Of all the vagaries and humours of humanity when considered in crowds,
there is nothing which appears more senseless and objectless than the
way in which it congregates outside the door of a church at a
fashionable or "society" wedding. The massed people pushing and shoving
each other about have nothing whatever to do with either bride or
bridegroom, the ceremony inside the sacred edifice has in most cases
ceased to be a "sacrament"--and has become a mere show of dressed-up
manikins and womenkins, many of the latter being mere OBJECT
D'ART,--stands for the display of millinery. And yet--the crowds fight
and jostle,--women scramble and scream,--all to catch a glimpse of the
woman who is to be given to the man, and the man who has agreed to
accept the woman. The wealthier the pair the wilder the frenzy to gaze
upon them. Savages performing a crazy war-dance are decorous of
behaviour in contrast with these "civilised" folk who tramp on each
other's feet and are ready to squeeze each other into pulp for the
chance of staring at two persons whom the majority of them have never
seen before and are not likely to see again. The wedding of Miss Lydia
Herbert with her "ancient mariner," a seventy-year-old millionaire
reputed to be as wealthy as Rockefeller,--was one of these
"sensations"--chiefly on account of the fact that every unmarried woman
young and old, and every widow, had been hunting him in vain for fully
five years. Miss Herbert had been voted "no chance," because she made
no secret of her extravagant tastes in dress and jewels,--yet despite
society croakers she had won the game. This in itself was
interesting,--as the millionaire she had secured was known to be
particularly close-fisted and parsimonious. Nevertheless he had shown
remarkable signs of relaxing these tendencies; for he had literally
showered jewels on his chosen bride, leaving no door open for any
complaint in that quarter. Her diamonds were the talk of New York, and
on the day of her wedding her gowns literally flashed like a firework
with numerous dazzling points of light. "The Voice that breathed o'er
Eden" had little to do with the magnificence of her attire, or with the
brilliancy of the rose-wreathed bridesmaids, young girls of specially
selected beauty and elegance who were all more or less disappointed in
failing to win the millionaire themselves. For these youthful persons
in their 'teens had social ambitions hidden in hearts harder than
steel--"a good time" of self-indulgence and luxury was all they sought
for in life--in fact, they had no conception of any higher ideal. The
millionaire himself, though old, maintained a fairly middle-aged
appearance--he was a thin, wiry, well-preserved man, his wizened and
furrowed countenance chiefly showing the marks of Time's ploughshare.
It would have been difficult to say why, out of all the feminine
butterflies hovering around him, he had chosen Lydia Herbert,--but he
was a shrewd judge of character in his way, and he had decided that as
she was not in her first youth it would be more worth her while to
conduct herself decorously as wife and housekeeper, and generally look
after his health and comfort, than it would be for a less responsible
woman. Then, she had "manner,"--her appearance was attractive and she
wore her clothes well and stylishly. All this was enough for a man who
wanted some one to attend to his house and entertain his friends, and
he was perfectly satisfied with himself as he repeated after the
clergyman the words, "With my body I thee worship, and with all my
worldly goods I thee endow," knowing that "with his body" he had never
worshipped anything, and that the "endowment" of his worldly goods was
strictly limited to certain settlements. He felt himself to be superior
to his old bachelor friend Sam Gwent, who supported him as "best man"
at the ceremony, and who, as he stood, stiffly upright in immaculate
"afternoon visiting attire" among the restlessly swaying,
semi-whispering throng, was all the time thinking of the dusky
night-gloom in the garden of the "Plaza" far away in California and a
beautiful face set against the dark background of myrtle bushes
exhaling rich perfume.
"What a startling contrast she would be to these dolls of fashion!" he
thought--"What a sensation she would make! There's not a woman here who
can compare with her! If I were only a bit younger I'd try my
luck!--anyway I'm younger than to-day's bridegroom!--but
she--Manella--would never look at any other man than Seaton, who
doesn't care a rap for her or any other woman!" Here his thoughts took
another turn.
"No," he repeated inwardly--"He doesn't care a rap for her or any other
woman--except--perhaps--Morgana! And even if it were Morgana, it would
be for himself and himself alone! While she--ah!--it would be a clever
brain indeed that could worry out what SHE cares for! Nothing in this
world, so far as I can see!"
Here the organ poured the rich strains of a soft and solemn prelude
through the crowded church--the "sacred" part of the ceremony was over,
and bride and bridegroom made their way to the vestry, there to sign
the register in the presence of a selected group of friends. Sam Gwent
was one of these,--and though he had attended many such functions
before, he was more curiously impressed than usual by the unctuous and
barefaced hypocrisy of the whole thing--the smiling humbug of the
officiating clergy,--the affected delight of the "society" toadies
fluttering like wasps round bride and bride-groom as though they were
sweet dishes specially for stinging insects to feed upon, and in his
mind he seemed to hear the warm, passionate voice of Manella in frank
admission of her love for Seaton.
"It is good to love him!" she had said--"I am happy to love him. I wish
only to serve him!"
This was primitive passion,--the passion of primitive woman for her
mate whom she admitted to be stronger than herself, to whom she
instinctively looked for shelter and protection, and round whose
commanding force she sought to rear the lovely fabric of "Home,"--a
state of feeling as far removed from the sentiments of modern women as
the constellation of Orion is removed from earth. And Sam Gwent's
fragmentary reflections flitting through his brain were more
serious--one might say more romantic, than the consideration of
dollars, which usually occupied all his faculties. He had always
thought that there was a good deal in life which he had missed somehow,
and which dollars could not purchase; and a certain irate contempt
filled him for the man who, unlike himself, was in the prime of
strength, and who, with all the glories of Nature about him and the
love and beauty of an exquisite womanhood at his hand for possession,
could nevertheless devote his energies to the science of destruction
and the compassing of death without compunction, on the lines Roger
Seaton had laid down as the remedy against all war.
