“Don’t you fret any about that. I’ve brought Smith along. Smith is the only living Englishman who speaks the Megalian language. He’s been explaining the situation to the high priest of the island for the last half-hour while we blew bugle calls on the syren to attract your attention. Smith is a wonderful man, worth any salary to a firm with a big foreign business.”
Smith bowed.
“It’s hardly a language, sir,” he said. “A dialect, a patois. Partly Turkish, partly Slavonic, with a Greek base.”
“Some language that,” said Mr. Donovan. “It would interest our college professors. If you found a university on the island, Daisy, you must institute a system of visiting lecturers from the colleges on our side.”
“Oh, here they are!” said the Queen. “How lovely! Look at all their bright dresses. And the men are as gay as the women. Oh! there’s the dinkiest little baby with a brown face. He’s smiling at me. I know I shall just love them all, especially the brown babies.”
The islanders were disembarking from their boats. They crowded together on the lower steps of the staircase which led up to the flagstaff. They talked rapidly in low voices and gazed with frank curiosity at the little group above them. Women held babies high in their arms. Men took up toddling children and set them on their shoulders. Evidently all, even the youngest, were to have their chance of gazing at the new queen.
The old man who had stood at the tiller of the leading boat disengaged himself from the crowd. He mounted the steps slowly, pausing now and then to bow low. He was a picturesque figure. He wore a short black jacket, heavily embroidered with gold thread. Underneath it was a blue tunic reaching to his knees. Round his waist was a broad crimson sash. He advanced with a grave dignity. Each bow—and he bowed often—was an act of ceremonial courtesy. There was no trace of servility, nor of any special desire to please or propitiate in his manner. He reached the step below the terrace on which the flagstaff stood. He bowed once more and then stood upright, looking straight at the Queen with calm, untroubled eyes.
He spoke a few words in a soft, low tone. Smith stepped forward to explain and interpret.
“This is Stephanos,” he said, “the Elder of Salissa.”