That man's career would change utterly, from that moment; thence to the grave it would be wholly different from the career which his first act as a child had arranged for him.Indeed, it might be that if he had gone to the well he would have ended his career on a throne, and that omitting to do it would set him upon a career that would lead to beggary and a pauper's grave.For instance: if at any time--say in boyhood--Columbus had skipped the triflingest little link in the chain of acts projected and made inevitable by his first childish act, it would have changed his whole subsequent life, and he would have become a priest and died obscure in an Italian village, and America would not have been discovered for two centuries afterward.I know this.To skip any one of the billion acts in Columbus's chain would have wholly changed his life.I have examined his billion of possible careers, and in only one of them occurs the discovery of America.You people do not suspect that all of your acts are of one size and importance, but it is true; to snatch at an appointed fly is as big with fate for you as is any other appointed act--""As the conquering of a continent, for instance?""Yes.Now, then, no man ever does drop a link--the thing has never happened! Even when he is trying to make up his mind as to whether he will do a thing or not, that itself is a link, an act, and has its proper place in his chain; and when he finally decides an act, that also was the thing which he was absolutely certain to do.You see, now, that a man will never drop a link in his chain.He cannot.If he made up his mind to try, that project would itself be an unavoidable link--a thought bound to occur to him at that precise moment, and made certain by the first act of his babyhood."It seemed so dismal!
"He is a prisoner for life," I said sorrowfully, "and cannot get free.""No, of himself he cannot get away from the consequences of his first childish act.But I can free him."I looked up wistfully.
"I have changed the careers of a number of your villagers."I tried to thank him, but found it difficult, and let it drop.
"I shall make some other changes.You know that little Lisa Brandt?""Oh yes, everybody does.My mother says she is so sweet and so lovely that she is not like any other child.She says she will be the pride of the village when she grows up; and its idol, too, just as she is now.""I shall change her future."
"Make it better?" I asked.
"Yes.And I will change the future of Nikolaus."I was glad, this time, and said, "I don't need to ask about his case; you will be sure to do generously by him.""It is my intention."
Straight off I was building that great future of Nicky's in my imagination, and had already made a renowned general of him and hofmeister at the court, when I noticed that Satan was waiting for me to get ready to listen again.I was ashamed of having exposed my cheap imaginings to him, and was expecting some sarcasms, but it did not happen.He proceeded with his subject:
"Nicky's appointed life is sixty-two years.""That's grand!" I said.
"Lisa's, thirty-six.But, as I told you, I shall change their lives and those ages.Two minutes and a quarter from now Nikolaus will wake out of his sleep and find the rain blowing in.It was appointed that he should turn over and go to sleep again.But I have appointed that he shall get up and close the window first.That trifle will change his career entirely.He will rise in the morning two minutes later than the chain of his life had appointed him to rise.By consequence, thenceforth nothing will ever happen to him in accordance with the details of the old chain." He took out his watch and sat looking at it a few moments, then said: "Nikolaus has risen to close the window.His life is changed, his new career has begun.There will be consequences."It made me feel creepy; it was uncanny.
"But for this change certain things would happen twelve days from now.
For instance, Nikolaus would save Lisa from drowning.He would arrive on the scene at exactly the right moment--four minutes past ten, the long-ago appointed instant of time--and the water would be shoal, the achievement easy and certain.But he will arrive some seconds too late, now; Lisa will have struggled into deeper water.He will do his best, but both will drown.""Oh, Satan! oh, dear Satan!" I cried, with the tears rising in my eyes, "save them! Don't let it happen.I can't bear to lose Nikolaus, he is my loving playmate and friend; and think of Lisa's poor mother!"I clung to him and begged and pleaded, but he was not moved.He made me sit down again, and told me I must hear him out.
"I have changed Nikolaus's life, and this has changed Lisa's.If I had not done this, Nikolaus would save Lisa, then he would catch cold from his drenching; one of your race's fantastic and desolating scarlet fevers would follow, with pathetic after-effects; for forty-six years he would lie in his bed a paralytic log, deaf, dumb, blind, and praying night and day for the blessed relief of death.Shall I change his life back?""Oh no! Oh, not for the world! In charity and pity leave it as it is.""It is best so.I could not have changed any other link in his life and done him so good a service.He had a billion possible careers, but not one of them was worth living; they were charged full with miseries and disasters.But for my intervention he would do his brave deed twelve days from now--a deed begun and ended in six minutes--and get for all reward those forty-six years of sorrow and suffering I told you of.It is one of the cases I was thinking of awhile ago when I said that sometimes an act which brings the actor an hour's happiness and self-satisfaction is paid for--or punished--by years of suffering."I wondered what poor little Lisa's early death would save her from.He answered the thought: