The Baroque Cycle - The System Of The World Part 74

Written right on the gold trial plate is the following: This standard composed of 22 carracts of fine gold, 2 carracts of alloy in the pound troy of Great Britain made the 13th day of April 1709. This standard composed of 22 carracts of fine gold, 2 carracts of alloy in the pound troy of Great Britain made the 13th day of April 1709. The late Sir Isaac Newton begged to differ-he suspected that the true numbers were more like 23 and 1, and that the goldsmiths had fixed the plate to make it more likely he'd fail the Trial-but in any case, the point is that Sir Isaac's guineas are supposed to be made almost entirely of gold, with small amounts of base metals permitted. That is to say that out of the twelve grains of guinea-shards that made up the sample, eleven grains (if the inscription on the trial plate is taken at face value) or more (if the Goldsmiths fudged it) must be pure gold. The way to verify this is chymically to separate the gold from the not-gold, then weigh the former. The Company of Goldsmiths learned, ages ago, that when an a.s.say is made in a cupel according to this receipt, the base metals in the sample will dissolve into the lead and be drawn, along with it, into the bone ash, like water into a sponge. But the pure gold will remain aloof, and form an ingot in the depression in the cupel's top. And that is what happens now, before the eyes of Daniel and all the Jurors. Though it is an everyday procedure, it seems nearly as magical, to Daniel, as what occurred a few moments ago in the sedan chair. The release of the body of pure radiant gold from the dissolving globe of lead reminds him of the dream-vision of which Princess Caroline spoke. The late Sir Isaac Newton begged to differ-he suspected that the true numbers were more like 23 and 1, and that the goldsmiths had fixed the plate to make it more likely he'd fail the Trial-but in any case, the point is that Sir Isaac's guineas are supposed to be made almost entirely of gold, with small amounts of base metals permitted. That is to say that out of the twelve grains of guinea-shards that made up the sample, eleven grains (if the inscription on the trial plate is taken at face value) or more (if the Goldsmiths fudged it) must be pure gold. The way to verify this is chymically to separate the gold from the not-gold, then weigh the former. The Company of Goldsmiths learned, ages ago, that when an a.s.say is made in a cupel according to this receipt, the base metals in the sample will dissolve into the lead and be drawn, along with it, into the bone ash, like water into a sponge. But the pure gold will remain aloof, and form an ingot in the depression in the cupel's top. And that is what happens now, before the eyes of Daniel and all the Jurors. Though it is an everyday procedure, it seems nearly as magical, to Daniel, as what occurred a few moments ago in the sedan chair. The release of the body of pure radiant gold from the dissolving globe of lead reminds him of the dream-vision of which Princess Caroline spoke.

If the a.s.say is left in the furnace for too long, the gold will evaporate and lose weight, which is not fair to the Master of the Mint. If it is not left in long enough, some base metal will remain allayed with the ingot of gold, which is not fair to the King. Knowing how long to leave it in there is a black art of the Goldsmiths, and Daniel gets the sense that William is silently polling the other eleven members of his Jury for their opinions. When a consensus seems to have been reached, he picks up the tongs again and withdraws the cupel and sets it on a brick to cool down. The lead jacket has vanished and the cupel has turned charcoal-gray. Remaining in the top of the cupel is the ingot: a tiny round lake of gold. The stars and moons that decorated Mr. Threader's black firmament have been changed by alchemy into this little sun. They need only wait for its heat to subside before they take the weight of it.

Holbourn HOLBOURN OUGHT TO BE the Valley of the Shadow of Death for Jack. Perhaps he'd see it that way if he were facing forwards, watching Tyburn creep toward him. But they've faced him the other way, towards the London he's leaving. There is intended to be a message in this: he is supposed to be looking back ruefully on his traitorous doings. But it is not working out thus. Jack is a spark dragged through a trench full of gunpowder. Far from being the Valley of the Shadow of Death, it is a roaring flume of vibrant riotous life, perfectly arrayed for viewing by Jack, and as such, a great distraction for one who really ought to be attending to his sins. the Valley of the Shadow of Death for Jack. Perhaps he'd see it that way if he were facing forwards, watching Tyburn creep toward him. But they've faced him the other way, towards the London he's leaving. There is intended to be a message in this: he is supposed to be looking back ruefully on his traitorous doings. But it is not working out thus. Jack is a spark dragged through a trench full of gunpowder. Far from being the Valley of the Shadow of Death, it is a roaring flume of vibrant riotous life, perfectly arrayed for viewing by Jack, and as such, a great distraction for one who really ought to be attending to his sins.

