Chapter 32

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_ CHAPTER XXXII

It was the eve of the reopening of Parliament. Maraton, who had been absent from London--no one knew where--during the last six weeks, had suddenly reappeared. Once more he had invited the committee of the Labour Party to meet at his house. His invitation was accepted, but it was obvious that this time their attitude towards the man who welcomed them was one of declared and pronounced hostility. Graveling was there, with sullen, evil face. He made no attempt to shake hands with Maraton, and he sat at the table provided for them with folded arms and dour, uncompromising aspect. Dale came late and he, too, greeted Maraton with bluff unfriendliness. Borden's attitude was non-committal. Weavel shook hands, but his frown and manner were portentous. Culvain, the diplomat of the party, was quiet and reserved. David Ross alone had never lost his attitude of unwavering fidelity. He sat at Maraton's left hand, his head a little drooped, his eyes almost hidden beneath his shaggy grey eyebrows, his lower lip protuberant. He had, somehow, the air of a guarding dog, ready to spring into bitter words if his master were touched.

"Gentlemen," Maraton began, when at last they were all assembled, "I have asked you, the committee who were appointed to meet me on my arrival England, to meet me once more here on the eve of the reopening of Parliament."

There was a grim silence. No one spoke. Their general attitude was one of suspicious waiting.

"You all know," Maraton went on, "with what ideas I first came to England. I found, however, that circumstances here were in many respects different from anything I had imagined. You all know that I modified my plans. I decided to adopt a middle course."

"A seat in Parliament," Graveling muttered, "and a place at the Prime Minister's dinner table."

"For some reason or other," Maraton continued, unruffled, "my coming into Parliament seemed obnoxious to Mr. Dale and most of you. I decided in favour of that course, however, because the offer made me by Mr. Foley was one which, in the interests of the people, I could not refuse. Mr. Foley has done his best to keep to the terms of his compact with me. Perhaps I ought to say that he has kept to it. The successful termination of the Lancashire strike is due entirely to his efforts. The prolongation of the Sheffield strike is in no way his fault. The blind stupidity of the masters was too much even for him. The position has developed very much as I feared it might. You cannot make employers see reason by Act of Parliament. Mr. Foley kept his word. He has been on the side of the men throughout this struggle. He has used every atom of influence he possesses to compel the employers to give in. Temporarily he has failed--only temporarily, mind, for a Bill will be introduced into Parliament during this session which will very much alter the position of the employers. But this partial failure has convinced me of one thing. This is too law-abiding a country for compromises. For the last six weeks I have been travelling on the Continent. I have realised how splendidly Labour has emancipated itself there compared to its slow progress in this country. From town to town in northern Europe I passed, and found the great industries of the various districts in the hands of a composite body of men, embracing the boy learning the simplest machine and the financier in the office, every man there working like a single part of one huge machine, each for the profit of the whole. A genuine scheme of profit-sharing is there being successfully carried out. It is owing to this visit, and the convictions which have come to me from the same, that I have called you together to-day."

"You invited us," Peter Dale remarked deliberately, "and here we are. As to what good's likely to come of our meeting, that's another matter. There's no denying the fact that we've not been able to work together up till now, and whether we shall in the future is by no means clear."

"I am sorry to hear you say so, Mr. Dale," Maraton declared. "I only hope that before you go you will have changed your mind."

"Not in the least likely, that I can see," Peter Dale retorted. "For my part, I can't reckon up what you want with us. You've gone into the House on your own and you've chosen to sit in a place by yourself. You've tried your best to manage things according to your own way of thinking, without us. Now, all of a sudden, you invite us here. I wonder whether this has anything to do with it."

With some deliberation, Peter Dale produced from his pocket a letter, which he smoothed out upon the table before him. He had the air of a man who prepares a bombshell. Maraton stretched out his hand toward it.

"Is that for me?" he asked.

Peter Dale kept his fingers upon it.

"Its contents concern you," he announced. "I'll read it, if you'll be so good as to listen. Came as a bit of a shock to us, I must confess."

"Anonymous?" Maraton murmured.

"If its contents are untrue," Peter Dale said, "you will be able to contradict them. With your kind permission, then. Listen, everybody:

"'Dear Sir:

"'The following facts concerning a recent addition to the ranks of your Party should, I think, be of some interest to you.

"'The proper name of Mr. Maraton is Mr. Maraton Lawes.

"'Mr. Maraton Lawes and a younger brother were once the possessors of the world-famous Lawes Oil Springs, and are now the principal shareholders in the Lawes Oil Company.

"'The person in question is a millionaire.

