Newton's Cannon

by J. Gregory Keyes

  “You should have heard him and his Couranteers trying to guess who slipped her ‘correspondence’ under their door.”

  “Whom did they guess?” John asked gleefully.

  “Only the most prestigious men of letters were mentioned as possibilities,” Ben replied. “Quite flattering.”

  “How can it be flattering when no one knows it was you?”

  “Because I know,” Ben replied. “If James knew who really wrote those letters, he would never print them. This way I can have my ideas flattered and debated without ever suffering an attack to my person.” He did not add his worry that such an attack might be a physical one.

  “I should want people to know that it was me,” John persisted. “I should want credit for my thoughts.”

  Ben shrugged. “That is a pity, since I had thought Silence Dogood might need a partner in debate.”

  “Oh, she will be debated, worry not about that,” John said. “Her jabs are so clearly and often aimed at members of the Selectmen.”

  “Yes, we've already gotten letters heatedly disagreeing with the good widow. But I had thought rather that the two of us might guide the debate—make it more clever, show the ridiculous elements on either side of the question.”

  “But I would write under an assumed name?” John asked.

  “Come, John Collins. It would be fun, don't you think?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Think on it, John. I have no doubt it would be great sport.”

  “I'll think on it. Meantime, have you taken down any more of those mathematical love letters?”

  Ben held up his finger. “Ah.” He reached up to steady himself on the boom and to prevent its swinging as he turned his head to search behind him for a second sheaf of papers. He came up with a roll of them, tied up with a ribbon.

  “A present for you,” he said, handing them to John.

  “I wondered,” John replied. “You have so much to do these days …”

  “Not too much to do you this favor,” Ben assured him.

  “Still, I wonder if we shouldn't build a second ‘Franklined’ device,” John went on, as he undid the ribbon and let the letters uncurl in his lap.

  “Please don't call it that or spread around that I've made such a thing,” Ben cautioned.

  “Yes, yes,” John answered testily. “But won't you take credit for anything you do?”

  “Why? If my design is copied, it's right back to the poorhouse for my brother and me.”

  John wrinkled his brow. “I think that there is more to it than that. Writing under a false name, keeping your inventions secret …”

  Ben stared hard at John, and it suddenly occurred to him that Trevor Bracewell had seen the both of them with the harmonicum.

  “John …” he began.

  “What?”

  “After we went to the millpond with my harmonicum … did anything … peculiar happen to you?”

  John nodded almost imperceptibly, and a shadow seemed to fall across his eyes. He sighed. “I was hesitant to broach … I wished to ask …” His contrived formality broke a bit, and he swallowed before going on. “Did it happen to you as well?”

  “Trevor Bracewell?” Ben asked in a very quiet voice.

  John's forehead wrinkled in a puzzled frown. “That name rings a bell,” he mumbled at last, “though as far as I remember the man in my dream had no name.”

  “Dream?”

  John nodded. “After we went to the millpond—later that night I had a dream, the most frightening I can ever remember. I was back down at the millpond, and a man started shouting at me to stop what I was doing, and then he took you by the neck— you were there, Ben—and he began to strangle you. I went to help you, and then …” John swallowed hard, and Ben realized that, though his friend was trying not to show it, he was still disturbed by his nightmare.

  “Go on,” Ben said.

  John chewed his lip. “Did you have a dream like this?” he asked.

  Ben nodded. “I'll tell you mine in a moment,” he promised. “Go on with yours.”

  John stared down at his lap, not meeting Ben's eyes. “Well, then there was an angel before me, all bright and with a flaming sword. It told me that God had condemned you, but that I might hope for redemption. But I … I didn't want you killed, so I tried talking to the angel. When that happened, he touched me with his sword, and I—” He lifted his shoulders and tried to smile. “—well, I think I dreamed I was dead. Worms were eating me, squirming out of my scalp. And I was in such a dark place …” His smile was very shaky, but he maintained it.

  “Well,” Ben said. “My dream was not nearly so bad.” He related his encounter with Bracewell, but neglected an important point; that his encounter had not been a dream. He was certain of this, for the very next day he had seen the spot on the street where he had vomited. But he did not want John to know that.

  “Have you had any since?” John asked.

  “Dreams like that? No.”

  “Do you think it was the harmonicum?” Before Ben answered, he went on in a rush. “Remember that pinkish light, which seemed to serve no other purpose?”

  “Yes, of course,” Ben replied.

  “Could that account for our dreams? Could we somehow have attracted nightmares from the aether?” John sounded sincere.

  Ben bit back a skeptical remark and considered the question.

  “I have read,” he began tentatively, “that Gottfried von Leibniz believes that matter resides in something he calls monads.”

  “Yes—his word for ferments,” John said.

  “No, only roughly,” Ben corrected. “And his theory is now largely discredited. Leibniz believed these monads to be alive, conscious—particles of the mind of God, perhaps.”

  “Newton proposed something similar, did he not?” John asked.

  “Not at all. Newton said that space and time are the organs of God, through which he perceives our actions. Leibniz held that substances themselves are animated by consciousness.”

