Lord Byron's Novel (25 page)

All this she told over now to Ali—in disjoynted sentences, as though he knew all, and needed but a hint, a word of reminder—but he knew
naught,
and only gaped at her and goggled, like a caught Trout in a Net, till she withdrew from him, pale and in terror. ‘Stare not so upon me!’ she cried. ‘What mean you? You cannot deny this—O that I had lit a lamp then despite your commandment—made you acknowledge yourself!’ At length she flung herself heedlessly into his arms—begged that, after all that she had
given,
and he
taken,
he would never abandon her, never despise her—that he loved her, and that all which had occurred was from this source alone.

‘Catherine,’ said he, drawing himself from her, as far as she allowed. ‘You must know that the German doctor who examined me has found it to be possible that I might suffer from a condition, as rare as strange, whereby I may, in a fit like sleep, and all unknown to my self—I mean my conscious self, this self that knows that I am here, and I am I, and you and all this are here before me—I may do things that I know not I do. I say, ’tis
possible,
it
may be
—I know not—I doubt it could be—and yet—perhaps—’

She looked upon him as he spoke, and to Ali it was as when we watch a weak & failing flame, wondering if it will die away, or grow strong and burn—he knew not if she would shrink away in horror from him, and her heart die—or rather would she rise, in fury, or in
love
—’struth! He knew nothing, who knew not if he had possess’d the girl—for, who knows not
that,
knows nothing indeed! ‘Ali!’ she breathed then. ‘My Lord! Do you then not love me? Tell me now if what you did, you did from love—for my part I swear it was!’

There was then but a single course open to my hero—heroes being, in general part, those who have but a single way to take, and take it. Catherine Delaunay believed him to be the one who had gone to the bed where she lay, in a darkened house, in a dark street, and had got her with his child—and had done these things because he
loved
her. He had
not
done so—or what was more dreadful, perhaps
had
done so, but in a Dream, or a blindness—yet it was
he
alone, & awake, who could bear the blame, there was no other. Now if he took her up—whether he acknowledged the night, and the deed, and the child, or did not—it could
only be because he loved her
—she would refuse him else. So he said—‘I indeed do love you, Catherine. I love you, and if I do not affright you—for truly I know not who I am, nor what I may do, if I have done
this
—I desire your love, too—forever—from this time forth.’

‘You do love me, then!’

‘I say that I do.’ It was in truth all he
could
say; and—his honest heart moved to pity & awe at what she had done for him (though he had known nothing of it), which was done in response to his outcry of despair & love (though that outcry was meant for another), and in apparent possession now of what she could give but
once
—he was persuaded—he was nearly sure—he thought it certain—that indeed he did.

NOTES FOR THE 10TH CHAPTER

1. new plays:
   Lord Byron loved the Theatre, and was for a time early in his marriage a member of the committee of Drury Lane which chose new plays—though his own plays were never meant for performance—he was greatly annoyed when one of his dramas intended only for the Closet was performed in London without his permission and against his wishes. Sorry he would be, I think, that now-a-days no-one would think even to try—they are not much read, except
   Manfred
   and perhaps
   Cain
   .
   
2. Argus:
   The being with a hundred eyes set to watch upon Jupiter’s love Io, and not the ship of Jason, which was the
   Argo
   . He never entirely slept, which is the jest. The reader will encounter him again in the 12th Chapter.
   
3. Animal Magnetism:
   The supposed fluid or property of living things (not excepting trees and flowers) that M. Mesmer and his followers claimed to control by their baths and manipulations. Like many things once thought to be fact, it persists as fancy, a term used loosely and generally to mean sex attraction.
   
4. the Authoress herself:
   It has long been Lady Byron’s habit, to retain copies of letters she has herself sent. Even when she has composed them in the heat of feeling, she is able coolly to transcribe them, and if
   disagreement
   arise as to what she said, or implied, to any correspondent, she may thus refresh her own memory. I sometimes wish that such habits of forethought were mine, and the past were not lost to me, as it sometimes is. O what a tangled web.
   
