{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_1695/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_1695","id":"gutenberg_1695","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1695","summary":null,"tags":["Allegories","Anarchists -- Fiction","Best Books Ever Listings","Category: Adventure","Category: British Literature","Category: Crime, Thrillers and Mystery","Category: Novels","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Detective and mystery stories","Fantasy fiction","London (England) -- Fiction","Police -- Fiction"],"text":"The Man Who Was Thursday\n\nA Nightmare\n\nby G. K. Chesterton\n\n\nContents\n\n A WILD, MAD, HILARIOUS AND PROFOUNDLY MOVING TALE\n THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY\n\n CHAPTER I. THE TWO POETS OF SAFFRON PARK\n CHAPTER II. THE SECRET OF GABRIEL SYME\n CHAPTER III. THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY\n CHAPTER IV. THE TALE OF A DETECTIVE\n CHAPTER V. THE FEAST OF FEAR\n CHAPTER VI. THE EXPOSURE\n CHAPTER VII. THE UNACCOUNTABLE CONDUCT OF PROFESSOR DE WORMS\n CHAPTER VIII. THE PROFESSOR EXPLAINS\n CHAPTER IX. THE MAN IN SPECTACLES\n CHAPTER X. THE DUEL\n CHAPTER XI. THE CRIMINALS CHASE THE POLICE\n CHAPTER XII. THE EARTH IN ANARCHY\n CHAPTER XIII. THE PURSUIT OF THE PRESIDENT\n CHAPTER XIV. THE SIX PHILOSOPHERS\n CHAPTER XV. THE ACCUSER\n\n\n\n\nA WILD, MAD, HILARIOUS AND PROFOUNDLY MOVING TALE\n\n\nIt is very difficult to classify THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY. It is\npossible to say that it is a gripping adventure story of murderous\ncriminals and brilliant policemen; but it was to be expected that the\nauthor of the Father Brown stories should tell a detective story like\nno-one else. On this level, therefore, THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY\nsucceeds superbly; if nothing else, it is a magnificent tour-de-force\nof suspense-writing.\n\nHowever, the reader will soon discover that it is much more than that.\nCarried along on the boisterous rush of the narrative by Chesterton\u2019s\nwonderful high-spirited style, he will soon see that he is being\ncarried into much deeper waters than he had planned on; and the totally\nunforeseeable denouement will prove for the modern reader, as it has\nfor thousands of others since 1908 when the book was first published,\nan inevitable and moving experience, as the investigators finally\ndiscover who Sunday is.\n\n\n\n\nTHE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY\nA NIGHTMARE\n\n\nTo Edmund Clerihew Bentley\n\nA cloud was on the mind of men, and wailing went the weather,\nYea, a sick cloud upon the soul when we were boys together.\nScience announced nonentity and art admired decay;\nThe world was old and ended: but you and I were gay;\nRound us in antic order their crippled vices came\u2014\nLust that had lost its laughter, fear that had lost its shame.\nLike the white lock of Whistler, that lit our aimless gloom,\nMen showed their own white feather as proudly as a plume.\nLife was a fly that faded, and death a drone that stung;\nThe world was very old indeed when you and I were young.\nThey twisted even decent sin to shapes not to be named:\nMen were ashamed of honour; but we were not ashamed.\nWeak if we were and foolish, not thus we failed, not thus;\nWhen that black Baal blocked the heavens he had no hymns from us\nChildren we were\u2014our forts of sand were even as weak as we,\nHigh as they went we piled them up to break that bitter sea.\nFools as we were in motley, all jangling and absurd,\nWhen all church bells were silent our cap and bells were heard.\n\nNot all unhelped we held the fort, our tiny flags unfurled;\nSome giants laboured in that cloud to lift it from the world.\nI find again the book we found, I feel the hour that flings\nFar out of fish-shaped Paumanok some cry of cleaner things;\nAnd the Green Carnation withered, as in forest fires that pass,\nRoared in the wind of all the world ten million leaves of grass;\nOr sane and sweet and sudden as a bird sings in the rain\u2014\nTruth out of Tusitala spoke and pleasure out of pain.\nYea, cool and clear and sudden as a bird sings in the grey,\nDunedin to Samoa spoke, and darkness unto day.\nBut we were young; we lived to see God break their bitter charms.\nGod and the good Republic come riding back in arms:\nWe have seen the City of Mansoul, even as it rocked, relieved\u2014\nBlessed are they who did not see, but being blind, believed.\n\nThis is a tale of those old fears, even of those emptied hells,\nAnd none but you shall understand the true thing that it tells\u2014\nOf what colossal gods of shame could cow men and yet crash,\nOf what huge devils hid the stars, yet fell at a pistol flash.\nThe doubts that were so plain to chase, so dreadful to withstand\u2014\nOh, who shall understand but you; yea, who shall understand?\nThe doubts that drove us through the night as we two talked amain,\nAnd day had broken on the streets e\u2019er it broke upon the brain.\nBetween us, by the peace of God, such truth can now be told;\nYea, there is strength in striking root and good in growing old.\nWe have found common things at last and marriage and a creed,\nAnd I may safely write it now, and you may safely read.\n\nG. K. C.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\nTHE TWO POETS OF SAFFRON PARK\n\n\nThe suburb of Saffron Park lay on the sunset side of London, as red and\nragged as a cloud of sunset. It was built of a bright brick throughout;\nits sky-line was fantastic, and even its ground plan was wild. It had\nbeen the outburst of a speculative builder, faintly tinged with art,\nwho called its architecture sometimes Elizabethan and sometimes Queen\nAnne, apparently under the impression that the two sovereigns were\nidentical. It was described with some justice as an artistic colony,\nthough it never in any definable way produced any art. But although its\npretensions to be an intellectual centre were a little vague, its\npretensions to be a pleasant place were quite indisputable. The\nstranger who looked for the first time at the quaint red houses could\nonly think how very oddly shaped the people must be who could fit in to\nthem. Nor when he met the people was he disappointed in this respect.\nThe place was not only pleasant, but perfect, if once he could regard\nit not as a deception but rather as a dream. Even if the people were\nnot \u201cartists,\u201d the whole was nevertheless artistic. That young man with\nthe long, auburn hair and the impudent face\u2014that young man was not\nreally a poet; but surely he was a poem. That old gentleman with the\nwild, white beard and the wild, white hat\u2014that venerable humbug was not\nreally a philosopher; but at least he was the cause of philosophy in\nothers. That scientific gentleman with the bald, egg-like head and the\nbare, bird-like neck had no real right to the airs of science that he\nassumed. He had not discovered anything new in biology; but what\nbiological creature could he have discovered more singular than\nhimself? Thus, and thus only, the whole place had properly to be\nregarded; it had to be considered not so much as a workshop for\nartists, but as a frail but finished work of art. A man who stepped\ninto its social atmosphere felt as if he had stepped into a written\ncomedy.\n\nMore especially this attractive unreality fell upon it about nightfall,\nwhen the extravagant roofs were dark against the afterglow and the\nwhole insane village seemed as separate as a drifting cloud. This again\nwas more strongly true of the many nights of local festivity, when the\nlittle gardens were often illuminated, and the big Chinese lanterns\nglowed in the dwarfish trees like some fierce and monstrous fruit. And\nthis was strongest of all on one particular evening, still vaguely\nremembered in the locality, of which the auburn-haired poet was the\nhero. It was not by any means the only evening of which he was the\nhero. On many nights those passing by his little back garden might hear\nhis high, didactic voice laying down the law to men and particularly to\nwomen. The attitude of women in such cases was indeed one of the\nparadoxes of the place. Most of the women were of the kind vaguely\ncalled emancipated, and professed some protest against male supremacy.\nYet these new women would always pay to a man the extravagant\ncompliment which no ordinary woman ever pays to him, that of listening\nwhile he is talking. And Mr. Lucian Gregory, the red-haired poet, was\nreally (in some sense) a man worth listening to, even if one only\nlaughed at the end of it. He put the old cant of the lawlessness of art\nand the art of lawlessness with a certain impudent freshness which gave\nat least a momentary pleasure. He was helped in some degree by the\narresting oddity of his appearance, which he worked, as the phrase\ngoes, for all it was worth. His dark red hair parted in the middle was\nliterally like a woman\u2019s, and curved into the slow curls of a virgin in\na pre-Raphaelite picture. From within this almost saintly oval,\nhowever, his face projected suddenly broad and brutal, the chin carried\nforward with a look of cockney contempt. This combination at once\ntickled and terrified the nerves of a neurotic population. He seemed\nlike a walking blasphemy, a blend of the angel and the ape.\n\nThis particular evening, if it is remembered for nothing else, will be\nremembered in that place for its strange sunset. It looked like the end\nof the world. All the heaven seemed covered with a quite vivid and\npalpable plumage; you could only say that the sky was full of feathers,\nand of feathers that almost brushed the face. Across the great part of\nthe dome they were grey, with the strangest tints of violet and mauve\nand an unnatural pink or pale green; but towards the west the whole\ngrew past description, transparent and passionate, and the last red-hot\nplumes of it covered up the sun like something too good to be seen. The\nwhole was so close about the earth, as to express nothing but a violent\nsecrecy. The very empyrean seemed to be a secret. It expressed that\nsplendid smallness which is the soul of local patriotism. The very sky\nseemed small.\n\nI say that there are some inhabitants who may remember the evening if\nonly by that oppressive sky. There are others who may remember it\nbecause it marked the first appearance in the place of the second poet\nof Saffron Park. For a long time the red-haired revolutionary had\nreigned without a rival; it was upon the night of the sunset that his\nsolitude suddenly ended. The new poet, who introduced himself by the\nname of Gabriel Syme was a very mild-looking mortal, with a fair,\npointed beard and faint, yellow hair. But an impression grew that he\nwas less meek than he looked. He signalised his entrance by differing\nwith the established poet, Gregory, upon the whole nature of poetry. He\nsaid that he (Syme) was poet of law, a poet of order; nay, he said he\nwas a poet of respectability. So all the Saffron Parkers looked at him\nas if he had that moment fallen out of that impossible sky.\n\nIn fact, Mr. Lucian Gregory, the anarchic poet, connected the two\nevents.\n\n\u201cIt may well be,\u201d he said, in his sudden lyrical manner, \u201cit may well\nbe on such a night of clouds and cruel colours that there is brought\nforth upon the earth such a portent as a respectable poet. You say you\nare a poet of law; I say you are a contradiction in terms. I only\nwonder there were not comets and earthquakes on the night you appeared\nin this garden.\u201d\n\nThe man with the meek blue eyes and the pale, pointed beard endured\nthese thunders with a certain submissive solemnity. The third party of\nthe group, Gregory\u2019s sister Rosamond, who had her brother\u2019s braids of\nred hair, but a kindlier face underneath them, laughed with such\nmixture of admiration and disapproval as she gave commonly to the\nfamily oracle.\n\nGregory resumed in high oratorical good humour.\n\n\u201cAn artist is identical with an anarchist,\u201d he cried. \u201cYou might\ntranspose the words anywhere. An anarchist is an artist. The man who\nthrows a bomb is an artist, because he prefers a great moment to\neverything. He sees how much more valuable is one burst of blazing\nlight, one peal of perfect thunder, than the mere common bodies of a\nfew shapeless policemen. An artist disregards all governments,\nabolishes all conventions. The poet delights in disorder only. If it\nwere not so, the most poetical thing in the world would be the\nUnderground Railway.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo it is,\u201d said Mr. Syme.\n\n\u201cNonsense!\u201d said Gregory, who was very rational when anyone else\nattempted paradox. \u201cWhy do all the clerks and navvies in the railway\ntrains look so sad and tired, so very sad and tired? I will tell you.\nIt is because they know that the train is going right. It is because\nthey know that whatever place they have taken a ticket for that place\nthey will reach. It is because after they have passed Sloane Square\nthey know that the next station must be Victoria, and nothing but\nVictoria. Oh, their wild rapture! oh, their eyes like stars and their\nsouls again in Eden, if the next station were unaccountably Baker\nStreet!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is you who are unpoetical,\u201d replied the poet Syme. \u201cIf what you say\nof clerks is true, they can only be as prosaic as your poetry. The\nrare, strange thing is to hit the mark; the gross, obvious thing is to\nmiss it. We feel it is epical when man with one wild arrow strikes a\ndistant bird. Is it not also epical when man with one wild engine\nstrikes a distant station? Chaos is dull; because in chaos the train\nmight indeed go anywhere, to Baker Street or to Bagdad. But man is a\nmagician, and his whole magic is in this, that he does say Victoria,\nand lo! it is Victoria. No, take your books of mere poetry and prose;\nlet me read a time table, with tears of pride. Take your Byron, who\ncommemorates the defeats of man; give me Bradshaw, who commemorates his\nvictories. Give me Bradshaw, I say!\u201d\n\n\u201cMust you go?\u201d inquired Gregory sarcastically.\n\n\u201cI tell you,\u201d went on Syme with passion, \u201cthat every time a train comes\nin I feel that it has broken past batteries of besiegers, and that man\nhas won a battle against chaos. You say contemptuously that when one\nhas left Sloane Square one must come to Victoria. I say that one might\ndo a thousand things instead, and that whenever I really come there I\nhave the sense of hairbreadth escape. And when I hear the guard shout\nout the word \u2018Victoria,\u2019 it is not an unmeaning word. It is to me the\ncry of a herald announcing conquest. It is to me indeed \u2018Victoria\u2019; it\nis the victory of Adam.\u201d\n\nGregory wagged his heavy, red head with a slow and sad smile.\n\n\u201cAnd even then,\u201d he said, \u201cwe poets always ask the question, \u2018And what\nis Victoria now that you have got there?\u2019 You think Victoria is like\nthe New Jerusalem. We know that the New Jerusalem will only be like\nVictoria. Yes, the poet will be discontented even in the streets of\nheaven. The poet is always in revolt.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere again,\u201d said Syme irritably, \u201cwhat is there poetical about being\nin revolt? You might as well say that it is poetical to be sea-sick.\nBeing sick is a revolt. Both being sick and being rebellious may be the\nwholesome thing on certain desperate occasions; but I\u2019m hanged if I can\nsee why they are poetical. Revolt in the abstract is\u2014revolting. It\u2019s\nmere vomiting.\u201d\n\nThe girl winced for a flash at the unpleasant word, but Syme was too\nhot to heed her.\n\n\u201cIt is things going right,\u201d he cried, \u201cthat is poetical! Our\ndigestions, for instance, going sacredly and silently right, that is\nthe foundation of all poetry. Yes, the most poetical thing, more\npoetical than the flowers, more poetical than the stars\u2014the most\npoetical thing in the world is not being sick.\u201d\n\n\u201cReally,\u201d said Gregory superciliously, \u201cthe examples you choose\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cI beg your pardon,\u201d said Syme grimly, \u201cI forgot we had abolished all\nconventions.\u201d\n\nFor the first time a red patch appeared on Gregory\u2019s forehead.\n\n\u201cYou don\u2019t expect me,\u201d he said, \u201cto revolutionise society on this\nlawn?\u201d\n\nSyme looked straight into his eyes and smiled sweetly.\n\n\u201cNo, I don\u2019t,\u201d he said; \u201cbut I suppose that if you were serious about\nyour anarchism, that is exactly what you would do.\u201d\n\nGregory\u2019s big bull\u2019s eyes blinked suddenly like those of an angry lion,\nand one could almost fancy that his red mane rose.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t you think, then,\u201d he said in a dangerous voice, \u201cthat I am\nserious about my anarchism?\u201d\n\n\u201cI beg your pardon?\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cAm I not serious about my anarchism?\u201d cried Gregory, with knotted\nfists.\n\n\u201cMy dear fellow!\u201d said Syme, and strolled away.\n\nWith surprise, but with a curious pleasure, he found Rosamond Gregory\nstill in his company.\n\n\u201cMr. Syme,\u201d she said, \u201cdo the people who talk like you and my brother\noften mean what they say? Do you mean what you say now?\u201d\n\nSyme smiled.\n\n\u201cDo you?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d asked the girl, with grave eyes.\n\n\u201cMy dear Miss Gregory,\u201d said Syme gently, \u201cthere are many kinds of\nsincerity and insincerity. When you say \u2018thank you\u2019 for the salt, do\nyou mean what you say? No. When you say \u2018the world is round,\u2019 do you\nmean what you say? No. It is true, but you don\u2019t mean it. Now,\nsometimes a man like your brother really finds a thing he does mean. It\nmay be only a half-truth, quarter-truth, tenth-truth; but then he says\nmore than he means\u2014from sheer force of meaning it.\u201d\n\nShe was looking at him from under level brows; her face was grave and\nopen, and there had fallen upon it the shadow of that unreasoning\nresponsibility which is at the bottom of the most frivolous woman, the\nmaternal watch which is as old as the world.\n\n\u201cIs he really an anarchist, then?\u201d she asked.\n\n\u201cOnly in that sense I speak of,\u201d replied Syme; \u201cor if you prefer it, in\nthat nonsense.\u201d\n\nShe drew her broad brows together and said abruptly\u2014\n\n\u201cHe wouldn\u2019t really use\u2014bombs or that sort of thing?\u201d\n\nSyme broke into a great laugh, that seemed too large for his slight and\nsomewhat dandified figure.\n\n\u201cGood Lord, no!\u201d he said, \u201cthat has to be done anonymously.\u201d\n\nAnd at that the corners of her own mouth broke into a smile, and she\nthought with a simultaneous pleasure of Gregory\u2019s absurdity and of his\nsafety.\n\nSyme strolled with her to a seat in the corner of the garden, and\ncontinued to pour out his opinions. For he was a sincere man, and in\nspite of his superficial airs and graces, at root a humble one. And it\nis always the humble man who talks too much; the proud man watches\nhimself too closely. He defended respectability with violence and\nexaggeration. He grew passionate in his praise of tidiness and\npropriety. All the time there was a smell of lilac all round him. Once\nhe heard very faintly in some distant street a barrel-organ begin to\nplay, and it seemed to him that his heroic words were moving to a tiny\ntune from under or beyond the world.\n\nHe stared and talked at the girl\u2019s red hair and amused face for what\nseemed to be a few minutes; and then, feeling that the groups in such a\nplace should mix, rose to his feet. To his astonishment, he discovered\nthe whole garden empty. Everyone had gone long ago, and he went himself\nwith a rather hurried apology. He left with a sense of champagne in his\nhead, which he could not afterwards explain. In the wild events which\nwere to follow this girl had no part at all; he never saw her again\nuntil all his tale was over. And yet, in some indescribable way, she\nkept recurring like a motive in music through all his mad adventures\nafterwards, and the glory of her strange hair ran like a red thread\nthrough those dark and ill-drawn tapestries of the night. For what\nfollowed was so improbable, that it might well have been a dream.\n\nWhen Syme went out into the starlit street, he found it for the moment\nempty. Then he realised (in some odd way) that the silence was rather a\nliving silence than a dead one. Directly outside the door stood a\nstreet lamp, whose gleam gilded the leaves of the tree that bent out\nover the fence behind him. About a foot from the lamp-post stood a\nfigure almost as rigid and motionless as the lamp-post itself. The tall\nhat and long frock coat were black; the face, in an abrupt shadow, was\nalmost as dark. Only a fringe of fiery hair against the light, and also\nsomething aggressive in the attitude, proclaimed that it was the poet\nGregory. He had something of the look of a masked bravo waiting sword\nin hand for his foe.\n\nHe made a sort of doubtful salute, which Syme somewhat more formally\nreturned.\n\n\u201cI was waiting for you,\u201d said Gregory. \u201cMight I have a moment\u2019s\nconversation?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertainly. About what?\u201d asked Syme in a sort of weak wonder.\n\nGregory struck out with his stick at the lamp-post, and then at the\ntree.\n\n\u201cAbout _this_ and _this_,\u201d he cried; \u201cabout order and anarchy. There is\nyour precious order, that lean, iron lamp, ugly and barren; and there\nis anarchy, rich, living, reproducing itself\u2014there is anarchy, splendid\nin green and gold.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll the same,\u201d replied Syme patiently, \u201cjust at present you only see\nthe tree by the light of the lamp. I wonder when you would ever see the\nlamp by the light of the tree.\u201d Then after a pause he said, \u201cBut may I\nask if you have been standing out here in the dark only to resume our\nlittle argument?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d cried out Gregory, in a voice that rang down the street, \u201cI did\nnot stand here to resume our argument, but to end it for ever.\u201d\n\nThe silence fell again, and Syme, though he understood nothing,\nlistened instinctively for something serious. Gregory began in a smooth\nvoice and with a rather bewildering smile.\n\n\u201cMr. Syme,\u201d he said, \u201cthis evening you succeeded in doing something\nrather remarkable. You did something to me that no man born of woman\nhas ever succeeded in doing before.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed!\u201d\n\n\u201cNow I remember,\u201d resumed Gregory reflectively, \u201cone other person\nsucceeded in doing it. The captain of a penny steamer (if I remember\ncorrectly) at Southend. You have irritated me.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am very sorry,\u201d replied Syme with gravity.\n\n\u201cI am afraid my fury and your insult are too shocking to be wiped out\neven with an apology,\u201d said Gregory very calmly. \u201cNo duel could wipe it\nout. If I struck you dead I could not wipe it out. There is only one\nway by which that insult can be erased, and that way I choose. I am\ngoing, at the possible sacrifice of my life and honour, to _prove_ to\nyou that you were wrong in what you said.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn what I said?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou said I was not serious about being an anarchist.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere are degrees of seriousness,\u201d replied Syme. \u201cI have never doubted\nthat you were perfectly sincere in this sense, that you thought what\nyou said well worth saying, that you thought a paradox might wake men\nup to a neglected truth.\u201d\n\nGregory stared at him steadily and painfully.\n\n\u201cAnd in no other sense,\u201d he asked, \u201cyou think me serious? You think me\na _fl\u00e2neur_ who lets fall occasional truths. You do not think that in a\ndeeper, a more deadly sense, I am serious.\u201d\n\nSyme struck his stick violently on the stones of the road.\n\n\u201cSerious!\u201d he cried. \u201cGood Lord! is this street serious? Are these\ndamned Chinese lanterns serious? Is the whole caboodle serious? One\ncomes here and talks a pack of bosh, and perhaps some sense as well,\nbut I should think very little of a man who didn\u2019t keep something in\nthe background of his life that was more serious than all this\ntalking\u2014something more serious, whether it was religion or only drink.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery well,\u201d said Gregory, his face darkening, \u201cyou shall see something\nmore serious than either drink or religion.\u201d\n\nSyme stood waiting with his usual air of mildness until Gregory again\nopened his lips.\n\n\u201cYou spoke just now of having a religion. Is it really true that you\nhave one?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh,\u201d said Syme with a beaming smile, \u201cwe are all Catholics now.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen may I ask you to swear by whatever gods or saints your religion\ninvolves that you will not reveal what I am now going to tell you to\nany son of Adam, and especially not to the police? Will you swear that!\nIf you will take upon yourself this awful abnegation if you will\nconsent to burden your soul with a vow that you should never make and a\nknowledge you should never dream about, I will promise you in return\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cYou will promise me in return?\u201d inquired Syme, as the other paused.\n\n\u201cI will promise you a very entertaining evening.\u201d Syme suddenly took\noff his hat.\n\n\u201cYour offer,\u201d he said, \u201cis far too idiotic to be declined. You say that\na poet is always an anarchist. I disagree; but I hope at least that he\nis always a sportsman. Permit me, here and now, to swear as a\nChristian, and promise as a good comrade and a fellow-artist, that I\nwill not report anything of this, whatever it is, to the police. And\nnow, in the name of Colney Hatch, what is it?\u201d\n\n\u201cI think,\u201d said Gregory, with placid irrelevancy, \u201cthat we will call a\ncab.\u201d\n\nHe gave two long whistles, and a hansom came rattling down the road.\nThe two got into it in silence. Gregory gave through the trap the\naddress of an obscure public-house on the Chiswick bank of the river.\nThe cab whisked itself away again, and in it these two fantastics\nquitted their fantastic town.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\nTHE SECRET OF GABRIEL SYME\n\n\nThe cab pulled up before a particularly dreary and greasy beershop,\ninto which Gregory rapidly conducted his companion. They seated\nthemselves in a close and dim sort of bar-parlour, at a stained wooden\ntable with one wooden leg. The room was so small and dark, that very\nlittle could be seen of the attendant who was summoned, beyond a vague\nand dark impression of something bulky and bearded.\n\n\u201cWill you take a little supper?\u201d asked Gregory politely. \u201cThe _p\u00e2t\u00e9 de\nfoie gras_ is not good here, but I can recommend the game.\u201d\n\nSyme received the remark with stolidity, imagining it to be a joke.\nAccepting the vein of humour, he said, with a well-bred indifference\u2014\n\n\u201cOh, bring me some lobster mayonnaise.\u201d\n\nTo his indescribable astonishment, the man only said \u201cCertainly, sir!\u201d\nand went away apparently to get it.\n\n\u201cWhat will you drink?\u201d resumed Gregory, with the same careless yet\napologetic air. \u201cI shall only have a _cr\u00eame de menthe_ myself; I have\ndined. But the champagne can really be trusted. Do let me start you\nwith a half-bottle of Pommery at least?\u201d\n\n\u201cThank you!\u201d said the motionless Syme. \u201cYou are very good.\u201d\n\nHis further attempts at conversation, somewhat disorganised in\nthemselves, were cut short finally as by a thunderbolt by the actual\nappearance of the lobster. Syme tasted it, and found it particularly\ngood. Then he suddenly began to eat with great rapidity and appetite.\n\n\u201cExcuse me if I enjoy myself rather obviously!\u201d he said to Gregory,\nsmiling. \u201cI don\u2019t often have the luck to have a dream like this. It is\nnew to me for a nightmare to lead to a lobster. It is commonly the\nother way.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are not asleep, I assure you,\u201d said Gregory. \u201cYou are, on the\ncontrary, close to the most actual and rousing moment of your\nexistence. Ah, here comes your champagne! I admit that there may be a\nslight disproportion, let us say, between the inner arrangements of\nthis excellent hotel and its simple and unpretentious exterior. But\nthat is all our modesty. We are the most modest men that ever lived on\nearth.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd who are _we?_\u201d asked Syme, emptying his champagne glass.\n\n\u201cIt is quite simple,\u201d replied Gregory. \u201c_We_ are the serious\nanarchists, in whom you do not believe.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d said Syme shortly. \u201cYou do yourselves well in drinks.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, we are serious about everything,\u201d answered Gregory.\n\nThen after a pause he added\u2014\n\n\u201cIf in a few moments this table begins to turn round a little, don\u2019t\nput it down to your inroads into the champagne. I don\u2019t wish you to do\nyourself an injustice.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, if I am not drunk, I am mad,\u201d replied Syme with perfect calm;\n\u201cbut I trust I can behave like a gentleman in either condition. May I\nsmoke?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertainly!\u201d said Gregory, producing a cigar-case. \u201cTry one of mine.\u201d\n\nSyme took the cigar, clipped the end off with a cigar-cutter out of his\nwaistcoat pocket, put it in his mouth, lit it slowly, and let out a\nlong cloud of smoke. It is not a little to his credit that he performed\nthese rites with so much composure, for almost before he had begun them\nthe table at which he sat had begun to revolve, first slowly, and then\nrapidly, as if at an insane seance.\n\n\u201cYou must not mind it,\u201d said Gregory; \u201cit\u2019s a kind of screw.\u201d\n\n\u201cQuite so,\u201d said Syme placidly, \u201ca kind of screw. How simple that is!\u201d\n\nThe next moment the smoke of his cigar, which had been wavering across\nthe room in snaky twists, went straight up as if from a factory\nchimney, and the two, with their chairs and table, shot down through\nthe floor as if the earth had swallowed them. They went rattling down a\nkind of roaring chimney as rapidly as a lift cut loose, and they came\nwith an abrupt bump to the bottom. But when Gregory threw open a pair\nof doors and let in a red subterranean light, Syme was still smoking\nwith one leg thrown over the other, and had not turned a yellow hair.\n\nGregory led him down a low, vaulted passage, at the end of which was\nthe red light. It was an enormous crimson lantern, nearly as big as a\nfireplace, fixed over a small but heavy iron door. In the door there\nwas a sort of hatchway or grating, and on this Gregory struck five\ntimes. A heavy voice with a foreign accent asked him who he was. To\nthis he gave the more or less unexpected reply, \u201cMr. Joseph\nChamberlain.\u201d The heavy hinges began to move; it was obviously some\nkind of password.\n\nInside the doorway the passage gleamed as if it were lined with a\nnetwork of steel. On a second glance, Syme saw that the glittering\npattern was really made up of ranks and ranks of rifles and revolvers,\nclosely packed or interlocked.\n\n\u201cI must ask you to forgive me all these formalities,\u201d said Gregory; \u201cwe\nhave to be very strict here.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, don\u2019t apologise,\u201d said Syme. \u201cI know your passion for law and\norder,\u201d and he stepped into the passage lined with the steel weapons.\nWith his long, fair hair and rather foppish frock-coat, he looked a\nsingularly frail and fanciful figure as he walked down that shining\navenue of death.\n\nThey passed through several such passages, and came out at last into a\nqueer steel chamber with curved walls, almost spherical in shape, but\npresenting, with its tiers of benches, something of the appearance of a\nscientific lecture-theatre. There were no rifles or pistols in this\napartment, but round the walls of it were hung more dubious and\ndreadful shapes, things that looked like the bulbs of iron plants, or\nthe eggs of iron birds. They were bombs, and the very room itself\nseemed like the inside of a bomb. Syme knocked his cigar ash off\nagainst the wall, and went in.\n\n\u201cAnd now, my dear Mr. Syme,\u201d said Gregory, throwing himself in an\nexpansive manner on the bench under the largest bomb, \u201cnow we are quite\ncosy, so let us talk properly. Now no human words can give you any\nnotion of why I brought you here. It was one of those quite arbitrary\nemotions, like jumping off a cliff or falling in love. Suffice it to\nsay that you were an inexpressibly irritating fellow, and, to do you\njustice, you are still. I would break twenty oaths of secrecy for the\npleasure of taking you down a peg. That way you have of lighting a\ncigar would make a priest break the seal of confession. Well, you said\nthat you were quite certain I was not a serious anarchist. Does this\nplace strike you as being serious?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt does seem to have a moral under all its gaiety,\u201d assented Syme;\n\u201cbut may I ask you two questions? You need not fear to give me\ninformation, because, as you remember, you very wisely extorted from me\na promise not to tell the police, a promise I shall certainly keep. So\nit is in mere curiosity that I make my queries. First of all, what is\nit really all about? What is it you object to? You want to abolish\nGovernment?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo abolish God!\u201d said Gregory, opening the eyes of a fanatic. \u201cWe do\nnot only want to upset a few despotisms and police regulations; that\nsort of anarchism does exist, but it is a mere branch of the\nNonconformists. We dig deeper and we blow you higher. We wish to deny\nall those arbitrary distinctions of vice and virtue, honour and\ntreachery, upon which mere rebels base themselves. The silly\nsentimentalists of the French Revolution talked of the Rights of Man!\nWe hate Rights as we hate Wrongs. We have abolished Right and Wrong.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd Right and Left,\u201d said Syme with a simple eagerness, \u201cI hope you\nwill abolish them too. They are much more troublesome to me.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou spoke of a second question,\u201d snapped Gregory.\n\n\u201cWith pleasure,\u201d resumed Syme. \u201cIn all your present acts and\nsurroundings there is a scientific attempt at secrecy. I have an aunt\nwho lived over a shop, but this is the first time I have found people\nliving from preference under a public-house. You have a heavy iron\ndoor. You cannot pass it without submitting to the humiliation of\ncalling yourself Mr. Chamberlain. You surround yourself with steel\ninstruments which make the place, if I may say so, more impressive than\nhomelike. May I ask why, after taking all this trouble to barricade\nyourselves in the bowels of the earth, you then parade your whole\nsecret by talking about anarchism to every silly woman in Saffron\nPark?\u201d\n\nGregory smiled.\n\n\u201cThe answer is simple,\u201d he said. \u201cI told you I was a serious anarchist,\nand you did not believe me. Nor do _they_ believe me. Unless I took\nthem into this infernal room they would not believe me.\u201d\n\nSyme smoked thoughtfully, and looked at him with interest. Gregory went\non.\n\n\u201cThe history of the thing might amuse you,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen first I\nbecame one of the New Anarchists I tried all kinds of respectable\ndisguises. I dressed up as a bishop. I read up all about bishops in our\nanarchist pamphlets, in _Superstition the Vampire_ and _Priests of\nPrey_. I certainly understood from them that bishops are strange and\nterrible old men keeping a cruel secret from mankind. I was\nmisinformed. When on my first appearing in episcopal gaiters in a\ndrawing-room I cried out in a voice of thunder, \u2018Down! down!\npresumptuous human reason!\u2019 they found out in some way that I was not a\nbishop at all. I was nabbed at once. Then I made up as a millionaire;\nbut I defended Capital with so much intelligence that a fool could see\nthat I was quite poor. Then I tried being a major. Now I am a\nhumanitarian myself, but I have, I hope, enough intellectual breadth to\nunderstand the position of those who, like Nietzsche, admire\nviolence\u2014the proud, mad war of Nature and all that, you know. I threw\nmyself into the major. I drew my sword and waved it constantly. I\ncalled out \u2018Blood!\u2019 abstractedly, like a man calling for wine. I often\nsaid, \u2018Let the weak perish; it is the Law.\u2019 Well, well, it seems majors\ndon\u2019t do this. I was nabbed again. At last I went in despair to the\nPresident of the Central Anarchist Council, who is the greatest man in\nEurope.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is his name?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cYou would not know it,\u201d answered Gregory. \u201cThat is his greatness.\nCaesar and Napoleon put all their genius into being heard of, and they\n_were_ heard of. He puts all his genius into not being heard of, and he\nis not heard of. But you cannot be for five minutes in the room with\nhim without feeling that Caesar and Napoleon would have been children\nin his hands.\u201d\n\nHe was silent and even pale for a moment, and then resumed\u2014\n\n\u201cBut whenever he gives advice it is always something as startling as an\nepigram, and yet as practical as the Bank of England. I said to him,\n\u2018What disguise will hide me from the world? What can I find more\nrespectable than bishops and majors?\u2019 He looked at me with his large\nbut indecipherable face. \u2018You want a safe disguise, do you? You want a\ndress which will guarantee you harmless; a dress in which no one would\never look for a bomb?\u2019 I nodded. He suddenly lifted his lion\u2019s voice.\n\u2018Why, then, dress up as an _anarchist_, you fool!\u2019 he roared so that\nthe room shook. \u2018Nobody will ever expect you to do anything dangerous\nthen.\u2019 And he turned his broad back on me without another word. I took\nhis advice, and have never regretted it. I preached blood and murder to\nthose women day and night, and\u2014by God!\u2014they would let me wheel their\nperambulators.\u201d\n\nSyme sat watching him with some respect in his large, blue eyes.\n\n\u201cYou took me in,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is really a smart dodge.\u201d\n\nThen after a pause he added\u2014\n\n\u201cWhat do you call this tremendous President of yours?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe generally call him Sunday,\u201d replied Gregory with simplicity. \u201cYou\nsee, there are seven members of the Central Anarchist Council, and they\nare named after days of the week. He is called Sunday, by some of his\nadmirers Bloody Sunday. It is curious you should mention the matter,\nbecause the very night you have dropped in (if I may so express it) is\nthe night on which our London branch, which assembles in this room, has\nto elect its own deputy to fill a vacancy in the Council. The gentleman\nwho has for some time past played, with propriety and general applause,\nthe difficult part of Thursday, has died quite suddenly. Consequently,\nwe have called a meeting this very evening to elect a successor.\u201d\n\nHe got to his feet and strolled across the room with a sort of smiling\nembarrassment.\n\n\u201cI feel somehow as if you were my mother, Syme,\u201d he continued casually.\n\u201cI feel that I can confide anything to you, as you have promised to\ntell nobody. In fact, I will confide to you something that I would not\nsay in so many words to the anarchists who will be coming to the room\nin about ten minutes. We shall, of course, go through a form of\nelection; but I don\u2019t mind telling you that it is practically certain\nwhat the result will be.\u201d He looked down for a moment modestly. \u201cIt is\nalmost a settled thing that I am to be Thursday.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear fellow.\u201d said Syme heartily, \u201cI congratulate you. A great\ncareer!\u201d\n\nGregory smiled in deprecation, and walked across the room, talking\nrapidly.\n\n\u201cAs a matter of fact, everything is ready for me on this table,\u201d he\nsaid, \u201cand the ceremony will probably be the shortest possible.\u201d\n\nSyme also strolled across to the table, and found lying across it a\nwalking-stick, which turned out on examination to be a sword-stick, a\nlarge Colt\u2019s revolver, a sandwich case, and a formidable flask of\nbrandy. Over the chair, beside the table, was thrown a heavy-looking\ncape or cloak.\n\n\u201cI have only to get the form of election finished,\u201d continued Gregory\nwith animation, \u201cthen I snatch up this cloak and stick, stuff these\nother things into my pocket, step out of a door in this cavern, which\nopens on the river, where there is a steam-tug already waiting for me,\nand then\u2014then\u2014oh, the wild joy of being Thursday!\u201d And he clasped his\nhands.\n\nSyme, who had sat down once more with his usual insolent languor, got\nto his feet with an unusual air of hesitation.\n\n\u201cWhy is it,\u201d he asked vaguely, \u201cthat I think you are quite a decent\nfellow? Why do I positively like you, Gregory?\u201d He paused a moment, and\nthen added with a sort of fresh curiosity, \u201cIs it because you are such\nan ass?\u201d\n\nThere was a thoughtful silence again, and then he cried out\u2014\n\n\u201cWell, damn it all! this is the funniest situation I have ever been in\nin my life, and I am going to act accordingly. Gregory, I gave you a\npromise before I came into this place. That promise I would keep under\nred-hot pincers. Would you give me, for my own safety, a little promise\nof the same kind?\u201d\n\n\u201cA promise?\u201d asked Gregory, wondering.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme very seriously, \u201ca promise. I swore before God that I\nwould not tell your secret to the police. Will you swear by Humanity,\nor whatever beastly thing you believe in, that you will not tell my\nsecret to the anarchists?\u201d\n\n\u201cYour secret?\u201d asked the staring Gregory. \u201cHave you got a secret?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI have a secret.\u201d Then after a pause, \u201cWill you\nswear?\u201d\n\nGregory glared at him gravely for a few moments, and then said\nabruptly\u2014\n\n\u201cYou must have bewitched me, but I feel a furious curiosity about you.\nYes, I will swear not to tell the anarchists anything you tell me. But\nlook sharp, for they will be here in a couple of minutes.\u201d\n\nSyme rose slowly to his feet and thrust his long, white hands into his\nlong, grey trousers\u2019 pockets. Almost as he did so there came five\nknocks on the outer grating, proclaiming the arrival of the first of\nthe conspirators.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme slowly, \u201cI don\u2019t know how to tell you the truth more\nshortly than by saying that your expedient of dressing up as an aimless\npoet is not confined to you or your President. We have known the dodge\nfor some time at Scotland Yard.\u201d\n\nGregory tried to spring up straight, but he swayed thrice.\n\n\u201cWhat do you say?\u201d he asked in an inhuman voice.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme simply, \u201cI am a police detective. But I think I hear\nyour friends coming.