The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-10-19
GTRANGE FOLK
~ QUEER THINGS
BY
David Christie
Murray

forget him. I should at least have had the
feeling that the thing was beyond repair
-over and lone with-and that IL / had
made a mistake there was an end OF ii.
But the idea got hold Of me that that poor
fellow was in a state of living death. He
wasn't more than four and twenty. and
he was sound In wind and limb. More like
Iy than not he had half a century OF cap
tivity before him. / know Broadmoor now.
Few men better. It's a very cheerful home,
indeed, for those who are In a fit state 10
appreciate the kindness lavished on its
inmates. 1t isn't an asylum like the dull
and dreadful hole 1 fancied it to be. But L
didn't know 1t then, and 1 worried Internal
ly about thai poor fellow. / thought OF him
Slows whitening into the grave, just droop-
ing, dropping, dropping, body and soul. It's
one prolonged process of decay with all of
us of course. Death has his hands on the
child In the cradle. The grip mayn't tight
en- till the child has grown to be a CEN
tenarian, but it's always ready to close,
and we begin to die when We are born.
But we breathe the free air. and we love
and worry and nave children, and we have
all manner OF crafts to work at, and the
stir and murmur Of the world are every
where, and it's a good thing to be alive.
But, stamped with the broad ~arrow-every
eye q stranger's-never a ireside pipe with
a friend, or a kiss from a sweetheart. or
a stroll down to the club, or a quiet spell
at work amongst your W retorts and
bottles and microscopes and test papers
with never a chance to be loved or praised,
or even to make yourself worth loving or
p~raising-if there's hell anywhere it's
there! The springs broken. the clocks
stopped, the pendulum's dead, the fingers
are always at II o'clock, and it's IL mid
night.
"And, as IL all this were not bad enough,
there's a shocking iniquity at the back OF
IL, which not one man in a thousand thinks
about, though everybody knows it. You
see, of course, that If that poor devil OF
whom I spoke just now had survived for
fifty years, the authorities would have pun
ished seven different people"
Seven different people?' I asked in
amazement.
Seven different people," he answered
impressively. isn't it a recognized physi-
illogical fact that the whole structure OF a
child of fourteen has rejected and cast
away every atom which helped TO compose
his body at the age of seven? Has the
young man of one and twenty one hum
dreth part of a drop or a grain which en-
tered into his composition at fourteen"
YES" 1 said, "I know the theory"
Theory" he almost shouted. Its no
theory"
The younger brother sauntered towards
us, cue in hand.
whats the matter, Dick?"
Nothing" said the elder Layland. ITS
all right"
Seven ages of man, Ell? New version?
Don't get mad about it."
"AIl right" said the elder. with a sort of
fretful submissiveness. A right"
The younger brother went back to his
game, but he made a mis-cue, and I knew
that his eye was on US, rather than on the
table.
But" / urged, taking up the fallen
thread, "the individuality remains. The
man is the same man in spite of physical
change"
No" he answered with a quiet decisive
ness. mo. That's the point. You're not
the man you were seven years ago.
Changed in bone, brain. blood. viscera.'
Granted L said, but 1 am held in fee
by nature all along. / cannot shake off old
| penalties. 1 slept in a damp bed twenty
years ago, and my bones still ache from it."
L could see that he would have said
much more, but his brother was looking
hard at him. and he simply threw his
| hands apart, and advised me to think it
over. 1 did think it over. and I came to
the conclusion that, scholarly and clever
as he was, he had a bee in his bonnet. He
rotnrnad 70 tho fdaa manu- SaoroS IF fipoac
| in the course of our acquaintance. and the
one point on which he was insistent was
that no term Of Imprisonment for any Of
Tense whatever should exceed seven years,
because at the expiration of that time a
new man had arisen in the place of the
old one, differing in fibre and particle from
| crown to sole, and it was manifestly un-
just to go on furnishing the new man for
what the vanished criminal had done.
My acquaintance with Layland lasted
through two whole seasons, and when he
was neither diagnosing mental disorders
nor expounding his theory OF the complete
s%eptennial change 1 found him a charming
companion. I shook hands with him on the
platform at Basic. He and his brother were
bound for Geneva and 1 was coming back
to London. AS I climbed into the carriage
1 found that / had one Of the oldest of my
friends for a travelling companion. The old
Belgian doctor made a third. He was on
| his way TO Brussels. He leaned back i'm his
| seat scrutinizing a cabinet photograph, and
as the train started he handed this across
to me.
Don't you think there's something
strange in the mans expression? p he asked.
My friend looked over my shoulder.
why" 1 said. that's Layland!'
You know him?'
why yes. 1 ought to know him. I ap-
peared against him on his trial."
His trial?"
AT the Old Bailey. Don't you remember
that? He is one of the very few men VINO
ever got out OF Broadmoor. He was tried
for murder. found insane and sentenced to
Imprisonment during her Majesty's pleas
ure. He enjoyed a high reputation as a
toxicologist at one time, but there is little
doubt now that his evidence hanged one Or
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