by Mark Twain
CHAPTER XVIII.
Washington shuddered slightly at the suggestion, then his face took ona dreamy look and he dropped into a trance of thought. After a little,Sellers asked him what he was grinding in his mental mill.
"Well, this. Have you got some secret project in your head whichrequires a Bank of England back of it to make it succeed?"
The Colonel showed lively astonishment, and said:
"Why, Hawkins, are you a mind-reader?"
"I? I never thought of such a thing."
"Well, then how did you happen to drop onto that idea in this curiousfashion? It's just mind-reading, that's what it is, though you may notknow it. Because I have got a private project that requires a Bank ofEngland at its back. How could you divine that? What was the process?This is interesting."
"There wasn't any process. A thought like this happened to slip throughmy head by accident: How much would make you or me comfortable?A hundred thousand. Yet you are expecting two or three of--theseinventions of yours to turn out some billions of money--and you arewanting them to do that. If you wanted ten millions, I could understandthat--it's inside the human limits. But billions! That's clear outsidethe limits. There must be a definite project back of that somewhere."
The earl's interest and surprise augmented with every word, and whenHawkins finished, he said with strong admiration:
"It's wonderfully reasoned out, Washington, it certainly is. It showswhat I think is quite extraordinary penetration. For you've hit it;you've driven the centre, you've plugged the bulls-eye of my dream. NowI'll tell you the whole thing, and you'll understand it. I don't need toask you to keep it to yourself, because you'll see that the project willprosper all the better for being kept in the background till the righttime. Have you noticed how many pamphlets and books I've got lyingaround relating to Russia?"
"Yes, I think most anybody would notice that--anybody who wasn't dead."
"Well, I've been posting myself a good while. That's a great and,splendid nation, and deserves to be set free." He paused, then added ina quite matter-of-fact way, "When I get this money I'm going to set itfree."
"Great guns!"
"Why, what makes you jump like that?"
"Dear me, when you are going to drop a remark under a man's chair thatis likely to blow him out through the roof, why don't you put someexpression, some force, some noise into it that will prepare him? Youshouldn't flip out such a gigantic thing as this in that colorless kindof a way. You do jolt a person up, so. Go on, now, I am all right again.Tell me all about it. I'm all interest--yes, and sympathy, too."
"Well, I've looked the ground over, and concluded that the methods ofthe Russian patriots, while good enough considering the way the boys arehampered, are not the best; at least not the quickest. They are tryingto revolutionize Russia from within; that's pretty slow, you know,and liable to interruption all the time, and is full of perils for theworkers. Do you know how Peter the Great started his army? He didn'tstart it on the family premises under the noses of the Strelitzes; no,he started it away off yonder, privately,--only just one regiment, youknow, and he built to that. The first thing the Strelitzes knew, theregiment was an army, their position was turned, and they had to takea walk. Just that little idea made the biggest and worst of all thedespotisms the world has seen. The same idea can unmake it. I'm goingto prove it. I'm going to get out to one side and work my scheme the wayPeter did."
"This is mighty interesting, Rossmore. What is it you are going to do?"
"I am going to buy Siberia and start a republic."
"There,--bang you go again, without giving any notice! Going to buy it?"
"Yes, as soon as I get the money. I don't care what the price is, Ishall take it. I can afford it, and I will. Now then, consider this--andyou've never thought of it, I'll warrant. Where is the place where thereis twenty-five times more manhood, pluck, true heroism, unselfishness,devotion to high and noble ideals, adoration of liberty, wide education,and brains, per thousand of population, than any other domain in thewhole world can show?"
"Siberia!"
"Right."
"It is true; it certainly is true, but I never thought of it before."
"Nobody ever thinks of it. But it's so, just the same. In those minesand prisons are gathered together the very finest and noblest andcapablest multitude of human beings that God is able to create. Nowif you had that kind of a population to sell, would you offer it to adespotism? No, the despotism has no use for it; you would lose money. Adespotism has no use for anything but human cattle. But suppose you wantto start a republic?"
"Yes, I see. It's just the material for it."
"Well, I should say so! There's Siberia with just the very finest andchoicest material on the globe for a republic, and more coming--morecoming all the time, don't you see! It is being daily, weekly, monthlyrecruited by the most perfectly devised system that has ever beeninvented, perhaps. By this system the whole of the hundred millions ofRussia are being constantly and patiently sifted, sifted, sifted, bymyriads of trained experts, spies appointed by the Emperor personally;and whenever they catch a man, woman or child that has got any brains oreducation or character, they ship that person straight to Siberia. It isadmirable, it is wonderful. It is so searching and so effective that itkeeps the general level of Russian intellect and education down to thatof the Czar."
"Come, that sounds like exaggeration."
"Well, it's what they say anyway. But I think, myself, it's a lie. Andit doesn't seem right to slander a whole nation that way, anyhow. Now,then, you see what the material is, there in Siberia, for a republic."He paused, and his breast began to heave and his eye to burn, under theimpulse of strong emotion. Then his words began to stream forth, withconstantly increasing energy and fire, and he rose to his feet as if togive himself larger freedom. "The minute I organize that republic, thelight of liberty, intelligence, justice, humanity, bursting from it,flooding from it, flaming from it, will concentrate the gaze of thewhole astonished world as upon the miracle of a new sun; Russia'scountless multitudes of slaves will rise up and march, march!--eastward,with that great light transfiguring their faces as they come, and farback of them you will see-what will you see?--a vacant throne in anempty land! It can be done, and by God I will do it!"
