BY G. K. AMBADY

There is no reason now why the veil of mystery surrounding the Carmichael case should not at last be lifted. The fate of Dr. Carmichael is no longer in doubt. The remnants of the stratosphere balloon in which he made his ascent, to study cosmic radiation, have been discovered and identified. Dr. James Carmichael has joined that heroic group of men who have dared to explore the unknown and made their last voyage. Even Sir Julian Magnus, to whose confidence I am indebted for most of the details, cannot object to what is, after all, and above all, a vindication of his best friend.

The case, it will be remembered, when it came up before the Coroner’s court, was the sensation of the times. Dr. James Carmichael, a medical biologist, was charged with the murder of his research assistant, Jean Merrivale, in his flat in Cambridge. Here she had been living with him for some time. The poor friendless girl had been seduced and betrayed. The crime, it was alleged, was the last act in an inhuman drama by which Carmichael hoped to evade the responsibility of his betrayal and honourable restitution to his victim. An "illegal operation," although not mentioned openly, was the corner-stone of the Police theory. The motive and opportunity were clear; and when the exhumation of the body was ordered, no one doubted that the last link in the chain of evidence would be unearthed and the ghastly crime brought to light.

The subsequent acquittal of Carmichael came as a complete surprise. Particularly so, as, during the trial, Carmichael had maintained a mulish, guilty silence. The exhumed body was found to be well preserved, but the most expert examination failed to disclose any traces of foul play. Apart from evidences of lowered vitality, nothing tangible could be discovered. An acquittal was thus inevitable, and the Carmichael case and Dr. Carmichael himself were gradually relegated in the public mind to the limbo of unsolved mysteries. The British Medical Council, however, struck him off their register, for moral turpitude.

The last public appearance of Carmichael, before the proceedings of the Coroner’s court had forced him into the lurid limelight of the press, was at the wedding of Julian Magnus to Pamela Manson. He was Julian’s best man. They were old friends, bound by a curiously exclusive and steadfast comradeship. They had been together as undergraduates and shared many triumphs in college sports and farther afield. Carmichael had always been a difficult man to know, thoughtful aloof and remote. But he had depths in him which were revealed in his rare flashes of understanding. Julian alone had been able to break through his reserve and had come to accept his friend almost as his ‘alter ego.’ When the storm broke over Carmichael, Julian was abroad on his honeymoon. On his hurried return he could find no tracks of his friend. Finally, he gave up all efforts to trace him: perhaps Carmichael himself desired to be left alone and forgotten.

Julian, nevertheless, felt the loss of his friend keenly. Now, in the fourth year of his marriage, a crisis was developing in his married life, and Carmichael was the one man who could have guided him right. His marriage had been happy, he loved his wife, and he was content to bask in the sunshine of her charm. They had no children, but this had been agreed upon, from the very beginning. Even before her marriage, the beautiful Pamela had enthroned herself as the Princess Charming of London Society. The very circumstances of her birth–her friends used to chaff her–marked her out for the limelight: she had been born a triplet, the only surviving one, the other two, after ceremoniously escorting her into this world, having decorously withdrawn. Since her marriage, the Magnus millions had been a further accession of strength. Nor did she take her social duties lightly, believing that privileges entailed responsibilities. Not without reason, for it was said that her sojourn once in an obscure continental winter resort had helped to put it on the fashionable map, and that in her absence the wine of the London season lost some of its bocquet.

The prospect of having no child of his- own had, however, ceased to obsess Julian. He was well-nigh reconciled to it, till that fateful evening when, driving home in a taxi from the theatre, Pamela had told him that she had discovered that she was with child. One crowded, transcendent moment of joy was his. The thrill of boundless hope, the surge of gratitude towards the mother of his child, nearly choked him–when disillusionment came like a blow. In her quiet manner, sweetly reasonable, almost maternally tender, she had whispered that he must see that it was impossible–she was not sure that it was not even dangerous–for her to have a child. She knew how inconsolable he would be, and yet she must look to him to take the necessary measures–there was no urgency yet–to relieve her from a condition which she dreaded she would not be able to sustain for long.

