Dark Matter

by Philip Kerr

  Newton had an expert’s knowledge of theology, and I knew he could have disputed doctrine with the Archbishop of Canterbury. And yet I was profoundly shocked to discover just what he believed, or, to put the case more correctly, what he did not believe. The beliefs of Galileo, heretical in the eyes of Rome, were as nothing compared with those of my master, for Newton’s Arianism was, like Roman Catholicism, specifically excluded from the Toleration Act of 1689 that offered religious freedom to all faiths. Even a Jew enjoyed more religious freedom than an Arian.

  My astonishment was tempered by the sense of trust that Newton had now put in me. For immediately I saw how Newton’s enemies would have taken delight in the public exposure of his avowed heresy, which would also have destroyed his position in society. I could not imagine how an avowed heretic such as he might have been allowed to remain as the Lucasian Professor at Trinity. At the very least he would have lost his place in the Mint. Possibly he might have suffered an even worse fate. It was only two years since a young man of just eighteen years had been hanged for denying the Holy Trinity in Scotland, despite his having recanted and done penance. Of course the Edinburghclergy, like all the Scots, were the most bigoted opponents of anti-Trinitarianism. But even in England the penalties for dissenting opinions could be severe. Although heresy was not punishable at English Common Law, a man’s blasphemous tongue could be branded with a hot iron, and his person whipped and pilloried. Therefore to be made the trustee of such a grave secret was confirmation indeed of the great faith Newton now placed in me. This pleased me greatly; but I confess I never foresaw how being exposed to Newton’s heretical creed would begin to work upon my own Christian conscience.

  From the Strand we returned to the Whit, where Newton explained that it was his intention to press Scotch Robin and John Hunter for information in the matter. When I asked why we did not simply question John Berningham, he explained that he still had hopes that Mrs. Berningham might yet work her uxorious way with her husband. Immediately we arrived at the Whit, Newton had Scotch Robin and John Hunter brought up from the Condemned Hold in the cellars to the Keeper’s Lodge, one after the other. Scotch Robin was a mean, red-haired fellow with a scowling fist of a face and a wen on the side of his scurvy-looking neck as large as a plover’s egg. To me he looked such an obvious jailbird the wonder was that he had ever been permitted to work in the Mint at all.

  “Have you considered what I said to you last night?” Newton asked him.

  “Aye, I have,” said Scotch Robin, and nonchalantly draped his shackles across his shoulders so that his hands hung about his neck like one almost indifferent to his fate. “But I’ve asked about, and I reckon I’ve got a bit more time than you told me. It seems that Wednesday’s not a hanging match.”

  “It’s not a regular hanging day, that’s true,” admitted Newton, colouring a little. “But you would do well to remember that yours could hardly be called a regular hanging. Not with all the attendant barbarities that the law requires the executioner to inflict upon your body. Do not take me lightly, Robin. I am a Justice of the Peace in seven counties of England. I have sworn to uphold the Law, and I will do so in the very teeth of Hell. And I can assure you that it is well within my power to go before a judge this very afternoon and obtain a special warrant for your immediate execution.”

  “For the love of Christ,” flinched Robin. “Have you no pity?”

  “None for such as you.”

  “Then God help me.”

  “He will not.”

  “Is it you who says so?”

  “He came not to Saul, who was a King and the Lord’s anointed. Why should he come to a wretch like you? Come, sir,” insisted Newton, “I grow weary of your prevarications. I did not come here to debate theology with you. You’ll dance for me or in the Sheriff’s picture frame with a rope about your neck.”

  Robin hung his head for a moment and at last uttered a name.

  Then Newton was Draco himself with John Hunter, who said that he would only co-operate with my master’s investigation on condition of a full pardon for all his past mistakes and the sum of twenty-five guineas to start a new life in the Americas.

