Newton's Cannon (37 page)

“Very well,” the philosopher said. “I will save my lecture on the ancients for another time. But while I have been locked in here with them, I have learned some things. You see my captive malakus and the aegis I wear. I have not been idle or completely mad. Tell them all this, Mr. Franklin. I choose you to be my messenger because you are new; you are the only one I do not suspect.” He stood and walked toward Ben, who found he had to close his eyes to keep from wobbling.

A warm, smooth hand took his own.

“Unclench your fingers and take this,” the magus said.

Something round and cool was pressed into his palm.

“Take this with you. One of you will understand what to do with it. Now turn around and go out. Wait to open your eyes until you turn, or you may lose your balance.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Thank you, Mr. Franklin. I will see you again. But next time I will visit the society at Crane Court.”

“When shall we expect you, sir?”

“You will not, I hope,” Newton replied.

“What of the orrery?”

“The wheels of the court move slowly. I shall register an objection by letter today. That will slow things a week or so.”

“Can't we stop them from taking it?”

“No. But it doesn't matter.”

“Sir?”

“It doesn't matter,”
Newton bellowed.
“Now go!”

Ben met the others at the Grecian at twenty after four—a bit late. They sat at the same table in nearly the same places as when he had first seen them.

“Well, here approaches the apprentice,” Voltaire called out, raising his bowl of coffee.

“Have a seat, Ben,” Maclaurin said. “Since you are informed of the situation, I've told the rest.”

“What will Newton do?” Heath demanded. “You did speak to him, didn't you?”

“Yes,” Ben answered. “He said that he was going to send a letter of protest today.”

“Did he?” Maclaurin asked. “He seemed …
lucid
, then?”

“More so than when last we spoke,” Ben said cautiously. “Still, he said the orrery doesn't matter—that he will see that we keep it another week or so, but that after that he didn't care.”

“Why another week?” Vasilisa asked.

Ben threw up his hands. “He didn't say. He talked about history and creatures he called malakim—”

“Malakim?”Voltaire interrupted. “A Hebrew word for angels or genies or what have you.”

Vasilisa's gaze flicked to Ben, and for an instant his heartsickness was forgotten as he remembered their conversation about such creatures. And was he imagining it, or did he see a warning there also?

“Sir Isaac often riddles at such things,” Stirling said. “He believes such references in the Bible and other ancient books to be ciphers of a sort, cryptic ways of speaking of natural law. For him, malakim might mean the heavenly bodies or the forces that govern such bodies.”

Ben remembered that thing atop the pyramid and knew that Stirling was wrong, but Vasilisa's implied warning had its effect, and he swallowed the explanation of what he had witnessed.

“You know,” Voltaire said, “I once knew a fellow who claimed to have seen an angel. A pious fellow who never failed to repent after taking a mistress or losing at cards. He had discovered the key to opening the mind, you see—as an alchemist opens metal—and his elixir was, I believe, of one third brandy, a second part arak, another third wine—and a fourth third more brandy—”

“Voltaire, dear, does this story have a point?” Vasilisa asked.

“Only,” Voltaire said, “that we are taking this perhaps too seriously.”

“Which ‘this’ would that be?” Heath snapped. “Our orrery being stolen or our mentor and benefactor being mad?”

Voltaire regarded Heath levelly and said, “This angel came
to my friend. He had six wings, but no head nor ass nor genitalia, and he resembled nothing at all, and he glowed like a lantern. He told my friend not to despair, because all was for the best. ‘Horses are made to be ridden,’ it said, ‘and so you ride them. Feet are made to wear boots, and so you have boots. You were made to contain vast quantities of wine and to empty your pockets and consort with the meanest of women, and you are admirably good at it. So have pity on yourself and cease basting in guilt!’”

“And what became of your friend?” Stirling asked.

“Oh, well, a few days after his celestial visitation, he was quite enthusiastically investigating the inner workings of a certain lady when her husband arrived home. My friend explained to the husband that married men were admirably suited to be cuckolded, that he had done his job quite well, and that he should be proud to be a part of such a lovely and orderly universe.”

“To which the husband replied?” Vasilisa asked.

