The Atomic Weight of Secrets or The Arrival of the Mysterious Men in Black

by Eden Unger Bowditch

  Noah’s mother had visiting admirers who were of the high social, well-dressed set. They were almost always elegant and fancy and colorful and bejeweled. They came with gifts and sweets and flowers. They were either dandies or duchesses or otherwise well-groomed patrons of the arts, followed by servants, and sometimes even adoring fans of their own.

  “Father’s visitors could not be more different than Mother’s,” Noah explained.

  Without exception, his father’s visitors had neither feathers nor baubles adorning their clothes. They wore dour faces and an air of brittle seriousness. His father’s visitors dressed either in serious gray or brown attire, and simple gray or brown derbies, and often wore monocles dangling from their pockets. Some of his father’s visitors wore white lab coats and thick glasses and always carried notepads full of computations.

  That morning’s visitors were neither dressed in feathers nor finery, nor were they in lab coats or prim suits. “They were both dressed totally in black—what a surprise, eh?” Noah said. “I do believe that those two might still be the strangest I have yet to see. Their very shapes were like something from one of Miss Brett’s nonsense poems. One man had arms that reached almost down to his knees. He had huge shoulders, but very short legs. If it hadn’t been for his enormous moustache, I could have easily mistaken him for an ape. In one oversized hand, he carried a black walking stick, like a prop in a circus show. His eyes were hidden behind thick glasses with lenses so dark they appeared black. His head was covered by a wide-brimmed hat pulled down so low it seemed to sit upon his glasses.

  “The other man was very, very thin, but only to his middle. His bottom half seemed to spread out like a Bartlett pear. His arms came just to his hips and sort of hung there at a forty-five-degree angle. He wore a very, very tall stovepipe hat, like they wore in Grandfather’s time. He had a standing collar and an oversized black cravat made into a prominent bowtie that fluttered whenever he let out a breath. On his nose was perched an extremely large pair of pince-nez spectacles with dark, almost reflective lenses hiding his eyes. His sideburns were so enormous they completely obscured the small bit of cheek above his cravat. They looked like two bushy gophers clinging to the sides of his face.”

  Noah remembered watching these strange creatures as they looked around, surveying the area before walking up to the door and raising the knocker.

  “I quickly put the volatile chemicals away and hurried to the top of the stairs. My best friend Ralph was with me, and Ralph followed quietly.

  “I thought Father would look out the window and send for the police. You can imagine my shock when he opened the door and greeted them, well, not as if they were old friends. But he greeted them as if he had expected them.

  “I was pretty well stunned. I really didn’t know what to think. But Ralph didn’t like them right away, and showed it. And Ralph usually likes everyone.”

  “So each of you had a very different visitor, it seems,” said Miss Brett, standing to clear the table. The children followed her lead and began to help. “Not a single one seems to have been in more than one place.”

  “How many of these blackguards could there be?” asked Faye, balancing all the plates atop one another. Helping around the farmhouse was a very exciting thing to do, she had found, and something she’d never done before. She walked over to the stove to warm the milk. Miss Brett brought in a tray of miniature tarts.

  “Oh, Miss Brett! How scrumptious!” exclaimed Lucy.

  “Don’t let the Knave of Hearts in here,” said Noah.

  “Exactly,” said Miss Brett.

  The tarts were delicious. They were strawberry jam tarts Miss Brett had made. She also brought out whipped cream that smelled of vanilla. Full though they were, all managed to devour two tarts each.

  “When did you first meet those blackguards?” Faye asked Miss Brett.

  All faces were suddenly upon their teacher. No one had asked before now, but obviously Miss Brett must have come across those fellows before arriving at Sole Manner Farm.

  “It was dear old Mr. Bell from the teaching college who had told me, in his strange accent, of this ‘special opportunity,’” she said. “Mr. Bell had, more or less, taken me under his wing when I came to study, and with that funny cape he always wore, ‘under his wing’ is the right way to put it. He had said there was a unique position available for which I would be perfect. Mr. Bell simply told me that I would be contacted.”

