Walter Besant
The inner house
CHAPTER X
THE COUNCIL IN THE HOUSE
"Brothers of the Holy College!" I cried, "you have beheld the crime – you are witnesses of the Fact – you have actually seen the Arch Physician himself revealing the Great Secret, which none of yourselves, even of the College, hath been permitted to learn – the Secret confined by the Wisdom of the College to himself and to his Suffragan."
"We are witnesses," they cried, with one consent. To my great satisfaction, even those who were of Dr. Linister's party, and who voted with him against the Administration and Policy of the College, spoke, on this occasion, for the plain and undeniable truth.
"What," I asked, "is the Penalty when one of the least among us, even an Assistant only, betrays to the People any of the secrets – even the least secret – of the work carried on in this House?"
"It is Death," they replied, with one voice.
"It is Death," I repeated, pointing to the Arch Physician.
At such a moment, when nothing short of annihilation appeared in view, one would have expected from the guilty pair an appearance of the greatest consternation and dismay. On the contrary, the Arch Physician, with an insensibility – or a bravado – which one would not have expected of him, stood before us all, his arms folded, his eyes steady, his lips even smiling. Beside him stood the girl, dressed in the ridiculous mummery of the nineteenth century, bowed down, her face in her hands.
"It is I," she murmured – "it is I, Harry, who have brought you to this. Oh, forgive me! Let us die together. Since I have awakened out of the stupid torpor of the Present – since we remembered the Past – and Love – let us die together; for I could not live without you." She knelt at his feet, and laid her head upon his arm. "My love," she said, "my Lord and Love! let me die with you."
At this extraordinary spectacle I laughed aloud. Love? I thought the old wives' tales of Love and Lordship were long, long since dead and forgotten. Yet here was a man for the sake of a woman – actually because she wanted to go away and begin again the old pernicious life – breaking his most sacred vows; and here was a woman – for the sake of this man – actually and truly for his sake – asking for death – death with him! Since, when they were both dead, there could be no more any feeling one for the other, why ask for death? What good could that do for either?
"Your wish," I said to this foolish woman, "shall be gratified, in case the Judges of your case decide that your crime can be expiated by no less a penalty. Fellows of the College, let this guilty pair be confined for the night, and to-morrow we will try them solemnly in the College Court according to ancient custom."
I know not how many years had elapsed since that Court was held. The offences of the old time were for the most part against property – since there had been no property, there had been no crimes of this kind. Another class of old offences consisted of violence rising out of quarrels; since almost all these quarrels originated in disputes about property – every man in the old time who had property was either a thief or the son of a thief, so that disputes were naturally incessant – there could be no longer any such quarrels or any such violence. A third class of crimes were caused by love, jealousy, and the like; these two had happily, as we believed, disappeared forever.
The last class of crimes to vanish were those of mutiny. When the People grew gradually to understand that the welfare of all was the only rule of the governing body, and that selfishness, individualism, property, privilege, would no longer be permitted, they left off murmuring, and mutiny ceased. You have seen how orderly, how docile, how tranquil, is the life of the People as it has been ordered by the Sacred College. Alas! I thought that this order, this sheep-like freedom from Thought, was going to be henceforth universal and undisturbed.
Our prisoners made no opposition. John Lax, the Porter, bearing his halberd of office, marched beside them. We closed in behind them, and in this order we led them to the strong room over the South Porch, which is provided with bars and a lock. It is the sleeping-chamber of John Lax, but for this night he was to remain on the watch below.
Then, as Suffragan, I called a Council of Emergency in the Inner House, taking the Presidency in the absence of the Arch Physician.
I told my brethren briefly what had happened; how my attention had been called to the fact that a company of the People, headed by the young girl called Christine, had begun to assemble every night in the Museum, there to put on clothes which belonged to the old time, and to masquerade in the manners, language, and amusements (so called) of that time; that this assemblage, which might have been innocent and even laudable if it led, as it should have done, to a detestation of the old times, had proved mischievous, because, strangely enough, it had exactly the opposite effect; that, in fact, everybody in the company had fallen into an ardent yearning after the Past, and that all the bad features of that bad time – the Social inequality, the Poverty, the Injustice – were carefully ignored.
