know you must detest me, but it suits you to suffer me because of the Haven. I'm not blind; you've used me, deliberately and calculatedly for your own selfish ends.”
Midbin could explain and excuse her outbursts by his “emotional pathology,” Ace accepted and suffered them as inescapable, so did her father, but I saw no necessity of being always subject to her tantrums. I told her so, adding, not too heatedly I think, “Maybe we shouldn't see each other alone after this.”
She stood perfectly immobile and silent, as if I were still speaking. “All right,” she said at last. “All right, yes… yes. Don't.”
Her apparent calm deceived me completely; I smiled with relief.
“That's right, laugh. Why shouldn't you? You have no feelings, no more than you have an intelligence. You are an oaf, a clod, a real bumpkin. Standing there with a silly grin on your face. Oh, I hate you! How I hate you!”
She wept, she shrilled, she rushed at me and then turned away, crying she hadn't meant it, not a word of it. She cajoled, begging forgiveness for all she'd said, tearfully promising to control herself after this, moaning that she needed me, and finally, when I didn't repulse her, exclaiming it was her love for me which tormented her so and drove her to such scenes. It was a wretched, degrading moment, and not the least of its wretchedness and degradation was that I recognized the erotic value of her abjection. Detachedly I might pity, fear, or be repelled; at the same time I had to admit her sudden humility was exciting.
Perhaps this storm changed our relationship for the better, or at least eased the constraint between us. At any rate it was after this she began speaking to me of her work, putting us on a friendlier, less furious plane. I learned now how completely garbled was my notion of what she was doing.
“Heavier-than-air flying machines!” she cried. “How utterly absurd!”
“All right. I didn't know.”
“My work is theoretical. I'm not a vulgar mechanic.”
“All right, all right.”
“I'm going to show that time and space are aspects of the same entity.”
“All right,” I said, thinking of something else.
“What is time?”
“Uh?… Dear Barbara, since I don't know anything I can slide gracefully out of that one. I couldn't even begin to define time.”
“Oh, you could probably define it all right—in terms of itself. I'm not dealing with definitions but concepts.”
“All right, conceive.”
“Hodge, like all stuffy people your levity is ponderous.”
“Excuse me. Go ahead.”
“Time is an aspect.”
“So you mentioned. I once knew a man who said it was an illusion. And another who said it was a serpent with its tail in its mouth.”
“Mysticism.” The contempt with which she spoke the word brought a sudden image of Roger Tyss saying “metaphysics” with much the same inflection. “Time, matter, space, and energy are all aspects of the cosmic entity. Interchangeable aspects. Theoretically it should be possible to translate matter into terms of energy and space into terms of time; matter-energy into space-time.”
“It sounds so simple I'm ashamed of myself.”
“To put it so crudely the explanation is misleading: suppose matter is resolved into its component…”
“Atoms?” I suggested, since she seemed at loss for a word.
“No, atoms are already too individualized, too separate. Something more fundamental than atoms. We have no word because we can't quite grasp the concept yet. Essence, perhaps, or the theological 'spirit.' If matter…”
“A man?”
“Man, turnip, or chemical compound,” she answered impatiently; “if resolved into its essence it can presumably be reassembled, another wrong word, at another point of the time-space fabric.”
“You mean… like yesterday?”
“No—and yes. What is 'yesterday'? A thing? An aspect? An idea? Or a relationship? Oh, words are useless things; even with mathematical symbols you can hardly ... But someday I'll establish it. Or lay the groundwork for my successors. Or the successors of my successors.”
I nodded. Midbin was at least half right; Barbara was emotionally sick. For what was this “theory” of hers but the rationalization of a daydream, the daydream of discovering a process for reaching back through time to injure her dead mother and so steal all of her father's affections?
XIV. MIDBINS EXPERIMENT
At the next meeting of the fellows Midbin asked an appropriation for experimental work and the help of Haven members in the project. Since the extent of both requests was modest, their granting would ordinarily have been a formality. But Barbara asked politely if Dr. Midbin wouldn't like to elaborate a little on the purposes of his experiment.
I knew her manner was a danger signal. Nevertheless Midbin merely answered good-humoredly that he proposed to test a theory of whether an emotionally induced physical handicap could be cured by re-creating in the subject's mind the shock which had caused—to use a loose, inaccurate term—the impediment.
“I thought so. He wants to waste the Haven's money and time on a little tart he's having an affair with while important work is held up for lack of funds.”
One of the women called out, “Oh, Barbara, no,” and there were exclamations of disapproval. I saw Kimi Agati look steadfastly down in embarrassment. Mr. Haggerwells, after trying unsuccessfully to hold Barbara's eye, said, “I must apologize for my daughter—”
“It's all right,” interrupted Midbin. “I understand Barbara's notions. I'm sure no one here really thinks there is anything improper between the girl and me. Outside of this, Barbara's original question seems quite in order. Quite in order. Briefly, as most of you know, I've been trying to restore speech to a subject who lost it—again I use an inaccurate term for convenience—during an afflicting experience. Preliminary explorations indicate good probability of satisfactory response to my proposed method, which is simply to employ a kinematic camera like those used to make entertainment tinugraphs—”
“He wants to turn the Haven into a tinugraph mill with the fellows as mummers!”
“Only this once, Barbara, only this once. Not regularly, not as routine.”
At this point her father insisted the request be voted on without any more discussion. I was tempted to vote with Barbara, the only dissident, for I foresaw Midbin's tinugraph would undoubtedly rely heavily on cooperation from me, but I didn't have the courage. Instead I merely abstained, like Midbin himself and Ace.
The first effect of Midbin's program was to free me from obligation, for he decided there was no point continuing the sessions with the dumb girl as before. All his time was taken up anyway with photography—no one at the Haven had specialized in it—kinematic theory, the art of pantomime, and the relative merit of different makes of cameras, all manufactured abroad.
The girl, who had never lost her tenseness and apprehension during the interviews, nevertheless clung to the habit of being escorted to Midbin's workroom. Since it was impossible to convey to her that the sessions were temporarily suspended, she appeared regularly, always in a dress with which she had taken manifest pains, and there was little I could do but walk her to Midbin's and back. I was acutely conscious of the ridiculousness of these parades and expectant of retribution from Barbara afterward, so I was to some extent relieved when Midbin finally made his decision and procured camera and film.
Now I had to set the exact scene where the holdup had taken place, not an easy thing to do, for one rise looks much like another at twilight and all look differently in daylight. Then I had to approximate the original conditions as nearly as possible. Here Midbin was partially foiled by the limitations of his medium, being forced to use the camera in full sunlight instead of at dusk. I dressed and instructed the actors in their parts, rehearsing and directing them throughout. The only immunity I got was Midbin's concession that I needn't play the role of myself,
