Einstein’s
Chauffeur

The podium hides half my body but it can't conceal my trembling hands. I take a deep breath, place his glasses on my nose, and look down at his notes. They are in German. I can’t read German. Why? Because I’m from Pittsburg. I shouldn’t even be up here.

I look around the amphitheatre full of researchers: there are grey heads, white heads, bald heads and young heads with alert, enthusiastic expressions. A hall full of physicists who want to learn from me. I’m a chauffeur, and I’m here to teach Relativity.

I clear my throat and take a drink of water. At the back of the amphitheatre I see a familiar figure dressed in my dark chauffeur's uniform, sitting on a stool with my cap pulled down over his eyes. Even from here I can see his white hair. He sits up and I see the quick, childish smile come across his face. He sticks his tongue out at me.

Now the crowd is becoming agitated. There is a noise of chairs moving, and I'm thinking they can smell my fear, they’ve got to know what’s up. But now my boss is smiling and I can feel his warmth right from the back of the hall.

I can’t blame him. He didn’t force me to do this. I gave him the idea and he just…persuaded me. I’ve been driving him for a couple of months now, and one thing I can tell you for certain, it’s hard to say no to the professor. Just last week, as I was driving Professor Einstein back from a conference in Baltimore, I remember his calm Austrian accent coming from the back of the car.

“Harry, did you enjoy the speech I made this evening?”

“Oh, absolutely, sir.”

“Yes…I saw that you were enjoying it. I had a very good view.”

“Sir?”

“It appears to me that you were in a state of repose at the back of the auditorium. Is that correct?”

I slowed down a little, and glanced up at him in the mirror.

“Repose? What do you mean, sir?”

“You were asleep, yes. That is correct, is it not?”

I took a second to think about that. There wasn’t any anger in his voice, just curiosity. I guess you’d call it a desire for knowledge. His dark eyes were watching me in the mirror.

“Well, I wouldn’t say I was asleep–”

“Harry, we have, how do you put it…we have been on the road for some months now, yes? And although for many people across America my theory is new, you have heard me explain it at least twenty times, is that correct?”

“Twenty-three times, sir.”

He chuckled and slapped his knees. “Exactly. I can see it clearly. Now, you cannot read a book twenty-three times and expect to stay interested, can you?”

“No sir, I imagine that would be difficult.”

He sat back for a few minutes and I drove on through the rain. It was an easy drive back to the hotel, but I was going slowly as I thought he had something more to say.

“Harry,” he said at last. “Am I boring?”

“Oh no, sir.”

“But my speech is boring you, yes?”

“Oh no, Mr Einstein. I wouldn’t say that at all. I guess I’ve just heard the old Theory of Relativity so many times, I could give your speech myself.”

“Really?”

For a moment I thought I’d gone too far. He sounded angry.

“Please, prove it,” he said.

“Well, sir…” I began. And I gave him his introduction, word for word. He sat back in the seat, laughing softly.

“I don’t mean to be disrespectful, sir, it’s just that I have a good memory–”

“An excellent memory,” he said. “And what about the central theme, hmm?”

I gave him the rest of the speech, without having any idea what it all meant. I even did it with an Austrian accent, as I’d spent a long time sitting at the back of conference halls mouthing out the words as he said them.

“Fascinating,” he said when I’d finished. “I couldn’t have put it any better! I can’t blame you for falling asleep. I’ve often felt a little drowsy myself, saying the same thing each time.”

“But it’s important, Mr Einstein! I’m sure lots of people hang on to your every word!”

“Yes…”

“One day it could even make you famous.”

He sat back in the seat so I couldn’t see him, and we drove on for another few minutes. Then he bounced forward, wringing his hands in his lap, his eyes wide and childish.

“Stop the car.”

I pulled over to the side of the road, and we sat for a few minutes. I remember the sound of the rain on the roof, like a hundred ticking clocks, and the shape of the physicist in the back of the cab, thinking.

“I think we can have a little fun, yes? Some refreshment. We go to Dartmouth next week…no one there knows me, not yet…no one knows what I look like. So, why not you go and give the speech, and I take a little repose at the back, yes?” He pulled at his bow tie and smiled in the dark.

I should have said no. Straight away I should have slammed the door on the idea, but Professor Einstein is one of those people it’s very difficult to refuse. More than that, he's the kind of man who’ll make you believe you can do anything. Anything I found difficult he’d just laugh away.

Over the next three days Professor Einstein spent a great deal of time explaining Relativity to me in simple terms a child might understand. He drew me pictures of a lift in a skyscraper, then one of trains pulling away from one another, and while I was no closer to understanding what the theory meant, his drive and his confidence were enough to make me agree to exchange clothes before we left the Dartmouth hotel, and he even persuaded me to let him drive us through the grounds of the university to the Physics Department.