The Syme Papers (37 page)

‘That is our creed, you see,’ said Tom gaily.

‘As ever, though, I began myself with a precision: that crack in the
universe
–
nicely measured
–
that opens upon such vague and powerful depths. It was a question of mass
–
a simple question of mass.’

He paused. The snow had ceased and the sky cleared. We had not
yet passed the midpoint of the shortened afternoon. Light fell
through the window and on to the blaze, like a bright ghost. There is
no cheer so ethereal as a sunny fire. My thoughts strayed from those
deep matters, as indeed did Syme’s, for when he spoke again, his
tone had softened and his subject changed.

‘I have been much plagued lately
–
by familiar dreams. For some
years
–
a dream has come to me
–
in different shapes at different
times
–
but saying the same thing. “Syme, you must get to work
and compose
–
music!”’ He laughed. ‘Formerly I took this to mean
what I was already doing; that the dream encouraged me, as fellows
cheer
–
the laggard in a race
–
that I should continue to practise that
particular science I have made my special study.’ He smiled, as
though he were ashamed of his fancy, and stared at his boots. ‘Lately
it has occurred to me, however
–
that the dream means nothing of
the kind
–
and that in fact I should listen more closely
–
and really
do as it says, and compose music. Especially since, in this regard, I 
have fallen some ways behind.’ He stretched his aching arms and
hunched his huge shoulders. ‘I
talk, upon occasion‚’ he said, ‘a great
deal of
nonsense.’

Tom and I did not answer, stood around him smiling, out of a
peculiar sort of
…
shyness, I suppose. A truly famous time, but the
coachman, like an evil messenger, summoned us at the door. Sam,
his tongue loosened, still bubbled over with talk and could not sit
quiet in the coach. The fire of his thought had burned its way into
his bones and blood. He crossed and uncrossed his legs, stared out of
the window, and then put his hands to his knees to keep them still.
His eloquence promised well for our visit, and in that confidence I
slept all the way to Baltimore.

The short day had set before we arrived. Syme had long fallen silent and Tom gave me a significant look as we forced open the frozen gate and followed Sam into the front garden of his old home. A shadow passed across a light within, and soon a figure stood in the open doorway. ‘I had begun to worry‚’ a man’s voice called out clear in the clear night. ‘Sam, my dear.’

Syme nodded and took his father’s hand, but soon pushed past him, calling, ‘Mother!’ and, ‘Bubbles!’ up the stairs and along the hallway. I heard a rush of steps and the delighted sigh of ‘Brother’. Tom shook Mr Syme warmly by the hand. ‘I have returned your son to you, you see. Please to keep him, if you will.’

‘I would if I could, Tom. But you do it better‚’ said the father. ‘It is good to see you. And the famous … Friedrich Müller, I believe, I am glad to meet you. There are some in this godless country, you see, who can speak a civilized tongue. I dare not think of the butchery Tom has practised on your name.’

‘Is it not Mooler, then?’ said Tom, delighted in some peculiar way by his own ignorance. ‘He is already Phidy to us, Mr Syme. I assure you that he is Greek to his heart’s blood.’ In truth I had never been called Phidy (short for Phaedon, I suppose, the steadfast narrator of Socrates’ final days) till that moment, but the name stuck. After that my title in America was always and only Phidy, and the Symes knew me as nothing else.

‘It has been such a pleasure to meet your son, Mr Syme‚’ I said
timidly, acutely conscious of my situation. Or rather, ignorant of it
– for my particular role regarding the Professor’s enterprise wanted
a great deal of clarification. I knew not whether I was Syme’s sup
plicant or his executor; and wavered in my dealings with him
between a kind of administrative arrogance and the humility of an
apprentice.

‘Yes,’ said the father with an air I could not name, ‘I suppose it
has.’ We had remained standing in the entrance hall, but Mr Syme
took our light travelling cases in hand and led us in. ‘Anne, my
dear,’ he called, ‘tonight we have with us a true European. One of
the old breed.’