"'A Socialist millionaire who conceals the fact of his wealth and keeps his purse closed, is a person, I think, open to criticism.

"'A sketch of Mr. Maraton Lawes' career will shortly appear in an evening paper.'"

Maraton listened without change of countenance. All eyes were turned upon him.

"Well?" he enquired nonchalantly.

"Is this true?" Peter Dale demanded.

Maraton inclined his head.

"The writer," he said, "a man named Beldeman, I am sure has been singularly moderate in his statements. I have been expecting the article to appear for some time."

They were all of them apparently afflicted with a curious combination of emotions. They were angry, and yet--with the exception of Graveling--there was beneath their anger some evidence of that curious respect for wealth prevalent amongst their order. They looked at Maraton with a new interest.

"A millionaire!" Peter Dale exclaimed impressively. "You admit it! You--a Socialist--a people's man, as you've called yourself! And never a word to one of us! Never a copper of your money to the Party! I repeat it--not one copper have we seen!"

The man's cheeks were flushed with anger, his brows lowered. Something of his indignation was reflected in the faces of all of them--momentarily a queer sort of cupidity seemed to have stolen into their expressions. Maraton shrugged his shoulders slightly.

"Why should I subscribe to your Party funds?" he asked calmly. "Some of you do good work, no doubt, and yet there is no such destroyer of good work as money. Work, individual effort, unselfish enthusiasm, are the torches which should light on your cause. Money would only serve the purpose of a slow poison amongst you."

"Prattle!" Abraham Weavel muttered.

"Rot!" Peter Dale agreed. "Just another question, Mr. Maraton: Why have you kept this secret from us?"

"I will make a statement," Maraton replied coolly. "Perhaps it will save needless questions. My money is derived from oil springs. I prospected for them myself, and I have had to fight for them. It was in wilder days than you know of here. I have a younger brother, or rather a half-brother, whom I was sorry to see over here the other day, who is my partner. My average profits are twenty-eight thousand pounds a year. Ten thousand pounds goes to the support of a children's home in New York; the remainder is distributed in other directions amongst institutions for the rescue of children. Five thousand a year I keep for myself."

"Five thousand a year!" Peter Dale gasped indignantly. "Did you hear that?" he added, turning to the others.

"Four hundred a year and a hundred and fifty from subscriptions, and that's every penny I have to bring up seven children upon," Weavel declared with disgust.

"And mine's less than that, and the subscriptions falling off," Borden grunted.

"What sort of a Socialist is a man with five thousand a year who keeps his pockets tightly buttoned up, I should like to know?" Graveling exclaimed angrily.

Maraton smiled.

"You have common sense, I am sure, all of you," he said. "In fact, no one could possibly accuse you of being dreamers. Every effort of my life will be devoted towards the promulgation of my beliefs, absolutely without regard to my pecuniary position. I admit that the possession of wealth is contrary to the principles of life which I should like to see established. Still, until conditions alter, it would be even more contrary to my principles to distribute my money in charity which I abominate, or to weaken good causes by unwholesome and unearned contributions to them. Shall we now proceed to the subject of our discussion?"

"What is it, anyway?" Peter Dale demanded gruffly. "Do you find that after being so plaguey independent you need our help after all? Is that what it is?"

"I want no one's help," Maraton replied quietly. "I only want to give you this earliest notice because, in your way, you do represent the people--that it is my intention to revert to my first ideas. I have arranged a tour in the potteries next week. I go straight on to Newcastle, and from there to Glasgow. I intend to preach a universal strike. I intend, if I can, to bring the shipbuilders, the coalminers, the dockers, the railroad men, out on strike, while the Sheffield trouble is as yet unsolved. Whatever may come of it, I intend that the Government of this country shall realise how much their prosperity is dependent upon the people's will."

There was a little murmur. Peter Dale, who had filled his pipe, was puffing away steadily.

"Look here," he said slowly, "Newcastle's my job."

"Is it?" Maraton replied. "There are a million and a quarter of miners to be considered. You may be the representative of a few of them. I am not sure that in this matter you represent their wishes, if you are for peace. I am going to see."

"As for the potteries," Mr. Borden declared, "a strike there's overdue, and that's certain, but if all the others are going to strike at the same time, why, what's the good of it? The Unions can't stand it."

"We have tried striking piecemeal," Maraton pointed out. "It doesn't seem to me that it's a success. What is called the Government here can deal with one strike at a time. They've soldiers enough, and law enough, for that. They haven't for a universal strike."

Peter Dale struck the table with his clenched fist. His expression was grim and his tone truculent.

