The System of the World

Princess Caroline’s Bedchamber,
Herrenhausen Palace
LATER THAT MORNING

“MRS. BRAITHWAITE, I SHALL depend on you to have the ivory thing near to hand at all times,” said Princess Caroline.

“I know just where it is, my lady.” Henrietta Braithwaite rose from the stool where she had been fussing with the Princess’s wig, twirled herself about in beautiful and attention-getting style, and crossed the room to where a selection of implements was arranged on a tabletop. These could have been mistaken for the trade-tools of a cook, physician, or torturer, save for the fact that the surface on which they rested was a slab of polished pink marble, topping a white-and-gilt dressing-table-cum-sculpture done up in the new, hyper-Barock style named Rokoko. It was adorned, for example, with several cherubs, bows drawn, eyes a-squint as they drew beads on unseen targets, butt-cheeks polished to a luster with jeweler’s rouge. It had, in other words, all the earmarks of a gift that had been sent to the Princess by someone with a lot of money who did not know her very well. On it were diverse mortars and pestles for compounding makeups; trowels, spatulas, and brushes for inflicting it; and certain objects whose purposes were not so obvious. Henrietta picked up a long-handled implement whose business end consisted of a gently curved tongue of polished ivory, stained pink around the edges from use. “See to it that it has not become stiff, as sometimes happens when these things get old,” Caroline commanded, “and inspect it for any rough edges-last time, I got an ugly welt.”

“Yes, my lady,” said Mrs. Braithwaite. With a curtsey, she turned her back on the Princess. Three other ladies-in-waiting were engineering her clothes, hair, and jewelry, some of which were already mounted on Caroline, others on wooden effigies. The Duchess of Arcachon-Qwghlm sat across from her, keeping her company. She was already dressed, albeit more simply. For anyone below the rank of Princess, dressing for mourning could be a simple undertaking. Eliza’s yellow hair was screened behind a fontange of stiff black lace and the rest of her was in black silk. It was expensive and well executed as such costumes went, but still deserved the name traditionally given to such garments: weeds.

“My son has reprimanded me,” announced the Duchess.

Caroline gasped and put a hand to the base of her throat in a gesture of mock outrage, as she understood that Eliza was being facetious. Henrietta Braithwaite, who knew the Duchess only by gossip, had to turn around and look to discern as much. Then, realizing she had been obvious, Henrietta turned back to the work at hand: running her fingertips over the ivory tool, inspecting for rough places.

“And why would such a well-brought-up young man speak to his mother so?” Caroline demanded.

The Duchess leaned closer, and spoke a bit more softly. All of the ladies in the room suddenly found ways to do whatever they were doing in nearly perfect silence. On the pretext of needing better light, Henrietta Braithwaite turned towards a window, bringing one ear to bear upon the target.

“I am sorry!” the Duchess said. “Until he told me, I had no idea that I had stupidly interrupted something! I thought I had found you alone in the garden.”

“You did find me alone-but only because, when he heard a carriage approaching, he took flight, not knowing it was only you.”

“Isn’t that just like a mother! Interrupting her son at such a moment! You should have shooed me away!”

“Oh, no, it is perfectly all right!” the Princess assured her. “We were never truly alone anyway, for I thought I could hear one or two people skulking about.”

“Spies!?”

“Oh, no, Eliza, this is not some Byzantine, spy-infested court such as Versailles. Doubtless they were some guests, here for the funeral, who simply forgot their manners.”

“Those must be the ones my dogs barked at. Naughty dogs!”

“It is nothing. This evening, at dusk, Sophie shall be at rest across the way. The English delegation, and most of the noble and royal visitors, will have departed. Then he and I shall meet where we met this morning, and resume where we left off.”

“I thought my son seemed…frustrated.”

“It is good for men to be frustrated,” Caroline announced, “that is when they behave in the manner that is most pleasing to us, with beautiful displays of daring and gallantry.”

The Duchess considered this for a long time before answering, “There is truth in that, your royal highness. But some day when we have more time I might tell you a tale of one whose frustration became perhaps too enormous.”

“What did he do then?”

“Behaved in a manner that was perhaps a bit over-daring, and too gallant, and kept it up for rather too long.”

“All for you, Eliza?”

Again this had to be considered. Eliza, who had shown no reluctance to discuss Caroline’s affairs of the heart in front of an audience, was suddenly reticent. “At the beginning, perhaps it was all for me. As it went on and on-it is difficult to say. He became rich, and powerful after a fashion. Perhaps he then began to act out of a desire for worldly increase.”

“So out of love for you, he did deeds of phantastickal gallantry and daring over many years-then went on to become rich and powerful? Why haven’t you married him yet?”

“It is complicated. Some day you will understand.”

“I see that my words have struck deeply into your heart, Eliza, for all of a sudden you are patronizing me.” Caroline said this cheerfully enough.

“Please forgive me, your royal highness.”

They were into it now.

“I do know something of complications-not a hundredth of what you do-and I know that there is always a way to surmount them. Do you love him?”

“The man I spoke of?”

“Is there any other man under discussion?”

“I believe that I did love him once, when he had nothing.”

“Nothing except you?”

“Me, a sword, and a horse. It was later, when he began to conceive absurd schemes for getting things, that we fell out.”

“Why should he concern himself with getting when he had you?”

“That is what I tried to tell him. It hurt my feelings, in a way!”

“If half the stories are true, you could have made more than enough to support yourself and him as well-ah, there’s the rub-it was masculine pride, wasn’t it?”

“That, and a perverse desire to better himself-to prove he was worthy of me, by becoming more like me. What he did not understand-and what I could not tell him-was that I loved him precisely because he was unlike me.”

