"Yes. Poor Harl!"
She read aloud to Larry the gist of it in the few closing paragraphs.
"... and so I want to confess to you that I have been taking credit for that which is not mine. I wish I had the courage to tell you personally; someday I think I shall. I did not help Tugh invent our Time-traveling cages. I was in the palace garden one night some years ago when the cage appeared. Tugh is a man from a future Time-world; just what date ahead of now, I do not know, for he has never been willing to tell me. He captured me. I promised him I would say nothing, but help him pretend that we had invented the cage he had brought with him from the future. Tugh told me he invented them. It was later that he brought the other cage here.
"I was an obscure young man here a few years ago. I loved you even then, Tina: I think you have guessed that. I yielded to the temptation—and took the credit with Tugh.
"I do love you, though I think I shall never have the courage to tell you so.
Harl."
ina rolled up the paper. "Poor Harl! So all the praise we gave him for his invention was undeserved!"
But Larry's thoughts were on Tugh. So the fellow was not of this era at all! He had come from a Time still further in the future!