CHAPTER XXII. THE STRUGGLE IN THE COUNCIL HOUSE
As Asano and Graham hurried along to the ruins about the Council House,they saw everywhere the excitement of the people rising. "To your WardsTo your Wards!" Everywhere men and women in blue were hurrying fromunknown subterranean employments, up the staircases of the middlepath--at one place Graham saw an arsenal of the revolutionary committeebesieged by a crowd of shouting men, at another a couple of men in thehated yellow uniform of the Labour Police, pursued by a gatheringcrowd, fled precipitately along the swift way that went in the oppositedirection.
The cries of "To your Wards!" became at last a continuous shoutingas they drew near the Government quarter. Many of the shouts wereunintelligible. "Ostrog has betrayed us," one man bawled in a hoarsevoice, again and again, dinning that refrain into Graham's ear untilit haunted him. This person stayed close beside Graham and Asano on theswift way, shouting to the people who swarmed on the lower platforms ashe rushed past them. His cry about Ostrog alternated with someincomprehensible orders Presently he went leaping down and disappeared.
Graham's mind was filled with the din. His plans were vague andunformed. He had one picture of some commanding position from which hecould address the multitudes, another of meeting Ostrog face to face. Hewas full of rage, of tense muscular excitement, his hands gripped, hislips were pressed together.
The way to the Council House across the ruins was impassable, but Asanomet that difficulty and took Graham into the premises of the centralpost-office. The post-office was nominally at work, but the blue-clothedporters moved sluggishly or had stopped to stare through the arches oftheir galleries at the shouting men who were going by outside. "Everyman to his Ward! Every man to his Ward!" Here, by Asano's advice, Grahamrevealed his identity.
They crossed to the Council House by a cable cradle. Already in thebrief interval since the capitulation of the Councillors a great changehad been wrought in the appearance of the ruins. The spurting cascadesof the ruptured sea water-mains had been captured and tamed, and hugetemporary pipes ran overhead along a flimsy looking fabric of girders.The sky was laced with restored cables and wires that served the CouncilHouse, and a mass of new fabric with cranes and other building machinesgoing to and fro upon it, projected to the left of the white pile.
The moving ways that ran across this area had been restored, albeit foronce running under the open sky. These were the ways that Graham hadseen from the little balcony in the hour of his awakening, not nine dayssince, and the hall of his Trance had been on the further side, wherenow shapeless piles of smashed and shattered masonry were heapedtogether.
It was already high day and the sun was shining brightly. Out of theirtall caverns of blue electric light came the swift ways crowded withmultitudes of people, who poured off them and gathered ever denserover the wreckage and confusion of the ruins. The air was full oftheir shouting, and they were pressing and swaying towards the centralbuilding. For the most part that shouting mass consisted of shapelessswarms, but here and there Graham could see that a rude disciplinestruggled to establish itself. And every voice clamoured for order inthe chaos. "To your Wards! Every man to his Ward!"
The cable carried them into a hall which Graham recognised as theante-chamber to the Hall of the Atlas, about the gallery of which he hadwalked days ago with Howard to show himself to the vanished Council, anhour from his awakening. Now the place was empty except for two cableattendants. These men seemed hugely astonished to recognise the Sleeperin the man who swung down from the cross seat.
"Where is Helen Wotton?" he demanded. "Where is Helen Wotton?"
They did not know.
"Then where is Ostrog? I must see Ostrog forthwith. He has disobeyed me.I have come back to take things out of his hands." Without waiting forAsano, he went straight across the place, ascended the steps at thefurther end, and, pulling the curtain aside, found himself facing theperpetually labouring Titan.
