At last! He rose once more softly, and crept with long cat-like steps towards the entrance of the shrine. The cressets burning within cast a faint pennon of light out of the pointed archway of the entrance, and as they wavered in the night wind, this banner of fire shook and trembled with an uncertain motion. Beeroo halted in the shadow. He was about to step forward again when he was startled by a strange, shrill chuckling cry that made his very flesh creep. He looked around him in fear, and the elvish laugh came again from amidst the leaves of the walnut trees. The man heaved a sigh of relief; "Pah!" he exclaimed in disgust at himself, "it is but a screech-owl." He had to wait a little, however, to steady himself; and then he boldly pressed forward and through the door of the shrine. There was not a soul within. The glimmering lights cast uncertain shadows around them, and the three heads of the idol faced the Sansi in a stony silence. There was but one eye in the centre of each forehead; but all three of these eyes seemed to lighten, and the thick lips on the three faces to widen in a grin of mockery at the thief. Like all natives of India, Beeroo was superstitious, and a fear he could hardly control fell on him. What if, after all, the stories of the idol's power were true? Aladin had not lied about the Shagul Tree; why should he lie about the power of the idol? Still Mohonagh was not the god of the Sansis. He would invoke his own gods, deities of forest and flood, against this three-headed monster. Then the Shagul Tree was there. He could all but touch it; he caught the flash of the winking gems, and the instincts of the robber, fighting with his fears, brought back his courage. "Aho, Mohonagh! Thy blessing is on me, the Sansi." He said this loudly in bravado, and was almost frightened again at the echoes of his own voice in the vault of the dome. He had spoken with the same feeling in his heart that makes a timid traveller whistle when passing a place he dreads. He had spoken to keep his heart up, and the very sound of his own voice terrified him. At last the echoes died away and there was silence in the shrine. Large beads of sweat stood on the man's forehead. Almost did he feel it in his heart to flee at once; but to leave that priceless treasure now! It could not be. In two strides he was beside the tree. A wrench of the claw-hammer and a jewelled bracelet was in his hand; another wrench and he had secured another blazing trophy. "Beeroo!" The man looked up in guilty amazement. To his horror he saw that the three heads of the idol, which were facing the door when he entered, had moved round, and were now facing him. The hammer fell from his hand with a crash, and he stood shivering, a grey figure with staring eyes and open gasping mouth. "_Ai_, Mohonagh!" he said in a choking voice.