Read The Expeditions for Free Online Page B

to your lips, to our bed.
    I am, now and forevermore,
Your deeply devoted,
G.

    Elisha replaced the letter feeling vaguely ashamed. He turned to depart but was drawn to a small framed portrait lying on the bed. It was a miniature painting of a Negro woman sitting on a carved wooden armchair, a lace shawl over her shoulders and white-gloved hands clasped in her lap. Behind her stood a plump, pasty man with orange muttonchops. He was dressed in a black frock coat and ruffled shirt and striped waistcoat, an opera hat. Wedding clothes. The sight confused Elisha; then he understood that she was the Dear Heart of the letter. The white man’s right hand rested on the Negro woman’s shoulder. A serene smile lay on his lips.
    A clatter of silverware rose from the dining room, and Elisha froze. He moved to the doorway: muttered conversation, a clink of glass, the first whistled notes of “Fanny Gray.” He turned back to the trunk and withdrew a shaving kit, a pair of woolen socks, a pocket compass, a Hebrew lexicon in chipped black boards. Beneath the lexicon was a parcel wrapped in oilcloth and bound tightly with twine. He turned it over in his hands. It was the size of a Bible, though rounder and heavier, lacking a book’s crisp rectangular form. He picked at the knotted twine.
    Footsteps rose on the stairs. Elisha shoved the parcel and lexicon and socks and shaving kit into the trunk and ran to the door. He stepped quietly into the hallway, and as he did a man appeared on the stairs holding a tumbler half-full of whiskey. He arched his eyebrows at Elisha.
    “Good afternoon.”
    “Good afternoon.”
    Professor Tiffin sat heavily on the hall bench. He was stouter than his portrait’s likeness, with an infant’s creamy skin and squint eyes and soft, sagging chin. Coarse orange muttonchops marked his cheeks. The man was sweating and his shirtsleeves were pinned at the elbows, exposing hairless forearms and fingers like steamed sausages. He tugged at his stained collar.
    “I resent the mundanity of town life—I much prefer the variety of a city like Detroit. I witnessed a Siamese elephant there last Monday. An exceedingly interesting creature: size of a steam locomotive, yet it could rise onto its hind legs for hoecakes. An Italian fellow rode it like a horse, just rode it along neat as can be. Far slower than a horse, however.”
    “I suppose it would be.”
    “Yes, on account of its colossal size requiring significant arterial pressure to induce motion of its limbs. It is physiologically impossible for such an animal to move rapidly.” Professor Tiffin removed his hat, exposing a pink scalp fringed by damp orange curls. He scrutinized Elisha as he rubbed his forehead. “And how did a healthy young fellow like yourself get joined with our humble expedition?”
    Elisha had imagined the man as a stooped, older gentleman in a high-buttoned vest and pince-nez spectacles, his brow wrinkled by years of contemplation. Instead he looked like a lounger in a Woodward Avenue billiard parlor. Elisha said, “I read your pamphlet,
Language and History of the North American Indian Tribes.
It’s why I wanted to join the expedition.”
    Professor Tiffin hooted, settling deeper onto the bench. “You will have me blushing!”
    “And I aim to identify a new species this summer—a fish or plant or insect, anything. I want to be a scientist, like you and Mr. Brush.”
    “You have your terminology misapplied, young fellow! We have a word in the sciences for men like Mr. Brush: we call them
toilers
. They are skilled professionals, adept at gathering specimens and running survey lines and executing sketches—but this is not the work of the scientist. Combining observation with hypothesis—synthesis,
suntithenai
—do you see? Drawing conclusions from a corpus of knowledge, to produce a greater truth. That is the prize. Do you understand?”
    “Yes sir.”
    “You see, facts are like rocks. They are dead. Ideas are like trees. They