\u201d\n\nFrom the doorway there came a murmur of \u201cMr. Joseph Chamberlain.\u201d It\nwas repeated twice and thrice, and then thirty times, and the crowd of\nJoseph Chamberlains (a solemn thought) could be heard trampling down\nthe corridor.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\nTHE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY\n\n\nBefore one of the fresh faces could appear at the doorway, Gregory\u2019s\nstunned surprise had fallen from him. He was beside the table with a\nbound, and a noise in his throat like a wild beast. He caught up the\nColt\u2019s revolver and took aim at Syme. Syme did not flinch, but he put\nup a pale and polite hand.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t be such a silly man,\u201d he said, with the effeminate dignity of a\ncurate. \u201cDon\u2019t you see it\u2019s not necessary? Don\u2019t you see that we\u2019re\nboth in the same boat? Yes, and jolly sea-sick.\u201d\n\nGregory could not speak, but he could not fire either, and he looked\nhis question.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t you see we\u2019ve checkmated each other?\u201d cried Syme. \u201cI can\u2019t tell\nthe police you are an anarchist. You can\u2019t tell the anarchists I\u2019m a\npoliceman. I can only watch you, knowing what you are; you can only\nwatch me, knowing what I am. In short, it\u2019s a lonely, intellectual\nduel, my head against yours. I\u2019m a policeman deprived of the help of\nthe police. You, my poor fellow, are an anarchist deprived of the help\nof that law and organisation which is so essential to anarchy. The one\nsolitary difference is in your favour. You are not surrounded by\ninquisitive policemen; I am surrounded by inquisitive anarchists. I\ncannot betray you, but I might betray myself. Come, come! wait and see\nme betray myself. I shall do it so nicely.\u201d\n\nGregory put the pistol slowly down, still staring at Syme as if he were\na sea-monster.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t believe in immortality,\u201d he said at last, \u201cbut if, after all\nthis, you were to break your word, God would make a hell only for you,\nto howl in for ever.\u201d\n\n\u201cI shall not break my word,\u201d said Syme sternly, \u201cnor will you break\nyours. Here are your friends.\u201d\n\nThe mass of the anarchists entered the room heavily, with a slouching\nand somewhat weary gait; but one little man, with a black beard and\nglasses\u2014a man somewhat of the type of Mr. Tim Healy\u2014detached himself,\nand bustled forward with some papers in his hand.\n\n\u201cComrade Gregory,\u201d he said, \u201cI suppose this man is a delegate?\u201d\n\nGregory, taken by surprise, looked down and muttered the name of Syme;\nbut Syme replied almost pertly\u2014\n\n\u201cI am glad to see that your gate is well enough guarded to make it hard\nfor anyone to be here who was not a delegate.\u201d\n\nThe brow of the little man with the black beard was, however, still\ncontracted with something like suspicion.\n\n\u201cWhat branch do you represent?\u201d he asked sharply.\n\n\u201cI should hardly call it a branch,\u201d said Syme, laughing; \u201cI should call\nit at the very least a root.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe fact is,\u201d said Syme serenely, \u201cthe truth is I am a Sabbatarian. I\nhave been specially sent here to see that you show a due observance of\nSunday.\u201d\n\nThe little man dropped one of his papers, and a flicker of fear went\nover all the faces of the group. Evidently the awful President, whose\nname was Sunday, did sometimes send down such irregular ambassadors to\nsuch branch meetings.\n\n\u201cWell, comrade,\u201d said the man with the papers after a pause, \u201cI suppose\nwe\u2019d better give you a seat in the meeting?\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you ask my advice as a friend,\u201d said Syme with severe benevolence,\n\u201cI think you\u2019d better.\u201d\n\nWhen Gregory heard the dangerous dialogue end, with a sudden safety for\nhis rival, he rose abruptly and paced the floor in painful thought. He\nwas, indeed, in an agony of diplomacy. It was clear that Syme\u2019s\ninspired impudence was likely to bring him out of all merely accidental\ndilemmas. Little was to be hoped from them. He could not himself betray\nSyme, partly from honour, but partly also because, if he betrayed him\nand for some reason failed to destroy him, the Syme who escaped would\nbe a Syme freed from all obligation of secrecy, a Syme who would simply\nwalk to the nearest police station. After all, it was only one night\u2019s\ndiscussion, and only one detective who would know of it. He would let\nout as little as possible of their plans that night, and then let Syme\ngo, and chance it.\n\nHe strode across to the group of anarchists, which was already\ndistributing itself along the benches.\n\n\u201cI think it is time we began,\u201d he said; \u201cthe steam-tug is waiting on\nthe river already. I move that Comrade Buttons takes the chair.\u201d\n\nThis being approved by a show of hands, the little man with the papers\nslipped into the presidential seat.\n\n\u201cComrades,\u201d he began, as sharp as a pistol-shot, \u201cour meeting tonight\nis important, though it need not be long. This branch has always had\nthe honour of electing Thursdays for the Central European Council. We\nhave elected many and splendid Thursdays. We all lament the sad decease\nof the heroic worker who occupied the post until last week. As you\nknow, his services to the cause were considerable. He organised the\ngreat dynamite coup of Brighton which, under happier circumstances,\nought to have killed everybody on the pier. As you also know, his death\nwas as self-denying as his life, for he died through his faith in a\nhygienic mixture of chalk and water as a substitute for milk, which\nbeverage he regarded as barbaric, and as involving cruelty to the cow.\nCruelty, or anything approaching to cruelty, revolted him always. But\nit is not to acclaim his virtues that we are met, but for a harder\ntask. It is difficult properly to praise his qualities, but it is more\ndifficult to replace them. Upon you, comrades, it devolves this evening\nto choose out of the company present the man who shall be Thursday. If\nany comrade suggests a name I will put it to the vote. If no comrade\nsuggests a name, I can only tell myself that that dear dynamiter, who\nis gone from us, has carried into the unknowable abysses the last\nsecret of his virtue and his innocence.\u201d\n\nThere was a stir of almost inaudible applause, such as is sometimes\nheard in church. Then a large old man, with a long and venerable white\nbeard, perhaps the only real working-man present, rose lumberingly and\nsaid\u2014\n\n\u201cI move that Comrade Gregory be elected Thursday,\u201d and sat lumberingly\ndown again.\n\n\u201cDoes anyone second?\u201d asked the chairman.\n\nA little man with a velvet coat and pointed beard seconded.\n\n\u201cBefore I put the matter to the vote,\u201d said the chairman, \u201cI will call\non Comrade Gregory to make a statement.\u201d\n\nGregory rose amid a great rumble of applause. His face was deadly pale,\nso that by contrast his queer red hair looked almost scarlet. But he\nwas smiling and altogether at ease. He had made up his mind, and he saw\nhis best policy quite plain in front of him like a white road. His best\nchance was to make a softened and ambiguous speech, such as would leave\non the detective\u2019s mind the impression that the anarchist brotherhood\nwas a very mild affair after all. He believed in his own literary\npower, his capacity for suggesting fine shades and picking perfect\nwords. He thought that with care he could succeed, in spite of all the\npeople around him, in conveying an impression of the institution,\nsubtly and delicately false. Syme had once thought that anarchists,\nunder all their bravado, were only playing the fool. Could he not now,\nin the hour of peril, make Syme think so again?\n\n\u201cComrades,\u201d began Gregory, in a low but penetrating voice, \u201cit is not\nnecessary for me to tell you what is my policy, for it is your policy\nalso. Our belief has been slandered, it has been disfigured, it has\nbeen utterly confused and concealed, but it has never been altered.\nThose who talk about anarchism and its dangers go everywhere and\nanywhere to get their information, except to us, except to the fountain\nhead. They learn about anarchists from sixpenny novels; they learn\nabout anarchists from tradesmen\u2019s newspapers; they learn about\nanarchists from _Ally Sloper\u2019s Half-Holiday_ and the _Sporting Times_.\nThey never learn about anarchists from anarchists. We have no chance of\ndenying the mountainous slanders which are heaped upon our heads from\none end of Europe to another. The man who has always heard that we are\nwalking plagues has never heard our reply. I know that he will not hear\nit tonight, though my passion were to rend the roof. For it is deep,\ndeep under the earth that the persecuted are permitted to assemble, as\nthe Christians assembled in the Catacombs. But if, by some incredible\naccident, there were here tonight a man who all his life had thus\nimmensely misunderstood us, I would put this question to him: \u2018When\nthose Christians met in those Catacombs, what sort of moral reputation\nhad they in the streets above? What tales were told of their atrocities\nby one educated Roman to another? Suppose\u2019 (I would say to him),\n\u2018suppose that we are only repeating that still mysterious paradox of\nhistory. Suppose we seem as shocking as the Christians because we are\nreally as harmless as the Christians. Suppose we seem as mad as the\nChristians because we are really as meek.\u201d\u2019\n\nThe applause that had greeted the opening sentences had been gradually\ngrowing fainter, and at the last word it stopped suddenly. In the\nabrupt silence, the man with the velvet jacket said, in a high, squeaky\nvoice\u2014\n\n\u201cI\u2019m not meek!\u201d\n\n\u201cComrade Witherspoon tells us,\u201d resumed Gregory, \u201cthat he is not meek.\nAh, how little he knows himself! His words are, indeed, extravagant;\nhis appearance is ferocious, and even (to an ordinary taste)\nunattractive. But only the eye of a friendship as deep and delicate as\nmine can perceive the deep foundation of solid meekness which lies at\nthe base of him, too deep even for himself to see. I repeat, we are the\ntrue early Christians, only that we come too late. We are simple, as\nthey revere simple\u2014look at Comrade Witherspoon. We are modest, as they\nwere modest\u2014look at me. We are merciful\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no!\u201d called out Mr. Witherspoon with the velvet jacket.\n\n\u201cI say we are merciful,\u201d repeated Gregory furiously, \u201cas the early\nChristians were merciful. Yet this did not prevent their being accused\nof eating human flesh. We do not eat human flesh\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cShame!\u201d cried Witherspoon. \u201cWhy not?\u201d\n\n\u201cComrade Witherspoon,\u201d said Gregory, with a feverish gaiety, \u201cis\nanxious to know why nobody eats him (laughter). In our society, at any\nrate, which loves him sincerely, which is founded upon love\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no!\u201d said Witherspoon, \u201cdown with love.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhich is founded upon love,\u201d repeated Gregory, grinding his teeth,\n\u201cthere will be no difficulty about the aims which we shall pursue as a\nbody, or which I should pursue were I chosen as the representative of\nthat body. Superbly careless of the slanders that represent us as\nassassins and enemies of human society, we shall pursue with moral\ncourage and quiet intellectual pressure, the permanent ideals of\nbrotherhood and simplicity.\u201d\n\nGregory resumed his seat and passed his hand across his forehead. The\nsilence was sudden and awkward, but the chairman rose like an\nautomaton, and said in a colourless voice\u2014\n\n\u201cDoes anyone oppose the election of Comrade Gregory?\u201d\n\nThe assembly seemed vague and sub-consciously disappointed, and Comrade\nWitherspoon moved restlessly on his seat and muttered in his thick\nbeard. By the sheer rush of routine, however, the motion would have\nbeen put and carried. But as the chairman was opening his mouth to put\nit, Syme sprang to his feet and said in a small and quiet voice\u2014\n\n\u201cYes, Mr. Chairman, I oppose.\u201d\n\nThe most effective fact in oratory is an unexpected change in the\nvoice. Mr. Gabriel Syme evidently understood oratory. Having said these\nfirst formal words in a moderated tone and with a brief simplicity, he\nmade his next word ring and volley in the vault as if one of the guns\nhad gone off.\n\n\u201cComrades!\u201d he cried, in a voice that made every man jump out of his\nboots, \u201chave we come here for this? Do we live underground like rats in\norder to listen to talk like this? This is talk we might listen to\nwhile eating buns at a Sunday School treat. Do we line these walls with\nweapons and bar that door with death lest anyone should come and hear\nComrade Gregory saying to us, \u2018Be good, and you will be happy,\u2019\n\u2018Honesty is the best policy,\u2019 and \u2018Virtue is its own reward\u2019? There was\nnot a word in Comrade Gregory\u2019s address to which a curate could not\nhave listened with pleasure (hear, hear). But I am not a curate (loud\ncheers), and I did not listen to it with pleasure (renewed cheers). The\nman who is fitted to make a good curate is not fitted to make a\nresolute, forcible, and efficient Thursday (hear, hear).\n\n\u201cComrade Gregory has told us, in only too apologetic a tone, that we\nare not the enemies of society. But I say that we are the enemies of\nsociety, and so much the worse for society. We are the enemies of\nsociety, for society is the enemy of humanity, its oldest and its most\npitiless enemy (hear, hear). Comrade Gregory has told us\n(apologetically again) that we are not murderers. There I agree. We are\nnot murderers, we are executioners (cheers).\u201d\n\nEver since Syme had risen Gregory had sat staring at him, his face\nidiotic with astonishment. Now in the pause his lips of clay parted,\nand he said, with an automatic and lifeless distinctness\u2014\n\n\u201cYou damnable hypocrite!\u201d\n\nSyme looked straight into those frightful eyes with his own pale blue\nones, and said with dignity\u2014\n\n\u201cComrade Gregory accuses me of hypocrisy. He knows as well as I do that\nI am keeping all my engagements and doing nothing but my duty. I do not\nmince words. I do not pretend to. I say that Comrade Gregory is unfit\nto be Thursday for all his amiable qualities. He is unfit to be\nThursday because of his amiable qualities. We do not want the Supreme\nCouncil of Anarchy infected with a maudlin mercy (hear, hear). This is\nno time for ceremonial politeness, neither is it a time for ceremonial\nmodesty. I set myself against Comrade Gregory as I would set myself\nagainst all the Governments of Europe, because the anarchist who has\ngiven himself to anarchy has forgotten modesty as much as he has\nforgotten pride (cheers). I am not a man at all. I am a cause (renewed\ncheers). I set myself against Comrade Gregory as impersonally and as\ncalmly as I should choose one pistol rather than another out of that\nrack upon the wall; and I say that rather than have Gregory and his\nmilk-and-water methods on the Supreme Council, I would offer myself for\nelection\u2014\u201d\n\nHis sentence was drowned in a deafening cataract of applause. The\nfaces, that had grown fiercer and fiercer with approval as his tirade\ngrew more and more uncompromising, were now distorted with grins of\nanticipation or cloven with delighted cries. At the moment when he\nannounced himself as ready to stand for the post of Thursday, a roar of\nexcitement and assent broke forth, and became uncontrollable, and at\nthe same moment Gregory sprang to his feet, with foam upon his mouth,\nand shouted against the shouting.\n\n\u201cStop, you blasted madmen!\u201d he cried, at the top of a voice that tore\nhis throat. \u201cStop, you\u2014\u201d\n\nBut louder than Gregory\u2019s shouting and louder than the roar of the room\ncame the voice of Syme, still speaking in a peal of pitiless thunder\u2014\n\n\u201cI do not go to the Council to rebut that slander that calls us\nmurderers; I go to earn it (loud and prolonged cheering). To the priest\nwho says these men are the enemies of religion, to the judge who says\nthese men are the enemies of law, to the fat parliamentarian who says\nthese men are the enemies of order and public decency, to all these I\nwill reply, \u2018You are false kings, but you are true prophets. I am come\nto destroy you, and to fulfil your prophecies.\u2019\u201d\n\nThe heavy clamour gradually died away, but before it had ceased\nWitherspoon had jumped to his feet, his hair and beard all on end, and\nhad said\u2014\n\n\u201cI move, as an amendment, that Comrade Syme be appointed to the post.\u201d\n\n\u201cStop all this, I tell you!\u201d cried Gregory, with frantic face and\nhands. \u201cStop it, it is all\u2014\u201d\n\nThe voice of the chairman clove his speech with a cold accent.\n\n\u201cDoes anyone second this amendment?\u201d he said. A tall, tired man, with\nmelancholy eyes and an American chin beard, was observed on the back\nbench to be slowly rising to his feet. Gregory had been screaming for\nsome time past; now there was a change in his accent, more shocking\nthan any scream. \u201cI end all this!\u201d he said, in a voice as heavy as\nstone. \u201cThis man cannot be elected. He is a\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme, quite motionless, \u201cwhat is he?\u201d Gregory\u2019s mouth\nworked twice without sound; then slowly the blood began to crawl back\ninto his dead face.\n\n\u201cHe is a man quite inexperienced in our work,\u201d he said, and sat down\nabruptly.\n\nBefore he had done so, the long, lean man with the American beard was\nagain upon his feet, and was repeating in a high American monotone\u2014\n\n\u201cI beg to second the election of Comrade Syme.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe amendment will, as usual, be put first,\u201d said Mr. Buttons, the\nchairman, with mechanical rapidity.\n\n\u201cThe question is that Comrade Syme\u2014\u201d\n\nGregory had again sprung to his feet, panting and passionate.\n\n\u201cComrades,\u201d he cried out, \u201cI am not a madman.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, oh!\u201d said Mr. Witherspoon.\n\n\u201cI am not a madman,\u201d reiterated Gregory, with a frightful sincerity\nwhich for a moment staggered the room, \u201cbut I give you a counsel which\nyou can call mad if you like. No, I will not call it a counsel, for I\ncan give you no reason for it. I will call it a command. Call it a mad\ncommand, but act upon it. Strike, but hear me! Kill me, but obey me! Do\nnot elect this man.\u201d Truth is so terrible, even in fetters, that for a\nmoment Syme\u2019s slender and insane victory swayed like a reed. But you\ncould not have guessed it from Syme\u2019s bleak blue eyes. He merely began\u2014\n\n\u201cComrade Gregory commands\u2014\u201d\n\nThen the spell was snapped, and one anarchist called out to Gregory\u2014\n\n\u201cWho are you? You are not Sunday;\u201d and another anarchist added in a\nheavier voice, \u201cAnd you are not Thursday.\u201d\n\n\u201cComrades,\u201d cried Gregory, in a voice like that of a martyr who in an\necstacy of pain has passed beyond pain, \u201cit is nothing to me whether\nyou detest me as a tyrant or detest me as a slave. If you will not take\nmy command, accept my degradation. I kneel to you. I throw myself at\nyour feet. I implore you. Do not elect this man.\u201d\n\n\u201cComrade Gregory,\u201d said the chairman after a painful pause, \u201cthis is\nreally not quite dignified.\u201d\n\nFor the first time in the proceedings there was for a few seconds a\nreal silence. Then Gregory fell back in his seat, a pale wreck of a\nman, and the chairman repeated, like a piece of clock-work suddenly\nstarted again\u2014\n\n\u201cThe question is that Comrade Syme be elected to the post of Thursday\non the General Council.\u201d\n\nThe roar rose like the sea, the hands rose like a forest, and three\nminutes afterwards Mr. Gabriel Syme, of the Secret Police Service, was\nelected to the post of Thursday on the General Council of the\nAnarchists of Europe.\n\nEveryone in the room seemed to feel the tug waiting on the river, the\nsword-stick and the revolver, waiting on the table. The instant the\nelection was ended and irrevocable, and Syme had received the paper\nproving his election, they all sprang to their feet, and the fiery\ngroups moved and mixed in the room. Syme found himself, somehow or\nother, face to face with Gregory, who still regarded him with a stare\nof stunned hatred. They were silent for many minutes.\n\n\u201cYou are a devil!\u201d said Gregory at last.\n\n\u201cAnd you are a gentleman,\u201d said Syme with gravity.\n\n\u201cIt was you that entrapped me,\u201d began Gregory, shaking from head to\nfoot, \u201centrapped me into\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cTalk sense,\u201d said Syme shortly. \u201cInto what sort of devils\u2019 parliament\nhave you entrapped me, if it comes to that? You made me swear before I\nmade you. Perhaps we are both doing what we think right. But what we\nthink right is so damned different that there can be nothing between us\nin the way of concession. There is nothing possible between us but\nhonour and death,\u201d and he pulled the great cloak about his shoulders\nand picked up the flask from the table.\n\n\u201cThe boat is quite ready,\u201d said Mr. Buttons, bustling up. \u201cBe good\nenough to step this way.\u201d\n\nWith a gesture that revealed the shop-walker, he led Syme down a short,\niron-bound passage, the still agonised Gregory following feverishly at\ntheir heels. At the end of the passage was a door, which Buttons opened\nsharply, showing a sudden blue and silver picture of the moonlit river,\nthat looked like a scene in a theatre. Close to the opening lay a dark,\ndwarfish steam-launch, like a baby dragon with one red eye.\n\nAlmost in the act of stepping on board, Gabriel Syme turned to the\ngaping Gregory.\n\n\u201cYou have kept your word,\u201d he said gently, with his face in shadow.\n\u201cYou are a man of honour, and I thank you. You have kept it even down\nto a small particular. There was one special thing you promised me at\nthe beginning of the affair, and which you have certainly given me by\nthe end of it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d cried the chaotic Gregory. \u201cWhat did I promise\nyou?\u201d\n\n\u201cA very entertaining evening,\u201d said Syme, and he made a military salute\nwith the sword-stick as the steamboat slid away.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\nTHE TALE OF A DETECTIVE\n\n\nGabriel Syme was not merely a detective who pretended to be a poet; he\nwas really a poet who had become a detective. Nor was his hatred of\nanarchy hypocritical. He was one of those who are driven early in life\ninto too conservative an attitude by the bewildering folly of most\nrevolutionists. He had not attained it by any tame tradition. His\nrespectability was spontaneous and sudden, a rebellion against\nrebellion. He came of a family of cranks, in which all the oldest\npeople had all the newest notions. One of his uncles always walked\nabout without a hat, and another had made an unsuccessful attempt to\nwalk about with a hat and nothing else. His father cultivated art and\nself-realisation; his mother went in for simplicity and hygiene. Hence\nthe child, during his tenderer years, was wholly unacquainted with any\ndrink between the extremes of absinth and cocoa, of both of which he\nhad a healthy dislike. The more his mother preached a more than Puritan\nabstinence the more did his father expand into a more than pagan\nlatitude; and by the time the former had come to enforcing\nvegetarianism, the latter had pretty well reached the point of\ndefending cannibalism.\n\nBeing surrounded with every conceivable kind of revolt from infancy,\nGabriel had to revolt into something, so he revolted into the only\nthing left\u2014sanity. But there was just enough in him of the blood of\nthese fanatics to make even his protest for common sense a little too\nfierce to be sensible. His hatred of modern lawlessness had been\ncrowned also by an accident. It happened that he was walking in a side\nstreet at the instant of a dynamite outrage. He had been blind and deaf\nfor a moment, and then seen, the smoke clearing, the broken windows and\nthe bleeding faces. After that he went about as usual\u2014quiet, courteous,\nrather gentle; but there was a spot on his mind that was not sane. He\ndid not regard anarchists, as most of us do, as a handful of morbid\nmen, combining ignorance with intellectualism. He regarded them as a\nhuge and pitiless peril, like a Chinese invasion.\n\nHe poured perpetually into newspapers and their waste-paper baskets a\ntorrent of tales, verses and violent articles, warning men of this\ndeluge of barbaric denial. But he seemed to be getting no nearer his\nenemy, and, what was worse, no nearer a living. As he paced the Thames\nembankment, bitterly biting a cheap cigar and brooding on the advance\nof Anarchy, there was no anarchist with a bomb in his pocket so savage\nor so solitary as he. Indeed, he always felt that Government stood\nalone and desperate, with its back to the wall. He was too quixotic to\nhave cared for it otherwise.\n\nHe walked on the Embankment once under a dark red sunset. The red river\nreflected the red sky, and they both reflected his anger. The sky,\nindeed, was so swarthy, and the light on the river relatively so lurid,\nthat the water almost seemed of fiercer flame than the sunset it\nmirrored. It looked like a stream of literal fire winding under the\nvast caverns of a subterranean country.\n\nSyme was shabby in those days. He wore an old-fashioned black\nchimney-pot hat; he was wrapped in a yet more old-fashioned cloak,\nblack and ragged; and the combination gave him the look of the early\nvillains in Dickens and Bulwer Lytton. Also his yellow beard and hair\nwere more unkempt and leonine than when they appeared long afterwards,\ncut and pointed, on the lawns of Saffron Park. A long, lean, black\ncigar, bought in Soho for twopence, stood out from between his\ntightened teeth, and altogether he looked a very satisfactory specimen\nof the anarchists upon whom he had vowed a holy war. Perhaps this was\nwhy a policeman on the Embankment spoke to him, and said \u201cGood\nevening.\u201d\n\nSyme, at a crisis of his morbid fears for humanity, seemed stung by the\nmere stolidity of the automatic official, a mere bulk of blue in the\ntwilight.\n\n\u201cA good evening is it?\u201d he said sharply. \u201cYou fellows would call the\nend of the world a good evening. Look at that bloody red sun and that\nbloody river! I tell you that if that were literally human blood, spilt\nand shining, you would still be standing here as solid as ever, looking\nout for some poor harmless tramp whom you could move on. You policemen\nare cruel to the poor, but I could forgive you even your cruelty if it\nwere not for your calm.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf we are calm,\u201d replied the policeman, \u201cit is the calm of organised\nresistance.\u201d\n\n\u201cEh?\u201d said Syme, staring.\n\n\u201cThe soldier must be calm in the thick of the battle,\u201d pursued the\npoliceman. \u201cThe composure of an army is the anger of a nation.\u201d\n\n\u201cGood God, the Board Schools!\u201d said Syme. \u201cIs this undenominational\neducation?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the policeman sadly, \u201cI never had any of those advantages.\nThe Board Schools came after my time. What education I had was very\nrough and old-fashioned, I am afraid.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere did you have it?\u201d asked Syme, wondering.\n\n\u201cOh, at Harrow,\u201d said the policeman\n\nThe class sympathies which, false as they are, are the truest things in\nso many men, broke out of Syme before he could control them.\n\n\u201cBut, good Lord, man,\u201d he said, \u201cyou oughtn\u2019t to be a policeman!\u201d\n\nThe policeman sighed and shook his head.\n\n\u201cI know,\u201d he said solemnly, \u201cI know I am not worthy.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut why did you join the police?\u201d asked Syme with rude curiosity.\n\n\u201cFor much the same reason that you abused the police,\u201d replied the\nother. \u201cI found that there was a special opening in the service for\nthose whose fears for humanity were concerned rather with the\naberrations of the scientific intellect than with the normal and\nexcusable, though excessive, outbreaks of the human will. I trust I\nmake myself clear.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you mean that you make your opinion clear,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI suppose\nyou do. But as for making yourself clear, it is the last thing you do.\nHow comes a man like you to be talking philosophy in a blue helmet on\nthe Thames embankment?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have evidently not heard of the latest development in our police\nsystem,\u201d replied the other. \u201cI am not surprised at it. We are keeping\nit rather dark from the educated class, because that class contains\nmost of our enemies. But you seem to be exactly in the right frame of\nmind. I think you might almost join us.\u201d\n\n\u201cJoin you in what?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cI will tell you,\u201d said the policeman slowly. \u201cThis is the situation:\nThe head of one of our departments, one of the most celebrated\ndetectives in Europe, has long been of opinion that a purely\nintellectual conspiracy would soon threaten the very existence of\ncivilisation. He is certain that the scientific and artistic worlds are\nsilently bound in a crusade against the Family and the State. He has,\ntherefore, formed a special corps of policemen, policemen who are also\nphilosophers. It is their business to watch the beginnings of this\nconspiracy, not merely in a criminal but in a controversial sense. I am\na democrat myself, and I am fully aware of the value of the ordinary\nman in matters of ordinary valour or virtue. But it would obviously be\nundesirable to employ the common policeman in an investigation which is\nalso a heresy hunt.\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s eyes were bright with a sympathetic curiosity.\n\n\u201cWhat do you do, then?\u201d he said.\n\n\u201cThe work of the philosophical policeman,\u201d replied the man in blue, \u201cis\nat once bolder and more subtle than that of the ordinary detective. The\nordinary detective goes to pot-houses to arrest thieves; we go to\nartistic tea-parties to detect pessimists. The ordinary detective\ndiscovers from a ledger or a diary that a crime has been committed. We\ndiscover from a book of sonnets that a crime will be committed. We have\nto trace the origin of those dreadful thoughts that drive men on at\nlast to intellectual fanaticism and intellectual crime. We were only\njust in time to prevent the assassination at Hartlepool, and that was\nentirely due to the fact that our Mr. Wilks (a smart young fellow)\nthoroughly understood a triolet.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you mean,\u201d asked Syme, \u201cthat there is really as much connection\nbetween crime and the modern intellect as all that?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are not sufficiently democratic,\u201d answered the policeman, \u201cbut you\nwere right when you said just now that our ordinary treatment of the\npoor criminal was a pretty brutal business. I tell you I am sometimes\nsick of my trade when I see how perpetually it means merely a war upon\nthe ignorant and the desperate. But this new movement of ours is a very\ndifferent affair. We deny the snobbish English assumption that the\nuneducated are the dangerous criminals. We remember the Roman Emperors.\nWe remember the great poisoning princes of the Renaissance. We say that\nthe dangerous criminal is the educated criminal. We say that the most\ndangerous criminal now is the entirely lawless modern philosopher.\nCompared to him, burglars and bigamists are essentially moral men; my\nheart goes out to them. They accept the essential ideal of man; they\nmerely seek it wrongly. Thieves respect property. They merely wish the\nproperty to become their property that they may more perfectly respect\nit. But philosophers dislike property as property; they wish to destroy\nthe very idea of personal possession. Bigamists respect marriage, or\nthey would not go through the highly ceremonial and even ritualistic\nformality of bigamy. But philosophers despise marriage as marriage.\nMurderers respect human life; they merely wish to attain a greater\nfulness of human life in themselves by the sacrifice of what seems to\nthem to be lesser lives. But philosophers hate life itself, their own\nas much as other people\u2019s.\u201d\n\nSyme struck his hands together.\n\n\u201cHow true that is,\u201d he cried. \u201cI have felt it from my boyhood, but\nnever could state the verbal antithesis. The common criminal is a bad\nman, but at least he is, as it were, a conditional good man. He says\nthat if only a certain obstacle be removed\u2014say a wealthy uncle\u2014he is\nthen prepared to accept the universe and to praise God. He is a\nreformer, but not an anarchist. He wishes to cleanse the edifice, but\nnot to destroy it. But the evil philosopher is not trying to alter\nthings, but to annihilate them. Yes, the modern world has retained all\nthose parts of police work which are really oppressive and ignominious,\nthe harrying of the poor, the spying upon the unfortunate. It has given\nup its more dignified work, the punishment of powerful traitors in the\nState and powerful heresiarchs in the Church. The moderns say we must\nnot punish heretics. My only doubt is whether we have a right to punish\nanybody else.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut this is absurd!\u201d cried the policeman, clasping his hands with an\nexcitement uncommon in persons of his figure and costume, \u201cbut it is\nintolerable! I don\u2019t know what you\u2019re doing, but you\u2019re wasting your\nlife. You must, you shall, join our special army against anarchy. Their\narmies are on our frontiers. Their bolt is ready to fall. A moment\nmore, and you may lose the glory of working with us, perhaps the glory\nof dying with the last heroes of the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is a chance not to be missed, certainly,\u201d assented Syme, \u201cbut still\nI do not quite understand. I know as well as anybody that the modern\nworld is full of lawless little men and mad little movements. But,\nbeastly as they are, they generally have the one merit of disagreeing\nwith each other. How can you talk of their leading one army or hurling\none bolt. What is this anarchy?\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not confuse it,\u201d replied the constable, \u201cwith those chance dynamite\noutbreaks from Russia or from Ireland, which are really the outbreaks\nof oppressed, if mistaken, men. This is a vast philosophic movement,\nconsisting of an outer and an inner ring. You might even call the outer\nring the laity and the inner ring the priesthood. I prefer to call the\nouter ring the innocent section, the inner ring the supremely guilty\nsection. The outer ring\u2014the main mass of their supporters\u2014are merely\nanarchists; that is, men who believe that rules and formulas have\ndestroyed human happiness. They believe that all the evil results of\nhuman crime are the results of the system that has called it crime.\nThey do not believe that the crime creates the punishment. They believe\nthat the punishment has created the crime. They believe that if a man\nseduced seven women he would naturally walk away as blameless as the\nflowers of spring. They believe that if a man picked a pocket he would\nnaturally feel exquisitely good. These I call the innocent section.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cNaturally, therefore, these people talk about \u2018a happy time coming\u2019;\n\u2018the paradise of the future\u2019; \u2018mankind freed from the bondage of vice\nand the bondage of virtue,\u2019 and so on. And so also the men of the inner\ncircle speak\u2014the sacred priesthood. They also speak to applauding\ncrowds of the happiness of the future, and of mankind freed at last.\nBut in their mouths\u201d\u2014and the policeman lowered his voice\u2014\u201cin their\nmouths these happy phrases have a horrible meaning. They are under no\nillusions; they are too intellectual to think that man upon this earth\ncan ever be quite free of original sin and the struggle. And they mean\ndeath. When they say that mankind shall be free at last, they mean that\nmankind shall commit suicide. When they talk of a paradise without\nright or wrong, they mean the grave.\n\n\u201cThey have but two objects, to destroy first humanity and then\nthemselves. That is why they throw bombs instead of firing pistols. The\ninnocent rank and file are disappointed because the bomb has not killed\nthe king; but the high-priesthood are happy because it has killed\nsomebody.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow can I join you?\u201d asked Syme, with a sort of passion.\n\n\u201cI know for a fact that there is a vacancy at the moment,\u201d said the\npoliceman, \u201cas I have the honour to be somewhat in the confidence of\nthe chief of whom I have spoken. You should really come and see him. Or\nrather, I should not say see him, nobody ever sees him; but you can\ntalk to him if you like.\u201d\n\n\u201cTelephone?\u201d inquired Syme, with interest.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the policeman placidly, \u201che has a fancy for always sitting\nin a pitch-dark room. He says it makes his thoughts brighter. Do come\nalong.\u201d\n\nSomewhat dazed and considerably excited, Syme allowed himself to be led\nto a side-door in the long row of buildings of Scotland Yard. Almost\nbefore he knew what he was doing, he had been passed through the hands\nof about four intermediate officials, and was suddenly shown into a\nroom, the abrupt blackness of which startled him like a blaze of light.\nIt was not the ordinary darkness, in which forms can be faintly traced;\nit was like going suddenly stone-blind.\n\n\u201cAre you the new recruit?\u201d asked a heavy voice.\n\nAnd in some strange way, though there was not the shadow of a shape in\nthe gloom, Syme knew two things: first, that it came from a man of\nmassive stature; and second, that the man had his back to him.\n\n\u201cAre you the new recruit?\u201d said the invisible chief, who seemed to have\nheard all about it. \u201cAll right. You are engaged.\u201d\n\nSyme, quite swept off his feet, made a feeble fight against this\nirrevocable phrase.\n\n\u201cI really have no experience,\u201d he began.\n\n\u201cNo one has any experience,\u201d said the other, \u201cof the Battle of\nArmageddon.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut I am really unfit\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are willing, that is enough,\u201d said the unknown.\n\n\u201cWell, really,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI don\u2019t know any profession of which mere\nwillingness is the final test.\u201d\n\n\u201cI do,\u201d said the other\u2014\u201cmartyrs. I am condemning you to death. Good\nday.\u201d\n\nThus it was that when Gabriel Syme came out again into the crimson\nlight of evening, in his shabby black hat and shabby, lawless cloak, he\ncame out a member of the New Detective Corps for the frustration of the\ngreat conspiracy. Acting under the advice of his friend the policeman\n(who was professionally inclined to neatness), he trimmed his hair and\nbeard, bought a good hat, clad himself in an exquisite summer suit of\nlight blue-grey, with a pale yellow flower in the button-hole, and, in\nshort, became that elegant and rather insupportable person whom Gregory\nhad first encountered in the little garden of Saffron Park. Before he\nfinally left the police premises his friend provided him with a small\nblue card, on which was written, \u201cThe Last Crusade,\u201d and a number, the\nsign of his official authority. He put this carefully in his upper\nwaistcoat pocket, lit a cigarette, and went forth to track and fight\nthe enemy in all the drawing-rooms of London. Where his adventure\nultimately led him we have already seen. At about half-past one on a\nFebruary night he found himself steaming in a small tug up the silent\nThames, armed with swordstick and revolver, the duly elected Thursday\nof the Central Council of Anarchists.\n\nWhen Syme stepped out on to the steam-tug he had a singular sensation\nof stepping out into something entirely new; not merely into the\nlandscape of a new land, but even into the landscape of a new planet.\nThis was mainly due to the insane yet solid decision of that evening,\nthough partly also to an entire change in the weather and the sky since\nhe entered the little tavern some two hours before. Every trace of the\npassionate plumage of the cloudy sunset had been swept away, and a\nnaked moon stood in a naked sky. The moon was so strong and full that\n(by a paradox often to be noticed) it seemed like a weaker sun. It\ngave, not the sense of bright moonshine, but rather of a dead daylight.\n\nOver the whole landscape lay a luminous and unnatural discoloration, as\nof that disastrous twilight which Milton spoke of as shed by the sun in\neclipse; so that Syme fell easily into his first thought, that he was\nactually on some other and emptier planet, which circled round some\nsadder star. But the more he felt this glittering desolation in the\nmoonlit land, the more his own chivalric folly glowed in the night like\na great fire. Even the common things he carried with him\u2014the food and\nthe brandy and the loaded pistol\u2014took on exactly that concrete and\nmaterial poetry which a child feels when he takes a gun upon a journey\nor a bun with him to bed. The sword-stick and the brandy-flask, though\nin themselves only the tools of morbid conspirators, became the\nexpressions of his own more healthy romance. The sword-stick became\nalmost the sword of chivalry, and the brandy the wine of the\nstirrup-cup. For even the most dehumanised modern fantasies depend on\nsome older and simpler figure; the adventures may be mad, but the\nadventurer must be sane. The dragon without St. George would not even\nbe grotesque. So this inhuman landscape was only imaginative by the\npresence of a man really human. To Syme\u2019s exaggerative mind the bright,\nbleak houses and terraces by the Thames looked as empty as the\nmountains of the moon. But even the moon is only poetical because there\nis a man in the moon.\n\nThe tug was worked by two men, and with much toil went comparatively\nslowly. The clear moon that had lit up Chiswick had gone down by the\ntime that they passed Battersea, and when they came under the enormous\nbulk of Westminster day had already begun to break. It broke like the\nsplitting of great bars of lead, showing bars of silver; and these had\nbrightened like white fire when the tug, changing its onward course,\nturned inward to a large landing stage rather beyond Charing Cross.\n\nThe great stones of the Embankment seemed equally dark and gigantic as\nSyme looked up at them. They were big and black against the huge white\ndawn. They made him feel that he was landing on the colossal steps of\nsome Egyptian palace; and, indeed, the thing suited his mood, for he\nwas, in his own mind, mounting to attack the solid thrones of horrible\nand heathen kings. He leapt out of the boat on to one slimy step, and\nstood, a dark and slender figure, amid the enormous masonry. The two\nmen in the tug put her off again and turned up stream. They had never\nspoken a word.