An Episode of Flatland by 1907

Author:1907
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2007-11-10T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER IX

LAURA TAKES A HAND

ON her return to Persepolis, Laura found herself immersed in the same gay whirl of society she had left. On the faces of some of her father's associates she detected traces of the same anxious pre-occupation that was plain on his, but she could find no suspicion on the part of people in general of any definite impending danger. There was a vague sense of uneasiness and restlessness which, no doubt, sprang from a subtle communication of unexpressed thought, but nothing more definite than that. Her uncle held no communication with her, and there was no sign of the activity on which he and Harold had embarked, unless it were a religious revival which involved the presence of ministers and preachers from the most distant regions.

One day she met Harold.

"It's hard," she said, "to do nothing, but I have have not spoken a word."

"That is right."

"Do they believe in uncle's ideas?"

"They think any hope is better than none."

"But you, Harold, what do you think?"

"It is not my part to think. The government has caused the construction of huge excavations all over the land under various pretexts that shows what they think. For my part to follow your uncle is better than to die like a rat in a hole. This very day at the palace of the Orbian pontiff all the clergy of every denomination meet for consultation."

"Harold, that isn't possible

"Wonderful, but true."

"Have all those different people laid their opposition aside?"

"We shall see. Keep silent a little longer."

"But Harold, what will it all come to? As soon as the preachers begin explaining to the people, my father will let loose a flood of ridicule. It will all come to nothing."

"They can educate public opinion, Laura."

"You are only telling me the same thing over again. Speak me true, Harold," she answered, flashing on him imperiously.

"It looks as if there were no way out."

"Harold, you ought to persuade the army; if they were determined on a thing nothing could resist them."

"I know my fellow soldiers pretty well, Laura, your uncle's theories would be mere unintelligible words to them. And even if they believed the strong men would not stir. It's bred in our bone, Laura, that we are the servants of the State. I could move a few miserables, but without heart, Laura, without heart. Do you think any of us would break our oath for all your uncle could say?"

"Oh, Harold, what is to become of us?"

"Laura, in the presence of that danger without, incalculable forces are stirring within-neither you nor I know them, they lie outside all your father has scanned with his wary eye. I feel something rising within me alert and ready to seize the moment. And I am preparing the ground. It's not men that would be wanting for any desperate errand I sent them on-but it is weight, force, mass, that I must get. Go home and rest in confidence because I tell you to, and always remember whatever they say of

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