The System of the World (24 page)

“What do you see?” she asked, studying him back.

“I can no longer see you as anything other than my friend, patroness, and Lady, Eliza,” he answered. “Marks of age, health, experience, and character, which a stranger might phant’sy he perceived in your face, are invisible to me.”

“But what do you really see?”

“I have not looked at enough skinny white women to be an apt judge. But I see that bone structure is a good thing to have, and that you have it; lo, the Creator hung you on an excellent frame.”

She found this curiously amusing. “Have you ever seen an Arcachon, or an honest rendering of one?”

“Only you, my lady.”

“I mean, an hereditary Arcachon. Suffice it to say that they are
not
hung on good frames, and they well know it. And I owe my position
in the world today, not to wit or courage or goodness, but to my being hung on a good frame, and being able to propagate it. And what think you of that, Dappa?”

“If it provides you with a sort of purchase on the sheer cliff that the world is, from which to make use of your abundant wit, courage, and goodness, why, here’s to bone structure!” Dappa returned, raising a teacup high.

She lost a struggle with a smile. Creases flourished around her eyes and mouth, but they did not look bad on her; they looked well earned and fairly won. She raised her own teacup and clinked it against Dappa’s. “Now you really do sound like the Apology of a book,” she said, and sipped.

“Are we back to talking of that, my lady?”

“We are.”

“I’d hoped I could ask you about those Hanoverian Countesses who seem to’ve joined your household in Antwerp.”

“What makes you think they are only Countesses?”

Dappa gave her a sharp look, but she had a glimmer in her eye to suggest that she was only baiting him. “ ’Twas only a guess,” he said.

“Then go on guessing, for I’ll tell you no more than you’ve already discerned.”

“Why Antwerp? Meeting with the Duke of Marlborough?”

“The less I tell you, the less likely you are to be interrogated by the sort of men who loiter in my front lawn with spyglasses.”

“Very well…if you put it that way…perhaps we should speak of my book!” Dappa said nervously.

She got a contented look, as if to say that this was a much more satisfactory topic of conversation, and settled herself for a moment—which gave Dappa a warning that she was about to unburden herself of a little address she’d composed ahead of time. “What you must never forget, Dappa, is that I myself might not be opposed to Slavery, had I not myself been a slave in Barbary! To most English people, it seems perfectly reasonable. The slavers put out the story that it is not so very cruel, and that the slaves are happy. Most in Christendom are willing to believe these lies, absurd as they are to you and me. People believe Slavery is not so bad, because they have no personal experience of it—it takes place in Africa and America, out of sight and out of mind to the English, who love sugar in their tea and care not how ’twas made.”

“I notice you do not sweeten yours,” Dappa mentioned, raising his cup.

“And from the fact that I still have teeth attached to my excellent bone structure, you may infer that I have
never
used sugar,” she returned.
“Our only weapon against this willful ignorance is stories. The stories that you alone are writing down. I have in one of my boxes down stairs a little packet of letters from English men and women that all go something like this: ‘I have never had the least objection to Slavery, however your book recently fell under my eye, and, though most of the slave-narratives contained in it were mawkish and dull, one in particular struck a chord in my heart, and I have since read it over and over, and come to understand the despicable, nay execrable crime that Slavery is…’ ”

“Which one? Which of the stories do these letters refer to?” Dappa asked, fascinated.

“That is the problem, Dappa: each of them refers to a different one. It seems that if you put enough stories out before the public, many a reader will find
one
that speaks to him. But there is no telling
which
.”

“What we’ve been doing, then, is a bit like firing grapeshot,” Dappa mused. “Chances are that a ball will strike home—but there’s no telling which—so, best fire a lot of ’em.”

“And grapeshot is a useful tactic sometimes,” Eliza said, “but it never sank a ship, did it?”

“No, my lady, grapeshot can never do that.”

“I say we have now fired enough grapeshot. It has had all the effect it is ever going to have. What we need now, Dappa, is a cannonball.”

“One slave-tale, that everyone will take note of?”

