhamda. Yet, in cases like this, well may the Leaf be opened.” Watson, wondering what was meant, listened closely to the prince as he continued: “It is written that there are times when all may see. Surely this is such a time. “Now let this stranger describe the Jarados. He says that he had seen him; that he is the Prophet's prospective son-in-law. Good! Let him describe the Jarados to us! “Then open the Leaf! If he speaks true, we shall know him to be from the Jarados. If he fail, then I shall claim him for purposes of my own.” Whatever the motives of the Senestro, he surely had the genius of quick decision. Watson knew that the moment had come to test his luck to the uttermost. There was but one thing to do; he did it. He said to the Rhamda Geos, in a tone of the utmost indifference: “I am willing.”