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\nTHE FEAST OF FEAR\n\n\nAt first the large stone stair seemed to Syme as deserted as a pyramid;\nbut before he reached the top he had realised that there was a man\nleaning over the parapet of the Embankment and looking out across the\nriver. As a figure he was quite conventional, clad in a silk hat and\nfrock-coat of the more formal type of fashion; he had a red flower in\nhis buttonhole. As Syme drew nearer to him step by step, he did not\neven move a hair; and Syme could come close enough to notice even in\nthe dim, pale morning light that his face was long, pale and\nintellectual, and ended in a small triangular tuft of dark beard at the\nvery point of the chin, all else being clean-shaven. This scrap of hair\nalmost seemed a mere oversight; the rest of the face was of the type\nthat is best shaven\u2014clear-cut, ascetic, and in its way noble. Syme drew\ncloser and closer, noting all this, and still the figure did not stir.\n\nAt first an instinct had told Syme that this was the man whom he was\nmeant to meet. Then, seeing that the man made no sign, he had concluded\nthat he was not. And now again he had come back to a certainty that the\nman had something to do with his mad adventure. For the man remained\nmore still than would have been natural if a stranger had come so\nclose. He was as motionless as a wax-work, and got on the nerves\nsomewhat in the same way. Syme looked again and again at the pale,\ndignified and delicate face, and the face still looked blankly across\nthe river. Then he took out of his pocket the note from Buttons proving\nhis election, and put it before that sad and beautiful face. Then the\nman smiled, and his smile was a shock, for it was all on one side,\ngoing up in the right cheek and down in the left.\n\nThere was nothing, rationally speaking, to scare anyone about this.\nMany people have this nervous trick of a crooked smile, and in many it\nis even attractive. But in all Syme\u2019s circumstances, with the dark dawn\nand the deadly errand and the loneliness on the great dripping stones,\nthere was something unnerving in it.\n\nThere was the silent river and the silent man, a man of even classic\nface. And there was the last nightmare touch that his smile suddenly\nwent wrong.\n\nThe spasm of smile was instantaneous, and the man\u2019s face dropped at\nonce into its harmonious melancholy. He spoke without further\nexplanation or inquiry, like a man speaking to an old colleague.\n\n\u201cIf we walk up towards Leicester Square,\u201d he said, \u201cwe shall just be in\ntime for breakfast. Sunday always insists on an early breakfast. Have\nyou had any sleep?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cNor have I,\u201d answered the man in an ordinary tone. \u201cI shall try to get\nto bed after breakfast.\u201d\n\nHe spoke with casual civility, but in an utterly dead voice that\ncontradicted the fanaticism of his face. It seemed almost as if all\nfriendly words were to him lifeless conveniences, and that his only\nlife was hate. After a pause the man spoke again.\n\n\u201cOf course, the Secretary of the branch told you everything that can be\ntold. But the one thing that can never be told is the last notion of\nthe President, for his notions grow like a tropical forest. So in case\nyou don\u2019t know, I\u2019d better tell you that he is carrying out his notion\nof concealing ourselves by not concealing ourselves to the most\nextraordinary lengths just now. Originally, of course, we met in a cell\nunderground, just as your branch does. Then Sunday made us take a\nprivate room at an ordinary restaurant. He said that if you didn\u2019t seem\nto be hiding nobody hunted you out. Well, he is the only man on earth,\nI know; but sometimes I really think that his huge brain is going a\nlittle mad in its old age. For now we flaunt ourselves before the\npublic. We have our breakfast on a balcony\u2014on a balcony, if you\nplease\u2014overlooking Leicester Square.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what do the people say?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s quite simple what they say,\u201d answered his guide. \u201cThey say we are\na lot of jolly gentlemen who pretend they are anarchists.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt seems to me a very clever idea,\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cClever! God blast your impudence! Clever!\u201d cried out the other in a\nsudden, shrill voice which was as startling and discordant as his\ncrooked smile. \u201cWhen you\u2019ve seen Sunday for a split second you\u2019ll leave\noff calling him clever.\u201d\n\nWith this they emerged out of a narrow street, and saw the early\nsunlight filling Leicester Square. It will never be known, I suppose,\nwhy this square itself should look so alien and in some ways so\ncontinental. It will never be known whether it was the foreign look\nthat attracted the foreigners or the foreigners who gave it the foreign\nlook. But on this particular morning the effect seemed singularly\nbright and clear. Between the open square and the sunlit leaves and the\nstatue and the Saracenic outlines of the Alhambra, it looked the\nreplica of some French or even Spanish public place. And this effect\nincreased in Syme the sensation, which in many shapes he had had\nthrough the whole adventure, the eerie sensation of having strayed into\na new world. As a fact, he had bought bad cigars round Leicester Square\never since he was a boy. But as he turned that corner, and saw the\ntrees and the Moorish cupolas, he could have sworn that he was turning\ninto an unknown Place de something or other in some foreign town.\n\nAt one corner of the square there projected a kind of angle of a\nprosperous but quiet hotel, the bulk of which belonged to a street\nbehind. In the wall there was one large French window, probably the\nwindow of a large coffee-room; and outside this window, almost\nliterally overhanging the square, was a formidably buttressed balcony,\nbig enough to contain a dining-table. In fact, it did contain a\ndining-table, or more strictly a breakfast-table; and round the\nbreakfast-table, glowing in the sunlight and evident to the street,\nwere a group of noisy and talkative men, all dressed in the insolence\nof fashion, with white waistcoats and expensive button-holes. Some of\ntheir jokes could almost be heard across the square. Then the grave\nSecretary gave his unnatural smile, and Syme knew that this boisterous\nbreakfast party was the secret conclave of the European Dynamiters.\n\nThen, as Syme continued to stare at them, he saw something that he had\nnot seen before. He had not seen it literally because it was too large\nto see. At the nearest end of the balcony, blocking up a great part of\nthe perspective, was the back of a great mountain of a man. When Syme\nhad seen him, his first thought was that the weight of him must break\ndown the balcony of stone. His vastness did not lie only in the fact\nthat he was abnormally tall and quite incredibly fat. This man was\nplanned enormously in his original proportions, like a statue carved\ndeliberately as colossal. His head, crowned with white hair, as seen\nfrom behind looked bigger than a head ought to be. The ears that stood\nout from it looked larger than human ears. He was enlarged terribly to\nscale; and this sense of size was so staggering, that when Syme saw him\nall the other figures seemed quite suddenly to dwindle and become\ndwarfish. They were still sitting there as before with their flowers\nand frock-coats, but now it looked as if the big man was entertaining\nfive children to tea.\n\nAs Syme and the guide approached the side door of the hotel, a waiter\ncame out smiling with every tooth in his head.\n\n\u201cThe gentlemen are up there, sare,\u201d he said. \u201cThey do talk and they do\nlaugh at what they talk. They do say they will throw bombs at ze king.\u201d\n\nAnd the waiter hurried away with a napkin over his arm, much pleased\nwith the singular frivolity of the gentlemen upstairs.\n\nThe two men mounted the stairs in silence.\n\nSyme had never thought of asking whether the monstrous man who almost\nfilled and broke the balcony was the great President of whom the others\nstood in awe. He knew it was so, with an unaccountable but\ninstantaneous certainty. Syme, indeed, was one of those men who are\nopen to all the more nameless psychological influences in a degree a\nlittle dangerous to mental health. Utterly devoid of fear in physical\ndangers, he was a great deal too sensitive to the smell of spiritual\nevil. Twice already that night little unmeaning things had peeped out\nat him almost pruriently, and given him a sense of drawing nearer and\nnearer to the head-quarters of hell. And this sense became overpowering\nas he drew nearer to the great President.\n\nThe form it took was a childish and yet hateful fancy. As he walked\nacross the inner room towards the balcony, the large face of Sunday\ngrew larger and larger; and Syme was gripped with a fear that when he\nwas quite close the face would be too big to be possible, and that he\nwould scream aloud. He remembered that as a child he would not look at\nthe mask of Memnon in the British Museum, because it was a face, and so\nlarge.\n\nBy an effort, braver than that of leaping over a cliff, he went to an\nempty seat at the breakfast-table and sat down. The men greeted him\nwith good-humoured raillery as if they had always known him. He sobered\nhimself a little by looking at their conventional coats and solid,\nshining coffee-pot; then he looked again at Sunday. His face was very\nlarge, but it was still possible to humanity.\n\nIn the presence of the President the whole company looked sufficiently\ncommonplace; nothing about them caught the eye at first, except that by\nthe President\u2019s caprice they had been dressed up with a festive\nrespectability, which gave the meal the look of a wedding breakfast.\nOne man indeed stood out at even a superficial glance. He at least was\nthe common or garden Dynamiter. He wore, indeed, the high white collar\nand satin tie that were the uniform of the occasion; but out of this\ncollar there sprang a head quite unmanageable and quite unmistakable, a\nbewildering bush of brown hair and beard that almost obscured the eyes\nlike those of a Skye terrier. But the eyes did look out of the tangle,\nand they were the sad eyes of some Russian serf. The effect of this\nfigure was not terrible like that of the President, but it had every\ndiablerie that can come from the utterly grotesque. If out of that\nstiff tie and collar there had come abruptly the head of a cat or a\ndog, it could not have been a more idiotic contrast.\n\nThe man\u2019s name, it seemed, was Gogol; he was a Pole, and in this circle\nof days he was called Tuesday. His soul and speech were incurably\ntragic; he could not force himself to play the prosperous and frivolous\npart demanded of him by President Sunday. And, indeed, when Syme came\nin the President, with that daring disregard of public suspicion which\nwas his policy, was actually chaffing Gogol upon his inability to\nassume conventional graces.\n\n\u201cOur friend Tuesday,\u201d said the President in a deep voice at once of\nquietude and volume, \u201cour friend Tuesday doesn\u2019t seem to grasp the\nidea. He dresses up like a gentleman, but he seems to be too great a\nsoul to behave like one. He insists on the ways of the stage\nconspirator. Now if a gentleman goes about London in a top hat and a\nfrock-coat, no one need know that he is an anarchist. But if a\ngentleman puts on a top hat and a frock-coat, and then goes about on\nhis hands and knees\u2014well, he may attract attention. That\u2019s what Brother\nGogol does. He goes about on his hands and knees with such\ninexhaustible diplomacy, that by this time he finds it quite difficult\nto walk upright.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am not good at concealment,\u201d said Gogol sulkily, with a thick\nforeign accent; \u201cI am not ashamed of the cause.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes you are, my boy, and so is the cause of you,\u201d said the President\ngood-naturedly. \u201cYou hide as much as anybody; but you can\u2019t do it, you\nsee, you\u2019re such an ass! You try to combine two inconsistent methods.\nWhen a householder finds a man under his bed, he will probably pause to\nnote the circumstance. But if he finds a man under his bed in a top\nhat, you will agree with me, my dear Tuesday, that he is not likely\neven to forget it. Now when you were found under Admiral Biffin\u2019s bed\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cI am not good at deception,\u201d said Tuesday gloomily, flushing.\n\n\u201cRight, my boy, right,\u201d said the President with a ponderous heartiness,\n\u201cyou aren\u2019t good at anything.\u201d\n\nWhile this stream of conversation continued, Syme was looking more\nsteadily at the men around him. As he did so, he gradually felt all his\nsense of something spiritually queer return.\n\nHe had thought at first that they were all of common stature and\ncostume, with the evident exception of the hairy Gogol. But as he\nlooked at the others, he began to see in each of them exactly what he\nhad seen in the man by the river, a demoniac detail somewhere. That\nlop-sided laugh, which would suddenly disfigure the fine face of his\noriginal guide, was typical of all these types. Each man had something\nabout him, perceived perhaps at the tenth or twentieth glance, which\nwas not normal, and which seemed hardly human. The only metaphor he\ncould think of was this, that they all looked as men of fashion and\npresence would look, with the additional twist given in a false and\ncurved mirror.\n\nOnly the individual examples will express this half-concealed\neccentricity. Syme\u2019s original cicerone bore the title of Monday; he was\nthe Secretary of the Council, and his twisted smile was regarded with\nmore terror than anything, except the President\u2019s horrible, happy\nlaughter. But now that Syme had more space and light to observe him,\nthere were other touches. His fine face was so emaciated, that Syme\nthought it must be wasted with some disease; yet somehow the very\ndistress of his dark eyes denied this. It was no physical ill that\ntroubled him. His eyes were alive with intellectual torture, as if pure\nthought was pain.\n\nHe was typical of each of the tribe; each man was subtly and\ndifferently wrong. Next to him sat Tuesday, the tousle-headed Gogol, a\nman more obviously mad. Next was Wednesday, a certain Marquis de St.\nEustache, a sufficiently characteristic figure. The first few glances\nfound nothing unusual about him, except that he was the only man at\ntable who wore the fashionable clothes as if they were really his own.\nHe had a black French beard cut square and a black English frock-coat\ncut even squarer. But Syme, sensitive to such things, felt somehow that\nthe man carried a rich atmosphere with him, a rich atmosphere that\nsuffocated. It reminded one irrationally of drowsy odours and of dying\nlamps in the darker poems of Byron and Poe. With this went a sense of\nhis being clad, not in lighter colours, but in softer materials; his\nblack seemed richer and warmer than the black shades about him, as if\nit were compounded of profound colour. His black coat looked as if it\nwere only black by being too dense a purple. His black beard looked as\nif it were only black by being too deep a blue. And in the gloom and\nthickness of the beard his dark red mouth showed sensual and scornful.\nWhatever he was he was not a Frenchman; he might be a Jew; he might be\nsomething deeper yet in the dark heart of the East. In the bright\ncoloured Persian tiles and pictures showing tyrants hunting, you may\nsee just those almond eyes, those blue-black beards, those cruel,\ncrimson lips.\n\nThen came Syme, and next a very old man, Professor de Worms, who still\nkept the chair of Friday, though every day it was expected that his\ndeath would leave it empty. Save for his intellect, he was in the last\ndissolution of senile decay. His face was as grey as his long grey\nbeard, his forehead was lifted and fixed finally in a furrow of mild\ndespair. In no other case, not even that of Gogol, did the bridegroom\nbrilliancy of the morning dress express a more painful contrast. For\nthe red flower in his button-hole showed up against a face that was\nliterally discoloured like lead; the whole hideous effect was as if\nsome drunken dandies had put their clothes upon a corpse. When he rose\nor sat down, which was with long labour and peril, something worse was\nexpressed than mere weakness, something indefinably connected with the\nhorror of the whole scene. It did not express decrepitude merely, but\ncorruption. Another hateful fancy crossed Syme\u2019s quivering mind. He\ncould not help thinking that whenever the man moved a leg or arm might\nfall off.\n\nRight at the end sat the man called Saturday, the simplest and the most\nbaffling of all. He was a short, square man with a dark, square face\nclean-shaven, a medical practitioner going by the name of Bull. He had\nthat combination of _savoir-faire_ with a sort of well-groomed\ncoarseness which is not uncommon in young doctors. He carried his fine\nclothes with confidence rather than ease, and he mostly wore a set\nsmile. There was nothing whatever odd about him, except that he wore a\npair of dark, almost opaque spectacles. It may have been merely a\ncrescendo of nervous fancy that had gone before, but those black discs\nwere dreadful to Syme; they reminded him of half-remembered ugly tales,\nof some story about pennies being put on the eyes of the dead. Syme\u2019s\neye always caught the black glasses and the blind grin. Had the dying\nProfessor worn them, or even the pale Secretary, they would have been\nappropriate. But on the younger and grosser man they seemed only an\nenigma. They took away the key of the face. You could not tell what his\nsmile or his gravity meant. Partly from this, and partly because he had\na vulgar virility wanting in most of the others it seemed to Syme that\nhe might be the wickedest of all those wicked men. Syme even had the\nthought that his eyes might be covered up because they were too\nfrightful to see.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\nTHE EXPOSURE\n\n\nSuch were the six men who had sworn to destroy the world. Again and\nagain Syme strove to pull together his common sense in their presence.\nSometimes he saw for an instant that these notions were subjective,\nthat he was only looking at ordinary men, one of whom was old, another\nnervous, another short-sighted. The sense of an unnatural symbolism\nalways settled back on him again. Each figure seemed to be, somehow, on\nthe borderland of things, just as their theory was on the borderland of\nthought. He knew that each one of these men stood at the extreme end,\nso to speak, of some wild road of reasoning. He could only fancy, as in\nsome old-world fable, that if a man went westward to the end of the\nworld he would find something\u2014say a tree\u2014that was more or less than a\ntree, a tree possessed by a spirit; and that if he went east to the end\nof the world he would find something else that was not wholly itself\u2014a\ntower, perhaps, of which the very shape was wicked. So these figures\nseemed to stand up, violent and unaccountable, against an ultimate\nhorizon, visions from the verge. The ends of the earth were closing in.\n\nTalk had been going on steadily as he took in the scene; and not the\nleast of the contrasts of that bewildering breakfast-table was the\ncontrast between the easy and unobtrusive tone of talk and its terrible\npurport. They were deep in the discussion of an actual and immediate\nplot. The waiter downstairs had spoken quite correctly when he said\nthat they were talking about bombs and kings. Only three days\nafterwards the Czar was to meet the President of the French Republic in\nParis, and over their bacon and eggs upon their sunny balcony these\nbeaming gentlemen had decided how both should die. Even the instrument\nwas chosen; the black-bearded Marquis, it appeared, was to carry the\nbomb.\n\nOrdinarily speaking, the proximity of this positive and objective crime\nwould have sobered Syme, and cured him of all his merely mystical\ntremors. He would have thought of nothing but the need of saving at\nleast two human bodies from being ripped in pieces with iron and\nroaring gas. But the truth was that by this time he had begun to feel a\nthird kind of fear, more piercing and practical than either his moral\nrevulsion or his social responsibility. Very simply, he had no fear to\nspare for the French President or the Czar; he had begun to fear for\nhimself. Most of the talkers took little heed of him, debating now with\ntheir faces closer together, and almost uniformly grave, save when for\nan instant the smile of the Secretary ran aslant across his face as the\njagged lightning runs aslant across the sky. But there was one\npersistent thing which first troubled Syme and at last terrified him.\nThe President was always looking at him, steadily, and with a great and\nbaffling interest. The enormous man was quite quiet, but his blue eyes\nstood out of his head. And they were always fixed on Syme.\n\nSyme felt moved to spring up and leap over the balcony. When the\nPresident\u2019s eyes were on him he felt as if he were made of glass. He\nhad hardly the shred of a doubt that in some silent and extraordinary\nway Sunday had found out that he was a spy. He looked over the edge of\nthe balcony, and saw a policeman, standing abstractedly just beneath,\nstaring at the bright railings and the sunlit trees.\n\nThen there fell upon him the great temptation that was to torment him\nfor many days. In the presence of these powerful and repulsive men, who\nwere the princes of anarchy, he had almost forgotten the frail and\nfanciful figure of the poet Gregory, the mere aesthete of anarchism. He\neven thought of him now with an old kindness, as if they had played\ntogether when children. But he remembered that he was still tied to\nGregory by a great promise. He had promised never to do the very thing\nthat he now felt himself almost in the act of doing. He had promised\nnot to jump over that balcony and speak to that policeman. He took his\ncold hand off the cold stone balustrade. His soul swayed in a vertigo\nof moral indecision. He had only to snap the thread of a rash vow made\nto a villainous society, and all his life could be as open and sunny as\nthe square beneath him. He had, on the other hand, only to keep his\nantiquated honour, and be delivered inch by inch into the power of this\ngreat enemy of mankind, whose very intellect was a torture-chamber.\nWhenever he looked down into the square he saw the comfortable\npoliceman, a pillar of common sense and common order. Whenever he\nlooked back at the breakfast-table he saw the President still quietly\nstudying him with big, unbearable eyes.\n\nIn all the torrent of his thought there were two thoughts that never\ncrossed his mind. First, it never occurred to him to doubt that the\nPresident and his Council could crush him if he continued to stand\nalone. The place might be public, the project might seem impossible.\nBut Sunday was not the man who would carry himself thus easily without\nhaving, somehow or somewhere, set open his iron trap. Either by\nanonymous poison or sudden street accident, by hypnotism or by fire\nfrom hell, Sunday could certainly strike him. If he defied the man he\nwas probably dead, either struck stiff there in his chair or long\nafterwards as by an innocent ailment. If he called in the police\npromptly, arrested everyone, told all, and set against them the whole\nenergy of England, he would probably escape; certainly not otherwise.\nThey were a balconyful of gentlemen overlooking a bright and busy\nsquare; but he felt no more safe with them than if they had been a\nboatful of armed pirates overlooking an empty sea.\n\nThere was a second thought that never came to him. It never occurred to\nhim to be spiritually won over to the enemy. Many moderns, inured to a\nweak worship of intellect and force, might have wavered in their\nallegiance under this oppression of a great personality. They might\nhave called Sunday the super-man. If any such creature be conceivable,\nhe looked, indeed, somewhat like it, with his earth-shaking\nabstraction, as of a stone statue walking. He might have been called\nsomething above man, with his large plans, which were too obvious to be\ndetected, with his large face, which was too frank to be understood.\nBut this was a kind of modern meanness to which Syme could not sink\neven in his extreme morbidity. Like any man, he was coward enough to\nfear great force; but he was not quite coward enough to admire it.\n\nThe men were eating as they talked, and even in this they were typical.\nDr. Bull and the Marquis ate casually and conventionally of the best\nthings on the table\u2014cold pheasant or Strasbourg pie. But the Secretary\nwas a vegetarian, and he spoke earnestly of the projected murder over\nhalf a raw tomato and three quarters of a glass of tepid water. The old\nProfessor had such slops as suggested a sickening second childhood. And\neven in this President Sunday preserved his curious predominance of\nmere mass. For he ate like twenty men; he ate incredibly, with a\nfrightful freshness of appetite, so that it was like watching a sausage\nfactory. Yet continually, when he had swallowed a dozen crumpets or\ndrunk a quart of coffee, he would be found with his great head on one\nside staring at Syme.\n\n\u201cI have often wondered,\u201d said the Marquis, taking a great bite out of a\nslice of bread and jam, \u201cwhether it wouldn\u2019t be better for me to do it\nwith a knife. Most of the best things have been brought off with a\nknife. And it would be a new emotion to get a knife into a French\nPresident and wriggle it round.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are wrong,\u201d said the Secretary, drawing his black brows together.\n\u201cThe knife was merely the expression of the old personal quarrel with a\npersonal tyrant. Dynamite is not only our best tool, but our best\nsymbol. It is as perfect a symbol of us as is incense of the prayers of\nthe Christians. It expands; it only destroys because it broadens; even\nso, thought only destroys because it broadens. A man\u2019s brain is a\nbomb,\u201d he cried out, loosening suddenly his strange passion and\nstriking his own skull with violence. \u201cMy brain feels like a bomb,\nnight and day. It must expand! It must expand! A man\u2019s brain must\nexpand, if it breaks up the universe.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t want the universe broken up just yet,\u201d drawled the Marquis. \u201cI\nwant to do a lot of beastly things before I die. I thought of one\nyesterday in bed.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, if the only end of the thing is nothing,\u201d said Dr. Bull with his\nsphinx-like smile, \u201cit hardly seems worth doing.\u201d\n\nThe old Professor was staring at the ceiling with dull eyes.\n\n\u201cEvery man knows in his heart,\u201d he said, \u201cthat nothing is worth doing.\u201d\n\nThere was a singular silence, and then the Secretary said\u2014\n\n\u201cWe are wandering, however, from the point. The only question is how\nWednesday is to strike the blow. I take it we should all agree with the\noriginal notion of a bomb. As to the actual arrangements, I should\nsuggest that tomorrow morning he should go first of all to\u2014\u201d\n\nThe speech was broken off short under a vast shadow. President Sunday\nhad risen to his feet, seeming to fill the sky above them.\n\n\u201cBefore we discuss that,\u201d he said in a small, quiet voice, \u201clet us go\ninto a private room. I have something very particular to say.\u201d\n\nSyme stood up before any of the others. The instant of choice had come\nat last, the pistol was at his head. On the pavement before he could\nhear the policeman idly stir and stamp, for the morning, though bright,\nwas cold.\n\nA barrel-organ in the street suddenly sprang with a jerk into a jovial\ntune. Syme stood up taut, as if it had been a bugle before the battle.\nHe found himself filled with a supernatural courage that came from\nnowhere. That jingling music seemed full of the vivacity, the\nvulgarity, and the irrational valour of the poor, who in all those\nunclean streets were all clinging to the decencies and the charities of\nChristendom. His youthful prank of being a policeman had faded from his\nmind; he did not think of himself as the representative of the corps of\ngentlemen turned into fancy constables, or of the old eccentric who\nlived in the dark room. But he did feel himself as the ambassador of\nall these common and kindly people in the street, who every day marched\ninto battle to the music of the barrel-organ. And this high pride in\nbeing human had lifted him unaccountably to an infinite height above\nthe monstrous men around him. For an instant, at least, he looked down\nupon all their sprawling eccentricities from the starry pinnacle of the\ncommonplace. He felt towards them all that unconscious and elementary\nsuperiority that a brave man feels over powerful beasts or a wise man\nover powerful errors. He knew that he had neither the intellectual nor\nthe physical strength of President Sunday; but in that moment he minded\nit no more than the fact that he had not the muscles of a tiger or a\nhorn on his nose like a rhinoceros. All was swallowed up in an ultimate\ncertainty that the President was wrong and that the barrel-organ was\nright. There clanged in his mind that unanswerable and terrible truism\nin the song of Roland\u2014\n\n    \u201cPa\u00efens ont tort et Chr\u00e9tiens ont droit,\u201d\n\nwhich in the old nasal French has the clang and groan of great iron.\nThis liberation of his spirit from the load of his weakness went with a\nquite clear decision to embrace death. If the people of the\nbarrel-organ could keep their old-world obligations, so could he. This\nvery pride in keeping his word was that he was keeping it to\nmiscreants. It was his last triumph over these lunatics to go down into\ntheir dark room and die for something that they could not even\nunderstand. The barrel-organ seemed to give the marching tune with the\nenergy and the mingled noises of a whole orchestra; and he could hear\ndeep and rolling, under all the trumpets of the pride of life, the\ndrums of the pride of death.\n\nThe conspirators were already filing through the open window and into\nthe rooms behind. Syme went last, outwardly calm, but with all his\nbrain and body throbbing with romantic rhythm. The President led them\ndown an irregular side stair, such as might be used by servants, and\ninto a dim, cold, empty room, with a table and benches, like an\nabandoned boardroom. When they were all in, he closed and locked the\ndoor.\n\nThe first to speak was Gogol, the irreconcilable, who seemed bursting\nwith inarticulate grievance.\n\n\u201cZso! Zso!\u201d he cried, with an obscure excitement, his heavy Polish\naccent becoming almost impenetrable. \u201cYou zay you nod \u2019ide. You zay you\nshow himselves. It is all nuzzinks. Ven you vant talk importance you\nrun yourselves in a dark box!\u201d\n\nThe President seemed to take the foreigner\u2019s incoherent satire with\nentire good humour.\n\n\u201cYou can\u2019t get hold of it yet, Gogol,\u201d he said in a fatherly way. \u201cWhen\nonce they have heard us talking nonsense on that balcony they will not\ncare where we go afterwards. If we had come here first, we should have\nhad the whole staff at the keyhole. You don\u2019t seem to know anything\nabout mankind.\u201d\n\n\u201cI die for zem,\u201d cried the Pole in thick excitement, \u201cand I slay zare\noppressors. I care not for these games of gonzealment. I would zmite ze\ntyrant in ze open square.\u201d\n\n\u201cI see, I see,\u201d said the President, nodding kindly as he seated himself\nat the top of a long table. \u201cYou die for mankind first, and then you\nget up and smite their oppressors. So that\u2019s all right. And now may I\nask you to control your beautiful sentiments, and sit down with the\nother gentlemen at this table. For the first time this morning\nsomething intelligent is going to be said.\u201d\n\nSyme, with the perturbed promptitude he had shown since the original\nsummons, sat down first. Gogol sat down last, grumbling in his brown\nbeard about gombromise. No one except Syme seemed to have any notion of\nthe blow that was about to fall. As for him, he had merely the feeling\nof a man mounting the scaffold with the intention, at any rate, of\nmaking a good speech.\n\n\u201cComrades,\u201d said the President, suddenly rising, \u201cwe have spun out this\nfarce long enough. I have called you down here to tell you something so\nsimple and shocking that even the waiters upstairs (long inured to our\nlevities) might hear some new seriousness in my voice. Comrades, we\nwere discussing plans and naming places. I propose, before saying\nanything else, that those plans and places should not be voted by this\nmeeting, but should be left wholly in the control of some one reliable\nmember. I suggest Comrade Saturday, Dr. Bull.\u201d\n\nThey all stared at him; then they all started in their seats, for the\nnext words, though not loud, had a living and sensational emphasis.\nSunday struck the table.\n\n\u201cNot one word more about the plans and places must be said at this\nmeeting. Not one tiny detail more about what we mean to do must be\nmentioned in this company.\u201d\n\nSunday had spent his life in astonishing his followers; but it seemed\nas if he had never really astonished them until now. They all moved\nfeverishly in their seats, except Syme. He sat stiff in his, with his\nhand in his pocket, and on the handle of his loaded revolver. When the\nattack on him came he would sell his life dear. He would find out at\nleast if the President was mortal.\n\nSunday went on smoothly\u2014\n\n\u201cYou will probably understand that there is only one possible motive\nfor forbidding free speech at this festival of freedom. Strangers\noverhearing us matters nothing. They assume that we are joking. But\nwhat would matter, even unto death, is this, that there should be one\nactually among us who is not of us, who knows our grave purpose, but\ndoes not share it, who\u2014\u201d\n\nThe Secretary screamed out suddenly like a woman.\n\n\u201cIt can\u2019t be!\u201d he cried, leaping. \u201cThere can\u2019t\u2014\u201d\n\nThe President flapped his large flat hand on the table like the fin of\nsome huge fish.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d he said slowly, \u201cthere is a spy in this room. There is a traitor\nat this table. I will waste no more words. His name\u2014\u201d\n\nSyme half rose from his seat, his finger firm on the trigger.\n\n\u201cHis name is Gogol,\u201d said the President. \u201cHe is that hairy humbug over\nthere who pretends to be a Pole.\u201d\n\nGogol sprang to his feet, a pistol in each hand. With the same flash\nthree men sprang at his throat. Even the Professor made an effort to\nrise. But Syme saw little of the scene, for he was blinded with a\nbeneficent darkness; he had sunk down into his seat shuddering, in a\npalsy of passionate relief.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\nTHE UNACCOUNTABLE CONDUCT OF PROFESSOR DE WORMS\n\n\n\u201cSit down!\u201d said Sunday in a voice that he used once or twice in his\nlife, a voice that made men drop drawn swords.\n\nThe three who had risen fell away from Gogol, and that equivocal person\nhimself resumed his seat.\n\n\u201cWell, my man,\u201d said the President briskly, addressing him as one\naddresses a total stranger, \u201cwill you oblige me by putting your hand in\nyour upper waistcoat pocket and showing me what you have there?\u201d\n\nThe alleged Pole was a little pale under his tangle of dark hair, but\nhe put two fingers into the pocket with apparent coolness and pulled\nout a blue strip of card. When Syme saw it lying on the table, he woke\nup again to the world outside him. For although the card lay at the\nother extreme of the table, and he could read nothing of the\ninscription on it, it bore a startling resemblance to the blue card in\nhis own pocket, the card which had been given to him when he joined the\nanti-anarchist constabulary.\n\n\u201cPathetic Slav,\u201d said the President, \u201ctragic child of Poland, are you\nprepared in the presence of that card to deny that you are in this\ncompany\u2014shall we say _de trop?_\u201d\n\n\u201cRight oh!\u201d said the late Gogol. It made everyone jump to hear a clear,\ncommercial and somewhat cockney voice coming out of that forest of\nforeign hair. It was irrational, as if a Chinaman had suddenly spoken\nwith a Scotch accent.\n\n\u201cI gather that you fully understand your position,\u201d said Sunday.\n\n\u201cYou bet,\u201d answered the Pole. \u201cI see it\u2019s a fair cop. All I say is, I\ndon\u2019t believe any Pole could have imitated my accent like I did his.\u201d\n\n\u201cI concede the point,\u201d said Sunday. \u201cI believe your own accent to be\ninimitable, though I shall practise it in my bath. Do you mind leaving\nyour beard with your card?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot a bit,\u201d answered Gogol; and with one finger he ripped off the\nwhole of his shaggy head-covering, emerging with thin red hair and a\npale, pert face. \u201cIt was hot,\u201d he added.\n\n\u201cI will do you the justice to say,\u201d said Sunday, not without a sort of\nbrutal admiration, \u201cthat you seem to have kept pretty cool under it.\nNow listen to me. I like you. The consequence is that it would annoy me\nfor just about two and a half minutes if I heard that you had died in\ntorments. Well, if you ever tell the police or any human soul about us,\nI shall have that two and a half minutes of discomfort. On your\ndiscomfort I will not dwell. Good day. Mind the step.\u201d\n\nThe red-haired detective who had masqueraded as Gogol rose to his feet\nwithout a word, and walked out of the room with an air of perfect\nnonchalance. Yet the astonished Syme was able to realise that this ease\nwas suddenly assumed; for there was a slight stumble outside the door,\nwhich showed that the departing detective had not minded the step.\n\n\u201cTime is flying,\u201d said the President in his gayest manner, after\nglancing at his watch, which like everything about him seemed bigger\nthan it ought to be. \u201cI must go off at once; I have to take the chair\nat a Humanitarian meeting.\u201d\n\nThe Secretary turned to him with working eyebrows.\n\n\u201cWould it not be better,\u201d he said a little sharply, \u201cto discuss further\nthe details of our project, now that the spy has left us?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I think not,\u201d said the President with a yawn like an unobtrusive\nearthquake. \u201cLeave it as it is. Let Saturday settle it. I must be off.\nBreakfast here next Sunday.\u201d\n\nBut the late loud scenes had whipped up the almost naked nerves of the\nSecretary. He was one of those men who are conscientious even in crime.\n\n\u201cI must protest, President, that the thing is irregular,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\nis a fundamental rule of our society that all plans shall be debated in\nfull council. Of course, I fully appreciate your forethought when in\nthe actual presence of a traitor\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cSecretary,\u201d said the President seriously, \u201cif you\u2019d take your head\nhome and boil it for a turnip it might be useful. I can\u2019t say. But it\nmight.\u201d\n\nThe Secretary reared back in a kind of equine anger.\n\n\u201cI really fail to understand\u2014\u201d he began in high offense.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s it, that\u2019s it,\u201d said the President, nodding a great many times.\n\u201cThat\u2019s where you fail right enough. You fail to understand. Why, you\ndancing donkey,\u201d he roared, rising, \u201cyou didn\u2019t want to be overheard by\na spy, didn\u2019t you? How do you know you aren\u2019t overheard now?\u201d\n\nAnd with these words he shouldered his way out of the room, shaking\nwith incomprehensible scorn.\n\nFour of the men left behind gaped after him without any apparent\nglimmering of his meaning. Syme alone had even a glimmering, and such\nas it was it froze him to the bone. If the last words of the President\nmeant anything, they meant that he had not after all passed\nunsuspected. They meant that while Sunday could not denounce him like\nGogol, he still could not trust him like the others.\n\nThe other four got to their feet grumbling more or less, and betook\nthemselves elsewhere to find lunch, for it was already well past\nmidday. The Professor went last, very slowly and painfully. Syme sat\nlong after the rest had gone, revolving his strange position. He had\nescaped a thunderbolt, but he was still under a cloud. At last he rose\nand made his way out of the hotel into Leicester Square. The bright,\ncold day had grown increasingly colder, and when he came out into the\nstreet he was surprised by a few flakes of snow. While he still carried\nthe sword-stick and the rest of Gregory\u2019s portable luggage, he had\nthrown the cloak down and left it somewhere, perhaps on the steam-tug,\nperhaps on the balcony. Hoping, therefore, that the snow-shower might\nbe slight, he stepped back out of the street for a moment and stood up\nunder the doorway of a small and greasy hair-dresser\u2019s shop, the front\nwindow of which was empty, except for a sickly wax lady in evening\ndress.\n\nSnow, however, began to thicken and fall fast; and Syme, having found\none glance at the wax lady quite sufficient to depress his spirits,\nstared out instead into the white and empty street. He was considerably\nastonished to see, standing quite still outside the shop and staring\ninto the window, a man. His top hat was loaded with snow like the hat\nof Father Christmas, the white drift was rising round his boots and\nankles; but it seemed as if nothing could tear him away from the\ncontemplation of the colourless wax doll in dirty evening dress. That\nany human being should stand in such weather looking into such a shop\nwas a matter of sufficient wonder to Syme; but his idle wonder turned\nsuddenly into a personal shock; for he realised that the man standing\nthere was the paralytic old Professor de Worms. It scarcely seemed the\nplace for a person of his years and infirmities.\n\nSyme was ready to believe anything about the perversions of this\ndehumanized brotherhood; but even he could not believe that the\nProfessor had fallen in love with that particular wax lady. He could\nonly suppose that the man\u2019s malady (whatever it was) involved some\nmomentary fits of rigidity or trance. He was not inclined, however, to\nfeel in this case any very compassionate concern. On the contrary, he\nrather congratulated himself that the Professor\u2019s stroke and his\nelaborate and limping walk would make it easy to escape from him and\nleave him miles behind. For Syme thirsted first and last to get clear\nof the whole poisonous atmosphere, if only for an hour. Then he could\ncollect his thoughts, formulate his policy, and decide finally whether\nhe should or should not keep faith with Gregory.\n\nHe strolled away through the dancing snow, turned up two or three\nstreets, down through two or three others, and entered a small Soho\nrestaurant for lunch. He partook reflectively of four small and quaint\ncourses, drank half a bottle of red wine, and ended up over black\ncoffee and a black cigar, still thinking. He had taken his seat in the\nupper room of the restaurant, which was full of the chink of knives and\nthe chatter of foreigners. He remembered that in old days he had\nimagined that all these harmless and kindly aliens were anarchists. He\nshuddered, remembering the real thing. But even the shudder had the\ndelightful shame of escape. The wine, the common food, the familiar\nplace, the faces of natural and talkative men, made him almost feel as\nif the Council of the Seven Days had been a bad dream; and although he\nknew it was nevertheless an objective reality, it was at least a\ndistant one. Tall houses and populous streets lay between him and his\nlast sight of the shameful seven; he was free in free London, and\ndrinking wine among the free. With a somewhat easier action, he took\nhis hat and stick and strolled down the stair into the shop below.