press”. More sense can be found in Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday.’ [2]
A tide of tittering ran through the audience. Stent raised his eyebrows, and shook the book in humorous fashion, as if hoping something would fall out. Chuckles ensued. Stent tried to read the book upside down. Something which might be diagnosed as a guffaw erupted from an elderly party near us. Moriarty turned to aim a bone-freezing glare at the old gent – but was thwarted by his disguise. He wore opaque black spectacles and held a white cane in order to pass himself off as a blind scholar from Trinity College, Dublin.
Stent slammed the book down on the lectern.
‘No, my friends, it will not do,’ he said. ‘Being beyond understanding is of no use to anyone. Astronomy will never progress from simple stargazing if we allow it to be dominated by such... and I don’t hesitate to use the term... piffling tripe as Professor Moriarty’s pound and a half of waste paper. It would be better titled The Dynamics of a Haemorrhoid, for its contents are piles of nonsense. This copy was taken by me this afternoon from the library of the Greenwich Observatory. As you know, this is the greatest collection of publications and papers in the field. It is open to the finest scholars and minds on the planet. Let us examine this Dynamics of an Asteroid, and see what secrets it has to tell...’
Stent picked up the book again and began to leaf through it. He showed the title page. ‘A first, and indeed only, edition!’ Then, he turned to the opening chapter, and drew his finger down the two-columned text, turned the page, and did the same, then turned the page and...
‘Aha,’ he exclaimed. ‘After twenty pages, we find that the next leaf is uncut. As are all remaining leaves. What can we deduce from that? This book has been in the library for six years. I have a list of academics, students and astronomers who have taken it out. Seventy-two names. Many I see before me this evening. It seems no one has managed to read beyond the first twenty pages of this masterwork. Because I am not averse to suffering for my field, I have read the book, cover to cover, 652 pages. I venture to say I am the only man in the room who can claim such a Herculean achievement. Is there any comrade here, to whom I can extend my condolences, with whom I can share my sufferings? In short, has anyone else managed to finish The Dynamics of an Asteroid? Hands up, don’t be shy. There are worse things to admit to.’
The handle of the Professor’s cane snapped. He’d been gripping it with both knotted fists. The sound was like a gunshot.
‘So you have joined us, James,’ Stent said. ‘I rather thought you might.’
A sibilance escaped Moriarty’s colourless lips.
‘We shall have need of you later,’ Stent said, producing a long thin knife – which he proceeded slip into the book, cutting at last its virgin leaves. ‘You can take off those ridiculous smoked glasses. Though, if you have suffered some onset of blindness which has not been reported in the press, it would explain a great deal. Gentlemen of the Royal Society of Astronomers, it is my contention that no man who has ever looked through a telescope with sighted eyes would ever be able to make the following statement, which I quote from the third paragraph of page one of The Dynamics of an Asteroid... ’
Stent proceeded to dissect the book, wielding words like a scalpel, and flicking blood in Professor Moriarty’s face. It was a merciless, good-humoured assassination. Entertaining asides raised healthy laughter throughout the evening.
The sums were well above my head, but I snickered once or twice at the amusing way Stent couched his refutations. I should have kept a stonier face: the next day, Moriarty had Mrs Halifax despatch Véronique, my second favourite French dollymop, to Alaska as a mail-order bride. Fifi, my first choice, was too good an earner to waste, but I’d learned a lesson.
At every point, Stent
A tide of tittering ran through the audience. Stent raised his eyebrows, and shook the book in humorous fashion, as if hoping something would fall out. Chuckles ensued. Stent tried to read the book upside down. Something which might be diagnosed as a guffaw erupted from an elderly party near us. Moriarty turned to aim a bone-freezing glare at the old gent – but was thwarted by his disguise. He wore opaque black spectacles and held a white cane in order to pass himself off as a blind scholar from Trinity College, Dublin.
Stent slammed the book down on the lectern.
‘No, my friends, it will not do,’ he said. ‘Being beyond understanding is of no use to anyone. Astronomy will never progress from simple stargazing if we allow it to be dominated by such... and I don’t hesitate to use the term... piffling tripe as Professor Moriarty’s pound and a half of waste paper. It would be better titled The Dynamics of a Haemorrhoid, for its contents are piles of nonsense. This copy was taken by me this afternoon from the library of the Greenwich Observatory. As you know, this is the greatest collection of publications and papers in the field. It is open to the finest scholars and minds on the planet. Let us examine this Dynamics of an Asteroid, and see what secrets it has to tell...’
Stent picked up the book again and began to leaf through it. He showed the title page. ‘A first, and indeed only, edition!’ Then, he turned to the opening chapter, and drew his finger down the two-columned text, turned the page, and did the same, then turned the page and...
‘Aha,’ he exclaimed. ‘After twenty pages, we find that the next leaf is uncut. As are all remaining leaves. What can we deduce from that? This book has been in the library for six years. I have a list of academics, students and astronomers who have taken it out. Seventy-two names. Many I see before me this evening. It seems no one has managed to read beyond the first twenty pages of this masterwork. Because I am not averse to suffering for my field, I have read the book, cover to cover, 652 pages. I venture to say I am the only man in the room who can claim such a Herculean achievement. Is there any comrade here, to whom I can extend my condolences, with whom I can share my sufferings? In short, has anyone else managed to finish The Dynamics of an Asteroid? Hands up, don’t be shy. There are worse things to admit to.’
The handle of the Professor’s cane snapped. He’d been gripping it with both knotted fists. The sound was like a gunshot.
‘So you have joined us, James,’ Stent said. ‘I rather thought you might.’
A sibilance escaped Moriarty’s colourless lips.
‘We shall have need of you later,’ Stent said, producing a long thin knife – which he proceeded slip into the book, cutting at last its virgin leaves. ‘You can take off those ridiculous smoked glasses. Though, if you have suffered some onset of blindness which has not been reported in the press, it would explain a great deal. Gentlemen of the Royal Society of Astronomers, it is my contention that no man who has ever looked through a telescope with sighted eyes would ever be able to make the following statement, which I quote from the third paragraph of page one of The Dynamics of an Asteroid... ’
Stent proceeded to dissect the book, wielding words like a scalpel, and flicking blood in Professor Moriarty’s face. It was a merciless, good-humoured assassination. Entertaining asides raised healthy laughter throughout the evening.
The sums were well above my head, but I snickered once or twice at the amusing way Stent couched his refutations. I should have kept a stonier face: the next day, Moriarty had Mrs Halifax despatch Véronique, my second favourite French dollymop, to Alaska as a mail-order bride. Fifi, my first choice, was too good an earner to waste, but I’d learned a lesson.
At every point, Stent
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