  John pushed back his hair and shot him a wry, skeptical grin. “Are you hypothesizing that those dreams were the revenge that the millpond got on us for meddling with its substance?”

  “No, because I believe that Leibniz was in error,” Ben said. “Here, throw me that line; I'll want to tack, now.”

  John did as directed, but the expression on his face made it clear that the conversation was not done. “It's not impossible,” John hesitantly offered.

  “Not impossible,” Ben agreed, “just not very likely, I think. The evidence of science is that the world operates according to laws—laws of motion, affinity, sympathy. What Leibniz suggests is nothing more or less than what the ancients believed— that the world is a nonsensical place governed by the capricious whims of a million petty deities. All the advances man has made in science and magic stand against that.”

  “Leibniz was no dolt.”

  “No, he wasn't,” Ben agreed. “But he was wrong.”

  John set his mouth in that tight line that indicated he remained unconvinced. “I have heard even you speculate on polytheism before,” he reminded Ben.

  “I think that perhaps the creator of this universe is too remote to want our worship or care for our needs. I think there might be intermediate stages of perfection between ourselves and God, just as there are between the lower animals and ourselves.”

  “Yes, arranged in Locke's great chain. But couldn't these ideas of Leibniz fit in with that?”

  Ben leaned overboard and, with a deft motion, scooped a handful of water through the air, which spattered onto John.

  “Hey!” his friend complained.

  “In this water live a hundred kinds of fish,” Ben said, “some lesser and some greater—lower down or farther up the chain. But that is not to say that the water itself has anything to say. If I had thrown a fish on you, you would know it to be alive, eh?”

  “I know only that you've gotten my sheets wet,” John snapped, brushing what drops he could fro
m the paper. “And that if you have some better hypothesis, I would be pleased to hear it.”

  “I don't know,” Ben said, suddenly irritated. “You may be right, in that particles from the aether may have made us ill, discomfited our minds so as to make us dream similar dreams.”

  “And the man in both of our dreams?”

  Ben smiled. “True. Then try this hypothesis. Let us suppose that there were another magician about, one well schooled in the arts. Might he not have perceived what we were doing, seen us as threats to his livelihood, and sent those dreams to haunt us?”

  John nodded but looked unconvinced. “That sounds more like the old-style witchcraft than real magic.”

  “I agree,” Ben said. “Science and alchemy are comprehensible because they can be logically and mathematically understood. And yet you were willing to propose as silly and unscientific a reason—”

  “It was you who brought up these ‘monads’!” John snapped.

  “To consider them and dismiss them. This is different; simply because you and I have not read of a science of dreams does not mean one does not exist. In France and Spain …”

  “Or wherever these formulae come from,” John added, glancing down at the papers he still held. “This is strange stuff.”

  Ben was glad that the subject had changed; he did not like deceiving John, but he just couldn't bring himself to admit aloud that his “dream” had been real …

  Perhaps, he thought suddenly, he couldn't tell anyone. That was ridiculous, of course, because he had made the decision himself. And yet, what if John had the same dilemma? What if both of them had suffered real encounters but could only speak of them as if they were dreams? Of course, John's must have been a dream, since Ben himself was in it …

  He would have to think about this some more.

  “What make you of those formulae, John? I've been working hard on my own mathematical skills, but much of this is still beyond me.”

  “At least something is,” John grunted. He was scanning the pages, nodding every now and then. After a moment he pressed one out on his lap. “This section is relatively straightforward,” he said. “Do you understand this much?”

  “It's calculus, describing a body in motion, is it not?”

  “It is, but this object in motion is in orbit about some much larger body. My guess is that it is the sun itself.”

  “And the smaller body is one of the planets.”

  John shook his head. “I don't know. A lot of this section is missing—they seemed to have solved this part long ago, and now only summarize the argument. What most of this correspondence is about is a problem with affinity.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They are trying to create a powerful attraction between two objects, a very specific attraction. You see this part here? It's almost exactly like Papin's theorem—the one that made warlock cannons possible.”

  “The ones Marlborough uses against the French.”

  “Yes!”

  “About which I know nearly nothing,” Ben remarked.

  “Well, with the cannon, a very specific resonance is set up between the cannonball and the target. When the ball is fired, its trajectory bends toward that target.”

  “A cannonball that chases you,” Ben said.

  Collins nodded enthusiastically. “But the cannon are mostly used to reduce walls from a great distance. Spies and engineers are sent to find the quarry from which the stones for the wall were cut. The alchemists then use a sample stone to create a mock affinity in their munitions. They fire these cannon from a great distance. They can rain tons of iron onto a fortress from incredibly far away with remarkable accuracy.”

  “I see. And this formula is for a similar operation?”

  “Yes,” John said. “But while they have the equation that describes the ferment of one of the bodies, they do not have that of the other.”

  “As if they had not found the quarry from which the stone came.”

  “Well, that's the odd thing,” John said. “They seem to have that. What they seem to lack is the ferment of the cannonball.”

  “Really?” Ben scrunched his face in concentration, trying to puzzle at what that could mean.

