ambushes, shaking his nerves like the throats of cannon. He could never
again, he felt, be sufficiently immured and fortified from men's
observing eyes; he longed to be home, girt in by walls, buried among
bedclothes, and invisible to all but God. And at that thought he
wondered a little, recollecting tales of other murderers and the fear
they were said to entertain of heavenly avengers. It was not so, at
least, with him. He feared the laws of nature, lest, in their callous
and immutable procedure, they should preserve some damning evidence of
his crime. He feared tenfold more, with a slavish, superstitious terror,
some scission in the continuity of man's experience, some wilful
illegality of nature. He played a game of skill, depending on the
rules, calculating consequence from cause; and what if nature, as the
defeated tyrant overthrew the chess-board, should break the mould of
their succession? The like had befallen Napoleon (so writers said) when
the winter changed the time of its appearance. The like might befall
Markheim: the solid walls might become transparent and reveal his doings
like those of bees in a glass hive; the stout planks might yield under
his feet like quicksands and detain him in their clutch; ay, and there
were soberer accidents that might destroy him: if, for instance, the
house should fall and imprison him beside the body of his victim; or the
house next door should fly on fire, and the firemen invade him from all
sides. These things he feared; and, in a sense, these things might be
called the hands of God reached forth against sin. But about God himself
he was at ease; his act was doubtless exceptional, but so were his
excuses, which God knew; it was there, and not among men, that he felt
sure of justice.
When he had got safe into the drawing-room, and shut the door behind
him, he was aware of a respite from alarms. The room was quite
dismantled, uncarpeted besides, and strewn with packing cases and
incongruous furniture; several great pier-glasses, in which he beheld
himself at various angles, like an actor on a stage; many pictures,
framed and unframed, standing, with their faces to the wall; a fine
Sheraton sideboard, a cabinet of marquetry, and a great old bed, with
tapestry hangings. The windows opened to the floor; but by great good
fortune the lower part of the shutters had been closed, and this
concealed him from the neighbours. Here, then, Markheim drew in a
packing case before the cabinet, and began to search among the keys. It
was a long business, for there were many; and it was irksome, besides;
for, after all, there might be nothing in the cabinet, and time was on
the wing. But the closeness of the occupation sobered him. With the tail
of his eye he saw the door--even glanced at it from time to time
directly like a besieged commander pleased to verify the good estate of
his defences. But in truth he was at peace. The rain falling in the
street sounded natural and pleasant. Presently, on the other side, the
notes of a piano were wakened to the music of a hymn, and the voices of
many children took up the air and words. How stately, how comfortable
was the melody! How fresh the youthful voices! Markheim gave ear to it
smilingly, as he sorted out the keys; and his mind was thronged with
answerable ideas and images; church-going children and the pealing of
the high organ; children afield, bathers by the brookside, ramblers on
the brambly common, kite-flyers in the windy and cloud-navigated sky;
and then, at another cadence of the hymn, back again to church, and the
somnolence of summer Sundays, and the high genteel voice of the parson
(which he smiled a little to recall) and the painted Jacobean tombs, and
the dim lettering of the Ten Commandments in the chancel.
And as he sat thus, at once busy and absent, he was startled to his
feet. A flash of ice, a flash of fire, a bursting gush of blood, went
over him, and then he stood transfixed and thrilling. A step mounted the
stair slowly and steadily, and presently a hand was laid upon the knob,
and the lock clicked, and the door opened.
Fear held Markheim in a vice. What to expect he knew not, whether the
dead man walking, or the official ministers of human justice, or some
chance witness blindly stumbling in to consign him to the gallows. But
when a face was thrust into the aperture, glanced round the room, looked
at him, nodded and smiled as if in friendly recognition, and then
withdrew again, and the door closed behind it, his fear broke loose from
his control in a hoarse cry. At the sound of this the visitant returned.
"Did you call me?" he asked pleasantly, and with that he entered the
room and closed the door behind him.
Markheim stood and gazed at him with all his eyes. Perhaps there was a
film upon his sight, but the outlines of the newcomer seemed to change
and waver like those of the idols in the wavering candle-light of the
shop; and at times he thought he knew him; and at times he thought he
bore a likeness to himself; and always like a lump of living terror,
there lay in his bosom the conviction that this thing was not of the
earth and not of God.
And yet the creature had a strange air of the commonplace, as he stood
looking on Markheim with a smile; and when he added, "You are looking
for the money, I believe?" it was in the tones of everyday politeness.
Markheim made no answer.