\n\nWhen he entered that lower room he stood stricken and rooted to the\nspot. At a small table, close up to the blank window and the white\nstreet of snow, sat the old anarchist Professor over a glass of milk,\nwith his lifted livid face and pendent eyelids. For an instant Syme\nstood as rigid as the stick he leant upon. Then with a gesture as of\nblind hurry, he brushed past the Professor, dashing open the door and\nslamming it behind him, and stood outside in the snow.\n\n\u201cCan that old corpse be following me?\u201d he asked himself, biting his\nyellow moustache. \u201cI stopped too long up in that room, so that even\nsuch leaden feet could catch me up. One comfort is, with a little brisk\nwalking I can put a man like that as far away as Timbuctoo. Or am I too\nfanciful? Was he really following me? Surely Sunday would not be such a\nfool as to send a lame man?\u201d\n\nHe set off at a smart pace, twisting and whirling his stick, in the\ndirection of Covent Garden. As he crossed the great market the snow\nincreased, growing blinding and bewildering as the afternoon began to\ndarken. The snow-flakes tormented him like a swarm of silver bees.\nGetting into his eyes and beard, they added their unremitting futility\nto his already irritated nerves; and by the time that he had come at a\nswinging pace to the beginning of Fleet Street, he lost patience, and\nfinding a Sunday teashop, turned into it to take shelter. He ordered\nanother cup of black coffee as an excuse. Scarcely had he done so, when\nProfessor de Worms hobbled heavily into the shop, sat down with\ndifficulty and ordered a glass of milk.\n\nSyme\u2019s walking-stick had fallen from his hand with a great clang, which\nconfessed the concealed steel. But the Professor did not look round.\nSyme, who was commonly a cool character, was literally gaping as a\nrustic gapes at a conjuring trick. He had seen no cab following; he had\nheard no wheels outside the shop; to all mortal appearances the man had\ncome on foot. But the old man could only walk like a snail, and Syme\nhad walked like the wind. He started up and snatched his stick, half\ncrazy with the contradiction in mere arithmetic, and swung out of the\nswinging doors, leaving his coffee untasted. An omnibus going to the\nBank went rattling by with an unusual rapidity. He had a violent run of\na hundred yards to reach it; but he managed to spring, swaying upon the\nsplash-board and, pausing for an instant to pant, he climbed on to the\ntop. When he had been seated for about half a minute, he heard behind\nhim a sort of heavy and asthmatic breathing.\n\nTurning sharply, he saw rising gradually higher and higher up the\nomnibus steps a top hat soiled and dripping with snow, and under the\nshadow of its brim the short-sighted face and shaky shoulders of\nProfessor de Worms. He let himself into a seat with characteristic\ncare, and wrapped himself up to the chin in the mackintosh rug.\n\nEvery movement of the old man\u2019s tottering figure and vague hands, every\nuncertain gesture and panic-stricken pause, seemed to put it beyond\nquestion that he was helpless, that he was in the last imbecility of\nthe body. He moved by inches, he let himself down with little gasps of\ncaution. And yet, unless the philosophical entities called time and\nspace have no vestige even of a practical existence, it appeared quite\nunquestionable that he had run after the omnibus.\n\nSyme sprang erect upon the rocking car, and after staring wildly at the\nwintry sky, that grew gloomier every moment, he ran down the steps. He\nhad repressed an elemental impulse to leap over the side.\n\nToo bewildered to look back or to reason, he rushed into one of the\nlittle courts at the side of Fleet Street as a rabbit rushes into a\nhole. He had a vague idea, if this incomprehensible old Jack-in-the-box\nwas really pursuing him, that in that labyrinth of little streets he\ncould soon throw him off the scent. He dived in and out of those\ncrooked lanes, which were more like cracks than thoroughfares; and by\nthe time that he had completed about twenty alternate angles and\ndescribed an unthinkable polygon, he paused to listen for any sound of\npursuit. There was none; there could not in any case have been much,\nfor the little streets were thick with the soundless snow. Somewhere\nbehind Red Lion Court, however, he noticed a place where some energetic\ncitizen had cleared away the snow for a space of about twenty yards,\nleaving the wet, glistening cobble-stones. He thought little of this as\nhe passed it, only plunging into yet another arm of the maze. But when\na few hundred yards farther on he stood still again to listen, his\nheart stood still also, for he heard from that space of rugged stones\nthe clinking crutch and labouring feet of the infernal cripple.\n\nThe sky above was loaded with the clouds of snow, leaving London in a\ndarkness and oppression premature for that hour of the evening. On each\nside of Syme the walls of the alley were blind and featureless; there\nwas no little window or any kind of eve. He felt a new impulse to break\nout of this hive of houses, and to get once more into the open and\nlamp-lit street. Yet he rambled and dodged for a long time before he\nstruck the main thoroughfare. When he did so, he struck it much farther\nup than he had fancied. He came out into what seemed the vast and void\nof Ludgate Circus, and saw St. Paul\u2019s Cathedral sitting in the sky.\n\nAt first he was startled to find these great roads so empty, as if a\npestilence had swept through the city. Then he told himself that some\ndegree of emptiness was natural; first because the snow-storm was even\ndangerously deep, and secondly because it was Sunday. And at the very\nword Sunday he bit his lip; the word was henceforth for hire like some\nindecent pun. Under the white fog of snow high up in the heaven the\nwhole atmosphere of the city was turned to a very queer kind of green\ntwilight, as of men under the sea. The sealed and sullen sunset behind\nthe dark dome of St. Paul\u2019s had in it smoky and sinister\ncolours\u2014colours of sickly green, dead red or decaying bronze, that were\njust bright enough to emphasise the solid whiteness of the snow. But\nright up against these dreary colours rose the black bulk of the\ncathedral; and upon the top of the cathedral was a random splash and\ngreat stain of snow, still clinging as to an Alpine peak. It had fallen\naccidentally, but just so fallen as to half drape the dome from its\nvery topmost point, and to pick out in perfect silver the great orb and\nthe cross. When Syme saw it he suddenly straightened himself, and made\nwith his sword-stick an involuntary salute.\n\nHe knew that that evil figure, his shadow, was creeping quickly or\nslowly behind him, and he did not care.\n\nIt seemed a symbol of human faith and valour that while the skies were\ndarkening that high place of the earth was bright. The devils might\nhave captured heaven, but they had not yet captured the cross. He had a\nnew impulse to tear out the secret of this dancing, jumping and\npursuing paralytic; and at the entrance of the court as it opened upon\nthe Circus he turned, stick in hand, to face his pursuer.\n\nProfessor de Worms came slowly round the corner of the irregular alley\nbehind him, his unnatural form outlined against a lonely gas-lamp,\nirresistibly recalling that very imaginative figure in the nursery\nrhymes, \u201cthe crooked man who went a crooked mile.\u201d He really looked as\nif he had been twisted out of shape by the tortuous streets he had been\nthreading. He came nearer and nearer, the lamplight shining on his\nlifted spectacles, his lifted, patient face. Syme waited for him as St.\nGeorge waited for the dragon, as a man waits for a final explanation or\nfor death. And the old Professor came right up to him and passed him\nlike a total stranger, without even a blink of his mournful eyelids.\n\nThere was something in this silent and unexpected innocence that left\nSyme in a final fury. The man\u2019s colourless face and manner seemed to\nassert that the whole following had been an accident. Syme was\ngalvanised with an energy that was something between bitterness and a\nburst of boyish derision. He made a wild gesture as if to knock the old\nman\u2019s hat off, called out something like \u201cCatch me if you can,\u201d and\nwent racing away across the white, open Circus. Concealment was\nimpossible now; and looking back over his shoulder, he could see the\nblack figure of the old gentleman coming after him with long, swinging\nstrides like a man winning a mile race. But the head upon that bounding\nbody was still pale, grave and professional, like the head of a\nlecturer upon the body of a harlequin.\n\nThis outrageous chase sped across Ludgate Circus, up Ludgate Hill,\nround St. Paul\u2019s Cathedral, along Cheapside, Syme remembering all the\nnightmares he had ever known. Then Syme broke away towards the river,\nand ended almost down by the docks. He saw the yellow panes of a low,\nlighted public-house, flung himself into it and ordered beer. It was a\nfoul tavern, sprinkled with foreign sailors, a place where opium might\nbe smoked or knives drawn.\n\nA moment later Professor de Worms entered the place, sat down\ncarefully, and asked for a glass of milk.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\nTHE PROFESSOR EXPLAINS\n\n\nWhen Gabriel Syme found himself finally established in a chair, and\nopposite to him, fixed and final also, the lifted eyebrows and leaden\neyelids of the Professor, his fears fully returned. This\nincomprehensible man from the fierce council, after all, had certainly\npursued him. If the man had one character as a paralytic and another\ncharacter as a pursuer, the antithesis might make him more interesting,\nbut scarcely more soothing. It would be a very small comfort that he\ncould not find the Professor out, if by some serious accident the\nProfessor should find him out. He emptied a whole pewter pot of ale\nbefore the professor had touched his milk.\n\nOne possibility, however, kept him hopeful and yet helpless. It was\njust possible that this escapade signified something other than even a\nslight suspicion of him. Perhaps it was some regular form or sign.\nPerhaps the foolish scamper was some sort of friendly signal that he\nought to have understood. Perhaps it was a ritual. Perhaps the new\nThursday was always chased along Cheapside, as the new Lord Mayor is\nalways escorted along it. He was just selecting a tentative inquiry,\nwhen the old Professor opposite suddenly and simply cut him short.\nBefore Syme could ask the first diplomatic question, the old anarchist\nhad asked suddenly, without any sort of preparation\u2014\n\n\u201cAre you a policeman?\u201d\n\nWhatever else Syme had expected, he had never expected anything so\nbrutal and actual as this. Even his great presence of mind could only\nmanage a reply with an air of rather blundering jocularity.\n\n\u201cA policeman?\u201d he said, laughing vaguely. \u201cWhatever made you think of a\npoliceman in connection with me?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe process was simple enough,\u201d answered the Professor patiently. \u201cI\nthought you looked like a policeman. I think so now.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I take a policeman\u2019s hat by mistake out of the restaurant?\u201d asked\nSyme, smiling wildly. \u201cHave I by any chance got a number stuck on to me\nsomewhere? Have my boots got that watchful look? Why must I be a\npoliceman? Do, do let me be a postman.\u201d\n\nThe old Professor shook his head with a gravity that gave no hope, but\nSyme ran on with a feverish irony.\n\n\u201cBut perhaps I misunderstood the delicacies of your German philosophy.\nPerhaps policeman is a relative term. In an evolutionary sense, sir,\nthe ape fades so gradually into the policeman, that I myself can never\ndetect the shade. The monkey is only the policeman that may be. Perhaps\na maiden lady on Clapham Common is only the policeman that might have\nbeen. I don\u2019t mind being the policeman that might have been. I don\u2019t\nmind being anything in German thought.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you in the police service?\u201d said the old man, ignoring all Syme\u2019s\nimprovised and desperate raillery. \u201cAre you a detective?\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s heart turned to stone, but his face never changed.\n\n\u201cYour suggestion is ridiculous,\u201d he began. \u201cWhy on earth\u2014\u201d\n\nThe old man struck his palsied hand passionately on the rickety table,\nnearly breaking it.\n\n\u201cDid you hear me ask a plain question, you pattering spy?\u201d he shrieked\nin a high, crazy voice. \u201cAre you, or are you not, a police detective?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo!\u201d answered Syme, like a man standing on the hangman\u2019s drop.\n\n\u201cYou swear it,\u201d said the old man, leaning across to him, his dead face\nbecoming as it were loathsomely alive. \u201cYou swear it! You swear it! If\nyou swear falsely, will you be damned? Will you be sure that the devil\ndances at your funeral? Will you see that the nightmare sits on your\ngrave? Will there really be no mistake? You are an anarchist, you are a\ndynamiter! Above all, you are not in any sense a detective? You are not\nin the British police?\u201d\n\nHe leant his angular elbow far across the table, and put up his large\nloose hand like a flap to his ear.\n\n\u201cI am not in the British police,\u201d said Syme with insane calm.\n\nProfessor de Worms fell back in his chair with a curious air of kindly\ncollapse.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a pity,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause I am.\u201d\n\nSyme sprang up straight, sending back the bench behind him with a\ncrash.\n\n\u201cBecause you are what?\u201d he said thickly. \u201cYou are what?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am a policeman,\u201d said the Professor with his first broad smile, and\nbeaming through his spectacles. \u201cBut as you think policeman only a\nrelative term, of course I have nothing to do with you. I am in the\nBritish police force; but as you tell me you are not in the British\npolice force, I can only say that I met you in a dynamiters\u2019 club. I\nsuppose I ought to arrest you.\u201d And with these words he laid on the\ntable before Syme an exact facsimile of the blue card which Syme had in\nhis own waistcoat pocket, the symbol of his power from the police.\n\nSyme had for a flash the sensation that the cosmos had turned exactly\nupside down, that all trees were growing downwards and that all stars\nwere under his feet. Then came slowly the opposite conviction. For the\nlast twenty-four hours the cosmos had really been upside down, but now\nthe capsized universe had come right side up again. This devil from\nwhom he had been fleeing all day was only an elder brother of his own\nhouse, who on the other side of the table lay back and laughed at him.\nHe did not for the moment ask any questions of detail; he only knew the\nhappy and silly fact that this shadow, which had pursued him with an\nintolerable oppression of peril, was only the shadow of a friend trying\nto catch him up. He knew simultaneously that he was a fool and a free\nman. For with any recovery from morbidity there must go a certain\nhealthy humiliation. There comes a certain point in such conditions\nwhen only three things are possible: first a perpetuation of Satanic\npride, secondly tears, and third laughter. Syme\u2019s egotism held hard to\nthe first course for a few seconds, and then suddenly adopted the\nthird. Taking his own blue police ticket from his own waist coat\npocket, he tossed it on to the table; then he flung his head back until\nhis spike of yellow beard almost pointed at the ceiling, and shouted\nwith a barbaric laughter.\n\nEven in that close den, perpetually filled with the din of knives,\nplates, cans, clamorous voices, sudden struggles and stampedes, there\nwas something Homeric in Syme\u2019s mirth which made many half-drunken men\nlook round.\n\n\u201cWhat yer laughing at, guv\u2019nor?\u201d asked one wondering labourer from the\ndocks.\n\n\u201cAt myself,\u201d answered Syme, and went off again into the agony of his\necstatic reaction.\n\n\u201cPull yourself together,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cor you\u2019ll get\nhysterical. Have some more beer. I\u2019ll join you.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou haven\u2019t drunk your milk,\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cMy milk!\u201d said the other, in tones of withering and unfathomable\ncontempt, \u201cmy milk! Do you think I\u2019d look at the beastly stuff when I\u2019m\nout of sight of the bloody anarchists? We\u2019re all Christians in this\nroom, though perhaps,\u201d he added, glancing around at the reeling crowd,\n\u201cnot strict ones. Finish my milk? Great blazes! yes, I\u2019ll finish it\nright enough!\u201d and he knocked the tumbler off the table, making a crash\nof glass and a splash of silver fluid.\n\nSyme was staring at him with a happy curiosity.\n\n\u201cI understand now,\u201d he cried; \u201cof course, you\u2019re not an old man at\nall.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t take my face off here,\u201d replied Professor de Worms. \u201cIt\u2019s\nrather an elaborate make-up. As to whether I\u2019m an old man, that\u2019s not\nfor me to say. I was thirty-eight last birthday.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, but I mean,\u201d said Syme impatiently, \u201cthere\u2019s nothing the matter\nwith you.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d answered the other dispassionately. \u201cI am subject to colds.\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s laughter at all this had about it a wild weakness of relief. He\nlaughed at the idea of the paralytic Professor being really a young\nactor dressed up as if for the foot-lights. But he felt that he would\nhave laughed as loudly if a pepperpot had fallen over.\n\nThe false Professor drank and wiped his false beard.\n\n\u201cDid you know,\u201d he asked, \u201cthat that man Gogol was one of us?\u201d\n\n\u201cI? No, I didn\u2019t know it,\u201d answered Syme in some surprise. \u201cBut didn\u2019t\nyou?\u201d\n\n\u201cI knew no more than the dead,\u201d replied the man who called himself de\nWorms. \u201cI thought the President was talking about me, and I rattled in\nmy boots.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I thought he was talking about me,\u201d said Syme, with his rather\nreckless laughter. \u201cI had my hand on my revolver all the time.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo had I,\u201d said the Professor grimly; \u201cso had Gogol evidently.\u201d\n\nSyme struck the table with an exclamation.\n\n\u201cWhy, there were three of us there!\u201d he cried. \u201cThree out of seven is a\nfighting number. If we had only known that we were three!\u201d\n\nThe face of Professor de Worms darkened, and he did not look up.\n\n\u201cWe were three,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we had been three hundred we could still\nhave done nothing.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot if we were three hundred against four?\u201d asked Syme, jeering rather\nboisterously.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the Professor with sobriety, \u201cnot if we were three hundred\nagainst Sunday.\u201d\n\nAnd the mere name struck Syme cold and serious; his laughter had died\nin his heart before it could die on his lips. The face of the\nunforgettable President sprang into his mind as startling as a coloured\nphotograph, and he remarked this difference between Sunday and all his\nsatellites, that their faces, however fierce or sinister, became\ngradually blurred by memory like other human faces, whereas Sunday\u2019s\nseemed almost to grow more actual during absence, as if a man\u2019s painted\nportrait should slowly come alive.\n\nThey were both silent for a measure of moments, and then Syme\u2019s speech\ncame with a rush, like the sudden foaming of champagne.\n\n\u201cProfessor,\u201d he cried, \u201cit is intolerable. Are you afraid of this man?\u201d\n\nThe Professor lifted his heavy lids, and gazed at Syme with large,\nwide-open, blue eyes of an almost ethereal honesty.\n\n\u201cYes, I am,\u201d he said mildly. \u201cSo are you.\u201d\n\nSyme was dumb for an instant. Then he rose to his feet erect, like an\ninsulted man, and thrust the chair away from him.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d he said in a voice indescribable, \u201cyou are right. I am afraid of\nhim. Therefore I swear by God that I will seek out this man whom I fear\nuntil I find him, and strike him on the mouth. If heaven were his\nthrone and the earth his footstool, I swear that I would pull him\ndown.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow?\u201d asked the staring Professor. \u201cWhy?\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause I am afraid of him,\u201d said Syme; \u201cand no man should leave in\nthe universe anything of which he is afraid.\u201d\n\nDe Worms blinked at him with a sort of blind wonder. He made an effort\nto speak, but Syme went on in a low voice, but with an undercurrent of\ninhuman exaltation\u2014\n\n\u201cWho would condescend to strike down the mere things that he does not\nfear? Who would debase himself to be merely brave, like any common\nprizefighter? Who would stoop to be fearless\u2014like a tree? Fight the\nthing that you fear. You remember the old tale of the English clergyman\nwho gave the last rites to the brigand of Sicily, and how on his\ndeath-bed the great robber said, \u2018I can give you no money, but I can\ngive you advice for a lifetime: your thumb on the blade, and strike\nupwards.\u2019 So I say to you, strike upwards, if you strike at the stars.\u201d\n\nThe other looked at the ceiling, one of the tricks of his pose.\n\n\u201cSunday is a fixed star,\u201d he said.\n\n\u201cYou shall see him a falling star,\u201d said Syme, and put on his hat.\n\nThe decision of his gesture drew the Professor vaguely to his feet.\n\n\u201cHave you any idea,\u201d he asked, with a sort of benevolent bewilderment,\n\u201cexactly where you are going?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied Syme shortly, \u201cI am going to prevent this bomb being\nthrown in Paris.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you any conception how?\u201d inquired the other.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Syme with equal decision.\n\n\u201cYou remember, of course,\u201d resumed the soi-disant de Worms, pulling his\nbeard and looking out of the window, \u201cthat when we broke up rather\nhurriedly the whole arrangements for the atrocity were left in the\nprivate hands of the Marquis and Dr. Bull. The Marquis is by this time\nprobably crossing the Channel. But where he will go and what he will do\nit is doubtful whether even the President knows; certainly we don\u2019t\nknow. The only man who does know is Dr. Bull.\u201d\n\n\u201cConfound it!\u201d cried Syme. \u201cAnd we don\u2019t know where he is.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said the other in his curious, absent-minded way, \u201cI know where\nhe is myself.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you tell me?\u201d asked Syme with eager eyes.\n\n\u201cI will take you there,\u201d said the Professor, and took down his own hat\nfrom a peg.\n\nSyme stood looking at him with a sort of rigid excitement.\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d he asked sharply. \u201cWill you join me? Will you take\nthe risk?\u201d\n\n\u201cYoung man,\u201d said the Professor pleasantly, \u201cI am amused to observe\nthat you think I am a coward. As to that I will say only one word, and\nthat shall be entirely in the manner of your own philosophical\nrhetoric. You think that it is possible to pull down the President. I\nknow that it is impossible, and I am going to try it,\u201d and opening the\ntavern door, which let in a blast of bitter air, they went out together\ninto the dark streets by the docks.\n\nMost of the snow was melted or trampled to mud, but here and there a\nclot of it still showed grey rather than white in the gloom. The small\nstreets were sloppy and full of pools, which reflected the flaming\nlamps irregularly, and by accident, like fragments of some other and\nfallen world. Syme felt almost dazed as he stepped through this growing\nconfusion of lights and shadows; but his companion walked on with a\ncertain briskness, towards where, at the end of the street, an inch or\ntwo of the lamplit river looked like a bar of flame.\n\n\u201cWhere are you going?\u201d Syme inquired.\n\n\u201cJust now,\u201d answered the Professor, \u201cI am going just round the corner\nto see whether Dr. Bull has gone to bed. He is hygienic, and retires\nearly.\u201d\n\n\u201cDr. Bull!\u201d exclaimed Syme. \u201cDoes he live round the corner?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d answered his friend. \u201cAs a matter of fact he lives some way off,\non the other side of the river, but we can tell from here whether he\nhas gone to bed.\u201d\n\nTurning the corner as he spoke, and facing the dim river, flecked with\nflame, he pointed with his stick to the other bank. On the Surrey side\nat this point there ran out into the Thames, seeming almost to overhang\nit, a bulk and cluster of those tall tenements, dotted with lighted\nwindows, and rising like factory chimneys to an almost insane height.\nTheir special poise and position made one block of buildings especially\nlook like a Tower of Babel with a hundred eyes. Syme had never seen any\nof the sky-scraping buildings in America, so he could only think of the\nbuildings in a dream.\n\nEven as he stared, the highest light in this innumerably lighted turret\nabruptly went out, as if this black Argus had winked at him with one of\nhis innumerable eyes.\n\nProfessor de Worms swung round on his heel, and struck his stick\nagainst his boot.\n\n\u201cWe are too late,\u201d he said, \u201cthe hygienic Doctor has gone to bed.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d asked Syme. \u201cDoes he live over there, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said de Worms, \u201cbehind that particular window which you can\u2019t\nsee. Come along and get some dinner. We must call on him tomorrow\nmorning.\u201d\n\nWithout further parley, he led the way through several by-ways until\nthey came out into the flare and clamour of the East India Dock Road.\nThe Professor, who seemed to know his way about the neighbourhood,\nproceeded to a place where the line of lighted shops fell back into a\nsort of abrupt twilight and quiet, in which an old white inn, all out\nof repair, stood back some twenty feet from the road.\n\n\u201cYou can find good English inns left by accident everywhere, like\nfossils,\u201d explained the Professor. \u201cI once found a decent place in the\nWest End.\u201d\n\n\u201cI suppose,\u201d said Syme, smiling, \u201cthat this is the corresponding decent\nplace in the East End?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is,\u201d said the Professor reverently, and went in.\n\nIn that place they dined and slept, both very thoroughly. The beans and\nbacon, which these unaccountable people cooked well, the astonishing\nemergence of Burgundy from their cellars, crowned Syme\u2019s sense of a new\ncomradeship and comfort. Through all this ordeal his root horror had\nbeen isolation, and there are no words to express the abyss between\nisolation and having one ally. It may be conceded to the mathematicians\nthat four is twice two. But two is not twice one; two is two thousand\ntimes one. That is why, in spite of a hundred disadvantages, the world\nwill always return to monogamy.\n\nSyme was able to pour out for the first time the whole of his\noutrageous tale, from the time when Gregory had taken him to the little\ntavern by the river. He did it idly and amply, in a luxuriant\nmonologue, as a man speaks with very old friends. On his side, also,\nthe man who had impersonated Professor de Worms was not less\ncommunicative. His own story was almost as silly as Syme\u2019s.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a good get-up of yours,\u201d said Syme, draining a glass of Macon;\n\u201ca lot better than old Gogol\u2019s. Even at the start I thought he was a\nbit too hairy.\u201d\n\n\u201cA difference of artistic theory,\u201d replied the Professor pensively.\n\u201cGogol was an idealist. He made up as the abstract or platonic ideal of\nan anarchist. But I am a realist. I am a portrait painter. But, indeed,\nto say that I am a portrait painter is an inadequate expression. I am a\nportrait.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t understand you,\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cI am a portrait,\u201d repeated the Professor. \u201cI am a portrait of the\ncelebrated Professor de Worms, who is, I believe, in Naples.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean you are made up like him,\u201d said Syme. \u201cBut doesn\u2019t he know\nthat you are taking his nose in vain?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe knows it right enough,\u201d replied his friend cheerfully.\n\n\u201cThen why doesn\u2019t he denounce you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have denounced him,\u201d answered the Professor.\n\n\u201cDo explain yourself,\u201d said Syme.\n\n\u201cWith pleasure, if you don\u2019t mind hearing my story,\u201d replied the\neminent foreign philosopher. \u201cI am by profession an actor, and my name\nis Wilks. When I was on the stage I mixed with all sorts of Bohemian\nand blackguard company. Sometimes I touched the edge of the turf,\nsometimes the riff-raff of the arts, and occasionally the political\nrefugee. In some den of exiled dreamers I was introduced to the great\nGerman Nihilist philosopher, Professor de Worms. I did not gather much\nabout him beyond his appearance, which was very disgusting, and which I\nstudied carefully. I understood that he had proved that the destructive\nprinciple in the universe was God; hence he insisted on the need for a\nfurious and incessant energy, rending all things in pieces. Energy, he\nsaid, was the All. He was lame, shortsighted, and partially paralytic.\nWhen I met him I was in a frivolous mood, and I disliked him so much\nthat I resolved to imitate him. If I had been a draughtsman I would\nhave drawn a caricature. I was only an actor, I could only act a\ncaricature. I made myself up into what was meant for a wild\nexaggeration of the old Professor\u2019s dirty old self. When I went into\nthe room full of his supporters I expected to be received with a roar\nof laughter, or (if they were too far gone) with a roar of indignation\nat the insult. I cannot describe the surprise I felt when my entrance\nwas received with a respectful silence, followed (when I had first\nopened my lips) with a murmur of admiration. The curse of the perfect\nartist had fallen upon me. I had been too subtle, I had been too true.\nThey thought I really was the great Nihilist Professor. I was a\nhealthy-minded young man at the time, and I confess that it was a blow.\nBefore I could fully recover, however, two or three of these admirers\nran up to me radiating indignation, and told me that a public insult\nhad been put upon me in the next room. I inquired its nature. It seemed\nthat an impertinent fellow had dressed himself up as a preposterous\nparody of myself. I had drunk more champagne than was good for me, and\nin a flash of folly I decided to see the situation through.\nConsequently it was to meet the glare of the company and my own lifted\neyebrows and freezing eyes that the real Professor came into the room.\n\n\u201cI need hardly say there was a collision. The pessimists all round me\nlooked anxiously from one Professor to the other Professor to see which\nwas really the more feeble. But I won. An old man in poor health, like\nmy rival, could not be expected to be so impressively feeble as a young\nactor in the prime of life. You see, he really had paralysis, and\nworking within this definite limitation, he couldn\u2019t be so jolly\nparalytic as I was. Then he tried to blast my claims intellectually. I\ncountered that by a very simple dodge. Whenever he said something that\nnobody but he could understand, I replied with something which I could\nnot even understand myself. \u2018I don\u2019t fancy,\u2019 he said, \u2018that you could\nhave worked out the principle that evolution is only negation, since\nthere inheres in it the introduction of lacuna, which are an essential\nof differentiation.\u2019 I replied quite scornfully, \u2018You read all that up\nin Pinckwerts; the notion that involution functioned eugenically was\nexposed long ago by Glumpe.\u2019 It is unnecessary for me to say that there\nnever were such people as Pinckwerts and Glumpe. But the people all\nround (rather to my surprise) seemed to remember them quite well, and\nthe Professor, finding that the learned and mysterious method left him\nrather at the mercy of an enemy slightly deficient in scruples, fell\nback upon a more popular form of wit. \u2018I see,\u2019 he sneered, \u2018you prevail\nlike the false pig in \u00c6sop.\u2019 \u2018And you fail,\u2019 I answered, smiling, \u2018like\nthe hedgehog in Montaigne.\u2019 Need I say that there is no hedgehog in\nMontaigne? \u2018Your claptrap comes off,\u2019 he said; \u2018so would your beard.\u2019 I\nhad no intelligent answer to this, which was quite true and rather\nwitty. But I laughed heartily, answered, \u2018Like the Pantheist\u2019s boots,\u2019\nat random, and turned on my heel with all the honours of victory. The\nreal Professor was thrown out, but not with violence, though one man\ntried very patiently to pull off his nose. He is now, I believe,\nreceived everywhere in Europe as a delightful impostor. His apparent\nearnestness and anger, you see, make him all the more entertaining.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI can understand your putting on his dirty old\nbeard for a night\u2019s practical joke, but I don\u2019t understand your never\ntaking it off again.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is the rest of the story,\u201d said the impersonator. \u201cWhen I myself\nleft the company, followed by reverent applause, I went limping down\nthe dark street, hoping that I should soon be far enough away to be\nable to walk like a human being. To my astonishment, as I was turning\nthe corner, I felt a touch on the shoulder, and turning, found myself\nunder the shadow of an enormous policeman. He told me I was wanted. I\nstruck a sort of paralytic attitude, and cried in a high German accent,\n\u2018Yes, I am wanted\u2014by the oppressed of the world. You are arresting me\non the charge of being the great anarchist, Professor de Worms.\u2019 The\npoliceman impassively consulted a paper in his hand, \u2018No, sir,\u2019 he said\ncivilly, \u2018at least, not exactly, sir. I am arresting you on the charge\nof not being the celebrated anarchist, Professor de Worms.\u2019 This\ncharge, if it was criminal at all, was certainly the lighter of the\ntwo, and I went along with the man, doubtful, but not greatly dismayed.\nI was shown into a number of rooms, and eventually into the presence of\na police officer, who explained that a serious campaign had been opened\nagainst the centres of anarchy, and that this, my successful\nmasquerade, might be of considerable value to the public safety. He\noffered me a good salary and this little blue card. Though our\nconversation was short, he struck me as a man of very massive common\nsense and humour; but I cannot tell you much about him personally,\nbecause\u2014\u201d\n\nSyme laid down his knife and fork.\n\n\u201cI know,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause you talked to him in a dark room.\u201d\n\nProfessor de Worms nodded and drained his glass.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\nTHE MAN IN SPECTACLES\n\n\n\u201cBurgundy is a jolly thing,\u201d said the Professor sadly, as he set his\nglass down.\n\n\u201cYou don\u2019t look as if it were,\u201d said Syme; \u201cyou drink it as if it were\nmedicine.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou must excuse my manner,\u201d said the Professor dismally, \u201cmy position\nis rather a curious one. Inside I am really bursting with boyish\nmerriment; but I acted the paralytic Professor so well, that now I\ncan\u2019t leave off. So that when I am among friends, and have no need at\nall to disguise myself, I still can\u2019t help speaking slow and wrinkling\nmy forehead\u2014just as if it were my forehead. I can be quite happy, you\nunderstand, but only in a paralytic sort of way. The most buoyant\nexclamations leap up in my heart, but they come out of my mouth quite\ndifferent. You should hear me say, \u2018Buck up, old cock!\u2019 It would bring\ntears to your eyes.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt does,\u201d said Syme; \u201cbut I cannot help thinking that apart from all\nthat you are really a bit worried.\u201d\n\nThe Professor started a little and looked at him steadily.\n\n\u201cYou are a very clever fellow,\u201d he said, \u201cit is a pleasure to work with\nyou. Yes, I have rather a heavy cloud in my head. There is a great\nproblem to face,\u201d and he sank his bald brow in his two hands.\n\nThen he said in a low voice\u2014\n\n\u201cCan you play the piano?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme in simple wonder, \u201cI\u2019m supposed to have a good touch.\u201d\n\nThen, as the other did not speak, he added\u2014\n\n\u201cI trust the great cloud is lifted.\u201d\n\nAfter a long silence, the Professor said out of the cavernous shadow of\nhis hands\u2014\n\n\u201cIt would have done just as well if you could work a typewriter.\u201d\n\n\u201cThank you,\u201d said Syme, \u201cyou flatter me.\u201d\n\n\u201cListen to me,\u201d said the other, \u201cand remember whom we have to see\ntomorrow. You and I are going tomorrow to attempt something which is\nvery much more dangerous than trying to steal the Crown Jewels out of\nthe Tower. We are trying to steal a secret from a very sharp, very\nstrong, and very wicked man. I believe there is no man, except the\nPresident, of course, who is so seriously startling and formidable as\nthat little grinning fellow in goggles. He has not perhaps the\nwhite-hot enthusiasm unto death, the mad martyrdom for anarchy, which\nmarks the Secretary. But then that very fanaticism in the Secretary has\na human pathos, and is almost a redeeming trait. But the little Doctor\nhas a brutal sanity that is more shocking than the Secretary\u2019s disease.\nDon\u2019t you notice his detestable virility and vitality. He bounces like\nan india-rubber ball. Depend on it, Sunday was not asleep (I wonder if\nhe ever sleeps?) when he locked up all the plans of this outrage in the\nround, black head of Dr. Bull.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you think,\u201d said Syme, \u201cthat this unique monster will be soothed\nif I play the piano to him?\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t be an ass,\u201d said his mentor. \u201cI mentioned the piano because it\ngives one quick and independent fingers. Syme, if we are to go through\nthis interview and come out sane or alive, we must have some code of\nsignals between us that this brute will not see. I have made a rough\nalphabetical cypher corresponding to the five fingers\u2014like this, see,\u201d\nand he rippled with his fingers on the wooden table\u2014\u201cB A D, bad, a word\nwe may frequently require.\u201d\n\nSyme poured himself out another glass of wine, and began to study the\nscheme. He was abnormally quick with his brains at puzzles, and with\nhis hands at conjuring, and it did not take him long to learn how he\nmight convey simple messages by what would seem to be idle taps upon a\ntable or knee. But wine and companionship had always the effect of\ninspiring him to a farcical ingenuity, and the Professor soon found\nhimself struggling with the too vast energy of the new language, as it\npassed through the heated brain of Syme.\n\n\u201cWe must have several word-signs,\u201d said Syme seriously\u2014\u201cwords that we\nare likely to want, fine shades of meaning. My favourite word is\n\u2018coeval\u2019. What\u2019s yours?\u201d\n\n\u201cDo stop playing the goat,\u201d said the Professor plaintively. \u201cYou don\u2019t\nknow how serious this is.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Lush\u2019 too,\u201d said Syme, shaking his head sagaciously, \u201cwe must have\n\u2018lush\u2019\u2014word applied to grass, don\u2019t you know?\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you imagine,\u201d asked the Professor furiously, \u201cthat we are going to\ntalk to Dr. Bull about grass?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere are several ways in which the subject could be approached,\u201d said\nSyme reflectively, \u201cand the word introduced without appearing forced.\nWe might say, \u2018Dr. Bull, as a revolutionist, you remember that a tyrant\nonce advised us to eat grass; and indeed many of us, looking on the\nfresh lush grass of summer...\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you understand,\u201d said the other, \u201cthat this is a tragedy?\u201d\n\n\u201cPerfectly,\u201d replied Syme; \u201calways be comic in a tragedy. What the\ndeuce else can you do? I wish this language of yours had a wider scope.\nI suppose we could not extend it from the fingers to the toes? That\nwould involve pulling off our boots and socks during the conversation,\nwhich however unobtrusively performed\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cSyme,\u201d said his friend with a stern simplicity, \u201cgo to bed!\u201d\n\nSyme, however, sat up in bed for a considerable time mastering the new\ncode. He was awakened next morning while the east was still sealed with\ndarkness, and found his grey-bearded ally standing like a ghost beside\nhis bed.\n\nSyme sat up in bed blinking; then slowly collected his thoughts, threw\noff the bed-clothes, and stood up. It seemed to him in some curious way\nthat all the safety and sociability of the night before fell with the\nbedclothes off him, and he stood up in an air of cold danger. He still\nfelt an entire trust and loyalty towards his companion; but it was the\ntrust between two men going to the scaffold.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme with a forced cheerfulness as he pulled on his\ntrousers, \u201cI dreamt of that alphabet of yours. Did it take you long to\nmake it up?\u201d\n\nThe Professor made no answer, but gazed in front of him with eyes the\ncolour of a wintry sea; so Syme repeated his question.\n\n\u201cI say, did it take you long to invent all this? I\u2019m considered good at\nthese things, and it was a good hour\u2019s grind. Did you learn it all on\nthe spot?\u201d\n\nThe Professor was silent; his eyes were wide open, and he wore a fixed\nbut very small smile.\n\n\u201cHow long did it take you?\u201d\n\nThe Professor did not move.\n\n\u201cConfound you, can\u2019t you answer?\u201d called out Syme, in a sudden anger\nthat had something like fear underneath. Whether or no the Professor\ncould answer, he did not.\n\nSyme stood staring back at the stiff face like parchment and the blank,\nblue eyes. His first thought was that the Professor had gone mad, but\nhis second thought was more frightful. After all, what did he know\nabout this queer creature whom he had heedlessly accepted as a friend?