“Now, just one thing more, friends, and I can tell you everything, while we are waiting for Jerome and the general to return.  But first I must see the one who preceded me out of the spot.”

“Ariadne!” from Charlotte, in wonder.

“Ariadne!” exclaimed Watson.  He was both puzzled and amazed.  “Did you call her—­Ariadne?”

“She is upstairs,” cut in Dr. Higgins.

“I must see her!”

A minute or two later they stood in the room where the girl lay.  The coverlet was thrown back somewhat revealing the bare left arm and shoulder, and the delicately beautiful face upon the pillow.  Her golden hair was spread out in riotous profusion.  The other hand was just protruding from the coverlet, and displayed a faint red mark, showing where Hobart’s bracelet had been fastened at the moment he disappeared.

Charlotte stepped over and laid her hand against the girl’s cheek. 
“Isn’t she wonderful!” she murmured.

But Dr. Higgins looked to Watson.

“Do you know her?”

The other nodded.  He stooped over and listened to her breathing.  His manner was that of reverence and admiration.  He touched her hand.

“I see how it must have happened.  Precisely what I experienced, only—­” Then:  “You call her Ariadne?”

“We had to call her something,” replied Charlotte.  “And the name—­ it just came, I suppose.”

“Perhaps.  Anyhow, it was a remarkably good guess.  Her true name is the Aradna.”

“The Aradna?  Who—­what is she?”

“Just that:  the Aradna.  She is one of the factors that may save us.  And on earth we would call her queen.”  Then, without waiting for the inevitable question, Watson said: 

“Your professional judgment will soon come to the supreme test, Dr. Higgins.  She is simply numbed and dazed from coming through the Spot.”  Charlotte had already described to him the girl’s arrival.  “The mystery is that she was permitted an hour of rationality before this came upon her.  I wonder if Hobart’s vitality had anything to do with it?”—­half to himself.  “As for the Rhamda”—­he smiled—­“he is merely interested in the Spot; that is all.  He would never harm the Aradna; he had nothing whatever to do with her condition.  We were mistaken about the man.  Anyway, it is the Spot of Life that interests us now.”

“The Spot of Life,” repeated Sir Henry.  “Is that—­”

“Yes; the Blind Spot, as it is known from the other side.  It overtops all your sciences, embraces every cult, and lies at the base of all truth.  It is—­it is everything.” ^

“Explain!”

Watson turned to the head upon the pillow.  He ventured to touch the cheek, with a trace of tenderness in his action and of wistfulness near to reverence.  It was not love; it was rather as one might touch a fairy.  In both spirit and substance she was truly of another world.  Watson gave a soft sigh and looked up at the Englishman.