The Dinosaur Feather

Chapter 4

Clive Freeman lived in Canada and was professor of Palaeoornithology at the department of Bird Evolution, Palaeobiology, and Systematics at the University of British Columbia—where he had worked for almost thirty years. He lived on Vancouver Island, not far from campus, and he specialized in bird evolution.

It was generally accepted that birds descended from a primitive reptile, the thecodont, and the most likely candidate for the role of the ancestor of all birds was the archosaur Longisquama. Most scientists—people whom Freeman respected—argued that modern birds were living dinosaurs. Professor Freeman disagreed.

Clive had grown up in the far north of Canada, the only child of the famous behavioral biologist David Freeman, one of Canada’s most important wolf experts in the latter half of the twentieth century. David taught his son all there was to know about the woods; the life cycle of trees, the forest floor, and the flora and fauna. There was never any doubt that Clive would grow up to be a biologist.

When Clive turned twelve, he made up his mind to specialize in birds. Birds were the most advanced animals on the planet. The primitive reptile they descended from was also believed to be the ancestor of turtles and crocodiles. A bird skeleton was streamlined, its bones were hollow and filled with air and provided the bird with superior movements, its plumage was perfect, and its egg-laying process was second to none. People never thought about that when sparrows pecked their lawns or pigeons soiled the windshields of their cars. This appealed to Clive. It was as if he alone had spotted the ruby in the dust.

Clive’s father didn’t care for birds.

“It’s actually shocking how little you know about the local wolves, given that your father is a world-famous expert,” the elder Freeman remarked one day. He had tested Clive on the subject of mammalian teeth over dinner, and Clive hadn’t been very successful. He could remember molars and premolars. “And eye-teeth,” he had added. Clive’s father gave him a long, hard stare.

“Eye-teeth are premolars, you moron,” he said after a lengthy pause, then he got up and went to his study. Clive had been on the verge of telling him something about bills. The structure of the bill was unique, evolved, and adapted to such an extent that Clive could barely believe it. Long, thin bills, short, stubby, curled bills. Herbivore, omnivore, or carnivore, there was a bill for every imaginable purpose. Clive’s heart was set on birds, and he didn’t mind that they weren’t mammals.

Clive was offered a place to study biology at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver when he was twenty and knew all there was to know about birds. He ran to the mailbox the day the letter arrived and tore it open. When he learned that he had been accepted—something he had been expecting—he looked back at his childhood home. Somewhere inside it, his father was clinging desperately to his books. Clive never wanted to end up like him. There was more to life than academia. The sun warmed Clive’s forehead, and he closed his eyes. As a child, he had worshipped and feared his father—he still did, as a matter of fact. However, as Clive’s knowledge of natural science had expanded, it had become impossible to believe everything his father told him. Besides, natural science was changing with new methods, modern behavioral research, and a world of technology that Clive believed to be the future, but that David Freeman had very little time for. In recent years their discussions had become so heated that Clive’s mother would sometimes take her plate to the kitchen to eat in peace.

In a few weeks he would put his childhood behind him. Perhaps this would improve their relationship? Perhaps David would visit him in Vancouver, proud that his son was following in his footsteps?

That evening, he told his parents about the offer and informed them he would be leaving home soon.

“The gait of birds is clumsy and ridiculous,” David Freeman observed, and carried on eating.

Clive’s mother said: “Stop it, both of you.”

Clive visualized himself leaving the table, casting a patronizing glance at his father’s bald patch, and taking his plate to the kitchen before going to his room to read. But instead he turned to his father and remarked calmly that even if one accepted birds didn’t walk with much elegance, it followed it was even more impressive that many of them still used their feet for walking, given their highly evolved ability to fly. After all, wolves could only walk. They didn’t master an alternative form of movement.

David said he couldn’t hear what Clive had said. Clive repeated his words, louder than strictly necessary.

David responded by firing off Latin terms for bones, but he messed up describing the wolf’s leg, whose construction he regarded as superior to that of a bird’s in every respect. Clive’s mother passed the potatoes and poured water into glasses. She shot Clive a quick, pleading look.

Suddenly Clive pricked up his ears.

What was it David had just said?

“What did you just say?”

Clive’s mother sat absolutely still and David’s face froze halfway through his argument, his hand suspended in midair, his mouth half-open. They both knew it. In his outburst, David had referred to a small bone, which in more primitive mammals was located between the talus bone and the tibia, though any fool knew that the bone in question had been reduced through evolution. David Freeman had made a mistake, Clive had heard it, and David knew that he had.

Nothing happened for several seconds. The air stood still and Clive’s heart raced. Then David pushed back his chair and walked out.

For two days Clive was ecstatic. David had finally been put in his place. He came downstairs for meals and would join in the conversation, though he was somewhat subdued. Even Clive’s mother livened up and said, “Don’t you think so, darling?” several times.

“Yes, yes,” David muttered.

Clive was the center of attention as he talked about the reading list he had been sent and the forthcoming term. His mother listened and David stayed silent. This had never happened before. Clive suddenly thought his father looked old, eaten up by the antagonism he had harbored over the years and, seized by a rare moment of tenderness, Clive called David “Dad,” which he never normally did.

Two days later, Clive decided to suggest to David a final walk through the woods before his departure. It was Clive’s fondest childhood memory, and he wanted to take a dew-fresh one with him to Vancouver. He was leaning against the kitchen table, drinking a glass of milk, while he summoned the courage to go to David’s study, when something in the garden caught his eye. Their lawn was a curved piece of land, scattered with Arctic plants; Clive’s bird table was at the far end, and behind it four large rocks broke the surface of the earth. Then the woods began.

There were dead birds all over the lawn. Three, seven, twenty, his eyes flickered as he started counting. He slammed down his glass and ran outside. There were dead birds everywhere. Limp balls of feather lay on the ground, on the naked area under the bird table, even on the board itself where Clive usually scattered seeds. Horrified, he inspected the feeding table. It was bare with the exception of a few husks whirling around in the wind. He checked the ground where the spike of the table had been pushed in, and that was where he saw the red pellets. There weren’t many left, but enough for him to know what they were: rat poison.

