It seemed George had gone insane, convinced he was talking to plants. Still, Jules thought, much of the experiment had been conducted methodically with intelligible charts and descriptions. How could he be certain it was all fantasy? Wasn’t he an open-minded scientist who believed that one should never reject a theory that hadn’t been completely disproven? He was stuck on Sparrow Island for two weeks. Why not further study the book and figure out if there was anything to it? That’s why he came, after all. George’s last request was for Jules to continue his work, and if there was any chance of discovering something that would change the world, no matter how remote, didn’t he owe that much to his friend?
He opened the book again and continued reading.
* * *
It was half past noon and Isabelle came into the lab with a cup of hot coffee and a biscuit. She smiled at Sean reading a book on botany, and put the mug and biscuit in front of Jules. “I thought you might be hungry.”
“Hm? Oh yes, that’s fine,” he said, not looking up from the book.
She saw the stacks of files on the desk. “It looks like you found a lot of interesting material.”
“What? Oh yes.”
She could see he was distracted. “I’ll just take Sean so you can work.”
Jules was suddenly aware of Isabelle in the room. “Uh, sorry. Thank you for the coffee.” He took a sip and put the book down. A wisp of dark hair fell over his eye and Isabelle had a terrible urge to push it back with her fingers. As if reading her mind, he pushed it back himself and smiled warmly. “I thought you were looking for the diamond.”
“I believe that’s a hopeless case.” She looked at Sean, who was enamored with the almanac, stroking the black ink drawings of holly leaves as though petting a cat. “Be careful with that book,” Isabelle told him. “My father made me wash my hands just to look at it.”
She picked up the green notebook. “The Eden Project. What is this?”
“Nothing you’d want to read. There are drawings…”
“Was this my father’s journal?”
He took it back with more force than intended.
“I’m not allowed to see it?”
“Some of it’s rather disturbing. Besides, your father left all his research to me and this is the only record of his most recent work. I’m afraid he might have burned the rest on the patio.”
“Yes, I saw the ashes.” She gazed down at the book. “Eden. That’s an odd word for George. Perhaps he found religion.”
“Doubt it. I think the title is a metaphor.”
“So, did he uncover something that would change the world?”
“He claims that plants were communicating with him, in English, no less. That’s a bit far-fetched for even my imagination.”
She shook her head sadly. “You’re right. That’s crazy.”
“Well, not entirely,” he said defensively. “I’ve been doing my own studies lately that show certain plants communicate with each other using acoustical signals, a series of clicks generated by their roots, which travel underground. The clicks seem to represent a particular message, warnings about things like drought or insect invasions in a language specific to each species, such as corn or peas.”
“A language, really?”
“The data is rather preliminary. More testing needs to be done.”
“Even so, communication between plants is very different from broccoli talking to my father.”
“That’s true. George was going down a strange path,” Jules said. “He believed that plant waves and human brain waves are naturally detected by each other, but only slightly because they’re on different frequencies. According to his notes, he found a way to synchronize the frequencies, entangling the thought waves of plants and humans.”
“That sounds insane.”
“Yes, it does, doesn’t it?” Jules frowned.
“What a waste of a brilliant mind.”
“It’s not all rubbish.” He opened the book to the pages on V-waves. “These notes reveal a detectable form of communication among trees. There’s no doubt that he discovered a type of electromagnetic wave produced by plants, which seems very similar to the waves given off by a thinking brain. He called them V-waves.”
“What’s the V?”
“Viridiplantae. Latin for ‘green plant.’”
“And he believed these waves are similar to human thoughts?”
Jules shrugged and opened the green notebook, displaying the strip charts.
“What am I looking at?”
“V-waves given off by trees,” he replied. “In this study, George hooked up a red cedar with probes to a voltmeter and spectrum analyzer. Then he chopped the tree with an ax. At the moment of impact, the V-waves changed dramatically in frequency. See, this is a recording of the plant’s reaction, which shows it suffered quite a jolt. But then…” Jules turned the pages of the book. “We have these timed recordings of six neighboring pines. There was a burst of energy among all of them the instant the blade struck the cedar, almost as if they could feel its pain.”
“Interesting. But those are physiological reactions. It doesn’t prove trees have conscious thought. It certainly doesn’t prove they could talk to George.”
“No, but combined with the rest of his data, it gets rather curious.” His fingers turned a few more pages. “These are the readings of your father’s brain waves, taken five years ago. Notice what happens over time, the similarities between the two waves. The V-waves show slight changes in frequency, until they’re completely synchronized with the readings of his own brain.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, in theory, he might have actually entangled the thought waves of plants and people.”
“Thought waves,” she said derisively. “Surely you don’t believe all this nonsense.”
“I’m not sure what to believe. George was scrupulous. Not one to make things up, especially test results. I mean, why would he lie?”
“Drugs. Mental disease.” She rubbed her arms. “He did kill himself, after all.”
“That’s another thing. I want to know why, don’t you? Why does a man claim to have made a miraculous discovery and then end his own life?”
She gave a hopeless shrug.
