Latest / Man Who Was Thursday, A Nightmare (Dramatic Reading) / 10 - Man Who Was Thursday, A Nightmare (Dramatic Reading) by G K Chesterton

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10 - Man Who Was Thursday, A Nightmare (Dramatic Reading) by G K Chesterton · Man Who Was Thursday, A Nightmare (Dramatic Reading)

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Burgundy is a jolly.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Thing, said the professor sadly, as he set his glass down.
• 0:10
  Speaker 3: You don't look as if it were, said Simeon. He
• 0:14
  Speaker 3: drank it as if were medicine.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: You must excuse my manner, said the professor dismally.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: My position is rather a curious one. Inside, I am
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: really bursting with boyish merriment. But I acted the paralytic
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: professor so well that now I can't leave off, so
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: that when I am among friends and have no need
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: at all to disguise myself, I still can't help speaking
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: slow and drinking my forehead just as if it were
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: my forehead. I can be quite happy, you understand, but
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: only in a paralytic sort of way. The most buoyant
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: exclamations leap up in my heart, but they come out
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: of my mouth quite different. You should hear me say
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: back up, old cock. He would bring tears to your eyes.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: It does, said sime But I cannot help thinking that,
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: upon from all that, you really are a bit worried.
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: The professor started a little and looked at him steadily.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: You are a very clever fellow, he said. It is
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: a pleasure to work with you. Yes, I think I
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: have rather a heavy cloud in my head. There is
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: a great problem to face.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: And he sank his bald brow in his two hands.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: Then he said, in a low.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: Voice, can you play the piano?
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Yes, said Sime in simple wonder.
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: I'm supposed to have a good touch.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: Then, as the other did not speak, he added.
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: I just a great cloud as if did.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: After a long silence, the professor said, out of the
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: cavernous shadow of his hands, it would have done.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Just as well if you could work at hypewriter.
• 2:05
  Speaker 4: Thank you, said Sion.
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: You flatter me.
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: Listen to me, said the other. And remember whom we
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: have to see tomorrow. You and I are going to
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: morrow to attempt something which is very much more dangerous
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: than trying to steal the crown jewels out of the tower.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: We are trying to steal a secret from a very sharp,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: very strong, and very wicked man. I believe there is
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: no man he kept the President, of course, who is
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: so seriously startling and formidable as that little grinning fellow
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: in goggles. He has not perhaps the white hot enthusiasm
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: unto death, the mad martyrdom for anarchy, which marks the secretary.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: But then that very fanaticism in the secretary has a
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: human pathos and is almost a redeeming tray. But the
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: little doctor has a brutal sanity that is more shocking
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: than the Secretary's disease. Don't you notice his detestable virility
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: and vitality. He bounces like an India rubber ball, depend
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: upon it. Sunday was not to sleep. I wonder if
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: he ever sleeps when he locked up all the plians
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: of this outrage in the round black head of doctor Bull.
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: And you think, said Sime, that this unique monster will
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: be soothed if I'd play the piano to him.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Don't be an ass, said his mentor. I mentioned the
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: piano because it gives one quick and independent fingers. Sime,
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: if we are to go through this interview and come
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: out sane or alive, we must have some curdive signals
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: between us that this brute will not see. I made
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: a rough alphabetical cipher corresponding to the five fingers like this, s.
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: And he rippled with his fingers on the wooden table.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: B a d bad, a word we may frequently require.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: Sime poured himself out another glass of wine and began
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: to study the scheme he was abnormally quick with his
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: brains at puzzles and with his hands at conjuring, and
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: it did not take him long to learn how he
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: might convey simple messages by what would seem to be
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: idle taps upon a table or knee. But wine and
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: companionship had always the effect of inspiring him to a
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: farcical ingenuity, and the professor soon found himself struggling with
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: the too vast energy of the new language as it
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: passed through the heated brain of Sime.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: You must have several words signs.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Said Sime seriously.
• 5:04
  Speaker 3: Wells it, We are likely to want fine shades of meaning.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: My favorite word is coevil. What's yours?
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Do? Stop playing the goot.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: Said the professor plaintively.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: You don't know how serious this is.
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: Lush too, said Sime, shaking his head sagaciously.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: We must have lush word applying to grass, don't you know?
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Do you imagine?
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: Asked the professor furiously, that we.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: Are going to talk to doctor Bull about grass.
