The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale
filled the silent Mr Verloc with inward consternation. He confounded
causes with effects more than was excusable; the most distinguished
propagandists with impulsive bomb throwers; assumed organisation where in
the nature of things it could not exist; spoke of the social
revolutionary party one moment as of a perfectly disciplined army, where
the word of chiefs was supreme, and at another as if it had been the
loosest association of desperate brigands that ever camped in a mountain
gorge. Once Mr Verloc had opened his mouth for a protest, but the
raising of a shapely, large white hand arrested him. Very soon he became
too appalled to even try to protest. He listened in a stillness of dread
which resembled the immobility of profound attention.
“A series of outrages,” Mr Vladimir continued calmly, “executed here in
this country; not only _planned_ here—that would not do—they would not
mind. Your friends could set half the Continent on fire without
influencing the public opinion here in favour of a universal repressive
legislation. They will not look outside their backyard here.”
Mr Verloc cleared his throat, but his heart failed him, and he said
nothing.
“These outrages need not be especially sanguinary,” Mr Vladimir went on,
as if delivering a scientific lecture, “but they must be sufficiently
startling—effective. Let them be directed against buildings, for
instance. What is the fetish of the hour that all the bourgeoisie
recognise—eh, Mr Verloc?”
Mr Verloc opened his hands and shrugged his shoulders slightly.
“You are too lazy to think,” was Mr Vladimir’s comment upon that gesture.
“Pay attention to what I say. The fetish of to-day is neither royalty
nor religion. Therefore the palace and the church should be left alone.
You understand what I mean, Mr Verloc?”
The dismay and the scorn of Mr Verloc found vent in an attempt at levity.
“Perfectly. But what of the Embassies? A series of attacks on the
various Embassies,” he began; but he could not withstand the cold,
watchful stare of the First Secretary.
“You can be facetious, I see,” the latter observed carelessly. “That’s
all right. It may enliven your oratory at socialistic congresses. But
this room is no place for it. It would be infinitely safer for you to
follow carefully what I am saying. As you are being called upon to
furnish facts instead of cock-and-bull stories, you had better try to
make your profit off what I am taking the trouble to explain to you. The
sacrosanct fetish of to-day is science. Why don’t you get some of your
friends to go for that wooden-faced panjandrum—eh? Is it not part of
these institutions which must be swept away before the F. P. comes
along?”
Mr Verloc said nothing. He was afraid to open his lips lest a groan
should escape him.
“This is what you should try for. An attempt upon a crowned head or on a
president is sensational enough in a way, but not so much as it used to
be. It has entered into the general conception of the existence of all
chiefs of state. It’s almost conventional—especially since so many
presidents have been assassinated. Now let us take an outrage upon—say a
church. Horrible enough at first sight, no doubt, and yet not so
effective as a person of an ordinary mind might think. No matter how
revolutionary and anarchist in inception, there would be fools enough to
give such an outrage the character of a religious manifestation. And
that would detract from the especial alarming significance we wish to
give to the act. A murderous attempt on a restaurant or a theatre would
suffer in the same way from the suggestion of non-political passion: the
exasperation of a hungry man, an act of social revenge. All this is used
up; it is no longer instructive as an object lesson in revolutionary
anarchism. Every newspaper has ready-made phrases to explain such
manifestations away. I am about to give you the philosophy of bomb
throwing from my point of view; from the point of view you pretend to
have been serving for the last eleven years. I will try not to talk
above your head. The sensibilities of the class you are attacking are
soon blunted. Property seems to them an indestructible thing. You can’t
count upon their emotions either of pity or fear for very long. A bomb
outrage to have any influence on public opinion now must go beyond the
intention of vengeance or terrorism. It must be purely destructive. It
must be that, and only that, beyond the faintest suspicion of any other
object. You anarchists should make it clear that you are perfectly
determined to make a clean sweep of the whole social creation. But how
to get that appallingly absurd notion into the heads of the middle
classes so that there should be no mistake? That’s the question. By
directing your blows at something outside the ordinary passions of
humanity is the answer. Of course, there is art. A bomb in the National
Gallery would make some noise. But it would not be serious enough. Art
has never been their fetish. It’s like breaking a few back windows in a
man’s house; whereas, if you want to make him really sit up, you must try
at least to raise the roof. There would be some screaming of course, but
from whom? Artists—art critics and such like—people of no account.
Nobody minds what they say. But there is learning—science. Any imbecile
that has got an income believes in that. He does not know why, but he
believes it matters somehow. It is the sacrosanct fetish. All the
damned professors are radicals at heart. Let them know that their great
panjandrum has got to go too, to make room for the Future of the
Proletariat. A howl from all these intellectual idiots is bound to help
forward the labours of the Milan Conference. They will be writing to the
papers. Their indignation would be above suspicion, no material
interests being openly at stake, and it will alarm every selfishness of
the class which should be impressed. They believe that in some
mysterious way science is at the source of their material prosperity.