“There’s no harm in looking a bit closer, poking around and finding some answers.”
“Of course. I’d be grateful if you found anything.” She picked up an ivy leaf off the counter and twirled it in her fingers. It was the one Sean found on the cliffs that morning. “Did you save this for a reason?”
Jules nodded. “I’ve never seen a fungus like this and I’m intrigued. From the texture and color, I’d say it’s a rare species, and yet it reminds me of something.”
She examined the leaf closer and noticed a purple smear on her fingertip.
“Unfortunately, all the microscopes are locked in that cabinet and there doesn’t seem to be a key.” He pointed to a six-foot display case made of mahogany and etched glass that didn’t match the blandness of the laboratory. Microscopes and other scientific equipment were visible behind glass doors.
Isabelle dropped the leaf on the counter and raised a brow. “You mean you’d rather look at fungus than figure out why George was talking to trees?”
He smiled back. “You’re right. It’s just a fungus.”
CHAPTER 9
ISABELLE WAS ABOUT TO SUGGEST to Jules they make some lunch when Luke and Monica came into the laboratory with gloomy expressions.
“This place sucks,” Monica declared. “I’m leaving.”
“You’re not leaving,” Isabelle replied. “We’re here for two weeks until the boat arrives, so make the best of it.”
Luke told his mother about Ginny’s reward and explained how they searched for the diamond all over the office and living room with no luck. “Can we look in the lab?”
“No, Dr. Beecher is working here,” Isabelle said. “Besides, you’ve done enough searching for today. Go do something fun.”
&nb
sp; “Fun?” Monica barked out a laugh. She complained that the island was cold and windy, with a creepy forest, an ugly beach, and absolutely nothing to do. “I’m going to die from boredom.”
“Don’t be so dramatic,” Isabelle said.
“But there’s no television.”
Jules squinted at the girl as if she were a diseased plant.
“Read a book, like Sean,” Isabelle suggested, opening the lower cabinets, one after another. “My father kept an enormous library.”
Luke shrugged. “If you like botany.”
“There’s plenty of fiction. And if we’re lucky…” She swung open the last door. “Here we go. Zenith circa 1980.” She revealed a small television set and put it on the counter.
“It’s an old one, all right,” Luke said. “Even if it still works, there’s no reception.”
Isabelle pointed to a stack of videotapes and a VCR inside the cabinet.
Luke slid a couple of tapes off the shelf and showed them to Monica. “These must have been my grandfather’s.”
“Oh yeah? What movies he got?”
“What movies he got?” Jules repeated. “Did you hear that sentence?”
Luke read from the labels. “Time-Lapse Study of Plant Signaling. Behavior in the Northeastern Poplar. Signaling Response Nexus of a Root.” He dropped them on the counter. “More botany crap.”
“Watch your language, please,” Isabelle said.
“We should see if these old machines even work.” Luke pushed the television and VCR closer to an outlet, plugged them in, and fiddled with their dials.
“What’s this?” Monica held up a tape. “Plant Telepathy.”
“May I see that?” Jules took the cassette and turned it over. “Cleve Backster.”
“Ah, yes,” Isabelle said. “Cleve Backster started a movement back in the sixties, remember, Jules? His experiments were supposed to show that plants have feelings, that they could think and read people’s minds. He had everyone talking to their plants.”
“That’s stupid,” Monica huffed.
“Surprisingly, I agree with you,” Jules said. “His experiments were hokum.”
“What kind of experiments?”
Isabelle explained that Backster was originally an interrogation agent with the CIA, specializing in lie detection. “One day, on a whim, he decided to attach his polygraph to the leaf of a Dracaena plant and see how long it took for water to reach the leaf.”
Monica faked a yawn. “Gee, that’s exciting.”
“Actually his polygraph test showed that plants react to external stimulation just like humans. When exposed to pain or pleasure, they exhibited the same excitement reaction. Then something really strange happened. He decided to burn a plant and went into another room to get matches. When he returned, the polygraph readings were off the charts. Just the thought of burning a leaf was enough to send the plant into full-blown panic.”
“Yeah, right,” Monica said. “It’s some kind of trick.”
“That’s what the skeptics thought, but his results caused quite a sensation at the time. Everyone was talking about it. He was on television and radio shows.”
Jules shook his head. “Backster reduced the science of plant biology to the level of spoon bending. For scientists, it was an embarrassment. But George was keen to discover the truth. He brought all the research into a real laboratory and set up experiments with proper equipment, control groups, and careful analysis.”
“And he proved Backster was a fraud?” Luke asked.
“Well, not exactly.” Jules exchanged a look with Isabelle. “Some of his trials with the polygraph revealed similar results. But George came up with an entirely different theory. He believed that plants had memory and could learn. His studies were based on pure science, not telepathy or magic.”
Isabelle nodded. “My father’s results caused a sensation of their own. The entire scientific world was amazed.”
“So he was famous?” Luke asked.
“For a while. He went on a transatlantic media tour, and was featured in a lot of American newspapers and magazines. Life magazine did an article on him.”
“That is so cool,” Luke said.
