'"Justified! How could that be?" I asked. I was astonished, as you may
imagine, at the answer I had got. The doctor wheeled round his chair and
looked steadily at me for a moment before he answered.
'"I suppose you are not a man of science yourself? No; then it would be
of no use my going into detail. I have always been firmly opposed myself
to any partnership between physiology and psychology. I believe that
both are bound to suffer. No one recognizes more decidedly than I do the
impassable gulf, the fathomless abyss that separates the world of
consciousness from the sphere of matter. We know that every change of
consciousness is accompanied by a rearrangement of the molecules in the
grey matter; and that is all. What the link between them is, or why
they occur together, we do not know, and most authorities believe that
we never can know. Yet, I will tell you that as I did my work, the knife
in my hand, I felt convinced, in spite of all theories, that what lay
before me was not the brain of a dead woman--not the brain of a human
being at all. Of course I saw the face; but it was quite placid, devoid
of all expression. It must have been a beautiful face, no doubt, but I
can honestly say that I would not have looked in that face when there
was life behind it for a thousand guineas, no, nor for twice that sum."
'"My dear sir," I said, "you surprise me extremely. You say that it was
not the brain of a human being. What was it then?"
'"The brain of a devil." He spoke quite coolly, and never moved a
muscle. "The brain of a devil," he repeated, "and I have no doubt that
Black found some way of putting an end to it. I don't blame him if he
did. Whatever Mrs. Black was, she was not fit to stay in this world.
Will you have anything more? No? Good-night, good-night."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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