The Project Gutenberg eBook of A. V. Laider, by Sir Max Beerbohm

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A. V. Laider

By

MAX BEERBOHM

I unpacked my things and best open ended dress up clothes for kidswent down to await luncheon.

It was good to be here again in this little old sleepy hostel by thesea. Hostel I say, though it spelt itself without an "s" and evenplaced a circumflex above the "o." It made no other pretension. Itwas very cozy indeed.

I had been here just a year before, in mid-February, after an attack ofinfluenza. And now I had returned, after an attack of influenza.Nothing was changed. It had been raining when I left, and thewaiter—there was but a single, a very old waiter—had told me it wasonly a shower. That waiter was still here, not a day older. And theshower had not ceased.

Steadfastly it fell on to the sands, steadfastly into the iron-graysea. I stood looking out at it from the windows of the hall, admiringit very much. There seemed to be little else to do. What little therewas I did. I mastered the contents of a blue hand-bill which, pinnedto the wall just beneath the framed engraving of Queen Victoria'sCoronation, gave token of a concert that was to be held—or, rather,was to have been held some weeks ago—in the town hall for the benefitof the Life-Boat Fund. I looked at the barometer, tapped it, was notthe wiser. I wandered to the letter-board.

These letter-boards always fascinate me. Usually some two or three ofthe envelops stuck into the cross-garterings have a certain newness andfreshness. They seem sure they will yet be claimed. Why not? WhySHOULDN'T John Doe, Esq., or Mrs. Richard Roe turn up at any moment? Ido not know. I can only say that nothing in the world seems to me moreunlikely. Thus it is that these young bright envelops touch my hearteven more than do their dusty and sallowed seniors. Sour resignationis less touching than impatience for what will not be, than theeagerness that has to wane and wither. Soured beyond measure these oldenvelops are. They are not nearly so nice as they should be to theyoung ones. They lose no chance of sneering and discouraging. Suchdialogues as this are only too frequent:

A Very Young Envelop: Something in me whispers that he will come to-day!

A Very Old Envelop: He? Well, that's good! Ha, ha, ha! Why didn't hecome last week, when YOU came? What reason have you for supposinghe'll ever come now? It isn't as if he were a frequenter of the place.He's never been here. His name is utterly unknown here. You don'tsuppose he's coming on the chance of finding YOU?

A. V. Y. E.: It may seem silly, but—something in me whispers—

A. V. O. E.: Something in YOU? One has only to look at you to seethere's nothing in you but a note scribbled to him by a cousin. Lookat ME! There are three sheets, closely written, in ME. The lady towhom I am addressed—

A. V. Y. E.: Yes, sir, yes; you told me all about her yesterday.

A. V. O. E.: And I shall do so to-day and to-morrow and every day andall day long. That young lady was a widow. She stayed here manytimes. She was delicate, and the air suited her. She was poor, andthe tariff was just within her means. She was lonely, and had need oflove. I have in me for her a passionate avowal and strictly honorableproposal, written to her, after many rough copies, by a gentleman whohad made her acquaintance under this very roof. He was rich, he wascharming, he was in the prime of life. He had asked if he might writeto her. She had flutteringly granted his request. He posted me to herthe day after his return to London. I looked forward to being tornopen by her. I was very sure she would wear me and my contents next toher bosom. She was gone. She had left no address. She neverreturned. This I tell you, and shall continue to tell you, not becauseI want any of your callow sympathy,—no, THANK you!—but that you mayjudge how much less than slight are the probabilities that youyourself—

But my reader has overheard these dialogues as often as I. He wants toknow what was odd about this particular letter-board before which I wasstanding. At first glance I saw nothing odd about it. But presently Idistinguished a handwriting that was vaguely familiar. It was mine. Istared, I wondered. There is always a slight shock in seeing anenvelop of one's own after it has gone through the post. It looks asif it had gone through so much. But this was the first time I had everseen an envelop of mine eating its heart out in bondage on aletter-board. This was outrageous. This was hardly to be believed.Sheer kindness had impelled me to write to "A. V. Laider, Esq.," andthis was the result! I hadn't minded receiving no answer. Only now,indeed, did I remember that I hadn't received one. In multitudinousLondon the memory of A. V. Laider and his trouble had soon passed frommy mind. But—well, what a lesson not to go out of one's way to writeto casual acquaintances!

My envelop seemed not to recognize me as its writer. Its gaze was themore piteous for being blank. Even so had I once been gazed at by adog that I had lost and, after many days, found in the Battersea Home."I don't know who you are, but, whoever you are, claim me, take me outof this!" That was my dog's appeal. This was the appeal of my envelop.

