"I think that you in your turn have misunderstood me, Dr. Eldrige," she said. "I deplore my own condition, certainly, but a menace to human happiness lies in the fact that the whole race is heir to the sufferings of the individual. Mine is not an isolated case. I am but one of the great world-wide family that is bound on the altar of human suffering."
Now the doctor saw that Mrs. Thorpe was discussing a subject broader than her own personal disability, and the first inkling of the truth came to him; and with it there came also an illumination of the woman's character. He saw her love for humanity and her compassion for its woes; and with keen perception he was able to understand something of her futile efforts toward an adjustment of existing conditions that might, to her own mind, seem fair and just. And great as was his concern for her physical condition, he now felt this to be of small importance compared to his desire to help her out of her mental dilemma. But the difficulty was as real to him as it was to her, yet there was this difference: it was a difficulty that he admitted, accepted, and dismissed from his thoughts, while with her he saw that it was rending the very fibre of her life and distorting her mental vision. But keenly as he realized the situation, he found no word of help to offer her, and so he said:
"I fear we shall find our task an arduous one, and unprofitable as well, if we undertake to account for humanity's burden."
"Whether we can account for it or not," she replied, "we, the children of a common Father, are sordidly indifferent to it. We go about our affairs during our waking hours with a sort of a pitiful gratitude toward the monster Disease, if by good fortune we have escaped him; we go to our rest at night, and if we are free from the fell hand, we sleep, while thousands and thousands of creatures, divinely made, are wrestling with mortal pain."
The doctor's eyes were upon her; not a movement, nor an expression of her face escaped him. He saw that the pupils of her eyes were dilated, and that a peculiar light burned within them; and he noticed that it was necessary for her to make a greater effort in order to control the nervous energy that possessed her. There was a ring of reckless protest in her voice as she continued:
"Is this a haphazard world, Dr. Eldrige, where men escape by chance, or are overwhelmed by circumstance? Is there no overruling power, no fixed law to which men may conform, and by which they may be governed and protected, even to the extent that our man-made laws govern and protect those who conform to them? I have been over this ground so many times; I have questioned and reasoned and studied, and yet I have learned--nothing at all."
Her hands fell to her sides with a nervous movement, but her face was averted now, as though she would not have him see its expression.
The doctor thought of what his father had said about the limitations the Lord has placed on human knowledge. He did not for a moment admit that there was a grain of truth in the theory, in fact he believed it to be one of his father's queer jests; yet the thought came to him that the woman before him seemed an actual demonstration of such a theory. But his answer was far from the thought and was intended to turn her mind to a more practical consideration of the subject.
"There are many laws of Nature that are intended to protect mankind. Our safety lies in obeying them; if we disobey, a penalty must be paid, and though the penalty may seem severe, or even, to us, unjust, this should but teach us to be the more obedient and circumspect."
"Do you believe that physical disability is always the result of a broken law of Nature?" The question was direct, incisive, and her eyes were upon him, demanding the truth.