"
Now Leo stared and I groaned, for I did not believe that it was gold,
and still less that she could make that metal. Then, reading my thought,
with one of those sudden changes of mood that were common to her, Ayesha
grew very angry.
"By Nature's self!" she cried; "wert thou not my friend, Holly, the fool
whom it pleases me to cherish, I would bind that right hand of thine
in those secret rays till the very bones within it were turned to gold.
Nay, why should I be vexed with thee, who art both blind and deaf?
Yet thou _shalt_ be persuaded," and leaving us, she passed down the
passages, called something to the priests who were labouring in the
workshop, then returned to us.
Presently they followed her, carrying on a kind of stretcher between
them an ingot of iron ore that seemed to be as much as they could lift.
"Now," she said, "how wilt thou that I mark this mass which as thou must
admit is only iron? With the sign of Life? Good," and at her bidding the
priests took cold-chisels and hammers and roughly cut upon its surface
the symbol of the looped cross--the _crux ansata_.
"It is not enough," she said when they had finished. "Holly, lend me
that knife of thine, to-morrow I will return it to thee, and of more
value."
So I drew my hunting knife, an Indian-made thing, that had a handle of
plated iron, and gave it her.
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