A door opened on our left and a woman stood in its light. She
looked as much like Sam as a woman may, though older and perhaps
less happy. Her figure was nearly as tall and her bones were built
for the same strength, though in her case only the frame was com
pleted, and the flesh hung loose off her neck and collarbones as a
well-worn dress. ‘You must forgive my husband,’ she said affection
ately, in a voice like old upholstery, both softened and frayed, ‘he is a
dreadful snob. For my part, I am pleased to welcome you, Mr
Müller, simply for your own sake, and as a friend of my son.’

‘Say rather my judge, Mother
‚’
called Sam laughingly from
behind the door, ‘or, should I say, my benefactor
–
Phidy?’ He sat
on a low settee beside afire, infinitely younger he appeared already,
and more easily
–
happy. The uncomfortable heat of his blue eyes
had been turned low, and he caught my own eye above his mother’s
shoulder, without flinching for once. A girl’s head, plain and contented, lay on his lap. The head rose quickly and sat upright on top
of its body
–
which appeared somewhat older, more used to things
–
and both were flustered at having been surprised in so intimate a
posture. ‘Tom!’ she cried, recovering, and flung herself at my …
friend. Then she stood straight and smoothed out her hair, more
childish still in her sudden propriety. ‘I
beg your pardon, sir,’ she
said to me. ‘Only we are old friends.’

‘Bubbles,’ Tom interposed, ‘meet Phidy.’

‘How-do-ye-do,’ she said, with a curtsy.

Sam called out, ‘You must excuse my sister; she is not accustomed
to the ways of gentlemen.’

‘Shame, Brother,’ she urged, from the side of her wonderful
mouth, which seemed to wriggle a hundred ways at once, while the
rest of her plain good face kept mum; ‘you know better.’

I kissed her hand
–
‘Such courtesy
!’
cried Sam
–
and saw a
wedding band on her finger. ‘I am a child only for tonight,’ she
whispered, observing my look, ‘to see my brother. Tomorrow I
return to my husband.’

That evening was the happiest of my stay thus far. Tom and Sam
(I shall call him Sam now, happily and easily at last) and Bubbles
rejoiced in my new sobriquet and ‘Phidies!’ flew across the supper
table like bees at a picnic. Only his mother Anne was quiet, quiet
and proper, and called me ‘Mr Müller’ if she passed along the
wine. She had what Tom later described to me as a ‘face upon a
face, like a painted doll’s’
–
a lovely girlish countenance carved
within the broader jaw of womanhood and motherhood, yet
unfilled, unfleshed by age, out of a curious
…
abstinence, which I
observed already. She said little and ate less. When she did speak,
the conversation halted like a boy beside an old woman. But after a
decorous moment, away we flew again. Sam’s father was charming,
a natural gentleman. But as the evening wore on and the wine ran
low, his eyes drained of colour and his face filled with red; the nose
looked pinched and pointed. There was something coarse in his
aspect then, as rough as parchment, and his tongue grew sharp.
‘Not every son travels to Pactaw to see the world,’ he said, laugh
ing heavily.

Sam replied, deep in the wine himself, ‘The world shall come to
us. Is that not so, Phidy?’ and I scarcely knew what to answer.

We sat before the fire after supper. Sam lay at his mother’s feet
with his head on her lap and his legs stretched along the grate. He
adored her, this much was clear already; and should have happily
opened the earth and led her by the hand into its wonderful heart for
her sake alone, to please her. Even though, as I guessed already, she
was the kind of lady who did not suffer the
extraordinary
gladly, as
others dislike fools. Sam for his part wished only to amaze her. Mrs
Syme sat quite straight with her hands on his head, though she did
not move them nor stroke his hair.

‘You’ll burn your boots, fool,’ cried Bubbles, and busied herself in
pulling them from her brother’s feet. She laughed more than he.

