Chapter Text
“O frati,” dissi, “che per cento milia
perigli siete giunti a l'occidente,
a questa tanto picciola vigilia
d'i nostri sensi ch'è del rimanente
non vogliate negar l'esperïenza
di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente.
Considerate la vostra semenza:
fatti non foste a viver come bruti,
ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza.”
“O brothers!” I began, “woe to the west
Through perils without number now have we reach'd;
To this the short remaining watch, that yet
Our senses have to wake, refuse not proof
Of the unpeopled world, following the track
Of Phoebus. Call to mind from whence ye sprang:
Ye were not form'd to live the life of brutes,
But virtue to pursue and knowledge high.”
Inferno, Canto XXVI
I.
13th March 1870, Buntingford
The invitation came on a Sunday morning.
Looking back at it, in the weeks and months after the fact, all implications settled and chewed upon, Jonathan Fanshawe would find the choice typical to the point of predictability. People change throughout the years, in someone -something- better or worse according to how reality twists itself around them, but there are a few fixed details that never quite seem to shift, no matter the how and the what. Distinctive traits, qualities and flaws, so ingrained in someone’s psyche that permeate all their works, marks of their personality for the decades to come.
The Magnus Institute, exactly as its founder, seemed to pride itself in causing the greatest possible inconvenience to everyone else.
The bell rang as Jonathan was sipping his breakfast tea, bread and marmalade on his plate, reading glasses on his eyes and a newspaper in his left hand. It was an habit he had shared with his late wife -going through the recent events and commenting them together-, and one he had never quite managed to lose, even almost ten years after her passing. Now, his children all grown up and away from the house, he just talked to himself.
By the time he got to the door, Jonathan had half-made up his mind on what to say to whoever thought the Lord’s sacred day a good timing for nuisances. Not that Jonathan actually believed in God -certainly not more and, given a few peculiar encounters in his youth, perhaps a little less than the average English gentleman-, but formalities were the baselines of peaceful coexistence amongst humans and to see them so blatantly disrespected-; well, that was upsetting per se.
He had expected to find himself in front of a charity group -religious or secular- or an affiliate of certain political parties, of the kind you would never see in Parliament, for lack of memberships and ideas.
The man who was waiting for him at the threshold belonged to neither groups.
He was tall and thin, all dressed up in what looked like his most formal attire, and couldn’t possibly be more than thirty years old. His face was slim, with short black hair combed to one side and a long straight nose in its center. He would have looked rather handsome, that Jonathan noticed, hadn’t it been for a certain ironic expression on his face, the ghost of an half-concealed knowing smile and eyes, light and grey, that seemed disturbingly out of place.
“Good morning and happy Sunday sir, may I ask to speak with Doctor Jonathan Fanshawe?”
“You may, as you already are,” Jonathan squinted and adjusted his glasses “My apologies if we have already made acquaintance, sir, but I am an old man and my memory fails me more than it helps me. Have we met before or-?”
Or are you a complete stranger showing at my house unannounced and uninvited? That second half of the question remained unsaid.
“Oh no we’ve-” the young man’s smile seemed to widen “we’ve never met before, Doctor. Never been- never been face to face, so to say. And I must add that I deeply apologize for intruding upon your private affairs in such manner, but I’ve come a long way carrying a message and it is not of the kind that can be delivered on a doorstep. It would be, well, undignified for both of us.”
The firmness in his tone of voice, inappropriate and impolite, would have been enough for Jonathan to slam the door in the stranger’s face, but something told him his visitor would not take a no for an answer, or at least not with ease and grace. Hours, and perhaps even days, of arguing would be the expected outcome.
Amongst all the things time corrodes, Jonathan had found his patience had grown thin and frail the older he got.
So, with a sigh and the hope to solve the business with a brief conversation, he opened the door for his guest and let him enter the house. The man kept apologizing for the interruption, though with a tone that seemed born more out of convenience than sincere regret.
“The matter is quite important, though. I would have not bothered disturbing you for anything less. Not urgent in the stricter sense of the word, no, but I would say grave.” A little chuckle escaped through his teeth: “Quite grave indeed.”
Pause.
“But I must not forget my manners. My name is William Taylor, newly appointed Head of the Magnus Institute, and I come here with a query, on behalf of former Head and Founder Jonah Magnus.”