\nWhat did he know, except that the man had been at the anarchist\nbreakfast and had told him a ridiculous tale? How improbable it was\nthat there should be another friend there beside Gogol! Was this man\u2019s\nsilence a sensational way of declaring war? Was this adamantine stare\nafter all only the awful sneer of some threefold traitor, who had\nturned for the last time? He stood and strained his ears in this\nheartless silence. He almost fancied he could hear dynamiters come to\ncapture him shifting softly in the corridor outside.\n\nThen his eye strayed downwards, and he burst out laughing. Though the\nProfessor himself stood there as voiceless as a statue, his five dumb\nfingers were dancing alive upon the dead table. Syme watched the\ntwinkling movements of the talking hand, and read clearly the message\u2014\n\n\u201cI will only talk like this. We must get used to it.\u201d\n\nHe rapped out the answer with the impatience of relief\u2014\n\n\u201cAll right. Let\u2019s get out to breakfast.\u201d\n\nThey took their hats and sticks in silence; but as Syme took his\nsword-stick, he held it hard.\n\nThey paused for a few minutes only to stuff down coffee and coarse\nthick sandwiches at a coffee stall, and then made their way across the\nriver, which under the grey and growing light looked as desolate as\nAcheron. They reached the bottom of the huge block of buildings which\nthey had seen from across the river, and began in silence to mount the\nnaked and numberless stone steps, only pausing now and then to make\nshort remarks on the rail of the banisters. At about every other flight\nthey passed a window; each window showed them a pale and tragic dawn\nlifting itself laboriously over London. From each the innumerable roofs\nof slate looked like the leaden surges of a grey, troubled sea after\nrain. Syme was increasingly conscious that his new adventure had\nsomehow a quality of cold sanity worse than the wild adventures of the\npast. Last night, for instance, the tall tenements had seemed to him\nlike a tower in a dream. As he now went up the weary and perpetual\nsteps, he was daunted and bewildered by their almost infinite series.\nBut it was not the hot horror of a dream or of anything that might be\nexaggeration or delusion. Their infinity was more like the empty\ninfinity of arithmetic, something unthinkable, yet necessary to\nthought. Or it was like the stunning statements of astronomy about the\ndistance of the fixed stars. He was ascending the house of reason, a\nthing more hideous than unreason itself.\n\nBy the time they reached Dr. Bull\u2019s landing, a last window showed them\na harsh, white dawn edged with banks of a kind of coarse red, more like\nred clay than red cloud. And when they entered Dr. Bull\u2019s bare garret\nit was full of light.\n\nSyme had been haunted by a half historic memory in connection with\nthese empty rooms and that austere daybreak. The moment he saw the\ngarret and Dr. Bull sitting writing at a table, he remembered what the\nmemory was\u2014the French Revolution. There should have been the black\noutline of a guillotine against that heavy red and white of the\nmorning. Dr. Bull was in his white shirt and black breeches only; his\ncropped, dark head might well have just come out of its wig; he might\nhave been Marat or a more slipshod Robespierre.\n\nYet when he was seen properly, the French fancy fell away. The Jacobins\nwere idealists; there was about this man a murderous materialism. His\nposition gave him a somewhat new appearance. The strong, white light of\nmorning coming from one side creating sharp shadows, made him seem both\nmore pale and more angular than he had looked at the breakfast on the\nbalcony. Thus the two black glasses that encased his eyes might really\nhave been black cavities in his skull, making him look like a\ndeath\u2019s-head. And, indeed, if ever Death himself sat writing at a\nwooden table, it might have been he.\n\nHe looked up and smiled brightly enough as the men came in, and rose\nwith the resilient rapidity of which the Professor had spoken. He set\nchairs for both of them, and going to a peg behind the door, proceeded\nto put on a coat and waistcoat of rough, dark tweed; he buttoned it up\nneatly, and came back to sit down at his table.\n\nThe quiet good humour of his manner left his two opponents helpless. It\nwas with some momentary difficulty that the Professor broke silence and\nbegan, \u201cI\u2019m sorry to disturb you so early, comrade,\u201d said he, with a\ncareful resumption of the slow de Worms manner. \u201cYou have no doubt made\nall the arrangements for the Paris affair?\u201d Then he added with infinite\nslowness, \u201cWe have information which renders intolerable anything in\nthe nature of a moment\u2019s delay.\u201d\n\nDr. Bull smiled again, but continued to gaze on them without speaking.\nThe Professor resumed, a pause before each weary word\u2014\n\n\u201cPlease do not think me excessively abrupt; but I advise you to alter\nthose plans, or if it is too late for that, to follow your agent with\nall the support you can get for him. Comrade Syme and I have had an\nexperience which it would take more time to recount than we can afford,\nif we are to act on it. I will, however, relate the occurrence in\ndetail, even at the risk of losing time, if you really feel that it is\nessential to the understanding of the problem we have to discuss.\u201d\n\nHe was spinning out his sentences, making them intolerably long and\nlingering, in the hope of maddening the practical little Doctor into an\nexplosion of impatience which might show his hand. But the little\nDoctor continued only to stare and smile, and the monologue was uphill\nwork. Syme began to feel a new sickness and despair. The Doctor\u2019s smile\nand silence were not at all like the cataleptic stare and horrible\nsilence which he had confronted in the Professor half an hour before.\nAbout the Professor\u2019s makeup and all his antics there was always\nsomething merely grotesque, like a gollywog. Syme remembered those wild\nwoes of yesterday as one remembers being afraid of Bogy in childhood.\nBut here was daylight; here was a healthy, square-shouldered man in\ntweeds, not odd save for the accident of his ugly spectacles, not\nglaring or grinning at all, but smiling steadily and not saying a word.\nThe whole had a sense of unbearable reality. Under the increasing\nsunlight the colours of the Doctor\u2019s complexion, the pattern of his\ntweeds, grew and expanded outrageously, as such things grow too\nimportant in a realistic novel. But his smile was quite slight, the\npose of his head polite; the only uncanny thing was his silence.\n\n\u201cAs I say,\u201d resumed the Professor, like a man toiling through heavy\nsand, \u201cthe incident that has occurred to us and has led us to ask for\ninformation about the Marquis, is one which you may think it better to\nhave narrated; but as it came in the way of Comrade Syme rather than\nme\u2014\u201d\n\nHis words he seemed to be dragging out like words in an anthem; but\nSyme, who was watching, saw his long fingers rattle quickly on the edge\nof the crazy table. He read the message, \u201cYou must go on. This devil\nhas sucked me dry!\u201d\n\nSyme plunged into the breach with that bravado of improvisation which\nalways came to him when he was alarmed.\n\n\u201cYes, the thing really happened to me,\u201d he said hastily. \u201cI had the\ngood fortune to fall into conversation with a detective who took me,\nthanks to my hat, for a respectable person. Wishing to clinch my\nreputation for respectability, I took him and made him very drunk at\nthe Savoy. Under this influence he became friendly, and told me in so\nmany words that within a day or two they hope to arrest the Marquis in\nFrance.\n\n\u201cSo unless you or I can get on his track\u2014\u201d\n\nThe Doctor was still smiling in the most friendly way, and his\nprotected eyes were still impenetrable. The Professor signalled to Syme\nthat he would resume his explanation, and he began again with the same\nelaborate calm.\n\n\u201cSyme immediately brought this information to me, and we came here\ntogether to see what use you would be inclined to make of it. It seems\nto me unquestionably urgent that\u2014\u201d\n\nAll this time Syme had been staring at the Doctor almost as steadily as\nthe Doctor stared at the Professor, but quite without the smile. The\nnerves of both comrades-in-arms were near snapping under that strain of\nmotionless amiability, when Syme suddenly leant forward and idly tapped\nthe edge of the table. His message to his ally ran, \u201cI have an\nintuition.\u201d\n\nThe Professor, with scarcely a pause in his monologue, signalled back,\n\u201cThen sit on it.\u201d\n\nSyme telegraphed, \u201cIt is quite extraordinary.\u201d\n\nThe other answered, \u201cExtraordinary rot!\u201d\n\nSyme said, \u201cI am a poet.\u201d\n\nThe other retorted, \u201cYou are a dead man.\u201d\n\nSyme had gone quite red up to his yellow hair, and his eyes were\nburning feverishly. As he said he had an intuition, and it had risen to\na sort of lightheaded certainty. Resuming his symbolic taps, he\nsignalled to his friend, \u201cYou scarcely realise how poetic my intuition\nis. It has that sudden quality we sometimes feel in the coming of\nspring.\u201d\n\nHe then studied the answer on his friend\u2019s fingers. The answer was, \u201cGo\nto hell!\u201d\n\nThe Professor then resumed his merely verbal monologue addressed to the\nDoctor.\n\n\u201cPerhaps I should rather say,\u201d said Syme on his fingers, \u201cthat it\nresembles that sudden smell of the sea which may be found in the heart\nof lush woods.\u201d\n\nHis companion disdained to reply.\n\n\u201cOr yet again,\u201d tapped Syme, \u201cit is positive, as is the passionate red\nhair of a beautiful woman.\u201d\n\nThe Professor was continuing his speech, but in the middle of it Syme\ndecided to act. He leant across the table, and said in a voice that\ncould not be neglected\u2014\n\n\u201cDr. Bull!\u201d\n\nThe Doctor\u2019s sleek and smiling head did not move, but they could have\nsworn that under his dark glasses his eyes darted towards Syme.\n\n\u201cDr. Bull,\u201d said Syme, in a voice peculiarly precise and courteous,\n\u201cwould you do me a small favour? Would you be so kind as to take off\nyour spectacles?\u201d\n\nThe Professor swung round on his seat, and stared at Syme with a sort\nof frozen fury of astonishment. Syme, like a man who has thrown his\nlife and fortune on the table, leaned forward with a fiery face. The\nDoctor did not move.\n\nFor a few seconds there was a silence in which one could hear a pin\ndrop, split once by the single hoot of a distant steamer on the Thames.\nThen Dr. Bull rose slowly, still smiling, and took off his spectacles.\n\nSyme sprang to his feet, stepping backwards a little, like a chemical\nlecturer from a successful explosion. His eyes were like stars, and for\nan instant he could only point without speaking.\n\nThe Professor had also started to his feet, forgetful of his supposed\nparalysis. He leant on the back of the chair and stared doubtfully at\nDr. Bull, as if the Doctor had been turned into a toad before his eyes.\nAnd indeed it was almost as great a transformation scene.\n\nThe two detectives saw sitting in the chair before them a very\nboyish-looking young man, with very frank and happy hazel eyes, an open\nexpression, cockney clothes like those of a city clerk, and an\nunquestionable breath about him of being very good and rather\ncommonplace. The smile was still there, but it might have been the\nfirst smile of a baby.\n\n\u201cI knew I was a poet,\u201d cried Syme in a sort of ecstasy. \u201cI knew my\nintuition was as infallible as the Pope. It was the spectacles that did\nit! It was all the spectacles. Given those beastly black eyes, and all\nthe rest of him his health and his jolly looks, made him a live devil\namong dead ones.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt certainly does make a queer difference,\u201d said the Professor\nshakily. \u201cBut as regards the project of Dr. Bull\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cProject be damned!\u201d roared Syme, beside himself. \u201cLook at him! Look at\nhis face, look at his collar, look at his blessed boots! You don\u2019t\nsuppose, do you, that that thing\u2019s an anarchist?\u201d\n\n\u201cSyme!\u201d cried the other in an apprehensive agony.\n\n\u201cWhy, by God,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI\u2019ll take the risk of that myself! Dr. Bull,\nI am a police officer. There\u2019s my card,\u201d and he flung down the blue\ncard upon the table.\n\nThe Professor still feared that all was lost; but he was loyal. He\npulled out his own official card and put it beside his friend\u2019s. Then\nthe third man burst out laughing, and for the first time that morning\nthey heard his voice.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m awfully glad you chaps have come so early,\u201d he said, with a sort\nof schoolboy flippancy, \u201cfor we can all start for France together. Yes,\nI\u2019m in the force right enough,\u201d and he flicked a blue card towards them\nlightly as a matter of form.\n\nClapping a brisk bowler on his head and resuming his goblin glasses,\nthe Doctor moved so quickly towards the door, that the others\ninstinctively followed him. Syme seemed a little distrait, and as he\npassed under the doorway he suddenly struck his stick on the stone\npassage so that it rang.\n\n\u201cBut Lord God Almighty,\u201d he cried out, \u201cif this is all right, there\nwere more damned detectives than there were damned dynamiters at the\ndamned Council!\u201d\n\n\u201cWe might have fought easily,\u201d said Bull; \u201cwe were four against three.\u201d\n\nThe Professor was descending the stairs, but his voice came up from\nbelow.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the voice, \u201cwe were not four against three\u2014we were not so\nlucky. We were four against One.\u201d\n\nThe others went down the stairs in silence.\n\nThe young man called Bull, with an innocent courtesy characteristic of\nhim, insisted on going last until they reached the street; but there\nhis own robust rapidity asserted itself unconsciously, and he walked\nquickly on ahead towards a railway inquiry office, talking to the\nothers over his shoulder.\n\n\u201cIt is jolly to get some pals,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been half dead with the\njumps, being quite alone. I nearly flung my arms round Gogol and\nembraced him, which would have been imprudent. I hope you won\u2019t despise\nme for having been in a blue funk.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll the blue devils in blue hell,\u201d said Syme, \u201ccontributed to my blue\nfunk! But the worst devil was you and your infernal goggles.\u201d\n\nThe young man laughed delightedly.\n\n\u201cWasn\u2019t it a rag?\u201d he said. \u201cSuch a simple idea\u2014not my own. I haven\u2019t\ngot the brains. You see, I wanted to go into the detective service,\nespecially the anti-dynamite business. But for that purpose they wanted\nsomeone to dress up as a dynamiter; and they all swore by blazes that I\ncould never look like a dynamiter. They said my very walk was\nrespectable, and that seen from behind I looked like the British\nConstitution. They said I looked too healthy and too optimistic, and\ntoo reliable and benevolent; they called me all sorts of names at\nScotland Yard. They said that if I had been a criminal, I might have\nmade my fortune by looking so like an honest man; but as I had the\nmisfortune to be an honest man, there was not even the remotest chance\nof my assisting them by ever looking like a criminal. But at last I was\nbrought before some old josser who was high up in the force, and who\nseemed to have no end of a head on his shoulders. And there the others\nall talked hopelessly. One asked whether a bushy beard would hide my\nnice smile; another said that if they blacked my face I might look like\na negro anarchist; but this old chap chipped in with a most\nextraordinary remark. \u2018A pair of smoked spectacles will do it,\u2019 he said\npositively. \u2018Look at him now; he looks like an angelic office boy. Put\nhim on a pair of smoked spectacles, and children will scream at the\nsight of him.\u2019 And so it was, by George! When once my eyes were\ncovered, all the rest, smile and big shoulders and short hair, made me\nlook a perfect little devil. As I say, it was simple enough when it was\ndone, like miracles; but that wasn\u2019t the really miraculous part of it.\nThere was one really staggering thing about the business, and my head\nstill turns at it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat was that?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll tell you,\u201d answered the man in spectacles. \u201cThis big pot in the\npolice who sized me up so that he knew how the goggles would go with my\nhair and socks\u2014by God, he never saw me at all!\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s eyes suddenly flashed on him.\n\n\u201cHow was that?\u201d he asked. \u201cI thought you talked to him.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo I did,\u201d said Bull brightly; \u201cbut we talked in a pitch-dark room\nlike a coalcellar. There, you would never have guessed that.\u201d\n\n\u201cI could not have conceived it,\u201d said Syme gravely.\n\n\u201cIt is indeed a new idea,\u201d said the Professor.\n\nTheir new ally was in practical matters a whirlwind. At the inquiry\noffice he asked with businesslike brevity about the trains for Dover.\nHaving got his information, he bundled the company into a cab, and put\nthem and himself inside a railway carriage before they had properly\nrealised the breathless process. They were already on the Calais boat\nbefore conversation flowed freely.\n\n\u201cI had already arranged,\u201d he explained, \u201cto go to France for my lunch;\nbut I am delighted to have someone to lunch with me. You see, I had to\nsend that beast, the Marquis, over with his bomb, because the President\nhad his eye on me, though God knows how. I\u2019ll tell you the story some\nday. It was perfectly choking. Whenever I tried to slip out of it I saw\nthe President somewhere, smiling out of the bow-window of a club, or\ntaking off his hat to me from the top of an omnibus. I tell you, you\ncan say what you like, that fellow sold himself to the devil; he can be\nin six places at once.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo you sent the Marquis off, I understand,\u201d asked the Professor. \u201cWas\nit long ago? Shall we be in time to catch him?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d answered the new guide, \u201cI\u2019ve timed it all. He\u2019ll still be at\nCalais when we arrive.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut when we do catch him at Calais,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cwhat are we\ngoing to do?\u201d\n\nAt this question the countenance of Dr. Bull fell for the first time.\nHe reflected a little, and then said\u2014\n\n\u201cTheoretically, I suppose, we ought to call the police.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot I,\u201d said Syme. \u201cTheoretically I ought to drown myself first. I\npromised a poor fellow, who was a real modern pessimist, on my word of\nhonour not to tell the police. I\u2019m no hand at casuistry, but I can\u2019t\nbreak my word to a modern pessimist. It\u2019s like breaking one\u2019s word to a\nchild.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m in the same boat,\u201d said the Professor. \u201cI tried to tell the police\nand I couldn\u2019t, because of some silly oath I took. You see, when I was\nan actor I was a sort of all-round beast. Perjury or treason is the\nonly crime I haven\u2019t committed. If I did that I shouldn\u2019t know the\ndifference between right and wrong.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve been through all that,\u201d said Dr. Bull, \u201cand I\u2019ve made up my mind.\nI gave my promise to the Secretary\u2014you know him, man who smiles upside\ndown. My friends, that man is the most utterly unhappy man that was\never human. It may be his digestion, or his conscience, or his nerves,\nor his philosophy of the universe, but he\u2019s damned, he\u2019s in hell! Well,\nI can\u2019t turn on a man like that, and hunt him down. It\u2019s like whipping\na leper. I may be mad, but that\u2019s how I feel; and there\u2019s jolly well\nthe end of it.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t think you\u2019re mad,\u201d said Syme. \u201cI knew you would decide like\nthat when first you\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cEh?\u201d said Dr. Bull.\n\n\u201cWhen first you took off your spectacles.\u201d\n\nDr. Bull smiled a little, and strolled across the deck to look at the\nsunlit sea. Then he strolled back again, kicking his heels carelessly,\nand a companionable silence fell between the three men.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme, \u201cit seems that we have all the same kind of morality\nor immorality, so we had better face the fact that comes of it.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d assented the Professor, \u201cyou\u2019re quite right; and we must hurry\nup, for I can see the Grey Nose standing out from France.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe fact that comes of it,\u201d said Syme seriously, \u201cis this, that we\nthree are alone on this planet. Gogol has gone, God knows where;\nperhaps the President has smashed him like a fly. On the Council we are\nthree men against three, like the Romans who held the bridge. But we\nare worse off than that, first because they can appeal to their\norganization and we cannot appeal to ours, and second because\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause one of those other three men,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cis not a\nman.\u201d\n\nSyme nodded and was silent for a second or two, then he said\u2014\n\n\u201cMy idea is this. We must do something to keep the Marquis in Calais\ntill tomorrow midday. I have turned over twenty schemes in my head. We\ncannot denounce him as a dynamiter; that is agreed. We cannot get him\ndetained on some trivial charge, for we should have to appear; he knows\nus, and he would smell a rat. We cannot pretend to keep him on\nanarchist business; he might swallow much in that way, but not the\nnotion of stopping in Calais while the Czar went safely through Paris.\nWe might try to kidnap him, and lock him up ourselves; but he is a\nwell-known man here. He has a whole bodyguard of friends; he is very\nstrong and brave, and the event is doubtful. The only thing I can see\nto do is actually to take advantage of the very things that are in the\nMarquis\u2019s favour. I am going to profit by the fact that he is a highly\nrespected nobleman. I am going to profit by the fact that he has many\nfriends and moves in the best society.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat the devil are you talking about?\u201d asked the Professor.\n\n\u201cThe Symes are first mentioned in the fourteenth century,\u201d said Syme;\n\u201cbut there is a tradition that one of them rode behind Bruce at\nBannockburn. Since 1350 the tree is quite clear.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s gone off his head,\u201d said the little Doctor, staring.\n\n\u201cOur bearings,\u201d continued Syme calmly, \u201care \u2018argent a chevron gules\ncharged with three cross crosslets of the field.\u2019 The motto varies.\u201d\n\nThe Professor seized Syme roughly by the waistcoat.\n\n\u201cWe are just inshore,\u201d he said. \u201cAre you seasick or joking in the wrong\nplace?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy remarks are almost painfully practical,\u201d answered Syme, in an\nunhurried manner. \u201cThe house of St. Eustache also is very ancient. The\nMarquis cannot deny that he is a gentleman. He cannot deny that I am a\ngentleman. And in order to put the matter of my social position quite\nbeyond a doubt, I propose at the earliest opportunity to knock his hat\noff. But here we are in the harbour.\u201d\n\nThey went on shore under the strong sun in a sort of daze. Syme, who\nhad now taken the lead as Bull had taken it in London, led them along a\nkind of marine parade until he came to some caf\u00e9s, embowered in a bulk\nof greenery and overlooking the sea. As he went before them his step\nwas slightly swaggering, and he swung his stick like a sword. He was\nmaking apparently for the extreme end of the line of caf\u00e9s, but he\nstopped abruptly. With a sharp gesture he motioned them to silence, but\nhe pointed with one gloved finger to a caf\u00e9 table under a bank of\nflowering foliage at which sat the Marquis de St. Eustache, his teeth\nshining in his thick, black beard, and his bold, brown face shadowed by\na light yellow straw hat and outlined against the violet sea.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\nTHE DUEL\n\n\nSyme sat down at a caf\u00e9 table with his companions, his blue eyes\nsparkling like the bright sea below, and ordered a bottle of Saumur\nwith a pleased impatience. He was for some reason in a condition of\ncurious hilarity. His spirits were already unnaturally high; they rose\nas the Saumur sank, and in half an hour his talk was a torrent of\nnonsense. He professed to be making out a plan of the conversation\nwhich was going to ensue between himself and the deadly Marquis. He\njotted it down wildly with a pencil. It was arranged like a printed\ncatechism, with questions and answers, and was delivered with an\nextraordinary rapidity of utterance.\n\n\u201cI shall approach. Before taking off his hat, I shall take off my own.\nI shall say, \u2018The Marquis de Saint Eustache, I believe.\u2019 He will say,\n\u2018The celebrated Mr. Syme, I presume.\u2019 He will say in the most exquisite\nFrench, \u2018How are you?\u2019 I shall reply in the most exquisite Cockney,\n\u2018Oh, just the Syme\u2014\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, shut it,\u201d said the man in spectacles. \u201cPull yourself together, and\nchuck away that bit of paper. What are you really going to do?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut it was a lovely catechism,\u201d said Syme pathetically. \u201cDo let me\nread it you. It has only forty-three questions and answers, and some of\nthe Marquis\u2019s answers are wonderfully witty. I like to be just to my\nenemy.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut what\u2019s the good of it all?\u201d asked Dr. Bull in exasperation.\n\n\u201cIt leads up to my challenge, don\u2019t you see,\u201d said Syme, beaming. \u201cWhen\nthe Marquis has given the thirty-ninth reply, which runs\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cHas it by any chance occurred to you,\u201d asked the Professor, with a\nponderous simplicity, \u201cthat the Marquis may not say all the forty-three\nthings you have put down for him? In that case, I understand, your own\nepigrams may appear somewhat more forced.\u201d\n\nSyme struck the table with a radiant face.\n\n\u201cWhy, how true that is,\u201d he said, \u201cand I never thought of it. Sir, you\nhave an intellect beyond the common. You will make a name.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, you\u2019re as drunk as an owl!\u201d said the Doctor.\n\n\u201cIt only remains,\u201d continued Syme quite unperturbed, \u201cto adopt some\nother method of breaking the ice (if I may so express it) between\nmyself and the man I wish to kill. And since the course of a dialogue\ncannot be predicted by one of its parties alone (as you have pointed\nout with such recondite acumen), the only thing to be done, I suppose,\nis for the one party, as far as possible, to do all the dialogue by\nhimself. And so I will, by George!\u201d And he stood up suddenly, his\nyellow hair blowing in the slight sea breeze.\n\nA band was playing in a _caf\u00e9 chantant_ hidden somewhere among the\ntrees, and a woman had just stopped singing. On Syme\u2019s heated head the\nbray of the brass band seemed like the jar and jingle of that\nbarrel-organ in Leicester Square, to the tune of which he had once\nstood up to die. He looked across to the little table where the Marquis\nsat. The man had two companions now, solemn Frenchmen in frock-coats\nand silk hats, one of them with the red rosette of the Legion of\nHonour, evidently people of a solid social position. Besides these\nblack, cylindrical costumes, the Marquis, in his loose straw hat and\nlight spring clothes, looked Bohemian and even barbaric; but he looked\nthe Marquis. Indeed, one might say that he looked the king, with his\nanimal elegance, his scornful eyes, and his proud head lifted against\nthe purple sea. But he was no Christian king, at any rate; he was,\nrather, some swarthy despot, half Greek, half Asiatic, who in the days\nwhen slavery seemed natural looked down on the Mediterranean, on his\ngalley and his groaning slaves. Just so, Syme thought, would the\nbrown-gold face of such a tyrant have shown against the dark green\nolives and the burning blue.\n\n\u201cAre you going to address the meeting?\u201d asked the Professor peevishly,\nseeing that Syme still stood up without moving.\n\nSyme drained his last glass of sparkling wine.\n\n\u201cI am,\u201d he said, pointing across to the Marquis and his companions,\n\u201cthat meeting. That meeting displeases me. I am going to pull that\nmeeting\u2019s great ugly, mahogany-coloured nose.\u201d\n\nHe stepped across swiftly, if not quite steadily. The Marquis, seeing\nhim, arched his black Assyrian eyebrows in surprise, but smiled\npolitely.\n\n\u201cYou are Mr. Syme, I think,\u201d he said.\n\nSyme bowed.\n\n\u201cAnd you are the Marquis de Saint Eustache,\u201d he said gracefully.\n\u201cPermit me to pull your nose.\u201d\n\nHe leant over to do so, but the Marquis started backwards, upsetting\nhis chair, and the two men in top hats held Syme back by the shoulders.\n\n\u201cThis man has insulted me!\u201d said Syme, with gestures of explanation.\n\n\u201cInsulted you?\u201d cried the gentleman with the red rosette, \u201cwhen?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, just now,\u201d said Syme recklessly. \u201cHe insulted my mother.\u201d\n\n\u201cInsulted your mother!\u201d exclaimed the gentleman incredulously.\n\n\u201cWell, anyhow,\u201d said Syme, conceding a point, \u201cmy aunt.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut how can the Marquis have insulted your aunt just now?\u201d said the\nsecond gentleman with some legitimate wonder. \u201cHe has been sitting here\nall the time.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, it was what he said!\u201d said Syme darkly.\n\n\u201cI said nothing at all,\u201d said the Marquis, \u201cexcept something about the\nband. I only said that I liked Wagner played well.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was an allusion to my family,\u201d said Syme firmly. \u201cMy aunt played\nWagner badly. It was a painful subject. We are always being insulted\nabout it.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis seems most extraordinary,\u201d said the gentleman who was _d\u00e9cor\u00e9_,\nlooking doubtfully at the Marquis.\n\n\u201cOh, I assure you,\u201d said Syme earnestly, \u201cthe whole of your\nconversation was simply packed with sinister allusions to my aunt\u2019s\nweaknesses.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis is nonsense!\u201d said the second gentleman. \u201cI for one have said\nnothing for half an hour except that I liked the singing of that girl\nwith black hair.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, there you are again!\u201d said Syme indignantly. \u201cMy aunt\u2019s was\nred.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt seems to me,\u201d said the other, \u201cthat you are simply seeking a\npretext to insult the Marquis.\u201d\n\n\u201cBy George!\u201d said Syme, facing round and looking at him, \u201cwhat a clever\nchap you are!\u201d\n\nThe Marquis started up with eyes flaming like a tiger\u2019s.\n\n\u201cSeeking a quarrel with me!\u201d he cried. \u201cSeeking a fight with me! By\nGod! there was never a man who had to seek long. These gentlemen will\nperhaps act for me. There are still four hours of daylight. Let us\nfight this evening.\u201d\n\nSyme bowed with a quite beautiful graciousness.\n\n\u201cMarquis,\u201d he said, \u201cyour action is worthy of your fame and blood.\nPermit me to consult for a moment with the gentlemen in whose hands I\nshall place myself.\u201d\n\nIn three long strides he rejoined his companions, and they, who had\nseen his champagne-inspired attack and listened to his idiotic\nexplanations, were quite startled at the look of him. For now that he\ncame back to them he was quite sober, a little pale, and he spoke in a\nlow voice of passionate practicality.\n\n\u201cI have done it,\u201d he said hoarsely. \u201cI have fixed a fight on the beast.\nBut look here, and listen carefully. There is no time for talk. You are\nmy seconds, and everything must come from you. Now you must insist, and\ninsist absolutely, on the duel coming off after seven tomorrow, so as\nto give me the chance of preventing him from catching the 7.45 for\nParis. If he misses that he misses his crime. He can\u2019t refuse to meet\nyou on such a small point of time and place. But this is what he will\ndo. He will choose a field somewhere near a wayside station, where he\ncan pick up the train. He is a very good swordsman, and he will trust\nto killing me in time to catch it. But I can fence well too, and I\nthink I can keep him in play, at any rate, until the train is lost.\nThen perhaps he may kill me to console his feelings. You understand?\nVery well then, let me introduce you to some charming friends of mine,\u201d\nand leading them quickly across the parade, he presented them to the\nMarquis\u2019s seconds by two very aristocratic names of which they had not\npreviously heard.\n\nSyme was subject to spasms of singular common sense, not otherwise a\npart of his character. They were (as he said of his impulse about the\nspectacles) poetic intuitions, and they sometimes rose to the\nexaltation of prophecy.\n\nHe had correctly calculated in this case the policy of his opponent.\nWhen the Marquis was informed by his seconds that Syme could only fight\nin the morning, he must fully have realised that an obstacle had\nsuddenly arisen between him and his bomb-throwing business in the\ncapital. Naturally he could not explain this objection to his friends,\nso he chose the course which Syme had predicted. He induced his seconds\nto settle on a small meadow not far from the railway, and he trusted to\nthe fatality of the first engagement.\n\nWhen he came down very coolly to the field of honour, no one could have\nguessed that he had any anxiety about a journey; his hands were in his\npockets, his straw hat on the back of his head, his handsome face\nbrazen in the sun. But it might have struck a stranger as odd that\nthere appeared in his train, not only his seconds carrying the\nsword-case, but two of his servants carrying a portmanteau and a\nluncheon basket.\n\nEarly as was the hour, the sun soaked everything in warmth, and Syme\nwas vaguely surprised to see so many spring flowers burning gold and\nsilver in the tall grass in which the whole company stood almost\nknee-deep.\n\nWith the exception of the Marquis, all the men were in sombre and\nsolemn morning-dress, with hats like black chimney-pots; the little\nDoctor especially, with the addition of his black spectacles, looked\nlike an undertaker in a farce. Syme could not help feeling a comic\ncontrast between this funereal church parade of apparel and the rich\nand glistening meadow, growing wild flowers everywhere. But, indeed,\nthis comic contrast between the yellow blossoms and the black hats was\nbut a symbol of the tragic contrast between the yellow blossoms and the\nblack business. On his right was a little wood; far away to his left\nlay the long curve of the railway line, which he was, so to speak,\nguarding from the Marquis, whose goal and escape it was. In front of\nhim, behind the black group of his opponents, he could see, like a\ntinted cloud, a small almond bush in flower against the faint line of\nthe sea.\n\nThe member of the Legion of Honour, whose name it seemed was Colonel\nDucroix, approached the Professor and Dr. Bull with great politeness,\nand suggested that the play should terminate with the first\nconsiderable hurt.\n\nDr. Bull, however, having been carefully coached by Syme upon this\npoint of policy, insisted, with great dignity and in very bad French,\nthat it should continue until one of the combatants was disabled. Syme\nhad made up his mind that he could avoid disabling the Marquis and\nprevent the Marquis from disabling him for at least twenty minutes. In\ntwenty minutes the Paris train would have gone by.\n\n\u201cTo a man of the well-known skill and valour of Monsieur de St.\nEustache,\u201d said the Professor solemnly, \u201cit must be a matter of\nindifference which method is adopted, and our principal has strong\nreasons for demanding the longer encounter, reasons the delicacy of\nwhich prevent me from being explicit, but for the just and honourable\nnature of which I can\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201c_Peste!_\u201d broke from the Marquis behind, whose face had suddenly\ndarkened, \u201clet us stop talking and begin,\u201d and he slashed off the head\nof a tall flower with his stick.\n\nSyme understood his rude impatience and instinctively looked over his\nshoulder to see whether the train was coming in sight. But there was no\nsmoke on the horizon.\n\nColonel Ducroix knelt down and unlocked the case, taking out a pair of\ntwin swords, which took the sunlight and turned to two streaks of white\nfire. He offered one to the Marquis, who snatched it without ceremony,\nand another to Syme, who took it, bent it, and poised it with as much\ndelay as was consistent with dignity.\n\nThen the Colonel took out another pair of blades, and taking one\nhimself and giving another to Dr. Bull, proceeded to place the men.\n\nBoth combatants had thrown off their coats and waistcoats, and stood\nsword in hand. The seconds stood on each side of the line of fight with\ndrawn swords also, but still sombre in their dark frock-coats and hats.\nThe principals saluted. The Colonel said quietly, \u201cEngage!\u201d and the two\nblades touched and tingled.\n\nWhen the jar of the joined iron ran up Syme\u2019s arm, all the fantastic\nfears that have been the subject of this story fell from him like\ndreams from a man waking up in bed. He remembered them clearly and in\norder as mere delusions of the nerves\u2014how the fear of the Professor had\nbeen the fear of the tyrannic accidents of nightmare, and how the fear\nof the Doctor had been the fear of the airless vacuum of science. The\nfirst was the old fear that any miracle might happen, the second the\nmore hopeless modern fear that no miracle can ever happen. But he saw\nthat these fears were fancies, for he found himself in the presence of\nthe great fact of the fear of death, with its coarse and pitiless\ncommon sense. He felt like a man who had dreamed all night of falling\nover precipices, and had woke up on the morning when he was to be\nhanged. For as soon as he had seen the sunlight run down the channel of\nhis foe\u2019s foreshortened blade, and as soon as he had felt the two\ntongues of steel touch, vibrating like two living things, he knew that\nhis enemy was a terrible fighter, and that probably his last hour had\ncome.\n\nHe felt a strange and vivid value in all the earth around him, in the\ngrass under his feet; he felt the love of life in all living things. He\ncould almost fancy that he heard the grass growing; he could almost\nfancy that even as he stood fresh flowers were springing up and\nbreaking into blossom in the meadow\u2014flowers blood red and burning gold\nand blue, fulfilling the whole pageant of the spring. And whenever his\neyes strayed for a flash from the calm, staring, hypnotic eyes of the\nMarquis, they saw the little tuft of almond tree against the sky-line.\nHe had the feeling that if by some miracle he escaped he would be ready\nto sit for ever before that almond tree, desiring nothing else in the\nworld.\n\nBut while earth and sky and everything had the living beauty of a thing\nlost, the other half of his head was as clear as glass, and he was\nparrying his enemy\u2019s point with a kind of clockwork skill of which he\nhad hardly supposed himself capable. Once his enemy\u2019s point ran along\nhis wrist, leaving a slight streak of blood, but it either was not\nnoticed or was tacitly ignored. Every now and then he _riposted_, and\nonce or twice he could almost fancy that he felt his point go home, but\nas there was no blood on blade or shirt he supposed he was mistaken.\nThen came an interruption and a change.\n\nAt the risk of losing all, the Marquis, interrupting his quiet stare,\nflashed one glance over his shoulder at the line of railway on his\nright. Then he turned on Syme a face transfigured to that of a fiend,\nand began to fight as if with twenty weapons. The attack came so fast\nand furious, that the one shining sword seemed a shower of shining\narrows. Syme had no chance to look at the railway; but also he had no\nneed. He could guess the reason of the Marquis\u2019s sudden madness of\nbattle\u2014the Paris train was in sight.\n\nBut the Marquis\u2019s morbid energy over-reached itself. Twice Syme,\nparrying, knocked his opponent\u2019s point far out of the fighting circle;\nand the third time his _riposte_ was so rapid, that there was no doubt\nabout the hit this time. Syme\u2019s sword actually bent under the weight of\nthe Marquis\u2019s body, which it had pierced.\n\nSyme was as certain that he had stuck his blade into his enemy as a\ngardener that he has stuck his spade into the ground. Yet the Marquis\nsprang back from the stroke without a stagger, and Syme stood staring\nat his own sword-point like an idiot. There was no blood on it at all.\n\nThere was an instant of rigid silence, and then Syme in his turn fell\nfuriously on the other, filled with a flaming curiosity. The Marquis\nwas probably, in a general sense, a better fencer than he, as he had\nsurmised at the beginning, but at the moment the Marquis seemed\ndistraught and at a disadvantage. He fought wildly and even weakly, and\nhe constantly looked away at the railway line, almost as if he feared\nthe train more than the pointed steel. Syme, on the other hand, fought\nfiercely but still carefully, in an intellectual fury, eager to solve\nthe riddle of his own bloodless sword. For this purpose, he aimed less\nat the Marquis\u2019s body, and more at his throat and head. A minute and a\nhalf afterwards he felt his point enter the man\u2019s neck below the jaw.\nIt came out clean. Half mad, he thrust again, and made what should have\nbeen a bloody scar on the Marquis\u2019s cheek. But there was no scar.\n\nFor one moment the heaven of Syme again grew black with supernatural\nterrors. Surely the man had a charmed life. But this new spiritual\ndread was a more awful thing than had been the mere spiritual\ntopsy-turvydom symbolised by the paralytic who pursued him. The\nProfessor was only a goblin; this man was a devil\u2014perhaps he was the\nDevil! Anyhow, this was certain, that three times had a human sword\nbeen driven into him and made no mark. When Syme had that thought he\ndrew himself up, and all that was good in him sang high up in the air\nas a high wind sings in the trees. He thought of all the human things\nin his story\u2014of the Chinese lanterns in Saffron Park, of the girl\u2019s red\nhair in the garden, of the honest, beer-swilling sailors down by the\ndock, of his loyal companions standing by. Perhaps he had been chosen\nas a champion of all these fresh and kindly things to cross swords with\nthe enemy of all creation. \u201cAfter all,\u201d he said to himself, \u201cI am more\nthan a devil; I am a man. I can do the one thing which Satan himself\ncannot do\u2014I can die,\u201d and as the word went through his head, he heard a\nfaint and far-off hoot, which would soon be the roar of the Paris\ntrain.