“Why don’t you tell him now? Is he coming to the funeral?”

“Oh, no no no! You don’t understand, highness, I do not speak of recent events. This happened thirty years ago. I’ve not seen him since. And be assured he is not attending the funeral!”

“Thirty years.”

“Yes.”

“Thirty years.”

“…”

“THIRTY YEARS! Longer than I have been alive. The whole time I have known you, this has been going on!”

“I should not say anything was ‘going on.’ It is an episode of my girlhood, forgotten.”

“Yes, I can see how well you have forgotten it.”

“…”

“Where is this man? England?”

“Two people can be a world apart, even when both are in the same city-”

“He’s in London!? And you have done nothing!?”

“Your royal highness-”

“Well, this is another good reason I must go there and become Princess of Wales, or Queen as the case may be, so that I can wield my monarchical powers to patch up your love life.”

“I beg you not to-” said the Duchess, looking thoroughly rattled for the first time. Then she stopped, for there had been an interruption.

“The rite is about to begin, your royal highness,” announced Henrietta Braithwaite, gazing out a window over a crowd in black wool and black silk, funneling itself toward the entrance of the family chapel. She turned to face the Princess, then cast her eyes down in submission, and held up the ivory tool. “This is smooth,” she added. “Be assured that no matter how many times we are forced to use it, your royal highness may go out this evening perfectly unmarked.”

“Henrietta,” said the Princess, “my life would not be the same without you.” An ambiguous statement-but Mrs. Braithwaite chose the most flattering interpretation, and responded with a curtsey and even a blush.

“I HAVE A PROBLEM, MADAME,” said the dark lean figure who had marred Eliza’s peripheral vision for the last quarter-hour, “and you have an opportunity.”

“Ugh, not another one!” Eliza said, and turned finally to confront this fellow, who had been following her around like a doppelganger despite her efforts to shake him off in the crowd of mourners.

They were outside the Palace of Herrenhausen, among the parterres of the northern end of the garden. Inside the palace was a private chapel, not nearly large enough to contain all of the mourners. Sophie’s funeral service had begun an hour ago. Caroline and other members of the family were within; the others were scattered like a flock of black doves across the white gravel of the paths.

In the corner of her eye Eliza had noticed that this troublesome man was dressed in black, and that his wig was white; but the same was true of every man here. Now, looking him squarely in the face for the first time, she saw that the white mane, though it was certainly fake, was no affectation. He was quite old.

“Even on the brightest days I have no desire to be pestered by men with opportunities. On a day like this-”

“It has to do with our absent friend.”

Eliza was almost certain this meant Leibniz. He had not arrived yet. The remarks that several courtiers had made concerning his absence were like wisps of smoke concealing an underlying fire of gossip. Who could this fellow be, then? An old Englishman who knew her, and was a friend of the Doctor-

“Dr. Waterhouse.”

He lowered his eyelids and bowed.

“It has been-?”

“To judge from appearances, a hundred years for me, and half an hour for you. If you prefer to go by calendars, the answer is twenty-five years or so.”

“Why have you not come to call on me at Leicester House?”

“Before I received your summons, I accepted one from another Lady,” Daniel said, glancing toward the Chapel entrance, “and it has kept me busy. I do hope you will forgive my rudeness.”

“Which rudeness? Not calling on me? Or pursuing me with an opportunity?”

“If you are discomposed by it, consider that I am acting as a proxy for the Doctor himself.”

“When I first met the Doctor he was at work on a scheme: a windmill to pump water from the mines of the Harz,” Eliza recalled fondly. “He hoped they would then produce enough silver to finance his world-library-cum-logic-mill.”

“Odd that you should say so. When I first met him, which was at least ten years before you did, he was working on the mill itself. Then he got distracted by the calculus.”

“What I am trying to say to you, in a gentle way, sir, is that-”

“The Doctor’s schemes are mad? Yes, I had already taken your meaning.”

“As much as I love the Doctor and his philosophy, and as much as you do-”

“Stipulated,” said the old man, and smiled warmly, pressing his lips together to hide whatever dental wreckage might be underneath.

“If he cannot make his project succeed with the resources of the Tsar at his back, what use am I?”

“It is of this that I wish to speak to you,” Daniel began. But the doors to the family chapel now swung open. Sophie’s coffin was borne out by a lot of Kings and Electors and Dukes.

They set it on a gun carriage, drawn by a single black horse. The rest of the family came out of the chapel. The coffin and carriage set out, followed by all of the mourners who were fit enough to accompany Sophie on her last walk. A procession took shape, moving southwards down the central axis of the garden towards the great fountain. Daniel strolled along at the rear of the column. Presently Eliza found him.

Daniel said, “You have probably guessed that Leibniz’s absence has to do with the work that he is doing for the Tsar. I believe that the Doctor is in St. Petersburg now.”

“Then no further explanation for his absence is wanted,” Eliza said. “For news to reach him there, and for him to make the journey back, when there’s a war on between the Russians and the Swedes-”

“Impossible,” Daniel agreed. “And you have not even addressed the question of whether he would be allowed to leave.”

A pause, a few steps down the gravel path, before Eliza answered, in a different voice altogether: “Why shouldn’t he be allowed to leave?”

“The Tsar is not renowned for his patience. He wants to see something that actually works.”

“Then our friend may be in grave difficulties indeed.”

“Not so very grave. I have been attending to it.”

“In London?”

“Yes. The Marquis of Ravenscar has supplied funding to erect a Court of Technologickal Arts in Clerkenwell.”

“Why?” Eliza asked sharply, thus proving that she knew something of the Marquis.

