Part 32 (2/2)
”I beg my lord's pardon,” said Peer, who had out of some blind herd instinct blundered out to act as scape-goat for his entire Party, ”but why bother to have a Trial of the Pyx, if the Pyx has been tampered with?”
”Why, to get all false coins out of it, so that we shall know that all coins put in thereafter shall be genuine samples of the Mint's produce-and not frauds put in as a desperate gambit to hide long-standing flaws in the coinage!”
”The poetry of it!” Roger exclaimed, though these reflections were concealed under a hubbub, the sound of Parties and Factions mobilizing and arming. ”Sir Isaac dares not a.s.sert that the Pyx is clean, for fear that Jack may have salted it with debased coins-which would be found out at the Trial, and laid to Sir Isaac. To save his hand and his b.a.l.l.s, he must admit that it has been compromised; but in doing so, he calls his own coins into question, and names himself as a suspect in the a.s.sault on the Tower!”
”My lord,” said a Tory, ”it is suggested that a year's coin-samples are now simply gone gone-stolen by Jack the Coiner! If that is so, how can we gauge the present soundness of Her Majesty's coinage? Our enemies in the world shall say that the Mint has spewed out false and debased guineas for a year or more.”
”It is a question of extraordinary gravity,” Bolingbroke allowed, ”and I say that it is a State affair, since the security of our State is founded on Trade, which is founded upon our currency currency. If it is true that the conspiracy has deprived us of our Pyx, why then we can only prove the soundness of our money by collecting samples of coins that are in circulation, and bringing them in for a.s.say.”
Ravenscar had told Newton not to pick up any handkerchiefs dropped in his way by Bolingbroke: advice that Newton, with the serene confidence of a man who had nothing to hide, had steadfastly ignored. Now was not the time for him to mend his ways. ”But my lord, I protest!” he said, ”there is a reason why the method you have just described is never used, and it is that a sampling of coins in circulation shall perforce include a number-an unknowable number-of counterfeits, slipped into circulation by the likes of Jack Shaftoe. 'Twere unfair and unreasonable to lay at my feet an a.s.say of counterfeits!”
Bolingbroke seemed impressed by Newton's sheer consistency. ”Sir Isaac, as a part of my investigations, I have read an Indenture with your name on it, kept under lock and key in the Cloisters of Westminster Abbey, just across the way. We can stroll over and have a look at it, if you should like to review its contents. But I can tell you that, in this solemn contract, you are sworn to pursue and prosecute coiners. Until now I have a.s.sumed that you were tending to your duties tending to your duties. Now you astonish this Chamber by testifying to the contrary testifying to the contrary! Tell me, Sir Isaac, if we make an a.s.say of circulating coins, and discover that they are rife with base metal, is it because you have failed in your duty to prosecute coiners? Or is it because you have debased the coinage produced by the Mint, to enrich yourself and your Whig backers? Or did you debase the coinage first first and and then then allow coiners to flourish in the Realm, so as to cover your traces? Sir Isaac? Sir Isaac? Oh well, he has quite lost interest.” allow coiners to flourish in the Realm, so as to cover your traces? Sir Isaac? Sir Isaac? Oh well, he has quite lost interest.”
In fact, Sir Isaac had lost consciousness, or was well on his way to it. During the last speech of Bolingbroke he had gradually softened and crumpled to the floor of Star Chamber, like a candle placed in an oven. He was breathing fast, and his extremities had gone into violent trembling, as if he were having fever-chills; but the hands pressed to his forehead felt a dry and cool brow and thumbs touched to the base of his heaving neck were drawn back in alarm at the furious drum-beat of his pulse. He was not so much sick as seized in an unstoppable paroxysm of mad, animal terror. ”Get him into my coach,” commanded Roger Comstock, ”and take him to my house. Miss Barton is there. She knows her uncle well, and she shall tend to him better than-G.o.d forbid-any physician.”
”You see?” Bolingbroke was remarking to Charles White, who was standing at his side, in the role of wide-eyed 'prentice a-gawp at the Master's skill. ”It is not necessary to bite their ears off. Oh, this is nothing. I have seen others drop dead in their shoes. One needs an apoplectic for that.” He seemed ready to offer up more advice in this vein, but his attention was drawn by the Marquis of Ravenscar, standing serenely on the opposite side of the Chamber as other Whigs bent their backs to the very odd job of dragging out Isaac Newton. Ravenscar held out a hand. Someone slapped a walking-stick into his palm. He hefted it. Charles White, antic.i.p.ating physical violence, took half a step forward, then realized he was being absurd, and brought his hands together in front of his silver greyhound medallion, absent-mindedly rubbing at an ancient dagger-scar that went all the way through one palm. Bolingbroke merely elevated an eyebrow.
Roger Comstock raised his walking-stick until it was pointed up at the starry ceiling, and brought the b.u.t.t of it to his face, then snapped it down briskly. It was a swordsman's salute: a gesture of respect, and a signal that the next thing to come would be homicidal violence. ”Let's to the Kit-Cat Clubb,” he said to Peer and a few other Whigs who had not yet been able to get their feet to move. ”Sir Isaac has the use of my coach; but I am in a mood for a walk. G.o.d save the Queen, my lord.”
