Having thus detailed rather minutely the situation in which the city and the actors in its drama found themselves, it now becomes necessary to move the action forward to the point where the moneyed interests took a hand in the game.
That was brought about in somewhat more than fifty hours.
In the meantime the facts as to vibrations were published in all the papers; the despatches and the relations between McCarthy and Monsieur X exclusively in the _Despatch_--to that organ's vast satisfaction and credit; and the possibilities of tragedy in none. This latter fact was greatly to the credit of a maligned class of men. It is common belief that no cause is too sacred or no consequence too grave to give pause to the editorial rapacity for news. The present instance disproved that supposition. No journal, yellow or otherwise, contained a line of suggestion that anything beyond annoyance was to be feared from these queer manifestations.
The consequences on a mixed population like that of New York were very peculiar. The people naturally divided themselves into three classes. In the first were those who had received their warning from logic, friends, or the outside world; and who either promptly left town or, being unable to do so, lived in fear. In the second were all that numerous body who, neurasthenically unbalanced or near the overbalance, shut instinctively the eyes of their reason and glowed with a devastating and fanatical religious zeal. Among these, so exextraordinarily are we constituted, almost immediately grew up various sects, uniting only in the belief that the wrath of God was upon an iniquitous people.
By far the largest class of all, comprising the every-day busy bulk of the people, were those who accepted the thing at its face value, read its own papers, went about its business, and spared time to laugh at the absurdities or growl at the inconveniences of the phenomena. With true American adaptability, it speedily accustomed itself to both the expectation of, and the coping with, unusual conditions. It went forth about its daily affairs; it started for home a little early in order to get there in season; it eschewed subways and theaters; it learned to wait patiently, when one of the three blights struck its world, as a man waits patiently for a shower to pass.
This class, as has been said, was preponderantly in the majority, but its mass was being constantly diminished as a little knowledge of danger seeped into its substance. News of the possible catastrophe passed from mouth to mouth; a world outside, waiting aghast at such fatuity, began to get in its messages. Street corner alarmists talked to such as would listen. Thousands upon thousands left the city. Hundreds of thousands more, tied hard and fast by the strings of necessity, waited in an hourly growing dread.
The "sign" had been sent promptly at six o'clock, as promised. It proved Darrow's prediction by turning out to be a stoppage of the electrical systems. This time it lasted only half an hour-long enough to throw the traffic and transportation into confusion. It was followed at short intervals by demonstrations in light and sound; none was of long duration.
After the first few, their occurrence came freakishly, in flashes, as though the hidden antagonist delighted in confusing his immense audience. The messages he sent over the wireless in the Atlas Building grew more and more threatening and grandiose. They demanded invariably that McCarthy should be sought out and delivered up to a rather vaguely described vengeance; and threatened with dire calamities all the inhabitants of Manhattan if the Unknown's desires were not fulfilled. These threats grew more definite in character as time went on.
The effect of all this in the long run was, of course, confusion and instability. People laughed or cursed; but they also listened and reasoned. Gradually, throughout the city, dread was extending the blackness of its terror. A knowledge that would have caused a tremendous panic if it had been divulged suddenly now gav............