The Emperor of All Things

The Emperor of All Things - By Paul Witcover


PART ONE


Prologue


CLOCKS. CLOCKS EVERYWHERE, on the wooden shelves and tables, even upon the sawdust-covered floor of the attic room: clocks of all shapes and sizes limned in the light of a gibbous moon that did not so much pierce the skylight as sift through its sooty glass – tall clocks in finely carved and polished casings of exotic woods with brass pendulums winking back and forth; ornate mantel clocks of ormolu and mahogany, marble and tortoiseshell; clocks of gold and silver set into or alongside precious metal and porcelain renderings of human figures in varied states of dress and undress as well as representations of beasts real and fabulous: lions consorting with unicorns, eagles and gryphons roosting side by side; cuckoo clocks and carriage clocks and tambour clocks and skeleton clocks; even pocket watches with their chains and ribbons neatly coiled or dangling free and loose as slipped lanyards. The ticking of so many timepieces, no two synchronized, filled the space with a facsimile of whispered conversation, as if some ghostly parliament were meeting in the dead of night.

Scattered among the clocks were glass flasks and vials of assorted shapes and sizes, some containing clear or opaque liquids, others quite empty, along with mortars and pestles, iron tongs, funnels, crucibles, and other such instruments bespeaking the practice of alchemy. Set in a row along one wall were three brick furnaces, one in the shape of a tower and as tall as a man, the other two smaller and squat in shape, like ornamental toads.

A mouse was making its way across the surface of one table, nosing amid a clutter of clock parts and tools: pins, clicks, rivets, coiled springs, tweezers, clamps, winders, files, and like essentials of the horologist’s trade. Every so often it rose off its tiny front paws to sniff the air, whiskers twitching, eyes aglitter like apple seeds in a bed of ash.

From a shelf overhead, a black cat followed its progress with glowing tourmaline eyes. The noise in the back of its throat, somewhere between a growl and a purr, was cloaked by the gossipy muttering of the clocks. The tip of its tail lashed from side to side like a metronome.

When the meanderings of the mouse brought it conveniently near, the cat moved with the grace of a gliding shadow, seeming as insubstantial … until it struck. In leaping to the table top, it did not disturb a single item yet knocked the rodent onto its side, pressing the half-stunned creature down with one paw and slashing with its teeth at the grey fur.

The cat tensed and flattened at a sound from overhead: a faint click followed by a drawn-out creaking, as if the old house were settling on its foundations. Hissing, the cat darted a glance upwards as a thin rope dropped through the now-open skylight to dangle above the floor a few feet away. The rope had not reached the end of its length before the cat bolted, with less stealth or silence than just moments before; small gears and other items scattered under its paws as it fled into the shadows. An empty vial slipped to the floor and shattered. The mouse was long gone. Drops of its blood glistened on the table, dark as oil.

A svelte figure slid down the rope and dropped soundlessly to the floor. The intruder was dressed in grey: soft grey boots, grey breeches, a grey shirt beneath a grey cloak. Strapped to its back was a small crossbow, and a blade as slender as a rapier yet no longer than a short sword hung in a grey scabbard from its belt, as did six leather pouches, also grey. A grey kerchief pulled across the nose hid the bottom half of the face; a grey hood cloaked the upper; in between, eyes as dark as the mouse’s glittered as they probed the shadowy corners of the room. The intruder strode to one of the tables.

The timepieces on this particular table were clearly the work of master craftsmen. Many were made with precious metals; not a few were inset with jewels. A single one of these clocks, selected at random, would have made a rich prize for a thief. Yet the grey-clad figure reached without hesitation for a mantel clock that appeared as out of place as an ordinary goblet set alongside the Holy Grail.

At a whisper of displaced air, the intruder turned, clock in one hand, the rapier-like blade in the other.

