The Three-Body Problem (22 page)

The little boy who then appeared was like another copy of poor little Edmund. He was extremely thin and fragile, his eyes were enormous and frightened, and he looked so abandoned and miserable that I understood all of Emily’s panic on his behalf. He looked from the woman to us as though wondering what was to befall him now, but when his eyes lit on Emily, he sprang towards her passionately and clutched her dress.

‘Oh, have you come to take me?’ he cried out in English.

‘Yes, yes, we have, come Robert, come with us now, darling! Come away – we shall leave, and you shall never come back here again!’ she answered, clasping him in her arms. ‘
Pouvons-nous avoir ses vêtements
?’ she added in her prim, studious French, turning to the woman.

The woman turned away, and soon came back with a canvas sack into which she had stuffed various ill-assorted rags.

‘
Votre mère me doit de l’argent, mademoiselle
,’ she began aggressively.

Emily took out her little purse, extracted a wad of notes, and handed them to the woman with a coolness worthy of a princess, then turned away, taking Robert by the hand,
without even waiting to see if she would count the money, or complain. We heard vociferations and imprecations behind us as we descended, but she must have been too pleased to get rid of the undesirable little boy to insist further. Ten minutes after having arrived, we were on our way, with one little blonde boy in tow and one canvas sack of useless items. Emily poked into it with distaste.

‘Tomorrow we shall shop for him first thing,’ she began. Then, seeing my face, she suddenly clapped her hand to her forehead. ‘No, we shall
not
– we shall do what
you
need to do, dear Miss Duncan. I promise total obedience. Please tell me whatever it is, and we shall do it.’

I could not help laughing. ‘I need to travel to Brussels tomorrow, and see a lady who lives in a village near the city,’ I told her. ‘You shall help me with the tickets and the rooms, and if we are lucky, we shall find time to shop for little Robert tomorrow. For tonight, let us be contented if he is washed and well fed.’

‘Oh, yes!’ she said joyfully. ‘We shall have dinner at the hotel, all three of us together. Come – let us go there now!’ And we did dine modestly on fish and green beans, served by a harassed waiter who expressed himself habitually in a peculiar mixture of French and English, which language he had personally developed to deal with the great numbers of English tourists who occupy the hotel daily. We then betook ourselves upstairs to our room, where we are at this very moment. Emily is washing Robert as best she can in front of the cracked washbasin behind the tattered screen, as I write to you.

Oh, Dora – I feel as though you are near me, as though
if I looked up I could see your sweet face in the candlelight. Surrounded by the peaceful domestic atmosphere, the gentle sounds of splashing, the scratching pen, the extraordinarily still and timeless moment in this quiet room – I feel we are all three protected, for a moment, within a magic circle, as though we have been allowed a brief rest in our struggle against the whirlpool of dreadful events which threaten us.

I feared this moment of being able to do nothing but wait. But it is not so – writing to you, and feeling Emily’s great release from anguish and little Robert’s incredulous wonderment at finding himself surrounded by love and care again, after so much misery and abandonment, make me realise that this moment is as full as all the others. I feel renewed courage; the map of Europe lies open before me – tomorrow to Belgium!

I will post this letter tomorrow, and write again at the very next one of these secret moments which seem to lie at the heart of the storm.

Your fearful, weary but courageous

Vanessa

My dearest Dora,

Today was so endlessly long, so filled with travel, with valises and stations and trains, carriages, horses, seeking addresses and hotels, that I feel as though I have been travelling for weeks!

And yet, we have been only from Calais to Brussels, and from Brussels to Wavre, or rather, to a farm in the
nearby countryside, inhabited by a certain Madame Walters, formerly Miss Akers, sister to Mr Akers and his next of kin.

We arose early this morning; how sweet it was to see Robert’s flushed face asleep upon his tumbled pillow, and to see him awaken giggling from Emily’s sly tickles. Emily loves him with a fierce passion which mingles protectiveness for the abandoned and threatened waif, and (perhaps unconsciously) all her adoration for the father she twice lost, and whom Robert and Edmund closely resemble.

