"If we meet him," said Mac Cann grimly, "I'll do something to him and he'll remember it, and it's likely that he will be able to make a story out of it too."
"I only saw him once," said Art, "but when Rhadamanthus tossed him through the void I recognised his face, although so long a time had elapsed since I did see him. He is now less than he was, but he is, nevertheless, much more than I had expected he would be."
"What is he now?" said Billy the Music.
"He is a man."
"We are all that," said Patsy, "and it isn't any trouble to us."
"It was more trouble than you imagine," said Finaun.
"I had expected him to be no more than one of the higher animals, or even that he might have been dissipated completely from existence."
"What was he at the time you met him?"
"He was a magician, and he was one of the most powerful magicians that ever lived. He was a being of the fifth round, and he had discovered many secrets."
"I have known magicians," commented Finaun, "and I always found that they were fools."