by Tim Mason
Don’t talk to him, thought Tom. Can’t you see how dangerous he is?
But Decimus did not look dangerous. He looked like a gentleman and he enjoyed playing one. After giving Tom a cautioning glance, he stood. “I’ll see if they know anything inside,” he said with a gracious bow and went into the inn. The man smiled at Tom.
Don’t talk to me, please don’t please don’t.
“Hello,” said the gentleman.
“’Lo,” said Tom, looking away.
“It’s the strangest thing,” said the man. “I mistook you for someone I once knew, a young sailor I’d been thinking of, just this morning.”
Tom stared straight ahead, willing the man to stop.
“I made a lengthy sea voyage some years ago, you see. Young Philip King and I had many profound philosophical conversations in the course of our travels. You look so much like him, I very nearly seized you by the hand when you sat down just now. It’s not just the hair color you share, there’s something else.” Tom didn’t respond. “Of course, Midshipman King would no longer be a boy but a grown man by now. Stupid of me.”
Inside the inn the man behind the bar told Decimus that rain on the road had delayed the coach but not by long. As the Chorister turned to go, the barman said, “You know who that is out there, don’t you? That’s the monkey-man, Mr. Charles Darwin himself!” Decimus flushed red and waited for a moment to regain control of his breathing. Then he went outside.
Darwin looked up expectantly at Decimus, who smiled thinly and said, “Should be arriving any moment now, sir.” Decimus had seen caricatures of Darwin in the press, of course. He had memorized artists’ impressions, but the man in person bore little resemblance to any of them. There was an amiable gentility and a playfulness about the man’s smile, which contrasted with his sharp, observant eyes. Decimus resumed his seat on the bench next to Darwin, with Tom on his other side. He could hear the heartbeats of both, having long ago learned to filter out his own. From Darwin’s moderately paced pulse his ears moved on to other things.
Faulty plumbing there. I should like a look at that gallbladder. And the man’s bowel! Peristaltic spasms. Turbulence. Parasites?
He thought of a tapeworm he’d once taken from the intestine of pretty young woman from Clapham. Thirty feet long it was. Decimus felt himself going red again and restrained himself with difficulty. Here the great man was, served up on a platter, and Decimus, forbidden to touch him! But was he? Truly? Decimus had such skills, he could bleed the man without his even being aware. In the confusion of the coach’s arrival, who would notice the man growing pale and faint? Even when he collapsed, it would take time for anyone to discover the small puncture wound in the man’s back . . .
No. Decimus would be obedient. He would stop young Gates—but how? How to prevent the meeting of David Gates, due to arrive imminently, and Charles Darwin?
“You’re expecting someone, obviously,” said Decimus.
“Our children’s old nurse,” said Darwin. “Miss Brodie left our employ some years ago and returned to her native Scotland. But she comes to us from time to time and we’re always happy to see her. She’s just been with my wife for a week, and now she’s visiting the sick—me!”
Decimus looked off, up the road. Perhaps the story was true; perhaps the naturalist was unaware of Gates. There was a distant sound of hooves.
“For whom, sir, are you waiting, if I might ask?” said Darwin.
“Doctor. A specialist, come about my son. He’s deaf and mute, you see.”
Darwin’s brow contracted. He looked at Tom and Tom looked away. “I’m sorry,” said Darwin uncertainly.
There was a clop and a clatter, and a mud-splattered carriage came into view, followed by three barking dogs. The barman emerged from the inn, and the hostler and a groom bounded out from the adjacent barn. Suddenly the forecourt of the inn was filled with shouted greetings and orders, and the honking of geese chased by the barking dogs, and the snorting of four hard-ridden horses. An old woman in black bombazine was the first to be helped down from the coach, her arms clutching bundles and an umbrella.
“Brodie!” shouted Darwin joyfully.
“Look at you, sir!” she said. “You’re that thin!”
“Brodie, Brodie, Brodie!” he cried, dancing the woman in a circle and causing several of her packages to drop to the ground.
