The System of the World

Halfway Along Cheapside
DAWN, MONDAY, 25 OCTOBER 1714

“DID ROGER COME TO YOU in a dream, or something?”

“I beg your pardon!?”

Saturn opened his eyes for the first time since he had upended his body into the carriage, back at Clerkenwell Court, a quarter of an hour ago. Since then he had only made himself more comfy with every bump and swerve. Confronted now with evidence that his companion had been conscious, and cogitating, the entire time, Daniel was mildly indignant.

Saturn pushed himself up a notch. “It is so unlike you to know of something before it happens. I wondered if you had had a spectral Visitation from the Shade of the late Marquis of Ravenscar.”

“My intelligence came from another source.”

“The Earl of Lostwithiel?”

“Shut up!”

“I thought so. Mortification was writ all over his lordship’s face the other day, at the Sack of Clerkenwell.”

“It’ll be worse if word gets round that he has been talking to me, and so please curtail this!”

“Hmph. I do not think that Ravenscar got people to be discreet by shushing them. I think rather he was an ingenieur of a sort, who balanced interests.”

“What is your point, other than that I am no substitute for Roger?”

“Clerkenwell Court was to me what a Gathered Church was to your dad’s lot. Now what you Gathered has been Scattered by the Powers that Be. Just as certain of your co-religionists, in such a pickle, would abscond to Massachusetts to erect a City on a Hill or something, I phant’sy that I shall get out of this bloody town and go to what, for a Mechanick, will be what Plymouth Rock was for Puritans.”

“And where, pray tell, is that?”

“Another place called Plymouth, but older, and easier to get to.”

The carriage, following Daniel’s instructions, had managed a right turn; Daniel had lost track of where they were, and was disoriented for a moment, until he saw the Church of St. Stephen Walbrook go by to their left. A light or two was already burning in a window there; good.

Saturn seemed a little provoked that Daniel had not risen to this most excellent bait. “Plymouth is where Mr. Newcomen is building his Engine, is it not?”

“Close enough,” Daniel said. “I shall buy you a map of the west country as a going-away present, and on the journey you can master the fine distinctions between Plymouth, Dartmouth, Teignmouth, et cetera.”

“ ’Sblood, the place has as many Mouths as Parliament,” Saturn muttered, and watched Daniel carefully-warily, even. Perhaps he had been worried as to how Daniel would react.

Daniel said, “I shall give Mr. Newcomen an excellent character of you.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll not say a word about Infernal Devices, or bursting out of whores’ toilets in the dead of night.”

“I would be indebted.”

“Please don’t think of it in that light…look on it rather as a selfish deed on my part,” Daniel said. “Newcomen needs fewer smiths, and more men like you.”

“I heard he was banging out great bloody monstrosities.”

“That he is. But where he wants help is in the fabricating of the small clever bits-the valves, and so on. Just the job for a Horologist Gone Bad.”

“Right! Let’s sort this, then!” said a radically more energetic Peter Hoxton, rolling out the carriage door even though it had not yet come to a full stop. Daniel smelled River, and felt it condensing on his brow; they’d pulled round on the Three Cranes, a wharf not far from where the lost river of Walbrook buried itself in the Thames. A row of warehouses fronted on it, running parallel to the riverbank and a stone’s throw back from the water. Separating two of these buildings was a narrow chink that anyone might have overlooked in the dark and the fog. Daniel was only able to pick it out because a light was burning some distance along this alley-way, on its right side. As Saturn shambled toward this, his head or shoulders would occult it from time to time. After a minute this stopped happening. Daniel heard a door opening, and eroded stumps of a few words, and then the door closing again.

The alley would broaden, after some distance, into the spacious back-court of the Vintners’ Hall. Many of the establishments around it, including the one Saturn had gone into, were cooperages.

“Back to the Church of St. Stephen Walbrook,” Daniel said to the coachman.

WILLIAM HAM WAS WAITING FOR them there, out front of the church where he’d been baptized. He climbed through the carriage door and settled into Saturn’s former perch with a grunt. “Never has a church been put to such uses,” he remarked.

