As the two paused before the door of the keep, Page Lomax glanced through the lattice across the vault to the wall on the other side. Through this, a postern gate opened, close to which he saw a prism-shaped mound, ending at head and foot in two marble posts on which—each opposing the other—the angels, Nekir and Munkir, will sit, as they debate whether the soul of Selim shall arise to heaven or descend to hell. Roses decked the hillock. In an orifice at its head, a yellow apple and a purple fig awaited the dead man’s appetite. But why was this grave fenced in with stout steel bars, set close together; and why was it screened overhead with them? Before the Christian had time to consider this problem till he might solve it, Hosein threw back the outside bar, which held the door to, and, whirling it round on its well-oiled hinges, exclaimed: “To you, my guest, I yield first place. Enter!” But when Page Lomax was crossing the sill, he felt himself gripped in a grasp of iron. His feet were knocked from under him with a swift and dexterous trip, and he fell heavily to the floor. Ere he could stagger up, dazed as he was, clang went the portal. He was a prisoner, with Hosein glaring at him through the grating. “Pray to your Nazarene now and see if he can help you,” chuckled his jailer. “Not even Mohammed himself could help you now. I vowed to sacrifice a hecatomb of unbelievers to my brother. Ninety and nine have already tapped at his tomb. You will make the hundredth victim.” The young man was a sinewy six-footer, robust and brave; but the boding indefiniteness of this threat so overwhelmed him that his fair hair bristled up and his blue eyes dilated to black, then faded to gray. He circled the dungeon, frantically seeking an exit, which yet he knew he would not find. Cursing himself for all sorts of a fool, because he had not taken his pistol with him, when he left the hotel, he ran to a corner, where something, which looked like a heaped-up pile of slender white sticks, was faintly gleaming beneath the dim light coming from above. But, when he saw that they were not sticks but bones, he staggered back, almost screaming, and made for the door, which he reached just in time to be knocked down by a body, which Hosein and Nakir were pitching in. It was Zaidee. Springing up, she wailed forth: “Oh! why did you not heed my warnings? Did I not sign to you to depart in the courtyard, and again under your window and still once more, as I was dancing? Now we are lost, both of us. Look up there!” Far above, an octagon of lustrous woof and warp was oscillating slowly. In it, something vast and dark was cradled. “My God! It’s Hosein’s spider!” gasped the young man.