Adventure Magazine Cover, November 10, 1924 — page 105: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Om walked when he descended to awaken the glory of Greece. It was almost awful to watch. No human had a right to move so marvelously! He was received in silence. He took from his breast the broken piece of jade that Ommony had lost and that the lama had recovered from the courtesan, and hold- ing it in both hands on a level with his shoulders passed among them, pausing to let each woman in turn devour it with her eyes. Some of them appeared to fall into a state of superstitious rapture; others were curious; all were respectful almost to the point of worship. And the lama watched them through a slit in the swinging gate as if all destiny depended on the outcome, every tendon in him rigid; the neck-tendon stood out like a bow-string. Then sud- denly, as if to calm himself, he took snuff and rubbed his nose violently with his thumb. The chela said nothing, but the women were allowed to touch him and appeared to think the touch conferred a priceless boon. They laid a finger of the right hand on his shoulder as he passed, and one woman, a Moslem, who laid both hands on him and clung almost passionately, was quietly re- proved for it by two of the girls in white. “The game begins to look political,”’. thought Ommony, watching the lama clean a snuff-filled nostril with a meditative fore- finger. ‘“Vasantasena—ummm! Now these women— I’ve always wondered why some genius didn’t try to conquer India by winning the women first! They rule the country anyhow.” The lama just then looked as calculating as a medieval cardinal, but despite that air of playing a deep game for tremendous stakes, there was now something almost Puck-like in his attitude. Ommony noticed for the first time that his ears did not lie close to his head, were large and slightly pointed at the top. Seen sidewise in the rather dim light there was a faint sugges- tion about him of one of those gargoyles that survey the street from a cathedral roof—not revolting, but distinctly mis- chievous. He was even more interesting to watch than the proceedings on the floor below. Suddenly the lama spoke again. When he did that his leathery throat moved like a pelican’s swallowing a big fish, and the noise that came out was hardly human— 103 startling—so abrupt that it completely broke the sequence of all other sounds. It monopolized attention. In the ensuing silence he sat back, took snuff again, and seemed to lose all interest in the proceedings. But to Ommony the interest increased. The girls in white threw black cloaks over their shoulders. The Hindu and Moslem women smothered themselves in the im- penetrable veils without which it is pollu- tion to face men-folk out of doors; and all of them, in groups of: three or four, each little group in charge of one of the lama’s female family, who shielded their faces in masked hoods that ‘formed part of the black cloaks, departed toward the street. There was no doubt that they did go to the street; a door opened on to a vestibule, and Ommony was able to see the sunlight through a street door at its farther end. He caught a glimpse of carriage wheels, and heard the pawing of more than one fly- bitten horse. Samding returned up the steps and gave the piece of jade to the lama, who stowed it somewhere in his bosom without glancing at it. Ommony watched the chela nar- rowly. Was he a European boy? There was something in the clean strong outline of his face and in the lithe, athletic figure that might suggest it. But he was too abstract looking—altogether too imper- sonal and, the word was as vague as the impression Ommony was trying to fix in his mind, too fascinating. No European youngster could have looked as he did without stirring resentment in whoever watched. Samding aroused in the beholder only admiration and an itching curiosity. CHAPTER XVII DIANA REHEARSES A PART THE LAMA’S STORY ~~ O ye who look to enter in through Discipline to Bliss, Ye shall not stray from out the Way, if ye remember this: . Ye shall not waste a weary hour, nor hope for Hope in vain, If ye persist with will until self-righteousness is slain. If through the mist of mortal eyes, deluded, ye discern That ye are holier than these, ye have the whole to learn! If ye are tied with tangled pride because ye learn the Law, Know then, your purest thoughts deny the Truth ye never sawl If ye resent in discontent the searchlight of reproof, In hooded pride ye stand aside, at sin’s not Soul’s behooft CO Ghbooks C© =