"I should warn you," resumed the other, "that the maid has left her
sweetheart earlier than usual and will soon be here. If Mr. Markheim be
found in this house, I need not describe to him the consequences."
"You know me?" cried the murderer.
The visitor smiled. "You have long been a favourite of mine," he said;
"and I have long observed and often sought to help you."
"What are you?" cried Markheim; "the devil?"
"What I may be," returned the other, "cannot affect the service I
propose to render you."
"It can," cried Markheim; "it does! Be helped by you? No, never; not by
you! You do not know me yet; thank God, you do not know me!"
"I know you," replied the visitant, with a sort of kind severity or
rather firmness. "I know you to the soul."
"Know me!" cried Markheim. "Who can do so? My life is but a travesty and
slander on myself. I have lived to belie my nature. All men do; all men
are better than this disguise that grows about and stifles them. You see
each dragged away by life, like one whom bravos have seized and muffled
in a cloak. If they had their own control--if you could see their faces,
they would be altogether different, they would shine out for heroes and
saints! I am worse than most; myself is more overlaid; my excuse is
known to me and God. But, had I the time, I could disclose myself."
"To me?" inquired the visitant.
"To you before all," returned the murderer. "I supposed you were
intelligent. I thought--since you exist--you would prove a reader of the
heart. And yet you would propose to judge me by my acts! Think of it; my
acts! I was born and I have lived in a land of giants; giants have
dragged me by the wrists since I was born out of my mother--the giants
of circumstance. And you would judge me by my acts! But can you not look
within? Can you not understand that evil is hateful to me? Can you not
see within me the clear writing of conscience, never blurred by any
wilful sophistry, although too often disregarded? Can you not read me
for a thing that surely must be common as humanity--the unwilling
sinner?"
"All this is very feelingly expressed," was the reply, "but it regards
me not. These points of consistency are beyond my province, and I care
not in the least by what compulsion you may have been dragged away, so
as you are but carried in the right direction. But time flies; the
servant delays, looking in the faces of the crowd and at the pictures on
the hoardings, but still she keeps moving nearer; and remember, it is as
if the gallows itself was striding towards you through the Christmas
streets! Shall I help you; I, who know all? Shall I tell you where to
find the money?"
"For what price?" asked Markheim.
"I offer you the service for a Christmas gift," returned the other.
Markheim could not refrain from smiling with a kind of bitter triumph.
"No," said he, "I will take nothing at your hands; if I were dying of
thirst, and it was your hand that put the pitcher to my lips, I should
find the courage to refuse. It may be credulous, but I will do nothing
to commit myself to evil."
"I have no objection to a death-bed repentance," observed the visitant.
"Because you disbelieve their efficacy!" Markheim cried.
"I do not say so," returned the other; "but I look on these things from
a different side, and when the life is done my interest falls. The man
has lived to serve me, to spread black looks under colour of religion,
or to sow tares in the wheat-field, as you do, in a course of weak
compliance with desire. Now that he draws so near to his deliverance, he
can add but one act of service--to repent, to die smiling, and thus to
build up in confidence and hope the more timorous of my surviving
followers. I am not so hard a master. Try me. Accept my help. Please
yourself in life as you have done hitherto; please yourself more amply,
spread your elbows at the board; and when the night begins to fall and
the curtains to be drawn, I tell you, for your greater comfort, that you
will find it even easy to compound your quarrel with your conscience,
and to make a truckling peace with God. I came but now from such a
death-bed, and the room was full of sincere mourners, listening to the
man's last words: and when I looked into that face, which had been set
as a flint against mercy, I found it smiling with hope."
"And do you, then, suppose me such a creature?" asked Markheim. "Do you
think I have no more generous aspirations than to sin, and sin, and sin,
and, at last, sneak into heaven? My heart rises at the thought. Is this,
then, your experience of mankind? or is it because you find me with red
hands that you presume such baseness? and is this crime of murder indeed
so impious as to dry up the very springs of good?"
"Murder is to me no special category," replied the other. "All sins are
murder, even as all life is war. I behold your race, like starving
mariners on a raft, plucking crusts out of the hands of famine and
feeding on each other's lives. I follow sins beyond the moment of their
acting; I find in all that the last consequence is death; and to my
eyes, the pretty maid who thwarts her mother with such taking graces on
a question of a ball, drips no less visibly with human gore than such a
murderer as yourself. Do I say that I follow sins? I follow virtues
also; they differ not by the thickness of a nail, they are both scythes
for the reaping angel of Death. Evil, for which I live, consists not in
action, but in character. The bad man is dear to me; not the bad act,
whose fruits, if we could follow them far enough down the hurtling
cataract of the ages, might yet be found more blessed than those of the
rarest virtues. And it is not because you have killed a dealer, but
because you are Markheim, that I offered to forward your escape."
