Part 49 (1/2)
”You think that because the disc of copper represents a fixed amount of money. Call it theft if you like. So then taking a pin would be theft.”
”Perhaps so.”
”But a theft so small that in any moral or legal reckoning it would not count. It would not count because your landlady would not feel it. So the paltry amount under discussion would not be felt by the company.”
”You call it a paltry amount, and yet it represents the value of a life.”
”My dear fellow, human life is not of much account in this world.
Governments--especially Christian Governments--sacrifice men by thousands for bits of barren territory that are not worth sixpence.”
”The Creator, perhaps, sets more value on them.”
”Use the word Nature and you talk sense. Only your suggestion is absolutely beside the mark. Nature puts no value on human life at all, no more than you do on the creeping things you trample to death at every step you take.”
”Nature does not destroy. She only changes the form. Nothing is lost.”
”Except life. That vanishes like the flame of a candle in a gust of wind.”
”Vanishes! But do you know what the word means?”
”I think I do. But what is all this talk leading to? What have you got at the back of your brain? If you are going to funk the business, say so, and let me know the worst.”
”I don't think I have suggested anything of the kind,” Rufus replied, uneasily. ”I frankly admit that I do not like the alternative, and wish that some other way of escape could be found.”
”But if there is no other way?”
”Then I must meet my doom, and go into darkness disgraced and dishonoured.”
”In a hundred years from now nothing will matter.”
”You are not even sure of that. But, candidly, I am as ready to face death as most other men. I am not aware that I have ever proved myself a coward, but I do abhor the thought of shrinking meanly out of life by a back door in order to cheat an insurance company.”
”You should have thought of all this earlier.”
”I know I should. I am simply amazed at myself. But I was so certain of success that I refused to look at failure, or the possible consequences of failure.”
”Exactly. But that is not my fault. I am sorry for you. More sorry than I can express. But I am powerless to help you.”
”And you are not concerned at my cheating the insurance company?”
”Not in the least. I am only concerned that you do not cheat me.”
”But suppose I paid you interest on the seven hundred pounds for a year or two?”
”It is not the interest I want, but the princ.i.p.al, which I must have by the first of January next, or I'm up a tree.”
”But could you not borrow the amount from some other client for awhile?”
”Where am I to get security? Why don't you ask me to make you a free gift of the amount in question?”