"Doesn't he frighten you?" Jane asked, in an awed whisper.
"Frighten me? I should say not! Why, Uncle Henry took me into its room this morning, before breakfast, and the creature was as gentle and affectionate as a kitten. It fascinates me. I'm really growing fond of it."
"But how is Henry going to manage it?" asked Jane.
"Oh, in several ways," Pat replied. "One is to dress it up in the latest style, and entertain it as befits a good-will ambassador from another planet. Niki, you know, is already acting as its valet, and teaching it good manners. The other, is to leave it 'as is,' and exhibit it before the leading scientific societies. Now, which do you advise?"
"Oh, stop, Pat!" Jane said, in an annoyed voice. "That's going too far. I know it's silly of me to be so afraid of the thing, but you're worse to play with it like that. It's right in Henry's line, though, and he's welcome to it. But, my dear, please, try and make him give it to some zoo, where it rightfully belongs, not in one of our best bedrooms. Anything to relieve us of the creature's unwanted presence."
"But it isn't a creature so much as we thought at first," Pat explained, sitting on the edge of Jane's bed, and patting her waxy, yellow hand. "The doctor from the village says it's almost genuinely human, like ourselves. It chatters now; says things you can't make head or tail of, in a strange tongue, of course. And—we've given it a name. At least, Mr. McGinity suggested one, which has met with Uncle Henry's approval, a name formed by the letters of the radio signal station of Mars. From now on our guest is a 'him,' and not an 'it,' and we're to address him as Mr.—" She paused, and then spelled the name—"Z-Z-y-x."
"Gracious!" Jane exclaimed. "How will you ever pronounce a name like that?"
"It's pronounced something like—Sykes. Like the name of Bill Sikes, in Dickens' 'Oliver Twist.'"
"All this doesn't matter," Jane groaned. "I tell you, I won't sleep another night in the castle with that ugly, hairy thing in it! I'll—I'll pack up and go—"
"Where could you go?" asked Pat, amusedly.