“Nae, sir, leave off! These are straight from Mrs. Darwin, they’ll be all mucky now!”
Decimus approached the carriage door. A portly bald man climbed out, rubbing the small of his broad back and shouting for someone to fetch down his bags from the top of the coach.
“And how are things at Down House?” Darwin was saying as he gathered up the fallen gifts.
“Well, everyone misses you, of course, sir, and Mrs. Darwin sends her best love, and so do the children. Horace says, ‘Tell Papa to feel good and to come home again, soon as ever he can.’”
The portly man and the groom were helping a rotund woman down from the coach. When they were clear, Decimus mounted the step and looked into the carriage. Empty.
The old Scottish nurse was still talking breathlessly as Darwin engaged a boy to load her bags and the gifts onto a waiting brougham. “All my old friends at Down House and from Orpington came to see me, sir, including the vicar, and all of them so concerned about you, with your old ailment acting up and you becoming so very famous and the papers writing such scandalous things about you, it makes me that angry, I can’t tell you!”
“There, there,” said Darwin. “We’ll have luncheon and a good long talk, shall we?” He turned back and said to Decimus, “Rotten luck, I’m afraid—looks like your man didn’t turn up. Goodbye, now.” He looked at Tom quizzically. “Goodbye, son.”
Decimus watched Darwin put the old nurse into the carriage and climb in after her. A red heat filled his brain.
The fools sent him to the wrong place! Down House! That’s where this Gates fellow was headed! To the man’s own home, of course!
He grabbed Tom by his lapel and jerked him to his feet. “Come!” he snapped, and set off running for the gig, Tom racing behind.
Down House
Emma Darwin rose when the young housemaid ushered David Gates into a cluttered sitting room, her eyes narrowing, trying to recognize the boy he once had been. David took her extended hand and bowed over it briefly, his mind racing. It had never occurred to him that Mr. Darwin might be away.
Now what do I do? What do I say? I was a fool to come!
“Yes,” said Mrs. Darwin, slowly. “I do remember you, Mr. Gates. You were little David, I can see it. The same age as our Annie. Come to the garden with me; it’s a shambles in here, I’m afraid. We still have young ones, you see.”
Her voice was neither warm nor cold. She led him through the house to the capacious gardens beyond, her arms folded across her chest, holding herself.
“If you’ve come to see Mr. Darwin, he’s at Richmond, taking the cure. Are you here to see Mr. Darwin? I cannot imagine you’re here to see me.”
David searched for words, but before he’d found any, Emma Darwin was stooping to pluck a weed.
“Is your father well?” she asked. “I’m afraid I have never met your mother.”
“My father is well, thank you, ma’am. My mother passed away some years ago.”
“Ah.” She found and pulled another weed. “I think I heard you were at Oxford.”
“I am, ma’am.” How was he ever going to bring up the fears that had set him traveling without sleep since the night before?
“Your course of study?” she asked, standing and flinging away the offending plants.
“Divinity.”
Mrs. Darwin glanced at him keenly and then continued to walk.
“Such strange weather for June,” she said. “The heat last week—or was it the week before?—fairly scorched half my garden, or so I thought. But then it cleared off and now I think it all just might survive. Do you remember Annie?”
“Vividly.”
“The achillea is coming on, you see, and the lady’s mantle. The early heat pushed everyone’s schedule forward, it seems. Those delphiniums will need staking. Are you at all familiar with my husband’s work, Mr. Gates?”
“I’ve read On the Origin of Species, or stumbled through most of it, rather. I couldn’t claim to be familiar with it. I’m afraid it’s rather a steep climb for me.”
“For us all, one way and another. Mr. Darwin has been sharing his thoughts and discoveries with me for two decades now, whatever the cost to me personally. He was reluctant to publish, you know, and put it off nearly twenty years for fear of igniting all this . . .” She made a sweeping, hopeless gesture.
“I suppose it’s because of all this,” said David, “that I’ve come today, although I had hoped to find Mr. Darwin at home.”
“Yes?” she said, striding on across the grass and leaving the gardens behind.
“His theories have distressed some persons, I imagine.”