A creeping sense of futility and defeat gradually enveloped Julian. It was a wonder he did not break up under the strain. It may have been his astounding vitality. More than that perhaps, a blind, desperate faith that the blow would somehow be averted, he had not deserved it. He was sinking into the depths of despair when the miracle happened. Carmichael turned up, as manna from heaven. There had been moments when, in his consuming sorrow, his deranged mind had conjured up a spectre of Carmichael, white-robed, with a scalpel in his hand. That was a nightmare, a treacherous concoction of the devil. That was past. His faith in Carmichael shone bright as a light, and that light would henceforth guide him.

Pamela was out of town at the time. Not once had they referred again to the fateful evening. Carmichael had dropped in, as if nothing had happened since he stood beside Julian four years ago as his best man–stood in the dock with the shadow of the halter round his neck. Neither could find words at first to speak. They gripped each other’s hands, and then for some minutes the routine of social formalities came to their aid to cloak the fire of their intense friendship.

When they had settled down and Carmichael began to talk, it was as if he was musing aloud rather than addressing Julian. He stared into the fire and spoke jerkily:

"I had to regenerate myself before I could again face the world. The French Academy has been good to me. They allowed me to continue my research work and respected my desire to remain incognito. I am now to make an ascent into the stratosphere. The balloon is not ready yet and I thought I should have a respite. Besides, I wanted to see You.

"The ascent of course is not free from danger. But it is the last stage of my present research, the journey’s end, a journey that began with my pathological work at Queen Charlotte’s. You must have wondered why I left Charlotte’s suddenly. The practice of medicine and the science of healing meant the same thing to me then. The professional aspect, the vocational exigencies, had not occurred to me. Doctors also must live; they make what they can, by retailing prescriptions from the vast resources of the pharmacopoeia. The surgeons have a more subtle and less obvious technique. Tonsils in childhood, circumcision in boyhood and appendix in adolescence–all removed at so many guineas a time. Whether the patients did well or not, the surgeons certainly did well. Now of course the physicians have their injections. Pasteur, Lister and so on are the professed gods, but Mammon is the ruling deity. There are many true worshippers, but the pharisees are to the front.

" Well, I had not the stomach for it. It nauseated me. Fortunately I was able to pick up that biological research fellowship at Cambridge and it gave me the chance to go deeper into my subject. The fundamental unity of plan in nature had always fascinated me. Biologically every living thing begins as an egg. Take a cold-blooded animal such as a frog. A frog’s spawn looks like a heap of small crystals. The size of these eggs and the yolk are small compared with a bird’s egg, small in proportion to the life-spot, that is the embryo. At the end of about a week the egg hatches. The creature that comes out, however, is not a frog but a tadpole, and it grows and changes into a frog outside, getting its own food while it develops and changes. In the case of a bird, after the egg has been laid, all the development takes place inside the egg shell, and when the chicken comes out it is really a bird. The three stages of development in the case of a frog–inside the mother’s womb, then as spawn, and finally the stage of free independent existence while growing and transforming into a frog–these are reduced to two in the case of a bird, and further still to one in the case of mammals. The mammalian young comes out of its mother’s’ womb, complete. But it is not to be supposed that this proves a diversity rather than a unity of plan. While the mother frog does not sit on her eggs, the glassy covering over the life spot, the embryo corresponding partly to the white of an egg and functioning as a protective shell, enables the sun’s rays to be directed to the embryo–similar to the action of a magnifying lens–enough to warm it up and help it to grow. In the case of the more evolved mammal, a more perfect hatching takes place in the intimate protection of the womb itself.

