Caller of Lightning

by Eytan Kollin

  ~ Letter from Benjamin Franklin

  to Deborah Read Franklin, July 17th, 1757

  Wiltshire County

  England

  July 23rd

  14

  Do You Hear That?

  The road from Amesbury to Stonehenge was smooth and regularly maintained by the Duke of Queensbury. William and Ben watched the landscape roll by, each observing from opposite windows. No matter the circumstance, the two never seemed able to share a view. They had changed to a smaller carriage, leaving their slaves and bags behind on the waiting high flyer, in order to enjoy a detour from their trip to London so they could visit the legendary stonework.

  Grass so green it seemed ready to jump to blue covered the turf, broken by the occasional farmhouse jutting up from the plain. The warm air smelled of the grass, of distant leaves, and even of the further distant ocean. It smelled clean in a way a city never could.

  “This is very exciting; I’ve always wanted to see the henge. Didn’t make the time when I was here last, which was foolishness.” Ben never took his eyes from the passing scene, hungry as he was to see everything. “Always make time, William. It may seem that you are too busy to accommodate your small desires, but you should never let them pass by unattended.”

  “Indeed, Father.” There was a hint of something deeper on his son’s mind, but Ben was too distracted to notice.

  “I cannot wait! It is a marvel, no doubt. A testament to what the kings of old could build.” He shifted in his seat, trying to get a better view ahead of the carriage.

  “I’m sure it will be most astounding,” William agreed without thinking. When his mind was elsewhere, but social obligation bade him speak, his habit—unknowingly learned from his father—was to declaim. He did so now. “I have recently reread the translated Historia Regum Britanniae in anticipation of arriving here. Monmouth believed that Merlin constructed the rings with rocks from Africa at the command of Aurelius Ambrosius. He calls them the giant’s dance. It is said the stones traveled from Africa to Ireland before they were eventually moved here.”

  At an earlier time Ben might have complained about the interjection of folklore, but now he paused. Given the events of the last few years, and the odd powers he himself now possessed, though in small measure, who was he to say that a tale of Merlin was mere fancy? “As I recall, wasn’t it a tomb for Arthur? Or Uther?”

  “It was for Uther, yes. Arthur is lost, but, according to myth, Stonehenge covers the bones of Uther, Aurelius, and Constantine the Third.”

  “There it is!” shouted Ben. They rode in silence the remaining way, as the carriage passed the embankment ring and then pulled to a stop. Ben’s eyebrows knitted in surprise. There was a faint but persistent—and familiar—hum in the air, from the direction of the henge.

  “Do you hear that?” he asked his son, already suspecting the answer.

  “Hear what?”

  “Never mind.”

  William reached past him and opened the door. The two climbed out of the carriage, and Ben stopped to gaze around in purest awe. The massive stones of the inner horseshoe were wider than a person and over twice as tall.

  William stepped around him to address the coachman. “You’ll just wait here?”

  “Yessirs.” The coachman tipped his hat. He had already dismounted and started tending to his charges. “Take yer time, I’ll brush down the horses and be ready when you are to go back to Amesbury.”

  The Franklins hadn’t bothered packing a lunch or doing anything special, since the monument was only a twenty-minute ride from the town. They had even left Peter and King alone to have some quiet time at the inn. The morning sun was cresting overhead as they approached the monument from the side of the horseshoe shape in the center. Walking forward slowly, both were speechless at what they saw.

  Ben scratched at his ear. The faint humming hadn’t gone away, and thoughts of Merlin and ancient magic seemed less preposterous by the second.

  The two men split, each intent on his own exploration of the site. Ben walked under the archway of the outer stones, drawn to the larger ones at the center. They pulled him along until he stood before the head. Tentatively he reached out and placed his hand upon it.

  The stone felt both cool and warm to him. It vibrated subtly under his touch. His brow furrowed in thought. The sensation was not unfamiliar. In kind it was much like touching the Key, only less present in the moment: fainter, distant, as though there had once been great power in these stones, but now it was only a memory.

