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The Sleeper Awakes Chapter 12 - Ostrog · The H. G. Wells Library

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Speaker 1: Chapter twelve of The Sleeper Awakes. This is a LibriVox recording.
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Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
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Speaker 1: by Zachary Brewster Geiss. The Sleeper Awakes by H. G. Wells,
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Speaker 1: Chapter twelve Ostrog. Graham could now take a clearer view
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Speaker 1: of his position. For a long time yet he wandered.
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Speaker 1: But after the talk of the old Man, his discovery
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Speaker 1: of this ostrog was clear in his mind. As the
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Speaker 1: final inevitable decision. One thing was evident. Those who were
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Speaker 1: at the headquarters of the revolt had succeeded very admirably
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Speaker 1: in suppressing the fact of his disappearance. But every moment
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Speaker 1: he expected to hear the report of his death or
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Speaker 1: of his recapture by the council. Presently a man stopped
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Speaker 1: before him. Have you heard, he said, no, said Graham,
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Speaker 1: starting near a dozen, said the man a dozen men,
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Speaker 1: and hurried on. A number of men and a girl
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Speaker 1: passed in the darkness, gesticulating and shouting. Capitulated, given up
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Speaker 1: a dozen of men, two dozen of men. Ostrog, Hurrah, Ostrog, Hurrah.
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Speaker 1: These cries receded, became indistinct. Other shouting men followed. For
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Speaker 1: a time, his attention was absorbed in the fragments of
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Speaker 1: speech he heard. He had a doubt whether all were
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Speaker 1: speaking English. Scraps floated to him, scraps like pigeon, English
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Speaker 1: like nigger, dialect, blurred and mangled distortions. He dared to
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Speaker 1: cost no one with questions. The impressions the people gave
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Speaker 1: him jarred altogether with his preconceptions of the struggle, and
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Speaker 1: confirmed the old man's faith in ostrog It was only
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Speaker 1: slowly he could bring himself to believe that all these
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Speaker 1: people were rejoicing at the defeat of the council, That
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Speaker 1: the council, which had pursued him with such power and vigor,
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Speaker 1: was after all the weaker of the two sides in conflict.
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Speaker 1: And if that was so, how did it affect him?
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Speaker 1: Several times he hesitated on the verge of fundamental questions.
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Speaker 1: Once he turned and walked for a long way after
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Speaker 1: a little man of rotund inviting outline, but he was
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Speaker 1: unable to master confidence to address him. It was only
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Speaker 1: slowly that it came to him that he might ask
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Speaker 1: for the wind vane offices. Whatever the wind vaned offices
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Speaker 1: might be. His first inquiry simply resulted in a direction
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Speaker 1: to go on towards Westminster. His second led to the
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Speaker 1: discovery of a short cut in which he was speedily lost.
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Speaker 1: He was told to leave the ways to which he
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Speaker 1: had hitherto confined himself, knowing no other means of transit,
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Speaker 1: and to plunge down one of the middle staircases into
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Speaker 1: the blackness of a cross way. Thereupon came some trivial adventures,
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Speaker 1: chief of these an ambiguous encounter with a gruff voiced,
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Speaker 1: invisible creature, speaking in a strange dialect that seemed at
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Speaker 1: first a strange tongue, a thick flow of speech, with
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Speaker 1: the drifting corpses of English words therein the dialect of
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Speaker 1: the latter day vile. Then another voice drew near, a
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Speaker 1: girl's voice, singing trala lah trella la. She spoke to Graham,
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Speaker 1: her English touch with something of the same quality. She
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Speaker 1: professed to have lost her sister. She blundered needlessly into him.
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Speaker 1: He thought, caught hold of him and laughed, But a
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Speaker 1: word of vague remonstrance sent her into the unseen again.
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Speaker 1: The sounds about him increased, stumbling people past him, speaking excitedly.
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Speaker 1: They have surrendered the council. Surely not the council, they
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Speaker 1: are saying. So in the ways the passage seemed wider.
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Speaker 1: Suddenly the wall fell away. He was in a great space,
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Speaker 1: and people were stirring remotely. He inquired his way of
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Speaker 1: an indistinct figure, strike straight across, said a woman's voice.