Clive went straight to his room and packed his bags. He didn’t want to spend another second in his father’s house.

In Vancouver, Clive rented a room from an elderly lady who lived in a villa. Her front garden was a mess, and Clive volunteered to tidy it up.

Jack lived next door. He was five years old when Clive moved in and had lost his father a few months previously. He was a beautiful boy with watchful eyes and one day, when Clive was gardening, he came over and started digging his toe into the ground. Clive asked him if he wanted to help.

Jack and Clive dug a hole for a rose bush the old lady had asked for and, together, they studied everything they unearthed: beetles, worms, pupae ready to burst, skeletons, and a recently deceased mole whose coat still was soft and black. Jack wanted to know all there was to know about nature.

College began the following week, and Clive soon became very busy. There were compulsory lectures on campus, and he had essays to read and write. Clive told Jack he had to entertain himself during the week. He wouldn’t have time for him until nine o’clock Saturday morning. Jack would show up at nine on the dot in the front garden under Clive’s window with his bucket, his dull pocket knife, and his butterfly net. To begin with, they stayed in the garden, but when they had examined every square inch of it, Clive took Jack into the woods, taking water bottles and packed lunches, reference books, and collection boxes for their findings.

Clive taught Jack to dissect an animal on a flat rock. A mouse, a rabbit, a pigeon. Clive bought scalpels from the supplies store on campus and made a big deal out of telling Jack how sharp they were. The boy gazed at him, wide-eyed. The first animal they opened up had died from natural causes only a few hours earlier. It was very fresh and didn’t smell at all. Clive guided the scalpel in Jack’s hand and when the animal was laid out and its abdomen revealed, he asked Jack if he wanted to dissect the spleen.

“The spleen is bluish and shaped like a plum, that’s all I’m going to tell you.”

Jack picked up the scalpel, lingered a little, and then he took a deep breath. Soon the boy—pale but smiling—held the shiny organ in the palm of his hand. He had specks of dried blood on his cheek and his hair was tousled, and when Clive praised him, his face lit up.

This became their game. Clive would tell him which organ to remove and Jack would do it. When Jack turned ten, he was a skilled surgeon, not just in terms of dexterity but also speed. Rarely more than fifteen minutes would pass from the time they found, or killed, an animal before Jack would have dissected it. Clive ruffled the boy’s hair.

Clive watched Jack’s mother from his window. She had four children, of whom Jack was the youngest. She worked at the checkout in the local supermarket, but she never seemed to recognize Clive when he did his shopping. She had bags under her eyes, she smoked too much, and yet there was something attractive about her. She had slim tanned arms and a narrow back. Not that Clive had any desire to take on another man’s children. Thanks, but no thanks. Jack, of course, wouldn’t be a problem. He was a good boy, Clive’s boy, but Clive found the other children irritating. The oldest one was a young man of sixteen—seventeen years, an apprentice mechanic somewhere. Clive would see him come home in the evening, hear him argue loudly with his mother, and watch him tinker with a car in the front yard, chucking beer bottles on the grass as soon as he had emptied them. One evening, he came home late and Clive heard a violent argument erupt inside the house. “Whore,” the young man shouted. Jack’s mother howled and something got broken. After that night Clive rarely saw him, and Jack told him his big brother had moved out. The middle children were fourteen-year-old twins. The girl was pretty, but had already acquired the same slutty look as her mother. From his window, Clive would watch her smoke furtively, put on makeup, and change into high-heeled boots behind the hedge when she went out in the evening. She would end up like her mother, anyone could see that. Have too many kids she couldn’t support when her boyfriends walked out on her. Her twin brother was no better. He looked like a mini version of his older brother, and when he was home alone he would sit in a deckchair in the garden and masturbate under a blanket. Clive could see from far away what he was doing; he could see what kind of magazines were lying on the grass next to the deckchair. Clive’s throat tightened at the thought of what Jack had to look forward to.

Clive started buying Jack presents. New scalpel blades and a pair of binoculars with Jack’s name engraved on them. He gave him reference and activity books, he let Jack have his scientific journals when he had finished with them. When they were out in the woods, Clive looked after Jack. He would help Jack across the stream, he would lend him his hat if the sun was blazing and Jack had forgotten his own; he only gave the boy challenges he could meet, and he listened to his answers. The boy deserved to be looked after properly when he was with Clive. Once in a while, he would clutch Jack’s chin and turn his face to his to emphasize something it was important for Jack to understand, or grab his arm if Jack was fidgeting and losing concentration. Obviously Clive never hit him, but it was essential Jack stay focused or he would never find the strength to break free from his background.

“Would you like to dissect a larger animal?” Clive asked. Jack was now so skilled at dissection that hares and hedgehogs no longer represented much of a challenge. It was early one Sunday morning and the mist lay thick under the rising sun. Clive carried a spade, and he had a flask of hot chocolate and some sandwiches in his backpack. Jack nodded unconvincingly. They began by building a trap in a clearing. Clive concentrated on the construction of the trap, and how they would lift up the animal once it had fallen in. Suddenly he became aware that Jack had stopped. He was standing a little distance away, and he didn’t look happy.

Clive went over to him and knelt down on the path, making their eyes level.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, softly.

“I don’t like always having to kill the animals,” the boy said. Clive embraced him.

“But nature’s like that,” Clive said into Jack’s hair. He smelled innocently of forest and sweaty child.

“Then why don’t you do it?” Jack said, wriggling free. Clive let go of him.

“We’ll do something else,” he said.

“Okay,” Jack said, relieved.

They walked further into the woods.

“I wish you were my dad,” Jack said out of the blue.

Clive smiled.

“Well, we can always pretend,” he said, lightly.

The weekends passed and weeks became years. When Jack turned thirteen, Clive’s present to him was a tree house in the woods. Clive had built it in secret and, on Jack’s birthday, he suggested they celebrate the day by camping in the woods. Jack was up for it. They packed provisions, a camping stove, sleeping bags, comics, and torches and off they went. Jack looked puzzled when Clive suddenly stopped and dumped his backpack on the ground beneath a huge tree. Then Clive pointed out the cleverly concealed pegs he had hammered into the tree trunk to serve as steps. Jack obediently climbed up and disappeared inside the foliage. A cry of joy soon followed and Clive smiled as he climbed up. When he reached him, Jack was sitting on the narrow walkway in front of the entrance to the tree house, dangling his legs over the edge.

