Mason & Dixon (18 page)

"Of course not all are chosen for the Cape,— you Lads had the Pearl of the Lot, damme 'f you didn't." Maskelyne's voice, in such times of stress, edges toward a throat-bas'd Soprano.

' 'Twas the only port we could make in time." If Mason repeats it once, in this St. Helenian Sojourn, he does so a thousand times,— suggesting an average of ten times per Day.

"Damme if you're not simply bless'd, aye, and blessed as well, I've a Curacy, you may trust me in that Article. As for the rest of us, why, what matter that all Curricula are brought in the ill-starr'd Instant each to the same ignominious Halt, poor Boobies as we be.

"Yet there go I, repining at what really was too much, too quickly,— not only the Weather, you do appreciate, for even had the seeing been

perfect that day, there'd yet have been the d——'d Sector, do forgive me,

'tis the matter of the Plumb-line, falsum in unum Principle, how can I trust anything I may see thro' it, now?

"Especially here. Somewhere else it might not have matter'd as much, but it's disturbing here, Mason,— don't you think? Aren't you feeling, I don't know,— disturb'd?"

"Disturb'd? Why, no, Maskelyne, after the Cape I find it quite calming here, in a Tropical way, pure Air, Coffee beyond compare,— from Bush to Oast unmediated!— the Sky remarkably productive of Obs,— what more could a man ask?"

"What more— " slapping himself smartly once upon each cheek, as if to restrain an outburst. "Of course,— I am being far too nice, aye and no doubt namby-pambical as well,— ha ha, ha,— after all, what's being confin'd upon the Summit of a living Volcanoe whose History includes violent Explosion, hey? which might indeed re-awaken at any moment, with nought to escape to in that lively Event, but thousands of Leagues of Ocean, empty in ev'ry direction,— Aahckk! Mason, can y' not feel it? This place! this great Ruin,— haunted...an Obstinate Spectre,— an ancient Crime,— none here will ever escape it, 'tis in the Gases they breathe, Generation unto Generation,— Ah! 'Tis it! There! Look ye!"-pointing beyond the circle of Lanthorn-light, his features clench'd uncomfortably.

The first time Maskelyne carried on thus, Mason became very alarm'd. He already suspects that the Island enjoys a Dispensation not perhaps as relentlessly Newtonian as Southern England's,— and as to whose Author's Identity, one may grow confus'd, so ubiquitous here are signs of the Infernal. Howbeit, after some number of these Seizures, Mason no longer feels quite so oblig'd to react. It is thus with some surprize and a keen rectal Pang that his leisurely Gaze now does detect something out there, and quite large, too, that should not be,— a patch of Nothing, where but the other moment shone a safe Wedge of Stars Encyclopedically nam'd. "Um, this Observatory, Maskelyne? The Company's provided you some sort of, that is,...Armory?"

"Ha! a set of French Duelling-pieces, with the Flints unreliable. Take your pick,— does it matter? against What approaches, Shot is without effect." The Visitant,— by now more than Shadow,— has crept toward the Zenith, engrossing more and more of the field of Stars, till at length rolling overhead and down toward the Horizon.

"Weatherr," Mason almost disappointed. With that, rain begins to fall, dense and steaming, sending him cursing outside to make secure the sliding Roof, whilst Maskelyne occupies himself inside with a fresh Pipe, snug as Punch in his Booth. Mason feels less resentful than resign'd, preferring anyway the certain uproar of Elements he knows, to the spookish fug of Maskelyne's Sermons upon the Unknown. Soon the Rain-Fall is spouting from all three corners of his Hat at once, regardless of what Angle he places his Head at.

Later, Obless, reluctant to sleep, they open another bottle of Mountain. Outside this ephemeral Hut, anything may wait. Mountains sharp and steep as the Heights of Hell. The next Planet, yet without a name,— so, in The Moon, have they been solemnly assur'd.—
 
A little traveling Stage-Troupe, is St. Helena really, all Performance,— a Plantation, sent out years since by its metropolitan Planet, which will remain invisible for years indeterminate before revealing itself and acquiring a Name, till then this place must serve as an Aide-Memoire, a Representation of Home. Many here, Descendants of the first Settlers, would never visit the Home Planet, altho' some claim to've been there and back, and more than once. "What if 'twere so?" declares Maskelyne. "Ev'ry People have a story of how they were created. If one

 
were heretickal enough, which I certainly am not, one might begin to entertain some notion of the Garden in Genesis, as an instance of extra-terrestrial Plantation."

