Dawn of All - Robert Hugh Benson (the read aloud family txt) 📗

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"Well?"

"They're wavering. It's no use denying it. They'd accept almost anything. It's perfectly desperate. They see that now."

He was fingering the priest's sleeve by now, and his eyes were full of a pitiable anxiety.

"What do you wish me to do?"

"Well, they'll say I was responsible--if the negotiations come to anything, I mean. They'll say I urged them on. They'll sacrifice me--me and the President. They'll say they never would have gone to such lengths----What's that noise?"

Monsignor jerked his head impatiently. He began to see light.

"Well," went on the other nervously, "I want you to speak for me, if necessary--if necessary, you understand? You're a Christian, Monsignor. . . You'll stand by me."

The priest waited before answering; as the situation took shape before his eyes, he began to understand more and more clearly; and yet----

A voice called out sharply beyond the door, and Hardy leapt to the handle, beckoning with his head; and as the priest obediently followed, he gave him one more look of entreaty and opened the door. The President stood there. The great man, more impressive than ever now, as his great height showed itself, ran his eyes slowly over the two.

"Come back to the hall," he said, so slowly that even the priest understood it, and turned.

"The envoy's coming," whispered Hardy breathlessly, as he paused before following. "You'll remember, Monsignor? . . ."

It was hardly a minute since they had left, and yet all confusion had vanished. Every man was back in his seat, with that same impassive and yet attentive air that they had worn when Monsignor first saw them. Yet, with his new knowledge, it seemed to him as if he could detect, beneath all that, something of the indecisiveness of which he had just learned. Certainly they were under admirable discipline; yet he began to see that even socialistic discipline had its limitations.

The President was already in the act of sitting down, Hardy was stepping up behind him, and the priest was still hesitating by the door, when down at the lower end of the hall there was a movement among those who guarded it, the great doors opened, and a figure walked straight in, without looking to right or left.

He came on and up; and as he came the hush fell deeper. It was impossible even to see his face; he was in a long travelling cloak that fell to his feet; a travelling cap covered his head; and about his throat and face was thrown a great white scarf, such as the air-travellers often use. He came on, still without looking to right or left, walking as if he had some kind of right to be there, straight up to the witness-box, ascended the steps, and stood there for an instant motionless.

Then he unwound his scarf, lifted his cap and dropped it beside him, threw back his cloak with a single movement, and stood there--a white figure from head to foot, white capped. . . . There was a great sigh from the men on the platform; two or three sprang to their feet, and sat down again as suddenly. Only the President did not move. Then there fell an absolute silence.


(V)

"Eh well," said the Pope in delicate French; "I am arrived in time then."

He looked round from side to side, smiling and peering--this little commonplace-looking Frenchman, who had in his hand at this period of the world's history an incalculably greater power than any living being on earth had ever before wielded--Father of Princes and Kings, Arbiter of the East, Father as well as Sovereign Lord of considerably more than a thousand million souls. He stood there, utterly alone with a single servant waiting out there, half a mile away, at the flying-stage, in the presence of the Council who in the name of the malcontents of the human race had declared war on the world of which he was now all but absolute master. No European nation could pass a law which he had not the right to veto; not one monarch claimed to hold his crown except at the hands of this man. And the East--even the pagan East--had learned at last that the Vicar of Christ was the Friend of Peace and Progress.

And he stood here, smiling and peering at the faces.

"I come as my own envoy," said the Pope presently, adjusting his collar. "'The King said, "They will reverence My Son,"' so I am come as the Vicar of that Son. You have killed my two messengers, I hear. Why have you done that?"

There was no answer. From where the priest stood he could hear laboured breathing on all sides, but not a man moved or spoke.

"Eh well then, I have come to offer you a last opportunity of submitting peacefully. In less than an hour from now the armed truce expires. After that we shall be compelled to use force. We do not wish to use force; but society must now protect itself. I do not speak to you in the name of Christ; that name means nothing to you. So I speak in the name of society, which you profess to love. Submit, gentlemen, and let me be the bearer of the good news."

He spoke still in that absolutely quiet and conversational tone in which he had begun. One hand rested lightly on the rail before him; the other gently fingered the great cross on his breast, naturally and easily, as the priest had seen him finger it once before in his own palace. It was unthinkable that such a weight in the world's history rested on so slight a foundation. Yet for a few frozen moments no one else moved or spoke. It is probable that the scene they witnessed seemed to them unsubstantial and untrue.