Clive had put up two shelves inside for their luggage and, at the end of the walkway, he had constructed a screened enclosure, so it was possible to pee over the edge in private. Inside the hut Clive had put up pictures of Jack and Clive. A friendship spanning eight years, where a child had become a boy and a boy had become a man. You could see it in their faces. The softness had left Clive’s, who was now twenty-eight years old, but it was more noticeable in Jack’s. His gaze was intelligent, his face slimmer, and his hair longer. The little boy was fading away.

That evening, they fried sausages in a pan Clive conjured up from his backpack and, for dessert they shared a bar of chocolate, which turned out to be cooking chocolate, but it tasted good all the same. They huddled together to keep warm and heard the owls hoot and the wapiti deer roar.

Early the next morning, while the moon still hung suspended in the sky, a nightingale sang very close to them. Jack was asleep and Clive looked at the boy’s lips, which were sharply outlined in the moonlight. He wanted to reach out and touch Jack. At that moment, Jack turned over in his sleep and was now facing Clive. Clive could smell his breath; it was strong and alien, and he was hit by an unfamiliar surge of arousal. Not like the feeling he got when he thought about Jack’s mother or the girls from college, but something infinitely deeper, as if unbridled lust had risen in him like an atoll from the sea. Clive struggled to breathe calmly and inched himself closer toward Jack’s warm, sleeping body.

Jack jerked upright and moved away.

“What is it?” he murmured. “What’s wrong?”

The light inside the tree house was still gray. Clive said nothing and pretended to be asleep. He was wide awake, but it wasn’t until it was daylight, at least an hour later, that he stretched out and said he hadn’t slept this well in a long time. Jack was already sitting on the walkway surveying the forest. They made oatmeal on the stove before they packed up and walked home. They said good-bye to each other by the garden gate outside Clive’s house, and Clive could feel his legs shake. Jack moved in to hug Clive, like they always did, a brief meeting of their chests and a friendly pat on each other’s back meant thanks for today and see you later. Clive shot out his hand to stop him. A surprised Jack shook it.

“You’re a man now,” Clive said. “Thirteen years old.”

Jack beamed with delight, and his surprise evaporated. Clive picked up his backpack and walked down the path.

“See you,” he called out over his shoulder.

Clive couldn’t sleep that night. Breathless, he lay in his bed, his body throbbing.

Three months later, Jack’s mother got a job in another city and they moved. Clive stood behind the window, watching the moving van being loaded. He heard the doorbell ring, he heard his landlady call out for him, and he watched a disappointed Jack walk back to the waiting van. When the van had disappeared around the corner, Clive uttered a deep cry of despair. Then he thought: it’s better this way. Jack had changed recently, the little boy had gone completely. Clive missed him and had no idea what to do with the new Jack. Since the birthday camp out in the forest, Jack had canceled their Saturday arrangement twice, and the previous Saturday he had failed to show. He hadn’t appeared until later that morning, his hair crumpled with sleep and a pimple on his cheek. Clive was sitting on the steps, carving a stick.

“Sorry, overslept,” Jack mumbled. He was wearing Bermuda shorts and no shirt and stretched languidly. Clive muttered something and carried on carving. He felt as if Jack had died. The boy Clive had protected and looked after was gone, and a young man had taken his place. Jack glanced at him from under his curly bangs, and his downy upper lip pointed at Clive.

It’s better this way, Clive told himself again long after the moving van had left. The way he felt about the new Jack was forbidden.

The next time Clive saw Jack, he could hardly believe his own eyes. It was 1993. Clive had married Kay, they had two children, and he had been appointed the youngest ever professor of the department of Bird Evolution, Paleobiology, and Systematics. Clive recognized Jack immediately. He was standing to the left of the entrance, glancing at his watch, a worn briefcase by his feet. He was tall with very dark hair, and he had the face of a grown man, but Clive recognized the sharp line of his upper lip. His eyes were still guarded, and the movement with which he swept aside his hair was the same it had always been. Clive felt flushed all over as he held out his hand to Jack. At first, Jack failed to recognize him, but then his eyes penetrated the soft beard Clive had grown and his face lit up.

“Clive, right?” he exclaimed, smiling. Jack was taller than Clive and, for a few seconds, they simply looked at each other.

“What are you doing here?” Clive said, at last.

“It’s my first day,” Jack said, smiling shyly. It was frightening how much he resembled his younger self. Clive couldn’t help feeling proud. This was his reward.

“You taught me everything about nature,” Jack said. “Everything I know. I’ll never forget that.”

“Don’t mention it,” Clive said. “You’ll find a way to pay me back one day,” he added, laughing.

Jack completed his biology degree and went on to do a PhD. He focused on the communication of natural science from the Renaissance up to the present day. Clive reviewed Jack’s PhD and felt edgy about it. He had hoped Jack would specialize in ornithology, and he didn’t regard the history of science as a proper subject. However, Jack was determined, and, shortly after his PhD had been accepted, he launched a new Canadian journal, Scientific Today, which quickly became the best-selling natural science journal in North America and soon also in Europe.

Eight years had passed since Clive and Jack had bumped into each other at the university, and they still met for lunch at regular intervals. They talked about science, they discussed recent university initiatives, they assessed scientific conferences, but they skillfully avoided ever mentioning their private lives, as though by tacit agreement. Sometimes they happened to stay in the same hotel during an out-of-town conference and, after the conference, they might dine together alone or with other colleagues. But it was never like the old days. It didn’t even come close. Clive wondered why he didn’t simply invite Jack and his wife, Molly, to his home for dinner. Kay would love it. She often remarked that they never entertained. But something inside him fought it. What would happen if the easy mood of a social setting loosened Jack’s tongue? Might he tell Kay that Clive had played with him every weekend for years, even though he had been fifteen years older than Jack? That Clive hadn’t had a single friend his own age? That Clive had taught Jack to kill and dissect animals but had never killed or dissected a single one himself? And what precisely did Jack remember about the night in the tree house? Clive shuddered. He had suffered beyond measure when Jack left, but it was all in the past now, and there it would stay.

