Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

by Susanna Clarke

  Her aunt and father were patient, though Dr Greysteel in particular thought it a little hard. He had not come to Italy to sit quietly in an apartment half the size of the rooms in his own comfortable house in Wiltshire. In private he grumbled that it was perfectly possible to read novels or embroider in Wiltshire (these were now Flora’s favourite pursuits) and a good deal cheaper too, but Aunt Greysteel scolded him and made him hush. If this was the way in which Flora intended to grieve for Jonathan Strange, then they must let her.

  Flora did propose one expedition, but that was of a most peculiar sort. After Dr Greysteel had been in Padua about a week she announced that she had a great desire to be upon the sea.

  Did she mean a sea-voyage, they asked. There was no reason why they should not go to Rome or Naples by sea.

  But she did not mean a sea-voyage. She did not wish to leave Padua. No, what she would like would be to go out in a yacht or other sort of boat. Only for an hour or two, perhaps less. But she would like to go immediately. The next day they repaired to a small fishing village.

  The village had no particular advantages of situation, prospect, architecture or history – in fact it had very little to recommend it at all, other than its proximity to Padua. Dr Greysteel inquired in the little wine-shop and at the priest’s house until he heard of two steady fellows who would be willing to take them out upon the water. The men had no objection to taking Dr Greysteel’s money, but they were obliged to point out that there was nothing to see; there would have been nothing to see even in good weather. But it was not good weather; it was raining – hard enough to make an excursion on the water most uncomfortable, not quite hard enough to dispel the heavy, grey mist.

  “Are you sure, my love, that this is what you want?” asked Aunt Greysteel. “It is a dismal spot and the boat smells very strongly of fish.”

  “I am quite sure, Aunt,” said Flora and climbed into the boat and settled herself at one end. Her aunt and father followed her. The mystified fishermen sailed out until all that could be seen in any direction was a shifting mass of grey water confined by walls of dull, grey mist. The fishermen looked expectantly at Dr Greysteel. He, in turn, looked questioningly at Flora.

  Flora took no notice of any of them. She was seated, leaning against the side of the boat in a pensive attitude. Her right arm was stretched out over the water.

  “There it is again!” cried Dr Greysteel.

  “There is what again?” asked Aunt Greysteel, irritably.

  “That smell of cats and mustiness! A smell like the old woman’s room. The old woman we visited in Cannaregio. Is there a cat on board?”

  The question was absurd. Every part of the fishing-boat was visible from every other part; there was no cat.

  “Is any thing the matter, my love?” asked Aunt Greysteel. There was something in Flora’s posture she did not quite like. “Are you ill?”

  “No, Aunt,” said Flora, straightening herself and adjusting her umbrella. “I am well. We can go back now if you wish.”

  For a moment Aunt Greysteel saw a little bottle floating upon the waves, a little bottle with no stopper. Then it sank beneath the water and was gone for ever.

  This peculiar expedition was the last time for many weeks that Flora would shew any inclination to go out. Sometimes Aunt Greysteel would try to persuade her to sit in a chair by the window so that she could see what was going on in the street. In an Italian street there is often something amusing going on. But Flora was greatly attached to a chair in a shadowy corner, beneath the eerie mirror; and she acquired a peculiar habit of comparing the picture of the room as it was contained in the mirror and the room as it really was. She might, for example, suddenly become interested in a shawl that was thrown across a chair and look at its reflection and say, “That shawl looks different in the mirror.”

  “Does it?” Aunt Greysteel would say, puzzled.

  “Yes. It looks brown in the mirror, whereas in truth it is blue. Do not you think so?”

  “Well, my dear, I am sure you are right, but it looks just the same to me.”

  “No,” Flora would say, with a sigh, “you are right.”

