THE System OF THE WORLD

by Neal Stephenson

  I wish someone would explain that to Isaac, Daniel mused, then felt bad, as Isaac was a sick man just now-he’d collapsed in Westminster Palace a couple of weeks ago, and was still lying on a sick-bed at Roger Comstock’s house.

  “A financier, asked for a loan, carries out a diligent summing-up of the debtor’s assets, to ensure that the loan shall be secured by something of worth,” Eliza continued. “You have gold. This gold could be weighed, to find its worth. There could be no better security for a loan. But there is a complication. You are not using the gold as gold. You are using it as a medium for storage of information. Or I might say it thus: you are informing it. Once informed by the card-punching organ, it possesses value-to you, at least-that it did not have before. If it were to be melted down, it would lose that value. The only like procedure that I can call to mind, is that whereby blank disks of gold are informed by the blow of a die at the Mint, making ’em into guineas, and thereby imbuing ’em with additional worth-seigneurage, they name it. And so I say that your organ at Bridewell is like a little Mint, and your punched cards are the Coin of a new Realm.”

  “You have convinced me,” Daniel said. “I only hope that Sir Isaac does not hear of it, and denominate me a rival.”

  “If the rumors as to Sir Isaac’s condition are true,” Eliza said, “you or some rival may soon be running the Mint at the Tower. But that is beside the point. Supposing you build the Logic Mill, and it works. Then the value-and I mean value not moral, ?sthetic, or spiritual, but ?conomic-of your Institute inheres in the ability to carry out logical and arithmetical work using the cards.”

  “Indeed, madame, that is all we can offer.”

  “If the cards were foreclosed upon by a creditor, and melted, the information would all be con-fused, the Logic Mill would not do work, and the value we just spoke of would be annihilated.”

  “True.”

  “It follows that the gold, once wrought into punched cards, becomes a poor form of security indeed, as it cannot be spent, in a monetary sense, without destroying your enterprise.”

  “I agree without reservation that the gold cannot secure the loan.”

  “Moreover, if I understand the nature of the project, the cards and the machine are to be shipped to the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg when they are finished.”

  “That is true of the first set.”

  “But subsequent ones, supposing you build more, shall become the property of the Marquis of Ravenscar.”

  “As currently envisioned, yes.”

  “All that I would be left with would be some news that I might use to my advantage in certain markets. This is a sort of game I played to great advantage when I was young, and had nothing to lose, and no one who depended on me. But now I require tangible equity in exchange for my investments. I invest with my head, not my heart.”

  “And yet it is plain that you support Dappa, and I have heard that you contribute generously to hospitals for Veterans and Vagabonds.”

  “As charities, yes. But it is too late for you to remake your Institute as a charity.”

  “Then let me tell you something of the Logic Mill that not even Roger knows,” Daniel sighed.

  “You have my attention, Doctor.”

  “It will not work.”

  “The Logic Mill will not do logic?”

  “Oh, yes, of course it will do that. Doing logic with a machine is not so very difficult. Leibniz took it up where Pascal dropped it, and I built upon Leibniz’s work for fifteen years in Boston. Now I have turned it over to a cabal of ingenious fellows who in fifteen weeks have advanced further than I did.”

  “Then what do you mean, when you say it will not work?”

  “When I returned from Hanover two days ago I devoted some time to reviewing the schemes that the ingenieurs have devised. I am most pleased with the results. But then I discovered a grave difficulty: we want power.”

  “Ah, you spoke to me of this in Hanover.”

  “Indeed, for then I had begun to suspect what I now know: that the Logic Mill shall require a source of Power, in the newfangled Mechanickal sense of that word, that is both mighty and steady. A very large water-wheel in a great river might serve; but much better would be-”

  “The Engine for Raising Water by Fire!”

  “If you were to invest in that, madame-and rest assured that it does want investors-you could obtain a controlling interest with little difficulty, thereby satisfying your requirement for Equity. With a new financial wind at his back, Mr. Newcomen could clear certain shoals on which the work has recently run aground, and drive on into open and beckoning seas. Meanwhile, here in London, the Logic Mill project shall arrive at an impasse, because of the dearth of Power. It shall happen soon-less than a year from now. You may then take the matter up with the Tsar, or with the Marquis of Ravenscar, or both; they will bargain with you then, madame, having no other choices.”