“Longitude. He hopes that some invention for discovering the Longitude shall be devised by the men who toil in this Court.”

“And they are-?”

“The most ingenious horologists, organ-makers, goldsmiths, mechanicks, and makers of theatrickal Machinery in all of Christendom.”

The procession had reached the plaza surrounding the great fountain, which would probably be described in any number of diaries this evening as howling with grief, and filling the heavens with its tears. They made a slow orbit around it, reversing their direction, and then began to trudge back toward the Palace. Eliza’s black fontange trapped some fountain-mist and began to wilt.

“If Leibniz is trapped between Peter the Great at one end, and Roger Comstock at the other, I fear he is beyond your help, or mine,” Eliza said.

“It is not so dire. What is wanted is not capital but financing.”

“Something in the nature of a bridge loan?”

“Possibly. Or, perhaps, an independent investment in an allied enterprise.”

“I am waiting,” said Eliza with the diction of one who is biting on a musket-ball waiting for the barber to saw her leg off.

“Your expertise with commodities is celebrated.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You know of Bridewell-where whores are sent to pound hemp and pick oakum.”

“Yes?”

“To build the Logic Mill we shall need a large, inexpensive force of workers to carry out certain operations of a repetitive nature. We have made discreet inquiries among the wardens of Bridewell. We are optimistic that an arrangement can be made to put those women to work at a new task. No longer will they produce hemp.”

“And so the price of hemp will rise,” Eliza concluded. “This is not an investment opportunity but more in the nature of a Hot Tip, sir. And a reminder, as if I wanted one, of why Natural Philosophers are not often seen haunting the ’Change-except when one has been put in the pillory by his creditors.”

“If the ‘hot tip’ makes you money, why, then, you might be able to invest in-”

“Stop-don’t say it-I already know: The Proprietors of the Engine for Raising Water by Fire.”

“Indeed, madame.”

“It is beyond astonishing. After all these years, we have come full circle: the Doctor wants me to invest in an amazing new device for pumping water out of mines!”

“In truth, the Doctor knows very little of the Engine for Raising Water by Fire.”

Now there was another interruption in their discourse as the procession met and absorbed the mourners who had stayed behind at the Palace. Several of these had boarded sedan chairs or carriages, which enlarged and enlivened the procession. A diversion round one wing of the Palace got them out of Sophie’s great garden. The main road from Hanover westwards ran across the other front of the Palace. They crossed over it directly, but slowly, for a crowd of common people of Hanover had come out to stand here and pay their respects to their Sovereign. Once again, Eliza found Daniel in the crowd.

“Then this is not a silver-mining scheme? For I have had enough-”

“As have I, madame,” Daniel returned.

“Tin-mining I might consider, for Cornwall is famed for it.”

“And lead, and others as well. But this is not about silver, tin, lead, or any other metals, noble or base.”

“Coal?”

“Nay, ’tis not a question of any sort of mining! I speak to you rather of Power.”

“It is a frequent topic of conversation in many settings high and low,” Eliza observed, glancing in the direction of the King of Prussia. He was walking arm in arm with Caroline. They were interrupted by a pair of Prussian ladies, probably Countesses or something, who threw themselves at Caroline and took turns pressing their soggy cheeks against hers several times each. Caroline exchanged politenesses with them, and then made her escape, as the gun-carriage had finally plunged across the road and entered the older and smaller garden that spread away from the Palace on that side. The crowd of mourners, pursuing the coffin, thinned out suddenly. Caroline turned around and found Henrietta Braithwaite in formation behind her. The Princess thrust her face forward, adopting the pose of a ship’s figurehead, and closed her eyes. Mrs. Braithwaite stepped in close, raised up the implement with the curved ivory blade, and scraped it quickly down Caroline’s left cheek, then her right, shaving off the cloud of tear-caked face-powder, and the slick of rouge, that had been deposited by the mourners. Caroline opened her eyes, mouthed “Danke schon,” and spun away. Mrs. Braithwaite wiped the ivory clean with a rag that had already seen a lot of use today.

“I am using the word Power in a novel sense,” Daniel explained, when the milling and jostling of the crowd had brought him and Eliza together once more. By this time they were halfway along the path that ran from the main door of Herrenhausen Palace straight up the middle of the Berggarten (as this park was called) to an extremely squat and heavy Doric temple that sat in the middle, guarded and shaded by fine old trees.

Daniel continued, “I use it in a mechanickal sense-to mean a sort of general ability to effect change, in a measurable way. Pumping water out of mines is one thing to spend Power on, but if you had a fund of such Power you might put it to other uses as well.”

“Such as pounding hemp?”

“Or moving the parts of a Logic Mill. Or other purposes we have as yet failed to imagine. Once this Idea or conception of Power has entered your mind, madame, you shall find it difficult to shake off. Everywhere you look you shall see opportunities to put Power to use; and you shall see so many enterprises that suffer from a want of Power that you shall wonder how we have gotten along without it.”

“There is much to consider in your discourse, Doctor, and little leisure, here and now, to consider it. I would be alone now with my grief for Sophie.”

“And I would too, madame, and I thank you.”

“When we are back in London I should like to see this Court in Clerkenwell, and hear more of your plans for the women of Bridewell.”

They had reached the stone temple, and pooled round it. The building was windowless. A pair of doors in the front gave entry to private crypts within; but those were storage for dead cousins and stillborns. The doors were not used today. In the front portico two immense slabs had been set into the floor, cut with the names of Johann Friedrich-the one who had brought Leibniz to Hanover-and Ernst August, Sophie’s late husband. A fresh rectangular hole, of equal size, had recently been let into the floor, and a grave dug in the earth beneath it. A slab bearing Sophie’s name lay to one side, ready.

