“I will not discuss individual comments.” Tulare looked worried for a moment and then sat back, studying the tip of his pencil as though a solution lay there. “However, you realize the … events … of the last few months have not inspired a great deal of confidence in your fellow faculty members.”
“So I had guessed.”
Tulare began a series of reflections on scientific credibility, keeping the discussion safely vague. Gordon listened, hoping there would be something in it he could learn from. Tulare was not the standard administrator sort, in love with his own voice, and this little lecture was more a defense mechanism than an oration. Despite his earlier bravado, Gordon began to feel a sinking sensation steal into his legs. This was serious. A Merit Increase was routine; only really questionable cases had trouble. The big test was the leap from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor, which spelled tenure. Gordon had started out as Assistant Professor I and been advanced to II within a year, which was speedy; most faculty spent two years at each step. Once he reached Assistant III he could be promoted to Associate I, although the typical route was to go to Assistant IV before making the jump to tenure. But now he wasn’t going to make the standard step from II to III on schedule. That didn’t bode well for his prospects when he came up for tenure review.
A coldness had reached up from his legs into his chest when Tulare said, “Of course, you have to be careful of what you do in any field, Gordon,” and discussed the necessary wariness a scientist had to have, the quality of being skeptical about his own findings. Then, incredibly, Tulare launched into a recital of the story of Einstein and the notebook for writing down thoughts, ending in the line, “So Einstein said, ‘I doubt it. I have only had two or three good ideas in my life.’ ” Tulare slapped the desk with genuine mirth, relieved at being able to turn a difficult interview into something lighter. “So you see, Gordon—not every idea is a good one.”
Gordon made a weak smile. He had told that story to Boyle and the Carroways and they had sat there and laughed. Undoubtedly they had heard it before. They were simply humoring a junior faculty member who must have appeared to be a buffoon.
He stood up. His legs were strangely weak. He found that he was breathing quickly, but there was no discernible cause. Gordon murmured something to Tulare and turned away. He knew he should be most concerned about the Merit Increase but for the moment all he could think of was the Carroways and their smiles and his own vast stupidity.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
JULY 7, 1963
During the summer the rhythm of their days changed. Penny began to sleep later and Gordon found himself waking before her. He resolved that he would stick to his Canadian Air Force exercise program religiously, and the best time to do it was in the early hours, on the deserted stretches of Windansea Beach. He never liked doing them at home, particularly if Penny was there. He liked going down to the white sands which had been cleaned by the night tides and working his way through the exercises as the sunlight brimmed above Mount Soledad to the east. Then he would run as far as possible along the beach. Each cove was a scooped-out world of its own, the shadows shortening as the sun rose. His sheen of sweat cooled in the blue shadows and the thick ocean air had a tangible watery weight as he sucked it in, puffing, legs setting a thump thump thump that came up through the bones, a curious sound in this air, like chunks of wood falling on an oak floor. He had run like this when he was a kid, on the scruffy beaches of New Jersey. His Uncle Herb took him there often, just after his father started with the sickness. When Jersey crowded in summertime, Uncle Herb took him for rides in a yellow Studebaker, out to Long Island. His mother had always spoken of the people who lived out there, of People Who Actually Owned Beach Front Property, as though they were another race. The first time Uncle Herb took him, Gordon asked if they were going to visit relatives, hoping he had some thread of connection with those