  “What?” sneered Newton. “Is it true? You still hope to profit from your crimes? Have you no shame? Am I bound to satisfy you, sir? Do you hear him, Mister Ellis? It seems he thinks it is not enough that I save him from a wry neck and wet pair of breeches. The Law trades not with ignorant vulgars such as you, sir. I shall only tell you that if you intend to save your life, you must be quick in informing, for I intend to lose no time. And when I am at last satisfied that you have done this, I shall petition the Lords Justices to deliver you from darkness. But hinder me, sir, and the day after tomorrow I shall deliver you to the hangman myself, my word upon it.”

  At which Hunter battered his own forehead with his chain darbies while all the air and bluster now seemed to go out of him. Then he smiled a wry smile and remarked that he had meant no harm.

  “I don’t like the black air of the cell,” he said. “Forgive me, sir. I was only trying to find a Jacob, I mean a ladder out of there. Any man would have done the same. But it’s a different kind of ladder I’d be mounting if I thwarted you, sir. I can see that now. And a darker kind of air at the top of it, I’ll warrant. Therefore I’ll peach. I’ll help you nail the man you want. The man what is still in the Mint, who is as ready to steal guinea dies to order as a physician is to let blood.”

  Then Hunter named one Daniel Mercer, who was known to both Newton and myself as an engraver whom we thought to be an honest man. This was the same man whom Scotch Robin, who was himself an engraver, had named.

  I read over the deposition I had taken and had Hunter sign it, as Scotch Robin had signed his, before having the cull return him to the Condemned Hold, for Newton still thought to extract yet more information from these two at some time in the future.

  “Shall we obtain a warrant for Daniel Mercer’s arrest?” I asked, when we were alone.

  “By heaven, no,” said Newton, fixing me with that eye of his: an eye that had stared into the eternal and the infinite. “We shall leave him at his liberty in the hope that we may observe this body’s orbit, so to speak. We shall have him watched, by Mister Kennedy, and decide what his motion argues. The matter may receive greater light from hence than from any means that might be available to us while he was in this dark place. He may still draw us to the main intelligence behind this scheme, as salt of tartar draws water out of air.”

  We returned to the Tower where we left a note for Mister Kennedy, he that was Newton’s best spy, and briefly walked about the Mint, now operating with more noise than a battlefield. We were not long there before Doctor Newton saw Master Worker Neale coming toward us, and remarked upon it as one who looked upon a Tory arrived in a club for Whigs.

  “It is he, I swear. Hang me if it isn’t. What on earth brings him here, I wonder?”

  “Who?” said I, for this was the first time I ever clapped eyes on Mister Neale, who was notionally in charge of the Mint but whose appearances there were as rare as hen’s teeth.

  “This, Ellis, is Mister Neale, who goes by the title of Master Worker, although I think he would count it some kind of misfortune indeed if ever he had to work at all. Indeed I think it would quite spoil the purchase of his office altogether if the business of this Mint were to intrude upon his pleasures and projections. For as I have told you he leaves the general management of this Mint to the joint comptrollers, and the chief clerk.”

  Seeing us now, the Master Worker saluted us most affably and walked toward us, while all the time Newton fulminated like salt-petre in a crucible upon Mister Neale’s lack of diligence.

  I judged Mister Neale to be about sixty years of age, somewhat fat, but handsomely dressed with wig and silk coat abundantly powdered, bullion-fringed gloves, a fine beaver hat, and a fur-lined cape. But by his conversation I found him to be an easygoing sort of fellow, the very kind of man I would once have chosen for to accompany to a
tavern, and mighty merry besides in inveighing against Lord Lucas, the Tower’s Lord Lieutenant, which was all the opinion he and Newton held in common.

  “This is unexpected,” said Newton, with a bow. “What brings you here, Mister Neale?”

  Mister Neale was accompanied at a distance by a middle-sized fellow who somehow seemed familiar to me. This other man was about forty years old, with a hooked nose, a sharp chin, grey eyes and a mole near his mouth; he wore an expensive wig, and a diamond pinkie on his finger; and yet he looked most unaccountably shabby and more melancholy of countenance than perhaps he ought to have.

  The Master Worker introduced his glum companion as Mister Daniel Defoe, to whom the Master Worker had let his official house that was in the Tower.

  “But I thought it was already let,” objected Newton. “To Mister Barry.”

