When he considered himself at a safe distance, he crawled into a clump of bushes; and not waiting for the night, lay down for a much-needed rest.
It was morning again before he woke. Making his way back to the road, he continued his interminable journey northward.
The word “northward” occurs very often, perhaps too often, in this narrative but it is typical of Myles Cabot’s quest. All day long, day after day, there rang in his ears the words, “northward, northward, ever northward.” He recited the words in cadence with his stride, they sang in the wind and in the swish of the trees.
Have you ever sat at the extreme stern of an ocean liner in the moonlight and listened to the throb of the engines, the purr of the wake, and the hum of the rigging? Have you ever stood on the rear platform of a transcontinental train at night and watched the green lights slide backward in the converging darkness, and listened to the rush of the air and the rhythmic clank of the rails? If you have, you will understand the lilting song which impelled Myles Cabot onward, ever onward, toward his journey’s end.
He had plenty of opportunity for thought as he dragged his weary feet along the road. He wondered as to the progress of the Civil War. Much of its success would depend upon whether Count Kamel had joined the Kew forces. Kamel had been the leader of the radicals in the popular assembly, who had launched the movement for a shorter working day, when the overthrow of the Formians two years ago had put an end to the period of slavery which every male Cupian had had to undergo in ant-land. But Prince Toron, the administration leader, at Cabot’s instigation had blocked this move, and had put through a bill authorizing the expenditure of this extra time upon the construction of public works. The measure had been cleverly baited with a promise which appealed strongly to the sport-loving Cupians, namely, that the first building erected would be a huge stadium for the holding of national games—the very stadium in which the assassination of Kew XII had later taken place. Another move which had helped in the passage of this legislation was the creation of a new cabinet post, the Minister of Public Works, which portfolio had been tactfully offered to Count Kamel, the leader of the radicals.
Cabot smiled as he recalled these facts.
“I hope that Toron gets to him again,” said Myles to himself, “and makes him some flattering offer in the present war.”
Then he fell to worrying about the loss of his own artificial antennae. Without these, he would be unable to talk even to his own wife! And then it occurred to him that perhaps, even so, she might be able to talk to him, and thus only one-half of the conversation would have to be carried on by pad and stylus. How so?
Quite a while ago, not content with adapting himself so as to talk in the antenna-fashion employed by these people with whom he had cast his lot, he had started to teach the Princess Lilla to talk with her mouth; for the anatomists of the university of Kuana had told him that the Cupians possess vocal chords like those of earth folk, even though they never use them. Myles had rigged up a small transmitting set, so that she could hear her own vocalization; but the performance had embarrassed her frightfully; and, therefore, she always practiced alone.