  Eliza gazed out the windows for some minutes. By now they had run the length of Saffron Hill, and the driver had made a detour to the edge of Clerkenwell Green and up Rag Street so as to spare himself, his horses, and his passengers a disagreeable and perilous transit of Hockley-in-the-Hole, where at this very moment outrages were being committed that would be punished six weeks hence at the next Hanging Day.

  They had entered into the extension of Rag Street called Coppice Row, bringing them full circle. Daniel, gazing forward out his window, spied a carriage stopped before Clerkenwell Court. His heart forgot to beat when he recognized it. Matters were about to become more complicated than he’d have liked them to be. He thumped on the roof, and the driver reined in his team at the corner, a stone’s throw short of the other carriage. “I will alight here,” Daniel said, “as this is an easier place to get your lovely carriage turned round.” Before Eliza could protest he opened the door, and one of her footmen jumped down to help him out.

  “You have cast a new light on the matter,” Eliza announced, giving him a prim smile that was the beginning of good-bye. “I am now willing to consider the proposal. But I cannot come to any conclusions until I have become well acquainted with the gentleman who founded the company.”

  “The Earl of Lostwithiel,” said Daniel, raising his voice, as he was now out in the street, addressing Eliza through the open carriage-door. “For some weeks he has excused himself from the House of Lords. The illness of his third son forced him to withdraw to the west country. The poor child’s demise extended his absence. I suspect that complications relating to the Engine have drawn it out even further. But even now, news is speeding westwards of yesterday’s doings in Parliament. Lostwithiel must return now. He will be back in London anon. I shall see to it that he pays a call on your grace at Leicester House.”

  “THIRTY-SEVEN MINUTES AGO,” said the big horologist named Saturn, “a strange old Tory appeared at our gates and begain baying for Doctor Waterhouse.” He nodded at the carriage parked in front of his shop.

  Daniel had already recognized it. “Where is Mr. Threader now?” he inquired.

  “I have plied him with tea, and given him a brief look round the place-not letting him see any of the good bits-and then advanced from tea to brandy. He is drinking it three doors down, in that shop where the plasterers were finishing up yesterday.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Hoxton,” Daniel said, putting a hand on the door to go out.

  “You are welcome,” Peter Hoxton said, in a guarded way, “but I must say, if I had known, when Fate brought us together, what sort of persons you associate with, I should never have pursued the acquaintance.”

  Daniel exited smiling. His expression changed over to one of surprise as a second carriage-a battered hackney, its wheel rims thumping from dents and clotted horse-turds-came up Coppice Row at reckless speed, and halted, in serial and ramshackle style, just ahead of Mr. Threader’s. The door flew open. Out stepped a red-faced, white-haired, black-suited Nonconformist. Immediately behind him came a small man in breeches, waistcoat, amp;c., of a more conventional c
ut, though made of materials so florid as to be almost tribal. And behind him came a common-looking bloke who was even bigger than Saturn. He stayed behind to flick coins into the outstretched palm of the coachman.

  “Brother Norman. Mr. Kikin. What a pleasure,” Daniel said, moving to intercept them before they could reach the door of the clock-shop, and further damage Saturn’s esteem for him. “I had not been notified that our Clubb was to meet to-day; but I welcome you to Clerkenwell Court, and I shall welcome our Treasurer too, when I have run him to ground.”

  “Mr. Threader is here?” said the astonished Mr. Kikin, and cast a comical look up and down Coppice Row. This was then mimicked by his bodyguard, who had taken up his usual station behind Mr. Kikin’s shoulder.

  “Why?” demanded Mr. Orney; but just then the door of a vacant storefront burst open, and out came Mr. Threader, already red in the ears from brandy.

  “I haven’t the vaguest notion of why you two are here,” he proclaimed, “but since you are, I hereby call to order an emergency meeting of the Clubb for the Taking and Prosecution of the Party or Parties responsible for the Manufacture and Placement of the Infernal Engines lately Exploded at Crane Court, Orney’s Ship-yard, et cetera!”

