“Is it possible?” I heard him murmur, before he said profoundly, “Boy!
you have been buried!”
“I have lived at Yellow Sands since my babyhood,” I said.
“Of course,” said he, “you could not know. But you are an Englishman,
and that makes your question sound more than ever strange to my English
ears. Well, listen! I’ll tell you something about our Empress and her
Empire.”
He proceeded to give me a startling description of the world, of its
rulers, its politics, and its universal unrest--a description which
caused my mind to expand, if not to respond, and my brain whirled when
I walked home.
MacCaskill I mention to say that we were partners only in name--that is
to say, we still lived together, Akshelah cooking for us and minding
us; but that was all. We were separated in work and in recreation. It
was my pleasure to watch the life and activity of the ever-growing
population of the city, but always at a distance. MacCaskill loved
life, too, but he liked to be a part of it, and it was the life of
the saloon and the gambling-den that he loved. The factor ran against
congenial spirits, who had knocked about the world; they suited him
better than the ignorant youth who, though born inside the world, had
been bred and brought up upon the outside.
We came to the beginning of September, when the population of Hanafin
City, the wind-crossed defile of the former month, was over five
thousand souls. One night I was teaching Akshelah to read, and proud
indeed to find myself in the position of schoolmaster, when a message
summoned me to the chief.
Hanafin was pushing himself to and fro in a rocking-chair beside his
table--luxuries which had just reached the city--and Carey stood
beside him. I imagined that something must have gone wrong, for the
Commissioner’s face was angry.
“Petrie,” he said at once, “have you heard anything of Redpath?”
When I had replied in the negative Hanafin mused for a few moments,
watching me, then said:
“Father Lacombe has arrived in the city.”