Remarkable Creatures

by Tracy Chevalier

  I hated Captain Cury being so nosy but didn’t dare be rude again for he frightened me. “Don’t like him here,” I whispered to Miss Elizabeth. “Don’t trust him. Can’t you get the Days to bring it home now, ma’am?”

  Billy and Davy were sitting on a rock, passing a jug and a loaf of bread between them. They looked as if they would not budge, though it was twilight and frost was already covering the rocks and sand. “They deserve their rest,” Miss Elizabeth said. “The tide will move them along soon enough.”

  At last the brothers wiped their mouths and stood. Once they’d picked up the stretcher, Captain Cury vanished into the gloom towards Charmouth. We headed in the opposite direction, back to Lyme, following the Days as if they were carrying a coffin to its grave. Indeed, we took the path that led into town through St. Michael’s graveyard, and then down Butter Market to Cockmoile Square. Along the way people stopped to peer at the slabs of stone on the stretcher, and there were murmurs of “crocodile” all along the street.

  THE DAY AFTER WE got the skull out, I run back to Church Cliffs as soon as the tide let me, but Captain Cury had already got there. He was willing to wade through water and freeze his feet so he would be first. I couldn’t challenge him, for I was on my own—Joseph had been hired to do a day’s work at Lyme’s mill, where one of the workers had taken ill, and couldn’t give up the chance to earn us a day’s bread. I hid and watched Captain Cury poking into the great hole the skull had left in the cliff. Cursing him, I hoped a rock would fall from above and hit his head.

  Then I had a wicked, wicked idea, and I’m ashamed to say I followed it. I never told anyone how bad I was that day. I run back along the beach then climbed the path above Church Cliffs, creeping along it to where I was just above the crocodile hole. “God damn you, Captain Cury,” I whispered, and pushed a loose rock the size of my fist over the edge. I heard him give a shout, and smiled as I lay flat on the ground to be sure he wouldn’t see me. Though I did not mean to hurt him, I did want to scare him off.

  He would be standing away from the cliff now, watching to see what more would come down. I chose a larger rock and shoved it over, along with a handful of dirt and pebbles to make it seem like an avalanche. This time I heard nothing, but kept low. If he knew what I was doing he would punish me, I was sure.

  Then it occurred to me he might come looking. Though it was common for rocks to fall, Captain Cury was the suspicious sort. I crept back from the cliff and hurried back down the path. Just in time I darted behind a clump of tall grass as he come past with a face full of fury. Somehow he’d worked out the stones weren’t naturally falling. I hid till he was out of sight, then nipped down the path to the beach and run along the cliff to the crocodile hole. With luck I could have a quick look before he come back, just to see if we would need to get the Day brothers digging again.

  In the clear daylight it was easier to see back into the hole Billy and Davy had made. The skull had come out at an angle, and the body, depending how long it was, could extend far into the stone. With a head four foot long it could easily be ten to fifteen feet into the cliff. I crawled into the space and felt near the spot where I remembered the skull’s verteberries ended. I touched a long ridge of knobbly rock and begun to scrape at it to get the dirt and clay off.

  Then Captain Cury rushed up behind me in a rage. “You! Not surprised to find you here, you nasty little bitch.”

  I shrieked and jumped out of the hole, then flattened myself against the cliff, terrified to be caught alone with him. “Get away from me—it’s my croc!” I cried.

  Captain Cury grabbed my arm and twisted it behind me. He were strong for an old man. “Trying to kill me, was you, girl? I’ll teach you a lesson!” He reached behind him for his spade.

  I never found out what he would have taught me, for at that moment the cliff come to my aid. In the years since I’ve many times felt it my enemy. That day, though, the cliff sent down a shower of rocks nearby, some of them as large as those I’d rolled over, accompanied by a slide of pebbles. Captain Cury, who’d been about to hurt me, suddenly become my savior, jerking me away from the cliff as a rock smashed down where I’d just been standing. “Quick!” he cried, and we clung onto each other as we stumbled towards the water, to a safe distance. Then we looked back to see that the whole section of cliff I’d been standing on top of not long before had crumbled, turning from solid ground into a river of stones raining down. The roar of it was like the thunder I’d heard as a baby, but it lasted longer and rushed through me like darkness rather than the bright buzz of lightning. It took at least a minute for the rocks and scree to finish falling to the bottom of the cliff. Captain Cury and I remained frozen, watching and waiting.