  “First order of business: selecting a shorter name,” Mr. Orney suggested.

  “The first order of business, as ever, shall be the Collection of Dues-presuming as always that you are still solvent, Mr. Orney.”

  “If news from Westminster is true, it is not my solvency that bears examination-Mr. Threader.”

  “It is of Parliament that I would discourse-which is why that is to be the second order of business-those Members who arrived late must wait their turn.”

  “How can we be late for a meeting that was called after we arrived!?”

  “Gentlemen,” Daniel said, “I fear we are disturbing our neighbors in Hockley-in-the-Hole. May we-please-take this inside?”

  IT MIGHT ONE DAY serve as a pub or coffee-house, but for the nonce it was an empty room, freshly plastered, strewn with straw. The walls were white, darkling to overcast gray in the corners where still-damp plaster emitted palpable warmth and a nostril-stinging fragrance. The Clubb set up an impromptu Parliament there, using overturned buckets as chairs, and an upright barrel as lectern. These were improvised by Saturn and Mr. Kikin’s bodyguard during the time that Mr. Threader raked in the Dues with all the weighing, biting, and microscopic examination of coins, and injurious commentary, that had become a Clubb custom. Then it was time for Mr. Threader to take command of the barrel. As he all too soon discovered, this was empty, and when struck with the fist emitted a tremendous boom, useful for rhetorical effect.

  “When a Ship of Force appears before the breakwater, and lobs a mortar-shell (boom) into the town (boom), you may be certain of two things: first (boom) that the enemy has been laying its plans for many months in advance; second (boom) that more (boom) mortar (boom) shells (boom) are shortly to follow (boom boom boom).”

  “More brandy, Mr. Threader?” suggested Mr. Orney; but Threader ignored him.

  “Yesterday,” continued Mr. Threader, “the notorious leader of the Faction dropped (boom) a bomb (boom) in the House of Lords, discomposing the awful dignity, and shattering the traditional somnolence, of that August Body!”

  “I have heard it said that if there were a way to invest in Apoplexy, one could have gotten rich in Westminster yesterday,” said the Russian.

  “As you are a Foreigner, sir, your amusement, like your person, are tolerated even if not welcomed. Those of us who live here must consider it soberly.” He shot Orney a warning look to nip in the bud any plays on the word. “To revisit my similitude of the Ship and the Mortar-Shell, we must ask, how long has Ravenscar been planning this? And where will the next (boom) shell (boom) fall (boom)?”

  “It’ll fall on your head if you keep striking that barrel-head,” Mr. Orney muttered.

  “I have heard that yesterday was a lively one indeed for the South Sea Company, and doubtless for your enterprise, Mr. Threader,” Daniel said. “In fact, such must be the demands upon your professional services, that I am astonished to find you here. Yes, Comstock has put Viscount Bolingbroke on the spot regarding that Asiento money. But what has that got to do with our Clubb?”

  “It has been a strange fortnight for men whose business is to handle money,” Mr. Threader said.

  “Thank you for sharing that reflection with us, sir,” returned Mr. Orney. “How does it bear on the very reasonable question just asked by Brother Daniel?”

  “Men have been gathering up guineas, removing them from circulation, paying for them with French coins or other specie. It is all part of a subtile and covert investigation of the coinage, set afoot, ’tis said, by Bolingbroke.”

  “I move,” said Daniel, “that we suspend Mr. Threader’s remarks, and move him away from the Barrel, until such time as he professes a willingness to divulge, plainly and tersely, why the hell he is here; and in the meantime that either Brother Norman or Mr. Kikin take the Barrel and explain why they are here.”

  This motion passed by acclamation. Threader turned his back on all of them, a sullen gesture that elicited some hooting. Orney rose to speak; and in his Nonconformist get-up, standing before a barrel on a straw-covered floor, he looked for all the world like an itinerant preacher-man convening a barn-load of rustic believers.

