The man took it with great interest, as I hoped he would, the yellow metal being apparently a very scarce commodity in his part of the planet.
"Gold?" he asked.
"Well--ahem! I forgot to ask the man who sewed them on for me what they were exactly, but it looks like gold, doesn't it?""Yes," he answered, turning it to and fro admiringly in his hand, "you are the first ghost I ever knew to pay in ad-vance, and plenty of them go to and fro through here. Such a pretty thing is well worth a meal--if, indeed, you can stomach our rough fare. Here, you woman within," he called to the lady whom I presume was his wife, "here is a gentleman from the nether regions who wants some break-fast and has paid in advance. Give him some of your best, for he has paid well.""And what," said a female voice from inside, "what if Irefused to serve another of these plaguy wanderers you are always foisting upon me?""Don't mind her tongue, sir. It's the worst part of her, though she is mighty proud of it. Go in and she will see you do not come out hungry," and the Thither man returned calmly to his honey stick.
"Come on, you Soul-with-a-man's-stomach," growled the woman, and too hungry to be particular about the tone of invitation, I strode into the parlour of that strange refreshment place. The woman was the first I had seen of the outer race, and better than might have been expected in appearance. Big, strong, and ruddy, she was a mental shock after the slender slips of girlhood on the far side of the water, half a dozen of whom she could have carried off without effort in her long arms. Yet there was about her the credential of rough health, the dignity of muscle, an upright carriage, an animal grace of movement, and withal a comely though strongly featured face, which pleased me at once, and later on I had great cause to remember her with gratitude. She eyed me sulkily for a minute, then her frown gradually softened, and the instinctive love of the woman for the supernatural mastered her other feelings.
"Is that how you looked in another world?" she asked.
"Yes, exactly, cap to boots. What do you think of the attire, ma'am?""Not much," replied the good woman frankly. "It could not have been becoming even when new, and you appear as though you had taken a muddy road since then. What did you die of?""I will tell you so much as this, madam--that what Iam like to die of now is hunger, plain, unvarnished hunger, so, in Heaven's name, get out what you have and let me fall-to, for my last meal was yesterday morning."Whereat, with a shrug of her shoulders at the eccentric-ities of nether folk, the woman went to the rear of the house, and presently came back with a meal which showed her husband had done scant justice to the establishment by calling it a dry fish shop. It is true, fish supplied the staple of the repast, as was inevitable in a seaport, but, like all Martian fish, it was of ambrosial kind, with a savour about it of wine and sunshine such as no fish on our side of space can boast of. Then there were cakes, steaming and hot, vegetables which fitted into the previous course with exquisite nicety, and, lastly, a wooden tankard of the in-variable Thither beer to finish off. Such a meal as a hungry man might consider himself fortunate to meet with any day.
The woman watched me eat with much satisfaction, and when I had answered a score of artless questions about my previous state, or present condition and prospects, more or less to her satisfaction, she supplied me in turn with some information which was really valuable to me just then.
