The Other Einstein

by Marie Benedict

  I ran out of the house, not bothering to mask the thuds of my ungainly hobble. Why should I? Mama and Papa had made clear that it was my limp that defined me.

  • • •

  I had grown quiet, thinking about the past. Helene released my hand and took me by the shoulders. “You do see, don’t you, Mileva? That your limp does not make you unmarriageable? Or limit you in any other way? That you need not be tied to such old-fashioned beliefs?”

  Looking into Helene’s clear blue-gray eyes and hearing the conviction in her steady voice, I agreed with her. For the first time in my life, I believed that—maybe, just maybe—my limp was irrelevant. To who I was, to who I could become.

  “Yes,” I answered with a voice as steady as Helene’s own.

  Helene let go of my shoulders, picked up the brush, and resumed the painful work of untangling my hair. “Good. Anyway, why should we even worry about marriage? Even if you wanted to get married, why would you? Look at our group—me, you, Ružica, and Milana. We will be four professional women with busy lives of our own, here in Switzerland with its tolerance of women, intelligence, and ethnic peoples. We will have one another and our work; we need not follow the traditional path.”

  I considered this for a moment. Her statement seemed almost revolutionary—a bit like Mr. Einstein’s description of a bohemian—even though it was a future we had all been marching toward. “You’re right. Why should we? What’s the point of marriage these days? Maybe it’s something we don’t need anymore.”

  “That’s the spirit, Mileva. What fun we’ll have! By day, we will work as historians or physicists or teachers, and by night and weekends, we will play our concerts and go for hikes.”

  I imagined the idyllic life Helene described. Was it possible? Could I really have a happy future full of meaningful work and friendships?

  Helene continued, “Shall we make a pact? To a future together?”

  “To a future together.”

  As we shook hands on our pact, I said, “Helene, please call me Mitza. It’s the name used by my family and everyone who knows me well. And you know me better than almost anyone.”

  Helene smiled and said, “I’d be honored, Mitza.”

  Laughing over the day, we finished with each other’s hair and readied for dinner. Unruly hair addressed and arms linked, Helene and I strode down the stairs. Deep in an animated debate about which of the rotating courses of entrees would be served that evening—I craved the creamy white wine and veal dish Zürcher Geschnetzeltes, and Helene was longing for something simpler—we were late in noticing Mrs. Engelbrecht standing at the bottom of the staircase, waiting for us. Or, rather, me.

  “Miss Marić,” she called up, her displeasure evident, “it seems you have a caller.”

  The sound of a throat clearing came from behind Mrs. Engelbrecht, and a figure stepped out from her silhouette. “Pardon me, ma’am, but I am a classmate, not a caller.”

  It was Mr. Einstein. Violin case in hand.

  He had not waited to be asked.

  Chapter 5

  May 4, 1897

  Zürich, Switzerland

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen. Is there not a single one among you who knows the answer to my query?” Professor Weber strutted across the front of the classroom, delighting in our ignorance. Why a teacher derived such glee from his students’ failures was incomprehensible and disturbing to me. Being called a gentleman did not trouble me nearly as much. Months ago, I had become inured to Weber’s regular slights, whether they be remarks about eastern Europeans or his insistence on referring to me as a man. I only wished Weber’s lectures were like those of other professors, like oysters cracked open to reveal the most lustrous of pearls.

  I knew the answer to Weber’s question, but, as usual, I hesitated to raise my hand. I glanced around, hoping someone else would answer, but every one of my classmates—including Mr. Einstein—had his arm glued to his desk. Why wasn’t anyone raising his hand? Perhaps the unseasonable heat was making them languorous. Unexpectedly hot for spring, even the opening of the classroom windows did not stir a breeze, and I saw Mr. Ehrat and Mr. Kollros pushing the limpid air around with makeshift fans. Perspiration beaded on my forehead, and I noticed that my classmates’ suit jackets were stained with sweat.

