An Elegant Solution

by Paul Robertson

  Far in front of me were the others of the family. Nicolaus and Gottlieb were together, and in the second row was Master Johann. Little Johann was close beside him. Daniel at the podium was confident and sure; the only betrayal of his anxiety was his occasional glances at the iron casket placid on the shelf beneath him.

  All eyes were on him as he began as I had. “Gentlemen, my subject today is the Mathematics of Hydraulics.” Which was the last word I heard as the door closed quietly behind me.

  16

  The Lost Hour

  The streets weren’t less filled than any other late morning. They were only empty of black robes and black gowns. For all the importance of what was happening inside the University, outside of it was still unaffected.

  I returned home. My grandmother was at the market square. I knew she wouldn’t be very long, so I was hasty in changing from my scholarly self to my humble. It was only minutes and I was back out in the dry sunlight.

  Then I ran; I loved to run. I came to the familiar alley, and then into the more familiar yard.

  Now came the first chance: I looked, and Mistress Dorothea was not in her kitchen.

  I went in as quiet as still air and passed through as silent as sunlight. It was a large house and the high attics could be in a frenzy with hardly a notice down where I was, but I heard nothing and felt nothing.

  As light as sunlit air I climbed the steps and came to the hall where my Master’s office was. I crossed the hall. Another chance was that the door might be locked, but I thought it wouldn’t be. The command of its Master was stronger than any lock. No one, not even Daniel, would have dared to open that door. No one but me. I put my hand on the knob. Then, another chance, a very great chance: I opened the door, onto an empty room. Then I closed it behind me, and I was in my Master’s office.

  This was a place of wonders. The short moments I’d seen it before had impressed themselves on me completely. I knew the room as if I’d always been there, as if it were my own. If I sat in the chair, I would know where every paper was and every book. I did sit.

  Immediately I felt, ten times as much, the thoughts and weight of being a Master and a Chair. I felt the center of Europe. Letters from every corner were here, from all the great minds: from Paris, from Lyon, from Potsdam and Berlin, from Padua and Bologna, from Master Leibniz himself—and even, even alone from the others, a letter from Newton.

  And also alone, away from all the correspondence, just where I’d seen it before, was one letter to Daniel from Paris.

  The room was just as my room would be if I were Master Johann. My own room was part study and part bedroom, and my collection of books was small in comparison, and my papers were trivial in number and content. But I knew the room, just how it was settled and ordered. Master Johann and I, we were very close, closer than he and his own children, close in our thoughts and visions.

  I returned my stare to the books. They were all the ones I knew, of course. Then, in a closed cabinet that I opened, I found, to no real surprise, Newton, Daniel’s Exercitations, and Jacob’s Ars Conjectandi. And also MacLaurin, and Taylor, and all the other Mathematicians that Master Johann of Basel had publicly reviled and fought, and whose books would never be found in any corner of his house; except that now they had been. I closed the cabinet.

  Then I looked at the papers on the desk. A new set of scrawled pages covered it, but few people would see that they were any different from the others I’d seen at my last visit there. I saw that they had to do with the integration of Logarithms. I would have studied them closely but I would never have stopped.

  But I did see papers looking out from beneath those others, and I saw that they were calculations of Reciprocal Squares. I saw his considerations on my proof, and a specific error he’d made. I resisted the desire to correct it. Then I saw there was a correction, from the notes I’d written for Daniel and Nicolaus at the inn.

  But all of this had been without touching anything but the cabinet door. Now it was time to break that rule, and I was reluctant. I sat waiting another moment.

  Master Johann’s black robe was hanging on the wall behind the door. I couldn’t handle these things in my simple brown clothes. I looked at the robe and imagined wearing it. It was a simple black, not the scarlet trimmed most formal robe he wore to gatherings such as today’s. This was the robe he would wear to reprimand an undergraduate or meet with a committee. I stood and put my hand on it. Then I removed it from its hook and held it, and then I slid my own arm into its arm, and then my other arm, and then I stood, enrobed, as if I was a true Chair. I felt the heavy hood hanging across my back. It was the first I’d ever worn such a robe. The folds didn’t come to the floor as they should have, and I thought of having the tailor cut me a new, longer one.