He does not recognize any one person in particular, but London, as an entire thing, is as familiar to him as the faces in a parish church, on Sunday morn, would be to an aged vicar. Groups are recognizable too. There's a battalion of fishwives, of approximately regimental size, who have outflanked the artillery batteries at the Bridge and, by a covert march along Chick Lane, worked their way round to the west bank of the Fleet. There they seem to have divided into companies and squads, and mustered themselves within striking-distance in such places as Saffron Hill, the Dyers' Court, the Plough-Yard, and Bleeding Heart Court. These are tributaries that empty into Holbourn along the hill that climbs up from the Fleet crossing, where the Hanging-March is doomed to move slowly. Triggered by the westward-propagating Mobb-roar, the fishwives mount vicious sallies from their nests and burst into the road, shouldering between the pikemen and the dragoons, pulling fistfuls of black coins from their ap.r.o.ns and flinging them at Jack's head. They pock the sledge like grapeshot, they ricochet and ring in the air like faery-bells. Jack rips a b.u.t.ton from his coat and underhands it to a fishwife who has actually penetrated to within a few yards of the sledge. She's too astonished to do anything but clap it out of the air. A knot of fish-guts strikes him square on the bridge of the nose. He returns fire with another golden b.u.t.ton.

Having beaten back the a.s.sault of the Fishwives' Regiment with only light casualties, they crest the hill and enter into the widest part of Holbourn, which runs for a mile to St. Giles's, pa.s.sing between diverse expensive squares, all converted from cow-pastures during Jack's lifetime. A Puritan in a black frock stands up on the street-island at Holbourn Bar, holding a Bible over his head, open to some pa.s.sage he guesses Jack should know about. Another breaks through the cordon and climbs into the sledge with Jack and gets ready to baptize him with a bucket of water he's brought along; but the Ordinary of Newgate, who's been riding in the cart, isn't having any of that. He's down on the pavement in a trice, hustling along beside the sledge, and makes a grab for the handle of the Baptismal pail. This leads to a tug-of-war, and creates enough of a diversion that a short procession of Catholics-or so he a.s.sumes, from the monks' robes they're all wearing-is able to slip in, and make itself part of the parade. One is a priest, the others are burly monks, which makes perfect sense as a lone Papist wouldn't survive for ten seconds in this crowd. The priest strides along behind the sledge, looks Jack in the eye, and begins to declaim rapidly in what Jack a.s.sumes is Latin. Jack is being given last rites! A very considerate gesture on someone's part. This tiny and intrepid Popish strike force was probably despatched by Louis XIV from a secret chapel-headquarters in a vault beneath Versailles.

The procession b.u.mps to a stop for some reason Jack can't see. Getting into the Christian spirit, he takes this opportunity to whip off his purple cape and toss it to the priest. He then indicates that the priest is to give it to a poor old woman, over yonder, who has somehow fought her way to the front of the crowd.

The rich people are having their say now. The procession has pa.s.sed Chancery Lane and travels now among the homes of the high and the mighty: Red Lyon Square, Waterhouse Square, Bloomsbury. All to the north side. To the south, Drury Lane plugs in, running up from Covent Garden and Long Acre. Which is to say that Dukes and Merchant Princes control one side of the parade route, wh.o.r.es and actresses the other. Captains of Commerce, worth millions of pounds sterling, practically topple from balconies and rooftops in their eagerness to shake their fists at him. The ladies on the other side are much more forgiving. Jack, on an impulse, stands up, shrugs off his coat, and throws it into a phalanx of prost.i.tutes. It's shredded in a heartbeat. He's down to his cloth-of-gold vest now, already missing a few b.u.t.tons. He turns around to make sure that Jack Ketch is getting a load of this. And indeed he is. The executioner was dismayed by Jack's alms-giving at St. Sepulchre, but after a while he seemed to put it out of his mind, reckoning it was an aberration, a moment of weakness, on Shaftoe's part. Which must have made it all the more painful for him when Shaftoe began to disrobe and hurl his priceless raiments into the Mobb.

