“Oh, well,” Ralph said contemptuously, “what can you expect of them?  I tell you it’s lack of gray matter.  They don’t cerebrate.  They don’t co-ordinate.  They don’t correlate.  They have no initiative, no creative faculty, no mental curiosity or reflexes or reactions.  They’re nothing but an unrelated bunch of instincts, intuitions, and impulses — human nonsense machines!  Why if the positions were reversed and we’d lost our wings, we’d have been trying to walk the first day.  We’d have been walking better than they by the end of a month.”

“I like it just as it is,” Pete said contentedly.  “They can’t fly and they don’t want to walk.  We always know where to find them.”

“Thank God we don’t have to consider that matter,” Billy concluded.  Apparently the walking impulse isn’t in them.  They might some time, by hook or crook, wheedle us into letting them fly a little.  But one thing is certain, they’ll never take a step on those useless feet.”

“Delicate, adorable, useless little feet of theirs,” Pete said softly as if he were reciting from an ode.

“There’s something moving along the trail, boys,” Frank said quietly.  “I keep getting glimpses of it through the bushes — white — blue — red and yellow.”

The others stopped, petrified.  They scowled, bending an intent gaze through the brilliant noon sunshine.

“Sure I get it!” Billy answered in a low tone.  “There’s something there.”

“I don’t.”  Honey shaded his eyes.

“Nor I.”  Pete squinted.

“Well, I don’t see anything,” Ralph said impatiently.  “But providing you fellows aren’t nuts, what the devil can it be?”

“It’s — " Billy began.  Then, “My God!” he ended.

Something white glimmered at the end of the trail.  It grew larger, bulked definitely, filled the opening.

“Julia!” Billy gasped.

“And she’s — she’s — .”  Honey could not seem to go on.

“Walking,” Billy concluded for him.

“And Peachy!” Ralph exclaimed.

“And why — and — and — — .”  It was Pete who stopped for breath this time.

“And she’s walking!” Ralph concluded for himself.

“And Clara!  And Lulu!  And Chiquita!” they greeted each one of the women as fast as they appeared.  And in between them came again and again their astonished “And walking!”

The five women were walking, and walking with no appearance of effort, swiftly, lightly, joyously.  Julia, at the head, moved with the frank, free, swinging gait of an Amazon.  Peachy seemed to flit along the ground; there was in her progress something of the dipping, curving grace of her flight.  Clara glided; her effect of motionless movement was almost obsidian.  Chiquita kept the slow, languid gait, both swaying and pulsating, of a Spanish woman.  Lulu trotted with the brisk, pleasing activity of a Morgan pony.

Their skirts had been shortened; they rippled away from slim ankles.  The swathing, wing-like draperies had disappeared; their slit sleeves fluttered away from bare shoulders.  The women did not pause.  They came on steadily, their eyes fixed on the group of men.