by Mark Helprin
“Mootfowl!”
“Yes, Mootfowl, and the little fat one is Mr. Cecil Wooley. However, their names won’t do you any good.”
“I’ll go through every archive that exists.”
“They’re not in archives.”
“You don’t travel around in a mile-long ship without someone, somewhere, writing it down.”
“You can,” said Harry Penn, interrupting himself to move the lever and shut off the water. A silence followed. “There are men who move through history without leaving a trace of themselves, even though they may change the world. Jackson Mead has been here before, several times before, but you won’t find it written down. He arranges it so that the traces disappear.”
“Is he going to make arrangements this time, too?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Meaning The Sun will ignore him?”
“Yes.”
“Meaning that, even though I have enough to fill a column, there will be no such column?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll have to resign. I don’t want to, but you’re forcing me.”
“I know.” Harry Penn’s expression was almost joyous.
“I thought I knew you,” Praeger said.
“I knew you didn’t,” Harry Penn answered. “No one really does. But hold through. It’s a pity. I don’t want to see you go. Why don’t you meet with Jackson Mead himself?”
“Don’t tell me that to do so I’ll have to saw off my right arm,” Praeger said. “Because I will.”
“I’ll see what I can do, although I don’t know if you’ll profit by it, or simply be overcome. He has a powerful presence.”
“Mr. Penn, before I met Jessica I was engaged to a young woman whose parents insisted that prior to our marriage we speak with a Jesuit. They wanted to convert me, and had in mind putting me under the fire of a large gun. The engagement was broken off later, for other reasons, but we did manage to see the Jesuit. We had lengthy discussions and disputations. He became a rabbi.”
“So you think you can make Jackson Mead a rabbi!”
“I might just do that.”
“Take Hardesty and Virginia with you.”
“Why?”
“He’ll have Mootfowl and Mr. Wooley. Do you want to be outnumbered?”
THEY WERE met at the small door in the plinth. It opened and closed in an instant, after which they found themselves shaking hands with a beaming Cecil Mature, who introduced himself as Mr. Cecil Wooley, and was full of laughter that gurgled from his nose and throat like water going down a stuffed drain. He was wearing a medieval boy’s tunic and a Chinese hat. It was a miracle that he could see, and they imagined that he looked out through his eyes like a sentry peering through firing slits. He was his usual good-natured self, and he waddled along with notable rapidity.
It was four-thirty in the morning, and the museum was empty even of guards. As they passed through its palatial chambers and long halls, they became aware of music, and the music swelled until it filled the corridors and made their hearts race. On a balcony overlooking a dim atrium, they were hit by the full flood of it, for a dozen musicians were playing below.
Then they found themselves in the New Great Hall, under a sky of gray and white opaque glass that suggested a perpetual March afternoon. Jackson Mead was working at a long desk in the middle of the room, seemingly half a mile away, surrounded by half a dozen paintings on three-legged easels. Mootfowl, who also wore a Chinese hat, was on his knees in prayer before a large canvas depicting St. Stephen’s Ascension. St. Stephen arose, his limp legs and downward-pointing feet trailing after him as if he were being pulled through water, or as if they were the swaddlings of a baby held high above its father. His clothing appeared to have been molded into the shape of the air. As light flooded down upon him, he stared beyond the upper edge of the painting, while in the background golden splays of birds were aflutter in the wind. Distant mountains, purple and white, looked almost as if they were rearing like frightened horses. Rivers leapt from their channels and leapt back in again, leaving dry bends of riverbed in which fish were straining to swim and breathe in water that was not there. Underneath St. Stephen was a ring of golden light. The skillfully rendered grasses on the little prairie from which he is said to have been assumed were beginning to kindle where they met the circle of light.
When he finished praying, Mootfowl got up and pulled a cloth across the papers on Jackson Mead’s desk. Cecil Mature showed the three visitors to their chairs, and they sat down opposite Jackson Mead, after which Cecil began to pace back and forth, laughing to himself now and then, calculating on his fingers, and muttering “Oh my, oh my.”
