In a minute or two he leaned forward and stared again, once more closing the curtains behind his head.

The sky seemed a little brighter, he thought, than when he had looked just now.  Perhaps the moon was hiding somewhere.  And certainly the sky was more in evidence.  Far away to the left behind, passing even as he looked, moved those gigantic horns of white, as if the ship stood still and the earth turned beneath; and below now, sloping to the right, lay long lines of darkness, jutting here and there with a sudden crag against the blaze of stars.  It was marvellous, he thought, how still all lay; there was a steady hiss, now heard for the first time, as the air tore past the glassy sides of the bird-shaped ship, as thin as the cry of a bat.

He shifted on his knees a little, and staring forwards, saw far ahead and at what seemed an incalculable distance something that baffled him entirely, for it changed its aspect every instant that he watched.

At first it was no more than a patch of luminosity; and he thought it to be, perhaps, a lighted town.  But the character of it was changed as he formulated his thought and three brilliant spots like blue stars broke out on a sudden, and these three stars shifted their positions.  He kept his eyes on these, marvelling; and, with something very like fear, saw that they were approaching upwards and onwards with the swiftness of thought.

Up and on they came.  He shrank back a little, instinctively; and then, as he leaned forward once more, determined to understand, shrank back with a sharp indrawing of breath, as there whirled past, it appeared only a few yards away, a flare of brilliant blue lines, in the midst of which passed a phantom-like body in a mist and accompanied by a musical sound (it seemed) of extraordinary clarity and beauty, that rose from a deep organ-note to the shrill of a flute, and down again Into a bass and a silence. . . .

He smiled to himself as he climbed back into bed a minute or two later, when he had reconstructed the phenomena and interpreted them.  It was but another volor, bound northwards, and it had probably passed at least half a mile away.

Well, he must sleep again if he could.  They would be in Rome by morning.

* * * * *

They had delayed their departure from Versailles to the last possible moment, since France was, after all, under the circumstances, one of the best places in the world for Monsignor to pick up again the threads of life.  For one thing, it was near to England—­English was spoken there amongst the educated almost as frequently as French; yet it was not England, and Monsignor’s plight would not cause him any great inconvenience.  Further, France was at present the theatre of the world’s interest, since the Emperor was there, and on the Emperor’s future depended largely the destinies of Europe:  his conversion, it was thought, might be the final death-blow to Socialism in his dominions.