The Poison Belt (Professor Challenger 2)

"There is one of our bacilli squeaking for help," said he with a grimsmile. "They are beginning to realize that their continued existence isnot really one of the necessities of the universe."

He was gone from the room for a minute or two. I remember that none ofus spoke in his absence. The situation seemed beyond all words orcomments.

"The medical officer of health for Brighton," said he when he returned."The symptoms are for some reason developing more rapidly upon the sealevel. Our seven hundred feet of elevation give us an advantage. Folkseem to have learned that I am the first authority upon the question. Nodoubt it comes from my letter in the Times. That was the mayor of aprovincial town with whom I talked when we first arrived. You may haveheard me upon the telephone. He seemed to put an entirely inflated valueupon his own life. I helped him to readjust his ideas."

Summerlee had risen and was standing by the window. His thin, bony handswere trembling with his emotion.

"Challenger," said he earnestly, "this thing is too serious for merefutile argument. Do not suppose that I desire to irritate you by anyquestion I may ask. But I put it to you whether there may not be somefallacy in your information or in your reasoning. There is the sunshining as brightly as ever in the blue sky. There are the heather andthe flowers and the birds. There are the folk enjoying themselves uponthe golf-links and the laborers yonder cutting the corn. You tell usthat they and we may be upon the very brink of destruction--that thissunlit day may be that day of doom which the human race has so longawaited. So far as we know, you found this tremendous judgment uponwhat? Upon some abnormal lines in a spectrum--upon rumours fromSumatra--upon some curious personal excitement which we have discerned ineach other. This latter symptom is not so marked but that you and wecould, by a deliberate effort, control it. You need not stand onceremony with us, Challenger. We have all faced death together beforenow. Speak out, and let us know exactly where we stand, and what, inyour opinion, are our prospects for our future."

It was a brave, good speech, a speech from that stanch an

d strong spiritwhich lay behind all the acidities and angularities of the old zoologist.Lord John rose and shook him by the hand.

"My sentiment to a tick," said he. "Now, Challenger, it's up to you totell us where we are. We ain't nervous folk, as you know well; but whenit comes to makin' a week-end visit and finding you've run full butt intothe Day of Judgment, it wants a bit of explainin'. What's the danger,and how much of it is there, and what are we goin' to do to meet it?"

He stood, tall and strong, in the sunshine at the window, with his brownhand upon the shoulder of Summerlee. I was lying back in an armchair, anextinguished cigarette between my lips, in that sort of half-dazed statein which impressions become exceedingly distinct. It may have been a newphase of the poisoning, but the delirious promptings had all passed awayand were succeeded by an exceedingly languid and, at the same time,perceptive state of mind. I was a spectator. It did not seem to be anypersonal concern of mine. But here were three strong men at a greatcrisis, and it was fascinating to observe them. Challenger bent hisheavy brows and stroked his beard before he answered. One could see thathe was very carefully weighing his words.

"What was the last news when you left London?" he asked.

"I was at the Gazette office about ten," said I. "There was a Reuterjust come in from Singapore to the effect that the sickness seemed to beuniversal in Sumatra and that the lighthouses had not been lit inconsequence."

"Events have been moving somewhat rapidly since then," said Challenger,picking up his pile of telegrams. "I am in close touch both with theauthorities and with the press, so that news is converging upon me fromall parts. There is, in fact, a general and very insistent demand that Ishould come to London; but I see no good end to be served. From theaccounts the poisonous effect begins with mental excitement; the riotingin Paris this morning is said to have been very violent, and the Welshcolliers are in a state of uproar. So far as the evidence to hand can betrusted, this stimulative stage, which varies much in races and inindividuals, is succeeded by a certain exaltation and mental lucidity--Iseem to discern some signs of it in our young friend here--which, afteran appreciable interval, turns to coma, deepening rapidly into death. Ifancy, so far as my toxicology carries me, that there are some vegetablenerve poisons----"

"Datura," suggested Summerlee.

"Excellent!" cried Challenger. "It would make for scientific precisionif we named our toxic agent. Let it be daturon. To you, my dearSummerlee, belongs the honour--posthumous, alas, but none the lessunique--of having given a name to the universal destroyer, the GreatGardener's disinfectant. The symptoms of daturon, then, may be taken tobe such as I indicate. That it will involve the whole world and that nolife can possibly remain behind seems to me to be certain, since ether isa universal medium. Up to now it has been capricious in the places whichit has attacked, but the difference is only a matter of a few hours, andit is like an advancing tide which covers one strip of sand and thenanother, running hither and thither in irregular streams, until at lastit has submerged it all. There are laws at work in connection with theaction and distribution of daturon which would have been of deep interesthad the time at our disposal permitted us to study them. So far as I cantrace them"--here he glanced over his telegrams--"the less developedraces have been the first to respond to its influence. There aredeplorable accounts from Africa, and the Australian aborigines appear tohave been already exterminated. The Northern races have as yet showngreater resisting power than the Southern. This, you see, is dated fromMarseilles at nine-forty-five this morning. I give it to you verbatim:--

"'All night delirious excitement throughout Provence. Tumult of vinegrowers at Nimes. Socialistic upheaval at Toulon. Sudden illnessattended by coma attacked population this morning. _Peste foudroyante_.Great numbers of dead in the streets. Paralysis of business anduniversal chaos.'

