The jogi, however, had fallen back a step, and Pidar Narâyan was in his place by the old gun. Pidar Narâyan and his strange God were now the "Teachers of Religion." What had they to say?
The crowd had not to wait long, for Father Ninian's voice, with that nameless ring in it which makes the orator and makes the audience, was already in its ears.
"Listen! Listen to me, for I carry in this cup the Blood of Sacrifice. The Victim required by your God and mine, by all the Gods, is here!
"We are free, brothers! you and I. The Eternal Womanhood hath had Her toll, in full. The Great Mother is appeased. There is no fear.
"Lift up your eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh your help, and follow me and my God, to find yours."
He pointed with the sword--as he paused a second for breath, for strength--to the mountains; to those far peaks which, now that the storm had ended, the earth-atoms returned to earth, had begun to show spectral in the dawn. To show shadowy, yet clear, with never a wreath of mist or a wandering cloud to hide the hollow whither the feet of millions had journeyed seeking righteousness, and journeyed in vain.
Faint and far they showed against the faint, far sky, but as Father Ninian pointed to them, a ray of light from the still unseen sun below the visible horizon of this world, a ray of light seeking perhaps another world among the stars, found the heights of the holy hills in its path, and dyed their snowdrifts red--blood red!
At the sight a roar rose from the crowd.
"Jai Kali Ma! She gives a sign! The sacrifice is there! She is appeased! He speaks the truth. Let us follow him and his God!"
"Ay! as my father did," cried one.