  Why was it so hard to raise my hand? I’d done it several times before, although not easily. I shook my head slightly as a recollection took hold of me. I was seventeen, and I had just left my first physics class at the all-male Royal Classical High School in Zagreb, where Papa managed to get me admitted after my time in Novi Sad, despite a law prohibiting Austro-Hungarian girls from attending high school, by applying successfully to the authorities for an exemption. Relieved and thrilled with my first day—where I ventured to answer the instructor’s question and got it correct—I floated out of my classroom. I had waited until the room nearly cleared so the hallway was empty. A man came behind me suddenly and pushed me down another more dimly lit hallway. Was he in such a rush that he didn’t see me?

  “Sir, sir,” I called out over my shoulder, but he didn’t stop pushing me down the ever-darkening corridor. There was no one around to hear my pleas. What was going on?

  I struggled to turn around but couldn’t. The man was over a foot taller than me. He shoved me against the wall—my face smashed against it and away from his, so I could not identify him later—and held me down tightly. My arms burned.

  “You think you’re so smart. Showing off with that answer.” He seethed, spit from his angry words spraying my one exposed cheek. “You should not even be allowed in our class. There’s a law against it.” He gave me a final shove into the wall and then ran off.

  I stayed frozen, still facing the wall, until I heard his last footstep. Only then did I turn around, shaking uncontrollably. I had not expected an eager welcome from my fellow students, but I had not expected this either. Leaning against the wall, I began to cry, something I had promised myself I would never do at school. Wiping away my tears and the attacker’s spittle from my cheeks, I realized that I was going to have to tamp down my intelligence and keep my smarts quiet too. Or risk everything.

  • • •

  Weber interrupted my unpleasant memory with chiding. “Tsk, tsk. I am very disappointed that not one of you has your hand raised. We have been leading up to this question for the entire class. Doesn’t anyone know the answer?”

  Remembering my conversation with Helene from a month ago, I decided to stop my past from paralyzing me. I took a deep breath and raised my hand. Weber stepped down from the podium and walked toward my seat. What sort of ignominy would he make me suffer if I was wrong? What would my classmates do if I was correct?

  “Ah, it’s you, Miss Marić,” he said as if surprised. As if he didn’t know whose desk he was walking toward. As if I hadn’t already demonstrated my intellect to him. This feigned astonishment was just another way he humiliated me. And tested me.

  “The answer to your question is one percent,” I said. I felt more heat rise in my cheeks and wished I hadn’t opened my mouth.

  “I’m sorry, can you repeat that a little louder, so we can all share in your wisdom?” Wisdom. It sounded as if Weber was mocking me. Had I gotten the answer wrong? Was he reveling in my failure?

  I cleared my throat and said, in the strongest voice I could muster, “Given the context of your question, the closest we can come to stating the time necessary to cool the earth is by one percent.”

  “Correct,” Weber admitted with not a small amount of surprise and disappointment. “For those of you who could not hear it, Miss Marić has arrived at the correct answer. By one percent. Please mark it down.”

  Murmurs built around me. At first, I could not hear any of the comments clearly, but then I teased a few pointed remarks out of the chatter. I heard “she got it” and “nice work” among the phrases. These compliments were a first; I had answer
ed a couple of Weber’s questions correctly before without a single reaction. Most likely, today, my classmates were merely delighted that someone got the better of Weber.

  As class came to an end, I stood and began to pack my satchel. Mr. Einstein walked the few steps over toward my desk. “Most impressive, Miss Marić.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Einstein.” I answered quietly with a nod. “But I’m certain any one of our classmates could have done just as well.” I resumed my packing, wondering why I felt the need to diminish my accomplishments.

  “You do yourself a disservice, Miss Marić. I can assure you that none of us other fellows knew the answer.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “Or else we wouldn’t have allowed Weber to badger us for so insufferably long.”

  An irrepressible smile crept upon my face at Mr. Einstein’s audacity in criticizing Weber while he was standing right there at the podium.