The mention of that name sent a shiver of dread down Jonathan’s spine. He tightened the grip on his walking stick, a sudden tension in his neck and jaw: “Mister Magnus and I have not met nor spoken in years, even decades I would say, and are not currently on the best of terms with each other. I am sorry to tell you sir that you’ve undertaken your journey in vain, for there is nothing left to say between us and no favor he could ask me that I would be willing to accomodate. You may find my words improper, and deem me ungrateful and too straightforward, but those are conditions Mr Magnus accepted a long time ago as the outcome of our falling out. I see no reason to renegotiate them now, regardless of his needs.”
Taylor looked at him with an blank stare and for a moment Jonathan thought he would raise his voice and scold him for his rudeness -after all, that had been a recurring argument between him and his wife: Jonathan’s unwillingness to smooth the edges of his personality to accomodate others.
Instead, Taylor threw his head back and laughed. A laugh, loud and bright and sharp, that sent Jonathan back to the happier days of his early youth.
“Oh you must pardon me, Doctor, I’m looking terrible in your eyes. A stranger bringing unwelcome news from a former friend. Sure not how you wished to spend your Sunday morning. But you need not to worry, for on one thing you are mistaken,” Taylor pulled out a paper envelope out of his waistcoat: “You see, Mister Magnus has no need for your services nor for other practicality of sort, as he regrettably passed away three days ago.”
The words hit Jonathan in the gut with a violence he himself would have not expected. It was not grief, of course, as the feelings he had once held for Jonah Magnus had long since shifted from affection to disgust to, finally, a strange kind of hateful indifference. A lingering unpleasant thought in the back of his mind that would resurface from time to time just to cause him an headache.
It was not grief, but it was surprise.
Everyone has to die, eventually, and Jonathan knew it better than most, as he had to watch more men than he could count meet their end. Still, the concept of death applied to Jonah Magnus, of all people, sounded as ill-suited as the image of a seven-legged dog, or a spotted zebra.
Taylor noticed his reaction: “Something wrong, Doctor?”
“No, no I just-” Jonathan shook his head, suddenly unsure of what to say: “may I-may I ask how he died? Just professional deformation, you’ll understand”
Taylor raised an eyebrow: “Well, of old age of course. He was well past his eightieth birthday. We found him dead at his desk, one afternoon, and that was it.”
Old age. Of course it was old age. Jonathan damned himself for even doubting: as much as he had loved to pretend and study otherwise, Jonah Magnus had just been another human being, and as such subjected to the natural cycle of things. Nothing mysterious, nothing esoteric, nothing supernatural.
“We were absolutely distraught, didn’t know what to do with the documents yet to sign, catalogue, how to elect our next Head, but soon found out he had left enough dispositions to help us overcome his passing. Very detailed dispositions.” Taylor smiled “Which brings us to the reason behind my visit.”
He brought one hand on the side of his head, in a weird gesture that reminded Jonathan of someone who’s adjusting their pair of glasses. Except Taylor carried none. He seemed to catch himself halfway through the movement and the hand came to an halt right next to his temple, pursed lips, shoulders tense and an expression on his face in sharp contrast with the previous joviality.
A moment later, though, it was all gone, with such rapidity and quickness Jonathan almost thought he had imagined it.
Taylor opened the paper envelop -revealing what seemed to be a long hand-written document- and went through it as someone who knew its content by heart: “Amongst the more… bureaucratic details of his will, Mr. Magnus added a few personal ones of great relevance, and in particular he described at length the measures and procedures for his future burial. Those, and a comprehensive list of all the people invited to the function.”
The unequivocal look Taylor gave him only served to fuel Jonathan’s disbelief: “I apologize, sir, I must have misinterpreted your words: are you perchance saying that you have come all this way, from London, just to invite me to your Founder’s funeral?”
Taylor’s unnerving smile didn’t waver: “Of course not, that would have been incredibly ridiculous of me. I have come all this way, from London, to make sure you would come to our Founder’s funeral”
It took a while for the words to start making sense in Jonathan’s head and, when it happened, the stunned silence in which he had fallen turned into a furious one.
How dare he. How dare that presumptuous egotistical self-centered-
How. Dare. He.