"I will lay my heart open to you," answered Markheim. "This crime on
which you find me is my last. On my way to it I have learned many
lessons; itself is a lesson, a momentous lesson. Hitherto I have been
driven with revolt to what I would not; I was a bond-slave to poverty,
driven and scourged. There are robust virtues that can stand in these
temptations; mine was not so: I had a thirst of pleasure. But to-day,
and out of this deed, I pluck both warning and riches--both the power
and a fresh resolve to be myself. I become in all things a free actor in
the world; I begin to see myself all changed, these hands the agents of
good, this heart at peace. Something comes over me out of the past;
something of what I have dreamed on Sabbath evenings to the sound of the
church organ, of what I forecast when I shed tears over noble books, or
talked, an innocent child, with my mother. There lies my life; I have
wandered a few years, but now I see once more my city of destination."
"You are to use this money on the Stock Exchange, I think?" remarked the
visitor; "and there, if I mistake not, you have already lost some
thousands?"
"Ah," said Markheim, "but this time I have a sure thing."
"This time, again, you will lose," replied the visitor, quietly.
"Ah, but I keep back the half!" cried Markheim.
"That also you will lose," said the other.
The sweat started upon Markheim's brow. "Well, then, what matter?" he
exclaimed. "Say it be lost, say I am plunged again in poverty, shall one
part of me, and that the worse, continue until the end to override the
better? Evil and good run strong in me, haling me both ways. I do not
love the one thing, I love all. I can conceive great deeds,
renunciations, martyrdoms; and though I be fallen to such a crime as
murder, pity is no stranger to my thoughts. I pity the poor; who knows
their trials better than myself? I pity and help them; I prize love, I
love honest laughter; there is no good thing nor true thing on earth but
I love it from my heart. And are my vices only to direct my life, and my
virtues to lie without effect, like some passive lumber of the mind? Not
so; good, also, is a spring of acts."
But the visitant raised his finger. "For six-and-thirty years that you
have been in this world," said he, "through many changes of fortune and
varieties of humour, I have watched you steadily fall. Fifteen years ago
you would have started at a theft. Three years back you would have
blenched at the name of murder. Is there any crime, is there any cruelty
or meanness, from which you still recoil?--five years from now I shall
detect you in the fact! Downward, downward, lies your way; nor can
anything but death avail to stop you."
"It is true," Markheim said huskily, "I have in some degree complied
with evil. But it is so with all: the very saints, in the mere exercise
of living, grow less dainty, and take on the tone of their
surroundings."
"I will propound to you one simple question," said the other; "and as
you answer, I shall read to you your moral horoscope. You have grown in
many things more lax; possibly you do right to be so; and at any
account, it is the same with all men. But granting that, are you in any
one particular, however trifling, more difficult to please with your own
conduct, or do you go in all things with a looser rein?"
"In any one?" repeated Markheim, with an anguish of consideration. "No,"
he added, with despair, "in none! I have gone down in all."
"Then," said, the visitor, "content yourself with what you are, for you
will never change; and the words of your part on this stage are
irrevocably written down."
Markheim stood for a long while silent, and indeed it was the visitor
who first broke the silence. "That being so," he said, "shall I show you
the money?"
"And grace?" cried Markheim.
"Have you not tried it?" returned the other. "Two or three years ago,
did I not see you on the platform of revival meetings, and was not your
voice the loudest in the hymn?"
"It is true," said Markheim; "and I see clearly what remains for me by
way of duty. I thank you for these lessons from my soul; my eyes are
opened, and I behold myself at last for what I am."
At this moment, the sharp note of the door-bell rang through the house;
and the visitant, as though this were some concerted signal for which he
had been waiting, changed at once in his demeanour.
"The maid!" he cried. "She has returned, as I forewarned you, and there
is now before you one more difficult passage. Her master, you must say,
is ill; you must let her in, with an assured but rather serious
countenance--no smiles, no overacting, and I promise you success! Once
the girl within, and the door closed, the same dexterity that has
already rid you of the dealer will relieve you of this last danger in
your path. Thenceforward you have the whole evening--the whole night, if
needful--to ransack the treasures of the house and to make good your
safety. This is help that comes to you with the mask of danger. Up!" he
cried; "up, friend; your life hangs trembling in the scales; up, and
act!"
