“Harry Wendel!” gasped Watson. It was too good to be true!
“Surest thing you know, Chick. It's me, alive and kicking!” as they grabbed one another.
“How did you get here?”
“Search me! Ask the lady; I'm just a creature of circumstance. I merely act; she does all the thinking.”
The Nervina smiled and nodded. Her eyes were just as wonderful as Chick remembered them, full of elusiveness, of the moonbeam's light, of witchery past understanding.
“Yes,” she affirmed. “You see, Mr. Watson, it is the will of the Prophet. Harry is of the Chosen. We have come for the great Dr. Holcomb—for the Jarados!”
And she led the way. Watson followed in silent wonder; behind him came the Geos and the rest, quiet and reverent. The soft glow still held, so that they seemed to be walking through the walls of cold fire. At the end of the passage they came to a door.
The Nervina touched three unmarked spots on the walls. The door opened. The queen stood aside, and motioned for Chick and Harry to enter.
It was a long room, pear-shaped, and fitted up like the most elaborate sort of laboratory. And at the far end, seated in the midst of a strange array of crystals, retorts and unfamiliar apparatus, was a man whom the two instantly recognised.
It was the missing professor, looking just as they remembered him from the days when they sat in his class in Berkeley. There was the same trim figure, the same healthy cheeks, pleasant eyes and close-cropped white beard. Always there had been something imperturbable about the doctor—he had that poise and equanimity which is ever the balance of sound judgment. Neither Chick nor Harry expected any rush of emotion, and they were not disappointed.