CHAPTER XI
I find it necessary to remind myself from time to time that the Queen of Salissa is a young girl, in mind and experience little more than a child. If I think of her as a woman or allow myself to credit her with any common sense, that blight which falls on the middle-aged, her actions become unintelligible.
She ought, no doubt, to have gone straight to her father and told him about the cisterns in the cave. That was the sane thing to do. Donovan was a man of clear understanding and wide knowledge. He would have—I do not know precisely what he would have done, but it would have been something entirely sensible. The Queen dreaded nothing so much as that. She found herself for the first time in her life in touch with a mystery, surrounded by things fascinatingly incomprehensible. Her island held a secret, was the scene—there could be no doubt about it—of a deep, dark, perhaps dangerous plot. She was thrilled. The more she thought of the cavern and the mysterious tanks, the more delightful the thrills became.
She made a confidant of Phillips, choosing instinctively the only person on the island likely to be in full sympathy with her. Phillips was older than she was. He was twenty-eight; but he was a simple, straightforward young man with his boyish taste for adventure unspoiled. He was also deeply in love with the Queen.
I have found it very difficult to get either from the Queen or from Phillips a complete and coherent account of what happened between the discovery of the cisterns and the day when the Ida sailed, taking Phillips away from the island. I gather that they were both the victims of a bad attack of detective fever. They have talked to me quite freely and cheerfully of the “Island Mystery.” That was the Queen’s phrase. About a much more important matter the Queen will not speak at all, and Phillips cannot be induced to dwell on details. I have been obliged to depend mainly on Kalliope for information, and even now Kalliope does not speak English well.
“We have three clues,” said the Queen hopefully, “three really good clues. We ought to be able to unearth the mystery. Detectives hardly ever have so many.”
Phillips named the three clues, ticking them off on his fingers.
“First, the torn envelope; second, Smith’s expedition to the cave before dawn——”