  That evening, when she had arrived home to the lady’s boarding house and opened her satchel, Miss Brett found that someone had secretly left her a note. She had clearly been contacted. A meeting had been scheduled.

  “My story is much like yours,” she continued, “except I had to go to an office. It was there that I met my first man in black, although I wouldn’t exactly call him a blackguard, Faye.” From there, Miss Brett told them of her meeting. At least, most of it.

  On the note Miss Brett was given, there was written a precise hour when a carriage would arrive to collect her. “And at that hour exactly, the carriage came to the boarding house. It drove a most circuitous route, all over town, round and about, until it finally stopped in front of a building. The driver told me to go to the seventh floor.

  “I climbed out of the carriage and entered the building. There was no one around, so I simply stepped into the elevator. As it began to ascend, I realized I had not been told what office number to go, but when I stepped out of the elevator, I learned it didn’t matter—there was only one door on the entire floor. I walked down the hall and stood in front of the door.

  “A high-pitched nasal voice from within told me to come in, just as I raised my hand to knock.

  “I entered the room. It was empty except for two chairs on either side of a small desk, upon which sat a small lamp. In the chair behind the desk sat a very small, very thin man who looked as if he might have a twist in his back.” He wore a black French-style hat, she added, that pulled down right to the top of his nose. He had on a black shirt with an Elizabethan ruff that came right up to his chin, and short trousers made of black velvet that ballooned out over his chair, almost floating above his knobby knees that stuck out on either side of the desk. Black stockings were pulled up and over those knees. “I would have liked a better look at those stockings,” Miss Brett said, “but I could have sworn they were made of the finest, most delicate, most intricate lace.”

  According to Miss Brett, the man also wore a pair of fine black leather gloves on his very thin hands whose bony fingers threatened to push through the thin tight leather. His spectacles featured dark, almost black, lenses. The hat and the lenses so hid his face that she could hardly see his features, except for the crooked nose upon which the spectacles sat.

  Miss Brett observed the man and wondered, briefly, if he was related to her own Mr. Bell. But the unusual choice of clothing, and perhaps the accent, seemed to be the only things the two men had in common. There was no gentle kindness emanating from the opposite side of the desk in that room. Perhaps, she reconsidered, it was just the accent. Perhaps they simply came from the same country.

  “The odd man placed a stack of papers in front of me,” Miss Brett said. “His gloved hand rested on the stack. I was not sure if he was keeping them from me or keeping them from falling off the desk.”

  “Your job is to teach,” she was told by the man with dark glasses. “But—and take heed, for this is at least as important as your teaching responsibilities—you are to keep those children from distracting their parents. These are brilliant people, Miss Brett, understand?”

  “The children?” she asked, grinning inwardly.

  “The parents, Miss Brett, the parents. They are vital and brilliant and must be removed from distraction. All distraction. Our work is very important, but you don’t need to know that. You don’t need to know anything.”

  “Not know anything?” Miss Brett asked, both amused and incredulous. “But, sir—I’m a teacher.”

  “I know that,” he said
with a snort. “Let’s just keep it that way.”

  Somewhat baffled, and certainly not enamored of this featureless man, Miss Brett decided to leave bad enough alone. “I agreed to take the job,” she now told the children, “and I signed all of the papers—under this odd cloak of secrecy—and made the commitment to tutor you.”

  She kept her concerns and questions to herself and did not share them with her charges as she told her story. But she had wondered then, as she continued to wonder, if the parents were doing work for some important government agency. Were they, in fact, some sort of secret agents? Or might they be an international team of scientists working on the world’s most top-secret projects? She had learned only that the parents were brilliant. And that they were important. But to whom?

  She was handed an envelope containing a train ticket and instructions. She was to leave in the morning for Dayton, Ohio. She was to tell no one where she was going.

  “So it was just the one?” asked Noah. “Just one funny blackbird, not a whole mob of them?”

  “Just the one,” she said.

  “But there were more to come, surely,” Noah said, as much of a statement as a question.

