5. Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon, pp. 125-157

One: Latitudes and Departures; 13-14

_____

Returning from seeing Dixon off, Mason encounters Maskelyne, and they fall into conversation. Mason asks, "if someone wish'd to disappear for a while, yet remain upon the Island," where would they go, and observes from Maskelyne's answer that he has "certainly thought this out." Maskelyne demurs: "No need for me to disappear. Oh, Dear, the Royal Soc's quite forgotten about old N.M., Esq. Lounging his life away waiting at the King's Expense for the Home Planet to move along." His assistant on St. Helena, Robert Waddington, had left as soon as he could after the transit took place, saying that further observations weren't in his contract. Mason agrees to help, though as Maskelyne observes, St. Helena is "not ev'ryone's Brochette of Curried Albacore, is it?" And Maskelyne's manner leaves Mason "sweating heavily, thinking, Dixon has left me alone with a dangerously insane person. And why did Waddington really have to leave so quickly?"

They go together to a tavern whose proprietor, Mr. Blackmer, is one of those people who pride themselves on knowing everything about everyone on an island where "anyone newly arriv'd is feasted upon with an eagerness match'd only in certain rivers of South America." Blackmer is, of course, delighted to point out Maskelyne as "Clive of India's brother-in-law." This celebrity allows Maskelyne "to run up a Tab, already legendary even in a hard-drinking port like this, that might finance a small War."

Then they go to the Upper Observatory, where Mason tries to get a look at the plumb-line suspension that Dixon noted was defective. But aware that Maskelyne remains touchy about his failure to observe the transit -- a cloud had appeared just before it began -- Mason tries not to irritate him. Maskelyne makes envious remarks about how Mason and Dixon had been "chosen for the Cape" -- even though it was second choice after the original Sumatran posting -- and "had the Pearl of the Lot" of places assigned for observing the transit. And he goes on about "being confin'd upon the Summit of a living Volcanoe whose History includes violent Explosion, hey? which might indeed re-awaken at any moment, with nought to escape to in that lively Event, but thousands of Leagues of Ocean, empty in ev'ry direction."

One day they visit the last orange grove left standing on the island, and Maskelyne speculates that St. Helena may have been the Earthly Paradise that St. Brendan claimed to have discovered, and that the Serpent dwells within the volcano. They talk a bit about how astronomy is confused with astrology, and Maskelyne confesses to have drawn people's charts at Cambridge for sixpence. Mason replies, "You got sixpence? I never did better than three." Maskelyne quotes Kepler as saying "that Astrology is Astronomy's wanton little sister, who goes out and sells herself that Astronomy may keep her Virtue." He offers to do Mason's chart if Mason will do his. "Mason blinks. Is it the Altitude? Hardly do to get into a Kick-up with Clive of India's brother-in-law, he supposes." And anyway, "what else is there to do in this miserable Place, but smoke Pipes and discuss God, -- as newly met guests at some Assembly might discuss a common Acquaintance but lately withdrawn?"

Maskelyne tells him that despite his relationship to Clive he rarely sees him. "He's not yet ready to make use of me, that's all. Someday he must ... I've been paid for ... it shan't cost him anything." Mason recalls how Maskelyne had written to Bradley, the astronomer royal whose assistant Mason was, and how confusing the letter was. Bradley and his wife, Susannah Peach, had only one child, a girl, though he wanted a son. And Mason recalls how "craz'd had he been after Susannah Peach." And Mason casts Maskelyne's horoscope, telling him, "Refrain from struggle, allow your Life to convey it to you when it will, and as in all else, Bob's your Uncle. Or in this case, Brother-in-Law."

Meanwhile, back in Cape Town, Dixon finds himself being shot at by Cornelius Vroom, "as if the Dutchman has decided to accept him as a fair substitute for Mason," there having been some gossip about Johanna's pursuit of Mason. They adjourn to a tavern where Cornelius recounds "the Vrooms' domestic Sadness." They then go to a brothel, where Dixon is surprised to see "Austra, in a black velvet Gown and a leather collar, being leash-led by a tiny, expressionless Malay Sylph." Cornelius refers to it as "our Garden of Amusement." One room is where "the town Madmen are kept."

Sometimes for their amusement the Herren will escort a particularly disobedient employee to a Madman's cell, push her inside, and lock the door. Next to each cell is a Viewing Room where the gentlemen may observe, through a wall of Glass disguis'd as a great Mirror, the often quite unviewable Rencontre. 

Another room is rumored to be "nine by seven feet and five inches, being with Dutch parsimony reduc'd to a quarter-size replica of the cell at Fort William, Calcutta, in which 146 Europeans were oblig'd to spend the night of 20-21 June 1756 ... the sex Entrepreneurs reasoning that the combination of Equatorial heat, sweat, and the flesh of strangers in enforc'd intimacy might be Pleasurable."