“With a musket ball. The postscript is that skulls are wonderfully suited to being perforated by musket balls.”

“And this Aesop's fable tells us what?” Maclaurin asked.

“My friends, I only suggest that the usefulness of our philosophies is limited by our own powers of reason and sense. As I have admitted, I am no scientific man. But we cannot judge such as Newton on such scanty evidence as we have before us. What is mad is to think that because his behaviors seem to suit our image of madness, we are right.”

“But the orrery!” Heath groaned.

“There
is
more,” Ben said.

“Oh?” Maclaurin and then the rest turned back to him.

“Three things more. First, he said to tell you he has not been idle. He has invented a number of things. One was something he called an aegis. It made him appear blurry, hard to look at—”

“The aegis is a sort of impenetrable armor the goddess Athena wore,” Voltaire volunteered.

“Go on, Ben,” Maclaurin encouraged.

“He believes that someone is trying to kill him.”
As someone tried to kill me
, he understood suddenly.
What do he and I have in common?

“Someone?” Stirling asked.

“Yes. He apparently once suspected everyone, but now— you must all forgive me, he
told
me to say this—he says to tell you all he knows now who it is.”

There was a general uproar, but Vasilisa banged on the table with her fist, silencing them. “Wait,” she said. “Benjamin, is that exactly how he said it?”

Ben thought about it. “I don't think so.”

“He did not imply that it was one of us?”

“Oh. Why no, I suppose he didn't. It's just from the way he was going on, I thought—”

“Think carefully,” Maclaurin said. “Don't let anyone lead you on. Did he imply that he suspects one of us of trying to murder him?”

Ben closed his eyes, relived the conversation as best he could. “No. He once suspected all of you, and Halley, and Flamsteed and John Locke—”

“Those last two are dead,” Heath growled. “Mad!”

“He said himself he had been ill,” Ben told them, “but now he seems to think he is well again.”

“To his health, then,” Voltaire said, lifting his bowl. The others imitated him a bit distractedly.

“There was one more thing, Ben?” Maclaurin inquired.

“Yes. This.” He withdrew the sphere from his pocket and handed it to Maclaurin.

“He said that one of us would know what to do with it.”

Maclaurin gave the object a long, thoughtful look. It was no larger than a marble but was oblong. Ben had examined it closely on the walk to the Grecian. Inscribed on its metallic surface were seven sets of three digits, each punctuated by an alchemical symbol, and a single set of two digits set apart in a square.

Each of the philosophers examined the object in turn, as Ben watched their faces carefully.

“Do any of you know what it is?” Ben asked, as Stirling, the last, turned it over in his palm.

Each answered in the negative.

“Well,” Ben said, trying as best he could to quash the flood of self-satisfaction that seemed to expand in his chest like a new heart, “
I
do.”

Adrienne woke with a start as her sedan chair thumped suddenly to the ground. She blinked at the scene before her, trying to recall where she was. To her left, a number of men and women were dismounting. To her right was the king in his sedan chair, waving for her attention. He let down the window, signaling for her to do the same.

“I shall be commanding a regiment personally,” he informed her, smiled, and then signaled his bearers to pick up and move on down the hill.

A vast meadow spread out before them. On the field marched two armies.

Yes, she remembered now. She had managed four hours of sleep before the king had sent for her. On a whim, he had decided to recreate one of the more famous early battles of the war. Once she might have thought such a spectacle interesting; now it seemed perverse. Her sedan chair was stiflingly hot. She signed for her servants to open the door.

The king was halfway down the hill, his chair and bearers looking like a fat, gilded beetle.

Standing was better; a breeze soughed through the elm, oak, and maple along the ridge of the hill. The court began entrenching itself around her, their servants spreading blankets, opening wine, and erecting tents and sunshades.

“Shall we set out your tabouret, Mademoiselle?” Helen asked.

“No, thank you, Helen. I should like to walk along toward the forest a bit. If you could inform the guard?” Then, not waiting for them, she began to stroll that way.

She could not keep Crecy's pronouncements out of her mind.
If the creatures of tale and legend had some scientific basis, then what was it? The stories she remembered often took place in deep forests. Auberon and his fey followers held court in sunless places. But what
she
had seen had been in
Versailles
, and it had been a thing of fire and air. Could life be built of such insubstantial stuff? Could such animalcules as could be seen through microscopes form into something like that?

