The strikers themselves looked formidable enough. There were several hundred of them, stem-faced men all; resolute, silent, determined, dogged, as though moved by a common deep-set purpose, they maintained a rough order of march, leaders at the head and on the flank of each band.
The mob hanging on their skirts were of a very different class, however; ill-clad, dirty, unkempt tatter-de-malions, the dregs of the alleys and by-ways of the city, ripe for any mischief or devilment. Evil men and worse women, they shuffled and scrambled and hustled along, with occasional cheers for the strikers, hoarse cries and oaths to one another, and execrations for the government: a towsled, disorderly rabble, unquestionably dangerous, and high-charged with thoughts and hopes of violence. It would not be their fault if the day ended without open resistance, looting and bloodshed.
For many minutes precious to me they filled the streets and made progress impossible; and before they had passed, a clock near by struck twelve.
An hour past the time at which I was to have met Volna. She would surely have given me up and in all probability had already gone back to the house to which in my fatuous confidence in my own cleverness I had been reckless enough to send Bremenhof.
“Where have the strikers come from?” I asked Burski, as a sudden thought chilled me.
“From where we are going, the Square in front of the Church of St. Paul. They have an ugly look and we shall have Petersburg over again, if they don’t shake themselves free from the rabble. And it may be even worse here, for the Fraternity have brought in arms and are prepared to resist. There will be fighting before night.”
“Spoken very much like a police agent that,” I exclaimed.
He shrugged his shoulders. “One gets the habit, I suppose. I was a police agent long before I joined the Fraternity; and one judges of things from that standpoint at times. See, they have swept the Square clear,” he added, as we reached the Church.
“And at this point we’ll part company, please.”
He assumed great surprise. “Part company? Why we have seen scarcely anything yet.”