Miss Benson's Beetle

by Rachel Joyce

  Freya moved her magnifying glass to the assistant. She was much older. Too old, really, to be in the field. Tall, big-boned, but frail, dressed in a man’s jacket and loose trousers. She stood at a sideways angle to the camera, gazing off to one side. There was something in her hair. A flower or something. At first Freya couldn’t make it out and then she realized it was a pom-pom and laughed. The old woman must also have suffered some kind of accident: one leg looked stiff and she leaned on a cane. Freya touched the photograph, wanting to know more.

  It was the closeness of the two women that got to her—and their different attitudes to the camera, the young woman looking straight at the lens, while the older one gazed to the side as if a third person in the distance held her eye. As if she no longer needed to demand the attention of the world because her love for the young woman was greater. Mother and daughter? Not quite. But Freya could feel their devotion, even in a black-and-white photograph.

  She looked again at the beetle in the young woman’s hand. Suddenly she couldn’t tell any more if this woman was showing Freya what she’d found, or inviting her to come and see for herself. Turning the photograph, she found a caption.

  The Golden Beetle of New Caledonia. 1983.

  Freya drifted to her desk. Already it was midmorning. She riffled through papers, picking them up and putting them down, as if none of them were the things they should be. She checked the atlas for New Caledonia and found an island shaped like a rolling pin on the other side of the world. She made a coffee that she forgot to drink. She put her eye to the microscope and failed to see. She couldn’t stop thinking of the two women. They seemed to inhabit every path she had not followed, every place she did not know, every friend she had not cared for. Freya felt a sudden tingling through her skin, a wildness in her breathing. A bolt of excitement.

  Swiftly she found her passport, notebooks, boots, toothbrush, and a few vials, and rolled them into her sleeping bag. She didn’t know if she was going to Scotland first, or New Caledonia. She didn’t know how she was going to get there, or when. But the real failure as a woman was not even to try.

  And she was going.

  This one is for you, Nell and Susan.

  When I set out to write a book about beetles and New Caledonia, I knew nothing about either of them. While this might have put some people off, it felt (to me) a very good place to begin.

  Alongside endless online maps—old and new—blogs, vlogs, websites, and articles, the following were invaluable in my research: Pocket Guide to New Caledonia issued by the U.S. War and Navy Department; New Caledonia Illustrated, 1942; Lonely Planet Guide to Vanuatu & New Caledonia; Who Stand Alone, Things Worth While, and Time Well Spent by Evelyn Cheesman; Unsuitable for Ladies: An Anthology of Women Travellers, edited by Jane Robinson; The Blessings of a Good Thick Skirt; Women Travellers and their World by Mary Russell; Collecting, Muensterberger; Beetles by Richard Jones; British Beetles by Norman H. Joy; Fabre’s Book of Insects; The Book of Beetles by Patrice Bouchard; An Inordinate Fondness for Beetles by Arthur V. Evans & Charles L. Bellamy; Living Jewels by Poul Beckmann; Beetle by Adam Dodd; On the Track of Unknown Animals by Bernard Huevelmans; Ten Pound Poms by A. James Hammerton and Alistair Thomson; Singled Out and Perfect Wives by Virginia Nicholson; Stranger in the House by Julie Summers; Austerity Britain by David Kynaston; Prisoner of Japan by Sir Harold Atcherley; Burma Railway Man by Charles Steel.

  Despite all the above, I could not have gotten very far without the kindness, patience, and expert wisdom of several entomologists who not only made time to speak to me, but explained—in words I could understand—their passion for beetles and how vital it is to learn what we have in the world before it is too late. Beulah Garner, senior curator at the Natural History Museum; Adam Hart, professor of science communication, University of Gloucester; Sally-Ann Spence, Oxford University Museum of Natural History and founder of Minibeast Mayhem; Simon Leather, professor of entomology at Harper Adams University: a million thank-yous.