”G.o.d save the Queen,” said Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke. ”And do enjoy your walk, Roger.”
Garden of Herrenhausen Palace, Hanover.
JUNE 23 (CONTINENTAL)/12 (ENGLISH) 1714.
”I LOVE YOU.” LOVE YOU.”
”I loaf you.”
”I love love you.” you.”
”I lubb lubb you.” you.”
”That's not quite it.”
”How can you tell tell? This 'I love you' strikes my ear like the sound of a tin sheet being wobbled. How can I say 'ich liebe dich' 'ich liebe dich' with such noises?” with such noises?”
”To me you can say it any way you please. But you need to work on certain vowels.” Johann von Hacklheber raised his head out of Caroline's lap, faltered-his ponytail had snagged in a pearl b.u.t.ton-worked it free, sat up, and spun around on the bench so that he could get face to face with her. ”Watch my lips, my tongue,” he said. ”I love love you.” you.”
There the English lesson ended. Not that the pupil had failed to observe the master's lips and tongue. She had done so most attentively-but not with a mind towards improving her vowels. ”Noch einmal, bitte,” ”Noch einmal, bitte,” she requested, and when he arched his sandy eyebrows and opened his mouth to p.r.o.nounce the ”I,” she was up and on him. His lips and tongue went through the movements for ”love,” but Caroline felt them with her own lips and tongue, and heard not a thing. she requested, and when he arched his sandy eyebrows and opened his mouth to p.r.o.nounce the ”I,” she was up and on him. His lips and tongue went through the movements for ”love,” but Caroline felt them with her own lips and tongue, and heard not a thing.
”That was much more informative,” she said, after a few more repet.i.tions of the etude.
His ponytail was coming undone, which was largely her doing, for she had her hands to either side of his head and was tugging blond locks free from the black ribbon that bound them in back, bringing him into a state of beautiful deshabillement. deshabillement. ”They say that your mother was the loveliest woman in all of Versailles.” ”They say that your mother was the loveliest woman in all of Versailles.”
”I thought that honor was reserved for the King's brother.”
”Stop it!” She gave him the tiniest tap on the cheek-bone. ”I was going to say, she gave her looks to you.”
”What are you going to say now now?”
”I am about to ask where you got your wit wit from, for it is not as pleasing to me.” from, for it is not as pleasing to me.”
”I do beg your royal highness's forgiveness. I did not know that you had such affection for the late brother of the King of France.”
”Think of his widow, widow, Liselotte, who lives still, and who exchanged letters almost every day with the lady we are laying in her tomb today.” Liselotte, who lives still, and who exchanged letters almost every day with the lady we are laying in her tomb today.”
”The connexion was so tenuous I-”
”No connexions are tenuous on a day such as this. All Christendom mourns for Sophie.”
”Excepting certain drawing-rooms in London.”
”For this one day, spare me your wit, and let me enjoy your looks. You need a shave!”
”The Doctor must have taught you about solstices and equinoxes.”
”What does that have to do with shaving? Behold, if I were wearing gloves, they should be snagged and ruined by these boar's bristles!” She dug a thumb in along his jaw-line and shoved the skin up to his cheek-bone. No longer did he look like the son of the most beautiful woman in Versailles, and no longer were his vowels perfectly formed when he said, ”A tryst in the garden at dawn's first light is a romantic conceit, and I do confess that this peachy morning-light makes your face more radiant than any flower, and more succulent than any fruit-”
”As it sets your golden mane, and your spiky hog-bristles, aglow, my angel.”
”However, as we dwell at above fifty degrees of lat.i.tude-”
”Fifty-two degrees and twenty-odd minutes, as you'd know, if the Doctor had drilled you as he did me in the use of the back-staff.”
”In any case, given that we are within a few days of the Solstice, 'dawn's first light,' at this lat.i.tude, works out to something like two o'clock in the morning.”
”Pfui, it's not that early!” it's not that early!”
”I note that your Ladies of the Bedchamber have not had a crack at you you yet-” yet-”
”Hmph.”
”Which suits me very well,” Johann added hastily, ”as powder, lacings, and beauty-spots can only detract from one who is perfect to begin with.”
” 'Twill be double powderings and lacings this day,” Caroline lamented. ”The usual one, that I may receive our n.o.ble and royal guests, and a second, for the funeral.”
”It is well that you have a st.u.r.dy husband to take the brunt of the ceremonies,” Johann reflected. ”Stand behind him, fan yourself, and look bereaved.”
”I am am bereaved.” bereaved.”
”You were were, and are becoming less so by the day, I think,” Johann said. Which was not the gentlest thing he could have said. But he had spent enough time among royals to know their heart-ways. ”Now your mind has already begun to turn elsewhere. You are getting ready for the burden to fall on your shoulders.”
”I wish you had not reminded me. Now the mood is spoiled.”
Johann von Hacklheber got to his feet. He was careful to take Caroline's hand in his own first, and to keep it clasped. ”Oh, I'm afraid the morning was ruined for me before it began. I have an extraordinary engagement. One that I could not get myself out of by pleading, 'I am very sorry but I shall be busy at that hour cuckolding the Prince of Wales.' ”
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