Lord of the World

  CHAPTER IV

  I

  A week later Mabel awoke about dawn; and for a moment or two forgotwhere she was. She even spoke Oliver's name aloud, staring round theunfamiliar room, wondering what she did here. Then she remembered, andwas silent....

  It was the eighth day she had spent in this Home; her probation wasfinished: to-day she wits at liberty to do that for which she had come.On the Saturday of the previous week she had gone through her privateexamination before the magistrate, stating under the usual conditions ofsecrecy her name, age and home, as well as her reasons for making theapplication for Euthanasia; and all had passed off well. She hadselected Manchester as being sufficiently remote and sufficiently largeto secure her freedom from Oliver's molestation; and her secret had beenadmirably kept. There was not a hint that her husband knew anything ofher intentions; for, after all, in these cases the police were bound toassist the fugitive. Individualism was at least so far recognised as tosecure to those weary of life the right of relinquishing it. Shescarcely knew why she had selected this method, except that any otherseemed impossible. The knife required skill and resolution; firearmswere unthinkable, and poison, under the new stringent regulations, washard to obtain. Besides, she seriously wished to test her ownintentions, and to be quite sure that there was no other way thanthis....

  Well, she was as certain as ever. The thought had first come to her inthe mad misery of the outbreak of violence on the last day of the oldyear. Then it had gone again, soothed away by the arguments that man wasstill liable to relapse. Then once more it had recurred, a cold andconvincing phantom, in the plain daylight revealed by Felsenburgh'sDeclaration. It had taken up its abode with her then, yet she controlledit, hoping against hope that the Declaration would not be carried intoaction, occasionally revolting against its horror. Yet it had never beenfar away; and finally when the policy sprouted into deliberate law, shehad yielded herself resolutely to its suggestion. That was eight daysago; and she had not had one moment of faltering since that.

  Yet she had ceased to condemn. The logic had silenced her. All that sheknew was that she could not bear it; that she had misconceived the NewFaith; that for her, whatever it was for others, there was no hope....She had not even a child of her own.

  * * * * *

  Those eight days, required by law, had passed very peacefully. She hadtaken with her enough money to enter one of the private homes furnishedwith sufficient comfort to save from distractions those who had beenaccustomed to gentle living: the nurses had been pleasant andsympathetic; she had nothing to complain of.

  She had suffered, of course, to some degree from reactions. The secondnight after her arrival had been terrible, when, as she lay in bed inthe hot darkness, her whole sentient life had protested and struggledagainst the fate her will ordained. It had demanded the familiarthings--the promise of food and breath and human intercourse; it hadwrithed in horror against the blind dark towards which it moved soinevitably; and, in the agony had been pacified only by the half-hintedpromise of some deeper voice suggesting that death was not the end. Withmorning light sanity had come back; the will had reassumed the mastery,and, with it, had withdrawn explicitly the implied hope of continuedexistence. She had suffered again for an hour or two from a moreconcrete fear; the memory came back to her of those shocking revelationsthat ten years ago had convulsed England and brought about theestablishment of these Homes under Government supervision--thoseevidences that for years in the great vivisection laboratories humansubjects had been practised upon--persons who with the same intentionsas herself had cut themselves off from the world in privateeuthanasia-houses, to whom had been supplied a gas that suspendedinstead of destroying animation.... But this, too, had passed with thereturn of light. Such things were impossible now under the newsystem--at least, in England. She had refrained from making an end uponthe Continent for this very reason. There, where sentiment was weaker,and logic more imperious, materialism was more consistent. Since menwere but animals--the conclusion was inevitable.

  There had been but one physical drawback, the intolerable heat of thedays and nights. It seemed, scientists said, that an entirely unexpectedheat-wave had been generated; there were a dozen theories, most of whichwere mutually exclusive one of another. It was humiliating, she thought,that men who professed to have taken the earth under their charge shouldbe so completely baffled. The conditions of the weather had of coursebeen accompanied by disasters; there had been earthquakes of astonishingviolence, a ripple had wrecked not less than twenty-five towns inAmerica; an island or two had disappeared, and that bewildering Vesuviusseemed to be working up for a denouement. But no one knew really theexplanation. One man had been wild enough to say that some cataclysm hadtaken place in the centre of the earth.... So she had heard from hernurse; but she was not greatly interested. It was only tiresome that shecould not walk much in the garden, and had to be content with sitting inher own cool shaded room on the second floor.