The music stopped. Praeger was about to speak, but Jackson Mead held up his hand and warned that the piece was not yet finished. “I’m wedded to the last movement,” he said. “Do you know what it is?”
“The allegro of the ‘Third Brandenburg,’” Hardesty answered.
“Yes,” said Jackson Mead. “The ‘Third’ is the only one without wind instruments. I never liked them in the other concerti, because they tend to clutter things up. They remind me of a bunch of monks running down a corridor, breaking wind. So many years in those monasteries, all through the Dark Ages. It was horrible.
“Here it is. Listen!” he commanded. “This part. It sounds like a good machine, a perfectly balanced rocker arm, something well-oiled and precise. Notice the progressions, the hypnotic repetitions. These are the tunnel rhythms, derived from the same timed intervals which are the irreducible base for planetary and galactic ratios of speed and distance, small particle oscillations, the heartbeat, tides, a pleasing curve, and a good engine. You cannot help but see such rhythms in the proportions of every good painting, and hear them in the language of the heart. They are what make us fond of grandfather clocks, the surf, and well-proportioned gardens. When you die, you know, you hear the insistent pounding that defines all things, whether of matter or energy, since there is nothing in the universe, really, but proportion. It sounds somewhat like an engine that became available at the beginning of the century, and was used in pumps and boats and that sort of thing. I thought for sure that people would realize what it was, but they didn’t. What a shame. Nonetheless, there is always music like this, which, in its way, comes just as close—as if the composer had actually been there, and returned.”
When the music stopped, Jackson Mead turned to Cecil Mature. “Mr. Wooley, please tell the musicians that they won’t be needed until five-thirty. Thank you.” Cecil Mature waddled out, flailing his sausagelike arms and legs. Mootfowl took his place by the side of Jackson Mead, looking maddeningly like an eighteenth-century Connecticut undertaker.
“The Reverend Doctor Mootfowl and I would be delighted to answer your questions—up to a point. We do have our privacy. If all things were one, there would be no privacy. But, since we are in a state of multiplicity, there are shades and differences, and privacy must be maintained—if only as a complement of and testament to physics.”
“We’re grateful that you’re seeing us,” Praeger said. “And we have no intention of violating your privacy. However, we didn’t come to talk about the unified field theory, or the aesthetics of architecture.”
Hardesty seemed slightly offended. Registering this, Jackson Mead imagined a path between Hardesty and Praeger, down which he intended to walk quite easily.
“Though, evidently, our newspaper won’t be making your answers public, we are, by habit, compelled to inquire of you in the manner of reporters. We feel that we are justified in this because of your private dealings with our elected officials, the general public curiosity about your arrival, and the unprecedented size of your ship.”
“Makes sense,” Jackson Mead answered.
“I’m glad you agree. Who are you, where do you come from, what are you planning to do, why have you kept your activities secret, what does the ship hold, where and how was it built, and when will you begin whatever it is that is to be begun? These are the t
hings that we must know to satisfy the public’s curiosity and our own.”
“That’s a rather arrogant approach,” stated Jackson Mead.
“How so?” Praeger returned, undisturbed.
“Why must you insert yourself in my business?”
“I told you, sir, and you said that it sounded reasonable.”
“What sounded reasonable to me, Mr. de Pinto, was your curiosity, not any idea that I’m obligated to satisfy it. You are sitting there and asking me brazen questions.”
“People buy The Sun to learn things they wouldn’t normally know. Normally, they wouldn’t insert themselves into your business or ask brazen questions, which is why I must.”
“I see,” replied Jackson Mead. “But apart from the fact that, as you yourself have guaranteed, the results of this interview will not appear in The Sun, tell me, for the sake of discussion, why people have a right to know my plans. You justify your right of inquiry by referring to theirs. What is theirs? Is it, despite their greater numbers, any more legitimate than yours, which you seem to have forsworn defending? What gives them the right?”
