Only remember—that if it wasn't Croft, his spirit—indwelling in the new patient's miserable wreck of a body—how would he have known the elements of the former story he had already mentioned—been able to pick it up where he left it off, and preface what he had promised to tell me, with his account of the actions of the Tamarizian high priest? That argument alone seemed enough to remove the last shreds of unbelief. Consequently I felt that when I entered my patient's room that evening, it would be to hear not so much a story as a narrative of life.
And at that I was to be amazed by what had happened to Jason Croft.
CHAPTER III
HARNESSED TO HEAVEN
Meanwhile I sent him the books he had said he wanted, together with a box of good cigars. And along about eight forty-five, when I had finished my evening round of patients, I went up myself.
I lighted up a cigar and took a chair, tacitly preparing for a stay of some considerable time, and then as Croft continued to smoke in an almost meditative silence, I opened the matter myself:
"Even supposing that Zud did get at your plans, I hardly see why he should have taken the step he did before your return."
Croft nodded. "It wasn't only the plans," he said. "You must recall Abbu, the priest of the pyramid at Scira—the one who was present when I entered Jasor's body and made it my own—who administered the last rites of his church to the dying Jasor, and with whom I talked after I had succeeded in compelling the Nodhurian's form to obey my will.
"I told you that to Abbu I had acknowledged that my spirit was not Jasor's, but that what I was about to do was for Tamarizia's good, thereby enlisting his aid in my undertakings—also how he acted as an instrument in saving Naia from becoming a victim of the plan Cathur's crown prince and his Zollarian coplotters had so cunningly laid.