The rest of the proceedings, then, were of an obvious nature. All grieved, some more sincerely than others, none more so than Caroline. But when the grave had been filled in, with handfuls of dirt from the family, and shovel-loads from almost as sad laborers, Caroline could be seen dusting the dirt from her hands, and uttering some witticism that caused several around her to erupt in shocked and shocking laughter. The procession made its way back to Herrenhausen in a gradually improving mood. None was gayer than Princess Caroline. But only Henrietta and a few others knew that she had something to look forward to.

THE SOLSTICIAL DAY HAD STRETCHED into its eighteenth hour. The English delegation had stayed long past its scheduled date of return so that they could represent Her Britannic Majesty at the funeral, and in doing so they had emptied their purses and worn out what little welcome they had enjoyed to begin with. With a celerity that was conspicuous, verging on rude, they got out of town, banging away along the west-road in a train of carriages and baggage-carts, hoping there’d be enough daylight to reach the inn at Stadthagen.

They had left behind one of their number, a frail codger, who was rumored to have been an indifferently clever chap in his prime, but who now was sadly far gone, and probably never should have attempted such a journey in the first place. He had become debilitated by the long journey to Hanover and was in no condition to make a forced march back to the Dutch coast. Some kind-hearted member of the Hanoverian court had stepped in and offered to arrange a slow and easy return journey for this man, one Dr. Waterhouse, and even to send him in a coach full of nurses and physicians if need be. The other English had accepted this proffer hastily, and with more than a few winks and smirks-seeing it as a calculated attempt by some nobody to get himself Noticed in London.

More than half of the other noble and royal funeral-guests had already gone, many headed eastwards toward Braunschweig, Brandenburg, and Prussia, others going back to wherever Sophie had family, friends, or admirers, which meant radiating to all points of the compass.

Most of those who had stayed behind at Herrenhausen had done so for a reason. That reason was George Louis, Elector of Hanover, out from under his mother’s thumb at last, and next in line to the British throne. And so in spite of the long hours of afternoon sun, the mood of the place had gone just a bit chilly.

Or so it seemed to Baron Johann von Hacklheber as he strolled through the garden, on another sort of mission entirely. Like a black bumblebee he was zigzagging from one flower-bed to the next. He was gathering a bouquet to award to his lady love whenever she showed up. The fundamental laws of the universe governing young men waiting for young ladies applied here as everywhere else, and consequently it was becoming a very large arrangement. Some while ago it had grown too large for one person to hold. In fact it had now become a sort of flower-dump atop the pedestal of a conveniently located statue. Every time Johann added to the pile, he would say a little prayer to Venus-for she was the pedestal’s tenant-and look up at the Palace of Herrenhausen, and lock his gaze on a window in the west wing where Caroline was being fussed over by her attendants. As long as the lace curtains remained drawn, she was a work in progress. So Johann would step back, examine the flower-pile, and ponder the balance of its colors and the variety of its shapes. He would hold an imaginary colloquy with the mute and unhelpful Venus. Then he would launch out in search of the one blossom that would make it perfect. The garden was parted into polygons-triangles and quadrilaterals mostly-and as the wait stretched out he measured with his strides many of their perimeters. A gardener of a suspicious temperament, observing his movements from a distance, might think he was some sort of spy performing horticultural espionage.

Anyone observing him more closely, though, would note that he spent more time gazing outwards toward the perimeter than in on the flower-beds. On the road that surrounded the whole garden, along the bank of the enclosing canal, a sparse but relentless traffic of riders went pointlessly to and fro on expensive horses. Mostly they traveled in groups of two and three. Spurs were jingling all round. Their sound infiltrated the garden’s humid fragrant air like midsummer f?ry-bells. When groups met, murmuring picked up where jingling left off. Someone unaccustomed to Courts in general, and Herrenhausen in particular, would have found it as annoying as it was mysterious. Johann von Hacklheber was used to it, understanding that courtiers literally had no other way to spend their lives. Once more he was put in mind of the wisdom Sophie had shown in situating the riding-path on the extreme frontier of the garden-shouldering all equestrian conspirators out away from the part she loved.

Spotting a likely rosebud, he drew his left hand up the outside of his thigh, black wool purring under his fingertips, and over the line of tiny silver buckles that fastened his rapier’s black leather scabbard to the end of a broad black leather strap-a baldric, it was called-slung diagonally over his body. Continuing up and back, his hand passed under the skirt of his black wool coat, peeling the hem up to expose its black satin lining. He bent his elbow and supinated his wrist. The back of his hand glided up his buttock and over the black leather belt that kept his breeches from falling down, and stopped above his left kidney. He closed his hand on something hard: the handle of his dagger, which lived in an angled scabbard fastened to his belt at the base of his spine. An outward movement of his elbow drew it from its sheath. He got it out in front of him smartly before his coat-skirts could settle back upon the blade and be damaged by it. This precaution would not have been necessary with many daggers of recent make, which were designed for poking, parrying, and nail-paring, and had little to nothing in the way of a cutting edge. Johann owned several such. But all of them were gloriously decorative, and so did not go well with the funeral-weeds he wore today. The same was true of his collection of swords, which was neither especially large nor small compared to those of other gentlemen. But in the back of his wardrobe he did have this old set, which he’d inherited from a great-uncle. It had been made in Italy at least a hundred years ago when styles of sword-fighting, and hence of weapon-making, had been rather different. The rapier was huge. Its blade was a good eight inches longer than his arm, and somewhat broader than was common today, bringing its weight near the practical limit of a one-handed weapon. The edge had been notched in practice or combat, and re-ground, so many times that the blade no longer looked straight, but instead, as one sighted down it, rambled from side to side.