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Speaker 1: He left his guiding wall, and in a moment had
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Speaker 1: stumbled against a little table, on which were utensils of glass.
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Speaker 1: Graham's eyes, now attuned to darkness, made out a long
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Speaker 1: vista with tables on either side. He went down this.
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Speaker 1: At one or two of the tables, he heard a
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Speaker 1: clang of glass and a sound of eating. There were
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Speaker 1: people then, cool enough to dine or daring enough to
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Speaker 1: steal a meal in spite of social convulsion and darkness.
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Speaker 1: Far off and high up, he presently saw pallid light
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Speaker 1: of a semicircular shape. As he approached this, a black
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Speaker 1: edge came up and hid it. He stumbled at steps
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Speaker 1: and found himself in a gallery. He heard a sobbing
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Speaker 1: and found two scared little girls crouched by a railing.
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Speaker 1: These children became silent at the near sound of feet.
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Speaker 1: He tried to console them, but they were very still
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Speaker 1: until he left them. Then as he receded, he could
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Speaker 1: hear them sobbing again. Presently he found himself at the
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Speaker 1: foot of a staircase and near a wide opening. He
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Speaker 1: saw a dim twilight above this, and ascended out of
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Speaker 1: the blackness into a street of moving ways. Again along
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Speaker 1: this a disorderly swarm of people marked shouting. They were
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Speaker 1: singing snatches of the song of the Revolt, most of
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Speaker 1: them out of tune. Here and there torches flared, creating
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Speaker 1: brief hysterical shadows. He asked his way, and was twice
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Speaker 1: puzzled by that same thick dialect. His third attempt won
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Speaker 1: in answer, he could understand he was two miles from
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Speaker 1: the wind Vane offices in Westminster, but the way was
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Speaker 1: easy to follow. When at last he did a aproached
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Speaker 1: the district of the wind Vane offices, it seemed to him,
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Speaker 1: from the cheering processions that came marching along the ways,
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Speaker 1: from the tumult of rejoicing, and finally from the restoration
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Speaker 1: of the lighting of the city, that the overthrow of
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Speaker 1: the Council must already be accomplished. And still no news
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Speaker 1: of his absence came to his ears. The re illumination
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Speaker 1: of the city came with startling abruptness. Suddenly he stood
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Speaker 1: blinking All about him, men halted, dazzled, and the world
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Speaker 1: was incandescent. The light found him already upon the outskirts
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Speaker 1: of the excited crowds that choked the ways near the
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Speaker 1: wind Vane offices, and the sense of visibility and exposure
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Speaker 1: that came with it turned his colorless intention of joining
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Speaker 1: ostrog to a keen anxiety. For a time he was jostled, obstructed,
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Speaker 1: and endangered by men horse and weary with cheering his name,
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Speaker 1: some of them bandaged and bloody in his cause. The
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Speaker 1: frontage of the wind Vane offices was illuminated by some
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Speaker 1: moving picture, but what it was he could not see, because,
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Speaker 1: in spite of his strenuous attempts, the density of the
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Speaker 1: crowd prevented him approaching it. From the fragments of speech
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Speaker 1: he caught, he judged it conveyed news of the fighting
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Speaker 1: about the council House. Ignorance and indecision made him slow
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Speaker 1: and ineffective in his movements. For a time he could
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Speaker 1: not conceive how he was to get within the unbroken
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Speaker 1: facade of this place. He made his way slowly into
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Speaker 1: the midst of this mass of people, until he realized
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Speaker 1: that the descending staircase of the central way led to
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Speaker 1: the interior of the buildings. This gave him a goal,
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Speaker 1: but the crowding in the central path was so dense
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Speaker 1: that it was long before he could reach it, and
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Speaker 1: even then he encountered intricate obstruction, and had an hour
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Speaker 1: of vivid argument, first in this guard room and then
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Speaker 1: in that before he could get a note taken to
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Speaker 1: the one man of all men who was most eager
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Speaker 1: to see him. His story was laughed to scorn at
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Speaker 1: one place, and wiser for that. When at last he
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Speaker 1: reached a second stairway, he professed simply to have news
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Speaker 1: of extraordinary importance. For ostrog what it was, he would
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Speaker 1: not say. They sent his note reluctantly. For a long
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Speaker 1: time he waited an the little room at the foot
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Speaker 1: of the lift shaft, and thither at last came Lincoln, eager, apologetic, astonished,
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Speaker 1: He stopped in the doorway, scrutinizing. Graham, then rushed forward effusively. Yes,
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Speaker 1: he cried, it is you, and you are not dead.
