"Let us take that up another time, sir, if it is satisfactory to you,"
said Morhange, always admirably polite.
"This digression had only one point, sir: to show you that I do not
count you among these unworthy scholars. You are really eager to know
the origin of this name, Antinea, and that before knowing what kind
of woman it belongs to and her motives for holding you and this
gentleman as her prisoners."
I stared hard at the little old man. But he spoke with profound
seriousness.
"So much the better for you, my boy," I thought. "Otherwise it
wouldn't have taken me long to send you through the window to air your
ironies at your ease. The law of gravity ought not to be topsy-turvy
here at Ahaggar."
"You, no doubt, formulated several hypotheses when you first
encountered the name, Antinea," continued M. Le Mesge, imperturbable
under my fixed gaze, addressing himself to Morhange. "Would you object
to repeating them to me?"
"Not at all, sir," said Morhange.
And, very composedly, he enumerated the etymological suggestions I
have given previously.
The little man with the cherry-colored shirt front rubbed his hands.
"Very good," he admitted with an accent of intense jubilation.
"Amazingly good, at least for one with only the modicum of Greek that
you possess. But it is all none the less false, super-false."
"It is because I suspected as much that I put my question to you,"
said Morhange blandly.
"I will not keep you longer in suspense," said M. Le Mesge. "The word,
Antinea, is composed as follows: ti is nothing but a Tifinar
addition to an essentially Greek name. Ti is the Berber feminine
article. We have several examples of this combination. Take Tipasa,
the North African town. The name means the whole, from ti and from
[Greek: nap]. So, tinea signifies the new, from ti and from
[Greek: ea]."
"And the prefix, an?" queried Morhang.
"Is it possible, sir, that I have put myself to the trouble of talking
to you for a solid hour about the Critias with such trifling effect?
It is certain that the prefix an, alone, has no meaning. You will
understand that it has one, when I tell you that we have here a very
curious case of apocope. You must not read an; you must read atlan.
Atl has been lost, by apocope; an has survived. To sum up, Antinea
is composed in the following manner: [Greek: ti-nea--atl'An]. And its
meaning, the new Atlantis, is dazzlingly apparent from this
demonstration."
I looked at Morhange. His astonishment was without bounds. The Berber
prefix ti had literally stunned him.