  Curious, Ben thought. He pulled a kerchief and his slip-joint knife from the pocket of his coat. Chiseling a few shavings from the stone immediately wrecked the blade, but it was a worthy sacrifice in pursuit of knowledge.

  “What are you doing, Father?”

  Quickly folding up the kerchief, he turned, “Simply testing the hardness and character of the stone. What of you—uncovered the door to Uther’s tomb yet?”

  William quirked an eyebrow but let the comment go. “Nothing so interesting. It is an extraordinary monument, to be sure, but I will soon have had my fill.”

  “That quickly? Have you even touched the stones? Felt their history?” Ben offhandedly tapped the headstone with the ruined slip-joint knife. The resulting sound was a humming clang that echoed between the stones, pulsing harmonically with the faint humming tone.

  “Well, that I heard.” William perked up interestedly and came to examine the struck stone.

  “Apparently, I have happened across a trait of the stones.” Ben stood back, tapping the megalith in a different spot. It made a hollow-sounding, deeper sound.

  William ran a finger along the rough surface, studying it intently. “It reminds me vaguely of your glass harp.”

  “Indeed. I keep meaning to fiddle with it, too, but I cannot find an arrangement I like.” Ben suddenly shook his head and looked around sharply. As plain as the sun in the sky, he knew—knew—that someone was watching him; and the fact that there was no one in view for miles save William and the coachman did not dull that absolute certainty one whit.

  For his part, William observed his father acting even more strangely than usual, and, after his own experience of the last several years, grew quickly concerned. Though this time there had been nothing to see, he was reminded of the strange events surrounding the close inspection of the bell, and how drained and ill his father had been for weeks afterward. He reached out to take Ben’s arm and led him to the carriage. “Come, Father, shall we?”

  “Pshaw,” Franklin said, waving the hand away. “I’m perfectly capable of moving myself to the post-chaise, William. For once, my knees don’t even hurt.” But the truth was that every instinct in his body was suddenly screaming at him to run, to hide, to get away from this place as quickly as possible and never return.

  No matter where he looked as they walked back to the cart, the sensation persisted, though there was no possible visible reason: just the mute, motionless stones, and the good English countryside stretching away in all directions.

  Ben could take it no more. He held up his hand and snapped his fingers, borrowing a motion from the Great Gasparini. “Slæp.”

  Both William and the driver slumped to the ground. Even the horse’s head drooped, he noted proudly.

  Ben, with great care, walked back to the stones. Using the sleep spell had tired him, but he was growing stronger in his manipulation of the arcane laws. As he walked into the circle once more, he waved a hand and focused his intent behind saying the word, “Revelare.”

  The air shimmered and Ben began to hear faint sounds of . . . a battle? It seemed to be coming from a thousand years away. Electrostatic sparks of purple and blue jumped from stone to stone. One caught Ben and knocked him to his knees. He struggled to regain his feet, leaning heavily on his cane, swatting away more of the sparks.

  “Hello?” He backed away warily. No one answered. Fire ringed the inner stones, erupting from nowhere and consuming the monoliths.

 
Either there was someone here messing with him, or there was no one here and he had accidentally triggered some primal force of the henge. Ben turned and ran back to the carriage as much as his bad hip would allow him to. He had to move William and the driver to safety before he faced down this . . . whatever it was, and figured this out.

  He urgently wrestled the limp William into the interior seat, then managed to get the driver up onto the perch. As he turned back, the flames and noise vanished. Stonehenge was once more just a series of megalithic rocks forming an ancient monument.

  Ben stood stock still, intently studying the formation. What just happened?

  Behind him, and a bit above, the driver woke. “How’d I get up here then?”

  “You collapsed, and I thought it best to move you up to the cushion than leave you laying on the ground,” Ben lied.

  “Well, I feel fine now. Drowsy, but fine.”

