by Whit Burnett
be asked.
"Only Sir Augustus. I merely told him that I suffered from
nightmares. He said I was overworked and recommended me
to go for a cruise. That's absurd. I can't leave the Foreign Office just now when the international situation needs constant attention. I'm indispensable, and I know it. On my conduct at
the present juncture my whole future depends. He gave me
sedatives. They had no effect. He gave me tonics. They wer.e
worse than useless. He's an old fool."
"Can you give any reason why it should be this particular
man who persists in coming into your dreams?"
"You asked me that question before. I answered it."
That was true. But Dr. Audlin had not been satisfied with
the answer.
"Just now you talked of persecution. Why should Owen Griffiths want to persecute you?"
"I don't know."
Lord Mountdrago's eyes shifted a little. Dr. Audlin was sure
that he was not speaking the truth.
"Have you ever done him an injury?"
"Never."
Lord Mountdrago made no movement, but Dr. Audlin had
a queer feeling that he shrank into his skin. He saw before
him a large, proud man who gave the impression that the questions put to him were an insolence, and yet for all that, behind that facade, was something shifting and startled that made you
think of a frightened animal in a trap. Dr. Audlin leaned forward and by the power of his eyes forced Lord Mountdrago to meet them.
"Are you quite sure?"
"Quite sure. You don't seem to understand that our ways
lead along different paths. I don't wish to harp on it, but I mu�t
remind you that I am a minister of the Crown and Griffiths IS
an obscure member of the Labour Party. Naturally there's no
58 • Nineteen Tales ol Terror
social connection between us; he's a man of very bumble origin,
he's not the sort of person I should be likely to meet at any of
the houses I go to; and politically our respective stations .are �o
far separated that we could not possibly have anythmg tn
common."
"I can do nothing for you unless you tell me the complete
truth."
Lord Mountdrago raised his eyebrows. His voice was
rasping.
"I'm not accustomed to having my word doubted, Dr. Audlin. If you're going to do that, I think to take up any more of your time can only be a waste of mine. If you will kindly let
my secretary know what your fee is, he will see that a cheque
is sent to you. "
For all the expression that was t o b e seen o n Dr. Audlin's
face you might have thought that he simply had not heard what
Lord Mountdrago said. He continued to look steadily into his
eyes, and his voice was grave and low.
"Have you done anything to this man that he might look
upon as an injury?"
Lord Mountdrago hesitated. He looked away, and then, as
though there were in Dr. Audlin's eyes a compelling force that
he could not resist, looked back. He answered sulkily:
"Only if he was a dirty, second-rate little cad."
"But that is exactly what you've described him to be."
Lord Mountdrago sighed. He was beaten. Dr. Audlin knew
that the sigh meant he was going at last to say what he had till
then held back. Now he had no longer to insist. He dropped his
eyes and began again drawing vague geometrical figures on his
blotting paper. The silence lasted two or three minutes.
"I'm anxious to tell you everything that can be of any use to
you. If I didn't mention this before, it's only because it was so
unimportant that I didn't see how it could possibly have anything to do with the case. Griffiths won a seat at the last election, and he began to make a nuisance of himself almost at once. His father's a miner, and he worked in a mine himself
when he was a boy; he's been a school-master in the board
schools and a journalist. He's that half-baked, conceited intellectual, with inadequate knowledge, ill-considered ideas and impractical plans, that compulsory education has brought forth
from the working classes. He's a scrawny, grey-faced man who
looks half starved, and he's always very slovenly in appearance;
heaven knows members nowadays don't bother much about
their dress, but his clothes are an outrage to the dignity of the
House. They're ostentatiously shabby, his collar's n�ver clean,
and his tie's never tied properly; he looks as if he hadn't had a
bath for a month, and his hands are filthy. The Labour Party
Lord Mountdrago • &9
have two or three fellows on the Front Bench who've got a
certain ability, but the rest of them don't amount to much. In
the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king: because
Griffiths is glib and has a lot of superficial information on a
number of subjects, the Whips on his side began to put him up
to speak whenever there was a chance. It appeared that he
fancied himself on foreign affairs, and he was continually asking me silly, tiresome questions. I don't mind telling you that I made a point of snubbing him as soundly as I thought he deserved. From the beginning I hated the way he talked, his whining voice and his vulgar accent; he had nervous mannerisms that intensely irritated me. He talked rather shyly, hesitatingly, as though it were torture to him to speak and yet he was forced to by some inner passion, and often he used to say some
very disconcerting things. I'll admit that now and again he had
a sort of tub-thumping eloquence. It had a certain influence
over the ill-regulated minds of the members of his party. They
were impressed by his earnestness, and they weren't, as I was,
nauseated by his sentimentality. A certain sentimentality is the
common coin of political debate. Nations are governed by selfinterest, but they prefer to believe that their aims are altruistic, and the politician is justified if with fair words and fine phrases
he can persuade the electorate that the hard bargain he is driving for his country's aavantage tends to the good of humanity.
