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"Prendick be damned!" said he. "Shut-up, that's your name. Mister Shut-up." It was no good answering the brute; but I certainly did not expect his next move. He held out his hand to the gangway by which Montgomery stood talking to a massive grey-haired man in dirty-blue flannels, who had apparently just come aboard. "That way, Mister Blasted Shut-up! that way!" roared the captain.
"Why did you set your people onto me when I was in the hut?" "We felt sure of catching you, and bringing you out of danger. Afterwards we drew away from the scent, for your good." I mused. It seemed just possible. Then I remembered something again. "But I saw," said I, "in the enclosure " "That was the puma." "Look here, Prendick," said Montgomery, "you're a silly ass!
"Listen to me for a moment," said the steady voice of Moreau; "and then say what you will." "Well?" said I. He coughed, thought, then shouted: "Latin, Prendick! bad Latin, schoolboy Latin; but try and understand. Hi non sunt homines; sunt animalia qui nos habemus vivisected. A humanising process. I will explain. Come ashore." I laughed. "A pretty story," said I. "They talk, build houses.
"Is it still to be this and that? Is he dead indeed?" "Is there a Law?" repeated the man in white. "Is there a Law, thou Other with the Whip?" "He is dead," said the hairy-grey Thing. And they all stood watching us. "Prendick," said Montgomery, turning his dull eyes to me. "He's dead, evidently." I had been standing behind him during this colloquy. I began to see how things lay with them.
I told him my name, Edward Prendick, and how I had taken to Natural History as a relief from the dulness of my comfortable independence. He seemed interested in this. "I've done some science myself. I did my Biology at University College, getting out the ovary of the earthworm and the radula of the snail, and all that. Lord! It's ten years ago. But go on! go on! tell me about the boat."
Sixteen years being bullied by nurses and schoolmasters at their own sweet will; five in London grinding hard at medicine, bad food, shabby lodgings, shabby clothes, shabby vice, a blunder, I didn't know any better, and hustled off to this beastly island. Ten years here! What's it all for, Prendick? Are we bubbles blown by a baby?" It was hard to deal with such ravings.
I saw him administer a dose of the raw brandy to M'ling, and saw the five figures melt into one vague patch. "Sing!" I heard Montgomery shout, "sing all together, 'Confound old Prendick! That's right; now again, 'Confound old Prendick!" The black group broke up into five separate figures, and wound slowly away from me along the band of shining beach.
I felt a gust of intense irritation, which passed as quickly as it came. I flung myself into the chair again, and pressed my hands on my forehead. The puma began once more. Montgomery came round behind me and put his hand on my shoulder. "Look here, Prendick," he said, "I had no business to let you drift out into this silly island of ours. But it's not so bad as you feel, man.
All about me the green masses of the thicket were swaying and cracking as the Beast People came rushing together. One face and then another appeared. "Don't kill it, Prendick!" cried Moreau. "Don't kill it!" and I saw him stooping as he pushed through under the fronds of the big ferns.
The rest stood silent watching. They may once have been animals; but I never before saw an animal trying to think. "AND now, Prendick, I will explain," said Doctor Moreau, so soon as we had eaten and drunk. "I must confess that you are the most dictatorial guest I ever entertained. I warn you that this is the last I shall do to oblige you.
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