Selingman came into the restaurant with a huge rose in his buttonhole
and another bunch of flowers--carnations this time--in his hands. He
made his way to the little round table where Julia and Aaron were
seated.
"For you, Miss Julia," he declared, depositing them by her side. "Pin
them in the front of your frock. Drink wine to-night. Be gay. Let us
see pink, also, in your cheeks. It is a great evening, this. Maraton
is here?"
"Not yet," Julia answered, smiling.
Selingman sat down between them. He gave a lengthy order to a waiter;
then he turned abruptly to Julia.
"He will keep to it, you think? This time you believe that he has made
up his mind?"
"I do," she asserted vigorously.
"What is he made of, that man?" Selingman continued, sipping the
Vermouth which he had just ordered. "He makes love to you, eh? Ach!
never mind your brother. For a man like Maraton, what does it matter?
You are of the right stuff. You would be proud."
She looked steadily out of the restaurant.
"I have been a worker," she said, "in a clothing factory since I was old
enough to stand up, and what little time I have had to spare, I have
spent in study, in trying to fit myself for the fight against those
things that you and I and all of us know of. There has been no
opportunity," she went on, more slowly, "I have not allowed myself--"
"Ah, but it comes--it must come!" Selingman interrupted. "You have the
instinct--I am sure of that. Use your power a little. It will be for
his good. Every man who neglects his passions, weakens. You have the
gifts, Julia. I tell you that--I, Selingman, who know much about woman
and more about love and life. You've felt it, too, yourself sometimes
in the quiet hours. Haven't you lain in your bed with your eyes wide
open, and seen the ceiling roll away and the skies lean down, and felt
the thoughts come stealing into your brain, till all of a sudden you
found that your pulses were beating fast, and your heart was trembling,
and there was a sort of faint music in your blood and in your ears? Ah,
well, one knows! Suffer yourself to think of these hours when he is
with you sometimes. Don't make an ice maiden of yourself. You've done
good work. I know all about you. You could do more splendid work still
if you could weave that little spell which you and I know of."
"It is too late," she sighed, "too late now, he has become used to me. I
am a machine--nothing more, to him. He does not even realise that I am
a woman."
"What do you expect?" Aaron asked harshly. "Why should a man, with
great things in his brain, waste a moment in thinking of women?"
Selingman's under-lip shot out, a queer little way he had of showing his
contempt.
"Little man," he told Aaron, "you are a fanatic. You do not understand.
It is a quarter past nine and I am hungry. . . . Ah!"
Maraton came in just then. He had the air of a man who has been through
a crisis, but his eyes were bright as though with triumph. Selingman
stood up and filled a glass with wine.
"The first rivet has been driven home," he cried. "I see it."
"It has indeed," Maraton answered. "For good or for evil, the railway
strike is decided upon. There is civil war waging now, I can tell you,"
he added, as he sat down. "Graveling was there with a message. The
whole of the Labour Party is against the strike. The leaders of the men
are hot for it, and the men themselves. There wasn't a single one of
them who hesitated. Ernshaw, who represents the Union, told me that
there wasn't one of them who wouldn't get the sack if he dared to waver.
They know what the Government did in Lancashire and they know what they
tried to do at Sheffield. With the railway companies they'll have even
more influence."
"Let us dine," Selingman insisted, welcoming the approach of the
waiters. "You see me, a man of forty-five, robust, the picture of
health. How do I do it? In this manner. When I dine, all cares go to
the winds. When I dine, I forget the hard places, I let my brain free of
its burden. I talk nonsense I love best with a pretty woman. To-night
we will talk with Miss Julia. You see, I have brought her more flowers.
She does not wear them, but they lie by her plate."
"I have never worn an ornament in my life," Julia told him, "and I don't
think that any one has ever given me flowers."
Selingman groaned.
"Oh, what pitiful words!" he exclaimed. "If there is one thing sadder
in life than the slavery of the people, it is to find a woman who has
forgotten her sex. Almost you inspire me, young lady, with the desire
to take you by the hand and offer you my escort into the gentler ways.
If I were sure of success, not even my fair friends on the other side of
the Channel could keep me from your feet. Maraton, look away from the
walls. There's nothing beyond--just a world full of fancies. There's
some _Sole Otèro_ on your plate which is worth tasting, and there's
champagne in your glass. What matter if there are troubles outside?
That's good--there is music."
He beckoned to the chef d'orchestre, engaged him for a few moments in
conversation, poured him out a glass of wine, and slipped something into
his hand. Then he recommenced his dinner with a chuckle of
satisfaction.
