"With your colors to wear, I shall have the honor of breaking a lance
against the biggest windmill in the world."
"You mean the Citadel of Science," she said, smiling.
"And its rock-ribbed respectability," I replied.
She looked at me thoughtfully, rolling and unrolling the scroll in her
hands. Then she sighed, smiled, and brightened, handing me the scroll.
"Read it carefully," she said; "it is an outline of the policy I
suggest that we follow. You will be surprised at some of the
statements. Yet every word is the truth. And, monsieur, your reward
for the devotion you have offered will be no greater than you deserve,
when you find yourself doubly famous for our joint monograph on the
ux. Without your vote in the committee I should have been denied a
hearing, even though I produced proofs to support my theory. I
appreciate that; I do most truly appreciate the courage which prompted
you to defend a woman at the risk of your own ruin. Come to me this
evening at nine. I hold for you in store a surprise and pleasure which
you do not dream of."
"Ah, but I do," I said, slowly, under the spell of her delicate beauty
and enthusiasm.
"How can you?" she said, laughing. "You don't know what awaits you at
nine this evening?"
"You," I said, fascinated.
The color swept her face; she dropped me a deep courtesy.
"At nine, then," she said. "No. 8 Rue d'Alouette."
I bowed, took my hat, gloves, and stick, and attended her to her
carriage below.
Long after the blue-and-black victoria had whirled away down the
crowded quay I stood looking after it, mazed in the web of that
ancient enchantment whose spell fell over the first man in Eden, and
whose sorcery shall not fail till the last man returns his soul.
X
I lunched at my lodgings on the Quai Malthus, and I had but little
appetite, having fed upon such an unexpected variety of emotions
during the morning.
Now, although I was already heels over head in love, I do not believe
that loss of appetite was the result of that alone. I was slowly
beginning to realize what my recent attitude might cost me, not only
in an utter collapse of my scientific career, and the consequent
material ruin which was likely to follow, but in the loss of all my
friends at home. The Zoological Society of Bronx Park and the
Smithsonian Institution of Washington had sent me as their trusted
delegate, leaving it entirely to me to choose the subject on which I
was to speak before the International Congress. What, then, would be
their attitude when they learned that I had chosen to uphold the
dangerous theory of the existence of the ux.
Would they repudiate me and send another delegate to replace me? Would
they merely wash their hands of me and let me go to my own
destruction?
"I will know soon enough," thought I, "for this morning's proceedings
will have been cabled to New York ere now, and read at the
breakfast-tables of every old, moss-grown naturalist in America before
I see the Countess d'Alzette this evening." And I drew from my pocket
the roll of paper which she had given me, and, lighting a cigar, lay
back in my chair to read it.
The manuscript had been beautifully type-written, and I had no trouble
in following her brief, clear account of the circumstances under which
the notorious ux-skin had been obtained. As for the story itself, it
was somewhat fishy, but I manfully swallowed my growing nervousness
and comforted myself with the belief of Darwin in the existence of the
ux, and the subsequent testimony of Wallace, who simply stated what he
had seen through his telescope, and then left it to others to identify
the enormous birds he described as he had observed them stalking about
on the snowy peaks of the Tasmanian Alps.
My own knowledge of the ux was confined to a single circumstance.
When, in 1897, I had gone to Tasmania with Professor Farrago, to make
a report on the availability of the so-called "Tasmanian devil," as a
substitute for the mongoose in the West Indies, I of course heard a
great deal of talk among the natives concerning the birds which they
affirmed haunted the summits of the mountains.
Our time in Tasmania was too limited to admit of an exploration then.
But although we were perfectly aware that the summits of the Tasmanian
Alps are inaccessible, we certainly should have attempted to gain them
had not the time set for our departure arrived before we had completed
the investigation for which we were sent.
One relic, however, I carried away with me. It was a single greenish
bronzed feather, found high up in the mountains by a native, and sold
to me for a somewhat large sum of money.
Darwin believed the ux to be covered with greenish plumage; Wallace
was too far away to observe the color of the great birds; but all the
natives of Tasmania unite in affirming that the plumage of the ux is
green.
It was not only the color of this feather that made me an eager
purchaser, it was the extraordinary length and size. I knew of no
living bird large enough to wear such a feather. As for the color,
that might have been tampered with before I bought it, and, indeed,
testing it later, I found on the fronds traces of sulphate of copper.
But the same thing has been found in the feathers of certain birds
whose color is metallic green, and it has been proven that such birds
pick up and swallow shining bits of copper pyrites.
Why should not the ux do the same thing?
Still, my only reason for believing in the existence of the bird was
this single feather. I had easily proved that it belonged to no known
species of bird. I also proved it to be similar to the tail-feathers
of the ux-skin in Antwerp. But the feathers on the Antwerp specimen
were gray, and the longest of them was but three feet in length, while
my huge, bronze-green feather measured eleven feet from tip to tip.
One might account for it supposing the Antwerp skin to be that of a
young bird, or of a moulting bird, or perhaps of a different sex from
the bird whose feather I had secured.
Still, these ideas were not proven. Nothing concerning the birds had
been proven. I had but a single fact to lean on, and that was that the
feather I possessed could not have belonged to any known species of
bird. Nobody but myself knew of the existence of this feather. And now
I meant to cable to Bronx Park for it, and to place this evidence at
the disposal of the beautiful Countess d'Alzette.
My cigar had gone out, as I sat musing, and I relighted it and resumed
my reading of the type-written notes, lazily, even a trifle
sceptically, for all the evidence that she had been able to collect to
substantiate her theory of the existence of the ux was not half as
important as the evidence I was to produce in the shape of that
enormous green feather.
I came to the last paragraph, smoking serenely, and leaning back
comfortably, one leg crossed over the other. Then, suddenly, my
attention became riveted on the words under my eyes. Could I have read
them aright? Could I believe what I read in ever-growing astonishment
which culminated in an excitement that stirred the very hair on my
head?
"The ux exists. There is no longer room for doubt. Ocular
proof I can now offer in the shape of _five living eggs_ of
this gigantic bird. All measures have been taken to hatch
these eggs; they are now in the vast incubator. It is my plan
to have them hatch, one by one, under the very eyes of the
International Congress. It will be the greatest triumph that
science has witnessed since the discovery of the New World.
[Signed] "SUSANNE D'ALZETTE."
"Either," I cried out, in uncontrollable excitement--"either that girl
is mad or she is the cleverest woman on earth."
After a moment I added:
"In either event I am going to marry her."