by E. Coulombe
Andrew hadn’t seen Grant much since then.
“So what, Grant,” he now said, “you going to put my friend George under house arrest?”
George flushed, but when he spoke, his tone was calm and measured. Years of dealing with challenging students had taught him how to subdue opposition. “It's okay, I understand,” he said, “it's not my dig, and honestly, I wanted to come to see Andrew and Emma and Michael anyway. The snail part just fell in yesterday, and if you're not comfortable with it, that's fine with me.”
His open and genuine manner appeared to calm Grant down, although Grant didn't budge. George leaned over and looked straight into his eyes. “You can trust me. I won't give out any information. I won’t collect or even look at snails while I’m here. Okay? This place is idyllic, and I agree with you one hundred percent that it should never be disturbed. I won't do anything that could upset this sanctuary in any way. You have my word on that.”
“I suppose it's all right,” Grant finally said, “as long as you keep anything you find to yourself.” Immediately, he stood to leave, mumbling that he needed to go over to the ranch to check gates because wild goats had gotten into the hay.
When Grant left, Andrew smiled and placed his hand on George's knee. “Well, my friend, looks like you still know how to kill a good party!”
“My specialty,” George said.
After a moment’s silence Andrew spoke up, “Now George, that’s enough banter. You still haven’t answered my first question. I know you didn’t come all the way out to Hawaii just to collect a few snails? And as much as I like you too, I know you didn’t come out here just to see me.”
Andrew’s tone was disconcerting to George but he shrugged it off, and smiled a wily, cat-like grin. “Okay, okay Andrew.” George lifted his wiry frame out of the chair, brushed back his curly hair and rose once more to center stage. “Didn’t take you long to get around that one! Well, you’re right. I’ve actually come to Hawaii to see a most remarkable find.” He sipped deliberately on his brandy and smiled his most winning grin at his remaining audience - Kerri, Emma and Andrew. His grin was infectious, and to a person, they smiled back.
“A colleague of mine at the University of Hawaii led a dig in Peru this past summer and they found some things they thought would interest me.” He paused for effect. “And they were right.”
“Alright George,” Andrew laughed, “enough dramatics. What in the hell is it?”
“It’s a saber tooth.”
“A saber tooth?” Emma asked.
“Yes,” George was barely able to control himself. “It’s a thirty-five million year old, single upper canine of a saber-tooth cat. Still intact.”
“But…” Kerri stammered. “What’s the big deal? We’ve all seen the saber tooth before.”
“Maybe…but not this one.”
“But if he found it in Peru, isn’t that the Smilidon?” asked Andrew. “Similar to the modern day bob-cat, but for the long tooth. Kerri’s right, they’ve been found all over North America, from the Age of the Mammals, 45 million years ago?”
“Yeah,” Kerri continued her interrupted train of thought, “so at some point they migrated down to Peru. Big deal.”
“But,” George turned to her, “eighty million years ago South America was carried away by the spreading sea floor,” he spread his hand to mimic the motion, “severing its last connection with Africa and becoming an immense island for forty-five million years, during which the mammals of South America developed in what George Gaylord Simpson has called ‘splendid isolation’. And in that time this little saber-tooth cat evolved.”
“The exact same tooth evolved? Even though it was completely isolated from other saber-toothed cats?” Emma asked in support.
“Right,” George smiled appreciatively.
“But wait a minute” Kerri interceded, “you said the dig site was 35 million years old, and you said the isolation ended at around that same time, so why couldn’t the saber-tooth have migrated down then?”
George beamed his most gracious smile at Kerri, “Oh, Andrew is right, you are a clever one,” he laughed. “True, the Smilidon of North America did eventually migrate down there, along with several other northern mammals, and they may have been what drove the native animals to extinction. And…” George stood directly in front of Kerri’s chair, “this could have been just such an occurrence; except for one, very important difference.”
“And that being? Damn you’re exasperating. Your students must love you.” Kerri burst out impatiently.
“This cannot be Smilidon,” George toyed with them all.
“Why not George?” Emma played along.
“Because this little cat was a marsupial.”
“A marsupial? Like the mammals of Australia?”
“Exactly! Marsupials evolved in South America as well. And the saber tooth cats found in the rest of the world were all placental. So this little saber-toothed cat must have evolved similarly … but separately.”
George sensed that Andrew’s quiet exterior disguised an inner excitement. “I see George,” Andrew finally spoke. “We have another example, don’t we?”
“All right, gloves off man!” George laughed, a little too loudly, revealing the over-consumption of alcohol. “Go on, say your ‘I told you so’ one more bloody time Andrew!”
Andrew smirked. “Now George” he teased, “you act as though I take great pleasure in that.”
“I know you do, and I know how glad you are to hear my news.”
“Yes. I am glad. Very glad. But not, surprised.”
A look of recognition passed between George and Andrew. “Okay, now I get what you two are on about,” Emma interjected, “you’ve seen this kind of thing before, haven’t you? Similar animals evolving separately?”
