He passed us each a closely printed typescript of The Suicide Club.
Two days later, just as I got in from work, Richard Lincoln phoned.
“The Fleece at eight,” he said without preamble. “An extraordinary meeting of the Gregory Merrall reading group. Can you make it?”
“Try keeping me away,” I said.
On the stroke of eight o’clock that evening all ten of us were seated at our usual fireside table.
Stuart said, “I take it you’ve all read the book?”
As one, we nodded. I’d finished it on the Sunday, profoundly moved by the experience.
“So… what do you think?”
We all spoke at once, echoing the usual platitudes: a work of genius, a brilliant insight, a humane and moving story…
Only Andy was silent. He looked uncomfortable. “Andy?” I said. He had not been part of the reading group, but Gregory had posted him a copy of the manuscript.
“I don’t know. It made me feel… well, uncomfortable.”
A silence ensued. It was Sam who spoke for the rest of us, who voiced the thought, insidious in my mind, that I had been too craven to say out loud.
“So,” she said, “when do we do it?”
Andy just stared around the group, horrified.
I tried to ignore him. I wondered at what point I had become dissatisfied with my life on Earth. Had the ennui set in years ago, but I had been too comfortable with the easy routine to acknowledge it? Had it taken Gregory Merrall’s presence among us to make me see what a circumscribed life I was leading now?
Sam and Stuart Kingsley were gripping each other’s hands on the tabletop. Sam leaned forward and spoke vehemently, “Reading Greg’s books brought it all back to me. I… I don’t think I can take much more of life on Earth. I’m ready for the next step.”
Beside her, Stuart said, “We discussed it last night. We’re ready to… go.”
They turned to look at Doug Standish, seated to their left.
He nodded. “I’ve been waiting for something for ten, fifteen years. Unlike you two,” he smiled at Sam and Stuart, “I haven’t been resurrected, so I’ve never experienced that lure… until now, that is. I’m ready for… for whatever lies ahead.”
He turned to Jeffrey Morrow, on his left. “Jeff?”
The schoolteacher was staring into his drink. He looked up and smiled. “I must admit I’ve never much thought about my own leaving. I had all the universe, and all the time in the universe, ahead of me—so why rush things? But… yes, it seems right, doesn’t it?”
Beside him, Richard Lincoln said in a quiet voice, “Earth holds very little for me now. I suppose the only thing that’s been keeping me here is…” he smiled and looked around the group, “the friendship of you people, and perhaps a fear of what might lie ahead, out there. But I feel that the right time has arrived.”
Ben and Elisabeth were next. They glanced at each other, their hands locked tight beneath the table. Elisabeth said, “We’re attracted to the idea. I mean, you could say that it’s the next evolutionary stage of humankind—the step to the stars.”
Ben took up where his wife had left off. “And we’ve noticed things on Earth… The apathy, the sense of limbo, of waiting for something to happen. I think by now it’s entered our subconscious as a race—the fact that life on Earth is almost over. It’s time to leave the sea.”
I looked across at Dan Chester. “Dan?”
He stared into his drink, smiling. “Ever since Lucy and Davey left, five years ago… Well, I’ve often thought I’d like to follow them. So… yes, I’m ready, too.”
A silence ensued. I was next to give my view.
“Like Sam and Stuart,” I said, “I experienced the lure while on Kéthan. And like Ben, I’ve noticed something about the mood on Earth recently, as I said a while back.” I paused, then went on, “And it isn’t only that more and more resurrectees are electing to remain out there. Increasing numbers of people are actually ending their lives and embarking on the next phase.”
Sam said, smiling at me, “You haven’t actually said, Khalid, if you want to be part of this.”
I laughed. “I’ve been your friend for years now. You’re a massive part of my life. How could I remain on Earth when you’re living among the stars?”
I paused and turned to Andy. “Well… what do you think?”
He was rock still, silent, staring down at his pint. He shook his head. “I’m sorry. It’s not for me. I… there’s a lot I still need to do, here. I couldn’t possibly contemplate…” He stopped there, then looked around the group. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
Stuart spoke for all of us. “We are, Andy. Of course we are.”
Sam nodded. “There… that’s it, then. I suppose the next thing to do is discuss how we go about it?”
Andy retreated into his pint.
Richard said, “Perhaps we should ask the man who initiated all this, Gregory himself?”
“I don’t know about that,” I said. “Don’t you think he might be horrified by what he’s started?”
Stuart was shaking his head. “Khalid, remember what he said a couple of weeks ago—that he was ready to go? And he wrote the book which endorses the group’s decision, after all.”
I nodded. Richard said, “So… tomorrow we’ll buttonhole Greg and see what he says.”
We fell silent and stared into our drinks. We were strangely subdued for the rest of the evening. Andy said goodbye and left before last orders.
The following day on the ward I could not concentrate fully on my work; it was as if I were at one remove from the real world, lost in contemplation of the future, and at the same time remembering the past.
It was almost ten by the time I arrived at the Fleece. The others were ensconced at our usual table, illuminated by the flames of the fire. It was a scene I had beheld hundreds of times before, but perhaps it was the realisation that our Tuesday nights were drawing to a close that invested the tableau with such poignancy.
Significantly, Andy Souter was conspicuous by his absence. No one commented on the fact.
The contemplative atmosphere had carried over from the previous evening. We sat in silence for a while, before Richard said, “Odd, but I was thinking today how insubstantial everything feels.”
Jeffrey laughed. “I was thinking the very same. There I was trying to drum the meaning of metaphor in Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show into a group of bored year tens… and I couldn’t help but think that there’s more to existence.”
“I feel,” Sam said, “that we’ll soon find out exactly how much more.”
I voiced something that had been preying on my mind. “Okay, I know you’re going to call me a hopeless romantic, but it’d be nice… I mean, once we’re out there, if we could remain together.”
Smiles and nods around the table reassured me.
Before anyone could comment on the likelihood of that, Gregory Merrall strode in. “Drink up. I seem to recall that it’s my round.” He stared at us. “What’s wrong? Been to a funeral?”
Sam looked up at him. “Gregory, we need to talk.”
He looked around the group, then nodded. He pointed to the bar.
While he was away, we looked at each other as if for reassurance that we did indeed agree to go ahead with this. Silent accord passed between us, and Sam blessed us with her radiant smile.
“So,” Gregory said two minutes later, easing the tray onto the tabletop, “how can I help?”
We looked across at Sam, tacitly electing her as spokesperson.
“Gregory,” she began, “we were all very affected by your novel, The Suicide Club. It made us think.”
Gregory smiled. “That’s always nice to hear. And?”