"What I say is this," he pronounced. "I'm dead against any interference from outsiders. If I think a strike's good for my people, well, I'll blow the whistle. If you're for Newcastle next week, Mr. Maraton, so am I. If you're for preaching a strike, well, I'm for preaching against it."

"Hear, hear!" Graveling exclaimed. "I'm with you."

Maraton smiled a little bitterly.

"As you will, Mr. Dale," he replied. "But remember, you'll have to seek another constituency next time you want to come into Parliament. Do be reasonable," he went on. "Do you suppose the people will listen to you preaching peace and contentment? They'll whip you out of the town."

"It's the carpet-bagger that will have to go first!" Dale declared vigorously. "There's no two ways about that."

Maraton sighed.

"Sometimes," he said, looking around at them, "I feel that it must be my fault that there has never been any sympathy between us. Sometimes I am sure that it is yours. Don't you ever look a little way beyond the actual wants of your own constituents? Don't you ever peer over the edge and realise that the real cause of the people is no local matter? It is a great blow for their freedom, this which I mean to strike. I'd like to have had you all with me. It's a huge responsibility for one."

"It's revolution," Culvain muttered. "You may call that a responsibility, indeed. Who's going to feed the people? Who's going to keep them from pillaging and rioting?"

"No one," Maraton replied quietly. "A revolution is inevitable. Perhaps after that we may have to face the coming of a foreign enemy. And yet, even with this contingency in view, I want you to ask yourselves: What have the people to lose? Those who will suffer by anything that could possibly happen, will be the wealthy. From those who have not, nothing can be taken. What I prophesy is that in the next phase of our history, a new era will dawn. Our industries will be re-established upon different lines. The loss entailed by the revolution, by the dislocating of all our industries, will fall upon the people who are able and who deserve to pay for it."

There was a moment's grim silence. Then David Ross suddenly lifted his head.

"It's a great blow!" he cried. "It's the hand of the Lord falling upon the land, long overdue--too long overdue. The man's right! This people have had a century to set their house in order. The warning has been in their ears long enough. The thunder has muttered so long, it's time the storm should break. Let ruin come, I say!"

"You can talk any silly nonsense you like, David Ross," Dale declared angrily, "but what I say is that we are listening to the most dangerous stuff any man ever spouted. What's to become of us, I'd like to know, with a revolution in the country?"

"You would probably lose your jobs," Maraton answered calmly. "What does it matter? There are others to follow you. The first whom the people will turn upon will be those who have pulled down the pillars. Our names will be hated by every one of them. What does it matter? It is for their good."

Peter Dale doubled up his fist and once more he smote the table before him.

"I am dead against you, Maraton," he announced. "Put that in your pipe and smoke it. If you go to Newcastle, I go there to fight you. If you go to any of the places in this country represented by us, our Member will be there to fight. We are in Parliament to do our best for the people we represent, bit by bit as we can. We are not there to plunge the country into a revolution and run the risk of a foreign invasion. There isn't one of us Englishmen here who'll agree with you or side with you for one moment."

"Hear, hear!" they all echoed.

"Not one," Graveling interposed, "and for my part, I go further. I say that the man who stands there and talks about the risk of a foreign invasion like that, is no Englishman. I call him a traitor, and if the thing comes he speaks of, may he be hung from the nearest lamp-post! That's all I've got to say."

Maraton opened his lips and closed them again. He looked slowly down that wall of blank, unsympathetic faces and he merely shrugged his shoulders. Words were wasted upon them.

"Very well, gentlemen," he said, "let it be war. Perhaps we'd better let this be the end of our deliberations."

Graveling rose slowly to his feet. His face was filled with evil things. He pointed to Maraton.

"There's a word more to be spoken!" he exclaimed. "There's more behind this scheme of Maraton's than he's willing to have us understand! It looks to me and it sounds to me like a piece of dirty, underhand business. I'll ask you a question, Maraton. Were you at the Ritz Hotel one night about two months ago, with the ambassador of a foreign a country?"

"I was," Maraton admitted coolly.

Graveling looked around with a little cry of triumph.

"It's a plot, this; nothing more nor less than a plot!" he declared vigorously. "What sort of an Englishman does he call himself, I wonder? It's the foreigners that are at the bottom of the lot of it! They want our trade, they'd be glad of our country. They've bribed this man Maraton to get it without the trouble of fighting for it, even!"

Maraton moved towards the door. Holding it open, he turned and faced them.