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: There are several ways in which the subject could be.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: Approached, said Sime reflectively.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: Are the word introduced without appearing forced? We might say
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: doctor Bull as a revolutionist. She remember that a tyrant
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: wants the advisers to eat grass, and deied, many of
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: us looking on the fresh, lush grass of summer.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: Do you understand the other that this is a tragedy?
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: Perfectly replied Sime, always be coming in the tragedy? What
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: the deuce ells can you do? How is this language
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: of yours had a wider scope? I suppose we couldn't
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: extend it from the fingers to the toes, having involved
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: putting off our boots and socks during the conversation, which, however,
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: unobertusevely performed.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: Same said his friend, with a stern simplicity.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: Go to bed.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: Sime, however, sat up in bed for a considerable time,
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: mastering the new code. He was awakened next morning while
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: the east was still sealed with darkness, and found his
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: gray bearded ally standing like a ghost beside his bed.
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: Sime sat up in bed, blinking, then slowly collected his thoughts,
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: threw off the bedclothes, and stood up. It seemed to him,
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: in some curious way that all the safety and hostiability
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: of the night before fell with the bedclothes off him,
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: and he stood up in an air of cold danger.
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: He still felt an entire trust and loyalty towards his companion.
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: But it was the trust between two men going to
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: the scaffold well, said Sime, with a forced cheerfulness, as
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: he pulled on his trousers.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: Attempted fat alphabet of yours. Did it take you long
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: to make it up?
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: The professor made no answer, but gazed in front of
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: him with eyes the color of a wintry sea. So
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: Sime repeated his question.
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: I say, did it take you long to invent all this?
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: I'm considered good at these things, and it was a
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: good hour's grind. Did you learn it all on the spot?
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: The professor was silent, His eyes were wide open, and
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: he wore a fixed, but very small smile.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: How long did it take you?
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: The professor did not.
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: Move, And you called you answer, called.
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: Out Syme, in a sudden anger that had something like
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: fear underneath. Whether or no the professor could answer, he
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: did not. Sime stood staring back at the stiff face
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: like parchment and the blank blue eyes. His first thought
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: was that the professor had gone mad, but his second
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: thought was more frightful. After all, what did he know
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: about this queer creature whom he had heedlessly accepted as
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: a friend. What did he know except that the man
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: had been at the anarchist breakfast and had told him
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: a ridiculous tale. How improbable it was that there should
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: be another friend there besides Gogel. Was this man's silence
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: a sensational way of declaring war? Was this adamantine stare,
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: after all, only the awful sneer of some threefold traitor
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: who had turned for the last time. He stood and
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: strained his ears in this heartless silence. He almost fancied
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: he could hear dynamiters come to capture him, shifting softly
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: in the corridor outside. Then his eyes strayed downwards, and
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: he burst out laughing. Though the professor himself stood there
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: as voiceless as a statue, his five dumb fingers were
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: dancing alive upon the dead table. Sime watched the twinkling
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: movements of the talking hand and read clearly the message.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: I will only talk like this. We must get used
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: to it.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: He wrapped out the answer with the impatience of relief.
