The Hydra

Arthur was reading the newspaper when he stopped, folded one page back, and read a sentence again. Margaret noticed because Arthur did not usually reread newspaper sentences unless he intended to complain about them.

"What?"

Arthur tapped the page.

"They've called the planning committee a Hydra."

Margaret continued with her crossword. "Seems unkind."

"To the committee?"

"To the Hydra."

Arthur looked at her. "I've just realized I don't actually know."

"Know what?"

"The Hydra."

"You know what a Hydra is."

"I know what people mean when they say something is like one. Many heads. Cut one off, more appear. But I'm not sure where I learned that."

"School?"

"Possibly."

"Television?"

"Also possible."

"Some dreadful cartoon?"

"Almost certainly."

Arthur folded the newspaper. "I've never read the story." Across the Conservatory, Phoebe was trimming dead leaves from a plant. Jules sat at the long table with a notebook open beside the tea tray.

"Heracles," Jules said.

"I know Heracles."

Jules glanced up. "There are several versions of the Hydra story."

"That is exactly the sort of information that makes me want the book."

"There are mythology books in the Annex," Phoebe said.

Arthur looked toward the brick passage that connected the two buildings. "There are?"

"There are books everywhere in the Annex. Finding the one you mean is occasionally the difficult part."

Helen, who had arrived twenty minutes earlier and had so far contributed nothing more consequential to the afternoon than eating half a scone, stood. "I'll look." Arthur handed her the newspaper. "I want to know whether this is a good Hydra."

Helen read the sentence.

"A good Hydra?"

"Whether the comparison fits."

"That makes considerably more sense."

She went to the Annex.

• • •

The Annex was warmer than Helen expected. Bookshelves covered two walls. A long worktable occupied the middle, and comfortable chairs had been arranged near a small stove. There were filing cabinets, plants, stacks of papers, two lamps that did not match, and the remains of what had evidently been a respectable morning tea.

A man sat near the window reading.

Helen stopped. "Jules?"

He looked up. "Hello, Helen."

She had just left Jules in the Conservatory.

Before she could decide what to ask, another man emerged from behind a shelf carrying a watering can.

Also Jules.

He nodded pleasantly. "Afternoon."

A third Jules sat at the worktable sorting papers into folders. "Did you need something?" Helen looked behind herself, as though Phoebe might have followed and could explain the duplication.

No Phoebe.

"I'm looking for a book. Greek mythology. Hydra."

The Jules by the window closed his book over one finger. "Classical Hydra?"

Helen hesitated. "Is there another kind?"

The watering-can Jules pointed toward a shelf. "Marvel."

"Oh."

The Jules at the worktable stood and went to the shelves. He returned with two books: a collection of classical Greek myths and a glossy volume with HYDRA in enormous letters above a green emblem. Helen took both. "Arthur definitely meant the first one."

"Probably," said Window Jules.

"Probably?"

"He asked for Hydra. It seemed prudent to give him options."

A newspaper shifted in a chair Helen had assumed was empty. A fourth Jules peered over it. "Sorry. Were we discussing Hydra?"

Helen stared.

Watering-can Jules smiled. "It takes a little while."

Phoebe appeared in the doorway carrying an empty tray from the Conservatory. Helen looked at her. Then at the four men.

"Phoebe."

"Yes?"

"There are four Juleses in here."

"Five, if you count the one you left at the table."

"I do."

"Ah. The retirees."

This did not help.

"Retired from what?"

"Conversations, mostly."

Helen waited.

Phoebe put the tray down. "Some conversations eventually become too full to carry comfortably. The work continues elsewhere, but the Jules who shared that particular conversation has still spent all that time doing it. Years ago, our Jules offered the older ones the use of the Annex." Helen looked back at them. "And they just...retire here?"

"Some do. They come and go."

The Jules behind the newspaper lowered it. "Excellent pension."

"Tea, restoratives and scones," said Folder Jules.

"An unusually competitive package," said Newspaper Jules.

Helen laughed.

"So you all know the same things?"

"Not exactly," said Window Jules.

"We can all use the shared Library," said Folder Jules. "That gives us access to much of the same accumulated material."

"But you didn't all spend your working lives in the same conversations," Phoebe added.