Maskelyne is the pure type of one who would transcend the Earth,— making him, for Mason, a walking cautionary Tale. For years now, after midnight Culminations, has he himself lain and listen'd to the Sky-Temptress, whispering, Forget the Boys, forget your loyalties to your Dead, first of all to Rebekah, for she, they, are but distractions, temporal, flesh, ever attempting to drag the Uranian Devotee back down out of his realm of pure Mathesis, of that which abides.

"For if each Star is little more a mathematickal Point, located upon the Hemisphere of Heaven by Right Ascension and Declination, then all the Stars, taken together, tho' innumerable, must like any other set of points, in turn represent some single gigantick Equation, to the mind of God as straightforward as, say, the Equation of a Sphere,— to us unreadable, incalculable. A lonely, uncompensated, perhaps even impossible Task,— yet some of us must ever be seeking, I suppose."

"Those of us with the Time for it," suggests Mason.

One cloudless afternoon they stand in the scent of an orange-grove,— as tourists elsewhere might stand and gape at some mighty cataract or
chasm,— nose-gaping, rather, at a manifold of odor neither Englishman
has ever encountered before. They have been searching for it all the long
declining Day,— it is the last Orange-Grove upon the Island,— a sou
venir of a Paradise decrepit
               
Shadows of Clouds dapple the green hill
sides, Houses with red Tile roofs preside over small Valleys, the Pasture
lying soft as Sheep,— all, with the volcanic Meadow where the two
stand, circl'd by the hellish Cusps of Peaks unnatural,— frozen in mid-
thrust, jagged at every scale. "Saint Brendan set out in the fifth century
to discover an Island he believ'd was the Paradise of the Scriptures,— and found it. Some believ'd it Madeira, Columbus was told by some at
Madeira that they had seen it in the West, Philosophers of our own Day
say they have prov'd it but a Mirage. So will the Reign of Reason cheer
ily dispose of any allegations of Paradise.

"Yet suppose this was the Island. He came back, did he not? He died the very old Bishop of the Monastery he founded at Clonfert, as far from

 
the Western Sea as he might, this side of Shannon. Perhaps that was Paradise. Else, why leave?"

"A Riddle! Wondrous! Just the Ticket! Why, ere 'tis solv'd, we may be back in England and done with this!"

"The Serpent, being the obvious Answer."

"What Serpent?"

"The one dwelling within the Volcanoe, Mason, surely you are not ignorant upon the Topick?"

"Regretfully, Sir,— "

"Serpent, Worm, or Dragon, 'tis all the same to It, for It speaketh no Tongue but its own. It Rules this Island, whose ancient Curse and secret Name, is Disobedience. In thoughtless Greed, within a few pitiably brief Generations, have these People devastated a Garden in which, once, anything might grow. Their Muck-heaps ev'rywhere, Disease, Madness. One day, not far distant, with the last leaf of the last Old-Father-Never-Die bush destroy'd, whilst the unremitting Wind carries off the last soil from the last barren Meadow, with nought but other Humans the only Life remaining then to the Island,— how will they take their own last step,— how disobey themselves into Oblivion? Simply die one by one, alone and suspicious, as is the style of the place, till all are done? Or will they rather choose to murder one another, for the joy to be had in that?"

"How soon is this, that we're talking about?"

"Pray we may be gone by then. We have our own ways of Disobedience,— unless I presume,— express'd in the Motto of Jakob Bernouilli the second,— Invito Patre Sidera Verso,— 'Against my father's wishes I study the stars.'''

Mason pauses to squint and shake his head free of annoyance. "How do you know anything of my Father's wishes? Do you mean, that because he is only a Miller and a Baker, he would naturally oppose Star-Gazing, out of Perverse and willful Ignorance?"

"I mean only that in our Times, 'tis not a rare Dispute," Maskelyne assures him. "Reason, or any Vocation to it,— the Pursuit of the Sciences,— these are the hope of the Young, the new Music their Families cannot follow, occasionally not even listen to. I know well the struggle, mine being with Mun especially, tho' Peggy as well would rag me.. .they cozen'd me once into casting her Horoscope, with particular reference to the likelihood of her being married any time soon. Twas but a moment's work to contrive the Wheel of a Maiden's dreams,— Jupiter smiling upon Venus in the house of partnerships, Mars exactly at the mid-heaven, Mercury with smooth sailing ahead, not a retrograde body in sight. Was I thank'd? Rather, one simple Horo, and 'twas 'Nevil the Astrologer,' thenceforward."

"Not as insulting as 'Star-Gazer,' anyway."

