The August Birds Page 4

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  The first public demonstration of wireless radio transmission was sent between the museum and the old Clarendon Laboratory. Had August been healthy he could have covered the distance between them in less than two minutes.

  “It’s not far at all,” he said.

  “It is far enough for Oliver,” said Muninn, and nudged him closer to conversations and to mechanism.

  “...might reach as far as half a mile,” Oliver said. Beside them, Huginn pecked at the equipment used to transmit the message, sent in Morse code, in dots and dashes, and his beak beat out a staccato rhythm of its own. August knew Morse code, but Huginn was transmitting too fast to be caught, although he thought that Muninn understood. It made him feel jealous again, and he was tired of feeling jealous but unable somehow to stop himself. Muninn was by his side, her stiff black feathers brushing against him, but she felt farther away than she had ever been, and closer to Huginn than she was to him.

  “Half a mile is still nothing much,” said August. “Why couldn’t we have seen him do better?”

  “He did not do better,” said Muninn. “This was the end of it. He had other interests, and it was left to others, to men like Marconi, to bridge the greater distances, to make a better communication and a longer one.

  “So that’s it?” said August. “That’s it? He just packs everything up and walks away?”

  “Yes,” said Muninn.

  “What for?” said August. “If he was going to give up why did he bother in the first place?”

  “He wanted to show it could be done,” said Muninn. “But Oliver lacked vision. He admitted it himself, that he could not see that there would be demand in the application.”

  “He was stupid,” grumbled August.

  “He was honest,” corrected Muninn. “A scientist is not a genius by virtue of his profession. A person may try hard and learn well and still not be a Galileo. Not everyone can see so well.”

  “Is that why you brought me here?” said August, out of sorts and snappish. “To see someone fail? Don’t you think I know enough of failing?”

  “There is a difference between failure and missed opportunity,” said Muninn, speaking of an experiment that did not fail and yet did not go far enough. “Some chances you don’t get back. Think hard about that, August, before you call other people stupid.”

  August would have talked back then, been as cutting and petty as he knew how, but if Muninn was still holding onto patience then Huginn was not, and he pecked at August’s leg: one hard snap with his black iron beak and that snap said Be silent. And so August, rubbing at the bruise, was silent and thought instead of what he could not say, of the liberties he could have taken and the apologies that he did not know how to make.