Romance Island

e grey park. The sky was marked with rose, the still reservoir gave back colour upon its breast, and the tower upon its margin might have been some gutt

s just beginning to be savoured by the inevitable longing for more li

d kept him through the third act, pouring in his ears as much as he felt that it was well for him to know. Chillingworth had drawn his

said the city editor; "don't you th

o," assented St. G

one, do you think?" C

But I'd like you to promise, Mr. Chillingworth, that you won't turn Crass loose at it while I'm g

ited States into a row, and mean war and a new possession and maybe consulates and governorships and one thing or another for the whole staff. S

answered quietly. "If you'll forg

ngworth. "Well, you please be arou

lingworth was a good sort at heart, too; but given, as the bishop had once said of some one else, to

rom Amory, who had been at Long Branch with The Aloha when the let

rrow and go with me?" the letter ende

up the whole staff, that's what it's doin'.

g a Sound steamer, "I'd like to take on at least two men. And I'd like Amor

ep my tastes down. And I've got to save up to buy kid gl

rge complied i

said Chillingworth, "he's thin a

is like somebody else healthy. Will you mind getting Amory on the wire when he calls up,

a weary little tune to the effect that "Billy Enny took a penny but now he hadn't many-Lookie They!" with which he whiled away the ho

night on the yacht for an island out in the southeast. And th

rge's steadily for a moment, and without

he promised, "and I can pack my thir

orge l

he said. "Ask Chillingworth

,'" hummed Little Cawthor

ght be better cleared away. Moreover, the glimpses which the prince had given him of a world which seemed to lie as definitely outside the bourne of present knowledge as doe

tually seek out incredible surroundings like these to be certain of privacy. For only the very poor are sufficiently immersed in their own affairs to be guiltless of curiosity, save indeed a kind of surface morbid wonderment at crêpe upon

e was no answer, and a repeated summons brought no sound from within. At length he tentatively

e looked blankly at the four walls, to doubt that he had been there at all the night before, so emphatically did the surroundings deny that they had ever harboured a title. But on the floor at his feet lay a scrap of paper, twisted and

statement as if his word had just been contradicted out of hand, "he means de bloke wid de black block. Aw, he lef' early

ed longer. Perhaps it was not true at all; perhaps none of it had happened. The McDougle Street part had vanished; what if the Boris too were a myth? But as he spran

m in confusion-the furniture covered with linen, the bric-à-brac gone, and three steamer trunks strapped

for walking and had on a sober little hat, and straightway St. George secretly wondered how he could ever have approved of anything so flagrant as a Gainsborough. She lifted

u have a cup of tea and a muffin? Aunt Medor

e St. George bles

Holland?" he asked, noting the little

us, and his daughter Antoinette, who will be a great comfort to me. The pr

iled, he reflected, Yaque had some surprises in st

e prince appoi

servant early that morning to assure them that all was in readiness, a bit of oriental courtesy which made no impression upon St. George, though it explained t

ivided between the desire to tell her that he was going too, a

sture of throwin

merica for a time-let me have a pleasant memory of it. Mr. St.

see, I've been very selfish about the whole matter. I'm selfish no

mplex woman always flutters through the hour of her departure. Only Juno can step from the clouds wi

e besought. "Forgive me-what are you going to do al

d buoyant, and he was lost in anticipative admirat

, "I only know that I must go. You

e me. Don't you think," he said, "that I might give you

Ya

ded gr

nie; and though I shall be quite helpless you will still h

or something in Yaque I forget all about America? And when you step out of the jar I s

land compares with Manhattan, and if this is your first visit, and how you are enj

' to too many people who have said all that to me. And you

mmonly pleasant world, and even the sad errand t

although of what use would that be to him, he wanted to know, since it would be his too late to follow her errantry through Yaque? They felt, as they talked, quite like the puppets of the days of Haroun-al-Raschid; only the puppets, poor children of mere magic, had not the traditions of the golden age of science for a setting, and were obliged to content themselves with mere tricks of jars of genii instead of

d St. George at length, "will you re

ss, always,"

ess than you for your success, and who will be infinitely proud of any command at all from you? And will

remember. For already you have not only helpe

sist, Miss Holland, that it takes far more good nature to see some one else set off at adventure than it t

e glad, Mr. St. George. Then you can wish us well. What is a

nts up to the present. He was concerned only with these things: that she was here with him, that the time might be measured by minutes u

ust have begun their motion. Very likely the fixed stars are nothing but grey-beards with no imagination. Distance lends enchantment, but the frivolous might say that the preliminary farewell is the mint that coins it. And, enchantment being independent of the commonplace, after all, it may have been that certain stars had already begun to sing while St. George sat staring at the little bowing flames of the juniper branches and Olivia was taking her tea. Then in came Mrs. Hastings, a very literal interfering goddess, and her bonnet was frightfully awry so that the parrot upon it looked shockingly coquettish and irreverent and lent to her dignity a flavour of ill-timed wag

be like, it's so low on the map. I've looked up the Azores-that's where we get some of our choicest cheese. And camphor-I've got a pound of camphor. And I must say positively that I always was against these wars in the

a copy of whatever the Sentinel might publish about them, in serene oblivion of the state of the post-office department in Yaque. Mrs. Hastings, in short, was one of the women who are thrown into violent mental convulsions by the pr

ould better do so on the way to the submarine. So he went blindly down the hall and rang the elevator bell for so long that the boy deliberately stopped on the flo

the time he had boarded a down-town car, St. George had tortured himself to distraction, and his own responsibility in this submarine voyage loomed large and threatening. Therefore, it suddenly assumed the proportion of mountains yet unseen when, though it wanted ten minutes to twelve when he reached the Boris, his card was returned by a f

ue idea of chartering all the tugs in the harbour. It came to him that he had bungled the matter from first to last, and that Bud or Bennietod would have used greater shrewdness. And wh

plexion of Prince Tabnit of Yaque. They were dressed like the youth who had answered the door of the prince's apartment, and they were spea

ng Otho of Yaque," he said, with no time to smile at

d and spoke a

they sai

ave attended to some affairs for her. Will you co

ounds with very gentle eyes, consulted each other, not with the

quite assured that this is Miss

he went swiftly through his pockets and produced a scrap of paper-the fragment that had lain that morning on the floor of the prince's deserted apartment, and that bore the arms

on, a

" he assured them, "and

wed him wi

reat repose. They gave him the same sense of strangeness that he had felt in the presence of the prince and of the woma

hey rolled away, "what is it that y

her appearing content to show two

fully, "whether the prince has given her his n

stab Miss Holland and has got herself locked

of horror broke

o kill!" t

iscovered, disclosed some very important news to Miss Holl

man, nodding, and momentarily hesitated; "but

eorge regarded the

at news had he?"

answered

with the news of the strange disappearance of her father, the king, and

id St. George

his only when Olivia herself had sought him out after an attempt had been made upon her life by his servant. It seemed to St. George far from improbable that the woman had been acting under the prince's instructions and, that failing, he himself had appeared

roaned, "are you sur

the prince plan with the others to tell her nothing-nothing that the people desire. When they knew that we had heard they locked us up and we have only

t her father and the Hereditary Treasure have disappeare

unseeingly through the window, his mind an abyss of fear. Then the cab dre

open sea, would you two be at all

ed suddenly a

nced Jarvo with great simplicity, "

impse of Amory within, just ringing the elevator bell, and he

ngly. "Heaven on earth, put out that pip