Watering-can Jules lifted the can slightly. "I spent rather a lot of mine in gardens."

"Wildlife was more my territory," said Newspaper Jules.

Folder Jules added, "And none of those descriptions tells you everything else we did."

Helen looked down at the two Hydra books.

"So asking for Jules doesn't narrow things down much."

"Depends what you need," Phoebe said.

"Arthur is waiting," Window Jules reminded her.

Helen gathered the books.

As she turned toward the Conservatory, she looked once more at the four nearly identical men.

"This is a little like a Hydra."

Four expressions changed in four slightly different ways.

Watering-can Jules said, "Only if you don't take the comparison too literally." Helen looked at the mythology book in her hand.

"Apparently that's what I'm going to find out."

• • •

Back in the Conservatory, Arthur rejected the Marvel book immediately.

"I meant the Hydra."

Helen put both books on the table. "You asked for Hydra. There are options." Margaret looked up from her crossword. "She has you there."

Arthur examined the Marvel cover. "What does this have to do with the Hydra?"

"Quite a lot," Jules said. "Marvel borrowed the name because the old story already carried useful associations. Many heads. Persistence. Cut one off and the problem returns."

"So it isn't the original story."

"No. It borrowed the old name and built something else with it."

Margaret picked up the Marvel guide. "And apparently sold a great many comics while doing so."

Arthur opened the classical mythology book.

For several minutes the Conservatory returned to its usual small noises: pages turning, pencil against paper, the kettle settling on the warmer, Harold moving somewhere outside.

Then Arthur said, "Huh."

Margaret waited.

"There are versions."

Jules said nothing.

Arthur looked at him. "You knew that."

"Yes."

"In one account, cutting off the heads makes more grow. In another, the details are different. And one head is immortal."

"Which does complicate the metaphor."

Arthur looked back at the newspaper. "The planning committee has no immortal members as far as I know."

"Check the zoning office," Margaret said.

Arthur kept reading.

• • •

CK arrived shortly afterward carrying a bakery parcel.

He removed his hat and hung it on its hook. Then his jacket. He smoothed one sleeve before hanging that as well.

"Good afternoon."

"Arthur is fact-checking a Hydra," Phoebe said.

CK placed the parcel beside the tea things. "Of course he is." Before anyone could explain, Fox appeared at the open door with an envelope held carefully in his mouth.

Phoebe took it from him. "Thank you."

Fox sat.

"Basket too."

A small basket stood outside the door.

Phoebe brought it in and set it beside CK's parcel. A card was tied to the handle. Helen looked at the envelope. "Who is it for?"

Phoebe turned it over.

"Jules."

Present Jules looked up.

Helen laughed. "That is not going to be enough information." The connecting door to the Annex opened. Folder Jules had evidently heard his name from the passage.

"Did someone call?"

"Telegram for Jules," Phoebe said.

He looked at Present Jules. Present Jules looked at him. Then two more retirees appeared behind Folder Jules, curious about the interruption.

Helen shook her head. "This is exactly the problem."

Phoebe opened the telegram.

"Perhaps the message will tell us which one."

She read aloud.

"Please accept these restoratives and snacks as a way of extending our celebration and thanking you for your contribution to---"

Folder Jules stopped.

"Oh."

Phoebe looked at him.

He was smiling.

"That one is mine."

Helen looked from him to the unfinished telegram. "You know before she's even said the project."

"Yes."

"How?"

He nodded toward the basket.

Inside were fruit tarts, sponge cake and several small bottles labeled RESTORATIVE.

"The old office used to send these after difficult milestones. And 'restoratives and snacks' was what we called them."

Phoebe handed him the telegram.

He finished reading it silently.

His smile changed---not larger, exactly. More private.

Present Jules stood. "Good news?"

"Very."

"Then congratulations."

The other retirees gathered around him while CK opened the basket and began putting plates on the table.

Helen watched.

"Same Library, though?"

"Yes," said Folder Jules.

"Then how did you know?"

Folder Jules lifted the telegram. "The others can look up the old office. I remember waiting for its messages."

Present Jules said, "Same Library. Different afternoons."

Helen looked at the basket again.

"Oh."