I raised my hand to the letter-board, meaning to effect a swift andlawless rescue, but paused at sound of a footstep behind me. The oldwaiter had come to tell me that my luncheon was ready. I followed himout of the hall, not, however, without a bright glance across myshoulder to reassure the little captive that I should come back.

I had the sharp appetite of the convalescent, and this the sea air hadwhetted already to a finer edge. In touch with a dozen oysters, andwith stout, I soon shed away the unreasoning anger I had felt againstA. V. Laider. I became merely sorry for him that he had not receiveda letter which might perhaps have comforted him. In touch withcutlets, I felt how sorely he had needed comfort. And anon, by the bigbright fireside of that small dark smoking-room where, a year ago, onthe last evening of my stay here, he and I had at length spoken to eachother, I reviewed in detail the tragic experience he had told me; and Isimply reveled in reminiscent sympathy with him.

A. V. LAIDER—I had looked him up in the visitors'-book on the night ofhis arrival. I myself had arrived the day before, and had been rathersorry there was no one else staying here. A convalescent by the sealikes to have some one to observe, to wonder about, at meal-time. Iwas glad when, on my second evening, I found seated at the tableopposite to mine another guest. I was the gladder because he was justthe right kind of guest. He was enigmatic. By this I mean that he didnot look soldierly or financial or artistic or anything definite atall. He offered a clean slate for speculation. And, thank heaven! heevidently wasn't going to spoil the fun by engaging me in conversationlater on. A decently unsociable man, anxious to be left alone.

The heartiness of his appetite, in contrast with his extreme fragilityof aspect and limpness of demeanor, assured me that he, too, had justhad influenza. I liked him for that. Now and again our eyes met andwere instantly parted. We managed, as a rule, to observe each otherindirectly. I was sure it was not merely because he had been ill thathe looked interesting. Nor did it seem to me that a spiritualmelancholy, though I imagined him sad at the best of times, was hissole asset. I conjectured that he was clever. I thought he might alsobe imaginative. At first glance I had mistrusted him. A shock ofwhite hair, combined with a young face and dark eyebrows, does somehowmake a man look like a charlatan. But it is foolish to be guided by anaccident of color. I had soon rejected my first impression of myfellow-diner. I found him very sympathetic.

Anywhere but in England it would be impossible for two solitary men,howsoever much reduced by influenza, to spend five or six days in thesame hostel and not exchange a single word. That is one of the charmsof England. Had Laider and I been born and bred in any other land thanEng we should have become acquainted before the end of our firstevening in the small smoking-room, and have found ourselves irrevocablycommitted to go on talking to each other throughout the rest of ourvisit. We might, it is true, have happened to like each other morethan any one we had ever met. This off chance may have occurred to usboth. But it counted for nothing against the certain surrender ofquietude and liberty. We slightly bowed to each other as we entered orleft the dining-room or smoking-room, and as we met on the wide-spreadsands or in the shop that had a small and faded circulating library.That was all. Our mutual aloofness was a positive bond between us.

Had he been much older than I, the responsibility for our silence wouldof course have been his alone. But he was not, I judged, more thanfive or six years ahead of me, and thus I might without improprietyhave taken it on myself to perform that hard and perilous feat whichEnglish people call, with a shiver, "breaking the ice." He had reason,therefore, to be as grateful to me as I to him. Each of us, not theless frankly because silently, recognized his obligation to the other.And when, on the last evening of my stay, the ice actually was brokenthere was no ill-will between us: neither of us was to blame.

It was a Sunday evening. I had been out for a long last walk and hadcome in very late to dinner. Laider had left his table almost directlyafter I sat down to mine. When I entered the smoking-room I found himreading a weekly review which I had bought the day before. It was acrisis. He could not silently offer nor could I have silentlyaccepted, six-pence. It was a crisis. We faced it like men. He made,by word of mouth, a graceful apology. Verbally, not by signs, Ibesought him to go on reading. But this, of course, was a vain counselof perfection. The social code forced us to talk now. We obeyed itlike men. To reassure him that our position was not so desperate as itmight seem, I took the earliest opportunity to mention that I was goingaway early next morning. In the tone of his "Oh, are you?" he triedbravely to imply that he was sorry, even now, to hear that. In a way,perhaps, he really was sorry. We had got on so well together, he andI. Nothing could efface the memory of that. Nay, we seemed to behitting it off even now. Influenza was not our sole theme. We passedfrom that to the aforesaid weekly review, and to a correspondence thatwas raging therein on faith and reason.