The little boy is really adorable; sweet, desperately eager to please, full of goodwill. He is bright-eyed, and I would guess that he must be a very lively and active little boy; I would naturally expect him to make a rumpus as little Violet and Mary do in class, and would love to see his cheeks flushed with some of their rosy colour. But he does not behave so; he is subdued and quiet, and seems to repress his natural energy. It cannot be easy for him, to have been twice snatched from familiar surroundings and flung into the unknown; the first experience must have taught him an unchildlike fear, which the second shall try its best to undo.

His father always spoke to him in English, so that although he may have forgotten a little during the last month, spent in the dreadful household we briefly saw, he still speaks charmingly. He is too young to have yet learnt to distinguish between tender, childish language, and ordinary speech. Today, taking Emily’s hand lovingly, he called her ‘my little birdie in a nest’, and she looked at him with amazement, then realised that she must be hearing, as though from the grave, the echo of her own father’s tender words to his child.
Tender and loving the little boy’s parents obviously were, however at fault they may have been to be parents at all.

After breakfast in the crowded hotel dining room – I could swallow only tea, such was my haste to depart – we paid our bill, and hastened on foot through the streets to the railway station, whence we were soon on our way to Brussels. I could not take my eyes from the scenery outside; countryside, just as in England and not so very far, yet so different! The distance was not too long, and after a reasonable time, we found ourselves descending in the Belgian metropolis, which turned out to be hardly more than a delightful village with a lovely central square, in comparison with the bustling capharnaum of London. I felt quite at home there, in spite of the fact that many less English people were to be heard than at Calais; the streets are small, charming and reassuring, and many useful words such as Hotel and Restaurant are identical to the English, so that one does not feel unlettered as one walks through them; then, also, I am presently accompanied by an accomplished little Frenchman, who in spite of his tender years, comes gravely to our aid whenever we are missing the necessary words to express ourselves.

My first care was to send a telegram to poor Mrs Burke-Jones. I felt that I must not only reassure as to Emily’s well-being, but immediately break the news that we had taken little Robert, so that she could reflect upon her future decision concerning him (and also, perhaps, to avoid the fearful scene of breaking the news to her directly!). I spent some precious time over the wording, trying to explain all
without undue waste of words, and finally wrote:
Emily insisted take Robert from Calais. Both children well travelling Germany tomorrow. Duncan
. I then set about the task of feeding my little brood, in spite of my burning impatience to hire a cab and ride at a gallop towards Wavre, and my tormenting fear that Madame Walters may be out for the day, or even away altogether, and that I might be obliged to wait, or to continue my journey without the knowledge I felt so certain she detained.

Thank Heaven, my fears proved groundless. After a modest meal, we proceeded to hire a hansom – the man was peculiar and leered, and I felt nervous, and began to feel that the presence of Emily and little Robert protects me greatly from many vexations – and he drove us several leagues, to a tiny village on the outskirts of Wavre. There, we were compelled to ask him to wait, as Emily and Robert descended and asked an old farmer passing down the lane with a load of hay, if he knew where Madame Walters resided. The man knew, of course, as the village is entirely visible from one end to other when standing at a single spot, and he showed us her farmhouse, standing at the edge of the fields some way off. Our cab driver took us as near as he could, but the way became muddy, and he began to become angry, and demanded his fare. I dared not demur, and paid him the rather exorbitant sum he required – thank goodness dear Emily had once again reminded me of the necessity to obtain something of the local currency at the railway station – after which we descended and he went cantering off to Brussels, although we had asked him to await our return.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ cried Emily gamely, ‘we shall walk back, if need be; I do not think it was over a few miles! Or perhaps we shall find a farmer’s wagon to take us back.’

Lifting our skirts, we stepped along the muddy lane, seeking as best we could to place our feet upon the various rocks and stones, until we came to the path leading to the farmhouse. My hopes rose as I saw the thread of smoke rising from the chimney, and the light which glowed within the cheerful windows against the dark, grey day.

We knocked at the door, which was soon opened by a woman no older than Mrs Burke-Jones, with brown hair pulled away from her face tightly, and an enormous apron – her face was wary, but not unfriendly. The sound of our English voices appeared to hearten her.

