XXI
``HELP!''
Did it take you so long to find it? asked the Lovely Person with
the smile. ``Of course I knew you would find it in the end. But
we had to give ourselves time. How long did it take?''
Marco removed himself from beneath the touch of her hand. It was
quietly done, but there was a disdain in his young face which
made her wince though she pretended to shrug her shoulders
amusedly.
``You refuse to answer?'' she laughed.
``I refuse.''
At that very moment he saw at the curve of the corridor the
Chancellor and his daughter approaching slowly. The two young
officers were talking gaily to the girl. They were on their way
back to their box. Was he going to lose them? Was he?
The delicate hand was laid on his shoulder again, but this time
he felt that it grasped him firmly.
``Naughty boy!'' the soft voice said. ``I am going to take you
home with me. If you struggle I shall tell these people that you
are my bad boy who is here without permission. What will you
answer? My escort is coming down the staircase and will help me.
Do you see?'' And in fact there appeared in the crowd at the
head of the staircase the figure of the man he remembered.
He did see. A dampness broke out on the palms of his hands. If
she did this bold thing, what could he say to those she told her
lie to? How could he bring proof or explain who he was--and what
story dare he tell? His protestations and struggles would merely
amuse the lookers-on, who would see in them only the impotent
rage of an insubordinate youngster.
There swept over him a wave of remembrance which brought back, as
if he were living through it again, the moment when he had stood
in the darkness of the wine cellar with his back against the door
and heard the man walk away and leave him alone. He felt again
as he had done then--but now he was in another land and far away
from his father. He could do nothing to help himself unless
Something showed him a way.
He made no sound, and the woman who held him saw only a flame
leap under his dense black lashes.
But something within him called out. It was as if he heard it.
It was that strong self--the self that was Marco, and it
called--it called as if it shouted.
``Help!'' it called--to that Unknown Stranger Thing which had
made worlds and which he and his father so often talked of and in
whose power they so believed. ``Help!''
The Chancellor was drawing nearer. Perhaps! Should he--?
``You are too proud to kick and shout,'' the voice went on.
``And people would only laugh. Do you see?''
The stairs were crowded and the man who was at the head of them
could only move slowly. But he had seen the boy.
Marco turned so that he could face his captor squarely as if he
were going to say something in answer to her. But he was not.
Even as he made the movement of turning, the help he had called
for came and he knew what he should do. And he could do two
things at once--save himself and give his Sign--because, the Sign
once given, the Chancellor would understand.
``He will be here in a moment. He has recognized you,'' the
woman said.
As he glanced up the stairs, the delicate grip of her hand
unconsciously slackened.
Marco whirled away from her. The bell rang which was to warn the
audience that they must return to their seats and he saw the
Chancellor hasten his pace.
A moment later, the old aristocrat found himself amazedly looking
down at the pale face of a breathless lad who spoke to him in
German and in such a manner that he could not but pause and
listen .
``Sir,'' he was saying, ``the woman in violet at the foot of the
stairs is a spy. She trapped me once and she threatens to do it
again. Sir, may I beg you to protect me?''
He said it low and fast. No one else could hear his words.
``What! What!'' the Chancellor exclaimed.
And then, drawing a step nearer and quite as low and rapidly but
with perfect distinctness, Marco uttered four words:
``The Lamp is lighted.''
The Help cry had been answered instantly. Marco saw it at once
in the old man's eyes, notwithstanding that he turned to look at
the woman at the foot of the staircase as if she only concerned
him.
``What! What!'' he said again, and made a movement toward her,
pulling his large moustache with a fierce hand.
Then Marco recognized that a curious thing happened. The Lovely
Person saw the movement and the gray moustache, and that instant
her smile died away and she turned quite white--so white, that
under the brilliant electric light she was almost green and
scarcely looked lovely at all. She made a sign to the man on the
staircase and slipped through the crowd like an eel. She was a
slim flexible creature and never was a disappearance more
wonderful in its rapidity. Between stout matrons and their thin
or stout escorts and families she made her way and lost
herself--but always making toward the exit. In two minutes there
was no sight of her violet draperies to be seen. She was gone
and so, evidently, was her male companion.
