The First Men in the Moon, H. Wells [latest books to read .TXT] 📗

with a copying-ink pencil, in a manner that made it hard even to seem to understand. ‘Yes,’ I said; ‘yes. Go on!’ Nevertheless I made out enough to convince me that he was no mere crank playing at discoveries. In spite of his crank-like appearance there was a force about him that made that impossible. Whatever it was, it was a thing with mechanical possibilities. He told me of a work-shed he had, and of three assistants — originally jobbing carpenters — whom he had trained. Now, from the work-shed to the patent office is clearly only one step. He invited me to see those things. I accepted readily, and took care, by a remark or so, to underline that. The proposed transfer of the bungalow remained very conveniently in suspense.

At last he rose to depart, with an apology for the length of his call. Talking over his work was, he said, a pleasure enjoyed only too rarely. It was not often he found such an intelligent listener as myself, he mingled very little with professional scientific men.

‘So much pettiness,’ he explained; ‘so much intrigue! And really, when one has an idea — a novel, fertilising idea — I don’t want to be uncharitable, but——’

I am a man who believes in impulses. I made what was perhaps a rash proposition. But you must remember that I had been alone, play-writing in Lympne, for fourteen days, and my compunction for his ruined walk still hung about me. ‘Why not,’ said I, ‘make this your new habit? In the place of the one I spoilt? At least, until we can settle about the bungalow. What you want is to turn over your work in your mind. That you have always done during your afternoon walk. Unfortunately that’s over — you can’t get things back as they were. But why not come and talk about your work to me; use me as a sort of wall against which you may throw your thoughts and catch them again? It’s certain I don’t know enough to steal your ideas myself — and I know no scientific men——’

I stopped. He was considering. Evidently the thing attracted him. ‘But I’m afraid I should bore you,’ he said.

‘You think I’m too dull?’

‘Oh no; but technicalities——’

‘Anyhow, you’ve interested me immensely this afternoon.’

‘Of course it would be a great help to me. Nothing clears up one’s ideas so much as explaining them. Hitherto——’

‘My dear sir, say no more.’

‘But really can you spare the time?’

‘There is no rest like change of occupation,’ I said, with profound conviction.

The affair was over. On my verandah steps he turned. ‘I am already greatly indebted to you,’ he said.

I made an interrogative noise.

‘You have completely cured me of that ridiculous habit of humming,’ he explained.

I think I said I was glad to be of any service to him, and he turned away.

Immediately the train of thought that our conversation had suggested must have resumed its sway. His arms began to wave in their former fashion. The faint echo of ‘zuzzoo’ came back to me on the breeze. . . .

Well, after all, that was not my affair. . . .

He came the next day, and again the next day after that, and delivered two lectures on physics to our mutual satisfaction. He talked with an air of being extremely lucid about the ‘ether,’ and ‘tubes of force,’ and ‘gravitational potential,’ and things like that, and I sat in my other folding-chair and said, ‘Yes,’ ‘Go on,’ ‘I follow you,’ to keep him going. It was tremendously difficult stuff, but I do not think he ever suspected how much I did not understand him. There were moments when I doubted whether I was well employed, but at any rate I was resting from that confounded play. Now and then things gleamed on me clearly for a space, only to vanish just when I thought I had hold of them. Sometimes my attention failed altogether, and I would give it up and sit and stare at him, wondering whether, after all, it would not be better to use him as a central figure in a good farce and let all this other stuff slide. And then, perhaps, I would catch on again for a bit.

At the earliest opportunity I went to see his house. It was large and carelessly furnished; there were no servants other than his three assistants, and his dietary and private life were characterised by a philosophical simplicity. He was a water-drinker, a vegetarian, and all those logical disciplinary things. But the sight of his equipment settled many doubts. It looked like business from cellar to attic — an amazing little place to find in an out-of-the-way village. The ground-floor rooms contained benches and apparatus, the bakehouse and scullery boiler had developed into respectable furnaces, dynamos occupied the cellar, and there was a gasometer* in the garden. He showed it to me with all the confiding zest of a man who has been living too much alone. His seclusion was overflowing now in an excess of confidence, and I had the good luck to be the recipient.

The three assistants were creditable specimens of the class of ‘handy-men’ from which they came. Conscientious if unintelligent, strong, civil, and willing. One, Spargus, who did the cooking and all the metal work, had been a sailor; a second, Gibbs, was a joiner; and the third was an ex-jobbing gardener, and now general assistant. They were the merest labourers. All the intelligent work was done by Cavor. Theirs was the darkest ignorance compared even with my muddled impression.

And now, as to the nature of these inquiries. Here, unhappily, comes a grave difficulty. I am no scientific expert, and if I were to attempt to set forth in the highly scientific language of Mr Cavor the aim to which his experiments tended, I am afraid I should confuse not only the reader but myself, and almost certainly I should make some blunder that would bring upon me the mockery of every up-to-date student of mathematical physics in the country. The best thing I can do therefore is, I think,