This correspondence had now reached its fourth and penultimatestage—its Australian stage. It is hard to see why thesecorrespondences spring up; one only knows that they do spring up,suddenly, like street crowds. There comes, it would seem, a momentwhen the whole English-speaking race is unconsciously bursting to haveits say about some one thing—the split infinitive, or the habits ofmigratory birds, or faith and reason, or what-not. Whatever weeklyreview happens at such a moment to contain a reference, however remote,to the theme in question reaps the storm. Gusts of letters come infrom all corners of the British Isles. These are presently reinforcedby Canada in full blast. A few weeks later the Anglo-Indians weigh in.In due course we have the help of our Australian cousins. By thattime, however, we of the mother country have got our second wind, andso determined are we to make the most of it that at last even theeditor suddenly loses patience and says, "This correspondence must nowcease.—Ed." and wonders why on earth he ever allowed anything sotedious and idiotic to begin.

I pointed out to Laider one of the Australian letters that hadespecially pleased me in the current issue. It was from "A MelbourneMan," and was of the abrupt kind which declares that "all yourcorrespondents have been groping in the dark" and then settles thewhole matter in one short sharp flash. The flash in this instance was"Reason is faith, faith reason—that is all we know on earth and all weneed to know." The writer then inclosed his card and was, etc., "AMelbourne Man." I said to Laider how very restful it was, afterinfluenza, to read anything that meant nothing whatsoever. Laider wasinclined to take the letter more seriously than I, and to be mildlymetaphysical. I said that for me faith and reason were two separatethings, and as I am no good at metaphysics, however mild, I offered adefinite example, to coax the talk on to ground where I should be safer.

"Palmistry, for example," I said. "Deep down in my heart I believe inpalmistry."

Laider turned in his chair.

"You believe in palmistry?"

I hesitated.

"Yes, somehow I do. Why? I haven't the slightest notion. I can givemyself all sorts of reasons for laughing it to scorn. My common senseutterly rejects it. Of course the shape of the hand means something,is more or less an index of character. But the idea that my past andfuture are neatly mapped out on my palms—" I shrugged my shoulders.

"You don't like that idea?" asked Laider in his gentle, rather academicvoice.

"I only say it's a grotesque idea."

"Yet you do believe in it?"

"I've a grotesque belief in it, yes."

"Are you sure your reason for calling this idea 'grotesque' isn'tmerely that you dislike it?"

"Well," I said, with the thrilling hope that he was a companion inabsurdity, "doesn't it seem grotesque to you?"

"It seems strange."

"You believe in it?"

"Oh, absolutely."

"Hurrah!"

He smiled at my pleasure, and I, at the risk of reentanglement inmetaphysics, claimed him as standing shoulder to shoulder with meagainst "A Melbourne Man." This claim he gently disputed.

"You may think me very prosaic," he said, "but I can't believe withoutevidence."

"Well, I'm equally prosaic and equally at a disadvantage: I can't takemy own belief as evidence, and I've no other evidence to go on."

He asked me if I had ever made a study of palmistry. I said I had readone of Desbarolles's books years ago, and one of Heron-Allen's. But,he asked, had I tried to test them by the lines on my own hands or onthe hands of my friends? I confessed that my actual practice inpalmistry had been of a merely passive kind—the prompt extension of mypalm to any one who would be so good as to "read" it and truckle for afew minutes to my egoism. (I hoped Laider might do this.)

"Then I almost wonder," he said, with his sad smile, "that you haven'tlost your belief, after all the nonsense you must have heard. Thereare so many young girls who go in for palmistry. I am sure all thefive foolish virgins were 'awfully keen on it' and used to say, 'Youcan be led, but not driven,' and, 'You are likely to have a seriousillness between the ages of forty and forty-five,' and, 'You are bynature rather lazy, but can be very energetic by fits and starts.' Andmost of the professionals, I'm told, are as silly as the young girls."

For the honor of the profession, I named three practitioners whom I hadfound really good at reading character. He asked whether any of themhad been right about past events. I confessed that, as a matter offact, all three of them had been right in the main. This seemed toamuse him. He asked whether any of them had predicted anything whichhad since come true. I confessed that all three had predicted that Ishould do several things which I had since done rather unexpectedly.He asked if I didn't accept this as, at any rate, a scrap of evidence.I said I could only regard it as a fluke—a rather remarkable fluke.

The superiority of his sad smile was beginning to get on my nerves. Iwanted him to see that he was as absurd as I.

"Suppose," I said—"suppose, for the sake of argument, that you and Iare nothing but helpless automata created to do just this and that, andto have just that and this done to us. Suppose, in fact, we HAVEN'Tany free will whatsoever. Is it likely or conceivable that the Powerwhich fashioned us would take the trouble to jot down in cipher on ourhands just what was in store for us?"

Laider did not answer this question; he did but annoyingly ask meanother.

"You believe in free will?"

"Yes, of course. I'll be hanged if I'm an automaton."

"And you believe in free will just as in palmistry—without any reason?"

"Oh, no. Everything points to our having free will."

"Everything? What, for instance?"