The hall was empty. Its appearance had changed very greatly sincehis first sight of it. It had suffered serious injury in the violentstruggle of the first outbreak. On the right hand side of the greatfigure the upper half of the wall had been torn away for nearly twohundred feet of its length, and a sheet of the same glassy film thathad enclosed Graham at his awakening had been drawn across the gap. Thisdeadened, but did not altogether exclude the roar of the people outside."Wards! Wards! Wards!" they seemed to be saying. Through it there werevisible the beams and supports of metal scaffoldings that rose andfell according to the requirements of a great crowd of workmen. An idlebuilding machine, with lank arms of red painted metal that caughtthe still plastic blocks of mineral paste and swung them neatly intoposition, stretched gauntly across this green tinted picture. On it werestill a number of workmen staring at the crowd below. For a moment hestood regarding these things, and Asano overtook him.
"Ostrog," said Asano, "will be in the small offices beyond there." Thelittle man looked livid now and his eyes searched Graham's face.
They had scarcely advanced ten paces from the curtain before a littlepanel to the left of the Atlas rolled up, and Ostrog, accompanied byLincoln and followed by two black and yellow clad negroes, appearedcrossing the remote corner of the hall, towards a second panel that wasraised and open. "Ostrog," shouted Graham, and at the sound of his voicethe little party turned astonished.
Ostrog said something to Lincoln and advanced alone.
Graham was the first to speak. His voice was loud and dictatorial. "Whatis this I hear?" he asked. "Are you bringing negroes here--to keep thepeople down?"
"It is none too soon," said Ostrog. "They have been getting out of handmore and more, since the revolt. I under-estimated--"
"Do you mean that these infernal negroes are on the way?"
"On the way. As it is, you have seen the people--outside?"
"No wonder! But--after what was said. You have taken too much onyourself, Ostrog."
Ostrog said nothing, but drew nearer.
"These negroes must not come to London," said Graham. "I am Master andthey shall not come."
Ostrog glanced at Lincoln, who at once came towards them with his twoattendants close behind him. "Why not?" asked Ostrog.
"White men must be mastered by white men. Besides--"
"The negroes are only an instrument."
"But that is not the question. I am the Master. I mean to be the Master.And I tell you these negroes shall not come."
"The people--"
"I believe in the people."
"Because you are an anachronism. You are a man out of the Past--anaccident. You are Owner perhaps of half the property in the world. Butyou are not Master. You do not know enough to be Master."
He glanced at Lincoln again. "I know now what you think--I can guesssomething of what you mean to do. Even now it is not too late to warnyou. You dream of human equality--of a socialistic order--you have allthose worn-out dreams of the nineteenth century fresh and vivid in yourmind, and you would rule this age that you do not understand."
"Listen!" said Graham. "You can hear it--a sound like the sea. Notvoices--but a voice. Do you altogether understand?"
"We taught them that," said Ostrog.
"Perhaps. Can you teach them to forget it? But enough of this! Thesenegroes must not come."
There was a pause and Ostrog looked him in the eyes.
"They will," he said.
"I forbid it," said Graham.
"They have started."
"I will not have it."
"No," said Ostrog. "Sorry as I am to follow the method of the Council--.For your own good--you must not side with disorder. And now that you arehere--. It was kind of you to come here."
Lincoln laid his hand on Graham's shoulder. Abruptly Graham realizedthe enormity of his blunder in coming to the Council House. He turnedtowards the curtains that separated the hall from the antechamber.The clutching hand of Asano intervened. In another moment Lincoln hadgrasped Graham's cloak.
He turned and struck at Lincoln'
s face, and incontinently a negrohad him by collar and arm. He wrenched himself away, his sleeve torenoisily, and he stumbled back, to be tripped by the other attendant.Then he struck the ground heavily and he was staring at the distantceiling of the hall.
He shouted, rolled over, struggling fiercely, clutched an attendant'sleg and threw him headlong, and struggled to his feet.
Lincoln appeared before him, went down heavily again with a blow underthe point of the jaw and lay still. Graham made two strides, stumbled.And then Ostrog's arm was round his neck, he was pulled over backward,fell heavily, and his arms were pinned to the ground. After a fewviolent efforts he ceased to struggle and lay staring at Ostrog'sheaving throat.
"You--are--a prisoner," panted Ostrog, exulting. "You--were rather afool--to come back."