"An hour later came the following, from the same source:--

"'We are threatened with utter extermination. Cathedrals and churchesfull to overflowing. The dead outnumber the living. It is inconceivableand horrible. Decease seems to be painless, but swift and inevitable.'

"There is a similar telegram from Paris, where the development is not yetas acute. India and Persia appear to be utterly wiped out. The Slavonicpopulation of Austria is down, while the Teutonic has hardly beenaffected. Speaking generally, the dwellers upon the plains and upon theseashore seem, so far as my limited information goes, to have felt theeffects more rapidly than those inland or on the heights. Even a littleelevation makes a considerable difference, and perhaps if there be asurvivor of the human race, he will again be found upon the summit ofsome Ararat. Even our own little hill may presently prove to be atemporary island amid a sea of disaster. But at the present rate ofadvance a few short hours will submerge us all."

Lord John Roxton wiped his brow.

"What beats me," said he, "is how you could sit there laughin' with thatstack of telegrams under your hand. I've seen death as often as mostfolk, but universal death--it's awful!"

"As to the laughter," said Challenger, "you will bear in mind that, likeyourselves, I have not been exempt from the stimulating cerebral effectsof the etheric poison. But as to the horror with which universal deathappears to inspire you, I would put it to you that it is somewhatexaggerated. If you were sent to sea alone in an open boat to someunknown destination, your heart might well sink within you. Theisolation, the uncertainty, would oppress you. But if your voyage weremade in a goodly ship, which bore within it all your relations and yourfriends, you would feel that, however uncertain your destination mightstill remain, you would at least have one common and simultaneousexperience which would hold you to the end in the same close communion.A lonely death may be terrible, but a universal one, as painless as thiswould appear to be, is not, in my judgment, a matter for apprehension.Indeed, I could sympathize with the person who took the view that thehorror lay in the idea of surviving when all that is learned, famous, andexalted had passed away."

"What, then, do you propose to do?" asked Summerlee, who had for oncenodded his assent to the reasoning of his brother scientist.

"To take our lunch," said Challenger as the boom of a gong soundedthrough the house. "We have a cook whose omelettes are only excelled byher cutlets. We can but trust that no cosmic disturbance has dulled herexcellent abilities. My Scharzberger of '96 must also be rescued, so faras our earnest and united efforts can do it, from what would be adeplorable waste of a great vintage." He levered his great bulk off thedesk, upon which he had sat while he announced the doom of the planet."Come," said he. "If there is little time left, there is the more needthat we should spend it in sober and reasonable enjoyment."

And, indeed, it proved to be a very merry meal. It is true that we couldnot forget our awful situation. The full solemnity of the event loomedever at the back of our minds and tempered our thoughts. But surely itis the soul which has never faced death which shies strongly from it atthe end. To each of us men it had, for one great epoch in our lives,been a familiar presence. As to the lady, she leaned upon the strongguidance of her mighty husband and was well content to go whither hispath might lead. The future was our fate. The present was our own. Wepassed it in goodly comradeship and gentle merriment. Our minds were, asI have said, singularly lucid. Even I struck sparks at times. As toChallenger, he was wonderful! Never have I so realized the elementalgreatness of the man, the sweep and power of his understanding.Summerlee drew him on with his chorus of subacid criticism, while LordJohn and I laughed at the contest and the lady, her hand upon his sleeve,controlled the bellowings of the philosopher. Life, death, fate, thedestiny of man--these were the stupendous subjects of that memorablehour, made vital by the fact that as the meal progressed strange, suddenexaltations in my mind and tinglings in my limbs proclaimed that theinvisible tide of death was slowly and gently rising around us. Once Isaw Lord John put his hand suddenly to his eyes, and once Summerleedropped back for an instant in his chair. Ea

ch breath we breathed wascharged with strange forces. And yet our minds were happy and at ease.Presently Austin laid the cigarettes upon the table and was about towithdraw.

"Austin!" said his master.

"Yes, sir?"

"I thank you for your faithful service." A smile stole over theservant's gnarled face.

"I've done my duty, sir."

"I'm expecting the end of the world to-day, Austin."