"The little man can play," he declared. "He has it in his fingers. We
shall hear now the waltzes that I love. Ah, Miss Julia, why is this not
Paris! Why can I not get up and put my arm around your waist and whisper
in your ear as we float round and round in a waltz? Stupid questions!
I am too short to dance with you, for one thing, and much too fat, But
one loves to imagine. Listen."
Maraton had already set down his knife and fork. The strains of the
waltz had come to him with a queer note of familiarity, a familiarity
which at first he found elusive. Then, as the movement progressed, he
remembered. Once more he was sitting in that distant corner of the
winter garden, hearing every now and then the faint sound of the
orchestra from the ballroom. It was the same waltz; alas, the same
music was warming his blood! And it was too late now. He had passed
into the other world. In his pocket lay the letter which he had
received that evening from Mr. Foley--a few dignified lines of bitter
disappointment. He was an outcast, one who might even soon be regarded
as the wrecker of his own country. And still the music grew and faded
and grew again.
It was late before they had finished dinner, and Maraton took Selingman
to one side.
"Remember," he insisted, "it is a bargain. Before I go north I must see
Maxendorf."
Selingman nodded.
"It is arranged," he said. "We both agreed that it was better for you
not to go to the hotel. Wait."
He glanced at his watch and nodded.
"Stay with your brother, little one," he directed, turning to Julia.
"We shall be away only a few moments. Come."
"Where are we going?" Maraton enquired, as they passed through the
restaurant and ascended the stairs.
Selingman placed his finger by the side of his nose.
"A plan of mine," he whispered. "Maxendorf is here, in a private room."
Selingman hurried his companion into a small private dining-room.
Maxendorf was sitting there alone, smoking a cigarette over the remnants
of an unpretentious feast. He welcomed them without a smile; his
aspect, indeed, as he waved his hand towards a chair, was almost
forbidding.
"What do you want with me, Maraton?" he asked. "They tell me--Selingman
tells me--there was a word you had to say before you press the levers.
Say it, then, and remember that hereafter, the less communication
between you and me the better."
Maraton ignored the chair. He stood a little way inside the room.
Through the partially opened window came the ceaseless roar of traffic
from the busy street below.
"Maxendorf," he began, "there isn't much to be said. You
know--Selingman has told you--what my decision is. It took me some time
to make up my mind--only because I doubted one thing, and one thing
alone, in the world. That one thing, Maxendorf, was your good faith."
Maxendorf lifted his eyes swiftly.
"You doubted me," he repeated.
"You're a people's man, I know," Maraton went one, "but here and there
one finds queer traits in your character. They say that you are also a
patriot and a schemer."
"They say truly," Maxendorf admitted, "yet these things are by the way.
They occupy a little cell of life--no more. It is for the people I live
and breathe."
"For the people of the world," Maraton persisted slowly--"for humanity?
Is there any difference in your mind, Maxendorf, between the people of
one country and the people of another?"
Maxendorf never faltered. His long narrow face was turned steadily
towards Maraton. His eyebrows were drawn together. He spoke slowly and
with great distinctness.
"I am for humanity," he declared. "Many of the people of my country I
have already freed. It is for the sufferers in other lands that I toil
in these days. If I am a patriot, it is because it is part of my
political outfit, and a political outfit is necessary to the man who
labours as I have laboured."
"So be it, then," Maraton decided. "I accept your words. Within a
month from this time, the revolution will be here. This land will be
laid waste, the terror will be brewed. I fear nothing, Maxendorf, but
as one man to another I have come to tell you, before I start north,
that if in your heart there is a single grain of deceit, if ever it
shall be made clear to me that I have been made the cat's-paw of what
you have called patriotism, if the people of this country have left a
breath of life in my body, I shall dedicate it to a purpose at which you
can guess."
"It is to threaten me that you have come?" Maxendorf asked quietly.
"Don't put it like that," Maraton replied. "These are just the words
which you yourself cannot fail to understand. Neither you nor I hold
life so dearly that the thought of losing it need make us quaver. I am
here only to say this one word--to tell you that the heavens have never
opened more surely to let out the lightning, than will your death be a
charge upon me if you should vary even a hair's-breadth from our
contract. If Maxendorf, the people's man, hides himself for only a
moment in the shadow of Maxendorf the politician, he shall die!"
Maxendorf held out his hand.
"Death," he said scornfully, "is not the greatest ill with which you
could threaten me, but let it be so. Humanity shall be our motto--no
other."
"You spar at one another," Selingman declared, "like a couple of
sophists. You are both men of the truth, you are both on your way to
the light. I give you my benediction. I watch over you--I, Selingman.
I am the witness of the joining of your hands. Unlock the gates without
fear, Maraton. Maxendorf will do his work."