Upon this, one of Dr. Linister's Party arose, and begged permission to interrupt the Suffragan. He wished to point out that memory was indestructible; that even if we succeeded in reducing Mankind, as the Suffragan wished, to be a mere breathing and feeding machine – the Ultimate Triumph of Science – any one of these machines might be at any time electrified into a full and exact memory of the Past; that, to the average man, the Emotion of the Past would always be incomparably preferable to the Tranquillity of the Present. What had just been done would be done again.
I went on, after this interruption, to narrate how I set myself to watch, and presently saw the Arch Physician himself enter the Museum; how he exchanged his gown for the costume in which the men disfigured themselves, play-acted, pretended, and masqueraded with them; danced with them, no external respect whatever being paid to his rank; and afterwards had certain love passages – actually love passages between the Arch Physician and a Woman of the People! – which I overheard, and repeated as far as I could remember them. The rest my brethren of the College knew already; how I hastily summoned them, and led them into the Inner House just before the arrival of the Criminals.
Thereupon, without any attempt of Dr. Linister's friends to the contrary, it was Resolved that the Trial of the Arch Physician and his accomplices should be held in the morning.
I next invited their attention to the behavior of the girl Christine. She it was, I told them, who had instigated the whole of the business. A culpable curiosity it was, no doubt, that first led her to consider and study the ways of the ancient world; what should be the ways of the Past to an honest and loyal person, satisfied with the Wisdom which ruled the Present? She read the old books, looked at the old pictures, and lived all day long in the old Museum. There were many things which she could not understand; she wanted to understand these things; and she conceived a violent, unreasoning admiration for the old time, which appeared to this foolish girl to be a continual round of pleasure and excitement. Therefore she gathered together a company of those who had belonged to the richer class in the days when property was permitted. She artfully awakened them out of their contentment, sowed the seeds of dissatisfaction among them, caused them to remember the Past with a vehement longing to reproduce the worst part of it – namely, the manners and customs of the richer class – the people for whom the bulk of mankind toiled, so that the privileged few might have nothing to do but to feast, dance, sing, and make love. I asked the College, therefore, what should be done with such a girl, warning them that one Penalty, and one only, would meet the case and render for the future such outbreaks impossible.
Again the Physician who had spoken before rose up and remarked that such outbreaks were inevitable, because the memory is indestructible.
"You have here," he said, "a return to the Past, because a young girl, by reading the old books, has been able to stimulate the memory of those who were born in the Past. Other things may bring about the same result; a dream, the talking together of two former friends. Let the girl alone. She has acted as we might have expected a young girl – the only young girl among us – to have acted. She has found that the Past, which some of us have represented as full of woe and horror, had its pleasant side; she asks why that pleasant side could not be reproduced. I, myself, or any of us, might ask the same question. Nay, it is well known that I protest – and always shall protest, my friends and I – against the Theory of the Suffragan. His Triumph of Science we consider horrible to the last degree. I, for one, shall never be satisfied until the Present is wholly abolished, and until we have gone back to the good old system of Individualism, and begun to encourage the People once more to cultivate the old happiness by the old methods of their own exertion."
I replied that my own recollection of the old time was perfectly clear, and that there was nothing but unhappiness in it. As a child I lived in the street; I never had enough to eat; I was cuffed and kicked; I could never go to bed at night until my father, who always came home drunk, was asleep; the streets were full of miserable children like myself. Where was the happiness described by my learned brother? Where was the pleasant side? More I said, but it suffices to record that by a clear majority it was Resolved to arrest the girl Christine in the morning, and to try all three prisoners, as soon as the Court could be prepared for them, according to ancient usage.
Early in the morning I sought an interview with the Arch Physician. I found him, with the woman Mildred, sitting in the Chamber over the Porch. There was no look of terror, or even of dejection, on the face of either. Rather there was an expression as of exaltation. Yet they were actually going to die – to cease breathing – to lose consciousness!
