Jack Faust - Michael Swanwick

by Unknown Author

  (Here we are.)

  Faust stopped. "Here we are."

  "Here? Where?"

  "Why, your lodgings, where else? So that I may read— what is it your thesis is called?—The Implications of Static Conditions Upon the Propagation of Light."

  * * *

  "Thomas Luffkin and Samuel Rid/' Jenkins said. He stood by his room's single window, staring blindly out into the air-shaft, while Faust went through his papers. "I might have been content with my sorry condition but for them. But you paid their way to Cambridge and then Oxford, and sent me along with them—as their bootblack! I had to wait upon those geese to earn my credits, perform the calculations they were too lazy to work themselves, and listen in silence to their misconstructions of what they had been taught. They were pigheaded fools! How could you not have known?"

  (Feign indifference.)

  "How indeed?"

  "How they mocked me! How they hated me for being what they pretended to be! Four years I waited upon them, while my supposed teachers fed me as much nonsense as fact. Ansely taught that color was a product of the conflict between light and darkness. I spent forty-eight hours without food or sleep trying to make sense of his system, before realizing at last that it was merely an allegory of the human soul, caught up in the war between good and evil."

  "You thought it insipid."

  "I thought it wrong! Then Luffkin and Rid put their two half-wits together and composed a tract asserting that light was neither motion nor particle but nothing other than a tension in the luminiferous ether—and for this they got not only their degrees, but positions as your scientific advisors!"

  (Soon. Not yet.)

  "Mmmmm."

  "I was denied my degree because the professors rejected out of hand my definition of time as a dimension. They would not hear my arguments! Rid and Luffkin, who do nothing now but attend plays, frequent the vaulting-houses, and grow fat on boiled puddings and clotted cream, have blocked my every attempt to find work worthy of me. But I shall have the last laugh! I have finished my great work, and will somehow get it published, and it shall be remembered long after Luffkin and Rid are quite forgotten!"

  (Now the truth.)

  "I never expected anything from them. They were but goads to urge you on."

  Jenkins swung around, so startled that all attempts to suppress those emotions that rose up unbidden within him were futile. Even as his mouth twisted into a denying smirk, his eyes grew wide with hope. Now he leaned over the paper Faust was reading and jabbed a finger at one heavily worked passage. "Do you—can you follow my reasoning? Any velocity compounded with the speed of light, you see, yields the same result. Invariably. And thus—"

  (Praise him.)

  Faust made a small correction. "Yes. You have not betrayed my faith in you. This work is excellent. Most fine."

  Wagner was waiting back at the office. The office-staff had deserted their desks and were clustered behind him, heads bobbing nervously, like so many contemptible fools and round-eyed owls. Wagner shot a jealous glance at the gangly mechanic and in his most formal voice said, "Master, Lord Sandwich bids you join with the Admiralty in Somerset House, to aid in their deliberations."

  "Tell Sandwich I have better ways to waste my time." Faust put a hand to his door. "This fellow has a thesis. Publish it, and see it is added to the curriculum of all the colleges. Find him a desk. Put him to work."

  "But you must obey the summons," Wagner squeaked. "You are needed to ..."

  "All that I can do is done. It is out of my hands. I will be in my office. Do not disturb me for any reason."

  He closed the door.

  Mephistopheles was already within. He had embodied himself as a scrawny caricature of an admiral, with a jutting chin and beak nose, hair pulled back tight in a pig-tail, and silken hose. He had a tiny corkscrew of a penis, whose outlines could be clearly seen through his tights.

  "Smile," he said. "You are about to make history."

  "History." Faust sat heavily upon the couch he kept in his office for those nights he worked late. "What does that word mean? I knew when I began this—but now? I feel such an emptiness. So much work! For what? Just what have I labored so long and hard to accomplish?" He looked at the demon with weary loathing. "Well?"

  "Tell me exactly what you want to hear," Mephistopheles said, fluffing the lace at his sleeves, "and I swear I will spoon every word into your ear, down to the last syllable."

  "I want nothing more nor less than the truth. The truth! And this time do not stuff me like a turkey with facts, numbers, schemata, tables, and graphs. I require perspective. Let me experience this great event vigorously and with the undimmed senses and emotions of youth."