\n\nHe fell to fighting again with a supernatural levity, like a Mohammedan\npanting for Paradise. As the train came nearer and nearer he fancied he\ncould see people putting up the floral arches in Paris; he joined in\nthe growing noise and the glory of the great Republic whose gate he was\nguarding against Hell. His thoughts rose higher and higher with the\nrising roar of the train, which ended, as if proudly, in a long and\npiercing whistle. The train stopped.\n\nSuddenly, to the astonishment of everyone the Marquis sprang back quite\nout of sword reach and threw down his sword. The leap was wonderful,\nand not the less wonderful because Syme had plunged his sword a moment\nbefore into the man\u2019s thigh.\n\n\u201cStop!\u201d said the Marquis in a voice that compelled a momentary\nobedience. \u201cI want to say something.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is the matter?\u201d asked Colonel Ducroix, staring. \u201cHas there been\nfoul play?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere has been foul play somewhere,\u201d said Dr. Bull, who was a little\npale. \u201cOur principal has wounded the Marquis four times at least, and\nhe is none the worse.\u201d\n\nThe Marquis put up his hand with a curious air of ghastly patience.\n\n\u201cPlease let me speak,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is rather important. Mr. Syme,\u201d he\ncontinued, turning to his opponent, \u201cwe are fighting today, if I\nremember right, because you expressed a wish (which I thought\nirrational) to pull my nose. Would you oblige me by pulling my nose now\nas quickly as possible? I have to catch a train.\u201d\n\n\u201cI protest that this is most irregular,\u201d said Dr. Bull indignantly.\n\n\u201cIt is certainly somewhat opposed to precedent,\u201d said Colonel Ducroix,\nlooking wistfully at his principal. \u201cThere is, I think, one case on\nrecord (Captain Bellegarde and the Baron Zumpt) in which the weapons\nwere changed in the middle of the encounter at the request of one of\nthe combatants. But one can hardly call one\u2019s nose a weapon.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you or will you not pull my nose?\u201d said the Marquis in\nexasperation. \u201cCome, come, Mr. Syme! You wanted to do it, do it! You\ncan have no conception of how important it is to me. Don\u2019t be so\nselfish! Pull my nose at once, when I ask you!\u201d and he bent slightly\nforward with a fascinating smile. The Paris train, panting and\ngroaning, had grated into a little station behind the neighbouring\nhill.\n\nSyme had the feeling he had more than once had in these adventures\u2014the\nsense that a horrible and sublime wave lifted to heaven was just\ntoppling over. Walking in a world he half understood, he took two paces\nforward and seized the Roman nose of this remarkable nobleman. He\npulled it hard, and it came off in his hand.\n\nHe stood for some seconds with a foolish solemnity, with the pasteboard\nproboscis still between his fingers, looking at it, while the sun and\nthe clouds and the wooded hills looked down upon this imbecile scene.\n\nThe Marquis broke the silence in a loud and cheerful voice.\n\n\u201cIf anyone has any use for my left eyebrow,\u201d he said, \u201che can have it.\nColonel Ducroix, do accept my left eyebrow! It\u2019s the kind of thing that\nmight come in useful any day,\u201d and he gravely tore off one of his\nswarthy Assyrian brows, bringing about half his brown forehead with it,\nand politely offered it to the Colonel, who stood crimson and\nspeechless with rage.\n\n\u201cIf I had known,\u201d he spluttered, \u201cthat I was acting for a poltroon who\npads himself to fight\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, I know, I know!\u201d said the Marquis, recklessly throwing various\nparts of himself right and left about the field. \u201cYou are making a\nmistake; but it can\u2019t be explained just now. I tell you the train has\ncome into the station!\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Dr. Bull fiercely, \u201cand the train shall go out of the\nstation. It shall go out without you. We know well enough for what\ndevil\u2019s work\u2014\u201d\n\nThe mysterious Marquis lifted his hands with a desperate gesture. He\nwas a strange scarecrow standing there in the sun with half his old\nface peeled off, and half another face glaring and grinning from\nunderneath.\n\n\u201cWill you drive me mad?\u201d he cried. \u201cThe train\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cYou shall not go by the train,\u201d said Syme firmly, and grasped his\nsword.\n\nThe wild figure turned towards Syme, and seemed to be gathering itself\nfor a sublime effort before speaking.\n\n\u201cYou great fat, blasted, blear-eyed, blundering, thundering, brainless,\nGodforsaken, doddering, damned fool!\u201d he said without taking breath.\n\u201cYou great silly, pink-faced, towheaded turnip! You\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cYou shall not go by this train,\u201d repeated Syme.\n\n\u201cAnd why the infernal blazes,\u201d roared the other, \u201cshould I want to go\nby the train?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe know all,\u201d said the Professor sternly. \u201cYou are going to Paris to\nthrow a bomb!\u201d\n\n\u201cGoing to Jericho to throw a Jabberwock!\u201d cried the other, tearing his\nhair, which came off easily. \u201cHave you all got softening of the brain,\nthat you don\u2019t realise what I am? Did you really think I wanted to\ncatch that train? Twenty Paris trains might go by for me. Damn Paris\ntrains!\u201d\n\n\u201cThen what did you care about?\u201d began the Professor.\n\n\u201cWhat did I care about? I didn\u2019t care about catching the train; I cared\nabout whether the train caught me, and now, by God! it has caught me.\u201d\n\n\u201cI regret to inform you,\u201d said Syme with restraint, \u201cthat your remarks\nconvey no impression to my mind. Perhaps if you were to remove the\nremains of your original forehead and some portion of what was once\nyour chin, your meaning would become clearer. Mental lucidity fulfils\nitself in many ways. What do you mean by saying that the train has\ncaught you? It may be my literary fancy, but somehow I feel that it\nought to mean something.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt means everything,\u201d said the other, \u201cand the end of everything.\nSunday has us now in the hollow of his hand.\u201d\n\n\u201cUs!\u201d repeated the Professor, as if stupefied. \u201cWhat do you mean by\n\u2018us\u2019?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe police, of course!\u201d said the Marquis, and tore off his scalp and\nhalf his face.\n\nThe head which emerged was the blonde, well brushed, smooth-haired head\nwhich is common in the English constabulary, but the face was terribly\npale.\n\n\u201cI am Inspector Ratcliffe,\u201d he said, with a sort of haste that verged\non harshness. \u201cMy name is pretty well known to the police, and I can\nsee well enough that you belong to them. But if there is any doubt\nabout my position, I have a card,\u201d and he began to pull a blue card\nfrom his pocket.\n\nThe Professor gave a tired gesture.\n\n\u201cOh, don\u2019t show it us,\u201d he said wearily; \u201cwe\u2019ve got enough of them to\nequip a paper-chase.\u201d\n\nThe little man named Bull, had, like many men who seem to be of a mere\nvivacious vulgarity, sudden movements of good taste. Here he certainly\nsaved the situation. In the midst of this staggering transformation\nscene he stepped forward with all the gravity and responsibility of a\nsecond, and addressed the two seconds of the Marquis.\n\n\u201cGentlemen,\u201d he said, \u201cwe all owe you a serious apology; but I assure\nyou that you have not been made the victims of such a low joke as you\nimagine, or indeed of anything undignified in a man of honour. You have\nnot wasted your time; you have helped to save the world. We are not\nbuffoons, but very desperate men at war with a vast conspiracy. A\nsecret society of anarchists is hunting us like hares; not such\nunfortunate madmen as may here or there throw a bomb through starvation\nor German philosophy, but a rich and powerful and fanatical church, a\nchurch of eastern pessimism, which holds it holy to destroy mankind\nlike vermin. How hard they hunt us you can gather from the fact that we\nare driven to such disguises as those for which I apologise, and to\nsuch pranks as this one by which you suffer.\u201d\n\nThe younger second of the Marquis, a short man with a black moustache,\nbowed politely, and said\u2014\n\n\u201cOf course, I accept the apology; but you will in your turn forgive me\nif I decline to follow you further into your difficulties, and permit\nmyself to say good morning! The sight of an acquaintance and\ndistinguished fellow-townsman coming to pieces in the open air is\nunusual, and, upon the whole, sufficient for one day. Colonel Ducroix,\nI would in no way influence your actions, but if you feel with me that\nour present society is a little abnormal, I am now going to walk back\nto the town.\u201d\n\nColonel Ducroix moved mechanically, but then tugged abruptly at his\nwhite moustache and broke out\u2014\n\n\u201cNo, by George! I won\u2019t. If these gentlemen are really in a mess with a\nlot of low wreckers like that, I\u2019ll see them through it. I have fought\nfor France, and it is hard if I can\u2019t fight for civilization.\u201d\n\nDr. Bull took off his hat and waved it, cheering as at a public\nmeeting.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t make too much noise,\u201d said Inspector Ratcliffe, \u201cSunday may hear\nyou.\u201d\n\n\u201cSunday!\u201d cried Bull, and dropped his hat.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d retorted Ratcliffe, \u201che may be with them.\u201d\n\n\u201cWith whom?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cWith the people out of that train,\u201d said the other.\n\n\u201cWhat you say seems utterly wild,\u201d began Syme. \u201cWhy, as a matter of\nfact\u2014But, my God,\u201d he cried out suddenly, like a man who sees an\nexplosion a long way off, \u201cby God! if this is true the whole bally lot\nof us on the Anarchist Council were against anarchy! Every born man was\na detective except the President and his personal secretary. What can\nit mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cMean!\u201d said the new policeman with incredible violence. \u201cIt means that\nwe are struck dead! Don\u2019t you know Sunday? Don\u2019t you know that his\njokes are always so big and simple that one has never thought of them?\nCan you think of anything more like Sunday than this, that he should\nput all his powerful enemies on the Supreme Council, and then take care\nthat it was not supreme? I tell you he has bought every trust, he has\ncaptured every cable, he has control of every railway line\u2014especially\nof _that_ railway line!\u201d and he pointed a shaking finger towards the\nsmall wayside station. \u201cThe whole movement was controlled by him; half\nthe world was ready to rise for him. But there were just five people,\nperhaps, who would have resisted him... and the old devil put them on\nthe Supreme Council, to waste their time in watching each other. Idiots\nthat we are, he planned the whole of our idiocies! Sunday knew that the\nProfessor would chase Syme through London, and that Syme would fight me\nin France. And he was combining great masses of capital, and seizing\ngreat lines of telegraphy, while we five idiots were running after each\nother like a lot of confounded babies playing blind man\u2019s buff.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell?\u201d asked Syme with a sort of steadiness.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d replied the other with sudden serenity, \u201che has found us\nplaying blind man\u2019s buff today in a field of great rustic beauty and\nextreme solitude. He has probably captured the world; it only remains\nto him to capture this field and all the fools in it. And since you\nreally want to know what was my objection to the arrival of that train,\nI will tell you. My objection was that Sunday or his Secretary has just\nthis moment got out of it.\u201d\n\nSyme uttered an involuntary cry, and they all turned their eyes towards\nthe far-off station. It was quite true that a considerable bulk of\npeople seemed to be moving in their direction. But they were too\ndistant to be distinguished in any way.\n\n\u201cIt was a habit of the late Marquis de St. Eustache,\u201d said the new\npoliceman, producing a leather case, \u201calways to carry a pair of opera\nglasses. Either the President or the Secretary is coming after us with\nthat mob. They have caught us in a nice quiet place where we are under\nno temptations to break our oaths by calling the police. Dr. Bull, I\nhave a suspicion that you will see better through these than through\nyour own highly decorative spectacles.\u201d\n\nHe handed the field-glasses to the Doctor, who immediately took off his\nspectacles and put the apparatus to his eyes.\n\n\u201cIt cannot be as bad as you say,\u201d said the Professor, somewhat shaken.\n\u201cThere are a good number of them certainly, but they may easily be\nordinary tourists.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo ordinary tourists,\u201d asked Bull, with the fieldglasses to his eyes,\n\u201cwear black masks half-way down the face?\u201d\n\nSyme almost tore the glasses out of his hand, and looked through them.\nMost men in the advancing mob really looked ordinary enough; but it was\nquite true that two or three of the leaders in front wore black\nhalf-masks almost down to their mouths. This disguise is very complete,\nespecially at such a distance, and Syme found it impossible to conclude\nanything from the clean-shaven jaws and chins of the men talking in the\nfront. But presently as they talked they all smiled and one of them\nsmiled on one side.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\nTHE CRIMINALS CHASE THE POLICE\n\n\nSyme put the field-glasses from his eyes with an almost ghastly relief.\n\n\u201cThe President is not with them, anyhow,\u201d he said, and wiped his\nforehead.\n\n\u201cBut surely they are right away on the horizon,\u201d said the bewildered\nColonel, blinking and but half recovered from Bull\u2019s hasty though\npolite explanation. \u201cCould you possibly know your President among all\nthose people?\u201d\n\n\u201cCould I know a white elephant among all those people!\u201d answered Syme\nsomewhat irritably. \u201cAs you very truly say, they are on the horizon;\nbut if he were walking with them... by God! I believe this ground would\nshake.\u201d\n\nAfter an instant\u2019s pause the new man called Ratcliffe said with gloomy\ndecision\u2014\n\n\u201cOf course the President isn\u2019t with them. I wish to Gemini he were.\nMuch more likely the President is riding in triumph through Paris, or\nsitting on the ruins of St. Paul\u2019s Cathedral.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis is absurd!\u201d said Syme. \u201cSomething may have happened in our\nabsence; but he cannot have carried the world with a rush like that. It\nis quite true,\u201d he added, frowning dubiously at the distant fields that\nlay towards the little station, \u201cit is certainly true that there seems\nto be a crowd coming this way; but they are not all the army that you\nmake out.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, they,\u201d said the new detective contemptuously; \u201cno, they are not a\nvery valuable force. But let me tell you frankly that they are\nprecisely calculated to our value\u2014we are not much, my boy, in Sunday\u2019s\nuniverse. He has got hold of all the cables and telegraphs himself. But\nto kill the Supreme Council he regards as a trivial matter, like a post\ncard; it may be left to his private secretary,\u201d and he spat on the\ngrass.\n\nThen he turned to the others and said somewhat austerely\u2014\n\n\u201cThere is a great deal to be said for death; but if anyone has any\npreference for the other alternative, I strongly advise him to walk\nafter me.\u201d\n\nWith these words, he turned his broad back and strode with silent\nenergy towards the wood. The others gave one glance over their\nshoulders, and saw that the dark cloud of men had detached itself from\nthe station and was moving with a mysterious discipline across the\nplain. They saw already, even with the naked eye, black blots on the\nforemost faces, which marked the masks they wore. They turned and\nfollowed their leader, who had already struck the wood, and disappeared\namong the twinkling trees.\n\nThe sun on the grass was dry and hot. So in plunging into the wood they\nhad a cool shock of shadow, as of divers who plunge into a dim pool.\nThe inside of the wood was full of shattered sunlight and shaken\nshadows. They made a sort of shuddering veil, almost recalling the\ndizziness of a cinematograph. Even the solid figures walking with him\nSyme could hardly see for the patterns of sun and shade that danced\nupon them. Now a man\u2019s head was lit as with a light of Rembrandt,\nleaving all else obliterated; now again he had strong and staring white\nhands with the face of a negro. The ex-Marquis had pulled the old straw\nhat over his eyes, and the black shade of the brim cut his face so\nsquarely in two that it seemed to be wearing one of the black\nhalf-masks of their pursuers. The fancy tinted Syme\u2019s overwhelming\nsense of wonder. Was he wearing a mask? Was anyone wearing a mask? Was\nanyone anything? This wood of witchery, in which men\u2019s faces turned\nblack and white by turns, in which their figures first swelled into\nsunlight and then faded into formless night, this mere chaos of\nchiaroscuro (after the clear daylight outside), seemed to Syme a\nperfect symbol of the world in which he had been moving for three days,\nthis world where men took off their beards and their spectacles and\ntheir noses, and turned into other people. That tragic self-confidence\nwhich he had felt when he believed that the Marquis was a devil had\nstrangely disappeared now that he knew that the Marquis was a friend.\nHe felt almost inclined to ask after all these bewilderments what was a\nfriend and what an enemy. Was there anything that was apart from what\nit seemed? The Marquis had taken off his nose and turned out to be a\ndetective. Might he not just as well take off his head and turn out to\nbe a hobgoblin? Was not everything, after all, like this bewildering\nwoodland, this dance of dark and light? Everything only a glimpse, the\nglimpse always unforeseen, and always forgotten. For Gabriel Syme had\nfound in the heart of that sun-splashed wood what many modern painters\nhad found there. He had found the thing which the modern people call\nImpressionism, which is another name for that final scepticism which\ncan find no floor to the universe.\n\nAs a man in an evil dream strains himself to scream and wake, Syme\nstrove with a sudden effort to fling off this last and worst of his\nfancies. With two impatient strides he overtook the man in the\nMarquis\u2019s straw hat, the man whom he had come to address as Ratcliffe.\nIn a voice exaggeratively loud and cheerful, he broke the bottomless\nsilence and made conversation.\n\n\u201cMay I ask,\u201d he said, \u201cwhere on earth we are all going to?\u201d\n\nSo genuine had been the doubts of his soul, that he was quite glad to\nhear his companion speak in an easy, human voice.\n\n\u201cWe must get down through the town of Lancy to the sea,\u201d he said. \u201cI\nthink that part of the country is least likely to be with them.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat can you mean by all this?\u201d cried Syme. \u201cThey can\u2019t be running the\nreal world in that way. Surely not many working men are anarchists, and\nsurely if they were, mere mobs could not beat modern armies and\npolice.\u201d\n\n\u201cMere mobs!\u201d repeated his new friend with a snort of scorn. \u201cSo you\ntalk about mobs and the working classes as if they were the question.\nYou\u2019ve got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come\nfrom the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have\nnever been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in\nthere being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in\nthe country. The rich man hasn\u2019t; he can go away to New Guinea in a\nyacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the\nrich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were\nalways anarchists, as you can see from the barons\u2019 wars.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs a lecture on English history for the little ones,\u201d said Syme, \u201cthis\nis all very nice; but I have not yet grasped its application.\u201d\n\n\u201cIts application is,\u201d said his informant, \u201cthat most of old Sunday\u2019s\nright-hand men are South African and American millionaires. That is why\nhe has got hold of all the communications; and that is why the last\nfour champions of the anti-anarchist police force are running through a\nwood like rabbits.\u201d\n\n\u201cMillionaires I can understand,\u201d said Syme thoughtfully, \u201cthey are\nnearly all mad. But getting hold of a few wicked old gentlemen with\nhobbies is one thing; getting hold of great Christian nations is\nanother. I would bet the nose off my face (forgive the allusion) that\nSunday would stand perfectly helpless before the task of converting any\nordinary healthy person anywhere.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the other, \u201cit rather depends what sort of person you\nmean.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, for instance,\u201d said Syme, \u201che could never convert that person,\u201d\nand he pointed straight in front of him.\n\nThey had come to an open space of sunlight, which seemed to express to\nSyme the final return of his own good sense; and in the middle of this\nforest clearing was a figure that might well stand for that common\nsense in an almost awful actuality. Burnt by the sun and stained with\nperspiration, and grave with the bottomless gravity of small necessary\ntoils, a heavy French peasant was cutting wood with a hatchet. His cart\nstood a few yards off, already half full of timber; and the horse that\ncropped the grass was, like his master, valorous but not desperate;\nlike his master, he was even prosperous, but yet was almost sad. The\nman was a Norman, taller than the average of the French and very\nangular; and his swarthy figure stood dark against a square of\nsunlight, almost like some allegoric figure of labour frescoed on a\nground of gold.\n\n\u201cMr. Syme is saying,\u201d called out Ratcliffe to the French Colonel, \u201cthat\nthis man, at least, will never be an anarchist.\u201d\n\n\u201cMr. Syme is right enough there,\u201d answered Colonel Ducroix, laughing,\n\u201cif only for the reason that he has plenty of property to defend. But I\nforgot that in your country you are not used to peasants being\nwealthy.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe looks poor,\u201d said Dr. Bull doubtfully.\n\n\u201cQuite so,\u201d said the Colonel; \u201cthat is why he is rich.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have an idea,\u201d called out Dr. Bull suddenly; \u201chow much would he take\nto give us a lift in his cart? Those dogs are all on foot, and we could\nsoon leave them behind.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, give him anything!\u201d said Syme eagerly. \u201cI have piles of money on\nme.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat will never do,\u201d said the Colonel; \u201che will never have any respect\nfor you unless you drive a bargain.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, if he haggles!\u201d began Bull impatiently.\n\n\u201cHe haggles because he is a free man,\u201d said the other. \u201cYou do not\nunderstand; he would not see the meaning of generosity. He is not being\ntipped.\u201d\n\nAnd even while they seemed to hear the heavy feet of their strange\npursuers behind them, they had to stand and stamp while the French\nColonel talked to the French wood-cutter with all the leisurely\nbadinage and bickering of market-day. At the end of the four minutes,\nhowever, they saw that the Colonel was right, for the wood-cutter\nentered into their plans, not with the vague servility of a tout\ntoo-well paid, but with the seriousness of a solicitor who had been\npaid the proper fee. He told them that the best thing they could do was\nto make their way down to the little inn on the hills above Lancy,\nwhere the innkeeper, an old soldier who had become _d\u00e9vot_ in his\nlatter years, would be certain to sympathise with them, and even to\ntake risks in their support. The whole company, therefore, piled\nthemselves on top of the stacks of wood, and went rocking in the rude\ncart down the other and steeper side of the woodland. Heavy and\nramshackle as was the vehicle, it was driven quickly enough, and they\nsoon had the exhilarating impression of distancing altogether those,\nwhoever they were, who were hunting them. For, after all, the riddle as\nto where the anarchists had got all these followers was still unsolved.\nOne man\u2019s presence had sufficed for them; they had fled at the first\nsight of the deformed smile of the Secretary. Syme every now and then\nlooked back over his shoulder at the army on their track.\n\nAs the wood grew first thinner and then smaller with distance, he could\nsee the sunlit slopes beyond it and above it; and across these was\nstill moving the square black mob like one monstrous beetle. In the\nvery strong sunlight and with his own very strong eyes, which were\nalmost telescopic, Syme could see this mass of men quite plainly. He\ncould see them as separate human figures; but he was increasingly\nsurprised by the way in which they moved as one man. They seemed to be\ndressed in dark clothes and plain hats, like any common crowd out of\nthe streets; but they did not spread and sprawl and trail by various\nlines to the attack, as would be natural in an ordinary mob. They moved\nwith a sort of dreadful and wicked woodenness, like a staring army of\nautomatons.\n\nSyme pointed this out to Ratcliffe.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied the policeman, \u201cthat\u2019s discipline. That\u2019s Sunday. He is\nperhaps five hundred miles off, but the fear of him is on all of them,\nlike the finger of God. Yes, they are walking regularly; and you bet\nyour boots that they are talking regularly, yes, and thinking\nregularly. But the one important thing for us is that they are\ndisappearing regularly.\u201d\n\nSyme nodded. It was true that the black patch of the pursuing men was\ngrowing smaller and smaller as the peasant belaboured his horse.\n\nThe level of the sunlit landscape, though flat as a whole, fell away on\nthe farther side of the wood in billows of heavy slope towards the sea,\nin a way not unlike the lower slopes of the Sussex downs. The only\ndifference was that in Sussex the road would have been broken and\nangular like a little brook, but here the white French road fell sheer\nin front of them like a waterfall. Down this direct descent the cart\nclattered at a considerable angle, and in a few minutes, the road\ngrowing yet steeper, they saw below them the little harbour of Lancy\nand a great blue arc of the sea. The travelling cloud of their enemies\nhad wholly disappeared from the horizon.\n\nThe horse and cart took a sharp turn round a clump of elms, and the\nhorse\u2019s nose nearly struck the face of an old gentleman who was sitting\non the benches outside the little caf\u00e9 of \u201cLe Soleil d\u2019Or.\u201d The peasant\ngrunted an apology, and got down from his seat. The others also\ndescended one by one, and spoke to the old gentleman with fragmentary\nphrases of courtesy, for it was quite evident from his expansive manner\nthat he was the owner of the little tavern.\n\nHe was a white-haired, apple-faced old boy, with sleepy eyes and a grey\nmoustache; stout, sedentary, and very innocent, of a type that may\noften be found in France, but is still commoner in Catholic Germany.\nEverything about him, his pipe, his pot of beer, his flowers, and his\nbeehive, suggested an ancestral peace; only when his visitors looked up\nas they entered the inn-parlour, they saw the sword upon the wall.\n\nThe Colonel, who greeted the innkeeper as an old friend, passed rapidly\ninto the inn-parlour, and sat down ordering some ritual refreshment.\nThe military decision of his action interested Syme, who sat next to\nhim, and he took the opportunity when the old innkeeper had gone out of\nsatisfying his curiosity.\n\n\u201cMay I ask you, Colonel,\u201d he said in a low voice, \u201cwhy we have come\nhere?\u201d\n\nColonel Ducroix smiled behind his bristly white moustache.\n\n\u201cFor two reasons, sir,\u201d he said; \u201cand I will give first, not the most\nimportant, but the most utilitarian. We came here because this is the\nonly place within twenty miles in which we can get horses.\u201d\n\n\u201cHorses!\u201d repeated Syme, looking up quickly.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied the other; \u201cif you people are really to distance your\nenemies it is horses or nothing for you, unless of course you have\nbicycles and motor-cars in your pocket.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd where do you advise us to make for?\u201d asked Syme doubtfully.\n\n\u201cBeyond question,\u201d replied the Colonel, \u201cyou had better make all haste\nto the police station beyond the town. My friend, whom I seconded under\nsomewhat deceptive circumstances, seems to me to exaggerate very much\nthe possibilities of a general rising; but even he would hardly\nmaintain, I suppose, that you were not safe with the gendarmes.\u201d\n\nSyme nodded gravely; then he said abruptly\u2014\n\n\u201cAnd your other reason for coming here?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy other reason for coming here,\u201d said Ducroix soberly, \u201cis that it is\njust as well to see a good man or two when one is possibly near to\ndeath.\u201d\n\nSyme looked up at the wall, and saw a crudely-painted and pathetic\nreligious picture. Then he said\u2014\n\n\u201cYou are right,\u201d and then almost immediately afterwards, \u201cHas anyone\nseen about the horses?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d answered Ducroix, \u201cyou may be quite certain that I gave orders\nthe moment I came in. Those enemies of yours gave no impression of\nhurry, but they were really moving wonderfully fast, like a\nwell-trained army. I had no idea that the anarchists had so much\ndiscipline. You have not a moment to waste.\u201d\n\nAlmost as he spoke, the old innkeeper with the blue eyes and white hair\ncame ambling into the room, and announced that six horses were saddled\noutside.\n\nBy Ducroix\u2019s advice the five others equipped themselves with some\nportable form of food and wine, and keeping their duelling swords as\nthe only weapons available, they clattered away down the steep, white\nroad. The two servants, who had carried the Marquis\u2019s luggage when he\nwas a marquis, were left behind to drink at the caf\u00e9 by common consent,\nand not at all against their own inclination.\n\nBy this time the afternoon sun was slanting westward, and by its rays\nSyme could see the sturdy figure of the old innkeeper growing smaller\nand smaller, but still standing and looking after them quite silently,\nthe sunshine in his silver hair. Syme had a fixed, superstitious fancy,\nleft in his mind by the chance phrase of the Colonel, that this was\nindeed, perhaps, the last honest stranger whom he should ever see upon\nthe earth.\n\nHe was still looking at this dwindling figure, which stood as a mere\ngrey blot touched with a white flame against the great green wall of\nthe steep down behind him. And as he stared over the top of the down\nbehind the innkeeper, there appeared an army of black-clad and marching\nmen. They seemed to hang above the good man and his house like a black\ncloud of locusts. The horses had been saddled none too soon.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\nTHE EARTH IN ANARCHY\n\n\nUrging the horses to a gallop, without respect to the rather rugged\ndescent of the road, the horsemen soon regained their advantage over\nthe men on the march, and at last the bulk of the first buildings of\nLancy cut off the sight of their pursuers. Nevertheless, the ride had\nbeen a long one, and by the time they reached the real town the west\nwas warming with the colour and quality of sunset. The Colonel\nsuggested that, before making finally for the police station, they\nshould make the effort, in passing, to attach to themselves one more\nindividual who might be useful.\n\n\u201cFour out of the five rich men in this town,\u201d he said, \u201care common\nswindlers. I suppose the proportion is pretty equal all over the world.\nThe fifth is a friend of mine, and a very fine fellow; and what is even\nmore important from our point of view, he owns a motor-car.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am afraid,\u201d said the Professor in his mirthful way, looking back\nalong the white road on which the black, crawling patch might appear at\nany moment, \u201cI am afraid we have hardly time for afternoon calls.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoctor Renard\u2019s house is only three minutes off,\u201d said the Colonel.\n\n\u201cOur danger,\u201d said Dr. Bull, \u201cis not two minutes off.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Syme, \u201cif we ride on fast we must leave them behind, for\nthey are on foot.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe has a motor-car,\u201d said the Colonel.\n\n\u201cBut we may not get it,\u201d said Bull.\n\n\u201cYes, he is quite on your side.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut he might be out.\u201d\n\n\u201cHold your tongue,\u201d said Syme suddenly. \u201cWhat is that noise?\u201d\n\nFor a second they all sat as still as equestrian statues, and for a\nsecond\u2014for two or three or four seconds\u2014heaven and earth seemed equally\nstill. Then all their ears, in an agony of attention, heard along the\nroad that indescribable thrill and throb that means only one\nthing\u2014horses!\n\nThe Colonel\u2019s face had an instantaneous change, as if lightning had\nstruck it, and yet left it scatheless.\n\n\u201cThey have done us,\u201d he said, with brief military irony. \u201cPrepare to\nreceive cavalry!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere can they have got the horses?\u201d asked Syme, as he mechanically\nurged his steed to a canter.\n\nThe Colonel was silent for a little, then he said in a strained voice\u2014\n\n\u201cI was speaking with strict accuracy when I said that the \u2018Soleil d\u2019Or\u2019\nwas the only place where one can get horses within twenty miles.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo!\u201d said Syme violently, \u201cI don\u2019t believe he\u2019d do it. Not with all\nthat white hair.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe may have been forced,\u201d said the Colonel gently. \u201cThey must be at\nleast a hundred strong, for which reason we are all going to see my\nfriend Renard, who has a motor-car.\u201d\n\nWith these words he swung his horse suddenly round a street corner, and\nwent down the street with such thundering speed, that the others,\nthough already well at the gallop, had difficulty in following the\nflying tail of his horse.\n\nDr. Renard inhabited a high and comfortable house at the top of a steep\nstreet, so that when the riders alighted at his door they could once\nmore see the solid green ridge of the hill, with the white road across\nit, standing up above all the roofs of the town. They breathed again to\nsee that the road as yet was clear, and they rang the bell.\n\nDr. Renard was a beaming, brown-bearded man, a good example of that\nsilent but very busy professional class which France has preserved even\nmore perfectly than England. When the matter was explained to him he\npooh-poohed the panic of the ex-Marquis altogether; he said, with the\nsolid French scepticism, that there was no conceivable probability of a\ngeneral anarchist rising. \u201cAnarchy,\u201d he said, shrugging his shoulders,\n\u201cit is childishness!\u201d\n\n\u201c_Et \u00e7a_,\u201d cried out the Colonel suddenly, pointing over the other\u2019s\nshoulder, \u201cand that is childishness, isn\u2019t it?\u201d\n\nThey all looked round, and saw a curve of black cavalry come sweeping\nover the top of the hill with all the energy of Attila. Swiftly as they\nrode, however, the whole rank still kept well together, and they could\nsee the black vizards of the first line as level as a line of uniforms.\nBut although the main black square was the same, though travelling\nfaster, there was now one sensational difference which they could see\nclearly upon the slope of the hill, as if upon a slanted map. The bulk\nof the riders were in one block; but one rider flew far ahead of the\ncolumn, and with frantic movements of hand and heel urged his horse\nfaster and faster, so that one might have fancied that he was not the\npursuer but the pursued. But even at that great distance they could see\nsomething so fanatical, so unquestionable in his figure, that they knew\nit was the Secretary himself. \u201cI am sorry to cut short a cultured\ndiscussion,\u201d said the Colonel, \u201cbut can you lend me your motor-car now,\nin two minutes?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have a suspicion that you are all mad,\u201d said Dr. Renard, smiling\nsociably; \u201cbut God forbid that madness should in any way interrupt\nfriendship. Let us go round to the garage.\u201d\n\nDr. Renard was a mild man with monstrous wealth; his rooms were like\nthe Mus\u00e9e de Cluny, and he had three motor-cars. These, however, he\nseemed to use very sparingly, having the simple tastes of the French\nmiddle class, and when his impatient friends came to examine them, it\ntook them some time to assure themselves that one of them even could be\nmade to work. This with some difficulty they brought round into the\nstreet before the Doctor\u2019s house. When they came out of the dim garage\nthey were startled to find that twilight had already fallen with the\nabruptness of night in the tropics. Either they had been longer in the\nplace than they imagined, or some unusual canopy of cloud had gathered\nover the town. They looked down the steep streets, and seemed to see a\nslight mist coming up from the sea.\n\n\u201cIt is now or never,\u201d said Dr. Bull. \u201cI hear horses.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d corrected the Professor, \u201ca horse.\u201d\n\nAnd as they listened, it was evident that the noise, rapidly coming\nnearer on the rattling stones, was not the noise of the whole cavalcade\nbut that of the one horseman, who had left it far behind\u2014the insane\nSecretary.\n\nSyme\u2019s family, like most of those who end in the simple life, had once\nowned a motor, and he knew all about them. He had leapt at once into\nthe chauffeur\u2019s seat, and with flushed face was wrenching and tugging\nat the disused machinery. He bent his strength upon one handle, and\nthen said quite quietly\u2014\n\n\u201cI am afraid it\u2019s no go.\u201d\n\nAs he spoke, there swept round the corner a man rigid on his rushing\nhorse, with the rush and rigidity of an arrow. He had a smile that\nthrust out his chin as if it were dislocated. He swept alongside of the\nstationary car, into which its company had crowded, and laid his hand\non the front. It was the Secretary, and his mouth went quite straight\nin the solemnity of triumph.\n\nSyme was leaning hard upon the steering wheel, and there was no sound\nbut the rumble of the other pursuers riding into the town. Then there\ncame quite suddenly a scream of scraping iron, and the car leapt\nforward. It plucked the Secretary clean out of his saddle, as a knife\nis whipped out of its sheath, trailed him kicking terribly for twenty\nyards, and left him flung flat upon the road far in front of his\nfrightened horse. As the car took the corner of the street with a\nsplendid curve, they could just see the other anarchists filling the\nstreet and raising their fallen leader.\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t understand why it has grown so dark,\u201d said the Professor at\nlast in a low voice.\n\n\u201cGoing to be a storm, I think,\u201d said Dr. Bull. \u201cI say, it\u2019s a pity we\nhaven\u2019t got a light on this car, if only to see by.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have,\u201d said the Colonel, and from the floor of the car he fished up\na heavy, old-fashioned, carved iron lantern with a light inside it. It\nwas obviously an antique, and it would seem as if its original use had\nbeen in some way semi-religious, for there was a rude moulding of a\ncross upon one of its sides.\n\n\u201cWhere on earth did you get that?\u201d asked the Professor.\n\n\u201cI got it where I got the car,\u201d answered the Colonel, chuckling, \u201cfrom\nmy best friend. While our friend here was fighting with the steering\nwheel, I ran up the front steps of the house and spoke to Renard, who\nwas standing in his own porch, you will remember. \u2018I suppose,\u2019 I said,\n\u2018there\u2019s no time to get a lamp.\u2019 He looked up, blinking amiably at the\nbeautiful arched ceiling of his own front hall. From this was\nsuspended, by chains of exquisite ironwork, this lantern, one of the\nhundred treasures of his treasure house. By sheer force he tore the\nlamp out of his own ceiling, shattering the painted panels, and\nbringing down two blue vases with his violence. Then he handed me the\niron lantern, and I put it in the car. Was I not right when I said that\nDr. Renard was worth knowing?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou were,\u201d said Syme seriously, and hung the heavy lantern over the\nfront. There was a certain allegory of their whole position in the\ncontrast between the modern automobile and its strange ecclesiastical\nlamp. Hitherto they had passed through the quietest part of the town,\nmeeting at most one or two pedestrians, who could give them no hint of\nthe peace or the hostility of the place. Now, however, the windows in\nthe houses began one by one to be lit up, giving a greater sense of\nhabitation and humanity. Dr. Bull turned to the new detective who had\nled their flight, and permitted himself one of his natural and friendly\nsmiles.\n\n\u201cThese lights make one feel more cheerful.\u201d\n\nInspector Ratcliffe drew his brows together.\n\n\u201cThere is only one set of lights that make me more cheerful,\u201d he said,\n\u201cand they are those lights of the police station which I can see beyond\nthe town. Please God we may be there in ten minutes.\u201d\n\nThen all Bull\u2019s boiling good sense and optimism broke suddenly out of\nhim.\n\n\u201cOh, this is all raving nonsense!\u201d he cried. \u201cIf you really think that\nordinary people in ordinary houses are anarchists, you must be madder\nthan an anarchist yourself. If we turned and fought these fellows, the\nwhole town would fight for us.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the other with an immovable simplicity, \u201cthe whole town\nwould fight for them. We shall see.\u201d\n\nWhile they were speaking the Professor had leant forward with sudden\nexcitement.\n\n\u201cWhat is that noise?\u201d he said.\n\n\u201cOh, the horses behind us, I suppose,\u201d said the Colonel. \u201cI thought we\nhad got clear of them.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe horses behind us! No,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cit is not horses, and\nit is not behind us.\u201d\n\nAlmost as he spoke, across the end of the street before them two\nshining and rattling shapes shot past. They were gone almost in a\nflash, but everyone could see that they were motor-cars, and the\nProfessor stood up with a pale face and swore that they were the other\ntwo motor-cars from Dr. Renard\u2019s garage.