A Honeymoon in Space Read Online Free PDF Page B

away to have another look at the clouds.
    â€œWhy, what on earth is the matter?” she exclaimed, shrinking back from the glass wall. “There’s nothing—we’re not anywhere!”
    â€œPardon me, Miss Rennick, you are on board the Astronef ,” said Lord Redgrave, as he reached the top of the companion way, “and the Astronef is at present travelling at about a hundred and fifty miles an hour above the clouds towards Washington. That is why you don’t see the clouds and sea as you did after we left the St. Louis . At a speed like this they simply make a sort of grey-green blur. We shall be in Washington this evening, I hope.”
    â€œTo-night, sir—I beg your pardon, my Lord!” gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler. “A hundred and fifty miles an hour! Surely that’s impossible.”
    â€œMy dear Mrs. Van Stuyler,” said Redgrave, with a side-look at Zaidie, “nowadays ‘impossible’ is hardly an English or even an American word. In fact, since I have had the honour of realising some of Professor Rennick’s ideas it has been relegated to the domain of mathematics. Not even he could make two and two more or less than four, but—well, would you like to come into the conning-tower and see for yourselves? I can show you a few experiments that will, at any rate, help to pass the time between here and Washington.”
    â€œLord Redgrave,” said Mrs. Van Stuyler, dropping gracefully back into her wicker armchair, “if I may say so, I have seen quite enough impossibilities, and—er, well—other things since we left the deck of the St. Louis to keep me quite satisfied until, with your lordship’s permission, I set foot on solid ground again, and I should also like to remind you that we have left everything behind us on the St. Louis , everything except what we stand up in, and—and—”
    â€œAnd therefore it will be a point of honour with me to see that you want for nothing while you are on board the Astronef , and that you shall be released from your durance—”
    â€œNow don’t say vile, Lenox—I mean—”
    â€œIt is perfectly plain what you mean, Zaidie,” said Mrs. Van Stuyler, in a tone which seemed to send a chill through the deck-chamber. “Really, the American girl—”
    â€œJust wants to tell the truth,” laughed Zaidie, going towards Redgrave. “Lord Redgrave, if you like it better, says he wants to marry me, and, peer or peasant, I want to marry him, and that’s all there is to it. You don’t suppose I’d have—”
    â€œMy dear girl, there’s no need to go into details,” interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, inspired by fond memories of her own youth; “we will take that for granted, and as we are beyond the social region in which chaperons are supposed to be necessary, I think I will have a nap.”
    â€œAnd we’ll go to the conning-tower, eh?”
    â€œBreakfast will be ready in about half an hour,” said Redgrave, as he took Zaidie by the arm and led her towards the forward end of the deck-chamber. “Meanwhile, au revoir ! If you want anything, touch the button at your right hand, just as you would on board the St. Louis .”
    â€œI thank your lordship,” said Mrs. Van Stuyler, half melting and half icy still. “I shall be quite content to wait until you come back. Really I feel quite sleepy.”
    â€œThat’s the effect of the elevation on the dear old lady’s nerves,” Redgrave whispered to Zaidie as he helped her up the narrow stairway which led to the glass-domed conning-tower, in which in days to come she was destined to pass some of the most delightful and the most terrible moments of her life.
    â€œThen why doesn’t it affect me that way?” said Zaidie, as she took her place in the little chamber, steel-walled and glass-roofed, and half filled with instruments of which she, Vassar