Jules read the back label on another tape. “This appears to be an early recording of George conducting a polygraph experiment.”
“Can we watch it?” Luke asked Isabelle as he turned on the TV and a snowy screen came to life.
“Might be fun,” she replied. “Sean, do you want to watch TV?”
Across the room, the boy scowled and turned the page of the botany book.
Luke blew dust off the tape and slipped it into the machine. He pressed the play button and an image emerged on the television.
Isabelle was struck by her father in living color, smiling and animated just as she remembered. He was talking to five young men in a classroom, most likely his students. There was no sound, but he seemed to be instructing them.
“I can’t get the volume to work,” Luke said. He pointed to one of the men. “Is that you, Dr. Beecher?”
Jules nodded. “Yes, the tall skinny lad. It was my first year at Oxford when I met George. We did quite a few of these experiments.”
“You weren’t bad looking,” Monica said. “Like a million years ago.”
Luke tried the volume again. “Forget it. There’s no sound.”
“I can tell you what’s happening.” Jules explained that George had gathered five of his botany students together for an experiment. They were all young men with longish hair and sideburns. They wore turtlenecks and plaid trousers.
“You were going for groovy, huh?” Monica said.
They watched the five students take turns pulling slips of paper from a gray fedora.
“We chose from the hat which of us would play the role of murderer. You see, we’re about to enter a room with two plants. The first is to be the victim and the second, a witness.”
The room on-screen was featureless except for a long table that held two identical dwarf palms, about four feet tall, in heavy pots. Attached to one of the trees was a polygraph. The first student entered the room, staring at the plants. Then he started speaking to them. Awkwardly at first, and then more casually, as if they were old friends.
“We were supposed to be kind to the plants, except for the killer, of course.”
The next three students took turns chatting with the palms, watering them, blowing softly on their leaves, and the whole thing began to seem a bit silly.
Finally, Jules entered the room alone.
“Bum bum bummm,” Monica said ominously. “I knew it would be you.”
“Oh my,” Isabelle said, smiling. “Are you really going to hurt that plant, Jules?”
“It’s an experiment, for goodness sakes.”
Isabelle smiled behind her fingers. The young man on-screen seemed so shy, with an innocent expression and timid manner. She wondered if he’d pluck off a leaf or two.
They all watched as Jules reached out to the plant, tracing his finger gently down a broad leaf. His eyes closed and he breathed deeply through his nose. Isabelle stopped smiling as the expression on young Jules’s face changed dramatically. It twisted into a gruesome snarl and his eyes sprang open and alert. With lightning speed he ambushed his prey, seizing the plant and straining to rip it from the pot.
Isabelle stepped back in alarm.
The roots clung on tightly, but it was no even match. Jules shook the trunk and the tree broke loose. The ceramic bowl smashed onto the floor. He threw the tree over his head like a javelin and it shot against the wall, sending dirt flying in every direction. Jules pounced on the injured tree, ripping the leaves to shreds and pulling apart the roots with powerful claws that came down again and again.
It was all happening so fast and Isabelle stared with wide eyes. As much as she tried, she couldn’t look away.
Dirt sprayed everywhere—across Jules’s shirt, his face and arms as if it were a bloody massacre. There was barely a leaf left on the
tree, but Jules wasn’t finished. A silent scream came from his mouth, a deplorable rage on his face as he stomped the trunk with all his might, using hands and feet to pry its lifeless body apart.
Her heart pounded in her ears and Isabelle thought Jules must be possessed. She watched in horror as he struck the tattered remains of the plant against the floor, blow after blow—
The tape stopped.
Jules stood by the VCR with his finger on a button, helplessly looking at the shocked faces around him. Then the dreadful moment was broken by Monica.
“What an actor! Jesus, you deserve a freaking Emmy for that!”
The others were silent as Jules struggled to explain. “Well, yes, you have to be … convincing … or, well, the experiment won’t work.”
Luke slipped from a dazed expression. “So, that was just an act?”
“Let’s see the rest of it,” Monica said, excited.
“No,” Jules said quickly. “It’s a bit disturbing to watch all these years later.”
“Well, how’s it end?” Monica whined.
Jules looked at her, pale and silent. There was sweat on his brow but he tried to act calm. He swallowed hard. “Um … let’s see. We left the plants alone for a while. There was the dead one on the floor.” He tried to sound scholarly, as if casually explaining the findings, but he was shaken by the video. He winced, as if trying to remember and forget at the same time. “We all had to go back into the room. You see, there was the other plant.”
“The witness,” Luke said.
“Yes, the one hooked up to the polygraph. We had to measure its reaction.”
“And? What happened when you went into the room?”
Jules spoke low, almost to himself. “The recorder was in a frenzy. A state of distress like I’ve never seen.”
Isabelle realized her hand was covering her mouth and lowered it.
“Excuse me,” he whispered, and stood up to leave. The others watched him walk to the door.
“Jules.” Isabelle went to him. “Are you all right?”
He nodded, but seemed drained. “Seeing George and all that.”
“I understand,” she said, and turned so she didn’t have to watch him walk out.
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