  Once back in the carriage, Ben leaned into the cushioned seat and closed his eyes. With a simple “hyup” from the coachman, the horses and carriage jostled into motion. As the stone circle fell further away to the rear, Ben could feel his nerves clear, and he idly wondered if insanity was the price for practicing magic.

  As the carriage rattled off, a middle-aged man with angular features and pudgy cheeks, wearing the finery of a noble, stepped out from behind the monument’s headstone, gazing after the departing Franklins. “How very weak he is. Surprising.” He muttered to himself, then walked away, headed away from Amesbury.

  The

  Collinson Home

  Ridgeway House,

  Mill Hill, Middlesex

  July 25th

  15

  Thy Best Interest

  at Heart

  William thought they were stopping for the night at the Bear Inn, where in the morning they could catch the Marine coach for their final leg into London, but it turned out his father had other plans. Ben directed Peter and King to shift the party’s luggage to a newly hired post-chaise, and informed his son that after their meal they would be continuing on to a secret destination that Ben had determined to visit even before leaving Philadelphia.

  In the dining hall of the stable yard, William sought to make plain his dissatisfaction. “I do not understand, Father,” he said, sitting down to a tolerable meal of leek potage and brown bread. “Why don’t we simply take rooms here for tonight and proceed tomorrow to the lodgings Mr. Charles has secured for us in the city? It is late. I am tired. I would much prefer to rest and prepare myself to enter London in proper form in the morning. Whatever else could you possibly think sensible?”

  Peter and King, eating their own meals nearby, remained attentive to their masters’ discussion.

  Ben smiled and gestured with his spoon. “I suppose I’ve kept it to myself long enough. London, as you will soon discover for yourself, is an exposure that takes some getting used to. Before we surrender to it, I am determined to go where one of the greatest gardens in England is being nurtured. And, having never met Peter Collinson face to face, I will not be turned from that happening as quickly as possible.”

  Peter and King glanced at each other. King rolled his eyes, and Peter shrugged in response. They went back to eating.

  William glanced uncomfortably at the two slaves, then back at his father, who was now wholly occupied with his food. There really was nothing to say. He dipped his bread and took a small bite, unhappily resigned to having his wishes ignored yet again.

  The rest of the meal was eaten in relative silence, filled only by the conversations of the tavern’s other patrons.

  When all four were done eating, they left on the chaise. It was a speedy carriage, with room for two inside and two on the back, plus the cargo tucked on the lower back. The drive kept them on a steady pace. Inside the carriage, William maintained his silence, and Ben let him, content to look ahead in pleasure as they rode. In what felt like much less time than it actually was, for Ben—and much more than actual for William—they neared their destination. They were beyond the city and its pervasive smells. The fragrant scent of blooming flowers was on the night breeze, and everywhere around them botanical skill was evident in the moonlight. They had left central London and arrived in Mill Hill, one of the better tended suburbs.

  The post-chaise brought them to the entrance of Ridgeway House, a modest three-story manse with steepled roofs and expansive gardens in back, where Peter Collinson grew his rare plants. The ground floor was red brick; the top two stories white trimmed. Ben was the first out of the carriage and bolted to the door, despite his various aching joints.

  He pulled the bell handle and waited expectantly. The door opened and a man with a severe expression and intense eyes opened the door. On seeing who stood before him, his visage immediately brightened.

  “You can only be Ben Franklin.”

  “Just so. And you, Peter Collinson,” Ben ventured happily. “I have been waiting for too many years for the pleasure of shaking your hand!”

  “The pleasure is all mine, all mine,” returned Collinson, eagerly returning his guest’s firmly enthusiastic grip.

  “I will not have anything acknowledged but the debt of gratitude I owe for your boundless generosity. I would never have wandered into my electrical experiments if you had not sent me that pamphlet and glass cylinder. And, as I remember it, that book was not part of the Library Company’s order that season. You added it like you’ve added so many generous gifts to our humble endeavor over these many years.”

  Collinson continued to smile as he turned his attention to William, who was now approaching.