I told the prisoner that I desired to represent my own conduct in its true light. I reminded him that, with him, I was guardian of the Holy Secret. The power and authority of the College, I pointed out, were wholly dependent upon the preservation of that Secret in its own hands. By divulging it to the People he would make them as independent of the Physician as the Great Discovery itself had made them independent of the Priest. The latter had, as he pretended, the Keys of the After Life. The former did actually hold those of the Actual Life. The authority of the Physician gone, the people would proceed to divide among themselves, to split up into factions, to fight and quarrel, to hold private property, and in fact would speedily return to the old times, and all the work that we had accomplished would be destroyed. Every man would have the knowledge of the Secret for himself and his family. They would all begin to fight again – first for the family, next for the Commune, and then for the tribe or nation. All this would have been brought about by his treachery had not I prevented it.
"Yes," he said, "doubtless you are quite right, Grout." He spoke quite in the old manner, as if I had been still his servant in the old laboratory. It was not till afterwards that I remembered this, and became enraged to think of his arrogance. "We will not argue the matter. It is not worth while. You acted after your kind, and as I might have expected." Again it was not until afterwards that I considered what he meant and was enraged. "When we allowed gentlehood to be destroyed, gentle manners, honor, dignity, and such old virtues went too. You acted – for yourself – very well, Grout. Have you anything more to say? As for us, we have gone back to the old times, this young lady and I – quite to the old, old times." He took her hand and kissed it, while his eyes met hers, and they were filled with a tenderness which amazed me. "This lady, Grout," he said, "has done me the honor of accepting my hand. You will understand that no greater happiness could have befallen me. The rest that follows is of no importance – none – not the least. My dear, this is Grout, formerly employed in my laboratory. Unfortunately he has no experience of Love, or of any of the Arts or Culture of the good old Time; but a man of great intelligence. You can go, Grout."
CHAPTER XI
THE TRIAL AND SENTENCE
I was greatly pleased with the honest zeal shown by John Lax, the Porter, on this occasion. When, after snatching three or four hours' sleep, I repaired to the House, I found that worthy creature polishing at a grindstone nothing less than a great, heavy Execution Axe, which had done service many times in the old, old days on Tower Hill, and had since peacefully reposed in the Museum.
"Suffragan," he said, "I am making ready." His feet turned the treadle, and the wheel flew round, and the sparks showered from the blunt old weapon. He tried the edge with his finger. "'Tis not so sharp as a razor," he said, "but 'twill serve."
"John Lax, methinks you anticipate the sentence of the Court."
"Suffragan, with submission, it is Death to divulge any secret of this House. It is Death even for me, Porter of the House, to tell them outside of any Researches or Experiments that I may observe in my service about the House. And if so great a Penalty is pronounced against one who would reveal such trifles as I could divulge, what of the Great Secret itself?"
"Lax, you are a worthy man. Know, therefore, that this Secret once divulged, the Authority of the College would vanish; and we, even the Physicians themselves – to say nothing of the Assistants, the Bedells, and you yourself – would become no better than the Common People. You do well to be zealous."
John Lax nodded his head. He was a taciturn man habitually; but now he became loquacious. He stopped the grindstone, laid down the axe, and rammed his hands into his pockets.
"When I see them women dressed up like swells – " he began, grinning.
"John, this kind of language belongs to the old days, when even speech was unequal."
"No matter; you understand it. Lord! Sammy Grout, the brewer's boy – we were both Whitechapel pets; but I was an old 'un of five and thirty, while you were on'y beginning to walk the Waste with a gal on your arm – p'r'aps – and a ha'penny fag in your mouth. Hold on, now. It's like this – "
What with the insolence of Dr. Linister, and the sight of the old dresses, and the sound of the old language, I myself was carried away. Yes, I was once more Sam Grout; again I walked upon the pavement of the Whitechapel Road; again I was a boy in the great brewery of Mile End Road.
"Go on, John Lax," I said, with condescension. "Revive, if it is possible, something of the Past. I give you full leave. But when you come to the Present, forget not the reverence due to the Suffragan."