This rather cornered me. I dodged out, as lightly as I could, bysaying:

"I suppose YOU would say it's written in my hand that I should be abeliever in free will."

"Ah, I've no doubt it is."

I held out my palms. But, to my great disappointment, he lookedquickly away from them. He had ceased to smile. There was agitationin his voice as he explained that he never looked at people's handsnow. "Never now—never again." He shook his head as though to beatoff some memory.

I was much embarrassed by my indiscretion. I hastened to tide over theawkward moment by saying that if Icould read hands I wouldn't, forfear of the awful things I might see there.

"Awful things, yes," he whispered, nodding at the fire.

"Not," I said in self-defense, "that there's anything very awful, sofar as I know, to be read in MY hands."

He turned his gaze from the fire to me.

"You aren't a murderer, for example?"

"Oh, no," I replied, with a nervous laugh.

"Iam."

This was a more than awkward, it was a painful, moment for me; and I amafraid I must have started or winced, for he instantly begged my pardon.

"I don't know," he exclaimed, "why I said it. I'm usually a veryreticent man. But sometimes—" He pressed his brow. "What you mustthink of me!"

I begged him to dismiss the matter from his mind.

"It's very good of you to say that; but—I've placed myself as well asyou in a false position. I ask you to believe that I'm not the sort ofman who is 'wanted' or ever was 'wanted' by the police. I should bebowed out of any police-station at which I gave myself up. I'm not amurderer in any bald sense of the word. No."

My face must have perceptibly brightened, for, "Ah," he said, "don'timagine I'm not a murderer at all. Morally, I am." He looked at theclock. I pointed out that the night was young. He assured me that hisstory was not a long one. I assured him that I hoped it was. He saidI was very kind. I denied this. He warned me that what he had to tellmight rather tend to stiffen my unwilling faith in palmistry, and toshake my opposite and cherished faith in free will. I said, "Nevermind." He stretched his hands pensively toward the fire. I settledmyself back in my chair.

"My hands," he said, staring at the backs of them, "are the hands of avery weak man. I dare say you know enough of palmistry to see that foryourself. You notice the slightness of the thumbs and of he two'little' fingers. They are the hands of a weak and over-sensitiveman—a man without confidence, a man who would certainly waver in anemergency. Rather Hamletish hands," he mused. "And I'm like Hamlet inother respects, too: I'm no fool, and I've rather a noble disposition,and I'm unlucky. But Hamlet was luckier than I in one thing: he was amurderer by accident, whereas the murders that I committed one dayfourteen years ago—for I must tell you it wasn't one murder, but manymurders that I committed—were all of them due to the wretched inherentweakness of my own wretched self.

"I was twenty-six—no, twenty-seven years old, and rather a nondescriptperson, as I am now. I was supposed to have been called to the bar.In fact, I believe I HAD been called to the bar. I hadn't listened tothe call. I never intended to practise, and I never did practise. Ionly wanted an excuse in the eyes of the world for existing. I supposethe nearest I have ever come to practicing is now at this moment: I amdefending a murderer. My father had left me well enough provided withmoney. I was able to go my own desultory way, riding my hobbies whereI would. I had a good stableful of hobbies. Palmistry was one ofthem. I was rather ashamed of this one. It seemed to me absurd, as itseems to you. Like you, though, I believed in it. Unlike you, I haddone more than merely read a book about it. I had read innumerablebooks about it. I had taken casts of all my friends' hands. I hadtested and tested again the points at which Desbarolles dissented fromthe Gipsies, and—well, enough that I had gone into it all ratherthoroughly, and was as sound a palmist, as a man may be without givinghis whole life to palmistry.

"One of the first things I had seen in my own hand, as soon as I hadlearned to read it, was that at about the age of twenty-six I shouldhave a narrow escape from death—from a violent death. There was aclean break in the life-line, and a square joining it—the protectivesquare, you know. The markings were precisely the same in both hands.It was to be the narrowest escape possible. And I wasn't going toescape without injury, either. That is what bothered me. There was afaint line connecting the break in the lifeline with a star on the lineof health. Against that star was another square. I was to recoverfrom the injury, whatever it might be. Still, I didn't exactly lookforward to it. Soon after I had reached the age of twenty-five, Ibegan to feel uncomfortable. The thing might be going to happen at anymoment. In palmistry, you know, it is impossible to pin an event downhard and fast to one year. This particular event was to be when I wasABOUT twenty-six; it mightn't be till I was twenty-seven; it might bewhile I was only twenty-five.