“Just so. And that is why it does not trouble me that you failed to sweep up any more grapeshot in Boston. Oh, write down what you have. Send it to me. I’ll publish it. But after that, no more scatter-shot tactics. You must begin to use your critical faculties, Dappa, and look for the slave-story that has something to it beyond the bathos that they all have in common. Look for the one that will be our cannonball. It is time for us to sink some slave-ships.”

THAT EVENING

“I
AM QUITE CERTAIN THAT
we are being watched,” Daniel said.

Dappa laughed. “Is that why you were at such pains to sit facing the window? I venture that no one in the history of this Clubb has ever desired a view of yonder alley.”

“You might do well to come round the table, and sit beside me.”

“I know what I’d see: a lot of Whigs gaping at the tame Neeger. Why don’t
you
come and sit beside
me
, so that we may enjoy a view of that naked lady reclining in that strangely long and narrow painting above your head?”

“She’s not
naked,
” Daniel retorted crossly.

“On the contrary, Dr. Waterhouse, I see incontrovertible signs of nakedness in her.”

“But to call her
naked
sounds prurient,” Daniel objected. “She is professionally attired, for an
odalisque
.”

“Perhaps all the eyeballs you phant’sy are watching
us,
are, truth be told, fixed on
her
. She is a new painting, I can still smell the varnish. Perhaps we should instead go sit ’neath yonder dusty sea-scape,” Dappa suggested, waving in the direction of another long narrow canvas that was crowded with stooped and shivering Dutch clam-diggers.

“I happened to see you greeting the Duchess of Arcachon-Qwghlm earlier,” Daniel confessed.

“She goes by de la Zeur—’tis less formal that way,” Dappa broke in.

Daniel was brought up short for a moment, then finally got a wry look on his face, and shook his head. “You are strangely giddy. I should never have ordered you usquebaugh.”

“Too long on land.”

“When do you sail for Boston?”

“Ah, to business! We’d hoped to depart in the second half of April. Now, we think early May. What do you wish us to fetch from there?”

“Twenty years’ work. I do hope you shall have a care with it.”

“In what form is the work? Manuscripts?”

“Yes, and machinery.”

“That is an odd word. What does it mean?”

“I beg your pardon. It is theatre-jargon. When an angel descends, or a soul lights up to heaven, or a volcano erupts, or any other impossible thing seems to happen on the stage, the people behind the scenes, who’ve made it happen, give the name
machinery
to the diverse springs, levers, rigging,
et cetera
used to create the illusion.”

“I did not know you ran a theatre in Boston.”

“You jest, sir, the Bostonians would never have allowed it—they’d have sent me packing to Providence.”

“Then how comes it you have machinery in Boston?”

“I used the term ironically. I built a machine there—across the river actually, in a shack about halfway ’tween Charlestown and Harvard—a machine that has nothing to do with theatrical illusions. I need you to bring it to me.”

“Then I must know, in order: Is it dangerous? Is it bulky? Is it delicate?”

“In order: yes, no, yes.”

“In what wise is it dangerous?”

“I’ve no idea. But I’ll tell you this, ’tis only dangerous if you turn the crank, and give it something to think on.”

“Then I’ll take the crank off and keep it in my cabin, and use it only to bash pirates on the head,” announced Dappa. “And I shall forbid the crew to hold conversations with your machinery, unless they are devoid of intellectual stimulation: nothing beyond a polite ‘Good day, machinery, how goes it with thee, does the stump of thy crank ache of a damp morning?’ ”

“I suggest you pack the parts in barrels, stuffed with straw. You shall also find many thousands of small rectangular cards with words and numbers printed on them. These are likewise to be sealed in watertight casks. Enoch Root may already have seen to it by the time you reach Charlestown.”

At the mention of Enoch’s name, Dappa glanced away from Daniel’s face, as if the older man had committed an indiscretion, and picked up his dram to take a sip. And that was all the opening needed for the Marquis of Ravenscar to irrupt upon their conversation. He appeared so suddenly, so adroitly, it was as if some
machinery
had injected him into the Kit-Cat Clubb through a trap-door.

“From one
odalisque
to another, Mr. Dappa! Haw! Is it not so! For I take it that you are the writer.”

“I am
a
writer, my lord,” Dappa answered politely.

“I hope I do not offend by confessing I’ve not read your books.”

