CHAPTER XXIII
GRAHAM SPEAKS HIS WORD
For a time the Master of the Earth was not even master of his own mind.Even his will seemed a will not his own, his own acts surprised him andwere but a part of the confusion of strange experiences that pouredacross his being. These things were definite, the negroes were coming,Helen Wotton had warned the people of their coming, and he was Master ofthe Earth. Each of these facts seemed struggling for complete possessionof his thoughts. They protruded from a background of swarming halls,elevated passages, rooms jammed with ward leaders in council,kinematograph and telephone rooms, and windows looking out on a seethingsea of marching men. The men in yellow, and men whom he fancied werecalled Ward Leaders, were either propelling him forward or following himobediently; it was hard to tell. Perhaps they were doing a little ofboth. Perhaps some power unseen and unsuspected propelled them all. Hewas aware that he was going to make a proclamation to the People of theEarth, aware of certain grandiose phrases floating in his mind as thething he meant to say. Many little things happened, and then he foundhimself with the man in yellow entering a little room where thisproclamation of his was to be made.
This room was grotesquely latter-day in its appointments. In the centrewas a bright oval lit by shaded electric lights from above. The rest wasin shadow, and the double finely fitting doors through which he came fromthe swarming Hall of the Atlas made the place very still. The dead thudof these as they closed behind him, the sudden cessation of the tumult inwhich he had been living for hours, the quivering circle of light, thewhispers and quick noiseless movements of vaguely visible attendants inthe shadows, had a strange effect upon Graham. The huge ears of aphonographic mechanism gaped in a battery for his words, the black eyesof great photographic cameras awaited his beginning, beyond metal rodsand coils glittered dimly, and something whirled about with a droninghum. He walked into the centre of the light, and his shadow drew togetherblack and sharp to a little blot at his feet.
The vague shape of the thing he meant to say was already in his mind. Butthis silence, this isolation, the withdrawal from that contagious crowd,this audience of gaping, glaring machines, had not been in hisanticipation. All his supports seemed withdrawn together; he seemed tohave dropped into this suddenly, suddenly to have discovered himself. Ina moment he was changed. He found that he now feared to be inadequate, hefeared to be theatrical, he feared the quality of his voice, the qualityof his wit; astonished, he turned to the man in yellow with apropitiatory gesture. "For a moment," he said, "I must wait. I did notthink it would be like this. I must think of the thing I have to say."
While he was still hesitating there came an agitated messenger with newsthat the foremost aeroplanes were passing over Madrid.
"What news of the flying stages?" he asked.
"The people of the south-west wards are ready."
"Ready!"
He turned impatiently to the blank circles of the lenses again.
"I suppose it must be a sort of speech. Would to God I knew certainly thething that should be said! Aeroplanes at Madrid! They must have startedbefore the main fleet.
"Oh! what can it matter whether I speak well or ill?" he said, and feltthe light grow brighter.
He had framed some vague sentence of democratic sentiment when suddenlydoubts overwhelmed him. His belief in his heroic quality and calling hefound had altogether lost its assured conviction. The picture of alittle strutting futility in a windy waste of incomprehensibledestinies replaced it. Abruptly it was perfectly clear to him that thisrevolt against Ostrog was premature, foredoomed to failure, the impulseof passionate inadequacy against inevitable things. He thought of thatswift flight of aeroplanes like the swoop of Fate towards him. He wasastonished that he could have seen things in any other light. In thatfinal emergency he debated, thrust debate resolutely aside, determinedat all costs to go through with the thing he had undertaken. And hecould find no word to begin. Even as he stood, awkward, hesitating,with an indiscreet apology for his inability trembling on his lips,came the noise of many people crying out, the running to and fro offeet. "Wait," cried someone, and a door opened. Graham turned, and thewatching lights waned.
Through the open doorway he saw a slight girlish figure approaching. Hisheart leapt. It was Helen Wotton. The man in yellow came out of thenearer shadows into the circle of light.
"This is the girl who told us what Ostrog had done," he said.
She came in very quietly, and stood still, as if she did not want tointerrupt Graham's eloquence.... But his doubts and questionings fledbefore her presence. He remembered the things that he had meant to say.He faced the cameras again and the light about him grew brighter. Heturned back to her.
"You have helped me," he said lamely--"helped me very much.... This isvery difficult."
He paused. He addressed himself to the unseen multitudes who stared uponhim through those grotesque black eyes. At first he spoke slowly.
"Men and women of the new age," he said; "you have arisen to do battlefor the race!... There is no easy victory before us."
He stopped to gather words. He wished passionately for the gift ofmoving speech.
"This night is a beginning," he said. "This battle that is coming, thisbattle that rushes upon us to-night, is only a beginning. All your lives,it may be, you must fight. Take no thought though I am beaten, though Iam utterly overthrown. I think I may be overthrown."
He found the thing in his mind too vague for words. He pausedmomentarily, and broke into vague exhortations, and then a rush of speechcame upon him. Much that he said was but the humanitarian commonplace ofa vanished age, but the conviction of his voice touched it to vitality.He stated the case of the old days to the people of the new age, to thegirl at his side.
"I come out of the past to you," he said, "with the memory of an agethat hoped. My age was an age of dreams--of beginnings, an age of noblehopes; throughout the world we had made an end of slavery; throughout theworld we had spread the desire and anticipation that wars might cease,that all men and women might live nobly, in freedom and peace.... So wehoped in the days that are past. And what of those hopes? How is it withman after two hundred years?
"Great cities, vast powers, a collective greatness beyond our dreams. Forthat we did not work, and that has come. But how is it with the littlelives that make up this greater life? How is it with the common lives? Asit has ever been--sorrow and labour, lives cramped and unfulfilled, livestempted by power, tempted by wealth, and gone to waste and folly. The oldfaiths have faded and changed, the new faith--. Is there a new faith?
"Charity and mercy," he floundered; "beauty and the love of beautifulthings--effort and devotion! Give yourselves as I would give myself--asChrist gave Himself upon the Cross. It does not matter if you understand.It does not matter if you seem to fail. You _know_--in the core of yourhearts you _know_. There is no promise, there is no security--nothing togo upon but Faith. There is no faith but faith--faith which iscourage...."
Things that he had long wished to believe, he found that he believed. Hespoke gustily, in broken incomplete sentences, but with all his heart andstrength, of this new faith within him. He spoke of the greatness ofself-abnegation, of his belief in an immortal life of Humanity in whichwe live and move and have our being. His voice rose and fell, and therecording appliances hummed as he spoke, dim attendants watched him outof the shadow....
His sense of that silent spectator beside him sustained his sincerity.For a few glorious moments he was carried away; he felt no doubt of hisheroic quality, no doubt of his heroic words, he had it all straight andplain. His eloquence limped no longer. And at last he made an end tospeaking. "Here and now," he cried, "I make my will. All that is mine inthe world I give to the people of the world. All that is mine in theworld I give to the people of the world. To all of you. I give it to you,and myself I give to you. And as God wills to-night, I will live for you,or I will die."
He ended. He found the light of his present exaltation reflected in theface of
the girl. Their eyes met; her eyes were swimming with tears ofenthusiasm.
"I knew," she whispered. "Oh! Father of the World--_Sire_! I knew youwould say these things...."
"I have said what I could," he answered lamely and grasped and clung toher outstretched hands.