Markheim steadily regarded his counsellor. "If I be condemned to evil
acts," he said, "there is still one door of freedom open--I can cease
from action. If my life be an ill thing, I can lay it down. Though I be,
as you say truly, at the beck of every small temptation, I can yet, by
one decisive gesture, place myself beyond the reach of all. My love of
good is damned to barrenness; it may, and let it be! But I have still my
hatred of evil; and from that, to your galling disappointment, you shall
see that I can draw both energy and courage."
The features of the visitor began to undergo a wonderful and lovely
change: they brightened and softened with a tender triumph; and, even as
they brightened, faded and dislimned. But Markheim did not pause to
watch or understand the transformation. He opened the door and went
downstairs very slowly, thinking to himself. His past went soberly
before him; he beheld it as it was, ugly and strenuous like a dream,
random as chance-medley--a scene of defeat. Life, as he thus reviewed
it, tempted him no longer; but on the further side he perceived a quiet
haven for his bark. He paused in the passage, and looked into the shop,
where the candle still burned by the dead body. It was strangely silent.
Thoughts of the dealer swarmed into his mind, as he stood gazing. And
then the bell once more broke out into impatient clamour.
He confronted the maid upon the threshold with something like a smile.
"You had better go for the police," said he; "I have killed your
master."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 90: First published in 1885.]
SUPPLEMENTARY READINGS
WITH SOME TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION AND FOR COMPOSITION
(Note.--The selections named below are as a rule short; and, since they
are contained in standard works of modern prose, they are accessible in
the average library. Page numbers in parentheses refer to the present
volume.)
I. THE PERSONAL LIFE
(_a_) William Hazlitt, _On Personal Character_, in "The Plain Speaker":
How the main thesis differs from that in Emerson's _Self-Reliance_ (page
1). (_b_) Walter Pater, _Diaphaneité_, in "Miscellaneous Studies": The
substance of the ideal personality here delineated, and how it differs
from the type suggested by Emerson. (_c_) Matthew Arnold, _Doing as One
Likes_, or _Hebraism and Hellenism_, in "Culture and Anarchy": The main
principles of personal endeavor suggested in either of these essays.
(_d_) Plutarch, _Marcus Cato,_ in "Lives," Vol. II of Clough's
translation: 1. Cato's Self-Reliance. 2. Cato's type of character in
American public life. (_e_) Walter Scott, fragment of _Autobiography_,
in Lockhart's "Life of Scott:" A comparison of Scott's early training
with Ruskin's. See also the early chapters of (_f_) Trevelyan's "Life of
Macaulay" and (_g_) Froude's "Life of Carlyle." (_h_) Charles Darwin,
_Autobiography_, in "Life and Letters:" 1. The change which came over
Darwin's attitude toward literature. 2. The contrast between Darwin's
type of mind and Lamb's as revealed in _Old China_ (page 40) and Pater's
essay (page 437).
II. EDUCATION
(_a_) R.W. Emerson, _The American Scholar_, in "Nature, Addresses,
Lectures:" The main points in the view here given of education. 2.
Certain considerations, somewhat neglected by Emerson, but developed by
Newman (page 52). (_b_) Woodrow Wilson, _The Training of Intellect_ (an
address to the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale University): How far your
own course of study is fulfilling the requirements here set forth, (_c_)
William Hazlitt, _On Application to Study_, in "The Plain Speaker:" 1.
Hazlitt's view of the study of composition. 2. How the principles of
application which he advocates may be applied to some other study in
which you are interested. (_d_) T.H. Huxley, _Science and Culture_, in
"Science and Education:" 1. How far the principles here set forth bear
out Huxley's definition of education (page 47). 2. The main point at
issue between Huxley and Arnold (Arnold's essay, page 75, is a reply to
Huxley), and your own view of the matter drawn from your own experience.
(_e_) J.S. Mill, _Inaugural Address at St. Andrew's,_ in
"Dissertations," Vol. IV: Mill's main contentions as to the exact
purpose and value of the study of language and literature in
universities. (_f_) H.D. Thoreau, _Reading_, in "Walden:" The author's
views in regard to reading not done in connection with school work.
(_g_) A.G. Balfour, _Pleasures of Reading_, in "Essays and Addresses"
(written as a reply to Harrison's claims, page 97): The main points at
issue between Harrison and Balfour, and your own view of the matter.
