Mason & Dixon

by Thomas Pynchon

  “Why, happen our vow of Chastity’s the very thing that allows us to approach the Transcendent . . . ?”

  “Happen,” growls Emerson, “it’s what makes you so mean, methodical, and without pity.”

  “Rubbish. You like glamor jobs? travel, excitement? chance to look into any number of things you may have been wond’ring about both inside and outside. Your success with the Transit of Venus was a mark of God, that He remains in Sympathy with our Designs, which now are entwin’d with the Projected Boundary-Line Survey in America. You are a perfect candidate for the Position,— a working Land-Surveyor with astronomical experience. I can assure you of Calvert approval,— that you come of a Quaker Family must appeal to at least one major faction in Pennsylvania,— and further, to the morbid delight of certain devotées of monarchies past, your Family is closely associated with Raby Castle, and thereby the melancholy yet darkly inspirational Tale of Sir Henry Vane the younger.”

  “What, Jacobites in America? thought all thah’ was over with . . . ?” Dixon puzzles.

  “Rather does the Tale go on, accumulating Power, told sweetly to Jacobite babes between the prayers and the Lullaby,— for Jacobites, like the Forces invisible that must ever create them, will persist. The Dispute did not end with Cromwell, nor Restoration,— nor William of Orange, nor Hanovers,— if English Soil has seen its last arm’d encounters, then the fighting-ground is now remov’d to America,— yet another use for the damn’d Place,— with Weapons likewise new, including fanciful Stuart Charters to American Adventurers, launch’d upon Futurity’s Sea like floating Mines, their purposes not to be met for years, perhaps for more than one Life-span, their Mischief incalculable.”

  “Young Vane was never a Regicide,” Dixon insists.

  “O, thou Fool,” needles Emerson, “he was treacherous as a Serpent.”

  “Yet ’round Raby, most believe ’twas the baseness of the father, in pursuing the destruction of Strafford, that caus’d the same fate to descend upon the son.”

  “ ’Twas your Vane Junior gave Pym the notes, for Heaven’s sake,” Emerson grumbles.

  “A copy of a copy,—” says Dixon, “useless as evidence, wouldn’t you call thah’ at least a venial sin, Friend Maire?”

  “Wrong!” Emerson feigning horror, “now we’ll be here all week . . . ?”

  The Jesuit, who has never master’d the European Art of expressive shrugging, spreads his hands. “What man may ever know, how much the son may have shared his father’s resentment, when the Barony of Raby went to Strafford? It seems a shabby enough motive for one man, let alone two, to feel it worth another’s life. Young Vane was twenty-seven,— about your age, Jeremiah. Had he no idea, of how easily those who pursue the Business of the World may resort to Murder? Perhaps he thought Pym and his people would use it only in private, as a negotiating point.”

  “Murder . . . ?” Dixon perplex’d.

  “Judicial Murder, Whelp,” Emerson glares, “— words cost them nothing, Scriveners only a little more,— and lo! another Bill of Attainder or Sentence of Death, both in this our Day common as washing-bills, for the human life figures as nothing,— that being all the secret to Governance upon Earth.”

  “Whilst Heaven,” Maire reminds him, “sets the worth of a Soul at Everything.”

  “Why aye, unless it be Indians of Paraguay, or Jews of Spain, or Jansenists across the way, and y’ knaah I’d love to sit about and talk of Religion till Hell freezeth oahver,— especially Newton’s Views upon Gravity and the Holy Ghost, tho’ yese’ll have to wait for my Volume upon the Subject, alas. Meantime, there being no Ale in the House,— ”

  “As if there ever would be,” mutters the Jesuit.

  “— and as in any case I find this Standing Bitch quite soon a source of fatigue,— better,” proposes Emerson, “we repair to my Local, The Cudgel and Throck.” A moment Dixon has been dreading, for those who drink at this Ale-Grotto of terrible Reputation, do so out of a Melancholy advanc’d beyond his understanding. He has not quite made a connection between himself, in his own Publick-House Habitude, and these other but provisionally vertical Blurs of Sentiment, beyond a common fatality, for as many as might present themselves, of the doubtful comforts of Sadness.

  Fr. Maire now removes his Cloak, revealing the snuff-color’d coat and breeches of a middling Town-Dweller. From an inner pocket he produces a costly Ramillies Wig, shakes it out in a brisk Cloud of scented Litharge, and claps it on, with a minimum of fuss, over his ascetic’s Crop. “There. I am now Mr. Emerson’s distant Cousin Ambrose, of Godless London.”