  Thank you to BBC Radio 4 where, years ago, I heard John Humphrys roasting a man about the madly brilliant world of cryptozoology and was so hooked I had to drive straight home and look it up. From there came my idea of an undiscovered gold beetle.

  Thank you to my sister Amy who read many versions and made suggestions that not only turned things around but brought them to life; to my mum, and to my sister Emily, who loved Enid so much she still can’t forgive me for the ending. Thank you to my friends Niamh Cusack and Sarah Edgehill, who also read scraps of early drafts (terrible things) and urged me to keep, keep going.

  Thank you to a man I never knew—my husband’s great uncle Mont—who made a trip from Tilbury to Brisbane on the R.M.S. Orion in the fifties and kindly wrote a very long letter about it.

  Thank you to Lisa Marshall for her generous advice on obstetrics and home-birthing half way up a mountain, and to Professor Dame Sue Black for knowing the answers to everything a person could ask about head wounds, suffocation, the decomposition of a human body, and how it would smell in a 1950s house without heating.

  Thank you to my agent and friend Clare Conville; thank you to Jake Smith-Bosanquet, Alexander Cochran, Kate Burton, and the entire wizzy team at Conville & Walsh. Thank you to Nick Marston, Camilla Young, Katy Battcock, and all at Curtis Brown. Thank you to Clio Seraphim and the amazing team at Penguin Random House U.S.: Avideh Bashirrad, Whitney Frick, Allyson Lord, and Katie Tull. Thank you to everyone at Transworld; to my editor and friend Susanna Wadeson, who has stood by me all these years and knew when exactly to wrench this book out of my hands; to Sharika Teelwah; to Katrina Whone, Kate Samano, Josh Benn, Hazel Orme, and all Doubleday editorial; to my friend Alison Barrow, every writer’s dream publicist; to Bradley Rose; to Emma Burton in marketing; Alice Twomey in audio; to Tom Chicken, Deirdre O’Connell, Emily Harvey, Gary Harley, Hannah Welsh, and all the U.K. sales reps; to Bethan Moore, Natasha Photiou, and all the international sales team; to Catriona Hillerton in production; to Richard Ogle in the art department; to Larry Finlay and Bill Scott-Kerr. Thank you to Neil Gower for the exquisite UK jacket; to Kimberly Glyder for the equally exquisite U.S. jacket. (“Never judge a book by its cover”? Get out of here.) I owe each and every one of you a small gold beetle.

  Thank you to the women in my life. I wrote this for you.

  Thank you, Susan Kamil. We talked about jeweled beetles and friendship over lunch at Claridge’s. I wish I could have shared this with you, too.

  Thank you most of all to my husband, Paul, who patiently reads every page at least six hundred times and still manages to look interested. Who has learned that even when something doesn’t work, it is best to start the sentence with “Yes, it’s very good….” Without you, I wouldn’t keep writing.

  Rachel Joyce: It’s very kind of you both to speak to me today. I appreciate the distance you’ve had to travel—not just physically but also spiritually—in order to make this happen.

  Margery Benson: It’s a pleasure.

  Enid Pretty: And anyway, it’s nice to get a change of scene.

  RJ: I think it’s fair to say your friendship changed your lives—

  EP: Oh no. That’s it. I’m crying already—

  RJ: —but what did you really think of one another when you first met?

  MB: I am not spoiling anything by saying it wasn’t the best circumstances in which to meet a person for the first time. I thought she was awful.

  [They laugh.]

  EP: Looking back, I was the last person Marge needed.

  MB: You were the last person I thought I needed.

  EP: I was on the run. I was in shock. But Marge saved my life, right from the start. And I had watched her for a while, you know, on the station concourse. My first thought was how is this going to work? But I am an optimist. I try to make the best of things.

  RJ: For me, a turning point is where you see yourself in a
shop window, Margery, and realize you like yourself. Until that point, it seems to me, you’ve avoided seeing who you really are.