Graham turned his head about and perceived through the irregulargreen window in the walls of the hall the men who had been working thebuilding cranes gesticulating excitedly to the people below them. Theyhad seen!
Ostrog followed his eyes and started. He shouted something to Lincoln,but Lincoln did not move. A bullet smashed among the mouldings abovethe Atlas The two sheets of transparent matter that had been stretchedacross this gap were rent, the edges of the torn aperture darkened,curved, ran rapidly towards the framework, and in a moment the Councilchamber stood open to the air. A chilly gust blew in by the gap,bringing with it a war of voices from the ruinous spaces without,an elvish babblement, "Save the Master!" "What are they doing to theMaster?" "The Master is betrayed!"
And then he realised that Ostrog's attention was distracted, thatOstrog's grip had relaxed, and, wrenching his arms free, he struggledto his knees. In another moment he had thrust Ostrog back, and he wason one foot, his hand gripping Ostrog's throat, and Ostrog's handsclutching the silk about his neck. But now men were coming towards themfrom the dais--men whose intentions he misunderstood. He had aglimpse of someone running in the distance towards the curtains of theantechamber, and then Ostrog had slipped from him and these newcomerswere upon him. To his infinite astonishment, they seized him. Theyobeyed the shouts of Ostrog.
He was lugged a dozen yards before he realised that they were notfriends--that they were dragging him towards the open panel. When he sawthis he pulled back, he tried to fling himself down, he shouted for helpwith all his strength. And this time there were answering cries.
The grip upon his neck relaxed, and behold! in the lower corner of therent upon the wall, first one and then a number of little black figuresappeared shouting and waving arms. They came leaping down from the gapinto the light gallery that had led to the Silent Rooms. They ran alongit, so near were they that Graham could see the weapons in their hands,Then Ostrog was shouting in his ear to the men who held him, and oncemore he was struggling with all his strength against their endeavours tothrust him towards the opening that yawned to receive him. "They can'tcome down," panted Ostrog. "They daren't fire. It's all right." "We'llsave him from them yet."
For long minutes as it seemed to Graham that inglorious strugglecontinued. His clothes were rent in a dozen places, he was covered indust, one hand had been trodden upon. He could hear the shouts of hissupporters, and once he heard shots. He could feel his strength givingway, feel his efforts wild and aimless. But no help came, and surely,irresistibly, that black, yawning opening came nearer.
The pressure upon him relaxed and he struggled up. He saw Ostrog's greyhead receding and perceived that he was no longer held. He turned aboutand came full into a man in black. One of the green weapons crackedclose to him, a drift of pungent smoke came into his face, and a steelblade flashed. The huge chamber span about him.
He saw a man in pale blue stabbing one of the black and yellowattendants not three yards from his face. Then hands were upon himagain.
He was being pulled in two, directions now. It seemed as though peoplewere shouting to him. He wanted to understand and could not. Someonewas clutching about his thighs, he was being hoisted in spite of hisvigorous efforts. He understood suddenly, he ceased to struggle. He waslifted up on men's shoulders and carried away from that devouring panel.Ten thousand throats were cheering.
He saw men in blue and black hurrying after the retreating Ostrogitesand firing. Lifted up, he saw now across the whole expanse of the hallbeneath the Atlas image, saw that he was being carried towards theraised platform in the centre of the place. The far end of the hall wasalready full of people running towards him. They were looking at him andcheering.
He became aware that a sort of body-guard surrounded him. Activemen about him shouted vague orders. He saw close at hand the blackmoustached man in yellow who had been among those who had greeted himin the public theatre, shouting directions. The hall was already denselypacked with swaying people, the little metal gallery sagged with ashouting load, the curtains at the end had been torn away, and theante-chamber was revealed densely crowded. He could scarcely make theman near him hear for the tumult about them. "Where has Ostrog gone?" heasked.
The man he questioned pointed over the heads towards the lower panelsabout the hall on the side opposite the gap. They stood open andarmed men, blue clad with black sashes, were running through them andvanishing into the chambers and passages beyond. It seemed to Grahamthat a sound of firing drifted through the riot. He was carried in astaggering curve across the great hall towards an opening beneath thegap.