  “ ‘Godless’ being just the note for the old Cudge,” nods Emerson, as they go, “— ’tis the Poahpish, that’s not overly welcome.”

  23

  Indeed, one look at the place is enough to reconcile Fr. Maire to the possibility of having to leave it. As a member of the Society of Jesus, he has been in and out of some all but intolerable taverns, among which he believes he has seen the worst Great Britain has to offer,— withal, as a native of County Durham, he has been hearing Tales of this iniquitous Sink all his Life, tho’ having till now successfully avoided it.

  “Awhrr, God’s blood, it’s old Back-to-Front,” they are greeted upon entering, “wi’ two bumbailiffs he’ll lose before sundown,— yet an honest Tapster has to put up wi’ all sorts,— I imagine ’twill be Porter won’t it, yes it would be . . . ? Goblin! bloody bastard, do not even be thinking of biting my valued guests, or you shall be smit wi’ the Gin Bottle again, yes y’shall . . . ? Eeh, mind your Boots, lads, bit of unpleasantness there from last night, servants haven’t quite gotten to it yet. . . .”

  “Lovely day, Mr. Brain.”

  “Aye happen that’ll change, too. Lud Oafery’s been in and out,— and as nearly as we could understand him, he’d be looking for you, Doctor.”

  “He’ll want another Spell,” Emerson guesses. “That’s if the last ’un work’d, of course. . . .”

  “William, William,” his “Cousin” admonishes.

  “He buys me a Pint. Where’s the Harm? This is Hurworth, not London, Namby. I do Horoscopes as well.”

  “Did mine,” the Landlord avers,” ’twas all there in the Stars, the whole miserable story, but did I pay attention? Nooaahh . . . I was regretting the Sixpence, a fool with his eyes in the glaur.”

  Fr. Maire’s eyebrows do take a Bounce when he hears the Price.

  “Whah’ then?” Emerson mischievously, “only the Church of Rome could quoahte yese any better.”

  “This place is even more depressing than I remember it,” Dixon mutters, just audibly, in case anyone cares to discuss it.

  “Oh, aye, ’tis no Jolly Pitman,” Emerson snorts, naming Dixon’s preferr’d Haunt at the edge of Cockfield Fell, close by the Road, where Miners and Waggoners seek refuge from a Nightfall pass’d alone, and where Travelers, no matter how many Miles they’ll have to make up next day, choose to put in, rather than enter at Night that Looming Heath.

  “There’s Musick at the Pitman, anyway.”

  “Hold, hold, stand easy, we’ve Musick here,” Mr. Brain producing from behind the Bar a batter’d Hurdy-Gurdy or Hum-Strum of antique design, left years ago by a Gypsy to settle a tab, “aye, Musick a-plenty, you need but ask,— wonderful to have Quality in,— Spot of Handel, perhaps?” whereupon he begins vigorously, though with no clear idea of how the Instrument works, to crank and finger, all in a G-dawful Uproar. The Dog Goblin, cowering eagerly, howls along. Emerson bears the Recital with an unexpected Calm, gazing at a Wall, as if imagining the Notes as they might appear upon some Staff as yet undevis’d, thumping time upon his knee. Dixon, whose mother, Mary Hunter, play’d each Day to her Children upon the Clavier, is less entertain’d.

  “Ye’d find nothing like this in China, Jeremiah, Lad,” cries Emerson.

  “Mr. Dixon,” declares the Jesuit, “at present,
owing to the pernicious Cult of Feng Shui, you would find it a Surveyor’s Bad Dream,— nowhere may a Geometer encounter an honest 360-Degree Circle,— rather, incomprehensibly and perversely, in willful denial of God’s Disposition of Time and Space, preferring 365 and a Quarter.”

  “That being the number of Days in a year, what Human Surveyor, down here upon the Earth, would reject thah’,— each Day a single, perfect Chinese Degree,— were 360 not vastly more convenient, of course, to figure with? Surely God, being Omniscient, has little trouble with either . . . ? all the Log Tables right there in His Nob, doesn’t he,—” Dixon, having been out tramping over the Fields and Fells for the past few weeks, with Table and Circumferentor, still enjoying a certain orthogonal Momentum, “and 365 and a quarter seems the sort of Division Jesuits might embrace,— the discomfort of all that extra calculation . . . ? sort of mental Cilice, perhaps . . . ?”

  “Oh dear,” Emerson’s voice echoing within his Ale-can.

