In the opportunity that the slight pause gave, Bale-Corphew sprang forward and, resting his hands upon the Sanctuary railing, faced the congregation.
"People!" he cried, hoa.r.s.ely, "be not deceived! This man pretends to tell you what he is. He is blinding you--weaving a bandage of specious words across your eyes. But I will undeceive you. I will tear the bandage--" He hesitated, stammered, paused.
With a movement full of fire, full of authority, the Prophet stepped from the Throne.
"Silence!" he cried. "There is no need for interference. This matter is between the People and myself." With a pale face and burning eyes he stepped forward, and standing beside the Arch-Mystic confronted the congregation.
"I will tell you everything that this man would tell you," he said, in a steady voice. "I believe I will even use the word he himself would choose. I am a thief! I am a thief--in intention if not in act!"
The effect of the word was tremendous. A perfectly audible gasp went up from the breathless crowd; and, by one accord, the people rose and swayed upward towards the Sanctuary.
Calm and immovable as a rock, the Prophet held his place.
"Yes," he said, steadily, "until this morning I have virtually been a thief. Until this morning it was my firm intention to take by force that which should have come to me as my right. The fact that my intention faltered at the last moment does not affect the case. I wish to make no appeal. My desire"--his voice suddenly quickened--"my desire is plainly and simply to state my case.
"Morally I have done you no wrong. My teaching has been the expounding of simple truths, that my personal action could not desecrate. I stand before you to-night empty-handed as I came. The one thing I claim from you is judgment!
"Judge me! I am in your hands. If you think I deserve punishment, punish me! If you think circ.u.mstances have made me what I am, then stand aside!
Let me pa.s.s out of your lives!"
There was a great silence; then a woman"s sharp cry rang out across the chapel, as, with a savage movement, three of the Arch-Mystics sprang upon the Prophet.
"Sacrilege! Sacrilege!" Bale-Corphew"s voice rose loud and violent.
But he had calculated without his host. The fanaticism of a crowd is a dangerous weapon with which to tamper, and the dethronement of a king is not accomplished in a day. With the speed of light, the element he had unloosed turned upon himself.
Again one word disentangled itself from the medley of sounds.
"The Prophet! The Prophet!" Like an ignited fuse, instinct had been lighted in the people. The man who for months had been exalted--honored--well-nigh worshipped--was in imminent peril!
That one thought submerged and demolished every other.
There was a forward movement--a roar--a crash--and the high, gilt railings of the Sanctuary went down as before a storm.
To Enid, who had been borne irresistibly upward on the human tide, there was one overpowering moment of fear and clamor, in which the cry of "The Prophet! The Prophet!" dominated her consciousness; then, to her, the world became suddenly and mercifully sightless, soundless, and void.
When at last her eyes opened--when at last her senses falteringly returned to the consciousness of present things--she was in her own familiar room. The atmosphere breathed of repose and peace; through the drawn curtains the hum of London came subdued and soothing; in the room itself the lights were modulated and the fire glowed soft and mellow, while a faint, pungent smell of restoratives filled the air. But these details came but vaguely to her appreciation, for the first object upon which her glance and her ideas rested was the figure of John Henderson, kneeling beside the couch on which she lay.
For a long, silent s.p.a.ce she gazed bewildered into the grave face bent over her own--striving to fathom whether this was another phase of an extraordinarily prolonged and hara.s.sing dream, or whether it had any bearing upon real life; then, as the pained, bewildered sensation deepened in her mind, it was suddenly illumined by a flash of recollection; and starting up, she caught Henderson"s hand.
But before she could speak he laid his fingers gently over her eyes.
"You are not to think," he said. "To-night is past."
"But h.e.l.lier Crescent? What happened after--after--?"
Again he made a soothing movement.
"You must not think of it. They gathered round me. They were generous.
They heaped coals of fire."
Enid lay silent, conscious with a keen yet poignant pleasure of his hand upon her face. Then suddenly a new thought obtruded itself, and drawing away his fingers, she looked up into his face.
"And after to-night--?" she said, in a low, unsteady voice.
For a moment he did not answer, and in the soft light it seemed to her that a shadow of pain pa.s.sed over his face.
Again she put out her hand and touched his.
"What are you going to do?" she asked, below her breath.
At last he raised his head and looked fully at her.
"I am going back to the East. The hardest task of my life is awaiting me there. It is a very bitter thing to disillusionize the person to whom one is a hero."
She looked at him quickly.
"You are speaking of your mother? You are thinking of your mother?"
He bent his head.
For a s.p.a.ce neither spoke. Vaguely, and in distant accompaniment to their thoughts, each was conscious of the hum of traffic and of the softly crackling fire; then at last Enid stirred, and with a gesture full of comprehension, her fingers closed round Henderson"s.
"Let me tell her the story!" she said, almost inaudibly. "Take me with you--and let me tell her! We are both women, and--" Her head drooped slightly; and her face flushed. "And we both love you."