In 2001 Clive published his life’s work, The Birds. The day the book came out, he spent a long time sniffing it. He had worked on it for four years, and every single one of his arguments was solid. Soon his opponents—Darren in New York, Chang and Laam in China, Gordon at the University of Sydney, and Clark and his team in South Africa—would be convinced that birds were a sister group to dinosaurs and not their descendants. Most of all, he was anticipating the reaction of Lars Helland in Denmark. The Danish vertebrate morphologist was the opponent who tormented Clive more than anyone else. Helland never attended any of the ornithology symposia held around the world, so Clive had never met him in person, but Helland’s papers were always meticulous and vicious. Every time Clive had published something on the evolution of birds, Helland could be relied on to provide an instant refutation, stating the exact opposite, as though he had nothing better to do than annoy Clive. However, Clive was convinced The Birds would silence Helland. Clive knew the Dane nearly always relied on the evolution of the manus, the bird’s hand, to illustrate the relationship between birds and dinosaurs, and neither Helland nor Clive’s other opponents had given much thought to the evolution of the feather. Consequently, Clive had decided the feather would be his trump card. He had studied the evolution of the feather for years. From now on, no one would be able to argue that feathers on present-day birds had anything to do with the feather-like structures found on dinosaurs.

When the book was published, it went straight to the bestseller lists in Canada and the United States. Every dinosaur-mad amateur biologist on the planet bought a copy. However, Clive’s fellow scientists ignored it. It received only a few peer reviews in the more serious journals, and, on each occasion, in a rather dismissive tone, as though it was a curiosity to fill column inches rather than an important scientific work. Only Scientific Today allocated it a half-decent amount of space, but even so Clive was dissatisfied. He tried to call Jack to find out why his book had received such minimal coverage and been bounced to page 22, but Jack was unavailable.

Clive volunteered to speak at every upcoming symposium and carefully rewrote every chapter of The Birds as individual papers that he submitted simultaneously to scientific journals all over the world. He thought about his father. Had his father still been alive, he would have been proud. The reactions came just under a month later. Clive was prepared. He had already drafted his counter arguments because he knew exactly where his opponents would attack: the crescent-shaped carpus, the reduction of fingers, the ascending process of the talus bone, and the alleged feathers.

Clive devoured the new journals, convinced that his opponents would go straight for the anatomical discussion. However, apart from two responses written by minor scientists, none of his opponents criticized Clive’s anatomical arguments; instead they focused solely on poor editorial control whose lethargy had allowed Clive Freeman’s original contribution to be published, thus causing a deeply regrettable undermining of the general credibility of the journals. The nature of the relationship between birds and dinosaurs isn’t a subject worthy of a serious medium, because there is nothing to discuss. Birds are present-day dinosaurs. The end.

In thirty-seven different publications.

Clive was consumed by a boiling rage. They were accusing him of incompetence. They were accusing him, Clive Freeman, a world-famous paleobiologist and a professor at the University of British Columbia, of scientific incompetence.

The most arrogant response came, not surprisingly, from Lars Helland who, on this occasion, listed an unknown, Erik Tybjerg, as his coauthor. This undoubtedly meant that Helland had told one of his PhD students to write his contribution. But the worst was yet to come.

The ultimate insult was that Helland’s reaction appeared in Scientific Today.

Clive called Jack immediately to request a meeting.

When Clive saw Jack three days later, he was suffering from an upset stomach. They had arranged to meet at a bar across the street from the office of Scientific Today, and Jack was already there when Clive arrived. He was wearing dark trousers and a thin T-shirt, and a newspaper rested on his casually arranged legs. Clive’s stomach lurched when Jack looked up, and he stared at Jack’s lips. Clive slammed the journal on the table.

“What the hell is this?” he demanded.

“Clive, there are five other people on the editorial committee besides me,” Jack said quietly.

Clive turned on his heel and left.

In the autumn of 2001 Clive was a guest speaker in Chicago. Normally, he kept strictly to material from The Birds, but the American audience was remarkably receptive, and Clive expanded on his feather argument. Asymmetrical feathers were linked to flight in present-day birds, and dinosaurs hadn’t had feathers—obviously—first, because they didn’t fly, second, because they were cold-blooded animals, and third: “Can you imagine Jurassic Park—with chickens?”

His joke brought the house down. Clive concluded with a challenge: “Show me a feathered dinosaur, and I will personally beg forgiveness from every advocate of the dinosaur theory!” He flapped his arms like a bird trying to take off. The laughter refused to die down.

That night, Clive drank too much white wine before he staggered back to his hotel room. The next morning, he woke up with a dreadful taste in his mouth and grabbed a soda from the minibar. While he was drinking it, he switched on the television and found CNN. For a fraction of a second, he thought he must be the victim of a cruel hoax. To the right of the anchor was a huge photograph, which, to Clive, looked like a dinosaur with clearly visible feathers.

At that moment, the anchor cut to a CNN reporter who announced, with cracked lips as though he had trekked all the way to Asia, that he was in the Liaoning Province in northeastern China.

“This is a sensation,” the reporter panted. “Early this morning farm workers discovered what might be the world’s first feathered dinosaur. Tonight, the first experts have already reached the area, and a few minutes ago they confirmed that the newly discovered fossil is not a prehistoric bird but a predatory dinosaur belonging to the Theropod family. The animal is believed to have lived between 121 and 135 million years ago, and the exciting feature is that it has fossilized but extremely well-preserved feathers running down in a ridge from its head and along its back. The tantalizing questions here in northeastern China are these: were dinosaurs able to fly and were they warm-blooded, or are these feathers astonishing proof that feathers weren’t only used for flying but also for insulation? We’ll know more once the experts have had a chance to examine this thrilling discovery in detail. Back to the studio.”

Clive stared at the screen for nearly twenty minutes. Then he crushed his soda can.

Kay greeted him with a nervous smile when he came back to Vancouver. The telephone had rung constantly all morning and please would he call… and she reeled off the names of everyone from his colleagues at the department to national television stations. Jack hadn’t called.

