“‘No, no, no!’ he cried emphatically. ‘That way is long and very weary.
At the end of the world, at the back of the dawn, I shall find the wife
I really married and the house that is really mine. And that house will
have a greener lamp-post and a redder pillar-box. Do you,’ he asked
with a sudden intensity, ‘do you never want to rush out of your house
in order to find it?’
“‘No, I think not,’ I replied; ‘reason tells a man from the first to
adapt his desires to the probable supply of life. I remain here,
content to fulfil the life of man. All my interests are here, and most
of my friends, and—’
“‘And yet,’ he cried, starting to his almost terrific height, ‘you made
the French Revolution!’
“‘Pardon me,’ I said, ‘I am not quite so elderly. A relative perhaps.’
“‘I mean your sort did!’ exclaimed this personage. ‘Yes, your damned
smug, settled, sensible sort made the French Revolution. Oh! I know
some say it was no good, and you’re just back where you were before.
Why, blast it all, that’s just where we all want to be—back where we
were before! That is revolution—going right round! Every revolution,
like a repentance, is a return.’
“He was so excited that I waited till he had taken his seat again, and
then said something indifferent and soothing; but he struck the tiny
table with his colossal fist and went on.
“‘I am going to have a revolution, not a French Revolution, but an
English Revolution. God has given to each tribe its own type of mutiny.
The Frenchmen march against the citadel of the city together; the
Englishman marches to the outskirts of the city, and alone. But I am
going to turn the world upside down, too. I’m going to turn myself
upside down. I’m going to walk upside down in the cursed upsidedownland
of the Antipodes, where trees and men hang head downward in the sky.
But my revolution, like yours, like the earth’s, will end up in the
holy, happy place— the celestial, incredible place—the place where we
were before.’
“With these remarks, which can scarcely be reconciled with reason, he
leapt from the seat and strode away into the twilight, swinging his
pole and leaving behind him an excessive payment, which also pointed to
some loss of mental balance. This is all I know of the episode of the
man landed from the fishing-boat, and I hope it may serve the interests
of justice.— Accept, Sir, the assurances of the very high
consideration, with which I have the honour to be your obedient
servant, “Jules Durobin.”
“The next document in our dossier,” continued Inglewood, “comes from
the town of Crazok, in the central plains of Russia, and runs as
follows:—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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