Skimming Stones 

I was fortunate enough some years ago to have secured a position at the University of Charlottesville. Despite my project proposal being somewhat unique the Dean had decided it showed promise. He would fund the theoretical research and support me in getting peer reviews for my work. The offer was a fair one besides which the Dean had Danish forebears and had decided a Dane who had a dog with an amusing name who had predicated his choice of university based on his love of fauna deserved a few breaks. 

The position came with an elegant wooden clad house on the edge of town and a modest living allowance which enabled me to purchase a battered Ford pick-up for camping trips into the rugged Virginia countryside. In return I was required to teach a poorly attended physics class, a role the University had struggled to fill. I quickly settled in while we waited for my reference letters to catch up with me. I don't think they ever arrived but as my publications began to garner interest from the international science community the University stopped chasing me. 

The woods of New England in the Fall bring back the drifting memories of my childhood. The forests that crowded our home like rolling clouds around a mountain top still hold their allure despite the passing of the years where the logic of adulthood should have subsumed the dreams of infancy. New England with its canopies of startlingly blue skies fringed with boughs crowded with turning colours, deep still lakes that grab the scenery around them and thrust it back into the wide open sky. Leaf strewn paths piled high with curling golden fringed leaves, shaded roots crowded with fungi displaying delicate filigreed undersides and wearing shiny waxen red warning coats. Here, alone, I can open my arms wide, throw my head back and spin my body round, sucking in the Kaleidoscope of dappled pools of mercurial light and the sun drenched colours of the passing of the seasons. The ethereal brightness, the smell, the stinging sharpness of the New England air are an elixir to me to be drawn deep into myself to evoke pleasures made distant by time itself. 

On weekends I take my leisure. I walk my dog through the autumnal leaves, allowing my ideas to reflect back to me off the flat lake waters and take solace in the gentle flow of the season's lengthening shadows thrown down by the simmering glow of the retreating sun. 

Sunday afternoon.  

I park my truck on Oakland Ridge and drift down the little used track to the lakes in the bowl. I'm alone in the woods apart from Asker my spaniel who runs ahead checking for squirrels to surprise and sticks suitable to throw into the lakes. A map, compass, knapsack are enough to ensure she and I are left alone to our thoughts.  

Ahead of me a solitary figure appears, standing immobile by the path. A human milestone ready to spring into life at the bark of a dog or rustling of feet through the leaves. I stop for a moment wondering why he is so far from the road and consider for a moment taking another route.  

I nod as I approach but avoid his gaze. 

'Dr Clausen. Dr Janus Clausen?' He asks but he clearly knows who I am. 

He is an odd individual. His head is too small. He has wrapped himself up in a dark grey coat and taken care to turn his high collars up to hide the fact. He rests geniality on a walking stick. It is straight, thin, and silver tipped. He probably does not need it. 

'You have a dog. What its name?' He feels the need to fill the silence. 

Up close I can see an unfurled shirt collar and a button missing from the neat row on his coat sleeve. A thread hangs there undone. He is Hessian faced, with eyes smiling through little holes in the fabric of his skin that dart this way and that-drawn by the flickering sunlight dripping through the trees playing like quicksilver over the feathered leaves.  

'Asker.' I reply, checking my watch as if I am running late for an appointment. 

'Ask her? It talks?' He looks after Asker paddling through the waves of upturned leaves and wrinkles his creased nose. 'Oh I see it's a joke. It's named after a Norse god. Do many people fall for it?' 

'Not in Denmark.' I remark dryly. 

Asker sniffs the odd man, wags her tail and then sets off rummaging in the undergrowth. Searching for elusive treasures.  

He's passed Askers test so I suppose I should talk to him. Asker is a good judge of character. 

'Yes, I'm Clausen.' I sound tired in the hope of discouraging any further conversation. 

'Abolt Merryweather.' He seems less certain about his name than mine but thrusts out his hand in an attempt to persuade me and himself of its validity. 'You don't know me but I know you. I've followed your work closely over the last five years since you've arrived at the University and started publishing your work. I must say it's excellent.' 

I stare at the lake and the water dripping from the rain sodden leaves. The droplets are sucked into the surface. Ripples radiate out and interact with each other in a sympathetic geometry of troughs and peaks. I try to estimate their spread and speed but I find I'm distracted. 

'I have wanted to meet you for some time but have been somewhat uncertain.' He pauses and waits for me to respond. 'You are somewhat of a recluse, don't mix well with the others. Not married. You are probably not interested in such things are you Dr Clausen? Most men with brilliant minds aren't.' 

'I have Asker, she does my socialising for me. She carries her responsibilities well.' 

