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The hour is late, and I shall not before to-morrow evening at eight o'clock begin a description of the exciting scenes through which the beautiful Lilama was so soon to pass, and the adventures of Pym and Peters adventures so terrible that for centuries to come they will descend, a thrilling romance, from generation to generation, in those usually quiet and peaceful islands."
Castleton, who was overflowing with joyous excitement, informed me that the dreaded yellow fever of the South was on its way North; and that if I would delay my return to England for a week or ten days I could see it. His remark did not much alarm me. Then I proceeded to tell him in outline what had become of Ahpilus, of the marriage of Lilama and Pym, and of the wedding-tour of the islands.
The young Hili-lite to whom I have alluded had been for more than a year with the exiles. His name was Ahpilus. Lilama did not reciprocate his love. She had known him from infancy, and for her there was no romance in poor Ahpilus.
Peters saw that Diregus had found Pym, and, as was also the boatman, he and Pym were, of course, viewing the struggle. I should not, however, have included Pym in the party of observers; for he knew too well how the combat would end to be much absorbed in it. He had no eyes for anything but Lilama.
True as in the days when moonlight fell amid the palaces of Babylon and Nineveh is the old poetic expression its truth older than Shakespeare, older than historic man that 'The course of true love never did run smooth. "It seems that among the so-called criminal exiles to the Volcanic Mountains was a young man of good family, who had known and of course loved Lilama.
"If I remember rightly," he said, "we left Ahpilus lying with a broken back, and Peters standing by him, with Lilama crouching near; whilst on the opposite side of the chasm or canyon stood Pym, Diregus, and the boatman, who had accompanied the rescue party in their ascent of the mountain.
And though they were in other ways very kind to him, they would not allow him to take away a single grain of gold, of which nuggets were as plentiful in the fissures of the Olympian ranges as are pebbles in the beds of mountain streams; nor would they allow him to retain, of the many precious stones in his possession, even the ruby which Lilama had given him; and no amount of argument or pleading could move them to a different decision.
"Pym and Peters moved about the house, making certain arrangements so rapidly as to startle the languid Hili-lites. In ten or fifteen minutes they had removed to the cellar all the necessary furniture of a comfortable room, including a bedstead for Lilama, and another for her two maids.
Lilama told a maid to bring out her dresses and wrappers, which she divided among the servants, each donning several garments. Peters, stoical, but always on the alert, called Pym aside, and explained to him that this change meant nothing less than the devastation of Hili-li that the temperature was steadily falling, the wind increasing, and that the storm was only beginning.
He did not doubt that Peters and himself could withstand the cold, though they might not be able to obtain more than a flimsy shelter from the biting antarctic winds. He scarcely thought of himself he thought only of Lilama, and, in a measure, of the other residents of the beautiful, stricken city.
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