He stood a moment bereft of earthly consciousness by his exaltation;then consciousness returned, bringing him a slight shock, and he saidwith grave earnestness:
"I must ask you to pardon me, Major Hawkins. I have never used thatexpression before, and I beg you will forgive it this time."
Hawkins was quite willing.
"You see, Washington, it is an error which I am by nature not liableto. Only excitable people, impulsive people, are exposed to it. Butthe circumstances of the present case--I being a democrat by birth andpreference, and an aristocrat by inheritance and relish--"
The earl stopped suddenly, his frame stiffened, and he began to starespeechless through the curtainless window. Then he pointed, and gaspedout a single rapturous word:
"Look!"
"What is it, Colonel?"
"IT!"
"No!"
"Sure as you're born. Keep perfectly still. I'll apply theinfluence--I'll turn on all my force. I've brought It thus far--I'llfetch It right into the house. You'll see."
He was making all sorts of passes in the air with his hands.
"There! Look at that. I've made It smile! See?"
Quite true. Tracy, out for an afternoon stroll, had come unexpectantlyupon his family arms displayed upon this shabby house-front. Thehatchments made him smile; which was nothing, they had made theneighborhood cats do that.
"Look, Hawkins, look! I'm drawing It over!"
"You're drawing it sure, Rossmore. If I ever had any doubts aboutmaterialization, they're gone, now, and gone for good. Oh, this is ajoyful day!"
Tracy was sauntering over to read the door-plate. Before he was half wayover he was saying to himself, "Why, manifestly these are the AmericanClaimant's quarters."<
br />
"It's coming--coming right along. I'll slide, down and pull It in. Youfollow after me."
Sellers, pale and a good deal agitated, opened the door and confrontedTracy. The old man could not at once get his voice: then he pumped out ascattering and hardly coherent salutation, and followed it with--
"Walk in, walk right in, Mr.--er--"
"Tracy--Howard Tracy."
"Tracy--thanks--walk right in, you're expected."
Tracy entered, considerably puzzled, and said:
"Expected? I think there must be some mistake."
"Oh, I judge not," said Sellers, who--noticing that Hawkins had arrived,gave him a sidewise glance intended to call his close attention to adramatic effect which he was proposing to produce by his next remark.Then he said, slowly and impressively--"I am--YOU KNOW WHO."
To the astonishment of both conspirators the remark produced no dramaticeffect at all; for the new-comer responded with a quite innocent andunembarrassed air--
"No, pardon me. I don't know who you are. I only suppose--but no doubtcorrectly--that you are the gentleman whose title is on the doorplate."
"Right, quite right--sit down, pray sit down." The earl was rattled,thrown off his bearings, his head was in a whirl. Then he noticedHawkins standing apart and staring idiotically at what to him was theapparition of a defunct man, and a new idea was born to him. He said toTracy briskly:
"But a thousand pardons, dear sir, I am forgetting courtesies due to aguest and stranger. Let me introduce my friend General Hawkins--GeneralHawkins, our new Senator--Senator from the latest and grandest additionto the radiant galaxy of sovereign States, Cherokee Strip"--(to himself,"that name will shrivel him up!"--but it didn't, in the least, andthe Colonel resumed the introduction piteously disheartened andamazed),--"Senator Hawkins, Mr. Howard Tracy, of--er--"
"England."
"England!--Why that's im--"
"England, yes, native of England."
"Recently from there?"
"Yes, quite recently."
Said the Colonel to himself, "This phantom lies like an expert.Purifying this kind by fire don't work. I'll sound him a little further,give him another chance or two to work his gift." Then aloud--with deepirony--
"Visiting our great country for recreation and amusement, no doubt. Isuppose you find that traveling in the majestic expanses of our Far Westis--"
"I haven't been West, and haven't been devoting myself to amusement withany sort of exclusiveness, I assure you. In fact, to merely live, anartist has got to work, not play."
"Artist!" said Hawkins to himself, thinking of the rifled bank; "that isa name for it!"
"Are you an artist?" asked the colonel; and added to himself, "now I'mgoing to catch him."
"In a humble way, yes."
"What line?" pursued the sly veteran.
"Oils."
"I've got him!" said Sellers to himself. Then aloud, "This is fortunate.Could I engage you to restore some of my paintings that need thatattention?"
"I shall be very glad. Pray let me see them."
No shuffling, no evasion, no embarrassment, even under this crucialtest. The Colonel was nonplussed. He led Tracy to a chromo which hadsuffered damage in a former owner's hands through being used as a lampmat, and said, with a flourish of his hand toward the picture--
"This del Sarto--"
"Is that a del Sarto?"
The colonel bent a look of reproach upon Tracy, allowed it to sink home,then resumed as if there had been no interruption--
"This del Sarto is perhaps the only original of that sublime masterin our country. You see, yourself, that the work is of such exceedingdelicacy that the risk--could--er--would you mind giving me a littleexample of what you can do before we--"
"Cheerfully, cheerfully. I will copy one of these marvels."
Water-color materials--relics of Miss Sally's college life--werebrought. Tracy said he was better in oils, but would take a chance withthese. So he was left alone. He began his work, but the attractionsof the place were too strong for him, and he got up and went driftingabout, fascinated; also amazed.