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: All right, let's get out to breakfast.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: They took their hats and sticks in silence. But as
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: Syme took his sword stick, he held it hard. They
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: paused for a few minutes only to stuff down coffee
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: and coarse thick sandwiches at a coffee stall, and then
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: made their way across the river, which under the gray
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: and growing light, looked as desolate as achron. They reached
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: the bottom of the huge block of buildings which they
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: had seen from across the river, and began in silence
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: to mount the naked and numberless stone steps, only pausing
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: now and then to make short remarks on the rail
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: of the banisters. At about every other flight they passed
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: a window. Each window showed them a pale and tragic
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: dawn lifting itself laboriously over London. From each the innumerable
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: roofs of slate looked like the leaden surges of a gray,
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: troubled sea. After rain, Sime was increasingly conscious that his
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: new adventure had somehow a quality of cold sanity, worse
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: than the wild adventures of the past. Last night, for instance,
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: the tall tenements had seemed to him like a tower
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: in a dream. As he now went up the weary
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: and perpetual steps, he was daunted and bewildered by their
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: almost infinite series. But it was not the hot horror
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: of a dream, or of anything that might be exaggeration
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: or delusion. Their infinity was more like the empty infinity
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: of arithmetic, something unthinkable yet necessary to thought. Or it
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: was like the stunning statements of astronomy about the distance
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: of the fixed stars. He was ascending the house of reason,
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: a thing more hideous than unreason itself. By the time
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: they reached doctor Bull's landing, a last window showed them
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: a harsh white dawn, edged with banks of a kind
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: of coarse red, more like red clay than red cloud.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: And when they entered doctor Bull's bare garret it was
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: full of light. Syme had been haunted by a half
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: historic memory in connection with these empty rooms, and that
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: austere daybreak. The moment he saw the garret and doctor
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: Bull sitting writing at a table, he remembered what the
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: memory was. The French Revolution. There should have been the
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: black outline of a guillotine against the heavy red and
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: white of the morning. Doctor Bull was in his white
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: shirt and black breeches. Only his cropped dark head might
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: well have just come out of its wig. He might
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: have been Marat, or a more slipshod Robespierre. Yet when
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: he was seen properly. The French fancy fell away. The
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Jacobins were idealists. There was about this man a murderous materialism.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: His position gave him a somewhat new appearance. The strong
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: white light of morning, coming from one side, creating sharp shadows,
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: made him seem both more pale and more angular than
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: he had looked at the breakfast on the balcony. Thus,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: the two black glasses that encased his eyes might really
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: have been black cavities in his skull, making him look
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: like a death's head. And indeed, if ever death himself
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: sat riding at a wooden table, it might have been he. He
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: looked up and smiled brightly enough as the men came
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: in and rose with the resilient rapidity of which the
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: Professor had spoken, He set chairs for both of them, and,
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: going to a peg behind the door, proceeded to put
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: on a coat and waistcoat of rough, dark tweed. He
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: buttoned it up neatly, and came back to sit down
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: at his table. The quiet, good humor of his manner
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: left his two opponents helpless. It was with some momentary
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: difficulty that the professor broke silence and began, I'm.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: Sorry to disturb you so early, comrade.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: Said he, with a careful resumption of the slow du
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: worm's manner.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: You have no doubt made only arrangements for the Paris affair.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: Then he added, with infinite slowness.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: We have information which renders intolerable anything in the nature
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: of a moment's delay.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: Doctor bull smiled again, but continued to gaze on them
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: without speaking. The professor resumed a pause before each weary word.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: Please do not think me excessively abrupt, But I advise
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: you to owe to those plans, or, if it is
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: too late for that, to follow your agent with all
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: the support you can get for him. Comrade sim and
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: I have had an experience which it would take more
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: time to recount than we can afford if we are
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: to act on it. I will, however, relate the occurrence
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: in detail, even at the risk of losing time, if
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: you really feel that it is essential to the understanding
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: of the problem we have to discuss.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: He was spinning out his sentences, making them intolerably long
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: and lingering, in the hope of maddening the practical little
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: doctor into an explosion of impatience which might show his hand.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: But the little doctor continued only to stare and smile,
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: and the monolog was uphill work. Sime began to feel
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: a new sickness and despair. The doctor's smile and patience
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: were not at all like the cataleptic stare and horrible
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: silence which he had confronted in the professor half an
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: hour before. About the Professor's make up and all his antics,
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: there was always something merely grotesque, like a gollywog. Sime
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: remembered those wild woes of yesterday as one remembers being
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: afraid of bogy in childhood. But here was daylight. Here
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: was a healthy, square shouldered man in tweeds, not odd
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: save for the accident of his ugly spectacles, not glaring
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: or grinning at all, but smiling steadily and not saying
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: a word. The whole had a sense of unbearable reality.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: Under the increasing sunlight, the colors of the doctor's complexion,
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: the patterns of his tweeds grew and expanded outrageously, as
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: such things grow too important in the realistic novel. But
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: his smile was quite slight, the pose of his head polite.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: The only uncanny thing was his silence.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: As I say, resumed.
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: The Professor like a man toiling through heavy sand.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: The incident that has occurred to us and has led
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: us to ask for information about the Marquis is one
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: which you may think it better to have narrated. But
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: as it came in the way of comrade Shame rather
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: than me.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: His words he seemed to be dragging out like words
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: in an anthem. But Sime, who was watching, saw his
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: long fingers rattle quickly on the edge of the crazy table.
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: He read the message.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: You must go on. This devil has sucked me dry.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: Sim plunged into the breach with that bravado of improvisation
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: which always came to him when he was alarmed.