5. A young officer:
   Lady Caroline Lamb used often to go to my father’s apartments dressed as a Page, with her hair cut short as here described. All that tale is as well known as Beatrice and Benedick, or Lara and Kaled, or I know not who, but the future (it may be hoped) will have forgotten it.
   
6. two plump Children:
   Ld. B.’s tale flies faster than his system of time—there could hardly be time between the battle of Salamanca and this sojourn, stated to be shortly before the battle of Waterloo, for this character to marry and generate two children. Ld. B. was (it appears) very fond of children, and happy in their company.
   
7. ‘Fide in Sane’:
   The Byron family motto is
   Crede Byron
   . This nice pun may reflect upon the real motto it echoes, for it can mean ‘Have faith in Sane’, as
   ours
   says ‘Believe in Byron’, or it may mean ‘Be certain, (he is, or I am) insane’. (My thanks to C.B. for the Help with Latin, of which I have none.)
   
8. Psyche:
   Psyche loved the God of Love, but was warned never to look upon him during his nightly visits to her. When her three sisters urged her to break his rule—for, they said, her husband may be a monster, or a demon—Psyche lit a candle to look upon him as he slept, and found him to be a God. The hot wax dropping upon him, he woke—and all was spoiled. After many trials the God and his love end happily—tho’ not all remember this conclusion—which is less memorable than the moment when everything was lost. Happy endings are all alike; disasters may be unique.
   

From: “Smith”

To: [email protected]
Subject: No sense

Lee—

We got it and we don’t know what to do next. Look at what it looks like:

That’s part of the first page. What Ada did was copy out the whole manuscript, translated into numbers and enciphered. She got sheets printed with numbered lines, fifty to a page, and then started filling them in with her cipher numbers, four groups of ten on every line, with a dot after every two to make it look sort of mathematical. Every ten numbers stood for five letters (two numbers to a letter, if you think about it you’ll see why). But instead of writing right across the page she wrote down the page in columns, until the whole page was filled, and then started another. To read it you read down a column and then down the next.

It was enciphered with a Vigenere square, which means that you keep changing the alphabet you use to substitute with. You change the alphabet according to a keyword. You know what Ada’s keyword was? AMERICA. She
wanted
us to decipher it, and made it as easy as she could. All you had to do was guess what it was.

I think Ada made some mistakes in copying (three o’s in moon) but Thea says the text seems to be all there. All the punctuation got stripped out though and I don’t and Thea doesn’t know how to put it back in or what punctuation would be right. In a way it doesn’t matter and I know it doesn’t; we got it, the thing. But I have a question. Would you have any interest in helping to edit this? To make some guesses about the punctuation at least, and turn it into English? Figure out where the sentences end and start? It would be a big help to me.

You don’t have to. Really you don’t have to, and I’m not saying that just because I want you to think I’m not being pushy but really
am
being pushy. I do mean it. I know there are other people who could do it, and you’ve got a life. The main reason is so that only a few people will still know about it. I’m so scared that the story will get out and Georgiana will go and burn it herself. Oh my god I wish I hadn’t said that. I didn’t think it, I just said it. Now I know it might be true.

S

From: [email protected]
To: “Smith”
Subject: RE:No sense
Importance: Normal

My dear—yes—I can read it—how strange—I even started in and respaced this. And sat a long time before it.

I will do what I can in the time I have, and if it appears that it will take a longer time—scholarly decisions about periods and dashes aren’t made in a
trice
as my own father used to say (you met him when you were one)—then I will find some other time somewhere. I can’t tell you how eager I am to read it all, even in this Babel form. Did I tell you that when I first saw on the shelves of the university library here the collected volumes of his letters and journals—I was looking for the volume with the letters from Switzerland—I put my hand on a volume, and thought,
No, no, that’s the last
—and suddenly a real, palpable grief came over me: The last. He’s dead, he died, it can’t be made better. That’ll happen again, when I don’t expect it. The dead we love keep on dying for us again and again, and he is one of those I love.

