The First Murders
:
The Blue Germ
The effect of Jason's newspapers on public opinion was remarkable.
Humanity ever contains within it the need for mystery, and the strange
and incredible, if voiced by authority, stir it to its depths. The facts
about the healing of sickness and the cure of disease in Birmingham were
printed in heavy type and read by millions. Nothing was said about
immortality save what Sarakoff and I had stated at the Queen's Hall
mee
ing. But instinctively the multitude leaped to the conclusion that
if the end of disease was at hand, then the end of death--at least, the
postponement of death--was to be expected.
Jason, pale and masterful, visited us in the afternoon, and told us of
the spread of the tidings in England. "They've swallowed it," he
exclaimed; "it's stirred them as nothing else has done in the last
hundred years. I visited the East End to-day. The streets are full of
people. Crowds everywhere. It might lead to anything."
"Is the infection spreading swiftly?"
"It's spreading. But there are plenty of people, like myself, who
haven't got it yet. I should say that a quarter of London is blue." He
looked at me with a sudden anxiety. "You're sure I'll get it?"
"Quite sure. Everyone is bound to get it. There's no possible immunity."
He sat heavily in the chair, staring at the carpet.
"Harden, I didn't quite like the look of those crowds in the East End.
Anything big like this stirs up the people. It excites them and then the
incalculable may happen. I've been thinking about the effect upon the
uneducated mind. I've spread over the country the vision of humanity
free from disease, and that's roused something in them--something
dangerous--that I didn't foresee. Disease, Harden, whatever you doctors
think of it, puts the fear of God into humanity. It's these sudden
releases--releases from ancient fears--that are so dangerous. Are you
sure you can't stop the germ, or direct it along certain channels?"
"I have already told you that's impossible."
"You might as well try and stop the light of day," said Sarakoff from a
sofa, where he was lying apparently asleep. "Let the people think what
they like now. Wait till they get it themselves. There are rules in the
game, Jason, that you have no conception of, and that I have only
realized since I became immortal. Yes--rules in the game, whether you
play it in the cellar or the attic, or in the valley, or on the mountain
top."
"Your friend is very Russian," said Jason equably. "I have always heard
they are dreamers and visionaries. Personally, I am a practical man, and
as such I foresee trouble. If the masses of the people have no illness,
and enjoy perfect health, we shall be faced by a difficult problem.
They'll get out of hand. Depressed states of health are valuable assets
in keeping the social organization together. All this demands careful
thought. I am visiting the Prime Minister this evening and shall give
him my views."
At that moment a newspaper boy passed the window with an afternoon
edition and Jason went out to get a copy. He returned with a smile of
satisfaction, carrying the paper open before him.
"Three murders in London," he announced. "One in Plaistow, one in East
Ham and one in Pimlico. I told you there was unrest abroad." He laid the
paper on the table and studied it "In every case it was an aged
person--two old women, and one old man. Now what does that mean?"
"A gang at work."
He shook his head.
"No. In one case the murderer has been caught. It was a case of
patricide--a hideous crime. Curiously enough the victim had the Blue
Disease. The end must have been ghastly, as it states here that the
expression on the old man's face was terrible."
He sat beside the table, drumming his fingers on it and staring at the
wall before him. I was not particularly interested in the news, but I
was interested in Jason. Character had formerly appealed little to me,
but now I found an absorbing problem in it.
"Harden, do you think that son killed his father because he had the
Blue Disease?"
I was struck by the remark. For some reason the picture of Alice's
father came into my mind. Jason sprang to his feet.
"Yes, that's it," he exclaimed. "That's what lay behind those restless
crowds. I knew there was something--a riddle to read, and now I've got
the answer. The crowd doesn't know what's rousing them. But I do. It's
fear and resentment, Harden. It's fear and resentment against the old."
He brought his fist down on the table. "The germ's going to lead to war!
It's going to lead to the worst war humanity has ever experienced--the
war of the young against the old. Not the ancient strife or struggle
between young and old, but open bloodshed, my friends. That's what your
germ is going to do."
I smiled and shook my head.
"Wait," said Sarakoff from the sofa; "wait a little. Why are you in such
a hurry to jump to conclusions?"