\n\n\u201cI tell you they were his,\u201d he repeated, with wild eyes, \u201cand they were\nfull of men in masks!\u201d\n\n\u201cAbsurd!\u201d said the Colonel angrily. \u201cDr. Renard would never give them\nhis cars.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe may have been forced,\u201d said Ratcliffe quietly. \u201cThe whole town is\non their side.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou still believe that,\u201d asked the Colonel incredulously.\n\n\u201cYou will all believe it soon,\u201d said the other with a hopeless calm.\n\nThere was a puzzled pause for some little time, and then the Colonel\nbegan again abruptly\u2014\n\n\u201cNo, I can\u2019t believe it. The thing is nonsense. The plain people of a\npeaceable French town\u2014\u201d\n\nHe was cut short by a bang and a blaze of light, which seemed close to\nhis eyes. As the car sped on it left a floating patch of white smoke\nbehind it, and Syme had heard a shot shriek past his ear.\n\n\u201cMy God!\u201d said the Colonel, \u201csomeone has shot at us.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt need not interrupt conversation,\u201d said the gloomy Ratcliffe. \u201cPray\nresume your remarks, Colonel. You were talking, I think, about the\nplain people of a peaceable French town.\u201d\n\nThe staring Colonel was long past minding satire. He rolled his eyes\nall round the street.\n\n\u201cIt is extraordinary,\u201d he said, \u201cmost extraordinary.\u201d\n\n\u201cA fastidious person,\u201d said Syme, \u201cmight even call it unpleasant.\nHowever, I suppose those lights out in the field beyond this street are\nthe Gendarmerie. We shall soon get there.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Inspector Ratcliffe, \u201cwe shall never get there.\u201d\n\nHe had been standing up and looking keenly ahead of him. Now he sat\ndown and smoothed his sleek hair with a weary gesture.\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d asked Bull sharply.\n\n\u201cI mean that we shall never get there,\u201d said the pessimist placidly.\n\u201cThey have two rows of armed men across the road already; I can see\nthem from here. The town is in arms, as I said it was. I can only\nwallow in the exquisite comfort of my own exactitude.\u201d\n\nAnd Ratcliffe sat down comfortably in the car and lit a cigarette, but\nthe others rose excitedly and stared down the road. Syme had slowed\ndown the car as their plans became doubtful, and he brought it finally\nto a standstill just at the corner of a side street that ran down very\nsteeply to the sea.\n\nThe town was mostly in shadow, but the sun had not sunk; wherever its\nlevel light could break through, it painted everything a burning gold.\nUp this side street the last sunset light shone as sharp and narrow as\nthe shaft of artificial light at the theatre. It struck the car of the\nfive friends, and lit it like a burning chariot. But the rest of the\nstreet, especially the two ends of it, was in the deepest twilight, and\nfor some seconds they could see nothing. Then Syme, whose eyes were the\nkeenest, broke into a little bitter whistle, and said,\n\n\u201cIt is quite true. There is a crowd or an army or some such thing\nacross the end of that street.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, if there is,\u201d said Bull impatiently, \u201cit must be something\nelse\u2014a sham fight or the mayor\u2019s birthday or something. I cannot and\nwill not believe that plain, jolly people in a place like this walk\nabout with dynamite in their pockets. Get on a bit, Syme, and let us\nlook at them.\u201d\n\nThe car crawled about a hundred yards farther, and then they were all\nstartled by Dr. Bull breaking into a high crow of laughter.\n\n\u201cWhy, you silly mugs!\u201d he cried, \u201cwhat did I tell you. That crowd\u2019s as\nlaw-abiding as a cow, and if it weren\u2019t, it\u2019s on our side.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow do you know?\u201d asked the professor, staring.\n\n\u201cYou blind bat,\u201d cried Bull, \u201cdon\u2019t you see who is leading them?\u201d\n\nThey peered again, and then the Colonel, with a catch in his voice,\ncried out\u2014\n\n\u201cWhy, it\u2019s Renard!\u201d\n\nThere was, indeed, a rank of dim figures running across the road, and\nthey could not be clearly seen; but far enough in front to catch the\naccident of the evening light was stalking up and down the unmistakable\nDr. Renard, in a white hat, stroking his long brown beard, and holding\na revolver in his left hand.\n\n\u201cWhat a fool I\u2019ve been!\u201d exclaimed the Colonel. \u201cOf course, the dear\nold boy has turned out to help us.\u201d\n\nDr. Bull was bubbling over with laughter, swinging the sword in his\nhand as carelessly as a cane. He jumped out of the car and ran across\nthe intervening space, calling out\u2014\n\n\u201cDr. Renard! Dr. Renard!\u201d\n\nAn instant after Syme thought his own eyes had gone mad in his head.\nFor the philanthropic Dr. Renard had deliberately raised his revolver\nand fired twice at Bull, so that the shots rang down the road.\n\nAlmost at the same second as the puff of white cloud went up from this\natrocious explosion a long puff of white cloud went up also from the\ncigarette of the cynical Ratcliffe. Like all the rest he turned a\nlittle pale, but he smiled. Dr. Bull, at whom the bullets had been\nfired, just missing his scalp, stood quite still in the middle of the\nroad without a sign of fear, and then turned very slowly and crawled\nback to the car, and climbed in with two holes through his hat.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the cigarette smoker slowly, \u201cwhat do you think now?\u201d\n\n\u201cI think,\u201d said Dr. Bull with precision, \u201cthat I am lying in bed at No.\n217 Peabody Buildings, and that I shall soon wake up with a jump; or,\nif that\u2019s not it, I think that I am sitting in a small cushioned cell\nin Hanwell, and that the doctor can\u2019t make much of my case. But if you\nwant to know what I don\u2019t think, I\u2019ll tell you. I don\u2019t think what you\nthink. I don\u2019t think, and I never shall think, that the mass of\nordinary men are a pack of dirty modern thinkers. No, sir, I\u2019m a\ndemocrat, and I still don\u2019t believe that Sunday could convert one\naverage navvy or counter-jumper. No, I may be mad, but humanity isn\u2019t.\u201d\n\nSyme turned his bright blue eyes on Bull with an earnestness which he\ndid not commonly make clear.\n\n\u201cYou are a very fine fellow,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can believe in a sanity\nwhich is not merely your sanity. And you\u2019re right enough about\nhumanity, about peasants and people like that jolly old innkeeper. But\nyou\u2019re not right about Renard. I suspected him from the first. He\u2019s\nrationalistic, and, what\u2019s worse, he\u2019s rich. When duty and religion are\nreally destroyed, it will be by the rich.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are really destroyed now,\u201d said the man with a cigarette, and\nrose with his hands in his pockets. \u201cThe devils are coming on!\u201d\n\nThe men in the motor-car looked anxiously in the direction of his\ndreamy gaze, and they saw that the whole regiment at the end of the\nroad was advancing upon them, Dr. Renard marching furiously in front,\nhis beard flying in the breeze.\n\nThe Colonel sprang out of the car with an intolerant exclamation.\n\n\u201cGentlemen,\u201d he cried, \u201cthe thing is incredible. It must be a practical\njoke. If you knew Renard as I do\u2014it\u2019s like calling Queen Victoria a\ndynamiter. If you had got the man\u2019s character into your head\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cDr. Bull,\u201d said Syme sardonically, \u201chas at least got it into his hat.\u201d\n\n\u201cI tell you it can\u2019t be!\u201d cried the Colonel, stamping.\n\n\u201cRenard shall explain it. He shall explain it to me,\u201d and he strode\nforward.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t be in such a hurry,\u201d drawled the smoker. \u201cHe will very soon\nexplain it to all of us.\u201d\n\nBut the impatient Colonel was already out of earshot, advancing towards\nthe advancing enemy. The excited Dr. Renard lifted his pistol again,\nbut perceiving his opponent, hesitated, and the Colonel came face to\nface with him with frantic gestures of remonstrance.\n\n\u201cIt is no good,\u201d said Syme. \u201cHe will never get anything out of that old\nheathen. I vote we drive bang through the thick of them, bang as the\nbullets went through Bull\u2019s hat. We may all be killed, but we must kill\na tidy number of them.\u201d\n\n\u201cI won\u2019t \u2019ave it,\u201d said Dr. Bull, growing more vulgar in the sincerity\nof his virtue. \u201cThe poor chaps may be making a mistake. Give the\nColonel a chance.\u201d\n\n\u201cShall we go back, then?\u201d asked the Professor.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Ratcliffe in a cold voice, \u201cthe street behind us is held\ntoo. In fact, I seem to see there another friend of yours, Syme.\u201d\n\nSyme spun round smartly, and stared backwards at the track which they\nhad travelled. He saw an irregular body of horsemen gathering and\ngalloping towards them in the gloom. He saw above the foremost saddle\nthe silver gleam of a sword, and then as it grew nearer the silver\ngleam of an old man\u2019s hair. The next moment, with shattering violence,\nhe had swung the motor round and sent it dashing down the steep side\nstreet to the sea, like a man that desired only to die.\n\n\u201cWhat the devil is up?\u201d cried the Professor, seizing his arm.\n\n\u201cThe morning star has fallen!\u201d said Syme, as his own car went down the\ndarkness like a falling star.\n\nThe others did not understand his words, but when they looked back at\nthe street above they saw the hostile cavalry coming round the corner\nand down the slopes after them; and foremost of all rode the good\ninnkeeper, flushed with the fiery innocence of the evening light.\n\n\u201cThe world is insane!\u201d said the Professor, and buried his face in his\nhands.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Dr. Bull in adamantine humility, \u201cit is I.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat are we going to do?\u201d asked the Professor.\n\n\u201cAt this moment,\u201d said Syme, with a scientific detachment, \u201cI think we\nare going to smash into a lamppost.\u201d\n\nThe next instant the automobile had come with a catastrophic jar\nagainst an iron object. The instant after that four men had crawled out\nfrom under a chaos of metal, and a tall lean lamp-post that had stood\nup straight on the edge of the marine parade stood out, bent and\ntwisted, like the branch of a broken tree.\n\n\u201cWell, we smashed something,\u201d said the Professor, with a faint smile.\n\u201cThat\u2019s some comfort.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re becoming an anarchist,\u201d said Syme, dusting his clothes with his\ninstinct of daintiness.\n\n\u201cEveryone is,\u201d said Ratcliffe.\n\nAs they spoke, the white-haired horseman and his followers came\nthundering from above, and almost at the same moment a dark string of\nmen ran shouting along the sea-front. Syme snatched a sword, and took\nit in his teeth; he stuck two others under his arm-pits, took a fourth\nin his left hand and the lantern in his right, and leapt off the high\nparade on to the beach below.\n\nThe others leapt after him, with a common acceptance of such decisive\naction, leaving the debris and the gathering mob above them.\n\n\u201cWe have one more chance,\u201d said Syme, taking the steel out of his\nmouth. \u201cWhatever all this pandemonium means, I suppose the police\nstation will help us. We can\u2019t get there, for they hold the way. But\nthere\u2019s a pier or breakwater runs out into the sea just here, which we\ncould defend longer than anything else, like Horatius and his bridge.\nWe must defend it till the Gendarmerie turn out. Keep after me.\u201d\n\nThey followed him as he went crunching down the beach, and in a second\nor two their boots broke not on the sea gravel, but on broad, flat\nstones. They marched down a long, low jetty, running out in one arm\ninto the dim, boiling sea, and when they came to the end of it they\nfelt that they had come to the end of their story. They turned and\nfaced the town.\n\nThat town was transfigured with uproar. All along the high parade from\nwhich they had just descended was a dark and roaring stream of\nhumanity, with tossing arms and fiery faces, groping and glaring\ntowards them. The long dark line was dotted with torches and lanterns;\nbut even where no flame lit up a furious face, they could see in the\nfarthest figure, in the most shadowy gesture, an organised hate. It was\nclear that they were the accursed of all men, and they knew not why.\n\nTwo or three men, looking little and black like monkeys, leapt over the\nedge as they had done and dropped on to the beach. These came ploughing\ndown the deep sand, shouting horribly, and strove to wade into the sea\nat random. The example was followed, and the whole black mass of men\nbegan to run and drip over the edge like black treacle.\n\nForemost among the men on the beach Syme saw the peasant who had driven\ntheir cart. He splashed into the surf on a huge cart-horse, and shook\nhis axe at them.\n\n\u201cThe peasant!\u201d cried Syme. \u201cThey have not risen since the Middle Ages.\u201d\n\n\u201cEven if the police do come now,\u201d said the Professor mournfully, \u201cthey\ncan do nothing with this mob.\u201d\n\n\u201cNonsense!\u201d said Bull desperately; \u201cthere must be some people left in\nthe town who are human.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the hopeless Inspector, \u201cthe human being will soon be\nextinct. We are the last of mankind.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt may be,\u201d said the Professor absently. Then he added in his dreamy\nvoice, \u201cWhat is all that at the end of the \u2018Dunciad\u2019?\n\n\u2018Nor public flame; nor private, dares to shine;\nNor human light is left, nor glimpse divine!\nLo! thy dread Empire, Chaos, is restored;\nLight dies before thine uncreating word:\nThy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtain fall;\nAnd universal darkness buries all.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n\u201cStop!\u201d cried Bull suddenly, \u201cthe gendarmes are out.\u201d\n\nThe low lights of the police station were indeed blotted and broken\nwith hurrying figures, and they heard through the darkness the clash\nand jingle of a disciplined cavalry.\n\n\u201cThey are charging the mob!\u201d cried Bull in ecstacy or alarm.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Syme, \u201cthey are formed along the parade.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey have unslung their carbines,\u201d cried Bull dancing with excitement.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Ratcliffe, \u201cand they are going to fire on us.\u201d\n\nAs he spoke there came a long crackle of musketry, and bullets seemed\nto hop like hailstones on the stones in front of them.\n\n\u201cThe gendarmes have joined them!\u201d cried the Professor, and struck his\nforehead.\n\n\u201cI am in the padded cell,\u201d said Bull solidly.\n\nThere was a long silence, and then Ratcliffe said, looking out over the\nswollen sea, all a sort of grey purple\u2014\n\n\u201cWhat does it matter who is mad or who is sane? We shall all be dead\nsoon.\u201d\n\nSyme turned to him and said\u2014\n\n\u201cYou are quite hopeless, then?\u201d\n\nMr. Ratcliffe kept a stony silence; then at last he said quietly\u2014\n\n\u201cNo; oddly enough I am not quite hopeless. There is one insane little\nhope that I cannot get out of my mind. The power of this whole planet\nis against us, yet I cannot help wondering whether this one silly\nlittle hope is hopeless yet.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn what or whom is your hope?\u201d asked Syme with curiosity.\n\n\u201cIn a man I never saw,\u201d said the other, looking at the leaden sea.\n\n\u201cI know what you mean,\u201d said Syme in a low voice, \u201cthe man in the dark\nroom. But Sunday must have killed him by now.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps,\u201d said the other steadily; \u201cbut if so, he was the only man\nwhom Sunday found it hard to kill.\u201d\n\n\u201cI heard what you said,\u201d said the Professor, with his back turned. \u201cI\nalso am holding hard on to the thing I never saw.\u201d\n\nAll of a sudden Syme, who was standing as if blind with introspective\nthought, swung round and cried out, like a man waking from sleep\u2014\n\n\u201cWhere is the Colonel? I thought he was with us!\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Colonel! Yes,\u201d cried Bull, \u201cwhere on earth is the Colonel?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe went to speak to Renard,\u201d said the Professor.\n\n\u201cWe cannot leave him among all those beasts,\u201d cried Syme. \u201cLet us die\nlike gentlemen if\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not pity the Colonel,\u201d said Ratcliffe, with a pale sneer. \u201cHe is\nextremely comfortable. He is\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cNo! no! no!\u201d cried Syme in a kind of frenzy, \u201cnot the Colonel too! I\nwill never believe it!\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you believe your eyes?\u201d asked the other, and pointed to the\nbeach.\n\nMany of their pursuers had waded into the water shaking their fists,\nbut the sea was rough, and they could not reach the pier. Two or three\nfigures, however, stood on the beginning of the stone footway, and\nseemed to be cautiously advancing down it. The glare of a chance\nlantern lit up the faces of the two foremost. One face wore a black\nhalf-mask, and under it the mouth was twisting about in such a madness\nof nerves that the black tuft of beard wriggled round and round like a\nrestless, living thing. The other was the red face and white moustache\nof Colonel Ducroix. They were in earnest consultation.\n\n\u201cYes, he is gone too,\u201d said the Professor, and sat down on a stone.\n\u201cEverything\u2019s gone. I\u2019m gone! I can\u2019t trust my own bodily machinery. I\nfeel as if my own hand might fly up and strike me.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen my hand flies up,\u201d said Syme, \u201cit will strike somebody else,\u201d and\nhe strode along the pier towards the Colonel, the sword in one hand and\nthe lantern in the other.\n\nAs if to destroy the last hope or doubt, the Colonel, who saw him\ncoming, pointed his revolver at him and fired. The shot missed Syme,\nbut struck his sword, breaking it short at the hilt. Syme rushed on,\nand swung the iron lantern above his head.\n\n\u201cJudas before Herod!\u201d he said, and struck the Colonel down upon the\nstones. Then he turned to the Secretary, whose frightful mouth was\nalmost foaming now, and held the lamp high with so rigid and arresting\na gesture, that the man was, as it were, frozen for a moment, and\nforced to hear.\n\n\u201cDo you see this lantern?\u201d cried Syme in a terrible voice. \u201cDo you see\nthe cross carved on it, and the flame inside? You did not make it. You\ndid not light it. Better men than you, men who could believe and obey,\ntwisted the entrails of iron and preserved the legend of fire. There is\nnot a street you walk on, there is not a thread you wear, that was not\nmade as this lantern was, by denying your philosophy of dirt and rats.\nYou can make nothing. You can only destroy. You will destroy mankind;\nyou will destroy the world. Let that suffice you. Yet this one old\nChristian lantern you shall not destroy. It shall go where your empire\nof apes will never have the wit to find it.\u201d\n\nHe struck the Secretary once with the lantern so that he staggered; and\nthen, whirling it twice round his head, sent it flying far out to sea,\nwhere it flared like a roaring rocket and fell.\n\n\u201cSwords!\u201d shouted Syme, turning his flaming face to the three behind\nhim. \u201cLet us charge these dogs, for our time has come to die.\u201d\n\nHis three companions came after him sword in hand. Syme\u2019s sword was\nbroken, but he rent a bludgeon from the fist of a fisherman, flinging\nhim down. In a moment they would have flung themselves upon the face of\nthe mob and perished, when an interruption came. The Secretary, ever\nsince Syme\u2019s speech, had stood with his hand to his stricken head as if\ndazed; now he suddenly pulled off his black mask.\n\nThe pale face thus peeled in the lamplight revealed not so much rage as\nastonishment. He put up his hand with an anxious authority.\n\n\u201cThere is some mistake,\u201d he said. \u201cMr. Syme, I hardly think you\nunderstand your position. I arrest you in the name of the law.\u201d\n\n\u201cOf the law?\u201d said Syme, and dropped his stick.\n\n\u201cCertainly!\u201d said the Secretary. \u201cI am a detective from Scotland Yard,\u201d\nand he took a small blue card from his pocket.\n\n\u201cAnd what do you suppose we are?\u201d asked the Professor, and threw up his\narms.\n\n\u201cYou,\u201d said the Secretary stiffly, \u201care, as I know for a fact, members\nof the Supreme Anarchist Council. Disguised as one of you, I\u2014\u201d\n\nDr. Bull tossed his sword into the sea.\n\n\u201cThere never was any Supreme Anarchist Council,\u201d he said. \u201cWe were all\na lot of silly policemen looking at each other. And all these nice\npeople who have been peppering us with shot thought we were the\ndynamiters. I knew I couldn\u2019t be wrong about the mob,\u201d he said, beaming\nover the enormous multitude, which stretched away to the distance on\nboth sides. \u201cVulgar people are never mad. I\u2019m vulgar myself, and I\nknow. I am now going on shore to stand a drink to everybody here.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\nTHE PURSUIT OF THE PRESIDENT\n\n\nNext morning five bewildered but hilarious people took the boat for\nDover. The poor old Colonel might have had some cause to complain,\nhaving been first forced to fight for two factions that didn\u2019t exist,\nand then knocked down with an iron lantern. But he was a magnanimous\nold gentleman, and being much relieved that neither party had anything\nto do with dynamite, he saw them off on the pier with great geniality.\n\nThe five reconciled detectives had a hundred details to explain to each\nother. The Secretary had to tell Syme how they had come to wear masks\noriginally in order to approach the supposed enemy as\nfellow-conspirators.\n\nSyme had to explain how they had fled with such swiftness through a\ncivilised country. But above all these matters of detail which could be\nexplained, rose the central mountain of the matter that they could not\nexplain. What did it all mean? If they were all harmless officers, what\nwas Sunday? If he had not seized the world, what on earth had he been\nup to? Inspector Ratcliffe was still gloomy about this.\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t make head or tail of old Sunday\u2019s little game any more than\nyou can,\u201d he said. \u201cBut whatever else Sunday is, he isn\u2019t a blameless\ncitizen. Damn it! do you remember his face?\u201d\n\n\u201cI grant you,\u201d answered Syme, \u201cthat I have never been able to forget\nit.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the Secretary, \u201cI suppose we can find out soon, for\ntomorrow we have our next general meeting. You will excuse me,\u201d he\nsaid, with a rather ghastly smile, \u201cfor being well acquainted with my\nsecretarial duties.\u201d\n\n\u201cI suppose you are right,\u201d said the Professor reflectively. \u201cI suppose\nwe might find it out from him; but I confess that I should feel a bit\nafraid of asking Sunday who he really is.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d asked the Secretary, \u201cfor fear of bombs?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cfor fear he might tell me.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us have some drinks,\u201d said Dr. Bull, after a silence.\n\nThroughout their whole journey by boat and train they were highly\nconvivial, but they instinctively kept together. Dr. Bull, who had\nalways been the optimist of the party, endeavoured to persuade the\nother four that the whole company could take the same hansom cab from\nVictoria; but this was overruled, and they went in a four-wheeler,\nwith Dr. Bull on the box, singing. They finished their journey at an\nhotel in Piccadilly Circus, so as to be close to the early breakfast\nnext morning in Leicester Square. Yet even then the adventures of the\nday were not entirely over. Dr. Bull, discontented with the general\nproposal to go to bed, had strolled out of the hotel at about eleven to\nsee and taste some of the beauties of London. Twenty minutes\nafterwards, however, he came back and made quite a clamour in the hall.\nSyme, who tried at first to soothe him, was forced at last to listen to\nhis communication with quite new attention.\n\n\u201cI tell you I\u2019ve seen him!\u201d said Dr. Bull, with thick emphasis.\n\n\u201cWhom?\u201d asked Syme quickly. \u201cNot the President?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot so bad as that,\u201d said Dr. Bull, with unnecessary laughter, \u201cnot so\nbad as that. I\u2019ve got him here.\u201d\n\n\u201cGot whom here?\u201d asked Syme impatiently.\n\n\u201cHairy man,\u201d said the other lucidly, \u201cman that used to be hairy\nman\u2014Gogol. Here he is,\u201d and he pulled forward by a reluctant elbow the\nidentical young man who five days before had marched out of the Council\nwith thin red hair and a pale face, the first of all the sham\nanarchists who had been exposed.\n\n\u201cWhy do you worry with me?\u201d he cried. \u201cYou have expelled me as a spy.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe are all spies!\u201d whispered Syme.\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re all spies!\u201d shouted Dr. Bull. \u201cCome and have a drink.\u201d\n\nNext morning the battalion of the reunited six marched stolidly towards\nthe hotel in Leicester Square.\n\n\u201cThis is more cheerful,\u201d said Dr. Bull; \u201cwe are six men going to ask\none man what he means.\u201d\n\n\u201cI think it is a bit queerer than that,\u201d said Syme. \u201cI think it is six\nmen going to ask one man what they mean.\u201d\n\nThey turned in silence into the Square, and though the hotel was in the\nopposite corner, they saw at once the little balcony and a figure that\nlooked too big for it. He was sitting alone with bent head, poring over\na newspaper. But all his councillors, who had come to vote him down,\ncrossed that Square as if they were watched out of heaven by a hundred\neyes.\n\nThey had disputed much upon their policy, about whether they should\nleave the unmasked Gogol without and begin diplomatically, or whether\nthey should bring him in and blow up the gunpowder at once. The\ninfluence of Syme and Bull prevailed for the latter course, though the\nSecretary to the last asked them why they attacked Sunday so rashly.\n\n\u201cMy reason is quite simple,\u201d said Syme. \u201cI attack him rashly because I\nam afraid of him.\u201d\n\nThey followed Syme up the dark stair in silence, and they all came out\nsimultaneously into the broad sunlight of the morning and the broad\nsunlight of Sunday\u2019s smile.\n\n\u201cDelightful!\u201d he said. \u201cSo pleased to see you all. What an exquisite\nday it is. Is the Czar dead?\u201d\n\nThe Secretary, who happened to be foremost, drew himself together for a\ndignified outburst.\n\n\u201cNo, sir,\u201d he said sternly \u201cthere has been no massacre. I bring you\nnews of no such disgusting spectacles.\u201d\n\n\u201cDisgusting spectacles?\u201d repeated the President, with a bright,\ninquiring smile. \u201cYou mean Dr. Bull\u2019s spectacles?\u201d\n\nThe Secretary choked for a moment, and the President went on with a\nsort of smooth appeal\u2014\n\n\u201cOf course, we all have our opinions and even our eyes, but really to\ncall them disgusting before the man himself\u2014\u201d\n\nDr. Bull tore off his spectacles and broke them on the table.\n\n\u201cMy spectacles are blackguardly,\u201d he said, \u201cbut I\u2019m not. Look at my\nface.\u201d\n\n\u201cI dare say it\u2019s the sort of face that grows on one,\u201d said the\nPresident, \u201cin fact, it grows on you; and who am I to quarrel with the\nwild fruits upon the Tree of Life? I dare say it will grow on me some\nday.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have no time for tomfoolery,\u201d said the Secretary, breaking in\nsavagely. \u201cWe have come to know what all this means. Who are you? What\nare you? Why did you get us all here? Do you know who and what we are?\nAre you a half-witted man playing the conspirator, or are you a clever\nman playing the fool? Answer me, I tell you.\u201d\n\n\u201cCandidates,\u201d murmured Sunday, \u201care only required to answer eight out\nof the seventeen questions on the paper. As far as I can make out, you\nwant me to tell you what I am, and what you are, and what this table\nis, and what this Council is, and what this world is for all I know.\nWell, I will go so far as to rend the veil of one mystery. If you want\nto know what you are, you are a set of highly well-intentioned young\njackasses.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you,\u201d said Syme, leaning forward, \u201cwhat are you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI? What am I?\u201d roared the President, and he rose slowly to an\nincredible height, like some enormous wave about to arch above them and\nbreak. \u201cYou want to know what I am, do you? Bull, you are a man of\nscience. Grub in the roots of those trees and find out the truth about\nthem. Syme, you are a poet. Stare at those morning clouds. But I tell\nyou this, that you will have found out the truth of the last tree and\nthe top-most cloud before the truth about me. You will understand the\nsea, and I shall be still a riddle; you shall know what the stars are,\nand not know what I am. Since the beginning of the world all men have\nhunted me like a wolf\u2014kings and sages, and poets and lawgivers, all the\nchurches, and all the philosophies. But I have never been caught yet,\nand the skies will fall in the time I turn to bay. I have given them a\ngood run for their money, and I will now.\u201d\n\nBefore one of them could move, the monstrous man had swung himself like\nsome huge ourang-outang over the balustrade of the balcony. Yet before\nhe dropped he pulled himself up again as on a horizontal bar, and\nthrusting his great chin over the edge of the balcony, said solemnly\u2014\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s one thing I\u2019ll tell you though about who I am. I am the man in\nthe dark room, who made you all policemen.\u201d\n\nWith that he fell from the balcony, bouncing on the stones below like a\ngreat ball of india-rubber, and went bounding off towards the corner of\nthe Alhambra, where he hailed a hansom-cab and sprang inside it. The\nsix detectives had been standing thunderstruck and livid in the light\nof his last assertion; but when he disappeared into the cab, Syme\u2019s\npractical senses returned to him, and leaping over the balcony so\nrecklessly as almost to break his legs, he called another cab.\n\nHe and Bull sprang into the cab together, the Professor and the\nInspector into another, while the Secretary and the late Gogol\nscrambled into a third just in time to pursue the flying Syme, who was\npursuing the flying President. Sunday led them a wild chase towards the\nnorth-west, his cabman, evidently under the influence of more than\ncommon inducements, urging the horse at breakneck speed. But Syme was\nin no mood for delicacies, and he stood up in his own cab shouting,\n\u201cStop thief!\u201d until crowds ran along beside his cab, and policemen\nbegan to stop and ask questions. All this had its influence upon the\nPresident\u2019s cabman, who began to look dubious, and to slow down to a\ntrot. He opened the trap to talk reasonably to his fare, and in so\ndoing let the long whip droop over the front of the cab. Sunday leant\nforward, seized it, and jerked it violently out of the man\u2019s hand. Then\nstanding up in front of the cab himself, he lashed the horse and roared\naloud, so that they went down the streets like a flying storm. Through\nstreet after street and square after square went whirling this\npreposterous vehicle, in which the fare was urging the horse and the\ndriver trying desperately to stop it. The other three cabs came after\nit (if the phrase be permissible of a cab) like panting hounds. Shops\nand streets shot by like rattling arrows.\n\nAt the highest ecstacy of speed, Sunday turned round on the splashboard\nwhere he stood, and sticking his great grinning head out of the cab,\nwith white hair whistling in the wind, he made a horrible face at his\npursuers, like some colossal urchin. Then raising his right hand\nswiftly, he flung a ball of paper in Syme\u2019s face and vanished. Syme\ncaught the thing while instinctively warding it off, and discovered\nthat it consisted of two crumpled papers. One was addressed to himself,\nand the other to Dr. Bull, with a very long, and it is to be feared\npartly ironical, string of letters after his name. Dr. Bull\u2019s address\nwas, at any rate, considerably longer than his communication, for the\ncommunication consisted entirely of the words:\u2014\n\n\u201cWhat about Martin Tupper _now?_\u201d\n\n\n\u201cWhat does the old maniac mean?\u201d asked Bull, staring at the words.\n\u201cWhat does yours say, Syme?\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s message was, at any rate, longer, and ran as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cNo one would regret anything in the nature of an interference by the\nArchdeacon more than I. I trust it will not come to that. But, for the\nlast time, where are your goloshes? The thing is too bad, especially\nafter what uncle said.\u201d\n\n\nThe President\u2019s cabman seemed to be regaining some control over his\nhorse, and the pursuers gained a little as they swept round into the\nEdgware Road. And here there occurred what seemed to the allies a\nprovidential stoppage. Traffic of every kind was swerving to right or\nleft or stopping, for down the long road was coming the unmistakable\nroar announcing the fire-engine, which in a few seconds went by like a\nbrazen thunderbolt. But quick as it went by, Sunday had bounded out of\nhis cab, sprung at the fire-engine, caught it, slung himself on to it,\nand was seen as he disappeared in the noisy distance talking to the\nastonished fireman with explanatory gestures.\n\n\u201cAfter him!\u201d howled Syme. \u201cHe can\u2019t go astray now. There\u2019s no mistaking\na fire-engine.\u201d\n\nThe three cabmen, who had been stunned for a moment, whipped up their\nhorses and slightly decreased the distance between themselves and their\ndisappearing prey. The President acknowledged this proximity by coming\nto the back of the car, bowing repeatedly, kissing his hand, and\nfinally flinging a neatly-folded note into the bosom of Inspector\nRatcliffe. When that gentleman opened it, not without impatience, he\nfound it contained the words:\u2014\n\n\u201cFly at once. The truth about your trouser-stretchers is known.\u2014A\nFRIEND.\u201d\n\n\nThe fire-engine had struck still farther to the north, into a region\nthat they did not recognise; and as it ran by a line of high railings\nshadowed with trees, the six friends were startled, but somewhat\nrelieved, to see the President leap from the fire-engine, though\nwhether through another whim or the increasing protest of his\nentertainers they could not see. Before the three cabs, however, could\nreach up to the spot, he had gone up the high railings like a huge grey\ncat, tossed himself over, and vanished in a darkness of leaves.\n\nSyme with a furious gesture stopped his cab, jumped out, and sprang\nalso to the escalade. When he had one leg over the fence and his\nfriends were following, he turned a face on them which shone quite pale\nin the shadow.\n\n\u201cWhat place can this be?\u201d he asked. \u201cCan it be the old devil\u2019s house?\nI\u2019ve heard he has a house in North London.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll the better,\u201d said the Secretary grimly, planting a foot in a\nfoothold, \u201cwe shall find him at home.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, but it isn\u2019t that,\u201d said Syme, knitting his brows. \u201cI hear the\nmost horrible noises, like devils laughing and sneezing and blowing\ntheir devilish noses!\u201d\n\n\u201cHis dogs barking, of course,\u201d said the Secretary.\n\n\u201cWhy not say his black-beetles barking!\u201d said Syme furiously, \u201csnails\nbarking! geraniums barking! Did you ever hear a dog bark like that?\u201d\n\nHe held up his hand, and there came out of the thicket a long growling\nroar that seemed to get under the skin and freeze the flesh\u2014a low\nthrilling roar that made a throbbing in the air all about them.\n\n\u201cThe dogs of Sunday would be no ordinary dogs,\u201d said Gogol, and\nshuddered.\n\nSyme had jumped down on the other side, but he still stood listening\nimpatiently.\n\n\u201cWell, listen to that,\u201d he said, \u201cis that a dog\u2014anybody\u2019s dog?\u201d\n\nThere broke upon their ear a hoarse screaming as of things protesting\nand clamouring in sudden pain; and then, far off like an echo, what\nsounded like a long nasal trumpet.\n\n\u201cWell, his house ought to be hell!\u201d said the Secretary; \u201cand if it is\nhell, I\u2019m going in!\u201d and he sprang over the tall railings almost with\none swing.\n\nThe others followed. They broke through a tangle of plants and shrubs,\nand came out on an open path. Nothing was in sight, but Dr. Bull\nsuddenly struck his hands together.\n\n\u201cWhy, you asses,\u201d he cried, \u201cit\u2019s the Zoo!\u201d\n\nAs they were looking round wildly for any trace of their wild quarry, a\nkeeper in uniform came running along the path with a man in plain\nclothes.\n\n\u201cHas it come this way?\u201d gasped the keeper.\n\n\u201cHas what?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cThe elephant!\u201d cried the keeper. \u201cAn elephant has gone mad and run\naway!\u201d\n\n\u201cHe has run away with an old gentleman,\u201d said the other stranger\nbreathlessly, \u201ca poor old gentleman with white hair!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat sort of old gentleman?\u201d asked Syme, with great curiosity.\n\n\u201cA very large and fat old gentleman in light grey clothes,\u201d said the\nkeeper eagerly.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme, \u201cif he\u2019s that particular kind of old gentleman, if\nyou\u2019re quite sure that he\u2019s a large and fat old gentleman in grey\nclothes, you may take my word for it that the elephant has not run away\nwith him. He has run away with the elephant. The elephant is not made\nby God that could run away with him if he did not consent to the\nelopement. And, by thunder, there he is!\u201d\n\nThere was no doubt about it this time. Clean across the space of grass,\nabout two hundred yards away, with a crowd screaming and scampering\nvainly at his heels, went a huge grey elephant at an awful stride, with\nhis trunk thrown out as rigid as a ship\u2019s bowsprit, and trumpeting like\nthe trumpet of doom. On the back of the bellowing and plunging animal\nsat President Sunday with all the placidity of a sultan, but goading\nthe animal to a furious speed with some sharp object in his hand.\n\n\u201cStop him!\u201d screamed the populace. \u201cHe\u2019ll be out of the gate!\u201d\n\n\u201cStop a landslide!\u201d said the keeper. \u201cHe is out of the gate!\u201d\n\nAnd even as he spoke, a final crash and roar of terror announced that\nthe great grey elephant had broken out of the gates of the Zoological\nGardens, and was careening down Albany Street like a new and swift sort\nof omnibus.\n\n\u201cGreat Lord!\u201d cried Bull, \u201cI never knew an elephant could go so fast.\nWell, it must be hansom-cabs again if we are to keep him in sight.\u201d\n\nAs they raced along to the gate out of which the elephant had vanished,\nSyme felt a glaring panorama of the strange animals in the cages which\nthey passed. Afterwards he thought it queer that he should have seen\nthem so clearly. He remembered especially seeing pelicans, with their\npreposterous, pendant throats. He wondered why the pelican was the\nsymbol of charity, except it was that it wanted a good deal of charity\nto admire a pelican. He remembered a hornbill, which was simply a huge\nyellow beak with a small bird tied on behind it. The whole gave him a\nsensation, the vividness of which he could not explain, that Nature was\nalways making quite mysterious jokes. Sunday had told them that they\nwould understand him when they had understood the stars. He wondered\nwhether even the archangels understood the hornbill.\n\nThe six unhappy detectives flung themselves into cabs and followed the\nelephant sharing the terror which he spread through the long stretch of\nthe streets. This time Sunday did not turn round, but offered them the\nsolid stretch of his unconscious back, which maddened them, if\npossible, more than his previous mockeries. Just before they came to\nBaker Street, however, he was seen to throw something far up into the\nair, as a boy does a ball meaning to catch it again. But at their rate\nof racing it fell far behind, just by the cab containing Gogol; and in\nfaint hope of a clue or for some impulse unexplainable, he stopped his\ncab so as to pick it up. It was addressed to himself, and was quite a\nbulky parcel. On examination, however, its bulk was found to consist of\nthirty-three pieces of paper of no value wrapped one round the other.\nWhen the last covering was torn away it reduced itself to a small slip\nof paper, on which was written:\u2014\n\n\u201cThe word, I fancy, should be \u2018pink\u2019.\u201d\n\n\nThe man once known as Gogol said nothing, but the movements of his\nhands and feet were like those of a man urging a horse to renewed\nefforts.\n\nThrough street after street, through district after district, went the\nprodigy of the flying elephant, calling crowds to every window, and\ndriving the traffic left and right. And still through all this insane\npublicity the three cabs toiled after it, until they came to be\nregarded as part of a procession, and perhaps the advertisement of a\ncircus. They went at such a rate that distances were shortened beyond\nbelief, and Syme saw the Albert Hall in Kensington when he thought that\nhe was still in Paddington. The animal\u2019s pace was even more fast and\nfree through the empty, aristocratic streets of South Kensington, and\nhe finally headed towards that part of the sky-line where the enormous\nWheel of Earl\u2019s Court stood up in the sky. The wheel grew larger and\nlarger, till it filled heaven like the wheel of stars.\n\nThe beast outstripped the cabs. They lost him round several corners,\nand when they came to one of the gates of the Earl\u2019s Court Exhibition\nthey found themselves finally blocked. In front of them was an enormous\ncrowd; in the midst of it was an enormous elephant, heaving and\nshuddering as such shapeless creatures do. But the President had\ndisappeared.\n\n\u201cWhere has he gone to?\u201d asked Syme, slipping to the ground.\n\n\u201cGentleman rushed into the Exhibition, sir!\u201d said an official in a\ndazed manner. Then he added in an injured voice: \u201cFunny gentleman, sir.\nAsked me to hold his horse, and gave me this.\u201d\n\nHe held out with distaste a piece of folded paper, addressed: \u201cTo the\nSecretary of the Central Anarchist Council.\u201d\n\nThe Secretary, raging, rent it open, and found written inside it:\u2014\n\n\u201cWhen the herring runs a mile,\nLet the Secretary smile;\nWhen the herring tries to _fly_,\nLet the Secretary die.\n                    Rustic Proverb.\u201d\n\n\n\u201cWhy the eternal crikey,\u201d began the Secretary, \u201cdid you let the man in?\nDo people commonly come to your Exhibition riding on mad elephants?