  61

  Tree speaks to Stone; Stone speaks to Water

  January—February 1817

  When Mr Norrell had destroyed Strange’s book, public opinion in England had been very much against him and very much in favour of Strange. Comparisons were made, both publicly and privately, between the two magicians. Strange was open, courageous and energetic, whereas secrecy seemed to be the beginning and end of Mr Norrell’s character. Nor was it forgotten how, when Strange was in the Peninsula in the service of his country, Norrell had bought up all the books of magic in the Duke of Roxburghe’s library so that no one else could read them. But by the middle of January the newspapers were full of reports of Strange’s madness, descriptions of the Black Tower and speculations concerning the magic which held him there. An Englishman called Lister had been at Mestre on the Italian coast on the day Strange had left Venice and gone to Padua. Mr Lister had witnessed the passage of the Pillar of Darkness over the sea and sent back an account to England; three weeks later accounts appeared in several London newspapers of how it had glided silently over the face of the waters. In the space of a few short months Strange had become a symbol of horror to his countrymen: a damned creature – scarcely human.

  But Strange’s sudden fall from grace did little to benefit Mr Norrell. He received no new commissions from the Government and, worse yet, commissions from other sources were cancelled. In early January the Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral had inquired whether Mr Norrell might be able to discover the burial place of a certain dead young woman. The young woman’s brother wished to erect a new monument to all the members of his family. This entailed moving the young woman’s coffin, but the Dean and Chapter were most embarrassed to discover that her burial place had been written down wrongly and they did not know where she was. Mr Norrell had assured him that it would be the easiest thing in the world to find her. As soon as the Dean informed him of the young lady’s name and one or two other details he would do the magic. But the Dean did not send Mr Norrell her name. Instead an awkwardly phrased letter had arrived in which the Dean made many elaborate apologies and said how he had recently been struck by the inappropriateness of clergymen employing magicians.

  Lascelles and Norrell agreed that the situation was a worrying one.

  “It will be difficult to sustain the restoration of English magic if no new magic is done,” said Lascelles. “At this crisis it is imperative that we bring your name and achievements continually before the public.”

  Lascelles wrote articles for the newspapers and he denounced Strange in all the magical journals. He also took the opportunity to review the magic that Mr Norrell had done in the past ten years and suggest improvements. He decided that he and Mr Norrell should go down to Brighton to look at the wall of spells that Mr Norrell and Jonathan Strange had cast around Britain’s coast. It had occupied the greater part of Mr Norrell’s time for the past two years and had cost the Government a vast sum of money.

  So on a particularly icy, windy day in February they stood together at Brighton and contemplated a wide stretch of featureless grey sea.

  “It is invisible,” said Lascelles.

  “Invisible, yes!” agreed Mr Norrell, eagerly, “But no less efficacious for that! It will protect the cliffs from erosion, people’s houses from storm, livestock from being swept away and it will capsize any enemies of Britain who attempt to land.”

  “But could you not have placed beacons at regular intervals to remind people that the magic wall is there? Burning flames hovering mysteriously over the face of the waters? Pillars shaped out of sea-water? Something of that sort?”

  “Oh!” said Mr Norrell. “To be sure! I could create the magical illusions you mention. They are not at all difficult to do, but you must understand that they would be purely ornamental. They would not strengthen the magic in any way whatsoever. They wo
uld have no practical effect.”

  “Their effect,” said Lascelles, severely, “would be to stand as a constant reminder to every onlooker of the works of the great Mr Norrell. They would let the British people know that you are still the Defender of the Nation, eternally vigilant, watching over them while they go about their business. It would be worth ten, twenty articles in the Reviews.”

  “Indeed?” said Mr Norrell. He promised that in future he would always bear in mind the necessity of doing magic to excite the public imagination.

  They stayed that night in the Old Ship Tavern and the following morning they returned to London. As a rule Mr Norrell detested long journeys. Though his carriage was a most superior example of the carriage-makers’ art with everything in the way of iron springs and thick-padded seats, still he felt every bump and dent in the road. After half an hour or so, he would begin to suffer from pains in his back and aches in his head and queasinesses in his stomach. But upon this particular morning he scarcely gave any thought to his back or his stomach at all. From the first moment of setting off from the Old Ship he was in a curiously nervous condition, beset by unexpected ideas and half-formed fears.