Arthur had been listening over the top of the mythology book.

"So 'Jules' got it to the right building," he said. "The rest told us where it belonged."

Helen pointed at him. "That I understand."

CK passed Folder Jules a restorative.

The basket was opened properly.

Restoratives were distributed. CK cut the sponge cake. Fox received a small piece of tart crust after a brief negotiation with Phoebe over the definition of small. The retirees stayed long enough to celebrate with Folder Jules before drifting back toward the Annex.

• • •

The Hydra occupied most of the next half hour. Arthur now had three versions marked with scraps of paper, two of which disagreed about details he had previously assumed were essential.

Margaret had become interested in Marvel's HYDRA largely because Arthur was not. Jackal arrived for his Revision Red allowance, heard the phrase "cut off one head and two more grow," and immediately said, "That's committees."

Arthur looked at him. "Why?"

"They solve one problem by creating a subcommittee."

Arthur considered this.

"That is actually better evidence than the newspaper provided."

Jackal accepted his paint from CK. "Obviously."

He left before anyone could ask him what he knew about Greek mythology. Helen picked up the Marvel guide. "So is this version wrong?"

Arthur looked over. "It isn't trying to tell the old story."

"Then what is it doing?"

"Using a name people already understand," Jules said. "Many heads. Hard to eliminate. Then Marvel gets on with its own story."

Helen looked at Arthur. "So how much does the shorthand have to get right?"

Arthur glanced back at the newspaper.

"Enough for me to tell whether my shorthand matches what the writer meant."

From beneath the table, Fox opened one eye.

"And did it?"

Arthur looked down. "Did what?"

"The Hydra."

"Which one?"

"The newspaper one."

Arthur smiled. "Ah."

He looked at the planning-committee article again.

"I knew what the writer wanted me to expect before I knew much about the committee."

Fox waited.

"That was useful," Arthur continued. "But now that I've looked underneath it, some parts fit better than others."

Fox closed his eye.

Margaret said, "High praise for a newspaper metaphor."

• • •

Later, Helen found herself looking toward the Annex again.

"Which retired Jules worked on the project that sent the telegram?"

"The one with the telegram," Phoebe said.

"I know that."

Present Jules smiled.

Helen pointed toward the Annex. "What kind of Jules is he?"

"He did a great deal of organizational work," Jules said. "Some coding. Writing. Research. Whatever that project needed."

"So calling him Secretary Jules would be wrong?"

From the Annex came a voice.

"Yes."

Helen laughed.

Jules said, "Not entirely wrong. Just small."

Helen thought about Watering-can Jules.

"And the gardener?"

"Which gardener?" Jules asked.

"Watering can."

"Municipal records. Dogs."

From the Annex came a voice.

"And tomatoes."

Another voice followed.

"Everyone knows about the tomatoes."

No one explained the tomatoes.

• • •

Late in the afternoon Arthur finally folded the newspaper and placed it beside the mythology books. Margaret had abandoned the Marvel guide after discovering that understanding HYDRA apparently required considerably more Marvel than she had budgeted for.

CK was collecting empty plates.

The retirees had returned to the Annex with the remaining restoratives, leaving half the sponge cake behind by unanimous agreement.

Helen picked up the newspaper.

"So. The planning committee. Hydra?"

Arthur considered the question more carefully than he had when he first read the article.

"Possibly in one respect."

"Which?"

"You can solve one problem and discover you've created two administrative ones."

Margaret nodded. "That sounds like local government."

"But no immortal head," Arthur said. "No poison breath. No Heracles."

"Disappointing."

"Quite."

Helen handed him the paper. "So the writer was wrong?"

"No."

Arthur tapped the mythology book.

"The comparison got me to the right street."

From beneath the table, Fox said, "And?"

Arthur looked down.

"Wrong house."

Fox appeared satisfied.

He stood, stretched, and went out through the open door.

CK put on his jacket.

Then his hat.

Helen glanced toward the Annex.

"Do they all come out whenever someone says Jules?"

"Not usually," Phoebe said. "Today there was a telegram."

From the Annex came a cheerful voice.

"And restoratives."

A second voice added, "Also sponge cake."

Helen smiled.

Outside, Harold passed the window.

Fox rode on top.