Chapter 18 #2
He’s as good as Buckland, I thought, as a hundred expressions flickered across a hundred faces. Shock, and awe, and disbelief, and joy, and fear, and every combination thereof.
A few men leapt to their feet and began shouting. One man threw himself to his knees and began praying loudly, asking God to forgive us, to forgive him, to save us from the coming damnation.
“It is a miracle,” someone cried fiercely, tears streaming down his face. “A miracle.”
“That can’t possibly be real,” blustered another voice. “It must be a hoax. It has to be.”
“Please,” said Henry, raising his hands for order. But I could tell he was delighted. “Please, my friends. It is no hoax, and no demon, I promise. Come. Come and see. Come and see the creature, and make up your own mind.”
“I told you,” declared a giddy man in his forties with prominent gray sideburns. “All creatures return in cycles. I told you. I was right, and you all called me a fool!”
I smiled; that had to be Charles Lyell. I’d managed to steal Lyell’s newest book from Henry’s cabin before we disembarked.
Lyell was infamous for his—obviously incorrect—hypothesis that Earth’s features were formed by gradual, cyclical phenomena like erosion rather than climactic occurrences such as volcanoes and floods.
That itself was a relatively harmless unorthodoxy, but Lyell had been mocked from the lecture stage, and by Henry, most memorably, for claiming that animal and plant species waxed and waned alongside these gradual cycles.
I knew Ajax didn’t prove what Lyell hoped, but the man was practically dancing a jig, and I couldn’t help but find his enthusiasm charming.
More men came forward, some hesitantly, others nearly leaping rows to race to the stage. A few refused, gathering in clusters to whisper and cast dark glances at my pterodactyl. But most of the geomagicians came.
Ajax squawked and spread his wings, putting on a good show and eliciting more gasps and excited chatter. The men crowded around his cage, commenting on his beak, his claws, the gold of his eyes, wondering what he ate, when he slept, how he flew.
I could answer all of those, if they let me.
He isn’t yours, though. You sold him; he’s theirs.
“See,” Buckland was saying. “No hoax. You have seen the sketches of the German pterodactyl skeletons; this is the same.”
“And for once, the professor and I agree,” Henry said smugly.
The most surprising reaction was Conybeare’s. He must not have known, because his already pale face was white with horror. He grasped Buckland’s elbow. “William,” he hissed. “You said—you told me—”
“Is it not miraculous?” Buckland said pleasantly.
But Conybeare shook his head fiercely. “No. No. That is a demon. A devil. That creature…” He drew a shuddering breath. “Sorcery. It must be. It has to be.”
Buckland frowned at his friend in alarm. “You misunderstand. Mary has—”
“Then she has ensorcelled you, too.”
Buckland protested, but Conybeare was backing away, muttering a prayer of protection under his breath. “I cannot abide it. I must not.”
He pivoted, walking quickly for the back door. A few others turned to watch, with worried looks. Two followed.
I chewed at my nail nervously. So, that was three who thought me a sorcerer. But Buckland didn’t seem concerned.
“Ah! Lyell,” he was saying already, “I see you have noticed the beast’s claws. Do you see the three fingers? His grip is quite strong.”
“Why don’t we bring her out? You can ask Miss Anning yourself. She’s only through there.”
I jumped at the sound of my name in Henry’s voice. He was standing with a cluster of geomagicians. His smirk widened when I met his eye, and he strode toward me, brushing the black curtain aside.
“Won’t you come and meet your admirers?” he said, offering an arm.
“Davies said to stay here, and Buckland—”
“Yes, the professor does like to keep you all for himself, doesn’t he,” Henry said, and I bristled. He was trying to get under my skin, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t working.
Henry led me out from the curtains and through the gathered crowd. I swallowed as the conversation fell, and every eye turned to us. My fingers tightened unconsciously on Henry’s arm.
Ajax, at least, gave a hoot and flapped his wings when he caught sight of me.
“Gentlemen, allow me to introduce Miss Mary Anning, of Lyme Regis,” Henry said, as we stood in the center of the crowd, beside the aviary. “Our great discoverer.”
“Is it true? Did the egg really hatch in your hand?”
I blinked, trying to find the source of the called question—a young man in his thirties with a patchy red beard and flushed cheeks.
There was a burst of chatter, heads turning to fellows and dropping whispers.
Buckland watched all of this with a neutral expression, and I wished I could read the thoughts in his skull. Did he disapprove?