"Before I came," he said, "I hoped that you might be men. I find you just the usual sort of pigmies. You call yourselves people's men! You haven't mastered the elementary truths of your religion. What's England, or France, or any other country in the world, by the side of humanity? Be off! I'll go my own way. Go yours, and take your little tinsel of jingoism with you. Whenever you want to fight me, I shall be ready."

"And fight you we shall," Peter Dale thundered, "mark you that! There's limits, even to us. The Government of this country mayn't be all it should be, but, after all, it's our English Government, and there is a point at which every man has to support it. The law is the law, and so you may find out, my friend!"

They filed out. Maraton closed the door after them. He was alone. He threw open the window to get rid of the odour of tobacco smoke which still hung about. The echo of their raucous voices seemed still in the air. These were the men who should have been his friends and associates! These were the men to whom he had the right to look for sympathy! They treated him like a dangerous lunatic. Their own small interests, their own small careers were threatened, and they were up in arms without a moment's hesitation. Not one of them had made the slightest attempt to see the whole truth. The word "revolution" had terrified them. The approach of a crisis had driven their thoughts into one narrow focus: what would it mean for them?

He resumed his seat. The empty chairs pushed back seemed, somehow or other, allegorical. He was alone. The man for whose friendship he had indeed felt some desire, the man who had opened his hands and heart to him--Stephen Foley--would know him henceforth no more. He drew his thoughts resolutely away from that side of his life, closed his ears to the music which beat there, crushed down the fancies which sprang up so easily if ever he relaxed his hold upon his will. He was lonely; for the first time in his life, perhaps, intensely lonely. In all the country there was scarcely a human being who would not soon look upon him as a madman. What did one live for, after all? Just to continue the dull, hopeless struggle--to fight without hope of reward, to fight with oneself as well as with the world?

The door was opened softly. Julia came in. Perhaps she guessed from his attitude something of his trouble, for she moved at once to his side.

"They have gone?" she asked.

"They have gone," he admitted.

She sighed.

"I shall not ask you anything," she said, "because I know. Pigs of men--pigs with their noses to the ground! How can they lift their heads! You could not make them understand!"

"I scarcely tried," he confessed. "They have found out, for one thing, that I am wealthy, a fact that does not concern them in the least, and they accused me of it as though it were a crime. It was all so hopeless. You cannot make men understand who have not the capacity for understanding. You cannot make the blind see. They even reminded me that they were Englishmen. They talked the usual rubbish about conquest and foreign enemies and patriotism."

"Clods!" she muttered. "But you?"

She sat down beside him, her eyes full of light. She laid her hands boldly upon his.

"You will not let yourself be discouraged?" she I pleaded. "Remember that even if you are alone in the world, you are right. You fight without hope of reward, without hope of appreciation. You will be the enemy of every one, and yet you know in your heart that you have the truth. You know it, and I know it, and Aaron knows it, and David Ross believes it. There are millions of others, if you could only find them, who understand, too--men too great to come out from their studies and talk claptrap to the mob. There are other people in the world who understand, who will sympathise. What does it matter that you cannot hear their spoken voices? And we--well, you know about us."

Her voice was almost a caress, the loneliness in his heart was so intense.

"Oh, you know about us!" she continued. "I--oh, I am your slave! And Aaron! We believe, we understand. There isn't anything in this world," she went on, with a little sob, "there isn't anything I wouldn't gladly do to help you! If only one could help!"

He returned very gently the pressure of her burning fingers. She drew his eyes towards hers, and he was startled to see in those few minutes how beautiful she was. There was inspiration in her splendidly modelled face--the high forehead, the eyes brilliantly clear, kindled now with the light of enthusiasm and all the softer burning of her exquisite sympathy. Her lips--full and red they seemed--were slightly parted. She was breathing quickly, like one who has run a race.

"Oh, dear master," she whispered--"let me call you that--don't, even for a moment, be faint-hearted!"

The door was suddenly thrown open. Selingman entered, an enormous bunch of roses in his hand, a green hat on the back of his head.

"Faint-hearted?" he exclaimed. "What a word! Who is faint-hearted? Julia, I have brought you flowers. You would have to kiss rue for them if he were not here. Don't glower at me. Every one kisses me. Great ladies would if I asked them to. That's the best of being a genius. Lord, what a wreck he looks! What's wrong with you, man? I know! I met them at the corner of the street. There was the rat-faced fellow with the red tie, and the miner--Labour Members, they call themselves. I would like to see them with a spade! Have you been trying to get at their brains, Maraton? What's that to make a man like you depressed? Did you think they had any? Did you think you could draw a single spark of fire out of dull pap like that? Bah!"

