The Complete Works: Fantasy & Sci-Fi Novels, Religious Studies, Poetry & Autobiography. C. S. Lewis
under enemy influence. This is in itself a grave danger. But it also means that to find her would probably mean discovering the enemy’s headquarters. Miss Hardcastle is probably right in maintaining that torture would soon induce Studdock to give up his wife’s address. But as you pointed out, a round-up at their headquarters, an arrest, and the discovery of her husband here in the condition in which the torture would leave him, would produce psychological conditions in the woman which might destroy her faculty. We should thus frustrate one of the purposes for which we want to get her. That is the first objection. The second is, that an attack on enemy headquarters is very risky. They almost certainly have protection of a kind we are not prepared to cope with. And, finally, the man may not know his wife’s address. In that case . . .”
“Oh,” said Wither, “there is nothing I should more deeply deplore. Scientific examination (I cannot allow the word Torture in this context) in cases where the patient doesn’t know the answer is always a fatal mistake. As men of humanity we should neither of us . . . and then, if you go on, the patient naturally does not recover . . . and if you stop, even an experienced operator is haunted by the fear that perhaps he did know after all. It is in every way unsatisfactory.”
“There is, in fact, no way of implementing our instructions except by inducing Studdock to bring his wife here himself.”
“Or else,” said Wither, a little more dreamily than usual, “if it were possible, by inducing in him a much more radical allegiance to our side than he has yet shown. I am speaking, my dear friend, of a real change of heart.”
Frost slightly opened and extended his mouth, which was a very long one, so as to show his white teeth.
“That,” he said, “is a subdivision of the plan I was mentioning. I was saying that he must be induced to send for the woman himself. That, of course, can be done in two ways. Either by supplying him with some motive on the instinctive level, such as fear of us or desire for her; or else by conditioning him to identify himself so completely with the Cause that he will understand the real motive for securing her person and act on it.”
“Exactly . . . exactly,” said Wither. “Your expressions, as always, are a little different from those I would choose myself, but . . .”
“Where is Studdock at present?” said Frost.
“In one of the cells here—on the other side.”
“Under the impression he has been arrested by the ordinary police?”
“That I cannot answer for. I presume he would be. It does not, perhaps, make much difference.”
“And how are you proposing to act?”
“We had proposed to leave him to himself for several hours—to allow the psychological results of the arrest to mature. I have ventured . . . of course, with every regard for humanity . . . to reckon on the value of some slight physical discomforts—he will not have dined, you understand. They have instructions to empty his pockets. One would not wish the young man to relieve any nervous tension that may have arisen by smoking. One wishes the mind to be thrown entirely on its own resources.”
“Of course. And what next?”
“Well, I suppose some sort of examination. That is a point on which I should welcome your advice. I mean, as to whether I, personally, should appear in the first instance. I am inclined to think that the appearance of examination by the ordinary police should be maintained a little longer. Then at a later stage will come the discovery that he is still in our hands. He will probably misunderstand this discovery at first—for several minutes. It would be well to let him realise only gradually that this by no means frees him from the—er—embarrassments arising out of Hingest’s death. I take it that some fuller realisation of his inevitable solidarity with the Institute would then follow. . . .”
“And then you mean to ask him again for his wife?”
“I shouldn’t do it at all like that,” said Wither. “If I might venture to say so, it is one of the disadvantages of that extreme simplicity and accuracy with which you habitually speak (much as we all admire it) that it leaves no room for fine shades. One had rather hoped for a spontaneous outburst of confidence on the part of the young man himself. Anything like a direct demand——”
“The weakness of the plan,” said Frost, “is that you are relying wholly on fear.”
“Fear,” repeated Wither as if he had not heard the word before. “I do not quite follow the connection of thought. I can hardly suppose you are following the opposite suggestion, once made, if I remember rightly, by Miss Hardcastle.”
“What was that?”
“Why,” said Wither, “if I understand her aright she thought of taking scientific measures to render the society of his wife more desirable in the young man’s eyes. Some of the chemical resources . . .”
“You mean an aphrodisiac?”
Wither sighed gently and said nothing.
“That is nonsense,” said Frost. “It isn’t to his wife that a man turns under the influence of aphrodisiacs. But as I was saying, I think it is a mistake to rely wholly on fear. I have observed, over a number of years, that its results are incalculable: especially when the fear is complicated. The patient may get too frightened to move, even in the desired direction. If we have to despair of getting the woman here with her husband’s goodwill, we must use torture and take the consequences. But there are other alternatives. There is desire.”
“I am not sure that I am following you. You have rejected the idea of any medical or chemical approach.”
“I was thinking of stronger desires.”
Neither at this stage of the conversation nor at any other did the Deputy Director look much at the face of Frost; his eyes, as usual, wandered over the whole room or fixed themselves on distant objects. Sometimes they were shut. But either Frost or Wither—it was difficult to say which—had been gradually moving his chair, so that by this time the two men sat with their knees almost touching.
“I had my conversation with Filostrato,” said Frost in his low, clear voice. “I used expressions which must have made my meaning clear if he had any notion of the truth. His senior assistant, Wilkins, was present too. The truth is that neither is really interested. What interests them is the fact that they have succeeded—as they think—in keeping the Head alive and getting it to talk. What it says does not really interest them. As to any question about what is really speaking, they have no curiosity. I went very far. I raised questions about its mode of consciousness—its sources of information. There was no response.”
“You are suggesting, if I understand you,” said Wither, “a movement towards this Mr. Studdock along those lines. If I remember rightly, you rejected fear on the ground that its effects could not really be predicted with the accuracy one might wish. But—ah—would the method now envisaged be any more reliable? I need hardly say that I fully realise a certain disappointment which serious-minded people must feel with such colleagues as Filostrato and his subordinate, Mr. Wilkins.”
“That is the point,” said Frost. “One must guard against the error of supposing that the political and economic dominance of England by the N.I.C.E. is more than a subordinate object: it is individuals that we are really concerned with. A hard unchangeable core of individuals really devoted to the same cause as ourselves—that is what we need and what, indeed, we are under orders to supply. We have not succeeded so far in bringing many people in—really in.”
“There is still no news from Bragdon Wood?”
“No.”
“And you believe that Studdock might really be a suitable person?”
“You must not forget,” said Frost, “that his value does not rest solely on his wife’s clairvoyance. The couple are eugenically interesting. And secondly, I think he can offer no resistance. The hours of fear in the cell, and