Mrs. Darwin’s laugh was a single bark, mirthless. “You might say so, Mr. Gates,” she said over her shoulder.
“Ma’am, I came in hopes of alerting your husband to the possibility that some persons in positions of authority may actually . . . wish him harm.”
“I shouldn’t be surprised. He gets the most dreadful mail.”
She seemed to David to be remarkably unconcerned.
“Ma’am, in the past week I have heard, in my college’s quad, and later in my own tutor’s study, direct threats made against your husband’s life and perhaps a member of the royal family.”
“There’s a strange combination. Who was making these threats?”
“Principally a retired sea captain named FitzRoy, ma’am.”
“Oh, poor FitzRoy! He piloted the Beagle, you know.”
“I am afraid I did not know.”
“He has had a dreadfully hard life since then, and I understand that his first wife’s death left him quite altered. They were friends, years ago, but Charles has had to break off correspondence with the man. I shouldn’t worry about poor old FitzRoy, Mr. Gates.”
“There were others at my college—at the House, you know—who seemed to tolerate his violent talk or perhaps even to encourage it.”
“Oh, isn’t there to be a great debate soon at Oxford? On the merits of my husband’s theories?”
Is she not hearing me? Am I not being sufficiently clear?
“Yes, ma’am, tomorrow, in fact. Bishop Wilberforce will likely take on Mr. Thomas Huxley.”
“That’s right. Huxley wanted Mr. Darwin to participate himself, but Charles is far too ill.”
“I am sorry to hear it, ma’am.”
“I am not! Thank God he’ll be well away from that circus! Anyway, it’s no wonder you’re hearing angry talk. My husband’s work has got everyone in a state.” She stopped before a neat gravel path that stretched on into the distance, bordering a stand of trees. “This is the Sandwalk. It goes on in a great elongated sort of oval. The Sandwalk is where Mr. Darwin walks and thinks, once in the morning and again in the afternoon. He’s done it for years and years, when his health has permitted it. This is where he created his masterwork, and our misery.”
“Misery, ma’am?”
“Mr. Gates, I believe my husband to be one of the greatest natural philosophers who ever lived. He is without doubt the kindest husband and father and the most decent of men. And I live in desperate fear for his eternal soul.” She looked at David searchingly.
“Surely you, a divinity student, can understand my feelings?”
He didn’t know what to say so he said nothing.
“If we are not created in the image of God, who are we? What are we? Accidents of nature?”
“I do not know, ma’am. I believe us to be God’s creatures, however he created us.”
She turned brusquely away from the Sandwalk and started back toward the house. “After Annie, nothing was the same. Mr. Darwin walks me and the children to the church and leaves us at the door. He shuffles about outside until the services are over. Me, inside; him, outside. Sums it up, really. Forgive me for speaking about such things; I never do. I don’t talk about her, normally. We neither of us do. But seeing your face so unexpectedly brought many things back. I can’t offer you lunch, I’m afraid. Nanny’s due back with the children at any moment, and it will be sheerest pandemonium here.”
“Ma’am, I was very fond of your daughter. It was a bitter loss for me as well, as young as I was.”
She turned back and grabbed his arm suddenly; she spoke in an altered voice. “Tell me God’s love is great enough, Mr. Gates. Tell me God’s love is sufficient to embrace my dearly beloved husband for all eternity. Tell me!”
David hesitated. “Mrs. Darwin, I hope and truly believe it is.”
She looked down at her own hand as though it belonged to someone else, gripping the young man’s arm. She released it hastily, flushing pink in the face, and continued on toward the house.
“Goodbye, Mr. Gates,” she said. She did not look back.
Orpington
The sign above the shop proclaimed gates haberdashery. Inside, David Gates’ father was rolling a bolt of silk, and Rebecca was adjusting a boater on a hat stand when David astonished them by walking in.
“Hullo?” cried Mr. Gates.
“David, you’ve been sent down!” cried Rebecca.
“Becca! Of course I haven’t been sent down, what a goose you are!”
