It is marvellous, I admit. But the very
definition puts me beyond your power."
"Why?"
"Because there is not a human being alive, and I do not believe that a
human being ever lived, who had the sense of independent individuality
which I have. Let a man have the very smallest doubt concerning his own
independence--let that doubt be ever so transitory and produced by any
accident whatsoever--and he is at your mercy."
"And you are sure that no accident could shake your faith in yourself?"
"My consciousness of myself, you mean. No. I am not sure. But, my dear
Unorna, I am very careful in guarding against accidents of all sorts,
for I have attempted to resuscitate a great many dead people and I have
never succeeded, and I know that a false step on a slippery staircase
may be quite as fatal as a teaspoonful of prussic acid--or an unrequited
passion. I avoid all these things and many others. If I did not, and if
you had any object in getting me under your influence, you would
succeed sooner or later. Perhaps the day is not far distant when I will
voluntarily sleep under your hand."
Unorna glanced quickly at him.
"And in that case," he added, "I am sure you could make me believe
anything you pleased."
"What are you trying to make me understand?" she asked, suspiciously,
for he had never before spoken of such a possibility.
"You look anxious and weary," he said in a tone of sympathy in which
Unorna could not detect the least false modulation, though she fancied
from his fixed gaze that he meant her to understand something which he
could not say.
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