A Second Coming

'Let them. The sooner the thing is done the better. To you and me what does it matter what comes?'

On the doorstep stood that Secretary of State who had given the dinner at which the Archbishop had been present. Behind him was the yelling mob.

'Your Eminence! This is an unexpected pleasure. The Archbishop, too! How delightful! The people seem in a curious frame of mind; our friend Braidwood is justified-already. It's a wonder I'm here alive. I am told that several persons have been killed in the crowd- terrible! terrible! My own opinion is that we're threatened with the most serious riot which London has known in my time. Ah, dear sir!' He bowed to the Stranger. 'I need not ask if you are he to whom I desire to tender my sincerest salutations. There is that about you which tells me that I stand in the presence of no mean person. Unfortunately, I am so constituted as to be incapable of those more ardent feelings which are to the enthusiast his indispensable equipment. Therefore I am not of that material out of which they fashion devotees. Yet, since I cannot doubt that my trifling personal peculiarities are known to him who, as I am informed, knows all, I venture to trust that they will be regarded as extenuating circumstances should I ever stand in instant need of palliation.'

The Stranger was still.

The stones still rattled against the windows, smashed against the door. Again there came a knocking. The tumult had grown so great, the cries so threatening, that those within were trembling, hesitating what to do. When the Stranger moved towards the door, the Secretary of State prevented Him.

'Sir, I beg of you! I fear it is you they wish to see, with what purpose you may imagine from the noise which they are making. Permit me to answer the knocking. At the present moment I am of less public interest than you.'

He opened. There was an excited sergeant of police.

'The person who's in here must get away by the back somewhere at once; those are my orders. The people have found out that they can get to this house from the street behind; they're starting off to do it. We don't want murder done, and there will be murder if he doesn't take himself off pretty quick.'

'Is it so bad as that?'

'So bad as that? Look at them yourself. I never saw them in such a state. They're stark, staring mad. All the streets about are full of them; they're all the same. That man Walters and his friends have been working a lot of them into a frenzy; murder is what they mean. Then there's over a hundred been killed in front here, so I'm told- poor wretches who came to be healed. The crowd will tear him to pieces if they get him. He must get away somehow over the walls at the back.'

'Over the walls at the back?'

'He can't get away by the front. We couldn't save him-nobody could. I tell you they'll tear him to pieces.'

As the sergeant spoke the Stranger came and stood at the door by the Secretary of State. A policeman rushed up the steps bearing something in his arms. He addressed the sergeant.

'This child's dead. Sir William Braidwood says most of the bones in its body are broken; it's crushed nearly to a jelly. It doesn't seem to have had any friends or anything. Could you see it taken into the house?'

The sergeant received the child. The Stranger said to him: 'Give it to Me.'

'You? Why you? Let it be taken into the house and put decent.'

'Give Me the child.'

He took the child and pressed it to His bosom, and the child, opening its eyes, looked up at Him. He kissed it on the brow.

'You have been asleep,' He said.

The child sat up in His arms and laughed.

The Archbishop whispered to the Cardinal:

'The child lives!'

The Stranger cried to those that were within the house:

'I return whence I came. Come there to Me.'

And a great hush fell on all the people, so that on a sudden they were still. And they fell back, so that a lane was formed in their midst, along which He went, with the child, laughing, in His arms.

It was as if the people had been carved out of stone. They moved neither limb nor feature, nor seemed to breathe, but stayed in the uncouth attitudes in which they had been flung by passion, with their faces as rage had distorted them, their mouths open as they had vomited blasphemies, their eyes glaring, their fists clenched.

Through the stricken people in the silent streets the Stranger went, the child laughing in His arms-on and on, on and on. Whither He went, no man knew. Nor has He been seen of any since, nor the child either.

And when He had gone, a great sigh went over all the people. Behold, they wept!

THE END