  “Then again,” says Maire, “there is a nice lad in Wigan who’d like the Job.”

  “Bonnie then, and please convey my best.— Most Geordie Surveyors make terrible Jesuit spies, I’m told.”

  “Look ye, Jeremiah,” the Jesuit placing upon his sleeve a hand Dixon briefly considers biting, “we would expect no reports, no Espionage, no action of any kind,— for the marking of this Line will be undertaken, with or without our Engagement,— we only wish Assurance that someone we know is there, materially, upon the Parallel. No more.”

  “Why, teach thy Grandam to grope Ducks . . . ? If we’re to have no communication, what matter where I may be?”

  The meek Nod again. “In the all but inconceivably remote event we did wish to reach you,— why aye, one does hear of Devices already in position, which could find you faster than any known Packet or Express.”

  “And . . . t’would be merely to say ‘Whatcheer,’ inquire after the Weather, perhaps pass a few Spiritual Remarks, I presume,— not to issue commands tha must already know I’d never o-bey.”

  “I’ll send your Thoughts along. You don’t seem eager for this.”

  “Ask Mr. Emerson. I’m but a county Surveyor,— not really at m’ best upon the grand and global type of expedition, content here at home, old Geordie a-slog thro’ the clarts, now and then, as if by magic, able to calculate lines that may not be chain’d,— the Surveyor’s form of walking upon Water.— May your Lancashire Lalande prove more boldly dispos’d . . . ?”

  Emerson lifts his head, the ends of his Hair a-sop with Ale, and leers at the Priest. “We had a wager upon this very Topick, I believe.”

  “No,—” gesturing with his own head at Dixon, “this is the one, William, God’s Instrument if ever I saw one. I’m not ready to concede.”

  “Hold,— am I a horse, in a horse-race, here? Friend Emerson’s bet upon a sure thing then, for I don’t fancy working for Jesuits,— no more than having others believe it’s what I’m doing.”

  “You see?” Emerson beams,” ’Tis the Coldness, if you ask me,— aye, more than anything,— that absence of Pity.”

  “Pity? Oh, as to Pity,—” The Phiz of the Jesuit, who hasn’t been missing too many Rounds, may be observ’d now in a certain state of Beefiness.

  “You are twiddling about with that Wig,” mutters Emerson, “so as to draw attention. Pray moderate it, Coz.”

  “You wonder why I’m stuck over in Flanders, with a herd of Boys, all of them with Erections more or less twenty-four hours a day? a sinners’ Paradise to some,— to others a form of Penance. Yea, ’tis Penance I do, for having once or twice, when it matter’d, unreflectively shewn an instant of this Pity whose value you cry up so . . . ? well, I have learn’d, ’tis not for any of us to presume to act as Christ alone may,— for Christ’s true Pity lies so beyond us, that we may at best jump and whimper like Dogs who cannot quite catch the Trick of it.”

  “What a Relief!” cries Dixon, “Whoo! no more Pity? Eehh, where’s me Pistols, then. . . .”

  “The simpler explanation,” Emerson with a distinct uvular component in his Sigh, “may be that none of you people has ever known a moment of Transcendence in his life, nor would re-cognize one did it walk up and bite yese in the Arse,— and in the long sorry Silence, grows the suspicion that Jesuits are but the latest instance of a true Christian passion evaporated away, leaving no more than the usual hollow desires for Authority and mindless Obedience. Poh, Cousin,— Poh, Sir.”

  In now strolls Lud Oafery’s friend and occasional Translator Mr. Whike, crying, “Eeh! were we having a little discussion as to the,— surely I heard the word,— Jesuits? not them again? that, that same secret cabal of traitorous Serpents, who seek ever to subvert our blessèd England before the Interests of Rome, and the Whore-House they call a Church,— those Jesuits? Why, here we’d thought there was no deep Conversation at The Cudgel and Throck.”

  “Hullo, Whike, I’m told Lud’s been asking for me.”

  “His Mum, actually. Lud had to go down to Thornton-le-Beans, but he’ll be back. Who’s your not quite credibly turn’d-out Friend here? (’Tis the Wig, Sir,— needs the immediate Attentions of a Professional. . . .) Just when I imagin’d I’d had all you lot sorted out at last!”

  “Did I forget to introduce yese? And ordinarily I’ve the manners of a Lord.”

  “Which Lord was that?”

  “Hadn’t plann’d on this so early in the Day,” Dixon in a low voice to Maire. To Whike, “Shall we get the Festivities going now, do tha guess, or would tha rather wait for thy Friend Lud,— ’tis all the same to me.”

