The Flaw in the Crystal Part 13

"But you told me--you told me you were giving yourself up to it. You said that was why you couldn't see us."

"It _was_ why. Do sit down, Milly."

They sat down, still staring at each other. Agatha faced the window, so that the light ravaged her.

Milly went on. "That was why I left you alone. I thought you were going on. You said you wouldn't let him go; you promised me you'd keep on ..."

"I did keep on, till ..."

But Milly had only paused to hold down a sob. Her voice broke out again, clear, harsh, accusing.

"What were you doing all that time?"

"Of course," said Agatha, "you're bound to think I let you down."

"What am I to think?"

"Milly--I asked you not to think it was me."

"Of course I knew it was the Power, not you. But you had hold of it. You did something. Something that other people can't do. You did it for one night, and that night he was well. You kept on for six weeks and he was well all that time. You leave off for three days--I know when you left off--and he's ill again. And then you tell me that it isn't you. It _is_ you; and if it's you you can't give him up. You can't stand by, Aggy, and refuse to help him. You know what it was. How can you bear to let him suffer? How can you?"

"I can because I must."

"And why must you?"

Milly raised her head more in defiance than in supplication.

"Because--I told you that I might give out. Well--I have given out."

"You told me that the Power can't give out--that you've only got to hold on to it--that it's no effort. I'm only asking you, Aggy, to hold on."

"You don't know what you're asking."

"I'm asking you only to do what you have done, to give five minutes in the day to him. You said it was enough. Only five minutes. It isn't much to ask."

Agatha sighed.

"What difference could it make to you--five minutes?"

"You don't understand," said Agatha.

"I do. I don't ask you to see him, or to bother with him; only to go on as you were doing."

"You don't understand. It isn't possible to explain it. I can't go on."

"I see. You're tired, Aggy. Well--not now, not to-day. But later, when you're rested, won't you?"

"Oh, Milly, dear Milly, if I could ..."

"You can. You will. I know you will ..."

"No. You must understand it. Never again. Never again."

"Never?"

"Never."

There was a long silence. At last Milly's voice crept through, strained and thin, feebly argumentative, the voice of a thing defeated and yet unconvinced.

"I don't understand you, Agatha. You say it isn't you; you say you're only a connecting link; that you do nothing; that the Power that does it is inexhaustible; that there's nothing it can't do, nothing that it won't do for us, and yet you go and cut yourself off from it--deliberately--from the thing you believe to be divine."

"I haven't cut myself off from it."

"You've cut Harding off," said Milly. "If you refuse to hold him."

"That wouldn't cut him off--from It. But Milly, holding him was bad; it wasn't safe."

"It saved him."

"All the same, Milly, it wasn't safe. The thing itself isn't."

"The Power? The divine thing?"

"Yes. It's divine and it's--it's terrible. It does terrible things to us."

"How could it? If it's divine, wouldn't it be compa.s.sionate? Do you suppose it's less compa.s.sionate than--_you_ are? Why, Agatha, when it's goodness and purity itself----?"

"Goodness and purity are terrible. We don't understand it. It's got its own laws. What you call prayer's all right--it would be safe, I mean--I suppose it might get answered anyway, however we fell short. But this--this is different. It's the highest, Milly; and if you rush in and make for the highest, can't you see, oh, can't you see how it might break you? Can't you see what it requires of _you_? Absolute purity. I told you, Milly. You have to be crystal to it--crystal without a flaw."

"And--if there were a flaw?"

"The whole thing, don't you see, would break down; it would be no good.

In fact, it would be awfully dangerous."

"To whom?"

"To you--to them, the people you're helping. You make a connection; you smash down all the walls so that you--you get through to each other, and supposing there was something wrong with _you_, and It doesn't work any longer (the Power, I mean), don't you see that you might do harm where you were trying to help?"

"But--Agatha--there was nothing wrong with you."

"How do I know? Can anybody be sure there's nothing wrong with them?"

"You think," said Milly, "there was a flaw somewhere?"

"There must have been--somewhere ..."

"What was it? Can't you find out? Can't you think? Think."