It was plain to Marco that to follow the profession of a spy was
not by any means a safe thing. The Chancellor had recognized
her-- she had recognized the Chancellor who turned looking
ferociously angry and spoke to one of the young officers.
``She and the man with her are two of the most dangerous spies in
Europe, She is a Rumanian and he is a Russian. What they wanted
of this innocent lad I don't pretend to know. What did she
threaten?'' to Marco.
Marco was feeling rather cold and sick and had lost his healthy
color for the moment.
``She said she meant to take me home with her and would pretend I
was her son who had come here without permission,'' he answered.
``She believes I know something I do not.'' He made a hesitating
but grateful bow. ``The third act, sir--I must not keep you.
Thank you! Thank you!''
The Chancellor moved toward the entrance door of the balcony
seats, but he did it with his hand on Marco's shoulder.
``See that he gets home safely,'' he said to the younger of the
two officers. ``Send a messenger with him. He's young to be
attacked by creatures of that kind.''
Polite young officers naturally obey the commands of Chancellors
and such dignitaries. This one found without trouble a young
private who marched with Marco through the deserted streets to
his lodgings. He was a stolid young Bavarian peasant and seemed
to have no curiosity or even any interest in the reason for the
command given him. He was in fact thinking of his sweetheart who
lived near Konigsee and who had skated with him on the frozen
lake last winter. He scarcely gave a glance to the schoolboy he
was to escort, he neither knew nor wondered why.
The Rat had fallen asleep over his papers and lay with his head
on his folded arms on the table. But he was awakened by Marco's
coming into the room and sat up blinking his eyes in the effort
to get them open.
``Did you see him? Did you get near enough?'' he drowsed.
``Yes,'' Marco answered. ``I got near enough.'
The Rat sat upright suddenly.
``It's not been easy,'' he exclaimed. ``I'm sure something
happened --something went wrong.''
``Something nearly went wrong--VERY nearly,'' answered Marco.
But as he spoke he took the sketch of the Chancellor out of the
slit in his sleeve and tore it and burned it with a match. ``But
I did get near enough. And that's TWO.''
They talked long, before they went to sleep that night. The Rat
grew pale as he listened to the story of the woman in violet.
``I ought to have gone with you!'' he said. ``I see now. An
aide- de-camp must always be in attendance. It would have been
harder for her to manage two than one. I must always be near to
watch, even if I am not close by you. If you had not come
back--if you had not come back!'' He struck his clenched hands
together fiercely. ``What should I have done!''
When Marco turned toward him from the table near which he was
standing, he looked like his father.
``You would have gone on with the Game just as far as you
could,'' he said. ``You could not leave it. You remember the
places, and the faces, and the Sign. There is some money; and
when it was all gone, you could have begged, as we used to
pretend we should.
We have not had to do it yet; and it was best to save it for
country places and villages. But you could have done it if you
were obliged to. The Game would have to go on.''
The Rat caught at his thin chest as if he had been struck
breathless.
``Without you?'' he gasped. ``Without you?''
``Yes,'' said Marco. ``And we must think of it, and plan in case
anything like that should happen.''
He stopped himself quite suddenly, and sat down, looking straight
before him, as if at some far away thing he saw.
``Nothing will happen,'' he said. ``Nothing can.''
``What are you thinking of?'' The Rat gulped, because his breath
had not quite come back. ``Why will nothing happen?''
``Because--'' the boy spoke in an almost matter-of-fact tone--in
quite an unexalted tone at all events, ``you see I can always
make a strong call, as I did tonight.''
``Did you shout?'' The Rat asked. ``I didn't know you shouted.''
``I didn't. I said nothing aloud. But I--the myself that is in
me,'' Marco touched himself on the breast, ``called out, `Help!
Help!' with all its strength. And help came.''
The Rat regarded him dubiously.
``What did it call to?'' he asked.
``To the Power--to the Strength-place--to the Thought that does
things. The Buddhist hermit, who told my father about it, called
it `The Thought that thought the World.' ''
A reluctant suspicion betrayed itself in The Rat's eyes.
