by E. M. DAVEY
“Ok. I don’t mind who you are. I really don’t want to know at all, in fact.”
“Sell it to Sierra Leone instead.”
“But they need it more in Nigeria. People are dying.”
“I really don’t give a damn.”
“We’ve signed a contract,” Khan said pathetically.
“I daresay you’ll find some way to wriggle out of it.”
An extremist, devoid of pity or scruples; this man will stop at nothing. Khan’s hands fell to his knees with a slap. He was reasonably fit, but his thighs looked thin and wizened in their Paul Smith cladding. He suddenly realised he was becoming elderly.
“Ok then,” he sighed.
“Glad we’re in agreement.” Serval extended a hand. “Pleasure doing business.”
Khan’s palms remained planted on his legs. His head tilted back and a little anger returned to his eyes, some nobility to those mahogany features.
“I’ll do what you want,” he said. “But I prefer not to shake your hand.”
A dusting of respect in Serval’s gaze for the first time. “Suit yourself.”
Khan glanced at the glove box. “Can I keep those?”
A snort of amusement this time. “If it makes you feel better, old fruit.” Serval opened the door. “One more thing. You know what’ll happen if you make a fuss, don’t you?”
Khan glanced at Serval’s jacket and nodded.
“Tell me.”
The businessman tried to speak, but the sides of his throat had stuck together.
“Tell me,” Serval growled again.
“You’ll kill me,” whispered Khan.
Serval got out of the car, closed the door and walked briskly away.
Khan recomposed himself. His breath was coming in gasps and there were sweat patches under the armpits of his silk shirt. The radio refilled the enclosed space; he realised it had been burbling away the whole time. He dabbed at his forehead with a turquoise handkerchief and started the car. As he drove towards his office in Pimlico that morning, he was no longer thinking about tennis or Anfield or shopping trips on New Bond Street. A single dilemma churned through his mind.
What the hell will I tell the Nigerians?
57
Lord Randolph’s speech grew explicit.
Gladstone is like Macbeth before the murder of Duncan; he plunges the knife into the heart of the British Empire as a thief in the night.
“A thief in the night.” Jake rubbed his eyes and blinked. “So, we think from Sir Neil Campbell’s diaries that Napoleon gave the Disciplina to the British Foreign Office, in return for the throne of Elba and the safety of his family. Almost overnight, Britain becomes the world’s superpower. For most of the century it dominates world trade and industry, imposes a Pax Britannica – a ‘British peace’ – across the globe. Unrivalled since the Pax Romana of old.” Jake laughed suddenly and rolled his eyes. “A peculiarly British use of a dire power, isn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“We didn’t use the Book of Thunder to conquer the world, like Hitler or Napoleon. Actually, Britain added very little to its empire between 1815 and 1870. Only the odd strategic trading base – Singapore, Hong Kong, Aden, Lagos. It was in the 1880s that the final Scramble for Africa happened, Randolph Churchill’s day. And we think the Disciplina was lost to them by then.”
A thought was niggling at him, something about borders, but it was embryonic and he could not grasp it.
“Instead of conquest, the Brits used the Disciplina to keep the other Great Powers in check through diplomacy,” he said. “Maintaining the balance of power, using the peace to amass great wealth through trade and industrial might. In those days, a level playing field was all Britain needed to assure commercial primacy. Then Gladstone enters Number 10, a Christian who would have no truck with a pagan text. At once Britain’s economic fortunes changed. It lost that geopolitical nous that had held the other great powers in perfect balance for sixty years. On the contrary, Gladstone’s foreign policy was a disaster. In the Transvaal, the British Army was humiliated by Boer farmers. He was outwitted during the Great Game in Afghanistan by Russia – the Pandjeh Incident. He allowed General Gordon to be destroyed by fanatical tribesmen at Khartoum in the Sudan, it was a major scandal at the time.”