  "It will not be easy." Mephistopheles chewed his lip, as if thinking. "But very well—lie down, make yourself comfortable. Stare at the ceiling. Relax."

  Faust lay back. He let his gaze unfocus and saw the ocean, vast beyond reckoning, and upon it ships in the thousands. Then his vision wrenched violently about, sea trading places with sky, and the ships that were so minuscule grew to monstrous size and swallowed him up and he was Faust no more.

  He was a young Catalan named Juan Miguel Aubrion у Ruiz. The metal deck of the ironclad Cor Mariae was scorching underfoot but he did not care, for the canvas hood had just been removed from his head. He gaped up at a sky so dazzlingly blue it made his head spin and his eyes ache, and at an enormous slanted smokestack on which was freshly painted the Mother of Sorrows displaying her heart, pierced by seven swords. The soldier who always smelled of garlic was striking his chains now.

  After three weeks in a convict-wagon, the freedom to move was intoxicating. Juan shook his head, sending pearls of sweat flying from the tips of his hair, and flung out his arms to stretch the stiffness from them. The clean salt air filled his lungs and he knew in that instant he could make a life for himself here.

  "That red bitch is mine!"

  He whirled. A line of sailors stood by the rail, looking at the newcomers. Some grinned, others did not. The bald giant in the torn shirt pursed his lips and made a little sucking noise. Juan's heart sank.

  In all the line, only he had red hair.

  Sergeant Garlic snorted a maybe-laugh and moved on to the next man in the coffle. The officer overseeing the transfer stroked his mustaches and looked elaborately away. Soldiers lounged about the deck, in attitudes of bored arrogance. He had no allies anywhere.

  Then the chains were all struck, and the sailing-master went down the line making assignments. Juan was handed over to a mulatto Portuguese named Gavilan—possibly because the bright pink scar on his arm looked something like a sparrowhawk—and sent below to muck out the stables.

  The forward hold had been rebuilt to house the mounts that the cavalry would require in the fields outside London. "Welcome to Horse Hell," Gavilan said as they descended into the dim-lit, malodorous region. "They hate it here. They hate the crowding, the metal, the dark, the smells, the electric lights, the way the ship moves under them. Watch out for their hooves. Watch out for their teeth. They are all crazy-mean. This is a manure fork. Over here is a canvas sack. You fill up the one with the other and then you drop the manure overboard. On the lee side—never windward, always on the lee side. You understand?"

  Juan nodded.

  "Good." Gavilan slapped him on the back. "Work hard, boy. Work hard, and you'll soon be out. Somebody will fuck up, and Don Sebastian will give him your job."

  He left.

  The work was hard. The horses stood in filth up to their fetlocks. The poor creatures were unnerved by their surroundings and at the least excuse would lash out at him in panic. They carried flies, which bit. The stench was unbelievable. Worst of all were the soldiers who, when they came down to fuss over their favorites and found them living in filth, would curse and strike Juan for his laziness. He tried explaining there was more work than one man could do, but they only abused him the more for insolence.

  He worked until he thought he would collapse
and then, remembering Gavilan's advice, kept on working.

  Finally, somebody came and put a hardtack biscuit in his hand and told him that his watch was over. When he had eaten, he went out on deck—all the berths had been reserved for the soldiers, who were going to conquer England for His Most Catholic Majesty and thus stood high in his regard—and found an empty expanse of deck alee of the other sailors.

  He went to sleep listening to the many voices of the sea: the bubbling noise it made against the ironclad's side, the whimsical bloops and chuckles. The soft crash of distant surf. The surge of a fresh wind racing across its surface. Such sounds a man would never grow tired of hearing.

  On the fourth day, he was made a gunnery-boy. This meant he had to carry shells for an irascible Dutch artilleryman named Rumbartus Jakobszoon. "Poo! Poo!" the Dutchman said when he first reported, waving a hand in front of his round face. "You go wash them clothes, boy. Wash yourself, too. Make them hose you down with the pumps."

  He was shown how to lift a shell safely, and how to slide it up into the gun. The skill seemed simple enough until the gun drill began. For three hours he toted the fifty-pound shells to the gun. There the gunner slammed open the breech and he slid in the shell. Together they threw their weight against the cannon so that it slid forward, out through the gun port.

