Page:The Island of Doctor Moreau.djvu/127

A Parley. “What I saw,” I said. “And those—yonder.”

“Hush!” said Moreau, and held up his hand.

“I will not,” said I. “They were men: what are they now? I at least will not be like them.”

I looked past my interlocutors. Up the beach were M’ling, Montgomery’s attendant, and one of the white-swathed brutes from the boat. Farther up, in the shadow of the trees, I saw my little Ape-man, and behind him some other dim figures.

“Who are these creatures?” said I, pointing to them and raising my voice more and more that it might reach them. “They were men, men like yourselves, whom you have infected with some bestial taint,—men whom you have enslaved, and whom you still fear. You who listen,” I cried, pointing now to Moreau and shouting past him to the Beast Men,—“You who listen! Do you not see these men still fear you, go in dread of you? Why, then, do you fear them? You are many—”

“For God’s sake,” cried Montgomery, “stop that, Prendick!” 121