George smiled. “Yep. Actually, there are several in South America alone. The horse-like litopterns which evolved the ability to run on their middle toe just like horses which evolved elsewhere. And large, heavy boned creatures, with long chiseled trunks which resembled modern African elephants. There were rabbit-like, rhinoceros-like, and even bear-like animals down there - all evolving in ‘splendid isolation’. We now call it convergent evolution, separate lineages converging on the same structural features.”
“And the explanation?” Emma asked.
But just as George was about to answer Andrew cut in. “Similar adaptations arose because they provided the best solution to an evolutionary problem,” he said. “The niche arose, the animals evolved to fill it. The fittest survived.”
“Well said!” George bowed in front of Andrew. “And that’s the usual explanation, isn’t it?” George turned his back to Andrew and walked in front of the others as though facing a jury, “but… I take it that’s not what you think happened?”
“When a scientist speaks heresy,” Andrew answered slowly, “the words must be carefully chosen.” And as though they had practiced the entire presentation, George took his seat, and Andrew stood up. “The animals evolved to fill it,” Andrew paused. “That’s the part that troubles me.”
“Take George’s saber-tooth. When Darwin wrote his treatise, he said that the millions of other possible random mutations, such as the hundred different ways these teeth could have changed, were all out there, but they were few in number, and the fossil record would be scanty. That was early in the days of fossil hunting, but today, with thousands of paleontologists digging up millions of bones around the world, what do we find? Do they find the thousands of random mutational events that could have ‘evolved to fill it’? Darwin’s hopeful monsters? No. Not at all. Instead we find, once again, the same damn tooth!”
A gentle breeze blew, slapping the overhead palms and filling the silence left from Andrew’s speech.
“The same exact mutation occurred twice. Call it what you will but that’s not random!”
“Wait a minute,” Emma cut in, her soft female voice outlining and containing the brusqueness of Andrew’s tirade, “what
about that fish fossil that was recently found, the one in Canada that provides the missing link between water and land animals because it has bones which are early versions of elbow and wrist bones? That surely fills one of Darwin’s gaps?”
“No it doesn’t. It fills in the stages between one form and another, but that only proves my point. If you see the evolution of the leg as a progression from fin to foot, of course, you would think that we would find the intermediary. And we now have. But, Darwin said it was not an orchestrated evolutionary event, but a random one! Which would mean that alongside that fossilized leg bone find you would also dig up a….. I don’t know a three footed fish, where the ventral fin would also become a leg bone and it would try to sort of pogo around like a tripod….”
“Or a three legged fish where the third leg is developing out of the back, coming off that top side fin, the…” Emma added.
“Dorsal fin,” Andrew finished for Emma. “Exactly.” He beamed at her. “See what I mean, see what I’m talking about? Instead of these weird, illogical life forms you have this predictable progression from fin to foot – just the opposite of random!!!”
This time it was George who had held his tongue, waiting for Andrew to finish. He shifted his frame, faced his audience to gain their attention, and spoke in a confessional voice. “I have always considered myself a conservative scientist, and I was attracted to paleontology because of its truthfulness. Bones are bones. You interpret them as best you can and avoid controversy. So, for me to be caught up in a controversial explanation of the past, I just don’t like it.”
He placed his drink on the rattan table, and sauntered to the edge of the lawn. He faced the jury, his dark form outlined by the light cast from the torches. “Nevertheless, here we are. We have in our grasp a fossilized tooth from a marsupial cat, irrefutable proof of a separate occurrence of the same mutation. As a conservative scientist I must choose the explanation that uses the fewest assumptions.” George paused, as if the words were forced out of him and he was trying to will them back. “Darwin’s simple explanation that the fossils were out there but as yet undiscovered….is no longer the simplest explanation.” He pulled his eyes away from the stars and focused on Andrew. “So Andrew, I may finally have to agree with you. Mutations are not random.”
Andrew tilted his head, and a look of recognition crossed his face, turning his lips up in a knowing smile. “I should have guessed old friend. It’s not just you is it? Convergent evolution must be in vogue?”
“Yes,” George’s eyes opened wide. “And that’s not all; the new buzzword is ‘genetic constraints’.”
“Genetic constraints?” Andrew asked.
“Yes. Genes can mutate randomly - within certain parameters.”
Andrew laughed long and loud, “Oh, that’s a good one. Random constraints. A bit of Orwellian doublespeak, wouldn’t you say?”
“Constrained by what?” Emma finally asked, “I must say I’m getting a bit tired of being the only one unable to follow this conversation.”
George took another sip before answering. “Sorry Emma, forgive. But the answer is that no one really knows. Some geneticists, just a few, I should add, think that there is something going on at the molecular level, in the genes themselves. A feedback mechanism or a complex regulatory system. They don’t really know, but something during the early growth of the embryo limits the kinds of changes that occur, and thus the types of variations in the offspring.”
“Yes,” Andrew appeared to agree, but George knew better. “And that’s very interesting,” Andrew said, shaking his head back and forth in an almost childlike manner. “But, I’m afraid, it’s not exactly right. Mutations are constrained. But you don’t go far enough. They’re not just constrained, they’re directed.”
“Directed by what? An outside force? Surely you don’t mean God.”