But in this it had nothing on the dagger, which was a serpentine blade of watered steel, astonishingly sharp on both edges. This style had become necessary when some Italian fighters, more sophisticated than Johann would ever be, had learnt the trick of reaching out with one hand to grab the blade of the foe’s dagger. The tactic actually worked, if the grip was firm and the dagger’s blade was straight; but it was most inadvisable to try it with a dagger such as this one. At any rate, the hilts of this dagger and this rapier were comparatively simple: Renaissance rather than Barock, and a world away from Rokoko. The scabbards were as plain as they could be, being simple undecorated black leather. Johann had belted them on this morning. Round midday he had finally stopped whacking the huge scabbard against tables’ legs and funeral-guests’ ankles. Now he was using the dagger to harvest flowers.

The light now came predominantly from the orange western sky, not the direct rays of the sun. The bouquet had to be re-examined in this new light. Johann returned to Venus, sheathing the serpentine dagger with extreme caution, and devoted a few moments to sifting through the pile of blossoms he’d made. Then he looked back at the palace, more out of habit than hope. But he noticed that clear orange sky-light was now shining in one side of Caroline’s apartment and out the other. The sheers had been drawn back from the windows; she was on her way. In a panic-convinced, suddenly, that all his flower-hunting efforts had been misspent-Johann rummaged through his harvest and drew out a generous arm-load of flowers that caught his fancy. He left the remainder as a sacrifice to the love-goddess and began moving toward the compound of the Teufelsbaum in the comical gait of one who is trying to put distance behind him as quickly as possible without breaking into a run. For there was only one portal in the triangular fence that imprisoned the serpent-like tree, and it was a good distance from here; meanwhile a carriage had set out from the palace stables and was moving down the garden path at a healthy clip. God help him if he were late.

Johann reached the iron gate with some moments to spare and slipped through it into the realm of the Teufelsbaum, which was an hour deeper into twilight than the rest of the garden. Having passed through, he about-faced, thrust his head back out over the path, and turned it to look both ways, making sure that no evening stroller had seen him entering the place where the Princess would soon arrive for two hours’ silent and solitary meditation.

Satisfied that no one was there, he drew back and closed the gate, carefully, so as not to make a clang. And there he stood, at attention, in the pose of a musketeer at port arms, save that he cradled a bouquet instead of a weapon. Presently a single great draught-horse boomed around the corner, constrained between a pair of long stout carriage-poles, which led back to a little coach. The driver had a terse exchange of noises with the horse. The horse slowed, passed the gate, stopped, and then (for he’d gone a bit too far, and the driver was remonstrating) backed up until the carriage’s side door was aligned with the iron gate. Quelled, the driver now set the brake, perhaps showing an excess of prudence. Johann stepped forward and opened the iron gate. Then he reached up to unlatch the carriage’s side door.

He swung it open to reveal a pair of mastiffs.

Their eyes were rolling and bulging. Their nostrils were seething, as each was being straddled by a strong man with both hands clasped around its muzzle to keep it from barking. Johann stepped out of the way. The dogs were launched.

Neither Scylla nor Charybdis appeared to touch the ground until they were twenty feet inside the gate. They bounded into the Teufelsbaum, bashing branches out of the way like runaway gun-carriages. Only after they had disappeared did they think to bark, and then as an afterthought. These were not hunters, bred to bay. They were workers.

On the path that ran along the back of the plot, hooves were cantering-then they changed over to a gallop. Johann looked up to the intersection just in time to see the rider flash across drawing a cutlass. It was one of his Leipziger cousins. From the back of the Teufelsbaum came a welter of furious barking and a yelp of pain. The two dog-wranglers-Eliza’s footmen-dove out the open door and ran after the dogs. Johann dropped his bouquet, for it had served its purpose, and followed them. He thought of drawing his rapier, but it would get hung up in the unfathomable windings of those branches. So he drew his dagger instead, and transferred it to his right hand.

He need not have bothered. By the time he stumbled to the back fence, the matter had been concluded. One of the dogs-Johann could not tell them apart in this light-was back in the corner, attending to a long dark robe that had fallen to the ground. On the off chance that the garment was a foe, he was doing battle with it. And on the assumption that it was a vertebrate, he was shaking it back and forth in a bid to crack its spinal column like a bullwhip.

The other dog was being soothed and attended to by one of the footmen-this had suffered a diagonal gash across the muzzle, which was bleeding a lot, though it was not an especially serious wound.

The second footman was kneeling beside a man in a dark robe who lay sprawled on his stomach near the fence. This footman must have been a student of anatomy, for with both hands he was methodically driving a dagger with a foot-long blade into diverse carefully selected locations in the fallen man’s back.

The injured dog-which had reluctantly been squatting on its haunches-got up. But its legs were twitching and it could not remain standing. It fell onto its side and gagged convulsively.

Johann went over to the dead man-for he had to be called dead now, even if his heart were still beating-and picked up with great care a small dagger that lay on the ground near his right hand. He raised it up into a shaft of light that still pierced the branches. One edge was red, and glistening wet, with the dog’s blood; but the entire blade gleamed with a shiny brown coating glazed with an oily rainbow sheen.

“Don’t touch it,” said a familiar woman’s voice. “Some are absorbed through the skin.”

“Yes, Mother.”

“I CANNOT IMAGINE A STATE of affairs more awkward than this,” Eliza thought out loud. They were walking back toward the palace, she picking up her skirts and breaking into a run from time to time to keep up with his strides. Normally Johann was more considerate. This evening, his mind was elsewhere. She wanted it back.

