The moment you see 'Napoleon' with the numbers under him--"
"Eh? Then it _is_ the French!" Again the Major bounced up from his
chair.
"The French? Yes, of course--but, excuse me--"
"_What_ numbers?" The Major's voice shook, though he bravely tried
to control it.
"Six hundred--"
"Good Lord! _Where_?"
"--And sixty and six. In Revelation thirteen, eighteen--I thought
you knew!" went on the Vicar reproachfully, as his friend dropped
back upon his chair, and, resting an elbow on the table, shaded
his eyes and their emotion. "As I can now prove to you in ten
minutes, the Corsican's name spells accurately the Number of the
Beast. But that's only the beginning. Power, you remember, was
given to the Beast to continue forty and two months. Add forty and
two months to the first day of the century, which I have shown to be
January 1st, 1801, and you come to May 1st, 1804: that is to say,
next May-day. You perceive the significance of the date?"
"Not entirely," confessed the Major, still a trifle pale. "Why, my
dear sir, all these rites and customs over which the Vicar of
Helleston and I have been disputing--these May-day observances, in
themselves apparently so puerile but so obviously symbolical to one
who looks below the surface--turn out to be not retrospective, not
reminiscent, not commemorative at all, but anticipatory. On every
1st of May our small urchins form a dragon or devil out of old pots
and saucepans, and flog it through the streets.
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