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Speaker 1: Graham made a brief explanation. My brother is waiting, explained Lincoln.
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Speaker 1: He is alone in the wind Vane offices. We feared
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Speaker 1: you had been killed in the theater. He doubted, and
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Speaker 1: things are very urgent still in spite of what we
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Speaker 1: are telling them there or he would have come to you.
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Speaker 1: They ascended a lift, passed along a narrow passage, crossed
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Speaker 1: a great hall empty safe for two hurrying messengers, and
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Speaker 1: entered a comparatively little room whose only furniture was a
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Speaker 1: long settee and a large oval disc of cloudy, shifting gray,
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Speaker 1: hung by cables from the wall. There, Lincoln left Graham
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Speaker 1: for a space, and he remained alone, without understanding the
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Speaker 1: smoky shapes that drove slowly across this disk. His attention
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Speaker 1: was arrested by a sound that began abruptly. It was cheering,
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Speaker 1: the frantic cheering of a vast but very remote crowd,
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Speaker 1: a roaring exultation. This ended as sharply as it had begun,
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Speaker 1: like a sound heard between the opening and shutting of
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Speaker 1: a door. In the outer room. Was a noise of
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Speaker 1: hurrying steps and a melodious clinking, as if a loose
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Speaker 1: chain was running over the teeth of a wheel. Then
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Speaker 1: he heard the voice of a woman, the rustle of
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Speaker 1: unseen garments. It is oestroc. He heard her say. A
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Speaker 1: little bell rang fitfully, and then everything was still again.
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Speaker 1: Presently came voices, footsteps, and movement without the footsteps of
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Speaker 1: some one person detached itself from the other sounds and
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Speaker 1: drew near firm, evenly measured steps. The curtain lifted slowly.
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Speaker 1: A tall, white haired man clad in garments of cream
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Speaker 1: colored silk appeared regarding Graham from under his raised arm.
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Speaker 1: For a moment, the white form remained holding the curtain,
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Speaker 1: then dropped it and stood before it. Graham's first impression
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Speaker 1: was of a very broad forehead, very pale blue eyes,
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Speaker 1: deep sunken under white brows, an aquiline nose, and a
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Speaker 1: heavily lined, resolute mouth. The folds of flesh over the eyes,
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Speaker 1: the drooping of the corners of the mouth contradicted the
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Speaker 1: upright bearing, and said the man was old. Graham rose
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Speaker 1: to his feet instinctively, and for a moment the two
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Speaker 1: men stood in silence regarding each other. You are Ostrog,
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Speaker 1: said Graham. I am Ostrog, the boss, so I am called.
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Speaker 1: Graham felt the inconvenience of the silence. I have to
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Speaker 1: thank you. Chiefly I understand for my safety, he said.
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Speaker 1: Presently we were afraid you were killed, said Ostrog, or
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Speaker 1: sent to sleep again forever. We have been doing everything
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Speaker 1: to keep our secret, the secret of your disappearance. Where
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Speaker 1: have you been? How did you get here? Graham him briefly.
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Speaker 1: Ostrog listened in silence. He smiled faintly. Do you know
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Speaker 1: what I was doing when they came to tell me
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Speaker 1: you would come? How can I guess? Preparing your double?
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Speaker 1: My double, a man as like you as we could find.
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Speaker 1: We were going to hypnotize him to save him. The
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Speaker 1: difficulty of acting it was imperative. The whole of this
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Speaker 1: revolt depends on the idea that you are awake, alive,
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Speaker 1: and with us. Even now, a great multitude of people
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Speaker 1: has gathered in the theater, clamoring to see you. They
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Speaker 1: do not trust you, know, of course, something of your position,
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Speaker 1: very little, said Graham. It is like this, ostrog walked
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Speaker 1: a pace or two into the room and turned. You
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Speaker 1: are absolute owner, he said, of the world. You are
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Speaker 1: king of the earth. Your powers are limited in many
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Speaker 1: intricate ways, but you are the figurehead, the popular symbol
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Speaker 1: of government this white Council, the Council of Trustees, as
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Speaker 1: it is called. I have heard the vague outlines of
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Speaker 1: these things. I wondered. I came upon it, garrulous, old man,
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Speaker 1: I see our masses. The word comes from your days.