"And I used to tell myself it mightn't be at all. My reason rebelledagainst the whole notion of palmistry, just as yours does. I despisedmy faith in the thing, just as you despise yours. I used to try not tobe so ridiculously careful as I was whenever I crossed a street. Ilived in London at that time. Motor-cars had not yet come in,but—what hours, all told, I must have spent standing on curbs, verycircumspect, very lamentable! It was a pity, I suppose, that I had nodefinite occupation—something to take me out of myself. I was one ofthe victims of private means. There came a time when I drove infour-wheelers rather than in hansoms, and was doubtful offour-wheelers. Oh, I assure you, I was very lamentable indeed.

"If a railway-journey could be avoided, I avoided it. My uncle had aplace in Hampshire. I was very fond of him and of his wife. Theirswas the only house I ever went to stay in now. I was there for a weekin November, not long after my twenty-seventh birthday. There wereother people staying there, and at the end of the week we all traveledback to London together. There were six of us in the carriage: ColonelElbourn and his wife and their daughter, a girl of seventeen; andanother married couple, the Bretts. I had been at Winchester withBrett, but had hardly seen him since that time. He was in the IndianCivil, and was home on leave. He was sailing for India next week. Hiswife was to remain in England for some months, and then join him outthere. They had been married five years. She was now just twenty-fouryears old. He told me that this was her age. The Elbourns I had nevermet before. They were charming people. We had all been very happytogether. The only trouble had been that on the last night, at dinner,my uncle asked me if I still went in for 'the Gipsy business,' as healways called it; and of course the three ladies were immenselyexcited, and implored me to 'do' their hands. I told them it was allnonsense, I said I had forgotten all I once knew, I made variousexcuses; and the matter dropped. It was quite true that I had given upreading hands. I avoided anything that might remind me of what was inmy own hands. And so, next morning, it was a great bore to me when,soon after the train started, Mrs. Elbourn said it would be 'too cruel'of me if I refused to do their hands now. Her daughter and Mrs. Brettalso said it would be 'brutal'; and they were all taking off theirgloves, and—well, of course I had to give in.

"I went to work methodically on Mrs. Elbourn's hands, in the usual way,you know, first sketching the character from the backs of them; andthere was the usual hush, broken by the usual little noises—grunts ofassent from the husband, cooings of recognition from the daughter.Presently I asked to see the palms, and from them I filled in thedetails of Mrs. Elbourn's character before going on to the events inher life. But while I talked I was calculating how old Mrs. Elbournmight be. In my first glance at her palms I had seen that she couldnot have been less than twenty-five when she married. The daughter wasseventeen. Suppose the daughter had been born a year later—how oldwould the mother be? Forty-three, yes. Not less than that, poorwoman!"

Laider looked at me.

"Why 'poor woman!' you wonder? Well, in that first glance I had seenother things than her marriage-line. I had seen a very complete breakin the lines of life and of fate. I had seen violent death there. Atwhat age? Not later, not possibly LATER, than forty-three. While Italked to her about the things that had happened in her girlhood, theback of my brain was hard at work on those marks of catastrophe. I washorribly wondering that she was still alive. It was impossible thatbetween her and that catastrophe there could be more than a few shortmonths. And all the time I was talking; and I suppose I acquittedmyself well, for I remember that when I ceased I had a sort of ovationfrom the Elbourns.

"It was a relief to turn to another pair of hands. Mrs. Brett was anamusing young creature, and her hands were very characteristic, andprettily odd in form. I allowed myself to be rather whimsical abouther nature, and having begun in that vein, I went on in it, somehow,even after she had turned her palms. In those palms were reduplicatedthe signs I had seen in Mrs. Elbourn's. It was as though they had beencopied neatly out. The only difference was in the placing of them; andit was this difference that was the most horrible point. The fatal agein Mrs. Brett's hands was—not past, no, for here SHE was. But shemight have died when she was twenty-one. Twenty-three seemed to be theutmost span. She was twenty-four, you know.

"I have said that I am a weak man. And you will have good proof ofthat directly. Yet I showed a certain amount of strength thatday—yes, even on that day which has humiliated and saddened the restof my life. Neither my face nor my voice betrayed me when in the palmsof Dorothy Elbourn I was again confronted with those same signs. Shewas all for knowing the future, poor child! I believe I told her allmanner of things that were to be. And she had no future—none, none inTHIS world—except—