"Right, guv'nor. Well, then, it's like this. I see them men and women dressed up in the old fallals, and goin' on like I've seen 'em goin' on long ago with their insolence and their haw-haws – damn 'em – and all the old feelings came back to me, and I thought I was spoutin' again on a Sunday mornin', and askin' my fellow-countrymen if they always meant to sit down and be slaves. And the memory came back to me – ah! proper it did – of a speech I made 'em one mornin' all about this French Revolution. 'Less 'ave our own Revolution,' I sez, sez I. 'Less bring out all the Bloomin' Kings and Queens,' I sez, 'the Dukes and Markisses, the fat Bishops and the lazy Parsons. Less do what the French did. Less make 'em shorter by the 'ed,' I sez. That's what I said that mornin'. Some of the people laughed, and some of 'em went away. There never was a lot more difficult to move than them Whitechappellers. They'd listen – and then they'd go away. They'd too much fine speeches give 'em – that was the matter with 'em – too much. Nothing never came of it. That night I was in the Public havin' a drop, and we began to talk. There was a row, and a bit of a fight. But before we was fired out I up and said plain, for everybody to hear, that when it came to choppin' off their noble 'eds I'd be the man to do it – and joyful, I said. Well now, Sammy Grout, you were in that Public Bar among that crowd – maybe you've forgotten it. But I remember you very well. You was standin' there, and you laughed about the choppin'. You've forgotten, Sammy. Think. It was a fine summer evenin': you weren't in Church. Come now – you can't say you ever went to Church, Sammy Grout."
"I never did. But go on, John Lax. Recall as much of the Past as you wish, if it makes you love the Present more. I would not say aught to diminish an honest zeal."
"Right, guv'nor. Well, I never got that chance. There was no choppin' of 'eds at all. When we had to murder the old people, your Honor would have it done scientifically; and there was as many old working-men killed off as swells, which was a thousand pities, an' made a cove's heart bleed. What I say is this. Here we've got a return to the old Times. Quite unexpected it is. Now we've got such a chance, which will never come again, let 'em just see how the old Times worked. Have a Procession, with the Executioner goin' before the criminals, his axe on his shoulder ready to begin. If you could only be Sammy Grout again – but that can't be, I'm afraid – what a day's outing you would have had to be sure! Suffragan, let us show 'em how the old Times worked. And let me be the Executioner. I'll do it, I promise you, proper. I've got the old spirit upon me – ah! and the old strength, too – just as I had then. Oh! It's too much!" He sat down and hugged the axe. I thought he would have kissed it. "It's too much! To think that the time would ever come when I should execute a swell – and that swell the Arch Physician himself. Damn him! He's always looked as if everybody else was dirt beneath his feet."
"I know not," I told him gently, "what may be the decision of the Court. But, John Lax, continue to grind your axe. I would not throw cold water on honest zeal. Your strength, you say, is equal to your spirit. You will not flinch at the last moment. Ah! we have some honest men left."
The Court was held that morning in the nave of the House itself. The Judges, who were the whole College of Physicians, sat in a semicircle; whereas the three prisoners stood in a row – the Arch Physician carrying himself with a haughty insolence which did not assist his chances: clinging to his arm, still in her silk dress, with her bracelets and chains, and her hair artfully arranged, was the woman called Mildred. She looked once, hurriedly, at the row of Judges, and then turned with a shudder – she found small comfort in those faces – to her lover, and laid her head upon his shoulder, while he supported her with his arm. The degradation and folly of the Arch Physician, apart from the question of his guilt, as shown in this behavior, were complete.
Beside Mildred stood the girl Christine. Her face was flushed; her eyes were bright: she stood with clasped hands, looking steadily at the Judges: she wore, instead of the Regulation Dress, a frock of white stuff, which she had found, I suppose, in the Museum – as if open disobedience of our laws would prove a passport to favor. She had let her long hair fall upon her shoulders and down her back. Perhaps she hoped to conquer her Judges by her beauty – old time phrase! Woman's beauty, indeed, to Judges who know every bone and every muscle in woman's body, and can appreciate the nature of her intellect, as well as of her structure! Woman's Beauty! As if that could ever again move the world!
Behind the President's Chair – I was the President – stood John Lax, bearing his halberd of office.
The Doors of the House were closed: the usual sounds of Laboratory work were silent: the Assistants, who usually at this hour would have been engaged in Research and Experiment, were crowded outside the Court.