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Speaker 1: You know, of course, that we still have masses regard
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Speaker 1: you as our actual ruler, just as a great number
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Speaker 1: of people in your days regarded the crown as the ruler.
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Speaker 1: They are discontented, the masses all over the earth with
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Speaker 1: the rule of your trustees. For the most part, it
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Speaker 1: is the old discontent, the old quarrel of the common man,
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Speaker 1: with this commonness, the misery of work, and discipline and unfitness.
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Speaker 1: But your trustees have ruled ill in certain matters. In
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Speaker 1: the administration of the labor companies, for example, they have
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Speaker 1: been unwise. They have given endless opportunities. Already we of
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Speaker 1: the Popular Party were agitating for reforms when your waking
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Speaker 1: came came. If it had been contrived, it could not
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Speaker 1: have come more opportunely, he smiled. The public mind, making
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Speaker 1: no allowance for your years of quiescence, had already hit
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Speaker 1: on the thought of waking you. In appealing to you
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Speaker 1: and flash he indicated the outbreak by a gesture, and
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Speaker 1: Graham moved his head to show that he had understood.
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Speaker 1: The council muddled, quarreled, they always do. They could not
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Speaker 1: decide what to do with you, you know how they
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Speaker 1: imprisoned you. I see, I see, And now we win,
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Speaker 1: We win, indeed we win tonight. In five swift hours,
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Speaker 1: suddenly we struck everywhere, the wind vane people, the labor
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Speaker 1: company and its millions, burst the bonds, We got the
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Speaker 1: pull of the aeroplanes, Yes, said Graham. That was of
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Speaker 1: course essential, or they could have got away. All the
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Speaker 1: city rose, Every third man almost was in it, all
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Speaker 1: the blue, all the public services, save only just a
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Speaker 1: few aeronauts, and about half the Red Police. You were
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Speaker 1: rescued and their own police of the ways. Not half
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Speaker 1: of them could be massed at the Council House, have
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Speaker 1: been broken up, disarmed, or killed. All London is ours.
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Speaker 1: Now only the Council House remains. Half of those who
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Speaker 1: remained to them. Of the Red Police were lost in
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Speaker 1: that foolish attempt to recapture you. They lost their heads
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Speaker 1: when they lost you. They flung all they had at
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Speaker 1: the theater. We cut them off from the council house there. Truly,
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Speaker 1: tonight has been a night of victory everywhere your star
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Speaker 1: has blazed. A day ago, the White Council ruled as
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Speaker 1: it has ruled for a gross of years, for a
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Speaker 1: century and a half of years, and then with only
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Speaker 1: a little whispering, a covert arming here and there suddenly,
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Speaker 1: So I am very ignorant, said Graham. I suppose I
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Speaker 1: do not clearly understand the conditions of this fighting. If
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Speaker 1: you could explain, where is the council? Where is the fight?
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Speaker 1: Ostrog stepped across the room. Something clicked, and suddenly, save
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Speaker 1: for an oval glow, they were in darkness for a moment.
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Speaker 1: Graham was puzzled. Then he saw that the cloudy gray
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Speaker 1: disc had taken depth and color had assumed the appearance
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Speaker 1: of an oval window looking out upon a strange, unfamiliar scene.
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Speaker 1: At the first glance, he was unable to guess what
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Speaker 1: this scene might be. It was a daylight scene, the
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Speaker 1: daylight of a wintry day, gray and clear across the picture,
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Speaker 1: and half way, as it seemed, between him and the
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Speaker 1: remoter view, a stout cable of twisted white wire stretched vertically.
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Speaker 1: Then he perceived that the rows of great wind wheels.
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Speaker 1: He saw the wide intervals, the occasional gulfs of darkness
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Speaker 1: were akin to those through which he had fled from
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Speaker 1: the council House. He distinguished an orderly file of red
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Speaker 1: figures marching across an open space between files of men
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Speaker 1: in black, and realized before Ostrog spoke that he was
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Speaker 1: looking down on the upper surface of latter day London.