Julia was moving quietly about the room, putting the flowers in water. Aaron had slipped in and was seated before his desk. Selingman, his broad face set suddenly into hard lines, plumped himself into the chair which Peter Dale had occupied.

"Man alive, lift your head--lift your head to the skies!" he ordered. "You're the biggest man in this country. Will you treat the prick of a pin like a mortal wound? What did you expect from them? Lord Almighty! . . . I've packed my bag. I'm ready for the road. Two hundred and fifty pounds a time from the _Daily Oracle_ for thumbnail sketches of the Human Firebrand! Lord, what is any one depressed for in this country! It's chock-full of humour. If I lived here long, I should be fat."

He looked downward at his figure with complacency. Julia laughed softly.

"Aren't you fat now?" she asked.

"Immense," he confessed, "but it's nothing to what I could be. It agrees with me," he went on. "You see, I have learnt the art of being satisfied with myself. I know what I am. I am content. That is where you, my friend Maraton, need to grow a little older. Oh, you are great enough, great enough if you only knew it! Even Maxendorf admits that, and he told me frankly he's disappointed in you. Don't sit there like a dumb figure any longer. We are all coming with you, aren't we? I have brought my car over from Belgium. It is a caravan. It will hold us all--Aaron, too. Let us start; let us get out of this accursed city. Where is the first move?"

"We can't leave tonight," Maraton said. "I am addressing a meeting of the representatives of the Amalgamated Railway Workers--that is, if Peter Dale doesn't manage to stop it. He'll do his best."

"He won't succeed," Aaron declared eagerly. "I saw Ernshaw two hours ago. They're on to Peter Dale and his move. Do you know why Peter Dale was late here this afternoon? He'd been to Downing Street. I heard. Foley's lost you, but he's holding on to the Labour Party. He's pitting the Labour Party against you in the country." Selingman laughed heartily.

"He's got it!" he exclaimed. "That's the scheme. I am all for a fight, spoiling for it. Fighting and eating are the grandest things in the world! What time is the meeting?"

"Seven o'clock," Maraton replied.

"Two hours we will give you," Selingman continued. "Nine o'clock, a little restaurant I know in the West End, the four of us before we start. We will do ourselves well."

"Before I leave London," Maraton said, "I must see Maxendorf once more."

Selingman stroked his face thoughtfully.

"Your risk," he remarked. "Don't you let these chaps think you are mixed up with Maxendorf."

"I must see Maxendorf," Maraton insisted. "When I leave London to-night, the die is cast. I have cut myself adrift from everything in life. I shall make enemies with every class of society. There must be one word more pass between Maxendorf and me before I hold up the torch."

"He's got it," Selingman declared. "The trick is on him already. Maxendorf he shall see. I will arrange a meeting somewhere--not at the hotel. Miss Julia, write down this address. This is where we all meet at nine. Half-past six now. I will take you round to your meeting, Maraton. Do you want any papers?"

"I want no papers," Maraton answered. "I speak to these men to-night as I shall speak to them in the north. I take no papers from London with me, no figures, nothing. It is just the things I see I want to tell them."

Selingman nodded.

"You shall speak immortal words," he declared. "And I--I am the one man in the world to transcribe them, to write in the background, to give them colour and point. What giants we are, Maraton--you with your stream of words, and I with my pen! Miss Julia," he added, "remember that you are to be our inspiration as well as my secretary. Put on your prettiest clothes to-night. It is our last holiday."

She looked at him coldly.

"I do not wear pretty clothes," she said.

"Little fool!" he exclaimed. "Just because you've the big things beating in your brain, you'd like to close your eyes to the fact that your sex is the most wonderful thing on God's earth. That's the worst of a woman. If ever she begins to think seriously, she does her hair in a lump, changes silk for cotton, forgets her corsets, and leaves off ribbons. Silly, silly child!" he went on, shaking his forefinger at her. "I tell you women have done their greatest work in the world when their brains have been covered with a pretty hat. . . . There she goes, he growled," as she left the room. "Thinks I'm a flippant old windbag, I know. And I'm not. Why don't you fall in love with her, Maraton? It would be the making of you. Even a prophet needs relaxation. She is yours, body and soul. One can tell it with every sentence she speaks. And she is for the cause," he concluded with a graver note in his tone. "She has found the fire somewhere. There were women like her who held Robespierre's hand."

Maraton glanced up. Selingman was leaning forward and his eyes were fixed steadily upon his friend.

"I was afraid, just a little afraid," he said slowly, "of the other woman. I am glad she didn't count enough. Women are the very devil sometimes when they come between us and the right thing!" _

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