"Gentlemen," repeated M. Le Mesge in his dry tone.
We followed him. When the three of us were back again in the library, he said, addressing me:
"You, sir, asked a little while ago what occult power holds you here. Your manner was threatening, and I should have refused to comply had it not been for your friend, whose knowledge enables him to appreciate better than you the value of the revelations I am about to make to you."
He touched a spring in the side of the wall. A cupboard appeared, stuffed with books. He took one.
"You are both of you," continued M. Le Mesge, "in the power of a woman. This woman, the sultaness, the queen, the absolute sovereign of Ahaggar, is called Antinea. Don't start, M. Morhange, you will soon understand."
He opened the book and read this sentence:
"'I must warn you before I take up the subject matter: do not be surprised to hear me call the barbarians by Greek names.'"
"What is that book?" stammered Morhange, whose pallor terrified me.
"This book," M. Le Mesge replied very slowly, weighing his words, with an extraordinary expression of triumph, "is the greatest, the most beautiful, the most secret, of the dialogues of Plato; it is the Critias of Atlantis."
"The Critias? But it is unfinished," murmured Morhange.