“I’ve explained to the vicar-and will gladly explain again if need be-that it is all in pursuit of a righteous and Christian undertaking.”

“Pray don’t speak of undertaking, uncle. Not today.”

That got them as far as the front entrance of the Bank of England, all of seven hundred feet away.

“I would like you to know something,” Daniel said, as William was fumbling with his keys. For Daniel had the sense that William’s slowness, his clumsiness, were not due to cold fingers alone.

“What is that, uncle?”

“I’ve never spoken of this to you before, as I know it is delicate. But after your father passed away, and his Vault was opened-forcibly-by order of the Lord Chancellor, I was among the party that went down into it, and found that it was empty.”

“It is a very odd time for you to bring that up,” William said, right snappishly, and smacked the Bank’s door open. His irritation had at least got the blood running through his fingers, and perhaps to his brain. There was now a short interlude in the foyer while he soothed the porter’s nerves, and urged him to get back in bed. Then he began to lead Daniel down into the labyrinthine basements and sub-basements of the Bank. While they walked, Daniel talked.

“Your choler is up, William. And no wonder! King Charles took from your father the plate, specie, and bullion that had been entrusted to the House of Ham by its depositors. The House was ruined. Your father died of shame. Others in the goldsmith trade had suffered likewise-though not as much-and understood that your father had been given no choice. The King had taken the gold by invoking his divine right to it. That’s why you’ve never wanted for a position in the banking trade-because the story is proverbial among money-goldsmiths, and you are a living link to it.

“Anyway,” Daniel continued, “after we found your father’s vault empty we went up on the roof of your house-”

“We?”

“Your uncles Raleigh and Sterling and I, and Sir Richard Apthorp. And do you know what happened up there on the roof?”

“Can’t imagine.”

“Sir Richard founded the Bank of England.”

“What do you mean!? This was not founded until twenty years later! And in any case, how can one man found a bank on the roof of a goldsmith’s shop that is being burned down by the Mobb?”

“I mean he saw it all together in his head. He saw that banks would never work right if the King could sack their vaults whenever he ran low on revenue. This was a revolutionary thought. Probably would not have entered his mind had he not been thrown together with the sons of Drake the King-killer, the enemy of Divine Right, the champion of Enterprise. But when Sir Richard put those elements together in his mind, he created-all this.”

“Bully for him,” said William. “Wish I’d been the one to do that. You know. Redeem the family honour and whatnot.” He had stopped before the door to the vault where the Logic Mill cards had been accumulating, as they had been brought in from Bridewell. There would be more messing about with keys now. Daniel relieved his nephew of the lanthorn and stood there Diogenes-like, shining light on his hands while he worked.

“As you know perfectly well, you were too young to found a Bank,” Daniel reminded him. “Instead, you are redeeming the family honour now. At this moment.”

“How do you reckon?” William said, gingerly pushing a gaudy key into one of the door-locks.

“The King-or some limb or other of his government-is coming, in a little while, to steal what I have deposited here. Oh, it is not my property. But is it the King’s?! He has no bloody right to it. If you were to hang your head and let him steal it, the family curse would be confirmed-it would be indelible, then.”

William Ham hauled open the Vault door. Stale air drained out of it. Daniel caught a whiff of sewer-nothing like the Fleet, but enough to stir the memory. “After you, uncle,” said William, sounding rather more serene than he had some minutes earlier.

“No, William, after you! You have precedence. This is your deed. A small one, but a great one. People around the City shall hear of it, and the stock of the Bank shall rise, because of the stand you have made. But more important: your father, if he can see this, is saying to the other departed spirits, this is my son, in whom I am well pleased.”

“Good of you to say so-since I know you don’t believe in any of that!” said William, a bit huskily. Daniel had averted his gaze from the sight of tears filling the pouches under his nephew’s eyes, and so was startled, and almost dropped the lanthorn, when William socked him on the shoulder. “But I do believe in such things, and I say that if my dad’s looking on, why, yours is right there next to him, and couldn’t be happier to see you poking your brand-new King in the eye with a sharp stick!”