At St. Giles's, there's another ritual: the procession stops so that bowls of ale may be brought out and given to the prisoners. Jack drinks several, paying for each with a golden b.u.t.ton. By the time they start moving again, and round the Tottenham Court bend into Oxford Road, his vest is hanging loose on his shoulders, not a single b.u.t.ton remaining.

A carriage is stopped in the intersection, like a boat run aground in the middle of a torrent. Standing atop it is a fat Duke who has positioned himself so that Jack will get a good long look at him as he is dragged away to the west. He screams something that must be very unpleasant, and, realizing that Jack cannot quite make out what he's saying over the general noise, turns red in the face and begins to bellow and gesticulate with such fury that his wig shudders askew. But the meaner sort of people, leaving aside the occasional angry fishwife, are much more forgiving. At the crossing of Marybone Lane, where the countryside finally opens up to the north side of the road, a common-looking fellow comes trotting alongside with a pint of wine for Jack, and Jack pays him by handing him the golden vest.

They have reached Tyburn Cross. It is a desert the size of the Pacific Ocean, paved with human faces. A few tall objects protrude above the flood, here and there: a stranded carriage, a tree that's about to collapse from the weight of the people who've climbed it, occasional men on horseback, and the Triple Tree itself. Which Jack does not see until he's underneath it. It is an alienated frame-work of six mighty timbers-three vertical pilings and three cross-bars forming a triangle high above-beautiful in a strange way. The feeling is of entering a house without a roof, a home whose ceiling is Heaven.

A s.p.a.ce about a stone's throw in width has been cleared round the base of the Deadly Nevergreen. The crowd's held at bay by pikemen, now reinforced by the King's Own Black Torrent Guards. Some bestride their war-horses facing outwards with sabers drawn and pistols c.o.c.ked; others have dismounted and fixed bayonets.

The preliminary hangings seem to take forever. Jack enlivens the proceedings by stripping off his breeches, whipping them around his head a few times, showering coins in all directions, and flinging them off into the crowd. Somewhere along the line he's lost his periwig, too. So now he's stripped down to white undergarments, shoes, and a noose. Going to his destiny a pauper, like that Lazarus the Ordinary read about in chapel this morning.

The others are all dead, decorating two of the Three-Legged Mare's cross-bars. The third is reserved exclusively for Jack. He climbs up onto the cart, and the driver maneuvers it beneath the clear s.p.a.ce. Jack's eyes are tired from seeing so much, and so he tilts his head back for a moment so that all he can see is the sky, divided in half by the rope-worn timber above.

Gunfire sounds from nearby. He swings his chin down again. This is the first time he's seen the crowd from a high vantage-point. Yet still he cannot find the edge of it. Gunpowder-smoke is drifting up from a black phalanx of Quakers or Barkers or some such. No one knows why.

Below, preparations are being made.

Flies explode from Jack Ketch's man-rated butcher block as Ketch heaves a rolled bundle onto it. He loosens a couple of ties and shakes out the contents: a complete suite of disembowelling-tools. The table is a scab the size of a bed. Ketch distributes his tools around it, occasionally testing an edge with a thumb. He takes particular care with some rusty shackles. This is a way of letting Shaftoe know that he can expect to be alive and conscious during the later phases of the operation.

When they pulled out of the Press-Yard some hours ago, Ketch had every expectation of being a rich man at the end of the day. All of those golden b.u.t.tons, all of those rich clothes, the coins in the pockets, all were for him. He was going to get out of debt and buy shoes for his children.

Now Ketch is going to get nothing. Shaftoe has avoided meeting Ketch's eye until now, not knowing, and not caring, whether Ketch was responding to the relentless destruction of his fortune with curses, tears, or shocked disbelief. But they do look at each other now, Shaftoe up on his cart, and Ketch down at his abattoir, and Shaftoe sees that Ketch is perfectly calm. There's no trace of the warm emotion he showed earlier, in the Press-Yard. It's as if that never occurred. Even if Ketch removed his hood, the face beneath would be no more expressive than is the black leather mask. He has gone into a cool professional mode. In a way, revenge is easy for Ketch, because he need only carry out the Court's sentence to the letter, and put him to death in terrorem in terrorem.

