"Hospitality shall be thine, outlander of the snows. Thou shalt rest and be refreshed. More of thy strange tales will I hear anon. And the girl—" His eyes softened as they strayed again to Rose Emer, and again the red blood flashed up in his cheeks. For a moment he seemed lost in his thoughts.
All through the interview the young man in the black stone seat had sat motionless and attentive, his eyes glued on the strangers, his ears drinking in every word spoken by Polaris, his expression rapt. Now he arose and stepped forward. Before the Prince Helicon could speak again he interposed.
"If it be pleasing to the strangers, I, Kalin the Priest, will make them welcome at mine own home in the Gateway to the Future." Without waiting for the objection which the prince seemed to be framing, Kalin addressed himself directly to Polaris.
"Is the hospitality of Kalin welcome to thee, O man with the hair of the sun? Much there is that Kalin fain would learn from thee, and perhaps some little that he may tell thee in return. Say, wilt come, thou and the woman?"
Polaris looked into his eyes, and somewhere in their dreamy depths he thought he read more meaning than the words of the priest conveyed to him. He stepped forward and tendered his hand, a form of salutation which, although new to the Sardanians, Kalin accepted.
"Thy most kind offer of hospitality I accept for myself and for the lady," Polaris said. "She hath, I fear, much need of rest."
They left Helicon on the throne in the Judgement House, looking as if he liked the new arrangement little enough. As they passed out of the hall, five or six men, all dressed in somber black, detached themselves from the crowd of Sardanians and joined Kalin the priest. Under his direction they fetched the sledge and drove it toward the lower end of the valley, whither Kalin and his two guests followed.
On the way Polaris told Rose Emer of the meaning of the conversation in the hall, which she had understood only so much as she was able to guess from the demeanor of the prince and of Polaris. As they talked, Kalin, although their tongue was unknown to him, courteously walked ahead.
"They seem to be a happy people, but I don't think I'm going to like this prince of theirs," said Rose Emer when she heard the details of the talk. "And you, who never have seen America, have so defended it that you have put the gentleman out sadly. From what you have said to him, he will think that we have no very exalted opinion of princes. If he were not such a grave-looking personage I should think that he tried to flirt with me."