The Egyptologist (9 page)

some of my housemates, feebly battling for control of a partial set of torn playing
cards. When you consider that I took notes, expanded them into full speeches
when I got home, rewrote them again for my report to London, and am now
fleshing them out further for you here, our readers should get a convincing pre•
sentation, but by all means you should add whatever you feel they still need.

Here we are then. Paul's eight or nine or ten. This is before winning the heart
of Mrs. Hoyt at age nineteen, before snake acts in the circus, before lightening
pockets in the market. This is a little boy going to the state school. He's a quiet,
sullen little fellow, no surprise. He absorbs his share of beatings from Eulalie and
the men she keeps. But he has no feeling at all for his fellow victims, his half sib•
lings, because when Eulalie's not whacking him about, she's holding him on her
lap and telling him that those other filthy kids aren't on his level, since he's the
son of the great gentleman Barnabas Davies, lost at sea, drowned on his way back
to Australia to take Eulalie and Paul to London. "Paul's mother was so blinded by
her respect for the rich, there she was feeding notions of class superiority to the
boy, even in the midst of their brutal poverty and oppression," said one of the Bar¬
rys, I didn't note which. They were both virulent Reds, you see, Macy, not to
shock you, but we have them down under, too. A dark and infectious philosophy
the Bolshie Barrys imbibed, and they cherished it, even after it sunk them.

Paul was—except for one quirk—nothing special at school, according to
Ronald Barry, his schoolmaster. He kept quiet. Filthy, of course, like most of the
very poorest kids, but disciplined enough to sit still and do as he was told.
"Mostly we were just trying to move the poor bastards along and keep them out
of trouble," said Ronald. "Not permitted to educate them at all, really. Just op•
pression by other means, pretending to teach them something, to dull them
enough to accept the conditions the owning class had in mind for them."

Then one day they do a little lesson on Egypt. Egypt's a place in the desert,
very old and pointy buildings, and the pagans in the old days, they didn't know
about Our Lord yet, so when their kings died, they wrapped them up in bed-
sheets and said they lived forever. "I probably added something along the lines of
'The pyramids were built by working folk, forced to labour for their brutal
kings,' " says Red Ron. And then they pass around a little picture book, and then
on to the day's arithmetic.

Well, end of the day comes and the ragamuffins head out the door, and
Ronald Barry is tidying up, and he can't find the picture book about Egypt, too
bad, since he'd borrowed it from his sister at the public library. Clearly, one of the
scoundrels had swiped it, and next morning, Ronald's thinking about how to

conduct his investigations when little Paul Caldwell comes in early. The boy
looks worse than usual, but he hands back the missing book. Turns out he hadn't
gone home the night before, had stayed out all night long just looking at this
book, actually slept outdoors. He doesn't say just what made it such a ripping
read, doesn't say much at all, "doesn't even apologise, the little thief," says Mr.
No-Private-Property. Then the boy asks, under his breath, might there be other
books like this one?

"Mr. Ferrell, there are few moments in my career when I felt real pride in what
I was doing. But I remember clearly how I felt that moment. This little child
wanted to learn. I forgot at once about the theft: this one was going to be one we
could save. Of course, if I knew then what I know now, I would have throttled the
viper when I could still get my hands round his neck."

That afternoon, Ronald Barry takes his prized pupil to one of the smaller
branches of the public library. And which librarian greets him that day but
Catherine Barry, the teacher's lovely sister. "Sis, here's a young fellow with real
promise who wants to learn how to get more books about ancient Egypt, of all
things.'' "Hello, Paul Caldwell," Miss Barry says sweetly, a little twinkle in her eye
saying, "Don't take me too seriously, I'm a good chum if you want one," all mis•
leading kindness and appropriately
red
curly hair and a sweet face. (Even by '22,
even after what she'd been through, I must confess she was a lovely thing. Treach•
erous, appearances.) The boy has no social graces, can barely speak, looks at the
ground, has probably never been in a building as clean and official as our little
library, has probably never been spoken to as kindly by anyone, has probably
never
seen
anyone as beautiful and apparently friendly as Miss Barry. All because
he'd been taken by something in a picture book.

