The house of Doctor Dee

by Peter Ackroyd

  'And slender threads sew sure stitches.'

  He was flyting me, and so I replied in kind with all good humour at his impertinence. 'Little hairs have their shadows.'

  'Blunt stones whet knives.'

  'From hard rocks flow soft springs.'

  'The whole world is drawn on a map.'

  'Homer's Iliad is found in a nutshell.'

  'And the queen's picture on a penny.'

  'Enough, sir,' I said. 'Enough. One day I will show you something greater than magician's baubles. Did Ferdinand Griffen ever expound to you the manner of drawing aromatic oils? Perhaps I may even relate to you the great secret of the elixir of salt.'

  'These are secrets which I would hope to be worthy of, sir. I will relish them well, but only after I have given you good reason to trust me and welcome me in your laboratory.'

  'That is well said, Edward Kelley. But do we not share a great secret already? Tomorrow we must rise early and find our way to Cheapside. Then, once the ancient papers have been restored to us, we can begin our search for the long-buried city of London.'

  'Sir,' he said, rising from his chair, 'you have made acquaintance with me and offered me great courtesy. For which I thank you.'

  'And so good night. Philip will light your way to your bedchamber.'

  After he had departed, I climbed up the back stairs towards my laboratory, which was always locked and bolted from prying eyes; it is a rambling, winding stairway, looking out upon my Clerkenwell winter garden, and when I put my eye against the narrow casement I thought I saw some dark form or shape running through the rain. Then it seemed to enter the very fabric of the house and, within a few moments, I heard something scurrying behind me up the stairs. In horror I put my gown around my knees in case this thing tried to clamber upon me, even as I heard it make another turning: then, when it came into sight, I saw that it was my cat. It was running in curious fashion, and then dropped some other thing at my feet. I moved it, but it was quite dead: it was a pigeon, and one which had only a single wing naturally. How had it grown so sleek and so fat without any chance to fly? So I took it with me into my laboratory, and laid it aside for further study, before taking down the carefully turned glass vessel in which I hoped to grow my little man.

  'God send you good rest,' I said to my wife before retiring to my chamber.

  'Are you not weary, sir,' she replied, 'having trotted out so many words with Mr Kelley? I have not known so long a discourse before, unless it be in St Paul's.'

  'It is true, Mrs Dee. I am weary. Will you call Philip to me? Ah, there you are, you knave, skulking behind the door like my neighbour's dog in the rhyme. Philip, come in and make ready the candlesticks with the wax candles: I have a long day before me, and cannot endure the smell of tallow. Where are the snuffers? Where is the warming-pan? And see that the chamber-pot is under the bed. Is the close-stool basin clean? I pray you, Philip, put clean water within it.' All these preparations were made as I requested, and yet still, as I lay upon my bed, I could not sleep: I dwelt so much on the substance of Edward Kelley's discoveries, and on the likely events of the morrow, that I kept myself from sleeping as the crane does when she keeps a stone in her foot.

  *

  'Are you up, sir?' The voice of Philip woke me from some flight into the upper air, when I dreamed I was leaving the dross of my mortality.

  'Yes, Philip, yes. What is the time?' I groaned at my return to my mortal state.

  'It is not late, sir. It is still dark, and the merchants had not yet opened their shops when I passed them.'

  'Command Audrey to prepare a dozen new-laid eggs rolled in the embers. We have a guest with us.'

  'I know, sir. He was drinking wine and singing to himself half the night.'

  'Go to, Philip. Say no more and help me to rise.' I cleaned myself and dressed pretty quickly, but when I came into the hall Mr Kelley was already warming himself by the fire while my wife helped Audrey to prepare the table. I wished them all good morrow, and he asked me how I did. 'Well, God be praised. And you also?'

  'Well, thanks be to God, seeing that I could not sleep all the night.'

  'You could not? Well, neither could I. I slept no more than the compass of an hour, before being startled out of my trance by my servant.'

  'I know. The minutes fell thicker than acorns around me, and I spent my time in taking out my watch and setting its wheels.'

