Chapter 40 - Page 2

he did not make the remark that truth was
stranger than fiction. It was evident that he was impatient to get to
other more important matters.

"You have doubtless heard from my wife," he said, "that I have parted
company with those misguided people that call themselves socialists.
Well, Miss Affleck, the fact is--"

"Eden," corrected Constance with a smile. She was quietly moving about
the room in her list slippers, engaged in remoistening the hangings,
which had now grown dry and hot.

"I beg your pardon, Miss Eden. Yes, thanks--Fan; that will be better
still among such old friends as we are. What I wish to say is, that my
mind was never really carried away with their fantastical theories--their
dreams of a social condition where all men will be equally far removed
from want and excessive wealth. I could have told them at once that they
were overlooking the first and greatest law of organic nature, that the
stone which the builders despised would fall on them and grind them to
powder. At the same time my feelings were engaged on their side, I am
bound to confess; I did think it possible to educe some good out of this
general ferment and dissatisfaction with the conditions of life. For,
after all, this ferment--this great clamour and shouting and hurrying to
and fro--represents force--blind brute force, no doubt, like that of
waves dashing themselves to pieces on the rocks, or of the tempest let
loose on the world. A tempest unhappily without an angel to guide it; for
I look upon the would-be angels--the Burnses--Morrises--Champions--
Hyndmans--merely as so many crows, rooks, and jackdaws, who have
incontinently rushed in to swell the noise with their outrageous cawing,
and to be tossed and blown about, hither and thither, among the dust,
sticks, old newspapers, and pieces of rotten wood stirred up by the wind.
Good would have come of it if it had been possible to introduce a gleam
of sense and reason into the foggy brains of these wretched men. But that
was impossible. I am ashamed to have to confess that I ever believed it
possible--that I assumed, when planning their welfare, that they were not
absolutely irrational. I have not only thrown the whole thing up, but the
disgust, the revulsion of feeling I have experienced, has had the effect
of making me perfectly indifferent as to the ultimate fate of these
people. If some person were to come to me to-morrow to say that all the
East-enders, from Bishopsgate Street to Bow, had been seized with a kind
of frenzy, like that which from time to time takes possession of the
Norway marmots, or bandicoots, or whatever they are called--"

"Lemmings," said Constance.

"Yes, lemmings. Thanks,