``Do you mean you prayed?'' he inquired, with a slight touch of
disfavor.
Marco's eyes remained fixed upon him in vague thoughtfulness for
a moment or so of pause.
``I don't know,'' he said at last. ``Perhaps it's the same
thing-- when you need something so much that you cry out loud for
it. But it's not words, it's a strong thing without a name. I
called like that when I was shut in the wine-cellar. I
remembered some of the things the old Buddhist told my father.''
The Rat moved restlessly.
``The help came that time,'' he admitted. ``How did it come to-
night?''
``In that thought which flashed into my mind almost the next
second. It came like lightning. All at once I knew if I ran to
the Chancellor and said the woman was a spy, it would startle him
into listening to me; and that then I could give him the Sign;
and that when I gave him the Sign, he would know I was speaking
the truth and would protect me.''
``It was a splendid thought!'' The Rat said. ``And it was quick.
But it was you who thought of it.''
``All thinking is part of the Big Thought,'' said Marco slowly.
``It KNOWS--It KNOWS. And the outside part of us somehow broke
the chain that linked us to It. And we are always trying to mend
the chain, without knowing it. That is what our thinking
is--trying to mend the chain. But we shall find out how to do it
sometime. The old Buddhist told my father so--just as the sun
was rising from behind a high peak of the Himalayas.'' Then he
added hastily, ``I am only telling you what my father told me,
and he only told me what the old hermit told him.''
``Does your father believe what he told him?'' The Rat's
bewilderment had become an eager and restless thing.
``Yes, he believes it. He always thought something like it,
himself. That is why he is so calm and knows so well how to
wait.''
``Is THAT it!'' breathed The Rat. ``Is that why? Has--has he
mended the chain?'' And there was awe in his voice, because of
this one man to whom he felt any achievement was possible.
``I believe he has,'' said Marco. ``Don't you think so
yourself?''
``He has done something,'' The Rat said.
He seemed to be thinking things over before he spoke again-- and
then even more slowly than Marco.
``If he could mend the chain,'' he said almost in a whisper, ``he
could find out where the descendant of the Lost Prince is. He
would know what to do for Samavia!''
He ended the words with a start, and his whole face glowed with a
new, amazed light.
``Perhaps he does know!'' he cried. ``If the help comes like
thoughts --as yours did--perhaps his thought of letting us give
the Sign was part of it. We--just we two every-day boys--are
part of it!''
``The old Buddhist said--'' began Marco.
``Look here!'' broke in The Rat. ``Tell me the whole story. I
want to hear it.''
It was because Loristan had heard it, and listened and believed,
that The Rat had taken fire. His imagination seized upon the
idea, as it would have seized on some theory of necromancy proved
true and workable.
With his elbows on the table and his hands in his hair, he leaned
forward, twisting a lock with restless fingers. His breath
quickened.
``Tell it,'' he said, ``I want to hear it all!''
``I shall have to tell it in my own words,'' Marco said. ``And
it won't be as wonderful as it was when my father told it to me.
This is what I remember:
``My father had gone through much pain and trouble. A great load
was upon him, and he had been told he was going to die before his
work was done. He had gone to India, because a man he was
obliged to speak to had gone there to hunt, and no one knew when
he would return. My father followed him for months from one wild
place to another, and, when he found him, the man would not hear
or believe what he had come so far to say. Then he had
jungle-fever and almost died. Once the natives left him for dead
in a bungalow in the forest, and he heard the jackals howling
round him all the night. Through all the hours he was only alive
enough to be conscious of two things--all the rest of him seemed
gone from his body: his thought knew that his work was
unfinished--and his body heard the jackals howl!''
``Was the work for Samavia?'' The Rat put in quickly. ``If he
had died that night, the descendant of the Lost Prince never
would have been found--never!'' The Rat bit his lip so hard that
a drop of blood started from it.
