“His reasons may not be his own,” murmured Polynesia.
“What do you mean?” asked the Doctor.
“Well,” said she, “others may be keeping him—and the rest, away from us.”
“You mean the Moon Man?” said John Dolittle.
But to this Polynesia made no reply and the subject was dropped.
“That isn’t the thing that’s bothering me so much,” said Chee-Chee.
There was a pause. And before he went on I know that all of us were quite sure what was in his mind.
“It’s our getting back home,” he said at last. “Getting here was done for us by these moon folks—for whatever reason they had. But we’d stand a mighty poor chance of ever reaching the Earth again if they’re going to stand off and leave us to ourselves to get back.”
Another short spell of silence—during which we all did a little serious and gloomy thinking.
“Oh, well,” said the Doctor, “come, come! Don’t let’s bother about the stiles till we reach them. After all we don’t know for certain that these—er—whoever it is—are definitely unfriendly to us. They may have reasons of their own for working slowly. You must remember that we are just as strange and outlandish to them as they and their whole world are to us. We mustn’t let any idea of that kind become a nightmare. We have only been here, let’s see, not much over two weeks. It is a pleasant land and there is lots to be learned. The Vegetable Kingdom is clearly well disposed towards us. And if we give them time I’m sure that the—er—others will be too, in the end.”