The Green Bay Tree (Bromfield, Frederick A. Stokes Company, printing 11)/Chapter 49
SHE was sitting thus when she turned at the sound of shuffling footsteps and saw Sarah coming softly toward her. The countenance of the mulatto carried a vague, indefinable expression of fear. It was gray with terror.
"What is it, Sarah?" asked Lily. "In the name of Heaven what is the matter?"
The woman trembled. "There's trouble a-brewin', Miss Lily," she said. The park is full of men. "They've been comin' in at the gate and they're all over the place." The woman hesitated again. "Hennery's watching now. He sent me to ask if he was to send for the police?"
Lily stood up and fastened the black and silver kimono higher about her throat.
"Who are they?"
"I don't know, Miss Lily. Hennery thinks mebbe they're strikers. He's put out the light at the back, so he can watch 'em without bein' seen."
For a moment Lily remained silent and thoughtful. Presently she said, "Put out the lights in here, Sarah. I'll go and look myself."
And she went out, leaving the frightened servant to extinguish the lamps.
A moment later, groping her way through the dark hallway to the servants' quarters, she stumbled suddenly upon the terrified figure of Hennery kneeling down by a window, keeping watch.
"It's Miss Lily, Hennery," she said. "Don't be frightened."
The window was a blue rectangle against the wall of the hallway. It was a clear night but moonless, although the bright, cold sky was all powdered with glistening stars. Outside in the park, among the dead trunks of the trees, moved scores of figures black against the blue gray snow. Some of them carried lanterns of one sort or another. There were even women among them, women with shawls over their heads, wezring short heavy skirts which cleared the top of the deep snow. Behind them, the searchlights from the mill yard fingered the blue dome of the sky nervously, sweeping now up and down, now across striking the black chimneys and furnace towers, cutting them cleanly in two as if the cold rays of light were knives.
In the hallway the nervous breathing of Hennery became noisy. It was clear that something about the scene. . . something which had to do with the silent, cold furnaces, the dead trees and the blackness of the moving figures aroused all the superstitious terror of the negro.
Outside the number of men increased. They appeared to be congregating now, in a spot near the deserted kennels. The lanterns moved among the trees like dancing lights above a swamp.
"It's all right, Hennery," said Lily presently. "It's all right. The police would only make matters worse. I suppose Miss Irene told them to meet here in the park. The police won't let them meet anywhere else. It's the last place they have."
"Mebbe," Hennery muttered, doubtfully. "Mebbe."
The figure of the mulatto woman appeared shuffling her way along the wall of the corridor.
"The best thing to do," said Lily softly, "is for you to go to bed and forget about it. Nothing will happen. Just don't interfere. Forget about it. I'll go up to my own room. . . . You might see that all the doors are locked."
And with that she left the two negroes crouching on the floor of the corridor gazing with a sort of fascination at the spectacle in the barren park.
Upstairs in her own room, she drew up the chaise longue and pulled aside the curtains from the window. The glass ran to the floor so that she was able, lying down, to watch everything that took place in the park. The room was in darkness and the French traveling clock, as if to comfort her, chimed out ten as she flung herself down, covering her long limbs with a silk comforter against the chill that crept in everywhere.
Outside the strange pageant continued to grow in size and animation. Sometimes the searchlight, swinging low in its course, flashed swiftly across the park, revealing for an instant a hundred swarthy faces and as many figures wrapped in heavy coats, bits of old blanket, rags . . . anything to shut out the bitter cold. Above each figure hung a little cloud of steaming breath, a soul hovering above a body. There were negroes among them,—the negroes doubtless, whom she had seen working in the choking fumes of the acid vats.
Yet none of the figures held any individuality. They might have been automatons. Figures in a single mob, none of them possessed a distinct personality. All this was welded into one vague mass, which carried a threat of anger and violence. The terror of Hennery was not altogether beyond conception. They kept moving about too in a restless uncertain fashion among the dead trees and deserted borders. In the niches of the dead hedge the figures of the Venus of Cydnos and the Apollo Belvedere gleamed darkly.
And as Lily watched, the light in her dark eyes brightened slowly and steadily. She became like one hypnotized. She began to breathe more quickly as if the old excitement, against which she was so powerless, had entered her blood. The soft white hand holding the back of the chaise longue trembled a little.
Slowly the moving figures gathered into a black throng at the side of the kennels. Somewhere in their midst a light began to glow, increasing slowly in volume until the tongues of red flame showed above the black heads of the mob. They had built a great fire for warmth, and near it some one had set up a barrel for the speakers to stand on. By the light of the flames she was able to see that the first speaker was a little man, rather thin and wiry like a bearded gnome, who danced about a great deal, waving his arms and legs. His manner was explosive. It was impossible to hear above the flames through the heavy glass of the window what he was saying, but clearly it produced an effect. The mob began to churn about and wave its lanterns. Sometimes the sound of shouts and cries vaguely penetrated the darkened room.
At last the little man finished and was lifted down by a score of hands. More wood was thrown on the fire and the red flames hungrily chased a shower of sparks high up among the dead branches of the trees. A moment later a second man climbed to the top of the barrel. He was an enormous fellow, a veritable giant who towered far above the mob. At the sight of him the strikers cheered wildly. Lily, from her point of vantage, must have recognized in him something vaguely familiar . . . the merest suggestion of memory in the sudden, eloquent gestures, the easy powerful grace with which he balanced himself as he spoke, the same grace she had seen one afternoon in the great shed beneath the hill. More wood was thrown upon the fire. The flames leaped higher and in the wild light, doubt was no longer possible. It was Krylenko who harangued, feverishly and desperately, the threatening sullen mob.