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“And now?”

“Oh, now! I think it’s cruel and deceitful.”

“That’s nothing short of blasphemy. The Serpent is a god!”

“Do you believe that?” she asked, suddenly looking up, and fixing his eyes with a look as keen as it was serious.

Two pairs of eyes, dark and light, each encountered one another—each trying to read the other’s secret—and both for once inscrutable, dark and light alike.

“Yes. I’ve got a pretty good mental digestion; it can take most things,” he said, the corners of his mouth curving into a smile. “Look! Miss—Miss—What’s your name, by the way?”

“My name is Rosalie—Rosalie Paleaf.”

“Well now, Miss Paleaf, let us turn to the second picture.”

Reluctantly she turned round once more, to behold a forest jungle, as fine and beautiful a scene as one could wish. Its size and realism made her put out her hand to pull a twig of feathery foliage, when suddenly she was startled to see beneath it a pair of eyes, wild and yet intelligent, gleaming out at her. It was an animal shaped and sized much like a monkey. Behind it was another of the same kind, a partner in its joys and sorrows evidently.