The casing of a tall clock some twelve feet away swung open. Out stepped a gentleman of middling height wearing a powdered wig and an elegant sky-blue coat over a lace-adorned white shirt and embroidered waistcoat, yellow breeches with pale blue hose, and embroidered green silk slippers. His powdered face glowed corpse white in the moonlight; a conspicuous beauty mark adorned his left cheek, and his lips were as red as cherries half sunk in a bowl of cream. He had the look of extreme age masquerading as youth … or perhaps it was the other way around. But the most striking feature of his appearance was the cocked duelling pistol that he held in the most negligent manner imaginable, as though it was by the merest chance that this object happened to be pointing at the breast of the intruder. ‘So good of you to drop in, Grimalkin,’ he drawled.

The hooded figure executed a slight but meticulous bow. ‘Lord Wichcote.’

‘I had thought you retired – or dead.’

‘Merely … elsewhere. Now, as you see, I have returned.’

‘And come to pay me a visit. I’m honoured. But my guests generally call at the front door. Many of them are thieves, it is true, but few take the trouble to mask themselves. Are you a coward, sir?’

‘Simply modest, my lord,’ answered the one addressed as Grimalkin.

‘Why, damn me if you are not a smooth-tongued rascal! But I will see who is beneath that mask.’ He gestured with the pistol. ‘Remove it, sir.’

‘As your lordship can see, my hands are occupied at present.’

‘Then I suggest you un-occupy them.’

‘Gladly, but your pistol is making me somewhat nervous.’

‘Afraid it might go off? You should be.’

‘I am more concerned that, in my nervousness, I might drop the clock.’

The tremor that shook the hand holding the pistol was evident in the man’s voice as well. ‘If you damage that clock, sir, I will kill you.’

‘Such is already your intent, is it not?’

‘Even if it were, some deaths are less pleasant than others. Now, set the clock down, sir. Gently.’

‘Since you will shoot me the instant I do so, that would be most foolish.’

‘Perhaps I will shoot you in any case.’

‘I think not. Even a steady hand is no guarantee of accuracy at this distance, in this poor light, and your hand is far from steady. Should you fire, you are as likely to strike the clock as to strike me. And if you do strike me, why, then I will drop the clock after all, and your precious timepiece will suffer the very damage you seek to avoid.’

‘I would sooner see it destroyed than give it up to you and your masters.’

‘I serve no masters,’ Grimalkin stated.

This provoked a laugh. ‘Come now, sir. It is common knowledge that you are, or at any rate used to be, an agent of those confounded meddlers, the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers.’

‘Common knowledge often masks uncommon ignorance.’

‘Hmph. How else would you know the value of that particular timepiece?’

‘Why, half of London knows it, sir, the way you have been broadcasting your acquisition of it! Indeed, the wonder is that no one has got here before me.’

‘It was to entice you to my workshop that I spoke so freely,’ Lord Wichcote said. ‘I had heard rumours of your return, and wished to see for myself.’

‘That was obvious. Still, I am nothing if not curious. And so I accepted your lordship’s invitation. I take it you are not normally in the habit of leaving the skylight unlocked, or your treasures unguarded.’

‘Most assuredly not.’

Grimalkin bowed again, making a mocking flourish with the blade, then straightened and said: ‘In that case, put up your pistol, sir. I do not think you have gone to so much trouble merely to kill me.’

Lord Wichcote cackled. ‘I like you, sir, damned if I do not!’ He kept the pistol pointed at the other’s chest, however. ‘Very well then: to business. It happens that I am an admirer of your peculiar talents. I have followed your career, if I may term it such, with avid interest, despite your efforts to cover your trail. Your pursuit of rare and unusual timepieces has led you from far Cathay to the New World and everywhere in between. The mysterious Grimalkin – the grey shadow whose identity is known to no man! Some say you are of noble, even royal blood. Others maintain you are naught but a brash commoner. Still others hold that you are no man at all, but a devil sworn to the service of Lucifer.’

Grimalkin shrugged. ‘People say many things, my lord. One grows weary of idle talk.’

‘Then I shall come straight to the point. I wish to employ you as my confidential agent, sir. Whatever the Worshipful Company is paying you, I shall double it. They need never know.’

‘I have told you that I am not in the service of that guild.’