The mistake people like Griffiths made is to take these fait
words and fine phrases at their face value. He's a crank, and a
noxious crank. He calls himself an idealist. He has at his
tongue's end all the tedious blather that the intelligentsia have
been boring us with for years. Non-resistance. The brotherhood
of man. You know the hopeless rubbish. The worst of it was
that it impressed not only his own party, it even shook some of
the sillier, more sloppy-minded members of ours. I heard rumours that Griffiths was likely to get office when a Labour Government came in; I even heard it suggested that he might
get the Foreign Office. The notion was grotesque but not impossible. One day I had occasion to wind up a debate on foreign affairs which Griffiths had opened. He'd spoken for an hour. I thought it a very good opportunity to cook his goose,
and by God, sir, I cooked it. I tore his speech to pieces. I
pointed out the faultiness of his reasoning and emphasized the
deficiency of his knowledge. In the House of Commons the
most devastating weapon is ridicule : I mocked him; I bantered
him; I was in good form that day and the House rocked with
laughter. Their laughter excited me, and I excelled myself.
The Opposition sat glum and silent, but even some of them
couldn't help laughing once or twice; it's
not intolerable, you
know, to see a colleague, perhaps a rival, made a fool of. And
60
Nineteen Tales of Terror
•
if ever a man was made a fool of, I made a fool of Griffiths. He
shrank down in his seat; I saw his face go white, and presently
he buried it in his hands. When I sat down I'd killed him. I'd
destroyed his prestige for ever; he had no more chance of getting office when a Lab9ur Government came in than the policeman at the door. I heard afterwards that his father, the old miner, and his mother had come up from Wales, with various
supporters of his in the constituency, to watch the triumph
they expected him to have. They had seen only his utter humiliation. He'd won the constituency by the narrowest margin. An incident like that might very easily lose him his seat. But that
was no business of mine."
"Should I be putting it too strongly if I said you had ruined
his career?" asked Dr. Audlin.
·
"I don't suppose you would."
"That is a very serious injury you've done him."
"He brought it on himself."
"Have you never felt any qualms about it?"
"I think perhaps if I'd known that his father and mother
were there I might have let him down a little more gently."
There was nothing further for Dr. Audlin to say, and he set
about treating his patient in such a manner as he thought might
avail. He sought by suggestion to make him forget his dreams
when he awoke; he sought to make him sleep so deeply that
he would not dream. He found Lord Mountdrago's resistance
impossible to break down. At the end of an hour he dismissed
him.
Since then he had seen Lord Mountdrago half a dozen
times. He had done him no good. The frightful dreams continued every night to harass the unfortunate man, and it was clear that his general condition was growing rapidly worse. He
was worn out. His irhtability was uncontrollable. Lord Mountdrago was angry because he received no benefit from his treatment, and yet continued it, not only because it seemed his only hope, but because it was a relief to him to have someone with
whom he could talk openly. Dr. Audlin came to the conclusion
at last that there was only one way in which Lord Mountdrago could achieve deliverance, but he knew him well enough to be assured that of his own free will he would never, never
take it. If Lord Mountdrago was to be saved from the breakdown that was threatening, he must be induced to take a step that must be abhorrent to his pride of birth and his self-complacency. Dr. Audlin was convinced that to delay was impossible. He was treating his patient by suggestion, and after several visits found him more susceptible to it. At length he
managed to get him into a condition of somnolence. With his
Lord Mountdrago
61
•
low, soft, monotonous voice he soothed his tortured nerves. He
repeated the same words over and over again. Lord Mountdrago lay quite still, his eyes closed; his breathing was regular, and his limbs were relaxed. Then Dr. Audlin in the same quiet
tone spoke the words he had prepared.
"You will go to Owen Griffiths and say that you are sorry
that you caused him that great injury. You will say that you
will do whatever lies in your power to undo the harm that you
have done him."
The words acted on Lord Mountdrago like the blow of a
whip acr9ss his face. He shook himself out of his hypnotic state
and sprang to his feet. His eyes blazed with passion, and he
poured forth upon Dr. Audlin a stream of angry vituperation
such as even he had never heard. He swore at him. He cursed
him. He used language of such obscenity that Dr. Audlin, who
had heard every sort of foul word, sometimes from the lips of
chaste and distinguished women, was surprised that he knew it.
"Apologize to the filthy little Welshman? I'd rather kill myself." .
"I believe it to be the only way in which you can regain your
balance."