I have been told, since, that there were omitted at the Trial many formalities which should have been observed at such a Trial. For instance, there should have been a Clerk or two to make notes of the proceedings: there should have been a Formal Indictment: and there should have been Witnesses. But these are idle forms. The guilt of the Prisoners was proved: we had seen it with our own eyes. We were both Judges and Witnesses.
I was once, however, in the old days, charged (and fined) before a magistrate in Bow Street for assaulting a Constable, and therefore I know something of how a Criminal Court should proceed. So, without any unnecessary formalities, I conducted the Trial according to Common Sense.
"What is your name?" I asked the Arch Physician.
"Harry Linister – once M.D. of Cambridge, and Fellow of the Royal Society."
"What are you by trade?"
"Physicist and Arch Physician of the Holy College of the Inner House."
"We shall see how long you will be able to describe yourself by those titles. Female Prisoner – you in the middle – what is your name?"
"I am the Lady Mildred Carera, daughter of the Earl of Thordisá."
"Come – come – none of your Ladyships and Earls here. We are now all equal. You are plain Mildred. And yours – you girl in the white frock? How dare you, either of you, appear before us in open violation of the Rules?"
"I am named Christine," she replied. "I have put on the white frock because it is becoming."
At this point I was interrupted by a whisper from John Lax.
"Christine's friends," he said, "are gathering in the Museum, and they are very noisy. They threaten to give trouble."
"When the Trial and Execution are over," I told him, "arrest them every one. Let them all be confined in the Museum. To-morrow, or perhaps this afternoon, we will try them as well."
The man grinned with satisfaction. Had he known what a fatal mistake I was making, he would not have grinned. Rather would his face have expressed the most dreadful horror.
Then the Trial proceeded.
"Dr. Linister," I said, "it is a very singular point in this case that we have not to ask you whether you plead 'guilty' or 'not guilty,' because we have all seen you with our own eyes engaged in the very act with which you are charged. You are guilty."
"I am," he replied, calmly.
"Your companion is also guilty. I saw her practising upon you those blandishments, or silly arts, by which women formerly lured men. We also saw her on the point of receiving from you the Great Secret, which must never be suffered to leave this Building."
"Yes," she said, "if he is guilty, I am guilty as well."
"As for you" (I turned to Christine), "you have been so short a time in the world – only nineteen years or so – that to leave it will cause little pain to you. It is not as if you had taken root with all the years of life which the others have enjoyed. Yet the Court would fail in its duty did it not point out the enormity of your offence. You were allowed to grow up undisturbed in the old Museum: you spent your time in developing a morbid curiosity into the Past. You were so curious to see with your own eyes what it was to outward show, that you cast about to find among the tranquil and contented People some whose minds you might disturb and lead back to the restless old times. This was a most guilty breach of confidence. Have you anything to say? Do you confess?"
"Yes, I confess."
"Next, you, with this woman and a Company who will also be brought to Justice before long, began to assemble together, and to revive, with the assistance of books, pictures, dress, and music, a portion of the Past. But what portion? Was it the portion of the vast majority, full of disease, injustice, and starvation? Did you show how the old Times filled the houses with struggling needlewomen and men who refused to struggle any longer? Did you show the Poor and the Unemployed? Not at all. You showed the life of the Rich and the Idle. And so you revived a longing for what shall never – never – be permitted to return – the Period of Property and the Reign of Individualism. It was your crime to misrepresent the Past, and to set forth the Exception as the Rule. This must be made impossible for the future. What have you to say, Christine?"
"Nothing. I told you before. Nothing. I have confessed. Why keep on asking me?"
She looked round the Court with no apparent fear. I suppose it was because she was so young, and had not yet felt any apprehension of the Fate which was now so near unto her.
"Dr. Linister," I said, "before considering its sentence, the Court will hear what you may have to say."