Clive made himself a sandwich, gave Kay’s cheek a reassuring pat, and went to his study. Calmly, he ate his sandwich. The discovery in China was obviously a prehistoric bird, not a dinosaur. Dinosaurs didn’t have feathers. He downloaded forty-eight e-mails and skimmed through them. With irritation, he opened one from Lars Helland. Typical. The Danish scientist just had to put his oar in, in his usual affable manner, of course, so that it might be mistaken for good-natured banter. Clive deleted the e-mail.

When he had finished on the computer, he leaned back and tried not to think about Jack. Why hadn’t he called? Clive still hadn’t met Molly, Jack’s wife. They had just had their second daughter, and Clive hadn’t even seen the first one yet. Once upon a time, Clive had been the sole recipient of Jack’s rare, blinding smiles, the one who triggered his exclamations of surprise, the one who prompted him to press the tip of his tongue against the corner of his mouth in concentration when learning new facts. Now it was likely to be Molly and the two little girls. Clive was well aware that the distance was partly his own making. Jack had briefly met Clive’s sons, Tom and Franz, one day when the boys had picked him up from the university parking lot, and had, on one occasion, met Kay at a conference dinner that Jack had attended alone. However, distance was one thing, deliberate avoidance was something else. Jack was conspicuously polite and friendly, and always had time for a professional discussion, but Clive found his private reticence unbearable. They didn’t have to get together with their wives and children, the very thought caused Clive to break into a sweat, but Clive and Jack had a connection and it was as if Jack refused to acknowledge it, even when they were alone. It was absurd. Clive knew Jack better than anyone. He had Jack in his blood, in the tips of his fingers, which still remembered the feeling of ruffling Jack’s dark hair.

Jack would know perfectly well that the discovery of an allegedly feathered dinosaur meant late nights for Clive, who would need weeks to defend his position and refute the implications that the media and every other idiot would draw from the discovery. Jack not letting Clive into his life might be a coincidence, it might even be Clive’s own fault. But Jack not calling him, that was deliberate.

Clive called a meeting with his department that Monday, and later the same day they issued a press release announcing that UBC’s department of Bird Evolution, Paleobiology, and Systematics was obviously excited at the discovery of a feathered dinosaur, but that they had nothing further to say until they had been allowed to examine the specimen themselves. Afterward Clive completed an application to view the animal, knowing full well that it would be a great deal of time before permission was granted. Jack still hadn’t called.

The following January, the two Chinese paleontologists, Chang and Laam, finally described and named the animal and announced that it wasn’t a dinosaur. Clive was triumphant. They named it Sinosauropteryx, concluded it was an ancient bird, and consequently no one was surprised that it had feathers.

However, Clive’s joy was short-lived. Fossils started pouring out of China’s soil, literally, and in every subsequent case, Chang and Laam had no doubts: these weren’t ancient birds, they were dinosaurs. And they were all feathered.

Clive sent a reminder regarding his application, and when it was finally approved he flew to China immediately. It took him two weeks to examine Sinosauropteryx, and he also had a closer look at Caudipteryx and Protarchaeopteryx. Delighted, he called Jack and told him to hold the front page. Clive’s enthusiasm was infectious. “This is a rotten line,” Jack laughed, “call me when you get back.”

Clive spent another two days in China before flying home. He was overjoyed. Beipiaosaurus, Sinornithosaurus, Microraptor, Caudipteryx, and Protarchaeopteryx were obviously all ancient birds but not dinosaurs. Furthermore, the Chinese had turned out to be very welcoming, not at all reticent as he had been told, and the food was superb. One afternoon he strolled through a garden of cherry trees, whose white petals fluttered poetically onto passersby and wished Jack could have been there with him. If only they could have some time together. Jack was a science writer, one of the very best, but, of course, there was a price to pay. Jack shared Clive’s scientific views, Clive knew that, but Jack self-evidently couldn’t appreciate the discussion about the origin of birds fully, when he also had to consider so many other topics. If only they could have some time together, then Clive could explain the details to him. This would boost Clive’s position enormously. Scientific Today was selling better than ever, everyone in the science community read it and wanted to publish in it. Jack and he would once more be an unbeatable duo.

Across from the cherry-tree garden was a market, where Clive bought two bronze beetles in a glass dome for his sons and a large piece of silk for Kay. When he got back, he would ask Jack if they could go away together. Just for a couple of days. Just the two of them.

When he got back to Canada, Clive went to see Jack. He had written most of his paper on the plane, and when he landed in Vancouver the major themes of his arguments were outlined. Triumphantly, he slammed it down in front of Jack.

“Did you have a good trip?” Jack asked, smiling.

“Yes,” Clive said.

“Coffee?”

Clive declined. Jack went to get some for himself, and when he returned he closed the door behind him and called his secretary to say he didn’t want to be disturbed for the next fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes, Clive thought. Jack let himself fall into the chair behind his desk and looked at Clive.

“I can’t print your paper,” he said.

“What?”

“I’ve got doubts,” Jack replied.

“About what?”

“About the origin of birds.” He held up his hand to forestall Clive’s reaction, but Clive was speechless.

“For years your position was reasonable. We were missing many decisive fossils, phylogenetic methods were still unreliable, and there were problems explaining the reduction of bird fingers…. During all that time I understood perfectly well why you didn’t buy the dinosaur theory. But now? New evidence is discovered every week, Clive. And everything points to birds being present-day dinosaurs, don’t you see? More than 250 apomorphies link birds and dinosaurs. Two hundred and fifty apomorphies! Including feathers. Feathers! Not to mention that more than 95 percent of the world’s scientists today agree that cladistics is the accepted phylogenetic method. Everyone’s using cladistics, except you. You have an impressive résumé, Clive. No one would think less of you if you changed your position—on the contrary. That’s the very core of science. That a hypothesis stands until it’s replaced by a better-supported one. Remember Walker? He dismissed his own theory when it no longer held up. He won a lot of admiration for that.”

Clive stared at Jack and, in that moment, he hated him. He remembered once when Jack was little and had cut his finger on a knife and Clive had stuck his finger in his mouth. Suddenly, he could taste the blood again.

“I want my story on the front page,” he whispered.

“We already have a lead story.”