  The Dutchman held a headset up to one ear, listening to the spotters' mock-reports, and consulted an imaginary ballistics table in his free hand. Then he made a few finicky adjustments to the aiming screws on his gun, clapped hand to a lever, and solemnly said, "Boom."

  After which the routine went: Run the gun back, open the breech, and remove the shell, as if it had been fired. Seize the swab, dip the head in a bucket of water, thrust it up the bore to clean out any residue, and return the tool to its clamp.

  And then repeat.

  The Cor Mariae was a 74-gun ship. All up and down the gun-deck, the cannons were being run out and in, their gunners cursing their assistants in a melange of Dutch, German, and Portuguese—for some reason there were no Spanish-born gunners—because none of them could get the rhythm right. Juan worked with a good will, but still the Dutchman swore at him almost constantly, and struck him several times.

  When the drill was finally over, the gunner patted Juan briefly on his back. "You are one piss-in-your-pants lazy gun-ner-boy," he said. "But better than I expect. Every day we drill like this, so we can beat them bastard English."

  "We'll crush them," Juan said confidently. He had been overwhelmed by the size of the ironclad, by its complexity, and its might. A boiler-man had told him it had the destructive force of an army. "The English will take one look at the Cor Mariae and—"

  "They look at her and they laugh their guts out. You know how they design her? They take a caravel, chop off the masts, add a boiler, and cover it with iron. What you got? Half-turtle and half-by-damn-donkey. Spain builds shit-ass stupid ships. The English, they put on women's dresses and spank each other with sticks, but they build good warships. Low in water, sleek like fish. Very fast. Also they got good crews. They don't use criminals. They don't use idiot boys. They don't train somebody two days and call him a sailor."

  Juan's dismay must have shown on his face, for the Dutchman chuckled.

  "Never you mind, boy," he said. "We win anyway. We blast them English dog-fuckers good with our big German guns."

  That day Juan twice thought he saw the bald giant looking at him. So cold and meaningful were those looks that that night he could not sleep. He threw his blanket over his shoulders and went to the stern, to lean over the rail and stare out across the water.

  It was a clear night. The lights of Lisbon harbor were a soft yellow, and the moon above it bright and cold. There were stars in the sky, more than any man could count.

  In the dark, somebody approached. He tensed.

  But it was only Gavilan. Pipe in mouth, the mulatto picked his way carefully between sleeping sailors. He extended the pipe, stem first. "Try some."

  "What is it?" Juan asked, accepting.

  "It's called tobacco."

  Tobacco was a new wonder. Everyone wanted to try it. Feeling honored, Juan cautiously drew in as much smoke as he could hold in his lungs. It made him dizzy. When he exhaled, all the world rose up in one voice and lifted him briefly into the air above the ship. He handed the pipe back, and after a time Gavilan said, "What was your crime?"

  "I was running guns for the Basques and the Communists. Up in the mountains."

  A silence. Then: "You should not have told me that."

  Juan shrugged. "The magistrate knew. He gave me the choice of prison or the Armada."

  For a long time neither spoke. Then Gavilan said, "I was sent here to tell you that you're wanted below, at the machine-shop, aft of the boilers."

  "All right." Juan started to fold his blanket.

  "Wait. You didn't ask who sent for you."

  Juan asked with his eyes.

  Gavilan ran a hand over his head, signifying baldness. "He'll be waiting for you just behind the door. I don't think you'll much enjoy what he wants to do with you."

  Juan's blood turned cold, and then hot again. But he had known this was coming. There were things, he now understood, a man was expected to take care of without help. Finally he said, "It is not so much what he wants to do, as how he wants to do it."

  A look flew between them, swift as a bird. Gavilan reached out a hand and touched Juan's red curls. He smiled. "Where did you get these?"

  Juan's father was an Irish sailor who had lost a foot unloading cargo in Barcelona and later drifted inland, looking for work. He had stayed long enough in Vilada to sire three children on Juan's mother and then left again. Juan said nothing of that, however, but moved his head under the mulatto's hand.

  "You'll need a weapon." Gavilan reached inside his jersey and withdrew a length of chain. "Wrap it around your hand, so you don't drop it. Make a loop, take the other end in your fist. You can hurt him as bad as you like, and nobody will complain. Only don't kill him. If you kill him, Don Sebastian will tie you to his corpse and drop you both overboard."