“Two dead assassins in the Electress’s-I mean, the Elector’s garden? Yes, I should say so.”

It was only a few moments since they had witnessed the terminal moments of some unpleasantness in the canal. They were walking along one of the garden’s transverse paths, glancing to the right at every intersection, looking for a straight route back to the palace. Now suddenly they saw it sprawling against a purple and orange sky at a distance of some five hundred Johann-paces, or seven hundred of Eliza’s. Johann snapped the right turn like a soldier at drill, and stormed on.

“No, the hashishin are easily managed,” Eliza said. “One died in the woods, the other in the canal-we’ll say that the latter got drunk, fell in, and drowned. The former has already vanished.”

“Then what is so damned awkward about it? By your leave.”

Eliza let it be seen that she was exasperated. “Think, son. Spies are ubiquitous, obviously. But this spy works for the Jacobites, and he-or to be precise, his wife-is Caroline’s lady-in-waiting-”

“She can be replaced.”

“-and the declared mistress of George Augustus!”

“Again, Mother, almost the whole point of mistresses is that they may be hot-swapped.”

“Caroline says that her husband is quite infatuated with this Henrietta. Short of actually dragging the corpses of the hashishin into his Presence, it is difficult for me to see how we can get him to comprehend-”

“Pardon me for interrupting, Mother, but Caroline also says that Henrietta is unlikely to be the spy. So perhaps it is Harold Braithwaite we ought to be speaking of.”

Eliza did pardon the interruption, if only because she had to stop talking anyway to catch her breath.

“They are married to each other, the Braithwaites are,” Eliza reminded her son, “joined together in God’s sight.” They had plunged out into the northern half of the garden, nearer the palace. This meant they’d emerged from a realm of higher trees, and deeper shadows, onto an open flat plain of clear light. A row of four rectangular pools stretched across their way. The water was perfectly smooth, and reflected the fiery colors of the heavens, creating an illusion that these were but Hell’s sky-lights, lit from below.

Johann had a ready answer to this, but he bit it off. Fifty more strides along, he said: “If spoken to in the right way he might elect to remove himself.”

“In a minor provincial court, who would mind such an arrangement? But when George Augustus is King of England, it will not be acceptable for his mistress’s husband to be permanently absent.”

“Very well, Mother, I agree with you! It is most awkward.” Johann spoke the last sentence sotto voce as they were drawing near to a couple of strolling courtiers-like Braithwaite, English Whigs who’d moved here recently to curry favor with the man they were gambling would be their next Sovereign. They had names and even titles; but for all that it really mattered, they could be called Smith and Jones.

“I beg your pardon, sirs, but have you any notions as to where I-we, rather-might find Mr. Braithwaite?”

“Yes, mein Herr, we spied him not a quarter of an hour ago, showing some French guests round the garden. They went to see the Maze,” said Smith.

“The Maze, now that is an excellent place for such an a-mazing fellow.”

“No,” said Jones, “I do believe that that is Mr. Braithwaite and his party, just yonder, bound for the other side of the garden.” He pointed to several men in black struggling across in front of the palace.

“Finished with the Maze so soon!” exclaimed Smith.

“I’m sure it is but a miserable imitation of the French labyrinths, and quite disappointing to his companions,” Johann said.

“They are going to the theatre, I’ll wager,” said Jones. “Oh, there is no play to-night. But they might be going to have a look round.”

“And who better to escort them than Mr. Braithwaite, who is an actor of note,” reflected Johann. “Mother, would you please go to the palace and relate all of the very latest gossip to our friend? She will be on tenterhooks.”

Eliza suddenly looked young, because uncertain. She glanced after Braithwaite.

“I shall be in with you momentarily, after I have spoken to Mr. Braithwaite concerning his travel plans.”

“Is Mr. Braithwaite to go on a journey?” asked Smith.

“A lengthy one, ’tis rumored,” Johann confirmed. “Mother? If you please?”

“If these two gentlemen would be so good as to accompany you-” Eliza suggested.

Smith and Jones exchanged a look. “Braithwaite is a merry sort of chap, he shan’t be offended if we cross paths with him-?” said Smith.

“I see no reason to suppose otherwise,” said Jones.

“Very well. I will see you in a quarter of an hour,” said Eliza, in adamant maternal style.

“Oh, Mama, it shall not even be that long.”

Eliza departed. Johann stood for a few moments, watching her go, then announced, distractedly: “Let’s to it. We are losing the light!”

“Er, why do you need light, my lord?” Smith inquired, after he had caught up, which took some exertion. Jones was already miles behind.

“Why, so that Mr. Braithwaite can see the going-away present that I will give him!”

THE GARDEN-THEATRE WAS A SLOPING rectangle of ground, walled in by hedges, and guarded by a picket line of white marble cherubs. These were charming in daylight but now took on the spectral, glabrous appearance of stillborns. A raised stage was at one end. Several of the French guests had climbed atop it and were amusing themselves with the trap-door. Braithwaite stood below the stage, in the orchestra, conversing with a man who like everyone else was dressed in black. But his clothing did not consist of the usual breeches, waistcoat, amp;c. but rather a ground-seeping cassock with a hundred silver buttons. As Johann drew nearer he recognized the man as Father Edouard de Gex, a Jesuit of noble birth, who’d figured into some of mother’s more disturbing Versailles anecdotes.

