The Three-Body Problem

by Catherine Shaw

  ‘Were the boys not beaten at your school?’ I asked him. ‘Little Emily, Charles Morrison’s niece, tells me that her brother complains bitterly about the treatment meted out to his classmates and himself, and can hardly bear it.’

  ‘Well, I never was,’ he said musingly, ‘perhaps because I was an orphan, or simply because I never made any trouble of any kind. It was probably for the latter reason; I was not an imaginative or mischievous child, I’m afraid. It certainly happened to others on occasion, but I admit that the reality of it never penetrated my conscious mind. I went all through school as though on a parallel plane, until I went up to college.’

  ‘When was that?’ I enquired with interest, wondering secretly how old he might be.

  ‘That was six years ago. After I took my d-degree, I obtained this fellowship; you see, I have not moved about much more than you in my life.’

  ‘Well, perhaps not,’ I concurred, ‘but still, think how lucky you are to have received such an education. I sorely miss it.’

  ‘I think that you possess a treasure infinitely more valuable than any education,’ he responded seriously, looking at me, then looking away.

  ‘Nonsense! Whatever do you mean?’

  ‘The gift of life,’ he said, reddening slightly. ‘You are like a fountain of spring water. No amount of education can teach that secret; quite the contrary, if anything, it probably dulls it. An education which consists mainly in running about the Forest of Arden picking wild flowers and jumping onto grazing ponies is much more likely to provide it, if you ask me!

  ‘And this our life, exempt from public haunt,

  Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

  Sermons in stones, and good in everything.

  I would not change it.’

  Hmmm. Mr Weatherburn appears to know his Shakespeare very well.

  I have decided to devote my short holiday these last four days to a great course of serious reading. I must improve my mind and study seriously in order to keep abreast of my teaching, especially as the oldest pupils never cease to advance rapidly in their studies! Emily’s interests, in particular, are maturing each day, and she needs to read works worthy of them. I have already reread much of Shakespeare. I have also obtained a very recent novel by a very modern, much disapproved of – indeed, quite scandalous, writer, Mr Thomas Hardy. It is called The Mayor of Casterbridge, and within the very first ten pages, an obnoxious gentleman puts his wife up for auction at a public gathering, and finds a taker for five guineas! The wife, poor thing, is only too eager to be sold, as she could hardly chance on someone more disagreeable than her own husband. Still, it is most shocking. The very moment the offer is made, she flings her wedding ring into her husband’s face and departs with the purchasing gentleman forever, carrying her baby on her arm. This unusual auction takes place in a tent at a fair, where people come and sit to eat a bowl of something called ‘furmity’. It sounds delicious; it appears to consist in corn and hulled wheat grains, cooked in milk and flavoured with sugar and spices. It is also generously laced with rum in the case of the horrid gentleman, but I shall not heed that addition to the recipe in trying it out for myself at home!

  Your delighted

  Vanessa

  Cambridge, Wednesday, April 11th, 1888

  My dearest Dora,

  I have not written for several days, as I was caught up, albeit in a secondary role, in some events which have shaken Emily’s family to its core. Fate has dealt poor Mrs Burke-Jones a heavy blow.

  It all began the Friday after my tea with Mr Weatherburn. In the late morning, as I was bent over my desk preparing the lessons for the afternoon, I heard a gentle knock on my door. Such a thing was so rare as to be unheard of, except that Mrs Fitzwilliam occasionally knocks to complain about something. Imagine my surprise upon opening the door, to see Mr Weatherburn upon the threshold!

  He did not enter, but stood shyly without, and stammering a little as usual, held a magazine out to me, saying,

  ‘I wonder if you have c-come across this new literary magazine which has begun to appear only very lately? I came across it on a trip down to London, and brought it back, thinking it might be of interest to you.’

  He handed it to me, and I observed the cover and turned the pages. It was called Woman’s World, edited by a certain Mr Oscar Wilde.

  ‘He has taken over the m-magazine but recently,’ Mr Weatherburn told me; ‘it seems he has made it literary, when previously it contained articles mainly about fashion. Oscar Wilde’s relation with the fair sex appears to be one of frank friendship and sympathy, such as can be felt only by a very special kind of man. The contributions are almost exclusively by women; I enjoyed reading it very much in the train. I particularly recommend the remarkable story by Amy Levy.’

