Graeme turned, and for a second sat looking at the speaker, a pale-faced Cockney; then, pulling out his revolver, he forced his way to where the man was standing, and shot him through the head. After this, wheeling his horse about, he faced each section of the crowd in turn, with the smoking weapon brandished in his hand. Back surged the mob, growling and calling on their leaders, but one was now gone and the others failed to appear.
"Dogs!" shouted Graeme, "hounds! Oh, snarl away if you like; it's all you can do, and I'm not afraid of you, though I'm only one against your thousands. Small wonder you got beat last night; they're soldiers yonder, but you, you're only jackals, noisy enough when there's no fighting, but slinking to your holes once a gun's fired. Hullo, you want to speak, do you?" pressing forward again; "out with it then."
"Nuthin', sir, I ain't got no call to say nothink."
"Forgotten it, eh? Funny how one does sometimes. Anyone else got a call to say anything, what, no one? Then I have," and thereupon Hector proceeded to let loose on the now silent crowd a torrent of blasphemous abuse, before which their own limited vocabularies sank ashamed. For full five minutes the flow poured on unchecked, nor was a single epithet repeated, and gradually at such proficiency a faint feeling of admiration dawned in his hearers' hearts, and replaced their former resentment. In this, at all events, he was their master, and, their minds admitting it, they listened in silence, with growing interest on their faces.
Graeme, noting the change, thereupon abandoned the mere bludgeon work of vituperation—for of sarcasm, knowing soldiers, not one word had he uttered—and then, discussing the matter in the light of cold common sense, he asked them if they wished for death, death at the lance-point and sabre, for such would assuredly be theirs in their present helpless state. On a memory that never failed he drew now, giving them many instances of what flight with cavalry in pursuit meant, painting its horrors in terms that caused a general feeling of uneasiness.
While he spoke, Graeme was closely watching them—waiting for the change of mood when he could make the final effort. Till then he knew he must refrain from an appeal to the emotions, which proves irresistible when the ground is ready, but when made too soon only excites ridicule.
At last it came. A voice from the crowd said: "We aren't afraid of no green-coats, we're Englishmen," a speech that was followed by a murmur of applause. At the sound Graeme stopped, the thrill running through him that every orator knows when he feels that his audience is his.
For a moment his throat seemed to close, and his heart to swell in his breast; then off went his hat, and he stood bareheaded before them, holding up his hand in an appeal for silence. Shouts of "Order" arose, and then there was a hush. For a few seconds Hector sat motionless, gazing over their heads with eyes blurred with tears, and then, as if fire were running through his veins, he threw back his head and spoke. With a face pale with exaltation, with eyes alight and grey hair streaming in the wind, he addressed them—his voice now sinking to a whisper, now rising to a shout.
"Men, soldiers of England," he concluded, "the eyes of those who love you are on you now. They are misty with tears for your wounds, men; they run over with water for the dead. But torn with grief though they are, that grief is tempered with pride, for those they mourn have given their lives for the Flag. Will you change that pride into shame, men? Will you bring disgrace on your homes?"
Fustian, emotional fustian, of the lowest, but now was the time and here the audience for fustian.