The Map of Chaos (Trilogía Victoriana #3)(133)
When the news reached Oxford that Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, had disappeared, swallowed up by the ocean, the whole university mourned his passing, as did all of England and the rest of the world: Who could begin to imagine the great works of literature humanity would lose because of that untimely tragedy! But, unquestionably, those who suffered his loss the most were the Wellses, from whom Dodgson had twice been taken. The wreath of flowers that the couple laid on his grave the day of his crowded funeral was much remarked upon by the other mourners, for no one could make sense of the words inscribed on the satin ribbon:
CHARLES LUTWIDGE DODGSON (1832–1898–1866)
OUR DEAR FRIEND, WE MOURN YOU IN MORE THAN ONE WORLD. GEORGE AND CATHERINE LANSBURY
25
PROFESSOR LANSBURY WOKE UP IN the middle of the night, his heart pounding, drenched in sweat, clutching his wife’s arm as if it were the only thing preventing him from falling off the edge of the world, and cried out the same words his mother was yelling at that very moment in other universes with equal terror: I’m dying!
Let me explain, dear reader, that despite their deafening howls, most of the Sarah Neal Wellses scattered throughout the many universes were hardened women, accustomed to confronting the trials and tribulations of life with heroic fortitude, and furthermore, in most cases, this child who would be named Herbert George was not their firstborn. However, they were all terrified of childbirth. Labor pains horrified them, and since, to put it mildly, they weren’t exactly paragons of self-control, each time the dreaded contractions ripped through them, their screams woke half of Bromley and the neighboring villages of the habitually quiet county of Kent. And while the supposedly moribund Mrs. Wellses lay on their beds, their backs arched and their eyes bulging, Professor Lansbury remained curled up on his, also insisting between groans that he was dying, as well as other still more terrifying nonsense, which his alarmed spouse found hard to understand.
“For God’s sake, Bertie . . . What’s happening to you?” Jane sobbed. “Tell me what to do.”
“Jane . . . I can’t breathe,” her husband gasped.
“Shall I open the window?
“No, water . . . I need water,” Wells implored, just as his infinite mothers broke their waters.
Jane ran to the kitchen and returned with a glass full to the brim.
“Here, my dear, drink this . . .”
“No!” Wells cried, snatching the glass from her and pouring the contents over his face. “I need water to breathe. My lungs are dry, they hurt!”
“Bertie . . .”
The dousing seemed to calm her husband, but after a while he began howling again, perching on the edge of the bed and glancing about in terror.
“The walls! They’re closing in on me, they’re crushing me!” He tried to halt their nonexistent advance, arms outstretched, only to fall back on to the bed seconds later, almost unconscious. For a few minutes he lay gasping for air, like a fish out of water. Then it all started again: “My head!” he cried, clutching his skull with both hands even as his infinite mothers pushed downward, the veins on their necks bulging, their faces distorted, gripping the heads of their infinite beds. “They’re squeezing my head! It’s going to burst!”
“Bertie, no one is . . .”
“Why are you shouting, woman?”
“I’m not shouting, dear . . . ,” Jane assured him, her eyes filled with tears.
“I can hear a woman shouting. No, lots of them . . . all shouting . . . Make them stop! Please, Jane, I beg you, make them stop. I can’t breathe . . .”
This wailing went on for many, many hours, and at no point did Jane rush off to fetch a doctor, because, after her initial shock, she quickly realized what was happening to her husband. When, the next afternoon, Wells finally stopped shouting and burst into tears, amid cries of joy, unable to express in words the immeasurable feeling of relief that spread through his whole body, relaxing him to the point where he even thought his bones had shaken loose, Jane remained by his side, stroking his hair, sticky with sweat, until he fell asleep.
“You weren’t dying, my dear . . . ,” she whispered gently. “You were being born.”
In fact, had he not been overwhelmed by that tumult of sensations, Wells would also have known instantly what was happening to him. Not for nothing had he been experiencing the most peculiar, beautiful dreams during the past few months. Dreams where he was floating in a warm, pink liquid. Bobbing contentedly in this kind of magical elixir, he occasionally drank from it and could feel the fluid filling all his cavities. He was lulled by a pounding heart, which seemed to have been echoing in that chamber from the beginning of time like some primordial drum, drowning out the other mysterious, soporific noises absorbed by the silence. In this gentle, warm place, Wells felt blessed, safe from all harm. There was no such thing as cold, pain, loneliness, fear, and anger . . . He was filled with a sense of boundless peace and a foolish, inexplicable happiness, but above all a stubborn desire to remain there forever. When he told Jane of these incredibly vivid recurring dreams, they both concluded that Wells was perceiving the sensations all his twins were experiencing as they prepared to be born in their different worlds, sleeping a dreamless sleep in their mothers’ wombs. Wells and Jane realized with amazement that they were possibly the only beings in all creation who had been given the privilege of witnessing such a miracle: of going back to their mothers’ wombs and feeling afresh all those sensations, forgotten by the rest of humanity. They were the recipients of an unexpected slice of the Supreme Knowledge. And yet, inevitably, they were filled with niggling doubts: if the connection with their twins in this universe was going to be as intense as Wells’s dreams suggested, what would happen once they were born? Would the vague murmur they constantly heard at the back of their minds turn into something even worse? Perhaps a deafening clamor of sensations and images, so strong and intense that they would be cast forever into the abyss of madness?