  I was grateful and moved by his thoughtfulness, and was awkwardly searching for words to express myself, turning over the pages of the magazine, when he continued,

  ‘I thought perhaps we m-might organise a theatre party for London, to see a Shakespeare play, with Morrison and his sister, and Emily, if you would like to join.’

  London! To see a Shakespeare play!

  ‘Oh, I would love to,’ I burst out. ‘I have never been to London!’

  ‘No, really? Well then, we must make up for it, there’s no time to lose!’ he answered, his face suddenly lit up by a warm and cheering smile. ‘Shall we go tomorrow, as it’s a Saturday? I believe they’re putting on The Merchant of Venice. I shall check if the others agree, and arrange for a box if they do. It will be delightful.’

  My dear Dora, I could not sleep the whole night for excitement. It seemed like a fairy tale. London – the theatre – things one only reads of!

  The very next day, the fairy tale began to come true. Yes, although the day was grey and drizzly, and the omnibus became stuck in the mud and caused a great delay, and our hems became very draggled on the way to the theatre, and our shoes were wet through, still I was carried along in a wave of delight which consisted not only in joyful expectation of the play, but also in the quality of the present moment. There was much laughter amongst us in spite of the bothersome weather; Emily in particular hopped over the puddles, refusing to take shelter under the umbrella, and claiming that the drizzle was sent purposely in order to teach us to appreciate the ‘gentle rain from heaven’.

  Arriving in the theatre was heavenly. The luxurious stalls, the plush seats, the gilded decor, the rich curtains; everything was a vision of pleasantness, and the play was magical, thanks to the great effort put into making the dream city of Venice come alive upon the stage. I leant forward to catch every word, and awaited the most familiar speeches eagerly, trying to guess how they would be spoken. Everyone was in the most light-hearted mood, and all was perfect until the interval.

  What happened next was so unexpected as to be almost unbelievable. We had just begun to rise and smooth our skirts in preparation for a short exploratory tour of the hall, when there was a knock on the door of our box, which opened of itself, and there stood a sober-faced gentleman with an air of gloom.

  ‘Pardon me for disturbing you, ladies and gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I am searching for Mrs Burke-Jones with a very urgent message.’

  ‘I am Mrs Burke-Jones,’ she said, stepping forward and growing pale. ‘What is amiss? Is it about my son Edmund?’

  ‘No, madam, it does not concern your son,’ he said. ‘Step this way, please, I must speak with you alone.’

  They departed, and our group remained silent with dismay. After some minutes, Mr Morrison left the box, saying, ‘I shall go and see if everything is all right.’

  Not five minutes passed before he returned. He opened the door, and his face bore a strange, hard look. Turning to Emily, he broke the bad news directly.

  ‘I am afraid it is about your father, Emily,’ he said almost sternly. ‘He is dead. He died yesterday in a boating accident, together with … with Mademoiselle Martin.’

  ‘Dead! Daddy’s dead! Oh, I
never saw him again, and I waited so long,’ she wailed heart-rendingly. Then, glancing about her with a look of panic, she suddenly cried ‘I must see Mother!’ She rushed out of the stall, followed by her uncle, who caught her arm and led her away firmly.

  I remained alone with Mr Weatherburn.

  ‘How dreadful,’ I said, ‘I had believed that her father was already dead.’

  ‘No,’ he replied softly. ‘He left several years ago. I believe – no, I know, that he left with the young French girl who was Emily’s governess at the time. They had a child very shortly afterwards, and went to live in France, as it was nearly impossible for them to remain together in England.’

  ‘I begin to understand,’ I said, thinking back over some things that had been said or alluded to in Emily’s house, which I had not really noticed at the time. ‘How difficult it must have been for Mrs Burke-Jones.’

  ‘I can imagine it was desperately difficult,’ he said, ‘although I did not know the family then. I know that she asked Morrison to leave his college rooms and come to live in her house at that time, and all in all I believe the arrangement suited him capitally. He really is a family man, and loves children.’

  The lights darkened, as the play was about to resume. Mr Weatherburn arose, and offered me his arm.

  ‘I do not believe we shall stay for the second half, after what has happened,’ he said. ‘It is awkward, one does not want to intrude on the family, nor to seem to abandon them.’

