4
As we hurried to the station, I told O’Rane that the approaches to Westminster had been barricaded earlier in the day and suggested that we should make for The Sanctuary by way of Waterloo and Lambeth. He nodded without speaking; and, after that, I left him undisturbed. I am not, I never have been, anything that could be called “a man of action”; I did not know whether we were hastening into the vortex of a revolution; and, if I had known, I should have had no idea what to do.
“I’m simply waiting for your orders,” I reminded him, as we struggled out of the lift.
“And I’m waiting for you to tell me what’s happening. How’s the fog?”
“I really believe it’s thicker than ever.”
“Good. Take my arm and come for all you’re worth. There’s no difference to me between night and day or fog and sunshine; but there’s all the difference in the world to these other fellows. I figure out that Griffiths’ gang ought to be arriving just about now, if they’ve come on foot. And if they’ve come at all. The police ought to be there before them, with luck. We’ve no idea of numbers on either side; but one policeman, attacking or defending, is a match for quite a few people who haven’t made up their minds how far they want to go. And it’s a trained against an untrained force. On the other hand, the police can’t go to extremes until they’re driven.”
“And in pitch darkness,” I added, “numbers and training and the majesty of the law don’t count for much.”
“I’m banking on that. This may be a one-man show. Me. The fog’s still holding everywhere? Good again. We’re all blind for this evening, but I’ve had more than seven years’ start of the others. I haven’t bumped you once so far? I can feel when people are near. And I’m coming to know London like my own bedroom. There’s a crossing here, with rather a high kerb. Left incline to the refuge! There’s a lorry feeling his way along . . . and getting tied up with a south-bound tram. We can go on now. People aren’t frightened of a fog nearly as much as I should have expected. When I remember the agony of fear I went through when I was blinded . . . The helplessness . . . Here’s Westminster Bridge, but I don’t think it’s the least use trying that.”
We hurried along the south bank of the river and only crossed when we were safely in the rear of all possible pickets.
“What happens if we get separated?,” I asked.
“Look after yourself as best you can, but don’t call me by name. D’you know Lilliburlero? Well, pretend you’re Uncle Toby and whistle that when you get a chance, just to shew me where you are. If you want help, whistle John Peel. I’ll get to you if I can . . . Of course, we may find everything as peaceful as the grave. If we do, I think I shall still take the precaution of moving Sonia and the boys to some other part of London.”
“Bring them to Seymour Street,” I suggested.
“I will, thankfully. If we find there’s a scrap in progress, we must arrange a retreat. There’ll be nobody on the west side of the house, because there are no windows for any one to break on the ground floor; and there’s a fairly high wall round the stable-yard. If you’ll keep cavé, I’ll slip in there and go up the fire-escape. I’ll give you the first line of The Campbells Are Coming to know if the coast’s clear; if you’ll reply with Over the Hills and Far Away, I shall know I can unlock the door. From there, the way is by Smith Square, Great College Street and Dean’s Yard. The gates will be shut against us; but the police will open them. . . . Are you feeling at all nervous?”
“A bit keyed-up. This damned fog . . .”
“You may live to bless it. If for any reason we don’t both get through, we’ll say good-bye now. Slow down a bit; we can’t be more than fifty yards from the corner.”
Though I fancied we were still half a mile away, I discovered—by the abrupt change from stucco to brick—that we had indeed reached the south side of the house. So far as I could see or hear, the neighbourhood was deserted; but a single distant thud, followed by a sharp tinkle, told me that some one on the other side of the house had broken a window and that the missile had been stopped by a shutter. I heard hurried footsteps and pulled up within an inch of colliding with a young policeman. His truncheon was drawn; and he had lost his helmet.
“You gentlemen had best keep out of this,” he warned us.
“What’s happening?,” I asked. “Are these the hunger-marchers?”
“I reckon so. And they’re out for mischief. If you could see them, it wouldn’t be so bad . . .”
He broke off as a fusillade of stones rattled against the house. A hollow ‘plump’, like the sound of a weight dropped into water, indicated another broken window; and in the moment’s silence that followed we heard another tinkle of glass.
“The house will stand a good deal of that,” O’Rane murmured. “They’ve had no luck with the door?”
“Two or three got in by the area window,” stated the constable. “Now they can’t get out again. There are two men waiting for them.”
O’Rane broke into an unexpected laugh:
“I’m afraid they’ll have a long wait. That’s the cellar; and the door’s sure to be locked. I hope they’ll find the wine to their taste.”
“Is this your house, sir?,” asked the policeman. “You’d best not let them see you, then. They’re after you.”
“So it seems,” O’Rane answered, as a new volley of stones rattled on to the pavement and a series of short scuffles gave place to the sound of running feet.
The battle, we were told, had been raging for half-an-hour. At first the assailants had concentrated on the front door; when that refused to yield, they began to break every window within reach until the police scattered them. Then the attack was transferred to a distance. On the Embankment twenty yards away, where the road was under repair, lay miscellaneous heaps of stones and granite blocks. By these the hunger-marchers collected and bombarded both the house and the newly formed cordon. It was a difficult attack to meet at any time, but the fog made it impossible. When the police charged, the assailants slipped between and round them, to reassemble in flank and to continue their bombardment of the house at close-quarters; when the police charged back, the hunger-marchers returned to their ammunition-dump and reopened a long-range fire. The present lull in the fighting was due to a change of tactics: half the police were stationed in open order round the house, while the other half encircled the granite piles to cut off supplies. Their numbers, however, were insufficient to hold either position effectively; and, though further reinforcements were reported to be on their way, there were enough stones lying loose about the house for a long spell of irregular practice.