"The amniotic membrane of the mother corresponds to the egg shell. If the development of the embryo could be accelerated, the membrane calcified, and the last stage of growth ensured in an incubator, it was obvious that the pain and labour of maternity as well as the period of gestation could be considerably curtailed. No new technique is required for the last two processes. As regards the first, the problem is to provide a suitable source of energy which, while accelerating the growth of the embryo, would not put an undue strain on the mother. Here it occurred to me that cosmic radiation offered a solution. It is the most intense and penetrative form of energy known, and its influence in biological mutations is not questioned. Millikan has suggested that cosmic radiations may be the result of aggregations of hydrogen atoms condensing into helium, a process constantly going on in the universe. He described these radiations as the "birth-cry of atoms," a significant phrase. That gave me a line of action. If nothing else, these ultra short radiations would certainly help to fix the calcium in the system. It may be that these radiations themselves are one of the sources of energy for the birds of the air and the fish of the sea which are more receptive of natural influences than man in his artificial surroundings and draperies.

"I started my experiments with mice, those much maligned and humble creatures which have so often collaborated with man in the cause of knowledge. Priestley used them in his discovery of oxygen for the first time: I used them for a daring biological adventure. I had a piece of luck when Jean joined me as research assistant. She brought to the work an imaginative intuition which was precious. It was gruelling hard work for both of us, but, beyond our wildest expectations, we were rewarded by a progeny of eggs by the mammalian mice!"

(I have recently seen part of Carmichael’s scientific papers and miscellaneous collections, in the custody of Julian Magnus. One curious item is an egg carefully kept in a specially prepared air-tight glass jar. The egg was no bigger than a pigeon’s, but the mottled design of brown Spots on it was strange to me. By the convenient arrangement of a focussed light, a more accurate examination was possible. Inside the shell could then be distinctly seen a small embryo, vaguely resembling a mouse, surrounded by an yellowish white fluid. There was something like a large bubble at the apex into which emerged what seemed to be the nose of the embryo.)

Carmichael continued:

"The details of the work had been kept a well guarded secret. I had known for some time that the long and unorthodox hours which we kept in the ‘lab’ had given rise to some salacious gossip, hinting that our work was a cloak for a species of biological experience of a more personal and intimate nature. I did not let this bother me at first, but point was given to this talk by a growing lassitude which was becoming apparent in Jean herself. Soon I was faced with the truth. ." One evening she completely broke down, and confessed to me that she was with child. She was on the border of hysteria, and talked of taking her Own life. In the state she was in, after the phenomenal strain of Our research work, I could not but feel that she might do something hasty. More as an immediate way out, rather than a final solution. I suggested that she should, for the time being, come and stay with me.

"Looking back, I do not know, even today, what else I could have done. My conscience was clear and my reactions had always been against keeping up appearances. I was not worried a bit, except for space. It was naturally cramped in the flat, but we managed. The problem of the expected child was still with us. In the end it was she who suggested that our experiments with mice should now be repeated on her.

"Ethically, I suppose, I should not have agreed to this monstrous suggestion. But the fire of scientific curiosity was burning too strong, and here was an opportunity in a million. And so the final decision was made, and the most questionable step ever taken in experimental verification was initiated.

"One day Jean did not feel well enough to accompany me to the ‘lab.’ When I returned home in the evening, something seemed amiss. She was not about. Since she came to stay with me, one of us would leave the ‘lab’ first, while the other remained to tidy up, and there would be a cup of tea waiting for the late comer. I suppose if a man lets a woman cross his threshold, he must be prepared for some innovation in the domestic routine. Mostly it was Jean who left first to prepare our tea, and I had come to expect some refreshment and an atmosphere of homeliness on my return each day.

"On going into her bedroom, I found her in bed. Her eyes were open and there was an unnatural look in them. She was either asleep or more probably in a stupor. I lifted the bed-sheet to feel her pulse, and what I saw froze the whole of my being….Between her breasts, lay, caressed, an egg, pale pink, and no bigger than that of an ostrich, protected gently by her nervous hands. I stood there, lost and bewildered, before the truth broke upon me. The human experiment had succeeded, just as in the case of the mice. I replaced the bed-sheet and left the room."

