And this scheme was alluring. The country for the people!...
He made his way along the causeway, thinking of it.
A Revolution! The old bad, mad order of things ended by one mighty upheaval! A new England, with a new outlook, a new Government!... A mighty movement which might grip the world. A new earth....
And he—Dick Faversham?
Here was scope for new enterprises! Here was a career! On the one hand, a paid working man member at £400 a year, regarded with a supercilious smile by the class to which he really belonged; and, on the other, a force which shook Society to its foundations—a leader whose name would be on all lips....
Of course it was all nonsense, and he would drive it from his mind.
And he would not meet Mr. John Brown that night. What a madcap idea to go to some midnight gathering—where, Heaven only knew! And for what?
He had reached Park Lane, and almost unconsciously he turned eastward.
He could not remember a single thing that had happened during his walk from Park Lane to Piccadilly Circus. The great tide of human life surged to and fro, but he was oblivious of the fact.
He was thinking—wildly thinking.