"But Father, I've been planning to accompany you on this expedition for months." I hastily pleaded under my breath. My father, the esteemed Professor Archimedes Q. Porter hurried out of the grand lecture arena and across the great hall.
"Jane, dear, I need you to finish your studies before you go traipsing off into the unchartered jungles of equatorial Africa." my father rebutted as he patted my shoulder.
If only he had broken the news to me in private and not in front of his board of investors, I might have been able to convince him to bring me along. I scurried to keep up with him, picking up the charts and itineraries he kept dropping in his wake. Apparently, being the head of the zoology department at London University didn't make one any less absent minded.
"Father, if its any question of whether I'm qualifi-"
"Nonsense! It's no such thing." Father interrupted turning back to me. He plucked a stray hair from his mustache and examined it like a rare specimen.
"You know as well as I do that you are the best technical illustrator we have here. As much as I would selfishly be delighted were you to come along, the board of trustees can't justify bringing along someone who has yet to finish their studies." He discarded the mustache hair and I suddenly felt a kinship with the strand. We had both been tossed away it would seem.
I knew there was no use arguing. Without the funds there would be no expedition, and Father's work regarding the migration patterns of Silver-backed Gorillas was extremely time-sensitive. He couldn't wait for me to finish here at the University.
I tried to ignore the obvious fact that I was being overlooked because I was a woman. The board had just approved a mission proposed by a student of my year a month prior. The young man, John Darling, I think his name was, had just shipped off to the Western United States by the Anthropological Association to contact native tribes previously undocumented. I felt a frustration that bubbled in the pit of my stomach like a kettle boiling for tea—
"The tea!" I exclaimed. I had left a pot on a small stove they kept in the Professor's quarters while I waited for the meeting to begin. It was just like me to forget something as silly as the kettle on the stove. I turned on my heels and ran full speed (as full a speed as my new boots would allow) towards—No, into. Into…I wasn't sure.
A flurry of papers had erupted and I was caught in a snow globe of words and pictures. My head throbbed and it was as though night had fallen quickly and suddenly. I saw Cygnus and Ursa Major and Minor on the inside of my eyelids. The constellations faded and alarmingly bulbous eyes appeared in their place. My eyes focused and realized the cartoonish lenses were in fact made of glass.
"My Gosh, Miss, I am so sorry, quite sorry, Oh dear…I didn't mean—" The young man stammered as he offered his hand to help me to my feet. I could feel his gaze searching to meet mine, no doubt to judge what sort of hysterical woman runs around knocking into Britain's best. Something was strange about this man and my caution combined with my haste demanded I urgently make an exit.
"The fault was entirely mine, sir. Please, excuse me."
I shoveled the documents into my arms and bolted out of the hall.
It wasn't until I had pulled the kettle off the stove that I realized what made the man so peculiar—He was American.