  Ben held out his arm to his son, proudly offering him for review. “This is my son, William Franklin. William, I am pleased to introduce you to Mr. Peter Collinson, Fellow of the Royal Society of London, brother printer, ahem, and master botanist.”

  William reached out his hand and shook Collinson’s with clear pleasure, “I have heard your gardens are a wonder to behold, and I see that I was not misled.”

  Collinson received the compliment graciously. “Thank you, though what you see out here is but a minor sampling. Wait till you tour the rear gardens! But that can wait until morning. Ben, dearest friend, I have made arrangements for you and your son, and your servants as well. You will rest well here.”

  Ben tapped the tip of his cane against the ground. “Please let us not discontinue all conversation. I am eager for your insight on how to facilitate His Majesty’s government annulling the powers of the Penns and creating Pennsylvania as a Crown Colony.”

  “Thank you, sir,” William gently chided his father by displaying better manners. “I confess I have great need of the offered arrangements, after so long a day, and lengthier journey.”

  Ben was of another mind. “Surely not straight to bed for you and me, Peter. We have so much to discuss. So much!”

  “It’s to be business straight away, instead of books and flowers? If only you’d arrived in daylight I might have kept this sortie at bay.” Collinson laughed heartily. “Well then, your servants can attend to unloading the baggage and seeing your son and themselves off to bed. For myself, I keep late hours, and am ready to match you subject for subject as we please.”

  Once Peter was sure the guests were being assisted with the unloading of the carriage, he motioned for Ben to huddle close, then continued the conversation. “As for your business in England, Ben, the Crown may feel that the colony’s name says it all. Most of the powerful socialites come from landed estates, and cannot help but think of Pennsylvania as a landed estate of the Penn family. As they would be loath to have their own ancestral lands disposed of without a clear and cogent cause, they would be, I think, wary to act in such a manner against the Penns. Your cause is not a popular one here. It is not noble, and it is not wanted. It is only on the strength of your own renown that you may carry your cause forward to any degree.”

  “But the Penns have barely been in Pennsylvania for eighty years,” Ben answered with a wicked glint in his eye,
though his lips were pursed. “Some few of the Lords in court were alive before there even was a Pennsylvania. Most have outhouses older than that! How ‘ancestral’ can it be, as a land goes?”

  Collinson chuckled. “A fair point, and if not for other pressing issues, it may have been fairly considered.”

  “What other issues do you mean?”

  “You know that the Penn family lives a life that is not strictly abstentious. William was a man very different from his sons.”

  “They plunder Pennsylvania and live in pomp,” Ben scoffed. “This is well known, I can assure you. It is one of the many grievances the people of Pennsylvania have sent me to discuss with the government. Our coffers are drained without defense, and the Penns are exempt from taxation and overrule us in our own Assembly. It is disgraceful.”

  “Have you not considered that the Penn family’s use of frill and finery is not so much a decadent outcome as a well-developed tool? Something which supports their real goal? Do not underestimate Thomas Penn.”

  “I am not sure what you mean,” Ben said, both annoyed that he did not understand something he felt he should and keenly interested to learn what it could be.

  A woman’s voice came calling from further inside the house. “What is all this, then? Our guests are being made to stand in the entryway like strangers? Come, Peter, you know better than that!”

  “My dear . . . ” Peter began sheepishly, as his wife Mary Collinson walked up to the group. “You are completely correct. May I introduce Mr. Benjamin Franklin and his fine young son, William Franklin, both late of Philadelphia. Mr. Franklin and William, this is my beautiful wife, Mary Collinson.”

  Mary took their hands, beaming with pleasure, “So glad we can enjoy your company as you begin your tour of England, Mr. Franklin. And William, I believe this might be your first visit? I hope it will be everything good that you might have considered. I can’t imagine how difficult your journey must have been. Think upon how shocked we were when the main body of your luggage arrived in England so many weeks before you did. How they must have shuffled you about—I mean, your possessions set sail without you, for goodness sake!” As she spoke, Mary managed to get William to let her take his arm, so she could lead him into the house.