"You said, Summerlee, that there was no possible truth in his contention."
"Dear me!" said Challenger, puffing out his chest and stroking his beard."No possible truth! I seem to have heard the words before. And may Iask with what arguments the great and famous Professor Summerleeproceeded to demolish the humble individual who had ventured to expressan opinion upon a matter of scientific possibility? Perhaps before heexterminates that unfortunate nonentity he will condescend to give somereasons for the adverse views which he has formed."
He bowed and shrugged and spread open his hands as he spoke with hiselaborate and elephantine sarcasm.
"The reason was simple enough," said the dogged Summerlee. "I contendedthat if the ether surrounding the earth was so toxic in one quarter thatit produced dangerous symptoms, it was hardly likely that we three in therailway carriage should be entirely unaffected."
The explanation only brought uproarious merriment from Challenger. Helaughed until everything in the room seemed to rattle and quiver.
"Our worthy Summerlee is, not for the first time, somewhat out of touchwith the facts of the situation," said he at last, mopping his heatedbrow. "Now, gentlemen, I cannot make my point better than by detailingto you what I have myself done this morning. You will the more easilycondone any mental aberration upon your own part when you realize thateven I have had moments when my balance has been disturbed. We have hadfor some years in this household a housekeeper--one Sarah, with whosesecond name I have never attempted to burden my memory. She is a womanof a severe and forbidding aspect, prim and demure in her bearing, veryimpassive in her nature, and never known within our experience to showsigns of any emotion. As I sat alone at my breakfast--Mrs. Challenger isin the habit of keeping her room of a morning--it suddenly entered myhead that it would be entertaining and instructive to see whether I couldfind any limits to this woman's inperturbability. I devised a simple buteffective experiment. Having upset a small vase of flowers which stoodin the centre of the cloth, I rang the bell and slipped under the table.She entered and, seeing the room empty, imagined that I had withdrawn tothe study. As I had expected, she approached and leaned over the tableto replace the vase. I had a vision of a cotton stocking and anelastic-sided boot. Protruding my head, I sank my teeth into the calf ofher leg. The experiment was successful beyond belief. For some momentsshe stood paralyzed, staring down at my head. Then with a shriek shetore herself free and rushed from the room. I pursued her with somethoughts of an explanation, but she flew down the drive, and some minutesafterwards I was able to pick her out with my field-glasses travellingvery rapidly in a south-westerly direction. I tell you the anecdote forwhat it is worth. I drop it into your brains and await its germination.Is it illuminative? Has it conveyed anything to your minds? What do_you_ think of it, Lord John?"
Lord John shook his head gravely.
"You'll be gettin' into serious trouble some of these days if you don'tput a brake on," said he.
"Perhaps yo
u have some observation to make, Summerlee?"
"You should drop all work instantly, Challenger, and take three months ina German watering-place," said he.
"Profound! Profound!" cried Challenger. "Now, my young friend, is itpossible that wisdom may come from you where your seniors have sosignally failed?"
And it did. I say it with all modesty, but it did. Of course, it allseems obvious enough to you who know what occurred, but it was not sovery clear when everything was new. But it came on me suddenly with thefull force of absolute conviction.
"Poison!" I cried.
Then, even as I said the word, my mind flashed back over the wholemorning's experiences, past Lord John with his buffalo, past my ownhysterical tears, past the outrageous conduct of Professor Summerlee, tothe queer happenings in London, the row in the park, the driving of thechauffeur, the quarrel at the oxygen warehouse. Everything fittedsuddenly into its place.
"Of course," I cried again. "It is poison. We are all poisoned."
"Exactly," said Challenger, rubbing his hands, "we are all poisoned. Ourplanet has swum into the poison belt of ether, and is now flying deeperinto it at the rate of some millions of miles a minute. Our young friendhas expressed the cause of all our troubles and perplexities in a singleword, 'poison.'"
We looked at each other in amazed silence. No comment seemed to meet thesituation.
