“But it must mean dreadful suffering to be held for the rest of one’s life within four walls among lunatics without hope of escape.”
“Why should it, if the mind is really unsound? You must remember that such people don’t suffer in the way that rational people do.”
“But suppose he doesn’t happen to be insane?”
“If he doesn’t happen to be insane the law cannot confine him as a lunatic.”
“Who will decide?”
“He will be certified by two doctors.”
Again came silence, only broken by the peaceful plodding of old Alice. And then said Edith suddenly: “Father, whoever certifies John Smith will take an awful responsibility upon himself.”
“No doubt,” said the vicar. “Yet hardly so grave a one as you might think. It is the only right, reasonable and charitable view to take of him. And if the medical profession cannot be brought to do its clear and obvious duty, the man will have to be dealt with in some other and less gentle way.”
“I am beginning to wish I hadn’t spoken of the matter,” said Edith, in an anxious tone.
“My dear,” said the vicar, shaking up old Alice, “in mentioning it, disagreeable and distressing as it may be, you did no more than your duty. You must now leave other people to do theirs, and at the same time you must have the good sense to dismiss the matter entirely from your thoughts.”