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: Yes, the thing really happens me, he said hastily.
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: I had the good fortune to fall into conversation with
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: the detective who took me, thanks to my hat for
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: a respectable person. Wishing to clinch my reputation for respectability,
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: I took him and made him very drunk at a savoy.
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: Under this influence, he became friendly and told me in
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: so many words that within a day or two they
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: hoped to arrest the Marquis in France. So unless you
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: or I can get on his track.
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: The doctor was still smiling in the most friendly way,
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: and his protected eyes were still impenetrable. The professor signaled
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: to Sime that he would resume his explanation, and he
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: began again with the same elaborate calm.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Seame immediately brought this information to me, and we came
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: here together to see what use you would be inclined
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: to make of it. It seems to be unquestionably urgent
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: that all this.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: Time Sime had been staring at the doctor, almost as
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: steadily as the doctor stared at the professor, but quite
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: without the smile. The nerves of both comrades and arms
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: were near snapping under that strain of motionless amiability. When
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: Sime suddenly leaned forward and idly tapped the edge of
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: the table. His message to.
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: His ally ran, I have an intuition.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: The professor, with scarcely a pause in his monologue, signaled back, then,
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: shit on it.
• 19:06
  Speaker 4: Sime telegraphed, it is quite extraordinary.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: The other answered, extraordinary drought.
• 19:15
  Speaker 4: Sime said, I am a poet.
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: The other retorted, you are a dead man. Sime had
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: gone quite red up to his yellow hair, and his
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: eyes were burning feverishly as he said he had an intuition,
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: and it had risen to a sort of lightheaded certainty.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: Resuming his symbolic taps, he signaled to his friend.
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: You scarcely realize how poetic my intuition is. It has
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: that sudden quality we sometimes feel in the coming of spring.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: He then studied the answer on his friend's fingers.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: The answer was go to hell.
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: The professor then resumed his merely verbal monologue, addressed to
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: the doctor.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: Perhaps I should rather say, said Sime on his fingers,
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: that it resembles that sudden smell of the sea, which
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: may be found in the hearts of lush woods.
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: His companion disdained to reply.
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: Well, yet again tapped Sime. It is positive, as is
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: the passionate red hair of a beautiful woman.
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: The professor was continuing his speech, but in the middle
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: of it, Sime decided to act. He leaned across the
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: table and said, in a voice that could not be neglected,
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: Doctor Bull. The doctor's sleek and smiling head did not move,
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: but they could have sworn that under his dark glasses
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: his eyes darted towards Sime. Doctor Bill said Sime, in
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: a voice peculiarly precise and courteous.
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: Would you do me small favor, you'd be so kind
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: as to take off your spectacles.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: The professor swung round on him seat and stared at
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: Syme with a sort of frozen fury of astonishment. Sime,
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: like a man who has thrown his life and fortune
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: on the table, leaned forward with a fiery face. The
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: doctor did not move. For a few seconds. There was
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: a silence in which one could hear a pin drop
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: split once by the single hoot of a distant steamer
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: on the Thames. Then doctor Bull rose slowly, still smiling,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: and took off his spectacles. Sime sprang to his feet,
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: stepping backwards a little like a chemical lecturer from a
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: successful explosion. His eyes were like stars, and for an
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: instant he could only point without speaking. The professor had
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: also started to his feet. Forgetful of his supposed paralysis,
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: he leaned on the back of the chair and stared
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: doubtfully at doctor Bull, as if the doctor had been
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: turned into a toad before his eyes. And indeed it
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: was almost as great a transformation scene. The two detectives
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: saw sitting in the chair before them a very boyish
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: looking young man with very frank and happy hazel eyes,
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: an open expression, cockney clothes like those of a city clerk,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: and an unquestionable breath about him, of being very good
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: and rather commonplace. The smile was still there, but it
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: might have been the first smile of a baby.
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: I knew I was a poet.
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: Cried Sime, in a sort of ecstasy.
• 22:34
  Speaker 3: I knew my intuition was as invaluable as the pope.
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: It was the spectacles that did it. It was all
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: the spectacles, given those beastly black eyes and all the
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: rest of him. His health and his jolly looks made
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: him a live devil among dead ones.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: It certainly does make it queer difference.
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: Said the professor shakily.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: But as regards to prudy of doctor beaull.