“Of course-” Taylor continued, unaware of the rage slowly taking over Jonathan’s body “of course it would be my pleasure to accompany you on my- I mean, the Institute’s private carriage, the very same I have used to come here. There’s an accommodation ready to host you in London and I will be personally responsible to satisfy your personal nee-”
“I’m not coming,” Jonathan had blurted it out through gritted teeth “I am sorry your previous employer has set you on such a task, Mr Taylor, for it’s an impossible one: I have no intention to come to the funeral of a man I despised. It would be senseless and hypocritical.”
“Would it?” Taylor frowned, his left hand now playing with a dime “Mr Magnus didn’t see it that way. There’s much to learn from our enemies, perhaps even more than our friends. And dead enemies are no exception to the rule. Furthermore,” he shrugged “the church won’t be crowded. I’m afraid most of Mr Magnus’ acquaintances and friends are either unavailable or… well, dead as he is now.” He chuckled “Yes, precisely as he is now. There won’t be anyone there to recognize you. No one to judge you for your decision. Nothing if not the satisfaction of beating an old friend at the game of survival. These aren’t my own words, of course,” he quickly added, raising a hand: “Only what I’ve been instructed to tell you in case of… resistance.”
“You have been given very detailed instructions indeed.”
“Mr Magnus was someone who liked planning ahead, as I’m sure you know.”
And, unfortunately, Jonathan did in fact know: “My answer stays the same”
“If I may add something personal,” Taylor took a step closer and Jonathan took one backwards, not fond of any invasion of his personal space: “Jonah Magnus was a… well, a remarkable man, and I cannot hide my admiration for him, especially not now that I’m taking his place as the Head of the Institute. It would give me great displeasure to disappoint his last and most pressing wish. And he was especially preoccupied with your presence at his funeral. I have not been given instructions to knock at anyone else’s door and practically beg for them to come. He wanted you of all people to see him one last time and he knew you would have refused him any approach of any kind in life. The last resort was in death.” He sighed: “I do not know the whys and the hows of your mutual falling out, but he is dead now. Resting in a coffin and about to be buried six feet underground. He won’t get any satisfaction from your presence, if not in Spirit, and all your reasons to be cross with him are as lifeless as he is. I am not talking about forgiveness, Doctor. I am talking about closure.”
It was that last sentence that rang as a small bell in Jonathan’s mind.
Closure.
Upon sending that one last angry letter to Jonah Magnus, all those years ago, he had expected a reply. Not apologies of course, that would have been delusional, but excuses. Attempts to minimize and rationalize. Anything indicating that he had cared -at least partially- for their friendship.
But all he’d gotten in return had been silence.
It had been hypocritical of course, that he could recognize with hindsight, and for years he’d masked the sense of disappointment underneath the fear -present, not fake, but over-exaggerated- that his former friend might actually be conspiring against him in some way, waiting to get back at him with a striking, devastating blow. It would have not been beneath him to do so, as much as he liked pretending he didn’t hold grudges.
And now this.
It would have been perfectly reasonable for him to say no one last time. To slam a metaphorical door in the face of a man who’d caused so much pain and misery in the lives of those he’d called friends. It would have been in his right to do so, coherent and moral in his choices as he had tried to be all his life.
Yet.
Jonah Magnus had indeed respected his wish of breaking contacts. He had kept his word, unuttered and unexpressed for almost forty years. And now a last favor, from beyond the grave.
It was senseless and it was tardive and it was flattering.
And, though he would never admit it, Jonathan was curious.
“I am an old man,” he counter-argued one last time, pro forma: “The journey will be tiring, I don’t know if my constitution allows me to undert-”
“As I have already told you, it will be my honor and obligation to look after your wellbeing for the entirety of your staying in London. You need not to worry about it in any way.” And, after Jonathan failed to reply, he added: “So may I take this as a confirmation? You will come to London with me?”
Jonathan sighed: “I will. As an homage to old times. Not forgiveness, not fondness. Just- just closure, as you said.”
Taylor’s face light up and his smile grew wide and bright, his arm outstretched to shake Jonathan’s hand: “It is a pleasure to hear so, Doctor. A great pleasure indeed. I most definitely look forward your company, and our journey together.”