Well, he couldn’t always be my protector. I couldn’t live in his shadow forever. The geomagicians would need to accept me or reject me on my own merits.
I squared my shoulders and waited for a hundred small decisions to be made, my fate in every one. The murmured discussions rolled over me like a river.
Crowds were fickle. Where would the waters carry this one? Would they doubt me still, or believe? Would they conclude it a hoax? Or sorcery, like Conybeare? Would they laugh—even if they believed—and push me out, even with Henry and Buckland both on my side?
“Yes,” I said, at last.
I bit my tongue, fighting the urge to ramble on. Let them doubt me, if they wanted. I’d told the truth, and it needed no further defense. Still, my pulse thudded in my ears.
“Could it fly from birth?”
The question cut through the rest, addressed to me and not another geomagician. It was the young man with red hair.
“Not fly,” I said. “Ajax still doesn’t fly as a songbird. But he could soar soon after hatching. Within the hour, I would say?”
“Within the hour!” an elderly gentleman with half-moon spectacles declared.
“That suggests very low parental involvement, then. Like a lizard, or crocodile,” another muttered thoughtfully.
“The mother was found with the egg, you say? So, she must have tended the nest before hatching.”
The spectacled gentleman cleared his throat. “And was there any evidence of nesting materials?”
“No. I didn’t see any imprints of sticks or twigs or other organic material at the site.”
“Perhaps they buried their eggs, then.”
“Yes, in moist sand, I think,” I said slowly.
“That seems reasonable. Then, Miss Anning, did you find…”
And on it went, the geomagicians asking their questions and me answering, until my cheeks ached from the effort required to keep from grinning.
Once introductions were made, the redheaded young man was revealed to be none other than my friend Gideon Mantell. I laughed when he finally sheepishly introduced himself.
Even with only correspondence to go on, I had always been fond of Mantell. His father had been a shoemaker, which made him unique among geomagicians for his lack of pedigree. I always assumed that Buckland first put us in touch because of our similar backgrounds.
“You will have to come to dinner and meet my wife,” Mantell said, grinning warmly. “Ann has long admired your career.”
Frankly, I had little interest in entertaining a bored housewife, but I gave a polite response before Henry’s hand on my back moved me smoothly along to meet others.
The bespectacled man who’d asked about nesting materials was Elias Goldsmild.
“An honor to meet you,” he said earnestly, when we shook hands, and I was immediately put at ease by his warm smile.
“And these”—Henry gestured at a cluster of three—“are Misters Thomas Reed, Thomas Whaley, and Samuel Enys.” Whaley and Reed looked to be about forty, but Enys was probably in his mid-twenties.
Whaley was glaring furiously at Goldsmild. Ah, it must have been Goldsmild who’d chided him earlier. Was the older man allied with Buckland, then?
And Samuel Enys, at last!
“You wrote a paper about my ichthyosaur,” I said eagerly.
He beamed. “I did indeed.”
“You misidentified the tail kink as a result of postmortem damage.”
His smile slipped. “There were few specimens available at the time with which to compare,” he said defensively.
“Well, yes, until I found them.”
Henry laughed and clapped the red-faced Enys on the shoulder.
“Now, gentlemen. Lady,”—Henry inclined his head at me; I couldn’t even tell if it was sarcastic—“I propose that we move this fascinating discussion to my estate, perhaps over some whiskey. Nothing formal. You’ll come, won’t you, Miss Anning?”
“Oh, I don’t think—”
“I’m sure the professor will allow it,” Henry continued, as if I hadn’t spoken. “Won’t you, Buckland? You are also welcome, of course.”
I could see Buckland wanted to decline—for the both of us—but the crowd was already in motion, men excitedly gathering coats and hats.
“You will come, won’t you, Miss Anning?” Goldsmild asked, and Mantell added, “Stanton always opens up his private collection. Did you know he has a partial saber-tooth tiger?”
Buckland came up behind me. “Please don’t make me go to Henry Stanton’s house,” he muttered so only I could hear. “Haven’t we had plenty of the man, these last few days?”
I snorted. “More than enough. But…” I chewed my lip. “Don’t you think I ought to go? Eventually, I will want their votes, won’t I? And it does seem like I am making progress….” Maybe even friends, I thought, glancing toward an expectant-looking Goldsmild and Mantell.
Buckland rubbed his brow, and sighed. “One more night of Stanton won’t kill me. I suppose.”