  Through the carriage glass he saw great numbers of large black birds – whether ravens or crows he did not know, and in his magician’s heart he was sure that they meant something. Against the pale winter sky they wheeled and turned, and spread their wings like black hands; and as they did so each one became a living embodiment of the Raven-in-Flight: John Uskglass’s banner. Mr Norrell asked Lascelles if he thought the birds were more numerous than usual, but Lascelles said he did not know. After the birds the next thing to haunt Mr Norrell’s imagination were the wide, cold puddles that were thickly strewn across every field. As the carriage passed along the road each puddle became a silver mirror for the blank, winter sky. To a magician there is very little difference between a mirror and a door. England seemed to be wearing thin before his eyes. He felt as if he might pass through any of those mirror-doors and find himself in one of the other worlds which once bordered upon England. Worse still, he was beginning to think that other people might do it. The Sussex landscape began to look uncomfortably like the England described in the old ballad:

  This land is all too shallow

  It is painted on the sky

  And trembles like the wind-shook rain

  When the Raven King passed by1

  For the first time in his life Mr Norrell began to feel that perhaps there was too much magic in England.

  When they reached Hanover-square Mr Norrell and Lascelles went immediately to the library. Childermass was there, seated at a desk. A pile of letters lay in front of him and he was reading one of them. He looked up when Mr Norrell entered the room. “Good! You are back! Read this.”

  “Why? What is it?”

  “It is from a man called Traquair. A young man in Nottinghamshire has saved a child’s life by magic and Traquair was a witness to it.”

  “Really, Mr Childermass!” said Lascelles, with a sigh. “I thought you knew better than to trouble your master with such nonsense.” He glanced at the pile of opened letters; one had a large seal displaying someone’s arms. He stared at it for several moments before he realized that he knew it well and snatched it up. “Mr Norrell!” he cried. “We have a summons from Lord Liverpool!”

  “At last!” exclaimed Mr Norrell. “What does he say?”

  Lascelles took a moment to read the letter. “Only that he begs the favour of our attendance at Fife House upon a matter of the utmost urgency!” He thought rapidly. “It is probably the Johannites. Liverpool ought to have requested your assistance years ago to deal with the Johannites. I am glad he realizes it at last. And as for you,” he said, turning upon Childermass, “are you quite mad? Or do you have some game of your own to play? You chatter on about false claims of magic, while a letter from the Prime Minister of England lies unattended on the desk!”

  “Lord Liverpool can wait,” said Childermass to Mr Norrell. “Believe me when I tell you that you need to know the contents of this letter!”

  Lascelles gave a snort of exasperation.

  Mr Norrell looked from one to the other. He was entirely at a loss. For years he had been accustomed to rely upon both of them, and their quarrels (which were becoming increasingly frequent) unnerved him completely. He might have stood there, unable to chuse between them, for some time, had not Childermass decided matters by seizing his arm and pulling him bodily into a small, panelled ante-chamber which led off the library. Childermass shut the door with a bang and leant on it.

  “Listen to me. This magic happened at a grand house in Nottinghamshire. The grown-ups were talking in the drawing-room; the servants were busy and a little girl wandered off into the garden. She climbed a high wall that borders a kitchen-garden and walked along the top of it. But the wall was covered in ice and she tumbled down and fell through the roof of a hot-house. The glass broke and pierced her in many places. A servant heard her screaming. There was no surgeon nearer than ten miles away. One of the party, a young man called Joseph Abney, saved her by magic. He drew the shards of glass out of her and mended the broken bones with Martin Pale’s Restoration and Rectification,2 and he stopped the flow of blood using a spell which he claimed was Teilo’s Hand.”3

  “Ridiculous!” declared Mr Norrell. “Teilo’s Hand has been lost for hundreds of years and Pale’s Restoration and Rectification is a very difficult procedure. This young man would have had to study for years and years …”

  “Yes, I know – and he admits that he has hardly studied at all. He barely knew the names of the spells, let alone their execution. Yet Traquair said that he performed the spells fluidly, without hesitation. Traquair and the other people who were present spoke to him and asked him what he was doing – the girl’s father was much alarmed to see Abney perform magic upon her – but, so far as they could tell, Abney did not hear them. Afterwards he was like a man coming out of a dream. All he could say was: ‘Tree speaks to stone; stone speaks to water.’ He seemed to think that the trees and the sky had told him what to do.”

