He considered himself. He did not feel old. He was forty-three. He knew that he must appear old to the young people around him. If he were unmarried, and should he ask a young girl to share his life, she might make it a jest to her companions.
But he had a good constitution, and he had lived temperately. His body was still strong and vigorous. Yet he had not the outlook of youth. He realized that his youth would not return, though twenty years should be taken from the age of his body.
With a sudden clarity he realized that, to regain his youth, it was not so much a new body which would be needed; that which he had would serve his purpose well enough, could it only throw off the appearances of thinning hair and growing corpulence, which disguised it from the youth around it; it was a new youth of the soul, an intervening Lethe, which would be needed... He had made no discovery in that direction. Physically, youth might continue, but, as the millenniums passed — even the centuries...
VII
He made efforts to regain the standpoint of his own youth, that he might explore its differences. He became absent-minded in reminiscence... He used to write poetry then. He had not done anything quite so foolish for many years. All the same, he had done it rather well. The only weak point was that the poems were usually left unfinished. It was so much easier to get the first lines. The memories of youth moved him to the old impulse. With a sudden keen recovery of emotion he remembered his first meeting with Molly... the picnic under the trees... the first shy kiss on her shoulder... That was before he had gone to college... He had always been loyal to her, and she to him... He was not of the shallower sort of those that change lightly... He loved her now as he had loved her then — but oh! the world between...
That was well expressed. He would have written those lines down twenty years ago. He would have intended to make them into a complete poem. But he knew better now. He knew that they would never be finished. He knew so much — about himself, and others. He even knew his own weaknesses.
That was the trouble. The inexperience of youth was something which could never be recovered, and the experience of age was no substitute. He realized that to abolish age is to abolish youth also.
Seeing this, his mind startled itself with a further possibility — might it be equally true to say that to abolish death would be to abolish life? In a moment’s vision he saw life and death in a conflict from which each wins recurrent victory: he saw them interdependent, and this strife as the condition on which they both existed...
VIII
He imagined his discovery applied to the vegetable world; an oak tree in perpetual vigor... Would there be no place left for fruit-time and harvest? For the young growths of spring? There was the question of food — corn must still be grown for food, and mown down in due season — or perhaps there might be developed roots of a continuing vigor? But the question of food was not merely a human one. All life grew by feeding upon the life around it.
This was fundamental. It had an aspect of cruel rapacity, seeming inconsistent with the idea of a beneficent God. Yet if there be mortality at all, there can be no better end to the outworn or defeated body than to support the vigor of a new life... His mind stooped, bewildered once again before the stupendous nature of the change which his discovery must bring to the earth’s economy.
Perhaps the question was too great for one man to face. Would it not be well to announce his discovery, and for some small committee of selected men to consider whether it should be used?... But he knew that there would be no such question in the minds of men. They might doubt its advantages for other men, for alien races, for animal or vegetable creations, but for themselves there would be no doubt at all.
It was true that he might withhold the discovery itself, and merely announce that he possessed it, but even that announcement (if it were believed) might rouse an excitement that he could not estimate... He imagined himself mobbed, beaten, even tortured, till he should consent to reveal it to a frantic world...
Pacing the laboratory restlessly, distracted with such thoughts as these, afraid to meet the reproaches of his wife, who could not understand why he was changed and aging so rapidly, so that he had acquired a habit of remaining there till it should be time to go out on his daily round, he regarded the rat, now running up the bars of his cage in a restless and tireless activity, with sudden hatred. He would kill the loathsome thing, and forget the horror he had discovered. Perhaps he might enjoy life once again...
He looked at his watch, and was startled to see that it was half an hour after the usual time at which he set out on his daily round — and he had a consultation with Sir William Brett at 10:30. He went out hurriedly.
IX
School was just commencing that morning when Peter Corner left it. He owed his freedom to his ability to take unscrupulous advantage of the caprice of circumstance, and the credulity of his fellows. His two sisters had colds, and his mother had kept them at home. Had he reported to his schoolmistress that his mother suspected measles he would have incurred the risk of ultimate retribution, which he was always adroit to avoid. Instead of that, he made the remark to Jessie Phipson, who could be relied upon to report it promptly. Challenged on the point, he strenuously denied the truth of the suggestion. His mother had never said so. He had told Jessie that they had not got measles nor scarlet fever. The mistress did not know what to believe, and sent him home till she could obtain more reliable information. He had expected that.
His expression was almost good-tempered as he dragged his clubfoot toward Dr. Merson’s surgery. His sisters usually called for his mother’s medicine, but as they had not come to school to-day the duty fell to him. He did not like going there. He hated Dr. Merson. He hated his eyes, which seemed to see through him without effort, and then to look elsewhere, as though he were not worth seeing. But he had to go today, and he had a hopeful idea this morning. He did not expect to get the medicine before noon. He knew that the doctor was not at home during the mornings. But he could not be blamed for calling on his way home.
He found the surgery door unlocked, as it was sometimes left when Dr. Merson was absent. He had expected that. He knew when and whether most of the doors in Belsham were locked or open. He did not often make use of this knowledge. His physical deformity, and the practical difficulties of secreting or disposing of illicit gains, had withheld him from active dishonesties. But in his waking dreams (for he had them, as much as more attractive children) he was most often a cat burglar of superhuman audacities.
Had he rung the surgery bell, the maid would have come, or the doctor’s wife, but he turned the handle without haste or hesitation, and stood quietly inside, in an attitude of respectful waiting, till he was reassured by the surrounding silence. Then he passed through to the passage. He could not move very quietly, but a sound of crockery in the distant kitchen reassured him, and — beyond his hopes — the key was in the door on the other side of the passage.