“Where have you been all these years since you disappeared from home?” I
asked accusingly.
“Why, you know perfectly well,” was his surprised reply, “for you
published my account of it.”
“Then what on earth are you doing here?” I countered.
To which he enigmatically answered: “Great are the powers of radio.”
“Were you really on Venus?” I inquired, still incredulous.
“On my word of honor as a gentleman,” said he, solemnly.
So the story was true after all, and I had not been hoaxed. I heaved a
sigh of relief.
It was soon arranged that he should return with me to the farm.
Forgotten was my freight, as I hurried him to the dory.
As I helped him into the boat, I noticed that his left hand was
bandaged, and asked him why.
“It happened night before last,” he answered laconically. “Man shot at
me.”
And not another word would he speak until the dory was tied to its stake
on the other side of the harbor, and we were chugging along the red road
which runs east across Chappiquiddick.
“Now tell me all about it,” I begged. “How did you ever get back to
earth, and how did you happen to come down here?”
Myles replied, “This is the way it was: After our conquest of the
ant-men, I resumed my experiments with the wireless transmission of
matter, which experiments had been so rudely interrupted by my
accidentally transmitting myself to the planet Poros—Venus, as you
earth-folk call it.
“I not only perfected the device, but also perfected it in such a way
that it could be used as an attachment to a certain common sort of
high-power hook-up. Now, before I left the earth, I knew that the
General Electric Company at Lynn had a hook-up of this kind in a
receiving station which was in almost constant operation, and was such a
standard installation that there was practically no chance of its not
being still in commission. I happened to remember its wave-length. So I
adjusted my apparatus in my electrical laboratory on Poros, with two
Cupian friends at the levers; and the next thing I knew, I found myself
back on earth, lying on the floor of a room, in front of a radio set.
“There was a man seated near by, the first human being whom I had seen
in over five earth-years. I rushed to greet him, and to ask him where I
was. But probably, in my haste, I spoke to him in the language of Poros.
That, and my Cupian toga, must have surprised him, for he fired several
shots at me with an automatic, and then turned and bolted through the
door. One of his shots nicked my left hand. Luckily, the rest missed
me.”
“Then you are the supposed madman of Lynn!” I exclaimed.
“The very same,” he answered.
“Well, well!” said I. “Who would have guessed it? And yet, as I read the
story in the _Boston Post_, it somehow or other made me think of you.”
Myles laughed. “Not very complimentary. They certainly gave me a weird
write-up.”
“They certainly did,” I replied. “But tell me, how did you get rid of
your nightgown?”
Myles laughed again. “My toga, you mean? I found a suit of overalls, an
old hat, and a pair of shoes in a locker, put them on, and made my
escape from the building. In one of the pockets there was some small
change, which carried me to Boston.
“The reason I happened to be here is because yesterday I ran across an
installment of ‘The Radio Man,’ which showed me for the first time that
my story had actually reached the earth. I was glad indeed, and
determined to look you up at once. So to-day I caught the afternoon
boat, and here I am.
“Three days ago I was king on Poros. To-day I am nobody, incognito, and
in hiding, on the planet Earth, millions of miles away.” And he shrugged
his shoulders.
“But, Myles,” said I, “tell me how you came to leave Venus. You talk as
though you just calmly up and left for no reason whatever. Why didn’t
you bring the Princess Lilla with you? The last that I knew, according
to that manuscript which you shot from the skies, you and she had been
married in state, and Cupia had settled down to an era of peace,
freedom, and prosperity.”
Myles smiled wanly. “You would hardly guess that my silver planet has
since then run crimson with blood, so as to rival even her red brother,
Mars.”
“How did it ever happen?” I asked.
“You must remember that Prince Yuri of Cupia, the traitorous friend of
the oppressor ants, was still unaccounted for at the close of the War of
Liberation. Also that there remained alive on our continent, crowded
behind a new pale it is true, but chafing under defeat, and eager for
_revanche_, a still numerous nation of ants, headed by a newly-hatched
queen, who was but putty in the hands of veteran Formian statesmen. What
better combination of match and powder-magazine could be imagined, to
threaten the peace of a planet!”
Myles had just completed this long harangue, when we turned into the
gate of the farm; and I was soon introducing him to Mrs. Farley and the
rest of the household. You can imagine how thrilled they were to meet,
in the flesh, the author and hero of those adventures on the planet
Venus, which they had read and reread so many times, and how eager they
were to hear more.
“Did the match reach the powder?” asked Mrs. Farley anxiously. “Did
Prince Yuri get his revenge?”
“Listen,” Cabot replied, “and I will tell you all about it.”
So, far into the night we sat, while our guest roughly sketched the
events which had occurred since he shot the manuscript of his previous
adventures earthward. The details, he filled in for us from time to time
during his stay at our farm. I took copious notes; and, now that he is
gone, I have—with his permission—written up the story in as nearly as
possible his own words, and herein give it to the world.