Jack now wonders whether this strategy was a good idea. A younger man would be scared. But it's normal to have second thoughts at this stage. It's the sign of a good plan.

He is expected to say a few words now.

"I, Jack Shaftoe, also known as L'Emmerdeur, L'Emmerdeur, the King of the Vagabonds, Ali Zaybak, Quicksilver, Lord of Divine Fire, Jack the Coiner, do hereby repent of all my sins and commend my soul to G.o.d," he says, "and ask only that I receive a decent Christian burial, with all of my quarters, if they can be rounded up, to be put together in the same box. And my head, too. For it is well known that the College of Physicians is gathered, as I speak, round their dissection-table on Warwick Lane, sharpening their scalpels, and getting ready to cut my head open so that they may rummage through my brains looking for the house where the Imp of the Perverse has dwelt lo these many years. I would prefer that this not happen. Having said that, Mr. Ketch, I turn myself over to your care. And I ask only that you check your knotwork twice over, for last night when Betty came to service me and these other fellows in the Condemned Hold, she was saying that you had quite lost your enthusiasm for the job, and were looking for a position as a maid-of-all-work. Step to it, man, the Physicians are waiting-" the King of the Vagabonds, Ali Zaybak, Quicksilver, Lord of Divine Fire, Jack the Coiner, do hereby repent of all my sins and commend my soul to G.o.d," he says, "and ask only that I receive a decent Christian burial, with all of my quarters, if they can be rounded up, to be put together in the same box. And my head, too. For it is well known that the College of Physicians is gathered, as I speak, round their dissection-table on Warwick Lane, sharpening their scalpels, and getting ready to cut my head open so that they may rummage through my brains looking for the house where the Imp of the Perverse has dwelt lo these many years. I would prefer that this not happen. Having said that, Mr. Ketch, I turn myself over to your care. And I ask only that you check your knotwork twice over, for last night when Betty came to service me and these other fellows in the Condemned Hold, she was saying that you had quite lost your enthusiasm for the job, and were looking for a position as a maid-of-all-work. Step to it, man, the Physicians are waiting-"

And that is all he can get out, for during this last bit, Ketch has slung the loose end of the rope over the timber above, and pulled it taut. Very taut. Earlier, he'd promised to put a lot of slack in it and give Shaftoe a nice long drop, so that it would be over quickly; but that was before Shaftoe breached a certain implied contract. Ketch pulls the rope so taut that Jack is only appearing to stand on the cart; in truth, the tips of his toes are barely grazing the floor-boards now. "I shall tend to you in a few minutes' time, Jack," he mumbles into Shaftoe's ear.

Jack's head is forced down by the knot behind his ear; he can't help but notice that the cart is no longer beneath him. He remembers the cord that he earlier strung from his shoe to the noose beneath his drawers, and pushes off against it with one leg. This relieves some of the pressure. Behind him on the cart, the Ordinary and the Catholic priest are striving to out-pray each other.

Four teams of horses stand at the ready in the clear s.p.a.ce below, facing different ways like the cardinal points on a compa.s.s-card, ready for the final and most spectacular part of the operation. A few people, presumably connected in one way or another with aspects of the drawing-and-quartering, are standing around down there, watching him.

One of these is a solitary man, dressed in a monk's robe. Come to think of it, he's one of the monks who was escorting the Catholic priest up Holbourn. He takes up a position in the open, next to the giant butcher block. The man's hood is drawn nearly closed, so that he looks out at the world down a tunnel of black homespun. He turns to face Jack, cleverly arranging it so that a tube of sunlight will s.h.i.+ne onto his face. Jack's expecting Enoch Root or, barring that, some wild holy man.

Instead he recognizes the face of his brother Bob.

And that explains how a lone monk is able to be here at all, because Bob, of course, knows his way around the King's Own Black Torrent Guard.

For one glorious moment of stupidity, Jack supposes that some kind of rescue is about to happen.

Then there's a moment of terror as he wonders if Bob is going to run up and hang from his legs to kill him fast. Or barring that, perhaps he'll pull a pistol and put Jack out of his misery directly.

