Nicholas Mosley - Hopeful Monsters

which, it was hoped, had been made radioactive was taken to yet another room to be tested for just what particles, if any, were being emitted. This test was carried out by means of Geiger-counters placed in the proximity of the irradiated material: the Geiger-counters themselves were gas-filled tubes with electrically charged wires strung inside: if any electrically charged particles from the irradiated and now (it was hoped) irradiating material entered these tubes then the gas inside them was affected so that electrons were released from it and were drawn to the wire with the effect of causing a change in the pulse of the electric current; this change was converted by an amplifier into a sound like a click, or it was shown in the form of a jump in a line of light on a screen. It was these clicks or jumps that were showing us what went on in the nucleus of an atom.

And so — for minutes, days, months — by listening to noises like those of old bones being cast out on the ground; by watching for bumps like those in a snake swallowing a mouse; by such rituals one felt one might be discovering the basic stuff of the universe — the ways in which humans might be able to use the secrets of the universe, or blow it up. I would think — Ah well, at least in so far as we are able to look at the style of this process by which scientists hope to understand the secrets of the universe, this is an interesting experiment!

There were innumerable variations which could be played with these games — in the type and strength of the neutron-emitting material; in the substance to be irradiated; in the type of packing by which the neutrons might be slowed down; in the spacings and duration of the experiment. Also, indeed, there were variations in the state of mind of an observer — who might sometimes be enthralled; might sometimes at the end of a long day find himself wondering — Well, if this is the way in which humans think they get into contact with the basic stuff of the universe, why shouldn't they blow themselves up? But then again — Is it not the state of mind of seeing that the observer in some way orders what he observes that might preserve the universe?

When I came home to you in the evenings you would be sitting with your hands held out to the fire: you would say 'But these little bits and pieces you say you are dealing with in these experiments — atoms, nuclei, particles, whatever — you do not in fact know what it is that exists?'

'Exactly.'

'What you see, hear, touch, are little clicks that come out of an amplifier; lines and bumps on a screen — '

'Right.'

'But because, according to science, you have to ask what causes these bumps and clicks, and because you have to give names to what you say are causing them, you make up atoms, nuclei, particles, neutrons — '

I said 'But what else do we do anyway with our sense-impressions?'

When you held out your hands to the fire you were like a being that is at home within flames.

You said 'What do you really think?'

I said 'It's often fairly ridiculous when you look at what you actually do: you do have the impression that you are engaged in some ritual for the sake of something quite different.'

You said 'Such as what is behind the shadows in that cave.'

I said 'If there is energy, constancy, then there is a sun. You know the sun, even if you see only what it does or doesn't light up.'

When we were together thus in the evenings, you and I, it was, yes, as if we were held by a force as strong and brittle as light; as gentle and vulnerable as that which forms a drop of water; so delicate that a shaft from outside might break us; so indestructible that we would still be together even if we were at different parts of the universe. I thought — What joy, even with the chance of the universe blowing up!

You said 'Human activities are games: words are toys — '

'For the sake of what — '

This.'

I said 'You see, one can say this much about it!'

The line of enquiry that you were pursuing at this time was to do with psychological implications of mediaeval and sixteenth- and seventeenth-century alchemy. Alchemists had talked as if they were concerned with the physical transformation of matter, but they had hardly ever talked about what they actually did, and from this it seemed that they themselves might have felt that there was something different going on. You said 'They were trying to examine ways in which there might be connections between the inside and outside worlds: but they couldn't talk about these much or they disappeared, or they occurred in individual instances, and thus were not to do with science, which depends on instances that are repeatable and with the statistics you get from these.'

I said They were coincidences.'

You said 'If you like.'

I said 'What sort of thing in fact did they say?'

You said 'Oh something like "Take a phial of an arcane substance such as mercury; entice darkness into it and seal the phial by fire. From this watch the dragon, half-serpent and half-bird, emerge. This will be the spirit imprisoned in matter; from its liberation, there can be the marriage of opposites — the spirit and the stone."'

I said 'Quite like we physicists.'

You said 'But alchemists seemed to know that they were using a code.'

I said 'But in physics there might in fact be a big bang at the end.'

You said 'Perhaps alchemists were talking about the sort of things that might follow from a big bang.'

I said 'Perhaps they were talking about us.'

When we carried on like this in the evenings it was, yes, as if we might be in contact with something quite different going on: with some parts of ourselves that were beyond the walls of a cave; that were burning, without being consumed, in a hot sun.

You said 'Oh I do love you.'

I said 'I love you too.'

I thought I might say — You are particles of light: I am the crests of waves.

— This room, this fireplace, you and I, will always be: whatever lives or dies in the sun.

There came a time when I felt that I should take you to visit my parents. I had telephoned them when I had got back from Spain: I had told them I had married my German girl. It was evident that they had not much liked the idea of this: you were, after all, not only a German but (though of course this was not said) also a Jew. I said to you 'They think you married me in order to get a passport.' You said, 'Well, I did marry you in order to get a passport.' I said 'Oh yes, of course, so you did.'

We went by train to Cambridge: we walked from the station. Here were the bits and pieces of the cocoon out of which I was born: the shop that sold sweets, the village post office, the stream in which there could be races with floating sticks. You walked with your long strides as if you had been trained like a camel to cover vast distances. I thought — A camel or a cloud; or an angel riding a horse across a battlefield.

My mother and father were in the room with the bow window

beyond which were the lawn, the croquet hoops, the red-brick walls. They had been playing cards: they were themselves like cards lying face up on a table, waiting to be picked up for a new game. I said This is Nellie, Eleanor; she saved my life, I told you; I was about to be shot.' My mother said 'I can't remember, what was it they were going to shoot you for?' My father said 'We could have sent the car for you to the station.'

I thought — Now tread carefully amongst these old bones, these bumps of childhood: remember that there is something different going on in the sun.

My mother would not look at me. She sat very upright during lunch. She watched you and my father at the other end of the table. You were saying 'Yes, we met in Spain. We had planned to meet, you see. I mean, we had planned to meet somewhere, but we didn't know that it would be Spain.'