I
suppose in time I should have a headache. For a little while it
is delicious."
The Prince sighed.
"Fresh air is good," he said, "but the air that comes from your
streets does not seem to me to be fresh, nor do I like the roar
of your great city always in my ears. Here I cut myself off, and
I feel that I can think. Duchess, you must try those preserved
fruits. They come to me from my own land. I think that the secret
of preserving them is not known here. You see, they are packed
with rose leaves and lemon plant. There is a golden fig, Miss
Penelope,--the fruit of great knowledge, the magical fruit, too,
they say. Eat that and close your eyes and you can look back and
tell us all the wonders of the past. That is to say," he added
with a faint smile, "if the magic works."
"But the magic never does work," she protested with a little
sigh, "and I am not in the least interested in the past. Tell me
something about the future?"
"Surely that is easier," he answered. "Over the past we have lost
our control,--what has been must remain to the end of time. The
future is ours to do what we will with."
"That sounds so reasonable," the Duchess declared, "and it is so
absolutely false. No one can do what they will with the future.
It is the future which does what it will with us."
The Prince smiled tolerantly.
"It depends a good deal, does it not," he said, "upon ourselves?
Miss Penelope is the daughter of a country which is still young,
which has all its future before it, and which, has proclaimed to
the world its fixed intention of controlling its own destinies.
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