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Speaker 1: The overnight snows had gone. He judged that this mirror
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Speaker 1: was some modern replacement of the camera obscura, but that
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Speaker 1: matter was not explained to him. He saw that though
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Speaker 1: the file of red figures was trotting from left to right,
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Speaker 1: yet they were passing out of picture to the left.
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Speaker 1: He wondered momentarily, and then saw that the picture was
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Speaker 1: passing slowly panorama fashion across the oval. In a moment,
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Speaker 1: you will see the fighting, said Ostrog at his elbow.
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Speaker 1: Those fellows in red you notice, are prisoners. This is
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Speaker 1: the roof space of London. All the houses are practically
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Speaker 1: continuous now, the streets and public squares are covered in
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Speaker 1: the gaps and chasms of your time have disappeared. Something
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Speaker 1: out of focus obliterated half the picture. Its form suggested
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Speaker 1: a man there was a gleam of metal, a flash,
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Speaker 1: something that swept across the oval, as the eyelid of
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Speaker 1: a bird sweeps across its eyes. And the picture was
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Speaker 1: clear again. And now Graham beheld men running down among
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Speaker 1: the wind wheels, pointing weapons, from which jetted out little
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Speaker 1: smoky flashes. They swarmed thicker and thicker to the right,
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Speaker 1: gesticulating it might be they were shouting, but of that
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Speaker 1: the picture told nothing. They and the wind wheels passed
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Speaker 1: slowly and steadily across the field of the mirror. Now,
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Speaker 1: said Ostrog, comes the council House. And slowly a black
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Speaker 1: edge crept into view and gathered Graham's attention. Soon it
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Speaker 1: was no longer an edge, but a cavity, a huge
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Speaker 1: blackened space amidst the clustering edifices, and from its thin
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Speaker 1: spires of smoke rose into the pallid winter sky. Gaunt,
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Speaker 1: ruinous masses of the building, mighty truncated piers and girders,
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Speaker 1: rose dismally out of this cavernous darkness. And over these
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Speaker 1: vestiges of some splendid place, countless minute men were clambering, leaping, swarming.
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Speaker 1: This is the council House, said Ostrog. Their last stronghold,
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Speaker 1: and the fools wasted enough ammunition to hold out for
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Speaker 1: a month in blowing up the buildings all about them
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Speaker 1: to stop our attack. You heard the smash. It shattered
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Speaker 1: half the brittle glass in the city. And while he spoke,
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Speaker 1: Graham saw that beyond this area of ruins, overhanging it
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Speaker 1: and rising to a great height, was a ragged mass
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Speaker 1: of white building. This mass had been isolated by the
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Speaker 1: ruthless destruction of its surroundings. Black gaps marked the passages
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Speaker 1: the disaster had torn apart. Big holes had been slashed open,
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Speaker 1: and the decoration of their interiors showed dismally in the
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Speaker 1: wintry dawn. And down the jagged walls hung for stoons
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Speaker 1: of divided cables and twisted ends of lines and metallic rods,
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Speaker 1: And amidst all the vast details moved little red specks,
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Speaker 1: the red clothes defenders of the council. Every now and
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Speaker 1: then faint flashes illuminated the bleak shadows. At the first sight,
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Speaker 1: it seemed to Graham that an attack upon this isolated
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Speaker 1: white building was in progress. But then he perceived that
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Speaker 1: the party of the revolt was not advancing, but sheltered
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Speaker 1: amidst the colossal wreckage that encircled this last ragged stronghold
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Speaker 1: of the red garbed men was keeping up a fitful firing,
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Speaker 1: and not ten hours ago he had stood beneath the
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Speaker 1: ventilating fans in a little chamber within that remote building,
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Speaker 1: wondering what was happening in the world. Looking more attentively
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Speaker 1: as this warlike episode moved silently across the center of
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Speaker 1: the mirror, Graham saw that the white building was surrounded
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Speaker 1: on every side by ruins and ostrog proceeded to describe,
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Speaker 1: in concise phrases how its defenders had sought, by such
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Speaker 1: destruction to isolate themselves from a storm. He spoke of
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Speaker 1: the loss of men that huge downfall had entailed in
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Speaker 1: an indifferent tone. He indicated an improvised mortuary among the
18:50
Speaker 1: wreckage showed ambulances swarming like cheese mites along a ruinous
18:55
Speaker 1: groove that had once been a street of moving ways.
