And when he shook his head, she quoted from Stephen Phillips’ masterpiece the wonderful declaration of Apollo in answer to the wish of his earth-love when she said,
. . . "Fain would I know Yon heavenly wafting through the heaven wide,
And the large view of the subjected seas.
And famous cities, and the various toil of men."
"And I will carry thee above the world,
To share my ecstasy of fling-ing beams.
And scattering without in-termission joy.
And thou shalt know the first leap of the sea Toward me; the grateful upward look of earth.
Emerging roseate from her bath of dew—
We two in heaven dancing.
Babylon Shall flash and murmur, and cry from under us.
And Nineveh catch fire, and
at our feet Be hurled with her inhabi-tants, and all Adoring Asia kindle and hugely bloom—
We two in heaven running —continents Shall lighten, ocean unto ocean flash,
And rapidly laugh till all this world is warm."
Bennie listened, as Rhoda spoke the lines, spellbound at the poet’s imagination.
"By golly," he cried, in admiration, "that’s more wonderful than—than actually doing it!”
Ill
Bentham T. Tassifer had paused, as usual, at the Metropoli-tan Club, on his way home from the Department of Justice, and, as a natural consequence, was exuding his regular post-meridian benignity. In his own little official occupation of the day—the joker in the contract for the new post-office at Pocalla, Texas— he had entirely forgotten the disappearance of his niece, as well as the anticipated collision between the wandering asteroid and the earth which he so honored by living upon it. He had followed his ordinary custom of going directly to the bar and consuming a sherry and bitters with an audible, guzzling satisfaction, something between fhe gurgles of a dying bathtub and the intake of a hippopotamus. Then his lordly little eye fell upon the lank form of his golfing friend Judson, of the Department of Agriculture, leaning in contemplation before a tumbler from which o’erlapped a sprig of mint.
' "Lo!" he remarked, with an intonation signifying " ’Behold, minion; King John, your king and England’s, doth approach!' "
' :Lo yuhself!" returned Judson. "Djuh see somethin' happened to that comet?"
"Eh?" demanded the solicitor. "Comet? You mean the asteroid, I suppose? What’s happened to it?"
Judson took a sip from the tumbler and turned savagely upon
Tassifer.
”Ass-eroid!” he shouted.
"Don’t get excited, Judson," commented Bentham patronizing-
ly.
"You make me tired!" retorted his agricultural friend. "What difference does it make what it is, if it’s been put out of business?"
"What do you mean?" cried Bentham. "Has anything unusual occurred?"
"Haven’t you seen the papers?" inquired Judson. "Huh! If you’re so blamed slow, lemme—I mean, let me—read it to you."
"Sure!" nodded Bentham. "Another sherry and bitters—and
another mint julep,” he added to the bartender, after a moment’s reflection.
"Listen here,” began Judson, elevating a newspaper which had been lying flat on the bar: " ’Extry’! Collision between ass —ass—what d’you call it?”
Tassifer grabbed the paper quickly out of his hand.
"As-ter-oid,” he articulated snappishly. "Let me see it. I can read,”
He read:
EXTRA - Four O’Clock-EXTRA!
COLLISION BETWEEN ASTEROID AND EARTH AVERTED!
PROBABLE SUCCESS OF HOOKER EXPEDITION!
MEDUSA NOW OUR SATELLITE!
There is every reason to believe that Professor Benjamin Hooker and his daring companions have achieved their stupendous object of diverting the falling asteroid from its course toward the earth, and have thus saved the human race from destruction. Professor Thornton, of the National Observatory, announced the receipt, early this morning, of a cable-despatch from an amateur astronomer at Honolulu, stating that, about ten hours after the time set for the departure of the Hooker Expedition in the Flying Ring, he suddenly observed a yellow glow surrounding the asteroid Medusa. This glow increased in volume and intensity for perhaps five minutes, and then as suddenly ceased, drawing away from the planet like a puff of smoke. No trace of the phenomenon was observed either at the Lick Observatory or in the great one-hundred-inch telescope at Mount Wilson, near Pasadena, the unfavorable position of the asteroid, low down in the western sky, probably accounting for this. All other observatories of note were on the daylight side of the earth at the time.
Professor Thornton further announces, however, that the observations upon Medusa’s position which were made last night at the various European observatories show conclusively that the path of the asteroid has been changed and its flight toward the sun checked. It is now moving in an elliptical orbit around the earth, with a period of approximately four months and twelve days. The astronomer states that, at the time of the asteroid’s nearest approach to us, it will be a conspicuous object—its apparent diameter being nearly one-half that of the moon. Professor Hooker and his associates have thus not only averted the impending catastrophe but have presented the earth with a new moon as a lasting monument to the boldest enterprise ever conceived by the human brain.
There were several columns more, but Bentham did not proceed further.
"Gee whiz!” he exploded. "He’s really done it!”
"Tush!” returned Judson. "You don’t believe that, do you? No matter how big a fool you are, you don't honestly suppose anyone can go sailin’ around in the air blowin’ comets—I mean ass-eroids—out of their orbits, like Buffalo Bill shootin’ glass balls?”
"Look here, Judson,” shrieked Tassifer: "You keep a civil tongue in your head! I know all about that flying machine; I’ve been in it, and, what’s more, my niece Rhoda—” He stopped unexpectedly.
"What about your niece?” inquired Judson.
"Nothing! Why, you saw the machine that day on the golf-course—don’t you remember? That was Hooker.”-
"Sure, I saw it!” assented the agriculturalist. "But that thing could only fly round in the air! The most it could do would be to go up five or six miles. You see, when you go higher up than that, there ain’t any more air—and you’d die! Besides, the
machine wouldn’t float unless there was air—any more’n a ship without water. That’s why all this is just bunk.”
Tassifer glared disgustedly at Judson.
Really, the fellow was too insignificant—too big a nincompoop to bother with!
"Darn it, Judson,” he said, with slow emphasis; "I don’t want to quarrel with you, but what you don’t know about flying machines would fill the Congressional Library. I’ve got to go home in a minute, but I’ve known you long enough not to want you to go around making an ass of yourself.”
"Don’ say!” sneered Judson.
"Now,” continued Tassifer, "this flying machine hasn’t anything to do with air at all. It goes up, air or no air. It goes up through the air and through the nothingness above the air, and it can go up easier without air than with air, because then there isn’t any resistance.”
"But what makes it go up?” inquired Judson.
"What makes a rocket go up" retorted Tassifer.
"But it ain’t a rocket!”
"I didn’t say it was. It’s like a rocket.”
"But a rocket has gunpowder. ”
"Well, this has something or other—I forget what—to make it go—” concluded Tassifer lamely. "Anyhow—”
"Rats!” snorted Judson. "You know a lot about it—you do! You—”
They might have landed under the bar in the tightly locked embrace of those defending their honor had not an unusual clamor from the avenue interrupted them. What seemed like the confused shoutings of a mob came through the closed windows.