This choice: To go to your room, turn to page 12 • Go Back...Chapter #25To go to your room, turn to page 12 by: Seuzz   She sets your bag down briefly and peels the mackintosh from your shoulders. "I see the nasty rain has stopped at last," she says, brushing it and folding it. "This way please, Mr. Meierson."
Your bag in one hand and your mackintosh in her other, she leads you up the stairs to a dark landing. Three broad hallways here intersect, and she takes you down the left-hand one, which is lit by a few gas lamps, and to a broad door about halfway down. Inside you find a large bed covered in red damask, and the usual dressers and tables and chairs. Another door, slightly open, apparently leads into a bathroom. The heavy curtains have been pulled back and the large windows opened slightly to let in fresh air. There is still an oppressive atmosphere, however, and you can't feel yourself relaxing, even after removing your shoes and stretching out on the bed.
After a few minutes you rise and move to a writing desk, where you find paper set out. The room's previous occupant had left part of a letter, and you wonder slightly that the housekeeper had not removed it. It reads, in part:
"... to Cecilia, who of course didn't know what to do with it. I tell you this privately and in every confidence that word of this catastrophe will not reach our mutual friend.
"I am otherwise occupied with surveying the foundations that were uncovered during last year's excavation, but I cannot find that they have evolved in the meantime. Vanderburg is of the opinion that there is more to be found on the next ridge, but I cannot agree; he does not know this territory as I do. We had a tedious discussion over dinner about it, and I fear we both lost our tempers. It is increasingly apparent that we are profoundly out of sympathy with each other; the premises of our antithetical philosophies cannot be reconciled but cannot be refuted by each other without question begging. I think one or other of us will be forced to resign if the chancellor does not intervene first and bring the investigation to a halt. Precious time will be lost in the latter case, but it is being wasted now.
"Thank you for the currant jam, by the way. I know it is expensive and difficult to procure this time of year, but it is a comfort to have on hand, especially with the weather turning as it has. We lost our observation balloon in a storm on Tuesday, and that will be another matter to lay before the Regents, regardless of the embarrassment it ..."
There is no more, and no other sheets, but you cannot stimulate any interest in the matter.
A gentle knock at the door brings you out of a reverie that had led you to the window, and the housekeeper enters with a tray and some tea things. "The Professor is inquiring whether you will be joining him for dinner," she says matter-of-factly. You look at your watch; it is a little after four o'clock, but you feel no hunger.
"Please convey my regrets, but ask if I might attend him at eight," you say. "If he would be so kind as to send up his manuscript, I would like to look it over before we talk."
She has only been gone a few minutes when the telephone by your bed rings harshly. Through the tinny receiver you hear the Professor's asthmatic voice. "I'm told you won't be at supper tonight," he says hoarsely. "I'm sorry to hear that, but I understand you must be tired. I'll have Mrs. McDonald fetch you at eight, though. I thank you for your interest."
"Thank you," you reply pleasantly. "Might I have a look at your manuscript beforehand?"
"I asked Mrs. McDonald to set it on the writing table in your room," he says. "Is it not there?"
"Oh, yes, I see now," you say, glad to have that particular mystery cleared up. "Yes, I will definitely have something to say when we meet. Thank you again."
You return to the writing table and look again at what you had mistaken to be a letter. Reading it more carefully you begin to see nuances that your earlier, more cursory reading had missed, and you are soon lost in the complexities of the Professor's thought. It contains many implications that you find obscure, but others you are able to tease out on your own, and you are decidedly impressed at the variations he has been able to extract from his initial and deceptively simple thesis. You take out a notebook of your own and scratch down a few of your own thoughts, before writing "REVOLUTIONARY" at the bottom. You underscore the word twice.
When you next look at your watch it is a little after seven, and you wonder if you should take a wash or a nap before meeting the Professor.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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