When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells (latest books to read TXT) š
- Author: H. G. Wells
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āYou are rather well-informed on these things,ā said Graham.
āI know what I hear. It isnāt all Babble Machine with me.ā
āNo,ā said Graham, wondering what Babble Machine might be. āAnd you are certain this Ostrogāyou are certain Ostrog organised this rebellion and arranged for the waking of the Sleeper? Just to assert himselfābecause he was not elected to the Council?
āEveryone knows that, I should think,ā said the old man. āExceptājust fools. He meant to be master somehow. In the Council or not. Everyone who knows anything knows that. And here we are with dead bodies lying in the dark! Why, where have you been if you havenāt heard all about the trouble between Ostrog and the Verneys? And what do you think the troubles are about? The Sleeper? Eh? You think the Sleeperās real and woke of his own accordāeh?ā
āIām a dull man, older than I look, and forgetful,ā said Graham. āLots of things that have happenedāespecially of late yearsā. If I was the Sleeper, to tell you the truth, I couldnāt know less about them.ā
āEh!ā said the voice. āOld, are you? You donāt sound so very old! But its not everyone keeps his memory to my time of lifeātruly. But these notorious things! But youāre not so old as meānot nearly so old as me. Well! I ought not to judge other men by myself, perhaps. Iām youngāfor so old a man. Maybe youāre old for so young.ā
āThatās it,ā said Graham. āAnd Iāve a queer history. I know very little. And history! Practically I know no history. The Sleeper and Julius Caesar are all the same to me. Itās interesting to hear you talk of these things.ā
āI know a few things,ā said the old man. āI know a thing or two. Butā. Hark!ā
The two men became silent, listening. There was heavy thud, a concussion that made their seat shiver. The passers-by stopped, shouted to one another. The old man was full of questions; he shouted to a man who passed near. Graham, emboldened by his example, got up and accosted others. None knew what had happened.
He returned to the seat and found the old man muttering vague interrogations in an undertone. For a while they said nothing to one another.
The sense of this gigantic struggle, so near and yet so remote oppressed Grahamās imagination. Was this old man right, was the report of the people right, and were the revolutionaries winning? Or were they all in error, and were the red guards driving all before them? At any time the flood of warfare might pour into this silent quarter of the city and seize upon him again. It behooved him to learn all he could while there was time. He turned suddenly to the old man with a question and left it unsaid. But his motion moved the old man to speech again.
āEh! but how things work together!ā said the old man. āThis Sleeper that all the fools put their trust in! Iāve the whole history of itāI was always a good one for histories. When I was a boyāIām that oldāI used to read printed books. Youād hardly think it. Likely youāve seen noneāthey rot and dust soāand the Sanitary Company burns them to make ashlarite. But they were convenient in their dirty way. Oh I learnt a lot. These new-fangled Babble Machinesāthey donāt seem new-fangled to you, eh?ātheyāre easy to hear, easy to forget. But Iāve traced all the Sleeper business from the first.ā
āYou will scarcely believe it,ā said Graham slowly, āIām so ignorantāIāve been so preoccupied in my own little affairs, my circumstances have been so oddāI know nothing of this Sleeperās history. Who was he?ā
āEh!ā said the old man. āI know. I know. He was a poor nobody, and set on a playful woman, poor soul! And he fell into a trance. Thereās the old things they had, those brown thingsāsilver photographsāstill showing him as he lay, a gross and a half years agoāa gross and a half of years.ā
āSet on a playful woman, poor soul,ā said Graham softly to himself, and then aloud, āYesāwell! go on.ā
āYou must know he had a cousin named Warming a solitary man without children, who made a big fortune speculating in roadsāthe first Eadhamite roads. But surely youāve heard? No? Why? He bought all the patent rights and made a big company. In those days there were grosses of grosses of separate businesses and business companies. Grosses of grosses! His roads killed the railroadsāthe old thingsāin two dozen years; he bought up and Eadhamited the tracks. And because he didnāt want to break up his great property or let in shareholders, he left it all to the Sleeper, and put it under a Board of Trustees that he had picked and trained. He knew then the Sleeper wouldnāt wake, that he would go on sleeping, sleeping till he died. He knew that quite well! And plump! a man in the United States, who had lost two sons in a boat accident, followed that up with another great bequest. His trustees found themselves with a dozen myriads of lionsā-worth or more of property at the very beginning.ā
āWhat was his name?ā
āGraham.ā
āNo, I meanāthat Americanās.ā
āIsbister.ā
āIsbister!ā cried Graham. āWhy, I donāt even know the name.ā
āOf course not,ā said the old man. āOf course not. People donāt learn much in the schools nowadays. But I know all about him. He was a rich American who went from England, and he left the Sleeper even more than Warming. How he made it? That I donāt know. Something about pictures by machinery. But he made it and left it, and so the Council had its start. It was just a council of trustees at first.ā
āAnd how did it grow?ā
āEh!ābut youāre not up to things. Money attracts moneyāand twelve brains are better than one. They played it cleverly. They worked politics with money, and kept on adding to the money by working currency and tariffs. They grewāthey grew. And for years the twelve trustees hid the growing of the Sleeperās estate, under double names and company titles and all that. The Council spread by title deed, mortgage, share, every political party, every newspaper, they bought. If you listen to the old stories you will see the Council growing and growing. Billions and billions of lions at lastāthe Sleeperās estate. And all growing out of a whimāout of this Warmingās will, and an accident to Isbisterās sons.
āMen are strange,ā said the old man. āThe strange, thing to me is how the Council worked together so long. As many as twelve. But they worked in cliques from the first. And theyāve slipped back. In my young days speaking of the Council was like an ignorant man speaking of God. We didnāt think they could do wrong. We didnāt know of their women and all
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