“In New York City,” answered her mistress, “just as it was the day we sailed.”
“Shall we be back there a year from now?” I asked.
She held my arm close. Chauncey Gale answered.
“I will. Too far away from the Bowery down here.”
But Ferratoni, who stood next me, said—speaking to himself, and so low that only I heard it—
“Not all of us will return.”
I did not seem to hear, either, and I doubt if he knew that he had spoken; but a thing said like that creates an impression, and it set me to wondering. Then the brief exhibition was over, and we descended hastily to the warmth and feast waiting for us below.
There would be still nearly two months before we were willing to attempt our journey inland. We did not much care to face darkness in unknown wastes, and our continuous day would not begin until late in October. We were determined, however, to make much sooner the trial ascension for the purposes of observation, and to test the carrying power of the Cloudcrest. By the middle of September our days were of good length, and on the twentieth the divisions of light and darkness would be equal. We decided to make our preliminary ascension on that day.
It was only by chance that Edith Gale missed taking part in this momentous event. She had begged to be allowed to do so, and while neither Gale nor I approved of her going, we had more than half consented when Ferratoni came to our rescue by suggesting that we ought by all means to make the carrying test with just those who expected to undertake the voyage later.
This, both Gale and I declared, was a weighty argument, and my fiancée at length yielded, though I must confess with but a poor show of either filial or spousal obedience. She had been quite prepared to undertake a voyage, too, and even this wild notion had not been surrendered without severe reasoning.