‘We are so terribly sorry to disturb you,’ I said, ‘but we have come a long way to see Madame Walters on urgent business.’

‘I am she,’ she said, speaking her native tongue almost as though it were rusty with disuse. ‘You are lucky to find me in today; I should be working out in the fields, but I am unwell.’

She led us inside; the door gave directly onto a spacious farmhouse kitchen, with an enormous fireplace and a large wooden table, surrounded by benches. We sat down, and she set a kettle directly over the fire on a hook, set mugs of milk and biscuits in front of the children, and enquired of us whence we came, and for what purpose.

‘It is about the murder of your brother, Madame,’ I told her.

Her eyes flashed. ‘I was told that the murderer had been arrested, and will be condemned!’ she snapped.

Before I could reply, Emily leapt to her feet. ‘Oh no, dear Madame Walters,’ she cried urgently, leaning forward, clinging to the table in her urgency. ‘It is a mistake, a dreadful mistake! Mr Weatherburn never killed your brother. He could not possibly have done it! Please, please believe us!’

The face of the lady changed several times at Emily’s words – first she seemed affected by Emily’s desperate tones, but then it flashed across her mind that we must, then, be friends or family of he who she had been assured was the murderer. She stared at us with hostility.

‘I am sure I can do nothing for you,’ she said quite coldly.

I feared that we had begun badly, and became alarmed at the prospect of being summarily ejected. I decided to adopt a different tactic, and speak only of manuscripts, and not of murderers. I glanced at Emily, hoping she could read my thoughts.

‘I want to tell Madame Walters about her brother’s mathematical idea,’ I said.

‘Oh – look at the lovely cat!’ suddenly interjected Robert, as a very large grey animal entered the kitchen with a distinguished step, its extremely furry tail erect, and stopped enquiringly in front of him. He immediately slipped off the settle, and began to play with the creature under the table. Madame Walters smiled, looking slightly mollified.

‘Her name is Reine,’ she told him, leaning down to watch for a moment, and reaching under the table to pass her hand through the cat’s thick, soft fur.

‘We only ask you for one small thing,’ I said to her, taking advantage of this momentary softening; ‘only a few
moments. Please do let me explain.’ I placed my valise upon the floor, opened it and extracted Mr Beddoes’ manuscript, which I had flattened out neatly at the very bottom, together with Mr Morrison’s translation of the announcement of King Oscar’s Birthday Competition.

‘I believe that the gentleman who wrote this manuscript of mathematics stole something from your brother,’ I began carefully.

‘Who is he? What did he steal? And how can I know anything of it?’ she answered suspiciously.

‘He stole an idea,’ I began, ‘a mathematical formula.’

‘I know nothing of such things,’ she said again, and I saw that she clung to the idea that her brother’s murderer had been discovered, and that we were his friends, and therefore she must regard us as enemies, with mistrust.

‘Oh, please – do let
me
tell you,’ cried Emily eagerly. ‘There was a great mathematical competition – why, it’s still going on, and your brother had a wonderful idea to solve the problem that was set! Perhaps he would have won the prize. But he died, and nobody found anything he wrote down, except that he wrote down one formula for Mr – for – for a friend of his, but then he put it back in his pocket, and then he was killed, so he could never send in his manuscript to the King of Sweden. And we don’t want his solution to be lost forever! He put it in his pocket, so my uncle said it must have been sent to you when he died. Oh, that is what you are looking for – that is why you are here, isn’t it, Miss Duncan? My uncle says it is ever so important!’

I thought that Madame Walters would be entirely taken
aback and confused by this whirlwind of competitions, uncles, kings and formulae. Instead, unexpectedly, she became very pale, and sank onto the bench across, leaning heavily upon the table.

‘You are right, you are right,’ she gasped. ‘The competition, the King of Sweden – Geoffrey wrote to me about it! He wrote that he believed he had a chance to win the grand prize, the golden medal, and he was keeping it all the deepest secret. How could you possibly know about it?’

‘We found it out little by little,’ I told her. ‘And now we have found something which may allow us to rediscover your brother’s lost idea. I have here a manuscript which may possibly hold the key to it.’