The Fixed Period

  CHAPTER III.

  THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN.

  It was now mid-winter, and it wanted just twelve months to that 30thof June on which, in accordance with all our plans, Crasweller was tobe deposited. A full year would, no doubt, suffice for him to arrangehis worldly affairs, and to see his daughter married; but it wouldnot more than suffice. He still went about his business with analacrity marvellous in one who was so soon about to withdraw himselffrom the world. The fleeces for bearing which he was preparing hisflocks, though they might be shorn by him, would never return theirprices to his account. They would do so for his daughter and hisson-in-law; but in these circumstances, it would have been well forhim to have left the flocks to his son-in-law, and to have turnedhis mind to the consideration of other matters. "There should be ayear devoted to that final year to be passed within the college, sothat, by degrees, the mind may be weaned from the ignoble art ofmoney-making." I had once so spoken to him; but there he was, asintent as ever, with his mind fixed on the records of the price ofwool as they came back to him from the English and American markets."It is all for his daughter," I had said to myself. "Had he beenblessed with a son, it would have been otherwise with him." So Igot on to my steam-tricycle, and in a few minutes I was at LittleChristchurch. He was coming in after a hard day's work among theflocks, and seemed to be triumphant and careful at the same time.

  "I tell you what it is, Neverbend," said he; "we shall have the flukeover here if we don't look after ourselves."

  "Have you found symptoms of it?"

  "Well; not exactly among my own sheep; but I know the signs of it sowell. My grasses are peculiarly dry, and my flocks are remarkablywell looked after; but I can see indications of it. Only fancy wherewe should all be if fluke showed itself in Britannula! If it once gotahead we should be no better off than the Australians."

  This might be anxiety for his daughter; but it looked strangely likethat personal feeling which would have been expected in him twentyyears ago. "Crasweller," said I, "do you mind coming into the house,and having a little chat?" and so I got off my tricycle.

  "I was going to be very busy," he said, showing an unwillingness. "Ihave fifty young foals in that meadow there; and I like to see thatthey get their suppers served to them warm."

  "Bother the young foals!" said I. "As if you had not men enough aboutthe place to see to feeding your stock without troubling yourself.I have come out from Gladstonopolis, because I want to see you;and now I am to be sent back in order that you might attend to theadministration of hot mashes! Come into the house." Then I enteredin under the verandah, and he followed. "You certainly have got thebest-furnished house in the empire," said I, as I threw myself on toa double arm-chair, and lighted my cigar in the inner verandah.

  "Yes, yes," said he; "it is pretty comfortable."

  He was evidently melancholy, and knew the purpose for which I hadcome. "I don't suppose any girl in the old country was ever betterprovided for than will be Eva." This I said wishing to comfort him,and at the same time to prepare for what was to be said.

  "Eva is a good girl,--a dear girl. But I am not at all so sure aboutthat young fellow Abraham Grundle. It's a pity, President, your sonhad not been born a few years sooner." At this moment my boy was halfa head taller than young Grundle, and a much better specimen of aBritannulist. "But it is too late now, I suppose, to talk of that. Itseems to me that Jack never even thinks of looking at Eva."

  This was a view of the case which certainly was strange to me, andseemed to indicate that Crasweller was gradually becoming fit forthe college. If he could not see that Jack was madly in love withEva, he could see nothing at all. But I had not come out to LittleChristchurch at the present moment to talk to him about the lovematters of the two children. I was intent on something of infinitelygreater importance. "Crasweller," said I, "you and I have alwaysagreed to the letter on this great matter of the Fixed Period."He looked into my face with supplicating, weak eyes, but he saidnothing. "Your period now will soon have been reached, and I thinkit well that we, as dear loving friends, should learn to discuss thematter closely as it draws nearer. I do not think that it becomeseither of us to be afraid of it."

  "That's all very well for you," he replied. "I am your senior."

  "Ten years, I believe."

  "About nine, I think."

  This might have come from a mistake of his as to my exact age; andthough I was surprised at the error, I did not notice it on thisoccasion. "You have no objection to the law as it stands now?" Isaid.

  "It might have been seventy."

  "That has all been discussed fully, and you have given your assent.Look round on the men whom you can remember, and tell me, on how manyof them life has not sat as a burden at seventy years of age?"

  "Men are so different," said he. "As far as one can judge of his owncapacities, I was never better able to manage my business than I amat present. It is more than I can say for that young fellow Grundle,who is so anxious to step into my shoes."

  "My dear Crasweller," I rejoined, "it was out of the question so toarrange the law as to vary the term to suit the peculiarities of oneman or another."

  "But in a change of such terrible severity you should have suited theeldest."