Johann stopped about ten paces short of this pair-close enough to interrupt their conversation. Bringing both hands together at his left flank, he gripped the junction of scabbard and baldric with his left, and the hilt of the rapier with his right. He drew the blade out a foot or so-enough to loosen it. But knowing the weapon was too long to pull free in a single movement, he then raised the whole rig-rapier, baldric, and scabbard-up in front of his face and lifted it clear of his shoulders. A sideways gesture sent the leather goods hurtling away into the cheap seats, leaving him free of all encumbrances, with exposed rapier in hand. His left hand was now free to draw the serpentine dagger as before. He stood squarely facing Braithwaite, dagger and rapier in front of him, both tips aimed at the hollow at the base of Braithwaite’s throat, knuckles down and backs of hands facing outwards, for Johann had been trained by Hungarians.

By this time Braithwaite, and all of the Frenchmen save one, had got their own swords half drawn-a cultivated reflex. De Gex had slipped his right hand into a slit-pocket in the breast of his cassock.

“Father de Gex,” Johann announced, “you shall not be needing whatever that is.”

De Gex’s hand dropped to his side. Johann made sure it was empty. “This is not a melee but a duel. Your presence is requested, padre; first, to act as Mr. Braithwaite’s second; after, to give him last rites. My second is one of these two gentlemen behind me; I care not which, and leave them to sort it out. If I should be struck by a meteorite during this combat, and killed, they will convey my apologies and my love to my mother.”

Johann guessed that he might have derived some low entertainment from observing the faces of Smith and of Jones at hearing this unexpected news; but having gone this far, he could not now remove his gaze from Braithwaite’s eyes until Braithwaite’s heart had stopped beating. De Gex uttered something that caused all of the Frenchmen to re-sheathe their swords. Then he said something rather different to Braithwaite; but Braithwaite remained frozen with his blade half out.

“Braithwaite! It is my prerogative as a gentleman to make you defend yourself with that weapon you are forever carrying around; will you please act like a gentleman, and draw it?”

“I propose tomorrow at dawn-”

“By which time you shall be where? Prague?”

“A proper duel is never conducted in haste-”

“This looks like dawn to me,” Johann answered. He could not even tell what language he was speaking now. He advanced a step, quickly, which finally prompted Braithwaite to draw his small-sword. Johann continued, “Dusk and dawn come so close to kissing at this time of year I never know which is which.”

Braithwaite had finally extracted his small-sword, and, with some assistance from de Gex, got himself disentangled from the scabbard and its strap-work. He got into a stance resembling Johann’s, but with the hand oddly curled under, in the English style. De Gex withdrew. Braithwaite had already cornered himself by standing with his back to the stage. Johann advanced. Braithwaite raised his weapon. Johann stung it out of the way with his dagger, put the tip of his rapier against Braithwaite’s solar plexus, shoved it in six inches, and then punched the hilt downward. Then he jerked it out, turned around, and walked back towards the palace where his mother and his sweetheart were waiting for him. “So much for awkward,” he said.

DANIEL WATERHOUSE REMOVED a handkerchief from his breast pocket, draped it over his hand, and used it to grip the handle of the assassin’s dagger. The weapon had been borne into the room-a servants’ pantry near Princess Caroline’s apartment-on a silver tray, like an hors d’ouevre. Daniel held it several inches above a candle, so that the blade split the current of warm air rising from the flame. Then he leaned forward and got his beak into a position some distance above that. He gave the air the tiniest sniff, then recoiled and turned away from it. The dagger he set back on the tray, and the handkerchief he wadded up and threw into a cold fireplace in the corner of the pantry.

Johann could smell it now, too: an acrid, smoky reek that reminded him of something.

“Nicotine,” said Daniel.

“Never heard of it.”

“That may be, but you have some in you right now, if you have smoked a pipe in the last few hours.”

“That’s what the smell reminds me of, a bit-an old pipe-bowl that has never been cleaned out.”

“It is an extract of the tobacco plant. When I was your age, it was in vogue, among certain Fellows of the Royal Society, to prepare this poison and inflict it on small animals. It is soluble in oil. It is bitter-”

“You’ve tasted it?!”

“No, but persons who have, invariably remark on its bitterness before they stop breathing.”

“How does it kill?”

“I have just told you-the victim stops breathing. But not before becoming twitchy and spasmodic for a brief time.”

“That was true of the dog, when I saw it. Then I lit out in pursuit of the other assassin. He had been pursued to the edge of the canal, and jumped in rather than perish at sword’s edge. He was sloshing about-for the water was but chest-deep-looking for some apt place to scale the opposite wall of the channel. Then he stopped moving, and sank below the surface. When we pulled him out he was dead.”

“Did water drain from his lungs?”

“Now that you mention it, no.”

“He did not drown then,” Daniel said. “If you examine the corpse carefully you shall find some place where he nicked himself with his dagger, or let it brush against his skin.” Daniel planted a hand to either side of the silver platter and gazed at the weapon. “This is an expert preparation, solved in some fine light oil, such as whale-oil. Smeared on the skin it would convey the nicotine into the capillaries and thence to the lungs in a few minutes’ time.” He looked up at Johann. “When you smoke your pipe, you feel an initial rush of stimulation, followed by a calmness, a steadying of the nerves. This is but a trace, a shadow, of nicotine poisoning. If you were cut with this dagger, that relaxation of the nerves would advance to the point where you would simply forget to breathe, and drown in air…every time you smoke tobacco, you are prefiguring your own death.”

“Horrid…it makes me want to smoke something just to calm down.”

“Mr. Hooke experimented with an herb called bhang that would cure what ails you-alas, it is harder to get.”

“I shall make inquiries. It is strange. During the events, I had a clarity of mind, a sharpness of perceptions, I’d never known before. Now, sitting here, I am terrified.”

“As I should be, if I had just received such a tongue-lashing from the Duchess of Arcachon-Qwghlm.”