  “The man at the desk was the first,” Miss Brett said, offering mystery in her voice. It was then that the seed of the question entered her mind: Was that man the first? He most certainly was not the last.

  On the carriage ride from the train to the schoolhouse, she decided there was no point in asking the strange driver what was going on. The driver, it should be said, wore a black knit hat, wide black trousers, a loose black shirt, and odd square glasses with very dark lenses. He was silent for the whole of the two-hour ride.

  Miss Brett had been told nothing of her students, and she now felt that nothing could have prepared her for what she was to find. Would she have believed that there could be five such children in the world? Her students were perhaps the most brilliant people Miss Brett had ever known. Still, remarkable as her students were, they were, after all, children. No matter how big their brains, no matter how brave they seemed to be—whatever they knew about the steam engine or how incandescent lamps worked, and no matter what they were able to invent during their free time—they were all so young. They needed care and love and attention, Miss Brett believed, even more than they did test tubes and periodic tables. Their worlds had been shaken beneath their feet. She, too, had endured sudden change, but she at least had chosen to come.

  “Where are my parents?” asked Faye.

  “Oh, yes, Miss Brett, if you know,” said Jasper. “We’d like to know where our parents are, as well. Have you heard? Are they, perhaps, with Faye’s parents?”

  “And my father?” Noah and Wallace said together.

  “Where?” Miss Brett was at a loss. “I... I’m sorry, children, I don’t know—”

  “Are they together?” asked Jasper.

  “I... I think they must be.” Miss Brett thought back to that day, that interview.

  “Are you sure you didn’t hear anything?” Faye insisted. “Are you sure you don’t know where they’re being kept?”

  “Kept? I don’t think they’re—”

  “Didn’t anyone tell you?” Faye was almost standing now.

  “I’m just as much in the dark as you, I’m sorry to say.”

  “But it doesn’t make sense,” Faye said, falling back into her seat. “Someone must know.”

  “I am very sorry, but I do not,” Miss Brett said, speaking with the deepest sincerity.

  There was a thick silence as one more disappointing answer led the children nowhere. She hoped they believed her, that she simply did not know any more than they did. She hoped that they knew she cared and that she was there solely to support them. She did not want them to see her as part of the machine that had separated them from their parents.

  Again, she thought to herself how children, all children, needed guidance and care and nurturing—especially from their parents. She could not imagine what kind of parents would simply abandon their children, even temporarily, without explanation. It was not her place to judge, she supposed, and things could well be out of the parents’ control, but no word had been sent and no message received.

  With absent parents involved in their own world of invention, Miss Brett could see that she had a larger role to play than merely teacher, no matter what the man with the dark glasses had said.

  That night, after everything was put away in the kitchen, Miss Brett helped the children get settled into their rooms. The boys were happy in the yellow room with their three beds. They each chose the one they wanted, with, to Miss Brett’s relief, no fighting. But Faye was not happy about sharing the big bed with Lucy.

  “I want my own room,” Faye demanded. “I’ve always had my own room.”

  “Well, now is your chance to share a room with someone else,” said Miss Brett. “It will be a new experience.”

  “I’ve had enough new experiences, thank you,” Faye said, “and now I’ll have to share a bed with a baby?”

  “I’m not a baby,” Lucy said. “I don’t wee in the bed and I’m very cozy to sleep with. Everyone says so.”

  “Really?” said Faye. “Who’s everyone?”

  “Mummy and Jasper and my dolly and—”

  “Your dolly doesn’t think you’re cozy because your dolly doesn’t think.”

  “Faye,” Miss Brett said. “This is your room and your room to share with Lucy. It is her room, too. That is that.”

  “I...” but Faye could not argue. There really was no choice. The farmhouse could offer only the rooms it had. Faye groaned and went into the white room, throwing herself on the bed. Lucy came in and jumped up beside her.

  “This will be fun,” she said. “Just us in our own bed.”

  Faye rolled over and groaned again.

