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extremity only such a folly could command the attention of the world.
    But command it to what? If the final catastrophe were at hand, its date computed irrevocably into the mechanism of creation, then why proclaim it at all? What counsel could prevail against the nightmare knowledge? What prayer had potency against a rescript written from eternity? There was a deep pathos in Jean Marie’s response to the questions:
    My dear brothers and sisters, my little children, we all fear death, we shrink from the suffering which may precede it. We quail from the mystery of the last leap, which we must all make, into eternity. But we are followers of the Lord, the Son of God who suffered and died in human flesh. We are the inheritors of the good news which he left with us: that death is the gateway to life, that it is a leap, not into darkness, but into the hands of Everlasting Mercy.
    It is an act of trust, an act of love, by which, as lovers do, we abandon ourselves to become one with the Beloved.
    The knock at the door startled Mendelius. His daughter, Katrin, entered, hesitant and timid. She was in her dressing gown, her blonde hair tied back with a pink ribbon, her face scrubbed clean of make-up, her eyes red with weeping. She asked: “May I talk with you, Papa?”
    “Of course, sweetheart.” He was instantly solicitous.
    “What’s the matter? You’ve been crying.” He kissed her gently and led her to a chair.
    “Now tell me what’s bothering you.”
    “This trip to Paris. Mother’s still very angry about it. She says I have to discuss it with you. She doesn’t understand, Papa truly she doesn’t. I’m nineteen. I’m a woman now, just as much as she is and
    …”
     
    “Take it easy, little one! Let’s start from the beginning.
    You want to go to Paris for the summer. Who’s going with you?”
    “Franz, of course! You know we’ve been going together for ages now. You said you liked him very much.”
    “I do. He’s a very nice young man. A promising painter, too. Are you in love with him?”
    “Yes, I am.” There was a note of defiance in the answer.
    “And he’s in love with me!”
    “Then I’m very happy for you both, little one!” He smiled and patted her hand.
    “It’s the best feeling in the world. So what comes next? You’ve talked about marriage? You want to become engaged? Is that it?”
    “No, Papa.” She was very firm about it.
    “Not yet, anyway. And that’s the point Mama refused to understand.”
    “Have you tried explaining it to her?”
    “Over and over! But she just won’t listen.”
    “Try me then,” said Mendelius gently.
    “It’s not easy. I’m not good with words like you. The thing is, I’m afraid; we’re both afraid.”
    “Of what?”
    “Of always… just that. Of getting married and having children and trying to make a home, while the whole world could tumble round our ears in a day.” Suddenly she was passionate and eloquent.
    “You older ones don’t understand.
    You’ve survived a war. You’ve left us! All along the borders there are rocket launchers and missile silos. The oil’s running out so we’re using atom power and burying the waste that will one day poison our children. You’ve given us everything except tomorrow! I don’t want my baby to be born in a bomb shelter and die of radiation sickness! All we’ve got is today and loving each other and we think we’ve got a right, at least to that!”
    Her vehemence shocked him like water dashed in his face.
    The little blonde madchen he had dandled on his knee was gone for ever. In her place was an angry young woman, filled with a deep resentment against himself and his whole generation. The grim thought struck him that perhaps it was for her and all the others like her that Jean Marie Barette had written his prescription for life in the last days. Certainly it was not the young ones who had suppressed it, but the men of his generation, the elders, the seeming wise, the perennial pragmatists, living,