The cord snaps! Jack drops a couple of inches, the noose clubs him in the back of the head, the rope draws tighter.

Jack keeps watching his brother. Now, as in the early years of his life, there is no one else in the world.

Bob until now has kept his hands together in front of him, tucked into the capacious sleeves of his garment. Now, seeing Jack's distress, he draws them apart, and holds them up in the air like a saint. The sleeves churn. Two larks fly out of the right one, and a blackbird from the left. They flutter aimlessly about the gallows for a few moments, then identify it as Not a Real Tree, and ascend into the light.

Jack feels the pressure of the world being relieved.

He has no trouble taking the birds' meaning: they have escaped they have escaped. All three of them. They are headed for America.

There is a roaring. He cannot know if it is the blood in his ears, or the Mobb, or, perhaps, a legion of demons and a choir of angels fighting for possession of his soul. Jack rolls his eyes high up in their sockets, trying to keep those birds in view. The sky, which was blue a moment ago, has turned uniformly gray, and its compa.s.s is narrowing. It shrinks to a lead coin with two white birds and a black one minted on its face.

Star Chamber IN DUE TIME M MR. T THREADER seizes the cupel with tongs and upends it over the freshly polished scale-pan of the balance. The ingot-an oblate bead-falls out, and spins and buzzes on the pan. Some flecks of burnt bone fall around it; Mr. Threader blows these away and then gives the ingot an exploratory nudge or two with his tweezers, to satisfy himself that no other impurities have stuck to it. When he is certain that there's nothing on that pan except for pure gold, he places a ten-grain standard weight on the opposite pan. This is not nearly enough to balance the ingot-which is good, as far as it goes-and so, now wielding the ivory-handled tweezers, he adds a one-grain weight. Then a half-grain. The scale has gone into motion but still inclines toward the ingot of gold. Mr. Threader is working now with standard weights so small that Daniel can hardly see them: they are evanescent squares of gold foil stamped with fractions. He makes a messy pile of them and then stops, stumped. He removes a lot of small ones and replaces them with a larger one, and hems and haws. Finally he removes every single one of the standard weights, sets them back in their niches in the case, and puts on the single twelve-grain weight that he used earlier to weigh the sample of guinea fragments. seizes the cupel with tongs and upends it over the freshly polished scale-pan of the balance. The ingot-an oblate bead-falls out, and spins and buzzes on the pan. Some flecks of burnt bone fall around it; Mr. Threader blows these away and then gives the ingot an exploratory nudge or two with his tweezers, to satisfy himself that no other impurities have stuck to it. When he is certain that there's nothing on that pan except for pure gold, he places a ten-grain standard weight on the opposite pan. This is not nearly enough to balance the ingot-which is good, as far as it goes-and so, now wielding the ivory-handled tweezers, he adds a one-grain weight. Then a half-grain. The scale has gone into motion but still inclines toward the ingot of gold. Mr. Threader is working now with standard weights so small that Daniel can hardly see them: they are evanescent squares of gold foil stamped with fractions. He makes a messy pile of them and then stops, stumped. He removes a lot of small ones and replaces them with a larger one, and hems and haws. Finally he removes every single one of the standard weights, sets them back in their niches in the case, and puts on the single twelve-grain weight that he used earlier to weigh the sample of guinea fragments.

The pans oscillate for a long time, the needle making equal excursions to either side of dead center. After a while, friction prevails, and it stops. It is so close to being perfectly centered that in order to read it Mr. Threader must place his hand over his nose and mouth, so that his breathing won't startle it, and practically polish the thing with his eyelashes.

Then he draws back: the only man in the room who is moving so much as a muscle. For everyone has marked the delay, and noticed the twelve-grain weight on the other pan: very odd.

"The ingot weighs twelve grains," Mr. Threader proclaims.

"There must be some error," says a flummoxed senior Goldsmith. "Such a thing is impossible unless all the guineas contain no base metals whatsoever!"

"Or," says Mr. Threader under his breath to Daniel, "the base metals were converted to gold in the cupel!"

"There must have been some error in the a.s.say," the senior Goldsmith continues, beginning now to look to his Guild-fellows, to erect a consensus.

But William Ham is having none of it. "That is a difficult accusation to sustain, without evidence," he points out.