A quietness came into Jenny’s voice as she read the end of the speech. “But Randolph thought it might be found again.”
The time may be at hand when the path of honour and safety is illuminated by the light of other days. It may be that this dark cloud will pass away without breaking.
The light of other days; this dark cloud. Jenny mouthed the words.
If it does, I believe you and your descendants will be safe for a long time to come. I believe this storm will blow over. And if it should be within the design of Providence, I do not hesitate to tell you that there will not be wanting those of position and influence in England who would be willing to share your fortunes and your fate.
Storms. Providence. Fortune. Fate. It was like a pronouncement of Napoleon Bonaparte. On the next page, oddly, was a letter to Lord Randolph from …
“Richard Burton!” exclaimed Jenny.
During the nineteenth century, numerous experts examined the Zagreb Linen – including the Victorian explorer Richard Burton …
“Burton was one of the nutters who nearly died hunting for the source of the Nile,” said Jake. “Well, this has got to be worth a read.”
October 15th, 1886
My Lord,
Since the £300 a year to which I think I am entitled is hardly equivalent of years of hard work in anything but wholesome climates, I beg you to favour me by placing my name on the civil list for a pension of £300 a year. There are precedents for such a privilege, but I would not quote names unless called upon. I have had several kind letters, expressing their conviction of the reasonable nature of my request; the general idea being mine is an exceptional case.
I am your most obedient humble servant,
Richard Burton.
“A begging letter from the second most famous British explorer of the Victorian age to the father of Winston Churchill,” said Jake. “Men who both have an Etruscan connection. Coincidence?”
“We just don’t know.”
Jenny continued through the papers. She paused at a speech Lord Randolph had made to electors in Paddington.
Since 1868, have you enjoyed domestic security or foreign credit? Lawlessness and disorder have been supreme. The blame must be borne by the man who is Minister now. Under the baneful insecurity which is inseparably connected with his name, your trade has gone from bad to worse, your Parliament has become demoralised, your foreign credit shaken, your colonies alienated, your Indian Empire imperilled. What frightful and irreparable Imperial catastrophe is necessary to tear the British people from the influence of this idol, which has brought upon them unnumbered woes? The hero of the Transvaal surrender, the betrayer of Khartoum, the person guilty of the death of Gordon, the patentee of the Panjdeh shame. Known to the country under various aliases – ‘The People’s William,’ ‘the Grand Old Man.’
“Here it is,” said Jenny. “He spells it out for us – 1868. The year Gladstone destroyed the Disciplina.”
“The year he first became Prime Minister,” said Jake. “And almost right away the Great Victorian Boom is over, the rot sets in.”
“So Lord Randolph did know about it. That was the content of Queen Victoria’s ‘curious letter’.”
“Do you know what?” Jake smiled warily. “I think I could defend this argument.”
58
“Where are Gladstone’s papers kept?” Jenny asked.
Jake studied his phone. “North Wales. At Gladstone’s Library in Flintshire – he established it himself.”
Her brain whirred, analysing practicality and risk.
“Not worth it,” she said at last. “But we are in a library. It probably has books …”
“Oh yeah,” said Jake. “Eight
million of them.”
Political history was on the fourth floor. Light flooded through big arched windows and library noises eddied about: a flapping like wings, the lowest baritone of murmur. They selected two dozen volumes on Gladstone and set to work.
“Look at this letter,” Jake said. “It’s 1862, and Gladstone’s Chancellor of the Exchequer – the coming man in British politics.”
I see the elements of future power and good; I also see the elements of danger and mischief. The forces brought into unrestrained play are by far too gigantic to be controlled.
“This is interesting,” said Jenny, who was studying another volume. “Another note from Gladstone. He was staying in Scotland at the time.”
I am come in from a nineteen mile walk to the Lake of Lochnagar, fresh as a lark! The Queen sent me a message not to go up Lochnagar if there was mist; and mist there was, with rain to boot. You forgot to tell me for what pious object you picked Lord P’s pocket.
