Chapter 50: Alice in Wonderland |
“I am Professor Philemon Herbert from Oldcourt University.”
“Ah, so it’s you.”
Upon hearing my name, Liddell’s demeanor shifted, his face registering recognition.
“You are familiar with me?”
“Indeed. Your name has begun appearing in my daughter’s letters of late. As a father, I cannot help but take notice when a man’s name starts appearing in my daughter’s correspondence.”
He added with a weary sigh.
“I had imagined someone considerably younger.”
I immediately grasped Liddell’s implication. He harbored suspicions about my relationship with Alice. I hastened to dispel this misunderstanding.
“I also serve as the Acting Dean of St. Henry VIII College, where she is enrolled.”
“An unusual title, I grant you, but accurate nonetheless.”
Liddell gave a measured nod.
“I’ve certainly heard of it. That’s the college overseen by the notorious Casey O’Gerald. That old man has remained in his position since my own university days. A remarkable scholar, indeed. Yet he manages the university under his presidency as though it were his personal playground. The fair Lord, it seems, rarely bestows multiple gifts upon a single individual.”
“Dean Casey O’Gerald has guided Oldcourt with wisdom for many years.”
Noting my increasingly sour expression, Liddell extended his thumb, index, and middle fingers, adding:
“I mean no disrespect. I merely question the purpose of having a chancellor simultaneously serve as dean of all colleges, necessitating such curious titles as ‘Acting Dean.’ Am I mistaken?”
“On one point, you certainly are. At Oldcourt, we do not employ the term ‘chancellor.'”
With my retort, we both fell silent as if by prior arrangement. Only the motes of dust, illuminated by sunbeams filtering through the window, drifted between us.
It was Liddell who eventually broke the silence.
“Well then, Mr. Acting Dean. As I inquired earlier, what brings you here today?”
The old man’s gaze remained keen enough to pierce, though its intensity had diminished somewhat. To my perception, he seemed more disquieted than his outward appearance suggested.
“I’ve come to inquire about Alice Liddell.”
“Is that truly your sole purpose? Such devotion for a single student is remarkable, Professor.”
As I had anticipated, Liddell responded with hostility. This revealed his weakness. Had he truly wished to conceal something, he would have masked his emotions more carefully.
Any proper English gentleman, especially a distinguished figure and devout churchman like Lord Liddell, was well-versed in the art of maintaining distance. If desired, one could sit for hours engaging in utterly meaningless conversation with grave sincerity—a ridiculous practice celebrated as gentlemanly refinement.
In that light, from our first encounter, I had resigned myself to returning to London without extracting any meaningful information. Yet this display of human frailty from an experienced gentleman nearing sixty was unmistakably an opening.
“Has she always been thus?”
“Been what?”
In response to my direct inquiry, Liddell feigned obvious ignorance.
“Alice Liddell. Has she always been so… unusual?”
“Do not speak so carelessly, Lord Herbert. Whatever your intentions may be, to disparage my daughter is to insult both my wife and myself. We raised that child with the utmost devotion.”
An exaggeratedly agitated voice.
The tactics employed by this wise old gentleman were so transparent it was almost painful to witness. His angry tone rang in my ears like a desperate plea—begging me not to probe any further.
While I took no pleasure in tormenting an elderly father with a late-born daughter, I could not allow misplaced compassion to derail my purpose.
“I speak as a representative of St. Henry VIII College. She has disturbing habits. Do you truly claim to know nothing of them?”
“You’ve done nothing but talk since you arrived. And with such offensive language. I too can engage in conversation if that’s all that’s required.”
Liddell persisted in his feigned ignorance.
His words amounted to little more than childish obstinacy, yet I had no means to breach his defenses. He had no obligation to answer my questions in the first place—he had found, in mere moments, a remarkably effective strategy.
I concluded that more shocking statements would be necessary to draw out his true thoughts.
Regrettably, preserving Alice’s reputation seemed increasingly difficult. While a gentleman ought not spread a lady’s secrets, sharing them with her father could hardly be considered a punishable offense.
“I have witnessed her engaging in strange behavior within the university buildings on multiple occasions.”
“What doesn’t one do at that age?”
“Would you consider it normal for someone to press themselves against a wall for hours at a time, inhaling deeply?”
“You claim to have observed this? Secretly watching a maiden young enough to be your daughter from a distance for hours on end? It seems to me, sir, that the peculiar one is not Alice, but yourself.”
I was momentarily at a loss for words.
“Beyond that wall was the dissection room.”
Liddell visibly flinched at my words.
