THE DREAM CIRCEAN
a dog-faced demon that seduceth thy soul from the sacred
Mysteries ; the Mysteries of Life and Duty.’
“* Let me tell my story!’ I replied, ‘and you shall judge—
for, whoever you may be, I feel your power and truth.’
“*T am Eliphaz Levi Zahed—men call me the Abbé
Constant,’ returned the other.
“©The great magician?’
“«The enemy of the great magician.’
“We went together to my house. I had begun to suspect
some trick of Hell. The malice of that devilish old woman, it
might be, had not slept, even at her death. She had hidden
the house beneath a magicveil? Or had her death itself in some
strange way operated to—to what? Even conjecture paled.
“ But magic somewhere there must be, and Eliphaz Levi
was the most famous adept in Paris at the time.
“T told my story, just as I have told it to you, but with
strong passion.
“«There is an illusion, master!’ I ended. ‘Put forth
the Power, and destroy it!’
“*Were I to destroy the illusion, returned the magus,
‘thinkest thou to see a virgin with gold hair? Nay, but the
Eternal Virgin, and a Gold that is not gold.’
“Ts nothing to be done ?’
“* Nothing!’ he replied, with a strange light in his eyes.
‘Yet, in order to be able to do nothing, thou must first
accomplish everything.
“One day,’ he smiled, seeing my bewilderment, ‘ thou wilt
be angry with the fool who proffers such a platitude.’
“JT asked him to accept me as a pupil.
“*T require pay,’ he answered, ‘and an oath.’
127