Apropos of this erotic re-creation of the Black Hole of Calcutta, Cherrycoke quotes from his journal:

 The British in India encourage the teeming populations they rule to teem as much as they like, whilst taking their land for themselves, and then restricting the parts of it the People will be permitted to teem upon. Yet hear the Cry, O Lord, when even a small Metaphor of this continental Coercion is practis'd in Reverse, as 'twas in the old B.H. of C.  "Metaphor!" you cry, -- "Sir, an hundred twenty lives were lost!" I reply, "British lives. What think you the overnight Harvest of Death is, in Calcutta alone, in Indian lives?"

When Cornelius leaves for a room he fancies, Dixon wanders about in search of Austra, but encounters only former police agent Bonk, who has resigned his position and is joining the trek to the interior. At dawn, he carries home "an equally, tho' perhaps not likewise, exhausted Cornelius." The daughters emerge to greet them, and Dixon remarks on their superstitious character.

One by one the girls have grown up believing the Vroom Clock, a long-case heirloom brought from Holland, to be a living Creature, conscious of itself, and of them, too, with its hooded Face, its heartbeat, the bearing of a solemn Messenger.... When Mason and Dixon arrived with the Ellicott Clock, the Girls assum'd it was a Traveling Companion of the Englishmen.

Now Greet warns him that since he's brought a new clock, "They think Charles and you've something to do with the Longitude" and that the clock may arouse suspicion that they have "a British State Secret." But Greet is also putting the moves on Dixon, ripping open her bodice. Dixon backs off, and she says, "Mr. Mason was never so cold." "Mason is naturally affectionate," he replies. "Tho' he appears not to to know one end of a Woman from another, yet 'tis all he thinks about, when he has a moment to think." He asks if she is going to betray him to the "Company Castle" -- i.e, the Dutch authorities. She just tells him to "Go carefully."

And in fact, Dixon is under suspicion for being "'connected dangerously,' allowing him to go on as ever at the Cape, running before any wind of Sensory delight, as the Church-Faithful carouse, Slaves conspire their Freedom, and Functionaries flee the Castle, and head for open Country." 

3, Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon, pp. 58-93

One: Latitudes and Departures; 7-9

_____

A change in plans has deposited Mason and Dixon at Cape Town, where they take rooms at a house owned by the Zeemanns, but have their meals -- because the Zeemanns' slaves have run away -- at the neighboring home of Cornelius Vroom, his wife, Johanna, and their three daughters. The Dutch mistrust Dixon "as unreliable in any white affairs here. They have noted his unconceal'd attraction to the Malays and the Black slaves, -- their Food, their Appearance, their Music, and so, it must be obvious, their desires to be deliver'd out of oppression." But Mason, the somberly dressed widower, is considered safe.

He is not safe, however, from the attentions of the Vrooms' daughters, Jet, Greet and Els. Jet, the oldest, is 16, but "Els, tho' a mere twelve by the Calendar back home, down here in the Southern World began long ago the active Pursuit of Lads twice her age, not all of them unwilling." When he finds himself alone with the girls, Jet asks him to brush her hair -- "There's a bit in back I can't reach" -- while Els sits (not very still) on his lap and say, "shall I tell you what she really wants you to do with that Hair-Brush?" Their mother enters, sends them away, and proceeds to flirt with him herself, taking note of the erection that the girls have inspired.

That night a slave girl named Austra slips into his bed. She explains that "their Wish is that I become impregnated, -- if not by you, then by one of you.... All that the Mistress prizes of you is your Whiteness, understand? Don't feel disparag'd, -- ev'ry white male who comes to this Town is approach'd by ev'ry Dutch Wife, upon the same Topick. The baby, being fairer than its mother, will fetch more upon the Market." She warns him that "the Mother will set her three Cubs upon ye without Mercy, and make her own assaults as well, all of it intended to keep this rigid with your Desire, -- and the only one in the House you'll be allowed to touch is me."

She's right about the continued efforts of the Vroom women, so Mason asks Dixon, who has been exploring the native culture, about "the various sorts of Magick, that they are said to possess." What he wants, he explains, is "Emphatickally not a Love-Potion, you understand, no, no, quite the contrary indeed." He wants something he can put in Mrs. Vroom's soup that will tame her appetites.

Dixon tries to get Mason to join him in exploring the town outside the Vrooms' house.

They do, to be sure, go out that Evening, as into various others together, in search of Lustful Adventure, but each time Mason will wreck things, scuttling hopes however sure, frightening off the Doxies with Gothickal chat of Headstones and Diseases of the Mind, swilling down great and occasionally, Dixon is told, exceptional Constantia wines with the sole purpose of getting drunk, exploding into ill-advis'd Song, losing consciousness face-first into a Variety of food and Drink, including more than one of the most exquisite karis this side of Sumatra, -- that is, proving a difficult carousing partner, block'd from simple enjoyment in too many directions for Dixon to be at all anger'd, -- rather marveling at him, as a Fair-goer might at some Curiosity of Nature. 