  This was dreadful to me,--that he, the first to receive at the handsof his country the great honour intended for him,--that he shouldhave already allowed his mind to have rebelled against it! If he, whohad once been so keen a supporter of the Fixed Period, now turnedround and opposed it, how could others who should follow be expectedto yield themselves up in a fitting frame of mind? And then Ispoke my thoughts freely to him. "Are you afraid of departure?" Isaid,--"afraid of that which must come; afraid to meet as a friendthat which you must meet so soon as friend or enemy?" I paused; buthe sat looking at me without reply. "To fear departure;--must it notbe the greatest evil of all our life, if it be necessary? Can Godhave brought us into the world, intending us so to leave it that thevery act of doing so shall be regarded by us as a curse so terribleas to neutralise all the blessings of our existence? Can it be thatHe who created us should have intended that we should so regard ourdismissal from the world? The teachers of religion have endeavouredto reconcile us to it, and have, in their vain zeal, endeavoured toeffect it by picturing to our imaginations a hell-fire into whichninety-nine must fall; while one shall be allowed to escape to aheaven, which is hardly made more alluring to us! Is that the way tomake a man comfortable at the prospect of leaving this world? But itis necessary to our dignity as men that we shall find the mode ofdoing so. To lie quivering and quaking on my bed at the expectationof the Black Angel of Death, does not suit my manhood,--which wouldfear nothing;--which does not, and shall not, stand in awe of aughtbut my own sins. How best shall we prepare ourselves for the daywhich we know cannot be avoided? That is the question which I haveever been asking myself,--which you and I have asked ourselves, andwhich I thought we had answered. Let us turn the inevitable intothat which shall in itself be esteemed a glory to us. Let us teachthe world so to look forward with longing eyes, and not with a faintheart. I had thought to have touched some few, not by the eloquenceof my words, but by the energy of my thoughts; and you, oh my friend,have ever been he whom it has been my greatest joy to have had withme as the sharer of my aspirations."

  "But I am nine years older than you are."

  I again passed by the one year added to my age. There was nothingnow in so trifling an error. "But you still agree with me as to thefundamental truth of our doctrine."

  "I suppose so," said Crasweller.

  "I suppose so!" repeated I. "Is that all that can be said for thephilosophy to which we have devoted ourselves, and in which nothingfalse can be found?"

  "It won't teach any one to think it better to live than to die whilehe is fit to perform all the functions of life. It might be very wellif you could arrange that a man should be deposited as soon as hebecomes absolutely infirm."

  "Some men are infirm at forty."

  "Then deposit
them," said Crasweller.

  "Yes; but they will not own that they are infirm. If a man be weakat that age, he thinks that with advancing years he will resume thestrength of his youth. There must, in fact, be a Fixed Period. Wehave discussed that fifty times, and have always arrived at the sameconclusion."

  He sat still, silent, unhappy, and confused. I saw that there wassomething on his mind to which he hardly dared to give words. Wishingto encourage him, I went on. "After all, you have a full twelvemonths yet before the day shall have come."

  "Two years," he said, doggedly.

  "Exactly; two years before your departure, but twelve months beforedeposition."

  "Two years before deposition," said Crasweller.

  At this I own I was astonished. Nothing was better known in theempire than the ages of the two or three first inhabitants to bedeposited. I would have undertaken to declare that not a man or awoman in Britannula was in doubt as to Mr Crasweller's exact age. Ithad been written in the records, and upon the stones belonging to thecollege. There was no doubt that within twelve months of the presentdate he was due to be detained there as the first inhabitant. And nowI was astounded to hear him claim another year, which could not beallowed him.

  "That impudent fellow Grundle has been with me," he continued, "andwishes to make me believe that he can get rid of me in one year. Ihave, at any rate, two years left of my out-of-door existence, and Ido not mean to give up a day of it for Grundle or any one else."

  It was something to see that he still recognised the law, though hewas so meanly anxious to evade it. There had been some whisperings inthe empire among the elderly men and women of a desire to obtain theassistance of Great Britain in setting it aside. Peter Grundle, forinstance, Crasweller's senior partner, had been heard to say thatEngland would not allow a deposited man to be slaughtered. There wasmuch in that which had angered me. The word slaughter was in itselfpeculiarly objectionable to my ears,--to me who had undertaken toperform the first ceremony as an act of grace. And what had Englandto do with our laws? It was as though Russia were to turn upon theUnited States and declare that their Congress should be put down.What would avail the loudest voice of Great Britain against thesmallest spark of a law passed by our Assembly?--unless, indeed,Great Britain should condescend to avail herself of her great power,and thus to crush the free voice of those whom she had alreadyrecognised as independent. As I now write, this is what she hasalready done, and history will have to tell the story. But it wasespecially sad to have to think that there should be a Britannulistso base, such a coward, such a traitor, as himself to propose thisexpedient for adding a few years to his own wretched life.