``When he was slowly coming alive again, a native, who had gone
back and stayed to wait upon him, told him that near the summit
of a mountain, about fifty miles away, there was a ledge which
jutted out into space and hung over the valley, which was
thousands of feet below. On the ledge there was a hut in which
there lived an ancient Buddhist, who was a holy man, as they
called him, and who had been there during time which had not
been measured. They said that their grandparents and
great-grandparents had known of him, though very few persons had
ever seen him. It was told that the most savage beast was tame
before him. They said that a man- eating tiger would stop to
salute him, and that a thirsty lioness would bring her whelps to
drink at the spring near his hut.''
``That was a lie,'' said The Rat promptly.
Marco neither laughed nor frowned.
``How do we KNOW?'' he said. ``It was a native's story, and it
might be anything. My father neither said it was true nor false.
He listened to all that was told him by natives. They said that
the holy man was the brother of the stars. He knew all things
past and to come, and could heal the sick. But most people,
especially those who had sinful thoughts, were afraid to go near
him.''
``I'd like to have seen--'' The Rat pondered aloud, but he did
not finish.
``Before my father was well, he had made up his mind to travel to
the ledge if he could. He felt as if he must go. He thought
that if he were going to die, the hermit might tell him some wise
thing to do for Samavia.''
``He might have given him a message to leave to the Secret
Ones,'' said The Rat.
``He was so weak when he set out on his journey that he wondered
if he would reach the end of it. Part of the way he traveled by
bullock cart, and part, he was carried by natives. But at last
the bearers came to a place more than halfway up the mountain,
and would go no further. Then they went back and left him to
climb the rest of the way himself. They had traveled slowly and
he had got more strength, but he was weak yet. The forest was
more wonderful than anything he had ever seen. There were
tropical trees with foliage like lace, and some with huge leaves,
and some of them seemed to reach the sky. Sometimes he could
barely see gleams of blue through them. And vines swung down
from their high branches, and caught each other, and matted
together; and there were hot scents, and strange flowers, and
dazzling birds darting about, and thick moss, and little
cascades bursting out. The path grew narrower and steeper, and
the flower scents and the sultriness made it like walking in a
hothouse. He heard rustlings in the undergrowth, which might
have been made by any kind of wild animal; once he stepped across
a deadly snake without seeing it. But it was asleep and did not
hurt him. He knew the natives had been convinced that he would
not reach the ledge; but for some strange reason he believed he
should. He stopped and rested many times, and he drank some milk
he had brought in a canteen. The higher he climbed, the more
wonderful everything was, and a strange feeling began to fill
him. He said his body stopped being tired and began to feel very
light. And his load lifted itself from his heart, as if it were
not his load any more but belonged to something stronger. Even
Samavia seemed to be safe. As he went higher and higher, and
looked down the abyss at the world below, it appeared as if it
were not real but only a dream he had wakened from--only a
dream.''
The Rat moved restlessly.
``Perhaps he was light-headed with the fever,'' he suggested.
``The fever had left him, and the weakness had left him,'' Marco
answered. ``It seemed as if he had never really been ill at
all-- as if no one could be ill, because things like that were
only dreams, just as the world was.''
``I wish I'd been with him! Perhaps I could have thrown these
away--down into the abyss!'' And The Rat shook his crutches
which rested against the table. ``I feel as if I was climbing,
too. Go on.''
Marco had become more absorbed than The Rat. He had lost himself
in the memory of the story.
``I felt that _I_ was climbing, when he told me,'' he said. ``I
felt as if I were breathing in the hot flower-scents and pushing
aside the big leaves and giant ferns. There had been a rain, and
they were wet and shining with big drops, like jewels, that
showered over him as he thrust his way through and under them.
And the stillness and the height--the stillness and the height!
I can't make it real to you as he made it to me! I can't! I was
there. He took me. And it was so high--and so still--and so
beautiful that I could scarcely bear it.''
But the truth was, that with some vivid boy-touch he had carried
his hearer far. The Rat was deadly quiet. Even his eyes had not
moved. He spoke almost as if he were in a sort of trance.
``It's real,'' he said. ``I'm there now. As high as you--go
on--go on. I want to climb higher.''
And Marco, understanding, went on.