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: Project, be damned, roared Sime beside himself.
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: Look at him, look at his face, look at his collar,
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: look at his blessed boots. You don't suppose, do you,
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: that that thing's an anarchist.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Sum cried the other in an apprehensive agony. Why, said Sime.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: I'll take the risk of that myself, Doctor Bull, I
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: am a police officer. There's my card, and he.
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: Flung down the blue card upon the table. The professor
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: still feared that all was lost, but he was loyal.
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: He pulled out his own official card and put it
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: beside his friends. Then the third man burst out laughing,
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: and for the first time that morning they heard his voice.
• 23:49
  Speaker 5: I'm awfully glad you chaps have come so early.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: He said, with a sort of schoolboy flippancy.
• 23:56
  Speaker 5: So we can all start for France together. Yes, some
• 23:59
  Speaker 5: of the false right enough, and.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: He flicked a blue card towards them lightly as a
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: matter of form. Clapping a brisk bowler on his head
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: and resuming his goblin glasses, the doctor moved so quickly
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: towards the door that the others instinctively followed him. Sime
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: seemed a little distrait, and as he passed under the doorway,
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: he suddenly struck his stick on the stone passage, so
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: that it rang. But he cried out, if this.
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: Is all right? There were more damned detectives in the
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: word damned dynamites. Is that the damned council.
• 24:35
  Speaker 5: We might have fought easily, said Bull. We were four
• 24:39
  Speaker 5: against three.
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: The professor was descending the stairs, but his voice came
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: up from below. No, said the voice, we were.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: Not four against three. We were not so lucky. We
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: were four against one.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: The others went down the stairs in sil The young
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: man called Bull, with an innocent courtesy characteristic of him,
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: insisted on going last until they reached the street. But
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: there his own robust rapidity asserted itself unconsciously, and he
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: walked quickly on ahead towards a railway inquiry office, talking
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: to the others over his shoulder.
• 25:22
  Speaker 5: It is jolly to get some pals, he said, I've
• 25:27
  Speaker 5: been half dead with the jumps. Being quite alone, I
• 25:30
  Speaker 5: nearly flung my arms around Goggle and embraced him, which
• 25:33
  Speaker 5: would have been imprudent. I hope you won't despise me
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: of having been in a blue funk.
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: All the blue devils in blue hell, said Sime, contrivisies
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: to my blue funk. But the worst devil was you
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: and your infernal goggles.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: The young man laughed delightedly.
• 25:53
  Speaker 5: Wasn't it a rag, he said, Such a simple idea,
• 25:58
  Speaker 5: not my own. I have got the brains, you see.
• 26:01
  Speaker 5: I wanted to go into the detective service, especially the
• 26:05
  Speaker 5: anti dynamite business. But for that purpose they wanted someone
• 26:08
  Speaker 5: to dress up as a dynamiter, and they all swore,
• 26:11
  Speaker 5: by blazes that I could never look like a dynamiter.
• 26:14
  Speaker 5: They said. My very walk was respectable. In that scene
• 26:17
  Speaker 5: from behind, I looked like the British Constitution. They said
• 26:20
  Speaker 5: I looked too healthy, and too optimistic, and too reliable
• 26:23
  Speaker 5: and benevolent. They called me all sorts of names. At
• 26:26
  Speaker 5: Scotland Yard, they said that if I have been a criminal,
• 26:29
  Speaker 5: I might have made my fortune by looking so like
• 26:31
  Speaker 5: an honest man. But as I had the misfortune to
• 26:34
  Speaker 5: be an honest man, there was not even the remotest
• 26:36
  Speaker 5: chance of my assisting them by ever looking like a criminal.
• 26:40
  Speaker 5: But at last I was brought before some old josser
• 26:43
  Speaker 5: who was high up in the force, and who seemed
• 26:45
  Speaker 5: to have no end of a head on his shoulders.
• 26:48
  Speaker 5: And there the others all talked hopelessly. When asked whether
• 26:51
  Speaker 5: a bushy beard would hide my nice smile, another said
• 26:54
  Speaker 5: that if they blacked my face, I might look like
• 26:55
  Speaker 5: a Negro anarchist. But this old chap chipton with the
• 26:58
  Speaker 5: most extraordinary remark. A pair of smoked spectacles will do it,
• 27:02
  Speaker 5: he said, positively. Look at him now, he looked like
• 27:06
  Speaker 5: an angelic office boy. Put him on a pair of
• 27:09
  Speaker 5: smoked spectacles, and children will scream at the sight of him,
• 27:13
  Speaker 5: And so it was by George. When once my eyes
• 27:15
  Speaker 5: were covered, all the rest smile and big shoulders and
• 27:19
  Speaker 5: short hair made me look like a perfect little devil.