  But Crasweller did not, as it seemed, intend to avail himself ofthese whispers. His mind was intent on devising some falsehood bywhich he should obtain for himself just one other year of life, andhis expectant son-in-law purposed to prevent him. I hardly knew as Iturned it all in my mind, which of the two was the more sordid; but Ithink that my sympathies were rather in accord with the cowardice ofthe old man than with the greed of the young. After all, I had knownfrom the beginning that the fear of death was a human weakness. Toobliterate that fear from the human heart, and to build up a perfectmanhood that should be liberated from so vile a thraldom, had beenone of the chief objects of my scheme. I had no right to be angrywith Crasweller, because Crasweller, when tried, proved himself tobe no stronger than the world at large. It was a matter to me ofinfinite regret that it should be so. He was the very man, the veryfriend, on whom I had relied with confidence! But his weakness wasonly a proof that I myself had been mistaken. In all that Assemblyby which the law had been passed, consisting chiefly of young men,was there one on whom I could rest with confidence to carry out thepurpose of the law when his own time should come? Ought I not so tohave arranged matters that I myself should have been the first,--tohave postponed the use of the college till such time as I mightmyself have been deposited? This had occurred to me often throughoutthe whole agitation; but then it had occurred also that none mightperhaps follow me, when under such circumstances I should havedeparted!

  But in my heart I could forgive Crasweller. For Grundle I feltnothing but personal dislike. He was anxious to hurry on thedeposition of his father-in-law, in order that the entire possessionof Little Christchurch might come into his own hands just one yearthe earlier! No doubt he knew the exact age of the man as well asI did, but it was not for him to have hastened his deposition. Andthen I could not but think, even in this moment of public misery, howwilling Jack would have been to have assisted old Crasweller in hislittle fraud, so that Eva might have been the reward. My belief isthat he would have sworn against his own father, perjured himselfin the very teeth of truth, to have obtained from Eva that littleprivilege which I had once seen Grundle enjoying.

  I was sitting there silent in Crasweller's verandah as all thispassed through my mind. But before I spoke again I was enabled to seeclearly what duty required of me. Eva and Little Christchurch, withJack's feelings and interests, and all my wife's longings, must belaid on one side, and my whole energy must be devoted to the literalcarrying out of the law. It was a great world's movement that hadbeen projected, and if it were to fail now, just at its commencement,when everything had been arranged for the work, when again wouldthere be hope? It was a matter which required legislative sanction inwhatever country might adopt it. No despot could attempt it, let hispower be ever so confirmed. The whole country would rise against himwhen informed, in its ignorance, of the contemplated intention. Norcould it be effected by any congress of which the large majority werenot at any rate under forty years of age. I had seen enough of humannature to understand its weakness in this respect. All circumstanceshad combined to make it practicable in Britannula, but all thesecircumstances might never be combined again. And it seemed to me todepend now entirely on the power which I might exert in creatingcourage in the heart of the poor timid creature who sat before me.I did know that were Britannula to appeal aloud to England, England,with that desire for interference which has always characterised her,would interfere. But if the empire allowed the working of the lawto be commenced in silence, then the Fixed Period might perhaps beregarded as a thing settled. How much, then, depended on the wordswhich I might use!

  "Crasweller," I said, "my friend, my brother!"

  "I don't know much about that. A man ought not to be so anxious tokill his brother."

  "If I could take your place, as God will be my judge, I would do sowith as ready a step as a young man to the arms of his beloved. Andif for myself, why not for my brother?"

  "You do not know," he said. "You have not, in truth, been tried."

  "Would that you could try me!"

  "And we are not all made of such stuff as you. You have talked aboutthis till you have come to be in love with deposition and departure.But such is not the natural condition of a man. Look back upon allthe centuries, and you will perceive that life has ever been dearto the best of men. And you will perceive also that they who havebrought themselves to suicide have encountered the contempt of theirfellow-creatures."

  I would not tell him of Cato and Brutus, feeling that I could notstir him to grandeur of heart by Roman instances. He would have toldme that in those days, as far as the Romans knew,

  "the Everlasting had not fixed His canon 'gainst self-slaughter."

  I must reach him by other methods than these, if at all. "Who can bemore alive than you," I said, "to the fact that man, by the fear ofdeath, is degraded below the level of the brutes?"

  "If so, he is degraded," said Crasweller. "It is his condition."

