cockpit.
Still jet-lagged, he had slept late that morning but awoke with a start, dressed, and ran downstairs to the parlor of the rooming house he had found on Tenison Road. Before taking his money the landlady had warned him twice about having guests in his room. He found strong tea and a scone on the sideboard, gulped them down, and hurried out to a dank drizzle. It was only his third day in Cambridge but already he had learned to carry a fold-up umbrella in his back pocket.
At the library, a huge brown-brick repository built around a massive central tower, the note from Simons under the Cornell letterhead had done the trick; he had obtained a reader’s card, a photo ID, and access to the vast third-floor room.
He picked his way through the books, reading sections here and there, not at all methodical in his search since he had no clear idea what he was looking for. After two hours he asked for more material; he handed in the request slips, and thin brown envelopes or small blue boxes were delivered without ceremony: manuscripts, notes, and sketches in Darwin’s scrawl, books and periodicals with jottings and exclamations in the margins. Then he looked through some of Darwin’s letters. There were thousands upon thousands of them. Some, written from the Beagle, were wrinkled and stained from long sailing voyages; he held them under his nose and imagined the scent of sea breezes and brine. Others, written in later years from his study, humbly begged for specimens, demanded data from pigeon breeders and barnacle fanciers, or spread flattery while seeming to fish for a review of one of his books.
Hugh scoured them for some clue to a larger mystery, some nugget that might shed light on how Darwin worked or the definitive moment when he formulated his theory. But they had yielded no such secrets, only bits and pieces of trivia about natural history, a throwaway line about the facial expressions of a monkey, a snippet of gossip about a rival—the mundane stuff of a naturalist’s daily life.
Hugh realized it was hopeless; he was flying blind.
Shortly after one o’clock he was eating in the library lunchroom and looked up to find a young man standing before him with a tray.
“Mind if I join you?”
Hugh recognized him—the assistant who had been snickering.
Although he didn’t feel like talking to anyone, he closed the book he was reading and nodded. The young man was thin, his features delicate and his head tending to cock to one side, like an attentive hound. He had a disconcerting smudge of a beard in the center of his chin.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to Hugh’s book.
“Voyage of the Beagle.”
“Oh, I thought you must have read that by now.”
“Yeah, I did. I’m rereading it.”
The young man cut into a slab of meat drenched in gravy.
“Mind if I ask you what line of research you’re pursuing?”
Hugh decided to keep his cards close to his chest but couldn’t come up with anything that sounded sufficiently esoteric.
“That’s kind of a sore subject. Something about Darwin. I’m looking around but I’m afraid I haven’t really come up with anything exciting, at least not yet. Actually, I’m a little worried about my thesis.”
He smiled lamely. There was more truth than he had expected in his words.
“My name’s Roland Damon, by the way,” the young man said, stretching his hand across the airspace of their two trays, a gesture that was touchingly awkward. Hugh shook it.
“Mine’s Hugh. Hugh Kellem.”
“American?”
“Yes.”
“From . . . ?”
“New York. Around New York. A place called Connecticut, actually.”
“Oh, I know it well. I spent a year there as an exchange student. New Canaan. Loved it. Life in an American high school is adolescent paradise. I joined all the clubs and got five pictures in the yearbook. I mention that only because there was a competition to see who got the most—very American, that sort of thing.”
Hugh smiled. There was
Still jet-lagged, he had slept late that morning but awoke with a start, dressed, and ran downstairs to the parlor of the rooming house he had found on Tenison Road. Before taking his money the landlady had warned him twice about having guests in his room. He found strong tea and a scone on the sideboard, gulped them down, and hurried out to a dank drizzle. It was only his third day in Cambridge but already he had learned to carry a fold-up umbrella in his back pocket.
At the library, a huge brown-brick repository built around a massive central tower, the note from Simons under the Cornell letterhead had done the trick; he had obtained a reader’s card, a photo ID, and access to the vast third-floor room.
He picked his way through the books, reading sections here and there, not at all methodical in his search since he had no clear idea what he was looking for. After two hours he asked for more material; he handed in the request slips, and thin brown envelopes or small blue boxes were delivered without ceremony: manuscripts, notes, and sketches in Darwin’s scrawl, books and periodicals with jottings and exclamations in the margins. Then he looked through some of Darwin’s letters. There were thousands upon thousands of them. Some, written from the Beagle, were wrinkled and stained from long sailing voyages; he held them under his nose and imagined the scent of sea breezes and brine. Others, written in later years from his study, humbly begged for specimens, demanded data from pigeon breeders and barnacle fanciers, or spread flattery while seeming to fish for a review of one of his books.
Hugh scoured them for some clue to a larger mystery, some nugget that might shed light on how Darwin worked or the definitive moment when he formulated his theory. But they had yielded no such secrets, only bits and pieces of trivia about natural history, a throwaway line about the facial expressions of a monkey, a snippet of gossip about a rival—the mundane stuff of a naturalist’s daily life.
Hugh realized it was hopeless; he was flying blind.
Shortly after one o’clock he was eating in the library lunchroom and looked up to find a young man standing before him with a tray.
“Mind if I join you?”
Hugh recognized him—the assistant who had been snickering.
Although he didn’t feel like talking to anyone, he closed the book he was reading and nodded. The young man was thin, his features delicate and his head tending to cock to one side, like an attentive hound. He had a disconcerting smudge of a beard in the center of his chin.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to Hugh’s book.
“Voyage of the Beagle.”
“Oh, I thought you must have read that by now.”
“Yeah, I did. I’m rereading it.”
The young man cut into a slab of meat drenched in gravy.
“Mind if I ask you what line of research you’re pursuing?”
Hugh decided to keep his cards close to his chest but couldn’t come up with anything that sounded sufficiently esoteric.
“That’s kind of a sore subject. Something about Darwin. I’m looking around but I’m afraid I haven’t really come up with anything exciting, at least not yet. Actually, I’m a little worried about my thesis.”
He smiled lamely. There was more truth than he had expected in his words.
“My name’s Roland Damon, by the way,” the young man said, stretching his hand across the airspace of their two trays, a gesture that was touchingly awkward. Hugh shook it.
“Mine’s Hugh. Hugh Kellem.”
“American?”
“Yes.”
“From . . . ?”
“New York. Around New York. A place called Connecticut, actually.”
“Oh, I know it well. I spent a year there as an exchange student. New Canaan. Loved it. Life in an American high school is adolescent paradise. I joined all the clubs and got five pictures in the yearbook. I mention that only because there was a competition to see who got the most—very American, that sort of thing.”
Hugh smiled. There was
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