  The entire audience had by now returned to its seats, and the hall remained nearly empty, so that we soon spotted the small group formed by Mr Morrison, his sister and her daughter, together with the bearer of ill-tidings. They seemed to be conversing urgently. We approached somewhat; I felt badly uncomfortable and much in the way, although Mr Weatherburn’s calm presence and the fact that he was in the same situation as I reassured me somewhat. However, seeing us at some distance, Mrs Burke-Jones turned to us and beckoned us to approach.

  ‘We must return to Cambridge immediately,’ she said, her face extremely pale and rather stern, much like her brother’s. ‘Perhaps you would prefer to remain here and return independently?’

  It was naturally unthinkable. I tried to imagine Mrs Fitzwilliam’s face if I returned alone with Mr Weatherburn from London, late at night. Besides, I believe no one had any stomach for the play after what had happened.

  We spent the entire way back to Cambridge in the dark, in almost complete silence. Once there, it was raining heavily, so we took a hansom and directed it first to Mrs Fitzwilliam’s house. Mr Weatherburn bid Mrs Burke-Jones goodbye in the gentlest tones, and descended from the hansom, where he waited below to help me alight. But Mrs Burke-Jones caught my hand in hers before I could descend.

  ‘I travel to France tomorrow,’ she told me. ‘My brother will accompany me, and Emily insists on coming also, although I am not sure it is for the best. Please excuse her if you do not see her in lessons on Monday or Tuesday. We will return as soon as our business in France is concluded.’

  She spoke with dignity, but Emily burst out uncontrollably. ‘Oh, Mother – how can you call it “business”! Oh, Miss Duncan, Father left a little boy there, in France, and he is an orphan now – he has no place to go!’

  ‘Emily!’ said her mother, perhaps more sharply than she intended. ‘We must return home now, and begin to prepare ourselves. Goodnight, Miss Duncan. Please accept my apologies for the sad conclusion of our evening together.’

  ‘Please do not even think of apologising,’ I cried. ‘If I can be of help to you in any possible manner, do not hesitate to ask me! It would be a great honour.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said a little more gently. I descended, and the hansom drove off. By this time it was storming. Mr Weatherburn stood still patiently waiting for me, seeming almost not to notice the rain which poured down upon him and dripped before his eyes from the brim of his hat.

  We entered the hall, and I opened my own door, and turned to bid him goodbye. Instead of which, I was surprised to hear myself say –

  ‘You do look wet and miserable! I should so like to give you a cup of tea!’

  ‘I sh-should love it!’ he replied, in a tone of timid audacity which exactly matched my own feelings. Suspecting that Mrs Fitzwilliam would strongly disapprove, we slipped inside quite silently and took off our wet things, and I built up the fire and put the kettle on, and lit the candles. The tea was soon ready, and we sat on either side of the hearth, avoiding by common consent any talk of the distressing events we had just witnessed. Oddly illumined by the flickering firelight, my cosy sitting room seemed enveloped in secret magic.

  We sipped our tea for a moment, looking into the fire, and I searched for words to thank him for the evening, and tell him how beautiful I had found it, in spite of everything.

  ‘It was a marvellous thing for me to see even half a play,’ I finally said. ‘My very first visit to the theatre.’

  ‘I should like to take you to see the other half,’ he said a little wistfully. ‘The very scene following the interval was that in which Bassanio chooses the right casket to win his beloved. Do you remember …’ Slowly turning his intense gaze upon me, he recited, softly and ardently,

  ‘Though for myself alone

  I would not be ambitious in my wish

  To wish myself much better, yet for you

  I would be trebled twenty times myself,

  A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich,

  That only to stand high in your account

  I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,

  Exceed account.’

  I was deeply confused. Hastily, I turned away, reached down my volume of Shakespeare’s plays, and turned to the casket scene. In a moment I had found the speech he was quoting. It was Portia’s speech to Bassanio. My eyes followed the lines, and as he paused, I continued it, although it cost me a strange effort.

  ‘But the full sum of me

  Is sum of something which, to term in gross,

  Is an unlessoned girl, unschool’d, unpractis’d;

  Happy in this, she is not yet so old

  But she may learn; happier than this,

  She is not bred so dull but she can learn.’

  The words were infinitely more powerful than any of our own could ever be. It seemed impossible to add to them. We remained silent, gazing into the fire for a long time, which was yet too short. Suddenly, without warning, he sprang to his feet.