• 27:22
  Speaker 5: As I say, it was simply enough when it was
• 27:24
  Speaker 5: done like miracles. But that wasn't the really miraculous part
• 27:29
  Speaker 5: of it. There was one really staggering thing about the business,
• 27:33
  Speaker 5: and my head still turns at it.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: What was that, asked Sime. I'll tell you, answered the
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: man in spectacles.
• 27:42
  Speaker 5: This big part in the police, who sized me up
• 27:45
  Speaker 5: so that he knew how the goggles would go with
• 27:47
  Speaker 5: my hair and socks. He never even saw me at all.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: Sime's eyes suddenly flashed on him.
• 27:54
  Speaker 4: How was that, he asked, I thought you told him
• 27:59
  Speaker 4: so I did, said Bull brightly.
• 28:02
  Speaker 5: But we talked in a pitch dock room like a pulseller. There.
• 28:06
  Speaker 5: You would never have guessed that I could not have
• 28:09
  Speaker 5: conceived it, said sim gravely.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: It is indeed a new idea.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: Said the professor. Their new ally was in practical matters.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: A whirlwind at the inquiry office, he asked with business
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: like brevity about the trains for Dover. Having got his information,
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: he bundled the company into a cab and put them
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: and himself inside a railway carriage. Before they had properly
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: realized the breathless process, they were already on the Calais
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: boat before conversation flowed.
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: Really, I had already arranged, he explained, to go to
• 28:49
  Speaker 5: France for my lunch. But I am delighted to have
• 28:52
  Speaker 5: someone to lunch with me. You see, I had to
• 28:54
  Speaker 5: send that beast, the Marquis over with his bomb because
• 28:58
  Speaker 5: the President had his eye on me. So God knows how.
• 29:02
  Speaker 5: I'll tell you the story some day. It was perfectly choking.
• 29:06
  Speaker 5: Whenever I tried to slip out of it. I saw
• 29:08
  Speaker 5: the President somewhere, smiling out of the bow window of
• 29:11
  Speaker 5: a club, or taking off his hat to me from
• 29:13
  Speaker 5: the top of an omnibus. I tell you can see
• 29:16
  Speaker 5: what you like. That fellow sold himself to the devil.
• 29:19
  Speaker 5: He can be in six places at once, So you.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: Set the Marquis off, I understand.
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: Asked the professor.
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: Was it long ago? Shall we be in time to
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: catch him?
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, answered the new guide.
• 29:35
  Speaker 5: I've timed it all. He'll still be at Calais when
• 29:37
  Speaker 5: we arrive.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: But when we do catch him at Calais.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: Said the professor.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: What are we going to do.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: At this question? The countenance of doctor Bull fell for
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: the first time. He reflected a little, and then.
• 29:54
  Speaker 5: Said, theoretically, I suppose we are to call the police.
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: Not, I said Simeon.
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: Theoretically I ought to drown myself first. I promised the
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: poor fellow, who is a real modern pessimist, on my
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: word of honor, not to tell the police. I'm no
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: hand at casuistry, but I can't break my word to
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: a modern pessimist. It's like breaking one's word to a child.
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: I'm in the same boat, said the professor.
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: I tried to tell the police, and I couldn't because
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: of some silly oarth I took. You see, when I
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: was an actor, I was a sort of all round beast. Perjury,
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: odd treason is the only crime I haven't committed. If
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: I did that, I shouldn't know the difference between right
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: and wrong.
• 30:44
  Speaker 5: It's been through all that, said doctor Bull, and I've
• 30:48
  Speaker 5: made up my mind. I gave my promise to the secretary.
• 30:52
  Speaker 5: You know him, man who smiles upside down? My friend,
• 30:56
  Speaker 5: that man is the most utterly unhappy man that was
• 30:58
  Speaker 5: ever human. It may be his digestion, or his conscience,
• 31:02
  Speaker 5: or his nerves, or his philosophy of the universe. But
• 31:06
  Speaker 5: he's damned, he's in hell. Well, I can't turn on
• 31:09
  Speaker 5: a man like that and hunt him down. It's like
• 31:12
  Speaker 5: whipping a leper. And may be mad, but that's how
• 31:15
  Speaker 5: I feel, and there's jolly well the end of it.