Jonathan winced, as the other man’s grip on his wrist had grown too strong for his own taste and his frail bones, and pulled it away with a snap, muscles aching out loud in protest. Taylor looked at him, then at his own hand, and frowned, his tone sincerely apologetic: “Oh, how embarrassing. I really did not expect-” He shook his head: “I’ve been ill for a long time, months that felt like years truth be told, and my strength had so diminished that now that I’m back in health I have almost forgotten how to use it properly. But I’ll get the hand of it, I’m sure.”
Jonathan started at him in perplexed silence, not sure if he should express distress for Taylor’s past illness, congratulations for his recovery, inquire on the origin and the symptoms of the sickness or simply accept those deeply strange apologies for what they were.
But Taylor didn’t stay in silence for long. Instead, now secured the reason why he’d come in the first place, he was fast to take leave from Jonathan’s house, promising to be back the following day to escort him safe and sound to the capital.
“I will keep an eye out for any possible inconvenience,” he stated once more, already in the carriage: “I assure you, dear Doctor, you will not regret your decision. I promise it myself.”
A difficult promise to keep, Jonathan thought, the door now firmly closed behind him, since I’m regretting it already.
But he couldn’t change his mind again and leave the rest of his life -as short as it would be- with an additional series of what ifs. He would re-open that door, left slightly ajar almost forty years prior, just to shut it tight and seal it once and for all.
Jonah Magnus was dead.
Jonathan sit again at his dining table and kept on drinking his tea, now cold against his lips.
The newspaper laid next to him, forgotten and unread.
He thought.
He remembered.
Jonah Magnus was dead.
26th September 1809, Edinburgh
The night was dark and chilly, the wind stabbing Jonathan with pointy gusts of cold air. He braced himself and tried to stop his teeth from rattling, as stepped out of the attic and reached the rooftop.
“There’s no way this can’t go wrong,” he shouted, not sure anyone was even listening to his protests: “We’ll both be sick by tomorrow.” Jonathan moved one, two, three steps in the narrow walkway on the roof, forcing himself not to look down: “Or, we could fall and break every single bone in our body.”
He had almost reached the end of the passage when he lost his footing. He stayed still for a moment that seemed to outstretch for hours, the weight of his body threatening to throw him off balance and onto the ground, several feet from where he stood.
Then, a hand grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him onto the terrace.
“For someone who wants to make a profession out of preserving others’ good health, Jonathan, you are awfully terrible at taking care of your own.”
Jonathan scoffed, annoyance to cover his fright: “Peculiar for you to make such comment, since this was your idea in the first place.”
Jonah laughed and sat on the small platform, beckoning him to do the same: “You indulge me too much, then.”
“I do often have that very same suspicion, to be frank.” Jonathan sat next to Jonah, arms outstretched behind his back and palms firmly pressed against the roof tiles: “But do not be flattered too much by it. My mother always says I am the only person she knows who manages to be both aggravating and accommodating at the same time. Which is to say: my ability to comply always comes with an additional propensity for complaining.”
“How boring would we all be, without our own contradictions,” Jonah shrugged: “But I still do believe the sight is worth the trouble,” he gestured towards the empty air: “Don’t you agree?”
The sky was clear of clouds -an extraordinary occurrence for late September- and the night was punctuated with stars. Jonathan had never been keen on learning astronomy, but Martha, the youngest of his sisters, just turned ten, was fascinated with the sky in all its facets and therefore pestered him with every new fact and data she learnt. As a result, he was able to recognize and categorize more constellations than he could count.
But, sterile data aside, he had to admit Jonah was right. The view was breathtaking.
“It is even better at sunset, and at dawn.” Jonah added, as if reading his thoughts: “Whenever I can’t sleep at night, and I don’t have new books to study, or nothing interesting to do with my time -which granted doesn’t happen often, but, alas, even the greatest minds of our time are subjected to the dread of ennui- I come here to collect my thoughts.”
“I’m sorry, are you calling yourself one of the greatest mind of our time?”
Jonah’s reply was firm, without any trace of irony: “And aren’t I?”
“You’re barely twenty-one”
“One can be ‘barely twenty-one’ and one of the greatest mind of our time. I sense no oxymoron here.”