"The evidence is right there before our eyes!" complains the elder, gesturing at the balance.

"That is evidence only that Sir Isaac makes good guineas, and that the British coin is the soundest currency of the whole world," William says doggedly. "Every member of this Jury watched-nay, is evidence only that Sir Isaac makes good guineas, and that the British coin is the soundest currency of the whole world," William says doggedly. "Every member of this Jury watched-nay, partic.i.p.ated in partic.i.p.ated in-the a.s.say. Did we not? None of us saw anything amiss. By our silence we have already consented to it, and vouchsafed its result. To reverse ourselves now now, and say 'twas all done wrong, is to go before that that man and say, 'My lord, we do not know how to do an a.s.say!' " William gestures toward the end of Star Chamber, where the Duke of Marlborough's absorbed in conversation with some other dignitary. man and say, 'My lord, we do not know how to do an a.s.say!' " William gestures toward the end of Star Chamber, where the Duke of Marlborough's absorbed in conversation with some other dignitary.

William's a banker, not a practicing Goldsmith. In the councils of that Company he is of low rank and little account. But outside their Clubb-house, in the City of London, he has earned a gravitas gravitas that makes heads turn his way when he speaks. This is why they nominated him as Fusour. Perhaps it is why the senior Goldsmith is calling the a.s.say into question; he's spooked by William's influence. Such political currents are too subtle for Daniel to follow; all he needs to know is that the Goldsmiths and the City men alike are swayed by William's words. If they trouble to look at the senior Goldsmith at all, it is in glances over their shoulders, as if looking back curiously at one who has fallen behind. that makes heads turn his way when he speaks. This is why they nominated him as Fusour. Perhaps it is why the senior Goldsmith is calling the a.s.say into question; he's spooked by William's influence. Such political currents are too subtle for Daniel to follow; all he needs to know is that the Goldsmiths and the City men alike are swayed by William's words. If they trouble to look at the senior Goldsmith at all, it is in glances over their shoulders, as if looking back curiously at one who has fallen behind.

To his credit, the elder sees clearly enough the way it's going. He cringes once at what he's being forced to do, then his face slackens. "Very well," he says, "let us give Sir Isaac his due, then. He has exasperated us more than any other Master of the Mint; but no one has ever claimed he did not know his way around a furnace." He turns toward Marlborough, as do the other Goldsmiths, and they all bow. Marlborough notes it and nods to the chap he's been talking to, who turns around to see it. Daniel recognizes the fellow as Isaac Newton, and feels a kind of pride that his friend is being honored in this way, and that he seems at last to have earned the trust of Marlborough. A moment pa.s.ses before Daniel remembers that Isaac is dead.

This courtly scene is disturbed by trouble in the gallery leading in from New Palace Yard: some uncivil person is trying to crash the party, and the Serjeant is dutifully trying to stop him. Their dispute and their footsteps draw nearer.

"What business-"

"The King's business, sir!"

"Whom would you-"

"My captain, sir! The Duke of Marlborough! Perhaps you will have heard of him!" The speaker stomps right into Star Chamber, moving in an uneven gait: a uniformed Colonel with a peg-leg of carven ebony. Then he stops, realizing he's just burst in upon a solemn moment, and doesn't know what to say. It promptly gets worse: recent evolutions have given the Lords waiting in the side chamber the idea that they have been missing out on something. Most of them choose this moment to debouche into the Star Chamber wearing expressions that say, "Explain, or be hanged!"

Daniel by now has recognized the peg-legged colonel: this is Barnes of the Black Torrent Guard. Barnes was already of a mind to dig his own grave and jump into it even before the King's Remembrancer, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, First Lord of the Treasury, Lord Privy Seal, and Lord Chancellor filed into the room, followed by enough Hanoverian Dukes and Princes to conquer Saxony. Barnes is now not only peg-legged but peg-tongued and peg-brained. The only man who dares make a sound is Marlborough.

"My lords," he says, when the side-chamber has emptied out, "we have news from the Jurors. And unless I have mistaken the signs, we have got news from Tyburn Cross as well."

