Evening star. [volume], May 04, 1947, Page 7, Image 92

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
On The Ledge
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BY DOROTHY MARVIN
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The famous scientist stood
there, ready to jump. It
was to be a final gesture
A Short Short Story
Standing calmly on the ten-inch ledge,
Gilchrist looked down at the outer reaches
of the crowd gathered on the street below.
The time, five in the afternoon. The crowd,
several thousand, more pressing in eagerly.
Gilchrist was uncomfortably cramped, facing
the rough concrete wall with arms extended
as one crucified, but he couldn't see that that
mattered. Soon he would be more uncomfort
able still, and then he would bç at peace —
spread out on the marquee eight stories down.
When the evening papers wire going to
press, they'd received by special messenger
a typed letter from Dr. William Gilchrist.
The letter explained how, when and especially
why Dr. Gilchrist would jump from the mid
dle story of his hotel. But if the letter had
merely commented on the weather, it would
still have been worth a box on page one.
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improvements on the atomic bomb.
Τ he fact that Gilchrist was going to commit
suicide as a protest against new threats of
war and what he felt was the misuse of peace,
was one more wonderful break for every eve
ning paper. But even the editors realized that
this was more than a news story. They took
time to notify the police; Washington learned
about it right away. Plenty of people who
heard the news realized that the loss of Gil
christ's brain was the worst threat to peace
yet. The doctor could not be spared for a
dramatic gesture. Friends, police, government
officials raced to stop him.
But when police dangled ropes in easy
reach, from a tiny closet window a floor
above, Gilchrist merely shook his tired head.
When a message from his wife was shouted
to him from another window, the scientist
felt a savage stab of loss, but shook his head
again. He had chosen his suicide ledge well.
No landing net could stop him because of the
marquee below. No one could reach him
without hazardous creeping across six feet
of ten-inch ledge. He thought that he could
never have made the trip himself, except that
hp was ralm with the intention of death.
Loud speakers were placed in the Hotel
Spatton across the street, and Gilchrist heard
a battery of voices hastily hooked up: friends,
colleagues, the mayor, a senator and two
cabinet members begged him to grasp the
rope, told him his gesture was tragic, unnec
essary.
Yes, his son had died in the Pacific, they
said, but this was no way to avenge him.
Yes, things did look bad, but — Gilchrist
shook his head to himself. He had thought
through all their arguments on many sleep
less nights. It seemed clear to him, in his
exhaustion, that the bomb had shown once
and for all that man's mind is not enough to
save mankind: the destruction of his own
brain was a small peace-offering for the think
ing he had done toward the waging of wars.
The orange sun, full and near, slid down
behind the Spatton across the street, and Gil
christ judged it as almost time. The crowd
was huge and. he could tell, solemn. That was
the important thing. Several thousand people
who had never seen the actuality of war
would now witness a graphic, messy 170
pound lesson in the proposition that science
alone can save mankind. Quickly, now, before
any scheme could be worked out to stop him.
Now.
Gilchrist made a silent prayer to the God
he knew, turned three-quarters away from
the wall, and —
It was a young man, obviously very drunk
indeed. He was sprawling out of the window
Gilchrist himself had used. "Go "head!" the
drunk said. "Jump. Hurry up. Get going."
Gilchrist, watching the drunk come un
concernedly on the ledge, as if it were the
hotel corridor, felt the beginning of confusion.
But the man was so young. He spoke to him
as he had spoken to a thousand students in
his classes: "Get back in there! You don't
know what you're doing. Get back in there
and sober up!"
But the drunk was not taking orders. To
some invisible pink bird on his left shoulder
he complained, "Isn't that too bad ! Ferfessor
thinks I'm not good 'ribugh f'r decorating
sidewalk. We'll show 'im."
Well, thought Gilchrist, let the darned
young fool jump. It's here or in some war
some day. And then, his anger passing, he
thought again, and in a voice much louder
than he had strength for, he spoke sharply:
"Listen, my boy, you're young. You've got
the world before you. You — " Gilchrist was
stopped by his own amazement. What was he
preaching? While there's life — there's hope.
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ago. Long before he planned his own death
this way.
The drunk was waving his bottle waggishly
at Gilchrist. He'd actually taken a step or
two along the ledge. He was begging, "Jus'
kindly step out of the way, brother, and — "
And then his voice was drowned out by a
curious sound from the crowd below. It rose
harshly and began to beat on Gilchrist's
unbelieving ears. It couldn't be — laughter?
Yes, and there was more of it. And more.
What had become of the scientist's heroic
gesture? Two suicides fighting for room on
one ledge. Yes, perhaps it was grotesque,
funny — so disconcertingly that it struck
him like a blow; his own humor came back
to Gilchrist. He wanted to laugh too, for the
first time in so long. And then, more than
anything else, he wanted to be off that ledge
and safe in a good wide bed, to think things
through and arrive at a different conclusion,
to enjoy the foolishness of mortality.
"What'sa matter?" burbled the drunk sus
piciously. "Want me to go first? Scared?"
"Yes," whispered Gilchrist honestly. His
voice held terror. "Afraid — I'll fall." His
fingers took a tearing hold on the concrete.
He made a little way toward the window.
"Chicken!" said the drunk, moving a little
toward Gilchrist. "Let a real man show you."
Gilchrist moved one hand, catfooted one
foot. Twelve inches gained, then — so much
more slowly — thirteen, fourteen, fifteen. His
nails were spurting blood on the microscopic
notches they tore for themselves. He breathed
the high air, heady with terror, then was
afraid to breathe again because it pushed him
away from the wall. He shut his eyes to close
out the blank wall, the empty air, the grinning
face of the drunk, the — and then he gave up
to hopelessness, swayed.
Suddenly he felt a strong lift, and the
dangling rope was about his chest. The drunk
had a rope too, funny. Must have —
Gilchrist opened his eyes again when he
was lifted onto a stretcher and covered with
He must act, now,
before any scheme
could be worked
out to stop him ...
a blanket. Laboriously he fought up from
shock, whispered to a face that was patently
a policeman's, "Did you get the kid in too?"
The face looked worried. "Yeah. He's out
like a light. Never saw such a faint. He was
scared stiff to go out there."
"Scared?" Gilchrist wondered in a whisper,
accepting a sip of some welcome drink.
"Didn't seem scared, just cocky, and drunk."
"He's no drunk," the policeman tucked
Gilchrist kindly. "No. doctor. He's a psy
chology perfesaer lives down the hall from
you. Told me he admired you, and he would
bring you in with psychology instead of
ropes. .. And he did." said the policeman,
marveling. "All I hadda do for him was get
the crowd laughing." The End