  'But now we may have a fit restorative. Where is the ale, wife, to help us in our quest today?'

  'It is by your hand, sir, waiting for you.'

  We made a quick meal, not wishing to lose even a minute before embarking on our journey, and Edward Kelley was about to call for his mare even as we ate. But I prevented him. 'I fear for our horses in the streets around Cheapside,' I told him. 'It is a place notorious for thieves, and if we were so much as to turn our backs upon them, they would be spirited away as if by city demons. No, sir, we must walk.'

  'Will that not lose us time?'

  'Time is never lost, for we make our own as we venture forward. If we go by way of Charterhouse and Smithfield, we will be within the city faster than you know.'

  So we took our course, well wrapped up against the cold, and pretty soon had passed through Aldersgate and down St Martin's into Cheapside. 'Where shall we find your friend?' I asked him. 'There are so many jewellers in London that we might be in the glittering cave of Rebus. Where does he keep?'

  'I know his sign when I see it. It is of the moon, and a hare jumping over it. He is somewhere over the other side of Eleanor Cross.'

  We made our way, but not without being called for and hindered by the merchants who were already at their stalls and who set up such a bawling and shouting that you would imagine yourself in hell.

  'Sirs, what would you gladly buy?' cries one. 'I will sell you as good and cheap as any man within London.'

  'Sirs, will it please you to enter into this shop,' calls another, 'and see if I have anything which serves your turn?'

  One came up to me so close that I could smell his stinking breath. 'Come in, come in. I have very fair and good cloth here, sirs. The best of the town.'

  'We have no use for cloth,' I replied.

  'But of what colour do you lack?' He brought out a roll which he put in front of me even as we tried to pass. 'It shall cost you only a crown a yard, sir. If I charged you less, I should lose in it.'

  'It is all one to me whether you sink or swim.' Edward Kelley laughed at my words. 'Now let us be on our way.'

  'You are too hard, sir. Truly you are.'

  We had come up by the corner of Bread Street, and I looked around for the jeweller's sign which Mr Kelley had mentioned. 'What is the name of your friend? Perhaps we may ask for him.'

  'His name is Porcliffe, but I know his place by sight.'

  'Oh,' said the pert little merchant who was still following us. 'Do not venture near Porcliffe. Go to the next shop on the other side of the street, and he will let you have whatever you wish cheap for my sake.'

  Then Edward Kelley saw the sign, half-concealed behind the ladder of a workman and a wagon piled high with straw. 'I know it now,' he said. 'I have been here only once before, but I know it well.' So he hastened forward while I stepped briskly behind him, hearing the taunts of the merchant as we crossed over Cheapside. 'Let you go,' he called out. 'I wish you God-speed. Truly you are like calves which, when they have run their bellyful about the fair, will be glad to come back again.'

  Edward Kelley laughed again, and let out a 'Moo! Moo!' into the air.

  We had come up now to the quarter of mercers and goldsmiths, and there under the sign of the moon and the hare saw three shallow steps leading down into an artificially lighted room. 'Madam,' a very ancient old man in a damask coat was saying as we entered upon this fresh scene, 'madam, what will it please you to have?' He had laid out certain stones upon a velvet cloth. 'Mistress, I will show you the fairest stones in London. If you do not like them, you may leave them. You bestow nothing but the l
ooking on, and the pain shall be mine to show you.'

  She was another ancient old party, in a blue farthingale as big as a church bell; she wore a French hood, but I could see that her lips were so lavishly red and her cheeks so sugar-candied and cherryblushed that she might have been a painted shape upon a wall. Mr Porcliffe glanced at us, yet he was for the moment intent upon other prey. 'Precious stones, my lady, have many great properties, but I can tell you the virtue of these just as the lapidary describes them. Have you heard of such ancient naturalists as Isidore, Dioscorides and Albertus Magnus?'

  'No indeed, but if they be as grave and as learned as their names, then by my faith I adore them.'

  'You have a great heart, mistress. So may I tell you plainly that Isidore named the diamond as the stone of love? Do you see it here, twinkling in the light of my candle? It is esteemed the chiefest of stones, which, by the hidden virtue that nature has given it, draws good affections towards those who carry it. Do you care for good affections, mistress?'

