Oddly enough, while the flight from the Council prison, the great crowd
in the hall, and the attack of the red police upon the swarming people
were clearly present in his mind, it cost him an effort to piece in his
awakening and to revive the meditative interval of the Silent Rooms. At
first his memory leapt these things and took him back to the cascade at
Pentargen quivering in the wind, and all the sombre splendours of the
sunlit Cornish coast. The contrast touched everything with unreality. And
then the gap filled, and he began to comprehend his position.
It was no longer absolutely a riddle, as it had been in the Silent Rooms.
At least he had the strange, bare outline now. He was in some way the
owner of the world, and great political parties were fighting to possess
him. On the one hand was the Council, with its red police, set
resolutely, it seemed, on the usurpation of his property and perhaps his
murder; on the other, the revolution that had liberated him, with this
unseen "Ostrog" as its leader. And the whole of this gigantic city was
convulsed by their struggle. Frantic development of his world! "I do not
understand," he cried. "I do not understand!"
He had slipped out between the contending parties into this liberty of
the twilight. What would happen next? What was happening? He figured the
red-clad men as busily hunting him, driving the black-badged
revolutionists before them.
At any rate chance had given him a breathing space.
Pages:
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122