Part 28 (2/2)
The cruel injury and loss preparing for thousands of innocent persons through the self-interested plotting of a few men, was almost incalculable,--and his blood burned with pa.s.sionate indignation as he realized on what a verge of misery, bloodshed, disaster and crime the unthinking people of the country stood, pushed to the very edge of a fall by the shameless and unscrupulous designs of a few financiers, playing their gambling game with the public confidence,--and cheating nations as callously as they would have cheated their partners at cards.
”Thank G.o.d, it is not too late!” he murmured; ”Not quite too late to save the situation!--to rescue the people from long years of undeserved taxation, loss of trade and general distress! It is a supreme task that has been given me to accomplis.h.!.+--but if there is any truth and right in the laws of the Universe, I shall surely not be misjudged while accomplis.h.i.+ng it!”
He quickened his pace;--and to avoid going up one of the longer thoroughfares which led to the citadel and palace, he decided to cross one of the many picturesque bridges, arched over certain inlets from the sea, and forming ca.n.a.ls, where barges and other vessels might be towed up to the very doors of the warehouses which received their cargoes.
But just as he was about to turn in the necessary direction, he halted abruptly at sight of two men, standing at the first corner in the way of his advance, talking earnestly. He recognized them at once as Sergius Thord and the half-inebriated poet, Paul Zouche. With noiseless step he moved cautiously into the broad stretch of black shadow cast by the great facade of a block of buildings which occupied half the length of the street in which he stood, and so managing to slip into the denser darkness of a doorway, was able to hear what they were saying. The full, mellow, and persuasive tone of Thord's voice had something in it of reproach.
”You shame yourself, Zouche!” he said; ”You shame me; you shame us all!
Man, did G.o.d put a light of Genius in your soul merely to be quenched by the cravings of a b.e.s.t.i.a.l body? What a.s.sociate are you for us? How can you help us in the fulfilment of our ideal dream? By day you mingle with litterateurs, scientists, and philosophers,--report has it that you have even managed to stumble your way into my lady's boudoir;--but by night you wander like this,--insensate, furious, warped in soul, muddled in brain, and only the heart of you alive,--the poor unsatisfied heart--hungering and crying for what itself makes impossible!”
Zouche broke into a harsh laugh. Turning up his head to the sky, he thrust back his wild hair, and showed his thin eager face and glittering eyes, outlined cameo-like by the paling radiance of the moon.
”Well spoken, my Sergius!” he exclaimed. ”You always speak well! Your thoughts are of flame--your speech is of gold; the fire melts the ore! And then again you have a conscience! That is a strange possession!--quite useless in these days, like the remains of the tail we had when we were all happy apes in the primeval forest, pelting the Megatherium or other such remarkable beasts with cocoanuts! It was a much better life, Sergius, believe me! A Conscience is merely a mental Appendicitis! There should be a psychical surgeon with an airy lancet to cut it out. Not for me!--I was born perfect--without it!”
He laughed again, then with an abrupt change of manner he caught Thord violently by the arm.
”How can you speak of shame?” he said--”What shame is left in either man or woman nowadays? Naked to the very skin of foulness, they flaunt a nudity of vice in every public thoroughfare! Your sentiments, my grand Sergius, are those of an old world long pa.s.sed away! You are a reformer, a lover of truth--a hater of shams--and in the days when the people loved truth,--and wanted justice,--and fought for both, you would have been great! But greatness is nowadays judged as 'madness'--truth as 'want of tact'--desire for justice is 'clamour for notoriety.' Shame?
There is no shame in anything, Sergius, but honesty! That is a disgrace to the century; for an honest man is always poor, and poverty is the worst of crimes.” He threw up his arms with a wild gesture,--”The worst of crimes! Do I not know it!”
Thord took him gently by the shoulder.
”You talk, Zouche, as you always talk, at random, scarcely knowing, and certainly not half meaning what you say. There is no real reason in your rages against fate and fortune. Leave the accursed drink, and you may still win the prize you covet--Fame.”
”Not I!” said Zouche scornfully,--”Fame in its original sense belonged also to the growing-time of the world--when, proud of youth and the glow of life, the full-fledged man judged himself immortal. Fame now is adjudged to the biped-machine who drives a motor-car best,--or to the fortunate soap-boiler who dines with a king! Poetry is understood to be the useful rhyme which announces the virtues of pills and boot-blacking!
Mark you, Sergius!--my latest volume was 'graciously accepted by the King'! Do you know what that means?”
”No,” replied Thord, a trifle coldly; ”And if it were not that I know your strange vagaries, I should say you wronged your election as one of us, to send any of your work to a crowned fool!”
Zouche laughed discordantly.
”You would? No, you would not, my Sergius, if you knew the spirit in which I sent it! A spirit as wild, as reckless, as ranting, as defiant as ever devil indulged in! The humility of my presentation letter to his Majesty was beautiful! The reply of the flunkey-secretary was equally beautiful in smug courtesy: 'Sir, I am commanded by the King to thank you for the book of poems you have kindly sent for his acceptance!' I say again, Thord, do you know what it means?”
”No; I only wish that instead of talking here, you would let me see you safely home.”
”Home! I have no home! Since _she_ died--” He paused, and a grey shadow crossed his face like the hue of approaching sickness or death.
”I killed her, poor child! Of course you know that! I neglected her,--deserted her--left her to die! Well! She is only one more added to the list of countless women martyrs who have been tortured out of an unjust world--and now--now I write verses to her memory!” He s.h.i.+vered as with cold, still clinging to Thord's arm. ”But I did not tell you what great good comes of sending a book to the King! It means less to a writer than to a boot-maker. For the boot-maker can put up a sign: 'Special Fitter for the ease of His Majesty's Corns'--but if a poet should say his verse is 'accepted' by a monarch, the shrewd public take it at once to be bad verse, and will have none of it! That is the case with my book to-day!”
”Why did you send it?” asked Thord, with grave patience. ”Your business with kings is to warn, not to flatter!”
”Just so!” cried Zouche; ”And if His Most Gracious and Glorious had been pleased to look inside the volume, he would have seen enough to startle him! It was sent in hate, my Sergius,--not in humility,--just as the flunkey-secretary's answer was penned in derision, aping courtesy! How you look, under this wan sky of night! Reproachful, yet pitying, as the eyes of Buddha are your eyes, my Sergius! You are a fine fellow--your brain is a dome decorated with glorious ideals!--and yet you are like all of us, weak in one point, as Achilles in the heel. One thing could turn you from man into beast--and that would be if Lotys loved--not you--she never will love you--but another!”--Thord started back as though suddenly stabbed, and angrily shook off his companion, who only laughed again,--a shrill, echoing laugh in which there was a note of madness and desolation. ”Bah!” he exclaimed; ”You are a fool after all!
You work for a woman as I did--once! But mark you!--do not kill her--as I did--once! Be patient! Watch the light s.h.i.+ne, even though it does not illumine your path; be glad that the rose blooms for itself, if not for you! It will be difficult!--meanwhile you can live on hope--a bitter fruit to eat; but gnaw it to the last rind, my Sergius! Hope that Lotys may melt in your fire, as a snowflake in the sun! Come! Now take the poor poet home,--the drunken child of inspiration--take him home to his garret in the slums--the poet whose book has been accepted by the King!”
Pulling himself up from his semi-crouching position, he seized Thord's arm again more tightly, and began to walk along unsteadily. Presently he paused, smiling vacantly up at the gradually vanis.h.i.+ng stars.
”Lotys speaks to our followers on Sat.u.r.day,” he said; ”You know that?”
Thord bent his head in acquiescence.
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