ll you all about it in a minute."

"Then, we're working together?"

"Yes."

"Well, all I'm working for is to get back home where I came from."

"You won't be when you hear all I've got to say."

He started at that; then, with sudden change of thought, his eyes turned
to Anina. The girl blushed under his admiring gaze.

"Say, she's a little beauty, isn't she? Who is she?"

"She's my sister," I said, smiling.

For once he was too dumfounded to reply.

Miela had finished her translation now, and, as she turned back to us,
spoke in English for the first time during the conversation.

"Do you know why it is they brought you here from the Twilight Country?"
she asked Mercer.

This gave him another shock. "Why, I--no. That is--say, how do you happen
to talk English? Is it one of your languages here, by any chance?"

Miela laughed gayly.

"Only we three, in all this world, speak English. I know it because--"

I interrupted her.

"Suppose I tell him our whole story, Miela? Then--"

"That's certainly what I want to hear," said Mercer emphatically. "And
especially why it is that I'm not supposed to want to get back to where I
belong."

My explanation must have lasted nearly an hour, punctuated by many
questions and exclamations of wonder from young Mercer. I told him the
whole affair in detail, and ended with a statement of exactly how matters
stood now on Mercury.

"Do you want to hurry back home to earth now?" I finished.

"Duck out of this? I should say not. Why, we've got a million things to do
here."

His eyes turned again toward Anina.

"And, say--about letting those girls keep their wings. I'm strong for
that. Let's be sure and fix that up before we leave."

It was not more than half an hour later when the king's guards arrived to
conduct us to the castle. Meanwhile young Mercer had discovered he was
hungry and thirsty. As soon as he had finished eating we started off--he
and I, with Lua and Miela. The guards led us away as though we were
prisoners, forming a hollow square--there were some thirty of them--with
us in the center. We attracted little attention from passersby; the few
who stopped to stare at us, or who attempted to follow, were briskly
ordered away.

Occasionally a few girls would hover overhead, but when the guards shouted
up at them they flew away obediently.

The king's castle was constructed of metal and stone--a long, low,
rambling structure, flanked by two spires or minarets