“See. I snap my fingers. Not in scorn for your ignorance, but to illustrate. While I was snapping my fingers, some of the stars shot through a million miles of space, taking thousands of our years to do it.”
“Mathematically—” began Mr. Sage, but got no further. The gypsy proceeded, impressively:
“They have witnessed all that is to transpire on this earth of ours during the next thousand years or two.”
“By gosh—it sounds reasonable,” said Mr. Link. “I never thought of it in that way before.”
“Will you permit me to inquire, my good woman, what college—what great seat of learning—you attended?” inquired Mr. Sage ironically.
“College?” she inquired, a trifle blankly.
“You speak the language of a cultivated woman. You use good English. You have colossal figures on the tip of your tongue. You—”
“I speak many languages,” she broke in. “The language of the stars is older than any of them. There were stars in the East when the Savior was born. They were there when this world was made and peopled with ignorant men and women. They saw from afar the birth of your Savior a million years before he was—”
“My dear Brother Baxter,” cried the parson, “this is perfect nonsense. Have you the impudence, Madam, to imply that we mortals are so far behind the times as all this?”
“I know of nothing, Reverend Sir, that proves the fact more clearly than the institution you represent,” said the gypsy, with a rare smile.