\nDo\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cLook!\u201d shouted Syme suddenly. \u201cLook over there!\u201d\n\n\u201cLook at what?\u201d asked the Secretary savagely.\n\n\u201cLook at the captive balloon!\u201d said Syme, and pointed in a frenzy.\n\n\u201cWhy the blazes should I look at a captive balloon?\u201d demanded the\nSecretary. \u201cWhat is there queer about a captive balloon?\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing,\u201d said Syme, \u201cexcept that it isn\u2019t captive!\u201d\n\nThey all turned their eyes to where the balloon swung and swelled above\nthe Exhibition on a string, like a child\u2019s balloon. A second afterwards\nthe string came in two just under the car, and the balloon, broken\nloose, floated away with the freedom of a soap bubble.\n\n\u201cTen thousand devils!\u201d shrieked the Secretary. \u201cHe\u2019s got into it!\u201d and\nhe shook his fists at the sky.\n\nThe balloon, borne by some chance wind, came right above them, and they\ncould see the great white head of the President peering over the side\nand looking benevolently down on them.\n\n\u201cGod bless my soul!\u201d said the Professor with the elderly manner that he\ncould never disconnect from his bleached beard and parchment face. \u201cGod\nbless my soul! I seemed to fancy that something fell on the top of my\nhat!\u201d\n\nHe put up a trembling hand and took from that shelf a piece of twisted\npaper, which he opened absently only to find it inscribed with a true\nlover\u2019s knot and, the words:\u2014\n\n\u201cYour beauty has not left me indifferent.\u2014From LITTLE SNOWDROP.\u201d\n\n\nThere was a short silence, and then Syme said, biting his beard\u2014\n\n\u201cI\u2019m not beaten yet. The blasted thing must come down somewhere. Let\u2019s\nfollow it!\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV.\nTHE SIX PHILOSOPHERS\n\n\nAcross green fields, and breaking through blooming hedges, toiled six\ndraggled detectives, about five miles out of London. The optimist of\nthe party had at first proposed that they should follow the balloon\nacross South England in hansom-cabs. But he was ultimately convinced of\nthe persistent refusal of the balloon to follow the roads, and the\nstill more persistent refusal of the cabmen to follow the balloon.\nConsequently the tireless though exasperated travellers broke through\nblack thickets and ploughed through ploughed fields till each was\nturned into a figure too outrageous to be mistaken for a tramp. Those\ngreen hills of Surrey saw the final collapse and tragedy of the\nadmirable light grey suit in which Syme had set out from Saffron Park.\nHis silk hat was broken over his nose by a swinging bough, his\ncoat-tails were torn to the shoulder by arresting thorns, the clay of\nEngland was splashed up to his collar; but he still carried his yellow\nbeard forward with a silent and furious determination, and his eyes\nwere still fixed on that floating ball of gas, which in the full flush\nof sunset seemed coloured like a sunset cloud.\n\n\u201cAfter all,\u201d he said, \u201cit is very beautiful!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is singularly and strangely beautiful!\u201d said the Professor. \u201cI wish\nthe beastly gas-bag would burst!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Dr. Bull, \u201cI hope it won\u2019t. It might hurt the old boy.\u201d\n\n\u201cHurt him!\u201d said the vindictive Professor, \u201churt him! Not as much as\nI\u2019d hurt him if I could get up with him. Little Snowdrop!\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t want him hurt, somehow,\u201d said Dr. Bull.\n\n\u201cWhat!\u201d cried the Secretary bitterly. \u201cDo you believe all that tale\nabout his being our man in the dark room? Sunday would say he was\nanybody.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know whether I believe it or not,\u201d said Dr. Bull. \u201cBut it\nisn\u2019t that that I mean. I can\u2019t wish old Sunday\u2019s balloon to burst\nbecause\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Syme impatiently, \u201cbecause?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, because he\u2019s so jolly like a balloon himself,\u201d said Dr. Bull\ndesperately. \u201cI don\u2019t understand a word of all that idea of his being\nthe same man who gave us all our blue cards. It seems to make\neverything nonsense. But I don\u2019t care who knows it, I always had a\nsympathy for old Sunday himself, wicked as he was. Just as if he was a\ngreat bouncing baby. How can I explain what my queer sympathy was? It\ndidn\u2019t prevent my fighting him like hell! Shall I make it clear if I\nsay that I liked him because he was so fat?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou will not,\u201d said the Secretary.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve got it now,\u201d cried Bull, \u201cit was because he was so fat and so\nlight. Just like a balloon. We always think of fat people as heavy, but\nhe could have danced against a sylph. I see now what I mean. Moderate\nstrength is shown in violence, supreme strength is shown in levity. It\nwas like the old speculations\u2014what would happen if an elephant could\nleap up in the sky like a grasshopper?\u201d\n\n\u201cOur elephant,\u201d said Syme, looking upwards, \u201chas leapt into the sky\nlike a grasshopper.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd somehow,\u201d concluded Bull, \u201cthat\u2019s why I can\u2019t help liking old\nSunday. No, it\u2019s not an admiration of force, or any silly thing like\nthat. There is a kind of gaiety in the thing, as if he were bursting\nwith some good news. Haven\u2019t you sometimes felt it on a spring day? You\nknow Nature plays tricks, but somehow that day proves they are\ngood-natured tricks. I never read the Bible myself, but that part they\nlaugh at is literal truth, \u2018Why leap ye, ye high hills?\u2019 The hills do\nleap\u2014at least, they try to.... Why do I like Sunday?... how can I tell\nyou?... because he\u2019s such a Bounder.\u201d\n\nThere was a long silence, and then the Secretary said in a curious,\nstrained voice\u2014\n\n\u201cYou do not know Sunday at all. Perhaps it is because you are better\nthan I, and do not know hell. I was a fierce fellow, and a trifle\nmorbid from the first. The man who sits in darkness, and who chose us\nall, chose me because I had all the crazy look of a conspirator\u2014because\nmy smile went crooked, and my eyes were gloomy, even when I smiled. But\nthere must have been something in me that answered to the nerves in all\nthese anarchic men. For when I first saw Sunday he expressed to me, not\nyour airy vitality, but something both gross and sad in the Nature of\nThings. I found him smoking in a twilight room, a room with brown blind\ndown, infinitely more depressing than the genial darkness in which our\nmaster lives. He sat there on a bench, a huge heap of a man, dark and\nout of shape. He listened to all my words without speaking or even\nstirring. I poured out my most passionate appeals, and asked my most\neloquent questions. Then, after a long silence, the Thing began to\nshake, and I thought it was shaken by some secret malady. It shook like\na loathsome and living jelly. It reminded me of everything I had ever\nread about the base bodies that are the origin of life\u2014the deep sea\nlumps and protoplasm. It seemed like the final form of matter, the most\nshapeless and the most shameful. I could only tell myself, from its\nshudderings, that it was something at least that such a monster could\nbe miserable. And then it broke upon me that the bestial mountain was\nshaking with a lonely laughter, and the laughter was at me. Do you ask\nme to forgive him that? It is no small thing to be laughed at by\nsomething at once lower and stronger than oneself.\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely you fellows are exaggerating wildly,\u201d cut in the clear voice of\nInspector Ratcliffe. \u201cPresident Sunday is a terrible fellow for one\u2019s\nintellect, but he is not such a Barnum\u2019s freak physically as you make\nout. He received me in an ordinary office, in a grey check coat, in\nbroad daylight. He talked to me in an ordinary way. But I\u2019ll tell you\nwhat is a trifle creepy about Sunday. His room is neat, his clothes are\nneat, everything seems in order; but he\u2019s absent-minded. Sometimes his\ngreat bright eyes go quite blind. For hours he forgets that you are\nthere. Now absent-mindedness is just a bit too awful in a bad man. We\nthink of a wicked man as vigilant. We can\u2019t think of a wicked man who\nis honestly and sincerely dreamy, because we daren\u2019t think of a wicked\nman alone with himself. An absentminded man means a good-natured man.\nIt means a man who, if he happens to see you, will apologise. But how\nwill you bear an absentminded man who, if he happens to see you, will\nkill you? That is what tries the nerves, abstraction combined with\ncruelty. Men have felt it sometimes when they went through wild\nforests, and felt that the animals there were at once innocent and\npitiless. They might ignore or slay. How would you like to pass ten\nmortal hours in a parlour with an absent-minded tiger?\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what do you think of Sunday, Gogol?\u201d asked Syme.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t think of Sunday on principle,\u201d said Gogol simply, \u201cany more\nthan I stare at the sun at noonday.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, that is a point of view,\u201d said Syme thoughtfully. \u201cWhat do you\nsay, Professor?\u201d\n\nThe Professor was walking with bent head and trailing stick, and he did\nnot answer at all.\n\n\u201cWake up, Professor!\u201d said Syme genially. \u201cTell us what you think of\nSunday.\u201d\n\nThe Professor spoke at last very slowly.\n\n\u201cI think something,\u201d he said, \u201cthat I cannot say clearly. Or, rather, I\nthink something that I cannot even think clearly. But it is something\nlike this. My early life, as you know, was a bit too large and loose.\n\n\u201cWell, when I saw Sunday\u2019s face I thought it was too large\u2014everybody\ndoes, but I also thought it was too loose. The face was so big, that\none couldn\u2019t focus it or make it a face at all. The eye was so far away\nfrom the nose, that it wasn\u2019t an eye. The mouth was so much by itself,\nthat one had to think of it by itself. The whole thing is too hard to\nexplain.\u201d\n\nHe paused for a little, still trailing his stick, and then went on\u2014\n\n\u201cBut put it this way. Walking up a road at night, I have seen a lamp\nand a lighted window and a cloud make together a most complete and\nunmistakable face. If anyone in heaven has that face I shall know him\nagain. Yet when I walked a little farther I found that there was no\nface, that the window was ten yards away, the lamp ten hundred yards,\nthe cloud beyond the world. Well, Sunday\u2019s face escaped me; it ran away\nto right and left, as such chance pictures run away. And so his face\nhas made me, somehow, doubt whether there are any faces. I don\u2019t know\nwhether your face, Bull, is a face or a combination in perspective.\nPerhaps one black disc of your beastly glasses is quite close and\nanother fifty miles away. Oh, the doubts of a materialist are not worth\na dump. Sunday has taught me the last and the worst doubts, the doubts\nof a spiritualist. I am a Buddhist, I suppose; and Buddhism is not a\ncreed, it is a doubt. My poor dear Bull, I do not believe that you\nreally have a face. I have not faith enough to believe in matter.\u201d\n\nSyme\u2019s eyes were still fixed upon the errant orb, which, reddened in\nthe evening light, looked like some rosier and more innocent world.\n\n\u201cHave you noticed an odd thing,\u201d he said, \u201cabout all your descriptions?\nEach man of you finds Sunday quite different, yet each man of you can\nonly find one thing to compare him to\u2014the universe itself. Bull finds\nhim like the earth in spring, Gogol like the sun at noonday. The\nSecretary is reminded of the shapeless protoplasm, and the Inspector of\nthe carelessness of virgin forests. The Professor says he is like a\nchanging landscape. This is queer, but it is queerer still that I also\nhave had my odd notion about the President, and I also find that I\nthink of Sunday as I think of the whole world.\u201d\n\n\u201cGet on a little faster, Syme,\u201d said Bull; \u201cnever mind the balloon.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen I first saw Sunday,\u201d said Syme slowly, \u201cI only saw his back; and\nwhen I saw his back, I knew he was the worst man in the world. His neck\nand shoulders were brutal, like those of some apish god. His head had a\nstoop that was hardly human, like the stoop of an ox. In fact, I had at\nonce the revolting fancy that this was not a man at all, but a beast\ndressed up in men\u2019s clothes.\u201d\n\n\u201cGet on,\u201d said Dr. Bull.\n\n\u201cAnd then the queer thing happened. I had seen his back from the\nstreet, as he sat in the balcony. Then I entered the hotel, and coming\nround the other side of him, saw his face in the sunlight. His face\nfrightened me, as it did everyone; but not because it was brutal, not\nbecause it was evil. On the contrary, it frightened me because it was\nso beautiful, because it was so good.\u201d\n\n\u201cSyme,\u201d exclaimed the Secretary, \u201care you ill?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was like the face of some ancient archangel, judging justly after\nheroic wars. There was laughter in the eyes, and in the mouth honour\nand sorrow. There was the same white hair, the same great, grey-clad\nshoulders that I had seen from behind. But when I saw him from behind I\nwas certain he was an animal, and when I saw him in front I knew he was\na god.\u201d\n\n\u201cPan,\u201d said the Professor dreamily, \u201cwas a god and an animal.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen, and again and always,\u201d went on Syme like a man talking to\nhimself, \u201cthat has been for me the mystery of Sunday, and it is also\nthe mystery of the world. When I see the horrible back, I am sure the\nnoble face is but a mask. When I see the face but for an instant, I\nknow the back is only a jest. Bad is so bad, that we cannot but think\ngood an accident; good is so good, that we feel certain that evil could\nbe explained. But the whole came to a kind of crest yesterday when I\nraced Sunday for the cab, and was just behind him all the way.\u201d\n\n\u201cHad you time for thinking then?\u201d asked Ratcliffe.\n\n\u201cTime,\u201d replied Syme, \u201cfor one outrageous thought. I was suddenly\npossessed with the idea that the blind, blank back of his head really\nwas his face\u2014an awful, eyeless face staring at me! And I fancied that\nthe figure running in front of me was really a figure running\nbackwards, and dancing as he ran.\u201d\n\n\u201cHorrible!\u201d said Dr. Bull, and shuddered.\n\n\u201cHorrible is not the word,\u201d said Syme. \u201cIt was exactly the worst\ninstant of my life. And yet ten minutes afterwards, when he put his\nhead out of the cab and made a grimace like a gargoyle, I knew that he\nwas only like a father playing hide-and-seek with his children.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is a long game,\u201d said the Secretary, and frowned at his broken\nboots.\n\n\u201cListen to me,\u201d cried Syme with extraordinary emphasis. \u201cShall I tell\nyou the secret of the whole world? It is that we have only known the\nback of the world. We see everything from behind, and it looks brutal.\nThat is not a tree, but the back of a tree. That is not a cloud, but\nthe back of a cloud. Cannot you see that everything is stooping and\nhiding a face? If we could only get round in front\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cLook!\u201d cried out Bull clamorously, \u201cthe balloon is coming down!\u201d\n\nThere was no need to cry out to Syme, who had never taken his eyes off\nit. He saw the great luminous globe suddenly stagger in the sky, right\nitself, and then sink slowly behind the trees like a setting sun.\n\nThe man called Gogol, who had hardly spoken through all their weary\ntravels, suddenly threw up his hands like a lost spirit.\n\n\u201cHe is dead!\u201d he cried. \u201cAnd now I know he was my friend\u2014my friend in\nthe dark!\u201d\n\n\u201cDead!\u201d snorted the Secretary. \u201cYou will not find him dead easily. If\nhe has been tipped out of the car, we shall find him rolling as a colt\nrolls in a field, kicking his legs for fun.\u201d\n\n\u201cClashing his hoofs,\u201d said the Professor. \u201cThe colts do, and so did\nPan.\u201d\n\n\u201cPan again!\u201d said Dr. Bull irritably. \u201cYou seem to think Pan is\neverything.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo he is,\u201d said the Professor, \u201cin Greek. He means everything.\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t forget,\u201d said the Secretary, looking down, \u201cthat he also means\nPanic.\u201d\n\nSyme had stood without hearing any of the exclamations.\n\n\u201cIt fell over there,\u201d he said shortly. \u201cLet us follow it!\u201d\n\nThen he added with an indescribable gesture\u2014\n\n\u201cOh, if he has cheated us all by getting killed! It would be like one\nof his larks.\u201d\n\nHe strode off towards the distant trees with a new energy, his rags and\nribbons fluttering in the wind. The others followed him in a more\nfootsore and dubious manner. And almost at the same moment all six men\nrealised that they were not alone in the little field.\n\nAcross the square of turf a tall man was advancing towards them,\nleaning on a strange long staff like a sceptre. He was clad in a fine\nbut old-fashioned suit with knee-breeches; its colour was that shade\nbetween blue, violet and grey which can be seen in certain shadows of\nthe woodland. His hair was whitish grey, and at the first glance, taken\nalong with his knee-breeches, looked as if it was powdered. His advance\nwas very quiet; but for the silver frost upon his head, he might have\nbeen one to the shadows of the wood.\n\n\u201cGentlemen,\u201d he said, \u201cmy master has a carriage waiting for you in the\nroad just by.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho is your master?\u201d asked Syme, standing quite still.\n\n\u201cI was told you knew his name,\u201d said the man respectfully.\n\nThere was a silence, and then the Secretary said\u2014\n\n\u201cWhere is this carriage?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt has been waiting only a few moments,\u201d said the stranger. \u201cMy master\nhas only just come home.\u201d\n\nSyme looked left and right upon the patch of green field in which he\nfound himself. The hedges were ordinary hedges, the trees seemed\nordinary trees; yet he felt like a man entrapped in fairyland.\n\nHe looked the mysterious ambassador up and down, but he could discover\nnothing except that the man\u2019s coat was the exact colour of the purple\nshadows, and that the man\u2019s face was the exact colour of the red and\nbrown and golden sky.\n\n\u201cShow us the place,\u201d Syme said briefly, and without a word the man in\nthe violet coat turned his back and walked towards a gap in the hedge,\nwhich let in suddenly the light of a white road.\n\nAs the six wanderers broke out upon this thoroughfare, they saw the\nwhite road blocked by what looked like a long row of carriages, such a\nrow of carriages as might close the approach to some house in Park\nLane. Along the side of these carriages stood a rank of splendid\nservants, all dressed in the grey-blue uniform, and all having a\ncertain quality of stateliness and freedom which would not commonly\nbelong to the servants of a gentleman, but rather to the officials and\nambassadors of a great king. There were no less than six carriages\nwaiting, one for each of the tattered and miserable band. All the\nattendants (as if in court-dress) wore swords, and as each man crawled\ninto his carriage they drew them, and saluted with a sudden blaze of\nsteel.\n\n\u201cWhat can it all mean?\u201d asked Bull of Syme as they separated. \u201cIs this\nanother joke of Sunday\u2019s?\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d said Syme as he sank wearily back in the cushions of\nhis carriage; \u201cbut if it is, it\u2019s one of the jokes you talk about. It\u2019s\na good-natured one.\u201d\n\nThe six adventurers had passed through many adventures, but not one had\ncarried them so utterly off their feet as this last adventure of\ncomfort. They had all become inured to things going roughly; but things\nsuddenly going smoothly swamped them. They could not even feebly\nimagine what the carriages were; it was enough for them to know that\nthey were carriages, and carriages with cushions. They could not\nconceive who the old man was who had led them; but it was quite enough\nthat he had certainly led them to the carriages.\n\nSyme drove through a drifting darkness of trees in utter abandonment.\nIt was typical of him that while he had carried his bearded chin\nforward fiercely so long as anything could be done, when the whole\nbusiness was taken out of his hands he fell back on the cushions in a\nfrank collapse.\n\nVery gradually and very vaguely he realised into what rich roads the\ncarriage was carrying him. He saw that they passed the stone gates of\nwhat might have been a park, that they began gradually to climb a hill\nwhich, while wooded on both sides, was somewhat more orderly than a\nforest. Then there began to grow upon him, as upon a man slowly waking\nfrom a healthy sleep, a pleasure in everything. He felt that the hedges\nwere what hedges should be, living walls; that a hedge is like a human\narmy, disciplined, but all the more alive. He saw high elms behind the\nhedges, and vaguely thought how happy boys would be climbing there.\nThen his carriage took a turn of the path, and he saw suddenly and\nquietly, like a long, low, sunset cloud, a long, low house, mellow in\nthe mild light of sunset. All the six friends compared notes afterwards\nand quarrelled; but they all agreed that in some unaccountable way the\nplace reminded them of their boyhood. It was either this elm-top or\nthat crooked path, it was either this scrap of orchard or that shape of\na window; but each man of them declared that he could remember this\nplace before he could remember his mother.\n\nWhen the carriages eventually rolled up to a large, low, cavernous\ngateway, another man in the same uniform, but wearing a silver star on\nthe grey breast of his coat, came out to meet them. This impressive\nperson said to the bewildered Syme\u2014\n\n\u201cRefreshments are provided for you in your room.\u201d\n\nSyme, under the influence of the same mesmeric sleep of amazement, went\nup the large oaken stairs after the respectful attendant. He entered a\nsplendid suite of apartments that seemed to be designed specially for\nhim. He walked up to a long mirror with the ordinary instinct of his\nclass, to pull his tie straight or to smooth his hair; and there he saw\nthe frightful figure that he was\u2014blood running down his face from where\nthe bough had struck him, his hair standing out like yellow rags of\nrank grass, his clothes torn into long, wavering tatters. At once the\nwhole enigma sprang up, simply as the question of how he had got there,\nand how he was to get out again. Exactly at the same moment a man in\nblue, who had been appointed as his valet, said very solemnly\u2014\n\n\u201cI have put out your clothes, sir.\u201d\n\n\u201cClothes!\u201d said Syme sardonically. \u201cI have no clothes except these,\u201d\nand he lifted two long strips of his frock-coat in fascinating\nfestoons, and made a movement as if to twirl like a ballet girl.\n\n\u201cMy master asks me to say,\u201d said the attendant, \u201cthat there is a fancy\ndress ball tonight, and that he desires you to put on the costume that\nI have laid out. Meanwhile, sir, there is a bottle of Burgundy and some\ncold pheasant, which he hopes you will not refuse, as it is some hours\nbefore supper.\u201d\n\n\u201cCold pheasant is a good thing,\u201d said Syme reflectively, \u201cand Burgundy\nis a spanking good thing. But really I do not want either of them so\nmuch as I want to know what the devil all this means, and what sort of\ncostume you have got laid out for me. Where is it?\u201d\n\nThe servant lifted off a kind of ottoman a long peacock-blue drapery,\nrather of the nature of a domino, on the front of which was emblazoned\na large golden sun, and which was splashed here and there with flaming\nstars and crescents.\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re to be dressed as Thursday, sir,\u201d said the valet somewhat\naffably.\n\n\u201cDressed as Thursday!\u201d said Syme in meditation. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t sound a\nwarm costume.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, yes, sir,\u201d said the other eagerly, \u201cthe Thursday costume is quite\nwarm, sir. It fastens up to the chin.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, I don\u2019t understand anything,\u201d said Syme, sighing. \u201cI have been\nused so long to uncomfortable adventures that comfortable adventures\nknock me out. Still, I may be allowed to ask why I should be\nparticularly like Thursday in a green frock spotted all over with the\nsun and moon. Those orbs, I think, shine on other days. I once saw the\nmoon on Tuesday, I remember.\u201d\n\n\u201cBeg pardon, sir,\u201d said the valet, \u201cBible also provided for you,\u201d and\nwith a respectful and rigid finger he pointed out a passage in the\nfirst chapter of Genesis. Syme read it wondering. It was that in which\nthe fourth day of the week is associated with the creation of the sun\nand moon. Here, however, they reckoned from a Christian Sunday.\n\n\u201cThis is getting wilder and wilder,\u201d said Syme, as he sat down in a\nchair. \u201cWho are these people who provide cold pheasant and Burgundy,\nand green clothes and Bibles? Do they provide everything?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, sir, everything,\u201d said the attendant gravely. \u201cShall I help you\non with your costume?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, hitch the bally thing on!\u201d said Syme impatiently.\n\nBut though he affected to despise the mummery, he felt a curious\nfreedom and naturalness in his movements as the blue and gold garment\nfell about him; and when he found that he had to wear a sword, it\nstirred a boyish dream. As he passed out of the room he flung the folds\nacross his shoulder with a gesture, his sword stood out at an angle,\nand he had all the swagger of a troubadour. For these disguises did not\ndisguise, but reveal.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV.\nTHE ACCUSER\n\n\nAs Syme strode along the corridor he saw the Secretary standing at the\ntop of a great flight of stairs. The man had never looked so noble. He\nwas draped in a long robe of starless black, down the centre of which\nfell a band or broad stripe of pure white, like a single shaft of\nlight. The whole looked like some very severe ecclesiastical vestment.\nThere was no need for Syme to search his memory or the Bible in order\nto remember that the first day of creation marked the mere creation of\nlight out of darkness. The vestment itself would alone have suggested\nthe symbol; and Syme felt also how perfectly this pattern of pure white\nand black expressed the soul of the pale and austere Secretary, with\nhis inhuman veracity and his cold frenzy, which made him so easily make\nwar on the anarchists, and yet so easily pass for one of them. Syme was\nscarcely surprised to notice that, amid all the ease and hospitality of\ntheir new surroundings, this man\u2019s eyes were still stern. No smell of\nale or orchards could make the Secretary cease to ask a reasonable\nquestion.\n\nIf Syme had been able to see himself, he would have realised that he,\ntoo, seemed to be for the first time himself and no one else. For if\nthe Secretary stood for that philosopher who loves the original and\nformless light, Syme was a type of the poet who seeks always to make\nthe light in special shapes, to split it up into sun and star. The\nphilosopher may sometimes love the infinite; the poet always loves the\nfinite. For him the great moment is not the creation of light, but the\ncreation of the sun and moon.\n\nAs they descended the broad stairs together they overtook Ratcliffe,\nwho was clad in spring green like a huntsman, and the pattern upon\nwhose garment was a green tangle of trees. For he stood for that third\nday on which the earth and green things were made, and his square,\nsensible face, with its not unfriendly cynicism, seemed appropriate\nenough to it.\n\nThey were led out of another broad and low gateway into a very large\nold English garden, full of torches and bonfires, by the broken light\nof which a vast carnival of people were dancing in motley dress. Syme\nseemed to see every shape in Nature imitated in some crazy costume.\nThere was a man dressed as a windmill with enormous sails, a man\ndressed as an elephant, a man dressed as a balloon; the two last,\ntogether, seemed to keep the thread of their farcical adventures. Syme\neven saw, with a queer thrill, one dancer dressed like an enormous\nhornbill, with a beak twice as big as himself\u2014the queer bird which had\nfixed itself on his fancy like a living question while he was rushing\ndown the long road at the Zoological Gardens. There were a thousand\nother such objects, however. There was a dancing lamp-post, a dancing\napple tree, a dancing ship. One would have thought that the untamable\ntune of some mad musician had set all the common objects of field and\nstreet dancing an eternal jig. And long afterwards, when Syme was\nmiddle-aged and at rest, he could never see one of those particular\nobjects\u2014a lamppost, or an apple tree, or a windmill\u2014without thinking\nthat it was a strayed reveller from that revel of masquerade.\n\nOn one side of this lawn, alive with dancers, was a sort of green bank,\nlike the terrace in such old-fashioned gardens.\n\nAlong this, in a kind of crescent, stood seven great chairs, the\nthrones of the seven days. Gogol and Dr. Bull were already in their\nseats; the Professor was just mounting to his. Gogol, or Tuesday, had\nhis simplicity well symbolised by a dress designed upon the division of\nthe waters, a dress that separated upon his forehead and fell to his\nfeet, grey and silver, like a sheet of rain. The Professor, whose day\nwas that on which the birds and fishes\u2014the ruder forms of life\u2014were\ncreated, had a dress of dim purple, over which sprawled goggle-eyed\nfishes and outrageous tropical birds, the union in him of unfathomable\nfancy and of doubt. Dr. Bull, the last day of Creation, wore a coat\ncovered with heraldic animals in red and gold, and on his crest a man\nrampant. He lay back in his chair with a broad smile, the picture of an\noptimist in his element.\n\nOne by one the wanderers ascended the bank and sat in their strange\nseats. As each of them sat down a roar of enthusiasm rose from the\ncarnival, such as that with which crowds receive kings. Cups were\nclashed and torches shaken, and feathered hats flung in the air. The\nmen for whom these thrones were reserved were men crowned with some\nextraordinary laurels. But the central chair was empty.\n\nSyme was on the left hand of it and the Secretary on the right. The\nSecretary looked across the empty throne at Syme, and said, compressing\nhis lips\u2014\n\n\u201cWe do not know yet that he is not dead in a field.\u201d\n\nAlmost as Syme heard the words, he saw on the sea of human faces in\nfront of him a frightful and beautiful alteration, as if heaven had\nopened behind his head. But Sunday had only passed silently along the\nfront like a shadow, and had sat in the central seat. He was draped\nplainly, in a pure and terrible white, and his hair was like a silver\nflame on his forehead.\n\nFor a long time\u2014it seemed for hours\u2014that huge masquerade of mankind\nswayed and stamped in front of them to marching and exultant music.\nEvery couple dancing seemed a separate romance; it might be a fairy\ndancing with a pillar-box, or a peasant girl dancing with the moon; but\nin each case it was, somehow, as absurd as Alice in Wonderland, yet as\ngrave and kind as a love story. At last, however, the thick crowd began\nto thin itself. Couples strolled away into the garden-walks, or began\nto drift towards that end of the building where stood smoking, in huge\npots like fish-kettles, some hot and scented mixtures of old ale or\nwine. Above all these, upon a sort of black framework on the roof of\nthe house, roared in its iron basket a gigantic bonfire, which lit up\nthe land for miles. It flung the homely effect of firelight over the\nface of vast forests of grey or brown, and it seemed to fill with\nwarmth even the emptiness of upper night. Yet this also, after a time,\nwas allowed to grow fainter; the dim groups gathered more and more\nround the great cauldrons, or passed, laughing and clattering, into the\ninner passages of that ancient house. Soon there were only some ten\nloiterers in the garden; soon only four. Finally the last stray\nmerry-maker ran into the house whooping to his companions. The fire\nfaded, and the slow, strong stars came out. And the seven strange men\nwere left alone, like seven stone statues on their chairs of stone. Not\none of them had spoken a word.\n\nThey seemed in no haste to do so, but heard in silence the hum of\ninsects and the distant song of one bird. Then Sunday spoke, but so\ndreamily that he might have been continuing a conversation rather than\nbeginning one.\n\n\u201cWe will eat and drink later,\u201d he said. \u201cLet us remain together a\nlittle, we who have loved each other so sadly, and have fought so long.\nI seem to remember only centuries of heroic war, in which you were\nalways heroes\u2014epic on epic, iliad on iliad, and you always brothers in\narms. Whether it was but recently (for time is nothing), or at the\nbeginning of the world, I sent you out to war. I sat in the darkness,\nwhere there is not any created thing, and to you I was only a voice\ncommanding valour and an unnatural virtue. You heard the voice in the\ndark, and you never heard it again. The sun in heaven denied it, the\nearth and sky denied it, all human wisdom denied it. And when I met you\nin the daylight I denied it myself.\u201d\n\nSyme stirred sharply in his seat, but otherwise there was silence, and\nthe incomprehensible went on.\n\n\u201cBut you were men. You did not forget your secret honour, though the\nwhole cosmos turned an engine of torture to tear it out of you. I knew\nhow near you were to hell. I know how you, Thursday, crossed swords\nwith King Satan, and how you, Wednesday, named me in the hour without\nhope.\u201d\n\nThere was complete silence in the starlit garden, and then the\nblack-browed Secretary, implacable, turned in his chair towards Sunday,\nand said in a harsh voice\u2014\n\n\u201cWho and what are you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am the Sabbath,\u201d said the other without moving. \u201cI am the peace of\nGod.\u201d\n\nThe Secretary started up, and stood crushing his costly robe in his\nhand.\n\n\u201cI know what you mean,\u201d he cried, \u201cand it is exactly that that I cannot\nforgive you. I know you are contentment, optimism, what do they call\nthe thing, an ultimate reconciliation. Well, I am not reconciled. If\nyou were the man in the dark room, why were you also Sunday, an offense\nto the sunlight? If you were from the first our father and our friend,\nwhy were you also our greatest enemy? We wept, we fled in terror; the\niron entered into our souls\u2014and you are the peace of God! Oh, I can\nforgive God His anger, though it destroyed nations; but I cannot\nforgive Him His peace.\u201d\n\nSunday answered not a word, but very slowly he turned his face of stone\nupon Syme as if asking a question.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Syme, \u201cI do not feel fierce like that. I am grateful to you,\nnot only for wine and hospitality here, but for many a fine scamper and\nfree fight. But I should like to know. My soul and heart are as happy\nand quiet here as this old garden, but my reason is still crying out. I\nshould like to know.\u201d\n\nSunday looked at Ratcliffe, whose clear voice said\u2014\n\n\u201cIt seems so _silly_ that you should have been on both sides and fought\nyourself.\u201d\n\nBull said\u2014\n\n\u201cI understand nothing, but I am happy. In fact, I am going to sleep.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am not happy,\u201d said the Professor with his head in his hands,\n\u201cbecause I do not understand. You let me stray a little too near to\nhell.\u201d\n\nAnd then Gogol said, with the absolute simplicity of a child\u2014\n\n\u201cI wish I knew why I was hurt so much.\u201d\n\nStill Sunday said nothing, but only sat with his mighty chin upon his\nhand, and gazed at the distance. Then at last he said\u2014\n\n\u201cI have heard your complaints in order. And here, I think, comes\nanother to complain, and we will hear him also.\u201d\n\nThe falling fire in the great cresset threw a last long gleam, like a\nbar of burning gold, across the dim grass. Against this fiery band was\noutlined in utter black the advancing legs of a black-clad figure. He\nseemed to have a fine close suit with knee-breeches such as that which\nwas worn by the servants of the house, only that it was not blue, but\nof this absolute sable. He had, like the servants, a kind of sword by\nhis side. It was only when he had come quite close to the crescent of\nthe seven and flung up his face to look at them, that Syme saw, with\nthunder-struck clearness, that the face was the broad, almost ape-like\nface of his old friend Gregory, with its rank red hair and its\ninsulting smile.\n\n\u201cGregory!\u201d gasped Syme, half-rising from his seat. \u201cWhy, this is the\nreal anarchist!\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Gregory, with a great and dangerous restraint, \u201cI am the\nreal anarchist.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Now there was a day,\u2019\u201d murmured Bull, who seemed really to have\nfallen asleep, \u201c\u2018when the sons of God came to present themselves before\nthe Lord, and Satan came also among them.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are right,\u201d said Gregory, and gazed all round. \u201cI am a destroyer.\nI would destroy the world if I could.\u201d\n\nA sense of a pathos far under the earth stirred up in Syme, and he\nspoke brokenly and without sequence.\n\n\u201cOh, most unhappy man,\u201d he cried, \u201ctry to be happy! You have red hair\nlike your sister.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy red hair, like red flames, shall burn up the world,\u201d said Gregory.\n\u201cI thought I hated everything more than common men can hate anything;\nbut I find that I do not hate everything so much as I hate you!\u201d\n\n\u201cI never hated you,\u201d said Syme very sadly.\n\nThen out of this unintelligible creature the last thunders broke.\n\n\u201cYou!\u201d he cried. \u201cYou never hated because you never lived. I know what\nyou are all of you, from first to last\u2014you are the people in power! You\nare the police\u2014the great fat, smiling men in blue and buttons! You are\nthe Law, and you have never been broken. But is there a free soul alive\nthat does not long to break you, only because you have never been\nbroken? We in revolt talk all kind of nonsense doubtless about this\ncrime or that crime of the Government. It is all folly! The only crime\nof the Government is that it governs. The unpardonable sin of the\nsupreme power is that it is supreme. I do not curse you for being\ncruel. I do not curse you (though I might) for being kind. I curse you\nfor being safe! You sit in your chairs of stone, and have never come\ndown from them. You are the seven angels of heaven, and you have had no\ntroubles. Oh, I could forgive you everything, you that rule all\nmankind, if I could feel for once that you had suffered for one hour a\nreal agony such as I\u2014\u201d\n\nSyme sprang to his feet, shaking from head to foot.\n\n\u201cI see everything,\u201d he cried, \u201ceverything that there is. Why does each\nthing on the earth war against each other thing? Why does each small\nthing in the world have to fight against the world itself? Why does a\nfly have to fight the whole universe? Why does a dandelion have to\nfight the whole universe? For the same reason that I had to be alone in\nthe dreadful Council of the Days. So that each thing that obeys law may\nhave the glory and isolation of the anarchist. So that each man\nfighting for order may be as brave and good a man as the dynamiter. So\nthat the real lie of Satan may be flung back in the face of this\nblasphemer, so that by tears and torture we may earn the right to say\nto this man, \u2018You lie!\u2019 No agonies can be too great to buy the right to\nsay to this accuser, \u2018We also have suffered.\u2019\n\n\u201cIt is not true that we have never been broken. We have been broken\nupon the wheel. It is not true that we have never descended from these\nthrones. We have descended into hell. We were complaining of\nunforgettable miseries even at the very moment when this man entered\ninsolently to accuse us of happiness. I repel the slander; we have not\nbeen happy. I can answer for every one of the great guards of Law whom\nhe has accused. At least\u2014\u201d\n\nHe had turned his eyes so as to see suddenly the great face of Sunday,\nwhich wore a strange smile.\n\n\u201cHave you,\u201d he cried in a dreadful voice, \u201chave you ever suffered?\u201d\n\nAs he gazed, the great face grew to an awful size, grew larger than the\ncolossal mask of Memnon, which had made him scream as a child. It grew\nlarger and larger, filling the whole sky; then everything went black.\nOnly in the blackness before it entirely destroyed his brain he seemed\nto hear a distant voice saying a commonplace text that he had heard\nsomewhere, \u201cCan ye drink of the cup that I drink of?\u201d\n\n\nWhen men in books awake from a vision, they commonly find themselves in\nsome place in which they might have fallen asleep; they yawn in a\nchair, or lift themselves with bruised limbs from a field. Syme\u2019s\nexperience was something much more psychologically strange if there was\nindeed anything unreal, in the earthly sense, about the things he had\ngone through. For while he could always remember afterwards that he had\nswooned before the face of Sunday, he could not remember having ever\ncome to at all. He could only remember that gradually and naturally he\nknew that he was and had been walking along a country lane with an easy\nand conversational companion. That companion had been a part of his\nrecent drama; it was the red-haired poet Gregory. They were walking\nlike old friends, and were in the middle of a conversation about some\ntriviality. But Syme could only feel an unnatural buoyancy in his body\nand a crystal simplicity in his mind that seemed to be superior to\neverything that he said or did. He felt he was in possession of some\nimpossible good news, which made every other thing a triviality, but an\nadorable triviality.\n\nDawn was breaking over everything in colours at once clear and timid;\nas if Nature made a first attempt at yellow and a first attempt at\nrose. A breeze blew so clean and sweet, that one could not think that\nit blew from the sky; it blew rather through some hole in the sky. Syme\nfelt a simple surprise when he saw rising all round him on both sides\nof the road the red, irregular buildings of Saffron Park. He had no\nidea that he had walked so near London. He walked by instinct along one\nwhite road, on which early birds hopped and sang, and found himself\noutside a fenced garden. There he saw the sister of Gregory, the girl\nwith the gold-red hair, cutting lilac before breakfast, with the great\nunconscious gravity of a girl.","title":"The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":58186}