"There is a mental inhibition by which such symptoms can be checked andcontrolled," said Challenger. "I cannot expect to find it developed inall of you to the same point which it has reached in me, for I supposethat the strength of our different mental processes bears some proportionto each other. But no doubt it is appreciable even in our young friendhere. After the little outburst of high spirits which so alarmed mydomestic I sat down and reasoned with myself. I put it to myself that Ihad never before felt impelled to bite any of my household. The impulsehad then been an abnormal one. In an instant I perceived the truth. Mypulse upon examination was ten beats above the usual, and my reflexeswere increased. I called upon my higher and saner self, the real G. E.C., seated serene and impregnable behind all mere molecular disturbance.I summoned him, I say, to watch the foolish mental tricks which thepoison would play. I found that I was indeed the master. I couldrecognize and control a disordered mind. It was a remarkable exhibitionof the victory of mind over matter, for it was a victory over thatparticular form of matter which is most intimately connected with mind.I might almost say that mind was at fault and that personality controlledit. Thus, when my wife came downstairs and I was impelled to slip behindthe door and alarm her by some wild cry as she entered, I was able tostifle the impulse and to greet her with dignity and restraint. Anoverpowering desire to quack like a duck was met and mastered in the samefashion.
"Later, when I descended to order the car and found Austin bending overit absorbed in repairs, I controlled my open hand even after I had liftedit and refrained from giving him an experience which would possibly havecaused him to follow in the steps of the housekeeper. On the contrary, Itouched him on the shoulder and ordered the car to be at the door in timeto meet your train. At the present instant I am most forcibly tempted totake Professor Summerlee by that silly old beard of his and to shake hishead violently backwards and forwards. And yet, as you see, I amperfectly restrained. Let me commend my example to you."
"I'll look out for that buffalo," said Lord John.
"And I for the football match."
"It may be that you are right, Challenger," said Summerlee in a chastenedvoice. "I am willing to admit that my turn of mind is critical ratherthan constructive and that I am not a ready convert to any new theory,especially when it happens to be so unusual and fantastic as this one.However, as I cast my mind back over the events of the morning, and as Ireconsider the fatuous conduct of my companions, I find it easy tobelieve that some poison of an exciting kind was responsible for theirsymptoms."
Challenger slapped his colleague good-humouredly upon the shoulder. "Weprogress," said he. "Decidedly we progress."
"And pray, sir," asked Summerlee humbly, "what is your opinion as to thepresent outlook?"
"With your permission I will say a few words upon that subject." Heseated himself upon his desk, his short, stumpy legs swinging in front ofhim. "We are assisting at a tremendous and awful function. It is, in myopinion, the end of the world."
The end of the world! Our eyes turned to the great bow-window and welooked out at the summer beauty of the country-side, the long slopes ofheather, the great country-houses, the cozy farms, the pleasure-seekersupon the links.
The end of the world! One had often heard the words, but the idea thatthey could ever have an immediate practical significance, that it shouldnot be at some vague date, but now, to-day, that was a tremendous, astaggering thought. We were all struck solemn and waited in silence forChallenger to continue. His overpowering presence and appearance lentsuch force to the solemnity of his words that for a moment all thecrudities and absurdities of the man vanished, and he loomed before us assomething majestic and beyond the range of ordinary humanity. Then tome, at least, there came back the cheering recollection of how twicesince we had entered the room he had roared with laughter. Surely, Ithought, there are limits to mental detachment. The crisis cannot be sogreat or so pressing after all.
"You will conceive a bunch of grapes," said he, "which are covered bysome infinitesimal but noxious bacillus. The gardener passes it througha disinfecting medium. It may be that he desires his grapes to becleaner. It may be that he needs space to breed some fresh bacillus lessnoxious than the last. He dips it into the poison and they are gone.Our Gardener is, in my opinion, about to dip the solar system, and thehuman bacillus, the little mortal vibrio which twisted and wriggled uponthe outer rind of the earth, will in an instant be sterilized out ofexistence."
Again there was silence. It was broken by the high trill of thetelephone-bell.