"And then, while I talked, there came to me suddenly a suspicion. Iwondered it hadn't come before. You guess what it was? It made mefeel very cold and strange. I went on talking. But, also, I wenton—quite separately—thinking. The suspicion wasn't a certainty.This mother and daughter were always together. What was to befall theone might anywhere—anywhere—befall the other. But a like fate, in anequally near future, was in store for that other lady. The coincidencewas curious, very. Here we all were together—here, they and I—I whowas narrowly to escape, so soon now, what they, so soon now, were tosuffer. Oh, there was an inference to be drawn. Not a sure inference,I told myself. And always I was talking, talking, and the train wasswinging and swaying noisily along—to what? It was a fast train. Ourcarriage was near the engine. I was talking loudly. Full well I hadknown what I should see in the colonel's hands. I told myself I hadnot known. I told myself that even now the thing I dreaded was notsure to be. Don't think I was dreading it for myself. I wasn't so'lamentable' as all that—now. It was only of them that Ithought—only for them. I hurried over the colonel's character andcareer; I was perfunctory. It was Brett's hands that I wanted. THEYwere the hands that mattered. If THEY had the marks— Remember, Brettwas to start for India in the coming week, his wife was to remain inEngland. They would be apart. Therefore—

"And the marks were there. And I did nothing—nothing but hold forthon the subtleties of Brett's character. There was a thing for me todo. I wanted to do it. I wanted to spring to the window and pull thecommunication-cord. Quite a simple thing to do. Nothing easier thanto stop a train. You just give a sharp pull, and the train slows down,comes to a standstill. And the guard appears at your window. Youexplain to the guard.

"Nothing easier than to tell him there is going to be a collision.Nothing easier than to insist that you and your friends and every otherpassenger in the train must get out at once. There ARE easier thingsthan this? Things that need less courage than this? Some of THEM Icould have done, I dare say. This thing I was going to do. Oh, I wasdetermined that I would do it—directly.

"I had said all I had to say about Brett's hands. I had brought myentertainment to an end. I had been thanked and complimented allround. I was quite at liberty. I was going to do what I had to do. Iwas determined, yes.

"We were near the outskirts of London. The air was gray, thickening;and Dorothy Elbourn had said: 'Oh, this horrible old London! I supposethere's the same old fog!' And presently I heard her father sayingsomething about 'prevention' and 'a short act of Parliament' and'anthracite.' And I sat and listened and agreed and—"

Laider closed his eyes. He passed his hand slowly through the air.

"I had a racking headache. And when I said so, I was told not to talk.I was in bed, and the nurses were always telling me not to talk. I wasin a hospital. I knew that; but I didn't know why I was there. Oneday I thought I should like to know why, and so I asked. I was feelingmuch better now. They told me by degrees that I had had concussion ofthe brain. I had been brought there unconscious, and had remainedunconscious for forty-eight hours. I had been in an accident—arailway-accident. This seemed to me odd. I had arrived quite safelyat my uncle's place, and I had no memory of any journey since that. Incases of concussion, you know, it's not uncommon for the patient toforget all that happened just before the accident; there may be a blankfor several hours. So it was in my case. One day my uncle was allowedto come and see me. And somehow, suddenly, at sight of him, the blankwas filled in. I remembered, in a flash, everything. I was quitecalm, though. Or I made myself seem so, for I wanted to know how thecollision had happened. My uncle told me that the engine-driver hadfailed to see a signal because of the fog, and our train had crashedinto a goods-train.

"I didn't ask him about the people who were with me. You see, therewas no need to ask.

"Very gently my uncle began to tell me, but—I had begun to talkstrangely, I suppose. I remember the frightened look of my uncle'sface, and the nurse scolding him in whispers.

"After that, all a blur. It seems that I became very ill indeed,wasn't expected to live.

"However, I live."

There was a long silence. Laider did not look at me, nor I at him.
The fire was burning low, and he watched it.

At length he spoke:

"You despise me. Naturally. I despise myself."

"No, I don't despise you; but—"

"You blame me." I did not meet his gaze. "You blame me," he repeated.

"Yes."

"And there, if I may say so, you are a little unjust. It isn't myfault that I was born weak."

"But a man may conquer his weakness."

"Yes, if he is endowed with the strength for that."

His fatalism drew from me a gesture of disgust.

"Do you really mean," I asked, "that because you didn't pull that cord,you COULDN'T have pulled it?"

"Yes."

"And it's written in your hands that you couldn't?"

He looked at the palms of his hands.

"They are the hands of a very weak man," he said.

"A man so weak that he cannot believe in the possibility of free willfor himself or for any one?"

"They are the hands of an intelligent man, who can weigh evidence andsee things as they are."

"But answer me: Was it foreordained that you should not pull that cord?"

"It was foreordained."

"And was it actually marked in your hands that you were not going topull it?"

"Ah, well, you see, it is rather the things one IS going to do that areactually marked. The things one isn't going to do,—the innumerablenegative things,—how could one expect THEM to be marked?"

"But the consequences of what one leaves undone may be positive?"

"Horribly positive. My hand is the hand of a man who has suffered agreat deal in later life."

"And was it the hand of a man DESTINED to suffer?"

"Oh, yes. I thought I told you that."

There was a pause.

"Well," I said, with awkward sympathy, "I suppose all hands are thehands of people destined to suffer."