  She simpered a little at that. 'Truly I cannot say.'

  'I would not give this diamond to any faint-hearted woman, no, not at any price. Only to one who can withstand the wearing of it.'

  'But I will not give you a pin above three pounds.'

  'Not so fast, mistress, not so fast. I have others here to show you. Do you see the emerald here? It has the power to resist enchantment — ' At that he looked upon me and smiled. 'I will be with you shortly, sirs,' he said, before once more addressing the ancient crone. 'This emerald also quenches lasciviousness.'

  'Oh, sir!'

  'Increases riches and beautifies the speech. Now as to this agatha here before you, it stirs up storms —'

  'In the heart?'

  'Wherever you may tread, mistress.' She simpered again. 'It also gives the interpretation of dreams, and makes the person to be agreeable. But you have no need of that. Would you have the sapphire instead, which is a royal stone and was called by the ancient heathens the Apolline Stone? It chases away melancholy, and is very profitable to the sight.'

  'My sight,' she said, 'is as good as ever it was. But as for melancholy, well, there are those who sometimes find themselves in a drooping humour. Now that my husband is dead…' She fetched a sigh from somewhere within her farthingale. 'Show me again that one you call the stone of love. Is it true that it comes from the entrails of the swallow?'

  'Enough,' I murmured. 'Let her try the topaz, which is good for lunatics.'

  The jeweller, making no sign that he had heard me, now took up the diamond and put it in the palm of her right hand. 'And on what finger is it to be placed, mistress? In our old books it is said that the thumb is the emblem of Venus, but we always have given the forefinger to love.' Then he put the jewel on his counter once more. 'How much will it please you, mistress?' he asked, more earnestly. 'How much will you give to me so that I may have your custom?'

  'I will give you forty shillings.' She no longer trifled with him. 'If you will take my money, make short, for I have other business than to tarry here.'

  'Truly I would be sorry to deny you if I could give it at that price, but in truth I cannot.'

  'I will give you forty-five, and not one half-penny more.'

  'So. Done. It is done. The stone of love finds its proper bearer. I do but my duty.' A very few minutes later she was gone from the shop, and the jeweller turned to me. 'I see,' he said, 'that you know the virtues infused in stones.'

  'I know of them, sir. With visitors such as her you should wear calcidonie upon your person, since it has power against devils.'

  He laughed at that, and then bowed towards Mr Kelley. 'Ned,' he said, 'Ned. I know for what you have come. Will you please walk into the inner shop? Look for the step there, it is mouldy.' We walked into a small chamber, where he left us; then, quickly enough, he came back to us bearing the oaken coffer of which I had heard. Mr Kelley took a key which had been hanging around his neck, and with trembling fingers unlocked the lid: I stood close behind him as he opened it, and saw there various papers together with a small globe of clear glass. 'Do you wish to go to an upper room,' he asked us, 'to view them the better? There may be others coming into my shop.' With that he led us up into a parlour and, once he had left us, I closed the door.

  Edward Kelley put the coffer upon a small table and, taking out the several contents, I observed that there were seven pieces of parchment — the smallest of them being in length about eight inches and in width five inches. 'We may be sure,' I told him, 'that this was once a roll of papers, with the one here which is of the smallest size rolled inmost and sealed separately because it contained the most important matter. The six others were rolled over it one after another, like so many covers but each with its own separate writing.' Upon the smallest sheet I observed lines and markings which seemed to be of an arithmetical sort: there was no time to read any of this matter, but there was enough to fire my curiosity. 'Here,' I told Mr Kelley, 'is a jewel more precious by far than any in the room below us. Do you know, from Isaiah, 'the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll'? Well, this is a prophecy of another sort.'

  'So you see something which may be of use to us? As for me, I cannot puzzle out the secret.'