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Speaker 1: He was more interested in point pointing out the parts
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Speaker 1: of the council house the distribution of the besiegers. In
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Speaker 1: a little while, the civil contest that had convulsed London
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Speaker 1: was no longer a mystery to Graham. It was No
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Speaker 1: tumultuous revolt had occurred that night, no equal warfare, but
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Speaker 1: a splendidly organized coupd'ettas. Ostrog's grasp of details was astonishing.
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Speaker 1: He seemed to know the business of even the smallest
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Speaker 1: knot of black and red specks that crawled amidst these places.
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Speaker 1: He stretched a huge black arm across the luminous picture
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Speaker 1: and showed the room. Whence Graham had escaped, and across
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Speaker 1: the chasm of ruins. The course of his flight, Graham
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Speaker 1: recognized the gulf across which the gutter ran, and the
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Speaker 1: wind wheels where he had crouched from the flying machine.
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Speaker 1: The rest of his path had succumbed to the explosion.
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Speaker 1: He looked again at the council house, and it was
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Speaker 1: already half hidden. And on the right a hillside with
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Speaker 1: a cluster of domes and pinnacles, hazy, dim and distant,
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Speaker 1: was gliding into view. And the council is really overthrown,
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Speaker 1: he said. Overthrown, said Ostrog. And I is it indeed
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Speaker 1: true that I you are master of the world. But
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Speaker 1: that white flag, that is the flag of the council,
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Speaker 1: the flag of the rule of the world, it will
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Speaker 1: fall the fight is over. Their attack on the theater
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Speaker 1: was their last frantic struggle. They have only a thousand
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Speaker 1: men or so, and some of these men will be disloyal.
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Speaker 1: They have little ammunition, and we are reviving the ancient arts.
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Speaker 1: We are casting guns. But help is this city the world?
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Speaker 1: Practically this is all they have left to them of
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Speaker 1: their empire. Abroad, the cities have either revolted with us
20:47
Speaker 1: or await the issue. Your awakening has perplexed them, paralyzed them.
20:52
Speaker 1: But haven't the council flying machines? Why is there no
20:55
Speaker 1: fighting with them? They had, but the greater part of
20:59
Speaker 1: the Aaron were in the revolt with us. They wouldn't
21:02
Speaker 1: take the risk of fighting on our side, but they
21:04
Speaker 1: would not stir against us. We had to get a
21:07
Speaker 1: poll with the aeronauts. Quite half were with us, and
21:10
Speaker 1: the others knew it directly. They knew you had got away.
21:13
Speaker 1: Those looking for you dropped. We killed the men who
21:16
Speaker 1: shot at you an hour ago, and we occupied the
21:19
Speaker 1: flying stages at the outset in every city we could,
21:22
Speaker 1: and so stopped and captured the greater aeroplanes. And as
21:25
Speaker 1: for those little flying machines that turned out for some
21:28
Speaker 1: did we kept up too straight and steady a fire
21:31
Speaker 1: for them to get near the council house. If they dropped,
21:34
Speaker 1: they couldn't rise again, because there's no clear space about
21:36
Speaker 1: there for them to get up. Several we have smashed,
21:39
Speaker 1: several others have dropped and surrendered. The rest have gone
21:42
Speaker 1: off to the continent to find a friendly city if
21:45
Speaker 1: they can before the fuel runs out. Most of these
21:48
Speaker 1: men were only too glad to be taken prisoner and
21:50
Speaker 1: kept out of harm's way. Upsetting in a flying machine
21:53
Speaker 1: isn't a very attractive prospect. There's no chance for the
21:56
Speaker 1: council that way. Its days are done. He laughed, and
22:00
Speaker 1: turned to the oval reflection again to show Graham what
22:03
Speaker 1: he meant by flying stages. Even the four nearer ones
22:06
Speaker 1: were remote and obscured by a thin morning haze, but
22:10
Speaker 1: Graham could perceive they were very vast structures, judged even
22:14
Speaker 1: by the standards of the things about them. And then
22:18
Speaker 1: as these dim shapes passed to the left, there came
22:21
Speaker 1: again the sight of the expanse across which the disarmed
22:24
Speaker 1: men in red had been marching, and then the black ruins,
22:27
Speaker 1: and then again the beleaguered, white fastness of the council.