"Not of people destined to suffer so much as Ihave suffered—as Istill suffer."

The insistence of his self-pity chilled me, and I harked back to aquestion he had not straightly answered.

"Tell me: Was it marked in your hands that you were not going to pullthat cord?"

Again he looked at his hands, and then, having pressed them for amoment to his face, "It was marked very clearly," he answered, "inTHEIR hands."

Two or three days after this colloquy there had occurred to me inLondon an idea—an ingenious and comfortable doubt. How was Laider tobe sure that his brain, recovering from concussion, had REMEMBERED whathappened in the course of that railway-journey? How was he to knowthat his brain hadn't simply, in its abeyance, INVENTED all this forhim? It might be that he had never seen those signs in those hands.Assuredly, here was a bright loophole. I had forthwith written toLaider, pointing it out.

This was the letter which now, at my second visit, I had foundmiserably pent on the letter-board. I remembered my promise to rescueit. I arose from the retaining fireside, stretched my arms, yawned,and went forth to fulfil my Christian purpose. There was no one in thehall. The "shower" had at length ceased. The sun had positively comeout, and the front door had been thrown open in its honor. Everythingalong the sea-front was beautifully gleaming, drying, shimmering. ButI was not to be diverted from my purpose. I went to the letter-board.And—my letter was not there! Resourceful and plucky little thing—ithad escaped! I did hope it would not be captured and brought back.Perhaps the alarm had already been raised by the tolling of that greatbell which warns the inhabitants for miles around that a letter hasbroken loose from the letter-board. I had a vision of my envelopskimming wildly along the coast-line, pursued by the old, but active,waiter and a breathless pack of local worthies. I saw it outdistancingthem all, dodging past coast-guards, doubling on its tracks, leapingbreakwaters, unluckily injuring itself, losing speed, and at last, in asplendor of desperation, taking to the open sea. But suddenly I hadanother idea. Perhaps Laider had returned?

He had. I espied afar on the sands a form that was recognizably, bythe listless droop of it, his. I was glad and sorry—rather glad,because he completed the scene of last year; and very sorry, becausethis time we should be at each other's mercy: no restful silence andliberty for either of us this time. Perhaps he had been told I washere, and had gone out to avoid me while he yet could. Oh weak, weak!Why palter? I put on my hat and coat, and marched out to meet him.

"Influenza, of course?" we asked simultaneously.

There is a limit to the time which one man may spend in talking toanother about his own influenza; and presently, as we paced the sands,I felt that Laider had passed this limit. I wondered that he didn'tbreak off and thank me now for my letter. He must have read it. Heought to have thanked me for it at once. It was a very good letter, aremarkable letter. But surely he wasn't waiting to answer it by post?His silence about it gave me the absurd sense of having taken aliberty, confound him! He was evidently ill at ease while he talked.But it wasn't for me to help him out of his difficulty, whatever thatmight be. It was for him to remove the strain imposed on myself.

Abruptly, after a long pause, he did now manage to say:

"It was—very good of you to—to write me that letter." He told me hehad only just got it, and he drifted away into otiose explanations ofthis fact. I thought he might at least say it was a remarkable letter;and you can imagine my annoyance when he said, after another interval,"I was very much touched indeed." I had wished to be convincing, nottouching. I can't bear to be called touching.

"Don't you," I asked, "think it IS quite possible that your braininvented all those memories of what—what happened before thataccident?"

He drew a sharp sigh.

"You make me feel very guilty."

"That's exactly what I tried to make you NOT feel!"

"I know, yes. That's why I feel so guilty."

We had paused in our walk. He stood nervously prodding the hard wetsand with his walking-stick.

"In a way," he said, "your theory was quite right. But—it didn't gofar enough. It's not only possible, it's a fact, that I didn't seethose signs in those hands. I never examined those hands. Theyweren't there. Iwasn't there. I haven't an uncle in Hampshire,even. I never had."

I, too, prodded the sand.

"Well," I said at length, "I do feel rather a fool."

"I've no right even to beg your pardon, but—''

"Oh, I'm not vexed. Only—I rather wish you hadn't told me this."

"I wish I hadn't had to. It was your kindness, you see, that forcedme. By trying to take an imaginary load off my conscience, you laid avery real one on it."

"I'm sorry. But you, of your own free will, you know, exposed yourconscience to me last year. I don't yet quite understand why you didthat."

