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Updated: May 5, 2025
"Cut off." Next morning the headlines of the newspapers blazed out the news of the meeting at the Queen's Hall, and the world read the words of Sarakoff. Strange to say, most of the papers seemed inclined to view the situation seriously.
Here Sarakoff suddenly pushed open a door and I followed him. We found ourselves in a brilliantly illuminated restaurant. A band was playing. We sat down at an unoccupied table. "Harden, I wish to try an experiment. I want to see if, by an effort, we can get back to the old point of view." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered champagne, cognac, oysters and caviare.
Sarakoff and I scrambled to our feet, pushed our way frantically through the throng, reached the corridor and dashed down it. Fear of indescribable intensity had flamed in our souls, and in a moment we found ourselves running violently down Regent Street. It had been a wet night. Pools of water lay on the glistening pavements, but the rain had ceased.
Harden, will you be so good as to ask your friend his name is Sarakoff, I believe to come in here?" I rose without haste and fetched the Russian. He behaved in an extremely quiet manner, nodded to Alberan and bowed to the Home Secretary. Sir Robert gave a brief outline of the conversation he had had with me, which Sarakoff listened to with an absolutely expressionless face.
Drive to Harley Street like the devil." Inside the cab I lay back, my mind in a whirl. "We begin the experiment to-morrow," said Sarakoff at last. "Have you made plans as I told you?" "Yes yes. Of course. Only I never believed it possible." I controlled myself and sat up. "I fixed on Birmingham. It seemed best but I never dreamed " "Good!" he exclaimed. "Birmingham, then!"
Sarakoff stood in the centre of the room, his hands deep in his pockets, his pipe sending up clouds of smoke, his tall muscular frame tilted back. His eyes were fixed on an extraordinary object that crawled slowly over the polished floor. It was a gigantic tortoise a specimen of Testudo elephantopus a huge cumbersome brute.
All those things that depended on worldly ambition, self-gratification, physical pleasure, conceit, lust, hatred, passion, egotism, selfishness, vanity, avarice, sensuality and so on, are undermined and rendered paralysed by the germ. What remains? Why, in most people, practically nothing remains." "Even so," I said, "I don't see why Sarakoff should go into a trance."
The stuff was nasty. It seemed like weak methylated spirits. "Continue," said Sarakoff firmly; "let us drink ourselves into the glorious past, whither the wizard of alcohol transports all men." I took two more gulps. Sarakoff did the same. It was something in the nature of a battle against an invisible resistance. I gripped the table hard with my free hand, and took another gulp.
I apologized. I was quite calm and smiling. But there the fact remained I had lost my voice. I had failed in public." "Extraordinary," muttered Sarakoff. "Are you sure it was not just nervousness?" "No, I'm certain of that. I felt absolutely self-possessed; far more so that I usually do, and that is saying a lot. No, my voice has gone. The Blue Disease has destroyed it.
The blue stain rapidly vanished from eyes, skin and nails.... I regained my waking sense on the evening of the seventh day and found myself in a small country cottage whither Thornduck had borne me in a motor-car, fearing lest awakened London might seek some revenge on the discoverers of the germ. Sarakoff lay on a couch beside me, still fast asleep.
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