A People's Man Part 49

"But forgive me," Selingman remarked, "I am a stranger in this country.

I have been told that Maraton is a friend of the people."

The man nodded gloomily.

"There's plenty that calls him so in other parts of the country," he a.s.sented. "I belong to a Working Man's Club and what we can't see is what's the bally use of a job like this? He's bitten off more than he can chew--that's what Maraton's done. He's stopped the railways and the coal, and even you can tell what that means, I suppose, sir? Pretty well every factory in the country is shutting down or has shut down.

Well, supposing the Government make terms, which they say they can't.

The miners and railway men may get a bit more. What about all the rest of us? We're more likely to get a bit less. Then what if the Germans get over here? There's all sorts of rumours about this morning. They say that three-quarters of the fleet is hung up for want of coal. . . .

My! Look there, they've fired his house! I wouldn't be in his shoes for something! They say he's hiding up in Northumberland."

The man pa.s.sed on. Maraton was the first to speak.

"Come," he said quietly, "there is nothing here to be discouraged at.

We knew very well that for the first few months--years, perhaps--this thing had to be faced. We must get rooms somewhere. I have to meet the railway men to-night. Young Ernshaw rode up from Derby on a motor-cycle to make the appointment. As for you, Selingman," Maraton went on, as they turned back towards New Oxford Street, "why do you stay here? Your coming has been splendid. It has been a joy to have you near. But between ourselves," he added, lowering his voice, "you know what mobs are. Take my advice and get back home for a time. We shall meet again."

Selingman shook his head.

"I helped to light the torch," he declared. "I'll see it burn for a while. I was in Paris through the last riots--a dirty sight it was!

You'll pull through this. Maybe we're better apart for a time. But we'll see one another housed first," he added. "I want to know where you all are."

There was no difficulty about shelter of a sort. The private hotels, which were plentiful in the neighbourhood, were half empty, and supplied rooms readily enough, although they were curiously apathetic about the matter. At each one of them the charges for food were enormous.

Maraton divided a bundle of notes into half and made Aaron take one portion.

"Look after Julia," he directed, "and I think you'd better keep away from me. A good many of them knew that you were my secretary. Look after your sister. Keep quiet for a time. Wait."

He tore a sheet of paper from his pocket-book, wrote a few lines upon it and twisted it up.

"You will find an address in New York there," he said. "If anything happens to me, go over and present it in person."

Aaron took it almost mechanically. His eyes scarcely for a second had left his master's face.

"Let me stay here," he begged, "if it's only an attic. There may be work to be done. Let me stay, sir. My little bit of life is of no more account to me than a snap of the fingers. Don't send me away. Julia's a woman--they won't hurt her. She can go back to her old rooms. The streets are quite orderly. Let me stay, sir!"

"No one seemed to notice us come in," Julia pleaded. "Let me stay, too.

You heard what the porter said--we could choose what rooms we liked. It is safer in this part of London than in the East End, and you know," she added, looking at him steadily, "that if there is trouble to come, I have no fear."

Maraton hesitated. Perhaps they were as well where they were, under shelter. He nodded.

"Very well," he agreed. "There seems to be no one to show us about. We will go and select rooms."

In the hall they pa.s.sed a man in the livery of the hotel. Maraton enquired the way to the telephone, but he only shook his head.

"Telephone isn't working, sir," he announced, "not to private subscribers, at any rate. They haven't answered a call for two days."

"Are any meals being served in the restaurant?" Maraton asked.

The man shook his head.

"Not regular meals, sir," he replied. "What food we've got is all locked up. You can get something between eight and nine. We close the hotel doors then."

"They tell me I can select any room I like upstairs that isn't occupied," Maraton remarked.

The porter nodded.

"Nearly all the servants have gone," he explained, "so they can't try to run the hotel. Gone out to find food somewhere. They couldn't feed them here."

"Is there wine in the place?" Selingman asked.

"Plenty," the man answered.

"If needs be, then, we will carouse," Selingman declared. "First, a wash. Then I will forage. Leave it to me to forage, you others. I know the tricks. I shall not go away. I shall stay here with you."

They selected rooms--Maraton and Selingman adjoining ones on the first floor; the others higher up. Then Selingman departed on his expedition, and Maraton sat down before the window in the sitting-room. He drew aside the curtain and stared. They had been in the hotel rather less than half an hour, but the autumn twilight had deepened rapidly.

Darkness had fallen upon the city--a strange, unredeemed darkness. The street lamps were unlit. It was as though a black hand had been laid upon the place. Only here and there the sky was reddened as though with conflagration. Maraton's head sunk upon his arms. These, indeed, were the days when he would need all his courage. He threw open the window.

There was a curious silence without. The roar of traffic had ceased entirely. The only sound was the footfall of the people upon the pavement. He looked down into the street, crowded with little knots of men, one or two of them carrying torches. He watched them stream by.

It was the breaking up of the crowd which had gathered together to sack and burn his house.

The door was softly opened and closed again. He turned half around.

Through the shadows he saw Julia's pale face as she came swiftly towards him. With a sudden gesture she fell on her knees by his side. Her fingers clasped him, she clung to his arm.

"Ah, I knew that I should find you like this!" she cried. "Don't look down into the street, don't look at those unlit places! Look up to the skies. See, there is a star there already. Nothing up there--nothing which really matters--is altered. This is only the destruction that must come before the dawn. It was you yourself who prophesied it, you yourself who saw it so clearly. Oh, don't be sad because you have pulled down the pillars! It isn't so very long before the morning."

He pa.s.sed his arm around her and gripped her fingers tightly. So they were sitting when, by and by, Selingman burst into the room.

CHAPTER x.x.xV

Selingman was once more entirely his old self. He staggered into the room with a tin of biscuits under one arm, and three bottles of hock under the other, all of which he deposited noisily upon the round table in the middle of the room.

"I am the prince of caterers," he declared. "I surpa.s.s myself. Come out of the shadows, you dreamer. There is work to be done, food to be eaten, wine to be drunk."

From his left-hand pocket he produced three candles, which he placed at intervals along the mantelpiece and lit. Then for the first time he saw Julia.

"Ah," he cried, "our inspiration! Congratulate yourself, dear Miss Julia. After all, you are going to dine or sup, or whatever meal you may choose to call it. Behold!"

From his other pocket he produced two great jars of potted meat, a jar of jam, a handful of miscellaneous knives and forks, and a corkscrew.

"I have found an intelligent person here," he confided to them. "He has shown me the way to the wine cellar. Only the landlord and he are permitted to fetch wine. They fear a raid. Niersteiner, of a reasonable vintage."

"I will fetch Aaron," Julia said as she left the room.

"The girl worships you, and you're a beast to her," Selingman exclaimed, his eyes fixed upon the door through which she had vanished. "A man, indeed! A creature of wood and sawdust! Listen!"

His hand flashed out, his hand which grasped still the corkscrew.

"Listen, you man from the clouds," he continued. "I shall rob you of her. I adore her. To-day she may think me merely fat and eccentric.

Don't rely upon that. I have the gift when I choose. I can tell fairy tales, I can creep a little way into her mind and fill her brain with delicate fancies, build images there and destroy them, play softly upon the keynote of her emotions, until one day she will wake up and what will have happened? She will be mine!"