  “Mystical nonsense!”

  “Perhaps. And yet I do not think so. Since we came to London I have read hundreds of letters from people who think they can do magic and are mistaken. But this is different. This is true. I would stake money upon it. Besides there are other letters here from people who have tried spells – and the spells have worked. But what I do not understand is …”

  But at that moment the door against which Childermass was leaning was subject to a great rattling and shaking. A blow hit it and Childermass was thrown away from the door and against Mr Norrell. The door opened to reveal Lucas and, behind him, Davey the coachman.

  “Oh!” said Lucas, somewhat surprized. “I beg your pardon, sir. I did not know you were here. Mr Lascelles said the door had jammed shut, and Davey and I were trying to free it. The carriage is ready, sir, to take you to Lord Liverpool.”

  “Come, Mr Norrell!” cried Lascelles from within the library. “Lord Liverpool is waiting!”

  Mr Norrell cast a worried glance at Childermass and went.

  The journey to Fife House was not a very pleasant one for Mr Norrell: Lascelles was full of spite towards Childermass and lost no time in venting it.

  “Forgive me for saying so, Mr Norrell,” he said, “but you have no one but yourself to blame. Sometimes it seems like wisdom to allow an intelligent servant a certain degree of independence – but one always regrets it in the end. That villain has grown in insolence until he thinks nothing of contradicting you and insulting your friends. My father whipped men for less – a great deal less, I assure you. And I should like, oh! I should like …” Lascelles twitched and fidgeted, and threw himself back upon the cushions. In a moment he said in a calmer tone, “I advise you to consider, sir, if your need of him is really as great as you think? How many of his sympathies are with Strange, I wonder? Yes, that is the real question, is it not?” He looked out of the glass
at the bleak, grey buildings. “We are here. Mr Norrell, I beg that you will remember what I told you. Whatever the difficulties of the magic which his lordship requires, do not dwell upon them. A long explanation will not make them grow any less.”

  Mr Norrell and Lascelles found Lord Liverpool in his study, standing by the table where he conducted a great deal of his business. With him was Lord Sidmouth, the Home Secretary. They fixed Mr Norrell with solemn looks.

  Lord Liverpool said, “I have here letters from the Lord Lieutenants of Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Somerset, Cornwall, Warwickshire and Cumbria …” (Lascelles could scarcely refrain from giving a sigh of pleasure at the magic and the money that seemed to be in prospect.) “… all complaining of the magic that has recently occurred in those counties!”

  Mr Norrell blinked his little eyes rapidly. “I beg your pardon?”

  Lascelles said quickly, “Mr Norrell knows nothing of any magic done in those places.”

  Lord Liverpool gave him a cool look as if he did not believe him. There was a pile of papers on the table. Lord Liverpool picked one up at random. “Four days ago in the town of Stamford,” he said, “a Quaker girl and her friend were telling each other secrets. They heard a noise and discovered their younger brothers listening at the door. Full of indignation, they chased the boys into the garden. There they joined hands and recited a charm. The boys’ ears leapt off their heads and flew away. It was not until the boys had made a solemn oath never to do such a thing ever again, that the ears could be coaxed back out of the bare rose-bushes – which was where they had alighted – and persuaded to return to the boys’ heads.”

  Mr Norrell was more perplexed than ever. “I am, of course, sorry that these badly behaved young women have been studying magic. That members of the Female Sex should study magic at all is, I may say, a thing I am very much opposed to. But I do not quite see …”