22:31
Speaker 1: It appeared no longer a ghostly pile, but glowing amber
22:34
Speaker 1: in the sunlight. For a cloud shadow had passed about it.
22:38
Speaker 1: A pigmy struggle still hung in suspense, but now the
22:41
Speaker 1: red defenders were no longer firing. So in a dusky stillness,
22:46
Speaker 1: the man from the nineteenth century saw the closing scene
22:49
Speaker 1: of the great revolt, the forcible establishment of his rule,
22:54
Speaker 1: with a quality of startling discovery. It came to him
22:57
Speaker 1: that this was his world, and not that other he
23:00
Speaker 1: had left behind, That this was no spectacle to culminate
23:04
Speaker 1: and cease. That in this world lay whatever life was
23:07
Speaker 1: still before him, lay all his duties and dangers and responsibilities.
23:13
Speaker 1: He turned with fresh questions. Ostrog began to answer them,
23:16
Speaker 1: and then broke off abruptly. But these things I must
23:20
Speaker 1: explain more fully later. At present, there are duties. The
23:24
Speaker 1: people are coming by the moving ways towards this ward
23:27
Speaker 1: from every part of the city. The markets and theaters
23:30
Speaker 1: are densely crowded. You are just in time for them.
23:33
Speaker 1: They are clamoring to see you, and abroad they want
23:36
Speaker 1: to see you. Paris, New York, Chicago, Denver, Capri. Thousands
23:41
Speaker 1: of cities are up and in a tumult undecided and
23:44
Speaker 1: clamoring to see you. They have clamored that you should
23:47
Speaker 1: be awakened for years, and now it is done. They
23:49
Speaker 1: will scarcely believe. But surely I can't go. Ostrog answered
23:56
Speaker 1: from the other side of the room, and the picture
23:58
Speaker 1: on the oval disk, pale and vanished at the light
24:01
Speaker 1: jerked back again. There are keneto telephotographs, he said. As
24:07
Speaker 1: you bow to the people here, all over the world,
24:10
Speaker 1: myriads of myriads of people packed and still in darkened
24:13
Speaker 1: halls will see you also in black and white, of course,
24:17
Speaker 1: not like this, and you will hear their shouts, reinforcing
24:21
Speaker 1: the shouting in the hall. And there is an optical
24:25
Speaker 1: contrivance we shall use, said Ostrog, used by some of
24:29
Speaker 1: the posturers and women dancers. It may be novel to you.
24:32
Speaker 1: You stand in a very bright light, and they see
24:35
Speaker 1: not you, but a magnified image of you thrown on
24:38
Speaker 1: a screen, so that even the furthest man in the
24:41
Speaker 1: remotest gallery can, if he chooses, count your eyelashes. Graham
24:46
Speaker 1: clutched desperately at one of the questions in his mind.
24:50
Speaker 1: What is the population of London? He asked eight and
24:53
Speaker 1: twenty myriads eight and what more than twenty three millions.
25:01
Speaker 1: These figures went beyond Graham's imagination. You will be expected
25:06
Speaker 1: to say something, said Ostrog, not what you used to
25:09
Speaker 1: call a speech, but what our people call a word,
25:12
Speaker 1: just one sentence, six or seven words, something formal. If
25:16
Speaker 1: I might suggest I have awakened and my heart is
25:19
Speaker 1: with you, that is the sort of thing they want.
25:23
Speaker 1: What was that, asked Graham. I am awakened and my
25:27
Speaker 1: heart is with you, and bow, bow royally. But first
25:32
Speaker 1: we must get you black robes, for black is your color.
25:36
Speaker 1: Do you mind? And then they will disperse to their homes.