He perceived men working with a sort of rude discipline to keep thecrowd off him, to make a space clear about him. He passed out of thehall, and saw a crude, new wall rising blankly before him topped by bluesky. He was swung down to his feet; someone gripped his arm and guidedhim. He found the man in yellow close at hand. They were taking him upa narrow stairway of brick, and close at hand rose the great red paintedmasses, the cranes and levers and the still engines of the big buildingmachine.
He was at the top of the steps. He was hurried across a narrow railedfootway, and suddenly with a vast shouting the amphitheatre of ruinsopened again before him. "The Master is with us! The Master! TheMaster!" The shout swept athwart the lake of faces like a wave, brokeagainst the distant cliff of ruins, and came back in a welter of cries."The Master is on our side!"
Graham perceived that he was no longer encompassed by people, that hewas standing upon a little temporary platform of white metal, part ofa flimsy seeming scaffolding that laced about the great mass of theCouncil House. Over all the huge expanse of the ruins, swayed andeddied the shouting people; and here and there the black banners ofthe revolutionary societies ducked and swayed and formed rare nuclei oforganisation in the chaos. Up the steep stairs of wall and scaffoldingby which his rescuers had reached the opening in the Atlas Chamber,clung a solid crowd, and little energetic black figures clinging topillars and projections were strenuous to induce these congested massesto stir. Behind him, at a higher point on the scaffolding, a number ofmen struggled upwards with the flapping folds of a huge black standard.Through the yawning gap in the walls below him he could look down uponthe packed attentive multitudes in the Hall of the Atlas. The distantflying stages to the south came out bright and vivid, brought neareras it seemed by an unusual translucency of the air. A solitary aeropilebeat up from the central stage as if to meet the coming aeroplanes.
"What had become of Ostrog?" asked Graham, and even as he spoke he sawthat all eyes were turned from him towards the crest of the CouncilHouse building. He looked also in this direction of universal attention.For a moment he saw nothing but the jagged corner of a wall, hard andclear against the sky. Then in the shadow he perceived the interior of aroom and recognised with a start the green and white decorations of hisformer prison. And coming quickly across this opened room and up to thevery verge of the cliff of the ruins came a little white clad figurefollowed by two other smaller seeming figures in black and yellow. Heheard the man beside him exclaim "Ostrog," and turned to ask a question.But he never did, because of the startled exclamation of another ofthose who were with him and a lank finger suddenly pointing. He looked,and behold
the aeropile that had been rising from the flying stage whenlast he had looked in that direction, was driving towards them. Theswift steady flight was still novel enough to hold his attention.
Nearer it came, growing rapidly larger and larger, until it had sweptover the further edge of the ruins and into view of the dense multitudesbelow. It drooped across the space and rose and passed overhead, risingto clear the mass of the Council House, a filmy translucent shape withthe solitary aeronaut peering down through its ribs. It vanished beyondthe skyline of the ruins.
Graham transferred his attention to Ostrog. He was signalling with hishands, and his attendants busy breaking down the wall beside him. Inanother moment the aeropile came into view again, a little thing faraway, coming round in a wide curve and going slower.
Then suddenly the man in yellow shouted: "What are they doing? What arethe people doing? Why is Ostrog left there? Why is he not captured? Theywill lift him--the aeropile will lift him! Ah!"
The exclamation was echoed by a shout from the ruins. The rattling soundof the green weapons drifted across the intervening gulf to Graham, and,looking down, he saw a number of black and yellow uniforms running alongone of the galleries that lay open to the air below the promontoryupon which Ostrog stood. They fired as they ran at men unseen, and thenemerged a number of pale blue figures in pursuit. These minute fightingfigures had the oddest effect; they seemed as they ran like little modelsoldiers in a toy. This queer appearance of a house cut open gave thatstruggle amidst furniture and passages a quality of unreality. It wasperhaps two hundred yards away from him, and very nearly fifty abovethe heads in the ruins below. The black and yellow men ran into anopen archway, and turned and fired a volley. One of the blue pursuersstriding forward close to the edge, flung up his arms, staggeredsideways, seemed to Graham's sense to hang over the edge for severalseconds, and fell headlong down. Graham saw him strike a projectingcorner, fly out, head over heels, head over heels, and vanish behind thered arm of the building machine.