"Because it's my business to jump to conclusions just six hours before
anyone else does," said Jason. "I calculate that my mind, for the last
twenty years, has been six hours ahead of time. I live in a state of
chronic anticipation, Dr. Sarakoff. Just let me use your telephone for a
moment."
He returned a quarter of an hour later. His expression was calm, but his
eyes were hard. "I was right," he said. "Those two old women had the
Blue Disease, and a girl, a daughter, is suspect in one case. Can't you
imagine the situation? Girl lives with her aged mother--can't get
free--mother has what money there is--not allowed to marry--girl
unconsciously counts on mother's death--probably got a secret
love-affair--is expecting the moment of release--and then, along comes
the Blue Disease and one of my newspapers telling her what it means. The
old lady recovers her health--the future shuts down like a rat trap and
what does the poor girl do? Kills her mother--and probably goes mad.
That, gentlemen, is my theory of the case."
He strode up and down the room.
"You may think I'm taking a low view," he cried. "But there are hundreds
of thousands of similar cases in England. God help the old if the young
forget their religion!"
For some reason I was unmoved by the outcry. It was no doubt owing to
the peculiar emotionless state that the germ induced in people. Jason
was roused. He paced to and fro in silence, with his brows contracted.
At length he stopped before me.
"Do you see any way out?"
"There will be no war between the young and the old," I replied. "In
another week everyone will get the germ and that will be the end of war
in every form."
He drew a chair and sat down before me.
"You don't understand," he said earnestly. "Perhaps you had a happy
childhood. I didn't. I know how some sons and daughters feel because I
suffered in that way. People are strangely blind to suffering unless
they have suffered themselves. When I was a young man, my father put me
in his office and gave me a clerk's wages. He kept me there for six
years at eighteen shillings a week. Whenever I made a suggestion
concerning the business he was careful to ridicule it. Whenever I tried
to break away and start on my own, he prevented it. There were a
thousand other things--ways in which he fettered me. My only sister he
kept at home to do the housework. He forbade her to marry. She and I
never had enough money to do anything, to go anywhere, or to buy
anything. Now, to be quite frank, I longed for him to die so that I
could get free. To me he was an ogre, a great merciless tyrant, a giant
with a club. Well, he died. When he was dead I felt what a man dying of
thirst in the desert must feel when he suddenly comes to a spring of
water. I recovered, and became what I am. My sister never recovered. She
had been suppressed beyond all the limits of elasticity. As far as her
body is concerned, it is alive. Her soul is dead."
He paused and looked at me meditatively.
"If your blue germ had come along then, Harden, I might---- Who knows? I
have often wondered why our pulpit religion ignores the crimes of
parents to their children. I'm not conventionally religious, but I seem
to remember that Christ indirectly said something pretty strong on the
subject. But the pulpit folk show a wonderful facility for ignoring the
awkward things Christ said. In about three years' time I'm going to turn
my guns on the Church. They've sneered at me too much."
"There will be a new Church by that time," murmured Sarakoff. "And no
guns."
Jason eyed the prostrate figure of the Russian.
"I refer to my newspapers. That's going to be my final triumph. Why do
you smile?"
"Because you said a moment ago that it was your business to be six hours
ahead of everyone else. You're countless centuries behind Harden and me.
We have taken a leap into the future. If you want to know what humanity
will be, look at us closely. You'll get some hints that should be
valuable. I admit that our bodies are old-fashioned in their size and
shape, but not our emotions."
The telephone bell rang in the hall and Jason jumped up.
"I think that's for me."
He went out. I remained sitting calmly in my chair. An absolute serenity
surrounded me. All that Jason did or said was like looking at an
interesting play. I was perfectly content to sit and think--think of
Jason, of what his motives were, of the reason why a man is blind where
his desires are at work, of the new life, of the new organizations that
would be necessary. I was like a glutton before a table piled high with
delicacies and with plenty of time to spare. Sarakoff seemed to be in
the same condition for he lay with his eyes half shut, motionless and
absorbed.
Jason entered the room suddenly. He carried his hat and stick.
"Two more murders reported from Greenwich, and ten from Birmingham. It's
becoming serious, Harden! I'm off to Downing Street. Watch the morning
editions!"