The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents | Page 3

The group round the cabmen's shelter became animated. Chorus: "Go it,
George!" "It's a race." "You'll ketch 'em!" "Whip up!"
"She's a goer, she is!" said the ostler boy.
"Strike me giddy!" cried old Tootles. "Here! I'm a-goin' to begin in a
minute. Here's another comin'. If all the kebs in Hampstead aint gone
mad this morning!"
"It's a fieldmale this time," said the ostler boy.
"She's a followin' him" said old Tootles. "Usually the other way about."
"What's she got in her 'and?"
"Looks like a 'igh 'at."

"What a bloomin' lark it is! Three to one on old George," said the ostler
boy. "Nexst!"
Minnie went by in a perfect roar of applause. She did not like it but she
felt that she was doing her duty, and whirled on down Haverstock Hill
and Camden Town High Street with her eyes ever intent on the
animated back view of old George, who was driving her vagrant
husband so incomprehensibly away from her.
The man in the foremost cab sat crouched in the corner, his arms tightly
folded, and the little tube that contained such vast possibilities of
destruction gripped in his hand. His mood was a singular mixture of
fear and exultation. Chiefly he was afraid of being caught before he
could accomplish his purpose, but behind this was a vaguer but larger
fear of the awfulness of his crime. But his exultation far exceeded his
fear. No Anarchist before him had ever approached this conception of
his. Ravachol, Vaillant, all those distinguished persons whose fame he
had envied dwindled into insignificance beside him. He had only to
make sure of the water supply, and break the little tube into a reservoir.
How brilliantly he had planned it, forged the letter of introduction and
got into the laboratory, and how brilliantly he had seized his
opportunity! The world should hear of him at last. All those people
who had sneered at him, neglected him, preferred other people to him,
found his company undesirable, should consider him at last. Death,
death, death! They had always treated him as a man of no importance.
All the world had been in a conspiracy to keep him under. He would
teach them yet what it is to isolate a man. What was this familiar street?
Great Saint Andrew's Street, of course! How fared the chase? He
craned out of the cab. The Bacteriologist was scarcely fifty yards
behind. That was bad. He would be caught and stopped yet. He felt in
his pocket for money, and found half-a-sovereign. This he thrust up
through the trap in the top of the cab into the man's face. "More," he
shouted, "if only we get away."
The money was snatched out of his hand. "Right you are," said the
cabman, and the trap slammed, and the lash lay along the glistening
side of the horse. The cab swayed, and the Anarchist, half-standing

under the trap, put the hand containing the little glass tube upon the
apron to preserve his balance. He felt the brittle thing crack, and the
broken half of it rang upon the floor of the cab. He fell back into the
seat with a curse, and stared dismally at the two or three drops of
moisture on the apron.
He shuddered.
"Well! I suppose I shall be the first. Phew! Anyhow, I shall be a Martyr.
That's something. But it is a filthy death, nevertheless. I wonder if it
hurts as much as they say."
Presently a thought occurred to him--he groped between his feet. A
little drop was still in the broken end of the tube, and he drank that to
make sure. It was better to make sure. At any rate, he would not fail.
Then it dawned upon him that there was no further need to escape the
Bacteriologist. In Wellington Street he told the cabman to stop, and got
out. He slipped on the step, and his head felt queer. It was rapid stuff
this cholera poison. He waved his cabman out of existence, so to speak,
and stood on the pavement with his arms folded upon his breast
awaiting the arrival of the Bacteriologist. There was something tragic
in his pose. The sense of imminent death gave him a certain dignity. He
greeted his pursuer with a defiant laugh.
"Vive l'Anarchie! You are too late, my friend. I have drunk it. The
cholera is abroad!"
The Bacteriologist from his cab beamed curiously at him through his
spectacles. "You have drunk it! An Anarchist! I see now." He was
about to say something more, and then checked himself. A smile hung
in the corner of his mouth. He opened the apron of his cab as if to
descend, at which the Anarchist waved him a dramatic farewell and
strode off