  EP: I love that moment. It makes me so proud of Marge.

  MB: It takes a long time for some people to face their reflection and like what they see.

  EP: Oh I agree. There’s such pressure on women to look like something they’re not. You know. To try and turn themselves into someone else.

  RJ: Does that include dying your hair?

  EP: Of course it doesn’t. Dying your hair is fun.

  RJ: So what were the turning points for you, Enid?

  EP: A real low point for me was what happened on the RMS Orion. It felt like everything was over.

  MB: I behaved so badly. I am still ashamed to think about that day.

  EP: Yes, it hurt terribly that you abandoned me. But looking back, I don’t see how you could have responded in any other way. You didn’t know how to at that point.

  MB: It was only in meeting you that I learned how.

  EP: Same for me, Marge.

  RJ: Any other moments that took you by surprise?

  MB: Obviously finding out the truth about Enid’s past was a big turning point, though deep down I think I’d known for a while that something terrible had happened. But there were other turning points that—even though they might seem smaller—had a deeper impact. Finding Enid at the camp in Waco and realizing that money was not enough was a big turning point. I realized I wanted to be the kind of woman who could be a friend to another woman. I also believed it was too late.

  EP: It was the same for me. I realized I had to take a risk and follow you to New Caledonia. Relying on a man to get me through was not the answer. Or rather, it wasn’t the answer I wanted for myself any more.

  RJ: What advice would you give to a young woman today?

  MB: Open your own bank account.

  EP: Learn how to change a car tire.

  RJ: Do you think your life has been shaped by men?

  MB: It’s true that we both had a hard beginning, but I wouldn’t want to say that made us the women we are.

  EP: That would take away our spirit.

  MB: I fell in love with the professor at the point in my life when I had to accept I had lost my father. You could say I replaced one lie with another.

  EP: We were expected to be less than we were, and to be happy about that. I realized when I met Marge that I wasn’t.

  RJ: What do you miss about New Caledonia?

  EP: The freedom. Definitely.

  MB: There’s nothing like the first expedition you make. The sense of achievement when you do something you didn’t realize you could do. Coffee has never tasted the same since.

  RJ: What does friendship mean to you?

  MB: My feelings about friendship changed during the course of knowing Enid. I realized that before meeting Enid, I spent a lot of my time trying to throw people off the scent. It was as if I had a mask on my face—and it’s also true that I couldn’t bear to see my face.

  EP: So sad.

  MB: I was always cutting my head out of photographs. But Enid was not the kind of woman who respects boundaries. That was a big lesson for me.

  EP: And you have to be able to disagree.

  MB: Also, surprises. Enid is the person I know best in the world, and she is certainly the person who knows me best. But she never does what I expect.

  EP: All I am saying here is…mules. That’s all I’m saying.

  RJ: What about you, Enid?

  EP: It’s funny. I knew loads of people before I met Marge but I never met someone who was so solid.

  MB: Solid! That’s a good word for it! And I’m even more solid now.

  EP: I needed to become more like Margery, and I guess Marge needed a touch more Enid.

  MB: I still can’t wear pink, though.

  EP: You can’t. No offense, Marge, but it isn’t your color.

  [They laugh so much they have to hold hands.]

  MB: The thing about friendship is that you can’t have that kind of love with every one you meet. A true friendship requires that you put in time. And you have to be prepared to go the whole journey.

  RJ: Mrs. Pope said of you that you hadn’t a political bone between you. Is that right?

  EP: She said that…?

  MB: Everything is political. Everything you do, where you shop, what you buy, how you live your life. You are a member of the world, you have opinions.

  EP: Even if you don’t go round shouting them.

  MB: Exactly. It’s still political.

  RJ: You use the word “vocation” a lot. What exactly do you mean by that?

  EP: Oh that’s a very good question.