  "But need he remain so? Is it not for you and me to raise him to ahigher level?"

  "Not for me--not for me, certainly. I own that I am no more thanman. Little Christchurch is so pleasant to me, and Eva's smiles andhappiness; and the lowing of my flocks and the bleating of my sheepare so gracious in my ears, and it is so sweet to my eyes to see howfairly I have turned this wilderness into a paradise, that I own thatI
would fain stay here a little longer."

  "But the law, my friend, the law,--the law which you yourself havebeen so active in creating."

  "The law allows me two years yet," said he; that look of stubbornnesswhich I had before observed again spreading itself over his face.

  Now this was a lie; an absolute, undoubted, demonstrable lie. Andyet it was a lie which, by its mere telling, might be made availablefor its intended purpose. If it were known through the capital thatCrasweller was anxious to obtain a year's grace by means of so foul alie, the year's grace would be accorded to him. And then the FixedPeriod would be at an end.

  "I will tell you what it is," said he, anxious to represent hiswishes to me in another light. "Grundle wants to get rid of me."

  "Grundle, I fear, has truth on his side," said I, determined to showhim that I, at any rate, would not consent to lend myself to thefurtherance of a falsehood.

  "Grundle wants to get rid of me," he repeated in the same tone. "Buthe shan't find that I am so easy to deal with. Eva already doesnot above half like him. Eva thinks that this depositing plan isabominable. She says that no good Christians ever thought of it."

  "A child--a sweet child--but still only a child; and brought up byher mother with all the old prejudices."

  "I don't know much about that. I never knew a decent woman who wasn'tan Episcopalian. Eva is at any rate a good girl, to endeavour to saveher father; and I'll tell you what--it is not too late yet. As far asmy opinion goes, Jack Neverbend is ten to one a better sort of fellowthan Abraham Grundle. Of course a promise has been made; but promisesare like pie-crusts. Don't you think that Jack Neverbend is quite oldenough to marry a wife, and that he only needs be told to make uphis mind to do it? Little Christchurch would do just as well for himas for Grundle. If he don't think much of the girl he must thinksomething of the sheep."

  Not think much of the girl! Just at this time Jack was talking tohis mother, morning, noon, and night, about Eva, and threateningyoung Grundle with all kinds of schoolboy punishments if he shouldpersevere in his suit. Only yesterday he had insulted Abrahamgrossly, and, as I had reason to suspect, had been more than onceout to Christchurch on some clandestine object, as to which it wasnecessary, he thought, to keep old Crasweller in the dark. And thento be told in this manner that Jack didn't think much of Eva, andshould be encouraged in preference to look after the sheep! He wouldhave sacrificed every sheep on the place for the sake of half an hourwith Eva alone in the woods. But he was afraid of Crasweller, whom heknew to have sanctioned an engagement with Abraham Grundle.

  "I don't think that we need bring Jack and his love into thisdispute," said I.

  "Only that it isn't too late, you know. Do you think that Jack couldbe brought to lend an ear to it?"

  Perish Jack! perish Eva! perish Jack's mother, before I would allowmyself to be bribed in this manner, to abandon the great objectof all my life! This was evidently Crasweller's purpose. He wasendeavouring to tempt me with his flocks and herds. The temptation,had he known it, would have been with Eva,--with Eva and the genuine,downright, honest love of my gallant boy. I knew, too, that at homeI should not dare to tell my wife that the offer had been made tome and had been refused. My wife could not understand,--Craswellercould not understand,--how strong may be the passion founded on theconviction of a life. And honesty, simple honesty, would forbidit. For me to strike a bargain with one already destined fordeposition,--that he should be withdrawn from his glorious, hisalmost immortal state, on the payment of a bribe to me and my family!I had called this man my friend and brother, but how little had theman known me! Could I have saved all Gladstonopolis from imminentflames by yielding an inch in my convictions, I would not havedone so in my then frame of mind; and yet this man,--my friend andbrother,--had supposed that I could be bought to change my purpose bythe pretty slopes and fat flocks of Little Christchurch!

  "Crasweller," said I, "let us keep these two things separate; orrather, in discussing the momentous question of the Fixed Period, letus forget the loves of a boy and a girl."

  "But the sheep, and the oxen, and the pastures! I can still make mywill."

  "The sheep, and the oxen, and the pastures must also be forgotten.They can have nothing to do with the settlement of this matter. Myboy is dear to me, and Eva is dear also, but not to save even theiryoung lives could I consent to a falsehood in this matter."

  "Falsehood! There is no falsehood intended."