She and Mr. Gates looked at him expectantly. “I just . . . I had some business in the area.”
“You did?” said Mr. Gates.
David felt foolish under the intelligent observation of his sibling and parent. “There was a message I needed to deliver to Mr. Darwin.”
“To Mr. Charles Darwin?” said Rebecca. “But he’s away!”
“I know, Rebecca, I know that now!” Why had he stopped? He could have gone straight to the inn and had a bite to eat while waiting for the return coach.
“What message?” asked Mr. Gates.
“It was just . . . to do with a debate that’s going to be held at the weekend.”
“Well,” said his father, finally beaming and pumping his son’s hand, “this is an unexpected pleasure, I must say.”
Rebecca moved forward, awaiting her turn, and then she was in her brother’s arms, alternately hugging him and looking intently into his face. “You’ve aged,” she said. “University is making you older. How is Mr. Callow?” Jack had spent a few days with them after Christmas and had made an enormous impression on Rebecca.
“He’s very well, thanks.”
“Do remember me to him, will you?” said Rebecca. “You won’t forget? People always say they will and never do.”
“Listen, Davy,” said Mr. Gates. “I’ll just shut up the shop, shall I?”
“Not on my account, Father.”
“Nonsense. Have you eaten?”
“No, sorry, Father, I can’t stay, I was simply wondering . . .”
“You mean you’re turning round and going back, just like that?” said Mr. Gates.
“Yes, and Father, I was wondering if I might have a five-pound advance against next month’s allowance?” David said in a rush.
Mr. Gates’ face registered only the briefest flicker of disappointment. He was genuinely proud of his son, and deeply fond. “Yes, of course,” he said.
Rebecca stared at her brother in silence.
“I thought I might travel a bit at the end of term. With Jack, you see.”
Mr. Gates nodded, moved to the till, and punched it open, producing a merry tinkle of bells that sent spasms of guilt through his boy.
“It’s too bad of you, David,” said Rebecca.
“Now, Becca . . .” said Mr. Gates.
“But it is, Father. ‘Thought I might travel a bit at the end of term.’ Oh, why could I not have been born a man, why?”
“It’s the strangest thing, Davy,” said Mr. Gates, surveying the c
ontents of the till, mentally calculating the impact of a five-pound diminishment.
“What’s that, Dad?”
“Your stopping by today, when just this morning you had a caller here at the shop.”
“A nice-looking gentleman and his son,” said Rebecca.
“He said he knew you from Oxford, but he was under the impression you would be down here today. I assured him that you were away at university. But here you were all along! I hope I haven’t done wrong.”
“Did he leave a name?”
“No, he said it wasn’t important, he was bound to catch up with you sooner or later. Here’s that fiver, son. See that you make it last now!”
“Thanks, Dad. I will do. Must run.” But he hesitated.
There was something in the faces of his father and sister that spoke of the limited margins of their lives, their loneliness and their yearnings. Impulsively, he threw an arm round his father’s shoulders and drew him into a brief, awkward embrace. Rebecca offered a cold handshake, which David rejected, pulling her to him in a hug that lifted her shrieking and laughing off the floor. The young man hurried away then, the shop door’s bell ringing after him.
The coach was already taking on passengers when David arrived at the Orpington Inn. It was bound for London, and then on to Oxford, making local stops all the way. It would be a long day, and David was already dizzy with exhaustion. Taking his seat, he nodded to the tall gentleman and ginger-haired youth who climbed up after him and took their seats just opposite. Despite the cramped quarters and the jolting ride, young Gates was soon asleep.
In London he swam briefly toward consciousness as the suburban passengers disembarked, all except for the father and son. New riders boarded and fresh horses were harnessed, and with that jingle in his ears, David Gates sank back into waters of profoundest sleep.
He awoke with an urgent need to relieve himself. His fellow passenger was speaking softly to the boy. The coach had somewhere taken on an elderly country woman. She held a walking stick with an ornamental brass eagle’s head in one hand and with the other clutched a handbag in her lap, as if expecting it to be taken from her forcibly at any moment.