Four Swiss Guards ran to catch up with her, and Nicolas, who was among them, shot her a dour look. The sight of him cheered her a bit.

Then she noticed that Torcy was on a path to intersect her, one guardsman and a young valet coming close behind.

“Good morning, dear Demoiselle,” he greeted her, kissing her hand. “I notice that you seek a somewhat different perspective on the king's battle. See, he has just reached his command.”

Adrienne followed Torcy's indicating finger, and there Louis was, stepping out of his chair. When one was near Louis, he seemed a giant, towering above all others. At several hundred yards, he could be seen for what he was: a short fat man. For a score of heartbeats, she pitied him. He was so convinced of his youth and health, so sure that she must find him as beautiful as he had once been, the man shown in glorious portraits. From her present view, he looked so vulnerable …

And then he
moved
. There was something so unlovable, so unsympathetic about his calculated, pompous motions that she almost shuddered.

She had almost forgotten that Torcy was there. “I am sorry, sir,” she told him. “My mind wanders a bit today.”

“Understandable,” he said. “Considering.”

“Considering?”

He smiled his wolfish smile. “I wonder if our servants might spread a blanket for us? I could then explain to you the maneuvers on the field.” He gracefully twisted his hand to indicate the “armies” below, but she had a chill feeling that he meant a different field, different maneuvers.

“That sounds lovely,” she said.

Within moments, a small pavilion had been erected for them,
as down below the flam of drums and the wild piping of hautboys signaled the battle had begun. Two lines of infantry advanced, and suddenly smoke bloomed from their rifles. The enfeebled bark of gunfire reached them a moment later, as if from a world away.

“Watch for the Light Horse to sweep in from the side in a few moments,” Torcy commented.

“Very well.”

Torcy waved the servants away.

“You have been a very busy young woman.”

“My wedding is approaching.”

“Yes, which is why I found it odd that you should be engaging in such precocious adventures, my dear. Posing as an Austrian baron? Breaking into Monsieur de Duillier's rooms?”

Adrienne knew she was still smiling. Aside from a small chill, she felt fine, her thinking seemed clear.

“What evidence do you have for these accusations, Monsieur?” she asked sweetly.

He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a bundle of letters. “These are the signed accounts of witnesses: guards who were bribed, servants who witnessed certain things. A number of people can swear that both you and your lady-in-waiting were at the Palais Royal. One of my agents followed you to de Duillier's apartments.”

Adrienne stared intently at the field. Horsemen in blue and gray uniforms were closing in upon one of the lines of infantry, but suddenly their horses were shying from a string of explosions; from the body of the infantry had stepped a group of tall, lanky men wearing floppy, unbrimmed hats. They had muskets slung on their backs, but they were hurling something.

“Grenadiers,” Torcy clarified.

“They have strange hats.”

“If they wore brims, they would knock their hats off when they unslung their muskets. I notice that you make no attempt to deny my accusations.”

“I do not
dignify
your accusations,” Adrienne replied.

“I prefer to think that even after all you have been through— after all of the poor judgment you have exercised and the evil
influences that have beset you—that you still prefer not to dissemble.”

“You are free to believe that.”

“Mademoiselle, I have not passed on what I know to the king, or Bontemps, or anyone else.”

Adrienne turned to face the minister. “And what could
that
possibly mean?”

“It means, Mademoiselle, that I would like your cooperation in a certain matter.”

“Well,” Adrienne said, in as pleasant a tone as she could muster, “I would not think that the marquis of Torcy would be second in anything, but I have been proved wrong, for anything you might want of me, someone else has already inquired after. You wish my virginity? Oh, I
am
sorry, but the king has taken that. You wish my soul? A pity, for it has been purchased. Surely not my heart, for as you know, that is not mine to give. But if you want to fuck what has already been used, I can accommodate you. If you wish to rent a share of a soul already transacted to others, by all means, lease it. My heart, I fear, I have no control of, but I am certain that I can act the part of a lover well enough.”