The Ninth Man/Chapter 11

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2401708The Ninth Man — Chapter 11Mary Heaton Vorse

CHAPTER XI

THEY bore him along triumphant on their shoulders, sealing the steep streets of San Moglio, and behind him hobbled the maimed and the very poor, and the very old, and the mothers of feeble children, and all those innocents upon whom great fear had been cast by the wise plan of Gubbio di Grollo. And there came not a few of the nobles and the first men of San Moglio, some sick with the thought of killing, and others drawn by curiosity.

They bore him up to the little Piazza Ogni Santi, and he went out on a balcony above a doorway, and all of the misery of San Moglio was packed into this piazza, and the nobles were jostled among them, and far down the streets came others, until every street that led away was packed with the people of San Moglio,

They cried out to him: "Are we saved? Tell us, Agnello, are we saved?"

He waited until it was quiet through all the place, and then said he: "And who could harm you? For upon me be your blood; for it was for this that I was born."

And the words that he spoke, that had once seemed to me the ravings of a madman, now seemed as though they were spoken by the voice of God. I felt, when I heard him speak, as if I had been dying of thirst and he gave me to drink. I had forgotten what hope was, and love, and, lo, here were both. And thus he delivered me, as he did all those wretched ones before him who had had to suffer not only the pains of poverty and of their feeble bodies, but also, under the wise plan of Messer Gubbio, the fear of death.

Brother Agnello called forth from all of us those fair things, love and hope, and he linked us together into a mighty army of love, and not one of us who heard him could have lifted his hand to kill his fellow-man. Hate was gone from among us: the San Moglio that I had seen turning to me the face of one who lives in hell was now full of the rejoicing of heaven, and we who heard him speak believed that for this end was Brother Agnello born.

Mighty and terrible is the tramping of an angry crowd, and red with lust a city drunk with the love of life, and worse a city that plays with the thought of death and rejoices at revenge, and terrible a city whose face is gray with fear. It seems as if no force there be on earth great enough to overcome such things; and, lo, the voice of one man—unfriended, unhelped, with no other weapon but the love in his heart—had been stronger than all other things. I joined the crowd that went rejoicing to their homes, transformed from the children of fear and hate to the children of love and pity. But as I went past the cobbler's shop, the cobbler's lame son sat and grinned his hate at me, and as I went into the great hall Mazzaleone and my lady sat talking in low tones by the window, and she turned away a blushing cheek as though she were his sweetheart; and Bartolommeo in his lustful pride stood apart and talked with other ladies, yet his eyes rested for ever on the two by the window.