  When at last the cliff stopped moving and it grew quiet, I begun to cry. It weren’t just that I’d almost died. The landslip was now completely blocking the hole where the crocodile’s body was. We couldn’t get to it without years of digging.

  Captain Cury took a pewter flask from his pocket, unscrewed the top, took a swig, and handed it to me. I wiped my eyes and nose on my sleeve, then drank. I’d never had strong spirits. It burned a road down my throat and made me cough, but I did stop crying.

  “Thanks, Captain Cury,” I said, handing back the flask.

  “All that hammering yesterday must have weakened the cliff and brought it down. There were a bit of it earlier, but I thought—” Captain Cury didn’t finish. “You’ll have the damned est work ahead of you, getting anything out of there.” He nodded at the landslip. “My spade’s in there too. Looks like I’ll have to get another.”

  It were almost comical how quickly hard work put him off looking for anything. Now it was my crocodile again—buried behind a pile of rubble.

  FOUR

  That is an abomination

  There are several people I have met throughout my life whom I have regarded with disdain, but none has angered me more than Henry Hoste Henley.

  Lord Henley came to see me the day after the Days dug out the skull. He did not use the boot scraper but trailed mud into our parlor. When Bessy announced him, Louise was out, Margaret was sewing, and I was writing to our brother to tell him about the events on the beach the previous day. Margaret gave a little cry, bobbed at Lord Henley, and excused herself, stumbling upstairs to her room. Although she often saw the Henleys at services at St. Michael’s, she did not expect ever to find one breaching the safety of her own home, where she did not have to wear her brave, lighthearted public face.

  Lord Henley looked so surprised at Margaret’s abrupt exit that it was clear he’d known nothing about what had gone on between her and his friend James Foot. Granted, that had taken place a few years before, and he might have expected Margaret to have got over it. Or he may have forgotten: He was not the sort of man to remember what women cared about.

  Not Margaret, however. A spinster does not forget. I felt for her.

  Nor, it appeared, had he noted our shunning of invitations to Colway Manor, or he would not have come to Morley Cottage. Lord Henley was a man of little imagination, who found it impossible to see the world through another’s eyes. It made his interest in fossils preposterous: Truly to appreciate what fossils are requires a leap of imagination he was not capable of making.

  “You must pardon my sister, sir,” I said now. “Just before you arrived she had been complaining of a cough. She would not want to inflict her illness on a visitor.”

  Lord Henley nodded with an attempt at patience. Margaret’s health was clearly not why he was paying a visit. At my insistence he sat in the armchair by the fire but on the edge, as if he would jump up at any moment. “Miss Philpot,” he said, “I have heard you discovered something extraordinary on the beach yesterday. A crocodile, is it? I should very much like to see it.” He looked about as if expecting it already to be on display in the room.

  I wasn’t surprised that he knew about the Annings’ find. Though Lord Henley was rather grand to be included in Lyme’s circle of wagging tongues, he
did often employ stonecutters, as he had land abutting the sea cliffs where he extracted stone for building. Indeed, he had obtained most of his best specimens from the quarrymen, who set aside finds for him from the stones they cut, knowing they would be paid extra. The Days must have told him of what they’d dug out for the Annings.

  “Your information is almost accurate, Lord Henley,” I replied. “It was young Mary Anning who found it. I merely oversaw the extraction. The skull is at her house in Cockmoile Square.” Already I was leaving Joseph out of the story, as would happen for generations. Perhaps it was inevitable given his retiring nature, the very nature that would stop him correcting people when they spoke of the creature as solely Mary’s discovery.