Daniel glances at Barnes, who is going through a chrestomathy of head-shaking, throat-slitting, eye-bulging, and hand-waving. But Marlborough is oblivious; he's got eyes only for the Lords of the Council, and the Hanoverians. He goes on, "Would the Juries care to make a preliminary report?"

The Pesour and the Fusour make after-you gestures at each other. Finally William Ham steps forward, and bows. "We shall of course draw up the doc.u.ment presently, and give it to the King's Remembrancer," he says, "but it is my great pleasure to inform my lords that the a.s.say has been performed, and it has proved beyond doubt that His Majesty's currency is sounder than it has ever been in all the history of this Realm, and that the highest accolades are owed to the Master of his majesty's Mint, Sir Isaac Newton!"

Isaac is diffident, but the Fusour's announcement starts up a round of hip-hip-huzzahs that only bates when he steps forward and bows to the room. Which he does gracefully and with perfect balance; he has not looked so spry in years. Daniel searches the room for Miss Barton, and only finds her when she appears at his side, seizes him by the right arm, and plants a kiss on his cheek.

"It is my very great honor," says Isaac, "to do what I can for my country. Some distinguish themselves in battle" (a nod at Marlborough), "others in sage advice" (a nod-astonis.h.i.+ngly-at Daniel), "still others in grace and beauty" (Miss Barton). "I make coins, and strive to make them sound, as a foundation on which the Commerce of this Realm may be builded by her thrifty and industrious Citizens." A nod to the Jurors.

"There is another thing that you do very well, besides making coins, is there not, Sir Isaac?"

This Marlborough enunciates very clearly, for the benefit of the Hanoverians, and he waits for Johann von Hacklheber to effect a translation before he goes on: "I refer, of course, to your duty of prosecuting those who make bad bad coins." coins."

"That, too, is the charge of the Master of the Mint," Isaac admits.

Barnes has gone back into frantic pantomiming, but he can't seem to get the eye of Marlborough, who is rapt on the Germans. Marlborough goes on, "Sir Isaac's triumph here, in the Trial of the Pyx, has, as I understand it, been matched-some would even say, surpa.s.sed-by a simultaneous triumph at Tyburn! Colonel Barnes?" And all eyes turn to Barnes. But he has dropped the gesticulations and now stands there the very picture of martial dignity.

"Indeed, my lord," he announces. "Jack Shaftoe, L'Emmerdeur, L'Emmerdeur, the King of the Vagabonds, a.k.a. Jack the Coiner, has been hanged." the King of the Vagabonds, a.k.a. Jack the Coiner, has been hanged."

"Hanged, drawn, and quartered, according to the sentence p.r.o.nounced against him?" Marlborough says, so fiercely that it is more a.s.sertion than query.

"Hanged, my lord," Barnes says. It dangles there for a terrible long time, like a kicking wretch on a gallows, and he feels a need to make improvements: "Hanged by the neck until dead."

"Half dead, I should say, and then cut down, drawn, and quartered?" dead, I should say, and then cut down, drawn, and quartered?"

"Mr. Ketch was balked from carrying out the, er, supplemental eviscerations and dismemberments and whatnot, upon the hanged hanged and and dead, corpse dead, corpse of of the late the late villain Shaftoe." villain Shaftoe."

"Prevented by what, what, pray tell? Squeamishness? Did Mr. Ketch forget to bring his cutlery?" pray tell? Squeamishness? Did Mr. Ketch forget to bring his cutlery?"

"Prevented by the Mobb. By the violence and the menace of the greatest and surliest Mobb that has ever a.s.sembled upon this Island."

A murky side-conversation now starts up in the Hanover contingent, as Johann von Hacklheber tries to translate "Mobb" into High German.

"I ordered the King's Own Black Torrent Guard to defend the gallows, precisely because I expected a larger than usual Mobb," says Marlborough distractedly, in a sort of quiet prodrome to raging anger. Recognizing it as such, Barnes says: "And that is precisely what we accomplished, my lord, and the hangings were all carried out in good order, and Jack Ketch and the bailiffs and gaolers conveyed out of there safe and sound. The gallows will, alas, have to be rebuilt, but that's a job for carpenters, not soldiers."

"I see. But you deemed it prudent to retreat before the drawing and quartering could be performed."

