"Well, I jest guessed at that by the time the future man an' I took to go back five weeks, ye know. But I can't seem to figur it out right."
Phœbe seated herself at the table and took up a blank sheet of paper.
"Please lend me your pencil," she said. "Now, then, every time you whirl once 'round the pole to westward you lose one day, don't you?"
"That's it," said Droop, cheerfully. "Cuttin' twenty-four meridians——"
"And how many days in twenty-two years?" Phœbe broke in.
"You mean in six years."
"Why, no," she replied, glancing at Droop with a mischievous smile, "it's twenty-two years back to 1876, ain't it?"
"To '76—why, but——"
He caught sight of her face and stopped short.
There came a pleased voice from one of the state-rooms.