  Lord Henley knew of the Annings, for Richard Anning had sold him a few specimens. He was not the sort of man to go to their workshop, however, and he was clearly disappointed that the skull was not at Morley Cottage, which was a more acceptable house for him to visit. “Have them bring it to me so I can look at it,” he said, jumping to his feet, as if he suddenly realized he was wasting time with inconsequential people.

  I stood as well. “It is rather heavy, sir. Did the Days tell you the skull is four feet long? They had enough to do to get it to Cockmoile Square from Church Cliffs. Certainly the Annings couldn’t manage the hill to Colway Manor.”

  “Four feet? Splendid! I will send my coach for it tomorrow morning.”

  “I am not sure—” I stopped myself. I did not know what Mary and Joseph planned to do with the skull and decided it was best not to speak for them until I did know.

  Lord Henley seemed to think the specimen was his to claim. Perhaps it was—the cliffs where it was found were on Henley’s land. Yet he should pay the hunters for their work and their skill at finding and extracting the fossil. I did not appreciate this proprietary attitude of the collector, who pays for others to find specimens for him to display. As I noted the greedy glitter in Lord Henley’s eyes, I vowed to get Mary and Joseph a good price for the crocodile—for I knew he would want to deal with me rather than the Annings. “I will speak to the family and see what I can arrange, Lord Henley. You may be sure of it.”

  When he had gone and Bessy was sweeping up the mud he’d left behind, Margaret came downstairs, her eyes red. She sat at the piano and began to play a melancholy song. I patted her shoulder and tried to comfort her. “You would not have been happy with that set.”

  Margaret shrugged off my hand. “You don’t know how I would have felt. Just because it suits you not to marry doesn’t mean the rest of us feel the same way!”

  “I never said I didn’t want to marry. It just didn’t happen—I am not the sort of lady a man chooses to marry, for I am too plain and too serious. Now I am reconciled to being on my own. I thought you were too.”

  Margaret was crying again. I could not bear it, for she would make me cry as well, and I do not cry. I left her to take refuge in the dining room with my fossils. Let Louise comfort her when she returned.

  Later that day I used Lord Henley’s visit as an excuse to go down to Cockmoile Square. I wanted to discuss with the Annings his interest in the skull, and also to hear about what Mary had found back on the beach, for she’d told me she was going to look for the crocodile’s body. When I arrived, I went first to the kitchen to speak to Mary’s mother. Molly Anning was a tall, gaunt woman wearing a mop cap and a grubby white apron. She stood at the range, stirring what smelled like oxtail broth, while a baby squalled without conviction in a drawer in the corner.

  I set down a bundle. “Bessy made too many rock cakes and thought you might like some, Mrs. Anning. There’s a round of cheese in there too, and part of a pork pie.” The kitchen was cold, with the fire in the range feeble. I should have brought coal as well. I did not tell her that Bessy had made the rock cakes only because I ordered her to. Whatever their hardships, Bessy did not like the Annings, feeling—like other good families in Lyme, I expect—that our association with them demeaned us.

  Molly Anning murmured thanks but did not look up. I knew she did not think much of me, for I was the embodiment of what she did not want Mary to become—unmarried and obsessed with fossils. I understood her fears. My mother would not have wished my life on me either—nor would I, a few years back. Now I was living it, though, it was not so bad. In some ways I had more freedom than ladies who married.

  The baby continued to wail. Of the ten children Molly Anning had borne, only three survived, and this one did not sound as if he would last his infancy. I looked around for a nurse or maid, but of course there was none. Forcing myself to go over to him, I gave the swaddled body a pat, which only made him cry harder. I have never known what to do with babies.

  “Leave him, ma’am,” Molly Anning called. “Attention will only make him worse. He’ll settle in a bit.”