'I wanted to meet you before I left. To tell you about my work.' He waves his walking stick down the path. 'I am writing a thesis. It's called Breaking the Mould. It theorises that nature throws up individuals of great intellect when civilisation requires it. Whether the need be a threat or need of technological advancement nature senses it and produces a single individual to meet the need. This process can lead to great leaps in advances in science. It allows races to evolve quickly when the situation demands. I believe nature has thrown up you. You will become that individual of your age Dr Clausen and make one of the greatest discoveries ever for your kind. In fact I've staked my reputation on it.' 

Asker has found a root that does not intend to come quietly. Crushingly it like bones between her teeth she persuades it to relinquish its hold. The noise jars in my head. I turn to walk along the path. 

'Your work on molecular bonding in water is riveting. In three years, if you stay on course it will lead to the one of the greatest discoveries this planet has ever seen. Cheap clean, replenishable energy. Fossil fuels will become outmoded, a grubby relic of your industrialised past. You will do your Earths peoples a great service.' 

I swing round and bear down on his mottled face. 'How can you know that?' 

He pauses and taps his cane on a weathered tree trunk. It has a silver handle in the shape of a gorgon's head. 'Do you believe in aliens Dr Clausen?' 

I look to the sky for my answer. 'Yes as it happens I do.' 

'You have summed up the probabilities and arrived at the correct answer. Perhaps the more salient question is, that given the vast distances of space do you believe that any one of the multitude of races out there could ever get here? There are certain issues to be addressed on that point that are hard to bridge given your current understanding of physics.' 

I shrug my shoulders. 'It isn't of interest to me. It's not my area.' 

'Today I'm going home to my own planet to present the first part of my thesis. When I come back I'll continue my studies on your society to understand the impact of the discovery I foresee you will make. I believe this work, you, will validate my theory. Think of Gutenberg, Newton, Tesla, Watt, Turing, Edison, Da Vinci, Einstein, Bohr. Like them I anticipate your contribution to the advancement of mankind will be extraordinary.  

He follows me as he talks to me, to the edge of the lake. I turn and look back. There is a trail of four footprints in the mud, two times two. The pricks in the mud that mark the progress of his cane are like a one footed animal. It looks unbalanced. I want to take his cane, walk back and add an extra set of prints to balance it up. I walk away. 

He calls after me. 'Like many great men you are uncertain of yourself. I wonder how connected you are to this world, do you see what your fellows see, feel what they feel. That remoteness, disconectivity that is that the source of your brilliance above your fellow man? Don't worry that they don't see it yet, they soon will do, that astounding intellect of yours. The sad thing is despite what you are soon to do I fear you'll die without ever truly understanding what you have done for your civilization. That is why I have come, to let you know others are watching and they value your life's contribution to this planet. Always remember this for we will not meet again.' 

We are by the lake. Beneath the shimmering surface is a darkness in its depths that eats it from the inside. He catches me up. 

The missing button and hanging thread are bothering me. 

'Are you surprised by what I've told you?' 

'Surprised? No not at all. I'm sure it's all true.'  

'I understand. My story is a too far-fetched. You are humouring an old man but I'm not as old as I might appear. You are an intellectual, you need proof. I can see that. The old man and the alien are hard to draw together.' He rummages through the leaves and picks up a couple of smooth round black pebbles. 'Are you familiar with the game skimming stones?' 

'I don't need proof. Really I don't. ' I whistle to Asker and urge her off down the path. 

He holds his hand up. 'No, no please Doctor. Stay for one moment. I'm happy to do this so don't be embarrassed on my behalf. Do you know the game, yes?' 

'The current record is fifty one skips, set by Russell Byars on July 19, 2007 in the Allegheny River, near Pittsburgh.' I should not have given that up. 

'You have an eidetic memory I know. A bit of a burden isn't it. Hard to block things out. I have one myself. It's common where I come from but you are lucky as it is relatively rare here. I'm glad you are making good use of it.'  

He waves his stick at the lake. Its end has impaled a leaf that shudders and flaps like a dying bird as he swings it through the air. 

He continues. He has not seen the stuck leaf. 'Of course you'd probably know that fact anyway with your work on water. I believe you're correct. Skipping stones are a bit of a hobby for me. Like you I have a fascination with water. We have no real parallel at home. So do you think you could beat me? The optimal angle is 19.8 degrees between the stone and surface and speed and rotation are factors if that helps you.' 

I look at his bent frame, his walking stick and spin the pebble in my hand. I've not played the game since I was young. I weigh the stone and think of home.  

He smiles the smile of the knowing. The smile of the victor.  

We watch the stones skip across the water like swallows catching mayflies. 

He manages sixty two. 

I beat him by five. 

'I wish you'd told me when we first met.' He mutters angrily and stalks back up the path. He stops, turns and shouts. 'Now I wonder about the others.'