“It pertains to them, Mr. Mead. They don’t always see everything—which is no reason to fault them, since they have to get on with their lives. Sometimes ships pass down the Hudson at night, big oceangoing ships, and no one, literally no one, sees them. I’m the watchman, here to make sure that the people know what is on their horizon, what ships pass down the river at dawn or, in your case, come upriver in the evening.”
“Mr. de Pinto, the dog who protects sheep quickly learns how to direct them, and it becomes a habit. The people have been trained by their watchmen to jump, and to trample what the watchmen want trampled.
“I have found, in many cities and in some places that were not yet cities, that those who would guard the people are their governors. The government admits that it is a government. The press pretends that it is not. But what a pretense! You orchestrate entire populations. They get all worked up, like children, running here and running there. It is certainly no coincidence that advertisers use your pages to influence the public. What do you think your editorials, your selection and emphasis, your criticisms, even your use of quotations do? And who elected you? No one. You are self-appointed, you speak for no one, and therefore you have no right to question me as if you represent the common good. When I’m ready to let the public know my purposes, I will. Until then, I will continue to make ready, so that I can weather popular opposition.”
“You know they’ll oppose you?” Virginia broke in.
“They always do. And they should.”
“Why?” she asked, mystified. “If you think they’re right to oppose you, why don’t you just refrain from whatever it is you’re planning? Wouldn’t that be the simplest way?”
“Of course it would, if I wanted to be loved. I would simply cut and run. But my purpose here is not to be loved.”
“What is your purpose, then?” Hardesty asked.
Because Jackson Mead thought he saw in Hardesty’s face that Hardesty wanted, above all, to understand, he confided in him. “My purpose,” he said, suddenly soft and benevolent, “is to tag this world with wider and wider rainbows, until the last is so perfect and eternal that it will catch the eye of the One who has abandoned us, and bring Him to right all the broken symmetries and make life once again a still and timeless dream. My purpose, Mr. Marratta, is to stop time, to bring back the dead. My purpose, in one word, is justice.”
Hardesty blinked. This peculiar man who talked about machines, time, and eternal rainbows, had dealt him the same hand that he had put down when he decided to stay in New York. “When?” he asked, and was truly stunned when Jackson Mead looked at him with a slight smile, and said:
“Patience.”
Though Jackson Mead had worked some kind of magic on Hardesty, Praeger pressed on, determined not to be taken up by the siren song that he could not, anyway, hear.
“With all due respect, Mr. Mead,” he said, “I don’t have the vaguest idea of what you’re talking about. If I were to publish in my paper the full quotation of what you’ve just said, in context, the state hospitals would be clawing each other for a chance to receive you.”
“Do you think he doesn’t know that!” snorted Cecil Mature, who had returned to the room.
“Thank you, Mr. Wooley,” snapped Jackson Mead. “I can speak for myself.”
“And furthermore,” Praeger said, “if you’ve been at this for a while, tagging the world with rainbows and such, pursuing the extraordinary goals of which you speak, then obviously you’ve failed. Meanwhile, you do whatever you do. If it’s disruptive, well then, maybe people ought to know about it, so they can stop you.”
“You see this painting?” Jackson Mead asked, gesturing toward The Ascension of St. Stephen.
“Yes. Of course,” Praeger answered.
“Do you believe that St. Stephen rose, actually?”
“No.”
“Then why did the artist paint it, and why do people venerate it and St. Stephen himself, if they did not and do not think that he rose? After all, if he didn’t rise, then who the hell was he?”
“They do think he rose,” said Praeger. “That’s why they venerate the painting, and St. Stephen himself, however mistakenly.”
“No,” Jackson Mead insisted. “They don’t think anything of the kind. Oh, maybe some do, the ones who believe in spells and amulets. But the painter, and I, and most people who have come to venerate St. Stephen, do not think that he actually rose, as if he were attached by wires to stage machinery.” This encouraged Praeger, until he heard more. “Absolutely not. They think, to the contrary, that he is rising, that he rises. The act is not complete. Even the painting freezes him in midair. It is, rather, in progress. To debate its actuality is useless, as it will not be confirmed—until we are able to see everything at once.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Praeger, somewhat indignantly.
