THE RETURN OF BELISARIUS
Grey days in the prairie country do not come very often, but they are
very depressing when they arrive. The landscape is not of the luscious
kind; it has no close correspondence with a picture by Corot or
Constable; sunlight is needed to give it the touch of the habitable and
the homelike. It was, therefore, unfortunate for the spirits of the
Lebanon people that the meeting summoned by local agitators to discuss
with asperity affairs on both sides of the Sagalac should, while starting
with fitful sunlight in the early morning, have developed to a bleak
greyness by three o'clock in the afternoon, the time set for the meeting.
Another strike was imminent in the factories at Manitou and in the
railway-shops at Lebanon, due to the stupidity of the policy of Ingolby's
successor as to the railways and other financial and manufacturing
interests. If he had planned a campaign of maladroitness he could not
have more happily fulfilled his object. It was not a good time for
reducing wages, or for quarrelling with the Town Councils of Manitou and
Lebanon concerning assessments and other matters. November and May
always found Manitou, as though to say, "upset." In the former month,
men were pouring through the place on their way to the shanties for their
Winter's work, and generally celebrating their coming internment by
"irrigation"; in the latter month, they were returning from their
Winter's imprisonment, thirsty for excitement, and with memories of
Winter quarrels inciting them to "have it out of someone."
And it was in October, when the shantyman was passing through on his way
to the woods--a natural revolutionary, loving trouble as a coyote loves
his hole--that labour discontent was practically whipped into action, and
the Councils of the two towns were stung into bitterness against the new
provocative railway policy. Things looked dark enough. The trouble
between the two towns and the change of control and policy of the
railways, due to Ingolby's downfall, had greatly shaken land and building
values in Lebanon, and a black eye, as it were, had been given to the
whole district for the moment.
So serious had the situation been regarded that the Mayor of Lebanon,
with Halliday the lawyer and another notable citizen, all friends of
Ingolby, had "gone East"--as a journey to Montreal, Toronto, or Quebec
was generally called--to confer with and make appeal to the directorate
of the great railways. They went with some elation and hope, for they
had arguments of an unexpected kind in their possession, carefully hidden
from the rest of the population. They had returned only the day before
the meeting which was to be held in the square in front of the Town Hall,
to find that a platform had been built at the very steps of the Town Hall
with the assent of the Chief Constable, now recovered from illness and
returned to duty. To the Deputy Mayor and the Council, the Chief
Constable, on the advice of Gabriel Druse, had said that it was far
better to have the meeting in front of the Town Hall where he could,
on the instant, summon special constables from within if necessary, while
the influence of a well-built platform and the orderly arrangement of a
regular meeting were better than a mob oration from the tops of ash-
barrels.
The signs were ominous. In a day of sunshine the rebellious and
discontented spirit does not thrive; on a wet day it is apt to take
shelter; on a bleak, grey day men are prone to huddle together in their
anger with consequent stimulation of their passions.
It was a grey enough day at Lebanon, and dark-faced visitors from Manitou
felt the need of Winter clothing as they shiveringly crossed the Sagalac
by Ingolby's bridge. The air was raw and searching; Nature was sulky.
In the sharp wind the trees shook themselves angrily free of leaves. The
taverns were greatly frequented, which was not good for Manitou and
Lebanon. Up to the time of the meeting, however, the expected strike had
not occurred. This was mainly due to the fact that Felix Marchand, the
evil genius of Manitou, had not been seen in the town or in the district
for over a week. It was not generally known that he was absent because a
man by the name of Dennis, whose wife he had wronged, was dogging him
with no good intent. Marchand had treated the woman's warning with
contempt, but at sight of her injured husband he had himself withdrawn
from the scene of his dark enterprises. His malign influence was
therefore not at work at the moment.
The tactics of the Lebanon Town Council had been careful and wise. So
that the meeting should not be composed only of the roughest elements,
they privately urged all responsible citizens to attend, and if possible
capture the meeting for law and order and legitimate agitation. That was
why Osterhaut, the town-crier, went about with a large dinner-bell
announcing the hour of the meeting and admonishing all "good folks" to
attend. No one had ever seen Osterhaut quite so cheerful--and he had a
bonny cheerfulness on occasion--as on this grisly October day when Nature
was very sour and the spirit of the winds was in a "scratchy" mood. But
Osterhaut was not more cheerful than Jowett who, in a very undignified
way, described the state of his feelings, on receiving a certain
confidence from Halliday, the lawyer, and Gabriel Druse, by turning a
cart-wheel in the Mayor's office; which certainly was an unusual thing
in a man of fifty years of age.
It was a people's meeting. No local official was on the platform.
Under the influence of alien elements who, though their co-operation was
directed against the common enemy, were intensely irritating, the meeting
became disorderly. One or two wise men, however, were able to secure
order long enough to have the resolution passed for forming a Local
Interests Committee whose duty it would be to see that the people were
not sacrificed to a "soulless plutocracy." While the names of those who
were to form the Committee were being selected, in a storm of disorder
arising from the Manitou section of the crowd, the sky overhead grew
suddenly brighter and the sun came out, bringing an instant change. It
was as though a hand, which had hypnotized them into anger, restored them
to good-humour once again.
