Gulliver of Mars
Original Title: Lieut. Gulliver Jones CHAPTER I Dare I say it? Dare I say that I, a plain, prosaic lieutenant in the republican service have done the incredible things here set out for the love of a woman--for a chimera in female shape; for a pale, vapid ghost of woman-loveliness? At times I tell myself I dare not: that you will laugh, and cast me aside as a fabricator; and then again I pick up my pen and collect the scattered pages, for I MUST write it--the pallid splendour of that thing I loved, and won, and lost is ever before me, and will not be forgotten. The tumult of the struggle into which that vision led me still throbs in my mind, the soft, lisping voices of the planet I ransacked for its sake and the roar of the destruction which followed me back from the quest drowns all other sounds in my ears! I must and will write--it relieves me; read and believe as you list.
"Nothing," said Barton.
"Mr. Jim Barton," ventured Eve.
"What?" asked Barton.
"Nothing," mumbled little Eve Edgarton.
Out of some emotional or purely social tensities of life it seems
rather that Time strikes the clock than that anything so small as a
clock should dare strike the Time. One--two--three--four--five! winced
the poor little frightened traveling-clock on the mantelpiece.
Then quite abruptly little Eve Edgarton emerged from her cozy
cushions, sitting bolt upright like a doughty little warrior.
"Mr. Jim Barton!" said little Eve Edgarton. "If I stayed here two
weeks longer--I know you'd like me! I know it! I just know it!"
Quizzically for an instant, as if to accumulate further courage, she
cocked her little head on one side and stared blankly into Barton's
astonished eyes. "But you see I'm not going to be here two weeks!" she
resumed hurriedly. Again the little head cocked appealingly to one
side. "You--you wouldn't be willing to take my word for it, would you?
And like me--now?"
"Why--why, what do you mean?" stammered Barton.
Original Title: Lieut. Gulliver Jones CHAPTER I Dare I say it? Dare I say that I, a plain, prosaic lieutenant in the republican service have done the incredible things here set out for the love of a woman--for a chimera in female shape; for a pale, vapid ghost of woman-loveliness? At times I tell myself I dare not: that you will laugh, and cast me aside as a fabricator; and then again I pick up my pen and collect the scattered pages, for I MUST write it--the pallid splendour of that thing I loved, and won, and lost is ever before me, and will not be forgotten. The tumult of the struggle into which that vision led me still throbs in my mind, the soft, lisping voices of the planet I ransacked for its sake and the roar of the destruction which followed me back from the quest drowns all other sounds in my ears! I must and will write--it relieves me; read and believe as you list.