THE RAT-TRAP
Some of the troops advanced toward the barricade. Instantly the long
line of its top bristled with fire; the fire was returned; the rattle
was continuous and terrible, mingled with the rapid, grinding noise
of the machine guns. The sound spread in every direction. The
barricades were all attacked.
Suddenly the noise began to decrease. It was as if some noble orator
had begun to speak in the midst of a tumultuous assembly. Those
nearest him catch his utterances first, and become quiet; the wave of
silence spreads like a great ripple in the water; until at last the
whole audience is as hushed as death. So something--some
extraordinary thing--had arrested the battle; down, down, dropped the
tumult; and at last there were only a few scattering shots to be
heard, here and there; and then these, too, ceased.
I could see the soldiers looking to the west. I swept the sky with my
glass. Yes, something portentous had indeed happened! Instead of the
whole dark flight of thousands of airships for which the soldiers had
been looking, there came, athwart the sky, like a great black bird, a
single Demon.
As it approached it seemed to be signaling some one. Little flags of
different colors were run up and taken down. I turned and looked to
the barricaded district. And there on the top of a very high
building, in its midst, I could see a group of men. They, too, were
raising and lowering little flags. Nearer and nearer swept the great
bird; every eye and many a field-glass in all that great throng were
fastened upon it, with awe-struck interest--the insurgents rejoicing;
the soldiers perplexed. Nearer and nearer it comes.
Now it pauses right over the tall building; it begins to descend,
like a sea-gull about to settle in the waves. Now it is but a short
distance above the roof. I could see against the bright sky the
gossamer traces of a rope ladder, falling down from the ship to the
roof. The men below take hold of it and steady it. A man descends.
Something about him glitters in the rising sun. He is probably an
officer. He reaches the roof. They bow and shake hands. I can see him
wave his hand to those above him. A line of men descend; they
disappear in the building; they reappear; they mount the ladder;
again and again they come and go.
"They are removing the treasure," I explain to our party, gathering
around me.
Then the officer shakes hands again with the men on the roof; they
bow to each other; he reascends the ladder; the air-ship rises in the
air, higher and higher, like an eagle regaining its element; and away
it sails, back into the west.
An age of bribery terminates in one colossal crime of corruption!
I can see the officers gathering in groups and taking counsel
together. They are alarmed. Then they write. They must tell the
Oligarchy of this singular scene, and their suspicions, and put them
on their guard. There is danger in the air. In a moment orderlies
dash down the street in headlong race, bearing dispatches. In a
little while they come back, hurrying, agitated. I took to the north.
I can see a black line across the street. It is a high barricade. It
has been quietly constructed while the fight raged. And beyond, far
as my eyes can penetrate, there are dark masses of armed men.
The orderlies report--there is movement--agitation. I can see the
imperious motions of an officer. I can read the signs. He is saying,
"Back--back--for your lives! Break out through the side streets!"
They rush away; they divide; into every street they turn. Alas! in a
few minutes, like wounded birds, they come trailing back. There is no
outlet. Every street is blockaded, barricaded, and filled with huge
masses of men. _The rat-trap has another rat-trap outside of it!_
The Oligarchy will wait long for those dispatches. They will never
read them this side of eternity. The pear has ripened. The inevitable
has come. The world is about to shake off its masters.
There is dead silence. Why should the military renew the fight in the
midst of the awful doubt that rests upon their souls?
Ah! we will soon know the best or worst; for, far away to the west,
dark, portentous as a thundercloud--spread out like the wings of
mighty armies--moving like a Fate over the bright sky, comes on the
vast array of the Demons.
"Will they be faithful to their bargain?" I ask myself; "or will old
loyalty and faith to their masters rise up in their hearts?"
No, no, it is a rotten age. Corruption sticks faster than love.
On they come! Thousands of them. They swoop, they circle; they pause
above the insurgents. The soldiers rejoice! Ah, no! No bombs fall, a
meteor of death. They separate; they move north, south, east, west;
they are above the streets packed full of the troops of the
government!
May God have mercy on them now! The sight will haunt me to my dying
day. I can see, like a great black rain of gigantic drops, the lines
of the falling bombs against the clear blue sky.
And, oh, my God! what a scene below, in those close-packed streets,
among those gaily dressed multitudes! The dreadful astonishment! The
crash--the bang--the explosions; the uproar, the confusion; and, most
horrible of all, the inevitable, invisible death by the poison.
The line of the barricade is alive with fire. With my glass I can
almost see the dynamite bullets exploding in the soldiers, tearing
them to pieces, like internal volcanoes.
An awful terror is upon them. They surge backward and forward; then
they rush headlong down the streets. The farther barricades open upon
them a hail of death; and the dark shadows above--so well named
Demons--slide slowly after them; and drop, drop, drop, the deadly
missiles fall again among them.
Back they surge. The poison is growing thicker. They scream for
mercy; they throw away their guns; they are panic-stricken. They
break open the doors of houses and hide themselves. But even here the
devilish plan of Prince Cabano is followed out to the very letter.
The triumphant mob pour in through the back yards; and they bayonet
the soldiers under beds, or in closets, or in cellars; or toss them,
alive and shrieking, from windows or roofs, down into the deadly gulf
below.
And still the bombs drop and crash, and drop and crash; and the
barricades are furnaces of living fire. The dead lie in heaps and
layers in the invisible, pernicious poison.
But, lo! the fire slackens; the bombs cease to fall; only now and
then a victim flies out of the houses, cast into death. There is
nothing left to shoot at. The grand army of the Plutocracy is
annihilated; it is not.
"The Demons" moved slowly off. They had earned their money. The
Mamelukes of the Air had turned the tables upon the Sultan. They
retired to their armory, doubtless to divide the fifty millions
equitably between them.
The mob stood still for a few minutes. They could scarcely realize
that they were at last masters of the city. But quickly a full sense
of all that their tremendous victory signified dawned upon them. The
city lay prostrate, chained, waiting to be seized upon.