“It’s something in the water, I’m sure of it. It can only be the water”, Hubbard said, as much to the hummingbird in front of him as he said it to me. “Charles will know I’m sure”, he continued, “if there is anyone who knows obscure animals and their habits it’s him. And there he is.” Hubbard was pointing toward a young man, very different from what I had created in my mind’s eye of an expert in unusual crustaceans. Only the unlit pipe dangling from his mouth reminded me of what I came to recognize as the ever confused scientist. Was I jealous? An understatement to be sure. Here was a man with a great body of knowledge at his fingertips, who shrugged at his capabilities as if he obtained the talents from last Sunday’s newspaper. “Mr. Hubbard, how good to see you again. Is it time for our annual repair week?” he asked. “No no Charles, I am here on different business. Ever hear of Triops?” Both men clearly did not believe in small talk and dove directly into an in-depth discussion of the ugly creatures. “They can’t get out of their skins you see, it’s very persistent. Only one left now and I haven’t found a way to get the eggs from them before they lay them”, Hubbard rattled off, trying to convey as much information in as short a period as possible. 

Maybe the subject of their discussion had never truly fascinated me, or perhaps having spent much time within the confines of the watch shop made me yearn for incentives other than dry facts and insubstantial ideas. Slowly, very slowly I removed myself from the discussion by examining animal specimens further removed from the two men, now engrossed in a discussion on eating habits of Triops. When I was confident I had put enough distance between myself and Hubbard, I turned out of the hall and walked briskly towards the entrance. If one wants to encounter London’s meandering public, it is sure to be found in the lounges and lobbies of public places. High-society is never satisfied with simply observing, it has to meddle and influence those people and things it surrounds itself with. Luck was on my side this evening and as I bought a small packet of warm salted peanuts. I almost lost said nuts when I spun around and turned straight into Miss Miriam Lavendish, a name concocted by Miriam herself, as her actual last name of Jones did not provide her with the appropriate stature. Miss Lavendish was also known to me and my co-urchins as: Miss Lovely Dish. She was another rare specimen like me, who had escaped the streets of London and exchanged the cobblestones for brownstones. The way she managed to become part of snob city was entirely different than the accidental manner in which I landed in Mr. Hubbard’s care. Miriam had been a rather different sort of girl prostitute. Are you surprised? Are you perhaps embarrassed reading these words so suddenly? It is true that most girls growing up in, around and on the streets, take on professions that keep them there. Miriam may have started her early adult life on the streets but her aim was far from that lowly existence. “Imagine what position you want to occupy in life and work backwards from that, figure out how to get there and you will succeed”, she always told me. I will admit that Miriam both impressed and scared me. Her fierce intellect and ever present drive did not compare favorably with my own diminished passion for things I perceived to be outside my reach. “Jemmy! I haven’t seen you in ages”, Miriam said, not moving an inch even though my hand was hovering close to her bosom, barely clutching the packet of half-spilled nuts. She did these sorts of things on purpose; it was part of her modus operandi. Men had a hard time resisting a woman, nee girl, who stayed within the limits of lady-like interaction, whilst at the same time came close to being shunned for indecent behavior. The only sign of her humble background, was in her usage of my urchin nickname, otherwise her guise was perfect and far better adjusted than my own recently acquired pronunciation of Standard English.

“Now don’t be shy, Jeremy”, she said, removing herself somewhat from my personal space. “I hear you are doing well these days, hobnobbing with the influential”, Miriam continued. “Yes, well sort of. Usually I am just an accidental observer”, I stammered. “I’m sure you are. I’m sure you listen and learn more than you are willing to admit. I’m proud of you, you did well and with a respectable occupation”, she kept on going, not letting me go. Not that I wanted to but I felt I needed to catch my breath. “I haven’t learned all that much yet about watch making Miriam. I’ve just started”, I tried to say. “Nonsense, I’m sure you’ve learned loads and loads”, she said. It was true, I had learned much since my arrival in Hubbard’s shop, but not about watch making. “Come, I want you to meet a friend of mine”, Miriam said, dragging me away from the entrance hall. She sometimes did this in the past, always introducing me to girls our age with the promise of some future romance. As we made our way past the display cases, paintings, informative plaques and other objects to be studied, I thought back with fond memories of all the incidental encounters created for me by Miriam. “Ah Lucy!” she would say, what a coincidence, “Have you met my friend Jeremy?” He is remarkably agile with his hands”, she would add, referring to my lock picking stints, and of course completely misinterpreted by the girl, the object of our introduction. No matter how many girls Miriam let before my eyes, I was only truly interested in Miriam herself. How many times I had wanted to tell her this I do not know. An inept nature to communicate my feelings and a sense of inadequacy compared to her boisterous lifestyle prevented me every single time. 