(Julian told me afterwards that, while listening to Carmichael, he felt as if Carmichael had taken him by the hand and was leading him through an emotional experience. He had no idea of their destination, but it fascinated him….)

"When she awoke, it soon became clear that her reason was impaired by what must have been a great shock to her. She never regained her full consciousness before she expired next morning. It never occurred to me then that what a woman wants is not a scientific success but the fulfillment of not being–a child of her own flesh. Something which needed her, which had to be cared for, which would cry, laugh, excrete–which would fall ill and drive her crazy with anxiety, a bit of original sin, but something human, and a piece of herself. I had not realised this. I had subjected Jean, as I had subjected the mice, to a cold-blooded biological experiment.

"From her delirious, heart-broken murmurings I could piece a few details together. It seemed that she had loved me, but had been engaged to marry a London stockbroker to whom she was obliged for her support and education. The whole thing was a farrago of contradictions. Loving me–unknown to myself–she had given herself to her stockbroker fiance. The talk of suicide was apparently a ruse to force her way into my flat. Once compromised she must have felt that I would offer her consolation. When I did not, her suggestion of the experiment on herself was the last attempt to force the issue. I was blind. The poor girl wanted love, and life for herself and life for her child, and I could not see. I gave her a mammalian egg instead! All her hatred for her seducer, all her repressions and despair were concentrated in that wild accusing look which never left her tearless eyes.

"Man walketh in a vain shadow, Julian…..My success in experimental science, for which I had laboured, which had made me arrogant, turned into ashes in my mouth. I had been worshipping false gods, just as much as those I had raved against. God had made his law, how man shall multiply and in what appointed time. Through all changes, one thing is changeless and supreme–human nature. What does not conform to our biological destiny is a complex, a phobia, a conflict or a neurosis."

Julian listened in breathless silence. Was this the destination, the message he had been waiting for? Had Carmichael divined his spiritual crisis? A neurosis, a complex or a phobia! Born a triplet, the only surviving one–the haunting dread of danger, the danger of child-birth! What a fool he had been! She had come to him with her fear, for support and strength. Poor, poor Pam! The scales fell from his eyes. Her recent interest in hospitals, charity balls for maternity homes: there was no longer a puzzle. Carmichael had talked of God. None of them had any background of confidence outside themselves; when they were confronted with a crisis they crashed into futile, criminal escapism, He had been a fool and a coward, but thank God that was over and done with.

Carmichael was visibly affected. He had talked as if impelled by some external force. A spiritual light shone in his eyes. When he spoke again, it was hardly more than a whisper:

"So I had to regenerate myself….It is the goal that matters, it must be a true goal–success or defeat is immaterial. There is not much more to tell. After Jean’s funeral, I thought a chapter was closed. But I had reckoned without my stock-broker friend. I had sent him a telegram–I had discovered his address from Jean’s papers–but he had not come for the funeral. Two days later he turned up, with a companion whom I had no difficulty in associating with Scotland Yard. His conscience must have goaded him to discover a scapegoat. His action cannot be explained on the basis of personal vindictiveness–we were practically strangers. It was, I suppose, the mental mechanism of displacement, fathering his sin, for the benefit of his conscience, on me. I deserved it. You know what happened afterwards. They could not even prove that Jean had been an expectant mother! The experiment was so perfect a success that nothing tangible could be discovered."

Carmichael’s stay in London was cut short by a telegram from Paris and he left abruptly. But Julian’s problem was solved. Carmichael had solved it. In the appointed time there was a pair of healthy, high-kicking, identical twins. A careless nurse mixed the two of them in their bath. And now Solomon himself will not be able to decide which of the two youngsters should by right succeed to the baronetcy!

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