(_h_) John Lubbock, _The Choice of Books_, in "The Pleasures of Life:"
Whether this essay goes to support Harrison's or Balfour's view, and
how. (_i_) Woodrow Wilson, essays in "Mere Literature." (_j_) John
Ruskin, _Sesame and Lilies_. (_k_) Consult several biographies of great
men--for example, Morley's _Gladstone_, Froude's _Carlyle_, Darwin's
_Life_, Huxley's _Life_--and make a comparative study of their early
reading.
III. RECREATION AND TRAVELS
(_a_) George Santayana, on _Work and Play_, sections 3 and following, in
"The Sense of Beauty," Part I: 1. The distinction between working and
playing. 2. The relation between the sense of beauty and the sense of
pleasure. (_b_) William Hazlitt, _On Living to One's Self_, in "Table
Talk:" 1. The general method of enjoying life, which is developed here
and illustrated further in _On Going a Journey_ (page 116). (_c_) R.L.
Stevenson, _Walking Tours_, in "Virginibus Puerisque;" and _Roads_, in
"Essays of Travel:" 1. The several ways in which these essays reflect
Hazlitt's views; the points which are peculiar to Stevenson. 2. How far
your own methods of securing outdoor enjoyment are in accord with
Hazlitt's and Stevenson's. (_d_) W.H. Hudson, _Idle Days_, in "Idle Days
in Patagonia:" What the author's so-called idleness consisted in. (_e_)
Francis Parkman, _Hunting Indians_, in "The Oregon Trail:" The mental
experiences of the writer himself in the course of the exploit he
describes.
IV. SOCIAL LIFE AND MANNERS
(_a_) R.W. Emerson, _Culture_, in "The Conduct of Life:" The relation
which the central thought bears to that of Behavior (page 154). (_b_)
Matthew Arnold, _Sweetness and Light_, in "Culture and Anarchy:" 1. The
chief motives and characteristics of culture. 2. The relation between
culture and bodily vigor. 3. The "Social Idea." 4. A comparison of
Emerson's and Arnold's attitude toward culture. (_c_) R.W. Emerson,
_Manners_, in "Essays, Second Series." How Emerson's view of the
relation between manners and fashion supplements Spencer's contention
(page 172). (_d_) Henri Bergson, _the first part of Chapter I_ in
"Laughter:" The function of laughter in social life. (_g_) William
Hazlitt, _On the Spirit of Obligations_, in "The Plain Dealer:" The
relation between good sense and good nature. (_f_) R.L. Stevenson, _The
Truth of Intercourse_, in "Virginibus Puerisque:" The complex meaning of
truthfulness in social life. (_g_) W.M. Thackeray, _George II_, in "The
Four Georges:" The chief characteristics of Georgian society.
V. PUBLIC AFFAIRS
(_a_) Plato, _The Apology_, in the "Dialogues," translated by Jowett,
and by others: 1. The part played by Socrates in the public life of
Athens. 2. What function Socrates could fulfil in American public life.
(_b_) J.S. Mill, _Civilization_, in "Dissertations and Discussions,"
Vol. I: The ill effects of civilization, and how they may be overcome.
(_c_) Henry George, _The Persistence of Poverty amid Advancing Wealth_,
in Book V of "Progress and Poverty:" George's exposition of the problem
tested by your own experience. (_d_) J.S. Mill, _Of the Dangers to which
Representative Government is Liable,_ in "Considerations on
Representative Government:" The extent to which Mill's contentions apply
to the United States. (_e_) Josiah Royce, _Some American Problems_, in
"The Philosophy of Loyalty:" 1. The general solution proposed. 2. How
this solution might be applied to some public or college problem you
know of.
VI. SCIENCE
(_a_) Herbert Spencer, _The Genesis of Science_, in "Illustrations of
Universal Progress:" The essential nature of science. (_b_) T.H. Huxley,
_The Method of Scientific Investigation_, in "Man's Place in Nature:"
The relation between scientific and everyday modes of thinking. (_c_)
John Tyndall, _On the nature and function of the sun_, in Chapter XIV of
"Heat as a Mode of Motion:" The general relation between the facts
presented by Tyndall and those presented in _The Physical Basis of Life_
(page 240). (_d_) A.R. Wallace, _Darwinism as Applied to Man_, in
"Darwinism": A comparison of this piece, in respect to aim and method,
with Darwin's _Mental Powers of Men and Animals_ (page 263). (_e_)
Charles Darwin, _On the flower of the ladies' slipper_, in Chapter VIII
of "Fertilization of Orchids by Insects." (_f_) T.H. Huxley, _On the
Formation of Coal_, in "Discourses Biological."
VII. NATURE