Meyer turned aside to hide his face, and presently looked up again, and spoke quite softly.

“I suppose that I must accept my answer, but when you talked of any living man just now, Miss Clifford, did you include your father?”

She shook her head.

“Then will you allow him to try to mesmerize you?”

Benita laughed.

“Oh, yes, if he likes,” she said.  “But I do not think that the operation will be very successful.”

“Good, we will see to-morrow.  Now, like you, I am tired.  I am going to bed in my new camp by the wall,” he added significantly.

*****

“Why are you so dead set against this business?” asked her father, when he had gone.

“Oh, father!” she answered, “can’t you see, don’t you understand?  Then it is hard to have to tell you, but I must.  In the beginning Mr. Meyer only wanted the gold.  Now he wants more, me as well as the gold.  I hate him!  You know that is why I ran away.  But I have read a good deal about this mesmerism, and seen it once or twice, and who knows?  If once I allow his mind to master my mind, although I hate him so much, I might become his slave.”

“I understand now,” said Mr. Clifford.  “Oh, why did I ever bring you here?  It would have been better if I had never seen your face again.”

On the morrow the experiment was made.  Mr. Clifford attempted to mesmerize his daughter.  All the morning Jacob, who, it now appeared, had practical knowledge of this doubtful art, tried to instruct him therein.  In the course of the lesson he informed him that for a short period in the past, having great natural powers in that direction, he had made use of them professionally, only giving up the business because he found it wrecked his health.  Mr. Clifford remarked that he had never told him that before.

“There are lots of things in my life that I have never told you,” replied Jacob with a little secret smile.  “For instance, once I mesmerized you, although you did not know it, and that is why you always have to do what I want you to, except when your daughter is near you, for her influence is stronger than mine.”

Mr. Clifford stared at him.

“No wonder Benita won’t let you mesmerize her,” he said shortly.

Then Jacob saw his mistake.

“You are more foolish than I thought,” he said.  “How could I mesmerize you without your knowing it?  I was only laughing at you.”

“I didn’t see the laugh,” replied Mr. Clifford uneasily, and they went on with the lesson.

That afternoon it was put to proof—­in the cave itself, where Meyer seemed to think that the influences would be propitious.  Benita, who found some amusement in the performance, was seated upon the stone steps underneath the crucifix, one lamp on the altar and others one each side of her.