“I don’t know,” I said.
Malcolmson and the ten or twelve thousand men in front of him were still growling like a very angry thunderstorm at a distance. The thing was exceedingly impressive. Then some one started the hymn again. I never heard a hymn sung in such a way before. If the explosions of large guns could be tuned to the notes of an octave the effect of firing them off, fully loaded with cannon balls, would be very much the same. Malcolmson, beating time very slowly with his hand from the front of the platform, controlled this human artillery. Lady Moyne came to me and shouted in my ear. It was necessary to shout on account of the terrific noise made by Malcolmson’s hymn.
“As soon as he sits down you’ll have to get up and say something.”
“I can’t,” I yelled. “I’m no good at all as a public speaker.”
The beginning of Lady Moyne’s next shout I could not hear at all. Only the last words reached me.
“—on account of your being a Liberal, you know.”
For the first time since I have known her I refused to do what Lady Moyne asked me. Very likely I should have given in at last and made an indescribable fool of myself; but before she succeeded in persuading me, Malcolmson’s hymn stopped. Malcolmson himself, apparently satisfied with his performance, sat down.
“What on earth am I to do?” said Moyne.
“You can write to the papers, to-morrow,” I said.
“But now?” said Moyne, “now.”