A People's Man Part 28

"I killed a man once, Mr. Beldeman," he said, "who threatened me."

"You will not kill me," Mr. Beldeman declared, with gentle confidence in his tone.

"If I had known," Maraton continued softly, "I'd have wrung your neck at Manchester."

"Quite easy, I should say," Mr. Beldeman agreed. "You look strong.

Without a doubt I could make you desperate. Better be reasonable. My people want the railway strike, the coal strike, and the iron strike--want them both within a month. Come, what are you afraid of?

Stick to your colours, Mr. Maraton. Wasn't it in the North. American Review you declared that a war and conquest were the inevitable prelude of social reform in this country?"

"Did I say that?" Maraton asked.

"You did. Now you are here, you are afraid. Never mind, war and conquest are to come. We give you a month in which to deliver your message. You have, I believe, two large meetings to address before that date. Make your p.r.o.nouncement and all will be well. The million is yours for the people."

"A sort of gigantic blackmail," Maraton remarked drily.

"You can call it what you like. If you have conditions to make, I am prepared to listen. I do not insult you by offering--"

Maraton flung open the door a little noisily.

"That will do, Mr. Beldeman," he said. "I congratulate you upon the manner in which you have conducted this interview. I presume I shall see you again one day before the month is up?"

"You certainly will," Mr. Beldeman replied. "If you should want me before--an advance payment or anything of that sort--I am at the Royal Hotel."

Maraton was alone in the room. For some moments he remained motionless.

He heard Aaron and Julia in the hall but he did not hasten to join them.

He moved instead to the window and stood watching Beldeman's retreating form.

CHAPTER XX

Maraton led the way on to the roof of one of London's newer hotels.

"They won't give us dinner here," he explained. "London isn't civilised enough for that yet, or perhaps it's a matter of climate. But we can get all sorts of things to eat, and some wine, and sit and watch the lights come out. I was here the other night alone and I thought it the most restful spot in London."

He called a waiter and had a table drawn up to the palisaded edge of the roof. Then he slipped something into the man's hand, and there seemed to be no difficulty about serving them with anything they required.

"A salad, some sandwiches, a bottle of hock and plenty of strawberries.

We shan't starve, at any rate," Maraton declared. "Lean back in your chairs, you children of the city, lean down and look at your mother.

Look at her smoke-hung arms, stretched out as though to gather in the universe; and the lights upon her bosom--see how they come twinkling into existence."

Both of them followed his outstretched finger with their eyes, but Julia only shivered.

"I hate it," she muttered, "hate it all! London seems to me like a great, rapacious monster. Our bodies and souls are sacrificed over there. For what? I was in Piccadilly and the parks to-day. Is there any justice in the world, I wonder? It's just as though there were a kink in the great wheels and they weren't running true."

"Sometimes I think," Maraton declared, "that the matter would right itself automatically but for the interference of weak people. The laws of life are tampered with so often by people without understanding.

They keep alive the unworthy. They try to make life easier for the unfit. They endow hospitals and build model dwellings. It's a sop to their consciences. It's like planting a flower on the grave of the man you have murdered."

"But these things help," Aaron protested.

"Help? They r.e.t.a.r.d," Maraton insisted. "All charity is the most vicious form of self-indulgence. Can't you see that if the poor died in the street and the sick were left to crawl about the face of the earth, the whole business would right itself automatically. The unfit would die out. A stronger generation would arise, a generation stronger and better able to look after itself. But come, we have been serious long enough. You are tired with your day's work, Miss Julia, and Aaron, too.

I've been in the committee room of the House of Commons half the day, and my head's addled with figures. Here comes our supper. Let us drop the more serious things of life. We'll try and put a little colour into your cheeks, young lady."

He served them both and filled their gla.s.ses with wine. Then, as he ate, he leaned back in his chair and watched them. For all her strange beauty, Julia, too, was one of the suffering children of the world. The lines of her figure, which should have been so subtle and fascinating, were sharpened by an unnatural thinness. Aaron's cheeks were almost like a consumptive's, his physique was puny. There was something in their expression common to both. Maraton was conscious of a wave of pity as he withdrew his eyes.