  ‘Of course!’ he said. ‘I have it! How could I not have thought of it before?’

  ‘What, what is it?’ I asked anxiously.

  ‘The proof! Yes – it all works!’ And he made a sudden dash for the door.

  ‘Wait – your overcoat, your hat!’ I called out quickly.

  He stopped in his tracks.

  ‘Oh, I am s-s-sorry,’ he said. ‘How rude of me to be so absent-minded. I had entirely forgotten where I was – I became lost in mathematical ideas. It is strange – all of a sudden, I saw how to accomplish something which has been eluding me for weeks!’ He returned towards me, holding out his hand, and thanked me warmly for the tea.

  ‘I am glad you had a moment to dry before returning to your mathematics, and to your nocturnal pacing,’ I told him, smiling.

  ‘Pacing? Oh yes. Do you hear me? I am very sorry! I never thought of it. But never fear, I shall not pace tonight. I do it only when my reflections are not proving fruitful. Tonight they are, thanks to you, thanks to Shakespeare.’ And he slipped out, his head aswirl, I imagine, with theorems and propositions, lemmas and corollaries.

  The very next day, Mrs Burke-Jones departed for France with Mr Morrison and Emily in tow; they are to return only today. I have thought of them a great deal in these last three days. I shall write to you again, just as soon as something interesting transpires.

  Yours ever,

  Vanessa

  Cambridge, Monday, April 16th, 1888

  My dearest little sister,

 
I have just returned home from tea with Emily; in spite of all that has happened this last week, Mrs Burke-Jones allowed her to continue our new habit of tea on Monday, as she so strongly wished it. Emily was bursting with the need to pour out her woes; I do not believe anybody really listens to them at home, and she cannot talk to me intimately during lessons.

  ‘Oh, Miss Duncan, Miss Duncan, what do you think? You cannot believe all that has happened,’ she began almost as soon as I settled down in front of the teapot. ‘Edmund has been sent home from school; he arrived yesterday, and he is dreadfully ill! But I believe it is not just illness, for the letter said that the school was found to be unsuitable for him, and that he is not to come back ever. Mother is furious, but she does not know what to be furious about really, for no one has told us what he has been expelled for. The letter did not say, and Edmund will not say anything to Mother either, no matter how much she presses him. Oh, Miss Duncan, I cannot help rejoicing really, now that Edmund is home again. I do hope he will stay forever. I believe he will tell me what really happened, sooner or later.’

  ‘You must take very good care of him,’ I told her, thinking of the frail little blonde child I had briefly laid eyes on at the dinner party. ‘It will be a great joy to you, once he gets well again.’

  ‘But then, the most dreadful thing happened in France,’ she went on, unable to contain her emotions. ‘Oh, Miss Duncan, we actually saw the little boy, Father’s son, who lived in France with him! He looks just like Edmund used to … they look the way I remember my father, too – he was slim and blonde. I don’t look like him at all; I resemble Mother. The little boy is not even six years old yet. His name is Robert, and he speaks English so sweetly, because Father always spoke English with him. Even though I never saw him before and did not even really know about him, not even his name, I felt that he was my very own brother, just like Edmund. I do so want another little brother! I was so excited, because I thought we were to bring him home! Mother saw lawyers and people for hours and hours. You know, Mademoiselle Martin was my governess until I was seven. She had no family at all, she had grown up in an orphanage and been educated in a convent, and she had come to England all by herself to seek for work, and she used always to say that we were the only family she had ever had. She fell in love with Daddy, you know. I am not supposed to know it, but I do know it, and I think it is very bad, but it could not have been her fault. I would have fallen in love with Daddy myself. I don’t know why he had to leave us all and go away with her for all those years, though. He never wrote to me at all after he left. But Mother says that he left me a letter which I will be allowed to open when I am eighteen. It’s a very long time from now, and I do so want to know what he says! He left a letter for Mother, too. That’s all that he left, for he and Mademoiselle Martin had almost nothing at all to live on; our house belongs to Mother, you know. Papa had not left a testament as people sometimes do, leaving their things to people, because he had nothing, but he had left these letters, in case anything ever happened to him. Mother told me that in the letter he wrote her, he told her how sorry he was about how unhappy he had made her by leaving, and how much he still loved Edmund and me.’