These great men will be some of your
companions in China."
"In China!"
"In China, Dr. Stuart, where I hope you will join them. You
misapprehend the purpose of my mission. It is not destructive,
although neither I nor my enlightened predecessor have ever scrupled
to remove any obstacle from the path of that world-change which no
human power can check or hinder; it is primarily constructive. No
state or group of states can hope to resist the progress of a movement
guided and upheld by a monopoly of the world's genius. The Sublime
Order, of which I am an unworthy member, stands for such a movement."
"Rest assured it will be crushed."
"Van Rembold is preparing radium in quantities hitherto unknown from
the vast pitchblend deposits of Ho-Nan--which industry we control. He
visited China arrayed in his shroud, and he travelled in a handsome
Egyptian sarcophagus purchased at Sotherby's on behalf of a Chinese
collector."
Fo-Hi stood up and crossed to the hissing furnace. He busied himself
with some obscure experiment which proceeded there, and:
"Your own state-room will be less romantic, Dr. Stuart," he said,
speaking without turning his head; "possibly a packing-case. In brief,
that intellectual giant who achieved to much for the Sublime Order--my
immediate predecessor in office--devised a means of inducing
artificial catalepsy----"
"My God!" muttered Stuart, as the incredible, the appalling truth
burst upon his mind.
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