  After everyone had gotten into their nightclothes, washed for bedtime, and climbed into their beds, Miss Brett sat down in her rocking chair to read to the children. That night, she read the second chapter of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

  The girls settled in their bed and drifted toward sleep. Faye closed her eyes, and only the thought of the evening’s conversation about the men in black kept her from slumber. Lucy, already asleep, rolled over and cuddled up to Faye.

  At first, Faye didn’t know what to do. No one had ever cuddled with her before. Her parents had kissed her and held her hand. She had embraced them, too, but never this cuddling thing.

  “Lucy?” she said softly. Lucy simply snored back. The little girl was deeply asleep. Her little body was warm and soft and, as if by instinct, Faye snuggled closer. Then Lucy burrowed into Faye’s embrace.

  Faye had a moment of worry, thinking it made her weak, somehow, to want to cuddle and snuggle like this. Knowing that Lucy was asleep, Faye felt safe to hold her, to feel glad to have someone near. Tears filled Faye’s eyes and she didn’t know why. Faye put her arm more tightly around the little girl. She let out a long hard breath and found that sleep came easier than she’d thought.

  The boys each had a harder time getting to sleep. Wallace lay in bed, wanting to ask Miss Brett to come in, but not wanting the others to hear him. Jasper, on the other hand, was worried about Lucy sharing a room with Faye. He again thought about Faye—so beautiful it was almost difficult to look at her, yet not a kind person. In fact, Jasper thought the girl could even be cruel. Lucy would need him to cuddle and hold her.

  Both he and Wallace managed to fall asleep before Noah. He was the only one awake when Miss Brett came in to make one final check.

  “I’m normally a very good sleeper,” Noah said. He thought to himself that he was probably more accustomed than the others to having at least one parent gone most of the time. “Do you mind if I play, Miss Brett?” he asked.

  “Play?” she asked, imagining building blocks or a ball and jacks. She was about to tell him it was late and he should try to sleep when he reached under his bed and brought out his violin.

  “Oh
,” she said. “Of course, if it helps you relax.”

  “Well, I won’t know until I try,” said Noah, giving her half a smile. He tightened and rosined his bow, then tuned the strings on his instrument. He smiled again as he lifted the violin to his chin.

  And then, he took her breath away. The sound that came from his violin was like the music of angels. She was sure that the dreams of the sleeping children were being embellished by the beauty and pleasure of his music. Miss Brett closed her eyes— the tune was both sad and joyous. As it came to an end, she felt the tears coming down her face. She opened her eyes to see Noah crying, too.

  “Sweet angel,” she said, putting her arms around him. “My sweet, sweet angel, you are amazing. Such beauty, such pleasure, such—”

  “I can’t play it anymore,” said Noah, trying to rub away the tears that had betrayed him. “I... I can’t play it. Not for a while, anyway.” He placed his violin back in the case. “It makes me think of her. She’s not, you know, one of them, one of the other parents. Music is what we share, my mother and me. It makes me think: What if she’s looking for me and I’m gone, or what if she doesn’t know where my dad is or where I am, or... I guess it’s not making me very relaxed, is it?”

  “I understand,” Miss Brett said gently. “But I want to thank you for playing tonight. It will make us all dream better dreams. Any time you want to play, let me know so I can be there to listen. I never want to miss a note.”

  Noah smiled and sheepishly pushed the violin case back under his bed. Soon, he thought—soon they’d know where his father was. They’d know why they’d all been moved so far. They’d know who was behind all this and how to make things right. And soon, somehow, he’d hear from his mother. He’d get one of her postcards—any day now.

  THE SOPRANO’S SON

  OR

  NOAH SHARES SOMEONE FIT FOR A KING

  Before that first day at Sole Manner Farm, Noah Canto-Sagas had exactly three friends. One was Marie, the little girl who lived in the flat below in Place d’léna in Paris, France. Noah had lived there for four months when he was about six. The little girl had spoken no English, and Noah had spoken little French. Still, they became friends, and would play at the Trocadéro together. By the end of their time in Paris, Noah’s French was excellent, and Marie spoke English rather well.