"No, of course not. I don't deserve that you should. But I think youwill. May I explain? I'm afraid I've talked a great deal alreadyabout my influenza, and I sha'n't be able to keep it out of myexplanation. Well, my weakest point—I told you this last year, but ithappens to be perfectly true that my weakest point—is my will.Influenza, as you know, fastens unerringly on one's weakest point. Itdoesn't attempt to undermine my imagination. That would be a forlornhope. I have, alas! a very strong imagination. At ordinary times myimagination allows itself to be governed by my will. My will keeps itin check by constant nagging. But when my will isn't strong enougheven to nag, then my imagination stampedes. I become even as a littlechild. I tell myself the most preposterous fables, and—the troubleis—I can't help telling them to my friends. Until I've thoroughlyshaken off influenza, I'm not fit company for any one. I perfectlyrealize this, and I have the good sense to go right away till I'm quitewell again. I come here usually. It seems absurd, but I must confessI was sorry last year when we fell into conversation. I knew I shouldvery soon be letting myself go, or, rather, very soon be swept away.Perhaps I ought to have warned you; but—I'm a rather shy man. Andthen you mentioned the subject of palmistry. You said you believed init. I wondered at that. I had once read Desbarolles's book about it,but I am bound to say I thought the whole thing very great nonsenseindeed."

"Then," I gasped, "it isn't even true that you believe in palmistry?"

"Oh, no. But I wasn't able to tell you that. You had begun by sayingthat you believed in palmistry, and then you proceeded to scoff at it.While you scoffed I saw myself as a man with a terribly good reason forNOT scoffing; and in a flash I saw the terribly good reason; I had thewhole story—at least I had the broad outlines of it—clear before me."

"You hadn't ever thought of it before?" He shook his head. My eyesbeamed. "The whole thing was a sheer improvisation?"

"Yes," said Laider, humbly, "I am as bad as all that. I don't say thatall the details of the story I told you that evening were filled in atthe very instant of its conception. I was filling them in while wetalked about palmistry in general, and while I was waiting for themoment when the story would come in most effectively. And I've nodoubt I added some extra touches in the course of the actual telling.Don't imagine that I took the slightest pleasure in deceiving you.It's only my will, not my conscience, that is weakened after influenza.I simply can't help telling what I've made up, and telling it to thebest of my ability. But I'm thoroughly ashamed all the time."

"Not of your ability, surely?"

"Yes, of that, too," he said, with his sad smile. "I always feel that
I'm not doing justice to my idea."

"You are too stern a critic, believe me."

"It is very kind of you to say that. You are very kind altogether.Had I known that you were so essentially a man of the world, in thebest sense of that term, I shouldn't have so much dreaded seeing youjust now and having to confess to you. But I'm not going to takeadvantage of your urbanity and your easy-going ways. I hope that someday we may meet somewhere when I haven't had influenza and am a notwholly undesirable acquaintance. As it is, I refuse to let youassociate with me. I am an older man than you, and so I may withoutimpertinence warn you against having anything to do with me."

I deprecated this advice, of course; but for a man of weakened will heshowed great firmness.

"You," he said, "in your heart of hearts, don't want to have to walkand talk continually with a person who might at any moment try tobamboozle you with some ridiculous tale. And I, for my part, don'twant to degrade myself by trying to bamboozle any one, especially onewhom I have taught to see through me. Let the two talks we have had beas though they had not been. Let us bow to each other, as last year,but let that be all. Let us follow in all things the precedent of lastyear."

With a smile that was almost gay he turned on his heel, and moved awaywith a step that was almost brisk. I was a little disconcerted. But Iwas also more than a little glad. The restfulness of silence, thecharm of liberty—these things were not, after all, forfeit. My heartthanked Laider for that; and throughout the week I loyally seconded himin the system he had laid down for us. All was as it had been lastyear. We did not smile to each other, we merely bowed, when we enteredor left the dining-room or smoking-room, and when we met on thewide-spread sands or in that shop which had a small and faded butcirculating library.

Once or twice in the course of the week it did occur to me that perhapsLaider had told the simple truth at our first interview and aningenious lie at our second. I frowned at this possibility. The ideaof any one wishing to be quit of ME was most distasteful. However, Iwas to find reassurance. On the last evening of my stay I suggested,in the small smoking-room, that he and I should, as sticklers forprecedent, converse. We did so very pleasantly. And after a while Ihappened to say that I had seen this afternoon a great number ofsea-gulls flying close to the shore.

"Sea-gulls?" said Laider, turning in his chair.

"Yes. And I don't think I had ever realized how extraordinarilybeautiful they are when their wings catch the light."

Laider threw a quick glance at me and away from me.

"You think them beautiful?"

"Surely."

"Well, perhaps they are, yes; I suppose they are. But—I don't likeseeing them. They always remind me of something—rather an awfulthing—that once happened to me."

IT was a very awful thing indeed.

[Transcriber's Note: I have closed contractions in the text, e.g.,"does n't" has become "doesn't" etc.; in addition, on page 18,paragraph 3, line 5, I have changed "Dyott" to "Dyatt".]

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