Hopeful Monsters

Then — But what if it is not bearable to live like this!

I walked through the streets holding the hand of the child.

There were bright white clouds as if gods were looking down.

The child walked beside me boldly.

When we came to the rectory Peter Reece seemed to be still standing where I had left him at the bottom of the scaffolding of the

half-finished Recreational Hall. I said to him 'She was here. My friend was here. What the devil are you up to?'

Peter Reece said 'What the devil do you mean what am I up to?*

I said 'She spoke to you. My friend. A German girl.'

Peter Reece said 'I forgot. I'm sorry.'

'You couldn't have forgotten.'

'I was worried, I thought you were in some sort of trouble with the child.'

'Why should you think I was in some sort of trouble with the child?'

'She was with a group of Communists. Your friend. The German girl.'

'Where are they now?'

'They've gone.'

'Where to?'

'They went in a bus.'

'You're mad.'

'You were on one of your walks on your own. How do I know where you go when you walk on your own! I thought you were in trouble with the child.'

'Did she leave a note?'

'I'll ask.'

I said 'You don't know what you're doing.'

I was still holding the hand of the child. Peter Reece was watching me, moving from foot to foot; he seemed about to cry. I thought — Oh well, why should he not be jealous of angels.

He said 'I thought you said the child couldn't talk.'

I said'Yes, I did.'

He said 'Well she talked to the German girl.'

I said 'She did?' Then — 'What did she say?'

'She told her where she thought you were.'

The child looked up at me brightly.

I said 'Can you find out if she left a note for me.'

Peter Reece began saying again 'I thought you might be in trouble — '

I said 'This girl is in trouble with her father.'

Peter Reece said 'Yes, I know.' Then — 'Why did your friend say you might be able to help her?'

I said 'Because I might be able to help her.'

Peter Reece said 'How?'

I said 'Will you get the note.'

While Peter Reece went off to the rectory I stood hand-in-hand with the child. I thought — Things do happen like this? If you don't expect them, but let them. Then — But you were here, this afternoon, my beautiful German girl, when I was down by the estuary, where small boats once blew like seeds on the wind, where in the mud there are bits of coloured glass. Could you not stay for me? Was there too much to be done? You said to the child 'I am sure we can do something for you' — ?

I said to the child, speaking slowly 'You do want me to help you?'

The child held my hand. She looked up at me brightly.

Peter Reece came back with the note that you had left for me.

Dearest Max,

Why are you not here? I told you I would come. The child is the only one who seems to know where I might find you. But I only have a few minutes. It was with much difficulty that I got people to call here in our bus.

Before I came here I did not know how much I wanted to see you. Now that I am here and you are not, I do! You will say 'Yes this is what happens!' Perhaps I would have stayed on if I had found you. Now I do not know what to do. I do not like your pastor.

Max, what is happening to us, do you know?

I hope you will be able to do something for the child. She said you had been good to her wherever it was you had met her: I imagined you meeting her in some forest! She wants to get away from her family. Whenever we meet, or nearly meet, you and I, there seems to be a child.

Will you telephone me before we leave London? I will tell you our address.

Max, what are we doing? I think we are mad. With very much love from your Nellie x x x x

I said to Peter Reece 'I will find out if legally I can do anything to help this girl. Can you see if there is a hostel run by nuns or something, where she can be looked after at least while I am away. I will go and talk to my mother about her.'

Peter Reece said 'You're going away?'

I said 'My mother will find her some school for the deaf and

dumb, or whatever is wrong with her. My mother will pay. But she mustn't be made to go back to her father if she doesn't want to. Isn't that right?'

I said this to the child. She looked up at me brightly.

Peter Reece said 'How do you know your mother will pay?'

I said 'I hope your Recreational Hall falls down.'

Peter Reece said 'All right.'

I said 'You will help me find somewhere she can stay tonight?'

Peter Reece said 'I hope the whole bloody church falls down.'

I said 'You promise?'

Peter Reece said 'I've said all right!'

I thought — I don't suppose there's anything, is there, about the Good Samaritan having a girlfriend whom he missed because he was looking at something else when a bus went by.

When I got back to Cambridge, which was towards the end of that summer, I found that there was being built there a machine which, it was hoped, would 'split the atom' (this was a phrase already in journalistic use). Such a process had been achieved in embryo in 1919 when Rutherford had 'bombarded' (this was a word in both journalistic and scientific use) the nucleus of a nitrogen atom with alpha particles that emanated naturally from a radioactive substance, and lo and behold — a rabbit from a hat — out of the nucleus had popped a proton (well, I suppose words describe our attitude to whatever occurs) and the nucleus of the nitrogen atom had been changed into that of an oxygen atom, although the release of energy had been very small. But there had been a glimpse of the enormous forces that might be hidden within the atom.

The machine that was being built in Cambridge in the autumn of 1931 was more elaborate than Rutherford's toy-like apparatus of 1919; but it still had a bizarre appearance like something constructed as a prop for a modern ballet. It was like an outsize village pump crowned with a tin top hat: whoever worked it had to sit in a tea-chest lined with lead; this was to protect him from possible effects of radiation. But such was the excitement of the time that physicists did not worry much about radiation. What were to be bombarded now were the nuclei of lithium atoms — it was known that these were potentially unstable. They were to be bombarded with protons accelerated artificially to enormous speeds, so that this time there would be a man-made release of energy which, it was hoped, would be of a different order of strength from that achieved naturally by