  “It was, it was,” chuckled Mister Neale. “However, another gentleman played me at cards and, having lost all of his money, persuaded me to take the lease as his bet. Which he then lost. But no sooner had I won it back myself than I lost it again to this friend of mine here.” Neale grinned railingly at Mister Defoe who nodded back at him silently.

  “Mister Defoe, this is the famous Doctor Newton, a very great scientist. If you stay in the house yourself you’ll see a lot of him about the Mint. He is, by reputation, most diligent in his duties as the Warden.”

  “Diligence is but the father of good economy,” said Mister Defoe, bowing to Newton.

  “Mister Defoe, I trust you will be very comfortable in your new house,” said Newton.

  “Is it always this noisy?” asked Mister Defoe.

  Newton glanced around, almost surprised. “I confess that I hardly notice the noise, unless someone mentions it first. One become used to it, I suppose.”

  Even as we spoke a cannon fired up on the outer rampire, which made Mister Defoe almost jump out of his own skin.

  Newton smiled. “One never becomes used to the sound of the cannon, I’m afraid.”

  By and by, these two men took their leave of us, upon which Newton sighed most profoundly and shook his head.

  “I thought this a better venture than a church living,” he said. “But with men like that around, their pockets full of false dice and fees from all sides, I’m not so sure. Did you not think Mister Defoe looked like the most dishonest gentleman you ever saw?”

  Even as I replied that I did think there were more honest-looking men in the condemned hold of Newgate, and that doubtless Mister Defoe would fit in well with some of the crook-fingered types that were already in the Tower, I remembered where it was that I had seen Mister Defoe.

  “I believe I have seen that gentleman before,” said I. “It was when I was still at Gray’s Inn. He was before the King’s Bench for debt, and threatened with the sponging house. I remember him only because of the peculiar circumstances of the case, which pertained to a scheme for the raising of sunken treasure by means of a diving bell.”

  “A diving bell?”

  “Yes sir, to enable a man to breathe under water.”

  Newton’s interest was piqued. “I would wish to know more about our new neighbour,” he admitted. “See what else you may discover about him. For I don’t much like having bankrupt men in a place like this. And at the very least I should like to be told if he be friend, or he be foe.”

  I smiled, for it was rare indeed that Newton did make a joke. “I will, master.”

  Walking on a way, near the engraver’s house, we saw Richard Morris, who was another engraver, and Newton spoke with him awhile about a great many things, so that I almost did not notice how he subtly enquired after the health of Daniel Mercer, who now stood accused by Scotch Robin and John Hunter.

  “He is well, I think,” said Mister Morris. “His uncle in America is lately died. But he is left some money, and does not seem too much put out.”

  “A little money will often soften a man’s grief,” said Newton.

  “It’s most convenient to have an uncle in America leave him money,” said Newton when we were alone in our office. “For there’s nothing attracts attention like a sudden bout of spending.”

  “I had the same thought,” I said.

  After this we had dinner, which I was very glad of, and while we dined we talked of other matters pertaining to the Mint as well as religious affairs, for I was keen to know more of why my master disputed Our Lord’s divinity; and I said that it was a strange thing indeed, for one who had been a professor at Holy Trinity College in Cambridge for so many years, not to believe in the very doctrine which had inspired the founding of that same college. But, hearing this, Newton became silent, as if I had accused him of hypocrisy, and I was glad when, by and by, his steel-nosed intelligencer in the mill rooms, Mister Kennedy, visited our office, as requested.

  “Mister Kennedy,” said Newton. “What do you know of Daniel Mercer?”

  “Only that he is an engraver, whom I had thought to be an honest man. I know him to look at, I think. But not to speak to.”

  “You said you thought he was an honest man?”

  “In truth, ’tis only your enquiry makes me think that it might be otherwise, sir. I’ve not seen or heard anything that might make me think otherwise. If I had, I assure you I would have told you straightaway.”

  “I know you are a good fellow, Kennedy.” Newton placed a bright new guinea on the table in front of him. “I should like you to perform a service for me. I should like you to spy on Daniel Mercer.”

