They made room for Jones, who sat down.
“What’ll you have?” said the same speaker, who was known to his friend’s as the Professor. “Order something good, old boy: won’t see you after to-morrow, y’u know. What is your drink?”
Jones decided on gin and ginger beer; ordered a pack of cigarettes, then settled down to enjoy his beverage, his smoke, and a last friendly chat.
“So you going to leave us, eh?” said a dark, serious-looking man, who sat stirring a bit of ice in a glass with his finger. “Going away! I travel once meself to Colon when the French was diggin’ the Canal. I nearly die, an’ when I came back to Jamaica I swear I never would go away again. A man don’t have long to live, an’ it’s just as well to remain here till his time come.”
“Why you talking like that?” asked Jones. “You not sick? When I come back y’u will be alive and kicking, Septimus, an’ yet you talking to-night like a dying duck in a thunder-storm. You are too pessimistical, man.”
“You don’t know what y’u saying,” replied the serious Septimus seriously. “I know you are a man don’t read the newspaper, but you should hear what Professor been reading to-night!”
Curious, Jones turned to the Professor, who impressively read from a local journal the views of a European astronomer on Halley’s Comet, then visible in the morning sky. Jones had heard of the comet, like most other people in the island, and, like them, had not given it much thought. Now, however, he listened to what the newspaper had to say about it with a great deal of interest. It appeared that somebody in Europe believed that he had discovered certain green bands in the tail of the comet, which indicated a poisonous gas, and now that astronomer was warning the inhabitants of the earth of their possible extermination at an early date. The whole article was read out aloud by the Professor (for the third time), and nearly everybody in the room listened intently. When the reader stopped, the serious man again took up the burden of his lamentations.
“There you are!” he exclaimed dismally. “I have been expecting that thing for I don’t know how long. It is written in the Book of Revelations that before the last day there shall be signs and wonders. The Kingston earthquake was a sign. An’ this comet is a perfect wonder; for when I saw it the first time a few days ago it only had a head, an’ yesterday morning I only saw its tail! Oh! you can laugh as y’u like” (Jones had laughed) “but I tell you the situation is serious.”
The seriousness of the situation so overcame him that he called for another drink.
“Well,” said Jones, “I wouldn’t trouble about that. I don’t see the comet yet; an’ you say you only see the tail. But if you see the tail, you see the comet. An’ if you see the comet, the head must be somewhere.”