“Picked his pocket for a pious object,” said Jake.
“Like a ‘thief in the night’,” said Jenny. “But who’s ‘Lord P’?”
“Ah. That would be Lord Palmerston, another of the century’s great Prime Ministers. He was in office for decades. Palmerston was a Liberal, like Gladstone. But there the similarities end. They absolutely hated each other. Palmerston was swashbuckling, full of bluster – and solely concerned with advancing British interests, ethical foreign policy be damned. The Opium War was Palmerston’s doing, China forced to accommodate British drug dealers at the barrel of a gun. ‘Gunboat diplomacy’ was the approach. Sail the fleet to the country you’re having a row with, blockade its ports – and if your demands aren’t met, then flatten their cities. It was very effective.”
“He sounds like a charmer.”
“To be fair, he was a doughty opponent of the slave trade. And wildly popular too. His finest hour was the …”
Jake’s words seized in his throat.
“The what?”
“The Civis Romanus sum speech.”
“I am a Roman citizen,” Jenny translated.
She looked up the passage in Hansard.
The Roman in days of old held himself free from indignity. He could say Civis Romanus sum; so also a British subject, in whatever land he may be, shall feel confident the watchful eye and strong arm of England will protect him against injustice and wrong.
The watchful eye. Again Jake felt a chilliness bleed out of the ink.
“So, that’s Palmerston,” he said. “A rogue by modern standards, but a veritable institution in Victorian times. And a good candidate for a custodian of the Disciplina I’d say, given his foreign policy. Queen Victoria loved him.”
Jenny studied a photograph of Palmerston in his dotage. He had sideburns of wiry white, hooded eyelids and a stern little mouth that betrayed an inkling of humour.
“What became of him?” asked Jenny.
“He died of old age in 1865 while still in Number 10, knowing for certain Gladstone would replace him.”
“This is intriguing,” said Jenny. “More entries from Gladstone’s diary.”
October 21st, 1864. A letter from Lord Palmerston holds out a dark prospect.
October 22nd – Wrote my reply to Lord Palmerston in a rather decisive tone, for I feel conscious of right and of necessity.
“Read this one too,” said Jake. “It’s a letter to Gladstone from Richard Cobden, the great Liberal thinker. He was writing just before Palmerston’s death.”
Unconsciously, you have administered to the support of a system which has no better foundation than a gigantic delusion.
“And Gladstone’s reply?”
You say unconsciously. I am afraid that in one respect this is too favourable a description. I suppose the duty of choosing the lesser evil binds me; the difficulty is to determine what the lesser evil is.
“Here we have it.” Jenny closed the book, held it to her chest. “The very moment Gladstone is contemplating doing something drastic.”
“Destroying the Disciplina Etrusca …”
“Though it would be to Britain’s great cost.”
“Because it was the right thing to do,” Jake finished. “He was one of us, Jenny.”
Then Jenny discovered the pamphlet. A blood vessel on the knuckle of her thumb was beating in time with her heart.
“What is it?” said Jake.
A mirthless smile. “If there was even a scintilla of doubt that Gladstone turned his back on the Disciplina, it just rode right out of town.”
The pamphlet was the sort of thing once sold to the masses for a few coins: the political Twitter campaign of its day. Low-grade paper, blotchy printing. It had been published in 1886 by Edward Stanford of Charing Cross.
Our Premier: Lord Palmerston’s Forecast Verified.
Many years before Mr Gladstone had achieved world-wide reputation, Lord Palmerston was reported to have thus spoken: “That man will live to be Prime Minister, but if he does, he will ruin the country.”
That Mr Gladstone was considered a reckless and dangerous politician is beyond doubt. Mr Laing, MP for the Wick Boroughs, says he was “engaged in writing the first chapter in the Decline and Fall of the British Empire.”