“On the contrary, my lord,” Dappa said, “there is nothing quite so
civilized as to be recognized in public places as the author of books no one has read.”

“If my good friend Dr. Waterhouse were polite enough to make introductions, I should not have to rely ’pon guess-work; but he was raised by Phanatiques.”

“It is too late for formalities now,” Daniel answered. “When another begins a conversation with a cryptickal outburst on
odalisques
, what is there for a polite gentleman to do?”

“Not cryptickal at all! Not in the slightest!” protested the Marquis of Ravenscar. “Why, ’tis known to all London now, at” (checking his watch) “nine o’clock, that at” (checking his watch a second time) “four o’clock, Mr. Dappa was on hand to greet the Duchess of Arcachon and of Qwghlm!”

“I told you!” Daniel said, in an aside to Dappa, and put his two fingers to his eyes, then pointed them across the room toward the phant’sied spies and observers.

“You told him what!?” Roger demanded.

“That people were watching us.”

“They’re not watching
you,
” Roger said, highly amused. Which told Daniel, infallibly, that they
were
. “Why should anyone watch
you
? They’re watching Dappa, making the rounds of the
odalisques
!”

“There you go again—what on earth—?” Daniel demanded.

Dappa explained, “He alludes to a sort of legend, only whispered by
discreet well-bred
Londoners, but openly bandied about by
drunken merry lords,
that the Duchess was once an
odalisque.
”

“Figuratively—?”

“Literally a harem-slave of the Great Turk in Constantinople.”

“What a bizarre notion—Roger, how could you?”

Roger, slightly nettled by Dappa, raised his eyebrows and shrugged.

Dappa proclaimed, “England being a nation of clam-diggers and sheep-shearers, must forever be a net importer of fantastickal tales. Silk, oranges, perfume, and strange yarns must all be supplied from across the seas.”

“If only you knew,” Daniel returned.

“I agree with Mr. Dappa!” Roger said forcefully. “The story of his
tête-à-tête
with the Duchess is racing up and down Grub Street like cholera, and will be in newspapers tomorrow at cock-crow!”

And then he was gone, as if by trap-door.

“You see? If you were more discreet—”

“Then Grub Street would be unawares. Nothing would be written, nothing printed, concerning me, or the Duchess. No one would hear of us—no one would buy my next book.”

“Ah.”

“Light dawns ’pon your phizz, Doctor.”

“ ’Tis a novel, strange form of commerce, of which I was unawares until just now.”

“Only in London,” Dappa said agreeably.

“But it is not the strangest form of commerce that goes on in this city,” Daniel pressed on.

Dappa visibly put on an innocent face. “Do you have some strange yarn to set beside my lord Ravenscar’s?”

“Much stranger. And, note, ’tis a
domestic
yarn, not imported. Dappa, do you recollect when we were being harried in Cape Cod Bay by the flotilla of Mr. Ed Teach, and you put me to work, down in the bilge?”

“You were in the
hold
. We do not put
elderly doctors
in the
bilge.
”

“All right, all right.”

“I remember that you obliged us by smashing up some old crockery to make ammunition for the blunderbusses,” Dappa said.

“Yes, and
I
remember that the location of that old crockery was pricked down, with admirable clarity, on a sort of bill posted on a beam next the staircase. A diagram, shewing how the hold, and the bilge, were packed with diverse goods.”

“There you go again with your confusion of ‘hold’ and ‘bilge.’ We do not pack goods in the bilge, as it is generally full of what I will euphemistically call
water,
which rapidly turns
goods
into
bads
. If you doubt it, I’ll pack some of your machinery in the bilge on our return voyage this summer, and you may see its condition ’pon arrival. If you had any idea of the foulness—”

Daniel was showing Dappa his palms. “Not necessary, my good man. Yet your lading-diagram
does
include the bilge, and all that lies in that foulness, does it not?”

“Are you referring to the
ballast
?”

“I suppose I am.”

“The
ballast
is carefully diagrammed, because it affects the balance and the trim of the ship,” Dappa said. “From time to time we must shift a few tons this way or that, to compensate for an uneven load, and then it is of course useful to have a diagram of where it is.”