"I have but little to say," he replied. "Everybody in the College knows that I have always been opposed to the methods adopted by the Suffragan and the College. During the last few days, however, I have been enabled to go back once more to the half-forgotten Past, and have experienced once more the Emotions of which you have robbed Life. I have seen once more, after many, many years, the Fighting Passion, the Passion of Private Rights, and" – his voice dropped to a whisper – "I have experienced once more the Passion of Love." He stooped and kissed the woman Mildred on the forehead. "I regret that we did not succeed. Had we not been caught, we should by this time have been beyond your power – the Secret with us, to use or not, as we pleased – with a company strong enough to defy you, and with the old Life again before us, such as we enjoyed before you robbed us of it. We should have welcomed the old Life, even under the old conditions: we welcome, instead of it, the Thing which, only to think of, makes your hearts almost to stop beating with fear and horror."
He stopped. That was a speech likely to win indulgence from the Court, was it not?
I turned to the woman Mildred.
"And you?" I asked.
"What have I to say? The Present I loathe – I loathe – I loathe. I would not go back to it if you offered me instant release with that condition. I have found Love. Let me die – let me die – let me die!"
She clung to her lover passionately, weeping and sobbing. He soothed her and caressed her. John Lax, behind me, snorted.
Then I asked the girl Christine what she wished to say.
She laughed – she actually laughed.
"Oh!" she said, "in return for the past weeks, there is no punishment which I would not cheerfully endure. We have had – oh! the most delightful time. It has been like a dream. Oh! Cruel, horrid, wicked men! You found such a Life in the old Time, and you destroyed it; and what have you given us in return? You have made us all equal who were born unequal. Go, look at the sad and heavy faces of the People. You have taken away everything, deliberately. You have destroyed all – all. You have left nothing worth living for. Why, I am like Mildred. I would not go back to the Present again if I could! Yes, for one thing I would – to try and raise a Company of Men – not sheep – and hound them on to storm this place, and to kill – yes, to kill" – the girl looked so dangerous that any thought of mercy was impossible – "every one who belongs to this Accursed House of Life!"
Here was a pretty outcome of study in the Museum! Here was a firebrand let loose among us straight from the bad old Nineteenth Century! And we had allowed this girl actually to grow up in our very midst.
Well, she finished, and stood trembling with rage, cheeks burning, eyes flashing – a very fury.
I invited the Court to retire to the Inner House, and took their opinions one by one.
They were unanimous on several points – first, that the position of things was most dangerous to the Authority of the College and the safety of the People; next, that the punishment of Death alone would meet the case; thirdly, that, in future, the Museum, with the Library and Picture Galleries, must be incorporated with the College itself, so that this danger of the possible awakening of memory should be removed.
Here, however, our unanimity ceased. For the Fellow, of whom I have already spoken as having always followed the Arch Physician, arose and again insisted that what had happened to-day might very well happen again: that nothing was more uncertain in its action, or more indestructible, than human memory: so that, from time to time, we must look for the arising of some Leader or Prophet who would shake up the people and bring them out of their torpor to a state of discontent and yearning after the lost. Wherefore he exhorted us to reconsider our Administration, and to provide some safety-valve for the active spirits. As to the Death of the three criminals, he would not, he could not, oppose it. He proposed, however, that the mode of Death should be optional. So great a light of Science as the Arch Physician had many secrets, and could doubtless procure himself sudden and painless death if he chose. Let him have that choice for himself and his companions; and, as regards the girl, let her be cast into a deep sleep, and then painlessly smothered by gas, without a sentence being pronounced upon her at all. This leniency, he said, was demanded by her youth and her inexperience.
In reply, I pointed out that, as regards our Administration, we were not then considering it at all: that as for the mode of punishment, he had not only to consider the criminals, but also the People, and the effect of the Punishment upon them: we were not only to punish, but also to deter. I therefore begged the Court to go back to one of the former methods, and to one of the really horrible and barbarous, yet comparatively painless, methods. I showed that a mere report or announcement, made in the Public Hall, that the Arch Physician had been executed for Treason, would produce little or no effect upon the public mind, even if it were added that the two women, Mildred and Christine, had suffered with him: that our people needed to see the thing itself, in order to feel its true horror and to remember it. If Death alone were wanted, I argued, there were dozens of ways in which Life might be painlessly extinguished. But it was not Death alone that we desired; it was Terror that we wished to establish, in order to prevent another such attempt.