Those who believe in a Providence ordering the destiny of nations must believe in the means, that is to say, in the men providentially used for the purpose. We may reasonably infer that if England, after a career of unequalled prosperity and glory, be destined to succumb, to be dismembered and dishonoured,
When that dread day come as it must,
And Britain’s power lies prostrate in the dust
She will find a statesman to play the part. Those who hold with Lord Palmerston that Mr Gladstone is destined to ruin England can now refer to the past as some index to the future. History tells us of a “William the Silent” who saved his country. Future history will tell us of a “William the Eloquent”, who did the reverse. Such a man may be wholly wanting in the political foresight without which all statecraft is work in the dark.
“Political foresight,” Jake muttered. “And without it? Leading a country is like wandering through history with your eyes shut. Like Napoleon trying to coordinate his armies without the Book of Thunder.”
Tis, of course, no surprise to those who always believed Lord Palmerston’s prediction. What is our course, if we would contend against the evil destiny of which Mr Gladstone is the blind instrument? Get rid of the physician.
The political epitaph of the Premier will doubtless be laudatory. Yet Truth will add – BUT HE RUINED THE EMPIRE.
There was movement on the other side of the bookcase. A man, walking away from them, glimpsed in the gaps between the volumes. Now: what was it about that figure – dark-skinned, robes and skullcap – that reminded Jake of di Angelo? Was it the build? The potency of his movements?
Jenny followed his gaze.
“Oh hell,” she said.
*
Out of the library. Through the Backs once more, a cow shying away from the sprinting figures. Past the Mathematical Bridge, so rickety for a structure designed by Newton. Along the riverside, where punt owners hauled plastic sheets over their vessels, for the sky had turned sullen and the first pinpricks of moisture were dotting Jake’s face. Over the river, approaching a T-junction, the limestone finery of Corpus Christi College to their left. A silver Ford Focus glided into their path. Four men in the car, staring right at him.
The car was hit side on by a white Ford Transit.
Sprinting again. Blindly, desperately, deeper into the maze of colleges and courtyards as the rain hammered down, cold searing Jake’s cheeks.
“Again they find us!” Jenny shouted. And more wildly, into the downpour, baring her teeth: “How?”
Above them came the first suggestion of thunder. The rumblings of a daemon whose puzzle was being unpicked.
We are not amused.
The denseness of the cloud was like a tumour, a vortex of black. Another rumble abov
e, another sweep of rain across the cobbled street. Jake didn’t want the thunder to break. Oh, more than anything he’d ever wished for he didn’t want the thunder to break. But still he ran towards it.
59
David began the lesson by apologising for the time.
“Not a prob,” said Kanisha, glancing at the art deco cocktail cabinet she had just bought at a ruinously expensive antique shop in Primrose Hill.
“I was hoping you could help me identify a couple of Etruscan letters,” David said.
“Sure,” she said. “They’re probably in a local dialect – or character forms that fell out of use. Ping them over.”
David sent her a hand-drawn image.
“Well, the first one’s almost a late Etruscan Z,” she said after a moment. “It looks like two stick men, one of them sitting down. But it’s not quite right. I’d need to see the full sentence for context.”
The resulting silence was somehow deliberative, then the inscription landed.
“Where did you get this, David?”
A pause. “Why?”
“I don’t recognise the inscription, that’s all. I thought I’d seen everything that’s been discovered. And new finds get reported in the journals.”
“It’s from a hand mirror I stumbled across at the National Archaeological Museum, in Umbria.”
“Tin did not make the world, he is a young god,” she read softly. “He commands the sacred thunder.”
Kanisha’s translation was answered immediately by a flicker of light to the north-west, as though the night sky was responding to her. She counted to three before the thunder was audible – somewhere over Willesden, perhaps.
“That was freaky,” she said.
“What was freaky?” said David.
“Oh, there’s a big storm here. The timing of the last thunderbolt was – dramatic, to say the least. You sketched this inscription yourself?”