  What the tricorne had begun, I now felt was finished. I sat again in the chair, necessarily bold.

  I took down the letter for Daniel. It was not so grand as from the Court of the Russian Tsar in Saint Petersburg, but it seemed more refined, simpler, and more beautiful. I set it back in its place.

  Then I sat still. Time was crucial, but I waited, and thought what I would do in this room, with these books and papers. What would I do? Where would I set any particular thing? I would have this room, one like it. I waited, letting myself know what I would do here. Where I would keep any particular thing.

  I leaned back down to the cabinet and opened it again. At its end, which needed the farthest reach, I felt beyond Newton and MacLaurin. There was another book behind them that I hadn’t seen. I pulled it out. It had no marking on its cover so I turned to the title page and read, Magia Naturalis et Innaturalis, printed in Passau and dated over a hundred years ago. It was a Faustbook. It would have intrigued me that it would have a place in that room, but I knew immediately why it was there, and that I’d found the single place I’d wanted. I leaned even more and felt behind where it had been, and felt what I knew would be there. I closed my fingers on it.

  In that moment, a voice from the Square screamed, “Thief! Thief! A thief in Master Johann’s house!” I knew the voice, rasping and shrill, like crows and like wolves. Then another voice took the cry, a voice like smoldering fire and red, hot iron.

  In immediate answer, I heard a clatter on the stairs, and a screeching I recognized that was Mistress Dorothea’s servant girl. “Mistress!” she wailed, “there’s a thief in the house! Oh, Mistress Dorothea!” And beyond all the cries and racket, I heard the Mistress’s step on the floor above.

  The robe had a hood. I pulled it over my head, pushed the Faustbook back into its place, closed the office door behind me, and ran.

  I shoved my way to the hall and flew down the stairs, but with care, so the girl wouldn’t be hurt, and passed her before she knew. I landed in the hall. The girl was quick, too, snatching at the robe, and I had a hasty choice: through the passage, through the kitchen, and to the alley behind, or straight ahead to the front and the Munster Square. The alley would lead to winding paths and hidden places, but it was longer and the kitchen might have obstacles. Out the front I went. And there, in the broad Munster Square, was the Munster itself, and at the far end of the Square a troop of the Day Watch. There were already cries from a dozen voices now, of “Thief!” Everyone in the Square turned to me.

  I loved to run.

  The first cries from the Munster Square had raised a wild alarm, all confused and cross-countered like waves in a high storm. I flew from the door into the open and became a magnet, and every motion was suddenly centered toward me. It was only that I was quick that I was not taken in the first moment. I already knew the way to run, straight ahead to the Cathedral with my wake of flapping black robe. And just before I reached the Munster door I dodged right, into the cloister.

  This quiet place was just then undisturbed and empty.

  I thought that I hadn’t been recognized and there was a chance that I could throw off the black robe and pretend to join the chase. Yet before I could, the Watch was after me. But I knew
a way.

  From the Cloister a path led, by a small alley behind the church, to the Augustine Street, close by the River. If the Watch had been quick, they’d have blocked it, but I was quicker. Only by a few steps, though, and they were just behind me.

  Everyone was behind me. Beside the Watch, there was now a mob of men and boys out for the adventure of the chase. So far I was ahead of their shouts and the road ahead was clear.

  The Augustine Street narrowed to become the Rhine Leap, the road passing the University and coming to the Bridge. As it did, the Martin Street turned left from it, away from the River, up toward Saint Martin’s Church. I took the turn.

  I’d been on this street only an hour earlier, wandering between my lecture and Daniel’s. I remembered fenced, hidden gardens.

