“Do you see that steamer out there?” said Gerry. “Well, she’s bound for home. I want to give you the chance that comes after the last chance. I want you to let me send you home.”
The consul looked around. His pendulous lip twisted into a smile.
“So you took all that talk for the preamble to a touch!” he said.
“Well, well, never mind,” said the consul. “There’s nothing left to go back to, and there’s nothing left to go back. That little account in the bank, and what it may do for some poor devil, is the only monument I’ll ever build.”
The whisky-bottle was almost empty, but Gerry’s glass was still untouched. The consul pointed at it.
“You can still leave it alone? I don’t know where you come from, or what you’re loafing in this haven of time-servers for, but I’m going to give you a bit of advice: you take that steamer yourself.”
“I can’t,” he stammered. “There’s nothing left for me either to go home to.” He said nothing more. The consul had suddenly turned drowsy.
Almost a month had passed since Gerry landed on his Lethean shore, and it had served him well. But that night on the balcony woke him up. The world seemed to have time-servers in small regard. First Alix and now this consul chap. Gerry began to think of his mother. He strolled over to the cable station. The offices were undergoing repairs. The ground floor was unfurnished save for a table and one chair. In the chair sat a chocolate-colored employee with a long bamboo on the floor beside him. Gerry’s curiosity was aroused. He went in and wrote his message to his mother, just a few words telling her he was all right. The chocolate gentleman folded the message, slipped it into the split end of the bamboo, and stuck it up through a hole in the ceiling to the floor above.
[Illustration: Loaned by George Inness, Jr. Color-Tone, engraved for ~The Century~ by H. Davidson
Gerry went out and rambled over the city. Night came on. He was restless. He wished he had not sent the message. It was forming itself into a link. He dined badly at a restaurant, and then wandered back to the quay. Arriving steamers were posted on a blackboard under a street lamp. The mail from New York was due to-morrow. The consul’s papers would be full of the latest New York society scandal--his scandal.