  “Though hangings might yesterday have been the talk of the Newgate-Tyburn axis, and the vanished Asiento money the sensation of Westminster and the City, the great happening of the day in Rotherhithe was the arrival-I shall employ dry understatement, and call it startling-of a Russian war-galley. She rowed here direct from St. Petersburg. To judge from the number of available places on her benches, she was driven with a speed fatal to several oarsmen; and the diverse large-caliber holes in her hull attest to at least one encounter with the Swedish Navy. At any rate, she got here, and now graces one of my docks, for she wants repairs. No sooner had she been made fast to my pier than several furry emissaries came down the gangplanks and fanned out into the city-”

  “Rats?” guessed Mr. Threader.

  “Russians,” said Orney, “though of course there were some rats, too. One of the Russians brought a message to Mr. Kikin. Another brought one to me.”

  “No doubt the Tsar is running low on warships, and wants to know when you will be finished with those you are supposed to be building for him,” said Mr. Threader.

  “Oh I am building them, sir,” Orney returned, “notwithstanding the best efforts of Infernal Engine-makers.”

  “I applaud you, Brother Norman,” Daniel said, “for being the first man to say anything that is actually relevant to this Clubb’s purpose.”

  “What shall your answer be, to the impatient Tsar?” Threader asked cruelly.

  “Progress is being made,” Orney said, “though I do confess it would be made faster if my fire-office would deign to make good on the losses for which they were supposedly insuring me.”

  “A-ha!” exclaimed Mr. Threader, satisfied.

  “Why should your fire insurer not compensate you for what was plainly a fire?” Daniel asked.

  “The policy that I bought from them contains an exemption for fires consequent to Acts of War. They have taken the position that the ship was set fire by Swedish incendiaries.”

  This was too much for Mr. Threader, who put both hands over his face to stifle a guffaw. Mr. Orney’s deadly adversary he might be in nearly every regard; but in their hostility towards the insurance industry, the two men were as blood brothers. “Oh yes,” he burst out, “a Londoner can scarce set foot out of his house nowadays without being set on fire by a roving Mobb of Swedish Incendiaries!”

  “I think you have made your predicament clear, Brother Norman,” said Daniel. “You require that the Clubb achieve its stated goal, so that you may claim the money you are due from your insurer; complete the ships; and escape the wrath of the Tsar.” He turned now to the Muscovite. “Mr Kikin, are
you at liberty to disclose the import of the message brought to you yesterday?”

  “His Imperial Majesty made some references to Mr. Orney. To relate these now were redundant,” said Kikin. “He takes the side of the insurance company in suspecting Swedish Incendiaries.” A pause to clear his throat and inspect his nails as another juicy spate of laughter escaped from behind the hands of Mr. Threader. “His Imperial Majesty then wrote, or I should say, dictated to his scribe, a surpassingly bizarre discourse concerning some gold plates, which he desires ardently, notwithstanding the fact that they have been, in some sense, damaged; and he puts it all down to a fellow named Doctor Daniel Waterhouse-a name I never dreamed I should stumble across in an official communication from the Tsar of All the Russias.”

  “It’s a long story,” Daniel said, to end the long and profound silence that ensued-for Mr. Kikin’s revelation had left even Mr. Threader dumbstruck.

  “The Tsar has a long memory-and a long reach,” Kikin reminded him.

  “Very well, it’s like this,” Daniel said, and flipped open the latch on the little card-case he had been carrying around. At Bridewell he had dropped off the blank cards made this morning, and swopped them for ones that had been punched by Hannah Spates, and audited by the clerk. He displayed one to the Clubb, holding it up to a window so that light would shine through the holes. “As you can see, to describe it as damaged reflects an error in translation or transcription-what the Tsar meant was that it would have a lot of holes punched in it.”

  “It is hardly the first strange request that His Imperial Majesty has made,” said Kikin. Indeed, the Russian was taking this much more matter-of-factly than Orney or Threader, who were so befuddled that they almost looked frightened.

  Daniel said, “By the time that Brother Norman has this galley ship-shape, which will be-?”

  “A week,” said Orney. “God willing.”

  “By then I shall have damaged quite a few more, and they shall be ready to ship to St. Petersburg. If the Tsar is pleased by the results, the project in question may then move forward. But as this has nothing to do with the Clubb, let us set it aside for now.” And he literally did, putting the card back in the chest and setting it aside.