“I’ve been an ornithologist for thirty years,” Clive said. “And now you’re telling me that some fashionable paleontology theory is going to end my career?” Clive shot up from his chair, reached over the desk and grabbed Jack’s jaw.

“Look at me,” he hissed. “I was like a father to you. I got you out of that shit hole you came from. Everything you’ve got,” he gestured toward the enormous desk and the stacks of journals, “you owe to me.”

Clive let go of Jack’s face and pointed at his paper lying on the desk. Then he left.

The next issue of Scientific Today was published in mid-August. On the cover was a photo of Caudipteryx, its left wing partly unfolded and beneath it the headline: THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES: THE CRETACEOUS TURKEY.

Clive was satisfied.

In the autumn of 2005, Clive was invited to take the hot seat at a major ornithology conference in Toronto, where he would participate in a live TV debate with a young Danish paleontologist, Dr. Erik Tybjerg, who appeared to have been promoted from being Lars Helland’s PhD student to his errand boy. Clive had met the young scientist several times because Helland made a point of staying away from conferences, and he found Tybjerg intensely annoying. He was an upstart who thought he knew it all, and Clive would regard it as a considerable pleasure to bring him down on national television.

Clive made a last-minute decision to fly to Toronto via his hometown. Since the death of his father, he tended to visit his mother every other year. She was an old lady now, practically blind and living in a nursing home. Clive looked forward to seeing her lined face and feeling her hand in his. He left three days before the conference and stayed at a hotel near the nursing home. When he wasn’t spending time with his mother, pushing her around in her wheelchair, he slept like a log in his room, ate well in the restaurant, and even managed four walks around the local area before traveling onward on the fourth day.

He landed in Toronto, rested and exhilarated. He was met at the airport and driven straight to the conference center where he left his luggage with a cloakroom attendant, collected his entry pass, and strolled around the many interesting booths.

Half an hour later he took a seat in a comfortable red armchair on the stage. Opposite was an identical but vacant armchair. The stage was bathed in light and Clive found it hard to see properly, but he was aware of a large audience taking their seats in the auditorium. A well-dressed young woman came out to greet him, introduced herself as the assistant to the producer, and asked if Clive was ready to be hooked up to his microphone. Of course, Clive answered and complimented her on her appearance. He noticed the young woman’s perfume, and she stood very close to him while she attached the clip of the micro port to his lapel.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it,” she burst out. “Of course, I’m no expert. But it came as a huge surprise to me!” She smiled at Clive, straightened his jacket, conjured up a powder compact from her pocket, and began dabbing powder on Clive’s nose.

“I’m sorry, I don’t follow?” Clive croaked. The cable for the microphone was choking him, and he tried to give it more slack.

“Allow me.” the young woman said. “Turn around.” Clive turned, and she carefully lifted up his jacket. Clive felt the cable loosen and became more comfortable.

“What did you mean just now?” Clive prompted her. His cell phone had been switched off, and he hadn’t looked at a newspaper while visiting his mother. He suddenly got the feeling that the President might have been assassinated and that he was the last to know.

“It’s really amaz—” the woman began, then she stopped to listen to something coming through her headset, excused herself, and hurried off.

Dr. Tybjerg entered, grinning like an idiot in the sharp light, and pushed up his unfashionable glasses.

“Professor Freeman,” he said, offering him a sweaty hand. Clive shook it. Tybjerg might be a walking encyclopedia, his knowledge was truly impressive, but he was devoid of charm.

“As a scientist you would have to rejoice, no matter what your views are, wouldn’t you say so?” Dr. Tybjerg stuttered. “You must admit that it’s hard to believe?”

“What are you talking about?” Clive said as calmly as he could manage, but he felt his voice tremble.

Dr. Tybjerg gave him a puzzled look.

At that moment the host appeared and explained the format of the debate to the audience. Professor Clive Freeman and Dr. Erik Tybjerg were introduced to each other by their full titles, to the audience and the viewers, after which the host handed floor to the two duelists. Clive made a friendly gesture to Tybjerg, who opened the debate.

“As you all know, the day before yesterday it was announced that the remains of a feathered Tyrannosaurus had been found in Makoshika State Park in the state of Montana, close to Hell Creek where the world’s first Tyrannosaurus Rex fossil was found in 1902.”

Clive stared at Tybjerg. His jaw dropped.

The duel lasted thirty minutes, and throughout the whole ordeal Tybjerg was visibly nervous but quick-thinking. He listened attentively, he never interrupted Clive and every time he demolished one of Clive’s arguments, he was thorough, meticulous, almost. When Clive declared that he wanted to examine the animal before forming an opinion, Tybjerg gave Clive a looked of genuine surprise and wonder, and said:

“How long are you going to use that argument? Until a feathered Apatosaurus turns up on your doorstep?” It was an obvious joke, but no laughed.

When the spotlights faded, the audience started to disperse and Clive studied his hands. He didn’t dare look at Dr. Tybjerg, who hadn’t moved since the stage lights dimmed. Afterward he had no idea what provoked him. A faint cough? The quiet superiority? Whatever it was, he glanced up and the second he met Tybjerg’s eyes, he slapped him with the back of his hand. Dr. Tybjerg sprang up, horrified, touching his eyebrow, which had split open. Clive looked at his hand, at his wedding ring. It was stained with blood. When he looked up again, Tybjerg had left.

Then he heard footsteps.

“What happened?” the confused young assistant shouted.

“Uh,” Clive began. He dusted off his clothes. The assistant looked at him and then in the direction in which Tybjerg had disappeared.

“Uh,” Clive repeated and dusted his clothes again.

Back in Vancouver, Clive felt strangely accepting of the news. He refused to talk to the press, didn’t reply to e-mails and telephone calls, and he informed the faculty press office that he had no plans to counter-attack.

“I have resigned myself to the folly of this world,” he told the press officer. Then he called a meeting with his department where they agreed to keep a low profile while redistributing their workload. The next allocation of research funding would take place in three years, and no one needed reminding that if they were unable to convince the world that birds were not descended from dinosaurs, they would never get another grant.

They decided to start three major excavations and an expensive developmental study to observe the cartilage condensation in bird embryos. Clive’s junior researcher, Michael Kramer, would be heading the project.