  “There it is, Miss Marić. That elusive smile. I believe I’ve only seen it twice before.”

  “Is that so?” I glanced up at him. I didn’t want to encourage his silly banter—especially in the presence of my classmates and Weber, who I wanted to think of me seriously—but I did not want to be rude.

  He met my gaze. “Oh yes, I’ve been keeping careful—and quite scientific—notes about your smiles. A few evenings ago, when you were kind enough to allow me to play music with you and your friends, I spied one. But that wasn’t the first. No, the first smile took place on the steps of your pension. That day I walked you home in the rain.”

  I didn’t know how to respond. He seemed serious, not at all his usual bemused self. And that very fact made me apprehensive. Was it possible that he was making some sort of overture toward me? I had no experience with such things, and other than Helene’s occasional warnings, I had no way to assess his comments.

  Out of nerves or discomfort, I started walking toward the classroom door. The rustle of papers behind me and the fast clip of shoes told me that Mr. Einstein was racing to follow me. “Will you ladies be playing this evening?” he asked once he reached my side.

  Ah, perhaps he simply sought musical companionship. Maybe his statements had not been flirtatious at all. A strange mix of disappointment and relief washed over me. This startled me. Was there some part of me that sought his attentions?

  “It is our custom to play before dinner,” I answered.

  “Do you have a piece selected?”

  “I believe Miss Kaufler chose Bach’s Violin Concerto in A Minor.”

  “Ah, that is a beautiful piece.” He hummed a few bars of the music. “May I join you again?”

  “I didn’t think that you waited for an invitation.” I surprised myself with my saucy retort. Despite my conflicted feelings and my attempts to steer the conversation back to a more appropriate course, I could not resist the jab at Mr. Einstein’s disregard of normal protocol over a week ago when he arrived uninvited to the pension after our Sihlwald outing.

  While he waited in the parlor for us to finish dinner, Milana and Ružica bombarded me with questions about Mr. Einstein, expressing their dismay at his presumptuousness, while Helene simply listened, her eyes wary. We agreed to let him join us for music, but the wariness lingered throughout our disjointed playing of a Mozart sonata. Since I did not think of the evening as a success, I was bewildered that he was inquiring about another such night.

  He snorted in surprise then chuckled. “I suppose that is well deserved, Miss Marić. But then, I already warned you that I am a bohemian.”

  Mr. Einstein followed me as I walked through the hallways toward the back entrance of the school building. Given that my nerves were already a bit jangled, I wanted to avoid the clamor of Rämistrasse. He pushed open the heavy doors, and we passed from the dim school hallways into the bright daylight of the terrace on the back side of the building. I squinted into the light, and the mountainous backdrop of Zürich, dotted equally with ancient church steeples and modern-day office structures, came into view.

  As we crossed the terrace, out of habit, I counted its right angles and calculated the symmetry of its design. I’d begun this ritual as a way of distracting myself from the derogatory whispers I sometimes overheard from male students and teachers—even their sisters, mothers, and girlfriends—as they too walked across the terrace. The criticisms about the inappropriateness of a woman student, the snickers about my limp, the ugly remarks about my dark looks and serious face—I didn’t want my confidence in the classroom to be tainted by their commentaries.

  “You are so quiet, Miss Marić.”

  “I am often accused of such, Mr. Einstein. Unfortunately, unlike a typical lady, I have no gift for small chatter.”

  “Unusually quiet, I mean. As if an important theory has taken hold. What thought has captured your formidable mind?”

  “In truth?”

  “Always the truth.”

  “I was assessing the colonnades and geometric layout of the square. I’ve realized that they have an almost exact bilateral, axial reflection, symmetry.”

  “Is that all?” he asked with a smirk.

  “Not quite,” I retorted. If Mr. Einstein did not play by the rules of social niceties, why should I? It was a relief, so I explained my actual thoughts. “Over the past few months, I’ve noted the parallels between artistic symmetry and the concept of symmetry as it plays out in physics.”

  “What have you concluded?”