"The kindest thing to think of him is that he's not quite sane,"--Gwent
mused--"He has been obsessed by the horrible carnage of the Great War,
and disgusted by the utter inefficiency of Governments since the
armistice, and this appalling invention of his is the result."
The crashing chords of the Bridal March from "Lohengrin" put an end to
his thoughts for the moment,--people began to crush and push out of
church, or stand back on each other's toes to stare at the bride's
diamonds as she moved very slowly and gracefully down the aisle on the
arm of her elderly husband. She certainly looked very well,--and her
smile suggested entire satisfaction with herself and the world.
Press-camera men clambered about wherever they could find a footing, to
catch and perpetuate that smile, which when enlarged and reproduced in
newspapers would depict the grinning dental display so much associated
with Woodrow Wilson and the Prince of Wales,--though more suggestive of
a skull than anything else. Skulls invariably show their teeth, we
know--but it has been left to the modern press-camera man to insist on
the death-grin in faces that yet live. The crowd outside the church was
far denser than the crowd within, and the fighting and scrambling for
points of view became terrific, especially when the wedding guests'
motor-cars began to make their way, with sundry hoots and snorts,
through the densely packed mob. Women screamed,--some fainted--but none
thought of giving way to others, or retiring from the wild scene of
contest. Gwent judged it wisest to remain within the church portal till
the crowd should clear, and there, safely ensconced, he watched the
maddened mass of foolish sight-seers, all of whom had plainly left
their daily avocations merely to stare at a man and woman wedded, with
whom, personally, they had nothing whatever to do.
"People talk about unemployment!" he mused--"There's enough human
material in this one street to make wealth for themselves and the whole
community, yet they are idle by their own choice. If they had anything
to do they wouldn't be here!"
He laughed grimly,--the utter stodginess and stupidity of humanity EN
MASSE had of late struck him very forcibly, and he found every excuse
for the so-called incapacity of Governments, seeing the kind of folk
they are called upon to govern. He realised, as we all who read
history, must do, that we are no worse and no better than the peoples
of the past,--we are just as hypocritical, fraudulent, deceptive and
cruel as ever they were in legalised torture-times, and just as
ineradicably selfish. The pagans practised a religion which they did
not truly believe in, and so do we. All through the ages God has been
mocked;--all through the ages Divine vengeance has fallen on the
mockers and the mockery.
"And after all," thought Gwent--"wars are as necessary as plagues to
clear out a superabundant population, only most unfortunately Nature
adopts such recklessness in her methods that it most often happens the
best among us are taken, and the worst left. I tried to impress this on
Seaton, whose system of destruction would involve the good as well as
the bad--but these intellectual monsters of scientific appetite have no
conscience and no sentiment. To prove their theories they would
annihilate a continent."
Here a sudden ugly rush of the crowd, dangerous to both life and limb,
pushed him back against the church portal with the force of a tidal
wave,--it was not concerned with the bridal pair who had already driven
away in their automobile, nor with the wedding guests who were
following them to the great hotel where the bride's reception was
held--it was caused by the wild dash of half a dozen or so of unkempt
men and boys who tore a passage for themselves through the swaying mob
of sightseers, waving newspapers aloft and shouting loudly with voices
deep and shrill, clear and hoarse--
"Earthquake in California! Terrible loss of life! Thousands dead! Awful
scenes! Earthquake in California!"
The people swayed again--then stopped in massed groups,--some clutching
at the newsboys as they ran and buying the papers as fast as they could
be sold, while all the time above the muffled roar of the city they
sent their cries aloft, echoing near and far--
"Thousands dead! Awful scenes! Towns destroyed! Terrible Earthquake in
California!"
Sam Gwent stepped out from the church portal, elbowing his way through
the confusion,--the yells of the news vendors rang sharply in his ears
and yet for the moment he scarcely grasped their meaning; "California"
was the one word that caught him, as it were, with a hammer
stroke,--then "Thousands dead!" Finding at last an open passage through
the dispersing crowd, he went at something of a run after one of the
newsboys, and snatched the last paper he had to sell out of his hand.
"What is it?" he demanded as he paid his money.
"Dunno!" the boy replied, breathlessly--"'Xpect everybody's dead down
California way!"
Gwent unfolded the journal and stared at the great headlines, printed
in fat black letters, still smelling strongly of printer's ink.
Appalling Earthquake In California!--Mountain Upheaval!--Towns Wiped
Out!--Plaza Hotel Engulfed!--Frightful Loss of Life!
His eyes grew dim and dazzled--his brain swam,--he gazed up unseeingly
at the blue sky, the tall "sky-scraper" houses, the sweep of human and
vehicular traffic around him; and to his excited fancy the beautiful
face of Manella came, like a phantom, between him and all else that was
presented to his vision--that face warm and glowing with woman's
tenderness--the splendid dark eyes aflame with love for a man whose
indifference to her only strengthened her adoration and he seemed to
hear the deep defiant voice of Roger Seaton ringing in his ears--
"Annihilation! A holocaust of microbes! I would--and could--wipe them
off the face of the earth in twenty-four hours!" He could--and would!
"And by Heaven," said Gwent, within himself--"He's done it!"