Page:The Ball and the Cross.djvu/391

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The Last Parley
381

apocalyptic fulfilment. This garden is the world gone mad.”

Turnbull did not move his head, and he had been listening all the time; yet, somehow, the other knew that for the first time he was listening seriously.

“The world has gone mad,” said MacIan, “and it has gone mad about Us. The world takes the trouble to make a big mistake about every little mistake made by the Church. That is why they have turned ten counties to a madhouse; that is why crowds of kindly people are poured into this filthy melting-pot. Now is the judgment of this world. The Prince of this World is judged, and he is judged exactly because he is judging. There is at last one simple solution to the quarrel between the ball and the cross——”

Turnbull for the first time started.

“The ball and—” he repeated.

“What is the matter with you?” asked MacIan.

“I had a dream,” said Turnbull, thickly and obscurely, “in which I saw the cross struck crooked and the ball secure——”

“I had a dream,” said MacIan, “in which I saw the cross erect and the ball invisible. They

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