``The day was over and the stars were out when he reached the
place were the ledge was. He said he thought that during the
last part of the climb he never looked on the earth at all. The
stars were so immense that he could not look away from them.
They seemed to be drawing him up. And all overhead was like
violet velvet, and they hung there like great lamps of radiance.
Can you see them? You must see them. My father saw them all
night long. They were part of the wonder.''
``I see them,'' The Rat answered, still in his trance-like voice
and without stirring, and Marco knew he did.
``And there, with the huge stars watching it, was the hut on the
ledge. And there was no one there. The door was open. And
outside it was a low bench and table of stone. And on the table
was a meal of dates and rice, waiting. Not far from the hut was
a deep spring, which ran away in a clear brook. My father drank
and bathed his face there. Then he went out on the ledge, and
sat down and waited, with his face turned up to the stars. He
did not lie down, and he thought he saw the stars all the time he
waited. He was sure he did not sleep. He did not know how long
he sat there alone. But at last he drew his eyes from the stars,
as if he had been commanded to do it. And he was not alone any
more. A yard or so away from him sat the holy man. He knew it
was the hermit because his eyes were different from any human
eyes he had ever beheld. They were as still as the night was,
and as deep as the shadows covering the world thousands of feet
below, and they had a far, far look, and a strange light was in
them.''
``What did he say?'' asked The Rat hoarsely.
``He only said, `Rise, my son. I awaited thee. Go and eat the
food I prepared for thee, and then we will speak together.' He
didn't move or speak again until my father had eaten the meal.
He only sat on the moss and let his eyes rest on the shadows over
the abyss. When my father went back, he made a gesture which
meant that he should sit near him.
``Then he sat still for several minutes, and let his eyes rest on
my father, until he felt as if the light in them were set in the
midst of his own body and his soul. Then he said, `I cannot tell
thee all thou wouldst know. That I may not do.' He had a
wonderful gentle voice, like a deep soft bell. `But the work
will be done. Thy life and thy son's life will set it on its
way.'
``They sat through the whole night together. And the stars hung
quite near, as if they listened. And there were sounds in the
bushes of stealthy, padding feet which wandered about as if the
owners of them listened too. And the wonderful, low, peaceful
voice of the holy man went on and on, telling of wonders which
seemed like miracles but which were to him only the `working of
the Law.' ''
``What is the Law?'' The Rat broke in.
``There were two my father wrote down, and I learned them. The
first was the law of The One. I'll try to say that,'' and he
covered his eyes and waited through a moment of silence.
It seemed to The Rat as if the room held an extraordinary
stillness.
``Listen!'' came next. ``This is it:
`` `There are a myriad worlds. There is but One Thought out of
which they grew. Its Law is Order which cannot swerve. Its
creatures are free to choose. Only they can create Disorder,
which in itself is Pain and Woe and Hate and Fear. These they
alone can bring forth. The Great One is a Golden Light. It is
not remote but near. Hold thyself within its glow and thou wilt
behold all things clearly. First, with all thy breathing being,
know one thing! That thine own thought--when so thou
standest--is one with That which thought the Worlds!' ''
``What?'' gasped The Rat. ``MY thought--the things _I_ think!''
``Your thoughts--boys' thoughts--anybody's thoughts.''
``You're giving me the jim-jams!''
``He said it,'' answered Marco. ``And it was then he spoke about
the broken Link--and about the greatest books in the world--that
in all their different ways, they were only saying over and over
again one thing thousands of times. Just this thing--`Hate not,
Fear not, Love.' And he said that was Order. And when it was
disturbed, suffering came--poverty and misery and catastrophe and
wars.''
``Wars!'' The Rat said sharply. ``The World couldn't do without
war--and armies and defences! What about Samavia?''
``My father asked him that. And this is what he answered. I
learned that too. Let me think again,'' and he waited as he had
waited before. Then he lifted his head. ``Listen! This is it:
`` `Out of the blackness of Disorder and its outpouring of human
misery, there will arise the Order which is Peace. When Man
learns that he is one with the Thought which itself creates all
beauty, all power, all splendor, and all repose, he will not fear
that his brother can rob him of his heart's desire. He will
stand in the Light and draw to himself his own.' ''
``Draw to himself?'' The Rat said. ``Draw what he wants? I
don't believe it!''
