Part 11 (1/2)

”What for? What good will it do? You won't see anything straight. It's no use trying to see daylight two hours before dawn. People are foolish enough sometimes to make the attempt, but they only strain their eyesight. For every step you've got to take there'll be something to show you the line to follow.”

”What?” She asked the question chiefly for the sake of humoring him. She was not susceptible to this kind of comfort, nor did she feel the need of it.

”W-well,” the old man answered, slowly, ”it isn't easy to tell you in any language you'd understand.”

”I can understand plain English, if that would do.”

”You can make it do, but it doesn't do very well. It's really one of those things that require what the primitive Christians called an unknown tongue. Since we haven't got that as a means of communication--”

He broke off, stroking his long beard with a big handsome hand, but presently began again.

”Some people call it a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. Some people have described it by other figures of speech. The description isn't of importance--it's the _Thing_.”

She waited a minute, before saying in a tone that had some awe in it, as well as some impatience: ”Oh, but I've never seen anything like that. I never expect to.”

”That's a pity; because it's there.”

”There? Where?”

”Just where one would look for it--if one looked at all. When it moves,”

he went on, his hand suiting the action to the word, on a level with his eyes, ”when it moves, you follow it, and when it rests, you wait. It's possible--I don't know--I merely throw out the suggestion--no one can really _know_ but yourself, because no one but yourself can see it--but it's possible that at this moment--for you--it's standing still.”

”I don't know what I gain either by its moving or its standing still, so long as I don't see it.”

”No, neither do I,” he a.s.sented, promptly.

”Well, then?” she questioned.

”Shall I tell you a little story?” He smiled at her behind his stringy, sandy beard, while his kind old eyes blinked wistfully.

”If you like. I shall be happy to hear it.” She was not enthusiastic.

She was too deeply engrossed with pressing, practical questions to find his mysticism greatly to the point.

He took a turn around the drawing-room before beginning, stopping to caress the glaze of one of the K'ang-hsi vases on the mantelpiece, while he arranged his thoughts.

”There was once a little people,” he began, turning round to where she sat in the corner of a sofa, her hands clasped in her lap--”there was once a little people--a mere handful, who afterward became a race--who saw the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night, and followed it. That is to say, some of them certainly saw it, enough of them to lead the others on. For a generation or two they were little more than a band of nomads; but at last they came to a land where they fought and conquered and settled down.”

”Yes? I seem to have heard of them. Please go on.”

”It was a little land, rather curiously situated between the Orient and the West, between the desert and the sea. It had great advantages both for seclusion within itself and communication with the world outside. If a divine power had wanted to nourish a tender shoot, till it grew strong enough to ripen seed that would blow readily into every corner of the globe, it probably couldn't have done better than to have planted it just there.”

She nodded, to show that she followed him.

”But this little land had also the dangers attendant on its advantages.

To the north of it there developed a great power; to the south of it another. Each turned greedy eyes on the little buffer state. And the little buffer state began to be very wise and politic and energetic. It said, 'If we don't begin to take active measures, the a.s.syrian, or the Egyptian, whoever gets here first, will eat us up. But if we buy off the one, he will protect us against the other.'”

”That seems reasonable.”

”Yes; quite reasonable: too reasonable. They forgot that a power that could lead them by fire and cloud could protect them even against conscript troops and modern methods of fighting. They forgot that if so much trouble had been taken to put them where they were, it was not that--a.s.suming that they behaved themselves--it was not that they might be easily rooted out. Instead of having confidence within they looked for an ally from without, and chose Egypt. Very clever; very diplomatic.

There was only one criticism to be made on the course taken--that it was all wrong. There was a man on the spot to tell them so--one of those fellows whom we should call pessimists if we hadn't been taught to speak of them as prophets. 'You are carrying your riches,' he cried to them, 'on the shoulders of young a.s.ses, and your treasures on the bunches of camels, to a people that shall not profit you. For the Egyptians shall help in vain, and to no purpose. Your strength is--_to sit still_!'” As he stood looking down at her his kindly eyes blinked for a minute longer, before he added, ”Do you see the point?”