A MINUTE LATER DANIEL was alone in the Temple of Mithras, and William Ham was on the other side of the Vault door, locking him in there.

In William’s hip-pocket was a document, freshly signed, in which Daniel took possession of his deposits, and relieved the Bank of all responsibility for them. If nothing else, it would slow the King’s men down for as long as it took them to read it.

Those deposits, of course, were all here and accounted for, stacked on the floor in front of Daniel. The golden cards of the Logick Mill had been sent over from Bridewell in frequent small shipments. After Daniel had visited this place with Solomon Kohan, and become aware of the well-shaft in its floor, he had instituted changes in how the cards were packaged for shipment. He had struck a deal with a cooper near the Vintner’s Yard, and this cooper, Mr. Anderton, had fabricated a run of purpose-built boxes of peculiar design. Most anyone who looked on one of these would guess it was either a snare-drum or a hat-box, about a foot in diameter and half that in height. They were lightweight and not especially rugged, made from splits of soft wood no more than an eighth of an inch thick, steam-bent into hoops, sewed together with rawhide, and sealed with pitch. Each arrived at Bridewell with wood-shavings (a resource produced in superabundance by Mr. Anderton’s arsenal of block-planes and draw-knives). Each had a close-fitting lid. These had been stockpiled at one end of the card-punching shop, handy to the desk where Mr. Ham weighed and accounted for all of the gold. Whenever a batch of cards was complete, and the paperwork all made out, one of these hat-boxes would be pulled off the stack and the lid set aside. Into the bed of wood-shavings would be pressed the stack of cards, all wrapped in paper, and next to it would go a wee purse containing the holes that had been punched out of them. The papers for this batch would be set atop, and finally the lid would be put on, laced down with more rawhide, and sealed all around its rim with tar. Then it was ready for dispatch to the Bank of England.

These containers were nothing like true barrels for strength, water-tightness, or cost. But they would fit down the well-shaft, and they would float, at least for a little while. Which was all that Daniel wanted. As soon as William Ham locked him in to the Vault, Daniel went over and pulled up the plank disk that covered the well-shaft. He was dizzy with a kind of terror that something would have gone wrong, and no one would be there. For a minute his fears were borne out. But then he began to hear voices, and a minute later he observed shreds of light skating and veering around, and finally a candle-flame, directly below. “Ready,” came a voice.

Daniel dropped a hat-box down the shaft. No crashing or splintering noises were returned: only a firm splunk as it was caught by two out-stretched hands, followed by some conversation, and a brief surge of laughter. Then: “Ready!” and Daniel dropped another. It was uneven the first dozen times, with too much conversation and apologizing. Then it seemed as though the men down below had got a bucket-brigade organized, and Daniel ended up being the bottleneck, as he could not seem to ferry the boxes to the hole rapidly enough. In the end Peter Hoxton had to climb up into the vault and assist him. After that, the place emptied out in a very short time.

But by the time the last of the Solomonic Gold went down the hole, voices-angry ones-could already be heard on the other side of the door, and hasty men were rattling the locks and picking curiously at the hasps and the hinges. William had promised to delay as long as he could by being indolent, then argumentative, and finally by pretending he couldn’t find the key; but clearly enough these pretenses were all wearing thin. Worse, Daniel was growingly certain that Isaac was on the other side of that door, and Isaac could pick any lock ever made. After a last look round to make sure no box had been forgotten, Daniel inserted himself into the shaft, and began to seek the ladder’s rungs with his toes. Saturn was not far behind, but he paused at the top of the ladder to fiddle with a bit of rope, and then to set the plank-disk lid into place above his head-closing the door behind him, as it were. That rope still dangled through a small hole bit from the rim of the lid. It led, as Daniel knew, to the underside of a large, ancient-looking crate that rested on the floor of the Vault next to the well-shaft. When Saturn was sure that Daniel had reached the base of the ladder and gotten well out of harm’s way by retreating into the side-shaft, he wrapped that rope around his hands and trusted his whole weight to it. He plunged straight down for about an arm’s length, then was caught short, and had to kick for a rung. The crate had shifted over and, or so they hoped, covered the lid. This might or might not buy them a few minutes of extra time, depending on how closely the Vault was searched.