"Well, Mr. Ferrell, we decided to take the little fellow under our wing,"
Catherine Barry told me with flirtatious pride. "Let's see about making you a
member of our library," says the Red agent to the little boy. That first day, Miss
Barry showed him all around, and though he barely spoke, she was encouraged to
see his eyes widen at the sight of all the books, the neat tables, the lamps and
chairs. "This is all yours to use as a citizen, the equal to any rich man," I can hear
her saying to the tiny scholar.

"He was heartbreaking," she told me, and I wrote that down and underlined
it, noting, "Why no children of her own?" "This boy had been betrayed by every•
one—family, state, church. It was all I could do to get the poor felow to speak to
me, and no surprise. Even then, the only thing he would really talk about was
Egypt. Something
about that
book Ronnie
had
shown him just tickled him. Well,

first things first: I found him a different one,
A Boy's Own Book of Egypt,
I re•
member the cover. He immediately took one of the chairs in the corner and did
not look up again until I came over to tell him the library was closing, but he
could come back tomorrow after school, and read some more, if he liked. 'Is no
one waiting for you at home, then?' I asked. Poor creature. You could see that
home held no meaning for him, even at that tender age.

"He did not want to go home, or say why not. So I asked him, 'Would you eat
a piece of kidney pie, then?' and the poor little fellow practically jumped out of
his skin." I can imagine that boy, Macy, with her standing behind him, gently
placing her hands on his shoulders, looking over his reading, smelling so nice, all
false promise. "Mr. Ferrell, it was a class crime, a fine young boy, starved by dev•
ilish church and corrupted state. I showed him how to shelve the book, and then
I led him back to the office. He was not such a fool as to turn down food, proba•
bly more than he saw in a week, more than he could steal in days. Oh, yes, have
no illusions, he was already stealing at that age. The rich need thieves, Mr. Ferrell,
and they are careful to breed them young. 'It's customary to thank someone,' I
told him. He managed to mutter a 'thank you, ma'am,' as he stuffed his face.

"Ronnie and I discussed it next day, and we were of one mind. As charitable
people, we would do what we could for this little one God had sent our way. As
political people, we owed it to him and to the future to prove that the working
class had as much brain and worth as the moneyed. And as educators, well, there
could be no question: this one wanted learning as much as he wanted food. We
would feed him, Ronnie and I, and split the expense."

(Ronald's words on the matter: "Cassie decided, Cassie dictated. The Pyg•
malion Fallacy, if you ask me, but she didn't. Party warns against this.")

Ask me, Paul Caldwell didn't have a chance to escape her lures, Macy. He met
Catherine Barry when she was probably twenty-six, and he was a little boy. I met
her in 1922, and even at forty-five or so, she was a powerful charmer, smelled
nice, smiled sweet. I was a man of the world, had my choice of lady friends, you
know, and I knew just how her sort used its wiles for nefarious purposes, but even
I found her something potent to sit near, nearly found myself begging her to dis•
cuss my questions with me over a supper. Her smile—of course, I could resist it,
but a little boy? No hope. It's a very certain smile, the smile of someone who
thinks they're so much smarter than you that they think they can see and steer
your very thoughts. They toy with you, make you jump to amuse them. Women
have it. Reds have it. Red women are the worst.

" 'Home doesn't appeal? Is that why you sit here at all hours reading about

pyramids?' I asked him a few days later when he was back, still shy. He had run
up to me and asked for the same book without looking me in the eye, as if he'd
never met me. I gave him the book, and after he read, I fed him again. And I of•
fered to see him home, it was late, but he said no, and was off.

"After three or four weeks he had come a dozen times and read nearly every•
thing we had on ancient Egypt, which was hardly so very much. Each time he
would read until closing, and then I would feed him, and each time he refused to
be walked home. He was growing friendlier, but not quickly. Whatever had been
done to him was enough to keep him suspicious of people for some time. I asked
Ronald to find his address from the school, and I went round to see his home my•
self. Oh, you've been there recently, Mr. Ferrell? I wonder if it's much changed.
When I saw it, it was the scene of a crime, a rape of the worker by the capitalist,
and nothing less. That humans were treated like this, and especially a little boy of
his quality and promise. Well, the closest I ever come to forgiving him is when I
think of how he was raised. Experiences like that make you either very strong or
very weak, and in Paul's case, it weakened his moral fibre beyond anything that
could be done to repair it. I believe everyone can improve themselves, but the last
I heard of him, he was still a selfish sentimentalist.