“What I am saying is that, until the canvas is set, actualities are no more than intentions, and intentions are as much as actualities. You see, it has all happened before, and it has not happened yet. And, whereas it is true that I have failed, and failed miserably, I have also succeeded—gloriously. The memory of that glory, in what you would call the future, is what I am intent upon retrieving, just as St. Stephen knew that he would rise, and was rising, though he was not. It has to do with time, you see. There is no such thing: only the suggestion of it, only a series of actions that we, because of our imperfection, must run together to comprehend. Look at the painting. You do see motion in it, don’t you? And yet, no one moves. How is that?
“I will tell you. The painting is close to the true state of things. Just as, in a film, there are only stills arranged in an illusion of motion, so in life and time. It is all locked hard within a matrix, and breathtakingly complicated, as if an infinite number of miniaturists had been employed forever in its startling depictions. But I assure you, there is no anarchy, everything happened/happens at once, and it does not move.”
“And yet, it moves!” said Praeger.
“Not from sufficiently afar.”
“Now how would you know?” Praeger asked. “Have you been there? And another thing: you said that when one dies one hears a pounding like that of an engine that was produced at the beginning of the century. How do you know?”
“Oh,” said Jackson Mead, modestly. “I’ve died many times. Let’s see,” he continued, and began to count on his fingers. “At least six. Maybe more. It’s hard to keep track. After a while, you tend to forget the exact number.”
“I see,” said Praeger, his eyes as wide as eggs.
“These assertions are enough to spin the dead in their graves,” Hardesty volunteered. “To debate them is useless. In the end, they must be judged in the heart.”
“Not so,” held Praeger. “The intelligence is the best instrument for weighing mad speculations like these.”
“Indeed not, Mr. de Pinto,” h
eld Jackson Mead. “The spirit is far more intelligent than the intellect. But though the spirit often moves less cautiously, it is far slower than the intellect to grasp a point, which is why I need time, and why I will not tell you the exact nature of my intentions.”
“That’s perfectly all right,” Praeger answered. “I’ll find out anyway. I’ll defeat you with practicalities.”
“And how do you propose to do that, if you have no access to The Sun? That doesn’t seem very practical to me. Does it to you?”
“Unlike you, Mr. Mead, I have something solid in mind, with which I will sweep away the cobwebs that you scatter, as if with iron.”
“Interesting that you should say that,” said Jackson Mead. “I mean about the cobwebs.” Suddenly, he was enjoying himself immensely, as if he had seen the very instrument of victory that Praeger did not think he had. “Wait till you see my cobwebs, Mr. de Pinto, just wait.” He rose to his full height and leaned over his desk to peer at his inquisitors. “Compared to them, iron is nothing.”
The interview was over.
IV
A GOLDEN AGE
A Very Short History of the Clouds
LONG BEFORE even the first millennium, when there were no people whatsoever on the islands and bays that were to become the city, the cloud wall had once blown in from the sea and tried to lift meadows, forests, and hills. An exceptionally beautiful fall was cause for this premature agitation, for the leaves were so perfectly gold and red, and the light reflecting off the water or from purple-bellied storm clouds was so pure, that the white wall had moved without discretion to capture the autumnal clarity. But because the time wasn’t right, because physics alone would not suffice, and since beauty was not the only issue, the meadows, forests, and hills were not lifted.
No longer susceptible to mistakes of infancy, and primed with the knowledge that justice sufficient to forge the opening into a new age would have to be derived from matters of the human heart, the cloud wall had run in one August to a harbor crowded with masts and sails. Amid the wharves and streets, there had been some saintly doings, and justice had been well served. But the machines were too young, and were not yet properly in place. They were still mounted on wooden bases, and their rough-hewn iron could not cleave the sky.