The Coming of the Ice Read online

me a very great deal more, but, after all, I think itamounted to little more than this. It would be impossible for me toexpress the great hold his discovery took upon my mind the moment herecounted it. From the very first, under the spell of his personality, Ibelieved, and I knew he was speaking the truth. And it opened up beforeme new vistas. I began to see myself become suddenly eternal, neveragain to know the fear of death. I could see myself storing up, centuryafter century, an amplitude of wisdom and experience that would make metruly a god.

  "Sir John!" I cried, long before he was finished. "You must perform thatoperation on me!"

  "But, Dennell, you are too hasty. You must not put yourself so rashlyinto my hands."

  "You have perfected the operation, haven't you?"

  "That is true," he said.

  "You must try it out on somebody, must you not?"

  "Yes, of course. And yet--somehow, Dennell, I am afraid. I cannot helpfeeling that man is not yet prepared for such a vast thing. There aresacrifices. One must give up love and all sensual pleasure. Thisoperation not only takes away the mere fact of reproduction, but itdeprives one of all the things that go with sex, all love, all sense ofbeauty, all feeling for poetry and the arts. It leaves only the fewemotions, selfish emotions, that are necessary to self-preservation. Doyou not see? One becomes an intellect, nothing more--a cold apotheosisof reason. And I, for one, cannot face such a thing calmly."

  "But, Sir John, like many fears, it is largely horrible in theforesight. After you have changed your nature you cannot regret it. Whatyou are would be as horrible an idea to you afterwards as the thought ofwhat you will be seems now."

  "True, true. I know it. But it is hard to face, nevertheless."

  "I am not afraid to face it."

  "You do not understand it, Dennell, I am afraid. And I wonder whetheryou or I or any of us on this earth are ready for such a step. Afterall, to make a race deathless, one should be sure it is a perfect race."

  "Sir John," I said, "it is not you who have to face this, nor any oneelse in the world till you are ready. But I am firmly resolved, and Idemand it of you as my friend."

  Well, we argued much further, but in the end I won. Sir John promised toperform the operation three days later.

  ... But do you perceive now what I had forgotten during all thatdiscussion, the one thing I had thought I could never forget so long asI lived, not even for an instant? It was my love for Alice--I hadforgotten that!

  * * * * *

  I cannot write here all the infinity of emotions I experienced later,when, with Alice in my arms, it suddenly came upon me what I had done.Ages ago--I have forgotten how to feel. I could name now a thousandfeelings I used to have, but I can no longer even understand them. Foronly the heart can understand the heart, and the intellect only theintellect.

  With Alice in my arms, I told the whole story. It was she who, with herquick instinct, grasped what I had never noticed.

  "But Carl!" she cried, "Don't you see?--It will mean that we can neverbe married!" And, for the first time, I understood. If only I couldre-capture some conception of that love! I have always known, since thelast shred of comprehension slipped from me, that I lost something verywonderful when I lost love. But what does it matter? I lost Alice too,and I could not have known love again without her.

  We were very sad and very tragic that night. For hours and hours weargued the question over. But I felt somewhat that I was inextricablycaught in my fate, that I could not retreat now from my resolve. I wasperhaps, very school-boyish, but I felt that it would be cowardice toback out now. But it was Alice again who perceived a final aspect of thematter.

  "Carl," she said to me, her lips very close to mine, "it need not comebetween our love. After all, ours would be a poor sort of love if itwere not more of the mind than of the flesh. We shall remain lovers, butwe shall forget mere carnal desire. I shall submit to that operationtoo!"

  And I could not shake her from her resolve. I would speak of danger thatI could not let her face. But, after the fashion of women, she disarmedme with the accusation that I did not love her, that I did not want herlove, that I was trying to escape from love. What answer had I for that,but that I loved her and would do anything in the world not to lose her?

  I have wondered sometimes since whether we might have known the love ofthe mind. Is love something entirely of the flesh, something created byan ironic God merely to propagate His race? Or can there be love withoutemotion, love without passion--love between two cold intellects? I donot know. I did not ask then. I accepted anything that would make ourway more easy.