"Yes my lord, 'twas at that moment when the Mobb became most frenzickal, and rushed the Gallows to cut him down-"

"Him, or or his corpse his corpse?" Isaac Newton asks.

"Colonel Barnes," says Marlborough, "did they cut him down, or did they merely or did they merely rush the gallows to cut him down rush the gallows to cut him down? There is a difference, you see."

"If you want to know whose hand wielded the knife that severed the rope, I cannot give you his name," Barnes says. "Just then, I was preoccupied with the larger task of leading my troops leading my troops."

"How did you lead them? What orders did you give?"

"To form a cordon with fixed bayonets around Jack Ketch and those other partic.i.p.ants who were still alive who were still alive."

"Did you give an order to fire?"

"No," says Barnes, "as I judged it would be suicidal; and though I am ever ready to die in the line of duty, I was of the view that for us to commit suicide would have impeded us in the conduct of our mission."

"I have often thought that the Vicar and the Warrior in you were struggling to achieve dominance, Colonel Barnes. Now I see that the Warrior has at last prevailed. For the Vicar would have opened fire and trusted to G.o.d. It is only the Warrior who would have chosen the difficult path of an orderly retreat."

Barnes-who has been expecting anything but praise-salutes, and goes red in the face.

"They wish to know why the soldiers did not fire on the Mobb to restore order!" says Johann von Hacklheber, speaking on behalf of a formation of very disgruntled-looking Hanoverians.

"Because this is England and we don't ma.s.sacre people in England!" Marlborough announces. "Or rather, we do do but we are striving to turn over a new leaf. Pray translate that into more diplomatic language, Freiherr von Hacklheber, and see to it that the new King quite gets the message, so that we don't have to send the Barkers after him." Marlborough winks at Daniel. but we are striving to turn over a new leaf. Pray translate that into more diplomatic language, Freiherr von Hacklheber, and see to it that the new King quite gets the message, so that we don't have to send the Barkers after him." Marlborough winks at Daniel.

Isaac has paid little heed to these last few exchanges. "In truth it is just as well for my purposes that Jack Shaftoe's corpse was left intact, for I have been looking forward to conducting an autopsy on the wretch at the College of Physicians, to find out what on earth made him the way he was."

"I know," says Barnes. "All London knows, for Jack announced as much-somewhat more colorfully-from the gallows. It was this very thing that so infuriated the Mobb."

"So be it," says Isaac, with a shrug. "Have your men take the corpse to the College of Physicians."

"We don't know where it is," says Colonel Barnes.

"On Warwick Lane, off Newgate."

"No. I meant, we don't know where the corpse the corpse is." is."

"I beg your pardon?" says Isaac, and looks to Marlborough. But the Duke is in a frank Cultural Exchange with his Hanoverian counterparts and has no time for Isaac. It has taken the Germans some time to fully comprehend the impertinence of Marlborough's quip about the Barkers, and to believe that the Duke actually said something that rude; now they are waxing wroth, getting a bit foamy even. Johann von Hacklheber, seeing he's caught in a perilous crossfire, is edging away, trying to make himself party to the safer and more interesting conversation re: Jack Shaftoe's carca.s.s.

"After the dead body was cut down," Barnes continues, "some of the Mobb raised it up. I sent soldiers to wrest it from them. The Mobb scampered away and gave it a right good heave."

"On to the ground?"

"No, it was caught and raised up on high again by others others of the Mobb; and when they spied my soldiers coming for them, they gave it another heave, so that others, farther from the gallows, took up the burthen. And from there it developed into a sort of, well, of the Mobb; and when they spied my soldiers coming for them, they gave it another heave, so that others, farther from the gallows, took up the burthen. And from there it developed into a sort of, well, orderly orderly procedure, and I had to climb up on to the scaffold to see where it went. He sort of procedure, and I had to climb up on to the scaffold to see where it went. He sort of glided glided. Like a leaf, floating on a turbulent and swirling stream, dodging and spinning in unseen Mobb-currents, but ever moving in the same general direction: away from me me."

Isaac sighs, and begins to look his age again. "Spare me any further poetick description and just say forthrightly, please, where did you last see the body of Jack Shaftoe?"

"Sort of dissolving into the western horizon."

Isaac stares at him.

"The Mobb was of tremendous size," Barnes explains.