Lord of the World 10

Lord of the World 10

He finished in half an hour, and again sat thinking; but this time it

was of poor Father Francis. He wondered what he was doing now; whether

he had taken off the Roman collar of Christ's familiar slaves? The poor

devil! And how far was he, Percy Franklin, responsible?

 

When a tap came at his door presently, and Father Blackmore looked in

for a talk before going to bed, Percy told him what had happened.

 

Father Blackmore removed his pipe and sighed deliberately.

 

"I knew it was coming," he said. "Well, well."

 

"He has been honest enough," explained Percy. "He told me eight months

ago he was in trouble."

 

Father Blackmore drew upon his pipe thoughtfully.

 

"Father Franklin," he said, "things are really very serious. There is

the same story everywhere. What in the world is happening?"

 

Percy paused before answering.

 

"I think these things go in waves," he said.

 

"Waves, do you think?" said the other.

 

"What else?"

 

Father Blackmore looked at him intently.

 

"It is more like a dead calm, it seems to me," he said. "Have you ever

been in a typhoon?"

 

Percy shook his head.

 

"Well," went on the other, "the most ominous thing is the calm. The sea

is like oil; you feel half-dead: you can do nothing. Then comes the

storm."

 

Percy looked at him, interested. He had not seen this mood in the priest

before.

 

"Before every great crash there comes this calm. It is always so in

history. It was so before the Eastern War; it was so before the French

Revolution. It was so before the Reformation. There is a kind of oily

heaving; and everything is languid. So everything has been in America,

too, for over eighty years.... Father Franklin, I think something is

going to happen."

 

"Tell me," said Percy, leaning forward.

 

"Well, I saw Templeton a week before he died, and he put the idea in my

head.... Look here, father. It may be this Eastern affair that is coming

on us; but somehow I don't think it is. It is in religion that something

is going to happen. At least, so I think.... Father, who in God's name

is Felsenburgh?"

 

Percy was so startled at the sudden introduction of this name again,

that he stared a moment without speaking.

 

Outside, the summer night was very still. There was a faint vibration

now and again from the underground track that ran twenty yards from the

house where they sat; but the streets were quiet enough round the

Cathedral. Once a hoot rang far away, as if some ominous bird of passage

were crossing between London and the stars, and once the cry of a woman

sounded thin and shrill from the direction of the river. For the rest

there was no more than the solemn, subdued hum that never ceased now

night or day.

 

"Yes; Felsenburgh," said Father Blackmore once more. "I cannot get that

man out of my head. And yet, what do I know of him? What does any one

know of him?"

 

Percy licked his lips to answer, and drew a breath to still the beating

of his heart. He could not imagine why he felt excited. After all, who

was old Blackmore to frighten him? But old Blackmore went on before he

could speak.

 

"See how people are leaving the Church! The Wargraves, the Hendersons,

Sir James Bartlet, Lady Magnier, and then all the priests. Now they're

not all knaves--I wish they were; it would be so much easier to talk of

it. But Sir James Bartlet, last month! Now, there's a man who has spent

half his fortune on the Church, and he doesn't resent it even now. He

says that any religion is better than none, but that, for himself, he

just can't believe any longer. Now what does all that mean?... I tell

you something is going to happen. God knows what! And I can't get

Felsenburgh out of my head.... Father Franklin---"

 

"Yes?"

 

"Have you noticed how few great men we've got? It's not like fifty years

ago, or even thirty. Then there were Mason, Selborne, Sherbrook, and

half-a-dozen others. There was Brightman, too, as Archbishop: and now!

Then the Communists, too. Braithwaite is dead fifteen years. Certainly

he was big enough; but he was always speaking of the future, not of the

present; and tell me what big man they have had since then! And now

there's this new man, whom no one knows, who came forward in America a

few months ago, and whose name is in every one's mouth. Very well,

then!"

 

Percy knitted his forehead.

 

"I am not sure that I understand," he said.

 

Father Blackmore knocked his pipe out before answering.

 

"Well, this," he said, standing up. "I can't help thinking Felsenburgh

is going to do something. I don't know what; it may be for us or against

us. But he is a Mason, remember that.... Well, well; I dare say I'm an

old fool. Good-night."