  “If it be for the good of the Mint, sir,” said Kennedy, eyeing the guinea. He made it sound as if he had not spied for us before, when he had done so, many times, and for less money than was being offered to him now.

  “It is. He is named from inside Newgate by Scotch Robin and John Hunter.”

  “I see.” Kennedy sniffed loudly, and then checked that his metal nose, held onto his face by a length of string tied behind his head, was straight. “They might think to save their skin, of course, by naming an innocent man.”

  “It does you credit to say so, Kennedy. But they were each questioned apart, and named Mercer separately, without any prompting from me.”

  “I see.” Kennedy picked up the guinea.

  “Mercer is suspected of stealing guinea dies. I should like you to tell me if you think it be true or not. Who his confederates are. And where they are to be found.” He nodded at the guinea in Kennedy’s grimy hand. “There will be another like it if your evidence may be used in court.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Kennedy pocketed the guinea and nodded. “I’ll do my best.”

  After this, Newton went to the Treasury while I returned to my house all the afternoon and night, writing up the depositions I had taken in several other cases that were pending—which work I was at till midnight, and then to supper, and to bed.

  At about three of the clock I was awakened by Thomas Hall, the special assistant to Mister Neale, who appeared before me in a highly agitated state.

  “What is it, Mister Hall?” I asked.

  “Mister Ellis. Something terrible has happened. Mister Kennedy has been found dead in the most horrible circumstances.”

  “Mr. Kennedy? Dead? Where?”

  “In the Lion Tower.”

  “Has there been an accident?”

  “I cannot tell, but it may be that you should fetch Doctor Newton.”

  So I made myself ready presently and accompanied Mister Hall to the Lion Tower, that was formerly known as the Barbican, which stood outside the main westward entrance to the Tower. It was a bitterly cold night and I was shivering inside my cloak, the more so when I was informed of the dreadful fate that had befallen Mister Kennedy, for it seemed he had been half eaten by a lion in the Tower menagerie. Amid much loud roaring, for the animal had only just been driven back to its cage with pikes and halberds, I entered the Lion Tower, which was most popular with visitors to the Tower since the Restoration. This tower was open to the elements, having no roof, with the animal cages arranged
around the perimeter with a large exercise yard in the centre, where I beheld a scene of almost indescribable carnage.

  A great deal of blood lay upon the ground so that my shoes were soon sticky with it, and in a corner of the yard was what remained of Mister Kennedy’s body. Although his neck was quite bitten through and his mouth gagged, his face was easily recognisable, if only by the absence of his false nose which lay on the ground nearby, glinting in the bright moonshine like a dragoon’s decorative cuirass. He was badly mauled, with great claw marks on his belly through which his guts were clearly visible, and was missing an arm and part of a leg, although it was no great mystery to whence these had been removed. Several members of the Ordnance were standing about holding pikes while the animal keeper busied himself with bolting the cage to which the murderous lion had now been returned.

  One of the warders was known to me, being Sergeant Rohan, and I entreated him that the body might not be moved or the scene much trampled over until my master should have had an opportunity to examine it.

  “Rightly, Mister Ellis,” growled the Sergeant, “this is the proper province of the Ordnance, not the Mint. Lions don’t fall within your proper jurisdiction, except when they appear upon a silver crown.”

  “True, Sergeant. However, the man who has been killed was employed in the Mint, and his death may very likely have a strong bearing on its business.”

  Sergeant Rohan nodded, his big face only part illuminated by the torchlight, so that his mouth was covered by darkness. “Well, that’s as may be. But Lord Lucas will decide the matter. If he can be woken. So I reckon the quicker you can fetch your master here, the better. Let the two of them dispute the matter like a couple of Titans, I say, and we’ll stay out of it, eh?”

  I nodded.

  “A proper mess, isn’t it?” he continued. “I seen men bayoneted, men blown to bits with cannonade, men cut to pieces with swords, but I never seen a man chewed by lions before. It gives me a new respect for the courage of them early Christian martyrs. To die for Christ facing such beasts as these, why it’s an inspiration. Aye, that’s what it is.”