  "Then there need be no bargain as to Eva, and no need for discussingthe flocks and herds on this occasion. Crasweller, you are sixty-sixnow, and will be sixty-seven this time next year. Then the period ofyour deposition will have arrived, and in the year following,--twoyears hence, mind,--the Fixed Period of your departure will havecome."

  "No."

  "Is not such the truth?"

  "No; you put it all on a year too far. I was never more than nineyears older than you. I remember it all as well as though it wereyesterday when we first agreed to come away from New Zealand. Whenwill you have to be deposited?"

  "In 1989," I said carefully. "My Fixed Period is 1990."

  "Exactly; and mine is nine years earlier. It always was nine yearsearlier."

  It was all manifestly untrue. He knew it to be untrue. For the sakeof one poor year he was imploring my assent to a base falsehood, andwas endeavouring to add strength to his prayer by a bribe. How couldI talk to a man who would so far descend from the dignity of manhood?The law was there to support me, and the definition of the law wasin this instance supported by ample evidence. I need only go beforethe executive of which I myself was the chief, desire that theestablished documents should be searched, and demand the body ofGabriel Crasweller to be deposited in accordance with the lawas enacted. But there was no one else to whom I could leave theperformance of this invidious task, as a matter of course. Therewere aldermen in Gladstonopolis and magistrates in the countrywhose duty it would no doubt be to see that the law was carried out.Arrangements to this effect had been studiously made by myself. Sucharrangements would no doubt be carried out when the working of theFixed Period had become a thing established. But I had long foreseenthat the first deposition should be effected with some _eclat_ ofvoluntary glory. It would be very detrimental to the cause to see myspecial friend Crasweller hauled away to the college by constablesthrough the streets of Gladstonopolis, protesting that he was forcedto his doom twelve months before the appointed time. Crasweller wasa popular man in Britannula, and the people around would not be soconversant with the fact as was I, nor would they have the samereasons to be anxious that the law should be accurately followed.And yet how much depended upon the accuracy of following the law! Awilling obedience was especially desired in the first instance, and awilling obedience I had expected from my friend Crasweller.

  "Crasweller," I said, addressing him with great solemnity; "it is notso."

  "It is--it is; I say it is."

  "It is not so. The books that have been printed and sworn to, whichhave had your own assent with that of others, are all against you."

  "It was a mistake. I have got a letter from my old aunt in Hampshire,written to my mother when I was born, which proves the mistake."

  "I remember the letter well," I said,--for we had all gone throughsuch documents in performing the important task of settling thePeriod. "You were born in New South Wales, and the old lady inEngland did not write till the following year."

  "Who says so? How can you prove it? She wasn't at all the woman tolet a year go by before she congratulated her sister."

  "We have your own signature affirming the date."

  "How was I to know when I was born? All that goes for nothing."

  "And unfortunately," said I, as though clenching the matter, "theBible exists in which your father entered the date with his usualexemplary accuracy." Then he was silent for a moment as though havingno further evidence to offer. "Crasweller," said I, "are you not manenough to do this thing in a straightforward, manly manner?"

  "One year!" he
exclaimed. "I only ask for one year. I do think that,as the first victim, I have a right to expect that one year should begranted me. Then Jack Neverbend shall have Little Christchurch, andthe sheep, and the cattle, and Eva also, as his own for ever andever,--or at any rate till he too shall be led away to execution!"

  A victim; and execution! What language in which to speak of the greatsystem! For myself I was determined that though I would be gentlewith him I would not yield an inch. The law at any rate was with me,and I did not think as yet that Crasweller would lend himself tothose who spoke of inviting the interference of England. The law wason my side, and so must still be all those who in the Assembly hadvoted for the Fixed Period. There had been enthusiasm then, and thedifferent clauses had been carried by large majorities. A dozendifferent clauses had been carried, each referring to variousbranches of the question. Not only had the period been fixed, butmoney had been voted for the college; and the mode of life at thecollege had been settled; the very amusements of the old men had beensanctioned; and last, but not least, the very manner of departure hadbeen fixed. There was the college now, a graceful building surroundedby growing shrubs and broad pleasant walks for the old men, endowedwith a kitchen in which their taste should be consulted, and with achapel for such of those who would require to pray in public; and allthis would be made a laughing-stock to Britannula, if this old manCrasweller declined to enter the gates. "It must be done," I said ina tone of firm decision.

  "No!" he exclaimed.

  "Crasweller, it must be done. The law demands it."

  "No, no; not by me. You and young Grundle together are in aconspiracy to get rid of me. I am not going to be shut up a wholeyear before my time."

  With that he stalked into the inner house, leaving me alone on theverandah. I had nothing for it but to turn on the electric lamp of mytricycle and steam back to Government House at Gladstonopolis with asad heart.