"I always thought it queer that they chose me," he said. "These Holy Men are free from racial prejudice. They are said to be super-national. Our leaders in Peking felt that if they sent a Chinese, the Holy Men might see in him one nation’s ambition, but if they chose an Occidental who was called to the struggle of New China because he had found it the purest dream for all Asia; one also who could place before the wise men the position relatively of other nations—" "What an equipment!" "I’m afraid it sounds more than it is," he said hastily. "You see they did not have many foreign adherents to choose from. Nifton Bend would have accomplished the mission far more wisely than I, but he is the Centre—needed every hour in Peking." "I’m afraid you can’t make me see anything insignificant now—about your being here. They thought you pure enough—real priest enough—to enter the Inner Temple and bring forth a sign to the many. You know the many always demand a sign. They did in Judea—" He did not look above her hands. They were tightly shut. "I asked you last night—if you ever had any sense about the Gobi, other than that of its terror and menace," he said, in an effort that he knew was vain to lift her from her part in keeping him from the journey. "The Chinese believe that the heart of the desert is a spirit-haunted land; that the Inner Pavilion holds all the ancient writings, all the seeds of wisdom and magic out of the past, the essence of truths gathered by forgotten civilisations. "In fact, the myths and legends which surround this country make the stories of Peru and Central America seem paltry and commonplace. There are forests, it is said, in which no white man has penetrated, buried gold and statuary and all that—" Romney smiled. "You do not need to be afraid of me," she whispered. "I love to believe such things." "Ten years away from America—perhaps I am too ready to believe," Romney finished. "Anyway the Chinese leaders say there are wise men, whom the world never hears of as persons, doing the great constructive tasks behind the scenes, and that the central pavilion of these wise men is in the heart of the Gobi, and not in Thibet.... But all these things belonged to yesterday. I know now that there are meeting-places in a man’s life, and that in the hours of meeting he cannot reckon even with missions of mercy.... This—last night—here in the court—has taken me almost like death takes a man—as the cups have taken him in there—something resistless—" He saw one hand leave the table between them. It was held out to him, palm outward, as if trying to stop his words. Her eyes were wide with terror.... Now a change came. She turned to the forward room, listening. "Hush," she whispered. Strangeness was all about them. Romney came down from his story, with the sense that he had not done well. The silence crowded in again, as if from the desert. "Perhaps he is awake," she said quietly. "Go on."