25:40
Speaker 1: Graham hesitated, I am in your hands, he said. Ostrog
25:46
Speaker 1: was clearly of that opinion. He thought for a moment,
25:49
Speaker 1: turned to the curtain, and called brief directions to some
25:51
Speaker 1: unseen attendants. Almost immediately, a black robe, the very fellow
25:55
Speaker 1: of the black robe Graham had worn in the theater,
25:58
Speaker 1: was brought, and as he threw it up his shoulders,
26:00
Speaker 1: there came from the room without the shrilling of a
26:03
Speaker 1: high pitched bell. Ostrog turned in interrogation to the attendant,
26:07
Speaker 1: then suddenly seemed to change his mind, pulled the curtain aside,
26:10
Speaker 1: and disappeared. For a moment. Graham stood with the deferential attendants,
26:16
Speaker 1: listening to Ostrog's retreating steps. There was a sound of
26:19
Speaker 1: quick question and answer, and of men running. The curtain
26:22
Speaker 1: was snatched back, and Ostrog reappeared, his massive face glowing
26:26
Speaker 1: with excitement. He crossed the room in astride, clicked the
26:30
Speaker 1: room into darkness, gripped Graham's arm and pointed to the mirror.
26:36
Speaker 1: Even as we turned away, he said. Graham saw his
26:41
Speaker 1: index finger black and colossal above the mirrored council house.
26:44
Speaker 1: For a moment he did not understand, and then he
26:47
Speaker 1: perceived that the flagstaff that had carried the white banner
26:50
Speaker 1: was bare. Do you mean, he began, The council is surrendered.
26:56
Speaker 1: Its rule is at an end. For every one look,
27:00
Speaker 1: and Ostrog pointed to a coil of black that crept
27:02
Speaker 1: in little jerks up the vacant flagstaff, unfolding as it rose.
27:08
Speaker 1: The oval picture paled as Lincoln pulled the curtain aside
27:11
Speaker 1: and entered. They are clamorous, he said. Ostrog kept his
27:16
Speaker 1: grip of Graham's arm. We have raised the people, he said.
27:19
Speaker 1: We have given them arms. For to day at least
27:22
Speaker 1: their wishes must be law. Lincoln held the curtain open
27:27
Speaker 1: for Graham and Ostrog to pass through. On his way
27:32
Speaker 1: to the market's Graham had a transitory glance of a long, narrow,
27:35
Speaker 1: white walled room in which men in the universal blue
27:38
Speaker 1: canvas were carrying covered things like beers, and about which
27:42
Speaker 1: men in medical purple hurried to and fro. From this
27:45
Speaker 1: room came groans and wailing. He had an impression of
27:48
Speaker 1: an empty, blood stained couch, of men on other couches,
27:52
Speaker 1: bandaged and blood stained. It was just such a glimpse
27:55
Speaker 1: from a railed footway, And then a buttress hid the place,
27:59
Speaker 1: and they were going on towards the markets. The roar
28:03
Speaker 1: of the multitude was near now it leaped to thunder,
28:06
Speaker 1: and arresting his attention, a fluttering of black banners, the
28:10
Speaker 1: waving of blue canvas and brown rags, and the swarming
28:13
Speaker 1: vastness of the theater near the public markets came into view.
28:17
Speaker 1: Down a long passage, the picture opened out. He perceived
28:21
Speaker 1: they were entering the last great theater of his first appearance,
28:25
Speaker 1: the great theater he had last seen as a chequer
28:27
Speaker 1: work of glare and blackness in his flight from the
28:30
Speaker 1: Red Police. This time he entered it along a gallery
28:34
Speaker 1: at a level high above the stage. The place was
28:37
Speaker 1: now brilliantly lit again. His eyes sought the gangway up
28:40
Speaker 1: which he had fled, but he could not tell it
28:42
Speaker 1: from among its dozens of fellows, nor could he see
28:46
Speaker 1: anything of the smashed seats, deflated cushions, and such like
28:49
Speaker 1: traces of the fight. Because of the density of the people,
28:53
Speaker 1: except the stage, the whole place was closely packed. Looking down,
28:56
Speaker 1: the effect was a vast area of stippled pink ea,
29:00
Speaker 1: each dot a still upturned face regarding him. At his
29:03
Speaker 1: appearance with Ostrog, the cheering died away, the singing died away.
29:07
Speaker 1: A common interest stilled and unified the disorder. It seemed
29:12
Speaker 1: as though every individual of those myriads was watching him.
29:18
Speaker 1: End of Chapter twelve. Recording by Zachary Brewstergeiss, Greenbelt, Maryland,
29:23
Speaker 1: June two thousand seven.