 

"One moment, father," said Percy slowly. "Do you mean--? Good Lord! What

do you mean?" He stopped, looking at the other.

 

The old priest stared back under his bushy eyebrows; it seemed to Percy

as if he, too, were afraid of something in spite of his easy talk; but

he made no sign.

 

* * * * *

 

Percy stood perfectly still a moment when the door was shut. Then he

moved across to his _prie-dieu_.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER III

 

I

 

Old Mrs. Brand and Mabel were seated at a window of the new Admiralty

Offices in Trafalgar Square to see Oliver deliver his speech on the

fiftieth anniversary of the passing of the Poor Laws Reform.

 

It was an inspiriting sight, this bright June morning, to see the crowds

gathering round Braithwaite's statue. That politician, dead fifteen

years before, was represented in his famous attitude, with arms

outstretched and down dropped, his head up and one foot slightly

advanced, and to-day was decked, as was becoming more and more usual on

such occasions, in his Masonic insignia. It was he who had given

immense impetus to that secret movement by his declaration in the House

that the key of future progress and brotherhood of nations was in the

hands of the Order. It was through this alone that the false unity of

the Church with its fantastic spiritual fraternity could be

counteracted. St. Paul had been right, he declared, in his desire to

break down the partition-walls between nations, and wrong only in his

exaltation of Jesus Christ. Thus he had preluded his speech on the Poor

Law question, pointing to the true charity that existed among Masons

apart from religious motive, and appealing to the famous benefactions on

the Continent; and in the enthusiasm of the Bill's success the Order had

received a great accession of members.

 

Old Mrs. Brand was in her best to-day, and looked out with considerable

excitement at the huge throng gathered to hear her son speak. A platform

was erected round the bronze statue at such a height that the statesman

appeared to be one of the speakers, though at a slightly higher

elevation, and this platform was hung with roses, surmounted by a

sounding-board, and set with a chair and table.

 

The whole square round about was paved with heads and resonant with

sound, the murmurs of thousands of voices, overpowered now and again by

the crash of brass and thunder of drums as the Benefit Societies and

democratic Guilds, each headed by a banner, deployed from North, South,

East and West, and converged towards the wide railed space about the

platform where room was reserved for them. The windows on every side

were packed with faces; tall stands were erected along the front of the

National Gallery and St. Martin's Church, garden-beds of colour behind

the mute, white statues that faced outwards round the square; from

Braithwaite in front, past the Victorians--John Davidson, John Burns,

and the rest--round to Hampden and de Montfort towards the north. The

old column was gone, with its lions. Nelson had not been found

advantageous to the _Entente Cordiale_, nor the lions to the new art;

and in their place stretched a wide pavement broken by slopes of steps

that led up to the National Gallery.

 

Overhead the roofs showed crowded friezes of heads against the blue

summer sky. Not less than one hundred thousand persons, it was estimated

in the evening papers, were collected within sight and sound of the

platform by noon.

 

As the clocks began to tell the hour, two figures appeared from behind

the statue and came forward, and, in an instant, the murmurs of talk

rose into cheering.

 

Old Lord Pemberton came first, a grey-haired, upright man, whose father

had been active in denouncing the House of which he was a member on the

occasion of its fall over seventy years ago, and his son had succeeded

him worthily. This man was now a member of the Government, and sat for

Manchester (3); and it was he who was to be chairman on this auspicious

occasion. Behind him came Oliver, bareheaded and spruce, and even at

that distance his mother and wife could see his brisk movement, his

sudden smile and nod as his name emerged from the storm of sound that

surged round the platform. Lord Pemberton came forward, lifted his hand

and made a signal; and in a moment the thin cheering died under the

sudden roll of drums beneath that preluded the Masonic Hymn.

 

There was no doubt that these Londoners could sing. It was as if a giant

voice hummed the sonorous melody, rising to enthusiasm till the music of

massed bands followed it as a flag follows a flag-stick. The hymn was

one composed ten years before, and all England was familiar with it.