  There was only one other matter of which she had asked, namely, theeffect of the new decree; but the nurse did not seem to know much aboutthat. It appeared that there had been an outrage or two, but the law hadnot yet been enforced to any great extent; a week, after all, was ashort time, even though the decree had taken effect at once, andmagistrates were beginning the prescribed census.

  * * * * *

  It seemed to her as she lay awake this morning, staring at the tintedceiling, and out now and again at the quiet little room, that the heatwas worse than ever. For a minute she thought she must have overslept;but, as she touched her repeater, it told her that it was scarcely afterfour o'clock. Well, well; she would not have to bear it much longer; shethought that about eight it would be time to make an end. There was herletter to Oliver yet to be written; and one or two final arrangements tobe made.

  As regarded the morality of what she was doing-the relation, that is tosay, which her act bore to the common life of man--she had no shadow ofdoubt. It was her belief, as of the whole Humanitarian world, that justas bodily pain occasionally justified this termination of life, so alsodid mental pain. There was a certain pitch of distress at which theindividual was no longer necessary to himself or the world; it was themost charitable act that could be performed. But she had never thoughtin old days that that state could ever be hers; Life had been much toointeresting. But it had come to this: there was no question of it.

  * * * * *

  Perhaps a dozen times in that week she had thought over her conversationwith Mr. Francis. Her going to him had been little more thaninstinctive; she did just wish to hear what the other side was--whetherChristianity was as ludicrous as she had always thought. It seemed thatit was not ludicrous; it was only terribly pathetic. It was just alovely dream--an exquisite piece of poetry. It would be heavenly tobelieve it, but she did not. No--a transcendent God was unthinkable,although not quite so unthinkable as a merely immeasurable Man. And asfor the Incarnation--well, well!

  There seemed no way out of it. The Humanity-Religion was the only one.Man was God, or at least His highest manifestation; and He was a Godwith which she did not wish to have anything more to do. These faint newinstincts after something other than intellect and emotion were, sheknew perfectly well, nothing but refined emotion itself.

  She had thought a great deal of Felsenburgh, however, and was astonishedat her own feelings. He was certainly the most impressive man she hadever seen; it did seem very probable indeed that He was what He claimedto be--the Incarnation of the ideal Man the first perfect product ofhumanity. But the logic of his position was too much for her. She sawnow that He was perfectly logical--that He had not been inconsistent indenouncing the destruction of Rome and a week later making Hisdeclaration. It was the passion of one man against another that Hedenounced--of kingdom against kingdom, and sect against sect--for thiswas suicidal for the race. He denounced passion, too, not judicialaction. Therefore, this new decree was as logical as Himself--it was ajudicial act on the part of an united world against a tiny majority that
threatened the principle of life and faith: and it was to be carried outwith supreme mercy; there was no revenge or passion or partisan spiritin it from beginning to end; no more than a man is revengeful orpassionate when he amputates a diseased limb--Oliver had convinced herof that.

  Yes, it was logical and sound. And it was because it was so that shecould not bear it.... But ah! what a sublime man Felsenburgh was; it wasa joy to her even to recall his speeches and his personality. She wouldhave liked to see him again. But it was no good. She had better be donewith it as tranquilly as possible. And the world must go forward withouther. She was just tired out with Facts.

  * * * * *

  She dozed off again presently, and it seemed scarcely five minutesbefore she looked up to see a gentle smiling face of a white-cappednurse bending over her.

  "It is nearly six o'clock, my dear--the time you told me. I came to seeabout breakfast."

  Mabel drew a long breath. Then she sat up suddenly, throwing back thesheet.