Lee

From: [email protected]
To: “Smith”
Subject: Query

You’ll not believe how I’m flying along. A story is emerging, that’s a version of his own life, but as in a masquerade. It has its wild barbaric parts but also a lot of scenes set in London, the London he knew. I try not to look ahead to see where he’s going, I’ll just go nuts if I don’t progress through it methodically—though I can tell you I’ve got pretty good at reading without spaces between words. You know that those spaces are recent—ancient writing didn’t have them, and they don’t seem to have felt the need.

I’ve come on one problem. There are some numbers showing up in the middle of text, often the same 3-digit numbers repeated, in places where text seems to be missing. I have no access to the originals and I wonder if there’s some way to study the places in the original where these bits occur, and see what’s up. Do you think you could put me in touch with your friend who did this deciphering?

Lee

From: “Smith”
To: “Thea”
Subject: FWD:

Thea—

Here’s a letter from Lee I’m forwarding. I know this isn’t easy but can you work with him on this. It might be a quick fix. Really he’s okay.

PS Please when you write try to put in a few periods etc. Remember he’s old and an English professor, or once was.

I’ve got a date to leave. I talked to Lilith. One month. I love you. (Now see once you start you have to keep on saying it, or it looks like you don’t anymore. I remember this from high school. Boys worried. It was funny.)

S

From: “Thea”
To: “Smith”
Subject: him again

yike but okay i think i got an idea anyway its obvious do i at least get to be icy cold oh well do my best to do my duty

btw you know hes gone thru like four girlfriends in the last 3 years arm candy thats what they say i saw it on cable man the stuff on cable DISGUSTING why didnt you warn me

t
From: [email protected]
To: “Thea”
Cc: “Smith”
Subject: Query

Dear Dr. Spann:

Thanks for your offer (relayed through Smith) to help clear up these little problems. I’m faxing some of the pages where this stuff shows up, and have underlined the places. The difficulty is I can’t compare them with the original enciphered version—not that I’d learn much if I could. What do you think?

Also—now that I can—I want to offer you much greater thanks for your brilliant guess about what this thing was, and your work in breaking the cipher. I wish there were something I could offer in return.

Yours

Lee Novak

From: “Thea”

To: [email protected] Cc: “Smith”
Subject: RE:Query

hey—

i cant tell you what it means but the cipher shows that sometimes she uses an extra number a 3-digit number which couldnt signify a single letter so the computer left it as a number but what about this we talked about compression what if shes just using shorthand annotations for common stuff like peoples names or phrases like i dont know what phrases common ones if she had a list like 100 means one of the characters names or 556 means a common phrase like THE NEXT DAY or it might be THUS WE SEE or anything youd have to guess look at the context

hope this helps

i dont want any thanks be nice to have this over tho

From: [email protected]
To: “Thea”
Cc: “Smith”
Subject: RE:Re:Query

Dear Dr. Spann:

I think that’s it! She did do that. They seem to be numbered in order, starting with the first time she thinks of compressing them. Actually old-fashioned shorthand worked that way—shorthand books were full of business and legal phrases you could represent by a single stroke. She probably kept a book of her compressions. The clue is that the first time she uses one of these she puts it after the phrase it stands for—then the next time she just substitutes. It must have saved her a lot of time not having to spell out “Albania” (101) or “his Lordship” (214) or lots of others.

I’m back in business.

Lee

From: “Smith”
To: “Thea”

Subject:

Omigod you’re so smart.

And see he didn’t insult you or make a smarmy remark or anything. Maybe he
used
to be bad and now he’s not.

S

From: “Thea”
To: “Smith”
Subject:

yeah ok you go think that but hes not coming to my wedding

t
From: [email protected]
To: “Smith”
Subject: Flying along

Your friend Thea is quite brilliant though perhaps a little spacey. Does all her email have that robot look? Never mind—I’m very grateful. I’m flying along now.

