Certain it is that I cannot
bounce over them as you do."
We heard the guard moving about from cell to cell, and finally, his
rounds completed, he again entered ours. When his eyes fell upon
me they fairly bulged from his head.
"By the shell of my first ancestor!" he roared. "Where have you
been?"
"I have been in prison since you put me here yesterday," I answered.
"I was in this room when you entered. You had better look to your
eyesight."
He glared at me in mingled rage and relief.
"Come," he said. "Issus commands your presence."
He conducted me outside the prison, leaving Xodar behind. There
we found several other guards, and with them the red Martian youth
who occupied another cell upon Shador.
The journey I had taken to the Temple of Issus on the preceding day
was repeated. The guards kept the red boy and myself separated,
so that we had no opportunity to continue the conversation that
had been interrupted the previous night.
The youth's face had haunted me. Where had I seen him before.
There was something strangely familiar in every line of him; in
his carriage, his manner of speaking, his gestures. I could have
sworn that I knew him, and yet I knew too that I had never seen
him before.
When we reached the gardens of Issus we were led away from the temple
instead of toward it. The way wound through enchanted parks to a
mighty wall that towered a hundred feet in air.
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