Eliot Pattison - Eye of the Raven

The worried query on Conawago's lips suddenly transformed into wonder. "Electrical flux!" he exclaimed. Vigorously he shook Marston's hand, then introduced himself and Duncan.

Marston beamed. "All creation can be reduced to the four main elements of earth, fire, water, and air." He finally removed his cloak as he spoke, revealing himself to be a slight, bespectacled man in his forties. "But it is electrical fluid that binds them all, the great common essence. We have wrung it out of the air to create fire, captured it in the water of the Leyden jars," he said, pointing to the glass containers on the table, "and used it to reduce any number of minerals to their base earth. We shall one day change the world with it!"

"We?" Duncan asked in a stunned voice.

"Dr. Franklin and I. Of course there are other practitioners today, but I was there in fifty-two to help launch his kite that first wonderful night when we captured the power of the storm in a jar. Such a spectacle! Newton had his apple, Archimedes his bath, Dr. Franklin his kite! When he returns from England I shall require days just to demonstrate the advances I have made since his departure!"

Conawago stepped to the strange device in the center of the room, nearly six feet long and almost as high. The near end was a tower of two wooden pillars between which a glass globe nearly twelve inches in diameter was suspended on wooden spindles. At the far end was a large ornate wooden wheel mounted between two short posts, with a leather belt wrapped around its rim connected to one of the spindles of the globe. "A variation on Nollet," Marston announced, as though they would surely recognize the name.

Conawago touched the handle extending from the center of the wheel and looked up at their host. It was all the invitation Marston needed. He would not be drawn into answering Duncan's questions until he had shared his thrilling advances with them.

"This afternoon," Duncan said as Marston showed Conawago how to turn the handle to spin the globe, "we saw flashes of light coming from here."

"Which is when I noticed you approach the building and study the lintel. I saw instantly that you recognized my signs. As you left I saw your friend's hidden braid and his bronze skin. I would have come immediately had I not been with a patient."

Duncan was more confused than ever. "You practice medical science as well?"

Marston lowered a finger to within an inch of the glass globe. "Here," he explained proudly as a spark leapt up to his finger, "is the primogenitor of all future science. Dr. Franklin and I began treating paralysis years ago with electrical fluids. Patients come now with toothaches, the cramp, sciatica. We have even seen some success with deafness."

The scientist gestured Duncan toward the table, took his arm, and extended his open hand over one of the glass containers. "A Leyden jar, with only a small charge left," he explained, and as he slowly lowered Duncan's hand toward the brass ball extending from the jar a small sparking arc leapt up and connected with his fingertip. He jerked his hand back in alarm. For an instant he had felt a burning sensation, but quickly confirmed there was no damage to his hand.

"Tonight at the tavern," Duncan said as he rubbed his hand, wondering at the tingling sensation that lingered in it, "you were not coming for a patient." He looked inside an empty jar. It held a small brass chain resting on the bottom, the top end brought up through a large cork stopper, then wrapped around a rod terminating in a ball. "But for us."

"I was walking along the river and saw you enter."

"But you could not have known we were in danger."

"As the night wore on there would be those who would recognize Mr. Conawago's features, trust me." As he spoke Marston gestured them through a side door, into a pleasant parlor that overlooked the street. "More than a few who frequent the Broken Jug have been set upon by Indians in the wilds. And red men arrayed in European clothes have not always been friends of our city."

Duncan studied the eccentric scientist as Marston lit several lamps. "We have heard of the great festival when the last Indian was hanged," he declared.

The words seemed to shake Marston. He turned toward the window to gaze into the night.

"You were the one making spirit fire at Shamokin," Duncan ventured.

"That was never a term I used."

"Why would you go two hundred miles to conduct your experiments?"

"My partner believed it would be a valuable way to learn about the upcountry. Our new upcountry."

"Your country?" Duncan asked.

Marston turned with a troubled expression on his face. "We had an alliance, the two of us. He would stake out new claims for our land company, sell half of them in Philadelphia, then use the proceeds to build there. I would have an edifice dedicated to my science, a temple of learning in the wilderness."

Duncan stared at the man uneasily, wondering now if they had been lured into a trap. "Does your partner have a name?"

"Francis Townsend, of course."

Duncan looked at the man in disbelief. Surely the coincidence was too much. "You and Townsend had a land company?"

Marston shrugged. "Many a new land company gets formed over cups in Philadelphia taverns. Most don't endure past the last round of rum punch, the others usually last a few months at most. The Dutch had their tulip craze, London had the South Sea bubble," he added, referring to two well-known financial disasters in Europe, "Philadelphia has its land companies."

Marston's voice grew distant for a moment. "Yet our bubble too was burst." He sighed heavily. "I used what was left of my inheritance to pay our expenses. Francis, ever the adventurer, went on into the mountains, looking for likely tracts, seeking minerals that might have value. I stayed in Shamokin with my projects."

"Projects?"

"There is much important work to be done. I correspond with Dr. Franklin. He and I agreed on a course of research to penetrate the mysteries of negative and positive particles and the role of electrical fluid in the human body. There are reports from France of the dead being revived with doses of flux. But," Marston added, "not all the city fathers share our enthusiasm."

From behind them Duncan heard a sharp intake of breath. "God's teeth!" Conawago exclaimed, "you were using Indians for your medical dogs!"

Marston stepped to a wingback chair and collapsed into it. "We forced no one. They were always compensated."

"What exactly," Duncan asked in a brittle voice, "did you do?"

"Flew some kites with wires into jars of brass dust. Charted individual tolerances to negative and positive flows. Energized open wounds. There were some possums brought back to life, a lot of frogs." The scientist looked up. "Dr. Franklin killed a turkey once with a flux machine," he added earnestly, though Duncan was at a loss as to whether this was an apology or a justification.

"Then why leave a proving ground as fertile as Shamokin?" Conawago wanted to know.

"I was going to stay until Townsend came back from the mountains. There was a man called the French bear. He had a lot of influence with some of the chiefs. I explained the French were in competition with us English for advancement in the sciences, and that it was their duty to help their English allies. But he told them I was experimenting with ways to extract the spirits from Indians."

Duncan lifted a candle in a pewter holder and explored the shadows of the parlor. Scattered about tables and chests were more Leyden jars. On a work table near the window were pieces of cork being carved into oval shapes, beside a spool of silk thread, with four completed spiders identical to the one Johantty treasured. In the winter, the youth had said, he could make the spiders dance.

"Testaments to our science," Marston explained. "Teaching instruments I give to the uninitiated." He saw Duncan's confusion and gestured to the adjoining table. "The largest jar still has a charge."