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The Sleeper Awakes Chapter 13 - The End of the Old Order · The H. G. Wells Library

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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirteen 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 Robert Flock. The Sleeper Awakes by H. G. Wells.
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  Speaker 1: The end of the old order, so far as Graham
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  Speaker 1: was able to judge, It was near midday when the
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  Speaker 1: white banner of the Council fell, but some hours had
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  Speaker 1: to elapse before it was possible to effect the formal capitulation,
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  Speaker 1: and so after he had spoken his word, he retired
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  Speaker 1: to his new apartments in the wind Vane offices. The
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  Speaker 1: continuous excitement of the last twelve hours had left him
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  Speaker 1: inordinately fatigued. Even his curiosity was exhausted. For a space
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  Speaker 1: he sat inert and passive, with open eyes, and for
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  Speaker 1: a space he slept. He was roused by two medical attendants,
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  Speaker 1: come prepared with still ambulants to sustain him through the
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  Speaker 1: next occasion. After he had taken their drugs and bathed
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  Speaker 1: by their advice in cold water, he felt a rapid
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  Speaker 1: return of interest and energy, and was presently able and
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  Speaker 1: willing to accompany ostrog through several miles, as it seemed,
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  Speaker 1: of passages, lifts and slides to the closing scene of
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  Speaker 1: the White Council's rule. The way ran deviously through a
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  Speaker 1: maze of buildings. They came at last to a passage
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  Speaker 1: that curved about and showed broadening before him an oblong opening,
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  Speaker 1: clouds hot with sunset, and the ragged skyline of their
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  Speaker 1: ruinous council house. A tumult of shouts came drifting up
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  Speaker 1: to him. In another moment they had come out high
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  Speaker 1: up on the brow of the cliff of torn buildings
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  Speaker 1: that overhung the wreckage. The vast area opened to Graham's eyes,
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  Speaker 1: none the less strange and wonderful for the remote view
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  Speaker 1: he had had of it in the oval mirror. This
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  Speaker 1: rudely amphitheateral space seemed now the better part of a mile.
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  Speaker 1: To its outer edge, it was gold lit on the
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  Speaker 1: left hand, catching the sunlight and below, and to the right,
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  Speaker 1: clear and cold in the shadow above the shadowy gray
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  Speaker 1: council house that stood in the midst of it. The
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  Speaker 1: great black banner of the Surrender still hung in sluggish
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  Speaker 1: folds against the blazing sunset. Severed rooms, halls and passages
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  Speaker 1: gaped strangely broken masses of metal projected dismally from the
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  Speaker 1: complex wreckage. Vast masses of twisted cable dropped like tangled seaweed,
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  Speaker 1: and from its base came a tumult of innumerable voices,
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  Speaker 1: violent concussions, and the sound of trumpets. All about this
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  Speaker 1: great white pile was a ring of desolation, the smashed
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  Speaker 1: and blackened masses, the gaunt foundations and ruinous lumber of
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  Speaker 1: the fabric that had been destroyed by the council's orders,
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  Speaker 1: skeletons of girders, titanic masses of wall, forests of stout pillars,
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  Speaker 1: amongst the somber rasage. Beneath running water flashed and glistened,
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  Speaker 1: and far away across the space, out of the midst
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  Speaker 1: of a vague, vast mass of buildings, there thrust the
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  Speaker 1: twisted end of a water main two hundred feet in
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  Speaker 1: the air, thunderously, spouting a shining cascade, and everywhere great
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  Speaker 1: multitudes of people. Wherever there was space and foothold, people swarmed,
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  Speaker 1: Little people, small and minutely clear, except where the sunset
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  Speaker 1: touched them to indistinguishable gold. They clambered up the tottering walls.
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  Speaker 1: They clung in wreaths and groups about the high standing pillars.
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  Speaker 1: They swarmed along the edges of the circle of ruins.
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  Speaker 1: The air was full of their shouting, and they were
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  Speaker 1: pressing and swaying towards the central space. The upper stories
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  Speaker 1: of the council house seemed deserted. Not a human being
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  Speaker 1: was visible. Only the drooping banner of the surrender hung
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  Speaker 1: heavily against the light. The dead were within the council House,
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  Speaker 1: or hidden by the swarming people, or carried away. Graham
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  Speaker 1: could see only a few neglected bodies in gaps and
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  Speaker 1: corners of the ruins, and amidst the flowing water. Will
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  Speaker 1: you let them see you, sire, said Ostrog, They are
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  Speaker 1: very anxious to see you. Graham hesitated, and then walked
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  Speaker 1: forward to where the broken verge of wall dropped sheer.
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  Speaker 1: He stood, looking down a lonely, tall black figure against
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  Speaker 1: the sky. Very slowly the swarming ruins became aware of him,
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  Speaker 1: and as they did so, little bands of black uniformed
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  Speaker 1: men appeared, remotely thrusting through the crowds towards the council house.