  “Was yere Stu-dent ever like this, Sir? One of these big Lads that needs to be thumping away so at us smaller, wee-er folk? Sad, it is.”

  “Some might find it amusing, Whike,” Emerson replies.

  “Jeremiah. I am astonish’d. Were you actually planning to strike this perfectly pleasant, tho’ strangely idle, young man? And I thought London taverns were quarrelsome!”

  “Years ago, once and once only,— all in a spirit of Scientifick Inquiry,— I did, well, take hold of him,— ”

  Jumping back apprehensively, “Didn’t ask me, did you?”

  “Nor have tha let me forget it,— I only wish’d to pick him up, and throw him at that very Dart-Board over there, to see if his Head, which seem’d pointed enough, might stick . . . ? And he’s been on about it ever since,— all right then, Whike? Whike, I admit ’twas the improper way to test thee for Cranial Acuity,— I ought to have ta’en the Board from the Wall, brought it to thee, and then clash’d it upon thy Nob,— tha Bugger.”

  “I knew one day he’d feel remorse,” carols Whike. “I accept yeer Apology most Graceful, Sir.”

  “Apology!” Dixon’s face, as all would swear to later, having commenc’d to glow in the Murk. “Why, You little— ”

  All light from the outside vanishes, as something fills the Doorway. “Gaahhrrhh!” it says.

  “ ‘Here then, don’t be laying a finger on my Mate,’” Whike translates,— for ’tis Lud, back from Thornton-le-Beans, and his Mother, Ma Oafery, with him.

  In the days of the ’45,— guessing that the Young Pretender would travel ev’rywhere he could by way of those secret Tunnels known to Papists from ancient times, which ran from most parish Churches away to other points of interest,— thro’ that wond’rous Summer, Lads after Adventure haunted these dank passages, all over England, day and night, Dixon among them, walking his own Patrol up and down the Tunnel that ran from Raby Castle to Staindrop Church, down amid whose elegant Stone Facing and Root-Aromas he and Lud Oafery first met. Dixon was carrying a Torch,— Lud was not.

  “Why bother,” Lud explain’d, “when there’s enough like you, who’ve brought their own light . . . ? How much light can anyone need, just to get thro’ a Tunnel, unless of course one stops to admire the Stone-work. Which is what you’re doing, ain’t it.�
�� He had a look. “This dates back to the time when Staindrop was the Metropolis of Stayndropshire with a , and the very Pearl of Wearside. Right clash amid the best pool of Boring talent in England,— outside the House of Lords, of course,— where would this ancient Drift have gone, if not between Castle and Church?— either of which could afford it easily, for far less than a single Week’s revenue. . . .”

  Lud in his ramblings claim’d to’ve been up and down ev’ry Tunnel in the County Palatinate of Durham,— some of them connected one to another, he said, so that any who truly needed to keep out of a Day-light so often perilous, might travel for great Distances, all under Ground.

  “Ahrahr AHR, ahr-ahrahr,” adds Lud, years later, in The Cudgel and Throck.

  “Very old, these Diggings,—” reports Whike, “yet never wandering about under Ground, all bearing true as an Italian Miner’s Compass between their Termini.”

  A Knowledge of Tunneling became more and more negotiable, as more of the Surface succumb’d to Enclosure, Sub-Division, and the simple Exhaustion of Space,— Down Below, where no property Lines existed, lay a World as yet untravers’d, that would clearly belong to those Pioneers who possess’d the Will, and had master’d the Arts of Pluto,— with the Availability of good Equipment besides, ever a Blessing. So, beneath the surfaces of English Parish-Towns, Bands of Pickmen once came a-stir like giant Worms, addressing themselves to Faces that would take them where they must . . . Fire-lit Earth Walls that betray’d nothing of what might lie a Shovel-ful away. Sometimes, ’twas told, a lucky Spademan might find buried Treasure,— “Huzzah, no more of this Earth-worming for me, tell the Master I’m off to London and the High Life, and oh yes here’s a shilling for your Trouble,—” And sometimes, ’twas told, the Devil sent his own Dodmen, to lead the Diggers in grisly play ’round the Corner again and into the Church-yard, where Death in its full unpleasantness waited them, a Skull, in the instant of any Spade’s burden, emerging from the Mud just at Eye-Level, smiling widely as in recognition, the Torches all at that instant guttering in some Vile breath-out of the suburbs of Hell.