  The road turned again in just a few steps and I was out of sight of the pursuit. This was a very narrow street with tall, quiet houses and a few thin gates into private yards. I pushed a gate open and closed it, and I was hidden in a small, empty courtyard. Immediately the street outside was filled and noisy, but I had an instant to think.

  There was a crack between planks in the fence. I looked out and saw a Watch with a sword and a pistol, and two tradesmen with clubs, pass the entrance. It seemed that now would be the time to throw off the robe and become myself. The gate would surely open very soon. I looked away from it to see where I might hide or escape through.

  There facing me, five feet away or less, was a man. He was in black as I was, but his was terribly black: a cloak, boots, a mask.

  I often see invisible things.

  All of his body that was not covered was his two hands holding an axe, and his eyes. He lifted his axe and he stepped toward me.

  He had been waiting there for me. He moved quickly, the blade raised higher.

  Some hands had torn my hat from Little Johann; and some hands had guided my hat into the stones of the arch to weaken them; and some hands had flung my hat back at me from the ruin of Lithicus’s death; some invisible hands whose malice was concentrated against me; and now I saw them.

  Before I could move he let the axe fall.

  The invisible was still real. More real than the visible.

  The axe would have cloven me except an angel stayed his arm. The white and gold hand grasped the black wrist. I had seen that angel in the Barefoot Church, and I knew that hand as well. That hand had brought one paper, and the words on it, from years of dust to my dresser-top.

  The black arm was very strong and broke the angel’s grip that had only held for seconds. Yet that was enough. I threw myself out of the axe’s arc.

  The angel was tall as the assassin, which was very tall, and strong as, which was very, very strong.

  I broke back out the gate into the street. And then I ran but I felt flame behind me, just as fast. And the street was empty. I didn’t know what angel was still with me but I knew my nemesis was on my heels.

  “He’s here, thief!” I shouted. “He’s here!”

  And like a match struck and thrown into straw, the street filled as the men returned from where they’d run past me. They were quick behind me, but they were all. No one else was with them.

  So the chase was on again and I ran.

  I could only think of one direction to run, to leave Basel. And all the gates would be warned that the chase was on. Or only in Large Basel. The word may not have yet been sent to Small Basel. So I ran toward the bridge.

  Around a corner, and the bridge was before me. The Bridge Gate guarded Large Basel against attacks from across the bridge, but also the bridge itself against escapees from Large Basel. I’d have to get through it. Strange as it was, though, no Watch stopped me as I sprinted through the gate. I was out on the bridge.

  The wood planks bounced under my slamming feet. I dodged a cart and a few walkers. Shouts from behind me told the people on the bridge to hold me, but I was too fast. I saw the far end: and the Watch there had already seen me. They were pulling their barricade closed, and two came onto the bridge toward me.

  Then I saw why I’d been let through the gate so easily. That barricade was also closing. I was trapped.

  I’d reached the Yoke Chapel and stopped. I was caught between the two ends. Watch from both were approaching.

  I stood and the moment stood, also, still. I was the center, the zero of numbers, and the bridge like stopped time on either side from beginning to end. But the Watch and the distance to them were finite and their advance like time compressed from future and past to now, like numbers descending toward their origin.

  The Yoke Chapel was beside me. It was no refuge. It had never saved any of those who’d prayed their last prayers in it, and now I was in their place. The thought of the condemned somehow led me to follow them. The Watch were walking on, pikes held forward. I put my foot on the rail and they saw at once what I was going to do and broke the walk into a run. But I had time, if I would use it. I hoisted myself onto the narrow rail, holding to the chapel to steady my balance, but only for the instant. And now I was standing where the criminals had stood. I looked down and saw the Rhine. The flow of water pulled my thoughts down and in. All my years I’d been beside it. But I’d never been in the river. There was nothing else left to do for the chase; it was finished.

  Then I leapt.