‘Who then?’ A look of repugnance, as if an offensive odour had wafted into the room, came over the powdered features. ‘Surely not the Frogs?’

‘I serve no master,’ Grimalkin repeated. ‘Not English, not French. None.’

Lord Wichcote smirked, revealing teeth as yellow as aged ivory. ‘Every man serves a master, my dear Grimalkin. Whether king or commoner, all of us bend the knee to someone or something.’

‘And who is your master, my lord?’

‘Why, His Majesty, of course. And Almighty God.’

‘So say you. Yet by the laws of His Majesty, only the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers has the right to such a workshop as this.’

The man bristled. ‘Do you take me for a shopkeeper, sir? A common artisan? I am a peer of the realm! Such petty restrictions do not apply to the likes of me. Nor do I claim exemption on the grounds of rank alone. I am a natural scientist. An investigator into the secret nature of the most elusive and mysterious of all substances in God’s creation. I refer, of course, to time. That is our true master, is it not, Grimalkin? Tempus Rerum Imperator, as the Worshipful Company has it. Time, the emperor of all things.’

‘Not of me.’

‘You would be time’s master?’ Lord Wichcote laughed. ‘You have the heart of a rebel, I find. Well, no matter. Worship who or what you will, or nothing at all, if it please you. I care only for my collection and my experiments. With your help, Grimalkin, that collection can be the finest in the world, and the fruit of my labours can be yours to share.’

‘What fruit?’

‘The very distillate of time, sir.’

‘You seek immortality?’

Lord Wichcote twitched the barrel of the pistol in a dismissive fashion. ‘That is the least of it. What men call time is the mind of God in its most subtle manifestation. Its purest essence, if you will. Imagine the potency of that divine essence, distilled into an elixir! To drink of it would be to become as God Himself.’

Now it was Grimalkin’s turn to laugh. ‘And you call me a rebel?’

‘I had hoped that you, of all men, might understand.’

‘Oh, I understand very well, my lord. Very well indeed. How much of this fabulous elixir have you managed to distil thus far?’

Lord Wichcote frowned. ‘Certain … difficulties in the refining process remain to be overcome, but—’

‘In other words, none,’ Grimalkin interrupted. ‘I thought as much. Alas, I fear I must decline your offer.’

‘Do not be hasty. You will not find a more generous patron. My fortune is vast, my influence at court vaster still. All I require to succeed are various timepieces that I regret to say are beyond my reach at present. My reach, but not yours.’

‘Your confidence is flattering. But the only collection that interests me is my own. As for this elixir of yours, it smacks more of alchemy than natural science. I do not believe that you have the skill to make it, nor even that it can be made.’

‘Is that your final answer?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

Lord Wichcote sighed. ‘A pity. But not entirely unexpected.’ He pulled the trigger of the duelling pistol. There was a spark, a roar, a cloud of smoke that reeked of sulphur.

Grimalkin flinched as the clock, struck, was torn free of the hand that held it.

At the same instant, the front panels of three other tall clocks swung open. From each emerged a man with a drawn rapier. One to Grimalkin’s right; another to the left; the third stood beside Lord Wichcote, who seemed vastly amused.

‘The clock,’ he said, ‘was of course a facsimile only.’

‘I am relieved to hear it,’ said Grimalkin, flexing the fingers of a now-empty hand. ‘Your lordship is a most excellent shot.’

‘I spend an hour each day at target practice.’ As he spoke, Lord Wichcote began the laborious process of reloading his pistol. ‘I want him alive,’ he added, addressing the three swordsmen without bothering to look up. ‘And take care you do not damage any of my timepieces in the process.’

‘Aye, m’lud,’ chorused the new arrivals. Rapiers held en garde, they converged on the intruder with the wary grace of professionals; they were met by a grey blur. The music of swordplay filled the room, providing a lively accompaniment to the stolid ticking of so many clocks.