Saturn pulled the ladder down and carried it with him as he followed Daniel to the bank of Walbrook. The stream’s course was now marked out, spottily, by a series of candles. One or two men could be heard sloshing downriver. Saturn here discarded the ladder and then followed Daniel down the current, snuffing out candles as he went, and both of them keeping an eye peeled for hat-boxes that had gone astray.

A few minutes’ wading brought them to the orifice that served as cellar-drain for St. Stephen Walbrook. Daniel went through first, crawling up it on his belly until rough hands grasped his, and drew him out in one long heave. He could not see very well for a minute, because there was suddenly too much light coming into his eyes. But he could smell the mineral tang of fresh mortar, and he knew from the calluses on those hands that they must have belonged to masons. There was a minute of bother trying to get Saturn up through the drain, which turned to hilarity when he popped loose; then he jumped to his feet and shushed them all furiously, saying that he had heard voices echoing down Walbrook from the Bank, and he thought one of them might be an angry Sir Isaac.

Daniel could see now. There was quite a crowd there in the crypt under the church: a mason and two younger assistants, two coopers from Mr. Anderton’s company, Daniel, Saturn, and a pair of mudlarks who had been part of the bucket brigade. As well as a very old and bent-over chap, in good clothes and good humor, seemingly fascinated by the hole in the floor whence so many novelties had just emerged.

“I had quite forgotten about it!” exclaimed Sir Christopher Wren. “I am indebted to you, Daniel. It is in the nature of building-projects, you know, that one gets a thing ninety-nine percent finished, then drifts away. Quite right of you to call this to my attention.”

By the time he had reached the end of this sentence, the drain had ceased to exist. The masons had brought with them a length of wrist-thick lead pipe, which they thrust down the tunnel, then buried in a wheelbarrow-avalanche of mixed mortar and rubble. The head of the pipe was stomped down until it was flush with the floor, and then the eldest of the masons set about finish-work, arranging a few small flat paving-stones around the orifice to cover up the rubble fill beneath.

At the other end of the room, Anderton’s men were stacking the hat-boxes into barrels. These were unfinished; the staves at the top were splayed apart, restrained by temporary hoops. A groove had been carved around their inner surfaces, near the ends, to accept the end-pieces. Each barrel was tall enough to accommodate a stack of half a dozen hat-boxes; more wood-shavings were dumped in around these, so they would not rattle around, and then the end-pieces were set in loose. In this state the barrels were dragged up stairs and out into the court behind the church, which communicated with a bigger court out back of Salters’ Hall: a place where no sight was more unremarkable than a huddle of barrels ready to be finished.

By day’s end, all of the barrels had been conveyed to the workshop of Mr. Anderton, and his coopers had bent the staves inward to imprison the end-pieces, and put on the permanent hoops.

Daniel was tired, and wanted to call it a day, but he could not bring himself to leave the cooperage until the last of the hat-boxes had been sealed up within the last of the barrels. He made himself at home in a corner of Anderton’s shop, stimulating himself as needed with coffee or tobacco, until the job was done. The barrels were then rolled down to Three Cranes and entrusted to a shipping-company; the destination marked on each one of them was LEIBNIZ-HAUS HANOVER. After all the care and bother that the Solomonic Gold had occasioned during its eventful passage from the Solomon Islands to the Palace of the Viceroy in Mexico, to its theft before Bonanza, to Cairo and Malabar and its many travels on or in the hull of Minerva, it felt very strange to turn one’s back on it and walk away, leaving it stacked out in the open on a wharf. But now, disguised as salt cod and placed in the care of a reputable shipping-agent, it was probably safer than it had ever been.