Once that was in place, Clive headed home.

As Clive cycled through the forest, the sun shining through the trees, he thought about Jack. They hardly ever spoke these days. When Clive submitted a paper, Jack rarely acknowledged receipt, and when Clive rang with changes, Jack’s secretary would deal with them. Clive had even called Jack at home and left a message, but Jack never called back.

Whenever Clive opened Scientific Today looking for his contributions, his joy at seeing them was diminished. Clive appreciated the expensive layout, the graphs, and the illustrations, but he felt no real pleasure. Jack and Clive had met in their passion for nature. Now he was alone.

Clive thought about the situation for a week, then he called Jack and invited him and Molly over for dinner. He practically pleaded with Jack to come.

“Jack,” he said. “Let’s put the past behind us. Let’s do the right thing, let’s not mix science and friendship.” Jack replied with silence.

“I can’t stand not seeing you,” Clive suddenly burst out, and held his breath.

Finally Jack said: “All right, we’ll be there.”

Kay was delighted that the famous Jack Jarvis and his wife were coming to dinner.

“What an illustrious guest,” she said, thrilled. “What will we serve them?”

Clive took the cookbook from his wife’s hand and led her into the living room where he told her the whole story. Or, almost the whole story. Kay was fascinated.

“He must have been like a son to you. Why didn’t you ever tell me? Fancy them moving away like that,” she added. “That poor boy must have felt like he was losing his father all over again.”

Clive nodded.

That Saturday Jack and Molly arrived right on time. Molly was radiant and very beautiful. She shook Clive’s hand energetically and said what a pleasure it was to meet such a legendary scientist. Her husband had talked so much about him over the years, she said, but she had no idea that they had known each other since childhood.

“I was sorry to hear about the recent trouble,” she carried on, cheerfully, “but Jack says that’s how it is with natural science. All storms blow themselves out eventually.”

Clive smiled and took their coats. What a chatterbox she was. He wasn’t entirely sure what he had imagined but definitely not this.

“Odd,” Kay said when the evening was over and Molly and Jack had left. “Molly is as outgoing and sparkling as Jack is closed.”

Clive nodded. Jack had seemed a little sullen, but then again with the women chirping away, it had been hard to get a word in.

At the start of July 2007, Clive developed an earache and decided to leave work early. He had been troubled by a cold since Kay and he had spent two weeks in their vacation home, and it was getting worse, not better.

The study of cartilage formation in embryonic chickens was looking very promising. Clive didn’t want to get his hopes up, but he had butterflies in his stomach as he followed its progress. He thought about Tybjerg and Helland. Helland still published, but it was nothing compared to Tybjerg, who was rapidly firing off papers. Even now, while Clive was awaiting the outcome of the condensation experiment and thus not publishing much himself, Tybjerg wrote one article after another, and in every single one of them he distanced himself from Clive’s views.

Neither Tybjerg nor Helland had commented on the incident in Toronto. Clive was amazed that Helland had managed to restrain himself. Helland still e-mailed Clive every now and then with references to papers he thought Clive ought to read, or attaching silly natural history cartoons. But he never once mentioned Tybjerg. The outcome of the cartilage condensation experiment filled Clive with rapture. Neither Helland nor Tybjerg had any idea of what was about to hit them.

By now he had cycled through the forest. He looked forward to reading the latest issues of Science, Nature, and Scientific Today in his bag. When he got home, he made himself comfortable on the sofa and started with Nature.

And there it was. “Helland, et al.” jumped out at him as early as page five, a lengthy and infinitely trivial description of the discovery of a dinosaur tooth on the Danish island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea. Obviously, his esteemed colleagues couldn’t help but remark how this find yet again proved the direct ancestry of modern birds to dinosaurs. Clive let the journal fall from the sofa.

Then he opened up Science. He had to flip as far as page seventeen before “Helland, et al.” leapt from the page. What the hell? Again, the article’s point of departure was some—in Clive’s opinion—utterly insignificant excavations on Bornholm, and the article was riddled with guesswork and conjectures, bordering on fluff. Clive scanned a few more pages before letting the journal slide to the floor.

Finally, he started on Scientific Today.

Jack’s beaming face greeted him from the editorial on page three, and Clive smiled back at him. They had seen each other only last Saturday, and the vibe between them had been really good, as it had been over the last six months. Kay and Molly had become fast friends, and Jack had been less defensive and recalled many of the things they had done together when Jack was a boy. Last Saturday he had mentioned the tree house. It must have been a big job to build, he remarked, and both women had turned to look at Clive. Clive’s heart started pounding, but Jack was relaxed and smiling and seemed to have no hidden agenda. Yes, Clive had replied, it had taken some time. How annoying that we had to move so soon afterward, Jack continued. They were having dinner in Clive and Kay’s freshly painted dining room when, out of the blue, Jack mentioned that his older brother had just been released from prison. “Is that right?” Clive said, relieved to let the tree house slip back into the past where it belonged.

“I never told anyone,” Jack admitted. “It’s not exactly something I’m proud of. But anyway, he’s out now. Fifteen years inside.”

Molly and Jack had visited him the previous day. Jack never explained what his brother had done, and Clive didn’t want to pry. Fifteen years spoke volumes. Jack simply said that it had been good to see him. He’d got a job sorting bottles at a recycling plant, and he was pleased about that. Jack suddenly looked directly at Clive and said “thank you.” The words hung awkwardly in the air, and Clive had no idea what to say. Molly’s eyes welled up, and Kay got up to serve dessert.

Clive stretched out on the sofa, flipped past the photo of Jack and further into the journal. On page five, he nearly choked on his tea. The paper took up six pages and at the top “Helland, et al.” stood out. This was no minor puff piece run during a scientific dry spell. Clive sat up. The subject of the article was the femur of the Berlin Specimen, Archaeopteryx, which Helland and Tybjerg had visited Berlin to remeasure. The last approved measurement, undertaken in 1999 by the ornithologist Professor Clive Freeman, was not only highly inaccurate, it had also led to a series of unfortunate conclusions which—according to Helland, et al.—had distorted important arguments relating to the origin of birds to a very considerable extent. The question now was whether this data distortion was the result of that margin of error that should always be factored into science, or whether the measurements in question were the expression of deliberate manipulation. A brief summary of the incident at the 2005 bird conference in Toronto followed with a reproduction of the press release from Clive’s department, which placed in this context sounded like a total surrender.