“Well, you still have not done much to deserve such praise.”
Jonah rolled his eyes, dismissing Jonathan’s arguments as if they were but mere technicalities: “The very same could be said about most of our scholars and academics. And yet they teach and explain as if they were holding the keys to infinite wisdom.” He opened his mouth to add something, then frowned and closed it without uttering a sound. Then, after a pause, he opened it again: “Are you satisfied of your teachings? Of your education?”
For someone so fond of attentions and public acknowledgment, Jonah safeguarded the facets of his personhood to the point of secrecy. Not only the private matters, family secrets that should remain such, but even thoughts and feelings seemed to pass through some sort of invisible filter before exiting his mouth. They weren’t insincere, or blatantly false, just- diluted. Diluted and slightly twisted into a proper, less genuine, shape. Even sterile, to a point.
It was an habit of his ever since Jonathan could remember, tracing back to the first year of boarding school where they met each other, and a maddening one, as it turned every conversation into a puzzle, a challenge to decipher Jonah’s true intentions. Jonathan didn’t know if Jonah did it on purpose, or if that perpetual reluctance was just an ingrained part of his personality, but what he did know was that when his friend -his closest friend, ironically so- asked a question such as the one he’d just uttered, harmless and quiet, there was something else entirely on his tongue, pressing to be said, begging to be let out.
“I can’t say I am discontented,” he replied then, carefully and tentatively “but I am still not an expert in the matters I’ve been taught, and the field of medicine is vast and unexplored in its entirety. Incredible discoveries have been made in the last century and I have no doubt that in a century our own medicine will look outdated and ridiculous. Such are the passing of time and the miracle of science. But I do understand you hold quite different feelings towards your own selected course of study, don’t you?”
Jonah pursed his lips, then drew a knee close to his chest: “It has been, well, unsatisfactory. Reductive. It seems to me I could have understood everything I’ve studied so far on my own. A waste of time and a waste of money.” His voice was thick with disgust.
“But surely your professors add their own insights and considerations to the texts they analyze and you are required to do the same. And isn’t it brilliant, how humanity strives for knowledge through shared effort? How we all contribute to a truer, more complex view of reality for the generations to come?”
Jonah placed an elbow on his knee, the arm lazily dangling over it: “Sometimes it seems to me we’re just running circles. Deceiving ourselves and saying we’re getting somewhere just because the alternative is scarier.”
“The alternative? What alternative?”
Jonah didn’t answer, eyes fixed on a spot, on something, Jonathan couldn’t see.
He couldn’t pretend he followed Jonah’s trail of thoughts most of the times, nor could he pretend he wasn’t fascinated by his own inability to understand his friend. His friend, who was sociable and agreeable and so well-liked in every social circle he found himself in, and who still seemed to wear ten thousands different masks all at once.
It would have been a terrible thing to confess, even for someone who prided themselves with uncompromising honesty, and therefore Jonathan kept the thought at bay in the back of his mind, looking at it only forced, but one of the reasons why he found Jonah’s company so intriguing was the subtle, persisting impression that there was something irreparably wrong with him.
As the son and grandson of doctors, Jonathan had spent his early years surrounded by discussions of illnesses and recoveries, the infinite ways in which the body cracks and breaks and heals. He’d be fascinated by the knowledge physicians held, the care with which they handed something as complex as human beings with firmness and self-confidence.
Of course, his childhood vision -of doctors as gods, able to solve every problem they set their mind on through knowledge and hard work- got complicated and even disproved with the passing of time, as Jonathan grew aware of the limits and challenges modern medicine still had to face, the myriad of blank spots that turned his practice more into an enigma than a proper, actual science.
But, nonetheless, in spite of all difficulties, Jonathan did believe that improvements were possible. That the human mind, short-lived as it was, could cooperate with science to achieve unthinkable wonders. Some limits could never be crossed, because mortality was ingrained in people’s very soul -as nature and God intended-, but it was a man’s duty, it was a man’s purpose, to take another step forward in the race towards progress, for their peers and the future generations.
But to solve, one had to understand and know.
And to understand and know, one had to observe.