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  Speaker 1: He saw little black heads become pink looking at him,
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  Speaker 1: saw by that means, a wave of recognition sweep across
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  Speaker 1: the space. It occurred to him that he should accord
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  Speaker 1: them some recognition. He held up his arm, then pointed
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  Speaker 1: to the council House and dropped his hand. The voi
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  Speaker 1: below became unanimous, gathering volume came up to him as
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  Speaker 1: a multitudinous wavelets of cheering. The western sky was a pallid,
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  Speaker 1: bluish green, and Jupiter shone high in the south. Before
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  Speaker 1: the capitulation was accomplished. Above was a slow, insensible change,
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  Speaker 1: the advance of night, serene and beautiful. Below was hurry, excitement,
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  Speaker 1: conflicting orders, pauses, spasmodic developments of organization, a vast, ascending
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  Speaker 1: clamor and confusion. Before the council came out, toiling, perspiring men,
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  Speaker 1: directed by a conflict of shouts, carried forth hundreds of
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  Speaker 1: those who had perished in the hand to hand conflict.
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  Speaker 1: Within those long passages and chambers, guards in black lined
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  Speaker 1: the way that the council would come, and as far
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  Speaker 1: as the eye could reach into the hazy blue twilight
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  Speaker 1: of the ruins and swarming now at every possible point
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  Speaker 1: in the captured council House and along the shattered cliff
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  Speaker 1: of its circumadjacent buildings were innumerable people, and their voices,
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  Speaker 1: even when they were not cheering, were as the soffing
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  Speaker 1: of the sea upon a pebble beach. Ostrog had chosen
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  Speaker 1: a huge commanding pile of crushed and overthrown masonry, and
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  Speaker 1: on this a stage of timbers and metal girders was
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  Speaker 1: being hastily constructed. Its essential parts were complete, but humming
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  Speaker 1: and clangorous machinery still glared fitfully in the shadows beneath
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  Speaker 1: this temporary edifice. The stage had a small higher portion,
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  Speaker 1: on which Graham stood, with Ostrog and Lincoln close beside him,
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  Speaker 1: a little in advance of a group of minor officers.
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  Speaker 1: A broader lower stage surrounded this quarter deck, and on
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  Speaker 1: this were the black uniformed guards of the Revolt, armed
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  Speaker 1: with the little green weapons, whose very names Graham still
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  Speaker 1: did not know. Those standing about him perceived that his
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  Speaker 1: eyes wandered perpetually from the swarming people in the twilight
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  Speaker 1: ruins about him, to the darkling mass of the white
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  Speaker 1: council House, whence the trustees would presently come, and to
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  Speaker 1: the gaunt cliffs of ruin that encircled him, and so
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  Speaker 1: back to the people. The voices of the crowd swelled
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  Speaker 1: to a deafening tumult. He saw the councilors first afar
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  Speaker 1: off in the glare of one of the temporary lights
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  Speaker 1: that marked their path, a little group of white figures
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  Speaker 1: in a black archway in the council house. They had
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  Speaker 1: been in darkness. He watched them approaching, drawing nearer past,
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  Speaker 1: first this blazing electric star, and then that. The minatory
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  Speaker 1: roar of the crowd, over whom their power had lasted
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  Speaker 1: for one hundred and fifty years, marched along beside them.
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  Speaker 1: As they drew still nearer, their faces came out, weary,
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  Speaker 1: white and anxious. He saw them blinking up through the
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  Speaker 1: glare about him and Ostrog. He contrasted their strange, cold
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  Speaker 1: looks in the halls of Atlas. Presently he could recognize
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  Speaker 1: several of them. The man who had wrapped the table
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  Speaker 1: at Howard, a burly man with a red beard, and
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  Speaker 1: one delicate featured, short dark man with a peculiarly long skull.
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  Speaker 1: He noted that two were whispering together, and looking behind
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  Speaker 1: him at Ostrog. Next there came a tall, dark and
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  Speaker 1: handsome man walking downcast Abruptly, he glanced up, his eyes
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  Speaker 1: touched Graham for a moment, and passed beyond him to Ostrog.
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  Speaker 1: The way that had been made for them was so
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  Speaker 1: contrived that they had to march past and curve about
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  Speaker 1: before they came to the sloping path of planks that
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  Speaker 1: ascended to the stage where their surrender was to be made.
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  Speaker 1: The Master, the Master God, and the Master shouted the
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  Speaker 1: people to hell with the council. Graham looked at their
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  Speaker 1: multitudes receding beyond counting into a shouting haze, and then
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  Speaker 1: at Ostrog beside him, white and steadfast, and still his
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  Speaker 1: eye went again to the little group of white councilors.
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  Speaker 1: And then he looked up at the familiar quiet stars overhead.
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  Speaker 1: The marvelous element in his fate was suddenly vivid. Could
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  Speaker 1: that be his? Indeed, that little life in his memory?
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  Speaker 1: Two hundred years gone by? And this as well. End
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  Speaker 1: of Chapter thirteen. Recording by Robert Flock www. Dot allauthors
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  Speaker 1: dot com.