“Needless to say, the place reeked of blood.”
“There must have been some misunderstanding.”
Unlike before, he showed neither surprise nor anger. He clearly had long been aware of Alice’s strange proclivities.
Then, as if suddenly realizing he should have displayed outrage, he abruptly raised his voice.
“What does it matter where my daughter goes! She has the right to move freely as she pleases. Merely because there was a dissection room beyond that wall, you attempt to cast my daughter as some Gothic monstrosity.”
“I am a veteran soldier. Though it shames me to say it, I pride myself on distinguishing the scent of blood better than most men.”
Liddell’s pupils trembled visibly.
“It was unmistakably the smell of blood, and it was so foul that even I found it repulsive. I hesitate to say this, but Miss Liddell appeared to be quite… enjoying it.”
In that moment, I had transformed into a witch hunter, bearing the full weight of our era’s moral sensibilities.
Conversely, Lord Liddell had become a father desperately defending his daughter against accusations of witchcraft. Though no woman in this age would be bound to a stake for an affinity toward the scent of blood, Lord Liddell’s demeanor suggested he took the matter with equal gravity.
“I find this utterly impossible to believe.”
Lord Liddell declared with strained composure.
“Your approach from the very beginning has been thoroughly dishonorable. You deceived my daughter.”
“Do you have evidence to support that accusation?”
“Your every word serves as evidence. Would I write a letter of introduction for someone who would slander my daughter to her father’s face? You must have beguiled the innocent Alice with honeyed words to obtain that letter. I’ve had my fill of charlatans who offer nothing but hollow rhetoric.”
“Was one of those charlatans the Acting Dean of the college where she studies?”
“Are you threatening me now?”
“Had that been my intention, I would have employed a far more cunning approach. And you are mistaken—Miss Liddell is hardly the innocent child you portray. If my intentions were malicious, she would never have granted me a letter of introduction.”
Of course, she likely hadn’t anticipated I would recount all her unseemly behaviors at university to her father. Lord Liddell was now visibly discomposed.
I decided to deliver the final blow by revealing an anecdote I had been reserving.
“There was another incident: After a dissection practice, Miss Liddell collected a fallen animal’s eye, remarking on its beautiful coloration before slipping it into her pocket…”
The old man’s face crumpled in anguish.
“Enough!”
A thunderous exclamation erupted from the weathered throat of the sixty-year-old man. I doubt he would ever speak with greater volume until his dying day.
“Very well, I acknowledge it. I concede—the child is peculiar. Now, what precisely is the matter this time?”
In that instant, Lord Liddell’s entire demeanor underwent a remarkable transformation.
The stern theologian representing Oxford University who had occupied the chair moments ago had vanished, leaving only an aging father consumed with worry for his troubled daughter.
“If compensation is required, I had no intention of evading responsibility. That was my plan from the outset. I surmised this could not be a trivial matter if someone journeyed from London rather than dispatching a letter. What has Alice done now? Has someone been injured, or has she damaged property? Surely you’re not informing me she’s been expelled?”
He released a profound sigh that seemed ill-suited to my initial impression of him. Deep furrows, seemingly worn by centuries of weathering, etched themselves across his brow.
“I must apologize for my impertinence. I had no intention of besmirching her reputation, but it was a necessary measure. And that is not the purpose of my visit. While I did describe her as peculiar, Miss Liddell is a diligent, exemplary student.”
No sooner had I finished speaking than mistrust clouded Lord Liddell’s eyes.
After a moment’s hesitation, I admitted candidly.
“She hasn’t broken anything—not yet.”
Only then did his faith in my words return. A father who trusted distrust—truly a scene of tragedy.
“So she still cannot conduct herself like others, can she?”
“I alone am aware of her peculiarities. She conceals them rather skillfully. Was she like this at home as well?”
“She was better when at home. At least there I could maintain some control.”
Liddell pressed two fingers against his sunken eyelids. In those few moments, he seemed to have aged a decade.
“Let me clarify this: the child was not born with this strange disposition. My wife and I brought five sons and three daughters into this world, but among all eight siblings, she was distinctly a lovable child who captured everyone’s attention. Yet she was also shy, a sweet child who avoided company.”
I recalled how Alice had been reserved around others. Her exceptional friendliness toward me and her peculiar habits had obscured it, but she was indeed reticent with strangers.
“She remains so.”
“I suppose she would. One’s essential nature doesn’t simply vanish. Then I presume she doesn’t associate well with other students either, correct?”
“I don’t profess to monitor every student’s activities.”