Mason begins to have bad dreams about being threatened by "some Presence with a Krees or Malay Dagger." He blames it on Cape Town, which he calls "one of the colonies of Hell," but Dixon disagrees, blaming Mason's dreams on "all this Malay food we're eating ev'ry day." Mason is upset that Dixon is "enjoying this miserable Viper-Plantation! Why, Damme if you're not going to miss it when we're shut of it at long last." Austra suggests that he consult "a certain Toko, a Negritoe, or Asian Pygmy, of a Malay tribe call'd the Senoi," who advises him that the dream world is as real as the waking world, and that he should ask the figure in his dream for "Some solid Gift you may bring back with you." So Mason asks the dream figure for the dagger, and is shocked to find it in bed with him the next morning. Dixon observes, "Happen 'twill be those Girls, teasing with thee....?" Which sends the two off into a heated (and very funny) dialogue.

The days until the transit pass slowly in Cape Town.

Temporally, as geographically, the End of the World. The unrelenting Vapor of debauchery here would not merely tempt a Saint, -- Heavens, 'twould tempt an Astronomer. Yet 'tis difficult, if not impossible, for these Astronomers to get down for a Chat upon the Topick of Desire, given Dixon's inability to deny or divert the Gusts that sweep him, and Mason's frequent failure, in his Melancholy, even to recognize Desire, let alone to act upon it, tho' it run up calling Ahoy Charlie.

At dinner with the Vrooms, Johanna observes that Dixon has "discovered another Cape delicacy ... our Malays call it ketjap." Dixon has brought his own bottle of to the table, where a particularly nauseous and fatty mutton is being served: "'Girls, don't even want you looking at it. Filthy Asian stuff,' Cornelius commands thro' clouds of aromatic pipe-smoke.  'Even' (puff) 'if something has to be done' (puff) 'to cover up the taste of this food.'" As is usual with ketchup, Dixon has a problem "with its slender Bottle, out of whose long neck he finds he has trouble getting the stuff to flow. 'Strike her upon the bottom,' whispers Els, 'and perhaps she will behave.' Dixon does a quick triple-take among the faces of the women, a Jocularity poised upon his Tongue but peering our warily, not quite trusting the open."

After dinner, the family retires to the porch, the Stoep, where the girls draw the attention of the local boys, whose "talk is of Roof-tops, Arch-ways, Sheds, and Warehouses -- any place secure from Traffick long enough for a Skirt to be lifted or Breeches unbuckl'd. Johanna keeps looking over at Mason, as if offering to translate."

Soon enough Mason and Dixon are desperate. Pretending astronomical Chores up at the Observatory, Bowls and Cutlery conceal'd in their Cloaks, they steal away, thinking of Oceanick Fish, African Game, hot Peppers, spices of the East. "I believe in Vibrations," declares Mason, "-- I believe, that Vibrations from that horrid family get into their food, which is difficult enough to enjoy to begin with." 

They learn that ripe mangoes will be available the next morning, and when they arrive at the market they find Cherrycoke there. The Seahorse has left him behind, explaining that Christian ministers are not welcome where they are going.

Mason finds himself trapped in an upstairs bedroom by Johanna Vroom, who tells him she has "chosen to be a very wicked woman" and starts undoing her bodice. Then Jet knocks on the door, and Mason takes the opportunity to jump out of a window. Then the rainy season begins, and Mason is trapped: Cornelius is up-country and "prevented by floods from returning" and Dixon has been rained in "across town at a certain Malay establishment." Much chasing about ensues.

The girls follow Mason and Dixon up the mountain to the observatory. "They are ascended into Africa. At some point alll note that they can no longer hear the Town. That is all it takes, to deliver them into Africa." At the observatory, which was built by the carpenter of the Seahorse, Mason takes it on himself to try to explain the nature of the transit and their observation of it.

"Thro' our whole gazing lives, Venus has been but a tiny Dot of Light, going through phases like the Moon, ever against the black face of Eternity. But on the day of this Transit, all shall suddenly reverse, -- as she is caught, dark, embodied, solid, against the face of the Sun, -- a Goddess descended from light to Matter." "And our Job," Dixon adds, "is to observe her as she transits the face of the Sun, and write down the Times as she comes and goes." 

They also explain about parallax, and the need for observations from everywhere around the world. "The Girls keep their Glances each looping 'round the others, like elaborately curl'd Tresses, trying to see if they should be understanding this, or, -- being cruel young beauties ev'ry one, -- even caring."