Jonathan hoped Jonah would never notice this side of their friendship, the way Jonah most of all craved not to be known in any way that mattered and Jonathan’s calm, pondered, but insisting inquisitiveness. Jonathan hoped so, even if a side of him he couldn’t quite name suggested that, even if he knew, even if he guessed, Jonah would not mind nearly as much as Jonathan feared. But those were all suppositions, and of the kind that would most likely never find disproval or confirmation.
“- nothing, nothing at all…”
“What?”
Jonah shook his head: “Just thinking out loud. You know,” he added, quickly, as if worried the words might refuse to come out of his mouth if he let them wait: “it just seems to me that the knowledge we’ve been taught, the data and the books and, well, everything really, has just been served to us on a silver platter. Easy and quick to digest, a pat on our back to reassure us of our own intelligence, of our place. You study a handful of notions, learn them by heart and add perhaps half a personal thought on the matter, get your degree and stroll in the civil society with a steadier ground under your feet, because now you know. But what do you know? What do we all know, really?” He let out a mocking laugh, then grew quiet again: “I feel like we’re barely scratching a veil. That reality is infinitely more complex, beautiful, frightening than what we’ve been taught it is, and that this cover-up only serves to fuel our futile human pride.”
“Your severity in marking human progresses is unfair. The steps might be small, barely visible at times, but look how far we’ve come just in the last century,” Jonathan gestured towards the landscape around them, the houses glittering with light and the stars above their heads “I cannot bring myself to despair for humanity when there’s so much good coming from it.”
Jonah passed a hand over his face: “Perhaps you’re right. But what if,” he averted his gaze from Jonathan and placed it on the same invisible spot on the horizon: “what if you were presented with the choice to Know, truly, once and for all? Which price would you be willing to pay to pursue virtue and knowledge high?”
It took a moment for Jonathan to understand the reference: “Are you quoting Dante?”
Jonah stretched his lips into a thin smile: “The imagery is quite impactful, you’ll agree with me. I think of it often, Ulysses and his crew, and a last, desperate attempt to pursue knowledge to the highest degree, irregardless of the consequences.”
“Quite grave consequences in their case.”
“Not unexpected,” Jonah scoffed: “if something is meant to remain secret, the uncovering of it would necessarily come with a cost. The question is if one would be willing to pay it.”
“Well, if we want to be precise about it,” Jonathan objected, not certain where the conversation was headed but not willing to be left behind: “Ulysses’ punishment came not from his pursuit of knowledge -though that caused his death- but from the deception he played throughout his life -counsellor of fraud through and through-, and last of all on his crew. Of course,” he added after a moment “his fault was also the hubris of challenging the unknowable armed only with a man’s wits, but I don’t think the underlying theological debate is what truly concerns you here.”
“No, you’re right. And can it really be called a deception, if his words alone were enough for them to eagerly follow him over the edge? Such devotion isn’t born in a day, and they had to at least sense the dangers of challenging the pre-established order of things. I’m not saying they had it coming, not in its stricter sense, but that his responsibility for them was feeble at best.”
“I don’t agree,” Jonathan tried to tone down the irritation in his voice, with mediocre results: “he was their captain. Their leader. It was just natural they would trust him, and he knew how to make them trust him. That is fraud, and of the worst kind.”
Jonah turned, eyes now fixed on Jonathan: “And would you?”
“Would I what? Follow as a member of the crew? Or lead as Ulysses did?”
Jonah did not clarify: “Would you?” He asked again.
“I… I have never thought about it,” Jonathan gulped, trying to collect his thoughts: “I could never sacrifice others to the torment of death and eternal damnation for my own personal gain, no matter how tempting that gain might be. And I am not a brave man, or at least not brave enough to risk myself and my life for the uncertain.” Then, suspicion rising in his chest, he added: “Would you?”
Jonah let out a deep breath: “I have asked myself that question countless times, and I’m not sure there’s an answer to it. I would never follow, of that I’m certain. Risking my life to chase someone else’s dream, no matter how alluring… doesn’t seem worth it, not in the greater scheme of things. But I don’t hold enough faith in my inherent goodness to properly trace the boundaries of what I would or wouldn’t do, if faced with a choice such as Ulysses’.Turning my back would be the moral option, but the prospect of such a revelation…” He sighed, then shrugged: “And what would one even do with it, if the consequence is to die shortly after? Of what good is infinte wisdom if our time then still runs out. No, the more I run my mind over it the more I don’t think there’s an answer.”