‘It is always like this,’ Tom whispered in my ear. ‘For a night, or
half of one, he is content to be a child again. But no more. You will
know him again in the morning.’

Still, afire is always companionable, and I contented myself
silently by reading in its busy flames the thousand images that had
impressed themselves upon me in that long week.

Sam’s father excused himself quite early. ‘I
am afraid I am too old
for my children now, Phidy. I must to bed.’ The room seemed much
emptier after he had gone; Anne’s uneasiness grew in proportion
and filled his absence. Her eyes had followed him anxiously as he left
and fixed themselves on the closed door while her ears traced his
light steps up the stairs. She remained stiffly in her seat and could
not think for the life of her what to do with Sam’s head. But when he
shifted to punish some foolishness of Bubbles, she rose quickly and
excused herself and bade us good night. That was the general signal
and we did not linger long.

I tiptoed upstairs and Sam followed more heavily with a lantern.
‘We have given you Bubbles’ room,’ he said. ‘She must make do
with the study. Never fear,’ he added laughing, ‘she is a tough
Bubbles.’ He opened a door to a cold, fireless room, and I saw
shadows and a white bed. ‘I
am glad you have come, Phidy, good
night.’ I fell in love then, I think, with the charm of being taken in
by a new family in a new world. ‘Do not be taken in,’ my father had
said. The Symes were a curious gallery of characters, and I rolled
their pet name for me on my tongue, in each of their various tones
and accents. Need I say that Bubbles’ voice fell most often on my
inward ear? I wondered what manner of man her husband might be
and fell asleep to the echo of her teasing ‘Phidy’.

The great affair of Sunday afternoon was dinner, after church. A
rare patch of sun from her own slight stores of happiness had fallen
on Anne Syme’s head that day. She had prepared a feast. Her face 
was red with steam and toil and her hair wrinkled in the kitchen
heat. But she was happy for once and did not glance for ever after
‘Father’.

There is no beauty like a well-laid table. Anne sat upright at the
head and watched her son carve the swelling ham, and she offered
the first cut to ‘Phidy’. I did not know her well then, nor Sam’s
father who in time I came to know better. Like Sam, he had his
faults, but envy was not among them, and he had that rare grace
that can charm equally in the corner or in the light. For Anne shone
and Sam shone in her heightened looks.

That Sunday dinner was significant for more than a woman’s brief
good spirits, however. The talk turned to Sam’s ‘great theories’, as
Anne called them, and she wished to hear my opinion of them. ‘I
con
fess’, she said, ‘that I am a little surprised, a gentleman such as your
self, sir, should have come such a long way to see my strange son.’

‘He sent us such an extraordinary petition,’ I said, ‘it would have
been churlish to decline. I pledge my life, he declared, I pledge my
life; the least I could undertake was a sea voyage.’

‘And what do you’, she enquired, touching a corner of her lips
with a napkin, ‘make of Sam?’

‘So far we have discussed only the bright surface of his theories.
We have not yet ventured inside to the matter of them.’

‘Do you mean the papers and all those numbers?’ she asked. ‘I
always quiz Sam for being so close with them. “In time,” he says,
“in time.” But I think nobody can work entirely alone. I know Tom
is there, bless you, Tom, but he’s not much good with figures, are
you? Sam needs somebody else with a head for figures. I was good
with them when I was a girl, I suppose that’s where Sam acquired
the habit. But I haven’t kept in practice and I don’t know all the
new fashions. I cannot understand any of the numbers he tells me
and I would have thought anybody could understand a number. But
Tom says you are a hot-off-the-press scientist in Germany. I think it
is so important to have colleagues.’

‘I told you before, Mother,’ said Sam. ‘He is not my colleague, he is my-judge.’

‘That sounds awful,’ said Anne. ‘You aren’t, are you?’

‘I am only a curious onlooker,’ I said. ‘I am his student, I suppose.’