Bold, debonair, I joined the revelers—how exquisitely fair were the women of this strange land!
I found Saxe. flushed with wine, haranguing learnedly and emphasizing his remarks with sweeping gestures. The subject was beyond my comprehension, but the intellectual circle about him were absorbed. Saxe. monopolized their attention entirely. He informed me before I left the group that he had made engagements, including the four of us, for the following day and told me to advise the others of it.
I strayed over to Sheldon, who was in his element making others happy. He was the center of a jovial set, and judging by the gayety was certainly amusing. I was too deeply in love to perceive the point of his jests, and out of my sphere sought Saunders, after learning, to my dismay, that Sheldon also had made engagements including all of us for the following day. Saunders, to my thinking, was the least interesting of the quartette. He had assumed his stilted, speech-making manner, and was lecturing on the hazy, mystic beauties of the great planet Virgillius to these people who knew more about the star than he did. I grew irritable, bored, and wrathily wondered if he, too, had arranged that we be taken somewhere on the morrow. Covertly I watched my inamorata, passive, calm of face, taller, darker, more beautiful than any woman in Centauri. Dare I approach such chilling loftiness? Yes; and subdue, overpower with the potency of my own passion.
Alpha Centauri shall be mine! We were born for each other—just a sweet woman of this earth, nothing more; else could she create desire? Boldly I forced my way to her side, determined to sweep away the tantalizing indifference. I would command her thoughts, then—— Ah, how irrational are dreams! Before her calm, expressionless regard my passion quelled. She was kind; yes, a dead kindness, as with a few words and slight inclination this regal woman passed from the hall. I hastened after her; she lingered reluctantly beneath the lofty arch. “Rest well, Virgillius,” she murmured sweetly; “in a few hours we meet again.”
I bent deeply before her, but glanced up quickly at the sound of a low laugh—she was gone.
Her departure signaled the end of festivities, and after many salutations and best wishes we four found ourselves alone in the vast hall, staring vaguely at each other. The lights grew dim, casting ghostly reflections in the mirrored spaciousness, and chilled with the deathly silence pervading this marvelous crystal palace we hurried to our apartments, where several very sleepy individuals awaited us, whom we promptly dismissed.
“To-morrow we go through the museum,” Saxe. informed us.
“Yes, and take in the city,” echoed Sheldon.
“And in the evening,” cried Saunders excitedly, “we visit the Observatory, situated upon a mountain somewhere. My acceptance is for all of us. I fancy this engagement the most important.”
“Are you at leisure to accompany us, Sally?” asked Sheldon insinuatingly; “or do instructions begin at once? No occasion to stare,” he replied to my look; “you have not been secretive. The women over here are all alike. When time hangs heavy and my mind unoccupied, I am to teach a couple of sweet morsels the art of love also, which, it seems, only the ancients knew anything about. Innocence, however, is a thorough accomplishment in this wonderful land of advancement. It will take centuries of progression before the charm of this trait is valued by the women of our world. Knowledge is the admitted great passion over here, the foundation of existence, etc., and sought from cradle to grave, even then not abandoned; hence, the Centauri brain is ever active, verdant, and dogged ennui as Love is a dead evil. Here a man is judged by deeds and what he knows, not by what he’s worth. Wealth, the common, is thought of with indifference, poverty has become obsolete. You see I did not waste my time this evening and, Sally, you have a powerful rival. You will lose, of course; that’s what you came over here for, to experience a losing game, never having done so before. But look sharp, ice-crusted volcanoes are risky toys. Notice anything peculiar about the remarkable Alpha? Certainly not; you are too much in love,” he added hastily, not giving me time to reply. “She is different from all the women of this land. The first Centauri was an off-shoot of the Potolili or Octrogona tribes—mark that! She has colored blood. I suspected it when I saw the old boy; but one glance at your divinity and all doubts vanished.”