  There is no need to draw out the tale. Already my hand wavers, and mytime grows short. Soon there will be no more of me, no more of mytale--no more of Mankind. There will be only the snow, and the ice, andthe cold ...

  * * * * *

  Three days later I entered John's Hospital with Alice on my arm. All myaffairs--and they were few enough--were in order. I had insisted thatAlice wait until I had come safely through the operation, before shesubmitted to it. I had been carefully starved for two days, and I waslost in an unreal world of white walls and white clothes and whitelights, drunk with my dreams of the future. When I was wheeled into theoperating room on the long, hard table, for a moment it shone withbrilliant distinctness, a neat, methodical white chamber, tall and moreor less circular. Then I was beneath the glare of soft white lights, andthe room faded into a misty vagueness from which little steel raysflashed and quivered from silvery cold instruments. For a moment ourhands, Sir John's and mine, gripped, and we were saying good-bye--for alittle while--in the way men say these things. Then I felt the warmtouch of Alice's lips upon mine, and I felt sudden painful things Icannot describe, that I could not have described then. For a moment Ifelt that I must rise and cry out that I could not do it. But thefeeling passed, and I was passive.

  Something was pressed about my mouth and nose, something with anethereal smell. Staring eyes swam about me from behind their whitemasks. I struggled instinctively, but in vain--I was held securely.Infinitesimal points of light began to wave back and forth on apitch-black background; a great hollow buzzing echoed in my head. Myhead seemed suddenly to have become all throat, a great, cavernous,empty throat in which sounds and lights were mingled together, in aswift rhythm, approaching, receding eternally. Then, I think, there weredreams. But I have forgotten them....

  I began to emerge from the effect of the ether. Everything was dim, butI could perceive Alice beside me, and Sir John.

  "Bravely done!" Sir John was saying, and Alice, too, was sayingsomething, but I cannot remember what. For a long while we talked, Ispeaking the nonsense of those who are coming out from under ether, theyteasing me a little solemnly. But after a little while I became aware ofthe fact that they were about to leave. Suddenly, God knows why, I knewthat they must not leave. Something cried in the back of my head thatthey _must_ stay--one cannot explain these things, except by afterevents. I began to press them to remain, but they smiled and said theymust get their dinner. I commanded them not to go; but they spoke kindlyand said they would be back before long. I think I even wept a little,like a child, but Sir John said something to the nurse, who began toreason with me firmly, and then they were gone, and somehow I wasasleep....

  * * * * *

  When I awoke again, my head was fairly clear, but there was anabominable reek of ether all about me. The moment I opened my eyes, Ifelt that something had happened. I asked for Sir John and for Alice. Isaw a swift, curious look that I could not interpret come over the faceof the nurse, then she was calm again, her countenance impassive. Shereassured me in quick meaningless phrases, and told me to sleep. But Icould not sleep: I was absolutely sure that something had happened tothem, to my friend and to the woman I loved. Yet all my insistenceprofited me nothing, for the nurses were a silent lot. Finally, I think,they must have given me a sleeping potion of some sort, for I fellasleep again.

&
nbsp; For two endless, chaotic days, I saw nothing of either of them, Alice orSir John. I became more and more agitated, the nurse more and moretaciturn. She would only say that they had gone away for a day or two.

  And then, on the third day, I found out. They thought I was asleep. Thenight nurse had just come in to relieve the other.

  "Has he been asking about them again?" she asked.

  "Yes, poor fellow. I have hardly managed to keep him quiet."

  "We will have to keep it from him until he is recovered fully." Therewas a long pause, and I could hardly control my labored breathing.

  "How sudden it was!" one of them said. "To be killed like that--" Iheard no more, for I leapt suddenly up in bed, crying out.

  "Quick! For God's sake, tell me what has happened!" I jumped to thefloor and seized one of them by the collar. She was