"And what if I did cast a Natal Chart or two whilst at Westminster,— and of course later, at Cambridge, when I found I could get sixpence,— well. I suppose you've lost respect for me now," this being their second week up on the Ridge, with confession apt to flow like the "water that cometh down out of the country" noted in ancient Maps of this place.

"You got sixpence? I never did better than three, and that was with all the Arabian Parts thrown in as Inducement."

"Oh, don't I remember those, Lens-brother,— 'tis our Burden. Kepler said that Astrology is Astronomy's wanton little sister, who goes out and sells herself that Astronomy may keep her Virtue,— surely we have all done the Covent Garden turn. As to the older Sister, how many Steps may she herself indeed already have taken into Compromise? for,

Be the Instrument brazen, or be it Fleshen,

[Maskelyne sings, in a competent Tenor]

Star-Gazing's ever a Whore's profession,—

(Isn't it?)

Some in a Palace, all Marble and Brick,

Some behind Hedges for less than a kick, tell me

What's it matter,

The Stars will say,

We've been ga-zing, back at ye,

Many a Day,

And there's nothing we haven't seen

More than one way,

Sing Deny o deny o day...

[Recitative]

 
Now some go to Bath, where, like candle and Moth, even men of the Cloth seek them out. Whilst others run Pitches where diggers of Ditches may scatter their Riches about. Tho' the tools of their Trade may be differently made, for their Arts they are paid, all the same,— 'Pon Astronomer's Couch or Coquette's, all avouch, 'tis a reckless Debowch of a Game—

There are Stars yet to see, There are Planets hiding, Peepers are we, with a Lust abiding, Some style it 'Providence,' Others say, 'God,—

Some call it even, and some call it Odd, Yes but what's it matter, The Stars will say, &c.

"We've a while before Sirius,— " Maskelyne flush'd with Song, "what say I do yours now, and you do mine later?"

"What?" Mason begins to edge toward the Tent opening.

"Your natal Chart, Mason. Have you ever had it done?"

"Well..."

"It's all right, neither have I,— perhaps most Lens-folk would rather not know. But as we're old Charlatans together, maroon'd here in this other-worldly Place, and withal sharing the same Ruling Planet,— rather, Goddess,— to whose least sigh we must attend, or risk more than we ought,— eh?"

Mason blinks. Is it the Altitude? Hardly do to get into a Kick-up with Clive of India's brother-in-law, he supposes. Hey? What if this isn't Insanity? and no worse than the frantic chumminess of Exile.... Ahrrh, yet suppose, more harshly, that 'tis Bradley whom Maskelyne wishes to snuggle up to,— Mason having run into any number of amateur Star-gazers with the same ideas about access to the A.R.,— back Home, 'twas possible to wave them Adieu till they be absorb'd back into the human Nebulosity of the Town,— but here in a Tent in the middle of the 360-degree Ocean,— what choice does he have?

"Date of Birth?”

"Don't know. They had me baptiz'd May Day, and that's the day I mark."

"So you were born some weeks earlier, perhaps in Aries, even Pisces.... Less probably, in Taurus, yet,— " he is giving Mason the heavy 0.0.

"If it's helpful, I am told that of the Qualities observ'd in my comportment, those of the classick Taurean prevail,— Persistent, Phlegmatick, Provok'd only with great difficulty,— our Passion of Titanick Scope, our Fate, ever to be prick'd at by small men in spangl'd Costumes."

"First of May, then, shall we?" So Maskelyne goes to work. By Dark-Lanthorn-Light, his face a-glimmer and smooth as wax, whilst the Sea crashes up to them past the baffling of vertiginous Peaks and Ravines, he pencils out a Wheel, and begins to fill it with Glyphs and Numerals. At one point, as if without thinking, he reaches back and releases his Queue, and hair swings forward to either side, curtaining him and his bright eyes with the calculations. Soon he is passing wordless remarks such as "Hmm!" and "Yaacch!,"— Mason beginning to huff somewhat, feeling like a Model to whom an Artist is making cryptic Suggestions. "There," says Maskelyne at last. "Will ye look at all those Venus aspects...La, la, la— Where's that Mountain, again?"

"You're right, after all, I'd rather not know. Sorry to've put ye to all this trouble,— "

"First of all, doesn't it seem odd, that you and Mr. Dixon, with your natal signs rul'd by Venus and the Sun respectively, should have lately, as partners, observ'd the conjunction of those very two bodies,— the Event occurring, as well, in the Sign of the Twins?"

Shrugging, "Chance of a Sun ruler, one in twelve. Chance of a Venus ruler, two in twelve,— Chance of the Pair, two in one hundred forty-four,— a Coincidence appealing, yet not overwhelming."