Tra-la-la. Tra-la-la.”
He was going on, but Sargon would not hear him. He lifted his voice to drown his antagonist. “I tell you, you poor soul! you are utterly wrong and blind,” he said. “For the light has come to me and understanding is mine. You are not the lost thing you deem you are, or at least you need not be. No! I, too, was a lost thing such as you are, a little while ago. I, too, thought I was a grain, a fragment, a thing of no account. But the call has come to me, and I have been called to call others to take part with me in a new awakening. I have had a vision and I have seen the world like one who awakens from a long sleep. All things are joined together and work together and continue for ever.”
The poet wrinkled up his nose and waved his hand at Sargon as who should wave aside some object of offence. “Tra-la-la,” he shouted.
“All things I tell you are joined together and work together——”
“Tra-la-la,” louder.
“I tell you,” much louder.
“Shuddup there,” cried the loud and wrathful voice of Sanity embodied in Mr. Higgs.
“You’ll have the whole ward jabbering in a minute,” said Mr. Higgs, approaching and addressing Sargon in tones of earnest expostulation. “Shud Dup.”
And after a brief pause of reflection the Lord of the Whole World obeyed.
With a gesture of extreme dignity he indicated to Higgs that his crude demands were conceded.