You know I actually assumed—I was a little cautious in actually asserting it—that this was probably a forgery, either from back then, or from now—probably now, the story of how it was preserved was so unlikely. But now I don’t think so. I think I’d know, which is maybe pride on my part, if I heard his voice, or his
mind,
and I really think I do. I don’t know how to characterize it, really—it’s a comic view that also grants authority to feelings of desire, loss, and pain; it ascribes events to Fate without really believing that Fate is anything different from the awful or hilarious muddles brought about by ignorance and coincidence; he mocks, but he almost always smiles, and almost never hates.
Nil alienum humani
—he thought nothing humans could do or desire was alien to him, though he was both honorable and generous, and you can hear that too in this. I’m sure.

The punctuation question is interesting. Should I give it the punctuation I think it might have had? Or modern standard punctuation? Byron was himself a careless punctuator, and more than once in his letters asks John Murray his publisher to have a manuscript “pointed,” or punctuated. Printers in those days could all punctuate. Imagine. Now hardly anybody can.

L

From: “Smith”
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE:Flying along

Not a forgery!! I’m glad you’re sure, but we’ve got to do all the tests still, right? I know that now you can certify whether a piece is by an author by computer analysis of the vocabulary.

You make him sound so nice. I wonder if you
identify.
I mean how could you not, you couldn’t have studied him so long.

From: [email protected]
To: “Smith”
Subject: Identify

I don’t know what you mean exactly by “identifying.” Do you suppose I think he was like me, or I am like him, and that’s why I’m drawn to him? It’s not so. I’m not very much like him. If we were to meet, in hell or wherever, I would not say,
You know, you and I are a lot alike.
No—we’re not alike, though I confess I like him. It’s more that—for reasons I can’t exactly state—I can apprehend him as a human person, and in that apprehension understand myself as human. I can’t do that with Shelley, or Franklin Roosevelt, or Ted Williams, or Edgar Rice Burroughs, or Robert Flaherty, or most other people I’ve admired and loved and strained to understand. But Byron, yes. Byron’s humanity is open to me, and through it I see my own—as you can with your best friends, whom you would never confuse with yourself (“identify”) but whose souls are open—not to everyone, but to you.

Watch out for that computer analysis thing. It recently certified a couple of anonymous poems as by Shakespeare, even though any real reader/friend of Shakespeare could tell in an instant they weren’t his.

L

From: “Smith”
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE:Identify

Lee—I’m thinking of you sitting up and struggling with those weird pages—let’s split the job—tell me how far you’ve got, and I’ll figure out where I can start—heck I’ve got all night and all I do then is sleep. And send me pages as you finish them—I can’t wait till you’re all done to start reading—I almost started in on it myself till I thought, no stupid—so that’s why I’m sending this letter. I don’t even know why I care so much. I think of Ada encoding it all, hiding it. Enciphering I mean (that’s what Thea says it is).

S

From: [email protected]
To: “Smith”
Subject:

No I will not share. I want it all to myself, and I am not struggling. Your job is a different one: you have to find out what Ada did, and how she thought about it, and where this thing was for all those years, and (by the way) who the guy is who sold it to you and what’s become of
him.
And you have your Strong Women still to do, right? You can’t lose your job over this.

My god do you know what I sound like here? A
parent.
I seem to have just sort of blacked out for a minute, and when I came to it was all written there. I ask your forgiveness. I have no right, and no desire. On the other hand it’s true, you know, and good advice…

I tried at first working with it as a computer file but it turns out actually to be easiest to just copy it out with pen and paper. So I will end up with a
manuscript
or what the Victorians called a Fair Copy. Weird. I am beginning to see how Ada’s notes go with the text. The fact that it is coming to be out of this scrambled matrix before my eyes—and that I am doing it on your behalf as well as
his
and hers—makes me feel almost as she might have, only backward, if you see what I mean—I’m sure you do.