``Nobody does,'' said Marco. ``We don't know. He said we stood
in the dark of the night--without stars--and did not know that
the broken chain swung just above us.''
``I don't believe it!'' said The Rat. ``It's too big!''
Marco did not say whether he believed it or not. He only went on
speaking.
``My father listened until he felt as if he had stopped
breathing. Just at the stillest of the stillness the Buddhist
stopped speaking. And there was a rustling of the undergrowth a
few yards away, as if something big was pushing its way
through--and there was the soft pad of feet. The Buddhist turned
his head and my father heard him say softly: `Come forth,
Sister.'
``And a huge leopardess with two cubs walked out on to the ledge
and came to him and threw herself down with a heavy lunge near
his feet.''
``Your father saw that!'' cried out The Rat. ``You mean the old
fellow knew something that made wild beasts afraid to touch him
or any one near him?''
``Not afraid. They knew he was their brother, and that he was
one with the Law. He had lived so long with the Great Thought
that all darkness and fear had left him forever. He had mended
the Chain.''
The Rat had reached deep waters. He leaned forward--his hands
burrowing in his hair, his face scowling and twisted, his eyes
boring into space. He had climbed to the ledge at the
mountain-top; he had seen the luminous immensity of the stars,
and he had looked down into the shadows filling the world
thousands of feet below. Was there some remote deep in him from
whose darkness a slow light was rising? All that Loristan had
said he knew must be true. But the rest of it--?
Marco got up and came over to him. He looked like his father
again.
``If the descendant of the Lost Prince is brought back to rule
Samavia, he will teach his people the Law of the One. It was for
that the holy man taught my father until the dawn came.''
``Who will--who will teach the Lost Prince--the new King--when he
is found?'' The Rat cried. ``Who will teach him?''
``The hermit said my father would. He said he would also teach
his son--and that son would teach his son--and he would teach
his. And through such as they were, the whole world would come
to know the Order and the Law.''
Never had The Rat looked so strange and fierce a thing. A whole
world at peace! No tactics--no battles--no slaughtered heroes
--no clash of arms, and fame! It made him feel sick. And yet--
something set his chest heaving.
``And your father would teach him that--when he was found! So
that he could teach his sons. Your father BELIEVES in it?''
``Yes,'' Marco answered. He said nothing but ``Yes.'' The Rat
threw himself forward on the table, face downward.
``Then,'' he said, ``he must make me believe it. He must teach
me--if he can.''
They heard a clumping step upon the staircase, and, when it
reached the landing, it stopped at their door. Then there was a
solid knock.
When Marco opened the door, the young soldier who had escorted
him from the Hof-Theater was standing outside. He looked as
uninterested and stolid as before, as he handed in a small flat
package.
``You must have dropped it near your seat at the Opera,'' he
said. ``I was to give it into your own hands. It is your
purse.''
After he had clumped down the staircase again, Marco and The Rat
drew a quick breath at one and the same time.
``I had no seat and I had no purse,'' Marco said. ``Let us open
it.''
There was a flat limp leather note-holder inside. In it was a
paper, at the head of which were photographs of the Lovely Person
and her companion. Beneath were a few lines which stated that
they were the well known spies, Eugenia Karovna and Paul Varel,
and that the bearer must be protected against them. It was
signed by the Chief of the Police. On a separate sheet was
written the command: ``Carry this with you as protection.''
``That is help,'' The Rat said. ``It would protect us, even in
another country. The Chancellor sent it--but you made the strong
call --and it's here!''
There was no street lamp to shine into their windows when they
went at last to bed. When the blind was drawn up, they were
nearer the sky than they had been in the Marylebone Road. The
last thing each of them saw, as he went to sleep, was the
stars--and in their dreams, they saw them grow larger and larger,
and hang like lamps of radiance against the violet--velvet sky
above a ledge of a Himalayan Mountain, where they listened to the
sound of a low voice going on and on and on.