"He looked up and saw me standing in the doorway of his dreadful home, and
I am certain my face revealed what I thought of the scene. I think it was the first
time he ever looked me in the eye. Up jumped the little boy, ignoring the chaos
and noise around him, and he took my hand. 'Why did you come here?' he asked,
pulling me out the door and walking me as fast as he could up the street, while
his family stuck their heads out to gawk. 'So I could see if you were all right,' I
said, 'because I worry about people I am fond of.' I'm fine,' he said, 'but you
shouldn't come anymore. That's not my family, not my real family.' He started to
talk more than he had the whole time I had known him. 'My father was lost at
sea, and
that
woman, she's not my real mother.' I did not know if this was true,
but I doubted it.

"Once he asked why Ronnie was not married, and then, very quietly, so I
thought my heart would burst, he asked me 'as his sister' if perhaps Ronnie ever
wanted a son."

The next day, Macy, I asked Ronald Barry if he recalled Paul Caldwell want•
ing to be his son. "Didn't last long. By the time he was thirteen or so, he was rag•
ing at everything and everyone except Cassie and Egypt. I had done something to
offend him. I didn't realise it at the time, but it was only this: I was telling him
that I had
once wanted to be
a
University professor, but of course that lofty task

was reserved for toffs. I was telling him that brains aren't counted, just your fam•
ily, and the rich take care of each other. Paul looks up from his reading—a book
on Egypt, of course—and he says, 'Your enemies block your advancement? Why
don't you slay them?' I thought he was joking. Mr. Ferrell, I tell you this as a fact:
he was not joking. That was how Cassie's pet was developing. I should have throt•
tled him right there, saved us all the subsequent trouble. He says to me, 'If you're
not strong enough to defeat your enemies, what are you?' A thirteen-year-old boy,
Ferrell."

Miss Barry now: "When he read everything we had on Egypt, I tried to lead
him into other areas, even other areas of archaeology or history, or just good sto•
rybooks, and he would try them, like a litle boy trying his vegetables, then he
would have no more of it. But the day he learnt I could
order
books for him, nearly
anything in the world, you should have seen his face. He asked for titles he had
seen in the bibliographies or notes of other Egypt books.

"He was amusing, the little researcher at eleven, twelve, thirteen. He would
come into the library, breathing very hard, and I knew he had run all the way
from the school building. I used to tease him: 'And what brings you into our hum•
ble establishment today, Mr. Caldwell? Something in particular you'd like to
read? Perhaps some stories about knights? I have a lovely
Ivanhoe.
No? Maybe a
history of Australia's brave pioneers, those raping monsters? How about a guide
to sheep and the farming thereof?' I would just talk on and on to see his little face
contort itself up, trying to remember what I had taught him about politeness. Fi•
nally, he would burst out, 'Please, Miss Barry. Has it come? Has it?' 'And what
would that be, Mr. Caldwell? We'll need to comport ourselves like a gentleman in
this world, mind our manners.' 'Please, Miss Barry, I am sorry to interrupt you,
but I am hoping that
Cults of Ra
by Professors Knutson and Anderson has ar•
rived.' Or some other work, Champollion's work on translating the Rosetta stone.
The requests he came up with! The orders I made for him! The time I spent justi•
fying to the Head Librarian these obscure volumes as being part of the local pop•
ulation's bottomless appetite for Egypt." She told me to wait a moment, she went
to a drawer next to her bed and came back with a piece of paper: "I used to keep
a list," she went on. "Listen: Pasint's work on the judicial records of the necropo•
lis courts. The ex-circus performer Belzoni's exploits with the British consul

Henry Salt. Mattison on the use of music in burial rites. Oskar Denninger's pam•

phlet,
The Chemistry and Function of Feline Mummification in the Shrine to Bastet.

Whatever the latest strange title, he would plead, 'Did it come, Miss Barry? Did
it?' 'Well, I certainly do not know offhand,' I would say, biting my lips. 'I should