Pause.
“But of course, this is all nonsense. There are no Pillars of Hercules waiting for us at Gibraltar, no forbidden knowledge begging to be discovered, no magical turn of the key for it all to make sense, no-” he stopped and bit his lip: “Just nothing. Nothing at all.”
“And isn’t it a good thing, though? There are no barriers preventing us from learning and improving -no barriers except our own mortality. Isn’t it comforting and encouraging? The way humanity can climb its way ahead and ahead?” Jonathan thought of his father, the steady hands with which he cured his patients, the decades of study to come, and could not but being overfilled with pride. Walking his very same footsteps. Leading humanity towards a better future. What better role to play in life? “This isn’t a race, but a relay, and one that’s been going on since the beginning of times.”
Jonah lowered his chin and looked at the roof under their feet. He pursed his lips, then frowned, and raised his head again: “You really don’t understand, do you?”
And his tone of voice, though not angry or annoyed, was enough for Jonathan to feel a sense of uneasy shame within his chest.
Before he could ask further questions, though, Jonah stretched his arms, yawned, and when he spoke again his tone was serene and flat as usual: “Oh, do not pay much attention to my ramblings, Doctor. I have been studying hard in the past month and a few nights of sleep would probably do me good.” Which, said by Jonah, probably meant he hadn’t slept at all in the past three or four days: “There is no reason for me to waste my time with idle mind games.”
Jonathan knew that was Jonah’s way to put an end to a conversation. It was abrupt, definite and non-negotiable: even if he kept asking, even if he didn’t give up and tried to understand what Jonah truly meant with his last question, his friend would do everything in his power not to answer. All Jonathan could do was to wait, let the words fade in the chill air of the night, and hope one day Jonah would open up with him once more. A rare occurrence, and therefore to be waited for with eagerness.
“Enough philosophical debates,” Jonah chuckled, his mood now deliberately playful: “Now, for the life updates. I don’t think I have told you about one of the most peculiar encounters I’ve had in a while. You see, while in London, a few months ago, my path crossed -in a rather amusingly unexpected manner- with one Robert Smirke, who-”
And so they chatted, for a few more hours, the night passing by without them even noticing. Jonah recounted of his new acquaintance with a friend of a friend, an emerging architect who seemed determined to make his name shine bright and clear, and carve himself a place of importance within the British society. Jonah seemed to have taken an interest in him, if only of the intellectual kind, for the hobbies he cultivated, mainly revolving around the occult and the supernatural. Jonathan, for his part, could not understand the why of Jonah’s fascination with that individual, and even less for a matter that was so illogical, irrational and, therefore, so beneath Jonah’s intellect, let alone his own. He decided, an impulsive decision that was so atypical for him, that he did not like the man, and hoped their paths would never cross. A likely outcome, for Jonah had always been volatile in his friendships, and quick to turn his back whenever boredom got the best of him.
Then, it came Jonathan’s turn to talk and he found he had ten thousand things to say, and not enough time and words to do so. He talked about his sisters, Pauline about to be married and Martha still deep into the golden days of childhood; he talked about his studies, about the apprenticeship with his father, about the hopes and dreams he was carefully cultivating in the closets of his mind, and the projects, the prospects, he would work towards the moment he got his degree. He talked and talked and talked, more than he would usually do in anyone else’s company, sentences and topics overlapping as the hours went by. Jonah sat still, in his usual fashion, chin resting on the palm of his hand and head slightly tilted to one side, and though Jonathan wasn’t sure how much he was actually listening, never once his eyes left Jonathan’s.
Then, dawn came, and the sky shone bright.
“See?” Jonah outstretched an arm towards the sun: “Isn’t it marvelous? I told you it was worth it.”
Jonathan nodded, because the view was indeed beautiful. And -a small, hidden fraction of his mind added- Jonah himself looked beautiful in the morning, sharp features and grey eyes reflecting the golden light. His red hair captured the sun rays in an hundred little fire sparks and for one, infinite, terrible moment they resembled a flame.
It didn’t come difficult for Jonathan to imagine Jonah in the twin flame next to Ulysses.
Already damned, and already lost.