  I stepped away from the drawer and looked about, trying not to reveal my dismay at the shabbiness of the room. Kitchens are normally the most welcoming part of a house, but the Annings’ lacked the basic warmth and well-stocked feeling that encourages lingering. There was a battered table with three chairs pulled up to it and a shelf holding a few chipped plates. No bread or pies or jugs of milk sat out as they did in our kitchen, and I felt a sudden fondness for Bessy. However much she grumbled, she kept the kitchen full of food, and that abundance was a comfort that spread through Morley Cottage. The security she created was what saw us Philpot sisters through the day. Not to have it must gnaw at the gut as much as real hunger did.

  Poor Mary, I thought. To be on the cold beach all day and come back to this. “I’m here to see Mary and Joseph, Mrs. Anning,” I said aloud. “Are they about?”

  “Joe’s got work at the mill today. Mary’s downstairs.”

  “Did you see the skull they brought back from the beach yesterday?” I couldn’t help asking. “It is quite exceptional.”

  “Haven’t had the time.” Molly picked up a head of cabbage from a basket and began to chop at it savagely. She led with her hands, though not as Margaret did with frivolous gestures. Molly’s hands were always busy with work: stirring, wiping, clearing.

  “It is just downstairs, though,” I persisted, “and well worth a look. It would only take a moment. You could do it now—I’ll look after the soup and the baby while you go.”

  Molly Anning grunted. “You look after the baby, eh? I’d like to see that.” Her chuckle made me turn red.

  “They’ll get a good price for the crocodile once they’ve cleaned it up.” I spoke of the skull in the one way I knew would interest her.

  Indeed, Molly Anning looked up but didn’t have a chance to reply before Mary came clattering up the stairs. “You here to see the croc, Miss Philpot?”

  “And you as well, Mary.”

  “Come down, then, ma’am.”

  I had been in the Annings’ workshop a handful of times during the years we’d lived in Lyme, to order cabinets from Richard Anning or to pick up or drop off specimens for Mary to clean, though most often she came to me. While Richard Anning worked as a cabinetmaker, the room had been a battleground between the elements representing two parts of his life: the wood he made a living from and the stone that fed his interest in the natural world. Still stacked against the wall on one side of the room were sheets of wood planed fine, as well as smaller strips of veneer. Buckets of old varnish and tools littered the floor, which was strewn with wood shavings. Little had been touched on this side of the room in the months since Richard Anning’s death, though I suspected the Annings had sold some of the wood in order to eat, and would soon sell off the rest, as well as the tools.

  On the other side of the room were long shelves crammed with chunks of rock containing specimens as yet unlocked by Mary’s hammer. Also on the shelves and on the floor, in no order that I could discern in the dim light, were crates of various sizes containing a jumble of broken bits of belemnites and ammonites, slivers of fossilized wood, stones carrying traces of fish scales, and many other examples of half-realize
d, incomplete, or inferior fossils that could never be sold.

  Over all of the room, uniting wood and stone, there lay the finest coat of dust. Crumbled limestone and shale creates sticky clay and, when dry, a ubiquitous dust that is almost as soft and fine as talcum powder, gritty underfoot and drying to one’s skin. I knew this dust well, as did Bessy, who complained bitterly about having to clean up after me when I brought back specimens from the cliffs.

  I shivered, partly from the cold of the cellar, where there was no fire, but also because the room’s disorder upset me. When out collecting, I had learned to discipline myself and not pick up every bit of fossil I found, but look instead for whole specimens. Both Bessy and my sisters would rebel against the insistent creep of partial fossils over all available space. Morley Cottage was meant to be our refuge from the harsh outdoor world. If allowed indoors at all, fossils had to be tamed—cleaned, catalogued, labeled, and placed in cabinets, where they could be looked at safely without threat to the order of our daily lives.

  The chaos in the Annings’ workshop signaled to me something worse than poor housekeeping. Here was muddled thinking and moral disorder. I knew Richard Anning had been politically rebellious, with admiring stories still circulating years later about a riot he had led protesting over the price of bread. The family were Dissenters—not unusual in Lyme, perhaps, which because of its isolation seemed to be a haven for independent Christians. I had no ill feelings towards Dissenters. I wondered, though, if now her father was gone, Mary might benefit from a little more order in her life—physical if not spiritual.