Preoccupied with the pistol, it was some seconds before Lord Wichcote, in response to a groan that seemed more a product of dismay than pain, glanced up to gauge the progress of the fight. There were now two men facing the masked intruder; the third was sprawled on the floor, a rose blooming on his chest. Frowning, Lord Wichcote returned to his work, a certain agitation visible in his movements. When next he glanced up, the intruder was facing but a single man. Lord Wichcote’s efforts now took on an unmistakable urgency, accompanied by a marked deterioration in manual dexterity. Gunpowder spilled over his shirt, and the ball he was trying to insert into the pistol’s muzzle seemed possessed of a perverse desire to go elsewhere. At last he rammed it home. But no sooner had he done so than he found the red-stained tip of a blade hovering near his throat.

‘Perhaps you should devote more time in your practice sessions to the loading rather than the firing of your pistols,’ Grimalkin suggested, somewhat breathlessly.

‘No doubt you have a point,’ Lord Wichcote conceded through gritted teeth.

‘Indeed I do. And you will become more intimately acquainted with my point unless you drop your pistol.’

The pistol dropped.

Grimalkin kicked the weapon aside.

‘You would not dare to shed even a single drop of my blood,’ Lord Wichcote declared, though he did not sound convinced of it. The powder on his face was streaked with sweat. The skin underneath was neither so white nor so smooth.

‘Would I not?’ The tip of the blade indented his throat, where the skin was as yellowed – and as thin – as ancient parchment. A red bead appeared there.

The man gasped but said nothing more.

‘Give me your parole, as a gentleman and a peer of the realm, that you will not cry out or otherwise attempt to impede me, and I will take my leave without doing you graver injury.’ Grimalkin pulled the blade back a fraction of an inch.

‘You have it,’ Lord Wichcote said.

As Grimalkin retreated a step, still holding the blade ready, the other pressed a white handkerchief to his throat and said in a tone of deepest disapproval, ‘What manner of fencing do you call that, sir? Three of my finest swordsmen dispatched in under two minutes! I have never seen a man wield a blade in such an outlandish fashion!’

‘I have travelled widely, my lord, and learned much along the way – not all of it to do with clocks.’ Grimalkin leaned forward to wipe the blade clean on the edge of his lordship’s sky-blue coat, then returned it to its scabbard.

This affront Lord Wichcote bore with barely controlled fury. ‘Do you know, Grimalkin, I don’t believe you are a gentleman at all.’

‘I have never claimed that distinction. And now, sir, I bid you adieu.’ Grimalkin gave another precise bow and backed away, moving towards the rope that dangled from the open skylight. In passing a table bestrewn with timepieces in various stages of assembly and disassembly – the very table, as it happened, where cat and mouse had earlier disported themselves – Grimalkin paused. A grey-gloved hand shot out.

Lord Wichcote gave a wordless cry.

‘I’ll take this for my trouble.’ A clock very like the one that had been the target of the gentleman’s pistol disappeared into the folds of Grimalkin’s cloak – as, moving more swiftly still, like a liquid shadow, did the mouse that had escaped the cat. ‘Did you really think you could hide it from me?’

The gentleman’s only reply was to begin shouting for help at the top of his lungs.

‘I don’t know what England is coming to when the parole of a lord cannot be trusted by an honest thief,’ Grimalkin muttered, reaching into a belt pouch. A small glass vial glittered in an upraised hand, then was flung to the floor. Thick clouds of smoke boiled up, filling the room.

By the time the air in the attic had cleared, the masked intruder stood on an empty rooftop half a mile away. Tendrils of fog and coal smoke eeled through the streets below, but a strong breeze, carrying the effluvial reek of the Thames, had swept the rooftops clear. Grimalkin fished out the timepiece and turned it this way and that in the silvery light of the moon. The exterior was unremarkable.

The whiskered nose of the mouse peeked out inquisitively from the collar of the grey hood.

‘Well, Henrietta,’ whispered the thief. ‘Let us see what hatches out of—’

A muffled footfall. Grimalkin spun, blade already sliding from scabbard …

Too late. With a sharp crack, the hilt of a rapier slammed into the side of the grey hood. The thief crumpled without another word.