They do. And the absurd ferocity of such a demonstration will affect
them more profoundly than the mangling of a whole street—or theatre—full
of their own kind. To that last they can always say: ‘Oh! it’s mere
class hate.’ But what is one to say to an act of destructive ferocity so
absurd as to be incomprehensible, inexplicable, almost unthinkable; in
fact, mad? Madness alone is truly terrifying, inasmuch as you cannot
placate it either by threats, persuasion, or bribes. Moreover, I am a
civilised man. I would never dream of directing you to organise a mere
butchery, even if I expected the best results from it. But I wouldn’t
expect from a butchery the result I want. Murder is always with us. It
is almost an institution. The demonstration must be against
learning—science. But not every science will do. The attack must have
all the shocking senselessness of gratuitous blasphemy. Since bombs are
your means of expression, it would be really telling if one could throw a
bomb into pure mathematics. But that is impossible. I have been trying
to educate you; I have expounded to you the higher philosophy of your
usefulness, and suggested to you some serviceable arguments. The
practical application of my teaching interests _you_ mostly. But from
the moment I have undertaken to interview you I have also given some
attention to the practical aspect of the question. What do you think of
having a go at astronomy?”
For sometime already Mr Verloc’s immobility by the side of the arm-chair
resembled a state of collapsed coma—a sort of passive insensibility
interrupted by slight convulsive starts, such as may be observed in the
domestic dog having a nightmare on the hearthrug. And it was in an
uneasy doglike growl that he repeated the word:
“Astronomy.”
He had not recovered thoroughly as yet from that state of bewilderment
brought about by the effort to follow Mr Vladimir’s rapid incisive
utterance. It had overcome his power of assimilation. It had made him
angry. This anger was complicated by incredulity. And suddenly it
dawned upon him that all this was an elaborate joke. Mr Vladimir
exhibited his white teeth in a smile, with dimples on his round, full
face posed with a complacent inclination above the bristling bow of his
neck-tie. The favourite of intelligent society women had assumed his
drawing-room attitude accompanying the delivery of delicate witticisms.
Sitting well forward, his white hand upraised, he seemed to hold
delicately between his thumb and forefinger the subtlety of his
suggestion.
“There could be nothing better. Such an outrage combines the greatest
possible regard for humanity with the most alarming display of ferocious
imbecility. I defy the ingenuity of journalists to persuade their public
that any given member of the proletariat can have a personal grievance
against astronomy. Starvation itself could hardly be dragged in
there—eh? And there are other advantages. The whole civilised world has
heard of Greenwich. The very boot-blacks in the basement of Charing
Cross Station know something of it. See?”
The features of Mr Vladimir, so well known in the best society by their
humorous urbanity, beamed with cynical self-satisfaction, which would
have astonished the intelligent women his wit entertained so exquisitely.
“Yes,” he continued, with a contemptuous smile, “the blowing up of the
first meridian is bound to raise a howl of execration.”
“A difficult business,” Mr Verloc mumbled, feeling that this was the only
safe thing to say.
“What is the matter? Haven’t you the whole gang under your hand? The
very pick of the basket? That old terrorist Yundt is here. I see him
walking about Piccadilly in his green havelock almost every day. And
Michaelis, the ticket-of-leave apostle—you don’t mean to say you don’t
know where he is? Because if you don’t, I can tell you,” Mr Vladimir
went on menacingly. “If you imagine that you are the only one on the
secret fund list, you are mistaken.”
This perfectly gratuitous suggestion caused Mr Verloc to shuffle his feet
slightly.
“And the whole Lausanne lot—eh? Haven’t they been flocking over here at
the first hint of the Milan Conference? This is an absurd country.”
“It will cost money,” Mr Verloc said, by a sort of instinct.
“That cock won’t fight,” Mr Vladimir retorted, with an amazingly genuine
English accent. “You’ll get your screw every month, and no more till
something happens. And if nothing happens very soon you won’t get even
that. What’s your ostensible occupation? What are you supposed to live
by?”
“I keep a shop,” answered Mr Verloc.
“A shop! What sort of shop?”
“Stationery, newspapers. My wife—”
“Your what?” interrupted Mr Vladimir in his guttural Central Asian tones.
“My wife.” Mr Verloc raised his husky voice slightly. “I am married.”
“That be damned for a yarn,” exclaimed the other in unfeigned
astonishment. “Married! And you a professed anarchist, too! What is
this confounded nonsense? But I suppose it’s merely a manner of
speaking. Anarchists don’t marry. It’s well known. They can’t. It
would be apostasy.”
“My wife isn’t one,” Mr Verloc mumbled sulkily. “Moreover, it’s no
concern of yours.”
“Oh yes, it is,” snapped Mr Vladimir. “I am beginning to be convinced
that you are not at all the man for the work you’ve been employed on.
Why, you must have discredited yourself completely in your own world by
your marriage. Couldn’t you have managed without? This is your virtuous
attachment—eh? What with one sort of attachment and another you are
doing away with your usefulness.”
Mr Verloc, puffing out his cheeks, let the air escape violently, and that