I said this, but in truth, I had never once observed Alice socializing with other students.
Upon reflection, she was invariably alone. In the corridors, during lectures—she never integrated with anyone, always remaining at the periphery. Indeed, her consistent engagement with an elderly man like myself was perhaps the clearest evidence of her inability to connect with her peers.
I betrayed no hint of these thoughts, but Lord Liddell was far too astute to be deceived.
“I had hoped that by departing from her parents’ side and mingling with students her own age, she would develop an understanding of normality. But it appears I was mistaken. Perhaps had I kept her home with private tutors like her sisters, rather than sending her to university, she might have blossomed into a proper lady. Sending her to London was my error.”
He had completely divined my thoughts from context alone and proceeded to express disappointment without any confirmation.
“My question remains as it was initially.”
“Is that truly all? You merely wish to know about my daughter? Then surely it would have been more expedient to inquire directly of her, rather than undertaking the lengthy journey from London to Oxford. Though I’m reluctant to acknowledge it, she appears to hold you in rather high esteem.”
Lord Liddell enunciated as if chewing his words. I began to wonder about these letters Alice had supposedly written. Perhaps my ordeal with Lord Liddell was a consequence of her correspondence.
“No, she likely couldn’t answer. I doubt she even retains the memories, and even if she did, they would scarcely be objective.”
“Childhood, then.”
He immediately grasped my meaning.
“As you suggested moments ago, if she wasn’t always this way, there must be a cause.”
“Yes, your deduction is accurate. Alice’s behavior is unnatural by any measure. You believe someone influenced her during her formative years, and your objective is to learn about that individual, not Alice herself. Am I mistaken?”
Liddell was truly a master of inference.
I had merely offered a hint, yet he had precisely discerned my unspoken thoughts and provided the exact answer I sought.
“You are correct.”
His characteristic directness, combined with this insight, left me no opening to interject. I now understood from whom Alice had inherited her forthright manner of speech.
“Initially you suspected me, though that would be incorrect. And my wife is equally blameless.”
“I presumed as much.”
After saying this, a shadow of revulsion darkened Liddell’s aged eyes.
“Everything began the day that accursed mathematician, Charles Luttwidge Dodgson, visited our family.”
Charles Luttwidge Dodgson. The mathematician’s other name was Lewis Carroll.
Historically known as the frail Oxford mathematician who gifted his invented tales, the Alice series, to Alice Liddell. But contrary to my understanding, he had never authored such books.
Moreover, this man, seemingly too timid to inspire anyone’s hatred, had already become someone’s bitter adversary.
“That stutterer was a magician. Literally a conjurer, yes, but I have never witnessed anyone capture the affection of three sisters with such rapidity. He enchanted us all with his comical speech patterns, irregular gait, preposterous wordplay, and thoughtful consideration. To my wife and me, he appeared merely a buffoon, but to the children, he must have represented something far greater. That was when I committed the gravest error of my existence.”
Liddell spoke with profound regret as he revisited his long-standing mistake.
“Observing his mathematical scholarship and his manner with children, I entrusted him with my daughter’s education. Subsequently, he visited our estate weekly to engage with the sisters. While he maintained distance from the three brothers, he cultivated a profound closeness with the three sisters. He displayed particular partiality toward Alice, the second daughter. I comprehend why. In those days, she was truly a luminous presence. Children are often likened to angels, but after beholding her, none could employ that comparison carelessly. After witnessing a truly angelic child, all others appeared as mere imps by comparison.”
As if recalling that distant time, Liddell’s wrinkled lips trembled perceptibly.
Then, the face that had momentarily glowed with happiness was once again shrouded in a profound darkness. With grave solemnity, he declared:
“Professor Herbert, what I am about to relate will sound like nothing more than preposterous fantasy. But since you have come seeking this truth, I shall divulge it. Whether you find it credible is entirely at your discretion. However, before I proceed, I must extract one promise from you. For the sake of the Liddell family’s honor, and indeed for the preservation of your own, swear that you will maintain absolute silence regarding everything you witness and hear within these walls. Can you pledge this?”
His countenance bore the imprint of an ancient dread. He was not merely cautioning me—he genuinely feared for my wellbeing. Confronted with such authentic concern, I responded with equal gravity.
“I swear it.”
“Then I shall reveal all. About Charles Luttwidge Dodgson, that fiend who styled himself Lewis Carroll, and how he systematically devastated our family.”
Henry George Liddell’s eyes grew misty as the aged gentleman’s gaze traversed backward through the corridors of time, retreating a decade into the shadows of the past.