Dr. Audlin had not often seen a man presumably sane in
such a condition of uncontrollable fury. Lord Mountdrago
grew red in the face, and his eyes bulged out of his head. He
did really foam at the mouth. Dr. Audlin watched him coolly,
waiting for the storm to wear itself out, and presently he saw
that Lord Mountdrago, weakened by the strain to which he had
been subjected for so many weeks, was exhausted.
"Sit down," he said then, sharply.
Lord Mountdrago crumpled up into a chair.
"Christ, I feel all in. I must rest a minute and then I'll go."
For five minutes perhaps they sat in complete silence. Lord
Mountgdrago was a gross, blustering bully, but he was also a
gentleman. When he broke the silence he had recovered his
self-control.
"I'm afraid I've been very rude to you. I'm ashamed of the
things I've said to you, and I can only say you'd be justified if
you refused to have anything more to do with me. I hope you
won't do that. I feel that my visits to you do help me. I think
you're my only chance."
"You mustn't give another tho].lght to what you said. It was
of no consequence."
"But there's one thing you mustn't ask me to do, and that is
to make excuses to Griffiths."
"I've thought a great deal about your case. I don't pretend to
understand it, but I believe that your only chance of release is
to do what I proposed. I have a notion that we're none of us
&2 • Nineteen Tales ol Terror
one self, but many, and one of the selves in you has risen up
against the injury you did Griffiths and has taken on the form
of Griffiths in your mind and is punishing you for what you
cruelly did. If I were a priest I should tell you that it is
your conscience that has adopted the shape and lineaments of
this man to scourge you to repentance and persuade you to
reparation."
"My conscience is clear. It's not my fault if I smashed the
man's career. I crushed him like a slug in my garden. I regret
nothing."
It was on these words that Lord Mountdrago had left him.
Reading through his notes, while he waited, Dr. Audlin considered how best he could bring his patient to the state of mind that, now that his usual methods of treatment had failed, he
thought alone could help him. He glanced at his clock. It was
six. It was strange that Lord Mountdrago did not come. He
knew he had intended to because a secretary had rung up that
morning to say that he would be with him at the usual hour. He
must have been detained by pressing work. This notion gave
Dr. Audlin something else to think of: Lord Mountdrago was
quite unfit to work and in no condition to deal with important
matters of state. Dr. Audlin wondered whether it behooved
him to get in touch with someone in authority, the Prime Minister or the Permanent Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and impart to him his conviction that Lord Mountdrago's mind
was so unbalanced that it was dangerous to leave affairs of moment in his hands. It was a ticklish thing to do. He might cause needless trouble and get roundly snubbed for his pains. He
shrugged his shoulders.
"After all," he reflected, "the politicians have made such a
mess of the world during the last five-and-twent
y years, I don't
suppose it makes much odds if they're mad or sane."
He rang the bell.
"If Lord Mountdrago comes now, will you tell him that I
have another appointment at six-fifteen and so I'm afraid I
can't see him."
"Very good, sir."
"Has the evening paper come yet?"
"I'll go and see."
In a moment the servant brought it in. A huge headline ran
across the front page : Tragic Death of Foreign Minister.
"My God !" cried Dr. Audlin.
For once he was wrenched out of his wonted calm. He was
shocked, horribly shocked, and yet he was not altogether surprised. The possibility that Lord Mountdrago might commit suicide had occurred to him several times, for that it was suicide
Lord Mountdraga • 63
he could not doubt. The paper said that Lord Mountdrago had
been waiting in a tube station, standing on the edge of the platform, and as the train came in was seen to fall on the rail. It was supposed that he had had a sudden attack of faintness. The
paper went on to say that Lord Mountdrago had been suffering
for some weeks from the effects of overwork, but had felt it
impossible to absent himself while the foreign situation demanded his unremitting attention. Lord Mountdrago was another victim of the strain that modem politics placed upon those who played the more important parts in it. There was a
neat little piece about the talents and industry, and patriotism
and vision, of the deceased statesman, followed by various surmises upon the Prime Minister's choice of successor. Dr. Audlin read all this. He had not liked Lord Mountdrago. The chief
emotion that his death caused in him was dissatisfaction with
himself because he had been able to do nothing for him.
Perhaps he had done wrong in not getting into touch with
Lord Mountdrago's doctor. He was discouraged, as always
when failure frustrated his conscientious efforts, and repulsion
seized him for the theory and practice of this empiric doctrine
by which he earned his living. He was dealing with dark and
mysterious forces that it was perhaps beyond the powers of the
human mind to understand. He was like a man blindfold trying
to feel his way to he knew not whither. ListJessly he turned the
pages of the paper. Suddenly he gave a great start, and an exclamation once more was forced from his lips. His eyes had fallen on a small paragraph near the bottom of a column. Sudden Death of an M.P., he read. Mr. Owen Griffiths, member for so-and-so, had been taken ill in Fleet Street that afternoon
