“I saw them,” said Amanda.

“Well.  Is it nothing to you that those things happen?”

“They must happen.”

“No.  They happen because there are no kings but pitiful kings.  They happen because the kings love their Amandas and do not care.”

“But what can you do, Cheetah?”

“Very little.  But I can give my life and all my strength.  I can give all I can give.”

“But how?  How can you help it—­help things like that massacre?”

“I can do my utmost to find out what is wrong with my world and rule it and set it right.”

“You!  Alone.”

“Other men do as much.  Every one who does so helps others to do so.  You see—­ . . .  In this world one may wake in the night and one may resolve to be a king, and directly one has resolved one is a king.  Does that sound foolishness to you?  Anyhow, it’s fair that I should tell you, though you count me a fool.  This—­this kingship—­this dream of the night—­is my life.  It is the very core of me.  Much more than you are.  More than anything else can be.  I mean to be a king in this earth.  King.  I’m not mad. . . .  I see the world staggering from misery to misery and there is little wisdom, less rule, folly, prejudice, limitation, the good things come by chance and the evil things recover and slay them, and it is my world and I am responsible.  Every man to whom this light has come is responsible.  As soon as this light comes to you, as soon as your kingship is plain to you, there is no more rest, no peace, no delight, except in work, in service, in utmost effort.  As far as I can do it I will rule my world.  I cannot abide in this smug city, I cannot endure its self-complacency, its routine, its gloss of success, its rottenness. . . .  I shall do little, perhaps I shall do nothing, but what I can understand and what I can do I will do.  Think of that wild beautiful country we saw, and the mean misery, the filth and the warring cruelty of the life that lives there, tragedy, tragedy without dignity; and think, too, of the limitless ugliness here, and of Russia slipping from disorder to massacre, and China, that sea of human beings, sliding steadily to disaster.  Do you think these are only things in the newspapers?  To me at any rate they are not things in newspapers; they are pain and failure, they are torment, they are blood and dust and misery.  They haunt me day and night.  Even if it is utterly absurd I will still do my utmost.  It is absurd.  I’m a madman and you and my mother are sensible people. . . .  And I will go my way. . . .  I don’t care for the absurdity.  I don’t care a rap.”

He stopped abruptly.

“There you have it, Amanda.  It’s rant, perhaps.  Sometimes I feel it’s rant.  And yet it’s the breath of life to me. . . .  There you are. . . .  At last I’ve been able to break silence and tell you. . . .”

He stopped with something like a sob and stood regarding the dusky mystery of her face.  She stood quite still, she was just a beautiful outline in the twilight, her face was an indistinctness under the black shadow of her hair, with eyes that were two patches of darkness.