Part 6 (1/2)

'That was an eloquent speech you made to Nepath about reopening the mine, using machinery,' s...o...b..ld said after a while. 'It was good of you to think of us, of the wider picture.'

At first the Doctor did not answer. He did not even indicate that he had heard. But eventually, he drained what remained in his gla.s.s with a single swallow. He held up the gla.s.s and twisted the stem slowly between his thumb and forefinger, letting the light spin off it. 'Not that it will make any difference,' he said. 'Does it worry you,' he went on slowly, 'that we live in a deterministic universe?'

'You think that whatever is going to happen will will happen, despite what we may do and say?' s...o...b..ld asked. 'Like the mine?' happen, despite what we may do and say?' s...o...b..ld asked. 'Like the mine?'

'What do you think?'

'I think that's a very simplistic view,' s...o...b..ld said. 'I think that G.o.d moves in a mysterious way.'

'Like evolution, you mean?' There was the glimmer of a smile on the Doctor's face.

s...o...b..ld smiled too. 'You are surprised to find a man of the church accepting so easily what Darwin propounds?'

'I'm sure it wasn't easy.'

s...o...b..ld's smile froze. 'No,' he said quietly. 'No it wasn't.'

'Do they remind you of the snow?' the Doctor asked.

Surprised out of his brief reverie, it took s...o...b..ld a second to respond. 'Does what?' he asked.

The Doctor gestured towards the fire. 'The sparks. See how they rise, carried upward on the hot air? They twist and turn, they collide and fall. Completely random.'

'I see. You are comparing the way the sparks rise in this manner to the way that the snow is falling outside? The way the flakes twist and turn, the way they too collide at random.' s...o...b..ld nodded. wondering where this was leading. 'Yes, I agree there are similarities.'

'And differences, of course. One up, the other down. One hot, the other cold.'

'One destroying, the other creating?'

'If you like.' The Doctor set down his gla.s.s on the table beside the chair. He leaned forward, his eyes glittering as he fixed s...o...b..ld with an unsettling stare. 'But Newton told us over a hundred years ago that this is not random at all. Given an understanding of the forces that are acting of gravity, of convection. of friction with the air, of opposing forces when the particles collide we can predict the path of any particle.'

'Yes,' agreed s...o...b..ld slowly. 'I suppose so.'

'And if we can predict the path of any particle, we can predict the path of every particle. And we know then how and when they will collide, what changes in their velocity and direction will ensue until the next collision.'

'Well...'

'Expand this notion further and we can predict the motion and life of any particle of any kind anywhere. Forever.' He leaned back in the chair, his face creased into a frown. 'Doesn't that scare you? The notion that we live in a clockwork universe?'

s...o...b..ld considered this. 'You are saying, I think, that G.o.d set things in motion according to His plan. But that if Newton is correct, then we could predict that plan.'

'Yes.' The Doctor's response was a harsh whisper.

'Which in turn means that there is no place for free will in the universe. Everything is pre*ordained. Predestined.'

'As you said, like the sparks, like the snow,' the Doctor said quietly. 'G.o.d moves in a mysterious way.'

s...o...b..ld pulled himself to his feet and fetched the decanter. He refilled first the Doctor's gla.s.s then his own. He set the decanter down in the hearth. He had a feeling they would need it again before the night was out. 'It seems to me,' he said as he settled back into his chair, 'that you are considering the human spirit to be composed of, what shall we say, Newtonian particles? Atoms?'

'You think the soul is exempt from the laws of physical science?'

'I hope so, indeed. If that is not the case, tell me Doctor, how can you live with the universe?' s...o...b..ld took a sip of the warm sherry. It was viscous and sticky, sweet and cloying. 'It was you yourself who preached the dangers of mechanisation to Mr Nepath this evening. Are you now saying that we have already lost our individuality, our free will?'