  “Realize, of course, that this is not the formula for a cannon. I only continued to speak as if it were for purposes of analogy. This seeks to alter the trajectory of one object by an increased and specific affinity with another. And the second object is moving, as well.”

  “A cannonball built to seek another cannonball in flight.”

  “Exactly. What I have seen of the motions involved is hellishly complicated—and I understand only the broadest strokes— but yes, a formula to bring two cannonballs together in flight would resemble this. But they cannot calculate the affinitive properties of one of the cannonballs.”

  For a moment the world seemed to spin around Ben, as if he were the boom caught in a sudden whirlwind. Beyond the river, sunlight winked from something bright in Boston.

  “In your opinion,” he asked, “are these great men at work on this formula? Important philosophers?”

  “The mathematics are an order higher than anything I've ever read about,” John said. “Much of this is far ahead of anything yet published. There are also hints that the Crown is financing the work.” He grinned. “Perhaps Newton himself is involved; all of the letters are unsigned or signed only with initials. Why do you ask?”

  “You remember that paper I said we should write?”

  “If you mean the one about your ‘Franklined’ aetherschreiber, yes. I've already worked out the formula. I'm not certain that it's right, but a more experienced mathematician could tell what I'm trying to express.”

  “Well, John, here is our opportunity,” Ben said. “We should send it to these mathematicians.”

  “Why? To what purpose?”

  “Because,” Ben replied, “we have the answer to their problem.”

  John stared hard at him for a moment, and then blew a long, low whistle as he understood. He turned to regard Boston. It lay bunched behind the beacon and the Trimontaine—a scattering of child's blocks, a few steeples, a single windmill.

  “It looks small from here,” John remarked.

  Ben leaned on the rudder; the resistance of the water felt good, but the boat obeying his command felt better. He simply nodded, his mind already racing ahead, away, overseas.

  9.

  Regicide

  Adrienne lay among the damned, her ears stuffed with their wretched shrieks, her nostrils and lungs choking upon more hideous scents than sulfur or brimstone. A man fell against her, arms writhing, his periwig a mass of flame, his eyes sightless. Adrienne was aware of the searing heat along her own back, and she rolled and rolled again, in case it should be on fire. It was not, or at least she decided not. Gasping, she struggled to her feet, and as she did, smoke reached sharp black claws into her lungs. Her vision blurred, then cleared as the barge rocked beneath her shoes.

  She did seem to be viewing a painting of hell, a miniature set before her. Centered in the frame, a pyramid blazed. At its base blackened bodies lay heaped like logs, some still burning. Farther from the pyramid, courtiers dressed in soot capered in a strange dance to music that only the devil might find soothing. Adrienne felt faintly surprised to see the duchess of Orléans, who was struggling to her feet, headdress smoking and gown disheveled but otherwise intact. A man near her was not so lucky; he clutched at a face as red as boiled lobster and rocked on his knees like a penitent.

  “The king!” the duchess of Orléans shrieked, waving her hands at the flaming pyramid. “The king! Father!”

  Of course, the king, Adrienne thought, and took a step toward the flames. Suddenly, the painting seemed to change. It was no longer the Inferno, but mighty Sodom, its towers consumed by the wrath of God. Her last thought as her legs refused to support her was that she had become a pillar of salt. Stupid, she thought. I should not have looked.

  * * *

  The next
thing she knew was the total shock of cold, and then water in her mouth, stinging her nose. She tried to scream and swallowed a draught of the foul liquid. Arms like bands of steel were wrapped about her waist. She could hear harsh breathing in her ear.

  I must not fight, she thought, as panic began to overcome her shock. I must not struggle or I shall drown us both. Even though she thought that, the next time her head dipped beneath the water, she began to kick, to lash back with her elbows.

  “Stop it,” a voice suddenly said in her ear. “Please.”

  A husky voice, soft and sincere. He was swimming on his back now, holding her above and somewhat to the side of him, his knees and thighs working behind her own. Her back still burned.

  With an awful effort, she let her body go limp. The man swam more strongly now, more confidently, and she felt safer. She blinked water from her eyes and saw gray sky; the rim of her vision was the horizon until she strained to look back the way they had come.

  The barge was aflame; the two miniature ships nearby had pulled alongside, and Adrienne could make out small figures being hauled from the water. Dully, she understood that the king and the dauphin would not be among them. They had been at the apex of the pyramid, the very seat of the conflagration. Louis XIV and Louis XV were dead.

  What had happened?

  Below her, the man's legs continued pushing at the water, and she realized, with that odd and pointless clarity that comes with shock, that this was the closest any man had ever held her— save perhaps her father or grandfather, many years ago.

  The rhythm of her rescuer's stroke suddenly changed, and then he shifted her, sweeping her up under his arm. She was suddenly almost cheek to cheek with this man whose face she hadn't seen. Nor did she now, save for the briefest glimpse of profile as he turned toward his other hand, grasping at the rim of the canal. At the edge, five pairs of hands reached down, and suddenly several more bodies splashed into the water. She felt herself lifted up and laid gently on the stones. She caught a glimpse of her rescuer—she thought it was he—supported by several of their benefactors, and then, in a crush of bodies, he was gone.