Clive was so outraged that he knocked over the teapot when he got up. This paper ridiculed him, and Jack had approved it. His thoughts whirred around inside his head so fast that he could barely keep his balance. He held the copy of Scientific Today away from his body, like a burning oven glove he wanted to chuck outside as quickly as possible. When he opened the front door to get rid of it, Kay was in the process of bringing in the groceries from the car. He tossed the journal aside, but it landed on his foot. He picked it up again and it stuck to his fingers. Kay came to his rescue and grabbed him by the elbows.

“Clive darling, what’s happened?”

“Jack,” Clive snarled. He shook his hand to free himself from the journal and a page with a colorful DNA double helix came loose and spiraled down to the ground. Finally Clive broke free of the journal and stomped past Kay, around the house, and into the back garden where he stayed for an hour.

He didn’t come back inside until Kay opened the living room window and told him dinner was ready. At 9:30 p.m. he called Jack and suggested a meeting. No, no particular reason, nothing that couldn’t wait. A game of chess, perhaps. And, by the way, there was something Clive wanted to discuss with him.

Jack came the next day, and while Kay and he made small talk, Clive said nothing. They retired to Clive’s study for a game of chess. It was a mild summer evening, the window to the garden was open, and Clive could hear birdsong in the distance. He could also hear Kay loading the dishwasher in the kitchen. Jack, who pretended that nothing had happened, pondered his next move for a long time. Clive forced himself to remember that Googling “Clive Freeman” attracted 41,700 hits in 0.11 seconds. When on earth was Jack going to make his next move? Clive got up and mixed them both a drink.

“Why?” he hissed from the drinks cabinet. Jack gave him a baffled look. “Why do you want to destroy the credibility of the world’s finest and most respected natural science journal?” Clive slammed down his drink so hard on the desk that it sloshed over.

Jack’s reaction shocked Clive. Clive had imagined immediate contrition. Downcast eyes, a boy confessing to a man of superior intellect. The only thing he hadn’t imagined was Jack’s calm reply: “That’s precisely what I’m trying to prevent.”

“Then why have you allowed that article in Scientific Today? I demand to know why!”

Jack looked at Clive for a long time before he said: “Because it’s my journal, Clive, and I decide which articles are published.” Clive detected a faint tremor in Jack’s voice.

“It’s unscientific,” Clive shouted, and stamped his foot. “And you know it! You know that their arguments aren’t properly supported. What about the reduction of the fingers, what about the ascending process of the talus, eh?” Clive swirled the alcohol around in his glass and continued his rant.

“What about the crescent-shaped carpus, you moron, the orientation of the pubic bone, and the colossal ifs and buts, which you know ad nauseam, and which allow you—in contrast to those idiots from Science and Nature—to weed out these crazy articles about kinship? When did you turn into someone who shapes his scientific views to fit a trend? Have you lost your mind?”

Jack gave Clive a neutral look.

“I don’t believe in you anymore,” Jack said eventually. “True, the other side still have certain problems explaining the reduction of the hand, but we’re talking about two hundred and eighty-six apomorphies, Clive, two hundred and eighty-six! A feathered Tyrannosaurus. What do you want? God to pop down from heaven and explain how it’s all connected before you’re satisfied? I’ve supported you professionally for years. I’ve done much for you. Much more than I should. Because you’re… my friend. But it has to stop now. A feathered Tyrannosaurus, Clive. Scientific Today is a scientific journal.”

“How do you know it’s a Tyrannosaurus?” Clive sneered. “How do you know it’s feathered? You want to put feathers on an animal that couldn’t fly? You know as well as I do that the development of feathers is primarily and inextricably linked with the evolution of flight and didn’t serve as insulation until later. And you also know Tyrannosaurus didn’t fly. You haven’t seen the creature. I haven’t seen it, either. The structures may look like feathers, but they’re likely to be the residual of a dorsal skin fold; they’re not precursors of genuine feathers. That should be self-evident! You’re publishing conjecture, it’s unscientific! Have you forgotten you should never, ever, base your conclusions on what others have seen?”

“No, I haven’t,” Jack replied, “and when it’s your turn to describe the animal, Scientific Today will be delighted to publish a properly researched article that may conclude that the discovery in Montana isn’t a Tyrannosaurus, and that the skin structure isn’t feathers. But not until your description is available and has been accepted. It’s never been the intention of science to claim to have found the absolute truth, Clive, but to put forward the most likely hypotheses, and my job,” Jack pointed to himself, “is to publish those papers that reflect the more probable ones, and right now, they aren’t coming from you.”

“Get out,” Clive said icily. He pointed to the door. Jack got up.

“You shouldn’t mix science and friendship,” Jack said calmly.

“Get out,” Clive repeated.

Jack left. Shortly afterward, Clive heard the engine of Jack’s car start.

Kay came into his study.

“Why did Jack leave? What happened?” Her eyes were bulging.

Clive said nothing. He was shaking all over. Jack was a traitor.

“Did you two fight?” she asked. “Clive, what did you say to him?”

Kay’s mouth moved. Say something for God’s sake, her lips mouthed, but there was no sound. Kay put her open, baffled face up to his; like a poker, she stoked the embers and the fire flared up. He struck her. The angle was unfortunate and the impact of his wedding ring made her cheek swell up. Horrified, she touched her face and stared at him. Then she left.

Clive stayed in his study and tried to calm himself down. He reread some of his old articles, and a few hours later he felt better. He went through the house to find Kay. It was dark and quiet. The dishwasher was beeping, and the door to the garden was ajar but Kay wasn’t in the kitchen or in the garden. He went upstairs to the master bedroom. The door was locked. Outside the bedroom door, to the right, lay a comforter and his pillow. Clive knocked on the door, but there was no reply. He started hammering on it.

“Open the door,” he commanded.

There was no sound from inside. Clive went downstairs and watched television. Close to midnight, he fell asleep on the sofa.