Andrew laughed loudly.
“No, you would never think that,” George said. “Self-directed mutations? An internal feedback mechanism controlling the mutations?” George circled the yard, his head spinning, and a wily smile lit Andrew’s face. The light clicked in George’s head when he caught Andrew and Kerri exchanging glances.
“That’s it, isn’t it? You think that the mutations are controlled by the genes themselves. The genes actually direct the changes! Oh my god!”
“Oh my genes!” Andrew said, and Kerri burst out laughing.
“Jesus, Andrew. Then you’re saying that evolution itself is self-directed. Are you thinking that? Really?” He spun around on the lawn and looked out to the inky black sea. “And if you could ever prove that” he screamed with sarcasm, “well then you could….you would….recreate evolution?”
As if in shock, George slowly turned and looked down into Andrew’s clear blue eyes.
“Yes,” Andrew answered but his tone implied there was something more.
“And…..if you understood the mechanism, you could ….. I don’t know, direct the next change, or at least spur it on to…..”
“To what George?” Andrew teased.
George looked at Andrew in disbelief, speaking softly as if the words themselves were dangerous.
“To….to show the next change, from chimp to human to…..what? I don’t know, but I guess you could use it to reveal man’s evolutionary destiny.”
Quiet descended upon the group, only the palm fronds stirred in the breeze. A restless wind to match my restless mind, George thought as he pretended to search for satellites in the star-studded sky. He had heard too much heresy for one evening.
To silence the white noise in his head he joked out loud, “Well Andrew, I can see it now. Old man Lamarck has risen from his grave. Come to pat you on the back and proclaim everlasting redemption.” George laughed loudly, and wobbled his finger high in the air, imitating an old man reaching upwards. In an overused voice he croaked “`At last, someone finally got it. That poor, starving giraffe did stretch her neck to reach those higher leaves….and her progeny were changed forever!’” Andrew smiled and slapped George on the back, as both men stood following Emma’s lead.
“No, no, please sit down, both of you. You must excuse me for just a moment. I’m going to help Cook put her children to bed.”
“My compliments on dinner Emma,” George said. “It was a most wonderful evening. My mind was challenged while my senses were delighted.”
“And for once, I wholeheartedly agree with George,” Andrew teased. “I’ve never enjoyed an evening more.”
Emma blushed. “We have many others to thank for the luau, and George, please, come as often as you can, and stay as long as you like.”
Andrew concurred. “And sorry about the snails. The island is Grant’s kuleana, his responsibility. In a way I am only a guest here like you. But I suppose, as long as you don’t turn Nakoa into a laboratory…”
“As you have done.”
“Touché.”
“Enjoy the night air,” said Emma. “I promise I won’t be long. Andrew, perhaps our guests would care for another drink?” she added as she walked away.
“Not for me, thank you. I think I’ll take a stroll on the beach,” Kerri stood and stretched, glancing surreptitiously at Andrew. He moved as if to join her, but instead walked to the table and retrieved the brandy.
George raised his eyebrows as they watched Kerri go. “Another devoted disciple?” he asked. Andrew shrugged, pretending not to understand the inference.
Holding the bottle suspended over George’s glass he asked, “Time for old friends to catch up then, wouldn’t you say?” George’s face beamed.
“I do envy you Andrew. Just look at what you have here.”
“Yes. I am a rich man George.” Andrew frowned exaggeratedly, “I have all of that.” He tried to wave his arm in front of him but it wobbled more than it waved. “But I don’t have one very important thing.”
“And what is that?” George asked worriedly, sucked in by the ruse.
“You George! I don’t have your company man!�
�� Andrew boomed out laughing. “You’re friendship is probably the one thing I miss most from Harvard.” He sobered himself quickly. “So please, I am serious now, stay as long as you can.”
“But I am even more serious,” George was beginning to slur his words, “look at this,” George did manage to wave his arm and encompass the beauty around them.
“Yes not too shabby.”
“Shabby? It’s incredible. And not just this. You have Emma as well. She’s so amazing.”
“Yeah, maybe I did stay away from here too long.”
“Why did you Andrew? Why didn’t you want to come back after we graduated?”
“I don’t know, the work I guess.”
“But you can do the work anywhere.”
Andrew looked down at his hands. “I suppose it was something else.” After a moment he shook his head as though to chase the demons away, but George had already seen the shadow cross his face.
“Well forget all that,” George said. “You’re here now. Life is good, and I envy you. And I’ve never said that to another soul but I say it to you. I envy your lifestyle. I envy you your wife, your family, your island, your work…”
“Enough already George. If this gets any sweeter I’m going to throw up.”
Andrew sat in quiet thought for a moment before speaking again, “I can trust you, can’t I George?”
“Trust me to do what?”
“To not steal my wife.” Andrew laughed, but didn’t retract the statement.
George started to answer but something in the bay caught his eye. “Looks like we’re going to have some fun now.”
“What is it?”
“Well, I may be a wee bit drunk, but I swear I just saw Kerri's naked body slip into the ocean.”
“What? Dammit, that's dangerous!”