The hour was midnight, and our business was with the dead.
"We had not waited above three minutes when I knew that the room was peopled--by whom I knew not, except that they came from that land from whose bourne, your greatest poet says, 'no traveller returns.' I looked at Abou.

His face was as the face of the dead, except for his eyes.

They burned like two coals of fire.

He uttered some strange words, the meaning of which was unknown to me, and then I knew some mighty forces were being exerted in that old sheik's hut.

My brain began to whirl, while a terrible power gripped me; but still I looked, and still I remembered.
"'Spirit of Ilfra,' said Abou, 'are you here ?' "No voice spoke that I could hear, and yet I realized that Abou had received his answer.
"'Enter thy body then, spirit of my daughter, and tell me, if thou darest, the secret I have desired so long.' "I looked at the embalmed body.