It was the Doctor's turn to consider now. He blew out a long breath before he answered. 'No. No, I hope that is not the case. My feeling is that we have a lot to learn yet, that there is more to life than Newton.'

'Indeed.'

'After all,' the Doctor added, again smiling, 'if our wills were not free would we ever be permitted to doubt that they were?' With that he lapsed into silence again.

'An interesting discussion,' s...o...b..ld said when it became plain that the Doctor was going to add nothing further. 'For myself, I have always found the difficulty not to be whether I may take decisions at all, but in taking the right ones.'

The Doctor nodded. 'With free will comes responsibility,' he said. 'And that is what I believe Nepath and Lord Urton have failed to appreciate.'

'Conscience comes with consciousness?'

'Well put,' the Doctor said. 'Well put indeed. There is a Newtonian order to the decisions we make. Each decision breeds another which twists and turns on its way, colliding with other decisions and affecting them, affected by them.' There was an edge to his voice now, an encroaching, rising pa.s.sion. 'Thus conscience doth make heroes of us all. So Luther interprets his stomach cramps and his misgivings, and he nails his own conscience, itemised, to the door of Wittenburg church. A decision taken. He makes his stand.' The Doctor's expression was one of intensity again, one side of his face shadowed from the firelight by the wings of the chair. 'He can do nothing else.'

The sudden intensity of the Doctor's short speech surprised s...o...b..ld. He was not sure whether he was supposed to take it seriously or not, whether to react. How to react. 'Are you a theologian, Doctor?' he asked, suddenly aware that he had invited into his house a man about whom he knew practically nothing.

'Perhaps,' the Doctor conceded.

'Meaning you don't wish to say?'

The darkness had spread across the entirety of the Doctor's face now. A mask of shadows. 'Meaning I don't know,' he breathed.

s...o...b..ld frowned. 'So, why are you here?' he asked. 'I understand that Professor Dobbs is a scientist. Mr Gaddis seems to be more of a humanitarian, if I can put it like that. But what is your interest in the fissure?'

'The fissure?' The Doctor's tone was once again light and easy 'What fissure is that?'

s...o...b..ld caught his breath in a half*laugh of surprise. 'What fissure? Why the one that has opened across the moorland, across the old river bed. You must have seen it.' He paused, another thought occurring to him. 'I thought that was why you came here. You are with Dobbs and Gaddis, are you not?' He was leaning forward in his chair for the response, holding his gla.s.s so tight that the edges of the cut gla.s.s bit into his palm.

'I never met the gentlemen before today,' the Doctor confessed. 'Though they seem pleasant enough. This really is excellent sherry, you know,' he added as if the whole conversation had been cautiously edging towards soliciting his opinion on the matter. 'Thank you.'

'You're welcome,' s...o...b..ld responded mechanically. 'So why are you here?'

In answer the Doctor leaned awkwardly to one side. s...o...b..ld wondered for a second if he was about to topple forwards out of the chair. But in fact he was reaching into his jacket pocket with one hand, his other unwilling to relinquish the sherry. 'Because of this,' he said quietly as he pulled something out.

It was a cube, completely black, apparently solid. It was about two inches across each side. The surface seemed to be smooth, glossy, reflective. So black that it almost seemed not to have a colour at all. s...o...b..ld could see his hand reflected in the cube, split across its surfaces as he reached for it. The firelight danced on its sides. But before his fingers closed on the thing, the Doctor tossed it suddenly in the air, caught it within his palm, and returned it to his pocket.

'What is it?' s...o...b..ld asked.

'Someone on the stairs outside,' the Doctor replied. And s...o...b..ld realised that he too had heard the sound. They both turned towards the door.

The hallway outside was in near darkness. The flickering light from the drawing room cut across the floor, deepening the shadows to either side. As they watched, another shadow a silhouette crept forward into the light, making its way across the opening towards the front door.

'Betty?' s...o...b..ld crossed the room quickly. She was at the door when he reached her, already undoing the catch.