The Americans Part 79

As though they had the Ark of the Covenant.

RALPH ARDSLEY.

If any one had said to me last week That that despondent crowd of shabby men, After six weeks of battle against odds, And beaten into silence, starved and cold, Had in them the capacity for this-- Who was it said we're always in a flux, That nothing's fixed? We don't know anything.

It's like a case of type; to-day it spells Egerton and to-morrow M-o-b.

To think of Donald Egerton at bay!

Egad!

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

These shouts once rose about the Church, But somehow we don't hear them any more.

RALPH ARDSLEY.

Don't think for a moment, Bishop, that you're alone.

We never had the tumult and the shout That you had in old days, but it's all the same.

The 'Power of the Press'! It makes me laugh.

If I could find a little farm somewhere, I'd sell my stock to Egerton and get out And let the world go hang. I'm tired of it.

(_Cheers outside_)

Yes, there's a ring about it you don't hear Even in Conventions.

(_The Guard enters the mill, back left, and comes through the gate in the railing_)

GUARD.

In a moment.

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

Thank you.

(_The Guard goes out down the stairs_)

RALPH ARDSLEY.

What's your opinion of the trouble, Bishop?

(_To himself_)

To think of Donald Egerton at bay!

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

We've had the matter up in Conference Several times.

RALPH ARDSLEY.

Yes.

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

But I somehow feel We don't get hold of it. The lower cla.s.ses-- They're going off. I don't believe it's Christ.

You say they're leaving you; and General Chadbourne-- Two thirds, I think you said, of his command.

RALPH ARDSLEY.

Facing State's prison, too

(_Cheers outside. The two men remain silent_)

RALPH ARDSLEY.

And Egerton-- They certainly have left him. I thought last night As I sat looking up toward that new home--

(_Cheers outside_)

They'll never light it up again that way, The way it was that day. Did you ever see Anything to equal that reception hall?

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

What's in the boy that these men follow him, And all his life so quiet, almost timid?

RALPH ARDSLEY.

'What go ye out into the wilderness for to see?'

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

Yes, if his cause were better.

RALPH ARDSLEY.

There you are.

BISHOP HARDBROOKE.

But this audacious, this deliberate Stealing--though I hate to use the word-- This seizing of the mill----

RALPH ARDSLEY.

Here he comes now.

(_He gets down from the stool_)

You do the talking, Bishop, the heavy part.