WILLIAM LE QUEUX: 15 Dystopian Novels & Espionage Thrillers (Illustrated Edition). William Le Queux

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      CHAPTER I

       A BLOW FOR FREEDOM

       Table of Contents

      “‘Daily Mail’ Office, Oct. 1st, 2 p.m.

      “Three days have passed since the revolt at King’s Cross, and each day, both on the Horse Guards’ Parade and in the Park, opposite Dorchester House, there have been summary executions. Von Kronhelm is in evident fear of the excited London populace, and is endeavouring to cow them by his plain-spoken and threatening proclamations, and by these wholesale executions of any person found with arms in his or her possession. But the word of command does not abolish the responsibility of conscience, and we are now awaiting breathlessly for the word to strike the blow in revenge.

      “The other newspapers are reappearing, but all that is printed each morning is first subjected to a rigorous censorship, and nothing is allowed to be printed before it is passed and initialled by the two gold-spectacled censors who sit and smoke their pipes in an office to themselves. Below, we have German sentries on guard, for our journal is one of the official organs of Von Kronhelm, and what now appears in it is surely sufficient to cause our blood to boil.

      “To-day, there are everywhere signs of rapidly-increasing unrest. Londoners are starving, and are now refusing to remain patient any longer. The Daily Bulletin of the League of Defenders, though the posting of it is punishable by imprisonment, and it is everywhere torn down where discovered by the Germans, still gives daily brief news of what is in progress, and still urges the people to wait in patience for ‘the action of the Government,’ as it is sarcastically put.

      “Soon after eleven o’clock this morning a sudden and clearly premeditated attack was made upon a body of the Bremen infantry who were passing along Oxford Street from Holborn to the Marble Arch. The soldiers were suddenly fired upon from windows of a row of shops between Newman Street and Rathbone Place, and before they could halt and return the fire they found themselves surrounded by a great armed rabble, who were emerging from all the streets leading into Oxford Street on either side.

      “While the Germans were manœuvring, some unknown hand launched from a window a bomb into the centre of them. Next second there was a red flash, a loud report, and twenty-five of the enemy were blown to atoms. For a few moments the soldiers were demoralised, but orders were shouted loudly by their officers, and they began a most vigorous defence. In a few seconds the fight was as fierce as that at King’s Cross; for out of every street in that working-class district lying between the Tottenham Court Road and Great Portland Street on the north, and out of Soho on the south, poured thousands upon thousands of fierce Londoners, all bent upon doing their utmost to kill their oppressors. From almost every window along Oxford Street a rain of lead was now being poured upon the troops, who vainly strove to keep their ground. Gradually, however, they were, by slow degrees, forced back into the narrow side-turnings up Newman Street, and Rathbone Place into Mortimer Street, Foley Street, Goodge Street, and Charlotte Street; and there they were slaughtered almost to a man.

      “Two officers were captured by the armed mob in Tottenham Street, and after being beaten were stood up and shot in cold blood as vengeance for those shot during the past three days at Von Kleppen’s orders at Dorchester House.

      “The fierce fight lasted quite an hour; and though reinforcements were sent for, yet, curiously enough, none arrived.

      “The great mob, however, were well aware that very soon the iron hand of Germany would fall heavily upon them; therefore, in frantic haste they began soon after noon to build barricades, and block up the narrow streets in every direction. At the end of Rathbone Place, Newman Street, Berners Street, Wells Street, and Great Titchfield Street huge obstructions soon appeared, while on the east all by-streets leading into Tottenham Court Road were blocked up, and the same on the west in Great Portland Street, and on the north where the district was flanked by the Euston Road. So that by two o’clock the populous neighbourhood bounded by the four great thoroughfares was rendered a fortress in itself.

      “Within that area were thousands of armed men and women from Soho, Bloomsbury, Marylebone, and even from Camden Town. There they remained in defiance of Von Kronhelm’s newest proclamation, which stared one in the face from every wall.”

      * * * * * * *

      “‘Daily Telegraph’ Office, Fleet Street,

       Oct. 1st, 2 p.m.

      “The enemy were unaware of the grave significance of the position of affairs, because Londoners betrayed no outward sign of the truth. Now, however, nearly every man and woman wore pinned upon their breasts a small piece of silk about two inches square, printed as a miniature Union Jack — the badge adopted by the League of Defenders. Though Von Kronhelm was unaware СКАЧАТЬ