ghting has been. All the city was screaming about
it. All the Babble Machines! Everywhere it was shouted. Even the fools
who speak for the Council were admitting it. Everyone was rushing off to
see him--everyone was getting arms. Were you drunk or asleep? And even
then! But you're joking! Surely you're pretending. It was to stop the
shouting of the Babble Machines and prevent the people gathering that
they turned off the electricity--and put this damned darkness upon us.
Do you mean to say--?"

"I had heard the Sleeper was rescued," said Graham. "But--to come back a
minute. Are you sure Ostrog has him?"

"He won't let him go," said the old man.

"And the Sleeper. Are you sure he is not genuine? I have never heard--"

"So all the fools think. So they think. As if there wasn't a thousand
things that were never heard. I know Ostrog too well for that. Did
I tell you? In a way I'm a sort of relation of Ostrog's. A sort of
relation. Through my daughter-in-law."

"I suppose--"

"Well?"

"I suppose there's no chance of this Sleeper asserting himself. I
suppose he's certain to be a puppet--in Ostrog's hands or the Council's,
as soon as the struggle is over."

"In Ostrog's hands--certainly. Why shouldn't he be a puppet? Look at his
position. Everything done for him, every pleasure possible. Why should
he want to assert himself?"

"What are these Pleasure Cities?" said Graham, abruptly.

The old man made him repeat the question. When at last he was assured
of Graham's words, he nudged him violently. "That's too much," said he.
"You're poking fun at an old man. I've been suspecting you know more
than you pretend."

"Perhaps I do," said Graham. "But no! why should I go on acting? No, I
do not know what a Pleasure City is."

The old man laughed in an intimate way.

"What is more, I do not know how to read your letters, I do not know
what money you use, I do not know what foreign countries there are. I
do not know where I am. I cannot count. I do not know where to get food,
nor drink, nor shelter."

"Come, come," said the old man, "if you had a glass of drink, now, would
you put it in your ear or your eye?"

"I want you to tell me all these things."

"He, he! Well, gentlemen who dress in silk must have their fun." A
withered hand caressed Graham's arm for a moment. "Silk. Well, well!
But, all the same, I wish I was the man who was put up as the Sleeper.
He'll have a fine time of it. All the pomp and pleasure. He