  My moments in the air were endless. My arms flailed. I thought of birds’ wings and gravity. I accelerated down. Then there were noise and splash and wetness as I plunged beneath the surface. I had no idea what to do; I had never swum. My arms were still flapping and I had no idea which direction was up or down. I thought of density and buoyancy. I knew my density was less than that of water. But I was still under, and I also realized I should have taken a breath while I was still in the air. I could not now! But I didn’t think to not breathe. A cold, choking fluid filled my mouth; it was water.

  I spewed the water out of my mouth, and I realized my head was in air. Coughing and spluttering took my attention, and blinking, and shaking like a dog to get water out of my eyes, and when I had enough sense I looked at where I was. I was in the Rhine.

  I found the bridge. It was already far off, and receding. I could see the guards on it, converging to the chapel. They were waving and pointing and shouting. I could still barely hear them. A musket was pointed. I couldn’t tell if it was fired.

  Then the men ran, to both ends of the bridge. I could see what they meant, to reach the banks and run the streets to the gates, but they’d have a long way of it. And the water was running swifter. I slowed my splashing and could hold my head out of the river with calmer motions. I worked my way more to the center. The water was chill. The robe was tangled around me. I fought it and pulled myself free. It floated beside me, then was pulled by the current away.

  A landing at the end of the bridge was just then boatless. A boat was nearby in the water, and a Watch waved and shouted for it.

  Only a small part of me was above the water, with which fortunately I could breathe. I stopped my limbs from moving and let myself hang in the water and be still. And just float.

  For a while I did just float. I was facing forward. The Wall of Small Basel and the Blaise Gate passed me on the right, and Huldrych’s house on my left, and the bridge was too far to see. Then the last Walls of Large Basel on my right were passing, and the Saint John Gate, and then were left behind. When a man left Basel and Basel Time, he was given back his hour that he’d lost at his entry. So I regained mine. I pushed myself toward the right bank. It wasn’t difficult to move across, though it was slow.

  I saw that the boat had been commandeered; the strong pull of two Watch on its oars was bringing it closer to me. Then it came even with me, but nearer the far bank, and then passed me, and I was never seen. I must have been a small thing, just my head, in the wide rippled river. Then I passed the boat, and the men on it were pulling the black robe from the water. They still never saw me. Then they were behind and I went on. All the city was behind me and gone. I felt beyond all the living
.

  It seemed strange to be standing on water, not walking but still making a good pace. I moved forward, or the bank moved backward. Which was really still and which in motion? The cold was numbing me but still I didn’t feel like leaving it.

  Perhaps two miles passed, and at least a half hour. I was becoming very cold, submerged as I was all but my head. I waited for a great fish to come swallow me. Three days in its belly would take me long past the final Election. I began to imagine the last bit of me sinking and all floating down into the deep water. It seemed for a moment a pleasant thought. In all the dry, rainless world, only the Rhine still had abundance of water.

  Then I began pulling my arms through the water, and pushing myself out of the flow. It was harder than I’d have thought and my arms were sluggish from cold. But the closer bank became closer and my feet touched mud and stones.

  I wriggled onto and up the bank, to a warm, dry set of grass, and stopped. Now I felt how very cold I’d been and I was shivering in the peaceful sun; shivering from the cold, and in the pause from the chase. I thought a moment about how the chase had happened. But I was interrupted in that by falling asleep. It was a long sleep.

  I was not alone when I woke. Two black shoes rested in the grass near me, and black parson’s stockings from them, and all the rest of a man, all in black, a generous and gentle black. I only needed the shoes to know their Master, and mine. I said, “Father!” and he considered me. His eyes, which always saw so much, were now on me and I was all that was in them. He was sitting on the top lip of the bank, his arms crossed about his knees.

  “What are you doing here, Leonhard?” he asked.

  “I was in the river.”

  “Oh. You were in the river.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  “Why?”

  “I jumped in.”

  “You jumped. From the bridge?”

  “At the Yoke Chapel.”