  I had been examining the smallest piece of parchment, and was bowed in contemplation over it for some minutes after he had spoken. 'There is no secret here,' I said at last. 'Not to the light of understanding. Do you see these marks like the figures of algebra, these squares and rounds? Someone has laboured diligently to set out buildings upon a portion or circuit of ground. This is geometria, which, according to the very etymology of the word, signifies land-measuring.' I looked upon it a little longer. 'Let us concur that this is the ancient city of London. Well, then, do you see here the serpentine line? Without doubt it is that river we call the Thames. And do you see how it bends somewhat at this place?' I put my finger upon a portion. 'There is no other spot like it, but the one just by the Wapping stairs where the river curves around into the Shadwell fields.' I paused, and carefully placed the sheet back in the coffer. 'So if this is a faithful image fetched up from the old world, then we must look to the east for our lost city.'

  'There is nothing in that quarter but low and rambling tenements.'

  'Yes, Mr Kelley. Is, not was. You have seen what is visible in the upper air, but there are always things under the ground.'

  'Were those the sights I viewed?' In my hot haste to be gone to the ancient places, I had almost forgot the stone. But now he took it from the coffer with much reverence. 'When I looked in crystallo, I saw the foundations of old things. And corridors between place and place, as it were for secret passageways.'

  'I recall everything you said, Mr Kelley.' All the while I was gazing upon the stone, which was as clear as day but with a curious lightness about it as if it were hollow within and contained nothing but bright air. 'There is a saying of any rare and precious thing,' I continued, 'that it is older than anything Merlin ever wrought. And truly if the glass has lain here for all these centuries past and has not lost its brightness, then it is more ancient and more wonderful than anything Merlin devised. You have seen, whereas as yet I have not; therefore you must become my berrylisticus.'

  'I would be honoured, sir, if I knew of what you spoke.'

  'You must be the scryer, the watcher in the stone, the observer of marvels. And now we must carry it with us everywhere, well wrapped in leather against the frost of this season, for it is known that in crystals, as in mirrors or the surfaces of water, it is possible to see most excellently and certainly the emblems of the past world. Come. Shall we go back to Clerkenwell for our horses, and make way while the sun stays in the sky?'

  And so we returned to my rambling house where, with great care and discretion, I made a full copy of the parchment map before entrusting those ancient papers to the safe-keeping of my locked laboratory. I placed the crystal stone within a very commodious leather satchel and, now that our horses had been made ready, we returned by Cheaps
ide into Leadenhall before passing out of the city at Aldgate. We came up to St Botolph's and then crossed over Goodman's Fields towards the Thames: I knew a track there just before the river bank which led eastwards into the hamlet of Wapping, and so we rode that way. 'If this great original city is to be found,' I called to Mr Kelley, who rode a little behind me where the track was but narrow, 'it will become the foundation for all our hopes. We will discover marvels which are not registered in chronicles or annals.' We had come up now by some mean and straggling tenements and, consulting the marks upon the map I had copied, I passed further on. 'If we could look back clearly into those old times, in the very first years of the world when our ancestors walked upon this ground, then might many great secrets be revealed.'

  'What secrets are those, sir?' He had rode up now beside me, where the path had grown more broad.

  'There are some who say that Arthur is not dead but sleeps — I cannot recall the authorities now — and yet what greater awakening would there be if the entire mystical city of London were to emerge from the night of forgotten things? Here we must turn north a little — ' We had now come some way from the waterside, amidst a jumble of wooden buildings with nothing around us save mean and dismal sheds or outhouses. It was still day, yet the sun was so low in the sky that I could look at it without winking. 'This is the area of the ground that conforms to the markings,' I told him. 'Look and see if you can find any notable or odd signs of pits, or passages, or suchlike. We might have had the use of a gauging rod, if we had prepared ourselves the better.'

  'But you know other arts, Doctor Dee.'

  'There are those who practise ars sintrilla with vessels of wine, water and oil in which the beams of the sun or the rays of the moon and stars may be reflected. Yet we have something more certain than divination by candlelight or by the smoke glare of the sun: we have the crystal stone, do we not?' I took it from my leather satchel, and handed it to him with care. 'You are the scryer. See if there is anything within which will inform us if we are on the right path.'