Then, as the priest still stood, fascinated and overwhelmed, he noticed a movement in the great chair before him. Very slowly the President shifted his position, clasping his hands loosely before him and bending forward a little. Then a dialogue began, of which every word remained in the priest's mind as if written there. It was in French throughout, the smooth delicacy of the Pope's intonation contrasting strangely with the heavy German accent of the other.

"You come as an envoy, sir. Do you then accept our terms?"

"I accept no terms. I offer them."

"And those?"

"Absolute and unconditional submission to myself."

"You received our notice as to the treatment of such envoys?"

(There was a rustle in the hall, but the other paid no attention.)

"But certainly."

"You come armed then--protected in some manner?"

The Pope smiled. He made a little opening gesture with his hands.

"I come as you see me; no more."

"Your armies are behind you?"

"The European air-fleets start from every quarter at midnight."

"With your consent?"

"But certainly."

"You understand that this means immeasurable bloodshed?"

"But certainly."

"You defend that?"

"My Master came bringing not peace, but a sword. But I am not here to teach theology."

"But until midnight----"

"Until midnight I am in your hands."

Again the silence fell, deeper than ever. Monsignor took his eyes off the Pope's face for an instant to glance round what he could see of the circle. All were staring steadily, some half sunk down in their seats, others stretched forward, clasping the outer edges of the desks with strained hands, all staring at this quiet white figure who faced them. He looked again at that face. If there had been in it, not merely agitation or fear, but even unusual paleness, if there had been in those hands, one of which bore the great Papal ring, not merely trembling, but even a sign of constriction or tenseness, it might well have been, thought the priest afterwards, that the scene would have ended very differently. But the naturalness and ease of the pose were absolute. He stood there, the hands lightly laid one upon the other, his face palish certainly, but not colourless. There was even a slight flush in his cheeks from his quick walk up the long hall. It was a situation in which the weight of a hair would turn the scale. . . .

Then the President lifted his head slightly, and a tremor ran round the circle.

"I see no reason for delay," he said heavily. "Our terms were clear. This man came with the full knowledge of them and the consequences of disregarding them----"

The Pope lifted his hand.

"One instant, Mr. President----"

"I see no reason----"

"Gentlemen-----"

A murmur of consent rolled round the thirty persons sitting there, so unmistakable that the man who up to now had ruled them all with a hint or gesture dropped his head again. Then the Pope went on.

"Gentlemen, I have really no more to say than that which I have said. But I beg of you to reconsider. You propose to kill me as you have killed my messengers. Well, I am at your disposal. I did not expect to live so long when I set out from Rome this morning. But, then, what will you gain? At midnight every civilized nation is in arms. And I will tell you what perhaps you do not know--that the East is supporting Europe. The Eastern fleets are actually on their way at this moment that I speak. You propose to reform Society. I will not argue as to those reforms; I say only that they are too late. I will not argue as to the truth of the Christian religion. I say only that the Christian religion is already ruling this world. You kill me? My successor will reign to-morrow. . . . You kill the Emperor; his son, now in Rome, at that moment begins to reign. Gentlemen, what do you gain? Merely this--that in days to come your names will be foul in all men's mouths. . . . At this moment you have an opportunity to submit; in a few minutes it will be too late."

He paused a moment.

Then, to the priest's eyes, it seemed as if some subtle change passed over his face and figure. Up to now he had spoken, conversationally and quietly, as a man might speak to a company of friends. But, though he had not noticed it at the time, he remembered later how there had been gathering during his little speech a certain secret intensity and force like the kindling of a fire. In this pause it swept on and up, flushing his face with sudden colour, lifting his hands as on a rising tide, breaking out suddenly in his eyes like fire, and in his voice in passion. The rest saw it too; and in that tense atmosphere it laid hold of them as with a giant's hand; it struck their tight-strung nerves; it broke down the last barriers on which their own fears had been at work.

"My children," cried the White Father, no longer a Frenchman now, but a very Son of Man. "My children, do not break my heart! So long and hard the labour--two thousand years long--two thousand years since Christ died; and you to wreck and break the peace that comes at last; that peace into which through so great tribulations the people of God are entering at last. You say you know no God, and cannot love Him; but you know man---poor wilful man--and would you fling him back once more into wrath and passion and lust for blood?--those lusts from which even