  MB: It wasn’t a word I used before I met Enid but it is a very important word. Bigger than something like “follow your dreams.” Dreams imply that the thing you want to do is out of your reach, and airy. Whimsical even. A woman’s vocation is an expression of who she is. There is nothing whimsical about that.

  EP: It’s your calling. It’s the thing that hits you like being punched in the heart.

  MB: You have to learn to believe in yourself despite the evidence. I felt I had a little flame of belief inside me, not a big one, but a little pilot-light-sized flame of belief.

  EP: Whatever it is that you need to do, you’ve got to look after that belief because, let’s face it, no one else is going to do it for you. I mean you could have waited your whole life, Marge, if you were hoping for someone else to tell you to go and find that gold beetle.

  MB: I almost did.

  EP: Yeah but you didn’t. You know what I think?

  MB: No. What?

  EP: I think your love of life kicked in. I think it just wouldn’t let you go.

  RJ: Do you think that need to be brave is essential for all women? Just women?

  MB: It is essential for us all, but I think women have been behind. It takes tenacity and determination to bring about change, and I know many women who have that, but I also see women who allow it to get put away.

  EP: You can’t always blame that on other people. You have to take—what’s the word?

  MB: Responsibility?

  EP [laughing]: Exactly!

  RJ: Men don’t come out of this adventure especially well. There’s a view that they are just stereotypes of the worst kind of masculinity. Do you think that’s a problem?

  MB: Nineteen-fifty was a time of terrible low after two world wars. Both men and women had suffered, and in different ways. There were men, too, who had seen such terrible things they couldn’t come back from them.

  EP: The society we lived in felt so narrow, we had no choice but to escape.

  MB: Besides, there are plenty of stories where men go off on adventures.

  EP: Yes, if men are unhappy, they can read those!

  RJ: What happened to Mundic? Do you know?

  MB: I heard he died in hospital. But I also heard he became a missionary.

  EP: Swings and roundabouts.

  RJ: What do you feel about the end of the novel?

  MB: It still breaks my heart.

  EP: To be honest, I haven’t read it.

  MB: The quality of a life is defined not by its length, but by its depth, its actions, and achievements. It is defined by our ability to love. By these criteria, Enid did a very good job with the years she was given. And I was lucky. I was lucky to get the chance to love someone so much. Every year that she is not with me, her memory becomes simpler, and I hate that.

  EP: I seriously must read the ending.

  MB: Seriously. I don’t think you should.

  RJ: Can you tell us what happened to Gloria? Did Freya find her? Did she find the gold beetle?

 
EP: [laughing] You want us to tell you everything?

  MB: Some things are just what they are, as well as being a sign of something more. I once found a dead blue bird. It was the most beautiful thing, and so delicate. I said to myself, “Do you think it’s a sign? Or just a dead bird?” It was only years later it occurred to me it was both a sign and a dead bird. Sometimes we have to live in the mystery.

  EP: Oh that’s lovely.

  For a long time, I had a feeling I was being followed. I’d look up and see someone, out of the corner of my eye. Or I’d walk into a room and feel certain that even though it was empty, someone was actually there. It wasn’t frightening. Once I sensed a large figure in trousers who seemed to be very interested in our drains. Another time it was a much smaller person, sitting in the driver’s seat of my car. And then it began to dawn on me that it wasn’t just one person but two, and not only that—they were women. One was large, one was small, and I don’t know how but I sensed they had something to tell me.

  After my father died, I had a phone call with a clairvoyant. I was deep in grief and I wanted to be given some reason to believe my father was still present, and still loving me. At one point she said, “What about the two women?”

  I said, “What two women?”

  She said, “I see two women.”

  But that wasn’t what I wanted to hear, and instead I asked another miserable question about my father, and that was how we went on, me asking about him and her giving answers that seemed not at all what I needed. Truthfully, the whole clairvoyant thing just left me feeling even more bereft. But a few months later, I passed two women sitting on a bench. One was whittling a large stick and the other was eating sandwiches. I turned to look again; they weren’t there.