The Angel of the Revolution | Page 4

that the cross cut on the forehead of the victim indicates that the crime
is the work not of the Nihilists proper, but of that unknown and
mysterious society usually alluded to as the Terrorists, not one of
whom has ever been seen save in his crimes. How the assassin
managed to enter and leave the car unperceived while the train was
going at full speed is an apparently insoluble riddle. Saving the victim
and the attendants the only passengers in the car who had not retired to
rest were another officer in the Russian service and Lord Alanmere,

who was travelling to St. Petersburg to resume, after leave of absence,
the duties of the Secretaryship to the British Embassy, to which he was
appointed some two years ago.
"Why, that must be the Lord Alanmere who was at Trinity in my time,
or rather Viscount Tremayne, as he was then," mused Arnold, as he laid
the paper down. "We were very good friends in those days. I wonder if
he'd know me now, and lend me a ten-pound note to get me out of the
infernal fix I'm in? I believe he would, for he was one of the few really
good-hearted men I have so far met with.
"If he were in London I really think I should take courage from my
desperation, and put my case before him and ask his help. However,
he's not in London, and so it's no use wishing. Well, I feel more of a
man for that shillingsworth of food and drink, and I'll go and wind up
my dissipation with a pipe and a quiet think on the Embankment."
CHAPTER II.
AT WAR WITH SOCIETY.
WHEN Richard Arnold reached the Embankment dusk had deepened
into night, so far, at least, as nature was concerned. But in London in
the beginning of the twentieth century there was but little night to speak
of, save in the sense of a division of time. The date of the paper which
contained the account of the tragedy on the Russian railway was
September 3rd, 1903, and within the last ten years enormous progress
had been made in electric lighting.
The ebb and flow in the Thames had at last been turned to account, and
worked huge turbines which perpetually stored up electric power that
was used not only for lighting, but for cooking in hotels and private
houses, and for driving machinery. At all the great centres of traffic
huge electric suns cast their rays far and wide along the streets,
supplementing the light of the lesser lamps with which they were lined
on each side.
The Embankment from Westminster to Blackfriars was bathed in a

flood of soft white light from hundreds of great lamps running along
both sides, and from the centre of each bridge a million candle-power
sun cast rays upon the water that were continued in one unbroken
stream of light from Chelsea to the Tower.
On the north side of the river the scene was one of brilliant and
splendid opulence, that contrasted strongly with the halflighted gloom
of the murky wilderness of South London, dark and forbidding in its
irredeemable ugliness.
From Blackfriars Arnold walked briskly towards Westminster, bitterly
contrasting as he went the lavish display of wealth around him with the
sordid and seemingly hopeless poverty of his own desperate condition.
He was the maker and possessor of a far greater marvel than anything
that helped to make up this splendid scene, and yet the ragged tramps
who were remorselessly moved on from one seat to another by the
policemen as soon as they had settled themselves down for a rest and a
doze, were hardly poorer than he was.
For nearly four hours he paced backwards and forwards, every now and
then stopping to lean on the parapet, and once or twice to sit down,
until the chill autumn wind pierced his scanty clothing, and compelled
him to resume his walk in order to get warm again.
All the time he turned his miserable situation over and over again in his
mind without avail. There seemed no way out of it; no way of obtaining
the few pounds that would save him from homeless beggary and his
splendid invention from being lost to him and the world, certainly for
years, and perhaps for ever.
And then, as hour after hour went by, and still no cheering thought
came, the misery of the present pressed closer and closer upon him. He
dare not go home, for that would be to bring the inevitable disaster of
the morrow nearer, and, besides, it was home no longer till the rent was
paid. He had two shillings, and he owed at least twelve. He was also
the maker of a machine for which