"Suppose it were true," he uttered aloud, in response to a sense of inward tremor, "suppose—it—were—true?" And he was not speaking either to the woman or the girl, and his forehead was damp.
"Gawd!" said Glad, her chin almost on her knees, her eyes staring fearsomely. "S'pose it was—an' us sittin' 'ere an' not knowin' it—an' no one knowin' it—nor gettin' the good of it. Sime as if—" pondering hard in search of simile, "sime as if no one 'ad never knowed about 'lectricity, an' there wasn't no 'lectric lights nor no 'lectric nothin'. Onct nobody knowed, an' all the sime it was there—jest waitin'."
Her fantastic laugh ended for her with a little choking, vaguely hysteric sound.
"Blimme," she said. "Ain't it queer, us not knowin'—if it's true."
Antony Dart bent forward in his chair. He looked far into the eyes of the ex-dancer as if some unseen thing within them might answer him. Miss Montaubyn herself for the moment he did not see.
"What," he stammered hoarsely, his voice broken with awe, "what of the hideous wrongs—the woes and horrors—and hideous wrongs?"
"There wouldn't be none if we was right—if we never thought nothin' but 'Good's comin'—good's 'ere.' If we everyone of us thought it—every minit of every day."
She did not know she was speaking of a millennium—the end of the world. She sat by her one candle, threading her needle and believing she was speaking of To-day.
He laughed a hollow laugh.
"If we were right!" he said. "It would take long—long—long—to make us all so."