And then a shadow came between Graham and the sun. He looked up and thesky was clear, but he knew the aeropile had passed. Ostrog had vanished.The man in yellow thrust before him, zealous and perspiring, pointingand blatent.
"They are grounding!" cried the man in yellow. "They are grounding. Tellthe people to fire at him. Tell them to fire at him!"
Graham could not understand. He heard loud voices repeating theseenigmatical orders.
Suddenly over the edge of the ruins he saw the prow of the aeropile comegliding and stop with a jerk. In a moment Graham understood that thething had grounded in order that Ostrog might escape by it. He saw ablue haze climbing out of the gulf, perceived that the people below himwere now firing up at the projecting stem.
A man beside him cheered hoarsely, and he saw that the blue rebelshad gained the archway that had been contested by the men in black andyellow a moment before, and were running in a continual stream along theopen passage.
And suddenly the aeropile slipped over the edge of the Council Houseand fell. It dropped, tilting at an angle of forty-five degrees, anddropping so steeply that it seemed to Graham, it seemed perhaps to mostof these below, that it could not possibly rise again.
It fell so closely past him that he could see Ostrog clutching theguides of the seat, with his grey hair streaming; see the white-facedaeronaut wrenching over the lever that drove the engine along itsguides. He heard the apprehensive vague cry of innumerable men below.
Graham clutched the railing before him and gasped. The second seemed anage. The lower fan of the aeropile passed within an ace of touching thepeople, who yelled and screamed and trampled one another below.
And then it rose.
For a moment it looked as if it could not possibly clear the oppositecliff, and then that it could not possibly clear the wind-wheel thatrotated beyond.
And behold! it was clear and soaring, still heeling sideways, upward,upward into the wind-swept sky.
The suspense of the moment gave place to a fury of exasperation as theswarming people realised that Ostrog had escaped them. With belatedactivity they renewed their fire, until the rattling wove into a roar,until the whole area became dim and blue and the air pungent with thethin smoke of their weapons.
Too late! The aeropile dwindled smaller and smaller, and curved aboutand swept gracefully downward to the flying stage from which it had solately risen. Ostrog had escaped.
For a while a confused babblement arose from the ruins, and thenthe universal attention came back to Graham, perched high among thescaffolding. He saw the faces of the people turned towards him, heardtheir shouts at his rescue. From the throat of the ways came the song ofthe revolt spreading like a breeze across that swaying sea of men.
The little group of men about him shouted congratulations on his escape.The man in yellow was close to him, with a set face and shining eyes.And the song was rising, louder and louder; tramp, tramp, tramp, tramp.
Slowly the realisation came of the full meaning of these things to him,the perception of the swift change in his position. Ostrog, who hadstood beside him whenever he had faced that shouting multitude before,was beyond there--the antagonist. There was no one to rule for him anylonger. Even the people about him, the leaders and organisers of themultitude, looked to see what he would do, looked to him to act, awaitedhis orders. He was King indeed. His puppet reign was at an end.
He was very intent to do the thing that was expected of him. His nervesand muscles were quivering, his mind was perhaps a little confused,but he felt neither fear nor anger. His hand that had been trodden uponthrobbed and was hot. He was a little nervous about his bearing. He knewhe was not afraid, but he was anxious not to seem afraid. In his formerlife he had often been more excited in playing games of skill. He wasdesirous of immediate action, he knew he must not think too much indetail of the huge complexity of the struggle about him lest he shouldbe paralysed by the sense of its intricacy. Over there those square blueshapes, the flying stages, meant Ostrog; against Ostrog he was fightingfor the world.