  Juan stood outside the machine-shop, savoring the darkness. The nearest electric bulb not burnt out or broken was far down the passageway, a pinpoint of light. He put one hand on the door. With the other he swung the chain slightly, noiselessly, until it felt right in his grip.

  Then he slammed the door open and in one smooth motion turned and whipped back his arm. Make the first blow to the face, as hard and savage as he could. Let it wrap around the giant's head. Then rip it back. Pull the bastard's face down and bring a knee up to meet it. After that it would be as simple as beating a drunk with a cudgel.

  "Take this, you bugger," he whispered savagely.

  But then something horrible happened.

  In the darkness, where the giant should have been, stood a grotesque figure, painted like a commedia delVarte player, and grinning like the moon. His face was all chin and jutting nose, yellow teeth and malice. He was dressed as an English admiral. A dark aura of absolute, unfettered evil gushed from him like a wind. There was no mistaking who it was.

  "Saint Anna preserve me!" Juan cried, stepping back.

  "Hello, Juan," the Tempter of Men said. "I'm so glad you could answer my summons."

  "Please ..." The chain fell from Juan's nerveless hand.

  The darkness welled and intensified until all that could be seen was that pale face, like a boat bobbing on the infinite sea of night. Two white-gloved hands floated up out of nowhere to seize Juan's shoulders in a painful grip.

  "Let me explain to you," the Horned One said, "the nature of history."

  "What?"

  "The first thing you need to know is that history happens almost exclusively in the dark. The second ... well, let's not get ahead of ourselves. I can sum up your lessons perfectly in three dicta. But will you learn? No. Mere assertion lacks the force and conviction of experience. As I shall now proceed to demonstrate."

  The Calamity o
f the World puckered his mouth and stuck out a long pink tongue. Juan could not move. The tongue stretched out far, far, impossibly far. He shivered with loathing at its approach. The tip reared back, then darted forward like a snake. It struck him in the center of his forehead. His skull cracked open like an eggshell.

  The cold black air flooded in and overwhelmed him.

  When he opened his eyes, it was three days later, and the English fleet had just been sighted.

  "I had a terrible dream," Juan said.

  "Don't tell me it." Gavilan made the sign of the cross and spat to one side. "Bad dreams are bad luck. Forget you had it, and maybe we'll survive this terrible day." He gave Juan a little squeeze, and Juan rubbed a thumb against the sparrow-hawk scar on his arm that he now knew to be a brand. Then everyone was called on deck to hear the admiral.

  They had followed a course north against an unfavorable wind. In the days before steam, such a wind would have held them helpless indefinitely. Now, the old hands joked, they'd be anchored in the Thames before the food had a chance to rot.

  The admiral spoke to the Armada over the radio. His speech was patched into the intercom. On deck the soldiers stood at attention in stiff ranks to listen to the hissing, crackling words. The seamen were more slovenly, lounging with elaborate lack of discipline against the rails, but every bit as intent. He told them to do their duty, that Jesus and all the saints were watching, and that divine intercession was all but guaranteed. Then he reminded them of the punishments for shirking, cowardice, desertion, and drawing a weapon on a superior officer.

  Juan was not really listening, because a devilish flea was hopping furiously about in his hair, biting him first here, then there, and finally burrowing into his ear. Unobtrusively, he brought his little finger to the opening and tried to dig it out.

  (That won't work, sweet baby!) cried a tiny voice from the bottom of the ear canal. (I promised to explain these things to you and I will—I will!)

  The admiral's voice still echoed and rattled in the loudspeakers. (He talks of Spanish technological superiority) said the flea (by which he means the German guns. From his spies, however, he has received sure intelligence that he cannot win the coming battle. Alas, he has no more choice than you. The King demands he fight, and so he must. Nor has the King any choice. His creditors must have England, or they'll foreclose on his holdings. They, in turn, are dangerously overextended from paying for these very ships and guns. Everyone knows this for folly; but from the bankers to the King to the admiral to Don Sebastian to you, the daisy-chain of economic necessity rules all. Here is your second lesson: History is that which cannot be prevented.)