As she lingers alone in Downing’s shop amidst the woodsy scent of sweet cedar oils, of wet skin, fur and feathers, of salt of tartar, of palm wine, of chalky plasters, earth-and-water clays, of any number of preservative soaps and astringents, powders and lime, it is the recognition of the rosemary pine-musk of camphor, the familiar stink which always emanated from Richard, that at last gives Rebecca Ostlet the courage she needs to turn away from the vixen.
It is two o’clock. The sun pours relentless into Titus Downing’s shop, casting onto the face of the aardvark a wide and clean arm of new light.
The face, she finds, whiskered all the way down the snout, is soft, its mien kindly looking, so similar to what she often sees in the Brontës after they’ve eaten their dinner. The aardvark’s hide gleams yellow-pink at the top, brown at the bottom, and whispers of dark fur launch out from the back of the thick legs—plantigrade at the front, digitigrade at the back—in sharp contrast to the ears, so broad, so thin that the sunlight shines through them, instantly reminding Rebecca Ostlet of the peach-colored inner fold of a tremendous conch that Richard brought home for her from the Galapagos, and suddenly standing among the Gentlemen all silently Viewing the aardvark, Rebecca feels, for a moment, a brand-new kind of reverence. Her own gender washes out of her. She is not a woman among men but a human among humans, and imagines the Gentlemen feel the same way: it is a kind of collective prayer for this ridiculous creature with the ears of a rabbit, the snout of a pig, and with that one hoof-claw raised, it absolutely does look awake, alive, as though it might walk straight off its mount!
More, there is something familiar about the creature that Rebecca Ostlet has observed: something in the flat space of its forehead, she thinks, which is low and roomy, or perhaps in the way Downing has positioned the eyelids so they appear to hammock the eyes, and the kindness in the expression, she thinks, is a shock, it almost looks human, which is strikingly odd against the rolling, furry back arched up to bear the weight of its incredulous belly, so round—yet when she lifts one hand to stroke it, as she has done with the vixen, a Gentleman moos:
“Madam, I wouldn’t do that.”
Twelve dark-suited men encircle the aardvark. Their hands are in their pockets. They have Viewed her not reverently but soberly, without generosity or even amusement.
“Don’t touch it,” the man says. “It’s indecent.”
“Vulgar,” says another.
A third Gentleman nods. “Quite right, John. Quite right.”
In turns, the aardvark is called by each man “obscene.” It is “an abomination,” like something discovered in some cave of some unholy world, but the men in their suits are not scientists, Rebecca remembers, they are just rich—they cannot love what they do not understand, and they only understand money—and as it is such a very hot day, outfitted as they are in formal wool suits, the men’s cheeks flush, they grow testy, any mild discomfort, they believe, is a slight against their god-given status, so within the aardvark, they cannot see beauty; in fact, she seems to be mocking them as long beads of sweat slide down their temples, and Downing really might have thought to provide refreshments, Rebecca thinks, for his guests, for the people who have all come to stand in line in the hot sun to gaze upon an Orycteropus afer in early August in Leamington Spa. But there is nothing.