“I’ve just talked that over with Ralph,” Frank Merrill answered him.  “If we’ve frightened them away forever, it will be a terrible loss to science.”

Ralph Addington emitted one of his cackling, ironic laughs.  “I guess I’m not worrying as much about science as I might.  But as to their coming back — why, it stands to reason that they’ll have just as much curiosity about us as we have about them.  Curiosity’s a woman’s strong point, you know.  Oh, they’ll come back all right!  The only question is, How soon?”

“It made me dream of music — of Siegfried.”  It was Pete Murphy who spoke and he seemed to plump from sleep straight into the conversation.  “What a theme for grand opera.  Women with wings!  Flying-girls!  Will you tell me what the Hippodrome! has on Angel Island?”

“Nothing,” said Honey Smith, “except this — you can get acquainted with a Hippodrome girl — how long is it going to take us to get acquainted with these angels?”

“Not any longer than usual,” said Ralph Addington with an expressive wink.  “Leave that to me.  I’m going now to see what I can see.”  He walked rapidly down the beach, scaled the southern reef, and stood there studying the horizon.

The others remained sitting on the sand.  For a while they watched Ralph.  Then they talked the whole thing over with as much interest as if they had not yet discussed it.  Ralph rejoined them and they went through it again.  It was as though by some miracle of mind-transference, they had all dreamed the same dream; as though, by some miracle of sight-transference they had all seen the same vision; as though, by some miracle of space-transference, they had all stepped into the fourth dimension.  Their comment was ever of the wonder of their strange adventure, the beauty, the thrill, the romance of it.  It had brought out in them every instinct of chivalry and kindness, it had developed in them every tendency towards high-mindedness and idealism.  Angel Island would be an Atlantis, an Eden, an Arden, an Arcadia, a Utopia, a Milleamours, a Paradise, the Garden of Hesperides.  Into it the Golden Age would come again.  They drew glowing pictures of the wonderful friendships that would grow up on Angel Island between them and their beautiful visitors.  These poetic considerations gave way finally to a discussion of ways and means.  They agreed that they must get to work at once on some sort of shelter for their guests, in case the weather should turn bad.  They even discussed at length the best methods of teaching the English language.  They talked the whole morning, going over the same things again and again, questioning each other eagerly without listening for an answer, interrupting ruthlessly, and then adding nothing.

The day passed without event.  At the slightest sound they all jumped.  Their sleeplessness was beginning to tell on them and their nerves were still obsessed by the unnaturalness of their experience.  It was a long time before they quieted down, but the night passed without interruption.  So did the next day.  Another day went by and another, and during this time they did little but sit about and talk.