'As nearly as making no difference. They are all negro, but haf not been buried. They are given drug to destroy memory, but not so much as to make them animal. In this way they remain capable off more useful service.'

'If they have some intelligence left, I should have thought they would try to escape.'

'Oddwhiles one has urge to, but always he betray it by restless manner. He ees then hypnotized by Abaddon and feels impulse no more. But they haf women; negresses for work in kitchen and to clean, who haf been drugged same as men. They haf drink, good food, and the work ees light. Life here for them ees good, very good; and for one to become wishing to see what ees outside no pleasant prison happens very seldom.'

Mary almost found herself subscribing to the idea that these coloured servants were better off where they were than they would have been if free and struggling in some slum for a meagre living. But the thought that they had been robbed of their identities and, no doubt, in many cases separated for ever from their loved ones far outweighed the fact of their material well-being.

It then occurred to her that, if she slipped up, the soul-destroying drug might be administered to her. With a fresh surge of inward terror she recalled Ratnadatta's telling her barely half-an-hour before that should she fail in her test he would hypnotize her into forgetting where the Temple was situated. Supposing she not only failed the test but, during it, gave away the fact that she had come there as a spy? There would then be no question of allowing her to attempt a second test in a week or a fortnight's time. For their own protection they would have to eliminate from her mind every memory of her connection with the Brotherhood.

During her induction as a neophyte she had feared that if she refused to deny Christ they would murder her. They might still do so if she gave herself away. The drug provided an alternative means of silencing her, but one almost as terrible, for the results it would have did not bear contemplating.

She wondered now how she had managed to get so far without putting a foot wrong. Abaddon had read the fears and doubts in her mind but accepted them as not unusual in a young woman. That he and Ratnadatta had not used their psychic powers to probe deeper into her mentality could only be because they had no reason to suspect that she was deceiving them. Fervently she prayed that she might be given the wit and courage to keep up the deception during her coming trial. Reaching out for her glass she swiftly drank the rest of her wine.