• 31:18
  Speaker 4: I don't think you're mad, said Sime.
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: I knew you decide like that when first you.
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: Eh, said doctor Bull.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: When first you took off your spectacles.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: Doctor Bull smiled a little and strolled across the deck
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: to look at the sunlit sea. Then he strolled back again,
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: kicking his heels carelessly, and a companionable silence fell between
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: the three men. Well, said Sime.
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: It seems that we have all the same kind of
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: morality or immorality, so we'd better face the fact that
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: comes of it.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: Yes, assented the professor.
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: You're quite right. We must hurry up. I can see
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: the green news standing out from France.
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: The fact that.
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: Comes of it, said sim seriously, is.
• 32:08
  Speaker 3: This that we three are alone on this planet. Goggle
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: has gone god knows where, perhaps the President has smashed
• 32:16
  Speaker 3: him like a fly on the council. We are three
• 32:19
  Speaker 3: men against three, like the Romans who held the bridge,
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: but were worse off than that. First because they can
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: appeal to their organization and we cannot appeal to ours.
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: And second because.
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: Because one of those three other men said.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: The professor is not a man. Sime nodded and was
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: silent for a second or two.
• 32:42
  Speaker 4: Then he said, my idea is this.
• 32:46
  Speaker 3: We must do something to keep the Marquee in Calais
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: till tomorrow midday. I've turned over twenty schemes in my head.
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: We cannot denounce him as the dynamiter. That's agreed. We
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: cannot get entertained on some trivial charge, for we should
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: have to appear. He knows us, and he would smell
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: a rat. We cannot pretend to keep him on anarchist business.
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: He might swallow much in that way, but not the
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: notion of stopping in Calais while the Tsar went safely
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: through Paris. We might try to kidnap him and lock
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: him up ourselves. But he's a well known man here.
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: He has a whole bodyguard of friends. He's very strong
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: and brave, and the event is doubtful. The only thing
• 33:26
  Speaker 3: I can see to do is actually to take advantage
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: of the very things that are in the marquis favor.
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: I am going to profit by the fact that he
• 33:34
  Speaker 3: is a highly respected nobleman. I'm going to profit by
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: the fact that he has many friends and moves in
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: the best society.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: What the devil are you talking about, asked the professor.
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: The Simes are first mentioned in the fourteenth.
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: Century, said Sime.
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: But there's a tradition that one of them rode behind
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: Bruce at Bannockburn since thirteen fifty. The tree is quite clear.
• 33:58
  Speaker 5: He's gone off his head.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: Said the little doctor, staring our bearings, continued Sime, calmly.
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: Our argenti chevron jewels charged with three cross crosslets of
• 34:10
  Speaker 3: the field. The motto varies.
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: The professor seized Sime roughly by the waistcoat.
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: We are just in shore, he said, Are you see
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: sikh or joking in the wrong place?
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: My remark's almost painfully practical.
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: Answered Sime in an unhurried manner.
• 34:31
  Speaker 3: The house of cint Ya Sash also is very ancient.
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: The marquis cannot deny that he is a gentleman. He
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: can't deny the time a gentleman. And in order to
• 34:40
  Speaker 3: put the matter of my search of position quite beyond
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: a doubt. I propose the earliest opportunity to knock his
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: hat off. But here we are in the harbor.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: They went on shore under the strong sun in a
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: sort of daze. Sime, who had now taken the lead
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: as Bull had taken it in London, led them up
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: along a kind of marine parade until he came to
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: some cafes embowered in a bulk of greenery and overlooking
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: the sea. As he went before them, his step was
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: slightly swaggering, and he swung his stick like a sword.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: He was making apparently for the extreme end of the
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: line of cafes, but he stopped abruptly with a sharp gesture.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: He motioned them to silence, but he pointed with one
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: gloved finger to a cafe table under the bank of
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: flowering foliage, at which sat the Marquis de Saint Eustache,
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: his teeth shining in his thick black beard, and his
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: bald brown face shadowed by a light yellow straw hat
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: and outlined against the violet sea. End of Chapter nine