“You could hear it this far away?”

“I do believe that the King of France sat up in his bed at Versailles wondering what new war had broken out in Germany.”

“It’s true, I have never seen her so angry. She did tell me never to duel. And I did promise. But this-”

“You chose the moment well,” Daniel assured him. “Physical violence is a means that I have never employed for any purpose. The risks are enormous, and a man of my mentality, who sees dangers where they are and are not, can always find a reason to take some other course. You are young and-”

“Stupid?”

“No, but less perceptive of risk. When, God willing, you have reached the age of forty, you’ll sit up in bed in the middle of the night, covered in sweat, with the memory of this night fresh in your mind, and say, ‘My God, I cannot believe I once fought a duel!’ Or so I hope.”

“Why do you hope for me to sleep poorly?”

“Because though I have not done violence I have seen rather a lot of it. Not all of the men who employ it are stupid, or evil. Only most of them. The rest use it reluctantly, as a way, when all else has failed, of seizing the main chance. Thus you tonight. Your mother will understand this and get her equilibrium back. But like a man who imbibes tobacco-smoke, you have died a little death tonight. I do not recommend that you become addicted to it.”

“It is very good advice. I thank you for it. As I thank you, again, for giving us information that saved Caroline’s life. You may expect that she will reward you-”

“I would glady forgo all thanks and rewards if I could simply take a nap.”

“You can nap in the carriage, Dr. Waterhouse,” said a woman’s voice. Hoarse, as if she’d been screaming a lot recently.

Daniel and Johann both looked over to see Eliza in the pantry’s doorway. She looked a good deal calmer.

“My lady,” Daniel said, and sighed, “from any other woman I should interpret this as a jest or non sequitur, but from you I fear-”

“It is well known that you stayed behind in Hanover, being too ill for arduous travel-”

“Thank you for reminding me, my lady, my infirmity had quite slipped my mind.”

“It is expected that you will take the slow way back, attended by a nurse. I give you your nurse.” Eliza came all the way into the room now. She was followed by a young woman dressed in a severe habit, her head swaddled in a length of white linen that had been wrapped around so as to conceal all of her hair, and a good bit of her face-hardly a la mode, but not particularly unusual in a time and place when nearly everyone sooner or later got smallpox, and some emerged in good health but almost impossible to look at. “This is Gertrude von Klotze, a petty noblewoman of Braunschweig, who after suffering and surviving a grave illness, has dedicated the remainder of her life to succouring others in need.”

“A noble woman indeed. It is my very great pleasure to meet you, mademoiselle,” said Daniel, adroitly looking past the fact that this woman was, in fact, Princess Caroline.

“Fraulein von Klotze shall accompany you all the way to London.”

“And how shall sweet Gertrude get back?” Johann demanded-having taken a few moments to recover from the abrupt transfiguration of his lover into a masked nurse. He made a step toward Caroline, but she sent him back with a dart of the eyes. “Surely her family will miss her!”

“Perhaps she won’t have to come back, as her family may be moving to London soon anyway,” Eliza said. “Gertrude shall lodge at Leicester House until we make rendezvous with her later.”

“I did not know that I was-we were-going to London!” Johann answered.

“We are,” Eliza said calmly, “but not before a detour to the chateau at Schlo? Ubersetzenseehafenstadtbergwald.”

“Eeyuh, that place? Are you joking? What’ll we do there, hunt bats?”

“Some minutes ago, you may have heard a woman screaming in this wing of the palace.”

“Indeed, my ears are still ringing.”

“That was Princess Caroline.”

“Are you certain? For during the time this screaming reached my ears I observed movements of your lips, Mother, curiously synchronized-”

“Your wit is tedious. ’Twas the Princess. Her grief over the death of Sophie is even deeper than was realized. Her braveness earlier today a mere affectation, masking a profound derangement of the nerves. Not long ago, she simply dissolved. She has been given tincture of opium and is under strict seclusion in her bedchamber. Before the sun is up, she shall be taken out in a sedan chair and loaded into my carriage. You, son, and I shall convey her to the Schlo? I have mentioned-one of the most remote and desolate out-croppings in Christendom. There, her royal highness shall spend several weeks in seclusion, tended only by a few trusted servants, turning away all visitors.”

“Especially ones carrying poisoned daggers-?”

“Rumors of assassins in the garden are absurd,” Eliza said, “They are chim?ras, figments of her royal highness’s fevered brain. Even if they did exist, they would face grave difficulties gaining entrance to the place to which we are taking her, which, as you know if you have been studying your family history, was built on a rock in a lake by a rich Baron so concerned for his personal security that he believed that even the birds of the air were wind-up toys invented by hashishin to fly in his windows and put anthrax into his beer.”

“Oh, was he the chap who invented beer-mugs with lids on them?” Daniel wondered aloud.

But Eliza was in no mood. “I should like it very much, Dr. Waterhouse, if you were to fall down and suffer a medical crisis.”

“I am here to serve, my lady,” Daniel returned gallantly, and began looking round the pantry for a comfortable place to hit the floor.

“Might I spend a moment with ‘Gertrude’ first?” Johann inquired. “There is much, er, advice I would give her concerning London and-”

“There is no time,” Eliza said, “and your advice is of little value, as ‘Gertrude’ does not expect to participate in any sword-fights.” And Eliza drew breath as if to expound upon this theme at greater length. But Daniel’s withered hand suddenly lay gentle on her arm. She faltered. “Gertrude” and Johann had locked their eyes together across the room. Eliza could have detonated a barrel of gunpowder and they would not have heard it.

“Let’s to London, then,” Daniel said.