Romance Island. Gale Zona
sure," Mrs. Hastings broke in plaintively, "that I hope your servant, for instance, is not a sample of what the world is coming to!"
The prince smiled indulgently, as if a child had laid a little, detaining hand upon his sleeve.
"Be that as it may," he said evenly, "the throne of Yaque was still empty. Many stood near to the crown, but there seemed no reason for choosing one more than another. One party wished to name the head of the House of the Litany, in Med, the King's city, who was the chief administrator of justice. Another, more democratic than these, wished to elevate to the throne a man from whose family we had won knowledge of both perpetual motion and the Fourth Dimension—"
St. George smiled angelically, as one who resignedly sees the last fragments of a shining hope float away. This quite settled it. The olive prince was crazy. Did not St. George remember the old man in the frayed neckerchief and bagging pockets who had brought to the office of the Sentinel chart after chart about perpetual motion, until St. George and Amory had one day told him gravely that they had a machine inside the office then that could make more things go for ever than he had ever dreamed of, though they had not said that the machine was named Chillingworth.
"You have knowledge of both these things?" asked St. George indulgently.
"Yaque understood both those laws," said the prince quietly, "when William the Conqueror came to England."
He hesitated for a moment and then, regardless of another soft explosion from Mr. Frothingham's lips, he added:
"Do you not see? Will you not understand? It is our knowledge of the Fourth Dimension which has enabled us to keep our island a secret."
St. George suddenly thrilled from head to foot. What if he were speaking the truth? What if this man were speaking the truth?
"Moreover," resumed the prince, "there were those among us who had long believed that new strength would come to my people by the introduction of an inhabitant of one of the continents. His coming would, however, necessitate his sovereignty among us, in fulfilment of an ancient Phœnician law, providing that the state, and every satrapy therein, shall receive no service, either of blood or of bond, nor enter into the marriage contract with an alien; from which law only the royal house is exempt. Thus were the two needs of our land to be served by the means to which we had recourse. For there being no way to settle the difficulty, we vowed to leave the matter to Chance, that great patient arbiter of destinies of which your civilization takes no account, save to reduce it to slavery. Accordingly each inhabitant of the island took a solemn oath to await, with an open mind free from choice or prejudice, the settlement of the event, certain that the gods would permit the possible. Five days after this decision our watchers upon the hills sighted a South African transport bound for the Azores to coal. A hundred miles from our coast she was wrecked, and it was thought that all on board had been lost. A submarine was ordered to the spot—"
"Do you mean," interrupted St. George, "that you were able to see the wreck at that distance?"
"Certainly," said the prince. "Pray forgive me," he added winningly, "if I seem to boast. It is difficult for me to believe that your appliances are so immature. We were using steamship navigation and limiting our vision at the time of Pericles, but the futility of these was among our first discoveries."
Involuntarily St. George turned to Miss Holland. What would she think, he found himself wondering. Her eyes were luminous and her breath was coming quickly; he was relieved to find that she had not the infectious vulgarity to doubt the possibility of what seemed impossible. This was one of the qualities of Mr. Augustus Frothingham, who had assumed an air of polite interest and an accurately cynical smile, and the manner of generously lending his professional attention to any of the vagaries of the client. Mrs. Hastings stirred uneasily.
"I'm sure," she said fretfully, "that I must be very stupid, but I simply can not follow you. Why, you talk about things that don't exist! My husband, who was a very practical and advanced man, would have shown you at once that what you say is impossible."
Here was the attitude of the Commonplace the world over, thought St. George: to believe in wireless telegraphy simply because it has been found out, and to disbelieve in the Fourth Dimension because it has not been.
"I can not explain these things," admitted the prince gravely, "and I dare say that you could prove that they do not exist, just as a man from another planet could show us to his own satisfaction that there are no such things as music or colour."
"Go on, please," said Olivia eagerly.
"Olivia, I'm sure," protested Mrs. Hastings, "I think it's very unwomanly of you to show such an interest in these things."
"Will you bear with me for one moment, Mrs. Hastings?" begged the prince, "and perhaps I shall be able to interest you. The submarine returned, bringing the sole survivor of the wreck of the African transport."
"Ah, now," Mrs. Hastings assured him blandly, "you are dealing with things that can happen. My brother Otho, my niece's father, was just this last year the sole survivor of the wreck of a very important vessel."
"I have the honour, Mrs. Hastings, to be narrating to you the circumstances attending the discovery of your brother and Miss Holland's father, after the wreck of that vessel."
"My father?" cried Olivia.
The prince bowed.
"After this manner, Chance had rewarded us. We crowned your father King of Yaque."
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