It was as
if the shape he could not trace in the darkness were some shape that
should not see the sun.
Then he had a flash of sanity and also of insight. The explanation
was very simple, but rather interesting. Obviously the man did not
use his voice because he did not wish his voice to be recognized. He
hoped to escape from that dark place before Fisher found out who he
was. And who was he? One thing at least was clear. He was one or
other of the four or five men with whom Fisher had already talked in
these parts, and in the development of that strange story.
"Now I wonder who you are," he said, aloud, with all his old lazy
urbanity. "I suppose it's no use trying to throttle you in order to
find out; it would be displeasing to pass the night with a corpse.
Besides I might be the corpse. I've got no matches and I've smashed
my torch, so I can only speculate. Who could you be, now? Let us
think."
The man thus genially addressed had desisted from drumming on the
door and retreated sullenly into a corner as Fisher continued to
address him in a flowing monologue.
"Probably you are the poacher who says he isn't a poacher. He says
he's a landed proprietor; but he will permit me to inform him that,
whatever he is, he's a fool. What hope can there ever be of a free
peasantry in England if the peasants themselves are such snobs as to
want to be gentlemen? How can we make a democracy with no democrats?
As it is, you want to be a landlord and so you consent to be a
criminal.
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