“Is that fellow Griffiths in charge?,” asked O’Rane.
“I’ve heard so,” answered the constable.
“I want to get hold of him. This must be stopped, but it’s no good breaking heads and putting people under arrest. We must stop it before the reinforcements come up and the whole thing starts again. There’s a lot to be said for these fellows: they’re hungry, to begin with, and they’ve been fooled by everybody, Griffiths most of all. The first thing they need is a meal; and I’m going to promise them that, if they’ll stop this stone-throwing business. And after that we must find ’em a place for the night; but I must promise them there’ll be no arrests. Where’s the inspector?”
“He’s guarding the area window, sir.”
“I hope to God I can make my voice heard,” O’Rane muttered, as he vanished from my side to be swallowed up in the fog.
I waited with the constable because I had been given no orders. He had been on duty for little more than half-an-hour and could tell me nothing of the battle’s beginning. On the other hand, he told me much about the rest of London: my premonition of a duel between Griffiths and the O’Ranes had come true; in every other part, the hunger-marchers were being peacefully conducted to makeshift kitchens and dormitories; Hampstead was quiet again; and this brawl, between unknown numbers on either side, was the nearest approach—as Philip Hornbeck might have said—to barricade-fighting.
Only a brawl, but an unpleasant brawl. I do not remember feeling unusually frightened, though I was more than usually helpless. From time to time a stone hurtled over my head or skated along the pavement at my feet; of all futile precautions, I pulled my hat over my eyes and turned up my coat-collar; also, I heard a sustained cursing of this Egyptian darkness and was surprised to recognize my own voice behind it. I could not see my watch; I have no idea how long it was before the next fusillade was followed by the now inevitable scuffling rush. Then came the sound of O’Rane’s voice from the front of the house. He called several times for Griffiths; and, when no answer came, he began to talk to the crowd and at their leader in the same breath.
Only once before had I heard O’Rane address a mass-meeting: that was in the early days of the war, when he came to gather recruits and wagered light-heartedly that he would stampede the meeting in five minutes. He won his bet; but then he had been able to see his audience, and his audience yielded to the double hypnotism of his voice and eyes. Now he was talking to a blind tent of darkness. I could not watch the effect; I could not tell how many heard him nor how many were present to hear. It was something that they listened in silence; but, until the speech was over, neither he nor I could tell for certain whether any one was in earshot.
There was little more in what he said now than in what he had rehearsed to me. After telling the crowd his name—which was received in silence—, he explained that, when the deputation called earlier in the day and at the moment when it was marching on his office in Hampstead, he had been taking steps to procure food for men whose only fault at that time was that they had listened to promises which could not be kept. If they did not know that, Griffiths did; the government had stated a dozen times that it would not receive their leaders; and the sympathy which the hunger-marchers had aroused on their way to London would vanish in a moment if they destroyed houses and helped themselves to private property. Though it was too late to undo the harm already done, it could be overlooked. If the rioting stopped instantly, no steps would be taken against the rioters, with the exception of Griffiths himself, against whom the police already held a warrant for inciting to crime. Further, immediate steps would be taken to provide shelter and food; but the stone-throwing must stop. Those who came forward empty-handed would be marshalled and led to Millbank Gardens, where supplies had already been collected.
The speech was over in three minutes; but twice that time passed before any answer came. I moved round to the front of the house, but the place from which O’Rane’s voice had issued was occupied by a single policeman. There was no more stone-throwing, but I could see nothing of the besieging army. Once I whistled a few bars of Lilliburlero, but they passed unacknowledged. Then I walked in a wider compass towards the battlefield on the Embankment. Everything was silent, every one was still; and each man suspected his neighbour. I could see neither policemen nor rioters until I was within a yard of them; then a face would leap at me out of the grey fog. Usually it was frightened, sometimes it was angry; always it seemed thin, hopeless and bewildered. The stench was oppressive; the sense of silent numbers suffocating.
As I turned back towards the house, I felt a slight tremor among the men who surrounded me. Perhaps my own aimless movement had given them the lead they were awaiting. Those ahead of us were pushed forward; those behind hurried to catch up. Suspicion seemed to die down; and I heard a hoarse murmur of conversation. Finding myself alone, I tried Lilliburlero again; and with an answering whistle O’Rane slipped like a snake through the intervening ranks and stationed himself at my side.
“You all right?,” he whispered.
“Yes, thanks. It’s over, Raney. What d’you want me to do now?”
“Let’s be sure first that it is over. . . . I don’t like the sound of that.”
Taking my arm, he led me in the direction of a voice that seemed to be answering his own speech. I could not hear the words; and, if I suspected the voice to be Griffiths’, that was only because a curious snarl, passed from lip to lip, was taken up as a cry.
“They’re saying it’s a trap,” I told O’Rane.
“Trap . . . Trap . . . Trap . . .” came the snarl; and those who were nearest the house turned headlong till we were almost swept off our feet.
“Trap be damned,” shouted a voice; and in place of the mutters and snarls came the roar of two opposing armies.