“Mister Hubbard!”, Miriam said as she spotted my mentor still located in the exact same spot I had left him. Hubbard turned around and recognized Miriam after a few seconds. It always took him a while to shrug himself away from a conversation, especially one that revolved around any of the subjects he was passionate about. “And what a coincidence”, Miriam continued, “Jeremy, I would like you to meet my fiancée: Charles.” You could have dropped a brick on my feet and I would not have noticed. “Did you two already meet?” she asked, when there was no appropriate response coming from my lips. “Only just”, Hubbard luckily intervened. “A lovely couple indeed”, he went on. “May I congratulate you two and wish you a long lifetime together. Jeremy, say something, don’t just stand there.” I must have mumbled something vaguely congratulatory, since the three of them now ignored me as they discussed future wedding plans. My ears only engaged slightly when Miriam started discussing Charles’ esteemed background and superb breeding. Raised in a privileged family of barristers, Charles was given free reign to study whatever he fancied, this due to the fortunate circumstances of having multiple older brothers responsible for managing the family’s fortune. Within the mansion in which Charles grew up there was located a rather large library. Not that any of the other family members had any interest in books or reading, a library was something one simply had to have. During his times in the library, Charles discovered works on natural history, which started an intense obsession with animals of the insect and crustacean persuasion. Miriam met Charles during one of the many dinners, at which one of the brother’s wives had invited her as a companion. Charles did not notice Miriam at first, but that soon changed when Miriam made him notice her, and did so in the library. It is easy to see what happens when one combines an attractive young girl with a young man, who himself is otherwise only interested in the location in which the girl presents her enthusiasm. I would normally be amused by the situation, in which a rather dull man all of a sudden finds an object of desire amongst a collection of inanimate objects. All this I gathered from what Miriam told us. Of course I had to fill in some of the blanks, since Miriam did not of course divulge the ways by which Charles was seduced that evening. Nothing more was said between me and Miriam and I was silent as the four of us walked out of the museum not much later. “I shall have to invite you and Jeremy over for dinner soon”, Miriam said. Hubbard accepted the invitation on behalf of the two of us. As Charles and Hubbard discussed some final points regarding Triops skin problems, Miriam leaned over and whispered in my ear: “I do love him you know.”

Most of the rest of the evening I was rather numb, intertwined with feelings of anger. Anger at myself, for having been immobile in the past. Miriam was getting married. She was one year younger than me and was now entering a stage of her life that had never crossed my mind as something that happens to people our age. Originally I set out to write down a description of how Hubbard discovered that the dying Triops were not, as he thought, slowly being poisoned by the water, but instead were not given the proper nutrients. There was some discussion of missing iodine from the food supply and mentionings of calcium that needed to be supplemented. I’m afraid I was rather pre-occupied with, well nothing. Hubbard, the hermit with a curiously strong understanding of human suffering did the wisest thing by letting me be, and instructed Helen to do likewise, with the opposite effect. Helen tried to divert my mind by going over her list of Russian friends, who would be positively suited for me and who would be firmly in charge of my well being. It was exactly the lack of Miriam’s direct meddling in my life that made me appreciate her so much over the last few years. A fatal mistake perhaps? 

Maybe this explains the absence of articles during the last few days, even with many interesting developments last week. I still have to report back on the progress of Hubbard’s intent to design and build a street clock. There is the story of the two urchins who returned from the United States after having illegally boarded passage along a traveling circus. More details came to be about Bibliotheca Echidna, which I’m sure you are curious about. You will hear from me and you will hear soon, especially since Helen has made it her sole purpose in life to make me return to writing, something she knows provides a guaranteed distraction.