“I, too, am ready,” observed the wizard, “and I, who have nothing to conceal, declare that I am he whom yonder man--Im Hokeis, and his Guebre-tribe, have for centuries believed to be the God of Fire and of Flame. The mystery of my being cannot yet be solved. I am not alone! The mastery, over Matter and over Magic, is an inheritance of the ages. We who were once as others are, became doomed ones by reason of the curse of a dying man, and like Isaac Ahasuerus, the Hebrew of Jerusalem, who cursed and spat upon the Man of Sorrows when bearing his gibbet up the steep lane of the Dolorous Way, and whom the Meek one cursed, and bade tarry on earth till he came--even so is he not alone. Powerful in all else, not one of us can read his own future; but for that must depend on gifted ones like yonder Beverly. Such are seldom born; but when they are, there is only one opportunity to make them subservient to our aid--they must be unwedded in soul, else they cannot enter the sleep of Sialam, and in no other way can the scroll of Fate be read for us. Hence the obstacles thrown in his path and in that of yonder girl.... It is possible to shift our fate upon the neutral, whoever he may be; but in this case a strong motive existed to saddle the centuries upon yonder man, who has, in various forms, been my contemporary since ages previous to the laying of the foundations of Babylon and Nineveh. “There is one more in being--by him I have been foiled--the Stranger--and still another--the mother of this Beverly’s body. I hoped to win him by Magic; I have failed. He has seen me thus, as I am,”--and so saying, Ravalette slowly moved around the screen, continuing to speak all the while, until he reappeared on the other corner--and saying, “and thus.” We were astonished beyond measure at the change that had, in less than twelve seconds, taken place. Ravalette no longer stood before us, but instead, we saw a thin, lean, little, wrinkled old man, the perfect opposite in everything of the person we had just conversed with. “Miakus! as I live--the man of Portland and of Boston--the same!” exclaimed Beverly, as the figure passed once more from view behind the screen, and almost instantly reappeared in a totally dissimilar guise. “And thus!” said the wizard. “My heaven!” said Beverly, “it is Ettelavar, my mysterious guide and teacher in the kingdom of Trance and Dream!” Again this strange being passed around the screen, saying, “and thus,” as he reappeared successively as the Italian Count and Vatterale. The wizard said, when in the last form, “Mai is but a transposition of I am; ‘Miakus’ is ‘Myself,’ Vatterale is an anagram of Ravalette, and a school-boy would have told you that Ettelavar is but Ravalette reversed--the name meaning ‘The Mysterious.’ To you, Beverly, I have been all these. Behold me now as I really am,” and he passed around the screen, and reappeared again as a little, withered old man, clothed in flaming red from head to heel.