"You cannot be sure it amounts to nothing. Sometimes I have the fancy that the entire round globe has just one inhabitant, of which we merely appear to be individual manifestations: that we are, in fact, a part of the earth herself, and she absorbs and casts us forth again, as she rushes along to her own destiny as sentient as ourselves. All the planets are alive in the same way, and they are all racing to see which will make the greatest showing on what we call down here the Judgment Day—that is to say, which shall have produced the most balanced and perfected being; which shall have whirled away the most original sin and sifted out a man, great and good without self-righteousness—to my mind the worst of mortal failings because its correlative, injustice, is the source of most of the unhappiness. That will be the millennium, and having no windmills and evils left to fight, we minute visibilities will welcome deindividualization. Then, no doubt, there will be a grand final battle between the great body of good thus formed, and the evil cast out, but roaming space and joining forces. If we do our best here we shall win, and be happy ever after. There is no question, that if you follow your higher instincts you are happier in the long run than if you fall a slave to your base and mean; and that, to my mind, is the proof that the highest instincts are meant to be followed to some greater end."
"Hm. I have heard a good many theories, first and last, and that sounds as plausible as any."
"All this is very casually related to American politics, except that we had better clean up when the opportunity is vouchsafed us; for nothing degrades human nature nor retards civilization so much as politics gone altogether wrong. As far as you are concerned, although it was understood that the compact was to end with my citizenship, I have no thought of ending it unless the conditions I hope for shall crystallize meanwhile. If it seems best to keep the Democratic party unsplit I shall do your canvassing and speaking, for it will make me known, and give me the opportunity to inculcate the principles I purpose to advocate. If you ignore them when you are in office, so much the worse for you, and better for me; for, as I have told you more than once, the moment I am in power I shall devote my energies to pulling you and your like down and out. But I should advise you to join the third party if it arises."
"No doubt I might, if it were strong enough," said Colton, frankly. "I don't propose to play any losing game, and if the Democratic party goes by the board, T. R. Colton doesn't follow. And if a third party came in to stay it would have to have a boss—"
"Not your sort."
"Oh, well, time enough." Colton's ill-humor was now somnolent under some two pounds of peanuts. He rose and shook hands with Gwynne. "Glad to see you looking so well—you're some heavier than when you came to California, by-the-way, and it suits you first rate. Be sure you call on my wife the first time you come to town."
He declined Gwynne's invitation to dinner, and drove off, looking slothful and amiable once more. But what went on behind that mask, within that long ill-built cranium, Gwynne had never pretended to guess. Nor, to-day, did he care.
At three o'clock he gave his horse to Abe, was told that the lady of the manor was out walking, and went into the house. He had a fancy to meet her again in the room that harbored the sweetest of his California memories. It was dark and cool. Only one window, looking upon the garden, was open. Beside it was a comfortable chair which he took possession of and looked out into the wild old garden so different from the excessively cultivated plots of Rosewater and his own meagre strips. There was no veranda on this side of the house, and the great acacia-tree, with its weight of fragrant gold, was but a few feet from the window. The entire garden was enclosed by a hedge of the Castilian roses of which he had heard so much, rare as they now were in California. The dull green leaves and tight little buds could hardly be seen for the mass of wide fluted roses of a deep old-fashioned pink. And there were large irregular borders covered with the luxuriant green and the blue stars of the periwinkle, beds of marguerites and violets, bushes of lilac and honeysuckles, roses and jasmine. The blended perfumes were overpowering, however delicious; Gwynne had sat up half the night before talking to his mother after a long hot journey; he fell asleep.
Perhaps it was his late conversation, perhaps something more subtle, but he felt himself transported to a void. In a moment he realized that the void was not space as he knew it, but rigid invisible substance. He slipped along through rocky strata, hearing strange echoes and inhaling the disagreeable odors of healing waters. Suddenly he found himself in a vast hollowed space, empty but for many pillars. His vision grew keener. In the very centre of the hall he saw two pillars of a colossal size, and standing between them a being almost as large. This unthinkable giant had an arm about each pillar and strained as Samson had strained at the pillars of the temple. Then a new and powerful force drew him upward once more, and he awoke.