At this moment, to the astonishment of all, there appeared at the back
of the platform between Jowett and Halliday the lawyer, the man with a
tragic history who had been as one buried for weeks past, who had
vanished from their calculations. It was their old champion, Ingolby.
Slowly a hush came over the vast assembly as, apparently guided by his
friends on the platform, he was given a seat on the right of the
Chairman's table.
A strange sensation, partly pleasure, partly resentment, passed through
the crowd. Why did Ingolby come to remind them of better days gone--of
his own rashness, of what they had lost through that rashness? Why had
he come? They could not say and do all that they wanted with him
present. It was like having a row in the presence of a corpse. He had
been a hero to all in Lebanon, but he was not in the picture now. His
day was done. It was no place for him. Yet it was a pleasant omen that
the sun broke clear and shining over the platform as Ingolby took his
seat. Presently in the silence he half-turned his head, murmured
something to the Chairman, and then got to his feet, stretching out a
hand towards the crowd.
For one moment there was silence, a little awestricken, a little painful,
and then as from one man a great cheer went up. For a moment they had
thought him inconsiderate to come among them in this crisis, for he was
no longer of their scheme of things, and must be counted out, a beaten,
battered, blind bankrupt. Yet the sight of him on his feet was too much
for them. Blind he might be, but there was the personality which had
conquered them in the past brave, adroit, reckless, renowned. None of
them, or very few of them, had seen him since that night at Barbazon's
Tavern, yet in spite of his tragedy there seemed little change in him.
There was the same quirk at the corner of the mouth, the same humour in
the strong face, not so ruddy now; and strangely enough the eyes were
neither guarded by spectacles, nor were they shrunken, glazed, or
diseased, so far as could be seen.
Stretching out a hand, Ingolby gave a crisp laugh and said: "So there's
been trouble since I've been gone, has there?" The corner of his mouth
quirked, his eyelids drooped in the old quizzical way, and the crowd
laughed in spite of themselves. What a spirit he had to take it all that
way!
"Got a little deeper in the mire, have you, boys?" he added. "They tell
me the town's a frost just now, but it seems nice and warm here in the
sun. Yes, boys, it's nice and warm here among you all--the same good old
crowd that's made the two towns what they are. The same good old crowd,"
he repeated, "--and up to the same old games!"
At this point he could scarcely proceed for laughter. "Like true
pioneers," he went on, "not satisfied with what you've got, but wanting
such a lot more--if I might say so in the language of the dictionary, a
deuce of a lot more."
Almost every sentence had been punctuated by cheers. His personality
dominated them as aforetime with some new accent to it; his voice was
like that of one given up from the dead, yet come back from the wars
alive and loving. They never knew what a figure he was until now when
they saw and heard him again, and realized that he was one of the few
whom the world calls leaders, because they have in them that immeasurable
sympathy which is understanding of men and matters. Yet in the old days
there never had been the something that was in his voice now, and in his
face there was a great friendliness, a sense of companionship, a Jonathan
and David something. He was like a comrade talking to a thousand other
comrades. There was a new thing in him and they felt it stir them. They
thought he had been made softer by his blindness; and they were not
wrong. Even the Manitou section were stilled into sympathy with him.
Many of them had heard his speech in Barbazon's Tavern just before the
horseshoe struck him down, and they heard him now, much simpler in manner
and with that something in his voice and face. Yet it made them shrink
a little, too, to see his blind eyes looking out straight before him.
It was uncanny. Their idea was that the eyes were as before, but seeing
nothing-blank to the world.
Presently his hand shot out again. "The same old crowd!" he said.
"Just the same--after the same old thing, wanting what we all want: these
two places, Manitou and Lebanon, to be boosted till they rule the West
and dominate the North. It's good to see you all here again"--he spoke
very slowly--"to see you all here together looking for trouble--looking
for trouble. There you are, Jim Barager; there you are, Bill Riley;
there you are, Mr. William John Thomas McLeary." The last named was the
butt of every tavern and every street corner. "There you are, Berry--old
brown Berry, my barber."
At first the crowd did not quite understand, did not realize that he was
actually pointing to the people whom he named, but presently, as Berry
the barber threw up his hands with a falsetto cry of understanding, there
was a simultaneous, wild rush forward to the platform.
"He sees, boys--he sees!" they shouted.
Ingolby's hand shot up above them with a gesture of command.
"Yes, boys, I see--I see you all. I'm cured. My sight's come back, and
what's more"--he snatched from his pocket a folded sheet of paper and
held it aloft "what's more, I've got my commission to do the old job
again; to boss the railways, to help the two towns. The Mayor brought it
back from Montreal yesterday; and together, boys, together, we'll make
Manitou and Lebanon the fulcrum of the West, the swivel by which to swing
prosperity round our centre."
The platform swayed with the wild enthusiasm of the crowd storming it to
shake hands with him, when suddenly a bell rang out across the river,
wildly, clamorously. A bell only rang like that for a fire. Those on
the platform could see a horseman galloping across the bridge.
A moment later someone shouted, "It's the Catholic church at Manitou on
fire!"