“As I recollect that diagram, the bottom-most hull-planks of the ship are covered with flat rectangular iron pigs, laid down side by side, like floor-tiles.”

“Kentledge, ’tis called. We also have some cracked cannons and old faulty cannonballs down there.”

“Atop that, you have piled many tons of rounded stones.”

“Shingle from a Malabar beach. Some use sand, but we use shingle, because it does not foul the pumps.”

“It is atop the shingle that you pile up casks of shot, salt, water, and other heavy goods.”

“As is the common—nay, universal—practice on non-capsizing ships.”

“But I recall that another layer of ballast was shewn on this diagram. It was below any casks, below the shingle, below the scrap metal, below even the kentledge. It was the thinnest possible layer, a mere membrane, and on the diagram it looked like onion-skin. It was pressed against the tarry inner surface of the hull-planks themselves, and it went by some name such as anti-fouling plates.”

“What of it?”

“Why put anti-fouling plates on the
inside
?”

“They are spares. You must have noticed that we carry extra stores of
everything,
Dr. Waterhouse.
Minerva
’s hull is clad in copper sheets—she’s famous for it—and the last time we had a coppersmith make up an order of such material, we had him make more than we needed, so as to get a better price, and to have some in reserve.”

“Are you certain you are not confusing them with the spares that are stowed in crates near the foremast step? I seem to recall sitting on them.”

“Some are stored there. Others are stored against the inside of the hull-planks, under the kentledge, as you described.”

“What an odd place to store anything. To get at them, one would have to unload the ship entirely, pump out the unspeakable contents of the bilge, shovel out tons of shingle, and winch up the massive pigs of kentledge, one by one.”

Dappa did not respond, but had taken to drumming his fingers on the table irritably.

“It seems more like buried treasure than ballast.”

“If you’d care to test your hypothesis, Doctor, you may do so the next time we are dry-docked, provided you show up with your own shovel.”

“Is that what you say to inquisitive Customs inspectors?”

“We are more polite to them—as
they
generally are to
us
.”

“But politeness aside, the underlying meaning is the same. The hold may be emptied, if some official demands it.
Minerva
shall then bob like a cork, but she shall not capsize, thanks to the ballast. But those anti-fouling plates may not be inspected unless the ballast is removed, which would render the vessel unstable—it could only be done if she were beached, or in dry-dock—as she was just a few weeks ago. No Customs inspector ever demands
that
, does he?”

“This is a very odd conversation,” Dappa observed.

“On an arbitrary numerical scale of conversational oddness, ranging
from one to ten, with ten being the oddest conversation I’ve ever had, and seven being the oddest conversation I have in a typical day, this rates no better than five,” Daniel returned. “But to make it less odd for you, I shall now speak directly. I know what those plates are made of. I know that you take some out from time to time, when you are in London, and I know that they find their way into the coinage. It does not matter to me how this is done, or why. But I say to you that you are putting yourselves in danger every time you spend the treasure from that bilge. You imagine that it may be fused, in a coiner’s crucible, with like metal from other sources, and that, once it has been thus con-fused, it has gone out into the world, and can never be traced back to you. But I say that there is one man, at least, who is not con-fused in the slightest, and who has drawn to within a hair’s breadth of divining your secret. You may find him at the Tower of London most days.”

Dappa had been greatly disquieted early in this little speech, but then had got a distracted, calculating look, as if reckoning how quickly
Minerva
could weigh anchor and get out of the Pool. “And you tell me this—why? To be good?”

“As you were good to me, Dappa, when Blackbeard called for me by name, and you refused to give me up.”

“Oh. We did not do that out of
goodness
, but
stubbornness.
”

“Then my warning to you is strictly an act of Christian charity,” Daniel said.

“God bless you, Doctor!” Dappa replied, but he was still wary.

“Until such time as we arrive at an understanding concerning the disposition of the gold,” Daniel added.

“There is something in this word
disposition
that makes me leery. How do you imagine we’ll
dispose
of it?”

“You have to get rid of it before it is found by the gentleman I spoke of,” Daniel pointed out. “But if you coin it, ’twill be as if you sailed
Minerva
under the guns of the Tower at noon, and ran those sheets of gold up the yard-arms.”