Page:Alien Souls by Achmed Abdullah (1922).djvu/217

Yung Han-Rai smiled dreamily.

"Did not Hoang Ti, the Yellow Emperor himself, once remark that. …?"

The sentence died unfinished on his lips. They smoked in silence for nearly half an hour. The room was filling with scented fog. Already the objects scattered about had lost their outline, and the silken stuffs on the walls and the floor gleamed less brilliantly.

Yung Han-Rai felt a confused sensation of the marrow of his bones and his muscles, some of which seemed to soften and almost to melt away, while others seemed to strengthen and grow greatly, while his subconscious brain seemed endowed with a new and intense vitality. He no longer noticed the weight of his body pressing on the mat; rather he became conscious of a tremendous intellectual and ethical power.

Hidden things became clear to him. The soul within his soul came to the surface with a flaming rush of speed. He felt himself part of nature—a direct expression of cosmic life. The currents of the earth pulsed in his veins with a puissant and mysterious rhythm.

High on the wall he saw a soft glow. It was an ancient gilt-wood statue representing Han Chung-le, the greatest of the Taoist immortals, who was supposed to have found the elixir of life.

Yung Han-Rai smiled at him familiarly, even slightly ironically.

After all, the thought came to him, he and Han Chung-le were brothers, immortal both.

He smoked again.

The poppy tasted sweet as summer rain. …

After a lapse of time, hours, days, weeks—he knew