"And you?" I asked.
"What have I to say? The Present I loathe—I loathe—I loathe. I would not go back to it if you offered me instant release with that condition. I have found Love. Let me die—let me die—let me die!"
She clung to her lover passionately, weeping and sobbing. He soothed her and caressed her. John Lax, behind me, snorted.
Then I asked the girl Christine what she wished to say.
She laughed—she actually laughed.
"Oh!" she said, "in return for the past weeks, there is no punishment which I would not cheerfully endure. We have had—oh! the most delightful time. It has been like a dream. Oh! Cruel, horrid, wicked men! You found such a Life in the old Time, and you destroyed it; and what have you given us in return? You have made us all equal who were born unequal. Go, look at the sad and heavy faces of the People. You have taken away everything, deliberately. You have destroyed all—all. You have left nothing worth living for. Why, I am like Mildred. I would not go back to the Present again if I could! Yes, for one thing I would—to try and raise a Company of Men—not sheep—and hound them on to storm this place, and to kill—yes, to kill"—the girl looked so dangerous that any thought of mercy was impossible—"every one who belongs to this Accursed House of Life!"
Here was a pretty outcome of study in the Museum! Here was a firebrand let loose among us straight from the bad old Nineteenth Century! And we had allowed this girl actually to grow up in our very midst.
Well, she finished, and stood trembling with rage, cheeks burning, eyes flashing—a very fury.
I invited the Court to retire to the Inner House, and took their opinions one by one.
They were unanimous on several points—first, that the position of things was most dangerous to the Authority of the College and the safety of the People; next, that the punishment of Death alone would meet the case; thirdly, that, in future, the Museum, with the Library and Picture Galleries, must be incorporated with the College itself, so that this danger of the possible awakening of memory should be removed.