"Sometimes," he said, "I feel almost angry with you two. You carry on your shoulders the burden of other people's sufferings. It is well to feel and realise them, and the gift of sympathy is a beautiful thing, but our own individualism is also a sacred gift. It is not for us to weaken or destroy it by encouraging a superabundant sympathy for others.

We each have our place in the world, whether we owe it to fate or our own efforts, and it is our duty to make the best of it. Our own happiness, indeed, is a present charge upon ourselves for the ultimate benefit of others. A happy person in the world does good always. You two have a leaning towards morbidness. If I had time, I would undertake your education. As it is, we will have another bottle of wine, and I shall take you to a music hall."

It was an evening that lived in Julia's mind with particular vividness for years to come, and yet one which she always found it difficult to piece together in her thoughts. They went to one of the less fashionable music halls, where the turns were frequent and there was no ballet. Aaron was very soon able to re-establish his temporarily lost capacity for enjoyment. Maraton, leaning back in his place with a cigar in his mouth, appreciated everything and applauded constantly. It was Julia who found the new atmosphere most difficult. She laughed often, it is true, but she had always a semi-subjective feeling, as though it were some other person who was really there, and she the instrument chosen to give physical indication of that other person's presence.

Only once life seemed suddenly to thrill and burn in her veins, to shoot through her body with startling significance, and in that brief s.p.a.ce of time, life itself was transformed for her. Maraton by chance found her hand, as they sat side by side, and held it for a moment in his. There was nothing secret about his action. The firm pressure of his fingers, even, seemed as though they might have been the kindly, encouraging touch of a sympathetic friend. But upon Julia his touch was magical.

The rest of the evening faded into insignificance. She understood feelings which had come to her that afternoon in the park with absolute completeness for the first time. From that moment she took her place definitely amongst the women who walk through life but whose feet seldom touch the earth.

When the performance was over, Maraton called a taxicab.

"Aaron," he directed, "you must take your sister back to her lodgings.

No, I insist," he added, as she protested. "No 'buses to-night. Go home and sleep well and think about yourself."

She shook her head.

"I will go home in a taxi," she agreed, "if you will do one thing for me. It won't take long. It has been in my mind ever since you said what you did about charity. I want us all to go down to the Embankment.

It isn't late enough really, but I want you to come."

He sighed.

"You are incorrigible," he declared. "Never mind, we will go. How good the air is! We'll walk."

They turned along the Strand and descended the narrow street which led to the Embankment. Then they walked slowly as far as Blackfriars Bridge. They neither of them spoke a word. From time to time they glanced at the silent and motionless figures on the seats. For the most part, the loiterers there were either asleep or sitting with closed eyes. Here and there they caught a glance from some spectral face, a glance cold and listless. The fires of life were dead amongst these people. The animal desires alone remained; their faces were dumb.

They stood together at the corner of Blackfriars Bridge.

"Well," Maraton said, "I have done your bidding. I have been here before many times, and I have been here in the winter."

"Tell me," she asked, "there is a girl there on that third seat, crying.

Am I doing wrong if I go to her and give her money for a night's lodging?"

"Without a doubt," he answered. "And yet, I expect you'll do it.

Principles are splendid--in the abnegation. If we are to be illogical, let me be the breaker of my own laws."

He thrust some money into her hand and Julia disappeared. For some time she remained talking with the figure upon the seat. Aaron and Maraton leaned over the corner of the bridge and looked down the curving arc of lights towards the Houses of Parliament.

"I shall end there, you know, Aaron," Maraton sighed. "I am not looking forward to it. It's a queer sort of a hothouse for a man."

"I wonder," Aaron murmured thoughtfully. "I used to think of you travelling from one to the other of the great cities, and I used to think that when you had spoken to them, the people would see the truth and rise and take their own. I used to be very fond of the Old Testament once," he went on, his voice sinking a little lower. "Life was so simple in those days, and the words of a prophet seemed greater than any laws."

"And nowadays," Maraton continued, "life has become like a huge and complex piece of machinery. Humanity has given way to mechanics.

Aaron, I don't believe I can help this people by any other way save by laws."

They both turned quickly around. Julia was standing by their side, and with her the girl.