ecovering_] it isnt true, you know. Let us keep sane.

CONFUCIUS [_to the Archbishop_] You wish us to understand that the
illustrious ancestors of the Accountant General communicated to you a
secret by which you could attain the age of three hundred years.

THE ARCHBISHOP. No. Nothing of the kind. They simply believed that
mankind could live any length of time it knew to be absolutely necessary
to save civilization from extinction. I did not share their belief: at
least I was not conscious of sharing it: I thought I was only amused by
it. To me my father-in-law and his brother were a pair of clever
cranks who had talked one another into a fixed idea which had become a
monomania with them. It was not until I got into serious difficulties
with the pension authorities after turning seventy that I began to
suspect the truth.

CONFUCIUS. The truth?

THE ARCHBISHOP. Yes, Mr Chief Secretary: the truth. Like all
revolutionary truths, it began as a joke. As I shewed no signs of ageing
after forty-five, my wife used to make fun of me by saying that I was
certainly going to live three hundred years. She was sixty-eight when
she died; and the last thing she said to me, as I sat by her bedside
holding her hand, was 'Bill: you really don't look fifty. I wonder--'
She broke off, and fell asleep wondering, and never awoke. Then I began
to wonder too. That is the explanation of the three hundred years, Mr
Secretary.

CONFUCIUS. It is very ingenious, Mr Archbishop. And very well told.

BURGE-LUBIN. Of course you understand that _I_ don't for a moment
suggest the very faintest doubt of your absolute veracity, Archbishop.
You know that, don't you?

THE ARCHBISHOP. Quite, Mr President. Only you don't believe me: that is
all. I do not expect you to. In your place I should not believe. You had
better have a look at the films. [_Pointing to the Accountant General_]
He believes.

BURGE-LUBIN. But the drowning? What about the drowning? A man might get
drowned once, or even twice if he was exceptionally careless. But he
couldn't be drowned four times. He would run away from water like a mad
dog.

THE ARCHBISHOP. Perhaps Mr Chief Secretary can guess the explanation of
that.

CONFUCIUS. To keep your secret, you had to die.

BURGE-LUBIN. But dash it all, man, he isn't dead.

CONFUCIUS. It is socially impossible not to do what everybody else does.
One must die at the usual time.

BARNABAS. Of course. A simple point of honour.

CONF