"Come on!" Hamar cried, somewhat imperatively. "Don't waste time. You've decided, and besides, remember this affair may turn out trumps. I'll go first," and walking up to the tree he plucked a fruit and began to eat it. Curtis and Kelson slowly followed suit. "I believe I'm eating a live slug, or a toad," Curtis muttered, with a retch. "And I, too," Kelson whispered. "It's filthy. I shall be sick. If I am, will it make any difference to the compact, I wonder?" What the fruit really tasted like they could never decide. It reminded them of many things and of nothing. It was sweet yet bitter; it repelled but at the same time pleased them; it was as perplexing as the voice--as enigmatical. When they had eaten it they resumed their former positions on the ground, and the voice once again addressed them. "The fruit you have consumed has created in you a fitness to make use of the powers about to be conferred. You have acquired the faculty of sorcery--you will be initiated by stages, into the knowledge and practice of it. These stages, seven in number, will cover the period of your compact, _i.e._ twenty-one months, and at the end of every three months--when a fresh stage is reached--you will receive fresh powers. "In the first stage, the stage you are now entering upon, you will receive the power of divination. You will be told how to detect the presence of water and all kinds of metals, and how to read people's thoughts. "In the second stage--exactly three months from to-day--you will receive the gift of second-sight; the power of separating your immaterial from your material body and projecting it, anywhere you will, on the physical plane; and, to a large extent, you will be enabled to circumvent gravity. Thus you will be able to perform all manner of jugglery tricks--tricks that will set the whole world gaping. Profit by them. "In the third stage you will possess the secrets of invisibility; of walking on the water; of breathing under the water; of taming wild beasts; and of understanding their language. "In the fourth stage you will understand how to inflict all manner of diseases, and work all sorts of spells; such, for instance, as bewitching milk, causing people to have fits, bad dreams, etc. You will also know how to create plagues--plagues of insects, or of any other noxious thing. "In the fifth stage you will possess absolute knowledge of the art of medicine and be able to cure every ailment. "In the sixth stage you will acquire the power of producing vampires and werwolves from the human being, and of transforming people from the human to any animal guise.