  “I’ve determined that a follower of Plato would say that the square’s beauty is solely attributable to its symmetry.” I didn’t mention how this conclusion saddened me; imbedded into the theories of the studies I love best, math and physics, was the ideal of symmetry, a standard that I myself, with my irregular legs, could never achieve.

  He stopped walking. “Impressive. What else have you noticed about this square, which I stroll by obliviously each day?”

  I gestured around the square to the abundant spires. “Well, I’ve noted that Zürich seems to sprout church towers rather than trees. Bordering this square alone, we have the Fraumünster, Grossmünster, and St. Peter’s.”

  He stared at me. “You were right, Miss Marić, about not being a typical lady. In fact, you are a most extraordinary young woman.”

  After this roundabout perambulation, Mr. Einstein made a turn leading toward Rämistrasse. I paused, not wanting to go that way. I craved instead the peace of a stroll through quiet residential neighborhoods on my way back to the pension. I wondered if he would follow, unsure whether I wanted his company. I enjoyed my conversations with Mr. Einstein, but I worried that he might follow me all the way back to the pension, and that might incur the girls’ acrimony again over his uninvited presence.

  “Mr. Einstein! Mr. Einstein!” A voice called out from a café across the street on Rämistrasse. “I say, you are late for our meeting! As usual!”

  The voice came from a sidewalk café table. Glancing over, I spotted a dark-haired, olive-complected gentleman waving his hands in our direction. I did not recognize him from the Polytechnic.

  Mr. Einstein waved to his friend, then turned back toward me. “Will you join me and my friend for a coffee, Miss Marić?”

  “My studies beckon, Mr. Einstein. I must go.”

  “Please, I should so like you to meet Mr. Michele Besso. Even though he graduated from the Polytechnic as an engineer and not a physicist, he’s introduced me to many new physics theorists, like Ernst Mach. He is very likable and intrigued by many of the same big, modern ideas as you and I.”

  I was flattered. Mr. Einstein seemed to believe that I could hold my own in a scientific discussion with his friend. Not many other men in Zürich would make such an offer. Part of me wanted to say yes, to accept his invitation, to sit across a café table from my classmate and discuss the thorny big questions that physics raised. Secretly, I longed to participate in the fervent conversations happening on the streets of
Zürich and in its cafés. Instead of just watching.

  But part of me was scared. Scared of the confusing nature of Mr. Einstein’s attention, and scared of stepping over the invisible divide and taking the risks that came with becoming the person I dreamed of being.

  “Thank you, but I can’t, Mr. Einstein. My apologies.”

  “Another time, perhaps?”

  “Perhaps.” I took my leave and began walking in the direction of the Engelbrecht Pension.

  I heard his voice piping up in the mounting distance. “Until then, we shall have music!”

  Feeling very bold—more like a fellow scholar instead of a lady—I called back over my shoulder. “I don’t recall extending an invitation!”

  Laughter came from Mr. Einstein. “As you yourself said, I have never waited for invitations!”

  Chapter 6

  June 9 and 16, 1897

  Zürich, Switzerland

  Ružica and I exited the Conditorei Schober and walked arm in arm down Napfgasse. The afternoon sun was soft and hazy, lighting the buildings from behind and creating a lambent glow on all the shop fronts we passed. We both sighed in satisfaction.

  “That was delicious,” Ružica said. Last night after dinner, she and I had made plans to try the coffee, hot chocolate, and patisseries at Conditorei Schober. The famous confectionary was located in between the University of Zürich, where Ružica studied, and the Polytechnic, and we had been fantasizing about the café’s delights since we learned of its existence from Mrs. Engelbrecht. Helene and Milana declined to join us for our outing; not only did they prefer savories to sweets, but they also weren’t inclined toward the frivolous adventures that Ružica sought out. I’d surprised myself by agreeing to join her.

  “I can still taste the caramel and walnuts from my torte,” I said about my selection, a delicious shortbread confection with decadent filling.